#oldwalkers

[soylent-crocodile]

Negator (Monster)

(Phyrexian Negator by John Zeleznik)

CR16 NE Medium Aberration (Phyrexian)

(The negator is another iconic creature, although one whose card is simply not up to snuff nowadays- the balance of power has tipped so that its astronomical drawback is not worth the creature you get. Still, the obliterator is clearly a riff on it- and got its own, incredibly aesthetically boring riff later- and even then it's simply too fabulous a design not to use. Can you say "xenomorph"?

Lorewise, these explicitly saw most usage in the leadup to full invasion- perhaps, in a hypothetical Phyrexia campaign, this could be the final boss of the second act, before the REAL invasion force finally arrives.)

Negators are perfected assassins of Phyrexia, designed to eliminate key targets with compleat efficiency. They are singleminded in this pursuit- one infamous document stated simply "It exists to cease." Indeed, a negator's heart is terribly stilled- they are not known to experience any emotion but the satisfaction of a job well done and the desire to achieve so.

Negators, being stealth operatives and assassins, are rarely used once a full-scale invasion begins, although they are often deployed just in the leadup to it. Each negator is given all Phyrexia knows of its target, and is simply placed as close as Phyrexia can get it without garnering attention and sent to kill. Negators are surprisingly skilled at stealth and disguise, able to walk as a hunched figure through whatever streets it may need to to reach its target, and are surprisingly eloquent and skilled actors when they need to lie. Once it makes its kill, however, a negator rarely makes time for stealth. Such negators will begin a return to Phyrexia (such that they might possibly be reset, reprogrammed, and reused), but generally lack the precautions of one who has yet to make a kill. These assassinations are its purpose; it seems some higher part of it shuts off once it is done.

This wicked creature stands humanoid, with razor sharp claws and a smooth nubby head lined with tiny triangular teeth. Its body is dotted with glasslike hemispheres and wires arcing between body parts.

Misc- CR16 NE Medium Aberration (Phyrexian) HD24 Init:+11 Senses: Blindsight 120ft Perception: +26, Detect Magic, Detect Good Stats- Str:27(+8) Dex:33(+11) Con:20(+5) Int:30(+10) Wis:8(-1) Cha:24(+6) BAB:+18/+13/+8/+3 Space:5ft Reach:5ft Defense- HP:228(24d8+120) AC:30(+11 Dex, +4 Armor, +5 Natural) Fort:+14 Ref:+19 Will:+15 (+4 Racial bonus vs Emotion) CMD:47 Resist: Cold 20, Fire 20, Electricity 20 Immunity: Acid, Fear, Curse, Polymorph, Petrification, Death effects, Disease, Poison Weakness: Special Defenses: Evasion, Negative Energy Affinity, DR10/Adamantine, SR27, Uncanny Dodge, Mycosynth Flesh Offense- Bite +24(1d6+8), 2 Claw +25(2d6+8/19-20x2) or Negation +29(90ft ranged, 10d8 plus Negation) CMB:+26 Speed:40ft Special Attacks: Coronous Ambush, Sneak Attack +5d6 Feats- Iron Will, Multiattack, Power Attack (-5/+10), Dodge, Mobility, Spring Attack, Wind Stance, Vital Strike, Improved Vital Strike, Improved Iron Will, Quicken Spell-Like Ability (Bestow Curse), Weapon Focus (Claw) Skills- Acrobatics +38, Bluff +31, Climb +29, Disable Device +35, Disguise +31, Escape Artist +38, Knowledge (Arcana, Planes, Religion) +34, Knowledge (Dungeoneering)* +37, Linguistics +15, Perception +26, Sense Motive +23, Spellcraft +17, Stealth +38, Survival +26, Swim +29, Use Magic Device +31 Spell-like Abilities-  Detect Magic, Detect Good, Mage Armor, Deathwatch /constant Bestow Curse (DC19), Fog Cloud, Silence (DC18) /at-will Quickened Bestow Curse (DC19) 3/day Special Qualities- Compression Ecology- Environment- Any Languages- Necril, Draconic, Elven, Aklo, Abyssal, Infernal Organization- Solitary Treasure- Incidental Special Abilities- Coronous Ambush (Ex)- A negator’s erratic, jerky movements and mastery of anatomy give it the opening to strike at its enemies weakest points. A negator may make a sneak attack against any creature vulnerable to precision damage as long as it has moved at least 10ft since the end of its last turn. Negation (Su)- As a standard action, a negator can fire a beam of oblivion energy. This is a 90ft ranged attack that deals 10d8 untyped damage. Additionally, a negator may immediately make a dispel check as with the spell Greater Dispel Magic at +18 against all magical effects the target is under.

[incorrect-mtg]

One very self-indulgent fanfic concept that I've been a BIG fan of since I was like 14 is "the big war arc of the story lasted a decade instead of a week, and somehow the main character travels back in time to prevent that." You know, the ones where the main character is extremely overpowered for the standards of canon, but they're in the bad timeline so it doesn't matter? The ones where every moment they spend in the past is fuel for the angst?

Anyways I think that a fic like that but for the Phyrexian War would fix me.

[haaaaaaaaaaaave-you-met-ted]

Commodore Guff by Matthew Stewart

[markrosewater]

Do you know if it was accidental or intentional that Loot is actually the second character in Magic with that name? The first was the main character in two short stories written by Michael A Stackpole, a planeswalker with amnesia (this was a loooong while ago, so he was an Oldwalker, technically).

My gut was it wasn't intentional, but I had nothing to do with it, so I don't definitively know.

[lootthekey]

Duskmourn- The Living Horror Plane Theory

Art by Antonio José Manzanedo

Hello, this is me making another big post, but this time related to an upcoming set we know almost nothing about other than its loose themes. Duskmourn, a set themed around modern horror, or more accurately horror from the 70’s and 80’s, is extremely unique in that it takes place on the plane of Duskmourn. Why is that unique? You see, Duskmourn, the plane, is not like other planes at all. Even the most corrupted of Magic’s natural worlds, like Innistrad and Amonkhet, have a natural appearance to them. They have wildlife, a difference between civilization and nature, and overall are just standard worlds with differing cultures and ecosystems.

Duskmourn is extremely different from that.

Duskmourn is just one, absolutely gigantic, haunted mansion. As far as we know, this plane has very little in terms of an actual “world” and is just this massive house of horrors, hence the name of the set “Duskmourn: House of Horrors”. What is so interesting about this is the potential implications of this. As said, Magic’s planes almost universally follow the basic blueprint of being an actual world not unlike our own aside from the magical aspects of them, like Kamigawa’s Spirit Realm and similar.

The only plane that comes close to not being an actual “world” is Mirrodin, now better known as New Phyrexia. Even New Phyrexia, a world molded to its core by Elesh Norn and the other praetors of New Phyrexia, loosely imitates a natural world with its various spheres each having their own… ecosystem if they can be called that.

Duskmourn, until it is shown further and they say otherwise, has none of this to our understanding. It’s ONLY this big mansion. This leads me to my main theory I have today:

Duskmourn is an unnatural world.

And I don’t just mean this by how different it is. I mean to imply either this plane was created, similar to Mirrodin, by an extremely powerful entity, OR has been so heavily corrupted/modified/etc by a similar entity that it can no longer be called a “natural plane”.

The first possibility is interesting, but there isn’t much to further analyze with that possibility. We don’t know of any characters currently that can CREATE planes that aren’t just some random oldwalker we probably haven’t met yet or some all powerful demon potentially.

The second possibility, that the plane was corrupted and shaped into its current form by an extremely powerful entity, does have more interesting implications, as there are hilariously several beings in Magic’s modern lore capable of doing so. This is mainly because it seems to take much less effort to corrupt an individual plane, especially if you have a lot of help, than it is to create a full plane. Not that it still isn’t world breaking power at play, but its possible. We saw the New Phyrexians do it to Mirrodin, and they probably could have done it to other worlds if they weren’t met with heavy pushback.

Let’s revisit the image that I posted above and has basically been WotC’s chosen image to showcase the plane in its little time slot on their release timeline.

This is an extremely large, very eldritch and/or demonic looking entity that dwells on Duskmourn… or perhaps more. If you study this art, its “body” naturally flows into what can be called doors, staircases, pillars, and windows. The sheer size of this thing is awe inspiring, and it is extremely eldritch in appearance. Its really only a little different in appearance to another cast of very eldritch entities in Magic’s lore that I also made big posts about.

Art by Eli Minaya

The Eldrazi Titans. Very similar bone-like appearance to Ulamog, very similar “multiple limb” design of Kozilek, and a similar “glowing eldritch hole(s)” design to Emrakul. You might see where I am going with this, which is:

Duskmourn is a giant, living plane, who’s World Soul has been supplanted by an Eldrazi Titan.

Now, you might say, “But Colin, Eldrazi’s do not do that. They eat worlds.” But how do we know that? Emrakul, in Eldritch Moon, was fully capable of taking over Innistrad. She had the entire plane in her grasp and there were no signs of her losing. She was delayed by the Gatewatch, but by the end all of them had been mentally overwhelmed by her powers. Emrakul sealed herself into Innistrad’s moon at the end of it all, clearly with a larger, more complex goal in mind that has haunted us to this day.

Duskmourn, I believe, is a world that has been completely corrupted by an Eldrazi not unlike Emrakul.

The inhabitants, who I don’t even know how they survive in such a world, are constantly bombarded by mental attacks from the world itself. This is not unlike what happened when Emrakul fought the Gatewatch. Every inhabitant of Duskmourn is a captive in Duskmourn’s corrupting grasp, and that will be central to the plane I believe. This is an unnatural world run by an eldritch entity, and the nature of it could be the key to learning more about the Eldrazi and/or how the World Souls of planes function.

I am very excited to see what Duskmourn has in store, and I hope it does not disappoint.

[vorthosjay]

The planeswalker guide mentioned that no one knows the origin of the big enchantment that transforms extraplanar visitors. Hypothetically, would such an enchantment have been within the abilities of an oldwalker to create? Basically, as we speculate, I'm wondering if oldwalkers are a legit option. Second, if the Phyrexians came to Bloomburrow, what kind of animals would they be? I really really really need the cutest Phyrexians in the multiverse to be a thing.

Oldwalker power sets were basically whatever the story required, so yes, it's possible.

Karn is a ironroot tree, so I suspect that IF the Phyrexians had come to Bloomburrow, that's what they'd be too.

[xantchaslegacy]

It's no secret that MtG has a fair number of characters with BCGE (Big Catholic Girl Energy); Liliana, Thalia, Teysa, etc. For Easter, I'd like to spotlight one of MtG's earliest and lesser-known big catholic-energy girls: Helana, from the short story Dual Loyalties by Glen Vasey.

Helana is the adopted daughter of preacher who oversees a rural sun-worshiping church. She is an intelligent, well-read and devout (albeit sheltered) young woman who is steadfast in her dedication to the sun-goddess, her father, and the well-being (both spiritual and physical, via healing magic) of the small community they serve.

The tl;dr of her story is that her father is suddenly (though not unexpectedly) summoned by a planeswalker to aid in a fight against a rival 'walker, and during the battle ends up getting cast into hell (this is in keeping with a running theme of the short stories in Distant Planes, a book that could have been fairly re-titled as Oldwalkers are Sociopaths and Here's a Dozen Case Studies Showing Why). Helana, left in charge of the church, immediately takes off to find her father, armed only with gumption, faith, a few pearls of white mana (which the sun god and her nighttime counterpart, Gohrah periodically leave for the devout to find), and a celestial prism (which will turn out to be critical later on, since her knowledge of spellcasting is *extremely basic*, and limited to healing spells used to treat the church's small congregation).

(She's also accompanied in her journey by a flying miniature dog named Rorsa; he's not plot-critical, but a very fun element in the story)

At the battlefield where the 'walkers dueled, she meets Illith, a demon who was summoned for the same fight her father was taken away to participate in. Illith, needing a hostage to return safely to his home in hell (demonic bureaucracy, don't ask), but also fascinated and sympathetic to Helana despite himself, agrees to guide her to the castle of the archduke of hell who has her father prisoner. The exchanges between Illith and Helana are all quite interesting, and I've included a sliver below b/c I really like how their dialogue is done:

(Illith is, though never explicitly stated as such, clearly meant to be the demon depicted on the original art for Demonic Tutor, based on the descriptions of how he assists the wizards/ planeswalkers who summon his aid.)

What Helana does once in hell is nothing short of stunning. Starting with a group of dark dwarves, who she tranquilizes with a surgery-prep spell, she proceeds to take on several squads of black-aligned creatures using nothing but her instincts and a selection of white-aligned healing spells that do absolutely twisted things to the minions of hell. She uses a proliferation/virility spell to make a group of skeleton warriors copulate each other to pieces, a healing spell on zombies so their flesh grows back and causes them immense pain. A spell of charity to make a rag man give her its kneecap. A spell of compassion and self-reflection to cause (implied lethal) psychic damage to an archduke of hell.

The story ends happily, with Helana and her new demon frenemy having gotten what they wanted out of the foray into hell (she her father and he his previous scholarly position). Helana is left at the story's end to confront a new duality of loyalties that has blossomed over the course of the story - to the Sun, but also to Gohrah, Daughter of Night.

It's a very interesting short that touches on the complexity of B and W characters, as well as gives some fun illustrations on how different card mechanics would work in the in-universe fantasy setting.

Happy Easter ;)

[littjara-mirrorlake]

Crackpot theory/headcanon time!

What if the oldwalker who created the plane of Phyrexia hailed from the plane of Iquatana? It's a seemingly-dead plane whose long-lost inhabitants created narcomoebas to store memories, which were lost in an unknown way.

Notably the plane of Phyrexia, long before Yawgmoth's settlement of it, already contained a potent form of memory storage: glistening oil. It would later be corrupted into Yawgmoth's tool of conquest, but it was not always so.

What if the oil was initially created as an experimental method to store Iquati memory, with the plane built around it? It's possible that at this point - roughly 9000 years pre-current canon - the Iquati were still living, but struggling through some unknown crisis.

What recollections could lay deep within the Phyrexian oil, deeper even than Yawgmoth's whispers, waiting to be unearthed?

[berrywinkle]

I think that one video about Sorin never getting a «win» has changed people’s perception of Sorin for the worse.

Like I won’t deny he can be a failure sometimes, but that doesn’t take away from the fact that he is one of the most powerful planeswalkers out there.

In fact, I think it’s good writing that he’s made so many mistakes, because he is over 7000 years old and an oldwalker, so he is naturally going to be stuck in his old ways and his biases and sense of superiority is what makes him fail. That’s why he is able to get a victory in Crimson vow, because he is going through character development where he learns to trust and depend on others, and to extend help to others in return.

[dude1818]

Namekkos: The Clockwork Plane

On the plane of Namekkos, everything is mechanical. The beasts and birds whir and click across the land, the people wind themselves up each day, and even the vegetation consists of simple machines. Whether the plane was artificially created as a mad experiment by an oldwalker, or was once truly alive before technology ran unchecked, no one knows. To the inhabitants, this is what Namekkos has always been.

In the northern reaches of the continent of Terle, the Kosmengeve Empire plots dominion. Led by Kosmen, the self-titled World Mind, Kosmengeve is a singular hive mind that aims to enfold all sentient organisms into itself. The proliferation of telegraph technology in recent years has allowed Kosmen to rapidly extend its reach. The lack of wireless technology limits how fast Kosmengeve can expand; however, long enough exposure to Kosmen can break down an organism's individuality enough that, even disconnected from the World Mind briefly, it still thinks of itself as an extension of Kosmen. Having expanded to the northern border of Terle, the Empire now feels its way southward, where the people are less than pleased to be absorbed.

South of Kosmengeve and somewhat protected by the Gensto mountain range lies the Association of Artina. Led by the Council of Vyst, Artina is a scientifically-focused society. Home to artificers, bioengineers, and naturalists, Artinans believe that nature is the greatest inventor. That's no excuse for stagnation though: it is every person's right, and even imperative, to continuously improve the mechanisms of nature. The Association doesn't have an end goal in mind, but posits that the process itself is the point. The leading minds of Artina are known as clockmakers, and their latest discovery is a mysterious energy called anima, which may be the motive force powering all life on the plane.

To the south of Terle, on the smaller continent of Tersol, the Morex Syndicate is in control. Less a political structure and more a response to Kosmen's growing reach, the Syndicate is an anarchistic collection of individuals who simply want what's best for themselves. Inhabitants of Tersol disdain the Terlian notions of societal evolution; rather, they desire merely to be allowed to modify themselves however they want, and don't care how that impacts those around them.

Venser has come to Namekkos while in search of another metal world. Intrigued by the artifice he finds, he decides to spend just a little time looking around, and discovers something shocking. He meets a promising young naturalist named Temmar; to Venser's surprise, he can tell that Temmar has a planeswalker spark, throwing into question what it means to be alive. As the Kosmengeve Empire presses into Artinan territory, Temmar gets thrown into the labyrinth of Association higher political and academic circles, while also trying to study this stranger who seems to be studying him in return.

[mtgpocketrealm]

Shared Planar History

The history of each realm is majorly unconnected to the other realms, however, there are particular events that were so major that they affected every realm, I will go ahead and mention them here, though they will be mentioned more specifically and in detail with each realm, how they responded, how they dealt with it, and how it affected them after the fact.

A Seed Planted

The first shared event for the plane is one of the more obvious events, and that would be its creation and the subsequent planting of the world tree. This seed was cultivated to the point it began bearing fruit. This tree bore only a single fruit initially.

Splitting of the Fruit

Whoever created the plane was apparently dissatisfied with the fruit the world tree bore. They methodically split the fruit, violently (maybe even sadistically) split the Worldsoul, and implanted the barriers around the realms. At this point, biospheres, guardians, and the Skeps (sliver hives (taken from what they are called on the plane of Shandalar)) were placed onto the realms. Whoever created the plane seemingly stopped interacting with it substantially after this point.

Asking a Realmsoul about the history of their realm from here back will result in them screaming in inhuman pain for about a minute and then becoming confused about what they were just doing, that is, if they have any intention of answering the question in the first place.

The Great Mending

The native populations of the realms who had ignited found themselves trapped within the realm they were born and, due to the nature of being an Oldwalker, were elevated to the level of gods and were revered as such. But only a short few thousand years after life truly began on the realms, Planeswalkers ceased being near godlike beings, and thus, the gods of the realms disappeared. Religion (cults technically I believe), generally, is still alive within the realms, but they now worship those that no longer exist, gods who do not answer, and beings who hear no prayers.

Eldrazi Incursions

Several times before the present, Eldrazi 'shadows' have brushed up against the plane. Leaving Scions, Spawns, Horrors, Drones, and lesser Eldrazi among the realms, unable to escape to the eternities to join their Titans as they so desperately seem to want to. The first of these 'incursions' occurred relatively early in the plane's history, though each incursion has added at least one additional realm to be under siege from these extraplanar menaces.

Credit: Mathias Kollros

Phyrexian Invasion

The most recent shared event was that of the Phyrexian invasion. The invasion tree broke into the various realms, and it was the Guardians who took the brunt of the combat, generally infecting them. Though, luckily for those who live in the realms, the infection took long enough that the invasion was over before the Guardians were reprogrammed to slaughter and infect, turning the once wholly mechanical stewards into somewhat fleshy stewards.

The realms have had further specific effects after the invasion, cults popping up who believe the voices in their heads will lead them to betterment or perfection is one such example, but they are few.

Credit: Campbell White

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[oops-prow-did-it-again]

The more I read into and about pre-mending Planeswalkers, the more I realize that these "oldwalkers" slowly lost the chance to become people. Once you were a planeswalker in the olden days, if you claimed dominion of a plane, it was now your duty to watch over it and guard it - essentially staking out territory - often in opposition to other planeswalkers.

And planeswalkers back then, they were not just people that could cross worlds. They were immortal, nigh unkillable (though not entirely, as Ugin and some others prove), could do virtually anything they wanted, could create their own realms!... they were gods. They WERE gods. These people were moving forces of nature, whose motivations were often unknown to all those they ran across.

And they found each other, oh they found each other, constantly. Sorin remarks that there are strict protocols of sorts for planeswalkers coming to one another's planes when he meets Nahiri, and I am of the opinion that this is because most planeswalkers, at least back then, were actually rather terrified of each other.

The world was a lot more vicious for them, even if things were a lot easier. Yes, their magic was much better, and they could succeed at their own goals easier - but so could other planeswalkers. Urza merely showed his face in Serra's Realm, and that damned it; he did not intend for it to be so, he didn't call the Phyrexians there purposefully, but his arrival was what doomed the plane and, arguably, Serra herself. While that specific example with Urza might not have been widespread knowledge, it probably WAS widespread knowledge back then that when a strange planeswalker arrives on your soil, you do not know what will change because of that.

You have immortal forces of nature, living gods, called planeswalkers, that stake their claim over worlds at a time (usually), and often fight for control of these worlds or for something from one another's worlds. They have a natural distrust and wariness of one another. They cannot afford to think of each other as people, to wonder about each other's emotions and underlying motivations, because to do so risks one's own safety (whether of themselves or any world they've claimed dominion of).

Oldwalkers were always on edge, always ready to defend, always seeing enemies and allies, never people they merely didn't like or friends. And even when they did claim to have friends, they always seemed to have a nagging voice in the back of their head reminding them to be careful and to still be wary.

And this, I think, is in direct contrast to post-mending Planeswalkers - they are people first, gods never (or later, if they do reach some unreasonable amount of power at all), whereas the immortal pre-mending planeswalkers were gods for so long they forgot what it meant to be a person ever.

And I propose that most oldwalkers retain this wariness of other walkers, even post-mending ones. They know it's undue, they know that they themselves are weakened (even if they are still stronger than the average post-mending walker). They know that the territorial times of pre-mending walkers is mostly dead and gone. But that instinct remains, that instinct remains to be on guard, to be wary...

And to be frank, they're not even entirely wrong to be. Postmending walkers might be weaker, and walkers themselves less godlike, but walkers can still cause indescribable damage. So premending walkers may know they are in a new age, where the rules and norms they knew are long gone, but they feel as if holding that culture tightly protects them to some degree.

So it permeates their behavior. And oldwalkers are seen as standoffish, cold, cruel, even - because the culture and world that shaped them is long gone, long forgotten. But it is the world they knew, and the world they will always know in their minds.

[incorrect-mtg]

Shout-out to the coolest oldwalker in mtg

[dimestoretajic]

MAGIC PLANESWALKER ULTIMATE BRACKET, ROUND TWO OF FOUR!

So first up, we got the dreaded 3Feri versus an old oldwalker! Let's see if the bad student beats the anger of the forest!

Make your choice!

[interplanaranathema]

Three Main Brywnfr Planeswalkers

Got these three done! Post MoM thoughts and designs.

Eriame Mel- an elven planeswalker centered in Blue and secondary in W/B. She is known as the Dreamer due to her dream magic . Being one of the few brywnfr planeswalkers who stil has access to the plane, shes made a name for herself their. Eriame is a cult leader who uses the motto "To grow and to improve ourselves, we must shatter our nightmares." She is also just... Angel sexual due to the nature of the Brwynfr Arch Angels.

Archangel Avalon- The Brywnfr archangel of Blue mana, a great artificer and powerful illusionist. He's the reason why the plane is so elusive to get to and he wants to protect his home. Being an old walker of ancient proportions, he doesn't care about trivial matters unless it's with planeswalkers. During March of Machines, Avalon was returning back to brywnfr to rest and reconnect so he doesn't lose his ability to go back. He was followed by a Phyrexian Aven planeswalker who aimed to pierce brywnfr and take down the pesty angel. These two fought and as Avalon went for the uppercut, the planeswalker casted a spell which broke some wings and sent Avalon spiralling down hundreds of feet down whilst the planeswalker was apprehended and killed by the Archangel of Red, who had responded to Avalon's leyline warnings. Avalon crashed, shattering and twisting his wings and his spine nearly broke. He was rushed to the healers and was promptly comatose for a few months. The permanent damage he sustains is lost of some oral tendrils, amputation of a few of his wings (only one major pair), a permanent gash into his empty torso and has to use a cane to walk.

Nym Kylem- one of the "lost children of Brywnfr," or brywnfr planeswalkers who are unable to return back to Brywnfr due to Avalon's planar restrictions. He is an extremely potent biomancer and formerly an oldwalker. Not much is known about him other than he's seems to be making a name for himself on the plane called "The Materium." He is an oc who shows up a lot in my Warhammer 40k x MTG au. He is aligned with the Tyranids becoming what is known as the "False Tyrant" , His Reds, yellows and plates are his Fleet's colorations. Bitch serves some pretty colors.

[niuttuc]

What's your opinion on Kamigawa?

I appreciate the effort that went into both modernizing it for Neon Dynasty and keeping it firmly rooted in its history and story. I wish the marketing hadn't leaned as heavily on the Neon and a bit more on the Dynasty, since the point of the setting was that it was in balance between the two, and a LOT of effort in worldbuilding went towards that.

I do wish we had more. On how technology works a bit more in detail, and kami channeling, and the Gates, and the merging and... The Neon Dynasty story was good in being its own self-contained thing but it didn't allow exploring much of the world, it was mostly very narrowly focused on Tezzeret and Phyrexians.

The set was great in almost every respect, even if a bit strong in places.

As far as old Kamigawa, these novels were pretty entertaining. Scott McGough, their author, was really good at writing compelling narratives around overpowered characters (a good skill to have in the oldwalker era), and Toshiro Umezawa definitively qualifies here. The card sets certainly had issues though. It is funny to see the stark difference in power between Kyodai/Michiko back in the old days and them being basically powerless against Tezzeret and the Phyrexian invasion in March of the Machine.