Now that they're reintroducing Geyadrone, an upcoming arc with be the Gatewatch teaming up with Bolas to take down a greater evil.

Not likely. The last time we saw the Meditation Realm it had reverted back to it's original state, including the horns being changed back to Ugin horns.

Unless something happened off-screen in the meantime (which seems unlikely), it must be a card from the past.

However, I do believe this is the first native creature that we've seen from the Meditation Realm.

Can I just take a moment and say how fantastically flavorful Geyadrone is?

Normally one of my biggest problems with planeswalkers is that their abilities have a tendency to be very generic...they don't often 'tell a story' so to speak.

Geyadrone's abilities just ooze with flavor. Someone who has no idea of her lore can get her character quite easily by just reading her card. First of all she has three abilities that match each of her colors, which I always find nice. Secondly, her static ability fits perfectly with what we know from Geyadrone: she corrupts people to become her slaves. Finally, each of her abilities corrupt along with their other effects.

All her abilities combined just make one very flavorful planeswalker. I love that card.

I'm particularly glad her color identity matches up to Sol'kanar.
Though I'd really wish for a new version of him. Our just a reasonable reprint.

Sol'kanar was one of those unfortunate characters who in the olden days were brought in whenever they needed a manacing heavy.

Love the card (I'm still amazed how solid it was for its time) and the character is very tragic.

Anyone else also a bit miffed that (so far) we didn't get Ashnod, Gix or Leshrac?

I mean...i love Garth, Carth and Geyadrone.....but those are fairly obscure background characters, whereas the three i mentioned above certainly aren't obscure.

I was so sure we would get at least Ashnod and Gix...

I'm substantially more bothered that we don't have a new Orim yet

Not really, but it's based on probably an unrealistic hope of mine.

I'm hoping that WotC starts flavorfully theming Horizons sets while keeping the mechanics open. Even though the Modern Masters sets had different mechanical themes, they all kinda jumble together for me. One of the flavor things I've liked about MH2 is that there's more of a "clustering" of flavor callouts. The Brothers War and Ice Age books were written past when those sets had been released, so there's plenty of callouts to be made. I'm more hoping for a Modern Horizons: The Brother's War or Modern Horizons: The Book of Jodah in the future. Or even MH: God-Emperor Dragon, MH: The Hyozan Oath or MH: Wake of the Wishgranter

There's also Sinister Starfish as a mono- starfish now. This at least I like since we need more non- water types.

I adore the fact we finally have a new Dauthi card printed.
On the other hand, I find the sudden appearance of Hydra in Lorwyn to be jarring as hell.

I also like how Tavern Scoundrel plays with Tavern Swindler.

Alright, jeez, the set as a whole is actually so damn cool that I can kinda look past that Svyelun problem for now. I guess I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and hope they'll deliver a damn good explanation for Svyelun while also not repeating the same mistake once we see more of Dominaria. This year is a freaking rollercoaster for Magic, though, I'm receiving so many mixed signals...

Anyway, on to the flavour gems in MH2, because I want to be hyped and happy about this set. Then again, there are maybe three or four cards or so in this set that I don't like (including Svyelun), so picking the gems is going to be tough.

I mean, the obvious choices are obvious? Tourach, Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar, Carth, Garth (heh), Dakkon, Geyadrone Dihada, and Piru are clearly the heavy hitters here. If you'd shown me all of those names on your wishlist for this set, I would have shaken my head and told you to set realistic expectations, and yet here we are. And that's not even taking into account that ALL OF THEM are actually great designs that look fun to play and that fit the characters.

Piru is the only character other than the five from Legends where the Elder Dragon type makes sense and actually means what it says. I love the mechanical callback to the Legends cycle, I've always felt that the upkeep costs were an important part of their flavour and that the remakes from Core 19 were quite disappointing. I'll admit that the artwork on Piru could have been better, but I'll take it.

Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar and all her associated cards were basically all that I wanted out of this set ever since the first rumours of her. I love Madness/discard/graveyard shenanigans, and I was thinking about putting a 60-card Madness deck together again anyway, it's one of my favourite mechanics. Bonus points for her artwork and that of Kitchen Imp and Discerning Taste in particular. Absolutely everything looks like it's described in the story she was in... the imps, the walls of her kitchen, and they even remembered to put her Drudge Skeletons in the art! The quality of the art direction for this set in general has vastly improved since Commander Legends, especially when it comes to portrayals of established characters. We've come a long way since Toggo, Hans and Akroma... So, yeah, I'm going to build that deck with all the cards that belong in it. I guess I'll finally have to learn how to say her name...

The design template on Garth One-Eye might open up interesting possibilities for the future. "Cast a copy of card X" certainly saves a lot of space, though they'll have to be careful to not overuse it. I could see this being a flavourful option on planeswalkers and legends going forward, though. Maybe even for Greensleeves? Or Worzel and/or Thomil? That would be the kind of super old character where the Garth template would fit. I hope I can get my hands on Garth, might be a fun alternative commander for my Jodah deck. Arena was the first Magic novel I ever read (by sheer coincidence), so finally seeing Garth on a card means a lot to me. The art is a bit of an odd choice because it makes him look older than we ever see him in the story (he's 25 and around 30 in Arena and Shattered Chains respectively), and it shows him after he has regrown his eye and stopped wearing the eye-patch. His clothes are different and he doesn't carry a dagger, but considering he's much older than we've known him and basically retired, that makes sense. At least he doesn't carry his satchel either because he gave it to Greensleeves, so the art is internally consistent in its choices. I'm still kinda holding out for the young and brooding Garth we saw in Arena, though, a version that actually looks 25, is wearing his eye-patch, satchel, dagger and iconic black shirt and that you could play in a Mardu politics deck. You know, with mechanics like Goad or taking control of creatures etc., something that would feel like a character who's inciting riots and manipulating his opponents.

It's great that they took two 'main characters' for this set (Dakkon and Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar) and built themed cards around them. Batching flavour like this makes for a more satisfying experience in my opinion.

I also love the mechanical themes. I already mentioned Madness, but all the token matters stuff that also includes non-creature tokens is something that I've wanted to happen for a long time. (In fact, it's bascially what I'd use for a return to Mercadia among other things, because goods and resources really help to evoke a mercantile plane). I used to play the hell out of Investigate back in the day, and I totally want to build around that expanded theme. Oh, and the squirrels are great. That's exactly how you do 'cute and whimsical' in Magic without diluting the brand.

Oh, and I want to say thank you to whoever wrote the new flavourtext on Zuran Orb! Probably my favourite flavourtext in the set. I'm always happy to get more Jodah, and I'm still holding out for the return of Zur so we can get a final confrontation between them.

I wonder whether the coloured Mirrodin artefact cards are fom an alternate timeline, like Sarcomite Myr and Brudiclad, Telchor Engineer. It almost looks like the art on some of them (and the bridges) is trying out some subtle visual designs in the background that go beyond the original Mirrodin style guide and are trying to make the 'metal world' concept a bit more interesting and varied. Speaking of Mirrodin, it's awesome that they seem to be serious about that Phyrexian creature type, they've been pretty inclusive with the errata, to the point where even Livin Weapon now produces a Phyrexian Germ! Love it, that's exactly what I was hoping for.

One last thing I'm going to nerd out about for now: I've been wondering since the second I saw the art on Glimpse of Tomorrow... Is the city in the art supposed to be Sumifa? It might sound weirdly specific, but that's pretty much exactly how I remember the description in Song of Time. Irregularly shaped wards separated by walls, a citadel with a high tower in the middle, market stalls, middle-eastern and perhaps some Renaissance Italy vibes...

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So, yeah, all things considered, I think supporting this set and having fun with it is going to send a better message than not supporting it, despite the big, fat writing on the wall that something might be very wrong with Dominaria when we go back there. I've also noticed that Quirion Ranger is now a Ranger. Get it, because Drizzt Do'Urden is a Ranger. Because it's a class in D&D. Never mind that we would have had things like Scout and Warrior for that, no, we are getting another completely redundant creture type from D&D that adds absolutely nothing to Magic, just like Warlock. And if they really insist on treating Dominaria like Theros (or Toril) going forward and actually have real gods show up there to pander to the D&D crowd, I'm pretty sure that'll do it for me. That wouldn't even be a retcon anymore, I think it would be such a far-reaching and pervasive change that it would essentially be a complete reboot of Dominaria, a re-imagining of the plane as a D&D setting. Remember what it said in the announcement of 'Universes Beyond' : https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/a ... 2021-02-25

"For now, we're reserving the Universes Beyond branding for worlds outside those built by Wizards of the Coast. As to whether the Forgotten Realms are now canonically part of Magic's Multiverse, for now, the answer is no. But we may change our minds in the future if it makes sense and is a fun net positive for Magic and D&D." As I already said when this came out, the mere fact that they are openly considering this is an admission of creative bankruptcy. And yeah, of course D&D isn't officially considered part of 'Universes Beyond', because I believe its influence is here to stay. We might just see a big dose of D&D injected into Magic planes new and old. I hope I'm wrong, but if I'm not, Svyelun is only the beginning.

Add that to the possible leaks of a Cyperpunk Kamigawa, or the non-Magic IPs that are coming and that will forever be a part of the game, and the writing on the wall is looking big and foreboding indeed. But I guess I might as well cling to the cool stuff while we're getting it.

I really enjoying the flavor of the set, both old call backs and getting stuff even from early as Kaldheim and love how the way this set works it gives support to past mechanical stuff, such as clues getting some good support.

As far as investigate goes, I'm just glad at the idea we'll get new clues that won't have anything to do with innistrad hopefully. Also new food tokens.

I knew from the moment that Wizards was taken over by Hasbro that there would be corporate tempering....but UB is truly aweful. I HATE cross-IP's.....just....don't.

My attitude is: I'll keep enjoying sets like these, which are for us, the enfranchised players. All the UB stuff an D&D crossover stuff...I just won't look it over. And I know thst I'm probably a horrible person for saving this, but I will refuse to play against anyone using those cards. Not because I'll hold something against that individual for using those cards; to each their own, but because I won't enjoy a game playing against those cards...in fact I'm pretty sure I'll thoroughly hate it.

On Modern Horizons 2: love the Jodah Flavortext on Zuran Orb! I love almost everything about the set.

I'm sad that we still don't have a Gix, Leshrac or Ashnod card...I love those characters and I want to see them done right. And an EDH-playable Mishra while they're at it!

To be fair Mishra is actually viable: You use Possibility Storm (the best option), Blood Funnel, and/or Nether Void to tuck/counter your own artifacts with the Mishra trigger on the stack, then fish them out of where you sent them to get free stuff off Possibility Storm, a cheating discount with Blood Funnel, or the ability to ignore the tax you're imposing on everyone else with Nether Void. He's painfully reliant on those support enchantments, but actually really strong when he starts to do his thing.

Uh, you realize Hasbro took over WotC after Urza's block, right (and is sounds like there was interest for a few years. So there was probably some sale prep restructuring involved before the sale)? For the majority of the time Hasbro's owned WotC, it wasn't too bad; though WotC didn't exactly push narratively well to some prompts from Hasbro (Hasbro did ask what a mascot for the IP could be, which, honestly is actually a decent question. WotC were the ones who made the Gatewatch instead of choosing to up using something that required less narrative space like Fblthp or the Myr.). The whole corporate interfering stuff more happened after the other parts of Hasbro started to not work as well (which was normally tied to merchandizing for outside IP). So weirdly enough, the current issues are actually somewhat linked to the reception of the Disney Star Wars movies.

I'd be happy with scout replaced with ranger, sounds cooler and invokes more of what it seems what they want scouts to be flavorfully.



I love Innistrad so wouldn't mind. That said I love clue (and food and treasure/gold) since they made multiple arts for them and I just love that.

Whoo more Myr! Even a 1 mana myr! I've wanted one of those forever now.

https://scryfall.com/search?as=grid&ord ... yr+cmc%3D1
!?

Revisionist history.