Magic: The Gathering (Unreleased Sets)

He could be a zombie, or a vampire, or just a scarred human.

Clearly, his secret identity is Arcanis the Omnipotent.

It would make sense for him to be human, since last time there was exactly one human guild leader (Augustin) and none of the new ones are.

The panel mentioned that he's a shapeshifter.

edited 14th Jul '12 2:08:31 PM by Lovecrafter

Ah, okay. Well, that's definitely fitting for the Dimir.

So we humans are unrepresented among the leaders this time. Well, we just won a big victory on Innistrad so I suppose that's okay.

So, which guilds will you be picking? I'm going with Golgari in RTR and either Gruul or Orzhov for GTC.

I believe you're actually allowed to use your prerelease card (which will be the leader of your chosen guild) in your deck at the prerelease.

I can't really offer anything regarding my own prerelease picks since there don't seem to be any actual places where Magic is played around here in meatspace.

Is Izzet RTR or GTC?

RTR

Izzet is RTR, and probably my choice for the prere.

Thought:

Classic Ravnica went Ravnica, Guildpact, Dissension.

RTR is going Return to Ravnica, Gatecrash...what's the bet the third set will start with D?

If I did make it to a prerelease, I'd probably go Rakdos for Return and Simic for Gatecrash.

I won't be able to go to the prerelease, but I'd pick Izzet and Simic.

Wow. How the hell are they going to do this? I don't think I could even think of ten more keywords.

Any speculation as to what they might be?

Golgari's all about the graveyard and reanimation, so maybe a keyworded Golgari Germination effect, or Firewing Phoenix's ability.

Do Future Sight keywords still count as "new"?

I doubt it. Ma Ro says they're "brand new", so that excludes the Future Sight stuff as well.

Apparently the original version of dredge didn't have you mill yourself as a cost, which seems a lot less abusive than the printed version. It doesn't really solve the problem of that kind of ability causing gameplay to become extremely repetitive, but flavourfully, the Golgari are supposed to be repetitive - the idea that existence is circular is central to their ethos.

How about "when this creature dies, return a creature card with the same converted mana cost to your hand"?

Maybe a version of soulshift without the spirit restriction?

I've seen one mechanic proposed that's effectively unearth crossed with persist - you can cast the creature from your graveyard, but if you do it enters with a special counter on it that means that if it would leave the battlefield, it's exiled. Cool idea, but it's not quite Golgari enough, since it means the creature can only return once - it's not "circle of life" enough.

I could actually see them using "X: return this creature from the graveyard to the battlefield with a -1/-1 counter on it". Or some other penalty.

Also, does anyone want fight? I got fight. You want some?

I'm sure Rav 2 will use +1/+1 rather than -1/-1 counters.

Speaking of which, I'm wondering if maybe they'll use Ethan Fleischer's Evolve mechanic from the Great Designer Search 2 for the Simic (whenever a creature with greater power than this enters the battlefield under your control, put a +1/+1 counter on this). Artificially-aided evolution is what the Simic are all about, after all.

Apparently the prerelease will also give participants a letter from the guildmaster of the guild you chose. Any idea as to the contents? I think Isperia's could be some kind of confusing legal document riddled with fine print

The Gruul one will just say "CRUSH THEM, THEN WE EAT!"

At the Prerelease, I'll be doing one flight for each guild (will probably buy in and drop for the Izzet one though, since the shops I play at do, at most, four flights).

I'll be starting with Golgari.

Niv-Mizzet's letter will probably just be an equation.