Magic: The Gathering MCP server for AI agents

This Magic: The Gathering MCP server provides access to card data, rules, and set information through the Model Context Protocol. It allows you to search for cards, view detailed information including rulings, access comprehensive rules, browse sets, and view card images where available.

Installation Requirements

PHP 8.1 or higher
- Check your version by running: php --version
- If needed, download from php.net
Composer (PHP's dependency manager)
- Download from getcomposer.org

Setup Instructions

Clone the repository:

git clone https://github.com/james2037/mcp-gatherer.git

Navigate to the project directory:
```
cd mcp-gatherer
```
Install dependencies:
```
composer install
```

Running the Server

Your MCP client, such as Claude Desktop, can start the server by invoking:

php path/to/mcp_server.php

The server will start and you can begin using the Magic: The Gathering tools through the MCP client. Be sure to specify the STDIO transport if necessary.

Configuration Example

For Windows users, a claude_desktop_config.json might look like:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "mcp-gatherer": {
      "command": "php",
      "args": ["C:\\mcp-gatherer\\mcp_server.php"],
      "disabled": false,
      "alwaysAllow": []
    }
  }
}

With this configuration, you can access Magic card data, rules information, and more directly through your MCP-enabled AI assistant.

How to install this MCP server

For Claude Code

To add this MCP server to Claude Code, run this command in your terminal:

claude mcp add-json "mcp-gatherer" '{"command":"php","args":["path/to/mcp_server.php"],"disabled":false,"alwaysAllow":[]}'

See the official Claude Code MCP documentation for more details.

For Cursor

There are two ways to add an MCP server to Cursor. The most common way is to add the server globally in the ~/.cursor/mcp.json file so that it is available in all of your projects.

If you only need the server in a single project, you can add it to the project instead by creating or adding it to the .cursor/mcp.json file.

Adding an MCP server to Cursor globally

To add a global MCP server go to Cursor Settings > Tools & Integrations and click "New MCP Server".

When you click that button the ~/.cursor/mcp.json file will be opened and you can add your server like this:

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "mcp-gatherer": {
            "command": "php",
            "args": [
                "path/to/mcp_server.php"
            ],
            "disabled": false,
            "alwaysAllow": []
        }
    }
}

Adding an MCP server to a project

To add an MCP server to a project you can create a new .cursor/mcp.json file or add it to the existing one. This will look exactly the same as the global MCP server example above.

How to use the MCP server

Once the server is installed, you might need to head back to Settings > MCP and click the refresh button.

The Cursor agent will then be able to see the available tools the added MCP server has available and will call them when it needs to.

You can also explicitly ask the agent to use the tool by mentioning the tool name and describing what the function does.

For Claude Desktop

To add this MCP server to Claude Desktop:

1. Find your configuration file:

macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json
Linux: ~/.config/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

2. Add this to your configuration file:

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "mcp-gatherer": {
            "command": "php",
            "args": [
                "path/to/mcp_server.php"
            ],
            "disabled": false,
            "alwaysAllow": []
        }
    }
}

3. Restart Claude Desktop for the changes to take effect