Magic: The Gathering Thread XXV: 3 Vorthoses barely clinging to sanity and 45 Spikes

[LaZodiac]

Yup, that was a mistype. I do see that it is 3 color.



Ahh. Always liked Elspeth, I think I might have a go at reading this set's story unless it's tripe. What's your verdict LaZodiac? I apologize if this is wrong, but I think you're the one who reads these things.

More or less yeah. Forgot to post about it cause I couldn't actually find the thread lol.

Anyway, story is quite good! The side stories are all very flavourful, showcasing the world and it's inhabitants, showing how... honestly kinda brutal it is. It is a mafia plane through and through, complete with a government body outside of the five families that can't do **** and all to anyone the families don't want things done to. The stories make good use of characters who actually get cards (pretty much every named character gets a card in the set or the commander stuff attached to it) and they're all rather well written,

The main story is also really good; the story of Elspeth finding her home thanks to Ajani, and realizing her home bares as many scars as she does... and that until Phyrexia is razed from the surface of existence she'll never truly feel right with herself, and thus never truly feel home no matter what plane she is on. Vivien is also here, and she teams up with, of all people, Tezzeret... and Urabrask, who of the three of them is probably the most trustworthy actually! Viviene has cooled down a bit from her "any civilization that abuses nature instead of living in harmony should be razed to the ground" mood due to her time on Ikoria, Tezzeret is by his own admission playing both sides because Elspeth REALLY has something he needs, but he really truly does not want her to win at all, and Urabrask is 100% behind bringing the flames of revolution to New Phyrexia, and has even forgone consuming people to repair his form. He's studying Halo, the magical oil of this plane that is (unknown to the people of the plane) made via fermenting the lost angels inside all of the city's splendid angel status.

The story ends with Elspeth finding most of the information she needs regarding how Old Capenna beat back the Phyrexian's (the angels of this plane, their blood is poisonous to Phyrexian's. The Archdemons betrayed them after making the flying super-city together and created the Halo system in doing so to use it to eradicate the Phyrexian's... and then most of the Phyrexian's shut off mysterious. Timeline wise it'd fit perfectly with Yawgmoth's death.) She then saves Giada, a cool young girl who is definitely smitten with her, who was giving the Cabaratti family access to unlimited Halo... because she could generate it. Because Giada was, unbeknowst to everyone, an angel (possibly half angel, with the idea that people on this plane are slowly becoming angels to compensate for all the angels dying off slowly inside statues). Giada frees all said angels, Ob Nixilis begins his conquest of the plane (killing Xander, maybe mortally wounding Jetmir, but that's about it so far as we know) and Elspeth ****s off to go tell Ajani about all she's learned, about the plane, their weapon, and Urabrask. Elspeth also gets a snazzy new sword given to her by Giada; so she's three for three for super cool blessed weapons.

If there is one negative I can say to this; It does feel a little rushed at times, to fit within the five stories structure they have now. It's not barebones, but it is pretty light. Maybe that's okay, but I'd like the return to novels... but as we've seen numerous times, the novels have a difficult time keeping with the cards, and need to be written QUICKLY, which can lead to some issues. There's really no way to win, not method that is perfect, so I'll take "heavily refined and excellently executed, but a little quick" over any other alternative.

And of course there's always the possibility of side-stories like Davriel's story, which aren't tied to a set and thus can be written in a way that is sane.

Some personal highlights
* There's a good showing of LGBTA stuff, as is usually the case nowadays. One of the side stories is about Anhelo trying to find time to make his daughter's wedding to her future wife, inbetween doing an important job. Both of these characters get cards and mechanically work well together! One of the side characters who doesn't get a mention beyond maybe like, an aside glance, is nonbinary so that's cool.
* They've clearly put a lot of thought into what the old Capenna was like, and I wouldn't be surprised if we got a supplemental or return "Kingdoms of Old Capenna" set somewhere down the line, going over more of the Kingdom Era and stuff.
* Tezzeret continues his trend of being the most ****ing nasty but also most genuinely pragmatic villains in the series. Vivien calls him on his bull**** of playing both sides even though Elspeth is absolutely going to kill him once he's done being useful and he straight up is like "yeah no **** I get that, but you need to understand how important this is to ME." He doesn't try to justify it, he just fully admits this is an incredibly stupid thing he's doing; it's just also necessary.
* Xander was my favorite of the family heads so of course he died q_q for me I guess.
* Mechanically showing that Urabrask is less nasty than the other Praetor's by having his card's non-symetrical effect actually be beneficial both ways, just more so for you, is genius.

One final note: The MTG Boom comics are apparently ****ING EXCELLENT. I've only seen bits and pieces of the Chandra comic they tried, cancelled, and then replaced with a far more successful MTG inprint. It's "canon until the main story decides otherwise" so I should really give it a check. It's finally Marit Lage! Among other things!