I've noticed that Epic Experiment doesn't seem to be getting a lot of press as it pertains to Modern. It seems like an absurd combo enabler when paired with the right cards, so I've run a few tests with it in a storm shell. Comboed with cheap draw, red rituals, and Past in Flames, its had some degenerately fast wins. Is it just me, or this a really fun, really quick deck that nobody seems to be talking about?
As much as I love spoilers, it is unfortunate that this (massive leak) happened again. Part of the fun of a new set is seeing the preview articles every night and getting a nice slow drip of new cards to consider.
When the leaks happens all at once, it takes a lot of fun out of the waiting. Now we have a couple of weeks and very little to look forward to, in the meantime. This also screws those who were given preview cards for articles, podcasts, and their own marketing.
Shame on this daygl0, and I hope WOTC finds out who he is (presuming WOTC didn't do this themselves).
Look, I don't intend to flame, but have you not known this site for long? I've been playing off and on since Nemesis, and it's been rare that something like this HASN'T happened. I'm not referring to Godbook-esque fiascos, but to the fact that even before WotC started giving out the full spoiler pre-prerelease, we had rumormongers to spoil cards ahead of time. It's been going on since before this site even existed and we were all on MTGnews. The fact that we get the full spoiler up on the mothership is due pretty much solely to the fact that WotC knew they were never going to be able to stop every leak ever, and wanted to meet rumormongers halfway. I understand your sentiment, but this has been as much a part of the game's history as the cards themselves. The existence of this site and this community is due largely in part to the rumor mill and the attraction that players have to early spoilers. There are many people who want to experience the prerelease as WotC intends, going in with a sense of mystery and cracking their first packs not knowing what they'll find. There's nothing at all wrong with that. But if that's what you want, you shouldn't spend your time on a rumor mill, much less a thread labeled Spoiler-Rama. Rumors aren't going anywhere, and neither are the people who spoil cards.
While I do appreciate the aristocratic vampire trope in literature and the game of Magic, I feel like vampires need a new direction. They should be redefined, and I don't mean in a sparkly Twilight kind of way. Magic could very well be the medium to provide a fresh look at them. It is difficult to freshen up something as old as the vampire, but the game of Magic should attempt to push the boundaries of tropes, not merely perpetuate the existing ones. The creative team at wizards does this whenever it comes up with new planes for us to discover and they do a superb job. I think they have the ability to go further. Wizards, please give us a new look at vampires.
Pretty sure they tried to with the tribal, shamanistic Zendikar vampires.
Is it just me or does there seem to be a lot of planeswalker story lines getting dropped into Innistrad? Already we have:
Lilianna hunting some demon
Garruk Hunting Liliana
Sorin somehow returning
Nissa Revane possibly showing up because she is hunting Sorin
Sifa Grent "Holed up in Innistrad"
Dack Fayden hunting for Sifa Grent
I wonder if they'll actually try to tie all those together...
Also, as an aside, is anyone else tired of planeswalker stories taking precedence over everything else on the plane? Innistrad is a beautifully flavorful setting, and as all the viral story marketing showed, more than capable of providing a rich and compelling story with characters that we may never even get to see as cards and may never even hear from again. Is there some reason we can't get to enjoy the organic stories of the plane itself, rather than just use it as a backdrop for more planeswalker hijinks? I'm almost not wanting them to go back to Ravnica anymore, because all the talk lately has been it becoming a haven for planeswalkers. Will they even talk about the plane itself, or just more OMGJACE?
Given that Nissa swore to track down Sorin and drag him back to the mess that is Zendikar, and seeing how we have pretty strong reason to believe that Sorin will be in the next set... Nissa is the most likely of the given choices.
I pretty much play only casual, and Progenitus fits in beautifully in both my multiplayer Fist of Suns deck and my Proteus Staff/Tokens "Russian Roulette" deck. Sounds like fun, any way you slice it!
an excerpt from "A Planeswalker's Guide to Alara" :
"Malfegor
Said to be born from an unthinkable union, Malfegor is a demonic dragon -- a dragon with a demonic soul. With scales like shiy black plates, a powerful, eight-limbed body, and enormous, batlike wings, Malfegor is the essence of both power and fury. However, though he is loath to take orders, it is said that Malfegor answers to one other. Malfegor's master may lurk somewhere on Grixis, or outside the plane entirely."
This tells us that Cruel Ultimatum very well could be a reference to Nicol Bolas being the unnamed master. we know he survived the events of Time Spiral, because he used Leshrac's power and planeswalker spark to close off one of the temporal rifts, particularly the rift created when Nicol Bolas fought another planeswalker, a massive Leviathan, millenia before when the plane was still in it's infancy.
"will you donate your power to close this rift?" Teferi asked.
"Certainly not. I am power. Even without a planeswaker's spark, I am still a dragon-god. Still supreme. Besides," Bolas continued. "There is no need for me to make that sacrifice. Not when Leshrac has so graciously volunteered.
--from Future Sight set novel
This is more than enough to silence anyone who says Nicol Bolas is long gone. he's an Elder Dragon, immortal since his birth and only slightly more powerful now than he was before his planeswalker spark ignited. unless someone can best him in combat, he is unlikely to die.
I'll post another excerpt later that I believe hints at part of the storyline of the block novel.
Ah, Gotcha! I haven't actually been able to get my hands on the Planeswalker's Guide yet, so I didn't know that little blurb about Malfegor. With that in mind, that IS pretty blatant foreshadowing of Bolas, although we probably wouldn't have had a clue if not for finding the Conflux list.
That makes a pretty good case for Bolas being both a planeswalker and the major villain of the block, but I still don't think it necessarily means he's the Grixis-'Walker. He's of Grixis's colors, but that doesn't mean he is going to be Grixis's planeswalker representative, like the other Alara 'Walkers are. Even if he's the planeswalker pulling the strings, i think that puts him outside any One shard in particular. I could just as easily say Malfegor as the Grixis 'Walker and Bolas being another 'Walker card in the set (maybe even as a 5-color 'Walker card) that Malfegor answers to. Even if Malfegor's a 'Walker, Bolas would still be far more powerful.
I'll admit that Bolas isn't just in the set for nostalgia now, but him being a major storyline presence still doesn't necessarily mean he'll be the Grixis 'Walker. I think my official prediction is that Malfegor is the Grixis entry in the "Shard Planeswalker" cycle (either mono-B, UB, RB, or UBR) and Bolas will be the first ever WUBRG planeswalker, seperate from the cycle and major villain of the block.
Even though there IS evidence toward Bolas being the Grixis 'Walker, I think I'm actually leaning more toward Malfegor. Check out the spoiled Conflux list: yes, there is a "Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker" card, but there is also a "Malfegor" card. So we know the dragon/demon will be in the set, at the very least.
Now, that being said, The only connection we legitimately have for Bolas being the Grixis 'Walker is his colors. I know there's other speculation, but i'm talking concrete reasoning. There's no storyline connection (yet) to any of Alara, let alone Grixis, and there's no real reason for him to show up on Grixis above all the others. (Seriously: yeah, it's in his colors, but what's the point of him being there? Ruling the plane wouldn't gain him anything in the long run, because it's pretty much devoid of resources that would make a difference anywhere outside of grixis. I don't see him being the kind of guy who's simply content to rule over the smallish hellscape of Grixis, when there are other bigger, more vital places he could conquer. Grixis just doesn't really have anything of value in and of itself over other places). It just doesn't make any sense to me why Bolas would be Grixis's Patron 'Walker.
On the other hand, we have Malfegor, a documented denizen of the Shard. And as a demon/dragon, an excessively powerful one at that. There alone is more storyline connection for his case than Bolas's, already. And being of the shard, he'd obviously be Grixis colors, in some combination. Also, we don't know anything about his personality whatsoever, whereas we have a pretty good handle on Bolas. Bolas has shown in the past to be excessively ambitious, and like i said before, would likely want more than just burned-out rotting Grixis under his wing. If he was to control the shard, it's my guess that he'd be doing it with the intention of using it to move on to bigger and better things. But we don't know Malfegor, as a demon/dragon, maybe he simply just likes it there in Grixis, and wants to rule the world he's content to stay in, like say Sarkhan Vol taking over Jund. I'm just saying, Malfegor may not be as good of a character for wide-spanning 'Walker, but as one just for Grixis? Seems like a good place for him.
The thing that really sticks out to me, aside from the storyline and personality things is the names of the cards that got spoiled. Although I have issues with the name "Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker" (having that name along with the inevitable "Planeswalker-Nicol" typeline annoys me to no end), it's pretty obvious that he'll be a planeswalker card. On the other hand, Malfegor's card is JUST his name, just like we saw with all the other planeswalkers aside from Elspeth and Tezzeret. I don't know, it's not as obvious "Nicol Bolas, planeswalker", but "Malfegor" could just as easily be a planeswalker card name as it could an everyday Legend card.
Like I said, i could be very much wrong, but it seems a bit hasty to write off Malfegor as the possible Grixis 'Walker just because Bolas is in the same set. Bolas makes no sense in this set to me whatsoever, and if you took his name off the list, Malfegor is the obvious choice. My honest opinion is that Malfegor is the Grixis 'Walker, and Bolas, on a planeswalker card, is only in the set in the same sense that the original batch of 'Walkers were in Lorwyn.
Sorry, you're all right. I remember now that I drew that conclusion when the art first came out, because there are floating rocks in the background, like on Mirrodin.
That kinda sucks. A walker from Mirrodin would have been awesome.
Some of the stuff in that second link points to Vengeant being the pre-walker Ajani as well. In his bio, it mentions that "To this day he searches for answers, carrying with him a double-bladed axe: his own signature weapon fused with that of his fallen brother." In his 'walker card, it's pretty obvious that his weapon is double-bladed, but in the Vengeant pic? Not so much. One blade is visible, but the second either is hidden behind his leg or simply doesn't exist. Given that the blades seem to be pretty big, i doubt it would be hidden. Meaning, the weapon in the pic is single-bladed, without his soon-to-be-dead brother's weapon fused to it. Looks like pre-'walker Ajani to me.
Well, looks like we broke WotC's site again... looks like they're even having trouble with the minisite today!
In the meantime, both the new cards look pretty spiffy, I'm liking how they seem to be pushing aggressively-costed beaters in this set. My inner Timmy rejoices!
I don't have much of any kind of theory of what the theme of the set may be, but I do have a very hard time seeing it being aura-centric. They'd have to do something seriously innovative with auras, purely because of the presence of equipment. If you recall, the reason equipment was created was because nobody seemed to want to play with creature enchantments due to the inherent card disadvantage. Equipment was, and still is, essentially all that auras want to be. It just seems hard for me to think that they'd make such an interesting card type as equipment, which still has some design space to be explored and that was inherently superior to auras, and then ditch it, even temporarily, for the weaker card type it replaced. In order for auras to be utilized as a major theme, they have to either drastically alter the amount of removal in the set or find a way to circumvent the two-for-oneing trait of auras.
I'm interested in the set no matter what they use. I'd love to see flip cards make a comeback, and if done in an interesting way, enchantments could be fun. I just don't see why they'd do an aura-themed block when they already spent an entire block trying to "fix" auras by making equipment.
I was bored in class yesterday, and tried coming up with some new ideas for Harvest. The best one I could think of was a variation of both cycling and modal spells. How about a couple examples?
Feral Boggart 1R
creature - goblin warrior
haste
Harvest R (R, remove this card from the game. Play this ability whenever you could play an instant, and only if this card is in the graveyard)
Whenever Feral Boggart is harvested, it deals 1 damage to target creature or player.
2/1
Grave Robbery B
instant
remove target card in a graveyard from the game.
Harvest 3B (3B, remove this card from the game. Play this ability whenever you could play an instant, and only if this card is in the graveyard.)
Whenever Grave Robbery is Harvested, put a creature from any graveyard into play under your control.
Goofy Blue land
nonbasic land
Goofy Blue land comes into play tapped.
Tap: add U to your mana pool.
Harvest UU.
Whenever Goofy Blue Land is harvested, counter target spell.
Basically, it plays like a hybrid of cycling and flashback. You play at the same time and with the same uncounterability of cycling, but you get a spell instead of drawing a card, like flashback. Can be put on bot creatures and spells, allows you to essentially play two spells per card, and has the drawback of having to be in the gy before you can play it.
Look, I don't intend to flame, but have you not known this site for long? I've been playing off and on since Nemesis, and it's been rare that something like this HASN'T happened. I'm not referring to Godbook-esque fiascos, but to the fact that even before WotC started giving out the full spoiler pre-prerelease, we had rumormongers to spoil cards ahead of time. It's been going on since before this site even existed and we were all on MTGnews. The fact that we get the full spoiler up on the mothership is due pretty much solely to the fact that WotC knew they were never going to be able to stop every leak ever, and wanted to meet rumormongers halfway. I understand your sentiment, but this has been as much a part of the game's history as the cards themselves. The existence of this site and this community is due largely in part to the rumor mill and the attraction that players have to early spoilers. There are many people who want to experience the prerelease as WotC intends, going in with a sense of mystery and cracking their first packs not knowing what they'll find. There's nothing at all wrong with that. But if that's what you want, you shouldn't spend your time on a rumor mill, much less a thread labeled Spoiler-Rama. Rumors aren't going anywhere, and neither are the people who spoil cards.
Pretty sure they tried to with the tribal, shamanistic Zendikar vampires.
Lilianna hunting some demon
Garruk Hunting Liliana
Sorin somehow returning
Nissa Revane possibly showing up because she is hunting Sorin
Sifa Grent "Holed up in Innistrad"
Dack Fayden hunting for Sifa Grent
I wonder if they'll actually try to tie all those together...
Also, as an aside, is anyone else tired of planeswalker stories taking precedence over everything else on the plane? Innistrad is a beautifully flavorful setting, and as all the viral story marketing showed, more than capable of providing a rich and compelling story with characters that we may never even get to see as cards and may never even hear from again. Is there some reason we can't get to enjoy the organic stories of the plane itself, rather than just use it as a backdrop for more planeswalker hijinks? I'm almost not wanting them to go back to Ravnica anymore, because all the talk lately has been it becoming a haven for planeswalkers. Will they even talk about the plane itself, or just more OMGJACE?
http://beta.gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Search/Default.aspx?action=advanced&set=%22Conflux%22
For those of us interested in art and flavor text, here ya go!
Ah, Gotcha! I haven't actually been able to get my hands on the Planeswalker's Guide yet, so I didn't know that little blurb about Malfegor. With that in mind, that IS pretty blatant foreshadowing of Bolas, although we probably wouldn't have had a clue if not for finding the Conflux list.
That makes a pretty good case for Bolas being both a planeswalker and the major villain of the block, but I still don't think it necessarily means he's the Grixis-'Walker. He's of Grixis's colors, but that doesn't mean he is going to be Grixis's planeswalker representative, like the other Alara 'Walkers are. Even if he's the planeswalker pulling the strings, i think that puts him outside any One shard in particular. I could just as easily say Malfegor as the Grixis 'Walker and Bolas being another 'Walker card in the set (maybe even as a 5-color 'Walker card) that Malfegor answers to. Even if Malfegor's a 'Walker, Bolas would still be far more powerful.
I'll admit that Bolas isn't just in the set for nostalgia now, but him being a major storyline presence still doesn't necessarily mean he'll be the Grixis 'Walker. I think my official prediction is that Malfegor is the Grixis entry in the "Shard Planeswalker" cycle (either mono-B, UB, RB, or UBR) and Bolas will be the first ever WUBRG planeswalker, seperate from the cycle and major villain of the block.
Now, that being said, The only connection we legitimately have for Bolas being the Grixis 'Walker is his colors. I know there's other speculation, but i'm talking concrete reasoning. There's no storyline connection (yet) to any of Alara, let alone Grixis, and there's no real reason for him to show up on Grixis above all the others. (Seriously: yeah, it's in his colors, but what's the point of him being there? Ruling the plane wouldn't gain him anything in the long run, because it's pretty much devoid of resources that would make a difference anywhere outside of grixis. I don't see him being the kind of guy who's simply content to rule over the smallish hellscape of Grixis, when there are other bigger, more vital places he could conquer. Grixis just doesn't really have anything of value in and of itself over other places). It just doesn't make any sense to me why Bolas would be Grixis's Patron 'Walker.
On the other hand, we have Malfegor, a documented denizen of the Shard. And as a demon/dragon, an excessively powerful one at that. There alone is more storyline connection for his case than Bolas's, already. And being of the shard, he'd obviously be Grixis colors, in some combination. Also, we don't know anything about his personality whatsoever, whereas we have a pretty good handle on Bolas. Bolas has shown in the past to be excessively ambitious, and like i said before, would likely want more than just burned-out rotting Grixis under his wing. If he was to control the shard, it's my guess that he'd be doing it with the intention of using it to move on to bigger and better things. But we don't know Malfegor, as a demon/dragon, maybe he simply just likes it there in Grixis, and wants to rule the world he's content to stay in, like say Sarkhan Vol taking over Jund. I'm just saying, Malfegor may not be as good of a character for wide-spanning 'Walker, but as one just for Grixis? Seems like a good place for him.
The thing that really sticks out to me, aside from the storyline and personality things is the names of the cards that got spoiled. Although I have issues with the name "Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker" (having that name along with the inevitable "Planeswalker-Nicol" typeline annoys me to no end), it's pretty obvious that he'll be a planeswalker card. On the other hand, Malfegor's card is JUST his name, just like we saw with all the other planeswalkers aside from Elspeth and Tezzeret. I don't know, it's not as obvious "Nicol Bolas, planeswalker", but "Malfegor" could just as easily be a planeswalker card name as it could an everyday Legend card.
Like I said, i could be very much wrong, but it seems a bit hasty to write off Malfegor as the possible Grixis 'Walker just because Bolas is in the same set. Bolas makes no sense in this set to me whatsoever, and if you took his name off the list, Malfegor is the obvious choice. My honest opinion is that Malfegor is the Grixis 'Walker, and Bolas, on a planeswalker card, is only in the set in the same sense that the original batch of 'Walkers were in Lorwyn.
Some of the stuff in that second link points to Vengeant being the pre-walker Ajani as well. In his bio, it mentions that "To this day he searches for answers, carrying with him a double-bladed axe: his own signature weapon fused with that of his fallen brother." In his 'walker card, it's pretty obvious that his weapon is double-bladed, but in the Vengeant pic? Not so much. One blade is visible, but the second either is hidden behind his leg or simply doesn't exist. Given that the blades seem to be pretty big, i doubt it would be hidden. Meaning, the weapon in the pic is single-bladed, without his soon-to-be-dead brother's weapon fused to it. Looks like pre-'walker Ajani to me.
In the meantime, both the new cards look pretty spiffy, I'm liking how they seem to be pushing aggressively-costed beaters in this set. My inner Timmy rejoices!
I'm interested in the set no matter what they use. I'd love to see flip cards make a comeback, and if done in an interesting way, enchantments could be fun. I just don't see why they'd do an aura-themed block when they already spent an entire block trying to "fix" auras by making equipment.
Feral Boggart 1R
creature - goblin warrior
haste
Harvest R (R, remove this card from the game. Play this ability whenever you could play an instant, and only if this card is in the graveyard)
Whenever Feral Boggart is harvested, it deals 1 damage to target creature or player.
2/1
Grave Robbery B
instant
remove target card in a graveyard from the game.
Harvest 3B (3B, remove this card from the game. Play this ability whenever you could play an instant, and only if this card is in the graveyard.)
Whenever Grave Robbery is Harvested, put a creature from any graveyard into play under your control.
Goofy Blue land
nonbasic land
Goofy Blue land comes into play tapped.
Tap: add U to your mana pool.
Harvest UU.
Whenever Goofy Blue Land is harvested, counter target spell.
Basically, it plays like a hybrid of cycling and flashback. You play at the same time and with the same uncounterability of cycling, but you get a spell instead of drawing a card, like flashback. Can be put on bot creatures and spells, allows you to essentially play two spells per card, and has the drawback of having to be in the gy before you can play it.
Thoughts?