I wasn't really feeling the multicolor gods in Theros anyway - I love all the gods and that variety, and was glad they were there (probably indeed better at Rare) but personally I preferred the Mono-color gods.
Something about the Amonkhet gods just hasn't been interesting to me. Perhaps because they've come after the Theros ones, or Egyptian gods aren't as prominent, or because Bolas ate up all their creative space? Whatever it is, they didn't appeal as much to me as the Monocolor Theros gods.
I think as cards the Theros gods are more interesting, but as characters both pantheons have been great. And guys, we need the duel colored minor gods so we can get more Kruphix, c'mon now.
One direction that i think could be taken is partnering up the minor gods. For example having a mardu card called "the twins of war" that shows Iroas and Mogis. That would be a way to have cards for all the minor gods while not eating up all the space for mythics and making a huge number of god cards. It would put some wedge/shard colored cards in an otherwise monocolor set but i think a cycle of 5 3-color cards at mythic isn't too excessive.
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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"
I think pairing the gods would be a poor decision but this is how I would imagine it. I doubt they will do this and with good reason
Ephara and Karametra
Mogis and Iroas
Phenax and Athreos (The Returned, etc.)
Pharika and Keranos?
Kruphix and Love God?
Eh. They can get individual cards, but as Rare. Or the story could focus on the major gods and just do those. Too many god cards to do a second cycle of them all. I'd just give the RG god and the Monochrome ones new cards.
I agree that it is unlikely, but i think it's doable. Especially if future Theros sets deal with an increasingly overbearing Heliod or a loss of faith from the mortals I could see a flavor of "these are the alliances the gods are making for this conflict"
Iroas & Mogis (Mardu, flavored as war coming together to compete/prove their strength)
Kruphix & rg god (temur,flavored as Kruphix watching over the newly born god)
Ephara & Keranos (jeskai, the gods most concerned w/ epiphany and wisdom sticking together)
Karametra & Athreos (abzan, Karametra cares for Setessa and the safety of mortals, Athreos only cares about making sure the dead go to the underworld, they're both very "this is the way things are" gods to me so i could see them being pro status quo in whatever the larger storyline is)
Phenax & Pharika (sultai, we know Phenax is a schemer, we dont know all that much about Pharika's hopes/desires, for the purpose of a full shard cycle i could see these two as an alliance of convenience)
As i said, i think it's unlikely. It's hard for me to see them printing a brand new rg god w/o giving it it's own card. However, I feel team-ups could easily be flavored and designed that would allow all the gods to appear as cards while saving on space.
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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"
Another way they could do it is to only include cards for the Gods that are actively involved in the set's storyline. So, none of the complete cycles would be guaranteed (unless they each make an appearance).
That runs the risk of pissing people off if THEIR god didn't make the cut, though.
I would be fine with the gold Gods coming back as rares. But why are we talking about Theros Gods in Amonkhet general discussion?
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MTGS Wikia Article about "New World Order"
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
PSA to everyone who keeps forgetting about the Reserved List:
You're on a website dedicated to talking about MtG. You're only a few keystrokes away from finding out what cards are on the Reserved List. You're also only a few keystrokes away from finding out why some cards on the Reserved List got foil printings in FtV, as Judge promos, or whatnot, as well as why that won't happen again. Stop doing this.
Well, on the subject of the Amonkhet gods, one thing I'm very interested in learning is what hsppens to Locust and Scarab. Will Bolas take thrm with him? If he doesnt will they just start randomly terroizing the wastes and hounding survivors or will they sort of shut down? My hope is they'll eventually be restored to their original forms but im unsure of how that would happen.
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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"
Well, on the subject of the Amonkhet gods, one thing I'm very interested in learning is what hsppens to Locust and Scarab. Will Bolas take thrm with him? If he doesnt will they just start randomly terroizing the wastes and hounding survivors or will they sort of shut down? My hope is they'll eventually be restored to their original forms but im unsure of how that would happen.
The real question is why do we kill characters at all... Oketra's death was not done for shock value but because it was an important part of the larger story we're telling. Why did Bolas do what he did to Amonkhet? What role did the Gods play? What is Bolas up to? Why does he need an Eternal army? Why did he kill the Gods of Amonkhet? These are all important questions that we want you to ask and will answer as the story develops.
I think we might learn something from tomorrows story. It is the (unknown) 5th hour which means by now the Bolas-gods filled their purpose.
I'm still on the theory that Bolas had the other gods killed to have full control over the world soul of Amonkhet with the (planned) only three pillar of it left are the corrupted gods he controls.
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“There are no weak Jews. I am descended from those who wrestle angels and kill giants. We were chosen by God. You were chosen by a pathetic little man who can't seem to grow a full mustache"
"You can tell how dumb someone is by how they use Mary Sue"
I'm not going to speculate anything. I really had thought the Eldrazi release would be some worthwhile time-spanning scheme that turned out as lame as ever possible, so I'll just wait.
The metropolitan nature of Ravnica would be more interesting if they stopped making everything happen in the capital. All the action lately takes place in the districts of the capital and the abandoned wastes around it, which undercuts the idea of a city wide Metropolis. Having some cards set in regions of the plane that are completely controlled by certain guilds, other cities, even "rural" areas that are still cities but just slightly less built up, like buildings are all 3 or 4 stories, would be interesting and help further the theme. Also, a mechanic that plays on the city flavor.
I don't think "plane-wide metropolis" is enough to build an entire block around mechanically and flavourfully. It probably only works as a flavour coating for a mechanical core theme, like they did with Zendikar, where "adventure world" was the flavour hook for a land-matters block. Just as how the coating also leads to some interesting designs not related to the mechanical theme (allies, quests, traps) could the metropolitan coating of such a world also lead to "city-based" mechanics while still having a larger theme.
Problem is, Ravnica already has a mechanical theme, so I don't see Wizards exploring the city-flavour at the cost of the guilds. The guilds made Ravnica popular, not the metropolis aspect. I'm not saying the metropolis aspect is bland (personally I'm a big sucker for Coruscant-like worlds) but it's by far not Ravnica's core appeal.
Nevertheless, for meta reasons, the pantheon won't be dissolved. We might get a reduced panthon (some gods merging into one) to reduce the need for 15 gods in the modern block system or the gods will change, but we won't get a godless Theros permanently. At most, we might see the removal of the theran gods in one set and then in the next revisit a resurgence of new gods.
Or the minor gods moved down to rare.
I highly doubt they'll ever print a creature with the typeline "God" as anything but Mythic.
I'd say it would actually be fairly easy by playing up an aspect that already exists, is related to the guild theme, and that many players expected to play a large part in RTR block: the Gateless. The mono colored, unguilded inhabitants of Ravnica. Have them play a role in next block as a sort of 11th guild that is both mono colored and 5 colored (contains all 5 colors but only mono colored cards) would play up a central aspect of cities: their diversity and how those diverse people end up living and working together. The original Guildpact sort of fulfilled this role by forcing the guilds to work together somewhat.
The questions we are asking about the story are the questions they wanted us to be asking at this point and will be answered, specifically why does Bolas need the eternals and why is he killing the gods.
I am sure that will be just as compelling and awesome as the reasons they came up with him for releasing the Eldrazi.
Bolas win, he very much wins. Lillian's defeat will bring a lot of interesting conflicts to the group later.
And it looks like Ral is an agent of Bolas.
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“There are no weak Jews. I am descended from those who wrestle angels and kill giants. We were chosen by God. You were chosen by a pathetic little man who can't seem to grow a full mustache"
"You can tell how dumb someone is by how they use Mary Sue"
That part surprised me...it makes me wonder what the true purpose of that project he was working on in Ravnica is.
I never really liked him as a good guy, kinda glad to see him is still a villain.
As far as I can think the project can tack walkers, which could be useful since it might also figure out optional walkers who Bolas could recruit. Unless there is something else Ral is really working on that we don't know about yet.
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“There are no weak Jews. I am descended from those who wrestle angels and kill giants. We were chosen by God. You were chosen by a pathetic little man who can't seem to grow a full mustache"
"You can tell how dumb someone is by how they use Mary Sue"
So unless I horrendously misread the end of the Aether Revolt storyline, Tezzeret did NOT succeed in obtaining the Planar Bridge for Bolas, right? I mean, a pretty big part of that story was the Bridge getting blown up by the Gatewatch. Makes me wonder if that was what Tezzeret was trying to tell him before Bolas told him to shut up and get Ral Zarek.
So unless I horrendously misread the end of the Aether Revolt storyline, Tezzeret did NOT succeed in obtaining the Planar Bridge for Bolas, right? I mean, a pretty big part of that story was the Bridge getting blown up by the Gatewatch. Makes me wonder if that was what Tezzeret was trying to tell him before Bolas told him to shut up and get Ral Zarek.
Oh, this could be huge. Bolas definitely thinks he has an undead army and the Planar Bridge. Oh man.
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"The essence of every world, every spell and every thought is power. Nothing else matters, because nothing else exists."
So unless I horrendously misread the end of the Aether Revolt storyline, Tezzeret did NOT succeed in obtaining the Planar Bridge for Bolas, right? I mean, a pretty big part of that story was the Bridge getting blown up by the Gatewatch. Makes me wonder if that was what Tezzeret was trying to tell him before Bolas told him to shut up and get Ral Zarek.
The art book says that Tezzeret had take the core of the planar bridge with him into his etherium arm. The story hints at this with doing that with this;
Tezzeret shrugged. He tugged the sleeve of his robe down to cover most of his etherium arm again, hiding a strange glow that seemed to echo the eddying light of his portal. Only then did he grace her with his full attention. He arched an eyebrow.
but doesn't ever out right states it.
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“There are no weak Jews. I am descended from those who wrestle angels and kill giants. We were chosen by God. You were chosen by a pathetic little man who can't seem to grow a full mustache"
"You can tell how dumb someone is by how they use Mary Sue"
Bolas had the whole damn Gatewatch destroyed by the end of the first section. That was as glorious a clownstomping as I've ever seen.
"I promise not to listen if you all shout at each other" <- this line killed me.
Anyways thoughts
1. My god is Jace a dumbass. He's really a dumbass. Sure, lets try to invade the mind of the anciant dragon planeswalker who's psychic taunting me the entire time I'm trying to do it. That couldn't have possibly been any sort of a trap, could it have?
2. Welp, that's it for Lilliana as a trusted member of the Gatewatch. Not that anyone really expected her to stay til the last if things got dire.
3. Love how Bolas pretty much defeated everyone by just crushing their strengths. The Gatewatch really were just a bunch of kids who got lucky a couple times.
4. The big shock of the story, of course, is that Ral Zarek is working with Bolas. Which does NOT have good implications, given this pretty much means that Bolas is at least somewhat connected to Project Lightning Bug. That seems bad. On a side note, could you imagine Niv-Mizzets reaction to finding out about all this?
5. Still not sure exactly why Bolas wants the Gatewatch alive. But not killing any of them seemed pretty vital to his plans.
Good ending, we got what we wanted. On to Ixalan!
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Something about the Amonkhet gods just hasn't been interesting to me. Perhaps because they've come after the Theros ones, or Egyptian gods aren't as prominent, or because Bolas ate up all their creative space? Whatever it is, they didn't appeal as much to me as the Monocolor Theros gods.
|| 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 ||
One direction that i think could be taken is partnering up the minor gods. For example having a mardu card called "the twins of war" that shows Iroas and Mogis. That would be a way to have cards for all the minor gods while not eating up all the space for mythics and making a huge number of god cards. It would put some wedge/shard colored cards in an otherwise monocolor set but i think a cycle of 5 3-color cards at mythic isn't too excessive.
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"
Are there any other pairs of gods that even share any sort of linked backgrounds, purposes or agendas?
Ephara and Karametra
Mogis and Iroas
Phenax and Athreos (The Returned, etc.)
Pharika and Keranos?
Kruphix and Love God?
Eh. They can get individual cards, but as Rare. Or the story could focus on the major gods and just do those. Too many god cards to do a second cycle of them all. I'd just give the RG god and the Monochrome ones new cards.
|| 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 ||
Iroas & Mogis (Mardu, flavored as war coming together to compete/prove their strength)
Kruphix & rg god (temur,flavored as Kruphix watching over the newly born god)
Ephara & Keranos (jeskai, the gods most concerned w/ epiphany and wisdom sticking together)
Karametra & Athreos (abzan, Karametra cares for Setessa and the safety of mortals, Athreos only cares about making sure the dead go to the underworld, they're both very "this is the way things are" gods to me so i could see them being pro status quo in whatever the larger storyline is)
Phenax & Pharika (sultai, we know Phenax is a schemer, we dont know all that much about Pharika's hopes/desires, for the purpose of a full shard cycle i could see these two as an alliance of convenience)
As i said, i think it's unlikely. It's hard for me to see them printing a brand new rg god w/o giving it it's own card. However, I feel team-ups could easily be flavored and designed that would allow all the gods to appear as cards while saving on space.
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"
Then again, I'm not a huge fan of Theros.
That runs the risk of pissing people off if THEIR god didn't make the cut, though.
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
TerribleBad at Magic since 1998.A Vorthos Guide to Magic Story | Twitter | Tumblr
[Primer] Krenko | Azor | Kess | Zacama | Kumena | Sram | The Ur-Dragon | Edgar Markov | Daretti | Marath
Because it started as comparing the two sets of Gods with each other, and then progressed to only talking about the Theros Gods.
Also, considering Samut planeswalked to Theros, the plane does have some relevance to the discussion, but not that much.
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"
Kinda on that subject this was from Maro article yesterday;
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/making-magic/odds-ends-hour-devastation-part-1-2017-07-24
I think we might learn something from tomorrows story. It is the (unknown) 5th hour which means by now the Bolas-gods filled their purpose.
I'm still on the theory that Bolas had the other gods killed to have full control over the world soul of Amonkhet with the (planned) only three pillar of it left are the corrupted gods he controls.
"You can tell how dumb someone is by how they use Mary Sue"
|| 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 am sure that will be just as compelling and awesome as the reasons they came up with him for releasing the Eldrazi.
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
I said, MTG Salvation.... are you rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrready?
Then, for the thousands in attendance.
And the billions watching all around the multiverse.
From the ruins of Nakthamun on Amonkhet...
LLLLETS GET RRREADY TO RRRRUUUUUMBUUUUUUUUUUULLLLLLL!!!!
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/magic-story/hour-devastation-2017-07-26
- but I already have a new favorite line from any Magic story, ever:
And it looks like Ral is an agent of Bolas.
"You can tell how dumb someone is by how they use Mary Sue"
That part surprised me...it makes me wonder what the true purpose of that project he was working on in Ravnica is.
I never really liked him as a good guy, kinda glad to see him is still a villain.
As far as I can think the project can tack walkers, which could be useful since it might also figure out optional walkers who Bolas could recruit. Unless there is something else Ral is really working on that we don't know about yet.
"You can tell how dumb someone is by how they use Mary Sue"
I didnt know Bolas was from Georgia!
Oh, this could be huge. Bolas definitely thinks he has an undead army and the Planar Bridge. Oh man.
The art book says that Tezzeret had take the core of the planar bridge with him into his etherium arm. The story hints at this with doing that with this;
but doesn't ever out right states it.
"You can tell how dumb someone is by how they use Mary Sue"
"I promise not to listen if you all shout at each other" <- this line killed me.
Anyways thoughts
1. My god is Jace a dumbass. He's really a dumbass. Sure, lets try to invade the mind of the anciant dragon planeswalker who's psychic taunting me the entire time I'm trying to do it. That couldn't have possibly been any sort of a trap, could it have?
2. Welp, that's it for Lilliana as a trusted member of the Gatewatch. Not that anyone really expected her to stay til the last if things got dire.
3. Love how Bolas pretty much defeated everyone by just crushing their strengths. The Gatewatch really were just a bunch of kids who got lucky a couple times.
4. The big shock of the story, of course, is that Ral Zarek is working with Bolas. Which does NOT have good implications, given this pretty much means that Bolas is at least somewhat connected to Project Lightning Bug. That seems bad. On a side note, could you imagine Niv-Mizzets reaction to finding out about all this?
5. Still not sure exactly why Bolas wants the Gatewatch alive. But not killing any of them seemed pretty vital to his plans.
Good ending, we got what we wanted. On to Ixalan!