Hello everybody, and welcome to another edition of the Magic Show. This week we’re going to be taking a look at the upcoming Alara Reborn and how its groundbreaking design could mean Legions 2.0 or a whole new world of fun. We also cover more Magic 2010 rumors, including the removal of mana burn and what it may mean for the game. Let’s go!
Alara Reborn Again
So this past Monday Wizards of the Coast had a very interesting Arcana piece. They gave us a brand new card from the upcoming Alara Reborn set…though it was completely lacking in rules text. So…Ardent Plea, a 1UW Enchantment…that features Elspeth appearing desperate…and it’s uncommon. What’s the big deal?
The big deal is that you have to look closer to see what’s so unique about this card. Because the uniqueness is Ardent Plea is card #1 in the set. What does that mean? It means that Alara Reborn will be a completely multicolor set. Or, better put, it will completely lack monocolor cards. So I’m sure we’ll still have artifacts and lands and things, but everything in the set appears to be multicolor.
What does this mean for you and Magic? Firstly, it’s never been done before. This is, once again, design and development space never attempted, and trying something new in Magic is always encouraged. Secondly, it’s scary because sometimes sets can become a slave to their theme. And by that I mean when you say a set is all “something”, whether that’s artifacts, enchantments, multicolor, whatever, you risk the problem of being “too linear.” The only true example of this is Legions. Legions was designed right smack in the middle of Onslaught block–the first tribal block that paved the way for Lorwyn–and every single card in it was a Creature. Yup, all 145 cards were Creatures. How did they ‘switch it up’ amongst all of these same-type cards? Well, that wasn’t exactly easy. The set was very narrow, causing interaction almost entirely in the combat step and nowhere else. Morph was there as well as Provoke and Amplify, but without the brilliant Lorwyn-introduced Changeling mechanic, Amplify was fairly limp and Provoke paired with Morph to keep things happening in a single step only.
However, you can’t argue with success. And Legions was, by all metrics at Wizards of the Coast, a success. It sold like gangbusters. But the Spikes of the world thought that set was subpar and didn’t want anything to do with it. Besides Akroma, Angel of Wrath, Phage the Untouchable, and some Slivers are there any real “successes” from Legions reaching beyond kitchen tables? (Not that there’s anything wrong with that)
So it is with some trepidation that the Magic community is warming up to this ‘All Multicolor’ thing. I mean, we’ve been inundated with multicolor for going on two years now, with Shadowmoor and Eventide’s Hybrid Mana and the tri-color Shards of Alara block. Conflux upped the ante with powerful and fun five-color cards, but all multicolor? Everything but artifacts and lands being multicolor? What about that? How will that ‘sit’? I think it will sit wonderfully. I’m not ashamed to say I’m 100% behind this move. This is a multicolor block, probably the last for years to come, and if we’re going to go whole hog for the last set, then do it right. Every single nonartifact, nonland card having at least two different mana symbols in its cost is a-okay with me.
The questions that arise from this are many, but the one that I keep coming back to is this: How will Wizards of the Coast develop 1-drop creatures, artifacts or enchantments in an all-multicolor set? Will they revert back to the use of hybrid mana, simply have no one-drops in the set, or will some new innovation come along? This is just one of the many questions that come up, and one we can look forward to in the weeks to come.
So for those who love multicolor, your wildest dreams just came true.
Mana Burnt Out
So a few weeks ago I had a show that focused solely on the upcoming core set changes headed our way this summer in the form of Magic 2010. In that episode I spoke of two major changes to the game: The first was renaming the “in play” zone to the battlefield, and the second was naming the “Removed From Game” zone Exile. While both of these have stood up to constant scrutiny these past few weeks, but the most major change was not covered in my last episode. What is it? How about this whopper:
Beginning with Magic 2010, there will be no more Mana Burn in Magic.
Whoa. Yeah. I know. Like, Keanu Reeves Whoa. This is big ladies and gentlemen. One of the first rules you had to understand was that mana is used to play–er, I mean, cast spells and that excess mana means you take that much damage. And also, that mana burn is loss of life, and is not preventable. It also doesn’t have a color, and oh, by the way, mana from your upkeep step doesn’t actually burn you until the end of your draw step.
Now the question is, and it’s a pretty brilliant one: Why do we have mana burn in the first place? Other than being somewhat flavorful–ie, you made so much mana it actively turned against you–there is not much else going for it. It’s just another rule that you have to learn when you first pick up Magic, and while it never comes up in regular gameplay, you can’t forget it or it may, god help me, “Burn” you in tournament play. Oh I made a funny!
Seriously folks, the more you think about this rule change, the more it makes sense. Now it hasn’t actually been revealed how they’re going to get rid of mana burn, and my guess is this: Mana in your pool will empty at the end of each step. This still allows Upwelling to work, and hopefully they get rid of that confusing mana-stays-from-upkeep-to-draw-step rule.
What is the upside of this rule? Well, a few cards get some upside and downside as a result. For example, look at Wake Thrasher. Now before this change Wake Thrasher required you to mana burn yourself in order to pump him up if you weren’t playing spells or dumping mana in an activated ability like Mutavault. With this rule change you can simply tap all of your lands at the end of your turn and be assured of providing him +X/+X each turn, where X is the number of lands you control. So that guy is much better in this regard.
However, on the flip side, look at a card like Spectral Searchlight. This card used to be a very interesting way of killing someone by giving them a free mana at the end of their turn they would have to deal with and usually burning from. Instead it becomes a very interesting Coalition Relic that can help your neighbor in a multiplayer game, but never help you otherwise.
In other words, the upsides don’t seem that great, and the downsides seem trivial. With this change it will be so much easier to teach players about mana management, and any confusion about damage versus loss of life is gone as well.
The best thing about this change is the design space that is opened up as a result. Wizards has often said it doesn’t want your lands to hurt you any longer, and that they will no longer do so as of Magic 2010. So imagine the following creature:
Conditional Beatstick
G
Creature – Elephant
Conditional Beatstick gets +3/+3 while your life total is 18.
1/1
Now if you look at that today you think “Holy crap, they just made a straight-up better Wild Nacatl.” But once you realize you can’t actively manipulate your life total in this way, it becomes a lot more difficult to achieve. By the same token, a simple Incinerate from your opponent can shrink this guy back to “normal” size.
How about this one?
Conditional Lifegainer
1W
Creature – Cleric
At the beginning of your upkeep, if your life total is odd, you may gain 2 life.
1/2
Again, this is easily abusable with the current mana burn rule, but much more difficult once you take that ability away. I could go on with these examples, but just imagine what you would do when suddenly your life total was no longer a fluid thing controlled by you, but rather the forces and effects the game provides.
This is another change that looks at Magic in the long run, allowing designers and developers even more room to flesh out life-based mechanics and cards. I for one look forward to our mana burn-less lives, and can’t wait for this rules change this summer. Be sure to share how you feel about this change in the feedback.
Odds & Ends
In this week’s last segment I wanted to cover a few quickies to tide us over.
First, look at the sexy new Conflux promos coming your way, in the form of Hellspark Elemental and Path to Exile.
But oh man, Path to Exile got all Guay-ed out. Look at how Guay that Path to Exile looks. I mean, seriously. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but how…Guay. Anyway, those in the Wizards Play Network, also known as the Gateway program, enjoy handing these out to your participants.
Moving on, Twitter is not just a vehicle for keeping track of Pro Tours, but also Magic personalities. Here is a short list of personalities you may want to check out:
twitter.com/misterorange – That’s me!
twitter.com/Top8Games – Brian David-Marshall
twitter.com/fivewithflores – Michael Flores from fivewithflores.com
I’m sure as the service gets more popular you too can begin following along with your favorite personality, and create your own twitter account. Too cool, I tell ya.
Lastly I want to mention my relaunch of cubedrafting.com. Over the past two weeks I’ve implemented a new content management system, written thousands of words about the Cube and its archetypes for the site, and got the new forums up and running where you can argue over such intricacies of choosing Ancestral Recall over Time Walk or vice versa. Feel free to check it out at your leisure.
And that’s it for this week everybody. Until next time Magic players, this is Evan Erwin. Tapping the cards…so you don’t have to.
Evan “misterorange” Erwin