Yes the names of the clans are indeed gone but the people are still there and they are treated well within all of the broods except Silumgar
I respectfully disagree. The Atarka dragons regularly eat their non-dragon membership while otherwise forcing them to work themselves to death and live on scraps. The Ojutai dragons have a system of law in which killing non-dragons isn't a crime. The Kohlgan dragons don't care at all about their non-dragon followers. The Dromoka dragon are still violently suppressing all religion except worship of them after 1000 years!
What frustrates me the most here is that honestly we barely discuss URs anymore. The UR comes out, it is purely a filler, everyone knows that and points it out and then we have to talk about other things (such as how Nissa compares with Garruk, which is not that far off from the UR). But suddenly there was a discussion about if Tarkir is better or worse, and it was incentivized even though is completely off-topic.
I bet if we had good URs then there wouldn't be that much derailing in the discussions, because we would have much more to talk about it. Of course, I don't think that justifies the rising animosity, but people in discussions with strong opinions (almost everyone one that is here) tend to get things a little heated once in a while.
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Would you like to read Commander stories? Check my latest stories, coming from Lorwyn and Innistrad: Ghoulcaller Gisa and Doran, The Siege Tower! If you like my writing, ask me to write something for your commander as well!
I didn't mind this story. I can imagine someone who lived with a Plane acting as a guide for her life suddenly losing the guide being loss, in more ways then one. I can see that she will be searching to find Zendikar's Soul until such time as she realise something really specific (I have no clue what) and restore her connection to the plane.
One thing I am wondering though, how can a Planeswalker planeswalk from 1 point to another on the same plane. She didn't want to leave Zendikar, so how did this happen??
I am having a "Return to Alara" moment with this...
Trembling, Nissa let go of the Vastwood; she stopped fighting the tugging, and the tingling at her edges worked its way inward. When it reached her center, Nissa planeswalked away—back home, back to Bala Ged, to find Zendikar.
Let this be the last thing I have to say on the matter, then.
Dictionary definition of "insane":
adjective
1.
not sane; not of sound mind; mentally deranged.
2.
of, relating to, or characteristic of a person who is mentally deranged:
insane actions; an insane asylum.
3.
utterly senseless:
an insane plan.
Sarkhan, post-Ugin voices in head, appears to be of sound mind. He assumed that certain groups of people would be better served by Dragon World rather than Warlord World, the same as R&D did, but he is not insane.
I have no reason to believe that Donald Trump is not of sound mind. He may be a bigot who has dangerously incorrect ideas about how this country would best be served, but he is not insane.
As someone who is mentally ill with a lot of mentally ill friends, when someone insists upon using the word "insane" to describe the above, I do perceive it as an attack on me and mine. Particularly when said insistence is followed up by an accusation of me being "overly PC." Which is fine. You're free to think what you want about me and my beliefs and feelings, just as I'm free to have my opinions about you and yours. However, as previously mentioned, that is a topic for another thread.
Funny that the traits that gave me respect to portrayal of Nissa in times of before retcon - pragmatic, thinking that her people are superior but still effectively working with other species, protector of her people even through dark means - are now on Drana. Who is vampire whom Nissa always hated.
Agree. The Drana UR existed to sell the card, and yet 1) more stuff happened and 2) Drana comes off as a more complex and relatable character than Nissa, despite having a fifth as much time to tell her story in (word count, Memories of Blood: ~5700. word count, Home, For Zendikar, The Silent Cry, Nissa's Quest: ~25,700. And with one more Nissa story still to come).
I found this bit particularly chilling:
Mortals shakily left the sleds and were handed food in slightly better shape than what the nulls were eating. By this point there was no more fighting and rioting from the mortals over food. They were too exhausted to fight. But not too exhausted to stay on the sleds. Everyone who could moved away from the sleds. They had learned.
It's essentially natural selection at work. There's not enough medical care to go around, so the ones who survive are the ones whose bodies manage to fight off wounds and disease on their own while the rest are culled by the vampires (for whom, it's implied, the blood they're getting is scarcely nourishment as it is).
Yes the names of the clans are indeed gone but the people are still there and they are treated well within all of the broods except Silumgar
I respectfully disagree. The Atarka dragons regularly eat their non-dragon membership while otherwise forcing them to work themselves to death and live on scraps. The Ojutai dragons have a system of law in which killing non-dragons isn't a crime. The Kohlgan dragons don't care at all about their non-dragon followers. The Dromoka dragon are still violently suppressing all religion except worship of them after 1000 years!
You guys are all getting hung up on 'good' or 'bad', as if they can only be one or another, and as if one has to be good and one has to be bad.
The societies in Khans and Dragons are both bad in different ways. Even the 'good' societies in Khans were doomed to failure. The whole point of the original Tarkir was that the conflict between Dragons and Clans had balance and was sustainable. The problem with BOTH societies is that they're out of balance. Each of these societies had some relatively major faults.
The new Dragon societies are problematic because the former clans are second class citizens. Obviously, that'll come to a head with a future Return to Tarkir block, and they've already sown the seeds for it with Narset discovering the hidden archive.
I think I figured out why Bolas wanted the Eldrazis released.
Alara was broken after a PW absorbed all of its mana, but what if it was the Eldrazis who did it and not a PW.
By releasing them, Bolas would hope for them to drain more world and he would seek the ones breaking off for sings of converging.
He was thwarted the first time but with multiple possible planes, he might be able to absorb more energy. Time is pretty much irrelevant to him anyway, unlike other PW.
"The Oath of the Gatewatch" would be engineered by Ugin who would have deduced Bolas plans, to make sure that doesn't happen.
Yeah, not seeing whats so bad about Khans Tarkir that makes it as bad as Fate Reforged or Dtk Tarkir. In all of them the clans are at war with each other, except in Fate Reforged they're also at war with dragons that regularly attack and slaughter encampments. In DTK it's the same set up as Khans Tarkir, except worse because everyone but dragons are second class citizens.
KTK was just the clans fighting, and that seems infinitely more sustainable since it's just skirmishes of swords and spells, as opposed to swords, spells and BREATH WEAPONS.
Maybe if Creative bothered to say something like "without the dragon tempests, the plane's mana is slowly running out and it will die," if they want us to think KTK is a bad world.
Ok non-dragons are second class citizens at best and pets or food at worst.
So what?
I don't get why everyone freaks out about it. What did everyone thought would happen? That humanoids would be buddies with the dragons and ride on their backs? Or that it would go back the way it was in Fate Reforged?
The dragons are the strongest things on Tarkir. They make the rules, much like we do here. And really there's only one rule and Surrak summarized it perfectly. Bring the meat or become the meal.
Ok non-dragons are second class citizens at best and pets or food at worst.
So what?
I don't get why everyone freaks out about it. What did everyone thought would happen? That humanoids would be buddies with the dragons and ride on their backs? Or that it would go back the way it was in Fate Reforged?
The dragons are the strongest things on Tarkir. They make the rules, much like we do here. And really there's only one rule and Surrak summarized it perfectly. Bring the meat or become the meal.
Uh, this discussion started from somebody mentioning characteristics of green planeswalkers (Sarkhan and his flawed plan to restore Tarkir), and somebody disputing that Tarkir is now worse off.
Nobody is freaking out about anything. It's just a discussion of Khans vs Dragons timelines on Tarkir.
No one is freaking out, we're discussing the relative merits of the timelines. Some people feel that new timeline is "better" is some sense than the original. Several of us disagree.
The dragons are the strongest things on Tarkir. They make the rules, much like we do here. And really there's only one rule and Surrak summarized it perfectly. Bring the meat or become the meal.
While those in power get to make the rules that doesn't mean the rules are good.
I positively adore Nissa for her design and the fact she was the very first planeswalker I got. It's disappointing on the way they handled her characterization. I was initially happy with the UR showing her transition from her naive and narrow perspective to a more mature and responsible one. Sadly, all subsequent stories did away with any significance that had, going as far as ignoring her past mistakes.
Every time I read a Nissa story I can't help but feel like everything that happens with her would have more weight for me if she still had the elf supremacy in her past. I might actually feel bad for her if they did something like without the world soul she felt the same kind of hollowness and shallowness that she now recognized was a big part of the problem of who she was before and she kind of hates the feeling now. Kind of a "who I am hates who I've been" kind of deal.
Oh well. I knew going in that some of these stories wouldn't be to my liking. It was bound to happen. They can't please everyone 100% of the time. Let's see how well they handle Kiora next time. I am looking forward to that.
One thing I am wondering though, how can a Planeswalker planeswalk from 1 point to another on the same plane. She didn't want to leave Zendikar, so how did this happen??
I am having a "Return to Alara" moment with this...
Trembling, Nissa let go of the Vastwood; she stopped fighting the tugging, and the tingling at her edges worked its way inward. When it reached her center, Nissa planeswalked away—back home, back to Bala Ged, to find Zendikar.
She left Zendikar for the blind eternities, but then went back to Zendikar. kind of like taking a plane ride to the other side of a city instead of a country.
@Tarkir, people tend to forget that every dragon ever dies in the KTK timeline. 5 (sub)species of sapient individuals die. Mass genocide. That's pretty bad.
Ok non-dragons are second class citizens at best and pets or food at worst.
So what?
Since dragons don't make up the majority, that means the majority are suffering. In Khans, everyone was equal and if you didn't like the way the clans were being run you could just kill the khan and take over*. In DTK, you try that and you're dragon food. Your only role in DTK is too shovel dragon feces, shave their nails, get them food and go to war for them. In KTK, you were your own person.
*We know this is the case for Mardu and Sultai. We know the strongest and best hunter becomes leader of the Temur. We know the best becomes leader of the Abzan. Finally, the most enlightened becomes leader of the Jeskai (humans flat out can't lead the Ojutai because they're considered an inferior species, regardless of how enlightened they become).
Since dragons don't make up the majority, that means the majority are suffering. In Khans, everyone was equal and if you didn't like the way the clans were being run you could just kill the khan and take over*. In DTK, you try that and you're dragon food. Your only role in DTK is too shovel dragon feces, shave their nails, get them food and go to war for them. In KTK, you were your own person.
*We know this is the case for Mardu and Sultai. We know the strongest and best hunter becomes leader of the Temur. We know the best becomes leader of the Abzan. Finally, the most enlightened becomes leader of the Jeskai (humans flat out can't lead the Ojutai because they're considered an inferior species, regardless of how enlightened they become).
In most of the KTK clans you were a warrior. The Temur and the Mardu had no use for burdensome non-combatants. The Abzan similarly had little use for those who weren't either warriors or merchants. The Sultai really didn't change. You're either fodder for the amusement of the naga or for Silmugar. The only ones that seemed like you could have a reasonably normal life was if you were a non-Jeskai living within their territory.
And in truth, humans are an inferior species when compared to dragons. When we're talking about sapient dragons rather than dumb beasts like the Jund dragons what possible reason could you have to believe that humans would be superior other than your own arrogance? The difference here is we are the only sapient species we know of. If suddenly dogs could speak English would you suddenly treat them as equal to humans even though they are clearly inferior to us?
In most of the KTK clans you were a warrior. The Temur and the Mardu had no use for burdensome non-combatants. The Abzan similarly had little use for those who weren't either warriors or merchants.
This is so far from true.
The Temur had shamans. Plus I want to see some citation where it says that all of Temur are hunters. They're basically a nomadic collection of tribes. But even in hunter-gatherer-communities not everyone is a hunter. (As evidenced by the word, in case you haven't noticed.)
The Mardu were the most warlike, but it was hinted at that even they had people who took care of the supplies and stuff.
The Abzan? The Abzan had all sorts of professions, mostly due to their relatively advanced infrastructure. They had merchants, they had spiritual leaders, they had all sorts of professions you'd find in a sufficiently large civilization.
But even if your claim was true, it would still be a pointless argument, because:
a) Being treated differently due to your profession is not the same as being treated differently due to your species. You can change your profession afterall, but you cannot change what you were born as.
b) It still wouldn't be a "downgrade" from DTK, because the problems you claim to exist in the clans do exist in the broods anyway, though in most cases several times amplified.
@Tarkir: The obvious issue is that Wizards (in increasingly common fashion) used "tell don't show" to imply that the Khans timeline was bad. Both timelines are bad for some subset of Tarkir's sapient species/cultures, and the only 'balanced" timeline was Fate Reforged (which wasn't that great either). I think some of us, myself included, connect more to the Khans timeline because we are humans and can better empathize with the human characters of Khans. Were we dragons, or maybe if we'd gotten even ONE story from the perspective of the dragon lords or their broods, we'd probably be better able to empathize with that side of the conflict. Personally, I feel Khans timeline was more interesting than Dragons timeline, but I do not feel it is necessarily the "better" outcome for the world because we've never been given evidence that the plane of Tarkir itself was doing particularly well/poorly either way.
@Nissa/The most recent uncharted Realms: I thought this was decent. Like everyone has pointed out Nissa stories are pretty bland and filler-y, and as a character she lost a lot of her complexity due to the retcons. Her weird "you can't say Zendikar is yours"snob moment while talking to Munda was kind of weird and made me like her as a character a little less. Which is the first time I've felt anything more than ambivalence towards her character since Worldwaker so right on for that. I am coming to the belief that the change in how UR is handled is a mistake. Whatever your feelings about Khans/Dragons of Tarkir the way UR was handled was excellent. We got cool random stories that let us immerse ourselves in the world and we got relevant plot-advancing stories of Sarkhan's quest and the fall of the Khans. In the new stories, by keeping the focus solely on the planeswalkers, I feel we are losing a lot. We're being given filler instead of individual vignettes, and because we're only following the main characters who we know appear next block there is nothing at stake. This also really undercuts the threat of the eldrazi, as we never see them from the perspective of the average Zendikari, but only from the perspective of badasses like Gideon and Nissa who can slaughter dozens of eldrazi single handedly. The best UR we've had recently has been Drana's, UR should be handled the way they were in Tarkir block, with the story only focusing on the main characters when something important or relevant has happened.
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My Decks:
UG Merfolk RG 8-Whack BWG Abzan midrange GRB Living End UWB Spirit Control
GU Kruphix's "Hug Assassin" RW Kalemne's "Play Fatties and Hope for the Best!" BUGW Atraxa's "All counters, all the time"
Eh, aside from some of the fight scenes, I wouldn't really say the planeswalker-centric stories are "filler." We've had two Gideon stories and one Jace story. In that time, we learn that Gideon 1) watches Sea Gate get run over by Eldrazi; 2) sets up a base camp on Sky Rock; 3) gets nominated leader of the refugees; and 4) is planning to eventually retake Sea Gate with a huge army of refugees he can expect to be streaming toward said camp. That could easily tide us over until OGW.
Meanwhile, Jace 1) is convinced by Gideon to go to Zendikar and 2) is headed toward the Eye of Ugin. There's probably room in this set's UR span for one more Jace story where he meets up with Ugin and the two hash out their differing philosophies.
Kiora's story is next, and I hope she can do something more useful than just get into a tentacle slap-fight (she did at least do something plot-relevant in the Theros novel IIRC).
I would much rather have stories that relate to the planeswalkers, legends, and other recurring characters in the PW's guide than random vignettes. The story about Drana wouldn't have been nearly as impactful if it was a band of vampires solely invented to star in the UR, for example.
Very reasonable, and I agree that stories focusing on legendary creatures are nice. Hopefully we'll get UR for Munda and Noyan Dar in the near future.
On filler, it is true that something plot relevant happens w/ each story we get, and the Gideon/Jace stories have generally been more interesting/plot advancing than Nissa's, but I feel there is still a lot of fluff for less substance. I liked the most recent Gideon story, but imagine if it had been from the perspective of one of the refugees fleeing the Smothering Abomination rather than Gideon's, there would have been genuine peril for the main character, we could have seen the eldrazi as the unchallengeable threat they are to most Zendikari, and at the end we still could have gotten the scene where Gideon becomes leader of the Zendikari resistance. I really enjoy the UR, even the Nissa ones, but I do feel we're getting a lot of stories about Gideon moving water falls and smashing eldrazi, and Nissa bemoaning her life, while parts of those stories (Pili and Leek, the refugees) probably could have made a more interesting UR that would still tie into, affect, and advance the primary plot. I will freely admit that not all the planeswalker centric stories are filler (Jace's was awesome and included plot-relevant material) I just feel that things are being really stretched out when they could be compacted to make room for more material.
I'm also looking forward to the Kiora story next week, and really looking forward to the Jace/Ugin story whenever we get it.
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My Decks:
UG Merfolk RG 8-Whack BWG Abzan midrange GRB Living End UWB Spirit Control
GU Kruphix's "Hug Assassin" RW Kalemne's "Play Fatties and Hope for the Best!" BUGW Atraxa's "All counters, all the time"
Reread the story and still couldn't bring myself to care about Nissa's mewling. Also, someone already mentioned it here, just noticed how smug Nissa was about her being "plane-chosen". I still care more about Pili than her. I wish there will be more stories with Pili in it.
Since dragons don't make up the majority, that means the majority are suffering. In Khans, everyone was equal and if you didn't like the way the clans were being run you could just kill the khan and take over*. In DTK, you try that and you're dragon food. Your only role in DTK is too shovel dragon feces, shave their nails, get them food and go to war for them. In KTK, you were your own person.
*We know this is the case for Mardu and Sultai. We know the strongest and best hunter becomes leader of the Temur. We know the best becomes leader of the Abzan. Finally, the most enlightened becomes leader of the Jeskai (humans flat out can't lead the Ojutai because they're considered an inferior species, regardless of how enlightened they become).
You assume that the majority matters and we don't really know whether the majority is suffering or not (2 clans are fine, 2 clans are not. The Kolaghan are a bit unknown). Tarkir is not a democracy or a world that cares about being politically correct in any of its timelines. The dragons have ruled for over 1000 years because they were the strongest. No non-dragon(except Surrak who punches his way through everything) can match them in strength or mind. Even characters who possibly can, like Narset and Sarkhan, are closer to dragons than humans.
About the UR thing:
To be honest I was one of those who was not really interested in the random daily events of the Khans UR. I was more interested on what Sarkhan and the Khans themselves were doing. To their credit though, these stories gave us a good feeling of the world, something the Dragons timeline failed to do. Still I'd like to see more stories from outside planeswalkers pov, as long as they progress the story in a meaningful way, especially if they are about legendaries.
Lol, uhm no. Life is awful in Atarka because if you don't hunt your ass off for the dragons, they eat you. Compared to Temur where everyone hunted for each other and spiritualism was celebrated there is no doubt which is a better life.
Ojutai vs Jeskai is equally as obvious. I mean, Ojutai executes humans that fail to protect their dragon overlords, as an example.
Mardu vs Kolaghan. In the Mardu you fight for the good of the Mardu. If the khan proves to be a liability, you can challenge and dethrone him, or the whole clan abandons them. With kolaghan we know you either kill your enemies or the dragons kill you: there is no camaraderie. We know the dragons also don't give a crap and will burn any non-dragons on the battlefield, friend and foe alike.
Sultai vs Silumgar. Essentially the same, except with Sultai you could outmaneuver the khan and take over, or climb up in the organization. This is not so in Silumgar where your only role is feeding dragons.
Finally, this has nothing at all to do with democracy. If the majority of sentient life have things worse than in the previous timeline, then life is worse. This isn't rocket surgery.
I don't mind filler articles if they are a) well-written and b) develop the world or characters well. I felt like Drana's story was great for this reason - it was filler that wasn't essential to the story, but it was intriguing and covered a unique character and her species on Zendikar.
But when I see these Gideon and Nissa filler, that's when I'm frustrated. We've had six or seven articles about the core planeswalkers but the story has barely progressed. These characters aren't interesting, especially Nissa, so we neither get sufficient plot advancement nor an interesting development of characters or the culture of the plane.
"EPISODE 7: HOME WATERS
The merfolk Planeswalker Kiora returns to Zendikar wielding a stolen prize of great power: the bident of Thassa, god of the sea on the plane of Theros. But her escape was a narrow one, her strength drained, and her people scattered. The merfolk of Zendikar face their own gods risen against them, a mockery of everything they once held dear, and hope is hard to come by. But Kiora is no stranger to defying the gods."
Can't wait to read next week's. Should be the last set-up piece before the release of the set and real meat of the story. Praying to the gods on all planes that the following Nissa story delivers.
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The rise and fall of civilizations is not inherently a bad thing.
I respectfully disagree. The Atarka dragons regularly eat their non-dragon membership while otherwise forcing them to work themselves to death and live on scraps. The Ojutai dragons have a system of law in which killing non-dragons isn't a crime. The Kohlgan dragons don't care at all about their non-dragon followers. The Dromoka dragon are still violently suppressing all religion except worship of them after 1000 years!
I bet if we had good URs then there wouldn't be that much derailing in the discussions, because we would have much more to talk about it. Of course, I don't think that justifies the rising animosity, but people in discussions with strong opinions (almost everyone one that is here) tend to get things a little heated once in a while.
Read my other stories as well (some ongoing):
Reaper King (a horror story), Kaalia of the Vast (an origin story), Sequels for Innistrad (Alternative sequels for Inn), Grey Areas (Odric's fanfic), Royal Succession (goblins),The Tracker's Message (eldrazi on Innistrad) and Ugin and his Eye (the end of OGW).
One thing I am wondering though, how can a Planeswalker planeswalk from 1 point to another on the same plane. She didn't want to leave Zendikar, so how did this happen??
I am having a "Return to Alara" moment with this...
adjective
1.
not sane; not of sound mind; mentally deranged.
2.
of, relating to, or characteristic of a person who is mentally deranged:
insane actions; an insane asylum.
3.
utterly senseless:
an insane plan.
Sarkhan, post-Ugin voices in head, appears to be of sound mind. He assumed that certain groups of people would be better served by Dragon World rather than Warlord World, the same as R&D did, but he is not insane.
I have no reason to believe that Donald Trump is not of sound mind. He may be a bigot who has dangerously incorrect ideas about how this country would best be served, but he is not insane.
As someone who is mentally ill with a lot of mentally ill friends, when someone insists upon using the word "insane" to describe the above, I do perceive it as an attack on me and mine. Particularly when said insistence is followed up by an accusation of me being "overly PC." Which is fine. You're free to think what you want about me and my beliefs and feelings, just as I'm free to have my opinions about you and yours. However, as previously mentioned, that is a topic for another thread.
Agree. The Drana UR existed to sell the card, and yet 1) more stuff happened and 2) Drana comes off as a more complex and relatable character than Nissa, despite having a fifth as much time to tell her story in (word count, Memories of Blood: ~5700. word count, Home, For Zendikar, The Silent Cry, Nissa's Quest: ~25,700. And with one more Nissa story still to come).
I found this bit particularly chilling:
It's essentially natural selection at work. There's not enough medical care to go around, so the ones who survive are the ones whose bodies manage to fight off wounds and disease on their own while the rest are culled by the vampires (for whom, it's implied, the blood they're getting is scarcely nourishment as it is).
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The societies in Khans and Dragons are both bad in different ways. Even the 'good' societies in Khans were doomed to failure. The whole point of the original Tarkir was that the conflict between Dragons and Clans had balance and was sustainable. The problem with BOTH societies is that they're out of balance. Each of these societies had some relatively major faults.
The new Dragon societies are problematic because the former clans are second class citizens. Obviously, that'll come to a head with a future Return to Tarkir block, and they've already sown the seeds for it with Narset discovering the hidden archive.
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Alara was broken after a PW absorbed all of its mana, but what if it was the Eldrazis who did it and not a PW.
By releasing them, Bolas would hope for them to drain more world and he would seek the ones breaking off for sings of converging.
He was thwarted the first time but with multiple possible planes, he might be able to absorb more energy. Time is pretty much irrelevant to him anyway, unlike other PW.
"The Oath of the Gatewatch" would be engineered by Ugin who would have deduced Bolas plans, to make sure that doesn't happen.
I was responding to the claim "they are treated well within all of the broods except Silumgar" which is patently false.
KTK was just the clans fighting, and that seems infinitely more sustainable since it's just skirmishes of swords and spells, as opposed to swords, spells and BREATH WEAPONS.
Maybe if Creative bothered to say something like "without the dragon tempests, the plane's mana is slowly running out and it will die," if they want us to think KTK is a bad world.
Your mods are terrified of me.
So what?
I don't get why everyone freaks out about it. What did everyone thought would happen? That humanoids would be buddies with the dragons and ride on their backs? Or that it would go back the way it was in Fate Reforged?
The dragons are the strongest things on Tarkir. They make the rules, much like we do here. And really there's only one rule and Surrak summarized it perfectly. Bring the meat or become the meal.
UBarrin, Master WizardU
USticher GeralfU
UIxidor, Reality SculptorU
UWNoyan Dar, Roil ShaperUW
Uh, this discussion started from somebody mentioning characteristics of green planeswalkers (Sarkhan and his flawed plan to restore Tarkir), and somebody disputing that Tarkir is now worse off.
Nobody is freaking out about anything. It's just a discussion of Khans vs Dragons timelines on Tarkir.
No one is freaking out, we're discussing the relative merits of the timelines. Some people feel that new timeline is "better" is some sense than the original. Several of us disagree.
While those in power get to make the rules that doesn't mean the rules are good.
Oh well. I knew going in that some of these stories wouldn't be to my liking. It was bound to happen. They can't please everyone 100% of the time. Let's see how well they handle Kiora next time. I am looking forward to that.
She left Zendikar for the blind eternities, but then went back to Zendikar. kind of like taking a plane ride to the other side of a city instead of a country.
@Tarkir, people tend to forget that every dragon ever dies in the KTK timeline. 5 (sub)species of sapient individuals die. Mass genocide. That's pretty bad.
Since dragons don't make up the majority, that means the majority are suffering. In Khans, everyone was equal and if you didn't like the way the clans were being run you could just kill the khan and take over*. In DTK, you try that and you're dragon food. Your only role in DTK is too shovel dragon feces, shave their nails, get them food and go to war for them. In KTK, you were your own person.
*We know this is the case for Mardu and Sultai. We know the strongest and best hunter becomes leader of the Temur. We know the best becomes leader of the Abzan. Finally, the most enlightened becomes leader of the Jeskai (humans flat out can't lead the Ojutai because they're considered an inferior species, regardless of how enlightened they become).
Your mods are terrified of me.
In most of the KTK clans you were a warrior. The Temur and the Mardu had no use for burdensome non-combatants. The Abzan similarly had little use for those who weren't either warriors or merchants. The Sultai really didn't change. You're either fodder for the amusement of the naga or for Silmugar. The only ones that seemed like you could have a reasonably normal life was if you were a non-Jeskai living within their territory.
And in truth, humans are an inferior species when compared to dragons. When we're talking about sapient dragons rather than dumb beasts like the Jund dragons what possible reason could you have to believe that humans would be superior other than your own arrogance? The difference here is we are the only sapient species we know of. If suddenly dogs could speak English would you suddenly treat them as equal to humans even though they are clearly inferior to us?
This is so far from true.
The Temur had shamans. Plus I want to see some citation where it says that all of Temur are hunters. They're basically a nomadic collection of tribes. But even in hunter-gatherer-communities not everyone is a hunter. (As evidenced by the word, in case you haven't noticed.)
The Mardu were the most warlike, but it was hinted at that even they had people who took care of the supplies and stuff.
The Abzan? The Abzan had all sorts of professions, mostly due to their relatively advanced infrastructure. They had merchants, they had spiritual leaders, they had all sorts of professions you'd find in a sufficiently large civilization.
But even if your claim was true, it would still be a pointless argument, because:
a) Being treated differently due to your profession is not the same as being treated differently due to your species. You can change your profession afterall, but you cannot change what you were born as.
b) It still wouldn't be a "downgrade" from DTK, because the problems you claim to exist in the clans do exist in the broods anyway, though in most cases several times amplified.
@Nissa/The most recent uncharted Realms: I thought this was decent. Like everyone has pointed out Nissa stories are pretty bland and filler-y, and as a character she lost a lot of her complexity due to the retcons. Her weird "you can't say Zendikar is yours"snob moment while talking to Munda was kind of weird and made me like her as a character a little less. Which is the first time I've felt anything more than ambivalence towards her character since Worldwaker so right on for that. I am coming to the belief that the change in how UR is handled is a mistake. Whatever your feelings about Khans/Dragons of Tarkir the way UR was handled was excellent. We got cool random stories that let us immerse ourselves in the world and we got relevant plot-advancing stories of Sarkhan's quest and the fall of the Khans. In the new stories, by keeping the focus solely on the planeswalkers, I feel we are losing a lot. We're being given filler instead of individual vignettes, and because we're only following the main characters who we know appear next block there is nothing at stake. This also really undercuts the threat of the eldrazi, as we never see them from the perspective of the average Zendikari, but only from the perspective of badasses like Gideon and Nissa who can slaughter dozens of eldrazi single handedly. The best UR we've had recently has been Drana's, UR should be handled the way they were in Tarkir block, with the story only focusing on the main characters when something important or relevant has happened.
RG 8-Whack
BWG Abzan midrange
GRB Living End
UWB Spirit Control
GU Kruphix's "Hug Assassin"
RW Kalemne's "Play Fatties and Hope for the Best!"
BUGW Atraxa's "All counters, all the time"
Meanwhile, Jace 1) is convinced by Gideon to go to Zendikar and 2) is headed toward the Eye of Ugin. There's probably room in this set's UR span for one more Jace story where he meets up with Ugin and the two hash out their differing philosophies.
Kiora's story is next, and I hope she can do something more useful than just get into a tentacle slap-fight (she did at least do something plot-relevant in the Theros novel IIRC).
I would much rather have stories that relate to the planeswalkers, legends, and other recurring characters in the PW's guide than random vignettes. The story about Drana wouldn't have been nearly as impactful if it was a band of vampires solely invented to star in the UR, for example.
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On filler, it is true that something plot relevant happens w/ each story we get, and the Gideon/Jace stories have generally been more interesting/plot advancing than Nissa's, but I feel there is still a lot of fluff for less substance. I liked the most recent Gideon story, but imagine if it had been from the perspective of one of the refugees fleeing the Smothering Abomination rather than Gideon's, there would have been genuine peril for the main character, we could have seen the eldrazi as the unchallengeable threat they are to most Zendikari, and at the end we still could have gotten the scene where Gideon becomes leader of the Zendikari resistance. I really enjoy the UR, even the Nissa ones, but I do feel we're getting a lot of stories about Gideon moving water falls and smashing eldrazi, and Nissa bemoaning her life, while parts of those stories (Pili and Leek, the refugees) probably could have made a more interesting UR that would still tie into, affect, and advance the primary plot. I will freely admit that not all the planeswalker centric stories are filler (Jace's was awesome and included plot-relevant material) I just feel that things are being really stretched out when they could be compacted to make room for more material.
I'm also looking forward to the Kiora story next week, and really looking forward to the Jace/Ugin story whenever we get it.
RG 8-Whack
BWG Abzan midrange
GRB Living End
UWB Spirit Control
GU Kruphix's "Hug Assassin"
RW Kalemne's "Play Fatties and Hope for the Best!"
BUGW Atraxa's "All counters, all the time"
You assume that the majority matters and we don't really know whether the majority is suffering or not (2 clans are fine, 2 clans are not. The Kolaghan are a bit unknown). Tarkir is not a democracy or a world that cares about being politically correct in any of its timelines. The dragons have ruled for over 1000 years because they were the strongest. No non-dragon(except Surrak who punches his way through everything) can match them in strength or mind. Even characters who possibly can, like Narset and Sarkhan, are closer to dragons than humans.
About the UR thing:
To be honest I was one of those who was not really interested in the random daily events of the Khans UR. I was more interested on what Sarkhan and the Khans themselves were doing. To their credit though, these stories gave us a good feeling of the world, something the Dragons timeline failed to do. Still I'd like to see more stories from outside planeswalkers pov, as long as they progress the story in a meaningful way, especially if they are about legendaries.
UBarrin, Master WizardU
USticher GeralfU
UIxidor, Reality SculptorU
UWNoyan Dar, Roil ShaperUW
Ojutai vs Jeskai is equally as obvious. I mean, Ojutai executes humans that fail to protect their dragon overlords, as an example.
Mardu vs Kolaghan. In the Mardu you fight for the good of the Mardu. If the khan proves to be a liability, you can challenge and dethrone him, or the whole clan abandons them. With kolaghan we know you either kill your enemies or the dragons kill you: there is no camaraderie. We know the dragons also don't give a crap and will burn any non-dragons on the battlefield, friend and foe alike.
Sultai vs Silumgar. Essentially the same, except with Sultai you could outmaneuver the khan and take over, or climb up in the organization. This is not so in Silumgar where your only role is feeding dragons.
Finally, this has nothing at all to do with democracy. If the majority of sentient life have things worse than in the previous timeline, then life is worse. This isn't rocket surgery.
Your mods are terrified of me.
But when I see these Gideon and Nissa filler, that's when I'm frustrated. We've had six or seven articles about the core planeswalkers but the story has barely progressed. These characters aren't interesting, especially Nissa, so we neither get sufficient plot advancement nor an interesting development of characters or the culture of the plane.
The merfolk Planeswalker Kiora returns to Zendikar wielding a stolen prize of great power: the bident of Thassa, god of the sea on the plane of Theros. But her escape was a narrow one, her strength drained, and her people scattered. The merfolk of Zendikar face their own gods risen against them, a mockery of everything they once held dear, and hope is hard to come by. But Kiora is no stranger to defying the gods."
Can't wait to read next week's. Should be the last set-up piece before the release of the set and real meat of the story. Praying to the gods on all planes that the following Nissa story delivers.