"Choose! Cake or Death!?"
He should have chosen the chicken.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVH0gZO5lq0&ab_channel=EddieIzzard
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- OathboundOne
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Member for 8 years, 1 month, and 8 days
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1
He's never actually met Jace, though? (Or Vraska, for that matter.)
Like, literally the closest Angrath and Jace/Vraska ever came to interacting in the Ixalan story was that Jace "sensed" a minotaur off in the jungle while he and Vraska were rowing their boat toward Orazca. Their paths never actually crossed, and Angrath would never have even known Jace existed.
This is twice that I've seen the idea that Angrath hates Jace posited, and I have no idea where people are getting it from. (The planeswalker decks? Which are full of events that never actually happened in the story?)
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Cards that I can find that let creatures deal damage directly to a player's face:
Arcbond (If the creature is dealt damage)
Backlash (their own creature hits them)
The Blood half of Flesh//Blood
Delirium (a card I had no idea existed until just now, works like Backlash above)
Gravitic Punch (you can even do it again)
Harsh Justice (is a weird take on a vaguely similar effect, makes all creatures that hit you also hit their controller, but you probably don't want to be taking many hits to the face in the first place, so eh)
There's Lightning Volley and a few other cards similar to it for go-wide/token strategies. Letting each of your creatures ping a target for 1.
If your opponent is the one going wide, there's Rakdos Charm (mode 3: each creature deals 1 damage to its controller)
There are other cards that let your creatures deal damage to other creatures, but I couldn't find all that many that let them hit players.
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I think that, to an extent, a lot of that simply goes with the MMO trappings. MMOs have always been, and likely will always be, built on repetitive gameplay elements. You're always going to have huge numbers of generic enemies to defeat just by shear virtue of MMO progression. They can't all be super villains, or the term "Super Villain" stops meaning anything.
I don't disagree that this WAS one of the game's problem areas, though for what it's worth, I think that CoH/V got better at this later on in its run. This was especially egregious back in the beginning.
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City of Heroes (interestingly, the OG Cryptic designed game) did a good job of it.
It didn't try to completely reinvent the wheel. There were still class archetypes, not some sort of freeform "everyone can be everything" type of system. The Trinity classes were still PRESENT in the game (Tankers (Tank, duh), Defenders(Support) and Blasters/Scrappers(Ranged/Melee DPS respectively), but there were also Controllers which were a primary control focused archetype. Not like you see in most games (A 3second stun with a 1 minute cooldown), but to the point where if you had a competent Controller you could do without a Tanker or without a Defender, or sometimes even with them filling the DPS role depending on what powersets the controller had. (Which was another great thing with CoH, every archetype had an array of different Primary and Secondary powersets to chose from (1 of each) so you could have two characters of the same Archetype that performed wildly differently, only really sharing their core traits.)
CoH's Support was also a lot more than just "Heals" as well. In fact there were a few Support sets that lacked heals entirely. Support was far more centered around buffing and debuffing, essentially preventing damage rather than just recovering from it. Buffs also stacked from different casters, so you were never in a situation where adding a second player with the same support set was redundant and actually hurt your performance. In fact, some of the strongest teams in the game came in the form of All Defender groups, where stacking multiple buffs or multiple types of buffs from different sources could push everyone into Tank level survivability with pure DPS levels of damage output.
You COULD run a group strictly adhering to the Trinity (and some players even insisted on it, since that was the system they were used to), but you could really run content with almost any team buildup, and never NEEDED to strictly obey "Tank, Healer, 3 DPS." No tank? Get a Controller; They can lock down enemies enough that you don't have to worry about who has agro. No DPS? Add another Defender; they'll either buff everyone else's damage/recharge/resource recovery, or debuff enemy defense/resistance enough to make up the difference (possibly more than that, even). Don't have a Defender? Get a Controller; they'll neuter incoming damage and have enough support powers to mitigate anything that slips through.
Man, I miss that game.
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Oh yeah. From reading the novella and what Sanderson has said about the character, Davrial's much less Liliana's "soulmate" and far more her foil. I think that he'd look at just about everything she's done and all her reasoning behind it with utter disdain.
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I'm just waiting for the Azorius story to inevitably come along and instead portray the main character as some laughable, incompetent lawful stupid - or even directly villainous - putz, because "gov'ment bad." It'd certainly fit the theme that MTG's been playing up in recent sets. (Seriously, when was that last set where the governing body wasn't either pointlessly useless, or actively corrupt?)
/salt
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Ultimately I think that WotC could make him whichever colors they felt like, but Sanderson did a pretty good job of fitting Davriel into the color pie as is.
UB works for him, even if it doesn't seem the most likely combination for a Demonologist simply due to the manner in which he goes about it. Unlike Liliana who apparently just signs whatever paper you put in front of her, Davriel specifically engineers contracts that are impossible for his demonic associates to fulfill. His deal with Crunchgnar for example, was for Crunch to ensure that Davriel lived to the age of (65 i think?) without dying, but Davriel has apparently already died once prior to crafting the contract, so Crunchgnar was literally incapable of fulfilling his end of the bargain and would never have been able to claim Davriel's soul.
The deals themselves are black, the methodology he applies to them is blue.
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The three Dryads that make up Trostani are actually in disagreement on what they (and thus the guild) should be doing. Ses/Order favors working with the other Guilds, Oba/Life favors focusing on strengthening the Conclave from within, while Cim/Harmony has fallen silent. Their inability to agree on a course of action isn't really a pro-Bolas stance, but it does favor Bolas in that they're disorganized and unprepared to oppose him. With Trostani is disagreement, Emmara is the one stepping up to try and align the Concalve with the other Guilds. This information comes from the Guilds of Ravnica Art Book.
It's similar to the situation with the Simic; Current prime speaker Vannifar (leader of the Adaptationist faction of the Combine) has directed the Guild's actions to prepare for conflict, where former prime speaker Zegana (who leads the Utopian faction of the Combine) favors an isolationist approach which would work in favor of Bolas even if not actually aligned with him, because the Simic are one of Ravnica's primary innovators (the other being Izzet), and WOULDN'T be prepared to fight him for control.
All of the guilds have factions that favor Bolas - directly or indirectly - it's mostly just a matter of if those factions are currently in charge.
Azorius - Is currently run by Dovin Baan, a Bolas agent, who's been expanding Azorius power and cracking down really harshly on several of the other guilds, sowing a LOT of resentment. Lavinia opposes him, but thus far it doesn't look like much of anyone else in the guild does. Looks more like she's on her own, or if there ARE other people within the Azorius who oppose the new Guildmaster, they seem to be very few.
Boros - Aurelia is trying to cooperate with the other guilds, where Tajic is of the opinion that the Boros should only worry about protecting itself. (Almost a direct inversion of their viewpoints from the previous block, where Tajic was the one in favor of cooperation.) Tajic's stance obviously favors Bolas, since it would mean that the Guild wouldn't come to the aid of other Guilds in trouble when he takes over.
Dimir - Lazav is still in charge, and it looks like he isn't happy that someone is trying to muscle in on his turf. Etrata isn't Bolas aligned, but she's in favor of getting rid of the old guard (such as Lazav) and making way for new people. The resulting power vacuum would likely throw the Dimir into chaos, making them a non-threat to Bolas.
Golgari - Vraska is the current Guildmaster and is loyal to Bolas, until such a time as she gets her memories restored. Izoni is the current Matka (high priestess of the Devkarin elves), who while not-known if she's anti-Bolas IS apparently anti-Vraska. (The Devkarin lost a lot of influence within the Guild when Jarad was killed.)
Gruul - These guys seem to be the outliers, in that there's really no anti-Bolas faction that we can see. They're pretty much all in on the end of days thing and both leaders that got a card in this set (Domri Rade and Nikya) are full steam ahead to just wreck the place. About the only indication that anyone opposes them is the fact that Ruric Thar flat out doesn't like Domri. That's not an indication that he opposes the end of days shtick, just that he's not a fan of Domri personally.
Izzet - Niv went into seclusion to do some secret, personal research and left Ral Zerek in charge as a sort of temporary guildleader. We know that Ral is or was in Bolas' employ at the time of the Amonkhet storyline, but thus far there's been no real indication that he's actively working towards Bolas's goals. In fact, the information from the art book seems to indicate that Ral is actively working against Bolas (or the unknown threat that turns out to be Bolas). Who/What/Where/Why/How? None of that is explained. It kinda really just seems like Ral did a job for Bolas (because if Bolas wants to hire you for a job, you don't say no - if you value your life, that is), but has no idea what Bolas is doing/planning and is just being manipulated by him.
Orzhov - Bolas hired Kaya to off the Ghost Council, then told her to take over. While she's in charge, she's been releasing all the bound spirits from guild control. She freed Teysa from Orzhov prison, and while we haven't seen much in the way of interation between the two, Teysa's been gunning for Guild leadership for a long time, and is just coming off a failed coup herself, so there's bound to be some resentment that Kaya beat her to it. Plus, by releasing the spirits, Kaya's directly undermining the Orzhov's power, and no doubt throwing Ravnica into economic disarray. (The Orzhov control the plane's economy, and contractual obligation and bound servitude are a key part of the Guild's strength.)
Rakdos - Still lead by Rakdos, who would/will oppose Bolas, just because Ravnica is HIS. Opposed by Judith, who's not pro-Bolas, but is anti-Rakdos. She's flat out resentful and jealous of the reverence the Guild gives to the demon, who spends all his time sleeping and doing nothing worthy of their devotion. She's looking to steal the show from him.
Selesnya - See above
Simic - See Above
A LOT of this is from the art book, since what few story articles we're getting for the Ravnica sets don't feature any of the actual relevant plotlines in the slightest, which irks me to no end.
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There's no reason to assume that the pro-Bolas factions KNOW that they're advancing Bolas' agenda, and it's possible that Zegana's more passive, non-interventionist/confrontational ways suit Bolas just fine. The other Simic faction seems to think that a battle is coming and want to prepare for that, where as Zegana isn't a proponent for the effectual "arms race" meaning that her faction could in fact be the one that benefits Bolas the most, given that Simic isn't a Bolas aligned Guild.
Inaction on the part of the Simic benefits Bolas, in that they're not prepared to oppose him.
From the Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica: