Even though Gideon himself regrets going away to find Jace to help Jori En, I think it was the correct thing for him to do, even if it cost a lot of Vorik's army. like I said earlier, I think Gideon is shown to be very aware that fighting the Eldrazi won't be enough to beat them in the latest story, and going off to find Jace to solve the puzzle of leylines was probably a better long-term decision as a result, since they need to find a new angle of attack. I like that Gideon was man enough to be able to go against his gut as a man who normally solves problems with fists.
I should've made more clear that "events on Ravnica" are not "seeking help", but "goblin gang war". Ravnica is a big, old place which looks like it could handle another guild vs. guildless conflict, while eldrazi are quite unique and new danger. Anyway, even if situation on Ravnica was deemed by Gideon dangerous to more people, I violently oppose the idea that, facing the conflict bigger than one can handle, one should go and find another big conflict and then try solving them simultaneously.
I guess the correctness of statement "sane peeps who like Gideons" depends on your definition of sanity. Or I'm just twisted, that's also a possibility. Since for me hero stopping in the middle of planar catastrophe to rescue one person = hero dooming the unseen people who will die due to catastrophe not being terminated in time. Something like hero deciding "it's okay if more people will die as long as I won't personally see it". My biggest complaint will be to Gideon getting distracted by the events on Ravnica.
Edit: damn I'm tongue tied these days. Should've made more clear that under "events on Ravnica" I mean not "seeking Jace's, or any other planeswalker's, for that matter, help", which is reasonable thought, but "getting into goblin confrontation", which, as it was pointed out in all those stories, led to him going multiple days without sleep and getting almost careless enough to get killed.
About Jace's effectiveness in battle: it might be telling about the consistency of current stories that I wouldn't even bother being disappointed, because minor details in characterization live shorter than chocolate in my room. He was quite good swordfighter in Agents of Artifice - worst of neowalkers in battle according to mr. Beyer's blog - passable in Secretist (...written by the same Doug Beyer in almost the same time as blog entry) - now looking at sword as if it were a snake; who knows what will be there tomorrow.
If it were up to me, I would, to give Jace something to do in story, have him figuring out that they can move survivors onto the flying hedrons, since he is (...was?) able to fly himself and might be more used to thinking in three dimensions. Still wouldn't be outraged while the level of pathetic wouldn't reach Test of Metal.
He was mediocre in AoA and the only reason he was able to put up a fight with Ruric-Thar in the Secretist was because he was reading the minds of all the other Gruul there around him and doing what they would do. In straight combat Jace is definitely the worst of the bunch.
<snip>
He had some training in AoA with Kallist, and during the last fight his opponent commented he got better at it. As for Ruric Thar, I went under assumption that in order to copy what gruul would do in one's place one must know at least how those movements are performed.
Thar said, in a pure nonmagical duel my bet on the worst performer would be on Liliana. Doubt she had any exercise in nonmagical fight in last hundred years or so.
About Jace's effectiveness in battle: it might be telling about the consistency of current stories that I wouldn't even bother being disappointed, because minor details in characterization live shorter than chocolate in my room. He was quite good swordfighter in Agents of Artifice - worst of neowalkers in battle according to mr. Beyer's blog - passable in Secretist (...written by the same Doug Beyer in almost the same time as blog entry) - now looking at sword as if it were a snake; who knows what will be there tomorrow.
If it were up to me, I would, to give Jace something to do in story, have him figuring out that they can move survivors onto the flying hedrons, since he is (...was?) able to fly himself and might be more used to thinking in three dimensions. Still wouldn't be outraged while the level of pathetic wouldn't reach Test of Metal.
I also had a deja vu. How many stories which basically are "Gideon fights eldrazi, almost loses, but concentrates, wins and gets oh-so-resolute on what to do next" will be there before plot will progress faster than glacier?
I would say the next block will definitely contain Liliana and one of her demons and, as far as I can remember Maro's short list, it will likely be egypt-themed block.
From strange things in the same list "murder mystery, noir block" piqued my attention since that souns as one of possible developments of now Avacyn'd Innistrad.
Btw, I've finally stumbled over the very likely inspiration of "greying out and turning into dust" effect of eldrazi. It's a short story named "the colour out of space". Took me quite long, I know.
Philosophy of several colors... it hurts my brain. "I'm awesome disney princess, channeling power of Zendikar to stop Eldrazi!" - gets lovecrafted before even physically encountering Emrakul -"I'm awesome disney princess channeling MORE power of Zendikar to stop Eldrazi!". Uh-huh, girl.
Also charming that she blames herself for failing to stop Emrakul back then, but not for actually releazing the titans. Charming as an example of protagonist portrayal, because no sane reader would think "Nissa didn't manage to singlehandedly defeat all three Eldrazi titans, bad Nissa", while "Nissa released titans hoping they will go nom another world and stop causing the roil and spawning spawns on Zendikar, bad Nissa" is pretty reasonable thought. Part of trend where Jace didn't accidentally brainwash teacher now and Chandra didn't directly reveal there was a pyromancer in a village?
I dislike flavors of red and green: rushing forward without a plan hoping my nature or my emotions will take care of a problem sounds like a suicide or delayed suicide for me. However, not using such resources in advantageous situation just because of personal preferences does not sound exceptionally thought out either
Not that powerful of a card, but each time I play mill in DotP I see goddamned Jace's Erasure with a very unfortunate shadow which look like mustaches of evil.
Ah, Jace. For person who supposedly is negotiator between guilds you managed to spectacularly fail in motivation of red character. Wonder how Rakdos, Niv Mizzet or whoever currect Gruul leader is would react to pleas to their responsibility.
Played on Ipad air, discovered that in fights with interesting opponents one can't use custom deck, in fights where custom decks are allowed all the opponents use same cards without rhyme and reason, and daily challenges tend to force you to use decks made with deck construction wizard, deleted it to hell.
For fun moments I can name second duel with Alhammaret. Beaten him twice, once through Psychic Spiral and once, to prove pre-battle screen telling he's too strong to take down through regular means, with unblockable creatures.
An interesting vidoe but not with that much new information. Two things that stood out to me came towards the end though.
1) Wizards considers Liliana to be neither a clear-cut hero nor a clear-cut villain.
2) The question about what separates her from the demons she made a pact with and what her soul means to her is a side of her that we will continue to see and explore.
And Wizards considering her neither a clear-cut hero nor a clear-cut villain sounded quite baffling. Guys, if you want her to be ambivalent (why making the second black walker ambiguous is another question), then show her committing something which can be considered even remotely heroic? Or maybe it's time to man up and admit she's villain protagonist?
About new info: closer to the end I got disappointed and decided to wait until the Liliana week for new info. Then got horrified.
Edit: damn I'm tongue tied these days. Should've made more clear that under "events on Ravnica" I mean not "seeking Jace's, or any other planeswalker's, for that matter, help", which is reasonable thought, but "getting into goblin confrontation", which, as it was pointed out in all those stories, led to him going multiple days without sleep and getting almost careless enough to get killed.
Thar said, in a pure nonmagical duel my bet on the worst performer would be on Liliana. Doubt she had any exercise in nonmagical fight in last hundred years or so.
If it were up to me, I would, to give Jace something to do in story, have him figuring out that they can move survivors onto the flying hedrons, since he is (...was?) able to fly himself and might be more used to thinking in three dimensions. Still wouldn't be outraged while the level of pathetic wouldn't reach Test of Metal.
At least eldrazi artworks are pretty.
From strange things in the same list "murder mystery, noir block" piqued my attention since that souns as one of possible developments of now Avacyn'd Innistrad.
Also charming that she blames herself for failing to stop Emrakul back then, but not for actually releazing the titans. Charming as an example of protagonist portrayal, because no sane reader would think "Nissa didn't manage to singlehandedly defeat all three Eldrazi titans, bad Nissa", while "Nissa released titans hoping they will go nom another world and stop causing the roil and spawning spawns on Zendikar, bad Nissa" is pretty reasonable thought. Part of trend where Jace didn't accidentally brainwash teacher now and Chandra didn't directly reveal there was a pyromancer in a village?
For fun moments I can name second duel with Alhammaret. Beaten him twice, once through Psychic Spiral and once, to prove pre-battle screen telling he's too strong to take down through regular means, with unblockable creatures.
About new info: closer to the end I got disappointed and decided to wait until the Liliana week for new info. Then got horrified.