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Magic: the Gathering |OT9| Kaladesh - Cruisin' Down the Street in my 6/4

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Ashodin

Member
I know you're joking...

Please be joking.

Breh. BREH. She got revenge on an asshole. I agree doing it the way she did was stupid, but she was RIGHT in that she was entitled to revenge after basically being put in Solitary Confinement (except worse, you know things are there but you can't perceive them).
 

Angry Grimace

Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
Except someone will eventually release Sorin. She probably should have just executed him when she had the chance. Honestly seemed a bit of cartoon villainy to me.
 
Pretty telling in that SaffonOlive article that the only color that hasn't had a banned card yet is Red.

RED UNDERPOWERED FOREVER
In Standard? Yeah, red's never been banned in Standard, but the Modern Banlist has plenty of red cards iirc.

Every single planeswalker not in the gatewatch > Gatewatch PWs

The need to embody 1 color and only 1 color just makes all of them feel really 2 dimensional and predictable.

Edit: Knew I'd find a caveat if I thought hard enough about it- Liliana is more interesting than Bobby Nixon, if only because they had to find a way to take a previously malovolent PW and give her enough character to make her a part of the power rangers while Ob just goes full ham as a Saturday morning cartoon villain.
Generally I can agree, if only because any sense of actual character(Gideon's underlying guilt from his hubris killing everyone he loved, Jace forgetting literally everything that made him somewhat interesting in his origins story) has been completely removed. We never see Gideon actively feeling guilt recently for those he can't save. Like, The need to force them as mono coloured(despite a very, very strong argument for them being dual colored) is frustrating from a character design point, because why the hell is the living Guildpact MonoBlue when White is the colour that most directly embodies a governing law?

Also, Bobby Nixillis is great because he's literally a Saturday Morning Cartoon Villain. Considering the Gatewatch(minus Liliana) is fundamentally a bunch of 1 dimensional characters. He also wasn't that bad until Nissa pissed him off, because Fuck Nissa and her Grodd Damned "I'm precious and Zendikar loves me" bullshit.

NAHIRI DID NOTHING WRONG
Sure, if by "Nahiri did nothing wrong " you mean "Willingly left Zendikar to get fucked by Ulamog(Despite the fact that said world was able to trap Ulamog even without her help) while completely fucking over Innistrad by killing the balance system Sorin Built( Shitty as it is, it at least allowed for the ecosystem to be stable for 1000ish years), bringing in Emrakul to nuke the plane, with no clear way to trap/remove Emrakul because she's mad at her ex." If Nahiri had her original plan unfold, Emrakul would have killed all of Innistrad and still be running around the Multiverse, with the potential bonus of another Titan being formed* and they're back to square one

*there's a theory that Brisela was Emrakul trying to make a new Titan based on the art.
 

Angry Grimace

Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
I don't get how anyone can like the Gatewatch characters or why they focus group so well.

They're uninteresting, flat and completely un-fun characters. The fact that WOTC has a mandate to never change their core identity (either flavor or mechanically) means they get boring in card form too.
 

traveler

Not Wario
But that's because Chandra getting pushed in card form has resulted in departing from identity- compare flamecaller to kaladesh: one summons tokens, wraths the board, and wheels; the other does a red draw/ping, mana ramps (?), shoots a single creature, and gives you an emblem that ends the game in time. There's very little in common.
 

Yeef

Member
But that's because Chandra getting pushed in card form has resulted in departing from identity- compare flamecaller to kaladesh: one summons tokens, wraths the board, and wheels; the other does a red draw/ping, mana ramps (?), shoots a single creature, and gives you an emblem that ends the game in time. There's very little in common.
With the exception of the wheeling, I'd disagree. Her +1 ability is basically burn that's a little more interactive and her -X is also just burn. It's perfectly in line with her identity mechanically.
 

Wulfric

Member
Hey, remember this guy? I would kill for a Chandra with that -2.

o5zF3fg.jpg
 
Noticed this line in today's Daily Update
The current schedule is to start this Wednesday with the first story and have one every week until DailyMTG takes a two week "best of" break December 19–30 (also known as we go home for the holidays). Then we pick back up again with two stories the week of Aether Revolt previews (January 2–5), and then one every week thereafter until the Aether Revolt story concludes.

So, since there aren't going to be previews on the week of December 26, and prerelease starts on January 14, it looks like Aether Revolt is only getting one week of spoilers. Weird.
 

OnPoint

Member
Can we please just agree to never talk again about whether Nahiri was right or wrong in here again until she's once more relevant in the story? I'm so sick of that debate. I'd much rather talk about what we all think they should or shouldn't do with Ajani, or what kind of coffee Jace drinks, or whether or not Gideon can read.
 

Ashodin

Member
In for Opal-Eye, Konda's Yojimbo:

+1 Captured by the Consulate
+1 Sigarda's Aid
+1 Thalia's Lancers

-1 Kor Landfetchdude
-1 Forced Worship
-1 Swords to Plowshares
 
Since when was Zendikar about adventure?

Since day one? I mean out of all the mechanics in the set, there's exactly one that's about lands and like four that are about D&D bullshit.

D&D adventuring involves bustling cities, roleplay/dialogue with the world's inhabitants, and evils to undo with their own hideouts/structures. In Zendikar, I felt like the various groups were few and far between and they were all struggling to survive against the world, not villains.

I guess this is, like, the Forgotten Realms approach? My D&D games growing up were always a bunch of nasty wilderness with some ancient ruins and shit in between.

Do any people who aren't furries actually give a shit about Ajani. I'm being serious. He always struck me as the blandest of the the original Planeswalker designs, with the only one rivaling him being Garruk, who they changed dramatically and then killed?

....Garruk's not dead though?

He's overly concerned with bizarre minutae that don't matter to most people while simultaneously believing that he has a good grasp on what it is that makes players tick because he takes sales and focus group feedback that we don't have access to extremely seriously.

I mean, and because on his watch the game like tripled in popularity and reached unprecedented success. The guy's definitely super wrong about some stuff but I don't think it helps to underplay his contribution either.
 

HK-47

Oh, bitch bitch bitch.
Since day one? I mean out of all the mechanics in the set, there's exactly one that's about lands and like four that are about D&D bullshit.



I guess this is, like, the Forgotten Realms approach? My D&D games growing up were always a bunch of nasty wilderness with some ancient ruins and shit in between.



....Garruk's not dead though?



I mean, and because on his watch the game like tripled in popularity and reached unprecedented success. The guy's definitely super wrong about some stuff but I don't think it helps to underplay his contribution either.

The Forgotten Realms approach is D&D at this point. Its the most popular setting in role playing games, easily.
 
Breh. BREH. She got revenge on an asshole. I agree doing it the way she did was stupid, but she was RIGHT in that she was entitled to revenge after basically being put in Solitary Confinement (except worse, you know things are there but you can't perceive them).

That's quite different from "DID NOTHING WRONG". :p

And tbf, Sorin was entitled to kill her after she attacked him, unprovoked.
He's still a dick though, just not a genocidal dick.

To clarify, I have no problem with what she did to Sorin personally, but what she did to Innistrad has jumped well past the point of no return.
 
She already made a mistake by being Boros, the most one dimensional two color combo in all of magic.
that's wotc fault but then again she's boros and only really enables control and tempo decks.
Considering she filters, protects and wins as her 3 abilities she's not very standard boros. Too bad wotc can't make legendary creatures that do the same.

Also RB is nearly as bad.
 
I also think Sorin should have lost the white for his latest incarnation tbh, dude explicitly (and, given past evidence, quite rightly) gave up on Innistrad. Revenge was his only motivation, there should be no white in him.
 
White isnt good

In fact white is the most vile colour.

To address this, white is the colour that is most likely to be good(much like black is most likely to be bad), but the colors themselves aren't bad.

White fundamentally at its core wants order peace in the name of the greater good. Now, that's great as an ideal, but when you dig into it you begin to realize that White as a color would be fine with genocide of a minority in order to keep the peace, or that a heavily segregated caste system, with everyone knowing their role is a white society. White is fine with the idea of arranged marriages, because in the case of politics it's two people unifying two groups together. White is also the color that is most likely to be opposed to societal change because it disrupts the peace and order they value, regardless of the actual harm done. White(and arguably to extent Green) are the most reactionary colors in terms of their philosophy. They aren't experiencing all the joys of life, or trying to perfect something that works just fine. Who cares what you feel, you're supposed to put the values of the many above yourself.

Black, on the other hand, is the colour that is most interested in itself(and to an extent those directly connected to it). It would do anything to protect itself/those it loves because it assumes that everyone else does the same.

If you want a perfect example of White(base, with arguments being possible for Selesyna based on his internal conflicts/you are what you once were idea) being evil and Rakdos being good in popular culture just look at Les Miserables. We have a man who was unfairly punished for a small crime he did out of love and the sense of trying to save his sister's child(Arguably a RB starting point) being hounded his entire life by an agent of the Law(Javert is base white, with arguably a green moralistic view towards Jean Valjean) with the chase ending due to Javert having an existential crisis over Valjean not being the monster he's been led to believe he is.
 

El Topo

Member
I know they keep bringing up the evil aspect of white in articles, but...have we actually seen it in a planeswalker or as a major aspect of a story (excluding New Phyrexia)? Black in general seems to be portrayed significantly less positive. It's an honest question, because for the love of Maro I don't recall all that much of Magic storylines anymore and I skipped a few (like Theros).
 
I know they keep bringing up the evil aspect of white in articles, but...have we actually seen it in a planeswalker or as a major aspect of a story (excluding New Phyrexia)? Black in general seems to be portrayed significantly less positive. It's an honest question, because for the love of Maro I don't recall all that much of Magic storylines anymore.
Older magic story repeatedly had white as evil. Kirtar and the order in Odyssey, Konda in Kamigawa, Heliod in theros,...

PWs are all too one dimensional to be anything but black evil white goody two shoes.
 

Santiako

Member
I know they keep bringing up the evil aspect of white in articles, but...have we actually seen it in a planeswalker or as a major aspect of a story (excluding New Phyrexia)? Black in general seems to be portrayed significantly less positive. It's an honest question, because for the love of Maro I don't recall all that much of Magic storylines anymore and I skipped a few (like Theros).

Theros and Kamigawa had white antagonists (Heliod and Konda), I'm not sure of any others (other than Elesh Norn in New Phyrexia like you said).
 

Haly

One day I realized that sadness is just another word for not enough coffee.
Conversely, Umezawa was a decent black protag.
 

jph139

Member
I feel like Aether Revolt is going to be good RB (Chandra, the revolutionaries, the Aetherborn) vs. bad WU (Dovin Baan and Tezz) so there's that as well.
 

OnPoint

Member
I just had an interesting thought. What would the color identity of some of some actual historical figures? I'll start right at the top: Would Hitler be base-white? He was big on order (gotta keep those trains running on time) and everything he did was, in his mind, for "the greater good", including mass genocide and war. I could see a shade of blue in there because of things like the Gestapo and the perception of strict law enforcement in Nazi Germany. Conversely would the Dali Lama be base green? This tweet seems to point in this direction. Kanye West is base red as far as I'm concerned as he wears his heart on his sleeve and seems to act impulsively. Creativity and performance also fall into the red spectrum. There's a bit of ego, but not enough I don't think to slide him into black.
 

OnPoint

Member
I dunno, we've had colourless angels before. While the followers of Emeria are white, that doesn't make Emeria herself white. Just like Emrakul's Hatcher is red while Emrakul herself is colourless.

Isn't the whole thing with the Eldrazi that they're colorless because we can't comprehend their motivations because they're so alien and otherworldly to us?
 
I dunno, we've had colourless angels before. While the followers of Emeria are white, that doesn't make Emeria herself white. Just like Emrakul's Hatcher is red while Emrakul herself is colourless.

just search for emeria it's all white, except the land that produces white mana but that's why I said technically. Emrakul is colourless but the goddess she impersonated is white.
 
just search for emeria it's all white. Except the land that produces white mana.

And that's fine, except the actual Emeria entity is Emrakul, which is colourless. The whole thing about the "gods" of Zendikar is that they are based on a fundamental misconception of what they are. Therefore we cannot take the followers as having any bearing on the nature of the entitiy. So while they may think Emeria is white, we know she's colourless.

EDIT: I suppose you're right in that the idea of Emeria is white but the actuality is colourless.
 

Supast4r

Junior Member
Eldrazi was mostly just goofy in Modern, but that's more a product of Modern as a format than of the actual Eldrazi. They're actually one of the best things R&D has done for Legacy and Vintage in ages since they're a powerful, metagame-altering budget deck that doesn't ruin anything for other playstyles.

I dunno, as a long long long time player it's hard for me to look at this list and get all that worked up. It's multiple different fuck-ups on BFZ block (which I agree is an absolute disaster of both design and development), a couple fiddly little single card/mechanic issues like there have always been in every game since forever, and then a moderately overpowered artifact without a good enough counter. SOI/Kaladesh are way better developed than BFZ at minimum.

The eldrazi design in the zendikar set was HORRIBLE. In the first zendikar they were either token producers or giant creatures which makes sense from a power level and a lore standpoint. BFZ/OGW made them into generic super overpowered goodstuff creatures that have muticolored abilities despite being colorless. Can you even defend bad designs like thought-knot seer or smasher? Eldrazi temple/eye of ugin were just icing on the shit pie. Even Rosewater believes that the set was bad.
 

Santiako

Member
First Aether Revolt story:

IN THE DEAD OF NIGHT

In an effort to quell a renegade uprising, the Consulate of Ghirapur forcibly confiscated all unapproved devices from the inventors of the city. Access to energy sources was drastically cut, and a mandatory curfew was set in place.

Yahenni, an aetherborn socialite and philanthropist, is minutes from death. Desperate for someone to be with them in their passing, Yahenni stumbles through the abandoned streets past curfew in search of the one thing every aetherborn is supposed to be guaranteed: a party before they die.
 
And that's fine, except the actual Emeria entity is Emrakul, which is colourless. The whole thing about the "gods" of Zendikar is that they are based on a fundamental misconception of what they are. Therefore we cannot take the followers as having any bearing on the nature of the entitiy. So while they may think Emeria is white, we know she's colourless.

EDIT: I suppose you're right in that the idea of Emeria is white but the actuality is colourless.

Yeah that was what I was getting at. She's clearly colourless but her personification was seen as white.
 
Can you even defend bad designs like thought-knot seer or smasher?

Yeah, because again, they've made multiple formats better by their existence. BFZ is a design nadir but the colorless mana costs in OGW are the one part of the block that was generally implemented pretty well.
 
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