Lore After Hours: Cynicism and modern lore

[@Merunemes]

Totally agree with you. 2019 was the "unofficial" death of the lore to me, and now we have short stories with zero character development. Kruphix saw three multiversal threats: Bolas, the Eldrazi and Phyrexia. But forgot one: Wizards/Hasbro. I'm only continue interested in the lore by the fact that once was held by the shoulders of an old artificer.

[@radioguy20]

Wizards just publishes fan fiction now a days

[@danielkubicek1323]

Sadly, Wizards took the wrong lessons from the backlash about the books that came out around War of the Spark (Being War of the Spark, Forsaken, Throne of Eldrane, and Shattered Bonds). Instead of taking their time, crafting the story with love, and keeping their soulless coperate overlords away from story direction, they have now decided to make the stories as inaccessable and irrelevant as possible. Didn't read the story? Well, the pictures on the cards tell you enough. Don't know the setting? The settings are tropes now, so it's easy to understand. Find the IP has become directionless and stale? Don't worry, Universes beyond and secret lair lets you pick and choose what other IPs you love to play with! My rant above aside, they tried to make money on the story and met alot of pushback and failure, and so they stopped investing in it. After all, people will buy cardboard rectangles these days no matter what they slap on it so long as it gives them an edge. I'm probably one of the last people in my playgroup that follows the story at all, which has been truly disheartening to see.

[@faridrodriguez4696]

I hope everything changes for the better, Loreseeker. I've loved fantasy since I was a kid and have had fun with books, movies, and MMOs like the classics LOTR and WoW since I could read. I also love Lore, and since I started playing magic about 9 months ago, your older videos, as well as Lorebrarians and Rhistic Studies have captivated me in the MTG multiverse. Unfortunately now everyone is tackling other topics due to the lack of rich or poorly written stories. But I hope everything gets better eventually. Thanks for your videos, and Greetings from Peru! 😊🇵🇪

[@The_Loreseeker]

Well fret not - old lore is coming back! And hello!

[@peterestrada391]

The stories I was introduced to when I started in MTG were the Tarkir story lines and was reintroduced to MTG again through the original Ixalan story. What I like about the characters in those stories was how they gave the real perspectives from people and factions. Unfortunately I do agree that after the War of the Spark the stories are not up to par from what they had earlier. What really kills it for me is the many new characters they are trying to push without proper pacing, I could be wrong about this but should have at least build up the new characters without any interaction with any other known characters. In my opinion this could have made their aspirations and motivations much better and clearer. I'm no writer, though I always try to be creative when I play my games, yet I don't feel the consistency with any of the stories currently. Maybe I'm thinking about it too much or need to reread them again but until then there's not much interest in the current characters they are working with, at least in my honest opinion.

[@jj-sc1kq]

So, I didn't realize this was a Magic the Gathering video from the title. But it ended up echoing sentiments that I expected the video to have about other media. I feel like maybe the decline in good lore writing took awhile to get to Magic but it seems to be affecting everywhere. I have a request, I am thinking about making a video soon. I'm going to talk about the poor writing. May I quote you?

[@The_Loreseeker]

Of course

[@ericjimenez4360]

Good to see you still hard at work outting out mtg content lore! Hope everyone on the discord is doing well!🎉

[@The_Loreseeker]

It's going good!

[@ericjimenez4360]

@@The_Loreseeker good to hear! Tell everyone I said hello and keep up posting the og mtg lore stuff!

[@brandonjensen586]

I can only hope that after the stupid omenpath arc, that the omenpaths are closed and interplanar travel becomes impossible for a while. So that we’d be able to focus on individual planes once again Also 2 set blocks would be a good idea Hell, throw in only 4 major releases a year But these are just wishes of an oldhead

[@marcoottina654]

as someone who started in Darksteel and wished to enjoy the atmosphere of the older days, I totally agree

[@absoul1233]

My biggest thing these days with the story is lowering my standards because often times it's going to do that with the direction Wizards has been pushing forward with. Now can I say everything about the story is bad? Not necessarily. However, I always seem to see this sort of stuff be pushed with character directive stuff, asking questions about who's going where, what brought them here, and why they're willing to help. In all honesty not all of those questions are revealed, but at the same time I guess part of the thing is to question. I just wish we could find more direction with what they want to be doing for themselves without it being "generic archetype city" over here for most of the characters. It should be more about the plane and the set, I found that the details describing duskmourn to be fascinating in its own way, with the traps, the shifting house layout and all, but not this overall sense of dread that I was hoping for. The side stories had some okay ideas involved but many were very easy to see what was going to happen. Nonetheless I was happy-ish with the fact that added some context to begin with. Will I say the new stuff is as good as before 2019? Not really, am I happy that they have some story at all? I'd say so. Within everything I'm not sure how to feel about it all, but the Wanderer has been one of my favorite characters to come out of the more recent story spotlight characters, if not a little disappointed when a lot of good planeswalkers, lost their sparks. Samut and Narset were probably my most favorite during Amonkhet and Dragons, but sadly I don't see them as being big forces anytime soon. I'll say at the end, I'm not thrilled with the story, but I'd be even more disappointed if they didn't bother creating any dynamicism between characters at all. Biggest issues with writing stories, making decent characters with poor executions in their world.

[@pokemonred7365]

Next set all of the multiversal threat will be participating in a wacky race that will determine who would end or rule or eat the multiverse.......I really stopped expecting anything from WotC if I'm interested in a set I buy and play with the cards if not I don't buy it same thing for the story after Urza's and Gerrard's story I'm simply not that invested in it anymore. If I liked a set's story good if not then meh on to the next set. 😅

[@Will_Morand]

Comparing to video games you say? So is Duskmourn better or worse than the Neon Dynasty Visual Novel?

[@The_Loreseeker]

_Better_

[@untrainedear]

A splurge of thoughts: - First things first: I'm not a teenager any more. Nostalgia colours stuff more than I'd like. - At this point, the pace of release is in full self-fulfilling prophecy mode. We know stuff's gonna come along at what feels like a monthly pace (or close enough). It won't necessarily be coherently linked to what came before or what follows. It's what we expect, what we get, what we (almost never I) spend money on. Novelty's the name of the game, and the game is money. I think so many releases shows little trust in the product being sold and that we're absolutely sprinting towards the end of MTG's sustainable life (which, to be clear, is still years away). It is not an infinite game. Regardless, it's the reality and the context for everything else. And more importantly, I'm not the target audience. - Observation rather than judgement: you would/could never get a Weatherlight Saga (the story I grew up with) today. And that isn't in itself a bad thing. It was a whole generation ago. I don't think I miss any actual detail of that story. What I miss is its easy pace and (above all) accessibility. - The writers aren't necessarily less able than they used to be. They aren't given the time and structure to build story momentum like they used to be. I'm sure they'd love it. - Presented with more sadness than judgement (we've all watched more reels/Shorts etc than we'd care to admit): people's expectations of narrative media ain't what they used to be. Waaay more choice now. A snack will get eaten. A feast takes too much time for many. - A player's attention is pulled 1,000 ways a day. See above. Dunno whether new players would read a novel. Be nice to have the chance though. - The death of the vanilla card is the death of a whoooole lot of worldbuilding depth. The fact that that horse has well and truly bolted colours a lot of what's even possible to redeem in terms of lore/story accessibility.

[@TastySnackies]

2:40 - 3:08 The answer you’re looking for is that you’re no longer the target demographic for Magic’s story. This can be echoed with most IPs that span decades. For example, I love Star Trek DS9, and only that show, out of all of Star Trek. It’s okay that the other shows aren’t for me, because I still have DS9. Or even better yet, look at Star Wars - there’s an Original Trilogy fandom, Prequel Trilogy fandom, Sequel Trilogy fandom, Clone Wars/Filoni fandom, and a Star Wars Legends/Old Canon fandom. When you have a fictional franchise that spans across hundreds of stories over the course of decades, there’s a 100% chance that whatever it is that resonated with you can’t be replicated again. If you liked the lore from the mid-90s to 2019, then that sounds like you got nearly 25 years worth of stories that you enjoyed. And now for last five years, a whole new generation of players now get to have their own stories to enjoy and identify with.

[@DominatorLegend]

Except nobody but the the most mindless consoomer bugmen who open their mouths into a gaping black hole when they see a new UB collab are the ones enjoying it. Don't sugarcoat it, dude, newer lore is factually of much lower quality.

[@MRDLT00]

It just seems like the longer a media franchise goes on, it’s original creators move on, die, or sell it to a corporation, and then the corporation bleeds it dry and it becomes a shell of its former self. Take MTG stories, D&D, Star Wars, the MSU, and a host of others that now feel like they’re created by committee instead of hand crafted by artists and creators.

[@marcoottina654]

7:00 same: a series made out of people that constantly "butting" onto each other is .... void, shallow, not nourishing nor inspiring

[@ChronoHarvester]

I'm bringing up Ikoria again, don't try and stop me! Trailers, online tales, full novels, card flavortext, card names, a hundred different components of a card's art... Ikoria is an example of a set which suffered severe mismatch between advertising, card, and novel presentations of the culture and prominent features of the setting. Was it about bonding with a digimon or pokemon that has blue and orange morality compared to humans? Was it about humans trying to survive in a plane that treated them like an infestation, rightly or wrongly? Was it a celebration of kaiju versus kaiju battles? Ultimately poor communication and mismanagement resulted in three fractured ideas, each of which COULD have fit in as a normal or above-average plane, if it had detail and polish. Recent planes lack ambition. They aren't earnestly competing with video game and novel settings, they just bulk up on carbohydrates (low-risk, enticing tropes) without putting in the hours for chiseled ART. Old settings were like a grandfather clock or a nice mechanical watch, while new settings are like a jigsaw puzzle! The pieces fit together for stories, but the final product traded so much away. Too much.

[@The_Loreseeker]

The worst part is - the actual story was ok! If WotC wasn't so fucking misleading with ALL THE MARKETING, it would have been very well received.

[@TrentOrTreat]

Sounds a lot like what comics went through in like 2015. But I’ll say I’ve liked some stories. Wilds of Eldraine, Crimson Vow, and Midnight Hunt were fun. Duskmourn is a weaker story just in general. No stakes and no real horror so I think the story fails on that end

[@Neocyberman1]

whats wrong with the ixalan story? It seemed good, relatively self contained

[@The_Loreseeker]

Not only does it retcon the world of Ixalan hard, it removes the core identity of the plane by making a clear 'villainous' faction for players to 'hate' with the Legion of Dusk instead of making all 4 factions something the players had to choose between.

[@Neocyberman1]

@@The_Loreseeker Dont take this the wrong way but, I saw the shift in the presentation of the Legion of Dusk as being more about reckoning with their historical influences. They're conquistadors, it was eventual. As time goes forward on Ixalan, the idea of presenting them as on an equal moral footing becomes absurd. Particularly coming from a company that says its trying to make right by its community.

[@ericjimenez4360]

Considering the first block set up the emperor of the sun empire to be a villain and that the savior fo the legion of Dusk was going back to fix the way the LoD separate from any real world influences. That and the whole Dinosaurs and magic thing

[@ericjimenez4360]

I think it should be OK to view fantasy things that were influenced by real world things as different as that is what they are, fantasy. I mean there were many bad knights and nobles in history as we still think knighthood as a awesome thing (mostly) in fantasy stories

[@konstantinkrastev4478]

the ideas they have are better than the old fashioned ideas they had. The issue is that the old stories were better written. If they could have the new ideas which are more dynamic and interesting with the old story quality it would be banger, the issue is they have no competent writers and most of the community does not care

[@The_Loreseeker]

I strictly disagree - most of the 'new' ideas they have are either poor simulacrums of older ideas they've already done, straight-up revisits to old worlds, or shameless rip-offs of pop culture tropes. WotC is devoid of creativity insofar as I'm concerned.

[@konstantinkrastev4478]

@@The_Loreseeker Eh, I will take pop culture rip offs, than doing the 50th itteration of the brothers war, or the gate watch which is just bad avengers , or the "heroes journey" with newbie people like jace.