Bolas roars in triumph as his magic billows in a steaming cloud around his hated foe, as his claws slice deep into his enemy's hotly beating hearts, as his teeth slash his rival's unprotected throat.
With a mighty splash, Ugin falls into the still waters. The impact resounds like thunder. Monstrous waves rise from the displacement and sweep across the craggy islets, crashing and destroying the ancient rocks. The disturbance washes far beyond the bounds of the Meditation Realm, spilling into the fathomless dark cavity whose infinite web connects the planes themselves. The sea empties, exposing the rock of the seabed like bones left to bleach in the sun.
Dragged by the sheer shocking force of the cataclysm, Bolas flares like a sun and vanishes, torn away to the plane of his birth, falling to the islands of Madara.
Where once the realm was filled with the silence of tranquility, now it is vacant. It has become a wilderness of rock, barren and wrecked, all its serenity drained away into the interstices of the blind eternities, a chasm that can never be filled.
Nothing moves because nothing remains.
A moment passes. A year. A generation.
A millennium.
Or maybe, no time at all.
A pale sheet of liquid trickles up as out of nowhere, returning from the unseen and untouchable web of darkness. With eerie silence, it inexorably rises, refilling the realm with its silvery waters. When the waters cease rising, they grow still, and in that still mirror waits the reflection of the dragon.
He inhales, pulling the waters into himself. They curl and froth into every crevice and wrinkle and scale and indentation until his horns sparkle and his claws gleam and his eyes shine with magic. Is he flesh and bone, or is he spirit and magic? Does it matter?
The dragon floats above the dry seabed beneath the luminous sky.
Yes, I believe Calix in fact houses Xenagos' spark. And I am a little bit disappointed that he isn't "Legendary Enchantment Planeswalker - Calix", but I get the line would be too long.
And about Bident of Thassa - on her regular card it seems Thassa holds other kind of tool, but in her "celestial" art, she has her old bident (which kind of makes sense, according to how myths and legends works on Theros).
Obviously there is a huge majority of players playing Ashiok. With Elspeth, the queue lasts less than 5 seconds, with Ashiok, the queue is about two minutes at least each time.
It is fun to play with some of Power 9 cards for the first time in my life, and I would say the Elspeth's deck is (a bit) better.
Luckily there were only two games when Elspeth's deck had rocket start, mainly the games were balanced. Played 15 games up to now, won 7 of them.
For me it was funny in both times. But as I am FTP casual, I don't take these events too seriously.
Last week, in "warm up" event, I ended 5:7. First I tried UR "second card" deck, with playsets of Irencrag Pyromancer, Faerie Vandal, and Bloodhaze Wolverine, supported by Loch Dragon, Improbable Alliance, The Royal Scions, and similar cards. After that I switched to funny BG Golgari food deck with two Rampage of the Clans and hoped for luck. This deck wasn't so successful, but in final 12th game I managed to cast it in the end of opponent's turn and created 12 centaurs from food.
So for the "serious" event, I chose the UR deck and finished 2:2.
My opponents were
GU with Oko, Thief of Crowns (win)
BG food similar to mine second testing deck (lost)
RG midrange (win)
Monoblack (lost)
But I must say all four games were quite long, interesting, and balanced. There were chances in every game for each of us to win. So it easily could end 4:0 (or 0:4 of course).
Quite disagree with this. For intro product they were quite good, and M20 ones are even a little bit better.
For me, as strictly casual player, in MTGA the M20 blue and black, and Ravnica's Domri's and Ral's are quite successful (in unranked - that is, for intro product).
Ral gets mail from Niv-Mizzet, who organized his meeting with Dimir agent willing to cooperate (since Lazav may be on Bolas side). Ral finds the agent dead and meets with Lazav himself, who informs him that the attack on Niv-Mizzet wasn't on Dimir's official agenda, and assures him about his loyalty to Ravnica (Ral does not quite believe him, but agrees on cooperation).
Meanwhile, Vraska tries to finish her throne from petrified victims. She is strangely off recently and does not know why. Xeddick (the albino telepath kraul) feels this and informs Vraska that her memory was altered. He tells her that the memory alteration was voluntary from Vraska's side, so he isn't sure if it is sensible to undo it. He recognizes the work of an expert and knows he won't be able to lock the memory again. Vraska still wants to restore her memories and Xeddick proceeds. Vraska regains her memories (together with small trauma) and immediately sends messenger to Ral Zarek for cooperation.
Later that day, Ral is doing preparation for the Guild summit, when Hekara as an official Rakdos representative arrives (there are nice dialogs between them). Finally a zombie arrives with a message from Vraska.
(I just want to add that when I read earlier that "Vraska's memories wasn't returned by Jace, but some random telepath", I was quite afraid, but the part about returning memories was written nicely and believably.)
...
...
Now I know how Bolas knew enough about sailing to teach Vraska. He has probably been a sailor on a ship before. Gee, I wonder how that voyage went.
Probably just parhelium
"After the battle where his twin brother Nicol Bolas left him wounded"
NO. Bolas not only killed him, he virtually ripped him to pieces.
from https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/magic-story/chronicle-bolas-unwritten-now-2018-08-15
^^ This.
Aethersquall Ancient was terrible to read, while Hightide Hermit was more or less OK.
W - Kithkin PW from Lorwyn / Teyo
B - Davriel
R - Flamekin PW from Lorwyn / Sarkhan
G - Garruk
And about Bident of Thassa - on her regular card it seems Thassa holds other kind of tool, but in her "celestial" art, she has her old bident (which kind of makes sense, according to how myths and legends works on Theros).
An you've already got male angels on Amonkhet ;-)
Or am I wrong?
It is fun to play with some of Power 9 cards for the first time in my life, and I would say the Elspeth's deck is (a bit) better.
Luckily there were only two games when Elspeth's deck had rocket start, mainly the games were balanced. Played 15 games up to now, won 7 of them.
Last week, in "warm up" event, I ended 5:7. First I tried UR "second card" deck, with playsets of Irencrag Pyromancer, Faerie Vandal, and Bloodhaze Wolverine, supported by Loch Dragon, Improbable Alliance, The Royal Scions, and similar cards. After that I switched to funny BG Golgari food deck with two Rampage of the Clans and hoped for luck. This deck wasn't so successful, but in final 12th game I managed to cast it in the end of opponent's turn and created 12 centaurs from food.
So for the "serious" event, I chose the UR deck and finished 2:2.
My opponents were
GU with Oko, Thief of Crowns (win)
BG food similar to mine second testing deck (lost)
RG midrange (win)
Monoblack (lost)
But I must say all four games were quite long, interesting, and balanced. There were chances in every game for each of us to win. So it easily could end 4:0 (or 0:4 of course).
And I don't know for sure if Oathsworn Knight is taken from Arthurian lore, but I definitely see it as from Monty Python's lore.
For me, as strictly casual player, in MTGA the M20 blue and black, and Ravnica's Domri's and Ral's are quite successful (in unranked - that is, for intro product).
Ral gets mail from Niv-Mizzet, who organized his meeting with Dimir agent willing to cooperate (since Lazav may be on Bolas side). Ral finds the agent dead and meets with Lazav himself, who informs him that the attack on Niv-Mizzet wasn't on Dimir's official agenda, and assures him about his loyalty to Ravnica (Ral does not quite believe him, but agrees on cooperation).
Meanwhile, Vraska tries to finish her throne from petrified victims. She is strangely off recently and does not know why. Xeddick (the albino telepath kraul) feels this and informs Vraska that her memory was altered. He tells her that the memory alteration was voluntary from Vraska's side, so he isn't sure if it is sensible to undo it. He recognizes the work of an expert and knows he won't be able to lock the memory again. Vraska still wants to restore her memories and Xeddick proceeds. Vraska regains her memories (together with small trauma) and immediately sends messenger to Ral Zarek for cooperation.
Later that day, Ral is doing preparation for the Guild summit, when Hekara as an official Rakdos representative arrives (there are nice dialogs between them). Finally a zombie arrives with a message from Vraska.
(I just want to add that when I read earlier that "Vraska's memories wasn't returned by Jace, but some random telepath", I was quite afraid, but the part about returning memories was written nicely and believably.)
No, he apparently only read about it a lot
Well, considering the head/body/leg ratio, maybe, just maybe, she could be a dwarf?
Bigger picture on Magali's pages.