So, Giada was an angel all along, and Elspeth saw the same glow around herself that she saw around Giada. Does this mean that Elspeth Tirel is and always has been an angel herself?
Shakedown Heavy seems perfectly costed for an aggressive Rakdos build that can become a Casuality for Mob Nixilis when you end up drawing him after being removed from combat. Then again, I'm far from the best constructed player, but it looks like a good combination. Am I wrong? (Seriously asking here, I don't know how well such a thing might work.)
Question about how this would work: An equipped planeswalker no longer counts as a planeswalker, so would they lose loyalty counters when taking damage? Or would those loyalty counters simply act as de facto +1/+1 counters on an otherwise 0/0 creature (along with every other counter)?
I love Elspeth as a character, and I'm wondering if maybe she could fit into some existing decks that run The Wandering Emperor, but maybe only one or two copies. I absolutely adore the artwork for every version of Elspeth Resplendent, and I've heard more than one person say that she looks a lot like Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman. To that, I would add that she looks like Wonder Woman borrowing from Emma Frost's wardrobe for the Hellfire Gala. And not just Elspeth, but the artwork and overall aesthetic from Streets of New Capenna on the whole... I love it! This card in particular is one that I might splurge on in foil versions just for the art, but that's just me.
This is an idea that came to mind when I was reading over some of the story, but I'm wondering if this might be a flavor sort of theme for cards that fit in the teaser that MaRo gave us as a the title of this thread. In the story, Halo is a super-substance of some sort, and it was a gift from the angels. We've seen Halo created in one of the stories, and I was thinking about what this might look like in card form. And that got me thinking... Halo = Angels = White Mana = White Cards Capable of Drawing a Card Each Turn?
This is more of a gameplay/story integration speculation, but it does make me wonder if that teaser that we were given will be a pseudo-mechanic for White Mana alone, or if each single color might get its own mechanic in addition to the ones that will be given to each Three-Color Family. I'm just spit-balling here. Does anyone else have anything to say about this idea of mine? Any merit behind it, do you think? Or am I just talking out of my butt?
So, Giada looks like a human woman, but can make Halo, which is supposed to be a gift from the angels. Urabrask wants Halo to help him fight Elesh Norn. Urabrask also wants Elspeth's help because Elesh Norn is afraid of her. The angels of this plane were somehow able to hold off a previous Phyrexian invasion and protect the city of New Capenna.
Giada doesn't have the wings of angels, so maybe she's descended from angels interbreeding with humans, or maybe the angels of this plane only manifest their wings under certain criteria. In the art we see of Elspeth's new sword, it looks like it has Halo swirling around in a sphere between the hilt and the blade. Am I alone in thinking that Elpseth might be some sort of angel or angelic descendant in a similar manner to Giada? The feathered clothing she wears in the artwork does give off an angelic vibe, I think. Maybe it's a coincidence, but maybe it's a symbolic message from the art team.
Something I noticed from the Command Zone video... The predecessors of the Brokers used to be traveling knights. The Brokers share colors with Bant, and if I recall, the real-world term for a wandering knight is a Knight-Errant. With Elspeth's homecoming, I can't help but wonder how much of this is intentional and how much is happy coincidence.
I dunno, I play Star Trek Online and I was pleasantly surprised by how faithful they are to the source material and even delve into rather obscure stuff. If they keep that approach for Magic, I will not complain.
As for the lootboxes, not trying to sound cheeky, but the existence of lootboxes isn't the problem. The problem is people actually buying them. Furthermore you can easily sidestep that whole PvP business (as SP and coop does not necessitate you have the biggest guns and latest ships) and I imagine they'll go for a similar approach for this. I haven't put a single penny into STO, so I don't see the problem.
Oh, I agree that STO does a good job with the story, but even as someone who knew that monetized gaming was something to be wary of, I had one month where I spent way too much on STO because I got sucked into the world. My fault for falling for it, but the temptation caught me off guard. Not saying that everyone will have my problems, but I just wanted to help people avoid the same pitfalls that I fell into once upon a time. With STO, so many cool ships were locked behind a paywall with RNG, and I'm kind of worried about what sorts of awesome things from MTG Lore might be locked behind a similar RNG paywall in this upcoming game, that's all.
Be warned, everyone. This is the same company that makes Star Trek Online. If they follow that model along with their other MMOs (Neverwinter is theirs, I think), then this will be "free-to-play" with tons of loot boxes that drop every which way, but that you can only unlock with keys that you buy with real cash, and of course all of the best content will be in these boxes, and new boxes with exclusive content will rotate in and out every few months. Be careful not to sink too much money into a game from this company.
On the one hand, hooray for Daxos coming back, apparently as a Nyxborn. On the other hand, I hope Elspeth doesn't have to go through him to get to Heliod. That would just be another layer of tragedy for her. Then again, what Elspeth story doesn't contain heaps of tragedy?
So, we have Vraska, Kaya, and Kiora as hybrid mana uncommon walkers. Two of those are the 'walkers from the past two Ravnica sets. Do you think we'll get hybrid, uncommon versions of Dovin Baan, Domri Rade, and Ral Zarek as well? And then maybe four others to fill out the other color-pairs a la Kiora? Maybe ten hybrid walkers at uncommon, leaving us with maybe 10 mono-colored walkers at uncommon, two for each color?
Just speculation, but anyone else have any thoughts?
Weaponcraft Enthusiast has some awesome artwork. My inner Starcraft player is just screaming "dark templar" when I see that.
I feel exactly the same way, only I see agents of the Conclave from the original game, personally. The more I see of the Aetherborn, the more they remind me of Protoss. I have a sudden urge to make an Aetherborn deck with all of my Swamps altered to look like Pylons. I can't be the only one, can I?
Very true. I would think that WotC would want to keep them as close to the main versions as possible to avoid confusion, but your point still stands. We will see, I suppose.
I think it is highly unlikely that either of the two planeswalkers in Aether Revolt will be three colors, if only because the Planeswalker Decks are supposed to be meant for new players and are, as far as I know, not supposed to be more or less than two colors. My theory is that we will get either a mono-black or a Dimir Tezzeret, and a mono-white or possibly Selesnya Ajani. That would fit with past flavor for the characters, and it would allow WotC to print two Planeswalker Decks for Aether Revolt without going into tri-color territory for the new players.
Careful with your words. After all, this is the setting where "crime does pay" is the whole point of the set.
This is more of a gameplay/story integration speculation, but it does make me wonder if that teaser that we were given will be a pseudo-mechanic for White Mana alone, or if each single color might get its own mechanic in addition to the ones that will be given to each Three-Color Family. I'm just spit-balling here. Does anyone else have anything to say about this idea of mine? Any merit behind it, do you think? Or am I just talking out of my butt?
Giada doesn't have the wings of angels, so maybe she's descended from angels interbreeding with humans, or maybe the angels of this plane only manifest their wings under certain criteria. In the art we see of Elspeth's new sword, it looks like it has Halo swirling around in a sphere between the hilt and the blade. Am I alone in thinking that Elpseth might be some sort of angel or angelic descendant in a similar manner to Giada? The feathered clothing she wears in the artwork does give off an angelic vibe, I think. Maybe it's a coincidence, but maybe it's a symbolic message from the art team.
Anyone else have any thoughts about this?
Oh, I agree that STO does a good job with the story, but even as someone who knew that monetized gaming was something to be wary of, I had one month where I spent way too much on STO because I got sucked into the world. My fault for falling for it, but the temptation caught me off guard. Not saying that everyone will have my problems, but I just wanted to help people avoid the same pitfalls that I fell into once upon a time. With STO, so many cool ships were locked behind a paywall with RNG, and I'm kind of worried about what sorts of awesome things from MTG Lore might be locked behind a similar RNG paywall in this upcoming game, that's all.
Just speculation, but anyone else have any thoughts?
I feel exactly the same way, only I see agents of the Conclave from the original game, personally. The more I see of the Aetherborn, the more they remind me of Protoss. I have a sudden urge to make an Aetherborn deck with all of my Swamps altered to look like Pylons. I can't be the only one, can I?
Just my two cents.