I kinda hope Nahiri stays dead. Not because I hate her, but because I find it a bit tiring that for such a supposedly dangerous place, surprisingly few people actually ever die in the multiverse. There was Venser (who killed himself...) Elspeth (who might not even be dead dead) and there was Xenagos, whose death is actually rather ambigious, but I'm willing to give Wizards the benefit of doubt. That's one and two half deaths so far.
Plus, if literally all three Zendikar oldwalkers survived all the way up to now, then it kinda cheapens the entire quest from Liliana and Nicol to remain immortal. Bah.
Heck, it even appears from the spoiled art that only Ulamog remains on Zendikar
What art? D:
By the way, did anyone else notice that there's an Efreet on the art for Atarka's command? Looks like the Efreet joined the Atarka after being expelled from the Jeskai.
Doug has kind of hinted that Gideon leans a little bit red, so it's entirely possible that he could be RW. We haven't had such a color alignment on a planeswalker since Ajani Vengeant, and maybe there's a big demand for a Boros 'walker? As much as they say that they don't do color box-checking for planeswalkers, it looks like we got every color on the spectrum represented by planeswalkers for each block starting with Innistrad (we've actually had it for every block since Lorwyn except for Scars, which was missing green), so it's clearly something that they're aware of. Plus, with Nahiri possibly showing up, the field is disproportionately represented by white planeswalkers (Ajani, Gideon, Elspeth (who's "dead" but strongly hinted to possibly return (hopefully not with an upper case "R")), and now Nahiri). They may just decide that Gideon, being the most "super hero vigilante type" planeswalker out there, would be the best fit for a RW alignment.
They made a statement that they feel Gideon is still a white walker, despite allying with the Boros (and apparently being from Akros). He isn't one to actually use red mana because of various reasons, one of which is he feels red blinds people to their actions, makes the short sighted and reckless, but even then, he has a rather poor history of interacting with red, as well as the constant teaching his master gave him of how the walker who originally wielded the sural died to a pyromancer.
So, he has issues with red to begin with.
I think Ajani would be much more likely to lapse back into R with the kind of resentment and anger he has over how the establishment and authority treated Elspeth. I could see an anarchistic trend develop in him.
I'm fairly sure they don't color balance when considering walkers. At least they've said that much.
They have... but then they kind of hedged that by saying they look for characters to fill what they want in the set. That's why Ashiok ended up being made.
And don't forget Ajani was WG only because they didn't want two white walkers in the block.
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Looks like a hedron from the end of the pax pannel.
Perhaps nahiri will hatch from one of them like ugin did after all she's the developer of the hardware part of the hedron.
I would think it likely that new planeswalkers would be introduced in BFZ so despite all the sense it makes to have all zendikar related 'walkers in the set, I'm positive they're not all getting cards.
I kinda hope Nahiri stays dead. Not because I hate her, but because I find it a bit tiring that for such a supposedly dangerous place, surprisingly few people actually ever die in the multiverse. There was Venser (who killed himself...) Elspeth (who might not even be dead dead) and there was Xenagos, whose death is actually rather ambigious, but I'm willing to give Wizards the benefit of doubt. That's one and two half deaths so far.
Plus, if literally all three Zendikar oldwalkers survived all the way up to now, then it kinda cheapens the entire quest from Liliana and Nicol to remain immortal. Bah.
To be fair, undeath and being a dragon tend to make you immune to death by old age.
On another note, how long do you guys think it will take Ugin to realize after he wakes up that the Mending happened and he has only a tiny piece of his former power?
I would think it likely that new planeswalkers would be introduced in BFZ
I hope not. They have tons of planeswalkers right now with little to no development. Creative is trying to pull thing together to be more cohesive so hopefully they're going to pull back on new walkers for a while.
I would think it likely that new planeswalkers would be introduced in BFZ
I hope not. They have tons of planeswalkers right now with little to no development. Creative is trying to pull thing together to be more cohesive so hopefully they're going to pull back on new walkers for a while.
TBH, all I want is for them to make a permanent RW walker and, assuming Ob Nixilis regains his spark and STAYS monoblack, one more green walker, given that Garruk is now BG so Nissa is the sole mono-G walker. MAYBE a dedicated GW walker as well, but since Doug seems to be implying that Ajani is going to bounce between monoW and GW, I'm not too concerned about that. They really don't need to make anymore besides those, IMO.
I too would like them to develop the current roster. Feels less epic when planeswalkers start falling out of the sky. Metaphorically... Because actually that does sound epic.
I kinda hope Nahiri stays dead. Not because I hate her, but because I find it a bit tiring that for such a supposedly dangerous place, surprisingly few people actually ever die in the multiverse. There was Venser (who killed himself...) Elspeth (who might not even be dead dead) and there was Xenagos, whose death is actually rather ambigious, but I'm willing to give Wizards the benefit of doubt. That's one and two half deaths so far.
Plus, if literally all three Zendikar oldwalkers survived all the way up to now, then it kinda cheapens the entire quest from Liliana and Nicol to remain immortal. Bah.
In the same vein as current Creative's "You know, he/she's actually an oldwalker" when introducing "new" planeswalkers, it's getting pretty bit jarring specially with how MaRo usually likes to blast out the canned speech of "Oldwalkers are god-like".
Add to that if they only used returning Neowalkers for Zendikar they'd not worry too much about background development but instead trying to connect the dots in conjunction with past sets imo.
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I would think it likely that new planeswalkers would be introduced in BFZ
I hope not. They have tons of planeswalkers right now with little to no development. Creative is trying to pull thing together to be more cohesive so hopefully they're going to pull back on new walkers for a while.
Yes, it can happen.
It's the first block of the new two-set-per-block two-blocks-per-year pattern. They can perfectly make a block with all 5 established walkers in an old plane, and later in the same year do a block with a good amount of new walkers in a new plane.
I hope not, it took way too long to finally get a kor walker. Tired of always getting human walkers. It's as if they are special and so get all the good things. I mean we finally got a zombie walker (i assume due to flavour) in Theros, Ashiok.
Ashiok isn't a zombie. If anything, Ashiok would qualify as a horror or nightmare.
I would think it likely that new planeswalkers would be introduced in BFZ
I hope not. They have tons of planeswalkers right now with little to no development. Creative is trying to pull thing together to be more cohesive so hopefully they're going to pull back on new walkers for a while.
Yes, it can happen.
It's the first block of the new two-set-per-block two-blocks-per-year pattern. They can perfectly make a block with all 5 established walkers in an old plane, and later in the same year do a block with a good amount of new walkers in a new plane.
There's even a solid number of established Planeswalkers who have reason to be involved in the story:
- Gideon
- Nissa
- Kiora
- Ugin
- Sorin
- Nahiri
That's six Planeswalkers that are potentially going to show up in Battle for Zendikar block. No need for a new one for that block.
- Nissa = G
- Kiora = Either U or UG
- Ugin = Colorless
- Sorin = Probably B
- Nahiri = W
That leaves Gideon. Will he be Mono W despite a potential Nihari as well? That's what I am wondering. I certainly wouldn't mind it. I think he's best as that, especially with Elspeth out of the picture for now.
I would think it likely that new planeswalkers would be introduced in BFZ
I hope not. They have tons of planeswalkers right now with little to no development. Creative is trying to pull thing together to be more cohesive so hopefully they're going to pull back on new walkers for a while.
Yes, it can happen.
It's the first block of the new two-set-per-block two-blocks-per-year pattern. They can perfectly make a block with all 5 established walkers in an old plane, and later in the same year do a block with a good amount of new walkers in a new plane.
There's even a solid number of established Planeswalkers who have reason to be involved in the story:
- Gideon
- Nissa
- Kiora
- Ugin
- Sorin
- Nahiri
That's six Planeswalkers that are potentially going to show up in Battle for Zendikar block. No need for a new one for that block.
May need to add Jace to that list, too. He was one of the three that helped unintentionally release the Eldrazi in the first place. He's not quite your prototypical hero like Gideon, but he has shown morals and compassion numerous times. I cant imagine the MtG poster boy not being present for MtG's biggest post-mending showdown, yet. Although it is super early BtZ has an Avengers or Justice League feel to me so far, (the multiverse's mightiest heroes).
Other potential players, but less likely, are Sarkhan and Chandra. First, both were at the Eye of Ugin with Jace and they are each Red walkers, which the list lacks so far. Next, Chandra hasnt played a major role in a featured block since Zendikar (and it's not like she was the centerpiece of the story). Now, Sarkhan may just chill on Tarkir, we'll have to see how the rest of this story plays out on Tarkir, but Sarkhan's mind is the clearest it has ever been. So, maybe he too, like Jace, feels a need to fight against the Eldrazi since he is responsible for their release. Sarkhan did just lead an entire block as the protagonist, so maybe we'll see more of that from him.
May need to add Jace to that list, too. He was one of the three that helped unintentionally release the Eldrazi in the first place. He's not quite your prototypical hero like Gideon, but he has shown morals and compassion numerous times. I cant imagine the MtG poster boy not being present for MtG's biggest post-mending showdown, yet.
I'm not sure how they'd justify that. Jace is very busy in Ravnica.
Well he still found time to hunt down Ob Nixilis on Zendiakr to remove the hedron. He also confronted Garruk on Shandalar, because Garruk becoming a demon would endanger every plane, including Ravnica, so he doesnt seem to tied up with Ravnica if something more pressing presents itself. And i dunno what's more pressing than the Eldrazi.
Well he still found time to hunt down Ob Nixilis on Zendiakr to remove the hedron. He also confronted Garruk on Shandalar, because Garruk becoming a demon would endanger every plane, including Ravnica, so he doesnt seem to tied up with Ravnica if something more pressing presents itself. And i dunno what's more pressing than the Eldrazi.
[edit] Wow I totally missed those events. My mistake.
Does Sarkhan even know he released the Eldrazi? I know he was in the Eye when it opened but did the brood pour out of it right away or did he walk away right after?
You know, if they have any interest in doing "team up" cards (i.e., one planeswalker card representing a collaboration between two or more walkers), this may be the block to do it. They have a bunch of planeswalker characters with stakes in the Zendikar/Eldrazi plot (up to 10-ish if we're being generous, but easily half a dozen), and a setting that's clearly supposed to include huge battles, giant monsters, and expensive spells. Seems like a reasonable place to, say, condense teams to single cards, like "Jace and Chandra, Their-Own-Mess-Cleaner-Uppers" or "Ugin et al, Super Hedron Friends".
Does Sarkhan even know he released the Eldrazi? I know he was in the Eye when it opened but did the brood pour out of it right away or did he walk away right after?
He did encounter some of the brood doing a corpsehatch out of a dragon. That's about when Ugin starting really chatting into his ear.
With the next block confirmed to be taking place on Zendikar, I have to wonder whether Ugin and Sorin get new cards in the block immediately after the block they last received new cards.
Obviously, they both have a big part to play in the Eldrazi storyline, but I wonder whether, considering that Nissa's Uncharted Realms from this summer indicated that Emrakul and Kozilek have left Zendikar, Sorin and Ugin could be part of a larger planning strategy and don't get directly involved in the fight against Ulamog on Zendikar.
From the art shown so far, we can bet that Gideon is a major player in BFZ, and Doug explicitly said at the panel that "we haven't seen the last of Nahiri," so she's likely in, too (Zendikar is her home plane. Where else would she show up?).
What about the other three (MaRo recently said that there'll be around 5 planeswalkers per block going forward)? Ob Nixilis seems like a given, with all of the teasing that they've done about him with his card in M15 and his Uncharted Realms from this past summer. Finally, given the fact that they specifically made Kiora's backstory be that she was a native of Zendikar who was gathering powerful sea creatures together to go back and fight the Eldrazi -- and the fact that they probably created this backstory around the time that they were developing BFZ (this element of Kiora's character wasn't present in the original DotP 2012 description), Kiora also seems like an auto-include.
So at this point, it's getting kind of crowded. Jace, Chandra, and Nissa all have connections to the situation on Zendikar. Chandra mostly because of her involvement/connection with Gideon. Jace because he seems to feel responsible for maintaining the stability of the Multiverse on some level. And Nissa obviously because she lives on Zendikar and because of her role in releasing the Eldrazi to begin with.
I would venture a guess that because Jace and Chandra are getting new cards in Magic Origins, we won't be seeing them in planeswalker card form in BFZ block. I would say the same about Nissa and Gideon, except that Gideon looks to be the "face" of the set a la Liliana in Innistrad, Jace in RTR, Elspeth in Theros, and Sarkhan in Khans/Dragons, he'll probably get a nice, pushed card. And the central theme of Nissa's character has been her connection to Zendikar and her role in the Eldrazi's release, so I'd guess she'd be in the block, too, but that could change based on how they told her Magic Origins story this summer.
The raw number of planeswalkers involved in this storyline makes be think that the Eldrazi arc will span multiple blocks and multiple worlds. We'll see, though.
Well, this whole block introduced two new walkers, two new sarkhans and a new Sorin. Theros then, introduced three, and gave us two returning characters. BFZ is the first of the new block structure. I think, because the new setup involves two large and two small sets per year, the large ones will include three walkers each (to make up for the loss of the planeswalker infested core-set) and the small set will get one walker. That means there is room for 4 characters in BFZ block.
Gideon is a given. I'm going to rule out Sorin and Ugin. They may be the most significant characters in terms of knowledge about the Eldrazi problem, but they just received cards. Ugin is probably going to be around a lot on card art though, as he will probably play a large role in the story. Sorin will be there, but he also has a longstanding history of making himself important but not actually doing anything.. This is probably because his presence fulfills a lot of players' dark fantasies, but his personality makes him a bad protagonist.
Gideon gets a new card in both Origins and BFZ, but I think he'll be the only one. The impact of multiple cards of one character diminishes their individual impact. Ajani Steadfast is a thing everyone probably forgot about, and the new Sarkhan also hasn't received nearly as much interest as Narset in terms of interest for the character. I think Kiora will also be back, because her Kraken thing also fits the theme of Zendikar a lot. Aside from that, Nicol Bolas might show up as he will take notice (I imagine him going what the ****) of the revival of Ugin. RnD might also want to play up to the Ugin vs Nicol Bolas fantasy by allowing their cards to exist simultaneously in standard. Then, there should be at least one new character.
They stated in the Pax panel that they intend to have the same number of planeswalkers in Standard at the same time. So right now we have the Theros ones (Ajani x2, Elspeth, Ashiok, Xenagos, Kiora, Jace, Lilliana, Chandra, Nissa, Sorin, Sarkhan x2, Narset) so about 14-15 which would put it at 5 PW's per block, which fits the Large/Small dynamic.
Looking at the new Planeswalkers' Guide (part 1 of 2; only the Ojutai and Silumgar orders are detailed at the moment)...The Ojutai order sounds...well, maybe not QUITE a cult, but getting there. I get the distinct feeling that Ojutai manipulates the Skywise every bit as much as his humanoid followers. Silumgar just wants delight and obeisance; Ojutai is just short of wanting worship.
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Plus, if literally all three Zendikar oldwalkers survived all the way up to now, then it kinda cheapens the entire quest from Liliana and Nicol to remain immortal. Bah.
What art? D:
By the way, did anyone else notice that there's an Efreet on the art for Atarka's command? Looks like the Efreet joined the Atarka after being expelled from the Jeskai.
This art. The one right there. Yes, that one.
Your mods are terrified of me.
They made a statement that they feel Gideon is still a white walker, despite allying with the Boros (and apparently being from Akros). He isn't one to actually use red mana because of various reasons, one of which is he feels red blinds people to their actions, makes the short sighted and reckless, but even then, he has a rather poor history of interacting with red, as well as the constant teaching his master gave him of how the walker who originally wielded the sural died to a pyromancer.
So, he has issues with red to begin with.
I think Ajani would be much more likely to lapse back into R with the kind of resentment and anger he has over how the establishment and authority treated Elspeth. I could see an anarchistic trend develop in him.
And don't forget Ajani was WG only because they didn't want two white walkers in the block.
"You can tell how dumb someone is by how they use Mary Sue"
Looks like a hedron from the end of the pax pannel.
Perhaps nahiri will hatch from one of them like ugin did after all she's the developer of the hardware part of the hedron.
To be fair, undeath and being a dragon tend to make you immune to death by old age.
On another note, how long do you guys think it will take Ugin to realize after he wakes up that the Mending happened and he has only a tiny piece of his former power?
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
I hope not. They have tons of planeswalkers right now with little to no development. Creative is trying to pull thing together to be more cohesive so hopefully they're going to pull back on new walkers for a while.
TBH, all I want is for them to make a permanent RW walker and, assuming Ob Nixilis regains his spark and STAYS monoblack, one more green walker, given that Garruk is now BG so Nissa is the sole mono-G walker. MAYBE a dedicated GW walker as well, but since Doug seems to be implying that Ajani is going to bounce between monoW and GW, I'm not too concerned about that. They really don't need to make anymore besides those, IMO.
In the same vein as current Creative's "You know, he/she's actually an oldwalker" when introducing "new" planeswalkers, it's getting pretty bit jarring specially with how MaRo usually likes to blast out the canned speech of "Oldwalkers are god-like".
Add to that if they only used returning Neowalkers for Zendikar they'd not worry too much about background development but instead trying to connect the dots in conjunction with past sets imo.
Yes, it can happen.
It's the first block of the new two-set-per-block two-blocks-per-year pattern. They can perfectly make a block with all 5 established walkers in an old plane, and later in the same year do a block with a good amount of new walkers in a new plane.
There's even a solid number of established Planeswalkers who have reason to be involved in the story:
- Gideon
- Nissa
- Kiora
- Ugin
- Sorin
- Nahiri
That's six Planeswalkers that are potentially going to show up in Battle for Zendikar block. No need for a new one for that block.
- Main Cube
- No Brains, All Feelings Cube
- Kiora = Either U or UG
- Ugin = Colorless
- Sorin = Probably B
- Nahiri = W
That leaves Gideon. Will he be Mono W despite a potential Nihari as well? That's what I am wondering. I certainly wouldn't mind it. I think he's best as that, especially with Elspeth out of the picture for now.
|| UW Jace, Vyn's Prodigy UW || UG Kenessos, Priest of Thassa (feat. Arixmethes) UG ||
Cards I still want to see created:
|| Olantin, Lost City || Pavios and Thanasis || Choryu ||
May need to add Jace to that list, too. He was one of the three that helped unintentionally release the Eldrazi in the first place. He's not quite your prototypical hero like Gideon, but he has shown morals and compassion numerous times. I cant imagine the MtG poster boy not being present for MtG's biggest post-mending showdown, yet. Although it is super early BtZ has an Avengers or Justice League feel to me so far, (the multiverse's mightiest heroes).
Other potential players, but less likely, are Sarkhan and Chandra. First, both were at the Eye of Ugin with Jace and they are each Red walkers, which the list lacks so far. Next, Chandra hasnt played a major role in a featured block since Zendikar (and it's not like she was the centerpiece of the story). Now, Sarkhan may just chill on Tarkir, we'll have to see how the rest of this story plays out on Tarkir, but Sarkhan's mind is the clearest it has ever been. So, maybe he too, like Jace, feels a need to fight against the Eldrazi since he is responsible for their release. Sarkhan did just lead an entire block as the protagonist, so maybe we'll see more of that from him.
I'm not sure how they'd justify that. Jace is very busy in Ravnica.
[edit] Wow I totally missed those events. My mistake.
BGStandard Green AggroGB
UWRGModern Saheeli CobraGRWU
UBRGLegacy StormGRBU
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He did encounter some of the brood doing a corpsehatch out of a dragon. That's about when Ugin starting really chatting into his ear.
They stated in the Pax panel that they intend to have the same number of planeswalkers in Standard at the same time. So right now we have the Theros ones (Ajani x2, Elspeth, Ashiok, Xenagos, Kiora, Jace, Lilliana, Chandra, Nissa, Sorin, Sarkhan x2, Narset) so about 14-15 which would put it at 5 PW's per block, which fits the Large/Small dynamic.