The only plot reaction I'm really intrigued in, was: Who was the other Planeswalker? I was surprised to learn there was an interloper, especially with only Lukka, Vivien, and Narset spoiled as cards, so I was so excited to learn the identity. The mind contact and visions made me think of Ashiok, but we just saw them, and Vivien used a male pronoun. This does not seem the work of Tezzeret. Vivien mentions she met this Planeswalker briefly on Ravnica, so that also discounts Oko. Tibalt doesn't seem to have an interest in monsters or offering wishes. I had assumed the mysterious Planeswalker was Ob Nixilis: his own background in wanting power and destruction seems to fit, but his mutations of monsters does not seem to be an approach he would take. I am very disappointed not to learn the identity of this antagonist.
One thing to note, is that word of god is the planeswalkers who got cards in War of the Spark weren't ALL the planeswalkers who were present on Ravnica, so it's entirely possible that this will be a new character we've never met before, but who was "present" on Ravnica for War of the Spark.
The differing Ozolith colours could be because in the book it was altered by Nahiri whoever it was.
I don't really think Nahiri makes sense here. Her motivation for attacking Innistrad was revenge, we have no indication that that plays any role (for her if she were a participant) in this story. Beyond that, Nahiri works with stone and metal, to the best of my recollection we've never seen her manipulate crystals, and we've certainly never seen her be able to manipulate another creature's biology the way these crystals mutate living (nonhuman) things.
Yes, technically crystals are just another facet of geomancy/lithomancy so she could at least theoretically manipulate it. My point being that there's no precedent thus far of her working with crystals, and it would seem out of place for her not to be using the same or similar skills to the ones she's used for 5 thousand years.
I mean, honestly she feels like Sarkhan to me, just Green not Red. Not a great PoV and goals that are maybe on some level understandable but also very much works as a villain.
Though other than killing hunters I’m not sure how Vivien would be a villain. She doesn’t hate humans. She hates poachers/people killing for purposes other than survival.
"Hate" maybe not, but she makes her absolute *disdain* for humanity very clear.
Sure, but disdain for humanity doesn’t make someone a villain. It could help them become one but there is plenty to be disdainful of.
This isn't a hypothetical, we have her last actions to go on. And her past actions include destroying a city and murdering thousands of innocents to save a few dinosaurs. She may not be actively trying to wipe out humanity, but she smiles when thousands of people die because of her actions. That's completely fine by her. She had a reason to get back out the vampire nobles that tortured her, but she went there looking for trouble in the first place and started the fight. But whatever, they tortured her so **** them. But to destroy the whole city, and be cool with people who were completely uninvolved with her treatment getting eaten by dinosaurs and killed in the flood and city's collapse? That's just insanely evil.
And the only reason that anyone even has a foot to stand on in claiming that Vivien's actions werent utterly evil is because WotC deliberately put her up against the most blatantly, mustache-twirlingly evil caricature of civilization short of the Phyrexians in order to make it seem palatable.
I mean, honestly she feels like Sarkhan to me, just Green not Red. Not a great PoV and goals that are maybe on some level understandable but also very much works as a villain.
Though other than killing hunters I’m not sure how Vivien would be a villain. She doesn’t hate humans. She hates poachers/people killing for purposes other than survival.
"Hate" maybe not, but she makes her absolute *disdain* for humanity very clear.
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I don't really think Nahiri makes sense here. Her motivation for attacking Innistrad was revenge, we have no indication that that plays any role (for her if she were a participant) in this story. Beyond that, Nahiri works with stone and metal, to the best of my recollection we've never seen her manipulate crystals, and we've certainly never seen her be able to manipulate another creature's biology the way these crystals mutate living (nonhuman) things.
Yes, technically crystals are just another facet of geomancy/lithomancy so she could at least theoretically manipulate it. My point being that there's no precedent thus far of her working with crystals, and it would seem out of place for her not to be using the same or similar skills to the ones she's used for 5 thousand years.
And the only reason that anyone even has a foot to stand on in claiming that Vivien's actions werent utterly evil is because WotC deliberately put her up against the most blatantly, mustache-twirlingly evil caricature of civilization short of the Phyrexians in order to make it seem palatable.
"Hate" maybe not, but she makes her absolute *disdain* for humanity very clear.