Barring a few questionable decisions, I largely enjoyed the story of All Will be One and March of the Machine. However, it’s clear that they have wasted Urabrask as a character. First introduced way back in Scars of Mirrodin, Urbrask and his red-aligned faction offered something remarkable: empathy, due to their unique mana alignment. Later in Theros we learn that Norn subjugated his layer precisely due to him allowing rebels to survive there, and New Capenna seemed to go in the direction of outright making him a rebellion against Phyrexia. Then All Will Be One that not only refuses to give him a POV despiste being an important player, we only hear about him from biased characters like Koth, who naturally want him dead. Then the Planeswalker’s Guide for the setting implies that, despiste preffering willing conversions, he’s still pro-Phyrexia, and the side stories have his underling Slobad using shady tactics for “willing conversions”. This effectively killed off all that was built in Scars, and it’s a damn shame. His whole contribution in March is an assist to Chandra – once again a biased character – and then dying via torture device. We could have had not only an unique character but an actual moral quandry on whereas it is possible to co-exist with some form of Phyrexia. Instead, we have the definition of wasted potential.
As much as I hate Urabrask being killed off this easily, I do appreciate the fact a domineering white villain killed off the red/black villain, her opposing colors, while having more reign over the blue/green villains, the friendly colors. It's flavorful, but yeah, Urabrask and Sheoldred deserve a lot better. (Ironic how Sheoldred accused Norn of being selfish, when that's a core characteristic of black.)
Personally I’m on the tin foil train Urabrask gets rebuilt/resurrected somehow just like what happened with roxith (tin foil could be that’s will be part of jins plan to stab elesh norn in the back.)
but yea they wasted a good opertunity infact the story could have ended him as father of machines so the new motive to phyrexians to compleat only those who want to be compleated
Well, with the spoiling of Merciless Repurposing it looks like Norn made the classic villain blunder of "And now I shall leave you for dead... ya know, instead of *actually* killing you."
Hate to break it to you folks, but it's another case of story and cards disconnecting. In the story he is well dead
In the story it was said that he was quartered. While normally the implication is that the person is dead, phyrexians are a bit of a special case here.
But yes, it could have been made much clearer. (That is all assuming the writer knew Urabrask should stay alive, which is not necessarily a given seeing how the story has been handled recently.)
Even if he was alive still by then he's stuck limbless on a crumbling plane dettached from red mana (since the suns of Mirrodin ended up on Zhalfir) and falling apart into oblivion, so he's dead either way.
My suspicion is that if they bring him back (and let's face it, they will) they will explain that he somehow made himelf some makeshift limbs from some passers-by like how Vorinclex did it on Kaldheim and quickly escaped through a portal to some obscure corner of the Multiverse before Wrenn did what she did.
Like, there is just absolutely no reason for WotC to explicitly point out in flavour text that he is alive when they don't plan on possibly bringing him back at some point. It makes zero sense to show the execution scene of a character, where the character doesn't die, just to later say they died off-screen.
(Ironic how Sheoldred accused Norn of being selfish, when that's a core characteristic of black.)
I don't think Sheoldred was castigating Elesh Norn for being selfish so much as she was accusing her of being a hypocrite. Sheoldred was open about her selfishness and always had been, and she had long seen straight through Norn's self-righteous facade. Her final accusation of "You only care about yourself" would hardly be a biting condemnation of her fellow Thanes, who have always been as shamelessly selfish and treacherous as she was. Against holier-than-thou Norn, however, the accusation was a well-aimed (and truthful) dart.
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look at flavor text of myr sire
but yea they wasted a good opertunity infact the story could have ended him as father of machines so the new motive to phyrexians to compleat only those who want to be compleated
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=484979
In the story it was said that he was quartered. While normally the implication is that the person is dead, phyrexians are a bit of a special case here.
But yes, it could have been made much clearer. (That is all assuming the writer knew Urabrask should stay alive, which is not necessarily a given seeing how the story has been handled recently.)
Like, there is just absolutely no reason for WotC to explicitly point out in flavour text that he is alive when they don't plan on possibly bringing him back at some point. It makes zero sense to show the execution scene of a character, where the character doesn't die, just to later say they died off-screen.
I don't think Sheoldred was castigating Elesh Norn for being selfish so much as she was accusing her of being a hypocrite. Sheoldred was open about her selfishness and always had been, and she had long seen straight through Norn's self-righteous facade. Her final accusation of "You only care about yourself" would hardly be a biting condemnation of her fellow Thanes, who have always been as shamelessly selfish and treacherous as she was. Against holier-than-thou Norn, however, the accusation was a well-aimed (and truthful) dart.