So, it's no secret that the last four weeks have been profoundly disappointing in their (lack of) new story content. Let's go over what happened:
For Commander 2015, in addition to info on each commander, gave us two full stories related to the commanders.
Prior to Commander 2016, we were told that Aether Revolt stories would begin five weeks after Kaladesh’s story ended (This ended up being a blatant lie. Kaladesh story continued up until Aether Revolt started, when only a 1 week break for C16.). The first of these weeks was C16’s spoiler week. There was no announcement regarding what stories we would get between Kaladesh and Aether Revolt. Since we had gotten Commander stories last year, we all assumed (very reasonably) that C16 would have info on each commander and at least one or two full stories. Not warning us otherwise was their first mistake; any time that something is going to contradict expectations, we should be informed to prevent a negative reaction. WOTC did a good job of this when they told us that Kaladesh would have no contraptions, as well as when they told us that we wouldn’t get a Wednesday story for Kaladesh after getting a Monday one that week (the previous week had stories on Monday and Wednesday). This time, the creative team failed to communicate and gave us not one, not two, not three, but four weeks of disappointment. Warning us wouldn’t justify the lack of content, but at least the disappointment wouldn’t come as a surprise.
Week 1: We get Commander 2016 spoilers. We are told that the four-color legends would be new (there's no reason to force them all to be new, Atraxa easily could have been Yawgmoth), but the two-colored ones would be ones that already existed but didn’t have cards. (This was another lie; several of the two-colored ones were completely new, even though they were supposed to be returning characters. People were still very excited to here about these characters, old and new. For our story articles, we got brief descriptions of each commander. Perfectly reasonable. This made people excited to learn more about these characters. We still our given no warning that we will get no stories for these characters. We were given plenty of hype for these characters. They gave us small tastes of planes we hadn’t heard about for a while, causing us to want more. Yet we would get no more information about them.
Week 2: Our story article is the Planeswalker’s Guide to Kaladesh. Planeswalker’s Guides are popular story articles and many people were disappointed to not have seen one before. We thought that we wouldn’t get one because Kaladesh’s story was “over.” Now that people got the article, they should be excited, right? Wrong! We wanted info about other planes, we got more info about Kaladesh (even though they told us that its story was over). But at least we got more info about the story, right? Wrong again! This was literally copied and pasted from the booklet found in Kaladesh’s bundle (fat pack), which was pretty easily available.
What should have been and informative and enjoyable article was disappointing and lazy filler. What should have been a C16 story was another Kaladesh article.
Week 3: We get more information about Kaladesh. This time, it’s about the creative team’s world-building and development of Kaladesh. But this still gives us virtually no new information, and it really doesn’t qualify as a story at all. Plus, it still isn’t about C16 (some people were still had hope for a C16 story before this, but not after).
Week 4: Kaladesh story summary. We have gotten story summaries before, so why would this be upsetting? Well, the other summaries came after an actual story and were followed by an actual story. A one week break from real magic story is disappointing, but not really a big deal. A four week break, however, is an incredible disappointment. This article was preceded by two filler, non-story articles and followed by another.
Week 5: Kaladesh Consulate. Throughout Kaladesh’s storyline, related information was being posted on the Kaladesh Consulate Facebook page. This was an interesting and informative supplement to the main story, not unlike the Hanweir Chronicle. So, they needed an article for the last week before Aether Revolt’s story. What should they do? Write an actual, original story for the first time in weeks? Of course not! They should copy and paste information they already gave us once again!
Since weekly online magic story articles have started, we have never seen anything like this. Gaps between two sets would be filled by “random” stories from worlds we hadn’t seen for some time, like the one about Kiora on Theros between sets in 2015. Or we might get the yearly “Checking in on the Planeswalkers” article (which we still haven’t gotten this year, BTW). Many people were hoping to during one of the later weeks covered above, but they didn’t get it. So why didn’t creative give us articles like those for our “gap between sets.” I have no idea. But what’s even crazier is that this wasn’t a gap between sets. Commander 2016 was just released, got one “story,” and then was done. The series of character bios we got was completely fine, but for both C14 and C15 we got at least two other articles in addition to the character bios.
So, we have a gap between stories for standard sets and a Commander set just released (which traditionally get stories). What do we expect? Commander stories. What do they give us? Information about Kaladesh that we don’t want and already know, most of it copied and pasted from somewhere else. Very disappointing. I don’t like being so negative but this was an appalling series of terrible decisions. We didn’t get any warning and we probably aren’t going to get an apology. I don’t know if this was caused by the creative team being remarkably lazy or just clueless, probably a combination of both.
What can we, the Vorthos community, the people who care about the story, do about it? Well, we can’t undo what happened, and we probably aren’t going to be able to convince them to write C16 stories now, but we can make sure that something like this never happens again. We need to be vocal about how we feel about this: surprised and disappointed. There were two main problems here: we got old Kaladesh content in place of C16 stories, and we weren’t warned about what was planned (causing us to get our hopes up for nothing). We need to tell WOTC about why we are so upset so that they know not to do it again. If they thought it was OK to do it once, there’s nothing stopping them from doing it again, unless they know that there are negative consequences. Be polite and reasonable, but be honest. It's not about making them feel bad, it's about making them do better. Tell them how we feel about this mess and help improve the quality of Magic’s storyline in the future.
Honestly, while I'm just as upset about the apparently misleading "story" articles we've gotten the past 5 weeks (remember, it was asked if there would be "5 commander stories", and the reply was "we have other plans"), I'm still happy with the story team as a whole. They've definitely worked hard on pulling things together recently, flushing out characters, and giving a deeper context to their worlds. If it weren't for them messing with our expectations, and the lack of a 2016 "checking in with the planeswalkers" (something I'm extremely fond of), I'd have no complaints whatsoever.
Alright, small thing. Atraxa should definitely NOT have been Yawgmoth.
Considering Yawgmoth was very much mono-black (well, flavorwise, he probably would have blue and green, but considering every single pre-Mirrodin phyrexian card was black...)
Also, just a reminder that while it has been a very disappointing five weeks, its not like any of us have truly been cheated. We're not exactly paying for any of this- these stories are free and pretty much for the purpose of advertising. So whatever we like or don't like, the fact is they are still paying people money to write stories that they're profiting zero off of. We're not entitled to them, and Wizards doesn't owe us anything, including an apology. So yeah, I'm disappointed too, but the only thing any of us have lost here is the couple of minutes it took to check the mothership on Wednesday morning and see nothing new.
I don't mind reading long posts, as long as they're reader-friendly. I'm sure we're taught to make use of spaces.
Having said that, yea the past 2 months are an absolute joke. I thought one should always end on a high note, especially at the end of the year. This should culminate in a big bang. And the meh-ness of the last 2 months really sours any work they've done, good or bad. People tend to remember the newer things, so in this case, they sucked big time.
And yes, why you want Yawgmoth? I'm more concerned about the lack of stories/content. Alot of the work thus far has been rehashed. In any case, I wouldn't wanna leave the story of Yawgmoth to this team. Or any of the artifact cycle to them. That's the holy grail of Magic stories.
They can take their rainbows, ponies and aetherpunk to wherever they please but don't ever messed with the Old Ones.
Are people still having expectations in the storyline? It is now exactly where the corporate suits and popular guys like Rosewater want it to be: a teenage mass-friendly buddy-movie blurb.
The "geek for geeks" ship has sailed. It's now all about mass consumption, so it needs to be basic and corresponding to commonly anticipated tropes.
Alright, small thing. Atraxa should definitely NOT have been Yawgmoth.
I’m not saying that they could have just thrown Yawgmoth’s name on her card, but if they were making a GWUB proliferate commander, why not make it Yawgmoth? If they were going to make a WUBR artifact commander, why not have it be Urza (before planeswalker spark)? Not Atraxa’s or Breya’s exact designs, but same color identities and themes could have worked. Commander sets are one of the few opportunities for dead or otherwise outdated (like non-demon Ob Nixilis) characters to get cards, but they’ve missed a number of obvious opportunities recently (Mizzix instead of Crixizix? Seriously?).
Are people still having expectations in the storyline? It is now exactly where the corporate suits and popular guys like Rosewater want it to be: a teenage mass-friendly buddy-movie blurb.
The "geek for geeks" ship has sailed. It's now all about mass consumption, so it needs to be basic and corresponding to commonly anticipated tropes.
Agreed. The writing quality has improved since BFZ (still room for improvement) but the plot is, for the part, predictable and repetitive. Every block has a Gatewatch member as a main character, a predictable plot twist, the Gatewatch assembling, the threat being defeated, and at least one oath. And maybe some other planeswalkers and legendary creatures besides the Gatewatch and main villains were there too, but who cares about them? BFZ was like this, SOI was like this, and Kaladesh will probably be that way too. That’s why I was looking forward to C16 stories as a break from the repetitive, Gatewatch-centered block stories. But why would we want to learn anything besides info about Kaladesh that we already knew? Honestly, this has ruined any hope and excitement I had left for Aether Revolt’s story.
I’m not saying that they could have just thrown Yawgmoth’s name on her card, but if they were making a GWUB proliferate commander, why not make it Yawgmoth? If they were going to make a WUBR artifact commander, why not have it be Urza (before planeswalker spark)? Not Atraxa’s or Breya’s exact designs, but same color identities and themes could have worked. Commander sets are one of the few opportunities for dead or otherwise outdated (like non-demon Ob Nixilis) characters to get cards, but they’ve missed a number of obvious opportunities recently (Mizzix instead of Crixizix? Seriously?).
Agreed. I feel like the latest Commander set was the perfect opportunity to finally make cards for old characters like Urza and Yawgmoth, and they messed it up with their bizarre insistence that all the four-color commanders be brand new characters (except for Kynaios and Tiro, who were kinda sorta existing characters). Urza would've been perfect for WUBR artifacts, Yawgmoth would've been perfect for WUBG and its proliferation theme. I also think Ludevig should've been the UBRG commander, and he should've had abilities that actually make sense for a mad scientist who specializes in creating monsters. Instead he got an underpowered UR card with a bad ability that doesn't fit the character at all, because they inexplicably decided to shoehorn him into the altruism deck even though he's clearly a better fit for chaos. Very disappointing all around.
Also, like everyone else, I'm frustrated that they went five weeks without giving us a new story and didn't even bother to tell us in advance. I was hoping we would at least get stories for some of the new commanders, especially since this set had twice as many as usual.
While I completely agree with the OP on one side, let's also not forget that all this is delivered to us freely. There's an element of entitlement in it that (unfortunately) simply does not apply.
Having said that, I'm still wondering what happened to Teysa and Tajic after they tried to mess with the Ghost Council.
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The secret to enjoyable Commander games is not winning first, but losing last.
If my post has no tags, then i posted from my phone.
I was really disappointed by these past few weeks too. I've already stopped following the Kaladesh story since I can't stand the Gatewatch so I was hoping for more info on the new commanders even though I don't play it.
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Modern RGTron UGInfect URStorm WUBRAd Nauseam BRGrishoalbrand URGScapeshift WBGAbzan Company WUBRGAmulet Titan BRGLiving End WGBogles
While I completely agree with the OP on one side, let's also not forget that all this is delivered to us freely. There's an element of entitlement in it that (unfortunately) simply does not apply.
Having said that, I'm still wondering what happened to Teysa and Tajic after they tried to mess with the Ghost Council.
Seriously. Just aren't seriously going to let that cliffhanger linger till Ravnica 3 are they?
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Level 1 Judge
"I hope to have such a death... lying in triumph atop the broken bodies of those who slew me..."
You don't call "dying to removal" if the removal is more expensive in resources than the creature. If you have to spend BG (Abrupt Decay), or W + basic land (PtE) to remove a 1G, that is not "dying to removal". Strictly speaking Goyf dies to removal, but actually your removal is dying to Goyf.
While I completely agree with the OP on one side, let's also not forget that all this is delivered to us freely. There's an element of entitlement in it that (unfortunately) simply does not apply.
Having said that, I'm still wondering what happened to Teysa and Tajic after they tried to mess with the Ghost Council.
Seriously. Just aren't seriously going to let that cliffhanger linger till Ravnica 3 are they?
I hope not!
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The secret to enjoyable Commander games is not winning first, but losing last.
If my post has no tags, then i posted from my phone.
I personally think it's good that Creative haven't been releasing so many stories; in my opinion they should stop telling stories altogether. They've been trying to get MTG players interested in their new, lazily written, corporate-driven "vision" of the story for a while now, and, judging from the attendance figures of this subforum, very few players have taken the bait. At this point Wizards is just wasting money churning out this pulp.
Instead of writing long pieces filled with the Power Rangers winking at each other and saying cringeworthy stuff like "Right on!" and "get real!" (before defeating the greatest threats in the multiverse in the most laughably nonsensical ways), Creative should hire sharper writers and have them focus solely on the flavour text on cards, creating subtle hints of a story that gives enough leeway for people to piece together into their very own story, which will inevitably be much richer and more coherent than any "prose" from the Wizards hacks.
Alternatively, if Wizards are intent on reaching a mass market, they should abandon this "free story" crap, hire quality tie-in fiction writers like Dan Abnett, and have them craft an elaborate and well-planned novel cycle, sold for profit. Although I find the MTG story embarrassingly awful in general, the shameless nerd in me would pay good money for a mature Game of Thrones-esque novel about the power struggles between the various Khans of Tarkir -- especially if it involves a secret alliance between the Sultai Brood and House Dimir...
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-- The Gatewatch
I personally think it's good that Creative haven't been releasing so many stories; in my opinion they should stop telling stories altogether. They've been trying to get MTG players interested in their new, lazily written, corporate-driven "vision" of the story for a while now, and, judging from the attendance figures of this subforum, very few players have taken the bait. At this point Wizards is just wasting money churning out this pulp.
What? The story is more popular than ever. What numbers are you basing this on, because the 'Magic Story' threads are our most trafficked basically ever.
Instead of writing long pieces filled with the Power Rangers winking at each other and saying cringeworthy stuff like "Right on!" and "get real!" (before defeating the greatest threats in the multiverse in the most laughably nonsensical ways), Creative should hire sharper writers and have them focus solely on the flavour text on cards, creating subtle hints of a story that gives enough leeway for people to piece together into their very own story, which will inevitably be much richer and more coherent than any "prose" from the Wizards hacks.
Alternatively, if Wizards are intent on reaching a mass market, they should abandon this "free story" crap, hire quality tie-in fiction writers like Dan Abnett, and have them craft an elaborate and well-planned novel cycle, sold for profit. Although I find the MTG story embarrassingly awful in general, the shameless nerd in me would pay good money for a mature Game of Thrones-esque novel about the power struggles between the various Khans of Tarkir -- especially if it involves a secret alliance between the Sultai Brood and House Dimir...
So... do what they were unsuccessful at for 20 years again? Look, magic players only want to buy Magic cards. If they switched back to for-pay novels, the storyline interest would drop significantly.
And seriously, what are you even doing here? If you find the story so awful, why do you have an account basically only to talk about it? I'm not saying the story is perfect, but not everything has to be a fantasy epic. I can see Warhammer players, who'd have to have money to spare, buying novels, but Magic players? The reality is the story is better known and more popular than ever thanks to the free online articles. And it's been pretty steadily improving in overall quality.
What? The story is more popular than ever. What numbers are you basing this on, because the 'Magic Story' threads are our most trafficked basically ever.
I'm basing my numbers on the number of people who view and post in the story subforum, relative to the forum in general. The Magic story threads may be the most trafficked ever, but that's only because the player base is at its largest ever.
So... do what they were unsuccessful at for 20 years again? Look, magic players only want to buy Magic cards. If they switched back to for-pay novels, the storyline interest would drop significantly.
What a strange thing to say. You're essentially saying that it is never worth trying again what you once failed at. You also make a bizarre assumption that "Magic players only want to buy cards" which is unsupported by any evidence. Your last sentence is also unsubstantiated.
And seriously, what are you even doing here? If you find the story so awful, why do you have an account basically only to talk about it?
What a welcoming mod you are. I post here because I want the MTG story to be good, but feel it falls seriously short. If you have a problem with that, ban me.
I'm not saying the story is perfect, but not everything has to be a fantasy epic. I can see Warhammer players, who'd have to have money to spare, buying novels, but Magic players?
Another puzzling statement. Why would Warhammer players have money to be spare where MTG players wouldn't? Both hobbies are arm-amputatingly expensive, with a primary demographic of middle-class professionals with disposable income.
The reality is the story is better known and more popular than ever thanks to the free online articles. And it's been pretty steadily improving in overall quality.
This is an unsubstantiated claim that doesn't really require a response.
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-- The Gatewatch
I'm basing my numbers on the number of people who view and post in the story subforum, relative to the forum in general. The Magic story threads may be the most trafficked ever, but that's only because the player base is at its largest ever.
If that's your evidence, then you have made several fundamental errors in reasoning. First, not everyone who reads this subforum posts-- some people lurk, as I do. In fact, I only created an account here to talk about the story every so often when I feel I have something to say, which is infrequent-- and indeed, that's your second error. Not everyone who reads feels like they have something worthwhile to say around here or on other websites. Thirdly, this website cannot possibly represent the entire Magic Community, including the parts of the community that reads the official story posts (or owns the old books). The only people who know the exact numbers on that are WotC, but lots of people have noted an increased interest in the lore and story of Magic ever since Origins was released, not just Jay13x.
Look, I loved the era of the Magic novels, but they weren't all great by any means. They were written by mercenary novelists just like other franchise novels, and with that comes a tendency for cliche or phoning it in for a paycheck. This isn't a slam against mercenary novelists, as many of them are VERY experienced in their craft, but its a fact that you need to be motivated to want to write quality fiction for someone else's franchise. ANd there is nothing inherently wrong with a serialized online format either, as attested to by many webcomic artists and so forth. The only problem is adjusting to the difference between that format and a novel, as well as just getting good at the craft in general, which I think some of the writers at WotC need to improve at. Otherwise, if WotC didn't see enough of a profit margin in novels, its unsurprising that they would be reluctant to go back to that format when the serialized format does better at advertising the product they really care about-- the cards.
I'm basing my numbers on the number of people who view and post in the story subforum, relative to the forum in general. The Magic story threads may be the most trafficked ever, but that's only because the player base is at its largest ever.
View and post is not the same as total traffic. There are plenty of people casually interested who only come to view. And the internet has evolved, MTGS's storyline subforum used to be the place to come to talk story. Now it's divided between MTGS, Reddit, Tumblr, Twitter, and Facebook.
What a strange thing to say. You're essentially saying that it is never worth trying again what you once failed at. You also make a bizarre assumption that "Magic players only want to buy cards" which is unsupported by any evidence. Your last sentence is also unsubstantiated.
You don't get to use the 'unsubstatiated' card when everything you've been saying is based entirely on your own opinion of the quality of the story. You're welcome to dislike the story, as long as you keep it civil, but I'm also going to call you out when you confuse your subjective opinion with objective fact.
I'm well aware that MTGsalvation is not the be-all and end-all of MTG. However, it is one of the best gauges that we have to determining the popularity of MTG's story, as people who are interested in a story tend to discuss it. This is known as "buzz", and it is used by literary agents, publishers and movie execs to determine the approximate popularity of a given story. It is a much better gauge than your claims of "Lots of people I know like it".
I never claimed that the MTG story was ever good. I know it has always been bad, and Jay, it is not just my opinion. I am basing my appraisal of the MTG story on several technical grounds which we discussed ad nauseam at the start of this year, and which I don't want to get into again. If you still don't get that storytelling isn't completely or even mostly subjective, there's no point in trying to convince you further. You brought up Warhammer, and I'm glad you did, because when you compare Wizards' story management with that of Black Library -- the New York Times bestselling publishing arm of Games Workshop, which I may soon be joining as commissioning editor -- you will hopefully see that there *is* a huge market for well-told game fiction, and so much potential for MTG's story that isn't being tapped into due to poor management.
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No air of superiority intended, and I don't think anyone is an idiot for enjoying a bit of escapist fantasy. Personally, I'm not a very good MTG player -- I play a casual Sultai delver deck about once a month and I'm sure most of you would obliterate me if we ever played a game. That's why I don't post in the Spike threads -- instead I read what more informed people than me have to say, and learn from it.
However, I happen to have a long background in understanding the marketing and mechanics of story, so I figured I'd give my informed opinion in this thread. I'm just trying to make the point that the MTG story could be monumentally better if only it was managed in a more organised way, and a few creative risks were taken, in the vein of Black Library.
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"For the sake of Hasbro's half-year financial report, we will keep watch."
-- The Gatewatch
It seems that the spam filter ate my previous post for reasons I don't understand (I guess referencing one too many other franchises even for comparison's sake triggers it or something?) but I guess I will be more concisethis time around: if you do indeed understand marketing, then you ought to realize this is a moot discussion. "Buzz" is an indirect way of gauging interest, and its got a participation bias. Sure, using it systematically can tell you something about whether people like the story or not, but that's something rather different than just gauging interest. More direct is the traffic to Wizard's website and the story posts (or when they were selling novels, sales data), and I don't think anyone except Wizards and the people they do business with have that data. Morover, they have to do a cost benefit analysis as well, and novels aren't cheap to make. Having some guy in the Creative dept. write something up once a week and accompany it with existing artwork on the other hand is probably incredibly inexpensive and easy to justify. And lastly, this is actually where Magic's story as we know it today started-- with the Weatherlight saga, which was published as serialized fiction in magazines. In some ways, those short stories were incredibly similar to what we are getting today, right down to the ups and downs in writing quality.
It seems that the spam filter ate my previous post for reasons I don't understand (I guess referencing one too many other franchises even for comparison's sake triggers it or something?) but I guess I will be more concisethis time around: if you do indeed understand marketing, then you ought to realize this is a moot discussion. "Buzz" is an indirect way of gauging interest, and its got a participation bias. Sure, using it systematically can tell you something about whether people like the story or not, but that's something rather different than just gauging interest. More direct is the traffic to Wizard's website and the story posts (or when they were selling novels, sales data), and I don't think anyone except Wizards and the people they do business with have that data.
Fervour of story discussion activity on Mtgsalvation, Reddit, Facebook, and elsewhere is the best measure you or I have to determining the popularity of MTG's story. But Wizards' behaviour can also be used. They have decided not to continue publishing novels, and to give away their scraps of story for free. Why do you think this is? Surely, if the MTG story was as popular as you suggest, Wizards would be selling it and by now have accreted a publishing arm to rival Black Library?
Morover, they have to do a cost benefit analysis as well, and novels aren't cheap to make. Having some guy in the Creative dept. write something up once a week and accompany it with existing artwork on the other hand is probably incredibly inexpensive and easy to justify. And lastly, this is actually where Magic's story as we know it today started-- with the Weatherlight saga, which was published as serialized fiction in magazines. In some ways, those short stories were incredibly similar to what we are getting today, right down to the ups and downs in writing quality.
I agree with all that. But again, Black Library. Why isn't Wizards spewing bestselling novels that cover production costs many times over? It's not because there is no market; MTG is just as popular as Warhammer 40,000. The reason Wizards is scared of its own stories is that Wizards has not yet learned how to organise an effective story department. Don't get me wrong, Creative has a lot of talent; I personally think Kelly Digges and Doug Beyer are capable of authentic awesomeness. Khanfall was a well-crafted story from virtually any perspective. And sure, the story team does have many good ideas -- I particularly like the profundity of the aetherborn, forced to embrace life by the shadow of death.
But the way stories are currently created at Wizards is not conducive to seduction. Their block narratives are overplanned and overdeveloped to the point of sterilisation. It doesn't have to be this way. Instead of constraining the story beats within a tight market rubric, forcing cliffhangers to coincide with weekly episodes or quarterly blocks, and characters to live up to brand archetypes or brand values, they should create breathing space between the card game and the wider story, give individual authors room for improvisation, feeling their way organically through the story using their characters as avatars. The flavour should give context to the story, not the other way round. Nissa should be allowed to grow and change, not be condemned to life as a hippy because Wizards wants a face for the colour green.
Wizards needs to learn, as Games Workshop did, that story shouldn't fit the brand -- story *is* the brand.
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Since weekly online magic story articles have started, we have never seen anything like this. Gaps between two sets would be filled by “random” stories from worlds we hadn’t seen for some time, like the one about Kiora on Theros between sets in 2015. Or we might get the yearly “Checking in on the Planeswalkers” article (which we still haven’t gotten this year, BTW). Many people were hoping to during one of the later weeks covered above, but they didn’t get it. So why didn’t creative give us articles like those for our “gap between sets.” I have no idea. But what’s even crazier is that this wasn’t a gap between sets. Commander 2016 was just released, got one “story,” and then was done. The series of character bios we got was completely fine, but for both C14 and C15 we got at least two other articles in addition to the character bios.
So, we have a gap between stories for standard sets and a Commander set just released (which traditionally get stories). What do we expect? Commander stories. What do they give us? Information about Kaladesh that we don’t want and already know, most of it copied and pasted from somewhere else. Very disappointing. I don’t like being so negative but this was an appalling series of terrible decisions. We didn’t get any warning and we probably aren’t going to get an apology. I don’t know if this was caused by the creative team being remarkably lazy or just clueless, probably a combination of both.
What can we, the Vorthos community, the people who care about the story, do about it? Well, we can’t undo what happened, and we probably aren’t going to be able to convince them to write C16 stories now, but we can make sure that something like this never happens again. We need to be vocal about how we feel about this: surprised and disappointed. There were two main problems here: we got old Kaladesh content in place of C16 stories, and we weren’t warned about what was planned (causing us to get our hopes up for nothing). We need to tell WOTC about why we are so upset so that they know not to do it again. If they thought it was OK to do it once, there’s nothing stopping them from doing it again, unless they know that there are negative consequences. Be polite and reasonable, but be honest. It's not about making them feel bad, it's about making them do better. Tell them how we feel about this mess and help improve the quality of Magic’s storyline in the future.
-Chandra Nalaar
Considering Yawgmoth was very much mono-black (well, flavorwise, he probably would have blue and green, but considering every single pre-Mirrodin phyrexian card was black...)
Also, just a reminder that while it has been a very disappointing five weeks, its not like any of us have truly been cheated. We're not exactly paying for any of this- these stories are free and pretty much for the purpose of advertising. So whatever we like or don't like, the fact is they are still paying people money to write stories that they're profiting zero off of. We're not entitled to them, and Wizards doesn't owe us anything, including an apology. So yeah, I'm disappointed too, but the only thing any of us have lost here is the couple of minutes it took to check the mothership on Wednesday morning and see nothing new.
Having said that, yea the past 2 months are an absolute joke. I thought one should always end on a high note, especially at the end of the year. This should culminate in a big bang. And the meh-ness of the last 2 months really sours any work they've done, good or bad. People tend to remember the newer things, so in this case, they sucked big time.
And yes, why you want Yawgmoth? I'm more concerned about the lack of stories/content. Alot of the work thus far has been rehashed. In any case, I wouldn't wanna leave the story of Yawgmoth to this team. Or any of the artifact cycle to them. That's the holy grail of Magic stories.
They can take their rainbows, ponies and aetherpunk to wherever they please but don't ever messed with the Old Ones.
UR Melek, Izzet ParagonUR, B Shirei, Shizo's CaretakerB, R Jaya Ballard, Task MageR,RW Tajic, Blade of the LegionRW, UB Lazav, Dimir MastermindUB, UB Circu, Dimir LobotomistUB, RWU Zedruu the GreatheartedRWU, GUBThe MimeoplasmGUB, UGExperiment Kraj UG, WDarien, King of KjeldorW, BMarrow-GnawerB, WBGKarador, Ghost ChieftainWBG, UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU, GWUDerevi, Empyrial TacticianGWU, RDaretti, Scrap SavantR, UTalrand, Sky SummonerU, GEzuri, Renegade LeaderG, WUBRGReaper KingWUBRG, RGXenagos, God of RevelsRG, CKozilek, Butcher of TruthC, WUBRGGeneral TazriWUBRG, GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
The "geek for geeks" ship has sailed. It's now all about mass consumption, so it needs to be basic and corresponding to commonly anticipated tropes.
I’m not saying that they could have just thrown Yawgmoth’s name on her card, but if they were making a GWUB proliferate commander, why not make it Yawgmoth? If they were going to make a WUBR artifact commander, why not have it be Urza (before planeswalker spark)? Not Atraxa’s or Breya’s exact designs, but same color identities and themes could have worked. Commander sets are one of the few opportunities for dead or otherwise outdated (like non-demon Ob Nixilis) characters to get cards, but they’ve missed a number of obvious opportunities recently (Mizzix instead of Crixizix? Seriously?).
Agreed. The writing quality has improved since BFZ (still room for improvement) but the plot is, for the part, predictable and repetitive. Every block has a Gatewatch member as a main character, a predictable plot twist, the Gatewatch assembling, the threat being defeated, and at least one oath. And maybe some other planeswalkers and legendary creatures besides the Gatewatch and main villains were there too, but who cares about them? BFZ was like this, SOI was like this, and Kaladesh will probably be that way too. That’s why I was looking forward to C16 stories as a break from the repetitive, Gatewatch-centered block stories. But why would we want to learn anything besides info about Kaladesh that we already knew? Honestly, this has ruined any hope and excitement I had left for Aether Revolt’s story.
Agreed. I feel like the latest Commander set was the perfect opportunity to finally make cards for old characters like Urza and Yawgmoth, and they messed it up with their bizarre insistence that all the four-color commanders be brand new characters (except for Kynaios and Tiro, who were kinda sorta existing characters). Urza would've been perfect for WUBR artifacts, Yawgmoth would've been perfect for WUBG and its proliferation theme. I also think Ludevig should've been the UBRG commander, and he should've had abilities that actually make sense for a mad scientist who specializes in creating monsters. Instead he got an underpowered UR card with a bad ability that doesn't fit the character at all, because they inexplicably decided to shoehorn him into the altruism deck even though he's clearly a better fit for chaos. Very disappointing all around.
Also, like everyone else, I'm frustrated that they went five weeks without giving us a new story and didn't even bother to tell us in advance. I was hoping we would at least get stories for some of the new commanders, especially since this set had twice as many as usual.
Having said that, I'm still wondering what happened to Teysa and Tajic after they tried to mess with the Ghost Council.
If my post has no tags, then i posted from my phone.
UR Melek, Izzet ParagonUR, B Shirei, Shizo's CaretakerB, R Jaya Ballard, Task MageR,RW Tajic, Blade of the LegionRW, UB Lazav, Dimir MastermindUB, UB Circu, Dimir LobotomistUB, RWU Zedruu the GreatheartedRWU, GUBThe MimeoplasmGUB, UGExperiment Kraj UG, WDarien, King of KjeldorW, BMarrow-GnawerB, WBGKarador, Ghost ChieftainWBG, UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU, GWUDerevi, Empyrial TacticianGWU, RDaretti, Scrap SavantR, UTalrand, Sky SummonerU, GEzuri, Renegade LeaderG, WUBRGReaper KingWUBRG, RGXenagos, God of RevelsRG, CKozilek, Butcher of TruthC, WUBRGGeneral TazriWUBRG, GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
RGTron
UGInfect
URStorm
WUBRAd Nauseam
BRGrishoalbrand
URGScapeshift
WBGAbzan Company
WUBRGAmulet Titan
BRGLiving End
WGBogles
Tomorrow!
The stories resume tomorrow!
Its only 12 hours awayyyyyyy!
Seriously. Just aren't seriously going to let that cliffhanger linger till Ravnica 3 are they?
"I hope to have such a death... lying in triumph atop the broken bodies of those who slew me..."
I hope not!
If my post has no tags, then i posted from my phone.
Instead of writing long pieces filled with the Power Rangers winking at each other and saying cringeworthy stuff like "Right on!" and "get real!" (before defeating the greatest threats in the multiverse in the most laughably nonsensical ways), Creative should hire sharper writers and have them focus solely on the flavour text on cards, creating subtle hints of a story that gives enough leeway for people to piece together into their very own story, which will inevitably be much richer and more coherent than any "prose" from the Wizards hacks.
Alternatively, if Wizards are intent on reaching a mass market, they should abandon this "free story" crap, hire quality tie-in fiction writers like Dan Abnett, and have them craft an elaborate and well-planned novel cycle, sold for profit. Although I find the MTG story embarrassingly awful in general, the shameless nerd in me would pay good money for a mature Game of Thrones-esque novel about the power struggles between the various Khans of Tarkir -- especially if it involves a secret alliance between the Sultai Brood and House Dimir...
-- The Gatewatch
So... do what they were unsuccessful at for 20 years again? Look, magic players only want to buy Magic cards. If they switched back to for-pay novels, the storyline interest would drop significantly.
And seriously, what are you even doing here? If you find the story so awful, why do you have an account basically only to talk about it? I'm not saying the story is perfect, but not everything has to be a fantasy epic. I can see Warhammer players, who'd have to have money to spare, buying novels, but Magic players? The reality is the story is better known and more popular than ever thanks to the free online articles. And it's been pretty steadily improving in overall quality.
TerribleBad at Magic since 1998.A Vorthos Guide to Magic Story | Twitter | Tumblr
[Primer] Krenko | Azor | Kess | Zacama | Kumena | Sram | The Ur-Dragon | Edgar Markov | Daretti | Marath
I'm basing my numbers on the number of people who view and post in the story subforum, relative to the forum in general. The Magic story threads may be the most trafficked ever, but that's only because the player base is at its largest ever.
What a strange thing to say. You're essentially saying that it is never worth trying again what you once failed at. You also make a bizarre assumption that "Magic players only want to buy cards" which is unsupported by any evidence. Your last sentence is also unsubstantiated.
What a welcoming mod you are. I post here because I want the MTG story to be good, but feel it falls seriously short. If you have a problem with that, ban me.
Another puzzling statement. Why would Warhammer players have money to be spare where MTG players wouldn't? Both hobbies are arm-amputatingly expensive, with a primary demographic of middle-class professionals with disposable income.
This is an unsubstantiated claim that doesn't really require a response.
-- The Gatewatch
If that's your evidence, then you have made several fundamental errors in reasoning. First, not everyone who reads this subforum posts-- some people lurk, as I do. In fact, I only created an account here to talk about the story every so often when I feel I have something to say, which is infrequent-- and indeed, that's your second error. Not everyone who reads feels like they have something worthwhile to say around here or on other websites. Thirdly, this website cannot possibly represent the entire Magic Community, including the parts of the community that reads the official story posts (or owns the old books). The only people who know the exact numbers on that are WotC, but lots of people have noted an increased interest in the lore and story of Magic ever since Origins was released, not just Jay13x.
Look, I loved the era of the Magic novels, but they weren't all great by any means. They were written by mercenary novelists just like other franchise novels, and with that comes a tendency for cliche or phoning it in for a paycheck. This isn't a slam against mercenary novelists, as many of them are VERY experienced in their craft, but its a fact that you need to be motivated to want to write quality fiction for someone else's franchise. ANd there is nothing inherently wrong with a serialized online format either, as attested to by many webcomic artists and so forth. The only problem is adjusting to the difference between that format and a novel, as well as just getting good at the craft in general, which I think some of the writers at WotC need to improve at. Otherwise, if WotC didn't see enough of a profit margin in novels, its unsurprising that they would be reluctant to go back to that format when the serialized format does better at advertising the product they really care about-- the cards.
You don't get to use the 'unsubstatiated' card when everything you've been saying is based entirely on your own opinion of the quality of the story. You're welcome to dislike the story, as long as you keep it civil, but I'm also going to call you out when you confuse your subjective opinion with objective fact.
TerribleBad at Magic since 1998.A Vorthos Guide to Magic Story | Twitter | Tumblr
[Primer] Krenko | Azor | Kess | Zacama | Kumena | Sram | The Ur-Dragon | Edgar Markov | Daretti | Marath
I'm well aware that MTGsalvation is not the be-all and end-all of MTG. However, it is one of the best gauges that we have to determining the popularity of MTG's story, as people who are interested in a story tend to discuss it. This is known as "buzz", and it is used by literary agents, publishers and movie execs to determine the approximate popularity of a given story. It is a much better gauge than your claims of "Lots of people I know like it".
I never claimed that the MTG story was ever good. I know it has always been bad, and Jay, it is not just my opinion. I am basing my appraisal of the MTG story on several technical grounds which we discussed ad nauseam at the start of this year, and which I don't want to get into again. If you still don't get that storytelling isn't completely or even mostly subjective, there's no point in trying to convince you further. You brought up Warhammer, and I'm glad you did, because when you compare Wizards' story management with that of Black Library -- the New York Times bestselling publishing arm of Games Workshop, which I may soon be joining as commissioning editor -- you will hopefully see that there *is* a huge market for well-told game fiction, and so much potential for MTG's story that isn't being tapped into due to poor management.
-- The Gatewatch
Nothing like being treated like an idiot for liking a bit of free to read escapist fantasy every Wednesday morning.
No air of superiority intended, and I don't think anyone is an idiot for enjoying a bit of escapist fantasy. Personally, I'm not a very good MTG player -- I play a casual Sultai delver deck about once a month and I'm sure most of you would obliterate me if we ever played a game. That's why I don't post in the Spike threads -- instead I read what more informed people than me have to say, and learn from it.
However, I happen to have a long background in understanding the marketing and mechanics of story, so I figured I'd give my informed opinion in this thread. I'm just trying to make the point that the MTG story could be monumentally better if only it was managed in a more organised way, and a few creative risks were taken, in the vein of Black Library.
-- The Gatewatch
Fervour of story discussion activity on Mtgsalvation, Reddit, Facebook, and elsewhere is the best measure you or I have to determining the popularity of MTG's story. But Wizards' behaviour can also be used. They have decided not to continue publishing novels, and to give away their scraps of story for free. Why do you think this is? Surely, if the MTG story was as popular as you suggest, Wizards would be selling it and by now have accreted a publishing arm to rival Black Library?
I agree with all that. But again, Black Library. Why isn't Wizards spewing bestselling novels that cover production costs many times over? It's not because there is no market; MTG is just as popular as Warhammer 40,000. The reason Wizards is scared of its own stories is that Wizards has not yet learned how to organise an effective story department. Don't get me wrong, Creative has a lot of talent; I personally think Kelly Digges and Doug Beyer are capable of authentic awesomeness. Khanfall was a well-crafted story from virtually any perspective. And sure, the story team does have many good ideas -- I particularly like the profundity of the aetherborn, forced to embrace life by the shadow of death.
But the way stories are currently created at Wizards is not conducive to seduction. Their block narratives are overplanned and overdeveloped to the point of sterilisation. It doesn't have to be this way. Instead of constraining the story beats within a tight market rubric, forcing cliffhangers to coincide with weekly episodes or quarterly blocks, and characters to live up to brand archetypes or brand values, they should create breathing space between the card game and the wider story, give individual authors room for improvisation, feeling their way organically through the story using their characters as avatars. The flavour should give context to the story, not the other way round. Nissa should be allowed to grow and change, not be condemned to life as a hippy because Wizards wants a face for the colour green.
Wizards needs to learn, as Games Workshop did, that story shouldn't fit the brand -- story *is* the brand.
-- The Gatewatch