I'm not surprised at all that Vehicles are back, I'm hoping like you that energy also comes back, and I agree with you that fabricate ISN'T coming back (just not enough design space)

They did mention multiple times that Energy as a mechanic demanded a lot of support. Making it just for one Set feels wrong.

That and it adds a whole extra layer of thing to track. Why do that for just one set? It'd be like if Scars had poison counters, and Besieged and New Phyrexia didn't.

They also mentioned that they made a huge mistake in Shadows over Innistrad block when they decided against bringing investigate back in Eldritch Moon. I doubt they'll make the same mistake two blocks in a row (though, the decision may have already been made by the time players provided feedback about investigate...).

Also, energy confirmed.

Which confirms what I've long thought...energy and vehicles return, fabricate does not.

You know what would be a good reprint for Aether Revolt? Burden of Greed.

Maybe bagels like Ornithopter too strong. But.... my crystal ball of story ham-handedness tells me will see a triumphant return of Kiran Naalar to end the revolution.

Maro has stated many times on his blog that they want death to matter, so they don't resurrect characters killed "on-screen". In fact, that Pia Nalaar was not killed on-camera was one of the bigger clues indicating that she was still alive.

I bet that in a rationally organized MTG plane, death wouldn't matter. They have magic... and isn't resurrection/immortality the first thing a rational person would want to learn ?
But of course, rationality and living forever is evil, love rules the world, harmony, freedom, emotions, flowers, FLOWERS, MORE FLOWERS !!!

Oh I didn't realize papa was killed in story. I thought he was "missing" (Lost Legacy)

They even considered that in this situation considering Kaladesh has little in the way of actual magic.

Wow, the ol' 2-fer-1 el wrongo.

Some far-off speculation:

1. Amonkhet or the next block will have -1/-1 counters. All the cards in Aether Revolt that deal with counters and especially Winding Constrictor makes me think this.

2. Amonkhet or the next block will have Evoke. Evoke is a "probably" on the Storm Scale, has some cool things going for it, was generally liked by players (I think?) and would make Revolt stand out tremendously. I'm less confident about this one, because the cards with Revolt are already reasonably strong.

A block with -1/-1 Counters is long overdue.

Yeah, I think -1/-1 counters will be a thing. Time to buy another color of dice!

Evoke / Revolt seems way too strong for standard... but there are some VERY powerful cards in this block.

Is it an Idle Speculation ? No, it is Quiet Speculation !

Evoke/Revolt is an AAA casual deck concept.

Probably yeah. If they bring back Evoke, they probably don't want to have to be too careful with the mechanic. Evoke is also reasonably hard to hate out. Like, if the block after Amonkhet has evoke, there's very little you can put in Amonkhet that weakens the Evoke/Revolt strategy.

They could put it in the Block right before KLD rotates out (I have no idea which one is that because WotC keeps changing their rotation schedule). It would be something powerful for players to have fun with, and if it ends up being too good, it would rotate soon after.

I doubt it, especially because of Winding Constrictor. the Constrictor's currently an all-upside ability, but it's not optional, so if there's bad counters running around it becomes a liability. if -1/-1s were coming soon, I suspect it would have given you the choice.