Just a comment to throw in amongst the general underwhelming reaction to party; anybody think it may turn out to be quite potent in a constructed changeling type deck? Should make hitting the 4 types a bit easier. Mirror Entity alone fixes the problem quite easily.
Those are the main ones for me, but there's an Orah Cleric deck in brew too if I can find a way to actually make it potent enough. What it really wants though is a legendary Edgewalker...
Anyone else getting an almost John William Waterhouse vibe from that art? For me, one of Seb's finest compositions. Card looks fun too - play with Segovian Angel for extra cuteness
Oh. Some of these are extremely nice. But now I need foil Sorin and Kaya for my Orzhov collection, though I doubt that Kaya will be too much - she certainly didn't get the best of the new arts. Sorin might be a bit pricier though. :/
ETA: To be fair, Kaya looks better in that full-art gallery.
Right at the end of the trailer where Liliana seems to die Gideon grabs her from behind and grants her his gift of invulnerability, basically exchanging it (permanently) for the pact with which Bolas is killing and holding power over Liliana. She begs him to not do it and let her die but he tells her he believes in her and she needs to be the one before going to ashes. Liliana proceeds to defeat Bolas by having Bontu bite him, causing him to lose his spark (but he doesn't die because of shenanigans). Gids then gets an afterlife scene akin to how Gladiator ends, but with him and his irregulars.
Just back able to view all this on laptop instead of phone and found this bit that I'd missed. If that really is 'permanently', then we could be in for some very interesting versions of Lili in the future! We've all talked about how Lili's arc with the four demon contracts, then Bolas, has been ending, but this could send her off down a whole new arc in itself. What will someone like her do with that kind of unlimitation? (Yes, that's a word - you understand what I mean by it )
There is a spot between the two ends of the scale you know? Pretty good, but not ground-breaking is about where I'd expect. And subjectively, I don't think this was bad. Certainly not 'lazy predictable hole laden terrible fan fiction'. *And* I haven't read Greg Weisman's story yet. Brandon Sanderson's tale for Davriel was great. I think the overall story is bound to be patchy, because actually, writing an entirely internally consistent fantasy fiction is a hard enough job for one excellent, dedicated, professional author. Managing it amongst a creative team of varying degrees of ability, all whilst tying it in to a card game whose needs trump those of the story when necessary, is near enough impossible.
ETA: And I'm saying this as someone who utterly detested the SOI/EMN story, so it's not like I'm a complete suck-up to the creative team. This one I'd give maybe 6 to 6.5/10, which is better than I think Magic's story has been at times, and not bad for a bolt-on to a card game.
There are a couple of awkward story elements to Kytheon being in the Therosian Elysium. First, how did he get to Theros after dying in his sacrifice on Ravnica? But more awkwardly still, if only those who die peacefully and with completeness about their existence go to Elysium rather than Erebos's underworld... what are the rest of his irregulars doing there?
So that said, I choose to see Heartwarming Redemption more as art than science. Gideon/Kytheon ain't coming back.
Heh at 'they need to sell more cards'. Of course they do. Magic is principally a card game, and everything about it is always going to be driven by this fact. Expecting it to provide award-winning fantasy story content is a recipe for disappointment. All things considered, I don't think this arc's been too bad (SOI/EMN aside).
Because, despite some execution flaws, I actually liked the old Masterpiece system. I personally watched multiple young players open Kaladesh Masterpieces at the prerelease and it was obviously the highlight of their day. That's important. The old system catered to everyone, anyone had a chance to own one, and most importantly it actually encouraged players to go out to FNM and actually participate in tournaments because of the potential to get a sweet ass card.
As mentioned above, the Mythic Edition caters solely to A) investors/scalpers or B) players with a large amount of disposable income. It's simply not the same, and in my opinion is far, far worse.
All of this. On holiday this week my 14 year old used some of his birthday money to buy a handful of old(ish) Amonkhet boosters and pulled an invocation Aven Mindcensor. Much happiness ensued. Just put the golden-ticket cards in the damned packs again will ya? That enables the feel-good; this 'Mythic Edition' method just creates feel-bad for the likes of him because he knows he'll never own them.
ETA: And I don't accept the 'but these are for collectors!' argument. The collectors with deep pockets can still dump all their cash into buying enough boxes of boosters to get them all, or just buy them on the secondary market, but ffs - 14 year olds are collectors too. At least give them a chance.
With the caveat that I haven't read the novel yet, I actually quite like the story elements that led to Bolas's downfall - Liliana choosing to go willingly to death rather than be at Bolas's command for the rest of her existence, and Gideon choosing to sacrifice himself to free Liliana from that end. The first he may have been expected to anticipate as a possibility, but the second, and especially the combination of the two, maybe less so. Both are choices outside of Bolas's way of thinking, and he was pretty confident he knew Liliana inside out. Everyone decrying this as 'Oh, Bolas is meant to be *so* smart, he should have anticipated everything' are, I think, overplaying his ability to empathise with those who hold different values and do things very differently to him. In his defence, he did at least anticipate that Gideon would attempt something heroic with the Blackblade, but what Gideon did next was too far outside of Bolas's ability to comprehend. B villains tend to sneer at W's propensity for self-sacrifice and think they can just manipulate it as a tool, but sometimes they misjudge just how potent it can be.
I presume Bolas gets desparked, but then don't see how he ends up in the Meditation Realm? Some kind of Ugin shenanigans presumably. Nevertheless, I also presume that means Ashiok can go and pay him a visit whenever they like - which could be quite often
Funnily enough, for me it's a common card that I'll be after most copies of. Marauding Blight-Priest is a 3CMC replacement for my 4CMC Cliffhaven Vampires in a bunch of triggers decks, so I'm going to need quite a few.
Relic Golem is another card I'll be using as another cheap CMC pilot for my Sydri Vehicles deck, to complement Lupine Prototype, Vantress Gargoyle and Kefnet the Mindful.
Forsaken Monument is a shoo in for Veladrazi - as I'm sure it is for everyone else's 'Drazi / Artifact decks.
And Angel of Destiny will go into Sephara.
Those are the main ones for me, but there's an Orah Cleric deck in brew too if I can find a way to actually make it potent enough. What it really wants though is a legendary Edgewalker...
ETA: To be fair, Kaya looks better in that full-art gallery.
That is a quite wonderful montage. Very nicely done Manite
Just back able to view all this on laptop instead of phone and found this bit that I'd missed. If that really is 'permanently', then we could be in for some very interesting versions of Lili in the future! We've all talked about how Lili's arc with the four demon contracts, then Bolas, has been ending, but this could send her off down a whole new arc in itself. What will someone like her do with that kind of unlimitation? (Yes, that's a word - you understand what I mean by it
ETA: And I'm saying this as someone who utterly detested the SOI/EMN story, so it's not like I'm a complete suck-up to the creative team. This one I'd give maybe 6 to 6.5/10, which is better than I think Magic's story has been at times, and not bad for a bolt-on to a card game.
So that said, I choose to see Heartwarming Redemption more as art than science. Gideon/Kytheon ain't coming back.
All of this. On holiday this week my 14 year old used some of his birthday money to buy a handful of old(ish) Amonkhet boosters and pulled an invocation Aven Mindcensor. Much happiness ensued. Just put the golden-ticket cards in the damned packs again will ya? That enables the feel-good; this 'Mythic Edition' method just creates feel-bad for the likes of him because he knows he'll never own them.
ETA: And I don't accept the 'but these are for collectors!' argument. The collectors with deep pockets can still dump all their cash into buying enough boxes of boosters to get them all, or just buy them on the secondary market, but ffs - 14 year olds are collectors too. At least give them a chance.
B villains tend to sneer at W's propensity for self-sacrifice and think they can just manipulate it as a tool, but sometimes they misjudge just how potent it can be.
That was her shooting Gideon's pegasus out of the sky as shown on Divine Arrow.