I can't believe...

We finally get a card called "Gossipmonger"...

And you know what its creature type isn't?

"Human Monger".

I'm quitting Magic the Gathering.

In all seriousness though I thing there's something to be said here, something that we've talked about before a number of times, about the lack of solid creature classes for, well, regular people. I assume the reason they didn't use Monger here is because Mongers do have a mechanical quality at least in the cards we've seen so far (though they've ditched mechanical specificity for creature types before, no?). But nevertheless, it kinda feels to me like there should be SOMETHING else here.

The loss of Lord and Townsfolk as creature types leaves a pretty big gap, and I really wish they'd bring back Townsfolk and create a Noble creature type. It's not the kind of thing that stands out on Zendikar necessarily but Innistrad or Ravnica? Yeah, those planes feel like they always have cards that are missing something creature type-wise.

Anyway, title of this thread is a joke and I'll probably change it later if I remember to but I'm kind of interested in seriously considering whether Innistrad would've been strengthened from a flavor perspective if it had Noble/Townsfolk creature types, or whether that's actually superfluous to the overall feel of the plane.

There's a card called Vampire Noble who's type is just Vampire. (He's also a common, so yeah...)

I've said it before, and I'll probably say it again: Merchant.

Yeah I think it stands out particularly on cards like that, or uh... what's the card that Barinellos always complains about for not having a Noble creature type?

It stands out most on cards that don't actually have a class, which is interesting because it suggests this is only a problem because the species/class thing is now so totally absorbed into our understanding of what a creature card should look like.

Merchant would be an excellent creature type as well. I like the generality of Townsfolk but yeah, Merchant would hit a lot of these ideas.

I don't know about Barinellos but I always complain about Imposing Sovereign

Oh maybe I was thinking of your complaints, sorry Szat.

Yeah that... that feels like it should have a Noble creature type.

On a similar note:



This one stands out to me because of the flavor text.

Well and also it jumped out at me in general because wow look at that art, it's so good.

I have an important question which is how did their coat also become a ghost

Residual Self Image. He really liked that coat.

It does look like a very nice coat, although it seems heavily frayed on the bottom...

I mean, gossipmongers aren't actual mongers or merchants. but yeah the lack of Townsfolk or Citizen there bugs me too.

"Townsfolk" was a great creature type. They really do need to bring that back.

creature types in general need a big rework

Most of my flavour pet peeves are about creature type, so I see where you're coming from. I agree that Citizen and Townsfolk are pretty evocative, but I think they'd clash pretty hard with places like Ravnica where everyone and their mum should be Citizen/Townsfolk by default in addition to their other creature types. I mean, the whole plane is one gigantic city, so... Gossipmonger and similar Innistrad cards just being Human doesn't bother me, though, it just fits their generic-ness. Maybe the people in the artwork all have different professions or creature types anyway; the posh old man to the left might be an Advisor, the other guy a Warrior or Artificer, the old lady a Scarecrow... Besides, a ton of elves, merfolk, goblins etc. only have a race type despite the inception of the race-class model. I'd even argue there are cases where the class type just doesn't belong there and the naked race type would have been most elegant on its own (e.g. Elvish Piper, Elvish Bard, Vampire Aristocrat or Rag Man, though the latter one bothers me for actual story reasons). What really bother me is all those tokens that just have a class type but should also be Humans (Soldiers, Knights etc.). I guess it would break Human tribal in half, but still.

I think things like Merchant or Farmer would be really good additions, and maybe Bard or Musician. Could cover a lot of generic folk without encompassing everyone who lives in a town or city. And seriously, Lord just has to come back. They also abolished Nymph and Werewolf and then brought them back years later, so it wouldn't be the first time that happens.

LT;NP

I second Merchant as a reinstated type. There's also been the annoying trend to ignore pre-Human descriptor types like Barbarian, Minion and Nomad (Barbarian is the most understandable to ignore, yet is the most referenced of those three in Modern). If they wanted a generic Tolksfolk type, I guess Citizen could work (Layperson and Plebeian don't quite work. Townsfolk naturally sounds plural.).

I would also like to point out that it confounds me that Drownyard Explorers is a Wizard and not a Scout.

I'm staying quiet because if I get started, I'm going to go berserk.

I tried to revive Citizen during Theros design, to no avail.

We have discussions about this stuff pretty regularly in R&D.

That said, Monger is quite possibly the worst creature type of all time.

How about Volvers? Can we have Volvers back?

And this may just be me, but I'd take a Monger over a Processor any day.



In all seriousness, Ethan, I know that contractually you have to be pretty tight-lipped about the behind-the-scenes stuff, and I totally get that, but are you at all able to tell us what goes into those sorts of decisions, as in why some types are taken out of the pool, as it were? Because if you are able to, and willing to, I would be fascinated to hear it.

Bring bringers back!

Also, I can't believe things like sable and mole make it through and yet we can't get.... No, said I wasn't going to get involved.

Though on the flip side, I notice that there is a wealth of race class style tokens this time. I applaud that. See, we aren't completely negative.

Bring back the barbarian class!

The coats easy - the shepherd wanted to mimicking werewolf skinchanging, so he had a necroalchemist brew up a solution that would preserve the life of whoever the shepherd flayed for skins. So his coat was alive, died with him, and appears as part of his geistliness.

I'd like to see Artist as a creature type. I think that if you get Artist, Citizen/Townsfolk, Merchant and Noble you can get far. And having those doesn't need to mean that you can't have creatures without class type any more, because you'd only use these when they add something, when their role in society matters or is pretty clear anyway.