#mtgmid

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Dire-Strain Rampage by Darek Zabrocki

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I forgot to share this here:

[bacejelerenvorthos]

The Lore of Innistrad: Midnight Hunt - Liesa, Forgotten Archangel

“Of all the archangels, only Liesa sought to understand her enemies and, in so doing, mitigate their evil. With her knowledge, she reasoned the monsters could be fought more effectively and bargained with the foul to do good.

One day, a new angel appeared as if from nowhere: Avacyn. She was inflexible in her righteousness and unstoppable in her power. She did not approve of Liesa's methods, and when Liesa made a pact with a demon lord, Avacyn declared her a heretic and destroyed her along with her entire flight of angels.

On Innistrad, demons reform sometime after being killed. Perhaps due to her demonic dealings, or perhaps because of the shared nature of angels and demons, Liesa has returned to the land of the living. To Liesa, reforming was a hellish ordeal. She struggled over the course of centuries, fighting to keep her very essence intact as the mana that formed her tried to tear itself apart. She has finally returned, albeit worse for the wear, at a time when Innistrad needs archangels more than ever.”

Art by Dmitry Burmak and Evan Cagle

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[wizardsmagic]

We want to know what you think about Innistrad: Midnight Hunt in our latest survey!

[tanknspank]

Gotta love their dedication to the bit

[lavalotmtg]

[radramblog]

Werewolves are still iffy in EDH

With the release of Innistrad: Midnight Hunt, I’m sure many people myself included were hoping that the set’s Werewolf focus would solve some of the issues with the tribe in Commander. Having been a big fan of the creature type’s mechanics and design in Shadows block, and playing a lot of them in Limited and Standard formats, I was excited to see what MID would bring to the table.

Unfortunately, despite the shiny new commander the deck has, I’m not confident that the many, many issues that make Werewolves awkward in Commander have actually found an answer.

Issue 1: The cardpool

Werewolves are kind of in this awkward place where due to mechanically being tied to Innistrad and its double-faced-card Transform mechanic, there just aren’t very many of them, even though we’ve been to Innistrad 3 times now. As well, of the current 6 Innistrad-based sets, 2 of them (DKA and EMN) are small sets and 1 (AVR) doesn’t actually have any werewolves in them. The number of werewolves, therefore, is not particularly big- at time of writing, 83 cards exist with the word Werewolf or Werewolves, and of those 5 are explicit hate pieces. And one is Victim of Night, a removal spell that happens not to hit them. That leaves 78 cards to work with, outside of Changelings.

Frustratingly, WoTC has done very little to supplement this when visiting other planes. There exist exactly 6 Werewolf-related cards printed outside of Innistrad, with only 4 of those actually being Werewolves. I appreciate the slight bones being thrown in the form of WAR Arlinn, Nightpack Ambusher, and AFR’s own Werewolf Pack leader, but that’s about a card a year, which is not enough to support a tribe like this.

There’s also an issue where most of the Werewolf cards are pretty much just limited fodder. Of the 62 cards with the type Werewolf on them (again not including Changelings), I’d wager maybe 30 of them are playable in Commander, using an extremely loose definition of the word playable and with the understanding that this deck is going to be janky as hell. The tribe really suffers from its flavour-based limits, especially with the lack of non-Innistrad support, even though many of the game’s mechanics could be adapted to flavour of the Werewolf.

The final problem with the cardpool is the weak support cards. Werewolves have a fair few support cards, actually, but the issue is most of them are either not scaled for the format or only apply on one side of a 2-sided card. Many tribes in the middle-ground of card quality can get propped up by a handful of really good support cards- as an example, Treefolk have Timber Protector and Leaf-Crowned Elder, and Myr have Myr Galvaniser, Myr Turbine, and basically every Artifact support card ever to exist. Werewolves are stuck with, outside of one or two spicy new cards, mostly just +1/+1 anthems/counters and a handful of keywords, and also Immerwolf/Geier Reach Bandit (but the latter only half the time).

The result of this is that despite arguably being one of the better supported tribes as far as card numbers, Werewolves seriously pale in comparison to the majority of the field, especially compared to their Innistradi brethren- they look real awkward next to Humans, Zombies, Spirits, and Vampires.

Issue 2: The colours

Werewolves are pretty shoehorned into Gruul as far as the cards go. Both legendary Werewolves and the Werewolf Planeswalker are in the colour combination, as well as the vast majority of the tribe’s members. However, Midnight Hunt has added some other options in all 3 other colours, and there are reasons to run each anyway- mostly to do with, you know, that whole cardpool issue.

Because as good as Tovolar is, this tribe needs a little help from another colour, in my opinion.

White is the most commonly added colour to Werewolf decks, due to getting to play Rule of Law effects to stop your Werewolves from getting flipped back over. If I build Werewolves, it probably will be Naya, just because I already have two Gruul decks, but my issue is the lack of a clear Commander. Samut is clearly the best option, mostly on account of Flash and the deck likely being fairly aggressive, but I have an issue with commanders, particularly Tribal commanders, not accurately representing the deck. But then, what am I supposed to go with? Anara/Bruse Tarl? Gahiji? Rin and Seri kinda work flavourfully, if you squint, but they do nothing for the gameplay of the deck. I probably would have to just get over it and play Samut, and maybe you should too.

Midnight Hunt did also throw some Black Werewolves in, to go with the original 3 from back in the day (the utterly terrible Treacherous Werewolf, Lesser Werewolf, and Greater Werewolf), opening Jund as an option, kind of. My issue with this is that aside from just general good cards, Black doesn’t really add much to the deck’s likely plans, and only one of the new Black Werewolves, Graveyard Tresspasser, is really any good. I suppose this does mean you could run 4-colour with Saskia, but…eh…

This set also added a singular Blue werewolf in Suspicious Stowaway, which is actually kinda okay. And also Blue gets one extra Rule of Law effect in Arcane Laboratory. But I don’t think I’m going to see Temur Werewolves anytime soon. I guess you could run Surrak? Blue does notably also get you a bunch of the better Changelings, on account of their recent Kaldheim iterations being in Green-Blue.

There is always, of course, Morophon. But that fucker’s for cowards. The TL;DR is, that Werewolves’s best commanders don’t give you access to everything the deck needs.

 Issue 3: The tribes

This is somewhat of a more minor issue, but one worth bringing up. Many of the Werewolf matters cards are shared with Wolf matters cards, and so it’s likely worth bringing a few of the better Wolves into the mix. Sarulf, if you’re including Black, or one or both Tolsimir-s in White. Wolves are a tribe with many, many more members, especially adding in all the Wolf Token producing cards, though there are still fewer Wolf Matters cards than Werewolf Matters ones. Also, some of the Werewolf Matters cards are Wolves, like Nightpack Ambusher, Silverfur Partisan, and Immerwolf. So there’s probably a fair few worth throwing in.

As well, seeing as the vast majority of Werewolves have Human front faces, some Humans matter cards like Angel of Glory’s Rise or the new Katilda are worth a shout. There are very few of these that work unfortunately, seeing as you are actively trying to have your humans not be humans, but it’s potentially worth the look.

The reason I find this to be an issue is that you can only add in so many subthemes like this before the deck’s real synergies start to get too heavily diluted. Every Wolf you add makes your Werewolves worse, you know?

I dunno maybe this one was less an issue and more just a recommendation. And yes I know most of the non-Human Werewolves are in fact Eldrazi, but as much as I love those cards they’re both mostly bad and there’s not enough of them, so don’t bother putting Eldrazi cards in there. You have to dump a lot of mana to flip them anyway.

Issue 4: The gameplay

Werewolves as a tribe are extremely challenging from a gameplay perspective. You have to be paying close attention every turn, in order to make sure that you know when your Werewolves are transforming- and in a format like Commander, they are probably not spending nearly as much time with the back half as they are the front half.

While I appreciate Midnight Hunt’s design efforts to simplify this with the Daybound mechanic, in Commander this kinda just makes it worse. Daybound means you are having to track this mechanic at all times, even when you or nobody else has a Werewolf on the field, as long as you’ve played one of the new ones beforehand. As well, the older cards (which you will need some of) are completely unlinked to this day/night cycle, even though they technically use the same trigger, which can lead to some confusion- if, for example, Tovolar makes it Night on your Upkeep, playing a Duskwatch Recruiter is still going to leave you with a Duskwatch Recruiter, not a Krallenhorde Howler.

Considering Tovolar is likely the leader for most Werewolf decks going forward, I appreciate the effort to make him work with the Werewolves of the past, and that he tries to mitigate the tribe’s biggest issue. But there are a whole bunch of really finicky interactions that are both difficult to get your head around and difficult to explain to others when you pull them off. For example, if the player before you casts two spells on their turn, it becomes Day as the turn begins, meaning all your MID Werewolves will transform immediately, then Upkeep happens, and any of your non-MID Werewolves flip as well. Then Tovolar triggers, and you can transform as many of your Werewolves as you want- so if you stack the triggers right, then something like, say, Huntmaster of the Fells or Ulrich of the Krallenhorde will get to transform twice in the same step and get both of its “when ~ transforms” effects.

The other half of this is just the mental load on your opponents. You know what all your cards do, but your opponents aren’t going to! And this is a typical thing in EDH, the game requires either a massive knowledge of Magic, an ability to pick up on new cards and interactions quickly, or both, but it gets so much worse when each of your cards has two sides worth of text to read off whenever you play one. And people (particularly those with less-than-perfect threat assessment) are going to typically assume that the more words on your cards the better they are, so you might get targeted just based on that even though half the words aren’t relevant most of the time.

The long and short of Werewolves in EDH is this: They’re still awkward and janky. I think you can actually build a deck, but you could already do that technically, and I think the additions from MID aren’t quite enough to bump the tribe up to Actually Good. They are, though, about the level of Jank that I appreciate, so maybe I’ll still just build them anyway.

There is potential hope, though. Innistrad: Midnight Hunt is an Innistrad Werewolf Set that contains no less than 15 Vampires (one of my biggest issues with the set!), and the next set is Innistrad: Crimson Vow, the Innistrad Vampire Set. Due to the mechanical requirements, I can’t imagine we’re seeing 15 Werewolves in that one, but I’m hoping we do at least get a couple extras. And hey, maybe one of that one’s Commander decks will be Werewolves!

…The previous was written under the assumption that we didn’t know what the VOW Commander Decks were. As it turns out, we have the names. Neither of them are Werewolf themed.

God damn it, maybe next time we come back to Innistrad then. So, see you in 2026.

[overgrown-estate]

Innistrad: Midnight Hunt Official Cinematic – Magic: The Gathering

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Innistrad: Midnight Hunt Booster Pack Art by Anna Podedworna

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What fun things can we do with this guy 🤔

[bacejelerenvorthos]

The Lore of Innistrad: Ormendahl, the Corrupter

“Not all the demons were killed when Avacyn escaped the Helvault, and some of their cults remain intact. The most important of these is the Skirsdag, which hides within the very hierarchy of the church. Upon the death of their first demon lord, Griselbrand, the Skirsdag turned to Ormendahl, the Reaper, a demon who survived the angelic purge by sequestering himself in caverns deep beneath the cathedral.

Back on the surface, Ormendahl became obsessed with expanding his influence, even corrupting Avacyn's own Lunarch Council. However, his power paled in comparison to the Eldrazi, and when The Travails began, the ambitious Ormendahl fell under Emrakul's influence and lost his own.”

Art by Yongjae Choi

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Midnight Hunt Prediction

Notice the way Graveyard Glutton (the backside of Graveyard Trespasser) is worded: "Whenever {this} enters the battlefield..." Were wolves have never entered the battlefield with their "night" side up. The night side of Arlinn here adds credence to the idea that there is some way to make these cards enter transformed: there would be no reason to put a starting loyalty cost on the night side if she could only ever enter on the day side.

Also worth noting: the wording on Nightbound limits transforming back to the front to only if "at least two spells" were cast "during their own turn" which is more limited than the previous iterations of Innistrad werewolves that transformed back as long as any one player cast two spells during any single turn, not just theirs.

[riverofmolecules]

6-1 best of three draft challenge, baby!