Given one is legendary and the other isn't it doesn't seem as unbelievable that something else exists that can do the same thing as the rings. Making the entire thing exclusive to Lorwyn seems rather extreme. If the name is a deal breaker I guess it's just one of those difference of opinions on things. Though either way it doesn't mean it is/isn't an actual artifact on Kaladesh.
Edit: And Maro at least said that the Masterpiece series cards are chosen for ones that thematically fit the world, so the Rings seem fine to Wizards elsewhere.
*Shrugs* Maybe Ajani brought them. His First Walk was Lorwyn, wasn't it?
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Rose tint my world, keep me safe from my trouble and pain.
Saying that Maro is sugar coating things isn't a basis for an argument that the Artifacts don't fit Kaladesh.
And I agree that if Creative said otherwise that makes sense. But so far nothing indicates it's an issue to me.
This isn't a thing about who says what. If they introduce a new character called Urza who has nothing to do with the Urza, there would be quite an outcry in the community, rightfully so.
Also I don't understand why you keep making this an issue about proving things. This isn't about proving things, it's about pointing things out. Rings of Brighthearth show us that Wizards is playing a bit fast and loose with their flavour for the masterpieces*. I only pointed out that due to this, we should take certain aspects of the masterpieces with a grain of salt. Nothing more, nothing less.
*Which, as I said earlier, is fine, I suppose. The masterpieces don't exist for the flavour, they exist to drive sales. Wizards kicked out some obvious out-of-place artifacts, but otherwise they seem to be willing to make compromises.
PS: "But wizards says they're fine" is not even an argument. I mean, of course what ELSE are they supposed to say. If Maro (or the creative team for that matter) went and told us that he's personally not a huge fan of the masterpieces or how they were handled BEFORE or right after release, it would have serious repercussions for his career. We might at most get some sort of "we learned from our mistakes and try to be more careful in the future" in a year, but they usually reserve that for really BIG blunders, not some sort of small flavour disconnect most people don't even care about.
Eh, guess it's just an agree to disagree thing. I haven't seen anything that shows they don't work flavor-wise, which makes it just a personal feeling/subjective thing. Though the reason why I'm trying to "prove" it is more because what started this was "they aren't canon to Kaladesh", which is why I bring up Wizards stance on it.
So, I just saw someone on twitter point out that Rashmi is an anagram of Mishra, which I also found out is a Hindu surname. Two layer reference or something more?
You know that guy we hired who publicly executes children but the general populace still totally thinks we're good guys? Yeah what about him. He needs to be head of a dept. because reasons. Sure sounds good, I'll send over the paperwork now. Yeah let's promote that man, screw the children.
Ugh.
I'm not saying white can't be the villain, but this is bad storytelling. A plane that is in relative peace (so far the "renegades" havent killed anyone on screen AFAIK) supports this kind of crap? I mean we have strife throughout America and you think for one second an FBI agent shooting a 16 year old hacker who got caught in the middle of a stadium would fly? Public executions of children are not a good thing, and he practically said he's been hunting down more children to Pia. W t f
Is it just me or is Baral kinda hot? I mean, he looks like prime stroller meat.
That aside he has got to be one of the most "stupidly evil" characters. Its like he exists only to be evil, wtf.
Also kida disappointed by the Chandra-Lily-Nissa getting owned by guards and security. This femme fatale represents JUND the anti-Law bullcrap. Chandra did not even go boom! No people or guards burning. She was like "oh noes there are people between me and mama already, and we are separated now even though we were just hugging less than a moment ago". DId Chandra get teleported away from Pia?
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MtG is where you can hate white players or black players, and still not be racist.
Is it just me or is Baral kinda hot? I mean, he looks like prime stroller meat.
That aside he has got to be one of the most "stupidly evil" characters. Its like he exists only to be evil, wtf.
Also kida disappointed by the Chandra-Lily-Nissa getting owned by guards and security. This femme fatale represents JUND the anti-Law bullcrap. Chandra did not even go boom! No people or guards burning. She was like "oh noes there are people between me and mama already, and we are separated now even though we were just hugging less than a moment ago". DId Chandra get teleported away from Pia?
First ewww, second I don't believe Cathartic Reunion has happened yet. And they didn't get owned they decided to retreat, Liliana hating to but Tezzeret had Pia hostage and Chandra ended up being emotionally crippled from her mom being alive and then semi-willingly arrested so she couldn't do much. Plus as other pointed out their where a lot of innocent people Baan was trying to get to safety so a huge attack won't been the best.
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You know that guy we hired who publicly executes children but the general populace still totally thinks we're good guys? Yeah what about him. He needs to be head of a dept. because reasons. Sure sounds good, I'll send over the paperwork now. Yeah let's promote that man, screw the children.
You know that guy we hired who publicly executes children but the general populace still totally thinks we're good guys? Yeah what about him. He needs to be head of a dept. because reasons. Sure sounds good, I'll send over the paperwork now. Yeah let's promote that man, screw the children.
So I read the post, while I sdmit to the fact that Baraal may have justification in his OWN mind...that's not the people around him. People, who love and raise their own children, should not accept his actions. Those same people who work for the government. The government, which regulates and promotes safety for those people and their children should not condone his actions.
You're telling me his staff of HUMANS (consul lieutenant were all on board with him slaughtering and torching an entire village to frame a little girl. If it was mindless automatons sure, no it was a sentient species that justified this. Then not a single person could see signs of lies during the report on a plane peopleed with a race of humanoids who are extremely in tune with small details (vedalken). Who better to give a lie detector test short of a telepath. Which you may would call into the picture considering the circumstances.
My argument isnt that white can't have "evil" qualities, as I like that part of its color. It fits. My issue is that the surrounding sentient species shouldn't have promoted a mentally unstable person to a position of power who hunts down children for a living. That's utter garbage when all we've seen so far are passive protests from the "renegades" aside from Chandra blowing up an EMPTY factory while fighting to survive what she rightfully assessed as a life threatening situation.
Bad writing is bad, sure you take the character out of context and he's a fine Villain. Living on the outskirts of society or part of a radical group, yeah I buy the whole package. Part of an established government that is full with workers from the local community? No sorry. kaladesh isn't grixis and people shouldn't turn a blind eye or promote this kind of behavior.
You know that guy we hired who publicly executes children but the general populace still totally thinks we're good guys? Yeah what about him. He needs to be head of a dept. because reasons. Sure sounds good, I'll send over the paperwork now. Yeah let's promote that man, screw the children.
So I read the post, while I sdmit to the fact that Baraal may have justification in his OWN mind...that's not the people around him. People, who love and raise their own children, should not accept his actions. Those same people who work for the government. The government, which regulates and promotes safety for those people and their children should not condone his actions.
You're telling me his staff of HUMANS (consul lieutenant were all on board with him slaughtering and torching an entire village to frame a little girl. If it was mindless automatons sure, no it was a sentient species that justified this. Then not a single person could see signs of lies during the report on a plane peopleed with a race of humanoids who are extremely in tune with small details (vedalken). Who better to give a lie detector test short of a telepath. Which you may would call into the picture considering the circumstances.
My argument isnt that white can't have "evil" qualities, as I like that part of its color. It fits. My issue is that the surrounding sentient species shouldn't have promoted a mentally unstable person to a position of power who hunts down children for a living. That's utter garbage when all we've seen so far are passive protests from the "renegades" aside from Chandra blowing up an EMPTY factory while fighting to survive what she rightfully assessed as a life threatening situation.
Bad writing is bad, sure you take the character out of context and he's a fine Villain. Living on the outskirts of society or part of a radical group, yeah I buy the whole package. Part of an established government that is full with workers from the local community? No sorry. kaladesh isn't grixis and people shouldn't turn a blind eye or promote this kind of behavior.
But we don't know just how corrupt, self-serving or "evil" this government is yet, do we? On the surface everything is happy and shiny, but when you dig deeper...I think that's the atmosphere Wizards is trying to create, but we'll have to wait and see. If Kaladesh is as you seem to imagine it, then I will totally agree with you. It wouldn't make sense. But if it's a Nazi or Stalinesque regime or the North Korea of the multiverse...Just saying, history is rife with inhumane events.
What if mages on Kaladesh, especially pyromancers, are viewed as witches? So they didn't throw Chandra in a pond to see if she'd float...But if, in peoples' minds she is the personification of evil, then being a child in and on itself has nothing to do with anything. She HAS to be eradicated.
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You know that guy we hired who publicly executes children but the general populace still totally thinks we're good guys? Yeah what about him. He needs to be head of a dept. because reasons. Sure sounds good, I'll send over the paperwork now. Yeah let's promote that man, screw the children.
So I read the post, while I sdmit to the fact that Baraal may have justification in his OWN mind...that's not the people around him. People, who love and raise their own children, should not accept his actions. Those same people who work for the government. The government, which regulates and promotes safety for those people and their children should not condone his actions.
You're telling me his staff of HUMANS (consul lieutenant were all on board with him slaughtering and torching an entire village to frame a little girl. If it was mindless automatons sure, no it was a sentient species that justified this. Then not a single person could see signs of lies during the report on a plane peopleed with a race of humanoids who are extremely in tune with small details (vedalken). Who better to give a lie detector test short of a telepath. Which you may would call into the picture considering the circumstances.
My argument isnt that white can't have "evil" qualities, as I like that part of its color. It fits. My issue is that the surrounding sentient species shouldn't have promoted a mentally unstable person to a position of power who hunts down children for a living. That's utter garbage when all we've seen so far are passive protests from the "renegades" aside from Chandra blowing up an EMPTY factory while fighting to survive what she rightfully assessed as a life threatening situation.
Bad writing is bad, sure you take the character out of context and he's a fine Villain. Living on the outskirts of society or part of a radical group, yeah I buy the whole package. Part of an established government that is full with workers from the local community? No sorry. kaladesh isn't grixis and people shouldn't turn a blind eye or promote this kind of behavior.
But we don't know just how corrupt, self-serving or "evil" this government is yet, do we? On the surface everything is happy and shiny, but when you dig deeper...I think that's the atmosphere Wizards is trying to create, but we'll have to wait and see. If Kaladesh is as you seem to imagine it, then I will totally agree with you. It wouldn't make sense. But if it's a Nazi or Stalinesque regime or the North Korea of the multiverse...Just saying, history is rife with inhumane events.
What if mages on Kaladesh, especially pyromancers, are viewed as witches? So they didn't throw Chandra in a pond to see if she'd float...But if, in peoples' minds she is the personification of evil, then being a child in and on itself has nothing to do with anything. She HAS to be eradicated.
Fair enough, I am making the assumption that the kaladeshian (is that a thing) society is a specific way without details. I'm not entirely sure this will get fleshed out in a handful of articles that appear to be pushing Chandra into a heroine type role.
@Jivan I agree that our history has some very dark splotches in the name of greater prosperity. The thing is, unless you were from a very specific political party, caste, lineage, etc. you were generally not of high opinion of that regime. People actively try to escape these kinds of places all the time IRL. Mass exodus at times. That's just not the brightly colored setting and mostly content inventor populace theyve given us so far. Aside from the renegades everyone feels like sheeple, but there's no description of food shortages, disease, poverty, etc even in seedy places like these alley ways the cast frequents.
To me the artwork and tone are sending signals of a strong economically stable first world country with a mostly happy populace. They are dependent on the government which regulates energy and reins in potentially harmful or unlawful activity. This activity doesn't come across as common place. The aetherborn don't even feel evil, they just come off as self indulgent, which is compounded by the lifespan issue they face.
Baraals actions kind of fly in the face of this. I mean surely youve heard people talk against snipers shooting children during war...could you imagine putting that child on a plane and executing them in a football stadium back in the US while restrained with an axe? Those feelings surfaced while we were at war... Public executions are not something that feels like it should be celebrated or rewarded in a stable society, especially one that is seeking prosperity for the whole.
Ancient Rome did have the gladiator fights, and I'll admit I have no clue what kind of age someone would be eligible for combat. I know there was slave trading at various ages for various things, but I know a "civil" society can have dark outlets.
Dovin straight up said that his actions were extreme...the only anecdote we have regarding how kaladesh feels about it was that it was viewed in bad light and not condoned by the consulate at the time. Now he's chief of compliance?
Maybe there was an internal coup and we're seeing a shift behind the scenes. Where people like tezz and Kambal, consulate of allocation are assuming power in the upper ranks. After the coup, Baraal was sought out to continue scouring the populace and undermine potential problems from early on after the "old" officials stripped him and sent him packing, or even imprissoned him.
I don't think questions this big should be flying around with this many short stories and arguably the bulk of the entire first set of a 2 set block. Setting a strong foundation for the setting is important for evaluating the characters and I feel like they dropped the ball.
You know that guy we hired who publicly executes children but the general populace still totally thinks we're good guys? Yeah what about him. He needs to be head of a dept. because reasons. Sure sounds good, I'll send over the paperwork now. Yeah let's promote that man, screw the children.
So I read the post, while I sdmit to the fact that Baraal may have justification in his OWN mind...that's not the people around him. People, who love and raise their own children, should not accept his actions. Those same people who work for the government. The government, which regulates and promotes safety for those people and their children should not condone his actions.
You're telling me his staff of HUMANS (consul lieutenant were all on board with him slaughtering and torching an entire village to frame a little girl. If it was mindless automatons sure, no it was a sentient species that justified this. Then not a single person could see signs of lies during the report on a plane peopleed with a race of humanoids who are extremely in tune with small details (vedalken). Who better to give a lie detector test short of a telepath. Which you may would call into the picture considering the circumstances.
My argument isnt that white can't have "evil" qualities, as I like that part of its color. It fits. My issue is that the surrounding sentient species shouldn't have promoted a mentally unstable person to a position of power who hunts down children for a living. That's utter garbage when all we've seen so far are passive protests from the "renegades" aside from Chandra blowing up an EMPTY factory while fighting to survive what she rightfully assessed as a life threatening situation.
Bad writing is bad, sure you take the character out of context and he's a fine Villain. Living on the outskirts of society or part of a radical group, yeah I buy the whole package. Part of an established government that is full with workers from the local community? No sorry. kaladesh isn't grixis and people shouldn't turn a blind eye or promote this kind of behavior.
But we don't know just how corrupt, self-serving or "evil" this government is yet, do we? On the surface everything is happy and shiny, but when you dig deeper...I think that's the atmosphere Wizards is trying to create, but we'll have to wait and see. If Kaladesh is as you seem to imagine it, then I will totally agree with you. It wouldn't make sense. But if it's a Nazi or Stalinesque regime or the North Korea of the multiverse...Just saying, history is rife with inhumane events.
What if mages on Kaladesh, especially pyromancers, are viewed as witches? So they didn't throw Chandra in a pond to see if she'd float...But if, in peoples' minds she is the personification of evil, then being a child in and on itself has nothing to do with anything. She HAS to be eradicated.
Fair enough, I am making the assumption that the kaladeshian (is that a thing) society is a specific way without details. I'm not entirely sure this will get fleshed out in a handful of articles that appear to be pushing Chandra into a heroine type role.
@Jivan I agree that our history has some very dark splotches in the name of greater prosperity. The thing is, unless you were from a very specific political party, caste, lineage, etc. you were generally not of high opinion of that regime. People actively try to escape these kinds of places all the time IRL. Mass exodus at times. That's just not the brightly colored setting and mostly content inventor populace theyve given us so far. Aside from the renegades everyone feels like sheeple, but there's no description of food shortages, disease, poverty, etc even in seedy places like these alley ways the cast frequents.
To me the artwork and tone are sending signals of a strong economically stable first world country with a mostly happy populace. They are dependent on the government which regulates energy and reins in potentially harmful or unlawful activity. This activity doesn't come across as common place. The aetherborn don't even feel evil, they just come off as self indulgent, which is compounded by the lifespan issue they face.
Baraals actions kind of fly in the face of this. I mean surely youve heard people talk against snipers shooting children during war...could you imagine putting that child on a plane and executing them in a football stadium back in the US while restrained with an axe? Those feelings surfaced while we were at war... Public executions are not something that feels like it should be celebrated or rewarded in a stable society, especially one that is seeking prosperity for the whole.
Ancient Rome did have the gladiator fights, and I'll admit I have no clue what kind of age someone would be eligible for combat. I know there was slave trading at various ages for various things, but I know a "civil" society can have dark outlets.
Dovin straight up said that his actions were extreme...the only anecdote we have regarding how kaladesh feels about it was that it was viewed in bad light and not condoned by the consulate at the time. Now he's chief of compliance?
Maybe there was an internal coup and we're seeing a shift behind the scenes. Where people like tezz and Kambal, consulate of allocation are assuming power in the upper ranks. After the coup, Baraal was sought out to continue scouring the populace and undermine potential problems from early on after the "old" officials stripped him and sent him packing, or even imprissoned him.
I don't think questions this big should be flying around with this many short stories and arguably the bulk of the entire first set of a 2 set block. Setting a strong foundation for the setting is important for evaluating the characters and I feel like they dropped the ball.
I do agree with your core argument here, I sort of assumed Baral was taken out of office, to see him being made Chief of Compliance weirded me out too. If they don't show us the darker side of things (soon), I feel your analysis is pretty much spot on.
One thing about Dovin's line though: the way he said it strongly came of as "His measures were extreme, but that didn't bother us as much as the expenses and inconveniences it ended up costing us", which gave me an Orwellian vibe. The problem is, as you point out, that so far we have very little indication of this. So far, the complaint we've heard from the renegades is that the consulate is restricting the distribution of Aether, but we don't know why yet. Wait and see, I'd say...
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One thing that stands out as overblown by you guys is this thought that Baral hunts children regularly. You hunt down one child(whom had more power than most fully armed regiments) and suddenly that's all you do? Obviously he is a terrible human with a wrapped perception of right and wrong, but as far as we know the only really bad thing he did was the whole Chandra event. If this is the only thing 'beyond protocol' that he has done, why would he not have a high ranking office, he appears fairly competent, having been able to hunt down the Nalaar's during their flight, and is obviously charismatic, otherwise his soldiers wouldn't have followed him when he went beyond the consuls decree. In congress right now we have a number of people who have done nearly as awful things but no one really cares. One more time for emphasis, BARAL IS/WAS HORRIBLE AND HE SHOULD ENCOUNTER A FATE WE CAN'T EVEN IMAGINE.
Edit: so saw this in the other thread and it perfectly captures my point way better than I ever could. My point being Baral is a total *&$@ but he isn't the 1 dimensional mustache twirler you guys are making him out to be.
I don't think people are giving Baral's psychology enough credit here.
The guy's a Knight Templar extremist bully through and through, although you can see his reasons for being so. They're not sympathetic reasons at all, but they are there.
First, the guy's a mage on a plane that's not a fan of non-artificer mages. Hence, likely treated as an outcast as a kid. Parents probably weren't exactly the most supportive either, if I'm guessing. Anyways, guy becomes a Consulate guard, gets a bit of power in him. Suddenly, he's not the outcast mage anymore, he's got power, and his magic powers are now considered valuable (maybe they're not known as magic powers, but whatever he does and however he presents it, its working for him). He gets promoted, moves up in the world. Still bitter that he was looked down on, and like any good bitter person who's suddenly been lifted up into power, its not a good combination. A draconian extremist mentality sets in.
Then he meets Chandra. First he's piqued that there's another mage just like him. Then he discover's she's a pyromancer, the worst kind of mage by Kaladeshi standards- a veritible bug of society. Oh, he's gonna look so good when he hauls this vermin in!
And then she runs away, and blows up the Foundry. I'm gonna bet that gets put on his head (Baan did mention that he got in trouble for making things so expensive, and it probably started with this). Now the little brat's made him look bad, and by Aether, he's gonna get her and drag her in and make her pay. So he starts investigating her whereabouts, no longer just to feel powerful about kicking a lesser mage around, but to save face with the Consulate. And during his investigation he finds out that not only does the brat escape out of the city from him, she does so with her parents, who are totally on board and proud to have a pyromancer daughter.
OH. HELL. NAW.
Why does this little destructive ***** get to run around in freedom wholly supported by her criminal mommy and daddy? His magic's is used for GOOD, and all he did was get kicked around for it. Her magic is BAD, and yet she's loved and coddled and... OH THAT LITTLE BRAT IS GONNA GET IT!
So now its not just a matter of dominance, its not just a matter of saving face with the Bosses, its flipping PERSONAL. Who cares if she's a kid, because evil can take any form, and it needs to be eradicated regardless. If this guy was in The Omen, he woulda stabbed Damien in his cradle.
So he goes into full Knight Templar mode. Scours the plane looking for three people on the run- pisses his bosses off even more, because now in addition to a ruined foundry, he's using up valuable resources up on three black-market smugglers. But it's all gonna be worth it, just as soon as he brings them to JUSTICE.
And so he does. He finds them, captures Pia, then gets Chandra. Suddenly it occurs to him, as he's about to haul Chandra off, that he just spent a Thopterload of money on hunting down an 11-year old girl. He knows she's the worst thing in existence- but will his bosses?
Nope, time to save face.
First, just to hurt Chandra even more (like I said, its personal in his mind), he kills Kiran in cold blood. Then he frames her for the villiage- two reasons here- one, to let Chandra know that HE has the power... and secondly, because he can now point out to his bosses just how dangerous the girl really is, and the expenses to bring her in were completely warranted. Power, revenge, and saving-face. What more could a guy want?
Except it doesn't really work that way- the Consulate's still not impressed, and formal charges are brought against him for wasting too many resources on the search. All that's left to him is the fact that, at the end of the day, he gets to execute the evil, flamey-handed, villiage destroying*, witch.
And then even that backfires. He raises the sword, bring it down, and BOOM! Apparently pyromancers explode when they die. Kinda wish the consulate training manual had mentioned that. He's engulfed in the flames from her "death" (totally unaware its actually a free trip to Pyromancertopia on Regatha), and disfigured for life as a result. Yet again, a moment of triumph has been taken from him and turned into a moment of humiliation and agony. He's been disgraced. He's been written up. Possibly he's been demoted. And now he's been deformed. All because of one little girl- and even worse, he can't get anymore revenge, because she's "dead"
There's just one person left he can kick around. One more way he can hurt the evil little girl, even after she's gone. Her mother, now sitting in a jail cell. Its the one part of his life that he can show dominance in right now, and really, Pia enabled Chandra, so she's just as bad. Torturing her would be the right thing to do. He can't do anything physically, but whipping out ye olde emotional salt and rubbing in ye olde emotional wounds? Well, if that's the best he can do, then so be it. And off he goes.
So yeah, I can't buy him as cartoon- he's not evil just because he's evil- he's an emotionally bitter, broken man who masks his insecurities behind a veil of power, authority, and his own brand of justice. Authoritarian dictatorships the world over have been havens for people like this. Remember, there's been plenty of real-life people who were more than happy to brutally kill children because they fit into some "evil" demographic.
He outrightly admits that he likes killing children because they're the most likely to misuse their power. Gloating cruelly to a grieving mother is clichéd enough, but then there's this.
He outrightly admits that he likes killing children because they're the most likely to misuse their power. Gloating cruelly to a grieving mother is clichéd enough, but then there's this.
Gloating cruelly to a grieving mother, whose child just burnt his face off... I really don't get your complains, there is nothing cartoonish about his actions in the last chapter. He simply not a nice person (to put it mildly) who has power over a relative of someone who burnt his face off. Prison guards/wardens do it sometimes as well, especially when they have a personal reason to hate the person.
The thing about White/Blue as a color is that their greatest strength is also the easiest way to missalign their power. White puts societal value over individual value, blue puts logic over emotion. And the practicality of killing children who have powers deemed 'dangerous to social order' outweighs any emotional view of how heinous such an act is. To us, killing children is terrible. To them, killing dangerous weapons of mass disorder and chaos is simply practically sound logic. And White can twist it that way because the need for social order outweighs one dangerous going-to-certainly-be-a-criminal's right to life.
And promoting someone capable at his job outweighs how ruthless and clearly morally corrupt he is, provided he is capable at his job. Given Chandra burst into flames in public I am not sure how he convinced anyone he is capable at his job but that's not here nor there.
The main problem with Baral being in charge of things right now is we haven't gotten an answer for how he offset the massive SNAFU that was hunting Chandra and her parents in the first place (it cost a lot of money and before she was caught she 'supposedly' burned down a village).
The flavor text is pretty clear, they've reflavored the brightheart in Rings of Brighthearth. It's not a place on Kaladesh, but a kind of ornamentation. That's all. Let's move on.
Bless you for this post.
It is at the same moment a name with particular meaning on Lorwyn, as well as generic enough for possible re-flavoring. That, of course, is what happened here.
Now, Mishra's Factory? Urza's Incubator? THAT would be a problem... people should take themselves less serious.
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He outrightly admits that he likes killing children because they're the most likely to misuse their power. Gloating cruelly to a grieving mother is clichéd enough, but then there's this.
If you mean this quote
"Children?" He barked out a humorless laugh. "Of course. Who better to misuse their abilities for selfish or misguided purposes. Besides, the years make little change to natural criminal dispositions, as you yourself evidence."
I don't really see any where in there him saying he likes killing children, only that children are far more dangerous when they have power than others. And that being a child isn't a blanket excuse for being disruptive. Everything he does in the story is to torture Pia and while he obviously has no regrets about killing children I can't find a single thing in the story to say he prefers killing them in any way.
Now, Mishra's Factory? Urza's Incubator? THAT would be a problem... people should take themselves less serious.
Amusingly enough, Kaladesh is the perfect place for those names to pop up again. Mishra is an Indian Surname and Urza means 'Power/Energy'.
While I don't think Mishra's name should show up Urza is known for travelling the multiverse and it would be very unlikely that he wouldn't have looked into Kaladesh assuming it's been a techno-paradise that long.
He outrightly admits that he likes killing children because they're the most likely to misuse their power. Gloating cruelly to a grieving mother is clichéd enough, but then there's this.
If you mean this quote
"Children?" He barked out a humorless laugh. "Of course. Who better to misuse their abilities for selfish or misguided purposes. Besides, the years make little change to natural criminal dispositions, as you yourself evidence."
I don't really see any where in there him saying he likes killing children, only that children are far more dangerous when they have power than others. And that being a child isn't a blanket excuse for being disruptive. Everything he does in the story is to torture Pia and while he obviously has no regrets about killing children I can't find a single thing in the story to say he prefers killing them in any way.
Why bother torturing her at all? We saw no motive to garner additional information on screen. He simply gloated about killing her child for weeks, and then we time jump to present day. If you don't think I should look at this character as mustache twirlingly bad, then drop 1-2 lines in the story that clears this up.
"After you break Pia, I'll get the answers I need." would have cleared this up perfectly in a way that organically fit into their conversations imo. We're not getting that though, is it wrong for me to want some character depth? Clear and clean motives? A cohesive storyline?
If story is going to drive the cards I have to stare at and read for the next two years, then I'm going to give my feedback on that story. It shapes the cast, quotes, artwork, promotional material, etc. If WotC want to take a higher position in appealing to the players who follow the story, then I feel like they should show the capacity to flesh out the characters move and stop using the retcon bat and bopping everyone and their mother. I've complained enough about the later, but I think the former should b addressed too.
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And I agree that if Creative said otherwise that makes sense. But so far nothing indicates it's an issue to me.
*Shrugs* Maybe Ajani brought them. His First Walk was Lorwyn, wasn't it?
This isn't a thing about who says what. If they introduce a new character called Urza who has nothing to do with the Urza, there would be quite an outcry in the community, rightfully so.
Also I don't understand why you keep making this an issue about proving things. This isn't about proving things, it's about pointing things out. Rings of Brighthearth show us that Wizards is playing a bit fast and loose with their flavour for the masterpieces*. I only pointed out that due to this, we should take certain aspects of the masterpieces with a grain of salt. Nothing more, nothing less.
*Which, as I said earlier, is fine, I suppose. The masterpieces don't exist for the flavour, they exist to drive sales. Wizards kicked out some obvious out-of-place artifacts, but otherwise they seem to be willing to make compromises.
PS: "But wizards says they're fine" is not even an argument. I mean, of course what ELSE are they supposed to say. If Maro (or the creative team for that matter) went and told us that he's personally not a huge fan of the masterpieces or how they were handled BEFORE or right after release, it would have serious repercussions for his career. We might at most get some sort of "we learned from our mistakes and try to be more careful in the future" in a year, but they usually reserve that for really BIG blunders, not some sort of small flavour disconnect most people don't even care about.
They wanted to do reprints. So they decided to reprint artifacts this time to go with the artifact themed block.
I don't think you should look for the thematic link any deeper than that, despite them adding new flavor text to try and do it where possible.
If my post has no tags, then i posted from my phone.
Lol no. Ajani's first walk was to Jund. None of the Lorwynn five were actually on Lorwynn.
You know that guy we hired who publicly executes children but the general populace still totally thinks we're good guys? Yeah what about him. He needs to be head of a dept. because reasons. Sure sounds good, I'll send over the paperwork now. Yeah let's promote that man, screw the children.
Ugh.
I'm not saying white can't be the villain, but this is bad storytelling. A plane that is in relative peace (so far the "renegades" havent killed anyone on screen AFAIK) supports this kind of crap? I mean we have strife throughout America and you think for one second an FBI agent shooting a 16 year old hacker who got caught in the middle of a stadium would fly? Public executions of children are not a good thing, and he practically said he's been hunting down more children to Pia. W t f
That aside he has got to be one of the most "stupidly evil" characters. Its like he exists only to be evil, wtf.
Also kida disappointed by the Chandra-Lily-Nissa getting owned by guards and security. This femme fatale represents JUND the anti-Law bullcrap. Chandra did not even go boom! No people or guards burning. She was like "oh noes there are people between me and mama already, and we are separated now even though we were just hugging less than a moment ago". DId Chandra get teleported away from Pia?
First ewww, second I don't believe Cathartic Reunion has happened yet. And they didn't get owned they decided to retreat, Liliana hating to but Tezzeret had Pia hostage and Chandra ended up being emotionally crippled from her mom being alive and then semi-willingly arrested so she couldn't do much. Plus as other pointed out their where a lot of innocent people Baan was trying to get to safety so a huge attack won't been the best.
"You can tell how dumb someone is by how they use Mary Sue"
So I read the post, while I sdmit to the fact that Baraal may have justification in his OWN mind...that's not the people around him. People, who love and raise their own children, should not accept his actions. Those same people who work for the government. The government, which regulates and promotes safety for those people and their children should not condone his actions.
You're telling me his staff of HUMANS (consul lieutenant were all on board with him slaughtering and torching an entire village to frame a little girl. If it was mindless automatons sure, no it was a sentient species that justified this. Then not a single person could see signs of lies during the report on a plane peopleed with a race of humanoids who are extremely in tune with small details (vedalken). Who better to give a lie detector test short of a telepath. Which you may would call into the picture considering the circumstances.
My argument isnt that white can't have "evil" qualities, as I like that part of its color. It fits. My issue is that the surrounding sentient species shouldn't have promoted a mentally unstable person to a position of power who hunts down children for a living. That's utter garbage when all we've seen so far are passive protests from the "renegades" aside from Chandra blowing up an EMPTY factory while fighting to survive what she rightfully assessed as a life threatening situation.
Bad writing is bad, sure you take the character out of context and he's a fine Villain. Living on the outskirts of society or part of a radical group, yeah I buy the whole package. Part of an established government that is full with workers from the local community? No sorry. kaladesh isn't grixis and people shouldn't turn a blind eye or promote this kind of behavior.
But we don't know just how corrupt, self-serving or "evil" this government is yet, do we? On the surface everything is happy and shiny, but when you dig deeper...I think that's the atmosphere Wizards is trying to create, but we'll have to wait and see. If Kaladesh is as you seem to imagine it, then I will totally agree with you. It wouldn't make sense. But if it's a Nazi or Stalinesque regime or the North Korea of the multiverse...Just saying, history is rife with inhumane events.
What if mages on Kaladesh, especially pyromancers, are viewed as witches? So they didn't throw Chandra in a pond to see if she'd float...But if, in peoples' minds she is the personification of evil, then being a child in and on itself has nothing to do with anything. She HAS to be eradicated.
Affinity
UW Control
Commander
Sidisi, Undead Vizier
Purphoros, God of the Forge
Dragonlord Ojutai
Gishath, Sun's Avatar
The Ur-Dragon
Fair enough, I am making the assumption that the kaladeshian (is that a thing) society is a specific way without details. I'm not entirely sure this will get fleshed out in a handful of articles that appear to be pushing Chandra into a heroine type role.
@Jivan I agree that our history has some very dark splotches in the name of greater prosperity. The thing is, unless you were from a very specific political party, caste, lineage, etc. you were generally not of high opinion of that regime. People actively try to escape these kinds of places all the time IRL. Mass exodus at times. That's just not the brightly colored setting and mostly content inventor populace theyve given us so far. Aside from the renegades everyone feels like sheeple, but there's no description of food shortages, disease, poverty, etc even in seedy places like these alley ways the cast frequents.
To me the artwork and tone are sending signals of a strong economically stable first world country with a mostly happy populace. They are dependent on the government which regulates energy and reins in potentially harmful or unlawful activity. This activity doesn't come across as common place. The aetherborn don't even feel evil, they just come off as self indulgent, which is compounded by the lifespan issue they face.
Baraals actions kind of fly in the face of this. I mean surely youve heard people talk against snipers shooting children during war...could you imagine putting that child on a plane and executing them in a football stadium back in the US while restrained with an axe? Those feelings surfaced while we were at war... Public executions are not something that feels like it should be celebrated or rewarded in a stable society, especially one that is seeking prosperity for the whole.
Ancient Rome did have the gladiator fights, and I'll admit I have no clue what kind of age someone would be eligible for combat. I know there was slave trading at various ages for various things, but I know a "civil" society can have dark outlets.
Dovin straight up said that his actions were extreme...the only anecdote we have regarding how kaladesh feels about it was that it was viewed in bad light and not condoned by the consulate at the time. Now he's chief of compliance?
Maybe there was an internal coup and we're seeing a shift behind the scenes. Where people like tezz and Kambal, consulate of allocation are assuming power in the upper ranks. After the coup, Baraal was sought out to continue scouring the populace and undermine potential problems from early on after the "old" officials stripped him and sent him packing, or even imprissoned him.
I don't think questions this big should be flying around with this many short stories and arguably the bulk of the entire first set of a 2 set block. Setting a strong foundation for the setting is important for evaluating the characters and I feel like they dropped the ball.
I do agree with your core argument here, I sort of assumed Baral was taken out of office, to see him being made Chief of Compliance weirded me out too. If they don't show us the darker side of things (soon), I feel your analysis is pretty much spot on.
One thing about Dovin's line though: the way he said it strongly came of as "His measures were extreme, but that didn't bother us as much as the expenses and inconveniences it ended up costing us", which gave me an Orwellian vibe. The problem is, as you point out, that so far we have very little indication of this. So far, the complaint we've heard from the renegades is that the consulate is restricting the distribution of Aether, but we don't know why yet. Wait and see, I'd say...
Affinity
UW Control
Commander
Sidisi, Undead Vizier
Purphoros, God of the Forge
Dragonlord Ojutai
Gishath, Sun's Avatar
The Ur-Dragon
Edit: so saw this in the other thread and it perfectly captures my point way better than I ever could. My point being Baral is a total *&$@ but he isn't the 1 dimensional mustache twirler you guys are making him out to be.
Gloating cruelly to a grieving mother, whose child just burnt his face off... I really don't get your complains, there is nothing cartoonish about his actions in the last chapter. He simply not a nice person (to put it mildly) who has power over a relative of someone who burnt his face off. Prison guards/wardens do it sometimes as well, especially when they have a personal reason to hate the person.
And promoting someone capable at his job outweighs how ruthless and clearly morally corrupt he is, provided he is capable at his job. Given Chandra burst into flames in public I am not sure how he convinced anyone he is capable at his job but that's not here nor there.
The main problem with Baral being in charge of things right now is we haven't gotten an answer for how he offset the massive SNAFU that was hunting Chandra and her parents in the first place (it cost a lot of money and before she was caught she 'supposedly' burned down a village).
Bless you for this post.
It is at the same moment a name with particular meaning on Lorwyn, as well as generic enough for possible re-flavoring. That, of course, is what happened here.
Now, Mishra's Factory? Urza's Incubator? THAT would be a problem... people should take themselves less serious.
Let this great clan rest in peace (2001-2011)
I don't really see any where in there him saying he likes killing children, only that children are far more dangerous when they have power than others. And that being a child isn't a blanket excuse for being disruptive. Everything he does in the story is to torture Pia and while he obviously has no regrets about killing children I can't find a single thing in the story to say he prefers killing them in any way.
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While I don't think Mishra's name should show up Urza is known for travelling the multiverse and it would be very unlikely that he wouldn't have looked into Kaladesh assuming it's been a techno-paradise that long.
Why bother torturing her at all? We saw no motive to garner additional information on screen. He simply gloated about killing her child for weeks, and then we time jump to present day. If you don't think I should look at this character as mustache twirlingly bad, then drop 1-2 lines in the story that clears this up.
"After you break Pia, I'll get the answers I need." would have cleared this up perfectly in a way that organically fit into their conversations imo. We're not getting that though, is it wrong for me to want some character depth? Clear and clean motives? A cohesive storyline?
If story is going to drive the cards I have to stare at and read for the next two years, then I'm going to give my feedback on that story. It shapes the cast, quotes, artwork, promotional material, etc. If WotC want to take a higher position in appealing to the players who follow the story, then I feel like they should show the capacity to flesh out the characters move and stop using the retcon bat and bopping everyone and their mother. I've complained enough about the later, but I think the former should b addressed too.