Okay, I've got to remain very skeptical of this. The orb reports crime/punishment just fine - why wouldn't it report this? Yeah, it could be buggy, but between the odd split (no color shared?) and the orb not producing results, I call shenanigans.
I strongly suspect that the graft keyword is going to be functionally similar to the artifact chimera structure. It'll be something like:
Flying graftmonster
Graft (sacrifice this: put a +1/+1 counter on target creature. That creature gains flying permanently).
It won't be a straight-up 'gain P/T and all abilities', but I think there will be a way to mix and match the creatures similar to modular but with a focus on abilities instead.
That's one hell of a preview card. I think most folks had called this when they had heard split cards would be back (the concept of splitting guilds, not colors), but I never thought that they would be this powerful.
WotC has done a great job with this set. It's a shame that they failed so heavily on the previous two.
I doubt they'll have it produce B, but producing R would make sense. Making it a Radkos card that only produces red mana would be an easy way to make it limited while still keeping the flavor of both colors - Red's fast mana and black's creature recursion in the graveyard.
Fenaris, that was an authorized release of the card; the card and the mechanic were both public knowledge. Are you saying that WotC should be able to sue people who negatively talk about things that are public knowledge? That's absurd.
kalbear: Saying it's narrow like Threshold doesn't prove your point, because threshold was deep enough to be the main mechanic for an entire block.
Just because a mechanic can be used for an entire block does not make it a particularly deep mechanic. Narrow, to me, means that the mechanic only works in one specific style of deck. Outside of that style of deck, it won't really work. Threshold is a perfect example of this. So is affinity for artifacts, so was madness, and so is this. Compare to cycling; cycling allows different costs, different enablers and is functionally useful in all sorts of decks. As a result, you get decks that are built around cycling as well as decks that just use cycling cards because they are good to have.
Threshold was a narrow mechanic; it was binary, could not be modified, and only improved cards. This is very similar. This is not the kind of mechanic that can be splashed into a deck, nor does it make cards good by themselves.
ETA: that isn't to say that this is a bad mechanic; it's going to be a strong one in various decks and the obvious synergy with cards like the seals and balduvian horde-type cards is clear. I'm just saying that for me, primarily a Johnny type, it's not that interesting of a mechanic. It's not fun to break and isn't applicable to a lot of different decks.
hydrokinesis, I don't see how it is not a narrow mechanic. It rewards people for a specific style of deck. That style of deck is fairly narrow. Because it only triggers on one state in the world and is not modifyable, it is also fairly narrow.
Narrow mechanics aren't bad in and of themselves; fear and vigilance are both very narrow mechanics that are also pretty useful. It just doesn't make the cards all that interesting to me. It is essentially a more narrow version of threshold, and we know how threshold plays out. Yes, spells can do more damage or have bigger effects (just like threshold), creatures can be transformative or gain new abilities (just like threshold), lands can do more interesting things (just like threshold), etc. That makes the mechanic no less narrow; it just means it enables some more broad things.
Even then, it doesn't enable that many broad things.
In general I've been really unimpressed with the mechanics for this block. The cards are cool and the power level is very decent, and I love the flavor behind them, but the mechanics themselves aren't that itneresting. Probably because instead of having deep mechanics that get expanded as the block continues we have shallow mechanics that get one set to shine and that's it - meaning they all feel very similar to any 'new' mechanic that is introduced in the small sets. That means those mechanics are fairly insular to themselves and tend to be simple. Ah well.
It's an interesting take on sui black or speed black, and makes a lot of sense given the RB combination. Flavor wise I like it a lot.
Game wise I'm not so happy about it. It seems like a very narrow version of threshold, essentially, that can only reward people at a very bare precondition. It's also a binary ability; unlike dredge or cycling or whatever, it is either on or off, with no real difference in between. It's a good aggro ability but I suspect it's not going to be as strong as bloodlust was, and bloodlust wasn't that strong to begin with.
That's an interesting point; we've assumed that the enemy guilds are transitive. That's not necessarily the case, is it? Boros may oppose Dimir, but Dimir doesn't necessarily oppose Boros.
The enemy guilds have an easy way of picking their 'opposites'. It's the reason that RW hates BU, because RW's shared ally is G, and G's enemy is BU. Similarly...
Simic should hate Radkos
Izzet should hate Selesnya
Golgari should hate Azorius
Orzhov should hate Gruul
But for the allied colors, it's a bit more complex. Gruul, for instance, must be opposed against a blue-flavored faction. Ideally it is either UW or UB. Both are pretty good fits. UB represents the secret order, sneakiness and underhandedness which RG is opposed to. UW represents order and lawfulness, the guild structure - which RG is opposed to as well. Similarly:
GW hates BR (anarchy vs order, community vs. individualism) or BU (openness vs. secrecy, community vs. individualism)
BU hates GW(see above) or GR (see above)
UW hates RG (law vs chaos) or BR (community law vs individual rights)
RB hates UW (see above) or GW (see above)
The interesting thing here is that none of the enemy guilds end up being totally the enemy of an allied guild. The enemy guilds are all kind of fence-sitters. Furthermore, no enemy guild will particularly hate any guild that has their shared allied color; it is more likely that an enemy guild will dislike strongly a color that shares a color with it. For instance, Golgari and Boros should get along better than Izzet and Boros do, since Izzet and Boros have two enemy pairings between them.
Each guild has an arch-rival, a guild that completely negates it, a foil.
Azorius vs. Golgari Boros vs. Dimir Dimir vs. Boros Golgari vs. Azorius Gruul vs. Orzhov Izzet vs. Selesnya Orzhov vs. Gruul Rakdos vs. Simic Selesnya vs. Izzet Simic vs. Rakdos
I still don't get why Azorius would be against Golgari instead of against Gruul - why the black-rotated color pattern is selesnya/izzet instead of azorius/gruul. I also don't see why Gruul would be specifically opposed to Orzhov instead of, well, any of the more community-minded and order-minded guilds. Why Orzhov instead of Azorius, or Selesnya, or Simic?
Radkos and Simic I've given up on because we know so little about either, but Azorius we know a great deal about - and what they're about is totally anti-Gruul. Of all the clans they're the ones most against the principles of GR.
So, rotating - and assuming that B's is Gruul/Azorius and G is Boros/Dimir, we have U, W and R.
U needs GWBR
W needs GUBR
R needs GWBU
with the guilds that are left, what can we do? We've got GW, GU, GB, UR, BR, and BW left. What can fit?
GW only works in GWBR.
UR only works in GUBR
with those constraints, there's only one solution that works.
I think we all agree on Boros/Dimir. Let's look at the other anti-pairings.
Gruul/Azorius is probably the easiest. Gruul represents everything against the guild structure. If they could, they'd bring down the whole system. Azorius is essentially the pinnacle of the guild system. They aren't the soldiers of the guilds (Boros) or the spies (Dimir) or the church (Orzhov) - they are, essentially, the system itself. They are the body politic. They are the guilds in the same way that a senator is the state they represent. Of all the guilds, Azorius is most against what the Gruul want.
Izzet/Golgari is the other one we know a lot about. Again, this is about nature and artifice. The natural vs the absolutely unnatural is probably more apt. It's also about the personal vs. the outside world. Izzet folks don't care about their personal power or abilities or anything; they care about knowing how the world works. Golgari are far more focused on themselves, personally growing themselves to be the best they can. In a simple way, it's essentially nerds and jocks.
Radkos/Selesnya is tough because we know nothing about Radkos. They're secretive (vs. Selesnya's openness), presumably selfish vs selfless, and moral vs amoral. Color wise they're the 'most' opposed given that there are three enemy pairings out of four here.
Finally, the weird one - Orzhov/Simic. Weird because it's the least enemy pairing, and really - who aside from Gruul would be specifically opposed to the Orzhov? The way I thought about it, finally, is one of faith. Orzhov believe entirely in a faith-based world. One with a life, an afterlife, a moral code and a contractual basis for that moral code. Orzhov believe entirely in the natural order of the metaphysical. Simic is the ultimate betrayer of this notion. They do not believe in metaphysics; they believe in transcending physical limitations not by metaphysics, but by science and experimentation. How I eventually thought about them is by categorizing this fight as one between fundamentalists and scientists. Simic encapsulate everything bad about science - the idea of progress without conscience. Orzhov encapsulate everything bad about faith - morals without question. These two are a good match to oppose each other.
Those enemy guild pairings don't make any sense to me from a conceptual basis. Like, okay, Boros and Dimir make perfect sense - being overt and direct vs. being subtle and secretive. I can vaguely see Selesnya vs Izzet - the concept of everyone coming together for the greater good vs. everyone setting off on their own and doing their own private research - but the rest of them just seem weird. Golgari vs. Azorius, for example - the guilds don't seem to have much in the way of opposing views at all. Gruul is opposed to everyone; they'd seem to be a much better enemy of Azorius than the criminally-oriented Orzhov. And why would Radkos care about Simic's unnatural creatures and vibe towards nature?
I'd either do it as a similar basis to the color chart or as something a bit more complex.
Boros vs Dimir makes perfect sense for both.
Gruul vs Azorius makes sense as well, and gives the same amount of enemy colors. Azorius really is philosophically directly opposed to Gruul.
Radkos vs Selesnya also seems to make more sense, at least from the small amount we know about Radkos. Being the group of community and openness and nature. vs the community of selfishness and raw power.
leaving Golgari, Izzet, Orzhov and Simic. The only pairings that 'work' from an enemy perspective are Golgari/Izzet and Simic/Orzhov. Does that make sense? Golgari/Izzet does make some sense; Golgari is about the cycle of life and nature, both its positive and negative abilities. It is about power and doing what is best for you directly. Izzet is about doing neat stuff, whatever you might feel works. It's about artifice and invention, creating new things from thin air.
The Orzhov/Simic is the one that is the oddest pairing of those. Simic almost seems like it should go against Golgari or Selesnya in philosophy. There's no real good fit for any of them. The only enemy part in Orzhov vs. Simic is the idea of creating new life vs. using the dead, but that's weak. The problem is that Selesnya uses three enemy slots when going against Radkos; white is enemies with Radkos entirely in addition to green being an enemy of black, whereas all the other pairings only have two enemies.
It was vaguely insulting because it was unclear whether or not WotC actually intended us to believe this. It's the difference between someone telling you a joke and someone telling you a lie. It had nothing to do with the content.
It was not that they made up a story or anything. It was whether they viewed the readers as gullible enough to buy it. And part of the problem - like MaRo said - was that they used the person who will never lie to you as the person to tell you the lie. That alone confused the issue - but more importantly, it gave the perception that it was supposed to be seriously said.
Were there any actual new keyworded mechanics in alliances? If they're going with the idea that this was a long-forgotten cardset, I think the whole keyword madness will not be present. Then again, they're seeming to go keyboard wacky these days; remember when it was so special that Onslaught had 3 keywords in the base set, even though one was 'fear'? Craziness.
I don't think that hydro was talking about specific keywords; I think he was talking about keywords in general. Either a domain-like mechanic for keywords or 'does X for each card with a keyword in your control'. I'd rather see a domain mechanic, honestly, if only because it's an easy way to make the cards automatically balanced.
I still hate, hate this idea. Some things just don't work well at all using this. For example - unless you have a lot of morph cards, morph doesn't work well as a mechanic because the bluffing angle is just not great.
Notice that the entire conversation about people speaking their mind and complaining about the boards has been kept around here. And some of it is against R_E. Crazy!
Maybe, just maybe, there was another reason that blisterguy got banned/modded other than 'speaking out against R_E'. I've seen plenty of posts that haven't been deleted that were in favor of WotC.
Flying graftmonster
Graft (sacrifice this: put a +1/+1 counter on target creature. That creature gains flying permanently).
It won't be a straight-up 'gain P/T and all abilities', but I think there will be a way to mix and match the creatures similar to modular but with a focus on abilities instead.
WotC has done a great job with this set. It's a shame that they failed so heavily on the previous two.
Threshold was a narrow mechanic; it was binary, could not be modified, and only improved cards. This is very similar. This is not the kind of mechanic that can be splashed into a deck, nor does it make cards good by themselves.
ETA: that isn't to say that this is a bad mechanic; it's going to be a strong one in various decks and the obvious synergy with cards like the seals and balduvian horde-type cards is clear. I'm just saying that for me, primarily a Johnny type, it's not that interesting of a mechanic. It's not fun to break and isn't applicable to a lot of different decks.
Narrow mechanics aren't bad in and of themselves; fear and vigilance are both very narrow mechanics that are also pretty useful. It just doesn't make the cards all that interesting to me. It is essentially a more narrow version of threshold, and we know how threshold plays out. Yes, spells can do more damage or have bigger effects (just like threshold), creatures can be transformative or gain new abilities (just like threshold), lands can do more interesting things (just like threshold), etc. That makes the mechanic no less narrow; it just means it enables some more broad things.
Even then, it doesn't enable that many broad things.
In general I've been really unimpressed with the mechanics for this block. The cards are cool and the power level is very decent, and I love the flavor behind them, but the mechanics themselves aren't that itneresting. Probably because instead of having deep mechanics that get expanded as the block continues we have shallow mechanics that get one set to shine and that's it - meaning they all feel very similar to any 'new' mechanic that is introduced in the small sets. That means those mechanics are fairly insular to themselves and tend to be simple. Ah well.
Game wise I'm not so happy about it. It seems like a very narrow version of threshold, essentially, that can only reward people at a very bare precondition. It's also a binary ability; unlike dredge or cycling or whatever, it is either on or off, with no real difference in between. It's a good aggro ability but I suspect it's not going to be as strong as bloodlust was, and bloodlust wasn't that strong to begin with.
The enemy guilds have an easy way of picking their 'opposites'. It's the reason that RW hates BU, because RW's shared ally is G, and G's enemy is BU. Similarly...
Simic should hate Radkos
Izzet should hate Selesnya
Golgari should hate Azorius
Orzhov should hate Gruul
But for the allied colors, it's a bit more complex. Gruul, for instance, must be opposed against a blue-flavored faction. Ideally it is either UW or UB. Both are pretty good fits. UB represents the secret order, sneakiness and underhandedness which RG is opposed to. UW represents order and lawfulness, the guild structure - which RG is opposed to as well. Similarly:
GW hates BR (anarchy vs order, community vs. individualism) or BU (openness vs. secrecy, community vs. individualism)
BU hates GW(see above) or GR (see above)
UW hates RG (law vs chaos) or BR (community law vs individual rights)
RB hates UW (see above) or GW (see above)
The interesting thing here is that none of the enemy guilds end up being totally the enemy of an allied guild. The enemy guilds are all kind of fence-sitters. Furthermore, no enemy guild will particularly hate any guild that has their shared allied color; it is more likely that an enemy guild will dislike strongly a color that shares a color with it. For instance, Golgari and Boros should get along better than Izzet and Boros do, since Izzet and Boros have two enemy pairings between them.
I still don't get why Azorius would be against Golgari instead of against Gruul - why the black-rotated color pattern is selesnya/izzet instead of azorius/gruul. I also don't see why Gruul would be specifically opposed to Orzhov instead of, well, any of the more community-minded and order-minded guilds. Why Orzhov instead of Azorius, or Selesnya, or Simic?
Radkos and Simic I've given up on because we know so little about either, but Azorius we know a great deal about - and what they're about is totally anti-Gruul. Of all the clans they're the ones most against the principles of GR.
So, rotating - and assuming that B's is Gruul/Azorius and G is Boros/Dimir, we have U, W and R.
U needs GWBR
W needs GUBR
R needs GWBU
with the guilds that are left, what can we do? We've got GW, GU, GB, UR, BR, and BW left. What can fit?
GW only works in GWBR.
UR only works in GUBR
with those constraints, there's only one solution that works.
Boros/Dimir
Azorius/Gruul
Selesnya/Radkos
Golgari/Izzet
Orzhov/Simic
I think we all agree on Boros/Dimir. Let's look at the other anti-pairings.
Gruul/Azorius is probably the easiest. Gruul represents everything against the guild structure. If they could, they'd bring down the whole system. Azorius is essentially the pinnacle of the guild system. They aren't the soldiers of the guilds (Boros) or the spies (Dimir) or the church (Orzhov) - they are, essentially, the system itself. They are the body politic. They are the guilds in the same way that a senator is the state they represent. Of all the guilds, Azorius is most against what the Gruul want.
Izzet/Golgari is the other one we know a lot about. Again, this is about nature and artifice. The natural vs the absolutely unnatural is probably more apt. It's also about the personal vs. the outside world. Izzet folks don't care about their personal power or abilities or anything; they care about knowing how the world works. Golgari are far more focused on themselves, personally growing themselves to be the best they can. In a simple way, it's essentially nerds and jocks.
Radkos/Selesnya is tough because we know nothing about Radkos. They're secretive (vs. Selesnya's openness), presumably selfish vs selfless, and moral vs amoral. Color wise they're the 'most' opposed given that there are three enemy pairings out of four here.
Finally, the weird one - Orzhov/Simic. Weird because it's the least enemy pairing, and really - who aside from Gruul would be specifically opposed to the Orzhov? The way I thought about it, finally, is one of faith. Orzhov believe entirely in a faith-based world. One with a life, an afterlife, a moral code and a contractual basis for that moral code. Orzhov believe entirely in the natural order of the metaphysical. Simic is the ultimate betrayer of this notion. They do not believe in metaphysics; they believe in transcending physical limitations not by metaphysics, but by science and experimentation. How I eventually thought about them is by categorizing this fight as one between fundamentalists and scientists. Simic encapsulate everything bad about science - the idea of progress without conscience. Orzhov encapsulate everything bad about faith - morals without question. These two are a good match to oppose each other.
I'd either do it as a similar basis to the color chart or as something a bit more complex.
Boros vs Dimir makes perfect sense for both.
Gruul vs Azorius makes sense as well, and gives the same amount of enemy colors. Azorius really is philosophically directly opposed to Gruul.
Radkos vs Selesnya also seems to make more sense, at least from the small amount we know about Radkos. Being the group of community and openness and nature. vs the community of selfishness and raw power.
leaving Golgari, Izzet, Orzhov and Simic. The only pairings that 'work' from an enemy perspective are Golgari/Izzet and Simic/Orzhov. Does that make sense? Golgari/Izzet does make some sense; Golgari is about the cycle of life and nature, both its positive and negative abilities. It is about power and doing what is best for you directly. Izzet is about doing neat stuff, whatever you might feel works. It's about artifice and invention, creating new things from thin air.
The Orzhov/Simic is the one that is the oddest pairing of those. Simic almost seems like it should go against Golgari or Selesnya in philosophy. There's no real good fit for any of them. The only enemy part in Orzhov vs. Simic is the idea of creating new life vs. using the dead, but that's weak. The problem is that Selesnya uses three enemy slots when going against Radkos; white is enemies with Radkos entirely in addition to green being an enemy of black, whereas all the other pairings only have two enemies.
It was not that they made up a story or anything. It was whether they viewed the readers as gullible enough to buy it. And part of the problem - like MaRo said - was that they used the person who will never lie to you as the person to tell you the lie. That alone confused the issue - but more importantly, it gave the perception that it was supposed to be seriously said.
I don't think that hydro was talking about specific keywords; I think he was talking about keywords in general. Either a domain-like mechanic for keywords or 'does X for each card with a keyword in your control'. I'd rather see a domain mechanic, honestly, if only because it's an easy way to make the cards automatically balanced.
Ugh. How creatively dull.
Maybe, just maybe, there was another reason that blisterguy got banned/modded other than 'speaking out against R_E'. I've seen plenty of posts that haven't been deleted that were in favor of WotC.
But hey, think what you like.