Zegana, Utopian Speaker
Zegana, Utopian Speaker
When Zegana, Utopian Speaker enters the battlefield, if you control another creature with a +1/+1 counter on it, draw a card.
: Adapt 4. (If this creature has no +1/+1 counters on it, put four +1/+1 counters on it.)
Each creature you control with a +1/+1 counter on it has trample.
illus. Slawomir Maniak # 214/259
Oracle Text
When Zegana, Utopian Speaker enters the battlefield, if you control another creature with a +1/+1 counter on it, draw a card.
: Adapt 4. (If this creature has no +1/+1 counters on it, put four +1/+1 counters on it.)
Each creature you control with a +1/+1 counter on it has trample.
The good news is, she works with riot and oddly enough mentor. In Standard, you're looking at the merfolk from Ixalan helping her. In Commander, Deepglow Skate, Gilder Bairn, or Vorel of the Hull Clade.
But I agree she won't see Modern or Legacy play.
Think of reach as better in the opening moves and trample as better in the endgame.
When you kick her (or Colossus) it costs a lot of mana (but you can do it on any turn, unlike traditional kicker cards, which is good because 10 mana for an 8/8 or 11 for a 9/9 looks bad), but you only get to do it once. Colossus gets to Plummet, Zegana gains trample.
The only thing is that unlike monstrosity, adapt has to be kicked before you put other +1/+1 counters on the creature in question, whereas monstrosity just defines a binary variable ("monstrous") and checks that, with the assumption that, at least in limited, +1/+1 counters can be used as a shorthand to the "monstrous" variable. (Yes, Phalanx Leader exists.)
If a Doubling Season variant (presumably just for +1/+1 counters, à la Corpsejack Menace, maybe in GU or just mono-G?) is present in this "block", that becomes an occasional 12/12 trampler as well.
When you think about it, it makes sense flavorwise:
Domri is...a bit naïve, and could easily fall under the sway of a millennia-old dragon who has been conspiring since long before even Azor was born. And the fact that the Gruul are pariahs, and Domri is a pariah among the pariahs, you see where this is going.
For Orzhov and Azorius, it's simpler. Pro-Bolas Orzhovniks and Azorii think they can control him (and the right and center parties in Weimar Germany thought the same of Hitler, so, yeah). And quite frankly, if I wanted to control just two guilds in Ravnica to make the whole system collapse, it would be those two.
Also we've already seen all 3 'walkers (among booster art and PW decks) and none of them is Simic
Then again, at least since Morningtide, they've used the more elegant design of just giving creatures you control with +1/+1 counters abilities, and they did it again in RTR and KTK blocks. Strangely, this is the fourth iteration of Bramblewood Paragon.
You're probably right but for story reasons I looooove the idea of Lili and Teysa helping each other get out of their contracts. Objectively I know Kaya's gonna lead the Orzhov but I can hope, right?