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Magic: the Gathering - Shadows over Innistrad |OT| Blue's Clues

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Santiako

Member
I think the next dual cycle should be generic-named pain lands. They are great, powerful but not too good, and they synergise well with the eldrazi.
 

Daedardus

Member
I actually want a completed Grove of the burnwillows cycle, even though I understand that it is probably too powerful in various decks and that it will never get printed.

I don't like the painlands much though, I'd rather see them do a new cycle, like the enemy fast lands.
 

Santiako

Member
I actually want a completed Grove of the burnwillows cycle, even though I understand that it is probably too powerful in various decks and that it will never get printed.

I don't like the painlands much though, I'd rather see them do a new cycle, like the enemy fast lands.

Grove cycle is way too powerful to ever be completed.
 

Angry Grimace

Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
I'm with GB. I've had times where Mindslaver didn't actually do anything without Academy Ruins. Emrakul lets you suicide one of their creatures at least but it also costs more mana and this version can be countered. On the other hand it's a reanimation target. Probably still not playable in eternal formats though.
The trigger is uncounterable and it costs less than Mindslaver in the deck that would play it.
 
They'll creep up over time. Don't look too the Shocks as an example though as the fetches should rebound to reprints quicker since they're used in greater volume. The only caveat being that they're going to reprint the Zendikar fetches at some point and that will suppress growth on the Khans fetches. I'm not convinced that we'll see them in Kaladesh over a different cycle like the enemy fast lands or something but we'll see if we hear any thing to tip us off as we get closer to release.

Kaladesh will be in Standard with Battle for Zendikar. There's a 0% chance they'll want fetches and BFZ's tangolands together again. If they want the fetches to work with delirium, though, then I imagine we'll see them in "Barrel".
 

Angry Grimace

Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
Kaladesh will be in Standard with Battle for Zendikar. There's a 0% chance they'll want fetches and BFZ's tangolands together again. If they want the fetches to work with delirium, though, then I imagine we'll see them in "Barrel".

People still refusing to admit they lost the tangoland fight, just like I lost the fight to call the SOI lands something other than "Shadowlands."

But the other thing is that they actually missed the interaction with the fetches and Battlelands, so you never know if they'll fuck up again. In fairness, there was definitely more than one reason why the BFZ standard let to 4C paradise. It wasn't just the fetchable lands, it was fetchable lands + mana-cheaty cards like Collected company + a strong incentive to play wedge colored KTK cards + no non-basic land hate.
 
I'm with GB. I've had times where Mindslaver didn't actually do anything without Academy Ruins. Emrakul lets you suicide one of their creatures at least but it also costs more mana and this version can be countered.

Emra2l is going to cost < 10 mana like 99% of the time.

I think the next dual cycle should be generic-named pain lands. They are great, powerful but not too good, and they synergise well with the eldrazi.

Yeah, I think their return to Standard just now has really shown that the painlands are a great design that's worth having the ability to print. Until now we had the core sets that could include them despite region-specific names, but now that that's over it'd be nice to be able to reprint the whole set.

People still refusing to admit they lost the tangoland fight, just like I lost the fight to call the SOI lands something other than "Shadowlands."

can't wait until the enemy halves of both sets get printed and it's super awkward to refer to them forever because the humorless whiners won~~~
 
People still refusing to admit they lost the tangoland fight, just like I lost the fight to call the SOI lands something other than "Shadowlands."
I CONTINUE TO FIGHT

But the other thing is that they actually missed the interaction with the fetches and Battlelands, so you never know if they'll fuck up again. In fairness, there was definitely more than one reason why the BFZ standard let to 4C paradise. It wasn't just the fetchable lands, it was fetchable lands + mana-cheaty cards like Collected company + a strong incentive to play wedge colored KTK cards + no non-basic land hate.
As seen in this article, M15 was going to have the Innistrad enemy check lands, but they changed it to the pain lands later in development. They are fully capable of changing what dual lands are printed relatively late in the process.
 

Angry Grimace

Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
I remember when people thought Scrylands weren't powerful enough to see constructed play. Good times.
 

OnPoint

Member
Yeah, I think their return to Standard just now has really shown that the painlands are a great design that's worth having the ability to print. Until now we had the core sets that could include them despite region-specific names, but now that that's over it'd be nice to be able to reprint the whole set
On one hand id love a renamed half of the cycle. On the other hand, maybe standard could just return to Dominaria... Sigh.


A boy can dream
 

Daedardus

Member
I wonder if they'll ever give Modern some new playable lands or if we're stuck with fetches + shocks as the baseline forever. Not that the manabase is bad in Modern and I also don't know how you could improve on it without breaking lots of things.

Would they also ever print some new eternal-only duals to provide somewhat of a replacement for the original duals, whose supply is really constrained because of the reserve list?
 

Angry Grimace

Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
I wonder if they'll ever give Modern some new playable lands or if we're stuck with fetches + shocks as the baseline forever. Not that the manabase is bad in Modern and I also don't know how you could improve on it without breaking lots of things.

Would they also ever print some new eternal-only duals to provide somewhat of a replacement for the original duals, whose supply is really constrained because of the reserve list?

The other half of the Scars fastlands will eventually show up.
 

alternade

Member
So a shop near me is having is creating a Modern EDH tournament.

But......................

Theres no ban list other than sol ring and protean hulk, they will create the ban list themselves. Is this guaranteed to be a shit show?
 
Creating the next thread at 3 PM (in 1 hour and 40 minutes). I'm putting the thread highlights in a separate post, so please wait until I make that before posting.
 
As seen in this article, M15 was going to have the Innistrad enemy check lands, but they changed it to the pain lands later in development. They are fully capable of changing what dual lands are printed relatively late in the process.

Yeah, it's funny to me how dual lands are both often the very first thing added to a set's file and one of the last things to change.

I remember when people thought Scrylands weren't powerful enough to see constructed play. Good times.

People who didn't think they would be played are clowns. I guess the best excuse was that people hadn't had a chance to play with scry in Standard recently.

On one hand id love a renamed half of the cycle. On the other hand, maybe standard could just return to Dominaria... Sigh.

Another Dominaria block, especially in a 2-blocks-per-year-50%-returns world, is basically guaranteed. I don't think I'd want them to be bound to reprint painlands there though, lol.

Would they also ever print some new eternal-only duals to provide somewhat of a replacement for the original duals, whose supply is really constrained because of the reserve list?

This doesn't fix the problems with paper Vintage and Legacy enough to be worth doing, unfortunately.

Creating the next thread at 3 PM (in 1 hour and 40 minutes). I'm putting the thread highlights in a separate post, so please wait until I make that before posting.

Just post both here and I can split them to a new thread.
 
In that case, I'll post both now. Split them off in 40 minutes.
Title:
Magic: the Gathering |OT8| Eldritch Moon - It's only a paper (and digital) moon

2vyZsSI.png

(version with captions)

Trailer
Official page
Eldritch Moon information
Previous topic: Shadows over Innistrad OT (OT7)
Next set: Kaladesh

Welcome to the Multiverse! Multiple worlds exist side by side in different dimensions, known as planes, and they are as different as night and day. All of them, however, have a form of magical energy known as mana, which can be channeled into powerful spells. Residents of these planes are usually unaware of other worlds, but there are some special beings with the ability to safely travel between them, known as Planeswalkers.

Magic: the Gathering is a Trading Card Game, the first of its kind, developed by Richard Garfield and his playtesters for the gaming company Wizards of the Coast in 1993. The game quickly became a hit, and it is currently bigger than it has ever been. In the standard game, you and your opponent play the role of dueling Planeswalkers, using customized 60-card decks made up of your spells, the creatures you can summon, your mana bonds with lands, and even other Planeswalkers you can call in to help out. Whoever can get his or her opponent down from 20 to 0 life, wins.

Shadows over Innistrad brought us back to the world of Innistrad, where the graveyard reigns and gothic horror is the name of the game. There, we learned that some dark force is warping the minds and flesh of the denizens, and now Eldritch Moon has revealed what it was:
d8pTr8j.gif

The powerful Eldrazi known as Emrakul has made its presence known, and thus, a flavor of Lovecraftian horror has been added to Innistrad. The heroes must find a way to stop it, or else this will be the fate of them all:

waynebeleren0ur6x.gif
This topic will cover the two weeks before all cards in the Eldritch Moon set are fully revealed, known as the spoiler weeks, where cards are slowly unveiled every weekday, up through the set release itself. Some cards have already been revealed, but this is when they are rolled out at a consistent pace. The main website updates at 8 AM PST / 11 AM EST, but Wizards also provides card previews to other sites that will unveil them throughout the day, including non-English sites.

GETTING STARTED
If you're a beginner, feel free to come in--that's why this is in OT, after all. Spoiler season is one of the most exciting times for a Magic player, and it would be great for more to join in. Us regulars can get a bit technical with card evaluations and use a lot of jargon, and many of us will loudly proclaim that a cool-looking card is junk, or say that a lame-looking card is really powerful, but feel free to ask us if you want an explanation.

To see what a game is like, check out Geek and Sundry's Spellslinger series, where Day[9] battles various geek celebrities, often losing, using simple and easy to follow decks.

To get started, check out the official page. Basically:
* It's recommended that new players play Magic Duels (thread). It's a great way to learn the game on your own, and it's free!
* For your first deck, you can buy an Intro Pack, a simple prebuilt deck that comes with a few booster packs. For each new set, five Intro Packs used to be released, but this will be the last set to do so. Starting with Kaladesh, there will instead be Planeswalker Decks, which are expected to be a worthy replacement. There are also Duel Decks that provide two decks for a game right out of the box, but are a bit more complicated.
* To get your physical collection started, buy a Deck Builder's Toolkit, which includes not just a starting collection of cards (including a lot of lands), but also has some booster packs and is a good place to store cards. You could also buy a Holiday Gift Box to get an even larger starting collection and better storage.
* To learn about the theories behind deckbuilding and gameplay, check out Level One.
* Once your skill advances, another popular way to play Magic casually is Commander. Each player chooses a legendary creature to act as commander and then chooses 99 additional cards, one of each card that isn't a basic land (of which you can have any number) and only of the colors of the commander, to make up the deck. In games, each player starts at 40 life and there are typically four or more players. Wizards provides prebuilt decks for this format too.
* While game stores will often hold Magic events at other times, every store that has Magic events will have Friday Night Magic. There, you will be able to find other players in your area to both have matches with and trade with. Find game stores here. And to get started participating in your local game store (LGS) scene, attend a prerelease!

PRERELEASE
While the set won't officially be sold until the release date, that isn't the first time you can get your hands on the new cards. Game stores hold prerelease events for every set, and in this set's event, every player is given a box with six booster packs and a random additional rare card. From this pool of cards, all of which you keep, each player builds a deck of 40 cards and participates in a Swiss-system tournament. This is a fun and casual event, where everyone is still trying to figure out the set, so don't worry about messing up. In addition to normal duels, there are also Two-Headed Giant events, where you pair up with another player and face off against another team.

Prerelease events will be held on July 16-17, 2016. Call your local game store a few days ahead of time to register, or they might just run out of room. Find local game stores here.

CHANGES
Shadows over Innistrad having released in spring and Eldritch Moon releasing in summer demonstrates a major change to how Magic sets are handled, with an in-depth explanation for why here. In short, the two-set block model means:
* No more core sets. Eldritch Moon will release in the previous core set slot.
* Blocks will have two sets instead of three. Yes, that means Shadows over Innistrad block will only have two sets.
* Without any core sets, there will now be two blocks a year.
* Standard (a rotating format that only includes the latest sets) rotates with each block, so it will now rotate twice a year. Three blocks will be in Standard at a time. Sets will be in Standard for a max of 18 months. Note that Standard rotation is kind of odd this time. For the final three-set block, Khans of Tarkir, only the first two sets have rotated out. Dragons of Tarkir and the final core set, Magic Origins, will remain in Standard until fall.

E0Sg8V0.jpg


STORY
Trailer
Lore introduction
Guide to Innistrad
Catch-up guide for Eldritch Moon story

Innistrad was always a world of monsters, but when a Planeswalker named Jace arrived there, he found that it was somehow getting worse. Some sort of madness was spreading through the land, and not even the angels were spared. Their wings had become soaked in blood and they were slaughtering humans, forcing the humans to fight both monsters and their former protectors. After helping fellow Planeswalker Tamiyo investigate, they discovered an ancient grudge.

Long ago, three Planeswalkers--dragon Ugin, vampire noble Sorin, and kor lithomancer Nahiri--sealed away ancient horrors known as the Eldrazi in the plane of Zendikar. A native of Zendikar, Nahiri vowed to stay behind and watch over the prison, on the condition that the others would come to her aid when she called. She remained vigilant for hundreds of years, until one day the seal loosened and she sent out her distress signal. Although she was able to fix the seal herself, she was dismayed to find that no one responded. Nahiri left to confront Sorin on his home plane of Innistrad. He informed her that he had constructed a special barrier to protect his plane, and that must have stopped her signal. She's appalled that he would do this without considering his promise to respond to her signal. Long story short, they both acted like punk-ass bitches, got into a fight, and Sorin sealed Nahiri into the Helvault, one of two pieces of the barrier and a prison that's impossible to break out of.

Nahiri remained in there for over a thousand years, accompanied only by the demons that were also placed there, until the Helvault was destroyed during the events of the original Innistrad story. She quickly returned to Zendikar, only to find out that Sorin hadn't watched over the Eldrazi, allowing them to break out and lay waste to the plane. She vowed to make Sorin suffer the way she did.

On Innistrad, she spent a year constructing monoliths to draw the Eldrazi known as Emrakul. It couldn't enter the plane, but the remaining source of the barrier, the archangel Avacyn, was driven mad by this, which is what led to the angels going crazy. Eventually, Sorin was forced to kill Avacyn, and the barrier fell. Emrakul has broken into Innistrad, and her presence is causing those weak of mind to transform in horrific ways.

Now, Jace has called for the aid of his friends in the Gatewatch. They defeated two Eldrazi before, but can they defeat the most powerful one of them all?

Eldritch Moon story
Story archive - Scroll to the bottom for chronological order; the layout of this archive is trash.

CHARACTERS
(Note, the linked biographies are often super outdated)
Main:
Jace Beleren - Blue - A psychic human Planeswalker driven by a thirst for knowledge, and a member of the Gatewatch. Jace comes from Vryn. He came to Innistrad to seek out Sorin, but he found himself drawn in by the mystery of what was happening to the plane. Jace is the most popular character in Magic, and is thus the most hated.
Tamiyo - Blue - A moonfolk researcher Planeswalker who prefers not to get involved. Tamiyo comes from Kamigawa. She came to Innistrad in order to research its unusual moon, and was studying the spread of madness in Innistrad well before Jace, but purely for academic purposes. She can summon magic by reading stories from special scrolls.
Sorin Markov - White/Black - An ancient vampire Planeswalker from a noble lineage on Innistrad. Long ago, he helped seal away the Eldrazi. He created the Helvault and the archangel Avacyn to protect Innistrad. While viewing things in the long term, he gives little regard to individuals, which is part of what led to him sealing Nahiri in the Helvault.
Nahiri - Red/White - A kor lithomancer (stone magic) Planeswalker who is really angry about being sealed away for a thousand years. Nahiri comes from Zendikar. Long ago, she helped seal away the Eldrazi, and later Sorin sealed her in the Helvault. When her prison was destroyed, she decided to get revenge on Sorin by summoning Emrakul.
Liliana Vess - Black - A ruthless human necromancer Planeswalker who only looks out for herself. Liliana comes from Dominaria, but she feels at home on Innistrad. Despite her youthful appearance, she is hundreds of years old; she made a deal with four demons to stop aging. She later discovered a powerful artifact called the Chain Veil, and used it to start killing her demon creditors, but the Veil could be a worse master than even them. She isn't a hero by nature, but she intends to fight Emrakul to protect her home.
Avacyn - Red/White - The guardian archangel of Innistrad who channeled the faith of humans into powerful magic. Sorin created her long ago to guard Innistrad from extraplanar threats. Without the Helvault supporting the barrier around Innistrad, Emrakul's attempts to break in caused her to go crazy, forcing Sorin to kill her. Now, Innistrad has no defense.
Emrakul - Colorless - A horror born in the space between planes before magic had developed into five colors. Emrakul is the strongest of all Eldrazi and its only purpose is to travel to different planes and convert everything there into itself. Emrakul was mistakenly remembered as a goddess by the Zendikari, and thus it is often addressed with female pronouns.

The Gatewatch is a group of Planeswalkers devoted to helping people whenever they can, and Jace has called for their aid.
Members besides Jace:
Chandra Nalaar - Red - A chaotic human pyromancer Planeswalker who does what she wants, damn the consequences. Chandra comes from Kaladesh, and for a while, was in the uncomfortable position of being the only representative of a plane based on India while being a white woman with red hair.
Gideon Jura - White - A human Planeswalker with shirtlessly rippling muscles (mandatory wording) who can't help but intervene when something bad is happening. Gideon comes from Theros. He uses magic to harden his skin and fights physically instead of with spells.
Nissa Revane - Green - A spiritual elf druid Planeswalker. She used to be a racist elf supremacist, but Wizards of the Coast wants you to forget that. Her magic allows her to control plants, summon nature elementals, and channel mana. By far the worst written of the Gatewatch, and that's saying something.
Probably sexually attracted to dirt.

Supporting:
Arlinn Kord - Red/Green - A werewolf Planeswalker who protects her pack. Arlinn comes from Innistrad. Unlike most werewolves, she can retain her human intelligence in wolf form, which she learned on another plane.
Thalia and Odric - White - When the angels started going crazy, many in the Church of Avacyn started executing heretics to appease them. Thalia and Odric left the Church and formed the Order of St. Traft to protect humanity.
Sigarda - Green/White - The one angel who was able to resist Emrakul's madness. She still fights to protect humans.

CARD THEMES
(LINK NOT UP: OFFICIAL CARD LIST) (alternate, includes leaks)
(LINK NOT UP: OFFICIAL MECHANICS GUIDE)

Eldritch Moon carries over some mechanics from Shadows over Innistrad and has some new ones
Transform - With cards that have two faces, this ability switches the side that's face-up.

Eldrazi
emrakulthepromisedend.jpg

With Emrakul's arrival on Innistrad come her brood. In truth, all of them are projections of the extra-dimensional being into the third dimension, so they are actually just parts of Emrakul itself. The Eldrazi are all colorless (no devoid to worry about in this set), but Emrakul's warping of nature can transform otherwise normal creatures into parts of it. Compared to Battle for Zendikar block, there are much fewer Eldrazi cards here.

RESOURCES
Official articles - Nicknamed the Mothership, these articles are the primary source of news. Recommended columns are Making Magic, written by the head designer, Mark Rosewater (aka MaRo); Uncharted Realms Magic Story, which tells the story, written by various authors; and Latest Developments, written by various Magic developers. The other articles generally discuss deck building. For older articles before the site changed, go here.
(LINK NOT UP: OFFICIAL CARD LIST) - Best way to see all of the spoiled cards together, but only updates once a day.
Blogatog - Tumblr ran by Mark Rosewater where he answers questions, updates very frequently.
Drive to Work - Mark Rosewater's weekly podcast about Magic that he literally records as he drives to work. Two episodes are released every Friday.
MTG Salvation's Rumor Mill - The best place to get new card information. The community sucks, though.
Mythic Spoiler - A good way to see what cards have been spoiled, updates throughout the day.
Gatherer - The official method of searching through released cards. Has an autocomplete.
magiccards.info - The better search engine for cards, with bigger pictures and more details. But it doesn't have an autocomplete.
Game store locator

PREVIOUS THREADS
Shadows over Innistrad (OT7)
Oath of the Gatewatch OT (OT6)
Battle for Zendikar OT (OT5)
OT4
OT3
OT2
OT1
 

Daedardus

Member
This doesn't fix the problems with paper Vintage and Legacy enough to be worth doing, unfortunately.

It's a shame because there are many viable decks if you don't account cards from the reserved list. Legacy can be a very interesting format that stands apart from Modern but unfortunately the supply of some key cards really holds it back. More than $300 for a Volcanic Island is just too much and then you have the issue of fakes. I really don't know how they could ever fix the problem of the reserved list. I guess nobody could have foresoon the consequences it would have in this day and age.
 

Ashodin

Member

Art is totally new. Also, I have a theory:

The other face is the same card, you just stack them on top of each other "Meld".

I'm basing it off of Hanweir, where you most likely need the Land (The activator) and two other creatures (presumably, the green card on the front side of the one we've seen)

So we're totally getting a separate Gisela and Bruna card + both backs = Brunela
 

Santiako

Member
Art is totally new. Also, I have a theory:

The other face is the same card, you just stack them on top of each other "Meld".

I'm basing it off of Hanweir, where you most likely need the Land (The activator) and two other creatures (presumably, the green card on the front side of the one we've seen)

The reason I think only one half is a DFC is because of limited, they'd be harder to assemble if both halves are DFC.
 

Ashodin

Member
The reason I think only one half is a DFC is because of limited, they'd be harder to assemble if both halves are DFC.

Nah, both are DFC, check the symbol + both have 5/6. It's just they can't "meld" unless both are available. It's not that hard to put together in limited, and you still get the original body to go with it.

What the 5/6 is on the other side will determine what the other "meld" cards will be. Do they think it will be hard as hell to pull off, so the meld DFC side will be powerful as hell?
 
And of course there's a leak right before the thread is made. Since we don't even know what the back sides look like, I'll hold off on adding them to the OT.

And charlequin, aren't you splitting off my posts into a new thread? Or should I go ahead and make it myself?
 

Santiako

Member
Nah, both are DFC, check the symbol + both have 5/6. It's just they can't "meld" unless both are available. It's not that hard to put together in limited, and you still get the original body to go with it.

What the 5/6 is on the other side will determine what the other "meld" cards will be. Do they think it will be hard as hell to pull off, so the meld DFC side will be powerful as hell?

Even with the symbols I still think one of them will have regular back (the scavengers in this case). We'll probably see tomorrow so it's kinda pointless to speculate now :p

How does that work with

Do they not transform because they don't say transform in their text?

They are melding not transforming, same way it doesn't work with origins planeswalkers.
 

kirblar

Member
We have a Natural Order/Birthing Pod mashup in the set, apparently.

Eldritch Evolution 1GG
Sorcery
As an additional cost, sacrifice a creature you control.
Search your library for a creature card with CMC equal to or less than the CMC of the sacrificed creature plus 2, and put it onto the battlefield. Then shuffle your library.
Exile Eldritch Evolution.
 
They are melding not transforming, same way it doesn't work with origins planeswalkers.

It does work with origin walkers they just die from having zero loyalty counters

They have to meld, not transform, so yes, they don't transform.

I wasn't sure if transform isn't just the action of flipping a card with a backside, so if the human card had a backside it could function. If transform is the action itself then a human with a backside could be forced to transform by moonmist.

rules said:
701.25a To transform a permanent, turn it over so that its other face is up. Only permanents represented by double-faced cards can transform. (See rule 711, &#8220;Double-Faced Cards.&#8221;)
 
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