Yep, the Mages are back. Naturally I’ve been wanting to do the redesign of these characters the moment that I finished watching the episode “Crusaders of the Lost Mark”. Mostly because it presented me with a challenge: design three unique “leveled-up” designs of the characters’ outfits that all incorporated the same symbol in a unified yet individual way. I had originally wanted to express these new designs in a short scene interpretation comic taken straight from the frames of the episode, but that was way too much work and would involve designing dozens of Mages versions of background characters. Speaking of scene interpretations, here’s something for fun I did not too long ago but decided not to upload to my DA gallery due to the background and comparison image being a direct screenshot from the show >>1000698
 
As for how gaining your Cutie Mark translates into the mythos of My Little Mages? Well, with all things I like to allow the fans to envision such things however they like, building their own mythos around the drawings. But I was to give my own take on it, I’d say that the moment your destiny is realized, magical circles manifest around you for the first time. These magic circles are the catalyst of each Mages individual magical arts. All Skyborn can fly and all Spellborn can use simple levitation magic, but each Mage has their own unique magic arts, which is where you get the individual titles like Pyromancer or Enchantress. These magic circles converge and form an image. That image is reflective of your personality and destiny, it is called your “Aura Mark”. Culturally, Mages like to incorporate their Aura Mark into their clothing. So the tradition is that during the celebration of a young mage realizing their unique magic arts, they are fashioned a new outfit. Rarity of course being the designer of these three. And yes, I realize that this contradicts the very fact that I already gave the CMC magic classes of Arcane Monk, Artificer, and Bard when I first drew them… so just consider this all as a retcon. NOW they all have those magical classes.