Watermark

A watermark is a faint imprint made into the text box area of certain Magic cards. In Contraptions, they are placed in the bottom right-hand corner.

History

The first card to bear a watermark was Incoming! from Unglued.

Events

Prerelease cards bear their expansion symbol as a watermark since Onslaught's Silent Specter, similarly release event cards bear their set symbol or logo. Other event cards not specific to a set bear the logo of that event, such as Friday Night Magic promo cards.

Affiliations

Mirrodin Besieged watermarks

Some cards in the Ravnica block were given watermarks showing the guild from which they came. In the Scars of Mirrodin block every single card that was not a basic land or a planeswalker bore the watermark of one of the two warring factions: Phyrexians and Mirrans. The Ravnican watermarks were used again in the Return to Ravnica block. Khans of Tarkir used watermarks for the different clans, with Fate Reforged adding watermarks for the different dragons broods. Watermarks are also used for the factions of Unstable.

Affiliation watermarks are searchable in Gatherer.

Watermark matters

Unstable has a small "watermark matters" theme with Hammerfest Boomtacular, Stamp of Approval and Watermarket. In this set, the faction marks found in the bottom right corner of Contraptions also count as watermarks.