Quote from SultaiAscendancy »If it was just the vampire thing, maybe I could believe that it was just a happy coincidence that no one died, but with the pirates they were clearly pulling their punches against their own best interests. Why would they burn the supplies of the pirates with said pirates nearby and then just leave? Either fight the pirates off for good, or don't provoke them in the first place. Otherwise, you're going to get ambushed by the pirates, which is exactly what happened with Angrath.
Not only are nonlethal tactics historically inaccurate for an Aztec-inspired faction and just plain stupid as a war strategy, but it also would be impossible to implement because they're fighting with dinosaurs on their side. Even if the people don't want to kill anyone, the dinosaurs will anyway. And, as you said, it feels like they're trying too hard to set up the good guys and bad guys, when it could (and should) be more complicated than that.
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Hopefully the utter absurdity of a dinosaur-riding Aztec warriors who refuse to kill anyone will prevent the writers from actually attempting it in anything more than this one story to not-so-subtly introduce Huatli as a protagonist.
If Creative does end up trying to sell the Sun Empire as a faction who avoids killing as a principle, even in the face of having their lands taken by murderous pirates and vampires, then the Sun Empire is too dumb to live and absolutely deserves to be overrun by conquistadors. It's unfortunate enough that they cut out all reference to human sacrifice (in the podcast they called it a "tired trope," but no, it was an essential characteristic of numerous pre-Columbian Mesoamerican religions, and no more "tired" than the mummies and Egyptian embalming we saw on Amonkhet), but if they pushed the Sun Empire as averse to killing, they'll be straining the credulity of their readers. So I don't think the writers will play that way--this was just an (admittedly ham-fisted) attempt to drive home Huatli as a white hat.
But as far as I'm concerned, Huatli's most egregious offense thus far was her feel-good prattling to that little girl about the nature of poetry. Anyone who has studied poetry outside a high school writing workshop can tell you that's completely ridiculous.
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http://media.wizards.com/2017/images/magic/amonkhet_players_guide-en.pdf
Am i wrong, or this is the first and only time the player's guide is provided online, without the need to buy a fat pack?
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Pretty bad translation of The "Insect" Gods, though... they are translated something like The Divine "Insects"...
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I missed it! Good to know (well, not really... I hate slivers!)
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The slivers plane post-mending seems to be Shandalar, since Magic 2014.
And we know the real threat to Dominaria are the Sarpadian thrulls... the Phyrexian feared them, too!
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First of all, I didn't draw it, it's the work of a really excellent artist, Francesca Baerald (I'm not sure I can post a link to her site, I didn't read anything about it in the rules). I found all the information needed to give the greatest detail to it in the novels, vignettes, fat pack and cards themselves.
Obviously I had to guess the location of some minor place (like Miren or Tomb of Urami), but the general direction of the major locations are all there. We know that Eiganjo is at the center, Takenuma swamp in the west, Sokenzan in the south, Jukai in the east and Minamo in the north.
Let me know what you think!
(Especially you, Squirle Master )