Magic Around the Web August 31, 2009
Posted by Norm in Casual.Tags: Magic articles
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A non-magic playing friend sent me a link to this article recently, How to Play Magic: The Gathering.
The basic summery of the article is the author, Matt Robison, meets up with John Finkel for an FNM where they are drafting SSC. All in all it was a fun read and interesting to see an outsider describe some serious gamers in action. I was a little disappointed that Finkel didn’t stay around and help Matt in the latter part of the night.
Zendikar Spoiler – Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle August 30, 2009
Posted by Norm in Spoilers, Zendikar.Tags: land, Spoiler, Valakut the Molten Pinnacle, Zendikar
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While looking at Zedikar Spoilers on Gathering Magic.com I stumbled across Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle. Now I’m not sure if this card is official or not but I’m really interested in that triggered ability, “…as long as you control 5 other mountains.” After the Shards of Alara block forcing three color decks are we seeing a direct and dramatic shift back to mono color? I seem to think so. The high color specific cost of Sorin and Chandra. The color specificness of the other official spoilers do seem to be pointing us in a mono color centric block.
Again assuming this spoiler is correct can we expect a cycle of these lands? Probably. Will green add elves or mana, will black destroy target creature, will blue draw a card, and white give +1/+1 counters. Cold be really awesome cycle.
Zendikar Spoilers – Sorin Markov Revealed August 30, 2009
Posted by Norm in Spoilers, Zendikar.Tags: Sorin Markov, Spoiler, Zendik
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Last week we got the final bit of rules text for Sorin Markov. One of three new planeswalkers in Zendikar. If you read my previous post when the art was spoiled you know that I had a feeling this guy was going to be a planeswalker. After taking a few minutes to consider the card I’ve got to say I’m having mixed feelings. First the good.
What I like is that the first ability is a guaranteed, once per turn, Vicious Hunger. Not shabby at all, even if you leave it open to execute on your second main phase after combat to finish off some wayward blocker. I also like that you can build up to 8 loyalty, activate the ultimate and repeat without loosing the card. Controlling another player’s turn is also just awesome. My final thought on what I like is the art. I know I said this in the last post but that art is killer.
What I don’t like about Sorin is the casting cost. He is going to have to sit in an almost mono black deck unless you are the 5 color control player who has access to all the colors. Even with Lorywin/Shadowmoor rotating out will make more that two colors hard to play. And while that isn’t really a big deal I’m wondering if the casting cost is too much.
Finally where I’m really on the fence with this guy is the middle ability. In my mind I keep thinking that by turn six I hope my opponent is already at 10 or less life. But at the same time I’m thinking what about some sort of black control deck that keeps the board clear and when your ready to make your move you only have 10 life points to worry about. This ability will be especially awesome in mutiplayer games where there is that one guy who always goes up 20 life and is really unreachable by the end of the game. Even taking a few opponents down would be interesting. This could also work in your favor bumping you up for 1 or 2 life to 10 entering the mid game when you finally stabilize. That ability would be pretty awesome in a faeries deck for sure, too bad that deck is rotating. All on all I’m not totally sold on that second one. We’ll see how it plays out.
So those are my initial thoughts on Sorin Markov. What do you guys think?
Zendikar Art Spoiler August 14, 2009
Posted by Norm in Spoilers, Zendikar.Tags: art spoiler, Magic: The Gathering, vampire, Zendikar
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In a unique twist for spoilers each day this week in the Wizard’s Daily Magic articles was a poll box called “You Decide.” Readers could choose different parts of a card in the poll. This being the first week it seems art was the #1 choice of the voters. I have a feeling that name will be next followed by rules. Here is the art:
Pretty wicked isn’t he. My first thought was new planeswalker. But since there was probaby a power/toughness choice in the poll (I can’t remember exactly) I’m assuming he is just some badass vampire ready to eat your annoying little sister.
Or perhaps he’s Liliana’s exboyfriend come back from the dead and ready to trash her new fling, Vampire Nocturnus.
Zendikar – Textless Basic Land Forest August 14, 2009
Posted by Norm in Spoilers, Zendikar.Tags: forest, Spoiler, textless lands, Zendikar
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The week of textless concludes today with forests. Now keep in mind there are 10 more textless lands we haven’t seen yet. I expect we’ll see them as we get closer to the spoiler season. As I’m sure Wizards got a nice bump in Arcana traffic this week with those lands.
If you are looking for wallpapers of any of the spoiled lands then follow the link to today’s arcana post and you will be rewarded. However if you are an iPhone user I’d suggest just grabbing the art that is provided each day because the aspect ration is just about right and it looks better with out any logos or clunky dates.
Zendikar – Textless Basic Land Mountain August 13, 2009
Posted by Norm in Spoilers, Zendikar.Tags: GenCon, Mountain, textless land, Zendikar
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Before we get to the textless Mountains I wanted to give a quick nod to everyone attending GenCon this week. I have been trying to work it into my schedule but external forces are against me. My brother and a few friends are going to make the drive from Pittsburgh for Saturday and Sunday. I’ve been enjoying all the GenCon twitter updates so keep them coming (if your on twitter and I’m not following you let me know and I’ll fix that.)
Now on to the Mountains.
Zendikar – Textless Basic Land Swamp August 12, 2009
Posted by Norm in Spoilers, Zendikar.Tags: Spoiler, swamp, textless lands, Zendikar
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This week is like the 5 days of Christmas in August. Textless Basic Sawmps out today.
And their counterparts.
Tomorrow we’ll get to see mountains!
Zendikar – Textless Basic Land Island August 11, 2009
Posted by Norm in Spoilers, Zendikar.Tags: island, Spoiler, textless lands, Zendikar
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As promised more textless land spoilers from Zendikar.
And here is the regular version:
But before I let you go I want to take a closer look at the first full art, and contemplate a comment cadenadebronce3 left yesterday,
Now, I know what that strange pyramid expansion symbol means… it shows the poligonal structures that apppear in Zendikar lands… what about talking about an Azthec theme in Zendikar?… I think that’s not the theme as I suspected… Now I see a real mystic and mathematical plane with a theme based on randomness or rolling dies or something like that… What do you think about it?
Seems like a valid and interesting theory to me.
Planechase Spoilers August 11, 2009
Posted by Norm in Casual, Spoilers.Tags: Magic: The Gathering, multiplayer, Planechase, Spoiler
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This week is one of those big weeks of announcements over at Wizards of the Coast. Zendicar textless lands and Planechase spoilers galore. Here are two of the plane cards we got to see on Monday.
Not only did we get to see these cards we also got the rules rundown for these new cards and multiplayer format. I’m gonna sum up the rules in general but make sure you read the official announcement for the complete rundown.
Basically the Planar cards are a new type of card that is not a permanent and resides in its own game zone, the Command Zone. From what I’ve seen the Planar cards each contain two triggered abilities. One that triggers on it’s own and another that happens when you choose to roll the new Planar Die.
The die rolling feature is one of my favorite new accompaniments to Planechase. Basically at sorcery speed you can choose to roll one of the die, which does not use the stack, but effects of the die roll (ie triggers from the Planar card do use the stack). You can roll the die multiple times per turn but each one after the first (that turn) costs +1 mana each time. So if it is the third time this turn you are choosing to roll the Planar die you must pay 2 colorless mana to roll. Check out the official announcement for the full rules on rolling the die.
Great so how do you actually put a Planar card into the Command Zone? Glad you asked, when you buy your Planechase game pack you will get 10 planar cards that go with a 60 card deck that also comes in the game pack. Naturally you can mix and match decks and planar cards, but you have to start with 10 planar cards per player. They sit in their own stack called your “Planar Deck” and is in a seperate pile from your library. The starting player puts their top planar card into the command zone and that card stays there until a player rolls the planeswalk symbol on the die.
This is a very interesting new take on multiplayer and I can’t wait to try it out myself!
Zendikar – Textless Basic Lands August 10, 2009
Posted by Norm in Spoilers.Tags: planes, Spoiler, textless lands, Zendikar
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If there was ever one way to get people excited about a new set innovating on the cards that everyone is going to use is a great place to start, Basic Land. Today in advance of the official Zendikar spoiler season Wizards of the Coast announced textless basic lands to appear in each booster pack and fat pack.
Here are the two spoiled to day in the Archana. There will be a total of four textless lands and I’m assuming four in each color. They are also printing regular old fashioned lands as well. So I’m wondering if you will always get a textless land in the booster pack and fat pack or if you will have random insersts. Also in that fat pack sealed bunch of land are they all going to be textless? We’ll have to wait to find out.
Oh and keep checking back I have a feeling that by the end of the week we’ll see two of each color. I’ll leave you with the two regular art versions.
