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

[Androgeus]

Anyone done any Bualdur's Gate drafts? I made a pretty sweet near mono-red deck helmed by Gut, True Soul Zealot and Inspiring Leader. I spent most of the draft just picking red cards that made treasure. I had like 3 Marching Duodrones.

[Personification]

Spoiler: A summary of post-WAR story publishing

Show

Quite well, now. We had a minor hiccup in War of the Spark, where they wanted to get a big ole set of two books to explore the war and the fallout of it, but due to extreme time constraints rushed the **** out of it- so much so that the pretty important prequel novella (which is much better written because it was allowed to take slightly more time) released like, a handful of months after the initial book.

The fallout of this led to a complete restructuring of the story team and how it does thing. As a consequence, Elspeth's return story was never seen, which sucks because she's the current primary protagonist of this entire story arc aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah god that sucks so much doesn't it.

On the plus side, the small novels done for Eldraine and Ikoria are good (Eldraine's got some shaky writing at points but it's good, Ikoria is more solid but also has a massive disconnect with the cards and also is a villain origin story so if you don't like those you're **** out of luck).

Following that they returned purely to web fiction, five short stories within the set and five plot stories. This has led to having much more refined stories over all, but stories that are a little light in content. Zendikar Rising was fun, Strixhaven was certainly enjoyable, the twin Innistrad series started good and eventually ramped up to actually pretty incredible, Kamigawa was executed wonderfully but suffered most from the "trim all the fat" style. New Capenna was great except a lot of people who aren't quite adept at reading comprehension didn't understand the big finale which led to it kinda flopping for some.

Over all we're now fully back on track, with great story content. I'm really excited to see where Dominaria United goes, especially since after that we're getting the Brother's War revamp, which means... well, what're they going to do? That's already a story. So it'll give them more time to work on future stories, potentially!

EDIT: STRAIGHT UP FORGOT ABOUT KALDHEIM LOL! It was good too and was the actual start of the current major story arc, showing Vorinclex doing his nasty business. I completely spaced on it though oops!

Generally I agree, but I think you are giving some things a bit too much leeway. ZNR and KHM were both fine, but suffered immensely from the "trim the fat" style, especially in the end (though Red Route, the first ZNR side story and the first thing they gave us after revealing that they were going back to the articles, still sticks in my head as great). They were generally good across the side stories and the first three mains, but then realized that they had two medium-sized chapters to finish two thirds of a novel and they each managed to salvage it as something fine. KHM's epilogue was nice though. STX was similar, but the side stories were more hit-and-miss, and the finale was rushed to the point of incoherence. Also, Kasmina was there, which is literally the only thing we know about her. Liliana's story was good enough to be a satisfying conclusion to her WAR arc, but it was surrounded by too much nonsense to salvage the story overall. Innistrad, I admit, actually gave me the hope that they had cracked the code, and Kamigawa, which, while still a bit rushed in the end, was so much better than the previous year seemed to confirm it (remember when Tamiyo got compleated and, for the first time since WAR, people actually cared, it was great!) but then New Capenna happened, and, while I enjoyed a lot of it, enderlord99's explanation that people were upset that it ended in the middle was a good description. They gave a side story to the main plot (depriving one of the factions of literally any lore, by the way, and the finale was still rushed to the point of incomprehensibility. The finale wasn't a matter of reading comprehension, the text simply wasn't there. We were supposed to interpret this:

"New Capenna will continue to fight over Halo," Elspeth said finally. "The supply is almost used up, and if it runs dry, they'll tear themselves apart." Her mind briefly wandered to Giada and the shining figures the young woman had departed with. Would the angels return to New Capenna to usher in a new age if the city were in dire need? Or had they all gone on to something greater?

as "Giada definitely becoming an angel and turning all of the angel statues into real boys". Capenna's story really did start out great, but they blew it by not giving it enough time.

For the record, I come off as super angry and hateful here, but I want to make it clear that, while I am currently complaining, generally speaking I do actually really like magic story, and I really like where it is right now with the exception that I think it is a bit hamstrung by the strict 5/5 pattern. Also, if you felt like the end of SNC was enough, great! Like what you like, I won't stop you. I just think that putting the blame for the bad pacing and writing (which I personally blame on the format more than the author, who was given an impossible job) at the feet of readers not being "quite adept at reading comprehension" is both inaccurate and slightly insulting.

[LaZodiac]

Generally I agree, but I think you are giving some things a bit too much leeway. ZNR and KHM were both fine, but suffered immensely from the "trim the fat" style, especially in the end (though Red Route, the first ZNR side story and the first thing they gave us after revealing that they were going back to the articles, still sticks in my head as great). They were generally good across the side stories and the first three mains, but then realized that they had two medium-sized chapters to finish two thirds of a novel and they each managed to salvage it as something fine. KHM's epilogue was nice though. STX was similar, but the side stories were more hit-and-miss, and the finale was rushed to the point of incoherence. Also, Kasmina was there, which is literally the only thing we know about her. Liliana's story was good enough to be a satisfying conclusion to her WAR arc, but it was surrounded by too much nonsense to salvage the story overall. Innistrad, I admit, actually gave me the hope that they had cracked the code, and Kamigawa, which, while still a bit rushed in the end, was so much better than the previous year seemed to confirm it (remember when Tamiyo got compleated and, for the first time since WAR, people actually cared, it was great!) but then New Capenna happened, and, while I enjoyed a lot of it, enderlord99's explanation that people were upset that it ended in the middle was a good description. They gave a side story to the main plot (depriving one of the factions of literally any lore, by the way, and the finale was still rushed to the point of incomprehensibility. The finale wasn't a matter of reading comprehension, the text simply wasn't there. We were supposed to interpret this:

as "Giada definitely becoming an angel and turning all of the angel statues into real boys". Capenna's story really did start out great, but they blew it by not giving it enough time.

For the record, I come off as super angry and hateful here, but I want to make it clear that, while I am currently complaining, generally speaking I do actually really like magic story, and I really like where it is right now with the exception that I think it is a bit hamstrung by the strict 5/5 pattern. Also, if you felt like the end of SNC was enough, great! Like what you like, I won't stop you. I just think that putting the blame for the bad pacing and writing (which I personally blame on the format more than the author, who was given an impossible job) at the feet of readers not being "quite adept at reading comprehension" is both inaccurate and slightly insulting.

First; you don't come off as super angry or hateful at all. Not in my experience anyway. I do agree that the trim the fat method (and I think I said that in the original post) is... not ideal, but it's better than having a bad story. I do feel bad for the Riveteers, who basically did just get skipped over lore wise, though they had guys from their faction show up in a bunch of the side stories so it kinda evens out?

And yeah, maybe it was a bit harsh to say it like that. I'm... known, among my friends for just being really good at catching subtle details in writing, and sometimes I forget that not everyone is me. My experiences are my own, and while I may have felt that line you quoted above was obvious, it's unfair of me to knock others for not getting it. I do agree taht the pacing for Capenna was a little messy, but each story did feel like it clicked well- it's just kind of impossible to tell a fully compelling crime mystery novel with that 5/5 format.

[Personification]

First; you don't come off as super angry or hateful at all. Not in my experience anyway. I do agree that the trim the fat method (and I think I said that in the original post) is... not ideal, but it's better than having a bad story. I do feel bad for the Riveteers, who basically did just get skipped over lore wise, though they had guys from their faction show up in a bunch of the side stories so it kinda evens out?

And yeah, maybe it was a bit harsh to say it like that. I'm... known, among my friends for just being really good at catching subtle details in writing, and sometimes I forget that not everyone is me. My experiences are my own, and while I may have felt that line you quoted above was obvious, it's unfair of me to knock others for not getting it. I do agree taht the pacing for Capenna was a little messy, but each story did feel like it clicked well- it's just kind of impossible to tell a fully compelling crime mystery novel with that 5/5 format.

But that's the point. It's impossible to tell the story with the format, so they should have tried to change the format.

That aside, while I have occasional facepalm worthy moments of missed subtext, I also think of myself as someone who is good at catching those little details. When I read the line I quoted, I, and I believe most others, assumed that it was a possible sequel hook, or that it meant that Giada was probably an angel and that she had maybe summoned more, not that all of the statues had come to life and angels were back in force. Soul of Emancipation wasn't even a story spotlight, because it never actually got shown in the articles. It kind of felt like the time between when WAR came out and when The Gathering Storm came out when, because they released the prequel after the set and book and because there was zero internal communication about story at the time, they told us that we were supposed to know that Niv-Mizzet was dead because of the flavor text on Command the Storm.

Also, mostly unrelated, as a weird complication with what was probably the best article of the batch, (The Family Man, written by the same person who did the Innistrad stories) there is a weird thing where the daughter of the Maestro (BRU) vampire has a mono-U human card and the daughter of the Obscura (BWU) human has a BRU vampire card, which is technically possible lore-wise, but feels like it is more likely that someone mixed up the names somewhere and it wasn't noticed.

[LaZodiac]

But that's the point. It's impossible to tell the story with the format, so they should have tried to change the format.

That aside, while I have occasional facepalm worthy moments of missed subtext, I also think of myself as someone who is good at catching those little details. When I read the line I quoted, I, and I believe most others, assumed that it was a possible sequel hook, or that it meant that Giada was probably an angel and that she had maybe summoned more, not that all of the statues had come to life and angels were back in force. Soul of Emancipation wasn't even a story spotlight, because it never actually got shown in the articles. It kind of felt like the time between when WAR came out and when The Gathering Storm came out when, because they released the prequel after the set and book and because there was zero internal communication about story at the time, they told us that we were supposed to know that Niv-Mizzet was dead because of the flavor text on Command the Storm.

Also, mostly unrelated, as a weird complication with what was probably the best article of the batch, (The Family Man, written by the same person who did the Innistrad stories) there is a weird thing where the daughter of the Maestro (BRU) vampire has a mono-U human card and the daughter of the Obscura (BWU) human has a BRU vampire card, which is technically possible lore-wise, but feels like it is more likely that someone mixed up the names somewhere and it wasn't noticed.

Soul of Emancipation's art did get shown in the article, if not the card. It is DEFINITELY a mistake that it's not a story spotlight, 10000% agreed there what the **** WOTC.

Also agreed that the handling of Niv's death was really bad. I figured his disappearance was him going off to prep a thing and maybe getting killed, and the fact that the actual killing blow happened in a prequel novel that was definitely supposed to be released before the actual WAR story is a sign of just how chaotic it was behind the scenes.

Yeah Errant and her wife feel like they're meant to be switched mechanics wise, but Anhelo's daughter being a graffiti artist who rope swings across the city is absolutely in line with his artistic beyond all measure ass. The weirdness about their cards aside, I'm glad they're married and mechanically work well together.

[enderlord99]

I know you've all tried to explain the reasoning, but I still don't get why consensus is that the game consists entirely of "number go down" and every other mechanic is your opponent cheatilly "stopping you from playing the game"

The game has over twenty thousand (individually optional) components and people praise it for its "simplicity" because they consider most of them to not count

[Dienekes]

I know you've all tried to explain the reasoning, but I still don't get why consensus is that the game consists entirely of "number go down" and every other mechanic is your opponent cheatilly "stopping you from playing the game"

The game has over twenty thousand (individually optional) components and people praise it for its "simplicity" because they consider most of them to not count

Is anyone saying you’re cheating or just that it isn’t fun to play against?

Because what you describe is not cheating or “cheatily” doing anything. But playing against a deck that tells you to sit in the corner and wait ten minutes before you can maybe do something isn’t fun to play against. And in that instance I would literally rather be off in a corner reading a book than playing the game.

And that’s really the marker here. Would I have more joy in my life by being by myself enjoying a book than continuing to play this game? If no. It’s a good game. If yes. It’s a bad game. MTG is somewhat interesting because the answer depends on what your opponent decides to do because there are just so many options and strategies. It’s part of why it’s so popular. Because there will be someone else who finds the gameplay I described absolutely riveting. And would say “no” to the good book test.

Such as yourself, I assume.

And you are in no way playing the game wrong.

I would just personally rather read a good book than play against you.

[enderlord99]

I don't hog priority for ten minutes, nor do my turns take ten minutes. Both are likely longer than you would like, admittedly, but not nearly that long.

I do, however, occasionally cast a counter-spell or two... and I really do mean "one or two" because I have literally two counterspells in my deck, and only one copy of each.

I'm sure that's two too many, by your standards.

[Dienekes]

I don't hog priority for ten minutes, nor do my turns take ten minutes. Both are likely longer than you would like, admittedly, but not nearly that long.

I do, however, occasionally cast a counter-spell or two... and I really do mean "one or two" because I have literally two counterspells in my deck, and only one copy of each.

I'm sure that's two too many, by your standards.

Honestly depends entirely on how the rest of the deck plays. I will admit I did use some hyperbolic language about the length of a turn. Though I will say there have been games where after ten minutes it felt like nothing happened because of board wipes and counter spells and various delaying tactics.

But importantly, why would you care if I enjoy playing against you? We will likely never meet or play against each other. Just have your fun.

[enderlord99]

One thing we appear to have in common is "not particularly liking wrath effects"

I agree that we're unlikely to encounter each other in-game.

[Personification]

Enderlord99, I've read the descriptions you give of your decks and they all sound hilarious to read about, interesting to play, and absolutely miserable to play against, and I mean that as a compliment. I don't think people consider it cheating, but describing prison (which you have definitely mentioned playing, even if it doesn't have many counters or wraths) as "not letting the opponent play" is pretty accurate. I don't think anyone is praising MTG for its simplicity on the grounds that they are discounting bon-aggressive mechanics, and I don't think people are calling your decks badwrongfun. I do think that it is ok to admit that playing against prison and/or combo can be boring and demoralizing, and that this fact isn't an attack on prison players or the concept, just a fact of how it plays out

[enderlord99]

Enderlord99, I've read the descriptions you give of your decks and they all sound hilarious to read about, interesting to play, and absolutely miserable to play against, and I mean that as a compliment. I don't think people consider it cheating, but describing prison (which you have definitely mentioned playing, even if it doesn't have many counters or wraths) as "not letting the opponent play" is pretty accurate. I don't think anyone is praising MTG for its simplicity on the grounds that they are discounting bon-aggressive mechanics, and I don't think people are calling your decks badwrongfun. I do think that it is ok to admit that playing against prison and/or combo can be boring and demoralizing, and that this fact isn't an attack on prison players or the concept, just a fact of how it plays out

I have exactly one prison deck (the Trampoline Museum) and your assessment of it is probably completely accurate. I haven't played it in months, because I figured out other deck-concepts (like Professor IKEA (formerly known as "Professor Google")) that I find more fun and that might, as a bonus, be tolerable to play against.

[JNAProductions]

Didn't we use to have a "Make your own Magic Card" thread?

Because I'm curious what the following characters would look like as Magic cards.

-Kirby
-Meta Knight
-Marx
-King Dedede (with possible Partner Bandana Waddle Dee)

[Personification]

Didn't we use to have a "Make your own Magic Card" thread?

Because I'm curious what the following characters would look like as Magic cards.

-Kirby
-Meta Knight
-Marx
-King Dedede (with possible Partner Bandana Waddle Dee)

Kirby is Valki

[JNAProductions]

Kirby is Valki

I don't think that quite fits. It's a good base to work from, but I don't think that really matches. Especially the Planeswalker side.

[Androgeus]

Didn't we use to have a "Make your own Magic Card" thread?

I think there was one in the homebrew section, but it may be past the thread necromancy point now.


As to your other question, I’m not familiar with Kirby games to do the other characters but I think PMPersonification is in the right ball park with Valki (I’m assuming just the front face). Maybe something like Dark Imposter would fit better? Probably make it only have the activated ablities of the card it most recently exiled. Not sure if that would match the colours Kirby would actually be though. I get the feeling he might be Red/White, if so you could do something like “at the beginning of combat, exile target creature until the end of combat, ~ becomes a copy of that creature as long as it remains exiled”

[Spore]

Kirby is Valki

Lazav, the Multifarious if you want the effect of turning into a consumed enemy.
Moritte of the Frost or Oko the Trickster if you somewhat care about Kirby not being black.

[Emmerlaus]

Didn't we use to have a "Make your own Magic Card" thread?

Because I'm curious what the following characters would look like as Magic cards.

-Kirby
-Meta Knight
-Marx
-King Dedede (with possible Partner Bandana Waddle Dee)

I don’t know about their lore so I’m going with Smash Bros abilities and mtg creatures types and abilities here:

Kirby - Identify Thief if we go by abilities only.

Meta Knight - Silverwing Squadron? Otherwise Meta Knight feels like a creature enchanted with Dub and Demonic Embrace. Maybe his cloak could be Cloak of the Bat.

King dedede need to be a bird type creature without flying and able to be wielding a hammer. Can’t think of anything for it sorry.

[Personification]

I don’t know about their lore so I’m going with Smash Bros abilities and mtg creatures types and abilities here:

Kirby - Identify Thief if we go by abilities only.

Meta Knight - Silverwing Squadron? Otherwise Meta Knight feels like a creature enchanted with Dub and Demonic Embrace. Maybe his cloak could be Cloak of the Bat.

King dedede need to be a bird type creature without flying and able to be wielding a hammer. Can’t think of anything for it sorry.

Storm Crow holding Colossal Hammer

[enderlord99]

Wilson's green specialization is turning out to be a great addition to the Gideon of the Trials pillowfort element of my Historic deck, especially in combination with Kaya the Inexorable.

EDIT: Yes, I admit that particular combo is kinda mean. It's not nearly as harsh as my old deck "The Trampoline Museum" which was an actual prison deck, but it's still a bit... overkill.

[Personification]

MaRo talked Unfinity at SDCC and now we know there will be stickers in Vintage.

Also, from the pre-pre-pre-announcement for Dominaria United, we know that 3% of collector boosters will contain a card from Legends.

[LaZodiac]

MaRo talked Unfinity at SDCC and now we know there will be stickers in Vintage.

Also, from the pre-pre-pre-announcement for Dominaria United, we know that 3% of collector boosters will contain a card from Legends.

Oh right I should talk about the Dominaria United stream that happened.

Teferi, Jaya, Karn, Ajani, and seemingly Liliana will be in, and we know from flavour text and a card preview that Sheoldred, the black praetor, is on plane waking up ancient Old P tech. So that's concerning. Very good chance someone on that list of names is gonna get ate, if this is meant to be the lead up to the next massive chunk of storyline they say it's going to be.

Karn specifically is looking to research the past and see how Urza first bested the Phyrexians, and that'll likely be the frame story for Brother War.

[Personification]

Don't forget Braids on the collector box art.

[LaZodiac]

Don't forget Braids on the collector box art.

And Braids in the set! We've seen art of her and she looks... impressive, to say the least. She escaped the nightmare hell realm she was apparently sent to! Might also be compleated, since she was part of the Cabal. I kinda hope she is because the idea of her returning to New Phyrexia to plop down a new Steel Thane would be really funny to me.

[JNAProductions]

What’s a good deck style for Chun Li?
I have a friend who will only play Commander if he plays her.

[Personification]

What’s a good deck style for Chun Li?
I have a friend who will only play Commander if he plays her.

Magecraft/prowess tribal and lots of instants

[Androgeus]

Karn specifically is looking to research the past and see how Urza first bested the Phyrexians, and that'll likely be the frame story for Brother War.

Wasn't that with the Sylex? Which Karn already has?

What’s a good deck style for Chun Li?
I have a friend who will only play Commander if he plays her.

First idea I get is just to fill the deck with cantrips, refund spells (I think only Snap and Frantic Search work well, trying to make the Rewind/Unwind work is probably too cute), and then either storm spells or a bunch of buff spells to make Chun Li lethal. A few ways to bounce Chun Li to hand so she can be recast and kick some more spells wouldn't go amiss.

[LaZodiac]

Wasn't that with the Sylex? Which Karn already has?



First idea I get is just to fill the deck with cantrips, refund spells (I think only Snap and Frantic Search work well, trying to make the Rewind/Unwind work is probably too cute), and then either storm spells or a bunch of buff spells to make Chun Li lethal. A few ways to bounce Chun Li to hand so she can be recast and kick some more spells wouldn't go amiss.

I don't recall if he's yet found the Sylex, but regardless of finding it he still needs to learn how it was used and the possible consequences. Karn, unlike his dad, is going to make sure he fully understands the dangers of using this nuke before setting it off on the plane he made with his own two hands.

[IthilanorStPete]

Wasn't that with the Sylex? Which Karn already has?

The Sylex ended the Brother's War, which wasn't primarily against the Phyrexians, although they were influencing Mishra by the end. That's probably what they're referring to, though, because Karn should definitely know all about the Legacy.

...now I'm worried that WotC's going to retcon the Brother's War into being all about Urza's first Big Heroic Fight against the Evil Phyrexians (tm), which would IMO detract from the tragedy and complexity of the original story. I really like the old books The Brother's War and Planeswalker, but honestly it probably makes more sense to unify the backstory with the current storyline, instead of being constrained by a couple of twenty-year-old books and Urza's old character arc, given that he's not likely to be reappearing in the modern story any time soon.

EDIT:

I don't recall if he's yet found the Sylex, but regardless of finding it he still needs to learn how it was used and the possible consequences. Karn, unlike his dad, is going to make sure he fully understands the dangers of using this nuke before setting it off on the plane he made with his own two hands.

That's a good point, given that the original use of the Sylex not only nuked Dominaria and started the Ice Age, it had a multiverse-level impact, creating the Shard that sealed off Dominaria and a few other planes from the rest of the multiverse for a while. That's not something to casually mess with.

[LaZodiac]

The Sylex ended the Brother's War, which wasn't primarily against the Phyrexians, although they were influencing Mishra by the end. That's probably what they're referring to, though, because Karn should definitely know all about the Legacy.

...now I'm worried that WotC's going to retcon the Brother's War into being all about Urza's first Big Heroic Fight against the Evil Phyrexians (tm), which would IMO detract from the tragedy and complexity of the original story. I really like the old books The Brother's War and Planeswalker, but honestly it probably makes more sense to unify the backstory with the current storyline, instead of being constrained by a couple of twenty-year-old books and Urza's old character arc, given that he's not likely to be reappearing in the modern story any time soon.

EDIT:



That's a good point, given that the original use of the Sylex not only nuked Dominaria and started the Ice Age, it had a multiverse-level impact, creating the Shard that sealed off Dominaria and a few other planes from the rest of the multiverse for a while. That's not something to casually mess with.

See the interesting thing is that IN UNIVERSE, people do consider Urza's fight against the compleated Mishra to be his first big heroic fight against Evil Phyrexians. Out of universe we know the truth, and Karn researching the old stories will likely lead to the shocking realization (to most modern folk, both in and out of universe) that this heroic war was really just a petty sibling squabble that Phyrexia only took advantage of, and that Urza is a hero only in comparison to his enemy's true evil.

So I don't think there'll be any retconning, persay. Maybe like, some clarification of some things (who slash what is Gix, who I bet will get a Praetor type line) and some elaboration on things the original story presented (what did Tawnos and Mishra's Tawnos whose name I forget but it's like, the girl, the cool girl everyone likes, what'd they do and stuff?).