# Iowa law professor brings 'Magic: The Gathering' to classroom  
**Published:** 2026-05-23T00:36:58.000Z  
**Source:** [Nebraska Examiner](https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2026/05/22/repub/university-of-iowa-law-professor-to-deal-out-lessons-through-magic-the-gathering/)  
**AI-generated:** yes (claude-haiku-4-5-20251001)  
**Canonical:** https://lincolne.news/article/iowa-law-professor-brings-magic-the-gathering-to-classroom

A University of Iowa law professor is turning a popular fantasy card game into a unique tool for teaching future attorneys the intricate skills of legal interpretation and text analysis.

[According to reporting from Iowa Capital Dispatch](https://iowacapitaldispatch.com/2026/05/22/university-of-iowa-law-professor-to-deal-out-lessons-through-magic-the-gathering/), Mihailis Diamantis, [a professor at the University of Iowa College of Law](https://law.uiowa.edu/people/mihailis-diamantis), will launch a new one-credit-hour course in May that uses Magic: The Gathering to teach students about interpreting complicated text, searching for rules and precedents, identifying areas of ambiguity, and resolving problems collaboratively.

The game's complexity mirrors legal work in surprising ways. With more than 300 pages of rules and an archive of over 35,000 cards, mastering Magic requires understanding how cards interact with one another and how different rules apply in various contexts—much like analyzing legal doctrine. "It's never as simple as you assumed it was," Diamantis said of the process.

Students will study rules and cards with deliberate ambiguities, draft briefs arguing their interpretations, and create their own cards and game mechanics for class votes. Their capstone project will involve presenting arguments to an expert judge—a Seattle-based lawyer and Magic player who will join via video call.

The course draws inspiration from Diamantis' earlier success teaching Foundations of Corporate Law through Dungeons & Dragons sessions. That course, offered last summer, had a waitlist twice as long as available seats for its next iteration. Business law, Diamantis explained, can seem intimidating and less inherently interesting than criminal law, so he designed the course for "people who didn't want to take a business class."

Diamantis returned to the Magic scene after his son Gibson developed an interest in the card game during the COVID-19 pandemic. The pair now regularly participates in Commander Night events at [Critical Hit Games in Iowa City](https://www.criticalhitgames.net/), where Diamantis recognized parallels between understanding game mechanics and developing the legal skills students need.

"Playing the game is awesome, because it's like painting the fence and waxing the floor—you're building this skill set in a non-threatening environment," Diamantis said. "That's the idea here: it's a universal skill set that will benefit them in whatever area of law they practice."

## Sources

- [Nebraska Examiner](https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2026/05/22/repub/university-of-iowa-law-professor-to-deal-out-lessons-through-magic-the-gathering/)
- [Iowa Capital Dispatch article on Magic: The Gathering law course](https://iowacapitaldispatch.com/2026/05/22/university-of-iowa-law-professor-to-deal-out-lessons-through-magic-the-gathering/)
- [University of Iowa College of Law profile for Mihailis Diamantis](https://law.uiowa.edu/people/mihailis-diamantis)
- [Critical Hit Games, Iowa City location](https://www.criticalhitgames.net/)

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This article was generated by AI (claude-haiku-4-5-20251001) based on source material from Nebraska Examiner, enriched with 3 web searches. The original source is available at https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2026/05/22/repub/university-of-iowa-law-professor-to-deal-out-lessons-through-magic-the-gathering/.