Chandra, on the other hand... actually when she just hugged Nissa still showed she still can show her emotional outburst positively, but even that was overshadowed by ANGRYBURNANGRYBURNITSBARALREALLYANGRYBURNEVENMORE that she showed and Nissa was right... can someone really be that bad at focusing all her power into a precise blade (of revenge)? Well, perhaps the way I can relate to Nissa while others can't, I really can't relate to Chandra, that one can be so angry (all the time) to the point you can't concentrate that anger at a precise point so you could achieve the goal to sate that anger. Or perhaps I'm really justified that Nissa's (extreme) introversion isn't a pure G aspect of any sort and therefore is more realistic, but Chandra's anger is R through and through to the point it cannot possibly be realistic, since in reality, characters are varying shades of all colors.
I don't think Chandra is unrealistically angry, here. If you've experienced rage or trauma, unreasonable levels of anger aren't 'unrealistic'. Especially with how traumatic Chandra's early life was.
I phrased it rather badly, my bad. Her levels of anger aren't unrealistic, but her channeling of that anger seems to be no different from that when she ascended, despite all that she tried to meditate (admittedly not very successfully) when she was on Regatha. One of the biggest gripes I have (and I'm sure some others as well) with her is she has no development at all, and I don't necessarily mean obvious character changes. Her anger literally manifested itself yet again in the form of mass-combustion, which is also pretty much the only thing she does even when she's not angry (Fall of the Titans). Yeah it can be somehwat precise if she isn't angry (Incendiary Flow), but I'm really frustrated that her presence in pretty much all stories had no impact on her for a subtle change in her. Yes, this is probably the even that strikes her the most emotionally, but to fall back on mass, unconcentrated combustion as the vent of anger seems to be a disservice to her planeswalking adventures rather than a service in favor of her "anger" at this point of time.
She definitely has all the right to feel all that rage and fury considering her past, but I feel that the "Chandra gets angry, mass-combusts and then gets too exhausted from anger/emotional to do anything else" tactic is way past expiry. I'm not particularly receptive of "this is the event closest to her heart and most emotional one" (even though I probably should be), because the problem is that they didn't develop her well enough before this event (having her do something with precision on Innistrad as a contrast... Incendiary Flow's flavor text implies... well the opposite) in order to emphasize that this event is the one that hits her the hardest. Yes, by logic we know this event hits her the hardest, but I'm just annoyed that the story simply expects us to just use that logic instead of setting up a flow in her character while we were with her on Zendikar/Innistrad. Ravnica tried to do that for that brief article, but it didn't really do much in the end. It somewhat destroys the illusion of progress and now it just feels like another overused "Chandra explodes with anger" storyline instead of "This is the event Chandra brought out her most emotional outburst"... and I'm somewhat disappointed by that.
Basically, this is "Chandra gets angry again classic" to me that felt unrealistic, because I was expecting "Chandra gets the angriest point of her life so far" based on prior knowledge we have.
Thing is some people are just angry. And some people deal with it in the same way. Realistically we haven't seen a while lot of Chandra and she has always had a lot of reason to be so when we are do. Besides perhaps this is their way of starting a new chapter for Chandra. Using the calming effect of Nissa as well as the cunning of Liliana to take what is likely to be a story of closure for Chandra to temper her. To stop the "always blows up everything when angry" and give her creative outlets for her anger while, likely, making her more powerful.
Thing is some people are just angry. And some people deal with it in the same way. Realistically we haven't seen a while lot of Chandra and she has always had a lot of reason to be so when we are do. Besides perhaps this is their way of starting a new chapter for Chandra. Using the calming effect of Nissa as well as the cunning of Liliana to take what is likely to be a story of closure for Chandra to temper her. To stop the "always blows up everything when angry" and give her creative outlets for her anger while, likely, making her more powerful.
I understand that. This is admittedly selfish, but I can't put it in other words - Kaladesh happened too early. I simply don't like using Chandra's past as the stepping stone for the "first" new chapter for her, because I have the expectation that her past is what would trigger her "angriest point".
Looking backwards, this should have been done with another plot-line, having Chandra learn new creative outlets to vent her anger (and demonstrating it visibly) and then for her past to catch up to her, making her "reversion" all the more meaningful (and multiplying the impact of her past trauma). As it stands, Baral almost "feels" like Kozilek in terms of Chandra's anger output, but bluntly put, we pretty much associate the scale of her fire with her emotions. (Of course, Kozilek was a titan and Chandra having Nissa channeling mana made the scenario way different, but the point was Innistrad didn't really show a still-much-needed contrast before we got here).
Looking forward, if Chandra indeed learns to control her anger after this plot, then I'll be hard-pressed to think of another scenario that could possibly get her as emotionally charged up again (obligatory Gatewatch barely suffer setbacks, let alone deaths) for a chance of a relapse... which is a chance for secondary development. They seem pretty bent on keeping the Gatewatch stuck on their mono-colored aspects, so for her secondary development to occur "in-color", the relapse is pretty much one of the most obvious ways (and as cliche as it is, I feel like it needed to happen once to emphasize "emotion" that Chandra represents).
So basically I felt that the arrangement of both the plot and Chandra's development did a disservice to both her past trauma and future development simultaneously. Well now that I've typed to this point, I guess it does feel realistic that fate doesn't arrange these things nicely in real life, and therefore this actually feels more "realistic" in that aspect, but in the twist of irony, my expectations for her character in the long-term were the more classic "unrealistic" arrangements. I won't deny it's both selfish and ironic on my part, but I still feel like I had to get this annoyance out of my system here.
So when we started the Kaladesh arc, we started with hints of who Chandra is without her anger. She's a happy-go-lucky thrill seeker who oversleeps, stays up all night, and enjoys goblins exploding. This seems fine, totally a reasonable place for Chandra to be. And if it wasn't for Dovin we'd probably have seen more of Chandra trying to figure out what to do with herself at rest. The same way we saw that Jace forgets to sleep, Gideon enjoys being slammed through floors, and Nissa awkwardly lurks in the background like your goth sister.
Chandra was pretty much still there when she was exploring Kaladesh with Lili, pretty excited about most things but with a small burning bitterness. Chandra was bitter at this 'gloss of everything is perfect' because she knows that the Consul has no problem burning a village to the ground, blaming her for it, killing her dad, trying to execute her, and killing her mom in the process. So her level of low burning bitterness (which Lili was actively fanning into 'blow it all up, it'll be fun') was also... totally fine. It wasn't quite so overbearing and hard to deal with because it wasn't urgent in her mind. It was just 'why can't people see how much all this sucks.'
The issue isn't Chandra's anger (when it comes to red traits), it's her impatience. Before, Chandra had some issues but they didn't matter right now. They just bothered her when either directly tossed at her (by Dovin), or when she was at rest (poor punching bag). And even then she had time to do other, silly, non angry things (sand castle). Now, now her mother is alive and beyond that not hugging her because of the stupid Consul. So Chandra, bless her heart, is trying to fix that now. Which anyone else would say is insane, that isn't how fixing things work. But Chandra is viewing every second she isn't with her mom as a huge problem, so she's getting frustrated.
Which... is reasonable, but not very interesting for character exploration, as we've seen this before. We saw this in Fire Logic. And during her fight with Ob. And generally when Chandra is doing things in plot. There are traces of 'Red is fickle and chaotic' in Chandra beyond just 'Red is impatient and angry,' but it hasn't been given a lot of room to work out in the story. Hopefully that'll change.
But it is often from the lowest point that people change. If you consider that much of her anger originates from that one point in her past it seems entirely reasonable to use this as the turning point for her rather than a relapse point.
But it is often from the lowest point that people change. If you consider that much of her anger originates from that one point in her past it seems entirely reasonable to use this as the turning point for her rather than a relapse point.
We were told as much with the concept description given by Doug on Cathartic Reunion.
What if red card-drawing were flavored as the process of expunging a complicated knot of painful feelings that are now, finally, in the past, and about the dawning possibility that, together, we might just be able to labor through the lingering ache of those past tragedies – and maybe even dare to feel a wrenching surge of hope?
Once we get there, we'll probably see a turnaround. But we're not there yet. We probably won't be there until the end of Kaladesh story (Aether Revolt will probably have a lot of newer less angry Chandra).
But it is often from the lowest point that people change. If you consider that much of her anger originates from that one point in her past it seems entirely reasonable to use this as the turning point for her rather than a relapse point.
Perhaps using relapse wasn't the correct term either (I probably shouldn't continue much longer either, using inaccurate terms so often)... yes, this is her lowest point and possibly her turning point... but we don't have anything to compare to establish that this is her lowest point. Her origins story was pretty much the only actual setback she encountered (Regatha was way too lenient to be of any actual setback) and since it's the only point (and this being the exact same point), I simply cannot feel the "lowest" point by comparison of any sort, which is why I feel that Kaladesh happened too early.
Yes, logic tells us that nothing would be able to surpass this "lowest point", but being presented with literally almost nothing substantial for her between her origins and the "turning point relapse incident" (which is now) feels like a very obvious "void in the story of Chandra".
In fairness she wasn't even expecting the "relapse" (mainly Pia being alive to kick-start everything), so she wouldn't have "new tools" to deal with the same situation, but at the same time the very fact she left for so many years and came back with literally the same skillset is just jarring (come on, even without Pia I don't think she'll expect Baral to be her new best friend on the return right?) Which was why Nissa was the best part of the article - without her it would have been a literal repeat of what happened years ago. In the sense, Nissa is the "new skillset", but less "skill" but more "lucky to have the right connections" instead, which seems a lot less impressive on any return record...
Still reading, but this an excellent story. We get Ajani, Tamiyo, modern Kamigawa. They mention Narset, and they even call back to specific events in Agents of Artifice.
Still reading, but this an excellent story. We get Ajani, Tamiyo, modern Kamigawa. They mention Narset, and they even call back to specific events in Agents of Artifice.
I second that. An excellent story with callbacks to many important events.
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OK, so where do all these WU planeswalkers meet and become such good friends? Will Jace ever get into that club or will Tamiyo snub him in a way consistent with their parting and never invite him to her place to swap tales?
I was a bit scrambled at first until I realized whose perspective the story was coming from. Overall, a solid story. Many different storylines are coming together. I can see how this story and all the others mentioned today are leading to a confrontation with Bolas in the next block.
Ajani is a far more intriguing character to me now that he has ever been. How did he come into contact with all these people and form such strong bonds?
The Kaladesh story started slow but is really starting to draw me in after today's offering. A- for the story. A+ for all the lore we got today.
Echoing what others have said, solid story today and love that we have a bit of a timeline to work off of, including the call backs to Agents of Artifice.
I also like how we learned a little more about Elspeth, and that Theros was her first 'walk before heading to Bant. If this was already known, I must have missed it.
I also like Mrs. Pashri's treatment towards Ajani, asking him if he's eating enough and chiding him on almost leaving the metal gauntlets at the end. So very grandmotherly!
Really hope the story sticks the landing, the story is doing well and hopefully will have a compelling ending.
I also like how we learned a little more about Elspeth, and that Theros was her first 'walk before heading to Bant. If this was already known, I must have missed it.
I think that was told in the prolog of the Theros novel.
The more interesting thing to me about the Elspeth story is it sounds like she grew up on a plane touched by Phyrexians. Is there another Phyrexian stronghold out in the multiverse, maybe not as overrun as Mirrodin?
With Ajani spreading word of Elspeth's tale across Theros, I wonder if that somehow foreshadows her ascension to godhood. Devotion and what not, yknow.
But I forget if that is how one becomes a god on Theros.
With Ajani spreading word of Elspeth's tale across Theros, I wonder if that somehow foreshadows her ascension to godhood. Devotion and what not, yknow.
But I forget if that is how one becomes a god on Theros.
One does not normally become a god, Xenagos was an exception. Normally, belief coalesces into a God whose dominion is that belief, then as that God acts, belief in them spreads strengthening them until their domain encompasses more or their legend merges with another God, which is how we have only 14 right now. Ajani was more trying to spread discord to make people realize the Gods are petty and controlled by their belief so they have real influence over them, so they should change them.
I thoroughly enjoyed the story. It was hard to figure out who was narrating in the beginning. Some of the descriptions made it feel like it was Ajani but I had a hard time buying that he could hide from plain sight being a 6'6 white-furred leonin on a plane where leonin don't exist. Even the cloak seemed like a stretch because they could just look down and be like "hey that guy's legs look really weird."
The Kamigawa flashbacks were great. Turns out Narset and Tamiyo have met (TAMIYOxNARSET SHIP IS REAL OMG!!11!) and Ajani is a frequent visitor to the plane (Elspeth too before she got got). If it wasn't clear before that Tamiyo is a mom, this confirms it. It was fun to read about Ajani's interactions with all the children and Tamiyo, especially with the nezumi child. I do admit that I'm a sucker for "slice-of-life" stories though. The Elspeth story hit me really hard. :/
Seeing Ajani refer to Pashiri as "Grandmother" and seeing her act like a grandmother to a hulking leonin was cute. Ajani's interaction with Chandra was also amusing (lol big kitty). I marked out when Ajani told the guard to go home and be a family man. This story was a solid A for me. I didn't actually realize how much I missed Ajani lol
My favorite planeswalker in a great story, lovely, simply lovely :3
I like how the white walkers gather from time to time to join story circle (Tamiyo being Bant color now), and how Ajani interact with Tamiyo's children. Him telling the emotional story of Elspeth's past was very moving. Ajani's interaction with Pashiri was also very cute.
And I freaking love the part where Ajani uses his power to gaze into the guard's soul, "seeking the titanic light that lay beyond," then tell him to go home be a family man. It's been too long since the last time I saw that ability, one of empathy and evoking potential. (Got a City of Heroes character made to mimic that power)
For the first time, after planeswalker cards debuted, Ajani met with Chandra. He will then meet Liliana and Jace. About time. He probably will join the Gatewatch, consider every team needs a wiser, gentler soul.
Question, though, I remembered a green card in Theros has a flavor text which indicates that Elspeth was trained with the Setessan centaurs, something along the line of, "She'd later become the hero of the sun." Perhaps Bant wasn't the first plane Elspeth walked to?
Another question is that, I don't remember Ajani missing fingers and was in need of a replacement gauntlet, when did that happen?
I phrased it rather badly, my bad. Her levels of anger aren't unrealistic, but her channeling of that anger seems to be no different from that when she ascended, despite all that she tried to meditate (admittedly not very successfully) when she was on Regatha. One of the biggest gripes I have (and I'm sure some others as well) with her is she has no development at all, and I don't necessarily mean obvious character changes. Her anger literally manifested itself yet again in the form of mass-combustion, which is also pretty much the only thing she does even when she's not angry (Fall of the Titans). Yeah it can be somehwat precise if she isn't angry (Incendiary Flow), but I'm really frustrated that her presence in pretty much all stories had no impact on her for a subtle change in her. Yes, this is probably the even that strikes her the most emotionally, but to fall back on mass, unconcentrated combustion as the vent of anger seems to be a disservice to her planeswalking adventures rather than a service in favor of her "anger" at this point of time.
She definitely has all the right to feel all that rage and fury considering her past, but I feel that the "Chandra gets angry, mass-combusts and then gets too exhausted from anger/emotional to do anything else" tactic is way past expiry. I'm not particularly receptive of "this is the event closest to her heart and most emotional one" (even though I probably should be), because the problem is that they didn't develop her well enough before this event (having her do something with precision on Innistrad as a contrast... Incendiary Flow's flavor text implies... well the opposite) in order to emphasize that this event is the one that hits her the hardest. Yes, by logic we know this event hits her the hardest, but I'm just annoyed that the story simply expects us to just use that logic instead of setting up a flow in her character while we were with her on Zendikar/Innistrad. Ravnica tried to do that for that brief article, but it didn't really do much in the end. It somewhat destroys the illusion of progress and now it just feels like another overused "Chandra explodes with anger" storyline instead of "This is the event Chandra brought out her most emotional outburst"... and I'm somewhat disappointed by that.
Basically, this is "Chandra gets angry again classic" to me that felt unrealistic, because I was expecting "Chandra gets the angriest point of her life so far" based on prior knowledge we have.
I understand that. This is admittedly selfish, but I can't put it in other words - Kaladesh happened too early. I simply don't like using Chandra's past as the stepping stone for the "first" new chapter for her, because I have the expectation that her past is what would trigger her "angriest point".
Looking backwards, this should have been done with another plot-line, having Chandra learn new creative outlets to vent her anger (and demonstrating it visibly) and then for her past to catch up to her, making her "reversion" all the more meaningful (and multiplying the impact of her past trauma). As it stands, Baral almost "feels" like Kozilek in terms of Chandra's anger output, but bluntly put, we pretty much associate the scale of her fire with her emotions. (Of course, Kozilek was a titan and Chandra having Nissa channeling mana made the scenario way different, but the point was Innistrad didn't really show a still-much-needed contrast before we got here).
Looking forward, if Chandra indeed learns to control her anger after this plot, then I'll be hard-pressed to think of another scenario that could possibly get her as emotionally charged up again (obligatory Gatewatch barely suffer setbacks, let alone deaths) for a chance of a relapse... which is a chance for secondary development. They seem pretty bent on keeping the Gatewatch stuck on their mono-colored aspects, so for her secondary development to occur "in-color", the relapse is pretty much one of the most obvious ways (and as cliche as it is, I feel like it needed to happen once to emphasize "emotion" that Chandra represents).
So basically I felt that the arrangement of both the plot and Chandra's development did a disservice to both her past trauma and future development simultaneously. Well now that I've typed to this point, I guess it does feel realistic that fate doesn't arrange these things nicely in real life, and therefore this actually feels more "realistic" in that aspect, but in the twist of irony, my expectations for her character in the long-term were the more classic "unrealistic" arrangements. I won't deny it's both selfish and ironic on my part, but I still feel like I had to get this annoyance out of my system here.
Chandra was pretty much still there when she was exploring Kaladesh with Lili, pretty excited about most things but with a small burning bitterness. Chandra was bitter at this 'gloss of everything is perfect' because she knows that the Consul has no problem burning a village to the ground, blaming her for it, killing her dad, trying to execute her, and killing her mom in the process. So her level of low burning bitterness (which Lili was actively fanning into 'blow it all up, it'll be fun') was also... totally fine. It wasn't quite so overbearing and hard to deal with because it wasn't urgent in her mind. It was just 'why can't people see how much all this sucks.'
The issue isn't Chandra's anger (when it comes to red traits), it's her impatience. Before, Chandra had some issues but they didn't matter right now. They just bothered her when either directly tossed at her (by Dovin), or when she was at rest (poor punching bag). And even then she had time to do other, silly, non angry things (sand castle). Now, now her mother is alive and beyond that not hugging her because of the stupid Consul. So Chandra, bless her heart, is trying to fix that now. Which anyone else would say is insane, that isn't how fixing things work. But Chandra is viewing every second she isn't with her mom as a huge problem, so she's getting frustrated.
Which... is reasonable, but not very interesting for character exploration, as we've seen this before. We saw this in Fire Logic. And during her fight with Ob. And generally when Chandra is doing things in plot. There are traces of 'Red is fickle and chaotic' in Chandra beyond just 'Red is impatient and angry,' but it hasn't been given a lot of room to work out in the story. Hopefully that'll change.
Once we get there, we'll probably see a turnaround. But we're not there yet. We probably won't be there until the end of Kaladesh story (Aether Revolt will probably have a lot of newer less angry Chandra).
Perhaps using relapse wasn't the correct term either (I probably shouldn't continue much longer either, using inaccurate terms so often)... yes, this is her lowest point and possibly her turning point... but we don't have anything to compare to establish that this is her lowest point. Her origins story was pretty much the only actual setback she encountered (Regatha was way too lenient to be of any actual setback) and since it's the only point (and this being the exact same point), I simply cannot feel the "lowest" point by comparison of any sort, which is why I feel that Kaladesh happened too early.
Yes, logic tells us that nothing would be able to surpass this "lowest point", but being presented with literally almost nothing substantial for her between her origins and the "turning point relapse incident" (which is now) feels like a very obvious "void in the story of Chandra".
In fairness she wasn't even expecting the "relapse" (mainly Pia being alive to kick-start everything), so she wouldn't have "new tools" to deal with the same situation, but at the same time the very fact she left for so many years and came back with literally the same skillset is just jarring (come on, even without Pia I don't think she'll expect Baral to be her new best friend on the return right?) Which was why Nissa was the best part of the article - without her it would have been a literal repeat of what happened years ago. In the sense, Nissa is the "new skillset", but less "skill" but more "lucky to have the right connections" instead, which seems a lot less impressive on any return record...
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/magic-story/release-2016-10-05
I didn't like the writing too much in places today, but I enjoyed the content of the story.
I want return to Kamigawa ;( I miss the Nezumi
that aside, him opening up his story hit me right in the feels.
Would that make Tamiyo Oracle?
I second that. An excellent story with callbacks to many important events.
Let this great clan rest in peace (2001-2011)
I was a bit scrambled at first until I realized whose perspective the story was coming from. Overall, a solid story. Many different storylines are coming together. I can see how this story and all the others mentioned today are leading to a confrontation with Bolas in the next block.
Ajani is a far more intriguing character to me now that he has ever been. How did he come into contact with all these people and form such strong bonds?
The Kaladesh story started slow but is really starting to draw me in after today's offering. A- for the story. A+ for all the lore we got today.
I also like how we learned a little more about Elspeth, and that Theros was her first 'walk before heading to Bant. If this was already known, I must have missed it.
I also like Mrs. Pashri's treatment towards Ajani, asking him if he's eating enough and chiding him on almost leaving the metal gauntlets at the end. So very grandmotherly!
Really hope the story sticks the landing, the story is doing well and hopefully will have a compelling ending.
I think that was told in the prolog of the Theros novel.
It was known:
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/feature/honor-bound-2009-05-07
Yes. Old Phyrexia attacked or had sleeper agents in many planes, including Moag (my personal headcannon for Elspeth's home plane) and Mercadia.
Plus Karn with his tainted heart stone could have infected countless worlds.
But I forget if that is how one becomes a god on Theros.
The Kamigawa flashbacks were great. Turns out Narset and Tamiyo have met (TAMIYOxNARSET SHIP IS REAL OMG!!11!) and Ajani is a frequent visitor to the plane (Elspeth too before she got got). If it wasn't clear before that Tamiyo is a mom, this confirms it. It was fun to read about Ajani's interactions with all the children and Tamiyo, especially with the nezumi child. I do admit that I'm a sucker for "slice-of-life" stories though. The Elspeth story hit me really hard. :/
Seeing Ajani refer to Pashiri as "Grandmother" and seeing her act like a grandmother to a hulking leonin was cute. Ajani's interaction with Chandra was also amusing (lol big kitty). I marked out when Ajani told the guard to go home and be a family man. This story was a solid A for me. I didn't actually realize how much I missed Ajani lol
"Kiora is the Aquaman of planeswalkers."
"Useless and everyone pretends to like her?"
I like how the white walkers gather from time to time to join story circle (Tamiyo being Bant color now), and how Ajani interact with Tamiyo's children. Him telling the emotional story of Elspeth's past was very moving. Ajani's interaction with Pashiri was also very cute.
And I freaking love the part where Ajani uses his power to gaze into the guard's soul, "seeking the titanic light that lay beyond," then tell him to go home be a family man. It's been too long since the last time I saw that ability, one of empathy and evoking potential. (Got a City of Heroes character made to mimic that power)
For the first time, after planeswalker cards debuted, Ajani met with Chandra. He will then meet Liliana and Jace. About time. He probably will join the Gatewatch, consider every team needs a wiser, gentler soul.
Question, though, I remembered a green card in Theros has a flavor text which indicates that Elspeth was trained with the Setessan centaurs, something along the line of, "She'd later become the hero of the sun." Perhaps Bant wasn't the first plane Elspeth walked to?
Another question is that, I don't remember Ajani missing fingers and was in need of a replacement gauntlet, when did that happen?
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He's not missing fingers. The gauntlets are gloves, to hide his hands (like the cloak does his head), since his race isn't native to Kaladesh.