MTG Salvation

So only the battle's controller can ever flip it, though other players can attack it? And presumably attacking it works like attacking a planeswalker. Do burns work to defeat it?

I assume the "protect" means that the player protecting it can block incoming attackers? But what does "whenever a player protects it" mean,a s we've seen on Maro's teaser? Just when you block?

Also, not a huge fan of the opaque textbox, it covers up so much of the art. And a narrow horizontal band of art feels very claustrophobic and doesn't have the same appeal as sagas. I would have prefered the cards were vertically oriented like any other card.

And I'm confused about the flavour. I assumed that the battle represents the phyrexian side, because it's called "Invasion of" and not "Defense of". And yet, when you win, the plane's defenders get a card? Huh? The flavour text makes it clear that Awakened Skyclave is not a phyrexian card but a zendikari card. And I'm a tad baffled at the decision behind it.

Also, the kerning around the "You" in the first line is absolutely driving me crazy.

So that's what the battle cards are. I'm guessing the 3 in teh explosive symbol at the bottom is the "HP" of it? Does it act in the same way as loyalty counters to planeswalkers? (remove a counter for each point of damage dealt to it?)

Quote from Flisch »

I assume the "protect" means that the player protecting it can block incoming attackers? But what does "whenever a player protects it" mean,a s we've seen on Maro's teaser? Just when you block?

Also, not a huge fan of the opaque textbox, it covers up so much of the art. And a narrow horizontal band of art feels very claustrophobic and doesn't have the same appeal as sagas. I would have prefered the cards were vertically oriented like any other card.

And I'm confused about the flavour. I assumed that the battle represents the phyrexian side, because it's called "Invasion of" and not "Defense of". And yet, when you win, the plane's defenders get a card? Huh? The flavour text makes it clear that Awakened Skyclave is not a phyrexian card but a zendikari card. And I'm a tad baffled at the decision behind it.

Also, the kerning around the "You" in the first line is absolutely driving me crazy.

I think that's the idea behind giving it to the opponent, they are the phyrexian side in this so to speak, and once you have broken through the siege (i.e. they weren't able to defend their stronghold), you get your reward. But I have to admit, it's a bit roundabout. And I agree that they should have made the textbox slightly transparent so we see more of this awesome artwork!

Quote from ChrisBP7 »

I think that's the idea behind giving it to the opponent, they are the phyrexian side in this so to speak, and once you have broken through the siege (i.e. they weren't able to defend their stronghold), you get your reward. But I have to admit, it's a bit roundabout. And I agree that they should have made the textbox slightly transparent so we see more of this awesome artwork!

But the card is called "Invasion of Zendikar" and the card type is "Siege". The opponent that protects it is the defender. From the wording it's very clear that it's the phyrexian side that's supposed to cast this.

Quote from Flisch »

Quote from ChrisBP7 »

I think that's the idea behind giving it to the opponent, they are the phyrexian side in this so to speak, and once you have broken through the siege (i.e. they weren't able to defend their stronghold), you get your reward. But I have to admit, it's a bit roundabout. And I agree that they should have made the textbox slightly transparent so we see more of this awesome artwork!

But the card is called "Invasion of Zendikar" and the card type is "Siege". The opponent that protects it is the defender. From the wording it's very clear that it's the phyrexian side that's supposed to cast this.

If the opponent protects the invasion then they are the invader, right? As I said, this is a bit strange and roundabout wording, maybe because of future uses of Battles?

Ah ha so these are the battles atraxa, grand unifier can grab

So these are attackable like planeswalkers and when it hits “0” it flips into the other side

Q&A as follows

1. Does the person who defeats it gets the DFC card?

2. Is this possible to do non DFC since it could just say “when defeated *benefits*”

The only thing I'm confused on is Why people here and on Reddit are confused. This is completely intuitive on all levels. You cast it, you get the first benefit. When it's defeated, You can cast the back side since you control it. This is the Invasion (siege), that an opponent is protecting and has the option to defend, They are the bad guys. When you defeat the invasion, you get a bonus for defeating the Phyrexians. What's so hard about this?

My only question is what is the opponent getting from defending it. Because preventing a 4/4 creature from hitting the board is a real mediocre prize when they already got two lands from the mana dropped on it. It really feels like there's no point in blocking for it unless there's some other rule to benefit the defender.

Quote from Max Rebo »

The only thing I'm confused on is Why people here and on Reddit are confused. This is completely intuitive on all levels. You cast it, you get the first benefit. When it's defeated, You can cast the back side since you control it. This is the Invasion (siege), that an opponent is protecting and has the option to defend, They are the bad guys. When you defeat the invasion, you get a bonus for defeating the Phyrexians. What's so hard about this?

I wouldn't say it's hard exactly, but it does seem like it is more accurately called a "counter offensive"

so its another flip card tranform card?

i wonder how many battle cards we will see later

I wonder if there are other battle subtypes in the set or if they're just future proofing the card type by making these the rules for sieges.

Quote from Flisch »

Also, not a huge fan of the opaque textbox, it covers up so much of the art. And a narrow horizontal band of art feels very claustrophobic and doesn't have the same appeal as sagas. I would have prefered the cards were vertically oriented like any other card.

Yeah, the art is way too obscured by the text box. Pretty sad since the art on those will probably all be pretty cool.

Happy to wait and see if the others don't suck. But based on this example, the mechanic leaves a lot to be desired.

I am guessing, by the language used, that if one were to "cast" the backside, one can also counter it? And when it is cast, if another were to cast Desertion then it can be taken (as it is a creature when "cast". Then another assumption (as we have seen this with other DFC's) that mana value is what's on the front. So if another were to counter it with a Thoughtbind it's a legal target, but not a legal target with Mental Misstep.

Let's this train of thought further: blinking it then will bring it back to the battlefield as a siege.

What other interactions can we assume here? Outside of a counterspell, there (so far) isn't any way to deal with it when it hits the board... am I right reading this? With that on the back burner (lack of interaction, that is), it is safe to assume there will be spells that can act like Naturalize but "destroy" a battle.

Next assumption I cannot make is how does it handle direct damage. Will a Lightning Bolt damage it or a Lava Spike, or maybe neither. Maybe it's only defeatable with combat damage... but then what about damage from a planeswalker (aka, in general, noncombat damage). Then there is it's considered "a land including it's other types," so I am also guessing that (this one, so far) can trigger landfall.

I'll read the article, maybe an answer lies there. If not, that info might come out at a later date.

EDIT: Nope, nada, zip zero answers. I am willing to bet there'll be answers to these pressing questions tomorrow (or if we're lucky, today after 10am, Pacific Time).

I would have thought that whoever defeated the Battle would get the reward (casting the backside), but its current wording indicates the owner of the battle gets the reward no matter who defeats it.

And if it enters with counters equal to the number in the corner, does that mean I can smack the player with Glissa Sunslayer and then use her ability to remove the counters and "defeat" the battle?

Also wondering how many subtypes there will be. This is a Siege and the reminder text says "As a Siege enters...," which indicates that other types of battles could play quite differently. Maybe Ambushes or Routs or whatever else they can come up with.

And this illustrates why they need to include the rules for new card types when previewed. They don't need all the rules, just a quick summary like if its treated like loyalty or if it loses a "HP" for lack of a better term when one creature attacks it.

Quote from FunkyDragon »

I would have thought that whoever defeated the Battle would get the reward (casting the backside), but its current wording indicates the owner of the battle gets the reward no matter who defeats it.

And if it enters with counters equal to the number in the corner, does that mean I can smack the player with Glissa Sunslayer and then use her ability to remove the counters and "defeat" the battle?

Also wondering how many subtypes there will be. This is a Siege and the reminder text says "As a Siege enters...," which indicates that other types of battles could play quite differently. Maybe Ambushes or Routs or whatever else they can come up with.

Some really good questions I missed. Looks like there's much to be explained, as they've done in the past when a new card type appears. My guess about the value in the bottom-right corner is that it's treated like power, so it must reset (go back to the printed amount) at turns end. I don't think the number would be able to change like a Planewalker's loyalty. I do believe anything that says "prevent 1 damage" can stop damage to it, but "prevent 1 damage to target player" or "prevent damage to target creature" won't work.

Also going to venture a guess that the Battle side will have other funky interactions. Imagine using a Liquimetal Torque to make it an artifact, then animating this "artifact" into a 4/4 that can now attack... wait, will a tapped Battle be defendable? Does it lose it's "Battle" status... oh my, my head's spinning...

Quote from Pokerkingdave »

And this illustrates why they need to include the rules for new card types when previewed. They don't need all the rules, just a quick summary like if its treated like loyalty or if it loses a "HP" for lack of a better term when one creature attacks it.

"Need" presupposes their goal is clarity. It's entirely reasonable that they are comfortable leaving us speculating for ~24 hours to build hype.

That being said, the vast majority of interactions with this card can be inferred from pre-existing rules. Speculation on the other scenarios and possibilities is part of the fun.

So far the new successful mechanics i like is type SAGA

the vehicle is kinda not bad but kinda okay

the companion look promising but I dont think they will continue on doing those again

the venture seems okay at first but a bit kinda out of place

I wonder if this new type that is battle would comeback in the next 2 set or be stuck on this set like companion

Quote from Grixh »

I wonder if there are other battle subtypes in the set or if they're just future proofing the card type by making these the rules for sieges.

I'd bet that there are other types....

Siege might be the one you want to beat, I'll bet that there's some other type that wou will want to defend because it's strong on the battlefield and the flip side might be bad for you...

IIRC, there will be one of those in every pack... so... they need a pretty large amount of those.

I know this is just an uncommon, but this doesn’t feel impactful enough to justify adding a whole new card type. It’s like they decided they wanted to add a new card type before they knew what it would be instead of finding a new design space and realizing it needed to be a new card type rather than a new subclass of enchantment.

Quote from Werewolf_Rawr »

Happy to wait and see if the others don't suck. But based on this example, the mechanic leaves a lot to be desired.

That will also be the thing about having a new kind of card, they will likely take some time to work out what the best designs are and what power levels to push them.

so if this is the only battle card for zendikar, and it's an uncommon...there could be quite a few battles. at least 15 (5 each at uncommon, rare, and mythic.)