The story was alright, though I have a question. Why did Nissa take all night to dig four holes in the ground? She probably started around midnight and Chandra starts chatting with her around dawn.
I debate the use of the term plot armor in relation to this story. I think people are too quick to cry "Plot Armor" just because they think someone should have died. Speaking as some one who beat a few odds in still being able to breath today, just because it was likely someone would die in a situation doesn't mean they should die in the story. Surviving incredibly bad odds does not instantly mean it was plot armor. That being said, when I think about this story, even I find it hard to make an argument that plot armor was NOT involved here. I'm still not quite jumping on the plot armor side, but I'm not sure it wasn't plot armor either.
The reason I say they have plot armor is because the structure of the story doesn't afford them dying or sustaining a debilitating injury. Marketing isn't going to waste their time in Origins promoting five Planeswalkers only to have one or two of them die in the next block, and likely several blocks after it as well. The same goes for Planes, especially for ones that were very popular. It takes away some useful tools from the creative team, but they can work around it.
2)Related: "you have to kill important characters so the readers can understand what happens once the eldrazi ravage the land... it's story writing 101." I am a writer. I've taken courses. I must say that particular statement never came up. You have to impart on your readers a sense of danger, scale, etc., sure. But there are many ways to do it. Killing important characters is certainly one easy way, to establish that. It is neither the only, nor the ultimate guaranteed best way. There are other ways to impart on the viewer such understanding. It takes more effort and skill than a lot of writers have, but it is possible.
I agree with you, but I feel you'd agree with me when I say the writers didn't really deliver on any other method either. I feel they could have, if the readers felt more invested in characters not obviously protected by plot armor. None of the Origins Planeswalkers were in any personal danger (except maybe from Ob) so that sense had to come from the native Zendikari. This is what helped make Tazri's and Drana's stories good. Tazri was in very real and very legitimate danger, and Drana had a strong connection with the people following her which were also seriously threatened. Drana also had the benefit of being a leader in a much more difficult scenario than Gideon's. The story focused on the (protected) Planeswalkers though, so that sense of danger was less present.
As a side note, I know Nissa is a Zendikari but she really didn't feel like one. Other than that one occasion towards the beginning, she didn't seem to have any empathy towards the people of Zendikar and any time her past on the plane was brought up it was always in the context of her old self/personal demons.
The problem with the logic of figuring out a tier list/power level of 'walkers as a group is the same as classifying superheroes in general. Because our minds want to do so based off of feats. And frankly, feats go hand in hand with circumstances whether you like it or not. Context is everything when it comes to power level. It's the same reason everyone got pissy Nissa bested Ob-Nixilis in their first fight. Rather than allowing the context to frame the fight, people wanted to isolate the two into separate bubbles, compare feats, and conclude that it shouldn't have been a contest. That's really problematic thinking when it comes to understanding storytelling.
Yeah power levels don't make a lot of sense generally. That doesn't mean we can't compare the ability of each Planeswalker to the each other, just that it's impossible to accurately rank them unless they were each measured equally and under identical conditions. You'd need to get them all in the same place and perform the same or similar tasks, like combat...
Calling it now, MTG tournament arc 2017. You heard it here first.
As for the story today, pretty good delivery on a very wonky plot moment. On the downside the writing jumped between Chandra and Kiora too much. Each time I figured out what was going on the perspective would switch.
Mostly for meta reasons. If the BFZ block is a war story, someone needs to bite the bullet. Munda's card was in BFZ, he didn't get an article and he's had very little characterization. He's basically a redshirt.
So that's basically the general idea. And yes, I know it has problems, such as cheese and schmaltz. But it IS a story that has to appeal to adolescents, so I've tried to take that into account. Before anyone attacks me, bear in mind that this is all simply off the top of my head. If I had as much time as the WOTC creative team, and actually sat down and planned it all out, I could come out with a much, much, much better plot. But unfortunately, I'm too busy for that.
You've put up the most well thought out suggestion so far, so that's a plus. Still, you know Jace is a secondary character in BFZ right? Rotating to the primary character position risks overexposing Jace, especially when he's headlining SOI right after. Additionally, killing Nissa off is a poor move, it wastes the narrative effort given to her in Origins, though it could work as a twist.
If I had to rewrite BFZ I would keep the focus on Gideon and Nissa, those two have the biggest stakes and are most central to the conflict. The plot would stay mostly the same, though I would move around the emphasis. Gideon will be the leader of the Gatewatch, but the story rarely shows his leadership capabilities. In my version, Vorik dies early and pass command to Gideon, who then has to contend with the all the troubles Zendikar as a leader. This gives much more time on how Gideon organizes, strategizes and handles problems as they arise. That way, you get a better understanding of Gideon and where he fits when the Gatewatch later forms. I would also use this extra time to show Ayli as a threat to the army as she steals away people for Ulamog sacrifice.
Nissa's I would retool, starting off Nissa out of connection with Zendikar and Ashaya. I would then echo her origin story as she goes on a quest of self discovery and understanding of her bond with the plane. This would culminate in her finding the Khalni Heart, and Ob. The two duel and after a desperate gamble Nissa touches the Khalni Heart and has a moment of epiphany about her nature and the nature of Zendikar. Then Ashaya wrecks house and leaves Ob Pinned to the Earth.
Jace and Kiora would stay mostly intact. Jace learns about Hedrons from Ugin, they argue about what they should do and Jace storms off. Kiora comes back, meets up with her sister and full charges towards Sea Gate.
As for the finale, I would get Jace back to Gideon much faster. Jace relays his plan and Gideon sees Sea Gate (or the Halimar Basin) as the perfect area for Jace's hedron trap. They army immediately gets to digging up hedrons as Jace unravels more and more of what they can do. While the duo have no concrete plans on how to power the trap they both agree that they should take Sea Gate. Cue Battle of Sea Gate, preferably with a little time spent on the planning phase and getting a bit more into the specifics. Kiora's and Nissa's entries here are perfectly fine. After the battle everyone meets and Nissa agrees to do her leyline thing with the hedrons to entrap Ulamog (and then attempt to destroy it). Ulamog's approach goes roughly the same, though right when Gideon jumps up to grapple a 100ft tall tentacle monster he gets batted all the way back to Sea Gate. Despite that, the trap works, Ob appears, Kozilek emerges etc etc.
I don't know all of OGW but I'll go with my impressions. Ob takes out Nissa Jace and Gideon then Chandra shows up out of the blue(red) and blasts Ob with fire until he peaces out. The four heroes get their bearings and look over the scene to see the devastation of the Eldrazi. Gideon rallies everyone and they hatch a new plan, to try and replicate the hedrons using just Nissa and the leylines. At this point Jace is running on hunches and theories and is fairly certain the plan isn't going to work. It's the only plan they've got though, so they go a head with it. After fighting through Eldrazi they catch with the Titans and execute their plan, and it seemingly works, though at a devastating cost to Zendikar. Zendikar has been drained of almost all its power and it doesn't look like it will survive. The plane begins to buckle and in a desperate attempt to save the plane Nissa channels the power of the Planeswalkers and stops Zendikar from dying completely. The Zendikari cheer and Ugin shows up to tell Jace he forgot the analogy. Ugin informs the Planeswalkers that while the Eldrazi have been damaged, they will return one day, then he scoffs and flies off like most dragons would. Gideon turns to the team and makes an Oath to protect other planes from Eldrazi and any other threat and invites the others to do the same. Inspired, everyone else makes an Oath.
At some point in there Kiora gives up and bails, what a wimp.
From there Gideon and Nissa hang back to find a way to help Zendikar recover while Jace and Chandra go off to investigate this Sorin guy on Innistrad.
This version stays very close to how I think the story will turn out but I think the revisions make for a more compelling narrative.
Her R aspects are more subtle. Her occupation probably had her working freely, and her reactions to things tend to come from the gut. By abilities she has the flame lanterns and her contortion skills blend very well with Red.
I have a question coming out of this, who is the cooler merfolk? Kiora or Jori?
Drawing random spells increases luck at the expense of skill (as you might get cards that aren't particularly useful in the current situation), but it also provides the valuable variance to ensure games play out differently each time.
True, and the system you suggest increases consistency and decreases variance overall. An increase of consistency creates a higher skill bar to play the game, because as you just said luck and skill are inversely correlated in magic. It also increases board complexity (two decks instead of one), and higher complexity always increases the amount of skill needed to play the game.
It is reasonable to assume that these changes would increase the amount of skill needed to play magic competently. This higher skill bar would make learning/playing magic, an already challenging game, even harder game to learn/play. Increased difficulty to learn decreases the amount of new players and higher skill reduces the amount of casual players who play the game. Fewer players means less money, less money means magic gets smaller.
Two other small complaints, the first is that having to shuffle and accommodate for two different decks would be annoying as hell. The second is that your system would put more spells in players hands, which upticks the amount of analysis paralysis players get. I've got no desire to spend more time sitting around waiting for my opponents to figure out what they want to play.
I think you're wrong about the effect of this change on the skill level. This would make Magic easier to play, not harder, because the decision making process "Do I need another Land? If so, I should draw another Land." is extremely easy for a new player to grok, while in normal Magic land management requires making the "Do I need another Land?" decision during the deck-building phase, well before you know if you're mana flooded or mana screwed.
To clarify, I'm not talking about deck building, I'm talking about sitting down and playing a round of magic. When you add a decision a player needs to make, it increases the amount of skill in the game. If a player has to make a decision every turn about whether to draw a spell or a land, it increases the amount of skill needed to play magic. You also never addressed the issue of having two libraries, which adds a massive amount of complexity to the game.
Drawing random spells increases luck at the expense of skill (as you might get cards that aren't particularly useful in the current situation), but it also provides the valuable variance to ensure games play out differently each time.
True, and the system you suggest increases consistency and decreases variance overall. An increase of consistency creates a higher skill bar to play the game, because as you just said luck and skill are inversely correlated in magic. It also increases board complexity (two decks instead of one), and higher complexity always increases the amount of skill needed to play the game.
It is reasonable to assume that these changes would increase the amount of skill needed to play magic competently. This higher skill bar would make learning/playing magic, an already challenging game, even harder game to learn/play. Increased difficulty to learn decreases the amount of new players and higher skill reduces the amount of casual players who play the game. Fewer players means less money, less money means magic gets smaller.
Two other small complaints, the first is that having to shuffle and accommodate for two different decks would be annoying as hell. The second is that your system would put more spells in players hands, which upticks the amount of analysis paralysis players get. I've got no desire to spend more time sitting around waiting for my opponents to figure out what they want to play.
This isn't to you specifically, but "logic" gets tossed around as an argument more often than Gideon whips his sural. People seem to think that just saying they're more logical means they have a better argument. Trust me when I say that whenever you use the word "logic" to defend one of your points you're wasting words. Words I could have used to talk about mathematical proofs, and not asinine discussions about resource management in a card game.
As a side note, I know Nissa is a Zendikari but she really didn't feel like one. Other than that one occasion towards the beginning, she didn't seem to have any empathy towards the people of Zendikar and any time her past on the plane was brought up it was always in the context of her old self/personal demons.
Calling it now, MTG tournament arc 2017. You heard it here first.
As for the story today, pretty good delivery on a very wonky plot moment. On the downside the writing jumped between Chandra and Kiora too much. Each time I figured out what was going on the perspective would switch.
If I had to rewrite BFZ I would keep the focus on Gideon and Nissa, those two have the biggest stakes and are most central to the conflict. The plot would stay mostly the same, though I would move around the emphasis. Gideon will be the leader of the Gatewatch, but the story rarely shows his leadership capabilities. In my version, Vorik dies early and pass command to Gideon, who then has to contend with the all the troubles Zendikar as a leader. This gives much more time on how Gideon organizes, strategizes and handles problems as they arise. That way, you get a better understanding of Gideon and where he fits when the Gatewatch later forms. I would also use this extra time to show Ayli as a threat to the army as she steals away people for Ulamog sacrifice.
Nissa's I would retool, starting off Nissa out of connection with Zendikar and Ashaya. I would then echo her origin story as she goes on a quest of self discovery and understanding of her bond with the plane. This would culminate in her finding the Khalni Heart, and Ob. The two duel and after a desperate gamble Nissa touches the Khalni Heart and has a moment of epiphany about her nature and the nature of Zendikar. Then Ashaya wrecks house and leaves Ob Pinned to the Earth.
Jace and Kiora would stay mostly intact. Jace learns about Hedrons from Ugin, they argue about what they should do and Jace storms off. Kiora comes back, meets up with her sister and full charges towards Sea Gate.
As for the finale, I would get Jace back to Gideon much faster. Jace relays his plan and Gideon sees Sea Gate (or the Halimar Basin) as the perfect area for Jace's hedron trap. They army immediately gets to digging up hedrons as Jace unravels more and more of what they can do. While the duo have no concrete plans on how to power the trap they both agree that they should take Sea Gate. Cue Battle of Sea Gate, preferably with a little time spent on the planning phase and getting a bit more into the specifics. Kiora's and Nissa's entries here are perfectly fine. After the battle everyone meets and Nissa agrees to do her leyline thing with the hedrons to entrap Ulamog (and then attempt to destroy it). Ulamog's approach goes roughly the same, though right when Gideon jumps up to grapple a 100ft tall tentacle monster he gets batted all the way back to Sea Gate. Despite that, the trap works, Ob appears, Kozilek emerges etc etc.
I don't know all of OGW but I'll go with my impressions. Ob takes out Nissa Jace and Gideon then Chandra shows up out of the blue(red) and blasts Ob with fire until he peaces out. The four heroes get their bearings and look over the scene to see the devastation of the Eldrazi. Gideon rallies everyone and they hatch a new plan, to try and replicate the hedrons using just Nissa and the leylines. At this point Jace is running on hunches and theories and is fairly certain the plan isn't going to work. It's the only plan they've got though, so they go a head with it. After fighting through Eldrazi they catch with the Titans and execute their plan, and it seemingly works, though at a devastating cost to Zendikar. Zendikar has been drained of almost all its power and it doesn't look like it will survive. The plane begins to buckle and in a desperate attempt to save the plane Nissa channels the power of the Planeswalkers and stops Zendikar from dying completely. The Zendikari cheer and Ugin shows up to tell Jace he forgot the analogy. Ugin informs the Planeswalkers that while the Eldrazi have been damaged, they will return one day, then he scoffs and flies off like most dragons would. Gideon turns to the team and makes an Oath to protect other planes from Eldrazi and any other threat and invites the others to do the same. Inspired, everyone else makes an Oath.
At some point in there Kiora gives up and bails, what a wimp.
From there Gideon and Nissa hang back to find a way to help Zendikar recover while Jace and Chandra go off to investigate this Sorin guy on Innistrad.
This version stays very close to how I think the story will turn out but I think the revisions make for a more compelling narrative.
I have a question coming out of this, who is the cooler merfolk? Kiora or Jori?
It is reasonable to assume that these changes would increase the amount of skill needed to play magic competently. This higher skill bar would make learning/playing magic, an already challenging game, even harder game to learn/play. Increased difficulty to learn decreases the amount of new players and higher skill reduces the amount of casual players who play the game. Fewer players means less money, less money means magic gets smaller.
Two other small complaints, the first is that having to shuffle and accommodate for two different decks would be annoying as hell. The second is that your system would put more spells in players hands, which upticks the amount of analysis paralysis players get. I've got no desire to spend more time sitting around waiting for my opponents to figure out what they want to play.
This isn't to you specifically, but "logic" gets tossed around as an argument more often than Gideon whips his sural. People seem to think that just saying they're more logical means they have a better argument. Trust me when I say that whenever you use the word "logic" to defend one of your points you're wasting words. Words I could have used to talk about mathematical proofs, and not asinine discussions about resource management in a card game.