#mtg rambling

[pigeonplaneswalker]

Honestly I'm not one to really complain about UB (I have the Fallout Mothman precon and I'm ok with using UB cards if the deck calls for them or is good, but then again I'm a new player so wtf do I know) but this is a side I never truly considered. I still think it's a good idea to rule 0 with your Commander play group in terms of whether or not that UB should be allowed but with formats like Standard you won't have that luxury. I'd say WOTC had good intentions, wanting newer players to feel comfortable jumping into the game with IPs they're familiar with and being able to play with people already invested in the game, however the execution here is controversial for a reason and is part of the reason why there was skepticism about WOTC acquiring Commander to begin with. I'm sorry for my earlier ramblings as I didn't fully grasp what this meant to older players and people who are more invested than I currently am in the worldbuilding and lore. I still think the reaction to some stuff is a bit much (like for example anyone mad at the SpongeBob Secret Lair, why?) but on the other hand it's reasonable to want to be able to play without having to deal with UB stuff

So recently WotC released this announcement regarding Universes Beyond being legal in MtG formats going forward from 2025.

And this is honestly the opposite of what I wanted to hear. I was looking for how to deal with avoiding UB in Commander. And I had hoped that UB and non-UB would get different formats. Because I don't want to play with UB all the time. I didn't come to MtG to play an IP blender mashup game. I came for the setting, lore, and flavor of the MtG setting I have come to love. I want to play the game that is about those settings, not a game that's about an IP crossover brawl.

I know I'm probably not alone in this, but I feel like we are not being listened to. I hope @wizardsmagic is listening and gives some space to the players like me in the community, but now I'm just sad it is a lot harder to play the game I like and be a player in the community.

I had recently started going to LGSs for MtG events again, but now I'll be reconsidering continuing that, because who is going to have decks without UB when all official formats allow UB stuff? Not to mention the increase in proportion of UB sets proposed. No point bringing a deck to stores or conventions for pick up games because no one will likely have a deck without UB.

-signed, a sad Vorthos

(had to recreate this whole post after apparently losing it to the void, hopefully it works this time)

[etirabys]

> MtG opponent swings with all 5 of their creatures while we're both low on life

> "block with all of yours," husband says

> I trust him & assign blockers to kill most of the attackers

> watch with dread, certain they have one of those cards that +2/+1s every creature

> they don't. I wipe their board and win the next turn

> "they were bluffing," says my husband, "which I figured because I looked at their open mana, and there's no spell with (a subset of) that mana profile that can have pump up every creature"

> speechless with lust

[peofun1]

playing MTG with people who have been in the game for like 20 years is so insufferable sometimes

every turn they're like "I play Cock Goblin of Guzzleberg" and everyone else at the table nods and goes "ah yes of course, the Cock Goblin, classic" and doesn't explain.

so I'm like okay. what does that do. and they go "well it has a Guzzler effect" and I'm like okay great what the FUCK is a Guzzler Effect™

and then after like 10 minutes of trying to get them to explain, eventually I figure out that there was a card called Guzzler Greebling that was only printed ONCE in 1998, and its text was "when this creature ETBs, everyone at the table has to suck your dick" and this card got so popular in Standard at the time that now all effects that involve dick-sucking are called "Guzzlers" by the players

[pikagatogirltits]

I also recently discovered Scryfall has an "LGBT" art tag that gives you all cards with LGBT characters in the art. I'm gonna browse through it to see if I notice anyone I missed.

[pigeonplaneswalker]

I only started playing Magic recently but I'm not giving up on it because of fucking SpongeBob. Yes, Hasbro is a sellout company and most likely pulling strings but Secret Lairs and cards based on properties have been a thing for years, it's not "becoming Fortnite" as fast as people say it is. Jurassic World cards were available in Ixalan packs and Transformers in Brother's War. Plenty of people I've played with have the Fallout Mothman precon (myself included). Did anyone complain when Post Malone got his own cards? I sure hope not because that's fucking stupid considering he's a huge MTG fan so it makes sense.

Foundations comes out in November so you'll be set until 2029 for Standard and if you play Commander literally just play with the cards you have, if UB bothers you so much rule 0 with your play group. I'm sick and tired of all this in fighting in a community for a card game. What happened to just having fun? Arguing and drama are the reason why WOTC owns Commander now. The harassment that occurred during the whole Mana Crypt/Jeweled Lotus ban controversy should have never happened and I'm disappointed in everyone who was involved.

If you want to quit the game because of Spider-Man and SpongeBob, be my guest, but don't disparage the whole game because of it.

Currently the top thread at r/MagicTGC

I am genuinely amazed the cardboard-crack addicts have put up with the absolute sellout of their thing until now. I mean, the shitshow WotC is putting on has some people over there singing the praises of GW as if they were saints. They most definetly are not - but how messed up does the situation have to be to get this sort of reaction from people?

[dlight98]

It's crazy to me that the Neopets Battle Dome TCG is rated higher than Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh, and Magic The Gathering on board game geek.

[macaronissi-mo]

so... I found a foil Gale magic card at my local game shop :>

also looked for Astarion or Astarion's Thirst but no luck there, I'm VERY happy with my Gale though <3 I also got Wyll and Halsin :D

I know very little about Magic other than watching my friend play the online version but I am (unsurprisingly) enticed by the D&D/Baldur's Gate cards

[folansstuff]

Watching the MTG Pro Tour and been following Nicole Tipple who;

Saw the Pro Tour at a Magicfest like, a year or two ago.

Studied Modern for 9 days

Immediately won a Modern RCQ

And is now 8-3 at her first PT rope-a-doping pros with the sickest deck imaginable.

I love Magic.

[pxper-cranes]

Liliana Vess

Never Love an Anchor - The Crane Wives // Rich Girl - Daryl Hall & John Oates // Iris - The Goo Goo Dolls // Running Up That Hill - Kate Bush // The Well - The Crane Wives // Love Like You - Rebecca Sugar // Good Luck, Babe! - Chappell Roan // Fake Out - Fall Out Boy

[nukacourier]

hes a Legendary Creature.....

[oops-prow-did-it-again]

New Phyrexia disturbed me - and not how it should have

This is going to be a VERY opinion-heavy post. Before I say anything, I want to make it abundantly clear that I am not condemning the entirety of the New Phyrexia arc, nor am I saying that the people who wrote these stories meant for them to be taken this way. This is just a post getting into why the New Phyrexia arc rubbed me the wrong way again and again, and why it's... kind of ruined my love for Magic, if I'm completely honest.

Also, yes, I understand that New Phyrexia was meant to horrify and unsettle people - but I feel like it unsettled me in ways that they kind of weren't going for. I expect horror to unsettle me and show me some fucked up shit, for lack of a better terminology - but I also was expecting, in the fantasy/scifi horror shit, I'd get some stuff that didn't feel like it hit so close to home.

More under the cut.

First of all, it has always felt as if Magic can never quite decide if Phyrexians are people or monsters. This is worsened in New Phyrexia, where time and time again, we are given reason to think that New Phyrexians are people that are simply heavily indoctrinated from birth. Yes, the glistening oil works in strange ways, and they have somewhat of shared knowledge amongst their entire network, but by and large, you see time and time again, that Phyrexians have individuality. This seems intentional - you are shown from the start that Elesh Norn is an egomaniac, a fool, and that her plans of grandeur are insane. But her insanity shapes this world.

In that way, everyone in this world are... mostly actually victims of her insanity. Ixhel and Urabrask on New Capenna stand out as examples of times where Phyrexians show that they are not the heartless monsters they are made out to be. In Urabrask's first cards, he claims that he wishes the Mirrans to be left alone.

Yet, in ONE, we see time and time again that red Phyrexians and Mirrans are fighting still, Urabrask doesn't seem to be paying that much attention to the Phyrexians, and... frankly, I don't know what the Halo subplot was supposed to be about (forgive me, if this was addressed in passing, I only skimmed the latter half of MOM to see what big things happened, because i was so upset with it at that point I didn't really WANT to read it anymore). Yes, I have read the creators saying time and time again that just because Urabrask doesn't say outright he wants the multiverse compleated, it doesn't mean it's not what he wants, deep down. However... this still harks back onto one idea.

Sapient creatures being born evil.

This is a trope that I LOATHE in fantasy/scifi to my core. I understand that Phyrexians, for all intents and purposes, are created in a monstrous fashion. They are not created in a similar way to people. However, in the end, they still ACT LIKE PEOPLE. They have individuality, free will (yes, even if it is limited by the strict theocratic control of Norn, they still have it - how did Ixhel create, otherwise? How did Sheoldred rebel? Why did Nahiri snap at Nissa to show the skyclaves? Why did Tamiyo freeze upon seeing children?), and whether you like it or not, this makes them people. They are extremely different people, and yes, their existence does present conflict - but they. are. still. people.

I understand how it may feel offensive to real people to call the (rightful) fear and concern towards Phyrexians to be racism, as I feel like that waters down the term. However... again, knowing that Phyrexians are largely a cult that has been severely indoctrinated by Elesh Norn... it becomes difficult not to feel bad for them, and as if they have all been written off simply because they have a terrible leader. It comes across, to me, as another case of fantasy racism; similar to orcs being portrayed as idiot, warmongering beasts in some settings, or goblins being portrayed as stupid people little better respected than animals (and full of antisemitic stereotypes), just with less baggage attached.

It comes across as them having wanted to create a sapient race of people that was okay to bash and throw under the bus, so to speak. And yes, they gave plenty of reasons for why these people needed to go... but ultimately, it still feels like people went out of their way to create a civilization of people and show us justification for exterminating them.

I'm not trying to water down the term racism, but like... maybe I don't know the right words, but you understand why that might be uncomfortable, right?

Furthermore, at the start, I thought the transformative nature of Phyrexians was cool. Hot, even, as plenty others here on Tumblr think. Yes, I always sort of knew it was meant to be horrifying, too... but I also thought that the creators also were making them semi-alluring on purpose. (Look at Elesh Norn in promotional art. Look at her in the ONE trailer!! Look at the email they sent out for Arena on Valentine's Day, for god's sake!) But as time goes on... I start to get this uncomfortable feeling that this borderline sensual, sexual tension the Phyrexians produce is supposed to be PART of the horror.

And that's where things start getting uncomfortable for me. I am a transgender man. I don't know if I like sexualized, different people that transform themselves... being treated as horrible monsters that can't be coexisted with. I know plenty of trans people felt otherwise about Phyrexians; I understand this likely wasn't even the intention. BUT it still felt that way to me, for someone living in a country where trans people are getting more and more hunted on the daily.

Suddenly, it wasn't so fun anymore, to look at Elesh Norn and see her as heehoo sexy dommy mommy everyone joked at her being. It felt, to me at least, like she was a caricature of what I was. Of what people like me are. Monstrous. Out to destroy the world. Egomaniacs who want to force others down our same "lifestyle."

This is not helped by how Strixhaven, despite being an obvious play on Hogwarts & Harry Potter, came back into importance in MOM. They made a new Planeswalker from that plane, even! I loathe Strixhaven, and I was not at all pleased to learn that they have made it more important. The stories from the original Strixhaven set make me uncomfortable, too; Lukka arrives at a tavern and is asking for food, as he is not doing so well, and people comment on how he dresses strange, and when he (not rudely!) tells them they wouldn't know where he's from even if he told them, they react by SHOOTING FIREBALLS AT HIM.

These people saw a stranger. And decided the appropriate reaction was to shoot fireballs. (More on Lukka later, as I'm not done with him yet) but you understand how that might have also been deeply uncomfortable, right? Like yes, it did seem very intentional, to show how unkind the general populace of Arcavios can be... but there never seemed to be any point to that?? So it just came across as people hating a guy for dressing unconventionally for ""flavor"" to the very-obviously-based-on-TERF-school set. Which. WHY?

I also was not blind to how most of the compleated Planeswalkers were the nonhuman ones. Barring Lukka and Jace, every compleated Planeswalker was nonhuman, which I think... was done purposefully, because nonhumans are viewed as inherently more "monstrous" to our primal little monkey brains. (I don't think it was coincidence; there are PLENTY of human planeswalkers, to the point the majority could have easily not been human.) But this makes me uncomfortable too, because it feels like it, again, not only implies that Phyrexians are not people and are monsters (even though they had been given traits again and again that very firmly confirmed them as people), but that these nonhuman planeswalkers are inherently more monstrous, too.

Ajani - leonin. Tamiyo - moonfolk. Tibalt - (half) devil. Nissa - elf. Vraska - gorgon. Nahiri - kor.

And of the human Planeswalkers compleated, they chose Lukka and Jace. Jace, who has had a steep history of being viewed as less than human and little more than a tool (even sometimes by himself, as much as he hates it), and Lukka, who was also viewed as less than human by the society he came from, and was essentially labeled a sick dog to be shot on sight by his home city. (But more on him and why I particularly hate what was done with him later.)

And like... I'm not saying that corruption arcs or that transformation horror can't be done in a tasteful way!! It just started to feel like, as time went on, that this stuff was... malicious. I already was uncomfortable with how Phyrexians were seemingly being set up to be offed or taken out the picture completely (for there being no feasible way for them to coexist in the multiverse), so maybe I was looking for flaws, even where most wouldn't see them. But, I mean.. it just... Idk man. That part, too, gets under my skin.

And Lukka. LUKKA. I loathe what has been done to his character like none other. It is frequent fan interpretation that Lukka is stupid, Lukka deserves everything that has happened to him, and that it's a good thing he is gone. However, having read everything he has ever appeared in, I am so infuriated that even the creators THEMSELVES seemed to have bought into this idea.

For those that don't know, Lukka first appeared in Ikoria: Lair of Behemoths - Sundered Bond, a digital novella. He was born and raised in Drannith, a heavily militarized city, one of three so-called "sanctuaries" that have actually managed to stay around on Ikoria. Ikoria is a world of kaiju-esque mutated, crazy monster animals, and he was raised in propaganda by Drannith's military, the Coppercoats. He is 40+ years old when we meet him; he has served the Coppercoats for half of that, and then another 2 years or so as Captain of a Specials force team. You see, through him, that he's actually a very caring leader and a rather simple guy: he is betrothed to Jirina Kudro, the daughter of General Kudro, leader of the Coppercoats, and his concerns seem to only be getting his team back home in one piece and getting quality time with his wife. He's not perfect, he's rough around the edges, would probably be an asshole to hang out with in real life, but it FITS for the world he comes from.

And then, he accidentally bonds with a winged cat that slaughters 3/4 of his team in front of him, within minutes of each other. General Kudro has kept the bonding magic Lukka experienced a secret from Drannith populace. He believes it makes Lukka "sick." (Need I explain why a leader referring to a group of people as inherently 'sick' is bad??) Even Jirina, for as much as she apparently loves her father, so emphatically believes her father will kill Lukka for this that she helps him escape! the city!!!

To recap, Lukka has his entire world upended from beneath his feet in the course of like, a day. He becomes the public enemy of the city he has defended with his life for years. In his eyes, it is us (the humans of Ikoria) versus them (the monsters of the plane). This is how he has been raised and trained; he did not choose the bonding and is (rightfully!) upset and horrified at it (ONE was incorrect when it said he "always knew he was different;" lukka made no such acknowledgments in Sundered Bond, that was an invention of ONE). He later then meets Vivien, who tells him how her home plane was DESTROYED (um??? Vivien? Why would you tell a man whose life is going to shit about that??) which makes Lukka vow to himself that he will not lose his home.

Later in the story, Lukka learns of a presence in a particular crystal called the Ozolith, and he goes to it. There, for reasons that would take too long to explain, a three-way battle ensues, and an unknown Planeswalker reaches out to Lukka through the Ozolith. The Planeswalker shows Lukka one of the bonders he has met along the way getting killed by a skysail's bolt meant to kill monsters and it is only then that Lukka accepts the power of the Ozolith.

Anyway, saying all this to say... Lukka is a villain, yes. But contrary to popular belief, he is NOT stupid. He is just as smart as anyone would be in the situation he was put into, coming from the world he comes from. He wanted, again and again and again, nothing more than to just go home. He even tried to spin his bonding into a way that Drannith could defend itself, by telling Kudro they should use monsters instead of peoples' lives (but Kudro wasn't hearing it; and the kicker? Drannith would go on to use bonders & monsters to protect the city anyway, after Lukka had been run off the world).

Lukka had a SHIT deck of cards handed to him in Ikoria, and he - REASONABLY - lashed out. It was just that when he lashed out, he had the power of a Planeswalker manipulating him, whispering in his ear, and the power to actually make people listen. He believed his choices were come home and die like a good soldier, or force them to let him come home. Maybe other people fault him for that, but I don't fault him for choosing to live, even if doing so caused much violence and bloodshed.

But yes, he was still a villain, and in Strixhaven, he was relegated to villain again, when people once again presume him to be an Oriq - which he doesn't even know what that is - and finally, he simply decides that if everyone keeps calling him one, he might as well be one. This comes after nearly starving to death and having his new bond, Mila, save his life. Had someone from Strixhaven maybe, I don't know, taken pity on this very clearly struggling guy.... I don't know! I feel like his role in Strixhaven really never would have happened. THE GUY LITERALLY JUST WANTED FOOD AND WATER. I cannot emphasize that enough

Anyway, saying this all to say, Lukka's arc felt like it was headed toward a redemption of some kind. He had been given a raw deal, reacted very humanly but very poorly, and now, the only way he had to go was up.

Instead, we got Vivien shooting him dead. Calling him "lukka-thing." We got Vivien saying nothing as she faces down the man she called a friend and seemingly felt bad for by the end of Sundered Bond and killing him.

As someone from a country that is VERY obviously careening toward more VERY conservative bullshit... THAT PLOT DID NOT SIT WELL WITH ME. It felt VERY MUCH like I was being told "if you are born into shit circumstances or bad things are done to you, and you don't sit there and take it, you will be punished for not simply taking it. And that punishment may very well be death."

I especially did not care for how Jirina seemed to be veering into her father's mindset in the story in MOM. And yes, she was called out for this, but the story also seemed to be trying to lean into this "survival, no matter the cost" vibe, which seemed like it was subtly justifying what she did, since it DID technically work in the end. Vivien's emo ass "but survival is the only law out here now" or w/e it was she said to herself as she killed Lukka definitely didn't help that feeling, either.

It upset me very much to see a character born into a shitty society, given raw deal after raw deal, and then be told that he deserved to die instead of get help. Or worse, that dying WAS getting help. It was "putting him out of his misery." He was "irreversibly changed," and "didn't know better anymore," he "couldn't be helped." That, combined with how compleation started to feel like a very negative allegory for transgender people after a point to me (see near the beginning of this), made Lukka's death feel like rapidfire punch after rapidfire punch to the gut.

AND NOT IN THE WAY THAT IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN! I would have loved to see Vivien upset that she can't get to apologize. I would have loved to see Vivien agonizing over the decision to kill him. I would have loved her maybe showing some more REMORSE over having to do it, even if she did feel it was the only way forward. We have seen that New Phyrexians, especially compleated Planeswalkers, are still themselves, even while compleated, so the fact Lukka had nothing to say to her either felt hollow, too. He thought she was his friend and she turned on him; why didn't he have anything to say about that?

Urabrask being pulled apart at the limbs, then, felt like the final message to me: New Phyrexians are not people, they are monsters, end of discussion. They are not making it out of this. Stop asking/talking about it.

Suffice to say, by the time I got to the story of Elspeth becoming an archangel, everything felt hollow and gross for me. I've seen the promo art of Aftermath showing Nahiri and Nissa at least recovered; I get the feeling most of them, bar Tamiyo, Tibalt, and Lukka, probably have recovered or will recover.

But, frankly, I don't think I'm very invested anymore. New Phyrexia felt like it crossed a lot of lines, and not in the way that I would have appreciated horror to do so. It hit on a lot of sensitive subjects that made it rather difficult to enjoy as mere entertainment. Maybe I am just oversensitive, due to the day and age I am living in, due to the fact I am deeply unhappy with the fact I am forced to live closeted irl and feel hypervigilant of all slights, but it felt very gross to me.

Lukka's death in particular just... sealed the deal for me. I know he wasn't a big deal. Maybe he was always intended to just be a villain that gets killed off. But it's not even necessarily about him, in particular, it was about what his death represented. It was about how he was a product of propaganda and hatred, and how he was never given a chance to be better. it's about how I was told that death was the only way forward for him.

Maybe when I was 12 I would have liked that, but I'm over my obsession with the 'death is the only salvation.' SO MUCH MEDIA uses this trope, and frankly, I'm fucking sick of it.

I want to see people, even some of the most depraved fucking people you can imagine, getting better. I want to see that people can change and recognize the error in their ways. I'm tired of being told to look and see "us vs. them."

I'm not saying that you can't have conflict. But I am saying that if you're going to have conflict of this scale, I would prefer it to be solved in ways that don't essentially boil down to "kill/put away the Them."

Because that fucking blows.

If you've made it this far, I am grateful, but again, please keep in mind that this is the ramblings of a deeply mentally unwell ADHD-addled 22 year old (who is not on and cannot get Adderall right now). Emotional dysregulation IS a big problem I deal with, and the world I live in right now fucking sucks. If you're reading this going "oh my godd, let people enjoy things, you crybaby" then please just... move on? Because I'm not trying to tell people not to enjoy it, quite the contrary I WISH these things didn't bother me so much because I JUST got into Magic, and I would love to keep enjoying it! And Im happy for you if you have tolerance/could enjoy it through these things!

I'm just... sad. I'm very, very disappointed in this story. It was pretty, it was flashy, people clearly put in effort, but it felt like a low blow, all things considered, and worse, it touches literally all aspects of canon and cannot be safely disregarded. Much like War of the Spark, it affects almost everything, and will for a while yet.

[sealapocalyptic]

Love to force my friend who doesn’t care about the show to listen to me complain about everything I was unhappy with vis a vis Arcane season 2

[archenarrow]

Having incoherent thoughts about aetherborn again

No coherent thoughts, just thinking about aetherborne again.

For those unfamiliar, one of the planes in Magic the Gathering is Kaladesh, a world of invention. This is fueled by aether, a magical fuel source harvested from the atmosphere. Something seemingly unique to Kaladesh is the aetherborn, people who seem to manifest spontaneously from the aether. They lack most biological processes or needs, but are very short lived, ranging from a few months to three years in lifespan. And, every aetherborn is aware of exactly how much time they have left before their lifespan runs out.

Some aetherborn are "gifted", able to siphon the life of others to extend their own, but this is very rare. A gifted aetherborn could theoretically live forever, but they don't get much time from draining someone to death all things considered. So even an aetherborn who went full vampire, living on the deaths of others, never has much of a buffer.

Anyway, most aetherborn live their lives as fast as possible, reckless behavior driven by the exact awareness of how little time they have left.

Anyway, there are lots of things that could be done with this and my brain keeps briefly bouncing off of them but not making anything coherent so now I'm just rambling again.

I need to steal the concept for more sci-fi/fantasy writing at some point.

[etirabys]

what's your favorite Magic the Gathering two-color combo

[planeswalker-umbral]

I haven't spoken of Last Week's Commander bans for good reason. It quickly turned toxic to the point no discussion could be had. I was busy trying to put out fires on Facebook and Tiktok about the topic to speak about it here but here is a summary of my take quickly:

Last Monday 4 cards were banned in Commander, the most played format, after 3 years of no bans. Mana Crypt ($120+), Nadu Winged Wisdom ($2), Dockside Extortionist ($80 ish), and Jewelled Lotus ($90+) all banned.

People got mad so many of their high value cards got banned. They lashed out, blamed everyone and got many people on the Commander Rules Advisory to quit.

Commander bans were not controlled by Magic's Developer, Wizards of the Coast. Commander has been a community ran format forever. The bans are made by a rules committee

Now that is no more. Because players were so toxic, the Rules Committee gave over the most popular format's control to Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast. This was a format by the players, for the players. Now that a corporation has control, and said corporation has shown in the past that they will sacrifice formats long term health for short term profit, things can easily get hairy. I hate how we lost control of a format because people got toxic.

[pikagatogirltits]

I got bored the other day and decided to supplement the Google doc version of my list of canonically queer Magic characters with a Moxfield version. Unlike the Google doc, which primarily sorts the list by source material (Magic lore, D&D, or UB) I used Moxfield's tagging system to organize this version by label. This includes the ability to tag characters with multiple labels (like the fact that Cadira is a trans lesbian) and have them show up in each label's section.

Putting this together also drew my attention to the fact that even with restricting things to one card per character there's 90 cards on this list! And considering three of these cards represent 2 characters (Kynaios and Tiro, Syr Joshua and Syr Saxon, Vladimir and Godfrey) that means it's 93 unique characters. 90+ unambiguously, canonically queer characters have appeared on Magic cards!