I'm still in the Emrakul camp at the moment. That Tamiyo's Journal / clue tokens puzzle is just too strong a piece of evidence to ignore, along with some of the mutations (Paranoid Parish-Blade as prime example). I get why there is a post-BFZ distaste for more Eldrazi, given the poor handling of that story, but I have to say that if this is Emrakul, then it's been Eldrazi done right, and I'm absolutely fine with it.
As for the very black aspects of those descriptors in 'I Am Avacyn', I think we can explain those along with Avacyn's black eyes that mirrored those of the Ormendahl cultist in the first story: it's demonic influence. I see it like this:
- Nahiri is trying to bring Emrakul to Innistrad.
- Nahiri knows Innistrad is protected from extra-planar threats by Sorin's creation of the Helvault and Avacyn, but the Helvault is now gone. One down, one to go.
- Nahiri's Machinations is her manipulating the cultists into bringing forth Ormendahl as a weapon to use against Avacyn.
- It's a combination of Nahiri's and Ormendahl's power that enables the corruption of Avacyn that we saw in the early story. Of key note: her eyes gradually turn black.
- Note that in 'I Am Avacyn', Avacyn calls her sight her main weapon - greater even than her spear. The demonic influence has completely corrupted that sight, causing her to see horrific, pestilential imagery even when she looks at innocents.
- With Avacyn's corruption complete, Nahiri knew Sorin would have no choice but to unmake her. Did she know that if she destroyed Markov Manor, Sorin would go to Olivia for help? Did she know Olivia would only offer that help in exchange for the removal of Avacyn? Maybe. Not sure.
- Regardless, SOI has been all about Nahiri manipulating things to remove Avacyn, the last extra-planar ward, clearing the path for EMN.
- Everything about the Drownyard and the Cryptoliths is then build-up for what is to come next. Nahiri has constructed a mana-locus, but it exists in some kind of non-visible form for now. Except for Jace when he touched the cryptolith and could suddenly Behold the Beyond - a great syphoning of mana up into the dark void of the Eldritch Moon.
- Up to now, Emrakul (in non-physical form; remember the Eldrazi on Zendikar were not like the Eldrazi in normal assault mode, because Ugin, Nahiri and Sorin forced them into physical form with the hedrons) has been off-plane, but beginning to feed through this mana-syphon. Maybe there has been a small amount of leakage triggering the little mutations we've seen so far. It could be about to get a whole lot worse.
So there we go: Nahiri, manipulating cultists and demons to get rid of Avacyn and enable a full-on visitation from Emrakul. All the blackness of some aspects explained, within the greater context of it still being Emrakul at Nahiri's behest. The big question that remains: why? Despite the flashback conflict with Sorin and Avacyn 1,000 years ago, it all still looks pretty extreme and un-white, but Maro's already said we need to wait for the rest of the story before we can fully understand it.
It has to be Emrakul. All signs point towards Emrakul being the big bad. Can't wait for it(Emrakul) to appear.
That is one of the reasons I don't think it is Emrakul. I would very much like to think that wizards is not circle jerking themselves thinking this is a "big mystery" if it is the single most obvious thing. I am really really hoping that we get an actual twist with this.
It has to be Emrakul. All signs point towards Emrakul being the big bad. Can't wait for it(Emrakul) to appear.
That is one of the reasons I don't think it is Emrakul. I would very much like to think that wizards is not circle jerking themselves thinking this is a "big mystery" if it is the single most obvious thing. I am really really hoping that we get an actual twist with this.
You are underestimating how big of a surprise this is going to be for people who are just playing the game and not closely following the story like us. Its not like most people are aware of the Tamiyo's journal clue puzzle. It is clearly going to be Emrakul, and our reward for obsessing over the puzzle and the cards is that we get to know that before most people.
It has to be Emrakul. All signs point towards Emrakul being the big bad. Can't wait for it(Emrakul) to appear.
That is one of the reasons I don't think it is Emrakul. I would very much like to think that wizards is not circle jerking themselves thinking this is a "big mystery" if it is the single most obvious thing. I am really really hoping that we get an actual twist with this.
I think you're over estimating the quality of writing Wizards has going on. A big twist only works with a big story. For all that this is a lot of story, it's still only a few thousand words once a week. For twists to be compelling they can't take three months to show up and then get ignored until the Plane is revisited in a few years.
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...but Maro's already said we need to wait for the rest of the story before we can fully understand it.
MaRo said too that returning to Inninstrad needed to have a conflict of apocalyptic proportions too, so they decided to ignore the "happy ending" of Avacyn Restored and shove down people's throats the whole "Avacyn goes mad and kills everyone" thing.
Emrakul won't be brought until it can be cozily destroyed in a short spasmic 2-block story, rendering all the whole "lovecraftian cosmic horror thing" completely meaningless as they did with Ulamog and Kozilek in the BFZ cycle, because it won't matter that they can freaking bend reality itself, no one can fight the mighty marketing device.
Also, they're likely going to kill Nahiri too in Eldritch Moon, perhaps to make it worse, it'll be Liliana the one that ends killing her for some convoluted reason that would most likely be sort of reasurring us again that Liliana is cool and not a jerk (Or mostly because they need a B-walker for the cycle)
And another reason for not having Emrakul right now: There won't be any cross-block synergy they're used to do by now, and we shouldn't be surprised if MaRo tells us later that people didn't like the Eldrazi because "Battle for Zendikar was full of them", which is absurd as claiming that "Invasion sucked because it had too much of the Phyrexians and the Coalition"
And another reason for not having Emrakul right now: There won't be any cross-block synergy they're used to do by now, and we shouldn't be surprised if MaRo tells us later that people didn't like the Eldrazi because "Battle for Zendikar was full of them", which is absurd as claiming that "Invasion sucked because it had too much of the Phyrexians and the Coalition"
Going by the timeline they say they use to make sets and how far in the future they are working, EMN was pretty much finished before BFZ was released. It would not have been possible for them to make huge changes to EMN in reaction to any sort of negative feelings about Eldrazi in BFZ block. They have made it pretty obvious that Emrakul is coming. Another reason why Emrakul is going to be in this block is because BFZ was originally going to be a 3 set block, so it seems logical to have a Ulamog set, followed by a Kozilek set, finishing with an Emrakul set. It was during BFZ design when they switched to the 2 set block paradigm. They may have been able to just push Emrakul into one of those 2 BFZ sets, but it looks like they decided Emrakul left Zendikar, and that the Emrakul set would be on another plane.
It has to be Emrakul. All signs point towards Emrakul being the big bad. Can't wait for it(Emrakul) to appear.
That is one of the reasons I don't think it is Emrakul. I would very much like to think that wizards is not circle jerking themselves thinking this is a "big mystery" if it is the single most obvious thing. I am really really hoping that we get an actual twist with this.
I think you're over estimating the quality of writing Wizards has going on. A big twist only works with a big story. For all that this is a lot of story, it's still only a few thousand words once a week. For twists to be compelling they can't take three months to show up and then get ignored until the Plane is revisited in a few years.
It is not "just a few thousand words a week" it is the announcements, the "Clues" the idea of Clue tokens, they are very much trying to get the theme and feel of a mystery novel going here, and if you are at all trying to do something like this you do not go with the obvious choice which is Emrakul. I don't think it is having too much Faith in the writing staff to set up a red herring that everyone will look at and leap on while leaving far more subtle hints towards the real culprit.
My personal guess is
Nahiri is going to remake Griselbrand, we know that Innistrad Demons form out of mana, and reform when killed. We know that Nahiri is altering the flows of mana and has the help of Gisa who is black mana aligned. Stirring up Madness and everything else is just icing on the cake.
Your guess is at best incomplete, because we know that Avacyn was preventing an extraplanar entity from entering Innistrad. There is a very, very short list of creatures known to exist in the blind eternities, and they all rhyme with "Emrakul"
It has to be Emrakul. All signs point towards Emrakul being the big bad. Can't wait for it(Emrakul) to appear.
That is one of the reasons I don't think it is Emrakul. I would very much like to think that wizards is not circle jerking themselves thinking this is a "big mystery" if it is the single most obvious thing. I am really really hoping that we get an actual twist with this.
I think you're over estimating the quality of writing Wizards has going on. A big twist only works with a big story. For all that this is a lot of story, it's still only a few thousand words once a week. For twists to be compelling they can't take three months to show up and then get ignored until the Plane is revisited in a few years.
It is not "just a few thousand words a week" it is the announcements, the "Clues" the idea of Clue tokens, they are very much trying to get the theme and feel of a mystery novel going here, and if you are at all trying to do something like this you do not go with the obvious choice which is Emrakul. I don't think it is having too much Faith in the writing staff to set up a red herring that everyone will look at and leap on while leaving far more subtle hints towards the real culprit.
My personal guess is
Nahiri is going to remake Griselbrand, we know that Innistrad Demons form out of mana, and reform when killed. We know that Nahiri is altering the flows of mana and has the help of Gisa who is black mana aligned. Stirring up Madness and everything else is just icing on the cake.
Why do you feel Emrakul is the "most obvious" thing? Because this is the crux of your argument for it not being Emrakul I wonder when did you decided that Emrakul was "obvious"? Was it the moment previews started? When we deciphered the clues? When it was said Avacyn was stopping an extraplanar entity from 'landing' on Innistrad? Because unless it was the first one then it is not the "Most Obvious" it is only obvious after all the clues have been gathered. which is the way these mysteries work. The vast majority of players haven't been exposed to all of the clues and context to see Emrakul as the "most obvious" so it will suprise them.
Your guess is at best incomplete, because we know that Avacyn was preventing an extraplanar entity from entering Innistrad. There is a very, very short list of creatures known to exist in the blind eternities, and they all rhyme with "Emrakul"
There's another, actually, but we haven't heard a peep from Marit since Coldsnap.
I also think the expansion symbol is going to be a stylized representation of Emrakul. It could very well be exactly what is on that amulet.
I think this was my theory back when they first revealed the clue tokens. Of all the iconography in SoI, this looks the most like something that might actually be an expansion symbol.
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It is hard to dispute Emrakul at this point, but part of me clings to the hope that Innistrad will be spared the Eldrazi treatment.
It is possible Emrakul is a red herring, however. Good story telling, especially with mysteries, set up one obvious culprit based on clues. In most cases this is because the real villain is attempting to frame someone else. Skyrim's "Blood on the Ice" quest is a prime example of this where the wrong person was caught and imprisoned at first. What's to say Wizards isn't "framing" Emrakul, set he/she/it up to be the big bad of EMN when it is actually someone else? I mean, with everything looking like Emrakul and people getting complacent about the whole thing and EMA spoilers starting now and leading straight into EMN spoilers, what better way for Wizards to generate hype for EMN than to say "Surprise! It's not Emrakul!" and thus causing the community to re-evaluate everything in that new light.
A man can dream
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It is hard to dispute Emrakul at this point, but part of me clings to the hope that Innistrad will be spared the Eldrazi treatment.
It is possible Emrakul is a red herring, however. Good story telling, especially with mysteries, set up one obvious culprit based on clues. In most cases this is because the real villain is attempting to frame someone else. Skyrim's "Blood on the Ice" quest is a prime example of this where the wrong person was caught and imprisoned at first. What's to say Wizards isn't "framing" Emrakul, set he/she/it up to be the big bad of EMN when it is actually someone else? I mean, with everything looking like Emrakul and people getting complacent about the whole thing and EMA spoilers starting now and leading straight into EMN spoilers, what better way for Wizards to generate hype for EMN than to say "Surprise! It's not Emrakul!" and thus causing the community to re-evaluate everything in that new light.
A man can dream
That would not go over well at all. There is no upside to doing that for wizards. The players who are not following the story (which is most of them) aren't going to be surprised that its someone other than Emrakul, because they aren't expecting Emrakul either. The enfranchised players who believe they have solved the mystery would be angry if they find out that they were basically lied to. If there was a plausible alternative among many suspects and it turns out the consensus went down the wrong path, that would be one thing, but there is no plausible alternative. Early on in the story before we solved the puzzle, there were many alternatives but at this point, Wizards has eliminated every possibility in the mystery except Emrakul (or 2+ big bads including Emrakul I guess, but Emrakul is involved). It was not an easy puzzle, and the enfranchised players are going to want to be paid off for their collective cleverness.
Your guess is at best incomplete, because we know that Avacyn was preventing an extraplanar entity from entering Innistrad. There is a very, very short list of creatures known to exist in the blind eternities, and they all rhyme with "Emrakul"
Allow me to tell you which other beings could be considered "Extraplanar threats":
If it turns to be Emrakul at the end, well, they'll just waste another interesting char just for the sake of marketing, and will be squandered even worse than Kozilek and Ulamog together, because those two at least survived a whole two expansions before getting destroyed by the League of Boring Invincible Heroes.
I wonder when did you decided that Emrakul was "obvious"?
Personally I've been calling that it would be Emmy from the moment I knew the set was called Shadows Over Innistrad, and I was pretty much certain when we started seeing all the mutants and madness.
You're right tho, most Magic fans aren't quite as obsessed as we collectively are so they're gonna be shocked.
If it turns to be Emrakul at the end, well, they'll just waste another interesting char just for the sake of marketing, and will be squandered even worse than Kozilek and Ulamog together, because those two at least survived a whole two expansions before getting destroyed by the League of Boring Invincible Heroes.
Man you've got even less evidence that Emmy will die than I had that she'd show up. For one thing, the rest of the Gatewatch is leaving Jace to his own devices right now.
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Your guess is at best incomplete, because we know that Avacyn was preventing an extraplanar entity from entering Innistrad. There is a very, very short list of creatures known to exist in the blind eternities, and they all rhyme with "Emrakul"
Allow me to tell you which other beings could be considered "Extraplanar threats":
If it turns to be Emrakul at the end, well, they'll just waste another interesting char just for the sake of marketing, and will be squandered even worse than Kozilek and Ulamog together, because those two at least survived a whole two expansions before getting destroyed by the League of Boring Invincible Heroes.
Really? Come on, Jace and Tamiyo weren't stopped.
Planeswalkers do not count. They can only briefly exist in the blind eternities, and several PW have easily traveled in and out of Innistrad without incident or interference from Avacyn, so she was obviously not created to prevent planeswalkers from entering Innistrad. You are just in denial at this point, Wizards has foreclosed all other possibilities.
Avacyn was created, among other reasons, to protect against extraplanar threats other than Planeswalkers. There's really only one known possibility at this point after Ulamog and Kozilek bit the dust. (wotc seems to have forgotten about Marit Lage)
If it turns to be Emrakul at the end, well, they'll just waste another interesting char just for the sake of marketing, and will be squandered even worse than Kozilek and Ulamog together, because those two at least survived a whole two expansions before getting destroyed by the League of Boring Invincible Heroes.
Man you've got even less evidence that Emmy will die than I had that she'd show up. For one thing, the rest of the Gatewatch is leaving Jace to his own devices right now.
All that was needed to destroy Ulamog, the nigh-invincible devourer that turns everything into dust just by standing close, and Kozilek, the abomination that freaking distorts reality (And thus EVERYTHING ELSE) AND time, was an uncommon hate card, then they were just burnt like every other normal creature in the game, the card even hints that Emrakul might have had the infamous Hexproof ability, yet the card would have leave it completely at the mercy of a stinkin' Doom Blade.
Planeswalkers do not count. They can only briefly exist in the blind eternities, and several PW have easily traveled in and out of Innistrad without incident or interference from Avacyn, so she was obviously not created to prevent planeswalkers from entering Innistrad. You are just in denial at this point, Wizards has foreclosed all other possibilities.
Avacyn was created, among other reasons, to protect against extraplanar threats other than Planeswalkers. There's really only one known possibility at this point after Ulamog and Kozilek bit the dust. (wotc seems to have forgotten about Marit Lage)
Jace and Tamiyo only survived because Sorin pulled a Big Damn Heroes there, otherwise they would both be very dead by now, Avacyn could have easily killed them both for all we've seen in the stories, which treat her as her first card incarnation, which was basically a "You lose" card. We know that Sorin didn't met with Liliana because he arrived to Inninstrad a lot of time later than she and Garruk did, and Liliana is basically isolated from the rest of the plane, not bothering anyone (aka "behaving fine") and Garruk is long gone from there, and both entered Inninstrad while Avacyn was locked in the Helvault anyway.
Denial is claiming that planeswalkers are not extra planar threats, when they precisely are that, omnipotent beings able to travel from one plane to another, and the Gatewatch has proven without a shadow of doubt that they are the most powerful forces in all the Multiverse, even more powerful than the Cthulhu + Galactus mix that the Eldrazi are.
Avacyn. His Avacyn. She had come to protect Innistrad from a planar threat—just as he had made her to do.
The stories themselves treat planeswalkers as possible planar threats.
And about Marit Lage, that's a prerevisionist character, meaning that she's unlikely to ever appear again, mostly because her place as the Lovecraftian cosmic horror was overtook by the Eldrazi.
Your guess is at best incomplete, because we know that Avacyn was preventing an extraplanar entity from entering Innistrad. There is a very, very short list of creatures known to exist in the blind eternities, and they all rhyme with "Emrakul"
Allow me to tell you which other beings could be considered "Extraplanar threats":
If it turns to be Emrakul at the end, well, they'll just waste another interesting char just for the sake of marketing, and will be squandered even worse than Kozilek and Ulamog together, because those two at least survived a whole two expansions before getting destroyed by the League of Boring Invincible Heroes.
Really? Come on, Jace and Tamiyo weren't stopped.
Planeswalkers do not count. They can only briefly exist in the blind eternities, and several PW have easily traveled in and out of Innistrad without incident or interference from Avacyn, so she was obviously not created to prevent planeswalkers from entering Innistrad. You are just in denial at this point, Wizards has foreclosed all other possibilities.
Avacyn was created, among other reasons, to protect against extraplanar threats other than Planeswalkers. There's really only one known possibility at this point after Ulamog and Kozilek bit the dust. (wotc seems to have forgotten about Marit Lage)
Planeswalkers very much count, as evidenced both by the story were Avacyn is attacking Jace and Tamiyo and the story where Sorin flashes back to Avacyn's creation and Nahiri visits him, only to be attacked by Avacyn
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Jace and Tamiyo only survived because Sorin pulled a Big Damn Heroes there, otherwise they would both be very dead by now, etc etc etc
All right, you did not understand what I'm saying. I'll reset and try again.
We know that Avacyn at the time of her destruction was preventing something from entering Innistrad. For anyone who still had a shred of doubt, that should have ended it.
You responded by saying that PW can also travel through the blind eternities, which is true, but not relevant because Avacyn is not keeping out planeswalkers. So, thats not something she's designed to do. I did not say that she wouldn't perceive them as a threat and kill PW, I was saying that she is keeping something that lives in the blind eternities from entering Innistrad, and since she's not keeping out planeswalkers, that basically leaves only Emrakul.
Your guess is at best incomplete, because we know that Avacyn was preventing an extraplanar entity from entering Innistrad. There is a very, very short list of creatures known to exist in the blind eternities, and they all rhyme with "Emrakul"
Allow me to tell you which other beings could be considered "Extraplanar threats":
If it turns to be Emrakul at the end, well, they'll just waste another interesting char just for the sake of marketing, and will be squandered even worse than Kozilek and Ulamog together, because those two at least survived a whole two expansions before getting destroyed by the League of Boring Invincible Heroes.
Really? Come on, Jace and Tamiyo weren't stopped.
Planeswalkers do not count. They can only briefly exist in the blind eternities, and several PW have easily traveled in and out of Innistrad without incident or interference from Avacyn, so she was obviously not created to prevent planeswalkers from entering Innistrad. You are just in denial at this point, Wizards has foreclosed all other possibilities.
Avacyn was created, among other reasons, to protect against extraplanar threats other than Planeswalkers. There's really only one known possibility at this point after Ulamog and Kozilek bit the dust. (wotc seems to have forgotten about Marit Lage)
Planeswalkers very much count, as evidenced both by the story were Avacyn is attacking Jace and Tamiyo and the story where Sorin flashes back to Avacyn's creation and Nahiri visits him, only to be attacked by Avacyn
You also did not understand our conversation. Avacyn is not preventing planeswalkers from entering Innistrad, so therefore she clearly wasn't designed to prevent PW from entering Innistrad.
So, if she is not preventing PW from entering Innistrad, then what else in the blind eternities is she keeping out of Innistrad? There's really only one possibility, not counting Marit Lage.
The bottom line is this: the journal puzzle is not a non sequitur or a red herring. It's the only out-of-game hint/puzzle they did, and they directed significant resources into creating it (think of the added art budget for an absurd number of clue tokens alone) and promoting it.
Any theory about the SOI/EMN plot that relies on the phrase "Remember this: they came as three" being irrelevant or some kind of trick is very obviously wrong. So where does that leave us?
Basically, Emrakul. There's a little leeway in making the phrase relevant and not having the big bad be Emrakul exactly... something like "destroying Ulamog and Kozilek caused their essence to combine with Emrakul and now there's just one even bigger titan," or "Emrakul is making new titans to replace the dead ones, and the Eldritch Moon is the 'cocoon' of a new proto-titan." Something like that's not off the table.
Or there could be a situation where Nahiri is trying to summon Emrakul, but there's more to the story that will still surprise us. Like there's an extra twist in Nahiri's motivations and plans that we haven't guessed at, or some other force is also involved. You know, "Nahiri is actually working with Bolas, who wants the titans out eating planes because them not performing that function caused the time rifts/mending, and Bolas thinks he can restore planeswalker godhood by getting the planar recycling system running again." Or "Nahiri has actually been Fblthp in a rubber Nahiri mask the whole time, and he's really sending a call out to every interplanar monster, Emrakul included, because he wants to prove he can beat them at arm wrestling." But whatever your theory is, the solution to the journal puzzle has to be relevant to it, in a way that makes some kind of sense.
* I think Nahiri still has the white color identity for a reason. I'm guessing her plan is to trap Emrakul (or whatever it is she is summoning) and the warping of Innistrad and destruction of Avacyn is a bonus.
* Sorin and Nahiri will fight in the next set, and I'm having trouble coming up with a situation where they both live. I predict one of them is going to get dunked.
* The planeswalkers to get cards will be Liliana and Tamiyo. As a side note, if Tamiyo were UG than all of the colors would be represented equally across the two sets.
* There's a nonzero chance we'll see an Oath of Liliana card in the near future.
* There will most likely be a RG legendary werewolf, but I'm not sure who it will be.
"Nahiri has actually been Fblthp in a rubber Nahiri mask the whole time, and he's really sending a call out to every interplanar monster, Emrakul included, because he wants to prove he can beat them at arm wrestling."
Yes. This is exactly what is happening. So obvious. How could I not see it before?
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As for the very black aspects of those descriptors in 'I Am Avacyn', I think we can explain those along with Avacyn's black eyes that mirrored those of the Ormendahl cultist in the first story: it's demonic influence. I see it like this:
- Nahiri is trying to bring Emrakul to Innistrad.
- Nahiri knows Innistrad is protected from extra-planar threats by Sorin's creation of the Helvault and Avacyn, but the Helvault is now gone. One down, one to go.
- Nahiri's Machinations is her manipulating the cultists into bringing forth Ormendahl as a weapon to use against Avacyn.
- It's a combination of Nahiri's and Ormendahl's power that enables the corruption of Avacyn that we saw in the early story. Of key note: her eyes gradually turn black.
- Note that in 'I Am Avacyn', Avacyn calls her sight her main weapon - greater even than her spear. The demonic influence has completely corrupted that sight, causing her to see horrific, pestilential imagery even when she looks at innocents.
- With Avacyn's corruption complete, Nahiri knew Sorin would have no choice but to unmake her. Did she know that if she destroyed Markov Manor, Sorin would go to Olivia for help? Did she know Olivia would only offer that help in exchange for the removal of Avacyn? Maybe. Not sure.
- Regardless, SOI has been all about Nahiri manipulating things to remove Avacyn, the last extra-planar ward, clearing the path for EMN.
- Everything about the Drownyard and the Cryptoliths is then build-up for what is to come next. Nahiri has constructed a mana-locus, but it exists in some kind of non-visible form for now. Except for Jace when he touched the cryptolith and could suddenly Behold the Beyond - a great syphoning of mana up into the dark void of the Eldritch Moon.
- Up to now, Emrakul (in non-physical form; remember the Eldrazi on Zendikar were not like the Eldrazi in normal assault mode, because Ugin, Nahiri and Sorin forced them into physical form with the hedrons) has been off-plane, but beginning to feed through this mana-syphon. Maybe there has been a small amount of leakage triggering the little mutations we've seen so far. It could be about to get a whole lot worse.
So there we go: Nahiri, manipulating cultists and demons to get rid of Avacyn and enable a full-on visitation from Emrakul. All the blackness of some aspects explained, within the greater context of it still being Emrakul at Nahiri's behest. The big question that remains: why? Despite the flashback conflict with Sorin and Avacyn 1,000 years ago, it all still looks pretty extreme and un-white, but Maro's already said we need to wait for the rest of the story before we can fully understand it.
That is one of the reasons I don't think it is Emrakul. I would very much like to think that wizards is not circle jerking themselves thinking this is a "big mystery" if it is the single most obvious thing. I am really really hoping that we get an actual twist with this.
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You are underestimating how big of a surprise this is going to be for people who are just playing the game and not closely following the story like us. Its not like most people are aware of the Tamiyo's journal clue puzzle. It is clearly going to be Emrakul, and our reward for obsessing over the puzzle and the cards is that we get to know that before most people.
I think you're over estimating the quality of writing Wizards has going on. A big twist only works with a big story. For all that this is a lot of story, it's still only a few thousand words once a week. For twists to be compelling they can't take three months to show up and then get ignored until the Plane is revisited in a few years.
MaRo said too that returning to Inninstrad needed to have a conflict of apocalyptic proportions too, so they decided to ignore the "happy ending" of Avacyn Restored and shove down people's throats the whole "Avacyn goes mad and kills everyone" thing.
Emrakul won't be brought until it can be cozily destroyed in a short spasmic 2-block story, rendering all the whole "lovecraftian cosmic horror thing" completely meaningless as they did with Ulamog and Kozilek in the BFZ cycle, because it won't matter that they can freaking bend reality itself, no one can fight the mighty marketing device.
Also, they're likely going to kill Nahiri too in Eldritch Moon, perhaps to make it worse, it'll be Liliana the one that ends killing her for some convoluted reason that would most likely be sort of reasurring us again that Liliana is cool and not a jerk (Or mostly because they need a B-walker for the cycle)
And another reason for not having Emrakul right now: There won't be any cross-block synergy they're used to do by now, and we shouldn't be surprised if MaRo tells us later that people didn't like the Eldrazi because "Battle for Zendikar was full of them", which is absurd as claiming that "Invasion sucked because it had too much of the Phyrexians and the Coalition"
Fan of Both old and new Slivers (But the new ones are still better anyway)
C Call of Emrakul - G vs R DD: Elves vs. Goblins - W vs B DD: Divine vs. Demonic - WUB Esper Artifice - RGW Aura Dancers
WUBRG Wrath of the Reaper King - WB Men of Faith - B Mercenaries - UB Phyrexian Assault 2.0 - WU Artifacts of Empires
BR Skeleton Warriors - RG Night of The Howlpack - B Bog Murderers - BR Eldrazi Assault - BGU Ulamog's Swarm
Going by the timeline they say they use to make sets and how far in the future they are working, EMN was pretty much finished before BFZ was released. It would not have been possible for them to make huge changes to EMN in reaction to any sort of negative feelings about Eldrazi in BFZ block. They have made it pretty obvious that Emrakul is coming. Another reason why Emrakul is going to be in this block is because BFZ was originally going to be a 3 set block, so it seems logical to have a Ulamog set, followed by a Kozilek set, finishing with an Emrakul set. It was during BFZ design when they switched to the 2 set block paradigm. They may have been able to just push Emrakul into one of those 2 BFZ sets, but it looks like they decided Emrakul left Zendikar, and that the Emrakul set would be on another plane.
It is not "just a few thousand words a week" it is the announcements, the "Clues" the idea of Clue tokens, they are very much trying to get the theme and feel of a mystery novel going here, and if you are at all trying to do something like this you do not go with the obvious choice which is Emrakul. I don't think it is having too much Faith in the writing staff to set up a red herring that everyone will look at and leap on while leaving far more subtle hints towards the real culprit.
My personal guess is
Dragons of Legend, Lead by Scion of the UR-Dragon
The Gitrog Monster
Gonti, Lord of Luxury
Shogun Saskia
Hive World
Atraxa hates fun
Abzan
I also think the expansion symbol is going to be a stylized representation of Emrakul. It could very well be exactly what is on that amulet.
There's another, actually, but we haven't heard a peep from Marit since Coldsnap.
I think this was my theory back when they first revealed the clue tokens. Of all the iconography in SoI, this looks the most like something that might actually be an expansion symbol.
"You say 'learn from history,' but that does not mean 'learn the same bull***** the people in history learned alongside phrenology and alchemy.'" - The Blinking Spirit
It is possible Emrakul is a red herring, however. Good story telling, especially with mysteries, set up one obvious culprit based on clues. In most cases this is because the real villain is attempting to frame someone else. Skyrim's "Blood on the Ice" quest is a prime example of this where the wrong person was caught and imprisoned at first. What's to say Wizards isn't "framing" Emrakul, set he/she/it up to be the big bad of EMN when it is actually someone else? I mean, with everything looking like Emrakul and people getting complacent about the whole thing and EMA spoilers starting now and leading straight into EMN spoilers, what better way for Wizards to generate hype for EMN than to say "Surprise! It's not Emrakul!" and thus causing the community to re-evaluate everything in that new light.
A man can dream
Standard - Some kind of control
Modern - UB Mill (casual)
EDH - Meren's Grave Shenanigans
That would not go over well at all. There is no upside to doing that for wizards. The players who are not following the story (which is most of them) aren't going to be surprised that its someone other than Emrakul, because they aren't expecting Emrakul either. The enfranchised players who believe they have solved the mystery would be angry if they find out that they were basically lied to. If there was a plausible alternative among many suspects and it turns out the consensus went down the wrong path, that would be one thing, but there is no plausible alternative. Early on in the story before we solved the puzzle, there were many alternatives but at this point, Wizards has eliminated every possibility in the mystery except Emrakul (or 2+ big bads including Emrakul I guess, but Emrakul is involved). It was not an easy puzzle, and the enfranchised players are going to want to be paid off for their collective cleverness.
Allow me to tell you which other beings could be considered "Extraplanar threats":
http://magic.wizards.com/en/game-info/story/planeswalkers
If it turns to be Emrakul at the end, well, they'll just waste another interesting char just for the sake of marketing, and will be squandered even worse than Kozilek and Ulamog together, because those two at least survived a whole two expansions before getting destroyed by the League of Boring Invincible Heroes.
Fan of Both old and new Slivers (But the new ones are still better anyway)
C Call of Emrakul - G vs R DD: Elves vs. Goblins - W vs B DD: Divine vs. Demonic - WUB Esper Artifice - RGW Aura Dancers
WUBRG Wrath of the Reaper King - WB Men of Faith - B Mercenaries - UB Phyrexian Assault 2.0 - WU Artifacts of Empires
BR Skeleton Warriors - RG Night of The Howlpack - B Bog Murderers - BR Eldrazi Assault - BGU Ulamog's Swarm
You're right tho, most Magic fans aren't quite as obsessed as we collectively are so they're gonna be shocked.
Man you've got even less evidence that Emmy will die than I had that she'd show up. For one thing, the rest of the Gatewatch is leaving Jace to his own devices right now.
Art is life itself.
Really? Come on, Jace and Tamiyo weren't stopped.
Planeswalkers do not count. They can only briefly exist in the blind eternities, and several PW have easily traveled in and out of Innistrad without incident or interference from Avacyn, so she was obviously not created to prevent planeswalkers from entering Innistrad. You are just in denial at this point, Wizards has foreclosed all other possibilities.
Avacyn was created, among other reasons, to protect against extraplanar threats other than Planeswalkers. There's really only one known possibility at this point after Ulamog and Kozilek bit the dust. (wotc seems to have forgotten about Marit Lage)
All that was needed to destroy Ulamog, the nigh-invincible devourer that turns everything into dust just by standing close, and Kozilek, the abomination that freaking distorts reality (And thus EVERYTHING ELSE) AND time, was an uncommon hate card, then they were just burnt like every other normal creature in the game, the card even hints that Emrakul might have had the infamous Hexproof ability, yet the card would have leave it completely at the mercy of a stinkin' Doom Blade.
...
Jace and Tamiyo only survived because Sorin pulled a Big Damn Heroes there, otherwise they would both be very dead by now, Avacyn could have easily killed them both for all we've seen in the stories, which treat her as her first card incarnation, which was basically a "You lose" card. We know that Sorin didn't met with Liliana because he arrived to Inninstrad a lot of time later than she and Garruk did, and Liliana is basically isolated from the rest of the plane, not bothering anyone (aka "behaving fine") and Garruk is long gone from there, and both entered Inninstrad while Avacyn was locked in the Helvault anyway.
Denial is claiming that planeswalkers are not extra planar threats, when they precisely are that, omnipotent beings able to travel from one plane to another, and the Gatewatch has proven without a shadow of doubt that they are the most powerful forces in all the Multiverse, even more powerful than the Cthulhu + Galactus mix that the Eldrazi are.
Also:
The stories themselves treat planeswalkers as possible planar threats.
And about Marit Lage, that's a prerevisionist character, meaning that she's unlikely to ever appear again, mostly because her place as the Lovecraftian cosmic horror was overtook by the Eldrazi.
Fan of Both old and new Slivers (But the new ones are still better anyway)
C Call of Emrakul - G vs R DD: Elves vs. Goblins - W vs B DD: Divine vs. Demonic - WUB Esper Artifice - RGW Aura Dancers
WUBRG Wrath of the Reaper King - WB Men of Faith - B Mercenaries - UB Phyrexian Assault 2.0 - WU Artifacts of Empires
BR Skeleton Warriors - RG Night of The Howlpack - B Bog Murderers - BR Eldrazi Assault - BGU Ulamog's Swarm
Planeswalkers very much count, as evidenced both by the story were Avacyn is attacking Jace and Tamiyo and the story where Sorin flashes back to Avacyn's creation and Nahiri visits him, only to be attacked by Avacyn
Standard - Some kind of control
Modern - UB Mill (casual)
EDH - Meren's Grave Shenanigans
All right, you did not understand what I'm saying. I'll reset and try again.
We know that Avacyn at the time of her destruction was preventing something from entering Innistrad. For anyone who still had a shred of doubt, that should have ended it.
You responded by saying that PW can also travel through the blind eternities, which is true, but not relevant because Avacyn is not keeping out planeswalkers. So, thats not something she's designed to do. I did not say that she wouldn't perceive them as a threat and kill PW, I was saying that she is keeping something that lives in the blind eternities from entering Innistrad, and since she's not keeping out planeswalkers, that basically leaves only Emrakul.
You also did not understand our conversation. Avacyn is not preventing planeswalkers from entering Innistrad, so therefore she clearly wasn't designed to prevent PW from entering Innistrad.
So, if she is not preventing PW from entering Innistrad, then what else in the blind eternities is she keeping out of Innistrad? There's really only one possibility, not counting Marit Lage.
Any theory about the SOI/EMN plot that relies on the phrase "Remember this: they came as three" being irrelevant or some kind of trick is very obviously wrong. So where does that leave us?
Basically, Emrakul. There's a little leeway in making the phrase relevant and not having the big bad be Emrakul exactly... something like "destroying Ulamog and Kozilek caused their essence to combine with Emrakul and now there's just one even bigger titan," or "Emrakul is making new titans to replace the dead ones, and the Eldritch Moon is the 'cocoon' of a new proto-titan." Something like that's not off the table.
Or there could be a situation where Nahiri is trying to summon Emrakul, but there's more to the story that will still surprise us. Like there's an extra twist in Nahiri's motivations and plans that we haven't guessed at, or some other force is also involved. You know, "Nahiri is actually working with Bolas, who wants the titans out eating planes because them not performing that function caused the time rifts/mending, and Bolas thinks he can restore planeswalker godhood by getting the planar recycling system running again." Or "Nahiri has actually been Fblthp in a rubber Nahiri mask the whole time, and he's really sending a call out to every interplanar monster, Emrakul included, because he wants to prove he can beat them at arm wrestling." But whatever your theory is, the solution to the journal puzzle has to be relevant to it, in a way that makes some kind of sense.
* I think Nahiri still has the white color identity for a reason. I'm guessing her plan is to trap Emrakul (or whatever it is she is summoning) and the warping of Innistrad and destruction of Avacyn is a bonus.
* Sorin and Nahiri will fight in the next set, and I'm having trouble coming up with a situation where they both live. I predict one of them is going to get dunked.
* The planeswalkers to get cards will be Liliana and Tamiyo. As a side note, if Tamiyo were UG than all of the colors would be represented equally across the two sets.
* There's a nonzero chance we'll see an Oath of Liliana card in the near future.
* There will most likely be a RG legendary werewolf, but I'm not sure who it will be.
Edit: I posted this is the wrong thread.
Yes. This is exactly what is happening. So obvious. How could I not see it before?
"You say 'learn from history,' but that does not mean 'learn the same bull***** the people in history learned alongside phrenology and alchemy.'" - The Blinking Spirit