Image courtesy of Ultimate Guard

Several days ago, Ultimate Guard, a designer of deck boxes and other card gaming accessories, released a deck box based on the newest Magic: The Gathering set, Edge of Eternities. This deck box utilized the art of Andrew Thompson (also known as @SchmandrewART on Bluesky and other platforms). However, upon further inspection from Thompson himself, Ultimate Guard seemed to also use generative AI to wrap the art around the box.

Picked this deck box up from @ultimateguard.bsky.social and I was so excited until I flipped it over. Looks like my art was extended with ai. @magic.wizards.com needs to make sure their partners don’t do this.I would have happily extended this for a couple hundred $$. Instead it looks awful!

— schmandrew➡️DragonCon (@schmandrewart.bsky.social) 2025-08-03T14:55:25.693Z

On Wednesday, August 21st, nearly three weeks later, Ultimate Guard made a statement confirming this information to be true. Furthermore, the company has also stated that it will no longer utilize Adobe's Generative Fill feature for its Magic-focused products.

Andrew Thompson (SchmandrewART) at Gen Con 2025. Image credit: Nick Wolf

You can read their full statement below:

Earlier this month, we saw the post and discussions about generative Al use in our "Haliya and Tezzeret" Flip'n'Tray deck box. We immediately conducted an internal review and, unfortunately, confirmed the claims.

When adapting 2D card art for 3D products like deck boxes, we sometimes extend the original artwork to fit complex shapes. Our review found that in some cases-including this deck box—a feature in Adobe called Generative Fill, which uses Al, was employed alongside our designers' hand work. Upon further research we also found it occurred in a small number of other products in development.

We deeply value the artists we work with and the trust of the community. Effective immediately, we will no longer use Generative Fill or any generative Al tools in our design process for Magic: The Gathering licensed products. Any that were in-production have been removed from our lineup and no future Al-assisted Magic: The Gathering licensed products will be made or sold by Ultimate Guard.

We recognize that at the heart of this issue is a concern for the livelihood of artists everywhere. Ultimate Guard wholeheartedly supports this sentiment. To that end, we have been steadily growing our own full-time team of illustrators and designers. We also commission unique art pieces from the freelance community; a practice that has and will continue to be part of Ultimate Guard's DNA.

Thank you for your understanding and continued support.
ULTIMATE GUARD

Backlash Towards Ultimate Guard

On social media, namely Bluesky, users were quick to point out a few potential holes in Ultimate Guard's apology statement. For one, the company only stated its discontinuation of the use of AI for Magic-related products. Nowhere in the statement do they disavow AI for their non-Magic products. This has led a fair few users to state their continued disenchantment with the accessory company.

Furthermore, a few users questioned the sincerity of this statement, asking the company if it had made the statement only to avoid losing its licensing agreement with Hasbro.

Finally, many pointed out another issue that has plagued Ultimate Guard's customer rapport quite a bit recently: its silence regarding its license with the Harry Potter book franchise. Even before the company's AI usage came to light, it had announced four deck boxes based on the houses of the Harry Potter books' Hogwarts school.

Because of the franchise's unbreakable affiliation with JK Rowling and Rowling's actions against the transgender community, many players since have disavowed the franchise. Therefore, many players further decried Ultimate Guard's affiliation with Harry Potter and Rowling as a result of the former's silence on that issue in their aforementioned apology statement.

Conclusion

This issue is currently at the forefront of social media discourse at the time of writing. Ultimate Guard continues to receive backlash from many Magic players, specifically those who used to use the company's products and those who never did. This apology statement rings out as hollow to many of them.

While we await any further news from Ultimate Guard on any of the other controversies surrounding this story, let's open the floor to you, dear readers. How do you feel about this story? Do you agree that Ultimate Guard should stop using generative AI altogether? Do you believe that they should cut ties with the Harry Potter franchise? Sound off in the comments below!