After the success of innistrad they probably realized they had struck gold with top down design, which is why majority of everything since has been built on top of a derivative of some real world mythos. Its probably why they have dinosaurs, pirates and other meme creature types as well. It may be creatively bankrupt, but this is what people who spend money on mtg want. They are probably just going to continue this and sprinkle in a return to ravnica / mirrodin/ zendikar/ dominaria, doing something like reveal phyrexian venser as the next big bad for the next few years until he enables bolas' eventual return (who will be corrupted by phyrexian oil no doubt).
Isn't magic the story thoroughly dead ever since WAR?
Oko is also legal in Vintage, for what it's worth. I'm sick and tired of the "can be Elk'd" argument - can we just ban Oko and call it a day? The way he warps everything is ridiculous.
As for the creature itself, it isn't too impressive in a format with StP and Karakas.
Nope. Because it's a 4 mana 1/1 that has some who cares abilities. The fact that anyone would even try to claim this card would see any play, in any format, is not even worth having a conversation about. Vintage? Nope. Legacy? Nope. Modern? Nope. Standard? Nope.
Most sets were top down design which in itself is not wrong.
They have been doing it since the beginning of the game.
What matters to me is the internal consistency of the world/story they create.
Ixalan was very meme heavy but kind of made sense in the theme they were going for.
As they have basically given up on telling a story by forsaking the block structure, the room for lore in one set is very narrow.
Instead of just doing a norse world which has ample material to work with they shoehorned the phyrexians back in because reasons.
I also don't mind revisiting older planes/settings and giving the people what they want.
However they completely forgot how to still make a set it's own thing.
Sets like WAR or DOM look more like fan fiction than something that advances existing material.
References for the sake of references.
I don't really follow the story since I despise the multiverse planeteers.
They use cards a lot better now to tell a story which is good, but the story they tell sucks ass.
Bolas was a terrible villain and thankfully not used for long.
The eldrazi were actually interesting but killed off to quickly to be effective.
Yawgmoth was an interesting character because he was an ominous faceless entity which didn't talk.
The agenda and means were rather clear, no need to twirl mustaches.
Without him, the phyrexians might as well be zombies or vampires.
Was there ever a real story in the last decade?
The rest of the old world died with Time Spiral.
Well it's a green and improved coastal piracy for what it's worth.
Commander players are probably already moist thinking about this.
I can also see this seeing some play in Standard and Pioneer giving mono/heavy green decks more card advantage.
It also counters most routes which green creature decks without Hendge active lose:
Mass removal and getting caught with your pants down since you've run out of steam.
Besides -/- or exile this furball survives everything.
Given the recent trend of printing ridiculous dorks like Questing Beast and Elder Gagaroth, I'm unsure if that was really necessary though.
This squirrel is purely for EDH and standard. Enjoy it for what it is.
-rob
I kind of hope that's the only Phyrexian in the set. The first tease on a new Phyrexian set came way back during Ixalan in the flavor text of a card. It'd be nice if they kept up that slow burn.
Do you mean Fountain of Ichor?
AFAIK they said somewhere that this was not a reference to Phyrexians but to the fact that oil is basically made from dinosaur remains.
Good thing they dropped the theme or people maybe would have remembered that Prohpecy was basically a set about a war for oil.
Also, teasing/slow burn is a bit difficult if you start with one of the heavies.
Well, dropping a "hint" in a masters set is bad anyway.
Also it was much less of a hint since people immediately spotted it and asked about it.
If anything we should have learned in the past years that wizards and subtlety don't go well together.
Same goes for good design in general to be honest.
WotC is like Rocket Launcher, but what they lack in subtlety, they make up for with FIRE.
Soul Sisters?
This seems pretty good in the right deck. It becomes a 4/6 flyer itself aside from a double Anthem when the condition is met. And since it isn't legendary, you can run multiples of it. Two of it already become two 6/8 flyers - that's pretty scary. Speaker of the Heavens seems to be tailor-made for it.
Edit: It's worth mentioning that this thing shits on flipped Delvers no matter what, which can be very relevant.
Edit #2:Foretell was spoiled:
Edit #3: Okay, it's trash, since the is a fixed cost.
Last edited by Barook; 12-31-2020 at 09:22 AM.
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