lol "sexism" - Sultai's post isn't sexist at all. Women cannot be as physically strong as their male counterparts. Their upkeep, especially every month, even more so if pregnant, is hindering to being out on high seas like that.
lol "sexism" - Sultai's post isn't sexist at all. Women cannot be as physically strong as their male counterparts. Their upkeep, especially every month, even more so if pregnant, is hindering to being out on high seas like that.
Maybe they use magic to fix this?
In MTG, probably. In comparison to the real-world influence of the source material, not so much - and that's where those expectations spawn from. It's not sexism to have a preconceived notion of what to anticipate. The real issue though isn't the deviation from the source material (this is a fantasy game after all) but the fact that females feel shoehorned in to meet a quota. The transparent agenda is what feels awkward. For example, we got our first gay male couple in Theros, which felt appropriate. A lot of decisions lately feel awkward. There's been a saturation of females in general abruptly, and so people notice where it feels out of place or is unexpected. Crying "sexism" at completely valid reasoning is a good way to upset people, make them uncompromising, and be judgmental. Which is a major reason liberals are unpopular (sorry mods, but you really should be stepping in at this point instead of punishing people for their opinions how about stop these social rants in story forum?)
For me personally, female pirates isn't as awkward. I like Beckett Brass and Lannery Storm. Ultimately though, do it too much and strong females rising in the ranks of a male dominated world becomes a lost trope.
lol "sexism" - Sultai's post isn't sexist at all. Women cannot be as physically strong as their male counterparts. Their upkeep, especially every month, even more so if pregnant, is hindering to being out on high seas like that.
Maybe they use magic to fix this?
In MTG, probably. In comparison to the real-world influence of the source material, not so much - and that's where those expectations spawn from. It's not sexism to have a preconceived notion of what to anticipate. The real issue though isn't the deviation from the source material (this is a fantasy game after all) but the fact that females feel shoehorned in to meet a quota. The transparent agenda is what feels awkward. For example, we got our first gay male couple in Theros, which felt appropriate. A lot of decisions lately feel awkward. There's been a saturation of females in general abruptly, and so people notice where it feels out of place or is unexpected. Crying "sexism" at completely valid reasoning is a good way to upset people, make them uncompromising, and be judgmental. Which is a major reason liberals are unpopular (sorry mods, but you really should be stepping in at this point instead of punishing people for their opinions how about stop these social rants in story forum?)
What is sexism if not a preconceived notion of to expect from members of a certain gender?
lol "sexism" - Sultai's post isn't sexist at all. Women cannot be as physically strong as their male counterparts. Their upkeep, especially every month, even more so if pregnant, is hindering to being out on high seas like that.
Maybe they use magic to fix this?
In MTG, probably. In comparison to the real-world influence of the source material, not so much - and that's where those expectations spawn from. It's not sexism to have a preconceived notion of what to anticipate. The real issue though isn't the deviation from the source material (this is a fantasy game after all) but the fact that females feel shoehorned in to meet a quota. The transparent agenda is what feels awkward. For example, we got our first gay male couple in Theros, which felt appropriate. A lot of decisions lately feel awkward. There's been a saturation of females in general abruptly, and so people notice where it feels out of place or is unexpected. Crying "sexism" at completely valid reasoning is a good way to upset people, make them uncompromising, and be judgmental. Which is a major reason liberals are unpopular (sorry mods, but you really should be stepping in at this point instead of punishing people for their opinions how about stop these social rants in story forum?)
What is sexism if not a preconceived notion of to expect from members of a certain gender?
Except no one is starting with gender here. We're looking at Pirates and the logistics of living on the sea, and the historical source material. All of which are facts. Noticing patterns is the natural workings of the human mind.
To me, Bolas's ability to grant knowledge mechanically would be like Stroke of Genius targeting the opponent. I'm pretty certain, based on the physical effects on Vraska, that Bolas can straight up make someone catatonic if he crams enough knowledge into their cranium.
Great story this week. Vraska has come a long way since her one-dimensional "The Gorgon and the Guildpact" days (geez, that was three and a half years ago already???).
I think the more "likeable" Jace is actually closer to his original personality. When Jace was mindwiped, I would guess that his pre-battle-with-Alhammarret memories are in the same state as his memories post-Alhammarret-incident, what with the "My past is a part of me, but it is not who I am" theme being emphasized in the story. When Jace gets his memories back, it'll very likely be ALL of his memories, and his personality will likely be far more reminiscent of this Jace than the Jace we've known up to Ixalan.
A little note about the "flats" comment. I think this was Wizards'/the writer's attempt to make Vraska seem like a "normal" woman, despite her being a shadowy, gorgon assassin planeswalker. For a normal human woman to say this would be trite. Vraska saying it obviously was an attempt to humanize her. Apparently, it didn't play too well with the audience, but that purpose remains.
In regards to whether Bolas "sent" Jace to Ixalan, I'm unsure. To be sure, there are a few factors weighing in favor of Bolas doing the sending:
Jace was being mindf***ed by Bolas at the moment that he planeswalked away from Amonkhet, and Ixalan was relatively fresh in Bolas's mind when he arrived on Amonkhet for the Hours (Vraska took several months to get her crew together, Jace took just short of that time to get to Vraska from when he planeswalked away from Amonkhet).
Bolas really seems to like his planning, so it couldn't be pure coincidence that Jace went to Ixalan right after Vraska was sent by Bolas. It's very likely that Bolas injected the location of Ixalan into Jace's head, knowing that Jace would instinctively planeswalk away when things were getting rough.
It's possible that Bolas wants Jace and Vraska to meet up and become chummy, considering that he was "testing" how a group of hero-type planeswalkers would handle an interplanar threat like the Eldrazi. Given that Nicol Bolas was (and likely still is) afraid of New Phyrexia (see Dark Discoveries webcomic), it's possible he wants a coalition of "heroes" ready to be able to fight New Phyrexia should they find a means to travel across planes (which they inevitably will). Also, Bolas's compass leading Vraska to Jace, who happened to be in the ass-opposite direction of Ixalan offers up some strong evidence that Bolas wanted Vraska to find Jace.
On the other hand, there are strong factors weighing against Jace's being in Ixalan on Bolas's whim:
Jace, even a mindwiped Jace, would be too much of a uncontrolled variable to just allow to roam free to interfere with Bolas's schemes.
With Ixalan being fresh in Bolas's mind, it's possible that Jace actually saw the plane in Bolas's mind without Bolas intending, and just planeswalked there instinctively.
There is no guarantee that Jace would do anything that Bolas intended had Bolas actually intended to send Jace to Ixalan.
If Jace gets his memory back, he could potentially turn Vraska against Bolas, and either way, Jace could take the sought-after artifact for himself where Bolas couldn't (immediately) get his hands on it (especially if it turns out to be related to Ugin, and Ugin detects that it has left Ixalan and reclaims it from Jace).
All in all, I'm curious to see how this thing unfolds. I hope Ugin is involved here, and that Bolas doesn't ultimate get his hands on the artifact.
To veer away from people complaining irrationally about women, I want to focus a bit on why Vraska hates Jarad so much.
Is Jarad really that bad? Has he changed that much since Ravnica block? Judging by how the Golgari are presented, it doesn't seem so. There's a reason the current structure is in place: the terratogens sucked at running the guild. They constantly engaged in petty fights for territory that kept the guild weak and chaotic. Jarad has done a better job at keeping the other guilds from muscling in on Golgari territory while keeping it open to the downtrodden. Is it really reasonable for the Kraul to expect to just show up and be given leadership positions without working up through the ranks first? Did Vraska really expect Jarad to try to annihilate the Azorious? She seems incredibly naive. I actually like that wrinkle in her character though. She is defined by wanting to be more than her nature and has a caring streak about her. I find it odd that a GB character wants to be a champion of the downtrodden though, as GB is really about earning your place. The Golgari don't open their doors wide out of the goodness of their hearts, but because they have a prove it mentality that is open to giving anyone a chance but expecting them to earn their place. They let anyone join, but you aren't guaranteed anything beyond what you can accomplish, they just don't artificially hold you back. Vraska seems to want to stand for the weak and forsaken. Will she find herself in a third color at some point, or are we exploring a unique mixture of black individuality and green communitarianism, resulting in a character that values her individuality and self determination, and wants others to have the same?
Also, the flats thing is fine. She's Ravnican. That plane has always been pretty modern, and it's characters have always been the most similar to modern people. They drink coffee, hang out in trendy bars and clubs, have indoor plumbing, etc. The first Ravnica novel was about a beat cop on the verge of retirement getting into the biggest case of his life. The whole plane is full of tropes for a contemporary setting given a fantasy veneer.
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Onering's 4 simple steps that let you solve any problem with Magic's gameplay
Whether its blue players countering your spells, red players burning you out, or combo, if you have a problem with an aspect of Magic's gameplay, you can fix it!
Step 1: Identify the problem. What aspect of Magic don't you like? Step 2: Find out how others deal with the problem. How do players deal with this aspect of the game when they run into it? Step 3: Do what those players do. Step 4: No more problem. Bonus: You are now better at Magic. Enjoy those extra wins!
The flats thing stood out as odd, but I'm going to take it as the writer being annoyed at female characters wearing impractical heels while dealing with dinosaurs or dragons (see: Jurassic World). Definitely also an attempt to both humanize Vraska and underscore one of her primary traits - she is a pragmatist and a survivor.
I enjoyed this story. Jace and Vraska DO make a good team, and since the chances of Jace table-flipping and quitting the Gatewatch when he gets his memory back are close to zero I hope instead Vraska joins on. She's a much more fun Black-aligned 'walker than Liliana and seems a more likely bet for long-term teammwork since she does have at least some amount of morality (granted "I only kill if there's money involved, or I'm threatened, or the other person is someone I deem pretty evil" is not a great moral compass).
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The flats thing stood out as odd, but I'm going to take it as the writer being annoyed at female characters wearing impractical heels while dealing with dinosaurs or dragons (see: Jurassic World). Definitely also an attempt to both humanize Vraska and underscore one of her primary traits - she is a pragmatist and a survivor.
I enjoyed this story. Jace and Vraska DO make a good team, and since the chances of Jace table-flipping and quitting the Gatewatch when he gets his memory back are close to zero I hope instead Vraska joins on. She's a much more fun Black-aligned 'walker than Liliana and seems a more likely bet for long-term teammwork since she does have at least some amount of morality (granted "I only kill if there's money involved, or I'm threatened, or the other person is someone I deem pretty evil" is not a great moral compass).
This story really has me hoping that Vraska joins the Gatewatch. She IS way more likable as a black-aligned character than Liliana, especially after Lili's little stunt during the Hours.
The strongest black element of Vraska's personality is the "by any means necessary." She still has a sense of justice/morality, she's just willing to do whatever it takes to effect that justice. That's been an element missing from the Gatewatch dynamic from the start (Liliana is certainly willing to do anything to achieve her goals, but she doesn't have any particularly strong convictions aside from keeping herself alive and doing what she wants). Vraska's presence in the Gatewatch would set up some very interesting moral dilemmas between the characters that should make for good reading.
To me, Bolas's ability to grant knowledge mechanically would be like Stroke of Genius targeting the opponent. I'm pretty certain, based on the physical effects on Vraska, that Bolas can straight up make someone catatonic if he crams enough knowledge into their cranium.
Exactly what I was thinking. Now we know what getting Stroked for X=50 feels like.
At first, I was surprised at the number of female pirates on Ixalan. Sure, there were a few female pirates in real life, but on Ixalam they make up at least half of all pirates, which isn't realistic at all. It's even stranger when you realize they didn't give the vampires the same PC treatment: virtually all the conquistadors are male, just like they were in real life. What gives?
But then I realized why this all makes sense: the pirates are refugees. Unlike in real life, where pirates were just a minority of sailors, Ixalan's pirates consist of all the non-vampires (save a few humans that are still being forced to serve the Dusk Legion) from Torrezon. All of them. All races and both sexes.
That still doesn't explain why 80% of pirate captains are female. We all know that sexism was still running rampant in the time period Ixalan was based on, so even if a lot of women were pirates, they would still have difficulty getting positions of leadership. I could see Vraska taking over by the virtue of being a deadly and intimidating gorgon, but that doesn't excuse four out of five planebound captains/admirals being female. So that part is revisionist history and perhaps overly PC. But the presence of so many female pirates in general makes a lot of sense.
As for the block's villain(s), I agree that Vraska has gone full anti-hero, so Angrath and Kumena are far more likely to take on antagonistic roles, especially in the second set. However, the villain I have my eye on is Arguel and the bat god whose name I don't care to look up or try to spell (I suspect that the latter will end up possessing the former).
Still, I'm really hoping for a "every faction is terrible in its own way" type of story, much like Tarkir and Ravnica. In general faction sets tend to result in storylines that are less black-and-white, which is a win in my book (New Phyrexia is obviously the exception to this).
The whole "Sun Empire doesn't kill people" thing, however, makes me skeptical that this block will be as morally grey as Tarkir, which would be disappointing. We haven't had a good moral debate since SOI, and that's a shame. Bolas and Tezzeret could not possibly be justified in their actions, which in my opinion makes those storylines much less interesting and compelling than something morally grey like SOI or Tarkir.
Is it so hard to believe that Ixalan just isn't sexist? There's no reason that, just because when we had pirates we were sexist, means that it has to be the same on a fantasy world that has pirates.
If it was a completely fantastical world, then sure. Same goes for the more science fiction-based worlds, because it makes sense for them to be more progressive. But when a world borrows very heavily from elements of a time period in our past, it's natural to assume that everything not explicitly different is about the same as was on Earth during that time. In Ixalan's case, it's based on about the 1500s, so while things that are obviously departures from that are fine (dinosaurs, vampires, magic), we kind of expect other things to line up with the time period. Even if it was just Vraska (whose species should make it easy to assume leadership regardless of gender roles) and one other female planebound captain, it wouldn't seem that out of place, but virtually every pirate with a leadership role is female, which has no basis in the actual history that Ixalan is based on.
On a different world with pirates that's heavier on fantasy or sci-fi than Ixalan, I wouldn't have a problem, but on a world where the pirates are based on real-world pirates from the real-world age of exploration, it just feels a bit off. It's so much that the pirates aren't sexist enough, because they did remove some of the more negative real-world aspects from all factions (like human sacrifice), it's just that real-world legendary pirates were almost invariably male, so not having a single one with a card in Ixalan doesn't feel very true to the source material. I guess there will be Angrath in the next set, but that's still a 3:1 ratio in favor of women (if not 4:1 or 5:1 since if we get more pirate legends in Rivals they will most likely be Vance and/or Parrish), when it should be 50/50 at the best if they're trying to be even a little historically accurate.
I honestly can't stand this kind of commentary. It's this kind of discussion that keeps sexism alive and strong.
Pretty sure it's the actual sexists who are keeping sexism alive and strong. If you think this is sexism, you need to get out more.
Let me be clear, whether they are male or female HAS ZERO influence over this story. I mean that insofar as the story could be just as compelling with a 3:1 male ratio as it can be with a 3:1 female ratio. Perhaps Wizards will explain the lopsided genders. Perhaps they won't. But the fact is, if they choose not to, then it wouldn't pull away from the story at all. In fact, why are you even counting? Why does it matter at all? I'm far from a social justice warrior. I'm not arguing that everything should be equal or that it should be lopsided one way or another. What I am arguing is that it has no bearing on the effectiveness of this story so you have no reason to be out there looking for something to pick at. It's absolutely ludicrous that this discussion even exists.
You're correct that it doesn't really affect the story. I just made the observation that the gender balance was a little off compared to real-world influences these pirates are clearly based on. Someone asked me why Ixalan's pirates would have to be the same way as real-world pirates, and I explained why. I'm not going to let it ruin the story for me, it's just a minor nitpick that I'm explaining my reasoning for.
And for the love of all that is good, can people PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, STOP thinking that this fantasy story needs to directly and accurately
reflect our history?!
It doesn't need to be a perfect reflection of history (obviously) but when we see pirates based on the 1500s showing an attitude towards gender roles from the 2000s, it's just a little strange. Yes, there's magic and dinosaurs on this world, but none of that would really affect how strong sexism is in that type of society. Age of Exploration pirates are Age of Exploration pirates, so seeing them being inexplicably progressive with regard to gender roles is a little odd and something for which an explanation might be nice.
It is inspired by tropes from our history.
There are a lot more tropes of male pirate captains from history than female ones, so even if they're aiming for the trope-based pop culture version of history they still aren't doing it very well in this regard. It's not like every captain has to be male by any means, but making them all female is really pushing it in my opinion.
This is not a story about the pirates that roamed the sea of earth, it is not about the meso-American people, and it has NOTHING to do with the dinosaurs that roamed the earth up to 65 million years ago.It is its OWN story in its OWN setting simply inspired by what we know as ALL STORIES SINCE THE DAWN OF TIME HAVE BEEN. Every story we tell is inspired by our experiences and learnings.
Which is exactly why having so many female captains feels so wrong. Our "experiences and learnings" tell us that pirates during the Age of Exploration were quite sexist and that their leadership positions were male-dominated, so when they not only ignore that but showcase the exact opposite, it's going to make people scratch their heads at the very least.
This is not the product for historically accurate ANYHING. Once you start realizing that, maybe, juuuusst maybe, you can enjoy the product and story for what it is and stop trying to find crap to be disappointed about.
If you look at the original post you'll see that the overall post was mostly positive, and I even explained how having a lot of female pirates actually made sense based on what we know about the world. My only complaint was that so many pirate captains being female was a little off-putting, which is of course the only part that people are focusing on now.
lol "sexism" - Sultai's post isn't sexist at all. Women cannot be as physically strong as their male counterparts. Their upkeep, especially every month, even more so if pregnant, is hindering to being out on high seas like that. And a woman on a ship with deprived men is a recipe for disaster. Men don't get ahead because they're superior, it's just a logistics thing. Here I can see WOTC wants representation. My issue with equal representation is it makes women less special. Usually, when a woman is a leader (like Queen Miralda for example) in a man's world, I always think to myself damn, she made it to the top in a male-dominated world, and I'm compelled to know more. For me it actually detracts not to have more scarcity. In history the women who defied the odds and made it to the top are always the most interesting, such as Queen Elizabeth being a more powerful monarch than any Tutor men. Here, that appeal feels cheapened "eh, so it's a female ruler in a world where women in leader roles is ubiquitous - and lately, the status quo"
What's sexist to me is hemorrhaging out female characters to get even by the same means. Just to get numbers? Seems disingenuous to me. Look at the native PWs lately from the past several worlds. Not that I mind, but it's pretty transparent. Yet people still complain. Don't even get me started on how people on Blogatog want Maro to be aware of every gender term they identify with.
At least the sexism debate is better than the stupid race/history debate from a few pages ago that made me cringe. I can't believe some of the things people were saying. Quit buying into propaganda and being media sheep by taking everything at face value. I blame the mods for allowing the bait to stay fresh for so long and banning anyone who takes it.
On the bright side - I love Ixalan. It's finally what I've been asking for - a relatively peaceful exploration story that takes a survey of the natural world and its denizens and showcases them all on cards. Not apocalyptic wastelands and war scenes everywhere in a dismal trash heap of world. Cynthia Shepherd took the art in a very welcoming vibrant direction too. Plane is gorgeous and the story is refreshing and equally compelling.
Yeah, basically this. Especially the part about how a female leader in a male-dominated world actually sends a much stronger message. When every world is as progressive as our world, it's kind of diminishes the importance of the individual female leaders. Vraska and perhaps one other female captain being captains would be a lot more interesting and impressive if there weren't female captains all over the place. I think a world where a few women manage to overcome the sexism of their time and take leadership roles is much, much more interesting than a world where there are female captains everywhere because these 16th-century pirates have modern views on gender for no discernable reason. Obviously there is a time and a place for progressive, modern/post-modern societies in Magic, Kaladesh and Ravnica being perfect examples, but Ixalan doesn't seem like the place for it.
Ok, enough about that, time for the actual story. Story was pretty good overall. Jarad being retconned into a villain annoys me. Vraska has gone from anti-hero to villain to anti-hero again. I’d like to see a character I actually like join the Gatewatch, so I kind of hope she replaces Liliana as the token anti-hero on the team. Vraska admitting that her plan to use Jace on Ravnica was clumsy, which seems like they’re admitting it wasn’t the best writing. I’m noticing a trend of them mocking their own writing and characters, between this, Jace’s self-depreciating humor, and of course, Bolas criticizing the Gatewatch. I like that they’re actually willing to point out the flaws in their own story rather than just repeating that “Gatewatch is great and everyone loves them”. Not taking themselves so seriously and making fun of themselves means that those of us who aren’t big fans of the Gatewatch or the modern style of story can still enjoy the writing quite a bit.
Bolas being able to info dump people is actually a pretty cool power, but of course you have to wonder why he hasn’t used it on his minions before. You also have to wonder why Bolas doesn’t simply mind control other planeswalkers instead of letting them retain their free will and potentially stop helping him or even work against him later. We’ve already seen this happen with Sarkhan, and both Tezzeret and Vraska have demonstrated a desire to not stay loyal to Bolas forever, and Bolas even knows that in both cases. Even if the writers don’t want Bolas to completely dominate those characters’ minds, they could at least have him use some sort of mental failsafe to prevent them from betraying him, like what he does on Tezzeret in Test of Metal (which has sadly also been retconned).
Bolas sending an associate to help Vraska is interesting of course. Here’s a crazy conspiracy theory that’s probably wrong: what if Bolas sent Jace as his “associate”? Jace had been a castaway for a long time when Vraska found him, so it’s entirely possible that Bolas didn’t enlist Vraska until after defeating Jace. Since Jace planeswalked away while Bolas was in his mind, it’s also entirely possible that Bolas influenced where Jace planeswalked to. And since Bolas’s explanation to Vraska was a flashback, we don’t for sure that she hasn’t used the device to call for the associate already. So what if instead of calling some planeswalker from across the multiverse, instead it changed the direction of Vraska’s compass (which she even said kept changing direction and pointed away from where they were supposed to go), causing it to temporarily point towards Jace instead of Orazca, thus explaining how Vraska somehow found Jace’s island in the middle of a giant ocean. Bolas, of course, knew that Jace would be there because he sent Jace there himself. And since Bolas claims that the Gatewatch are his pawns, what better way to show him actually using a Gatewatch member that way?
Yeah, there’s probably no way that this is correct, but it’s fun to speculate. More realistic predictions would probably be Ral Zarek, Tezzeret, and maybe Dovin Baan.
There's a pretty simple answer as to why these pirates are so progressive on gender that's given in the story, which is that the pirates are refugees from the conquest of their homeland by the Legion of Dusk. They all turned to piracy to survive, and their home is literally a floating pirate city. Everyone's a pirate.
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The Meaning of Life: "M-hmm. Well, it's nothing very special. Uh, try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in, and try and live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations"
Onering's 4 simple steps that let you solve any problem with Magic's gameplay
Whether its blue players countering your spells, red players burning you out, or combo, if you have a problem with an aspect of Magic's gameplay, you can fix it!
Step 1: Identify the problem. What aspect of Magic don't you like? Step 2: Find out how others deal with the problem. How do players deal with this aspect of the game when they run into it? Step 3: Do what those players do. Step 4: No more problem. Bonus: You are now better at Magic. Enjoy those extra wins!
The biggest mystery introduced here IMO is who the unknown associate is, and I'd like to think it's someone we don't expect.
I generally like "good" black-aligned characters, and I can't exactly pinpoint why; I liked Drana in BFZ block, and I like Vraska. I hesitate to say they're more interesting, because we've had interesting characters in all colors, but the pragmatic, "I protect what's mine" attitude stands out from the typical heroism we see from Magic protagonists.
Human Sacrifice is "A tired old trope." and CRAPPY LOVECRAFT RIPOFFS ARE NOT?
To be fair, Emrakul's version of the Eldrazi in Eldritch Moon was (IMO) how the Eldrazi should have always been done (both in terms of flavour and gameplay), but yeah Lovecraft has been a tad overused.
Nah, Emrakul was stapled onto the plane after they decided to move onto the two block format and couldn't get all 3 into Battle for Zendikar, it was a dumb move, ruined the "mystery" since everyone guessed it from the start and pretty much doomed a plane that WAS interesting because at some point they are going to have to revisit "We stuffed Emrakul in a Fridge Moon" at some point.
Dime Store Lovecraft Ripoffs are terrible 99% of the time and authors need to stop doing them.
Human Sacrifice is "A tired old trope." and CRAPPY LOVECRAFT RIPOFFS ARE NOT?
To be fair, Emrakul's version of the Eldrazi in Eldritch Moon was (IMO) how the Eldrazi should have always been done (both in terms of flavour and gameplay), but yeah Lovecraft has been a tad overused.
Nah, Emrakul was stapled onto the plane after they decided to move onto the two block format and couldn't get all 3 into Battle for Zendikar, it was a dumb move, ruined the "mystery" since everyone guessed it from the start and pretty much doomed a plane that WAS interesting because at some point they are going to have to revisit "We stuffed Emrakul in a Fridge Moon" at some point.
Dime Store Lovecraft Ripoffs are terrible 99% of the time and authors need to stop doing them.
I'm not arguing about why they did it. All I'm saying is I preferred the EMN approach to the Eldrazi than the Zendikar one.
Also, Innistrad had a few other options to keep it interesting post-Avacyn's return, but I doubt they were taking any of those.
At first, I was surprised at the number of female pirates on Ixalan. Sure, there were a few female pirates in real life, but on Ixalam they make up at least half of all pirates, which isn't realistic at all. It's even stranger when you realize they didn't give the vampires the same PC treatment: virtually all the conquistadors are male, just like they were in real life. What gives?
But then I realized why this all makes sense: the pirates are refugees. Unlike in real life, where pirates were just a minority of sailors, Ixalan's pirates consist of all the non-vampires (save a few humans that are still being forced to serve the Dusk Legion) from Torrezon. All of them. All races and both sexes.
That still doesn't explain why 80% of pirate captains are female. We all know that sexism was still running rampant in the time period Ixalan was based on, so even if a lot of women were pirates, they would still have difficulty getting positions of leadership. I could see Vraska taking over by the virtue of being a deadly and intimidating gorgon, but that doesn't excuse four out of five planebound captains/admirals being female. So that part is revisionist history and perhaps overly PC. But the presence of so many female pirates in general makes a lot of sense.
As for the block's villain(s), I agree that Vraska has gone full anti-hero, so Angrath and Kumena are far more likely to take on antagonistic roles, especially in the second set. However, the villain I have my eye on is Arguel and the bat god whose name I don't care to look up or try to spell (I suspect that the latter will end up possessing the former).
Still, I'm really hoping for a "every faction is terrible in its own way" type of story, much like Tarkir and Ravnica. In general faction sets tend to result in storylines that are less black-and-white, which is a win in my book (New Phyrexia is obviously the exception to this).
The whole "Sun Empire doesn't kill people" thing, however, makes me skeptical that this block will be as morally grey as Tarkir, which would be disappointing. We haven't had a good moral debate since SOI, and that's a shame. Bolas and Tezzeret could not possibly be justified in their actions, which in my opinion makes those storylines much less interesting and compelling than something morally grey like SOI or Tarkir.
Is it so hard to believe that Ixalan just isn't sexist? There's no reason that, just because when we had pirates we were sexist, means that it has to be the same on a fantasy world that has pirates.
If it was a completely fantastical world, then sure. Same goes for the more science fiction-based worlds, because it makes sense for them to be more progressive. But when a world borrows very heavily from elements of a time period in our past, it's natural to assume that everything not explicitly different is about the same as was on Earth during that time. In Ixalan's case, it's based on about the 1500s, so while things that are obviously departures from that are fine (dinosaurs, vampires, magic), we kind of expect other things to line up with the time period. Even if it was just Vraska (whose species should make it easy to assume leadership regardless of gender roles) and one other female planebound captain, it wouldn't seem that out of place, but virtually every pirate with a leadership role is female, which has no basis in the actual history that Ixalan is based on.
On a different world with pirates that's heavier on fantasy or sci-fi than Ixalan, I wouldn't have a problem, but on a world where the pirates are based on real-world pirates from the real-world age of exploration, it just feels a bit off. It's so much that the pirates aren't sexist enough, because they did remove some of the more negative real-world aspects from all factions (like human sacrifice), it's just that real-world legendary pirates were almost invariably male, so not having a single one with a card in Ixalan doesn't feel very true to the source material. I guess there will be Angrath in the next set, but that's still a 3:1 ratio in favor of women (if not 4:1 or 5:1 since if we get more pirate legends in Rivals they will most likely be Vance and/or Parrish), when it should be 50/50 at the best if they're trying to be even a little historically accurate.
I honestly can't stand this kind of commentary. It's this kind of discussion that keeps sexism alive and strong.
Pretty sure it's the actual sexists who are keeping sexism alive and strong. If you think this is sexism, you need to get out more.
Let me be clear, whether they are male or female HAS ZERO influence over this story. I mean that insofar as the story could be just as compelling with a 3:1 male ratio as it can be with a 3:1 female ratio. Perhaps Wizards will explain the lopsided genders. Perhaps they won't. But the fact is, if they choose not to, then it wouldn't pull away from the story at all. In fact, why are you even counting? Why does it matter at all? I'm far from a social justice warrior. I'm not arguing that everything should be equal or that it should be lopsided one way or another. What I am arguing is that it has no bearing on the effectiveness of this story so you have no reason to be out there looking for something to pick at. It's absolutely ludicrous that this discussion even exists.
You're correct that it doesn't really affect the story. I just made the observation that the gender balance was a little off compared to real-world influences these pirates are clearly based on. Someone asked me why Ixalan's pirates would have to be the same way as real-world pirates, and I explained why. I'm not going to let it ruin the story for me, it's just a minor nitpick that I'm explaining my reasoning for.
And for the love of all that is good, can people PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, STOP thinking that this fantasy story needs to directly and accurately
reflect our history?!
It doesn't need to be a perfect reflection of history (obviously) but when we see pirates based on the 1500s showing an attitude towards gender roles from the 2000s, it's just a little strange. Yes, there's magic and dinosaurs on this world, but none of that would really affect how strong sexism is in that type of society. Age of Exploration pirates are Age of Exploration pirates, so seeing them being inexplicably progressive with regard to gender roles is a little odd and something for which an explanation might be nice.
It is inspired by tropes from our history.
There are a lot more tropes of male pirate captains from history than female ones, so even if they're aiming for the trope-based pop culture version of history they still aren't doing it very well in this regard. It's not like every captain has to be male by any means, but making them all female is really pushing it in my opinion.
This is not a story about the pirates that roamed the sea of earth, it is not about the meso-American people, and it has NOTHING to do with the dinosaurs that roamed the earth up to 65 million years ago.It is its OWN story in its OWN setting simply inspired by what we know as ALL STORIES SINCE THE DAWN OF TIME HAVE BEEN. Every story we tell is inspired by our experiences and learnings.
Which is exactly why having so many female captains feels so wrong. Our "experiences and learnings" tell us that pirates during the Age of Exploration were quite sexist and that their leadership positions were male-dominated, so when they not only ignore that but showcase the exact opposite, it's going to make people scratch their heads at the very least.
This is not the product for historically accurate ANYHING. Once you start realizing that, maybe, juuuusst maybe, you can enjoy the product and story for what it is and stop trying to find crap to be disappointed about.
If you look at the original post you'll see that the overall post was mostly positive, and I even explained how having a lot of female pirates actually made sense based on what we know about the world. My only complaint was that so many pirate captains being female was a little off-putting, which is of course the only part that people are focusing on now.
lol "sexism" - Sultai's post isn't sexist at all. Women cannot be as physically strong as their male counterparts. Their upkeep, especially every month, even more so if pregnant, is hindering to being out on high seas like that. And a woman on a ship with deprived men is a recipe for disaster. Men don't get ahead because they're superior, it's just a logistics thing. Here I can see WOTC wants representation. My issue with equal representation is it makes women less special. Usually, when a woman is a leader (like Queen Miralda for example) in a man's world, I always think to myself damn, she made it to the top in a male-dominated world, and I'm compelled to know more. For me it actually detracts not to have more scarcity. In history the women who defied the odds and made it to the top are always the most interesting, such as Queen Elizabeth being a more powerful monarch than any Tutor men. Here, that appeal feels cheapened "eh, so it's a female ruler in a world where women in leader roles is ubiquitous - and lately, the status quo"
What's sexist to me is hemorrhaging out female characters to get even by the same means. Just to get numbers? Seems disingenuous to me. Look at the native PWs lately from the past several worlds. Not that I mind, but it's pretty transparent. Yet people still complain. Don't even get me started on how people on Blogatog want Maro to be aware of every gender term they identify with.
At least the sexism debate is better than the stupid race/history debate from a few pages ago that made me cringe. I can't believe some of the things people were saying. Quit buying into propaganda and being media sheep by taking everything at face value. I blame the mods for allowing the bait to stay fresh for so long and banning anyone who takes it.
On the bright side - I love Ixalan. It's finally what I've been asking for - a relatively peaceful exploration story that takes a survey of the natural world and its denizens and showcases them all on cards. Not apocalyptic wastelands and war scenes everywhere in a dismal trash heap of world. Cynthia Shepherd took the art in a very welcoming vibrant direction too. Plane is gorgeous and the story is refreshing and equally compelling.
Yeah, basically this. Especially the part about how a female leader in a male-dominated world actually sends a much stronger message. When every world is as progressive as our world, it's kind of diminishes the importance of the individual female leaders. Vraska and perhaps one other female captain being captains would be a lot more interesting and impressive if there weren't female captains all over the place. I think a world where a few women manage to overcome the sexism of their time and take leadership roles is much, much more interesting than a world where there are female captains everywhere because these 16th-century pirates have modern views on gender for no discernable reason. Obviously there is a time and a place for progressive, modern/post-modern societies in Magic, Kaladesh and Ravnica being perfect examples, but Ixalan doesn't seem like the place for it.
Ok, enough about that, time for the actual story. Story was pretty good overall. Jarad being retconned into a villain annoys me. Vraska has gone from anti-hero to villain to anti-hero again. I’d like to see a character I actually like join the Gatewatch, so I kind of hope she replaces Liliana as the token anti-hero on the team. Vraska admitting that her plan to use Jace on Ravnica was clumsy, which seems like they’re admitting it wasn’t the best writing. I’m noticing a trend of them mocking their own writing and characters, between this, Jace’s self-depreciating humor, and of course, Bolas criticizing the Gatewatch. I like that they’re actually willing to point out the flaws in their own story rather than just repeating that “Gatewatch is great and everyone loves them”. Not taking themselves so seriously and making fun of themselves means that those of us who aren’t big fans of the Gatewatch or the modern style of story can still enjoy the writing quite a bit.
Bolas being able to info dump people is actually a pretty cool power, but of course you have to wonder why he hasn’t used it on his minions before. You also have to wonder why Bolas doesn’t simply mind control other planeswalkers instead of letting them retain their free will and potentially stop helping him or even work against him later. We’ve already seen this happen with Sarkhan, and both Tezzeret and Vraska have demonstrated a desire to not stay loyal to Bolas forever, and Bolas even knows that in both cases. Even if the writers don’t want Bolas to completely dominate those characters’ minds, they could at least have him use some sort of mental failsafe to prevent them from betraying him, like what he does on Tezzeret in Test of Metal (which has sadly also been retconned).
Bolas sending an associate to help Vraska is interesting of course. Here’s a crazy conspiracy theory that’s probably wrong: what if Bolas sent Jace as his “associate”? Jace had been a castaway for a long time when Vraska found him, so it’s entirely possible that Bolas didn’t enlist Vraska until after defeating Jace. Since Jace planeswalked away while Bolas was in his mind, it’s also entirely possible that Bolas influenced where Jace planeswalked to. And since Bolas’s explanation to Vraska was a flashback, we don’t for sure that she hasn’t used the device to call for the associate already. So what if instead of calling some planeswalker from across the multiverse, instead it changed the direction of Vraska’s compass (which she even said kept changing direction and pointed away from where they were supposed to go), causing it to temporarily point towards Jace instead of Orazca, thus explaining how Vraska somehow found Jace’s island in the middle of a giant ocean. Bolas, of course, knew that Jace would be there because he sent Jace there himself. And since Bolas claims that the Gatewatch are his pawns, what better way to show him actually using a Gatewatch member that way?
Yeah, there’s probably no way that this is correct, but it’s fun to speculate. More realistic predictions would probably be Ral Zarek, Tezzeret, and maybe Dovin Baan.
Jace has apparently been on Ixalan for 40 days:
The galley around them dissolved. Vraska remained seated in her chair, but now sat in a grove of bamboo taller than the masts of her ship. Jace sat in his chair, eyes aglow, and began an illusory summary of his last forty days.
Vraska's been there for at least 60 days, but likely longer:
She had spent the prior months assembling her crew.
So Vraska's been there longer.
The general timeline seems to be:
1) Flashbacks of Vraska and Marizek chatting; Pride of the Kraul
2) Meditation realm flashback, Vraska walks to Ixalan and starts gathering her crew; The Talented Captain Vraska
3) Marizek carries out his assassination and starts his power play; Pride of the Kraul
4) Gathewatch gets owned by Bolas and Jace ends up on Ixalan
5) Jace's story on Useless Island; Jace, Alone
6) The rest of The Talented Captain Vraska
I think the other Bolas agent will either be Tezzeret, as the story implies that Vraska will need the Planar Bridge to move the Immortal Sun (the likely macguffin) off-world. Or less likely Ral, assuming Ral's assignment was related to rebuilding/powering the Planar Bridge from the core that Tezzeret was able to acquire.
Thus, counting the number of males vs. females just seems petty at this point.
And yet, if the situation were reversed and all we saw was male captains, people would be having a fit. What the heck is it with this thread and people arguing about dumb crap by the way? It is always some inane topic.
So Bolas is the machine from The Matrix and can inject stuff into people's minds.
"Sailing. I know... sailing."
"Show me."
It makes sense though, he would need a way to fix..Accidents like when he almost destroyed Ramses Overdark's mind in Legends 2.
This story really has me hoping that Vraska joins the Gatewatch. She IS way more likable as a black-aligned character than Liliana, especially after Lili's little stunt during the Hours.
This has been my complaint about Lili in the Gatewatch from the start. She has never been a Chainer/Toshiro style "Greedy, but protective of the people he cares about" or "I do things for money, but I am GOOD for my word unless absolutely necessary for me to break it" Mono Black sort.
I generally like "good" black-aligned characters, and I can't exactly pinpoint why; I liked Drana in BFZ block, and I like Vraska. I hesitate to say they're more interesting, because we've had interesting characters in all colors, but the pragmatic, "I protect what's mine" attitude stands out from the typical heroism we see from Magic protagonists.
Because they are usually the most fun. A Black Aligned Good guy will Rip out your soul, and make it dance for their pleasure..if you screw with something important enough outside of that they are chill people who love fun. Vraska seems to be having a ton of fun playing Pirate. "We need a new Figurehead..."
I'm not arguing about why they did it. All I'm saying is I preferred the EMN approach to the Eldrazi than the Zendikar one.
Also, Innistrad had a few other options to keep it interesting post-Avacyn's return, but I doubt they were taking any of those.
Yeah, and I was just pointing out how stupid "it is a tired old trope." as an excuse why they didn't do the human sacrifice is when they spent blocks pushing one of the most tired old tropes in fiction.
There is one thing that bugs me about the story with Vraska..when last I saw Jarad in Ravnica 1..he seemed like a legitimately decent guy who was in charge of the Golgari only cause of the obscure "You break it you bought it." rule the guild had in regards to being in charge..did something happen in Ravinca 2 that made him evil?
There is one thing that bugs me about the story with Vraska..when last I saw Jarad in Ravnica 1..he seemed like a legitimately decent guy who was in charge of the Golgari only cause of the obscure "You break it you bought it." rule the guild had in regards to being in charge..did something happen in Ravinca 2 that made him evil?
We still haven't been shown, or even told, anything that should lead any of the readers to believe Jarad is different(evil) from his last appearance. All we have is Vraska's general complaints that sound more like he is disinterested in the suffering of some people she cares about rather than any actual wrong doings.
So Vraska is completely in the wrong when it comes to wanting to overthrow Jarad then? Like I am all for trying to improve conditions for the lowest of the low but..going from Zero to "Assassinate the thing keeping Ravnica from descending into utter anarchy" seems like a real bad idea.
It appears that Vraska did not PW from Ravnica to Ixalan but from Ravnica to Bolas's Meditation Realm. As such, it would seem that Lightning Bug's 'bug' was due to the spell Bolas provided than anything about Ixalan.
She went to Ravnica before heading to Ixalan:
The area around her darkened into shadow. Vraska stepped through a rip of night in the midday air and planeswalked home.
She had preparations to make.
So the blip to nowhere was indeed Ixalan. Though it does raise an interesting question. How does Bolas' Meditation Realm show up on Ral's radar? Does it look like walking to Dominaria, seeing as BMR is a pocket plane of it. Is it its own thing just very close to Dominaria, kinda like an offshore island?
About the thaumatic compass (?) what if getting to Orazca requires a certain chain of events or objects to unlock the path to the golden city (because let's face it, it's located smack-dab in the middle of the continent, someone must have found it by chance by now, especially seeing as people have flying mounts. So a magical shroud is likely.) kinda like the Eye of Ugin? (Which would further strengthen the Ugin connection.) If this was the case, the compass keeps changing directions, because it does not only point to the city, but to all the subobjectives as well (or it acts as a magical device that automatically knows what the user desires, which would fit the thaumatic aspect of it).
At any rate, of all character-interaction-centric pieces, I liked this one the most by far. The interaction between Vraska and Jace feel natural, yet strange enough to be interesting. I got a good chuckle when Vraska was musing that she was in hell. Also, two characters have now likened Jace to a pet. That's both funny and sad at the same time.
As for Vraska being a black character who cares about others: My rationalization is that she is projecting. Black is about self-interest and Vraska sees herself in others who are similarly at the bottom of the foodchain, so to speak. In a way, she doesn't really care about the others as much as she cares about what she sees of herself In them. if that makes sense. That's a reasonably enough black notion for me, especially coupled with the "born into it" part that green comes with and Vraska realizes is part of the problem.
So Vraska is completely in the wrong when it comes to wanting to overthrow Jarad then? Like I am all for trying to improve conditions for the lowest of the low but..going from Zero to "Assassinate the thing keeping Ravnica from descending into utter anarchy" seems like a real bad idea.
Well shes not starting at zero. There is quite a bit of oppression and other horrible things going on in Ravnica, there always has been, just like the in real world. She appears to feel that the world as a whole needs to change because she currently belongs to the group that is being oppressed. So its hard to say if she is actually wrong.
To be fair, Vraska doesn't want to make the world a better place. She wants the Golgari to rule Ravnica. If she has her way, she'll end updoing the wrong things for the right reasons.
As for Jarad being "evil", let's not forget that this is only Vraska's view. If I remember correctly, in the Kraul story, Jarad was actually portrayed as not completely against the Kraul joining the leadership ranks. Jarad likely has to deal with a lot of political maneuvering that comes with leading a guild (that isn't Gruul) that is invisible for the lower ranks, so Vraska only sees all the wrongs Jarad does, but not how much damage to the Golgari he wards of. Politics, especially in a place like Ravnica, is an endless game of compromises.
At least, that's I hope what the case will be. It'll be interesting to see Vraska claim leadership of the Golgari and opening another guild war, especially with the current Orzhov conflict thrown in the mix.
As for Vraska being a black character who cares about others: My rationalization is that she is projecting. Black is about self-interest and Vraska sees herself in others who are similarly at the bottom of the foodchain, so to speak. In a way, she doesn't really care about the others as much as she cares about what she sees of herself In them. if that makes sense. That's a reasonably enough black notion for me, especially coupled with the "born into it" part that green comes with and Vraska realizes is part of the problem.
I have to massively disagree here, Black is about Ambition, and Desire. It can go into self-interest such as Liliana but it can go to strange places depending on what the person truly wants.
"You wanna bring back someone you lost, ya might want money, maybe you want women, or you might wanna protect the world. These are all common things people want, things that their hearts desire, Greed may not be good, but its not so bad either. You humans think Greed is just for money and power, when everyone wants something they don't have."
—Greed
Well shes not starting at zero. There is quite a bit of oppression and other horrible things going on in Ravnica, there always has been, just like the in real world. She appears to feel that the world as a whole needs to change because she currently belongs to the group that is being oppressed. So its hard to say if she is actually wrong.
Well she is not wrong persay, but I wonder if she ever tried having a proper meeting with Jarad and Jace..
For me personally, female pirates isn't as awkward. I like Beckett Brass and Lannery Storm. Ultimately though, do it too much and strong females rising in the ranks of a male dominated world becomes a lost trope.
|| 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 ||
|| 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 ||
I liked this article, it describes well how Vraska got hired, attained seamanship so quickly and a surprising development of comradeship with Jace.
I hope that when Jace recovers his memories, that he retains some of these fresher qualities he's developed.
The Vorthos community will await the consequences of the Eldrazi Titans' deaths/sealing. We will keep the watch.
“The wind whispers, ‘come home,’ but I cannot.”
— Teferi
I think the more "likeable" Jace is actually closer to his original personality. When Jace was mindwiped, I would guess that his pre-battle-with-Alhammarret memories are in the same state as his memories post-Alhammarret-incident, what with the "My past is a part of me, but it is not who I am" theme being emphasized in the story. When Jace gets his memories back, it'll very likely be ALL of his memories, and his personality will likely be far more reminiscent of this Jace than the Jace we've known up to Ixalan.
A little note about the "flats" comment. I think this was Wizards'/the writer's attempt to make Vraska seem like a "normal" woman, despite her being a shadowy, gorgon assassin planeswalker. For a normal human woman to say this would be trite. Vraska saying it obviously was an attempt to humanize her. Apparently, it didn't play too well with the audience, but that purpose remains.
In regards to whether Bolas "sent" Jace to Ixalan, I'm unsure. To be sure, there are a few factors weighing in favor of Bolas doing the sending:
On the other hand, there are strong factors weighing against Jace's being in Ixalan on Bolas's whim:
All in all, I'm curious to see how this thing unfolds. I hope Ugin is involved here, and that Bolas doesn't ultimate get his hands on the artifact.
Is Jarad really that bad? Has he changed that much since Ravnica block? Judging by how the Golgari are presented, it doesn't seem so. There's a reason the current structure is in place: the terratogens sucked at running the guild. They constantly engaged in petty fights for territory that kept the guild weak and chaotic. Jarad has done a better job at keeping the other guilds from muscling in on Golgari territory while keeping it open to the downtrodden. Is it really reasonable for the Kraul to expect to just show up and be given leadership positions without working up through the ranks first? Did Vraska really expect Jarad to try to annihilate the Azorious? She seems incredibly naive. I actually like that wrinkle in her character though. She is defined by wanting to be more than her nature and has a caring streak about her. I find it odd that a GB character wants to be a champion of the downtrodden though, as GB is really about earning your place. The Golgari don't open their doors wide out of the goodness of their hearts, but because they have a prove it mentality that is open to giving anyone a chance but expecting them to earn their place. They let anyone join, but you aren't guaranteed anything beyond what you can accomplish, they just don't artificially hold you back. Vraska seems to want to stand for the weak and forsaken. Will she find herself in a third color at some point, or are we exploring a unique mixture of black individuality and green communitarianism, resulting in a character that values her individuality and self determination, and wants others to have the same?
Also, the flats thing is fine. She's Ravnican. That plane has always been pretty modern, and it's characters have always been the most similar to modern people. They drink coffee, hang out in trendy bars and clubs, have indoor plumbing, etc. The first Ravnica novel was about a beat cop on the verge of retirement getting into the biggest case of his life. The whole plane is full of tropes for a contemporary setting given a fantasy veneer.
Onering's 4 simple steps that let you solve any problem with Magic's gameplay
Step 1: Identify the problem. What aspect of Magic don't you like? Step 2: Find out how others deal with the problem. How do players deal with this aspect of the game when they run into it? Step 3: Do what those players do. Step 4: No more problem. Bonus: You are now better at Magic. Enjoy those extra wins!
I enjoyed this story. Jace and Vraska DO make a good team, and since the chances of Jace table-flipping and quitting the Gatewatch when he gets his memory back are close to zero I hope instead Vraska joins on. She's a much more fun Black-aligned 'walker than Liliana and seems a more likely bet for long-term teammwork since she does have at least some amount of morality (granted "I only kill if there's money involved, or I'm threatened, or the other person is someone I deem pretty evil" is not a great moral compass).
RCRDaretti: Superfriends Forever RCR
WGBDoran: Ent-mootWBG
GGGMultani: Group Bear HugGGG
GB(B/G)The Gitrog Monster: Dredgefall DurdleGB(B/G)
RGWGahiji, the Honored Group Hug MonsterRGW
UB(U/B)Yuriko, Ninja Trinket AggroUB(U/B)
WUBRGAtogatog: Assembling a OHKOWUBRG
This story really has me hoping that Vraska joins the Gatewatch. She IS way more likable as a black-aligned character than Liliana, especially after Lili's little stunt during the Hours.
The strongest black element of Vraska's personality is the "by any means necessary." She still has a sense of justice/morality, she's just willing to do whatever it takes to effect that justice. That's been an element missing from the Gatewatch dynamic from the start (Liliana is certainly willing to do anything to achieve her goals, but she doesn't have any particularly strong convictions aside from keeping herself alive and doing what she wants). Vraska's presence in the Gatewatch would set up some very interesting moral dilemmas between the characters that should make for good reading.
Exactly what I was thinking. Now we know what getting Stroked for X=50 feels like.
Pretty sure it's the actual sexists who are keeping sexism alive and strong. If you think this is sexism, you need to get out more.
You're correct that it doesn't really affect the story. I just made the observation that the gender balance was a little off compared to real-world influences these pirates are clearly based on. Someone asked me why Ixalan's pirates would have to be the same way as real-world pirates, and I explained why. I'm not going to let it ruin the story for me, it's just a minor nitpick that I'm explaining my reasoning for.
It doesn't need to be a perfect reflection of history (obviously) but when we see pirates based on the 1500s showing an attitude towards gender roles from the 2000s, it's just a little strange. Yes, there's magic and dinosaurs on this world, but none of that would really affect how strong sexism is in that type of society. Age of Exploration pirates are Age of Exploration pirates, so seeing them being inexplicably progressive with regard to gender roles is a little odd and something for which an explanation might be nice.
There are a lot more tropes of male pirate captains from history than female ones, so even if they're aiming for the trope-based pop culture version of history they still aren't doing it very well in this regard. It's not like every captain has to be male by any means, but making them all female is really pushing it in my opinion.
Which is exactly why having so many female captains feels so wrong. Our "experiences and learnings" tell us that pirates during the Age of Exploration were quite sexist and that their leadership positions were male-dominated, so when they not only ignore that but showcase the exact opposite, it's going to make people scratch their heads at the very least.
If you look at the original post you'll see that the overall post was mostly positive, and I even explained how having a lot of female pirates actually made sense based on what we know about the world. My only complaint was that so many pirate captains being female was a little off-putting, which is of course the only part that people are focusing on now.
Yeah, basically this. Especially the part about how a female leader in a male-dominated world actually sends a much stronger message. When every world is as progressive as our world, it's kind of diminishes the importance of the individual female leaders. Vraska and perhaps one other female captain being captains would be a lot more interesting and impressive if there weren't female captains all over the place. I think a world where a few women manage to overcome the sexism of their time and take leadership roles is much, much more interesting than a world where there are female captains everywhere because these 16th-century pirates have modern views on gender for no discernable reason. Obviously there is a time and a place for progressive, modern/post-modern societies in Magic, Kaladesh and Ravnica being perfect examples, but Ixalan doesn't seem like the place for it.
Ok, enough about that, time for the actual story. Story was pretty good overall. Jarad being retconned into a villain annoys me. Vraska has gone from anti-hero to villain to anti-hero again. I’d like to see a character I actually like join the Gatewatch, so I kind of hope she replaces Liliana as the token anti-hero on the team. Vraska admitting that her plan to use Jace on Ravnica was clumsy, which seems like they’re admitting it wasn’t the best writing. I’m noticing a trend of them mocking their own writing and characters, between this, Jace’s self-depreciating humor, and of course, Bolas criticizing the Gatewatch. I like that they’re actually willing to point out the flaws in their own story rather than just repeating that “Gatewatch is great and everyone loves them”. Not taking themselves so seriously and making fun of themselves means that those of us who aren’t big fans of the Gatewatch or the modern style of story can still enjoy the writing quite a bit.
Bolas being able to info dump people is actually a pretty cool power, but of course you have to wonder why he hasn’t used it on his minions before. You also have to wonder why Bolas doesn’t simply mind control other planeswalkers instead of letting them retain their free will and potentially stop helping him or even work against him later. We’ve already seen this happen with Sarkhan, and both Tezzeret and Vraska have demonstrated a desire to not stay loyal to Bolas forever, and Bolas even knows that in both cases. Even if the writers don’t want Bolas to completely dominate those characters’ minds, they could at least have him use some sort of mental failsafe to prevent them from betraying him, like what he does on Tezzeret in Test of Metal (which has sadly also been retconned).
Bolas sending an associate to help Vraska is interesting of course. Here’s a crazy conspiracy theory that’s probably wrong: what if Bolas sent Jace as his “associate”? Jace had been a castaway for a long time when Vraska found him, so it’s entirely possible that Bolas didn’t enlist Vraska until after defeating Jace. Since Jace planeswalked away while Bolas was in his mind, it’s also entirely possible that Bolas influenced where Jace planeswalked to. And since Bolas’s explanation to Vraska was a flashback, we don’t for sure that she hasn’t used the device to call for the associate already. So what if instead of calling some planeswalker from across the multiverse, instead it changed the direction of Vraska’s compass (which she even said kept changing direction and pointed away from where they were supposed to go), causing it to temporarily point towards Jace instead of Orazca, thus explaining how Vraska somehow found Jace’s island in the middle of a giant ocean. Bolas, of course, knew that Jace would be there because he sent Jace there himself. And since Bolas claims that the Gatewatch are his pawns, what better way to show him actually using a Gatewatch member that way?
Yeah, there’s probably no way that this is correct, but it’s fun to speculate. More realistic predictions would probably be Ral Zarek, Tezzeret, and maybe Dovin Baan.
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Step 1: Identify the problem. What aspect of Magic don't you like? Step 2: Find out how others deal with the problem. How do players deal with this aspect of the game when they run into it? Step 3: Do what those players do. Step 4: No more problem. Bonus: You are now better at Magic. Enjoy those extra wins!
I generally like "good" black-aligned characters, and I can't exactly pinpoint why; I liked Drana in BFZ block, and I like Vraska. I hesitate to say they're more interesting, because we've had interesting characters in all colors, but the pragmatic, "I protect what's mine" attitude stands out from the typical heroism we see from Magic protagonists.
Nah, Emrakul was stapled onto the plane after they decided to move onto the two block format and couldn't get all 3 into Battle for Zendikar, it was a dumb move, ruined the "mystery" since everyone guessed it from the start and pretty much doomed a plane that WAS interesting because at some point they are going to have to revisit "We stuffed Emrakul in a
FridgeMoon" at some point.Dime Store Lovecraft Ripoffs are terrible 99% of the time and authors need to stop doing them.
Dragons of Legend, Lead by Scion of the UR-Dragon
The Gitrog Monster
Gonti, Lord of Luxury
Shogun Saskia
Hive World
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I'm not arguing about why they did it. All I'm saying is I preferred the EMN approach to the Eldrazi than the Zendikar one.
Also, Innistrad had a few other options to keep it interesting post-Avacyn's return, but I doubt they were taking any of those.
Jace has apparently been on Ixalan for 40 days:
Vraska's been there for at least 60 days, but likely longer:
So Vraska's been there longer.
The general timeline seems to be:
1) Flashbacks of Vraska and Marizek chatting; Pride of the Kraul
2) Meditation realm flashback, Vraska walks to Ixalan and starts gathering her crew; The Talented Captain Vraska
3) Marizek carries out his assassination and starts his power play; Pride of the Kraul
4) Gathewatch gets owned by Bolas and Jace ends up on Ixalan
5) Jace's story on Useless Island; Jace, Alone
6) The rest of The Talented Captain Vraska
I think the other Bolas agent will either be Tezzeret, as the story implies that Vraska will need the Planar Bridge to move the Immortal Sun (the likely macguffin) off-world. Or less likely Ral, assuming Ral's assignment was related to rebuilding/powering the Planar Bridge from the core that Tezzeret was able to acquire.
And yet, if the situation were reversed and all we saw was male captains, people would be having a fit. What the heck is it with this thread and people arguing about dumb crap by the way? It is always some inane topic.
It makes sense though, he would need a way to fix..Accidents like when he almost destroyed Ramses Overdark's mind in Legends 2.
This has been my complaint about Lili in the Gatewatch from the start. She has never been a Chainer/Toshiro style "Greedy, but protective of the people he cares about" or "I do things for money, but I am GOOD for my word unless absolutely necessary for me to break it" Mono Black sort.
Because they are usually the most fun. A Black Aligned Good guy will Rip out your soul, and make it dance for their pleasure..if you screw with something important enough outside of that they are chill people who love fun. Vraska seems to be having a ton of fun playing Pirate. "We need a new Figurehead..."
Yeah, and I was just pointing out how stupid "it is a tired old trope." as an excuse why they didn't do the human sacrifice is when they spent blocks pushing one of the most tired old tropes in fiction.
There is one thing that bugs me about the story with Vraska..when last I saw Jarad in Ravnica 1..he seemed like a legitimately decent guy who was in charge of the Golgari only cause of the obscure "You break it you bought it." rule the guild had in regards to being in charge..did something happen in Ravinca 2 that made him evil?
Dragons of Legend, Lead by Scion of the UR-Dragon
The Gitrog Monster
Gonti, Lord of Luxury
Shogun Saskia
Hive World
Atraxa hates fun
Abzan
Dragons of Legend, Lead by Scion of the UR-Dragon
The Gitrog Monster
Gonti, Lord of Luxury
Shogun Saskia
Hive World
Atraxa hates fun
Abzan
She went to Ravnica before heading to Ixalan:
So the blip to nowhere was indeed Ixalan. Though it does raise an interesting question. How does Bolas' Meditation Realm show up on Ral's radar? Does it look like walking to Dominaria, seeing as BMR is a pocket plane of it. Is it its own thing just very close to Dominaria, kinda like an offshore island?
About the thaumatic compass (?) what if getting to Orazca requires a certain chain of events or objects to unlock the path to the golden city (because let's face it, it's located smack-dab in the middle of the continent, someone must have found it by chance by now, especially seeing as people have flying mounts. So a magical shroud is likely.) kinda like the Eye of Ugin? (Which would further strengthen the Ugin connection.) If this was the case, the compass keeps changing directions, because it does not only point to the city, but to all the subobjectives as well (or it acts as a magical device that automatically knows what the user desires, which would fit the thaumatic aspect of it).
At any rate, of all character-interaction-centric pieces, I liked this one the most by far. The interaction between Vraska and Jace feel natural, yet strange enough to be interesting. I got a good chuckle when Vraska was musing that she was in hell. Also, two characters have now likened Jace to a pet. That's both funny and sad at the same time.
As for Vraska being a black character who cares about others: My rationalization is that she is projecting. Black is about self-interest and Vraska sees herself in others who are similarly at the bottom of the foodchain, so to speak. In a way, she doesn't really care about the others as much as she cares about what she sees of herself In them. if that makes sense. That's a reasonably enough black notion for me, especially coupled with the "born into it" part that green comes with and Vraska realizes is part of the problem.
As for Jarad being "evil", let's not forget that this is only Vraska's view. If I remember correctly, in the Kraul story, Jarad was actually portrayed as not completely against the Kraul joining the leadership ranks. Jarad likely has to deal with a lot of political maneuvering that comes with leading a guild (that isn't Gruul) that is invisible for the lower ranks, so Vraska only sees all the wrongs Jarad does, but not how much damage to the Golgari he wards of. Politics, especially in a place like Ravnica, is an endless game of compromises.
At least, that's I hope what the case will be. It'll be interesting to see Vraska claim leadership of the Golgari and opening another guild war, especially with the current Orzhov conflict thrown in the mix.
I have to massively disagree here, Black is about Ambition, and Desire. It can go into self-interest such as Liliana but it can go to strange places depending on what the person truly wants.
"You wanna bring back someone you lost, ya might want money, maybe you want women, or you might wanna protect the world. These are all common things people want, things that their hearts desire, Greed may not be good, but its not so bad either. You humans think Greed is just for money and power, when everyone wants something they don't have."
—Greed
Well she is not wrong persay, but I wonder if she ever tried having a proper meeting with Jarad and Jace..
Dragons of Legend, Lead by Scion of the UR-Dragon
The Gitrog Monster
Gonti, Lord of Luxury
Shogun Saskia
Hive World
Atraxa hates fun
Abzan