One of the main problems of the Gatewatch has always been that it centers around Jace, a character who is already incredibly polarizing. Most opinions on Jace are either "I HATE HIM", "he's pretty awesome", or "I don't get why everybody hates him". It probably would have been wise to leave him out of their number, and have him pop up at points. But it's too late for that.
So far, the biggest problem with the Gatewatch is the classic "the good guys win, and the bad guys lose" paradigm. This certainly has no place in Magic. Perhaps they're setting up for the Gatewatch to have a catastrophic failure after beating the Eldrazi at every turn without losing a single member (or even getting mutilated). This is what I'm hoping for. If they all die except maybe one or two of them in Amonkhet, that would be pretty good writing, and would shake up some expectations. If the good guys keep going along without deaths and mutilations, that is mediocre writing at its mediocre-est.
As it stands, I'm a lot more interested in the side stories than the Gatewatch stories. Why would I care about the good guys who always win?
The dominant opinion, at least here seems to be "Threading the story together more clearly is generally a positive shift, but I don't really like the specific characters in the Gatewatch." That's more or less how I feel as well, and I think that could be solved with a few deaths, and new characters.
I have to agree with essentially all you're saying here. My huge thing with the Gatewatch is that in the multiverse of Magic, has villains and heroes alike, and people who wouldn't fit into either of those categories at all, and overall makes the overall story of everything happening seem so much more real. In reality, people aren't good, or evil. People have good attributes and bad ones, and people have motives behind almost everything they do. Liliana is a great example (and one of my favourite PW's). She started out just trying to save her brothers life, and ended up making a deal with demons that she's finding a hard time trying to defeat. She obviously has feelings for Jace, but feels she can't act upon them for so many various reasons. THAT is good storytelling. What isn't, is "good guys come, defeat bad guys, all is well". That'll get repetitive really fast. I really do hope stuff goes insane on Amonkhet, and everyone realizes how big of a threat Bolas can be, and how threats like that are rampant throughout the multiverse.
Also, on the topic of hating the main PW's in the Gatewatch, it isn't even that I hate most of them. Nissa is a super interesting character and she's grown a lot throughout the recent stories. She went from a straight up racist, to someone who realizes she needs to stand up for everyone in order to help her and her close ones (if that makes sense). Liliana I love, as said, Ajani is pretty token good guy but he isn't uninteresting, Gideon has a perfect example of "greek hero" as someone had said.
I dunno, I really hope they don't continue the good guys vs. bad guys thing
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The fact that he is supposed to be a player analogue is the worst part. I don't see anything remotely similar about him and myself. He's just some guy with psychic powers he did not earn, with no initiative and no passion for what he does. He's also a smarmy jerk and acknowledges as much when trapped in his own mind by Emrakul. He got the highest position in all of Ravinca and not only does nothing with that, he takes every excuse to leave the place (again, the place he considers his true home) and his responsibilities behind him in favor of traipsing about pretending to be the hero of the story. Sooner or later, if the story was more grounded and consequences mattered more, he would eventually prove Tamyio correct about heroes being mere tragedies waiting to happen. I find him no more enjoyable to read about than watching Tidus from Final Fantasy X claiming to be the main protagonist when for better or for worse that's actually Yuna's role in the game. The only good thing is that Jace does less whining.
That's exactly why he is so popular. He is the generic young adult novel/Light novel protagonist in a nutshell. A handsome and inteligent, yet strangely isolated teen. Cheap victimizing backstory, trying to make him sympathetic. Passive with no real motivations. Suddenly discoveres new powers/that he is the chosen one. Goes on adventures saving the world from evil, because he is just so goddamn special. Notice how the poster above says ''charming Harry Potter vibe''. Jace was made to be HP, a generic protagonist in these kinds of stories. I agree when someone earlier said you either love him or hate him. And as someone who dislikes Harry Potter, the character and the book series, I also dislike Jace.
OT: I don't like the GW. Not that I dislike the concept. But what we have in our story is not a natural development, but the guys at wizards deciding this would be cool and popular. I don't think the original 5 are characters which would team up for such a thing. Much less care about the whole multiverse. And yet when you read Jace's oath flavortext it says he cares precisely about that. Since when? Also lol at Lilianas oath. ''Happy now?''. This is bad. Just so so bad. What I wanted to say is that (like always) it all depends on the execution. And wotc failed miserably.
The fact that he is supposed to be a player analogue is the worst part. I don't see anything remotely similar about him and myself. He's just some guy with psychic powers he did not earn, with no initiative and no passion for what he does. He's also a smarmy jerk and acknowledges as much when trapped in his own mind by Emrakul. He got the highest position in all of Ravinca and not only does nothing with that, he takes every excuse to leave the place (again, the place he considers his true home) and his responsibilities behind him in favor of traipsing about pretending to be the hero of the story. Sooner or later, if the story was more grounded and consequences mattered more, he would eventually prove Tamyio correct about heroes being mere tragedies waiting to happen. I find him no more enjoyable to read about than watching Tidus from Final Fantasy X claiming to be the main protagonist when for better or for worse that's actually Yuna's role in the game. The only good thing is that Jace does less whining.
That's exactly why he is so popular. He is the generic young adult novel/Light novel protagonist in a nutshell. A handsome and inteligent, yet strangely isolated teen. Cheap victimizing backstory, trying to make him sympathetic. Passive with no real motivations. Suddenly discoveres new powers/that he is the chosen one. Goes on adventures saving the world from evil, because he is just so goddamn special. Notice how the poster above says ''charming Harry Potter vibe''. Jace was made to be HP, a generic protagonist in these kinds of stories. I agree when someone earlier said you either love him or hate him. And as someone who dislikes Harry Potter, the character and the book series, I also dislike Jace.
OT: I don't like the GW. Not that I dislike the concept. But what we have in our story is not a natural development, but the guys at wizards deciding this would be cool and popular. I don't think the original 5 are characters which would team up for such a thing. Much less care about the whole multiverse. And yet when you read Jace's oath flavortext it says he cares precisely about that. Since when? Also lol at Lilianas oath. ''Happy now?''. This is bad. Just so so bad. What I wanted to say is that (like always) it all depends on the execution. And wotc failed miserably.
He isn't strangely isolated, he is clearly socially inept. He can read minds, but he doesn't understand them. He has some motivations, he is obsessive about solving mysteries and problems. Often at the expense of others. He used to ignore the consequences of his actions: Eldrazi, Infinite Consortium, etc. Now he is a lot about taking responsibility for his actions, yet is still blinded by this obsession to the growing powder keg that is Ravnica. He is incapable of physical combat and barely survived a couple of werewolves. There is very little that is "special" about him compared to any other Planeswalker.
Can't say I'm a fan. Not because it's a super group, or the characters picked (these will both be trope and market research driven) but...because I don't really have investment in a meta story in MTG and I'm not sure if there is one, or that I want one.
I don't want to be Jace, or Ashiok, I wanted as a kid to be the main character in my story. I wasn't casting Jace's spells, he didn't exist!
I wasn't fighting in the shadow of the Gatewatch, I was bending a multiverse to my whims and fighting other mages (or my brother...)
That's my issue with it, it makes the game universe smaller.
I hate the Gatewatch. Like AlabasterLight said it's much lass likelier to have one of its members killed the longer they keep being the protagonists of nearly all stories. The story will lose a lot of suspence until there will be an event like in Marvel's Civil war or members start dieing.
By the way I was so disappointed after wednesday's story for Chandra not killing herself. Until the end the story seemed so good :(.
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I apologize for my English, it's not my main language.
I hate the group. I like Chandra, but hate the group. They have so much plot armor they can't move and it's very much a Superman deal, enough plot power to be boring.
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In order to make a storyline work, main characters are necessary. Urza/Karn was the main character of the original story, so I would prefer to see them again, but I've always wanted the storytelling to be less... pointless, so I think the Gatewatch is a success. They could have chosen way better planeswalkers, but they had to choose something.
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After a supposed promise of a more concise story and the Origins Retcon, I SORT OF HOPED SOMETHING FOR THEM.
After Jace continually plastered his BLAH arse on almost every set and the the "Main Walker" roles never get shook too largely, I GOT TIRED ON HOPING AND WENT ON LOOKING ON OTHER SHALLOW THINGS TO LIKE ABOUT THEM.
Now, if 15 years from now Jace is still around largely with the group and is still moonlighting as "The Guildpact" (he should really just give it to Lavinia, who cares more for Ravnica than he does me thinks) I don't even know.
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While I have a problem with the Gatewatch, it isn't a problem that most people seem to have with it. If anything, it is far simpler.
I don't like serial storytelling. I like stories with a clear beginning, middle, and defined end point. While MTG does include references to prior events and a few mechanations here and there, the actual "storyline" is only a few steps stronger than the old Justice Friends cartoon. Blocks feel disconnected and my mind demands progress towards discrete goals in place of simple character development.
The goals of gatewatch members are generally left very open-ended. In fact, just about everyone's goals are left open-ended. Jace wants to discover his past. Garruk wants to kill all planeswalkers. Nicol Bolas wants power. Phyrexians want to spread their metallic perfection through the planes. I have problems finding a single recurring character with a definite, discrete long-term goal that seems realistic.
I want someone who wants to meet with his long-lost brother. Someone who wants to kill a specific nemesis. Someone who wants a specific Macguffin. Anything like that. I used to like Garruk because "Find Liliana and make her remove her curse" was the type of goal I could get behind. Even if it would take a while, I knew what he wanted in specific terms.
But yeah, hard to do continuous stories like that. I can understand why they are doing this. Even so, I'm not a fan.
I dislike the Gatewatch for many reasons already stated, but unlike others, I have a big issue with the core concept. The SOI storyline did such a good job exemplifying exactly what my problem is, so I'll use it as an example.
So before Eldritch Moon, many people asked about Tamiyo. And afterwards, they asked "Why Bant". The answer given was "Colour balance - Jace was the protagonist, so he needed to be there. Nahiri was the big villain, so she needed to be there. Sorin and Liliana were major characters, so they needed to be there. Arlinn had to be there for colour balance reasons." My question here is - why did Jace need to be there? And this isn't even mindless Jace bashing, this is a legitimate question I have. What purpose did Jace serve in the story? You could easily snip Jace (and by extension, the Gatewatch) out of that story entirely and still tell the story perfectly well. But because they needed to push the Gatewatch, they just had to cram Jace in there, screwing over other potential characters in the process.
"But a cosmic horror story needs a core detective! That's the role Jace filled!"
My answer to this is, it didn't have to be Jace. In fact, it shouldn't have been Jace. It should have been someone with a real connection to Innistrad. If the main "detective" character of the story was, say, Sorin, Thalia, Arlinn, or some other denizen of Innistrad, then there would have been real purpose behind the whole thing. They would have to get to the bottom of what was going on. They would have to solve the mystery, because everything is at stake for them. If they fail, they lose everything. Their home, their family and friends, everything they know and love. Even if it was a planeswalker who could go to another plane to escape, losing their entire home world would be a huge deal to them. Jace, on the other hand, could just fart off back to Ravnica and who would care? He would lose nothing. He had no stakes. Nothing was on the line for him. Jace had no reason to be invested (beside this ham-fisted "I'm the hero now!" mentality), which made it all but impossible for me to get invested in anything he was doing.
And that's the core issue I have with the Gatewatch as a concept. They shove out characters and ideas that have more potential. Jace shoved out Tamiyo mechanically because he apparently "had" to be the blue walker of the block, and he shoved out other characters story-wise because he "had" to be the main character because Gatewatch. I'm not interested in these jerks who jaunt all around the Multiverse solving people's problems because "Oh, we're the only ones who can!". I'm interested in the people of the planes, the ones who actually have the problems. I'm interested in seeing those people figure out and solve their own problems, not leave it up to these buttheads. I had the same issue in BFZ block - who cares about the struggles of the Zendikari people when these four randos can just waltz in, effortlessly annihilate two of the most powerful beings in the multiverse, and peace out? My problem with the concept of the Gatewatch is that they trivialise the problems of the actual people of the plane.
Of course, I have problems with the execution as well, but a bunch of people have already gone over those so I won't bother repeating them.
"But a cosmic horror story needs a core detective! That's the role Jace filled!"
My answer to this is, it didn't have to be Jace. In fact, it shouldn't have been Jace. It should have been someone with a real connection to Innistrad. If the main "detective" character of the story was, say, Sorin, Thalia, Arlinn, or some other denizen of Innistrad, then there would have been real purpose behind the whole thing.
I seem to recall a certain astronomer working with Tamiyo on researching Innistrad's moon. You know, the object which ended up sealing Emrakul. I can't quite recall.
Jenrik was killed off and left cardless because Jace took his role. I like Jace and I did feel a telepath was perfect to be the lead investigating protagonist. SOI/EMN had a good story IMO and was handled well. I can see both sides though. I mean let's be honest, Tamiyo was the best aspect of that. But she was given a respectable, balanced role without overexposing her. The fact she had to be Bant bothered me too - but that's a game logistics issue. I think overall SOI/EMN was fair enough.
I have mixed feelings in that the Gatewatch stories take up room otherwise used for flavor stories which don't advance the plot, but are pretty critical to setting a plane's tone. While I feel these stories are pointless overall, sometimes we get gems like Emonberry Red, or the ending to The Sea God's Labyrinth. I enjoyed those, although frankly, they didn't advance any plot (they're nice to have during lull periods like we had recently rather than getting no story). But the Gatewatch stories taking up that room is welcome IMO, because it's consistency and they ARE an interesting group of individuals which are capable of making a difference.
I do expect Amonkhet to be their first loss though. Charging headstrong into Bolas's lair. Yep. And I expect them each to planeswalk individually somewhere else, and have an after-story of them all reflecting on their own broken spirit before regrouping.
I hate it because it is the equivalent of the avengers, which they just completely ripped the idea from marvel only instead of the cool individuals in the avengers you have a bunch of blandness. I hate jace showing up every damn time. It also feels like they will never ever lose a big fight, which is horrible storytelling in my eyes because if the gatewatch never loses the story never really progresses from 'oh we went to a plane, dealt with the bad guy(s), and then celebrated our victory afterwards.' More than anything I wish some member of the gatewatch would die for the sake of story progression characters have to die or change drastically so we don't keep getting the same rehashed bull***** over and over.
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Conceptually, as others said, I'm not opposed to it. The execution is lacking is all. There is nothing wrong with a core group of heroes, it's just that the heroes they chose are immensely boring to me. Granted they said as much, they wanted characters who represent the "core" of the colors of Magic, it's just that those aren't terribly exciting. Doesn't help that the Planeswalkers I do like are almost assuredly going to be relegated to the sidelines.
I have to say, a lot of the issues we seem to have with the Gatewatch seem to be being addressed in this current block..
Don't like how the Gatewatch members never lose? Baral just beat the s*** out of Chandra and would've killed her if Nissa and Dovin Baan hadn't impeded him.
Don't like how it's always good vs evil? The consulate is a pretty grey antagonist. Sure Tezzeret and Kambal are scumbags but the Consulate as a whole seems to just genuinely want to maintain the peace. Padeem, Sram, and Dovin could probably be considered good guys, if misled, and the fact the Gatewatch is working with Gonti doesn't exactly put them on the side of the angels.
Don't like how the gatewatch members are one dimensional? We've had some very fleshed out and interesting stories for Gideon and Chandra lately, and Jace got a nice look at himself while speaking with Emrakul that I thought made him more interesting.
I definitely still have my concerns, but for something that's only been around for less than 3 blocks the story telling and plot for the Gatewatch has improved dramatically by block, BFZ story was doodoo, but we should admit that SOI and KLD have both been pretty good.
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My Decks:
UG Merfolk RG 8-Whack BWG Abzan midrange GRB Living End UWB Spirit Control
GU Kruphix's "Hug Assassin" RW Kalemne's "Play Fatties and Hope for the Best!" BUGW Atraxa's "All counters, all the time"
I have to say, a lot of the issues we seem to have with the Gatewatch seem to be being addressed in this current block..
Don't like how the Gatewatch members never lose? Baral just beat the s*** out of Chandra and would've killed her if Nissa and Dovin Baan hadn't impeded him.
A suspenseful moment is not the same thing as a loss. What you're describing is pretty much like the Morpheus torture scene in The Matrix. We know that the main characters will escape from something like that. When people talk about a "loss", they (in my experience) mean that the protagonists suffer something permanent, or near enough to it. It doesn't have to be death, but it should affect them deeply, and influence their actions from that moment on. Maybe one or more members gets permanently scarred. Maybe they discover something that calls their entire life into question. Maybe they have to make a deal with a monster. Maybe they have to break the world in order to save it.
Thus far, they've managed to defeat and/or contain every block-scale antagonist they've come across, and their victories have come at little cost to them.
Don't like how it's always good vs evil? The consulate is a pretty grey antagonist. Sure Tezzeret and Kambal are scumbags but the Consulate as a whole seems to just genuinely want to maintain the peace. Padeem, Sram, and Dovin could probably be considered good guys, if misled, and the fact the Gatewatch is working with Gonti doesn't exactly put them on the side of the angels.
Again, not true. The Consulate is a fairly typical dictatorship. It's not out for peace, but order. Every action they're taking is to ensure that their order is run smoothly and efficiently. Independent thought is discouraged, and disobedience punished. The Consulate controls the so-called means of production. There's a thriving black market. Seems like a dictatorship to me.
I definitely still have my concerns, but for something that's only been around for less than 3 blocks the story telling and plot for the Gatewatch has improved dramatically by block, BFZ story was doodoo, but we should admit that SOI and KLD have both been pretty good.
Shadows over Innistrad was good in spite of the Gatewatch. The best parts of SOI's story involved Sorin, Nahiri, Avacyn, Arlinn, Odric and Thalia, Gisa and Geralf...
It's occurred to me over the past year that the people behind the story are intentionally keeping the five main characters shallow in order to maintain the status quo and keep things moving along. Other characters are allowed to develop and change, because we're not seeing so much of them. The main five remain relatively static so that new writers won't have to reconcile a lot of continuity in order to write them.
The Consulate is no typical dictatorship. It is more of an Oligarchy akin to the Roman Republic. The problem is that Tezzeret has hijacked it for his own ends.
How is independent thought discouraged? They hold a fair specifically to showcase new ideas and fund inventors. They control Aether because it is frankly dangerous, and very valuable. There is also a black market in any society that has anything regulated.
Especially with the Eldrazi that was just turning into a joke.
As the group could simply beat these "unstoppable" forces completly hurts the game story for the forseeable future , as no threat will actually matter, as they dont lose anything of meaning, nobody that "matters" dies, and they just defeat all opponents.
That is terrible and boring.
If at least the Eldrazi would simply annihilate Zendikar completly and the Gatewatch just "rescued" a bunch of survivors , that would be satisfying, as we would at least have a major opponent and a threat that is real.
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The characters themselfs were totally fine in Origin. The small set featured backstory for each walker and it fine to have 1 walker in some form of story involved that fits the plane they are on.
It becomes terrible boring if you always have ALL of them running around and without any real threat remaining, theres still story arcs that exist and currently are just ignored (Phyrexia, Ajani pops up and Elspeth story line etc. etc.).
I like that they have at least some "evil" planeswalkers that can be a threat, but i will totally be angry if they just "beat" Nicol Bolas in his set , that will be terrible.
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Phyrexia felt like a threat because they FAILED to save Mirrodin, that was what made it feel like a real force. They still got Karn back, which is a major plus, but the plane is still lost at this point and should stay so.
Phyrexia invading Ravnica and turning all of it would be great. But here again, the current powerlevel of the gatewatch would just make it not feel like a threat, if they can beat the invasion in just the matter of 1 small set.
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As it is, story lost a lot of its appeal as theres no real enemies that feel like they can be a real threat , and that former "evil" planeswalkers like Liliana join the gatewatch is also more annoying (as it eliminates just another potential enemie and makes the gatewatch stronger than it has to be).
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The best story lines are made by sacrifice, loses, failure and struggle.
Even the main characters have to be in danger to "potentially" dying, even a planeswalker should fear the opponent, and not just wander in and beat them in a matter of small magic tricks.
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The storyline about Sorin and Nahiri felt good, they both could die, both had loses and both had to struggle.
Would be overall more interesting if they do not bring the full gatewatch team in every set to clean up whatever happened.
I don't know..I never really worry about Spider-man dying when I read a spider-man comic but I still enjoy them
@Mercury01 To reply to your points
1) I definitely see what you mean, a beatdown isn't the same as a fatality, but Baral got Chandra to seriously consider killing herself. Idk if that will be given any attention later in the story but being nearly talked into suicide seems like something that could have a pretty deep and long lasting effect.
2)I would agree with @Phantom_king_Radix that the consulate isn't truly a dictatorship and wasn't truly oppressive pre-Tezzeret. I would also add that in the mtg universe dictatorships and monarchies are just kind of the general form of governance, and within the context of mtg shouldn't be considered evil because of that. Have we ever seen any democracies in MTG? I think even in Meletis the leadership was appointed. Sure the Consulate had bad parts (Baral and Kambal) but if a few racist police officers and corrupt politicians mean the whole system is evil than I think every government ever is squarely in that category.
3) I thought most of the Jace investigation stories in SOI were pretty cool, especially the ones with Tamiyo, but that's just me
Anyway I'm mostly playing Devil's advocate, like I said I don't feel the GW is the best thing to ever happen in MTG story telling, but I do think we've seen an exponential improvement in the Gatewatch stories in a very short time.
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My Decks:
UG Merfolk RG 8-Whack BWG Abzan midrange GRB Living End UWB Spirit Control
GU Kruphix's "Hug Assassin" RW Kalemne's "Play Fatties and Hope for the Best!" BUGW Atraxa's "All counters, all the time"
This has probably already been said, but I think the Gatewatch would be enjoyable if the characters were much more fleshed out than they are. The reason why The Avengers are so popular is that the writers give the characters time to breathe and develop. Magic's story eschews this, going mostly from story setup straight to fighting. Although I will give them credit where its due, they have been giving a couple GW members more dimensions of late, specifically Chandra and Gideon, who were the two flattest chracters going into Kaladesh imo.
How is independent thought discouraged? They hold a fair specifically to showcase new ideas and fund inventors.
I'm talking about dissenting opinions. Criticism. A dictatorship does not preclude innovation, especially the kind of innovation that serves the needs of the dictatorship. Some of the greatest leaps in technology of the last century were created in dictatorial regimes.
While I'm not saying that Gatewatch members should die, WotC has kind of written themselves into a corner when it comes to creating "fail-states".
Depending on their mission, a typical hero can "fail" in a number of ways without dying. They can be horribly injured. They can fail to guard a person or city. They can fight on the losing side of a war. These small victories can create lasting adversity without large-scale ruin being involved.
In MTG, however, these small failures don't work. The design of blocks forces us to shift planes every other set. If a failure isn't definitive and final, it is hard to explain why planeswalkers don't head back and try again. If Jace was knocked into a psychic coma at a block's conclusion, for example, the story can't let him wake up until 1)his target has moved to another plane or 2)we are ready to return to the first plane. Otherwise, what would stop the Gatewatch from just trying again? Eldrazi destroying a plane? Phyrexians converting it? A giant spell cutting off a plane from the multiverse?
Considering the scope of the conflicts the gatewatch engage in, you have to break out some multiversal threat (or death) for "failure" to make sense.
Honestly, I'm in the camp that expects the confrontation with Bolas to the the Gatewatch's first failure. With that said, the story will have to bend over backwards to keep them from coming right back and trying new tactics. Personally, I'm betting that they'll be scattered across the planes and have their sparks temporarily fizzle. Maybe one death of a two-colored walker (*cough*Ajani*cough*) to go with all of that.
So... yeah. It feels like Wizards is trying to marry Superhero dynamics to the epic scale of multiverse conflicts... which doesn't jive too well with me.
How is independent thought discouraged? They hold a fair specifically to showcase new ideas and fund inventors.
I'm talking about dissenting opinions. Criticism. A dictatorship does not preclude innovation, especially the kind of innovation that serves the needs of the dictatorship. Some of the greatest leaps in technology of the last century were created in dictatorial regimes.
Example of stamping out dissenting opinions? And enforcing the law against Aether smuggling doesnt really count. We have seen very little evidence of the Consulate being sinister except for Tezzeret and Baral's actions.
Looking at the characters in terms of their likelihood of death:
The Red Ranger perfectly embodies the function of red burn, as well as the flavor of the pyromancer. The other red walkers have been kept consciously out of her mechanical turf, so if she died, there would be no clear replacement, which may be just fine, since Chandra cards are often too simple to be all that good. Still, Chandra is a popular character, partly because her personality and powers come through easily on the cards without any deeper understanding. You don't have to read the stories to get what Chandra's about, and that is appealing to players. Death: highly unlikely.
The Green Ranger is not really anybody's favorite, and was elevated after being a minor planeswalker. She's been instrumental in both of the team's major victories, but mechanically, she borrows a lot from previous green planeswalkers, and fails to really carve out any part of green's color pie as clearly her own since abandoning her tribal roots. However, if she was killed, new green walkers would definitely be needed, since Garruk is in time out. Death: possible.
The Black Ranger could definitely die, but if she does, it would be wrong to not have it be at the hands of her own demons. Faust never gets to live forever. Still, I doubt she'll die for the Gatewatch. She'd gladly abandon the others to save her own skin, so it seems likely enough she'll survive whatever big battle. Death: likely, but probably not in service of the Gatewatch.
The Blue Ranger is Jace. Jace is Jace. Killing him off would make a lot of people happy, and I am optimistic that someday they will have the guts to kill him, but that day is not today. They'll give it a while longer before they kill the golden goose. Jace would ironically be one of the easiest to replace mechanically, since his main claim to fame is drawing cards, which is something tons of other planeswalkers also do, and there are a few decent blue planeswalkers that could already replace him mechanically in mono blue iterations (such as Tamiyo and Narset). Death: highly unlikely.
The White Ranger would sacrifice himself any old time to save the day. Seriously, this dude loves fighting lost causes. Not only that, but he is mechanically super replaceable. His main gimmick is turning into a creature, but that was never what made him good. He's only good when he has decent white goodstuff abilities, which could go on any white walker. Since Elspeth is currently dead, Ajani is also in the Gatewatch, and Nahiri has a very different skillset, there may not be an obvious replacement for him now, but one would be easy to find. Death: likely.
The Yellow Ranger is different at least in that he doesn't just look like a human. He is definitely the odd one right now, but there has been a new member added to the team in the second set of both blocks since the gatewatch's creation, so it wouldn't surprise me if that trend persisted, making him seem less superfluous. Since Ajani has three full colors in his color identity, they don't have to replace him mechanically if they kill him off: RW, GW, and GR are none of them due for a new planeswalker for a long time, and none of those would have to be Ajani. I could see Gideon dying, and Ajani replacing him as the core white planeswalker. As the newest member, I think he will at least live through Amonkhet block. Death: somewhat likely.
I have to agree with essentially all you're saying here. My huge thing with the Gatewatch is that in the multiverse of Magic, has villains and heroes alike, and people who wouldn't fit into either of those categories at all, and overall makes the overall story of everything happening seem so much more real. In reality, people aren't good, or evil. People have good attributes and bad ones, and people have motives behind almost everything they do. Liliana is a great example (and one of my favourite PW's). She started out just trying to save her brothers life, and ended up making a deal with demons that she's finding a hard time trying to defeat. She obviously has feelings for Jace, but feels she can't act upon them for so many various reasons. THAT is good storytelling. What isn't, is "good guys come, defeat bad guys, all is well". That'll get repetitive really fast. I really do hope stuff goes insane on Amonkhet, and everyone realizes how big of a threat Bolas can be, and how threats like that are rampant throughout the multiverse.
Also, on the topic of hating the main PW's in the Gatewatch, it isn't even that I hate most of them. Nissa is a super interesting character and she's grown a lot throughout the recent stories. She went from a straight up racist, to someone who realizes she needs to stand up for everyone in order to help her and her close ones (if that makes sense). Liliana I love, as said, Ajani is pretty token good guy but he isn't uninteresting, Gideon has a perfect example of "greek hero" as someone had said.
I dunno, I really hope they don't continue the good guys vs. bad guys thing
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That's exactly why he is so popular. He is the generic young adult novel/Light novel protagonist in a nutshell. A handsome and inteligent, yet strangely isolated teen. Cheap victimizing backstory, trying to make him sympathetic. Passive with no real motivations. Suddenly discoveres new powers/that he is the chosen one. Goes on adventures saving the world from evil, because he is just so goddamn special. Notice how the poster above says ''charming Harry Potter vibe''. Jace was made to be HP, a generic protagonist in these kinds of stories. I agree when someone earlier said you either love him or hate him. And as someone who dislikes Harry Potter, the character and the book series, I also dislike Jace.
OT: I don't like the GW. Not that I dislike the concept. But what we have in our story is not a natural development, but the guys at wizards deciding this would be cool and popular. I don't think the original 5 are characters which would team up for such a thing. Much less care about the whole multiverse. And yet when you read Jace's oath flavortext it says he cares precisely about that. Since when? Also lol at Lilianas oath. ''Happy now?''. This is bad. Just so so bad. What I wanted to say is that (like always) it all depends on the execution. And wotc failed miserably.
He isn't strangely isolated, he is clearly socially inept. He can read minds, but he doesn't understand them. He has some motivations, he is obsessive about solving mysteries and problems. Often at the expense of others. He used to ignore the consequences of his actions: Eldrazi, Infinite Consortium, etc. Now he is a lot about taking responsibility for his actions, yet is still blinded by this obsession to the growing powder keg that is Ravnica. He is incapable of physical combat and barely survived a couple of werewolves. There is very little that is "special" about him compared to any other Planeswalker.
I don't want to be Jace, or Ashiok, I wanted as a kid to be the main character in my story. I wasn't casting Jace's spells, he didn't exist!
I wasn't fighting in the shadow of the Gatewatch, I was bending a multiverse to my whims and fighting other mages (or my brother...)
That's my issue with it, it makes the game universe smaller.
Spirits
By the way I was so disappointed after wednesday's story for Chandra not killing herself. Until the end the story seemed so good :(.
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After a couple of years, I TOLERATED THEM.
After a supposed promise of a more concise story and the Origins Retcon, I SORT OF HOPED SOMETHING FOR THEM.
After Jace continually plastered his BLAH arse on almost every set and the the "Main Walker" roles never get shook too largely, I GOT TIRED ON HOPING AND WENT ON LOOKING ON OTHER SHALLOW THINGS TO LIKE ABOUT THEM.
Now, if 15 years from now Jace is still around largely with the group and is still moonlighting as "The Guildpact" (he should really just give it to Lavinia, who cares more for Ravnica than he does me thinks) I don't even know.
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I don't like serial storytelling. I like stories with a clear beginning, middle, and defined end point. While MTG does include references to prior events and a few mechanations here and there, the actual "storyline" is only a few steps stronger than the old Justice Friends cartoon. Blocks feel disconnected and my mind demands progress towards discrete goals in place of simple character development.
The goals of gatewatch members are generally left very open-ended. In fact, just about everyone's goals are left open-ended. Jace wants to discover his past. Garruk wants to kill all planeswalkers. Nicol Bolas wants power. Phyrexians want to spread their metallic perfection through the planes. I have problems finding a single recurring character with a definite, discrete long-term goal that seems realistic.
I want someone who wants to meet with his long-lost brother. Someone who wants to kill a specific nemesis. Someone who wants a specific Macguffin. Anything like that. I used to like Garruk because "Find Liliana and make her remove her curse" was the type of goal I could get behind. Even if it would take a while, I knew what he wanted in specific terms.
But yeah, hard to do continuous stories like that. I can understand why they are doing this. Even so, I'm not a fan.
So before Eldritch Moon, many people asked about Tamiyo. And afterwards, they asked "Why Bant". The answer given was "Colour balance - Jace was the protagonist, so he needed to be there. Nahiri was the big villain, so she needed to be there. Sorin and Liliana were major characters, so they needed to be there. Arlinn had to be there for colour balance reasons." My question here is - why did Jace need to be there? And this isn't even mindless Jace bashing, this is a legitimate question I have. What purpose did Jace serve in the story? You could easily snip Jace (and by extension, the Gatewatch) out of that story entirely and still tell the story perfectly well. But because they needed to push the Gatewatch, they just had to cram Jace in there, screwing over other potential characters in the process.
"But a cosmic horror story needs a core detective! That's the role Jace filled!"
My answer to this is, it didn't have to be Jace. In fact, it shouldn't have been Jace. It should have been someone with a real connection to Innistrad. If the main "detective" character of the story was, say, Sorin, Thalia, Arlinn, or some other denizen of Innistrad, then there would have been real purpose behind the whole thing. They would have to get to the bottom of what was going on. They would have to solve the mystery, because everything is at stake for them. If they fail, they lose everything. Their home, their family and friends, everything they know and love. Even if it was a planeswalker who could go to another plane to escape, losing their entire home world would be a huge deal to them. Jace, on the other hand, could just fart off back to Ravnica and who would care? He would lose nothing. He had no stakes. Nothing was on the line for him. Jace had no reason to be invested (beside this ham-fisted "I'm the hero now!" mentality), which made it all but impossible for me to get invested in anything he was doing.
And that's the core issue I have with the Gatewatch as a concept. They shove out characters and ideas that have more potential. Jace shoved out Tamiyo mechanically because he apparently "had" to be the blue walker of the block, and he shoved out other characters story-wise because he "had" to be the main character because Gatewatch. I'm not interested in these jerks who jaunt all around the Multiverse solving people's problems because "Oh, we're the only ones who can!". I'm interested in the people of the planes, the ones who actually have the problems. I'm interested in seeing those people figure out and solve their own problems, not leave it up to these buttheads. I had the same issue in BFZ block - who cares about the struggles of the Zendikari people when these four randos can just waltz in, effortlessly annihilate two of the most powerful beings in the multiverse, and peace out? My problem with the concept of the Gatewatch is that they trivialise the problems of the actual people of the plane.
Of course, I have problems with the execution as well, but a bunch of people have already gone over those so I won't bother repeating them.
Jenrik was killed off and left cardless because Jace took his role. I like Jace and I did feel a telepath was perfect to be the lead investigating protagonist. SOI/EMN had a good story IMO and was handled well. I can see both sides though. I mean let's be honest, Tamiyo was the best aspect of that. But she was given a respectable, balanced role without overexposing her. The fact she had to be Bant bothered me too - but that's a game logistics issue. I think overall SOI/EMN was fair enough.
I have mixed feelings in that the Gatewatch stories take up room otherwise used for flavor stories which don't advance the plot, but are pretty critical to setting a plane's tone. While I feel these stories are pointless overall, sometimes we get gems like Emonberry Red, or the ending to The Sea God's Labyrinth. I enjoyed those, although frankly, they didn't advance any plot (they're nice to have during lull periods like we had recently rather than getting no story). But the Gatewatch stories taking up that room is welcome IMO, because it's consistency and they ARE an interesting group of individuals which are capable of making a difference.
I do expect Amonkhet to be their first loss though. Charging headstrong into Bolas's lair. Yep. And I expect them each to planeswalk individually somewhere else, and have an after-story of them all reflecting on their own broken spirit before regrouping.
|| 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 ||
The Vorthos community will await the consequences of the Eldrazi Titans' deaths/sealing. We will keep the watch.
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Don't like how the Gatewatch members never lose? Baral just beat the s*** out of Chandra and would've killed her if Nissa and Dovin Baan hadn't impeded him.
Don't like how it's always good vs evil? The consulate is a pretty grey antagonist. Sure Tezzeret and Kambal are scumbags but the Consulate as a whole seems to just genuinely want to maintain the peace. Padeem, Sram, and Dovin could probably be considered good guys, if misled, and the fact the Gatewatch is working with Gonti doesn't exactly put them on the side of the angels.
Don't like how the gatewatch members are one dimensional? We've had some very fleshed out and interesting stories for Gideon and Chandra lately, and Jace got a nice look at himself while speaking with Emrakul that I thought made him more interesting.
I definitely still have my concerns, but for something that's only been around for less than 3 blocks the story telling and plot for the Gatewatch has improved dramatically by block, BFZ story was doodoo, but we should admit that SOI and KLD have both been pretty good.
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A suspenseful moment is not the same thing as a loss. What you're describing is pretty much like the Morpheus torture scene in The Matrix. We know that the main characters will escape from something like that. When people talk about a "loss", they (in my experience) mean that the protagonists suffer something permanent, or near enough to it. It doesn't have to be death, but it should affect them deeply, and influence their actions from that moment on. Maybe one or more members gets permanently scarred. Maybe they discover something that calls their entire life into question. Maybe they have to make a deal with a monster. Maybe they have to break the world in order to save it.
Thus far, they've managed to defeat and/or contain every block-scale antagonist they've come across, and their victories have come at little cost to them.
Again, not true. The Consulate is a fairly typical dictatorship. It's not out for peace, but order. Every action they're taking is to ensure that their order is run smoothly and efficiently. Independent thought is discouraged, and disobedience punished. The Consulate controls the so-called means of production. There's a thriving black market. Seems like a dictatorship to me.
Shadows over Innistrad was good in spite of the Gatewatch. The best parts of SOI's story involved Sorin, Nahiri, Avacyn, Arlinn, Odric and Thalia, Gisa and Geralf...
It's occurred to me over the past year that the people behind the story are intentionally keeping the five main characters shallow in order to maintain the status quo and keep things moving along. Other characters are allowed to develop and change, because we're not seeing so much of them. The main five remain relatively static so that new writers won't have to reconcile a lot of continuity in order to write them.
How is independent thought discouraged? They hold a fair specifically to showcase new ideas and fund inventors. They control Aether because it is frankly dangerous, and very valuable. There is also a black market in any society that has anything regulated.
Especially with the Eldrazi that was just turning into a joke.
As the group could simply beat these "unstoppable" forces completly hurts the game story for the forseeable future , as no threat will actually matter, as they dont lose anything of meaning, nobody that "matters" dies, and they just defeat all opponents.
That is terrible and boring.
If at least the Eldrazi would simply annihilate Zendikar completly and the Gatewatch just "rescued" a bunch of survivors , that would be satisfying, as we would at least have a major opponent and a threat that is real.
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The characters themselfs were totally fine in Origin. The small set featured backstory for each walker and it fine to have 1 walker in some form of story involved that fits the plane they are on.
It becomes terrible boring if you always have ALL of them running around and without any real threat remaining, theres still story arcs that exist and currently are just ignored (Phyrexia, Ajani pops up and Elspeth story line etc. etc.).
I like that they have at least some "evil" planeswalkers that can be a threat, but i will totally be angry if they just "beat" Nicol Bolas in his set , that will be terrible.
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Phyrexia felt like a threat because they FAILED to save Mirrodin, that was what made it feel like a real force. They still got Karn back, which is a major plus, but the plane is still lost at this point and should stay so.
Phyrexia invading Ravnica and turning all of it would be great. But here again, the current powerlevel of the gatewatch would just make it not feel like a threat, if they can beat the invasion in just the matter of 1 small set.
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As it is, story lost a lot of its appeal as theres no real enemies that feel like they can be a real threat , and that former "evil" planeswalkers like Liliana join the gatewatch is also more annoying (as it eliminates just another potential enemie and makes the gatewatch stronger than it has to be).
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The best story lines are made by sacrifice, loses, failure and struggle.
Even the main characters have to be in danger to "potentially" dying, even a planeswalker should fear the opponent, and not just wander in and beat them in a matter of small magic tricks.
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The storyline about Sorin and Nahiri felt good, they both could die, both had loses and both had to struggle.
Would be overall more interesting if they do not bring the full gatewatch team in every set to clean up whatever happened.
Thats what hurts the story the most.
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@Mercury01 To reply to your points
1) I definitely see what you mean, a beatdown isn't the same as a fatality, but Baral got Chandra to seriously consider killing herself. Idk if that will be given any attention later in the story but being nearly talked into suicide seems like something that could have a pretty deep and long lasting effect.
2)I would agree with @Phantom_king_Radix that the consulate isn't truly a dictatorship and wasn't truly oppressive pre-Tezzeret. I would also add that in the mtg universe dictatorships and monarchies are just kind of the general form of governance, and within the context of mtg shouldn't be considered evil because of that. Have we ever seen any democracies in MTG? I think even in Meletis the leadership was appointed. Sure the Consulate had bad parts (Baral and Kambal) but if a few racist police officers and corrupt politicians mean the whole system is evil than I think every government ever is squarely in that category.
3) I thought most of the Jace investigation stories in SOI were pretty cool, especially the ones with Tamiyo, but that's just me
Anyway I'm mostly playing Devil's advocate, like I said I don't feel the GW is the best thing to ever happen in MTG story telling, but I do think we've seen an exponential improvement in the Gatewatch stories in a very short time.
RG 8-Whack
BWG Abzan midrange
GRB Living End
UWB Spirit Control
GU Kruphix's "Hug Assassin"
RW Kalemne's "Play Fatties and Hope for the Best!"
BUGW Atraxa's "All counters, all the time"
I'm talking about dissenting opinions. Criticism. A dictatorship does not preclude innovation, especially the kind of innovation that serves the needs of the dictatorship. Some of the greatest leaps in technology of the last century were created in dictatorial regimes.
Depending on their mission, a typical hero can "fail" in a number of ways without dying. They can be horribly injured. They can fail to guard a person or city. They can fight on the losing side of a war. These small victories can create lasting adversity without large-scale ruin being involved.
In MTG, however, these small failures don't work. The design of blocks forces us to shift planes every other set. If a failure isn't definitive and final, it is hard to explain why planeswalkers don't head back and try again. If Jace was knocked into a psychic coma at a block's conclusion, for example, the story can't let him wake up until 1)his target has moved to another plane or 2)we are ready to return to the first plane. Otherwise, what would stop the Gatewatch from just trying again? Eldrazi destroying a plane? Phyrexians converting it? A giant spell cutting off a plane from the multiverse?
Considering the scope of the conflicts the gatewatch engage in, you have to break out some multiversal threat (or death) for "failure" to make sense.
Honestly, I'm in the camp that expects the confrontation with Bolas to the the Gatewatch's first failure. With that said, the story will have to bend over backwards to keep them from coming right back and trying new tactics. Personally, I'm betting that they'll be scattered across the planes and have their sparks temporarily fizzle. Maybe one death of a two-colored walker (*cough*Ajani*cough*) to go with all of that.
So... yeah. It feels like Wizards is trying to marry Superhero dynamics to the epic scale of multiverse conflicts... which doesn't jive too well with me.
Example of stamping out dissenting opinions? And enforcing the law against Aether smuggling doesnt really count. We have seen very little evidence of the Consulate being sinister except for Tezzeret and Baral's actions.
The Red Ranger perfectly embodies the function of red burn, as well as the flavor of the pyromancer. The other red walkers have been kept consciously out of her mechanical turf, so if she died, there would be no clear replacement, which may be just fine, since Chandra cards are often too simple to be all that good. Still, Chandra is a popular character, partly because her personality and powers come through easily on the cards without any deeper understanding. You don't have to read the stories to get what Chandra's about, and that is appealing to players. Death: highly unlikely.
The Green Ranger is not really anybody's favorite, and was elevated after being a minor planeswalker. She's been instrumental in both of the team's major victories, but mechanically, she borrows a lot from previous green planeswalkers, and fails to really carve out any part of green's color pie as clearly her own since abandoning her tribal roots. However, if she was killed, new green walkers would definitely be needed, since Garruk is in time out. Death: possible.
The Black Ranger could definitely die, but if she does, it would be wrong to not have it be at the hands of her own demons. Faust never gets to live forever. Still, I doubt she'll die for the Gatewatch. She'd gladly abandon the others to save her own skin, so it seems likely enough she'll survive whatever big battle. Death: likely, but probably not in service of the Gatewatch.
The Blue Ranger is Jace. Jace is Jace. Killing him off would make a lot of people happy, and I am optimistic that someday they will have the guts to kill him, but that day is not today. They'll give it a while longer before they kill the golden goose. Jace would ironically be one of the easiest to replace mechanically, since his main claim to fame is drawing cards, which is something tons of other planeswalkers also do, and there are a few decent blue planeswalkers that could already replace him mechanically in mono blue iterations (such as Tamiyo and Narset). Death: highly unlikely.
The White Ranger would sacrifice himself any old time to save the day. Seriously, this dude loves fighting lost causes. Not only that, but he is mechanically super replaceable. His main gimmick is turning into a creature, but that was never what made him good. He's only good when he has decent white goodstuff abilities, which could go on any white walker. Since Elspeth is currently dead, Ajani is also in the Gatewatch, and Nahiri has a very different skillset, there may not be an obvious replacement for him now, but one would be easy to find. Death: likely.
The Yellow Ranger is different at least in that he doesn't just look like a human. He is definitely the odd one right now, but there has been a new member added to the team in the second set of both blocks since the gatewatch's creation, so it wouldn't surprise me if that trend persisted, making him seem less superfluous. Since Ajani has three full colors in his color identity, they don't have to replace him mechanically if they kill him off: RW, GW, and GR are none of them due for a new planeswalker for a long time, and none of those would have to be Ajani. I could see Gideon dying, and Ajani replacing him as the core white planeswalker. As the newest member, I think he will at least live through Amonkhet block. Death: somewhat likely.
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