Magic: The Gathering (Spoiler-free)

The only thing I ship Lilliana with is death/being dead, to be honest.

Games.

I initially was distressed that we're getting another filler chapter but pleased that we're getting to catch up with Geralf and Gisa, who are always fun. But then she happened. Now we know where all those zombies came from.

Actually i think this is one of my favourite uncharted rea...ahem official magic stories in a long while. The conversations were hilarious and we actually got some informations.

edited 27th Apr '16 11:31:01 AM by Samaldin

I initially thought Ludevic had sent the skaabs to break out Gisa as a gesture of goodwill toward Geralf. I was surprised that Geralf did it.

Some fan-art inspired by the last Magic Story:

• Look at these BFFS
• Gisa and Geralf Cecani
• Gisa

I never really understood how to two became so popular before.

Now I do.

LOL just won with my Standard UR Prowess deck in a Modern mini-tourney. Won against Storm and Living End 2-1 for both, I lost 0-2 to monowhite Human Tribal though. My creatures were in hiding during that game (except for the tokens from Dragon Fodder LOL).

Nobody expects the Lunarch Inquisition.

I really liked Thalia in Innistrad. I'm glad to see she's still awesome.

Bit dismayed that Jace still hasn't arrived in Thraben yet, but this was great for setting the stage and creating an impression of just what he's going to find when he gets there.

Also, it's nice to know the Lunarch Inquisition isn't actively serving Avacyn. That's been bothering me; Avacyn is attempting to purge all humans, so why would she have human servants? It makes more sense now; she doesn't. The Inquisition isn't the human arm of her genocide, it's a bunch of scared religious people frantically trying to interpret her behavior in a way that makes sense - while secretly undermined by a demon cult in their ranks.

Tamiyo arrives!

And she's great, everything I could have wanted from the character and more.

Reminds me of Ugin a lot too, in a good way.

Reminds me of Ugin too. The argument she has with Jace is basically the same argument Jace held with Ugin about fighting the Eldrazi. Big picture versus little one.

Are moonfolk notably long-lived? She sounds old.

Who else is expecting a last-second rescue by Markov next chapter? The stage seems properly set for Anguished Unmaking to occur.

Is this setting up a crazy Jace arc? It pretty much spells out that what happened to Jace was already there, just brought out by Innistrad's general crazy. I'm intigued by what an insane telepath can do. Imagine him in a heavily populated area... like Ravnica. Where his word is law.

Yes and no. Jace's mind was already pretty f*cked up to begin with but that's not what's influencing his behavior right now. His memories have been wiped and rewiped and self-wiped so many times that there is basically zero continuity of identity from the beginning of his life to where he is today. From the moment he woke up on Ravnica with a broken mirror where his self-image is supposed to be, he's been reinventing himself from scratch.

What Tamiyo encountered in his mind isn't new information. It could still be foreshadowing or setting something up in the future, but we already knew Jace was a fractured mess with psychic powers.

edited 11th May '16 1:43:32 PM by TobiasDrake

This was a great read, especially that opening paragraph and the mini stories.

Am I the only person who's kind of fed up of Jace?

I know, I know, he's a main character, but every time the story is focused on him and he gets another card I sort of just groan. Like oh, there he is again.

Well, he's currently being mentally torn apart by a mad angel. Take solace in that.

As I've said before, Jace is basically made of animated Marmite: everyone seems to either love him (he rates highly in Wizards' character polls) or hates him.

After this block, they'll probably switch him out for one of the other Gatwatchers.

I used to dislike Jace, but since he's received more character development, I've become very fond of him. Crazy Jace is best Jace.

I wouldn't say I hate Jace, but I'm not really fond of him either.

I'm tired of seeing Jace around for every single standard rotation. There's always some version of him being in print.

edited 13th May '16 9:52:19 AM by nightwyrm_zero

I'm also enjoying his character more as he gets more narrative presence. Before, he was mostly overexposed within the cards. He has a truly obscene number of Planeswalker cards - seven in total at the time of this statement - but half of them have no narrative presence to correlate to them.

Story Involvement

• Jace, the Mind Sculptor - Worldwake. One of the three planeswalkers that opened the lock on the Eldrazi's containment in the online comic that precedes the novel.
• Jace, Architect of Thought - Return to Ravnica, main protagonist.
• Jace, Telepath Unbound - Magic Origins, one of the five Origin Planeswalkers.
• Jace, Unraveler of Secrets - Shadows Over Innistrad, main protagonist.

No Story Involvement

• Jace Beleren - Lorwyn. Jace was one of the first Planeswalker cards and when they were introduced, there was one of each color that were printed just for the sake of existing. They were completely unrelated to the actual plot of Lorwyn, which was an isolated story about events within the plane.
• Jace, Memory Adept - Magic 2012 through 2014. Core sets don't have a plot.
• Jace, the Living Guildpact - Magic 2015, another Core set.

By contrast, Gideon has 4 and they're all plot-relevant in some way.

• Gideon Jura - Worldwake, minor side character.
• Gideon, Champion of Justice - Gatecrash, side character.
• Gideon, Battle-Forged - Magic Origins, one of the five Origins planeswalkers.
• Gideon, Ally of Zendikar - Battle for Zendikar, ensemble protagonist.

Chandra has 6, 3 of which are plot-relevant.

Story

• Chandra Ablaze - Zendikar, another of the three Planeswalkers that released the Eldrazi.
• Chandra, Roaring Flame - Magic Origins, yet another Origins Planeswalker.
• Chandra, Flamecaller - Oath of the Gatewatch, ensemble protagonist.

Non-Story

• Chandra Nalaar - Lorwyn, one of the first Planeswalker cards.
• Chandra, the Firebrand - Magic 2012 and 2013.
• Chandra, Pyromaster - Magic 2015.

Sarkhan Vol has 4, all plot-intensive.

• Sarkhan Vol - Shards of Alara, minor character, servant to Nicol Bolas.
• Sarkhan the Mad - Rise of the Eldrazi, the third of the Planeswalkers who released the Eldrazi.
• Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker - Khans of Tarkir, main protagonist.
• Sarkhan Unbroken - Dragons of Tarkir, same block as above, still main protagonist.

And as a last example, let's look at Sorin Markov.

• Sorin Markov - Zendikar, main protagonist.
• Sorin, Lord of Innistrad - Dark Ascension, minor role.
• Sorin, Solemn Visitor - Khans of Tarkir, minor role.
• Sorin, Grim Nemesis - Shadows Over Innistrad, extent of role yet to be determined.

While the only one that comes close to Jace's sheer number of cards is Chandra, both only got as high as they did because of overexposure in the Core Sets. If we exclude those, this is Jace's fourth plot card which puts him on-level with many of his peers.

Magic 2015 did have a plot. It revolved around Jace hunting down Garruk and jamming a hedron into him. There were several stories about Jace as the Living Guildpact on the site. Same thing with Garruk, Apex Predator.