Pretty sure the Rakshasa were all male. All the ones on cards appeared to be male and the one shown in the stories, I believe conspiring with Taigam pre-time****ery, was also male.
Pretty sure the Rakshasa were all male. All the ones on cards appeared to be male and the one shown in the stories, I believe conspiring with Taigam pre-time****ery, was also male.
Location: In the desert outside a distant Dromoka fortress
Action: A FEMALE SILUMGAR-CLAN RAKSHASA stands amid several fallen DROMOKA-CLAN SOLDIERS. The rakshasa has markings like that of a leopard on dark fur. She is raising her arms as though pulling on the strings of puppets. In response to her magical command, two of the Dromoka dead are rising as zombies.
Focus: The rakshasa
Mood: You have failed in life. Now you will serve in death.
I see nothing that indicates the one in Glint is female. Similarly, for as strongly as they pointed it out in the description, it also has nothing to make it look remotely female.
I see nothing that indicates the one in Glint is female. Similarly, for as strongly as they pointed it out in the description, it also has nothing to make it look remotely female.
I think the beard pretty well cinches it as being a Male, despite the art description.
FYI: The Amonkhet plane page is up on the website. Most notable are the small legendary creature bios which give us a little more info on these characters. I find it interesting that Samut discovered the truth about Amonkhet's past while studying dance. :/
FYI: The Amonkhet plane page is up on the website. Most notable are the small legendary creature bios which give us a little more info on these characters. I find it interesting that Samut discovered the truth about Amonkhet's past while studying dance. :/
Interpretive dance is the key to the multiverse, obviously!
For those not able to visit, this is what it says:
Samut, Voice of Dissent
Samut is an initiate who doubted the legitimacy of the God-Pharaoh. Renowned for her speed and skill in hand-to-hand combat, Samut was a leader in her crop. Secretly, she studied the dance and martial arts of the past, and discovered that her people's history had been wiped from memory.
By the way...did we ever learn what the Bolas horns depicted in the full-art lands exactly are?
This doesn't say that she learned of that through dancing though. She was just searching for martial arts and dance techniques of the past and discovered that there is a sudden end to the archives a few decades ago. At least that's how I read it.
No, we have no idea at this point what exactly the horns are, but knowing Bolas they are just a monument of his dominion over Amonkhet (doubling as a sign of the encroachment of the Hours).
A few people wanted to discuss the imagery of Nissa’s visions, and since I was one of the early instigators of the leyline conflict (which I could argue until the moon comes over the mountain), I decided to give my own take on the imagery. Long write-up follows, largely due to quoting the story text. I’ve broken up the sections according to their natural points:
---
“A dark snake, winged and venomous, cast its shadow upon the desert. The snake was huge, bigger than an oak, bigger than a forest of oaks. Its shadow covered the whole world.
The shadow spoke, its voice rumbling across the empty desert. "They would take away my power. They would take away what makes me me. This I will not abide."
The shadow of the snake wrapped its coils around the world.
"For what I require, I would drain every world. I would devour every single one. But I start here."
The shadow squeezed. The world screamed. Nissa screamed.
The scene crumbled, fleeing from the pain.”
- So it seems that Amonkhet was the first plane Bolas went to after losing his power (‘I start here’). When he says “They would take away my power,” he doesn’t mean it in a future sense, but in the way we walk out of meetings at work or at school, like, ‘They would have me do all this work?! I will crush them!’ And the fact that he says he will start with Amonkhet makes me feel it is of far more importance than the Conflux, unless that was a happy accident that he stumbled upon Alara after Amonkhet.
---
“She was looking up into space, into the stars. Eight stars. Eight stars in a loose circle and evenly spaced, lighting up the entire night sky.” – This, to me, indicates balance. The eight gods were evenly spaced in a circle. Which makes it stranger that the five remaining were monocolored. There’s no real combination for only three creatures/gods that would properly balance the five colors (unless all three were five-color).
“A line of darkness, somehow visible even against the night, a line that shone darkness, wove its way through the eight stars. The line twisted and turned and vibrated, its pulsing a violent cry. When the line ceased moving, it was a figure eight on its side, a snake eating its own tail. It encompassed all eight stars, each star twinkling desperately against the curtain of dark now nestled close against them.” – Clearly, to me, Bolas’ influence on the gods. The fact that Bolas pulled them out of their perfect circle into an infinity symbol, instead of just maintaining them in the circle, implies to me that Bolas needs them to be out of balance and attuned to something specific. And from the description, the natures of the gods seemed to struggle to return to how they were before.
“Three of the stars winked out. Their generation of light and heat snuffed. Their lives vanished.
But Nissa could still see movement where those three stars had been. Stars no more, just three dark rents in the fabric of the sky. Three dark holes, possessed of an energy and fury all their own, pulsing to a rhythm malevolent.” – Accident, or design? I don’t think we have enough data to tease this one out. However, the writer does write ‘snuffed,’ which implies an action, instead of a reaction. So maybe it was by design, instead of accident. Since we’re talking stars, this description makes me think of the death of massive stars into black holes. Still there, but not at all what it once was, and now ‘dark holes possessed of an energy and fury all their own.’ So, to me, it seems the three gods that were ‘snuffed’ are not dead, but may be the Amonkhet version of a dead god. If a human or any living thing becomes a zombie/mummy on Amonkhet because whatever dies doesn’t stay ‘dead,’ then the ‘curse’ could logically hold true for the gods as well. So maybe the three gods, the three stars, are ‘undead’ in the same way black holes are ‘undead’ stars.
“The five remaining stars moved, their new alignment warped, all bending to the shadowy line woven through their constellation. Their new outline suggested a pair of horns.” – My visualization is that one side of the infinity symbol of the eight gods dissolved, so all three of the snuffed gods were on one side. That would leave the five in a pattern similar to Bolas’ horns. But it would also make an incomplete pattern. We’ve gone from a balanced circle, to a forced infinity symbol, to a broken shape. Will this have an impact on the story? Will the broken shape make it easier to dissolve Bolas’ influence? If so, why would he allow the other three gods to be snuffed? Back to the accident or design argument.
---
“Awkward figures wrapped in white linen bent and dug in the harsh sands. Mummies, they called them. The anointed. Hundreds, thousands of the mummies dug into a deep pit, pulling out a blue ore. Cartloads of the ore snaked their way in a large procession toward the city.” – The Anointed seem to be Bolas’ design for Amonkhet, so I feel this takes place after Bolas’ influence campaign. Bolas seems to have a need for lazotep. We don’t know much about it apart from Wizards describing it as a ‘mysterious mineral.’
“Farther away, three young children stopped before a barrier. The beautiful city on one side, the stark emptiness of the desert on the other. They're whispering to each other. They look around, look at each other. Uncertain. A child presses through. The two others follow. All three are swallowed by the hungry sands.” – Like others, I’m leaning toward these three children being the other three gods that were snuffed. Which would place this moment AFTER the circle becoming an infinity symbol, but right BEFORE they were snuffed. The city and the desert, I feel, are representations of life and death. The fact that they chose to wander into godly ‘undeath’ goes back to the ‘accident or design’ argument. Maybe they knew that removing themselves from the equation would weaken Bolas’ design for the gods (circle -> infinity -> broken symbol/horns), leading to an inevitable cataclysm, thus sticking it to Bolas?
---
“She saw a young man, his face erased, stumbling among a garden of statues. High above the man a growing cloud of dusk attacked the sun. From somewhere outside the garden there was a mighty roar.” – Like others, I’m leaning Ashiok, for the host of reasons other people have mentioned over the months, from his shoulder-armor appearing elsewhere on Amonkhet art, to his knowledge or at least interest in the gods of Theros, and the fact that his face is erasing itself into mist. Garden of statues? The Trial of Strength requires you to get a basilisk scale (basilisks kill you/turn you to stone?), and involves jungles/’gardens.’ Which would imply Ashiok’s face started poofing before his ‘death’ on Amonkhet. So was he a walker before the Trial of Strength? Who can say.
---
“Nissa saw a world, then tens of worlds, hundreds of worlds. Thousands. She saw this world, the world of Amonkhet, and wrapped around it was a dark sinewy line. That line stretched back through all the worlds, all the thousands of worlds, and she saw an unbroken line of darkness from Amonkhet all the way back to the beginning of the line.” – Now, if Amonkhet was the first world Bolas went to after the Mending, this passage would make it sound like the last in a long line of planes. Which flusters me. And thousands of worlds is a tall order for even Bolas, if the line means conquest or influence, instead of just passing through. However, Dominaria is/used to be the center of Dominia, and so what happened on Dominaria impacted all the other planes. What if Bolas is creating a ‘network’ among planes, in order to make one specific location the new center of Dominia and the planar universe? That would make him even more powerful than his oldwalker self. Otherwise, the thousands of planes seem a little arbitrary.
---
“A large golden disc, shaped and stylized like a sun, descending from the sky. The sun disc approached a large circular stone tablet covered with strange sigils, and the two discs merged, becoming a single golden disc. Cracks appeared in the golden disc, small at first, then widening, growing. The disc crumbled away into nothingness.” – I think this is what happens when the two ‘suns’ of Amonkhet meet. But the constant-dusk-sun seems to travel along the horizon toward the horns, and isn’t ‘descending.’ So is the horizon sun the ‘circular stone tablet’ and the second sun is the ‘large golden disc’? And when they meet, do they leave the plane in darkness, unleashing whatever Bolas had planned? Or maybe that’s what the three ‘undead’ gods have been waiting for?
---
“The scenes shifted faster now, barely even an image forming before being replaced. A fizzling torch. A broken clock with a clean face. A mummified head facing backward atop a mummified body. A split tree, its sap oozing into the ground. A shattered shield, its shiny metallic pieces torn and scattered.” – Call me crazy, but I think this is the Gatewatch being broken. A fizzling torch = Chandra. A split tree, oozing sap = Nissa. A shattered shield = Gideon. I’m leaning Liliana being the mummified head (moving forward but always looking back?) and Jace being the broken clock with a clean face (mind broken when he was younger, new personality/persona ever since?). What does this ultimately mean? I have no idea, but it seems that they’re going to be (or likely to be) slammed.
“She closed her eyes against the onslaught, but still the images came tumbling through her head, crumpling her in mid-air. A falling dragon. Giants, covered in metallic blue, stomping through streets. A massive flash of light, consuming a world.” – A falling dragon could be anything. Bolas, Ugin, the collapse of Bolas’ system. The giants, covered in metallic blue, could be the reason for mining lazotep. But what they are/where they are, who can know. The massive flash of light, consuming a world, seems pretty clear on its face: Some massive cataclysm.
---
That’s about it for my input for these scenes. A fun question: What happens on a plane where anything that dies rises in undeath, when the plane itself dies?:
“I lived, once, the plane seems to whisper in a hoarse, sand-scraped voice.
She senses life, but it is not alive. What is left of the plane defiantly groans.
He could never truly kill me. I abhor death.
An image: half-eaten, undead antelope being trailed by hungry happy vultures. An elephant mother caressing the newly-arisen body of her dead child.
Those that die will always return. That is the Curse of Wandering. My gift.”
This doesn't say that she learned of that through dancing though. She was just searching for martial arts and dance techniques of the past and discovered that there is a sudden end to the archives a few decades ago. At least that's how I read it.
No, we have no idea at this point what exactly the horns are, but knowing Bolas they are just a monument of his dominion over Amonkhet (doubling as a sign of the encroachment of the Hours).
I would assume they're like the horns in Pools of Becoming. Dragon sticks his brand on everything.
Honestly, being plane-bound is enough of a handicap for non-PWs. So actually being able to traverse the planes and learn, etc. really is a wondrous and special trait of PWs. It really is enough that they can do this.
Which is one reason why it's so damn nauseating for me to see how Planeswalkers are written. They're going out of their way to make them out to be the absolute best thing in the Multiverse even at the expense of gods and Eldrazi titans or Avacyn. No. A planeswalker marches into a plane, they should be subject to its physical laws and its superior beings. Just being a PW does not allow someone to march right up to monarchs that have entire kingdoms and armies at their disposals, let alone GODS of an entire dimension, which planes represent. And above that, even the entire current cast Neo-Walker mages including Ugin and Bolas should not have been able to handle Ulamog alone. Thassa should have killed Kiora (this I can excuse, because she almost did) and Kefnet should have humbled Nissa.
Sometimes I feel like Creative fears it shot itself in the foot with the mending (it didn't) that it has this agenda of making a mockery out of the entire multiverse and lore for the sake of making Neo-walkers appear as powerful as Oldwalkers without having to retcon the mending.
Honestly, being plane-bound is enough of a handicap for non-PWs. So actually being able to traverse the planes and learn, etc. really is a wondrous and special trait of PWs. It really is enough that they can do this.
Which is one reason why it's so damn nauseating for me to see how Planeswalkers are written. They're going out of their way to make them out to be the absolute best thing in the Multiverse even at the expense of gods and Eldrazi titans or Avacyn. No. A planeswalker marches into a plane, they should be subject to its physical laws and its superior beings. Just being a PW does not allow someone to march right up to monarchs that have entire kingdoms and armies at their disposals, let alone GODS of an entire dimension, which planes represent. And above that, even the entire current cast Neo-Walker mages including Ugin and Bolas should not have been able to handle Ulamog alone. Thassa should have killed Kiora (this I can excuse, because she almost did) and Kefnet should have humbled Nissa.
Sometimes I feel like Creative fears it shot itself in the foot with the mending (it didn't) that it has this agenda of making a mockery out of the entire multiverse and lore for the sake of making Neo-walkers appear as powerful as Oldwalkers without having to retcon the mending.
Avacyn was made by a planeswalker who, while not having the power to create her again, clearly retained the knowledge to unravel her in a worst-case scenario like SOIs. The Eldrazi weren't defeated by the innate powers of the planeswalkers, but by the machinations (the hedron network) and the knowledge of oldwalkers, as well as the help of an entire sentient plane and its mana, as I described before (whether that is lame or not is another subject entirely). Actually, for the Eldrazi they had to do what you describe here to defeat them: Pull them into a plane so that they are subject to it's physical rules and can be killed at all. Those aren't really displays of power by the neowalkers.
Now on the subject of gods: Look. Elspeth couldn't fight Heliods power for long and had to abide by the rules of the pantheon. The same can be said of Kiora. But as manifestations of certain natural forces, the gods of these planes are also bound by specific rules. The Theros pantheon depends on belief for example (they have become more stable by believing in themselves, but still obviously need mortal belief as well). Using this they can be manipulated, even "forgotten" like the missing RG god was over time. Ashiok nearly created a protogod by carefully using his dream manipulations. This doesn't take away from the gods, it's what makes them what they are. The same goes for the Amonkhet gods: They are beings intrinsically bound to their plane by virtue of being made of leylines/mana/whatever. This makes them divine and powerful forces of the plane, but it also makes them vulnerable to beings capable of manipulating the forces they are made of, like Nissa or Bolas (I guess leyline manipulation isn't something common on Amonkhet, giving planeswalkers exactly the edge they should gain by being not bound to one plane: knowledge of extraplanar origin). On the other hand they don't seem to need belief to exist, so there.
Edit (Sorry, forgot to write my last sentence): You might have a point if the gatewatch clearly win over Emrakul (they didn't), Jace, Liliana, Gideon or Chandra were capable of the same stuff Nissa just pulled off (which wasn't much more than a very small and subtle manipulation by the way) or if Kiora actually defeated Thasse (which as you've said yourself, she didn't).
Sometimes I feel like Creative fears it shot itself in the foot with the mending (it didn't) that it has this agenda of making a mockery out of the entire multiverse and lore for the sake of making Neo-walkers appear as powerful as Oldwalkers without having to retcon the mending.
I think a lot of decisions Creative made have proven to be somewhat incompatible with the current story, like Jace being the Living Guildpact. The guy is essentially to Ravnica what the President is to the USA; someone who can't just up and disappear as he wishes without telling someone where he's going, for how long, how do they get a hold of him in case of emergency, etc, etc.
Sometimes I feel like Creative fears it shot itself in the foot with the mending (it didn't) that it has this agenda of making a mockery out of the entire multiverse and lore for the sake of making Neo-walkers appear as powerful as Oldwalkers without having to retcon the mending.
I think a lot of decisions Creative made have proven to be somewhat incompatible with the current story, like Jace being the Living Guildpact. The guy is essentially to Ravnica what the President is to the USA; someone who can't just up and disappear as he wishes without telling someone where he's going, for how long, how do they get a hold of him in case of emergency, etc, etc.
I still believe that Ravnica 3 (inevitable in my opinion) will show the consequences of his disappearing acts. It just strikes me as something that, even if I were to assume creative was that bad at what they are doing (wich I'm not), they would still use in a future story. There was too much foreshadowing already for this not to happen. And the fact that Jace was missing too often and became rather lazy in fulfilling his duties already was acknowledged by several character like Ral Zarek and Teysa. Strikes me as odd if they didn't actually want to go this route.
Sometimes I feel like Creative fears it shot itself in the foot with the mending (it didn't) that it has this agenda of making a mockery out of the entire multiverse and lore for the sake of making Neo-walkers appear as powerful as Oldwalkers without having to retcon the mending.
I think a lot of decisions Creative made have proven to be somewhat incompatible with the current story, like Jace being the Living Guildpact. The guy is essentially to Ravnica what the President is to the USA; someone who can't just up and disappear as he wishes without telling someone where he's going, for how long, how do they get a hold of him in case of emergency, etc, etc.
I still believe that Ravnica 3 (inevitable in my opinion) will show the consequences of his disappearing acts. It just strikes me as something that, even if I were to assume creative was that bad at what they are doing (wich I'm not), they would still use in a future story. There was too much foreshadowing already for this not to happen. And the fact that Jace was missing too often and became rather lazy in fulfilling his duties already was acknowledged by several character like Ral Zarek and Teysa. Strikes me as odd if they didn't actually want to go this route.
I would love this to happen. He's the only member of the gatewatch (well, I guess we can count Chandra in the mix now, too) who has ties to continuously visit a plane. Him not being there and grossly ignoring his duties is really getting on my nerves. I know Kaladesh block through Amonkhet has only been a few weeks of in-universe time, but between that, BFZ, and SOI blocks, he's only gone back once or twice?
I know it's just a byproduct of the nature of planeswalkers, but still, I just can't wait for the gatewatch to have more members so we can believably have characters come in and out of the main story. I find it extremely jarring for everyone to get up and leave when they have other obligations. I'd love to see Koth again, but if he showed up I would be pissed, since leaving New Phyrexia would be against his character.
On a whole though, these recent stories have just made it more clear that above all else, it's not that I dislike the gatewatch as a concept, or even the fact that they exhibit powers and abilities well above that of a plane-bound mage. It's their cavalier attitude that gets to me. I can't wait for Bolas to take them down a peg.
As a side note, am I the only one hoping that Ixalan block takes place concurrently as Amonkhet, and features Ajani as the sole Gatewatch member?
We meet Djeru and Gids goes through the trial of ambition and we see story moments 2 and 3. Also it shows that its Bontus (unseen) keeping Gideon held by the two initiates in Cruel Reality.
Bontus remark about being stronger now leads some to the theory she is willing working for Bolas.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
“There are no weak Jews. I am descended from those who wrestle angels and kill giants. We were chosen by God. You were chosen by a pathetic little man who can't seem to grow a full mustache"
"You can tell how dumb someone is by how they use Mary Sue"
On Zendikar, Gideon fought to protect people from the Eldrazi. On Innistrad, to protect people from angels and more Eldrazi. On Kaladesh, he fought for a cause he wasn't sure he believed in, but against an agent of an oppressor. Correct me if I'm wrong, but this is the first time we've seen Gideon fight out of personal righteousness or actual anger. Originally I thought he'd end up dying on Amonkhet trying to protect someone, or by making it to the end of the trials and getting killed by Hazoret, but now I'm not so sure. He's kinda abandoned subtlely by physically calling out Bontu, and a combination of stubbornness, righteous anger, and the knowledge that he's so far been indestructible makes me legitimately wonder if he's not gonna go full Drax here and do something really stupid.
Nothing like an extremely dark story to head us towards Bolas's return.
It shows that Bolas did not fully brainwash all of the Gods. Bontu is aware of what's going on and embraces death and what sacrifice means in this context. The interaction between Gideon and Bontu had such a Therosian feel to it.
Three of the gods on Amonkhet have corresponding races. Kefnet is an ibis, which is part of the aven found on the plane. Rhonas is a cobra- connected to the naga. And Hazoret is a jackal- khenra.
Oketra is a cat- and while we've had cat-humanoids before, most prominently leonin, there are none on Amonkhet, to the point that its probably fortunate that Ajani came along, because there'd be no way to even remotely explain him. Bontu's croc-headedness hasn't been represented ever in Magic, outside of BOntu herself.
There a significance to this? Or just a coincidence?
In the very last room, flesh-eating scarabs had poured out the walls, devouring Imi, who had stumbled as we scrabbled up an impossibly high wall to the exit. Her arm came off when Meris tried to pull her free.
Brutal.
This may have been my favorite chapter of this arc yet, and they've been really good all season. No big revelations, but it was fun finally getting Gideon to see how the sausage is made, so to speak, and wake up.
Fantastic story today - the combat had real meaning that was clear - something that is often missing in the MTG Stories. They are doing a wonderful job creating depth with Gideon.
Three of the gods on Amonkhet have corresponding races. Kefnet is an ibis, which is part of the aven found on the plane. Rhonas is a cobra- connected to the naga. And Hazoret is a jackal- khenra.
Oketra is a cat- and while we've had cat-humanoids before, most prominently leonin, there are none on Amonkhet, to the point that its probably fortunate that Ajani came along, because there'd be no way to even remotely explain him. Bontu's croc-headedness hasn't been represented ever in Magic, outside of Bontu herself.
There a significance to this? Or just a coincidence?
Probably the best story so far for this set, as we finally get a real taste for a Trial. Bontu is pretty cool, too, and it seems the gods influence those around them according to their traits, so maybe that revelation will assist Gideon in seeing through Oketra and the way she made him feel.
Also, Gideon's righteous anger makes me feel he's better suited for R/W (in the present place in the story) vs. straight-up white. Which makes his monocolor Of the Trials probably a pre-Trial of Ambition version. That being said, what if Gideon is the son of Iroas? Akros I think was Iroas' city, Gideon is indestructible, he's leaning R/W right now, and his birth last name, Iora, is not too far from Iroas.
Also, I'm assuming the next story will be the release of the dissenters, though I'm uncomfortable in my curiosity about why their hands are left exposed in the sarcophogi.
I def enjoyed the Hunger Games-esque feel of today's story. Seeing Gideon's PoV and being constantly scolded by Djeru (Where's your ambition!) was nice as we get more depth out of Gideon. He just doesn't understand the faith on Amonkhet, as Bontu points out. Gideon and Bontu's conversation at the end was a great payoff and my favorite scene from the story. I like that Bontu is the embodiment of Black's ambition and her views on things clashing with Gideon's was highly enjoyable. I don't think she is actively working with Bolas, rather that her inherent lust for power would just naturally tie in with Bolas' plans. Bolas probably made the least changes to Bontu, just my thoughts.
Lastly, I like that Bontu, as a god, really set herself apart from Erebos as far as characterization. Where Erebos accepts fate and begrudging acceptance, Bontu advocates greatness at any cost. I enjoy that we get to see two different sides of Black between the two gods.
The writers are really finding their stride with these Amonkhet stories.
even the one about Nissa and her new blue side - as much as everyone complained about it - was a marked improvement over, say, anything from BFZ.
We're seeing some real growth here for beefslab, as he is being forced to take a good, hard look in the mirror and question his motivations and M.O.
I also thought the trial was a very new and interesting take on the black ethos, especially the how and why of members of the team sacrificing themselves for the sake of the crop. this would normally be a white thing, but it made sense in the black trial.
and I know it won't happen, but now I'm interested in seeing what the other gods would tell Gids about himself if given the opportunity.
I enjoyed this week's story well enough. Wasn't my favorite of this block (I really enjoyed the first few), but was still solid overall. As Spaz pointed out, it's interesting to see how this differs from his usual approach where the enemy is tangible. It's also interesting to see how his usual stance gets in the way of finishing the trial, to the point of him actually causing additional losses due to not being able to mesh with the setup of the Trial.
The only jarring part to me was that he's able to hold his ground (even if only briefly) v Ulamog in the BFZ story but gets more or less tossed around by the ammit.
Pretty sure the Rakshasa were all male. All the ones on cards appeared to be male and the one shown in the stories, I believe conspiring with Taigam pre-time****ery, was also male.
Nope.
Glint, Rakshasa Gravecaller had female demons.
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/arcana/exploiting-art-descriptions-2015-04-22
From the art description for Rakshasa Gravecaller:
I see nothing that indicates the one in Glint is female. Similarly, for as strongly as they pointed it out in the description, it also has nothing to make it look remotely female.
I think the beard pretty well cinches it as being a Male, despite the art description.
EDIT: Glint does appear to be a female, though:
http://magic.wizards.com/en/story/planes/amonkhet
This doesn't say that she learned of that through dancing though. She was just searching for martial arts and dance techniques of the past and discovered that there is a sudden end to the archives a few decades ago. At least that's how I read it.
No, we have no idea at this point what exactly the horns are, but knowing Bolas they are just a monument of his dominion over Amonkhet (doubling as a sign of the encroachment of the Hours).
---
“A dark snake, winged and venomous, cast its shadow upon the desert. The snake was huge, bigger than an oak, bigger than a forest of oaks. Its shadow covered the whole world.
The shadow spoke, its voice rumbling across the empty desert. "They would take away my power. They would take away what makes me me. This I will not abide."
The shadow of the snake wrapped its coils around the world.
"For what I require, I would drain every world. I would devour every single one. But I start here."
The shadow squeezed. The world screamed. Nissa screamed.
The scene crumbled, fleeing from the pain.”
- So it seems that Amonkhet was the first plane Bolas went to after losing his power (‘I start here’). When he says “They would take away my power,” he doesn’t mean it in a future sense, but in the way we walk out of meetings at work or at school, like, ‘They would have me do all this work?! I will crush them!’ And the fact that he says he will start with Amonkhet makes me feel it is of far more importance than the Conflux, unless that was a happy accident that he stumbled upon Alara after Amonkhet.
---
“She was looking up into space, into the stars. Eight stars. Eight stars in a loose circle and evenly spaced, lighting up the entire night sky.” – This, to me, indicates balance. The eight gods were evenly spaced in a circle. Which makes it stranger that the five remaining were monocolored. There’s no real combination for only three creatures/gods that would properly balance the five colors (unless all three were five-color).
“A line of darkness, somehow visible even against the night, a line that shone darkness, wove its way through the eight stars. The line twisted and turned and vibrated, its pulsing a violent cry. When the line ceased moving, it was a figure eight on its side, a snake eating its own tail. It encompassed all eight stars, each star twinkling desperately against the curtain of dark now nestled close against them.” – Clearly, to me, Bolas’ influence on the gods. The fact that Bolas pulled them out of their perfect circle into an infinity symbol, instead of just maintaining them in the circle, implies to me that Bolas needs them to be out of balance and attuned to something specific. And from the description, the natures of the gods seemed to struggle to return to how they were before.
“Three of the stars winked out. Their generation of light and heat snuffed. Their lives vanished.
But Nissa could still see movement where those three stars had been. Stars no more, just three dark rents in the fabric of the sky. Three dark holes, possessed of an energy and fury all their own, pulsing to a rhythm malevolent.” – Accident, or design? I don’t think we have enough data to tease this one out. However, the writer does write ‘snuffed,’ which implies an action, instead of a reaction. So maybe it was by design, instead of accident. Since we’re talking stars, this description makes me think of the death of massive stars into black holes. Still there, but not at all what it once was, and now ‘dark holes possessed of an energy and fury all their own.’ So, to me, it seems the three gods that were ‘snuffed’ are not dead, but may be the Amonkhet version of a dead god. If a human or any living thing becomes a zombie/mummy on Amonkhet because whatever dies doesn’t stay ‘dead,’ then the ‘curse’ could logically hold true for the gods as well. So maybe the three gods, the three stars, are ‘undead’ in the same way black holes are ‘undead’ stars.
“The five remaining stars moved, their new alignment warped, all bending to the shadowy line woven through their constellation. Their new outline suggested a pair of horns.” – My visualization is that one side of the infinity symbol of the eight gods dissolved, so all three of the snuffed gods were on one side. That would leave the five in a pattern similar to Bolas’ horns. But it would also make an incomplete pattern. We’ve gone from a balanced circle, to a forced infinity symbol, to a broken shape. Will this have an impact on the story? Will the broken shape make it easier to dissolve Bolas’ influence? If so, why would he allow the other three gods to be snuffed? Back to the accident or design argument.
---
“Awkward figures wrapped in white linen bent and dug in the harsh sands. Mummies, they called them. The anointed. Hundreds, thousands of the mummies dug into a deep pit, pulling out a blue ore. Cartloads of the ore snaked their way in a large procession toward the city.” – The Anointed seem to be Bolas’ design for Amonkhet, so I feel this takes place after Bolas’ influence campaign. Bolas seems to have a need for lazotep. We don’t know much about it apart from Wizards describing it as a ‘mysterious mineral.’
“Farther away, three young children stopped before a barrier. The beautiful city on one side, the stark emptiness of the desert on the other. They're whispering to each other. They look around, look at each other. Uncertain. A child presses through. The two others follow. All three are swallowed by the hungry sands.” – Like others, I’m leaning toward these three children being the other three gods that were snuffed. Which would place this moment AFTER the circle becoming an infinity symbol, but right BEFORE they were snuffed. The city and the desert, I feel, are representations of life and death. The fact that they chose to wander into godly ‘undeath’ goes back to the ‘accident or design’ argument. Maybe they knew that removing themselves from the equation would weaken Bolas’ design for the gods (circle -> infinity -> broken symbol/horns), leading to an inevitable cataclysm, thus sticking it to Bolas?
---
“She saw a young man, his face erased, stumbling among a garden of statues. High above the man a growing cloud of dusk attacked the sun. From somewhere outside the garden there was a mighty roar.” – Like others, I’m leaning Ashiok, for the host of reasons other people have mentioned over the months, from his shoulder-armor appearing elsewhere on Amonkhet art, to his knowledge or at least interest in the gods of Theros, and the fact that his face is erasing itself into mist. Garden of statues? The Trial of Strength requires you to get a basilisk scale (basilisks kill you/turn you to stone?), and involves jungles/’gardens.’ Which would imply Ashiok’s face started poofing before his ‘death’ on Amonkhet. So was he a walker before the Trial of Strength? Who can say.
---
“Nissa saw a world, then tens of worlds, hundreds of worlds. Thousands. She saw this world, the world of Amonkhet, and wrapped around it was a dark sinewy line. That line stretched back through all the worlds, all the thousands of worlds, and she saw an unbroken line of darkness from Amonkhet all the way back to the beginning of the line.” – Now, if Amonkhet was the first world Bolas went to after the Mending, this passage would make it sound like the last in a long line of planes. Which flusters me. And thousands of worlds is a tall order for even Bolas, if the line means conquest or influence, instead of just passing through. However, Dominaria is/used to be the center of Dominia, and so what happened on Dominaria impacted all the other planes. What if Bolas is creating a ‘network’ among planes, in order to make one specific location the new center of Dominia and the planar universe? That would make him even more powerful than his oldwalker self. Otherwise, the thousands of planes seem a little arbitrary.
---
“A large golden disc, shaped and stylized like a sun, descending from the sky. The sun disc approached a large circular stone tablet covered with strange sigils, and the two discs merged, becoming a single golden disc. Cracks appeared in the golden disc, small at first, then widening, growing. The disc crumbled away into nothingness.” – I think this is what happens when the two ‘suns’ of Amonkhet meet. But the constant-dusk-sun seems to travel along the horizon toward the horns, and isn’t ‘descending.’ So is the horizon sun the ‘circular stone tablet’ and the second sun is the ‘large golden disc’? And when they meet, do they leave the plane in darkness, unleashing whatever Bolas had planned? Or maybe that’s what the three ‘undead’ gods have been waiting for?
---
“The scenes shifted faster now, barely even an image forming before being replaced. A fizzling torch. A broken clock with a clean face. A mummified head facing backward atop a mummified body. A split tree, its sap oozing into the ground. A shattered shield, its shiny metallic pieces torn and scattered.” – Call me crazy, but I think this is the Gatewatch being broken. A fizzling torch = Chandra. A split tree, oozing sap = Nissa. A shattered shield = Gideon. I’m leaning Liliana being the mummified head (moving forward but always looking back?) and Jace being the broken clock with a clean face (mind broken when he was younger, new personality/persona ever since?). What does this ultimately mean? I have no idea, but it seems that they’re going to be (or likely to be) slammed.
“She closed her eyes against the onslaught, but still the images came tumbling through her head, crumpling her in mid-air. A falling dragon. Giants, covered in metallic blue, stomping through streets. A massive flash of light, consuming a world.” – A falling dragon could be anything. Bolas, Ugin, the collapse of Bolas’ system. The giants, covered in metallic blue, could be the reason for mining lazotep. But what they are/where they are, who can know. The massive flash of light, consuming a world, seems pretty clear on its face: Some massive cataclysm.
---
That’s about it for my input for these scenes. A fun question: What happens on a plane where anything that dies rises in undeath, when the plane itself dies?:
“I lived, once, the plane seems to whisper in a hoarse, sand-scraped voice.
She senses life, but it is not alive. What is left of the plane defiantly groans.
He could never truly kill me. I abhor death.
An image: half-eaten, undead antelope being trailed by hungry happy vultures. An elephant mother caressing the newly-arisen body of her dead child.
Those that die will always return. That is the Curse of Wandering. My gift.”
I would assume they're like the horns in Pools of Becoming. Dragon sticks his brand on everything.
Honestly, being plane-bound is enough of a handicap for non-PWs. So actually being able to traverse the planes and learn, etc. really is a wondrous and special trait of PWs. It really is enough that they can do this.
Which is one reason why it's so damn nauseating for me to see how Planeswalkers are written. They're going out of their way to make them out to be the absolute best thing in the Multiverse even at the expense of gods and Eldrazi titans or Avacyn. No. A planeswalker marches into a plane, they should be subject to its physical laws and its superior beings. Just being a PW does not allow someone to march right up to monarchs that have entire kingdoms and armies at their disposals, let alone GODS of an entire dimension, which planes represent. And above that, even the entire current cast Neo-Walker mages including Ugin and Bolas should not have been able to handle Ulamog alone. Thassa should have killed Kiora (this I can excuse, because she almost did) and Kefnet should have humbled Nissa.
Sometimes I feel like Creative fears it shot itself in the foot with the mending (it didn't) that it has this agenda of making a mockery out of the entire multiverse and lore for the sake of making Neo-walkers appear as powerful as Oldwalkers without having to retcon the mending.
|| UW Jace, Vyn's Prodigy UW || UG Kenessos, Priest of Thassa (feat. Arixmethes) UG ||
Cards I still want to see created:
|| Olantin, Lost City || Pavios and Thanasis || Choryu ||
Avacyn was made by a planeswalker who, while not having the power to create her again, clearly retained the knowledge to unravel her in a worst-case scenario like SOIs. The Eldrazi weren't defeated by the innate powers of the planeswalkers, but by the machinations (the hedron network) and the knowledge of oldwalkers, as well as the help of an entire sentient plane and its mana, as I described before (whether that is lame or not is another subject entirely). Actually, for the Eldrazi they had to do what you describe here to defeat them: Pull them into a plane so that they are subject to it's physical rules and can be killed at all. Those aren't really displays of power by the neowalkers.
Now on the subject of gods: Look. Elspeth couldn't fight Heliods power for long and had to abide by the rules of the pantheon. The same can be said of Kiora. But as manifestations of certain natural forces, the gods of these planes are also bound by specific rules. The Theros pantheon depends on belief for example (they have become more stable by believing in themselves, but still obviously need mortal belief as well). Using this they can be manipulated, even "forgotten" like the missing RG god was over time. Ashiok nearly created a protogod by carefully using his dream manipulations. This doesn't take away from the gods, it's what makes them what they are. The same goes for the Amonkhet gods: They are beings intrinsically bound to their plane by virtue of being made of leylines/mana/whatever. This makes them divine and powerful forces of the plane, but it also makes them vulnerable to beings capable of manipulating the forces they are made of, like Nissa or Bolas (I guess leyline manipulation isn't something common on Amonkhet, giving planeswalkers exactly the edge they should gain by being not bound to one plane: knowledge of extraplanar origin). On the other hand they don't seem to need belief to exist, so there.
Edit (Sorry, forgot to write my last sentence): You might have a point if the gatewatch clearly win over Emrakul (they didn't), Jace, Liliana, Gideon or Chandra were capable of the same stuff Nissa just pulled off (which wasn't much more than a very small and subtle manipulation by the way) or if Kiora actually defeated Thasse (which as you've said yourself, she didn't).
I think a lot of decisions Creative made have proven to be somewhat incompatible with the current story, like Jace being the Living Guildpact. The guy is essentially to Ravnica what the President is to the USA; someone who can't just up and disappear as he wishes without telling someone where he's going, for how long, how do they get a hold of him in case of emergency, etc, etc.
I still believe that Ravnica 3 (inevitable in my opinion) will show the consequences of his disappearing acts. It just strikes me as something that, even if I were to assume creative was that bad at what they are doing (wich I'm not), they would still use in a future story. There was too much foreshadowing already for this not to happen. And the fact that Jace was missing too often and became rather lazy in fulfilling his duties already was acknowledged by several character like Ral Zarek and Teysa. Strikes me as odd if they didn't actually want to go this route.
I would love this to happen. He's the only member of the gatewatch (well, I guess we can count Chandra in the mix now, too) who has ties to continuously visit a plane. Him not being there and grossly ignoring his duties is really getting on my nerves. I know Kaladesh block through Amonkhet has only been a few weeks of in-universe time, but between that, BFZ, and SOI blocks, he's only gone back once or twice?
I know it's just a byproduct of the nature of planeswalkers, but still, I just can't wait for the gatewatch to have more members so we can believably have characters come in and out of the main story. I find it extremely jarring for everyone to get up and leave when they have other obligations. I'd love to see Koth again, but if he showed up I would be pissed, since leaving New Phyrexia would be against his character.
On a whole though, these recent stories have just made it more clear that above all else, it's not that I dislike the gatewatch as a concept, or even the fact that they exhibit powers and abilities well above that of a plane-bound mage. It's their cavalier attitude that gets to me. I can't wait for Bolas to take them down a peg.
As a side note, am I the only one hoping that Ixalan block takes place concurrently as Amonkhet, and features Ajani as the sole Gatewatch member?
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/magic-story/brazen-2017-05-03
We meet Djeru and Gids goes through the trial of ambition and we see story moments 2 and 3. Also it shows that its Bontus (unseen) keeping Gideon held by the two initiates in Cruel Reality.
Bontus remark about being stronger now leads some to the theory she is willing working for Bolas.
"You can tell how dumb someone is by how they use Mary Sue"
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/magic-story/brazen-2017-05-03
And that was... a bit on the ****ed up side...
It shows that Bolas did not fully brainwash all of the Gods. Bontu is aware of what's going on and embraces death and what sacrifice means in this context. The interaction between Gideon and Bontu had such a Therosian feel to it.
Three of the gods on Amonkhet have corresponding races. Kefnet is an ibis, which is part of the aven found on the plane. Rhonas is a cobra- connected to the naga. And Hazoret is a jackal- khenra.
Oketra is a cat- and while we've had cat-humanoids before, most prominently leonin, there are none on Amonkhet, to the point that its probably fortunate that Ajani came along, because there'd be no way to even remotely explain him. Bontu's croc-headedness hasn't been represented ever in Magic, outside of BOntu herself.
There a significance to this? Or just a coincidence?
Brutal.
This may have been my favorite chapter of this arc yet, and they've been really good all season. No big revelations, but it was fun finally getting Gideon to see how the sausage is made, so to speak, and wake up.
I dunno, the Viashino seem like they'd correspond to Bontu if they existed on Amonkhet. Burning-Tree Bloodscale, Thorn-Thrash Viashino and Thunder-Thrash Elder come to mind.
Also, Gideon's righteous anger makes me feel he's better suited for R/W (in the present place in the story) vs. straight-up white. Which makes his monocolor Of the Trials probably a pre-Trial of Ambition version. That being said, what if Gideon is the son of Iroas? Akros I think was Iroas' city, Gideon is indestructible, he's leaning R/W right now, and his birth last name, Iora, is not too far from Iroas.
Also, I'm assuming the next story will be the release of the dissenters, though I'm uncomfortable in my curiosity about why their hands are left exposed in the sarcophogi.
Lastly, I like that Bontu, as a god, really set herself apart from Erebos as far as characterization. Where Erebos accepts fate and begrudging acceptance, Bontu advocates greatness at any cost. I enjoy that we get to see two different sides of Black between the two gods.
The writers are really finding their stride with these Amonkhet stories.
even the one about Nissa and her new blue side - as much as everyone complained about it - was a marked improvement over, say, anything from BFZ.
We're seeing some real growth here for beefslab, as he is being forced to take a good, hard look in the mirror and question his motivations and M.O.
I also thought the trial was a very new and interesting take on the black ethos, especially the how and why of members of the team sacrificing themselves for the sake of the crop. this would normally be a white thing, but it made sense in the black trial.
and I know it won't happen, but now I'm interested in seeing what the other gods would tell Gids about himself if given the opportunity.
Click the pic for more info.
The only jarring part to me was that he's able to hold his ground (even if only briefly) v Ulamog in the BFZ story but gets more or less tossed around by the ammit.
Draft my cube! (630 cards)