Please Don't Do This Again

[@travis_approved]

Ngl magics story has far more potential than what wizards ever decides to do with it

[@dngerouds]

Not only story wise. We could take the color pie. Make an Anime thats mainly about EDH (so everyone has their pet-deck, that they tweak and change with new card releases). While we are at it. Have the protagonists and antagonists represent the color pie with their personalities. This shit writes itself.

[@tineye5100]

Too true. I can’t think of a single thing they’ve done outside of the card game that hasn’t been a failure.

[@phyrexian_dude4645]

The issue is that someone from WoTC or Hasbro always meddle in and fuck things up. Be either is rushed out of the door, abandoned in middle of development, impatience on letting it grow in popularity and/or plain simple greed. MTG: Battlegrounds had all the potential to become a fast paced casual MTG and now it would be perfect for mobile gaming but it was rushed out and abandoned after just 1 game. MTG: Tactics had the potencial to make diversify the game outside of cards to tactical miniature like gameplay but greed and lack of support killed it 2 years in. And that MTG animation that was announced like 4 years ago has not materialiced for god know why.

[@dendostar5436]

Word.

[@wiiblewobble]

THIS

[@nickman217]

Dack Fayden dying off screen and never getting a second card was criminal

[@maggiek8616]

He honestly could have been the Buy a Box promo. Or at least appeared in several pieces of art and flavor text throughout the cards in the set. Put Tez in the main set and just not printed one of Davriel, Teyo or Kasmina.

[@johnsanko4136]

At least the one card he got was a real banger.

[@jojodosjogos]

If there's anything that should be retconned is that. It was off-screen, the novel fucking sucks anyway.

[@SonictheBedHog]

Drew Tucker is the best MTG artist.

[@Mmoll1990]

@@SonictheBedHog Seb McKinnon by a kilometer.

[@DaijDjan]

In one of his many articles MaRo once talked about the importance of card art. How art tells the story. How art makes cards recognizable. How iconic cards make iconic art - and vice versa. With all these alternative arts, more than a dozen different template/artwork versions existing for some cards, this article nowadays reads like a satire.

[@PleasantKenobi]

What is the name of that article?

[@jinxed7915]

(MaRo) articles that later on age like milk are quickly becoming a trope in Magic sadly

[@stoephil]

I'd have no idea what happened in a set if it weren't for Magic Arcanum's "what happens in [set name]" series

[@MarkWomack11]

Same. Every set I listen and every time it feels like I’m being told about another person’s D&D campaign. Ryan does great work with often flimsy material.

[@ArmadilloAl]

0:50 It's nice that Wizards actually went long enough without creating a pitchfork moment that Kenobi was able to create a video about something just mildly annoying for once instead of moving straight from one pitchfork moment to the next.

[@cuckoophendula8211]

Oh gosh yeah, I totally hate off screen deaths. Particularly in my mind were when Glissa became compleated in her sleep and Slobad "fell in battle" before Scars of Mirrodin. Like...there was no mentioned struggle or story about the old Mirrodin protagonists unceremoniously getting corrupted

[@underscore_5450]

I've always thought Venser was a pretty cool character and then he just wasn't brought up forever and ever until he's suddenly compleated?

[@drpibisback7680]

@@underscore_5450 Venser died the last time we were on New Phyrexia, sacrificing his life to restore Karn with his spark. So there is a reason why he disappeared for so long, his corpse was likely compleated some short time after his sacrifice but we didn't see that happen so it could be a surprise for All Will Be One (or, more likely, they didn't come up with that development until recently).

[@Sevifor]

And then they brought Slobad back, again, and corrupted him, again, and wasted him on a throwaway role in a side story. Slobad deserved better coming off the ending Fifth Dawn.

[@rolandking640]

SLOBAD DESERVED BETTER

[@rolandking640]

@@Sevifor I didn't read your comment but I'm glad I'm not the only one. Glissa and Bosh where cool too and should have gotten better treatment

[@tipulsar85]

Something tells me that the alternate timeline arts was almost a Secret Lair, but they were told that it was "good enough for the main set's alt art".

[@lysander3262]

"Let's not commission more when we could use what we have" or "No time to commission more, just send it" or "Players say fewer secret lairs, cut this lair and just use the art in the set"

[@SingerOfW]

Theros Beyond Death just reminds me of how it came out soon after the War of the Spark novel outrage, so Wizards had to announce they're going to write the story in-house from now on, except the Theros story will have to come out later because of it... and then it never did. Well, it did, but as a short summary which is probably 404'd by now.

[@goonerbear8659]

Elspeth Conquers Death and gets to go home for a spell...only to grab the Idiot Ball and the magical nuke they were going to use to destroy New Phyrexia at the last second and die again anyway. Or be trapped in a void of nothingness that may as well be death. Which is...kinda dumb since she's...seen how Phyrexians wreck other planes and would be someone with a major grudge against them. And a major asset considering her past with them. Oh, well, guess they needed to write...something...and have an excuse for March of the Machines.

[@jasonblauet8838]

The artwork for Hero's Downfall was removed for two reasons according to MaRo, (1) it would have been a huge spoiler for the end of the story (2) the card is black but both elspeth and heliod are white, so they thought that was confusing

[@yoav.kats6328]

Vince is slowly becoming the voice for the Vorthos community and I'm all for it.

[@ALTR_no_EGO]

I gotta say, it kinda bugs me that there's less flavor text on cards. I get that everything has like 5 keywords and cool abilities, but one of the reasons I liked Jaya was funny flavor text quotes. I actually built a deck with a Jaya sub-theme, and I didn't know any lore until after she got killed.

[@cooljoe500]

Compleated Wanderer is cute so it's fine. Also, she doesn't have the compleated mechanic, so it's kinda obvious she is not really a phyrexian (yet)

[@andycic.544]

I stand by the fact that the "what if" treatments should have been anatomical diagrams of how Jin Gitaxias was planning to compleat each of the walkers a-la brothers war schematic art. It would be clearly a what if scenario and would have led to cool spoiler season where we see which ones get confirmed.

[@alexloree6208]

To be fair, while they didn't have a card for it, they did have a story written depicting Niv-Mizzet's demise, the Gathering Storm by Djanjo Wexler, a novella released online for free. Unfortunately due to varying issues (Contractual? I don't recall the exact reason) it was released a month or so after War of the Spark, leaving players perplexed. So they did intend for it to be explained, but things didn't work out that way.

[@benpuffer7891]

100 % agree that the core set cards should tell the canonical story. Save the "what if" for Secret Lair.

[@oneinfinity]

What pissed me off a little with regards to the Phyrexia set is that Lukka and Nissa got a card each, even though they are barely in the story, while Tibalt and Elspeth, who feature much more prominently and are referenced on other cards in the set, didn't. I guess it's about spreading out the planeswalkers evenly among colors in the set, but it seems almost insulting how two more planeswalker characters just get killed off again unceremoniously without even giving them a card for their final story appearance.

[@clawtooth35]

we don't even know that Elspeth is dead

[@jemm113]

Wait they actually killed Tibalt?!?

[@servantofcygnus]

We don't even know that Elspeth is dead. What are you even talking about?

[@clawtooth35]

@@servantofcygnus you mean me?

[@PushyMeas44]

@@jemm113 he fell from a great height and went still. He could be dead, but he's probably not. I assumed he'd get an alchemy card, but he might show up in MOTM.

[@asaffin1]

"And I'll reveal this sorcery, and flip my Delvers." "What are you-- are you scooping?" "No, I'm flipping my playmat."

[@NezMog]

Super small thing, but Oketra has a bow in both her appearances? It's not even obstructed in either art?

[@atlys258]

Man I love the flavor text on _Compleat Devotion,_ it's kind of heartbreaking because it shows us even though compleation has inverted and perverted his ideals and mind to serve Phyrexia, we can still see that it's still Ajani.

[@OGDanteZero]

I personally loved the manga art versions of all the planeswalkers Phyrexianized but I also agree to separate the what if stories in a separate set.

[@astrid_257]

IMO the issue is having the alternate story before the primary story is over. Like the alters are cool, but I would say the story could also be improved so people are not confused about alternatives. (Like Planeswalkers taking a back seat and going back to blocks so we could flush out a set for instance).

[@irishbug4744]

Some writing advice that helped me a lot with D&D and that rings true here is that the story is only whats put in front of the audience, the rest is just lore. If the medium is the cards, Elspeth's death isnt a part of that story, its just lore. By not separating these "what if" walkers from the main set, theyre inadvertently putting these compleated characters into the place players are expecting to be told the story, which causes confusion. These walkers shouldve been a secret lair or something, and WotC should respect the story theyre trying to tell by actually showing the imporant beats on cards. If you have to look it up on a wiki to learn it, its not a part of the story.

[@kyubi78]

I think it's criminal that we never got a card showing Tamiyo being mind broken by Emrakul to seal her away or Jace's fever dream. That was the most interesting beat in that story and most people would just think the good guys beat Emrakul from the cards.

[@Sevifor]

Well, the moment kind of got a card in Imprisoned in the Moon, but that doesn't do a good job of showing what *actually* happened.

[@ILikePi31415926535]

On another note, I find it increasingly difficult to A. Keep track of how many alt arts there are in a set and B. How you even get those alt arts There's like 4 different levels of foil between oil slick, normal, step-and-compleat, and non-foil and then there's 5? different Elesh norn alts (6 or more counting Phyrexian Text) and I have no idea how many of those are exclusive to which product or even available (like is Junji Ito Step-and-Compleat foil a thing?) Personally I feel like 1 alt art treatment per card in the main boosters and 1 other in set/collectors for special cards like Norn is plenty and not too hard to keep track of

[@rinmathews9337]

I for one hate black and white versions of cards. It makes the card 10 times harder to recognize when playing against it upside down.

[@johnsanko4136]

They're designed that way so German U-boats cannot easily determine their speed or direction.

[@malakimphoros2164]

They make for nice colouring activities

[@Rewwgh]

Aside from a couple exceptions (like Liesa), they are also uglier than their colorful counterparts.

[@copycat2696]

Things I learned in this video: Niv-Mizzet died?? Yeah, they got some work to do to make the story clearer through cards I think too.

[@doublee343]

Very interesting concept for a video! It’s cool to hear your opinion on stuff like this. Im personally engaged in both the competitive gameplay aspects of mtg as well as the lore too, so it’s great to see others who feel the same :)

[@KingOfDepravity]

With the mangaka alt art treatments I would rather them be in everything then be exclusively in collectors boosters like before. And I neeeeeeeed to know how, and when Ajani got compleated😂 they always do this to my favorite characters; Elspeth being my other favorite, let’s hope we get to see/read/whatever happened with all that energy from the blast. I am convinced she will return full on angel,and bring with her an angel army from across the multiverse!(or just urza lol)

[@zztzgza]

He got compleated during the Dominaria United story, between the first and second chapters. He held off an assault of phyrexians, got captured, compleated into a sleeper agent and only discovered that he was compleated at the battle of the mana rig.

[@jamesjohnson1290]

For the "what if" art, I would love a set literally called "what if..." kind of like the UN sets, but featured cards with the alt arts. It'd have fun reprints, would be fun for chaos drafts, and could feature sick art or unused art. WotC has a TON of art they rarely use, which is why they released a bunch of planchase packets for D&D ages ago. As for moments that need art, the big pivotal moments. Koth's sacrifice from the Battle for Mirrodin block is something I've always yearned for.

[@breawycker]

I mean we kind had a "what if" set with Planar Chaos

[@willvmurdaugh]

I'm glad that someone has brought this up. These "what if they had been compleated" treatments should have been given a "what if..." flavor text or something along those lines.

[@OGNoNameNobody]

Here's a interesting aside to that line of thinking. I bought a single Set Boster of ONE over the weekend, and had a good pull: 2 Copies of *Kaito, Dancing Shadow* - one regular, one "special treatment" version. But, here's the rub; if you, Vince, had not just told me the special treatment was "alternate reality" versions, I would have had *NO IDEA* that was the case.

[@lorenfarque1571]

I'd love a card for the Brother's War short story moment where Elspeth takes Jaya's final gift from Jodah and Kamehamehas an airship.

[@Everythingwastanke]

I really struggle with multiple arts of the same card in the same set. When it was a special situation that was kind of cool, but now with 10 versions of some cards for seemingly no reason it's just distracting.

[@mols556]

Also, I despise getting the same rare in multiple packs because there are so many treatments of the same card. This is part of the problem of overprinting product. I thought these special treatments is what Secret Lair was for.

[@LunaLasceria]

Why do you think that alt art / treatments increases your chances of getting the same rare in multiple packs?

[@Ashen-Crow]

I hate when characters are undermined in their own story, like, the whole Ikoria thing started because Lukka and the cat, but the cat got no legendary creature. In the same vein Tibalt was hugely important in the phyrexia story, but he died without getting a compleated card.

[@MusicoftheDamned]

Ikoria was just the worst instance of this in general, honestly, given we got flavor text on cards that outright contradicted the actual story, which is somehow worse than Theros 2's lack of story and which I think is part of the reason no one really cares about Lukka. Hell, Ikoria was such a mess that on top of the cat never getting a legendary card even just at like uncommon rarity, I'm still unsure when or even if Zilortha ever actually got its regular variant printed even though it finally shows up on Scryfall. Dishonorable mentions to War of the Spark for killing off both Niv-Mizzet and especially Dack Fayden outside of the cards.

[@BIGxWIGGLY]

Did Helium Squirter get compleated? Couldn’t find any information anywhere lemme know

[@D-Skotes]

The best part of the story is Jace: Lukka don't try and fuse with Phyrexian it will corrupt you. Lukka: Aight I won't. *30 minutes later* I'm gonna fuse with this Phyrexian beast.

[@cooljoe500]

Based Lukka. Wouldn't take any advice from Jace.

[@D-Skotes]

@@cooljoe500 I mean I'm all for it Phyrexian Lukka is the only Lukka I like playing

[@Sevifor]

In fairness, that's pretty on-brand for Lukka's character.

[@robertfisher6685]

New Capenna's story was very much at odds with the story on the cards. Giada rejoins the angelic chorus after creating Luxior and the story explicitly asks if the angels would return to protect the city. There are like 10 angels in the set so I guess the answer is yes. Also if the flavor texts are to be believed of somewhat mixed feelings about it.

[@DerekScottBland]

I miss when the lore was more out there. I will always love Fallen Empires for being the first set to have a major story running through the cards and flavor text. I always looked forward to buying a Fat Pack to get the latest novel. Now no one knows WTF is going on in the lore.

[@stepniak18]

I'm not a story guy but I'm heavely into art and art on Vraska and Nahiri cards is criminal. There is a lot of bad art in this set but these two take the crown.

[@chrayez]

This stuff confused me briefly too. I took home a box of set boosters after my prerelease and one of the first art cards was the alternate Thrun. I stared at it for a while, because I was pretty sure I remembered Thrun’s card art and he wasn’t phyrexian. But maybe I didn’t notice something. Or maybe I’m misinterpreting the stylization of this alt version? And I stayed confused until a later art card was the alternate Phyrexian Kaito, having known he definitely wasn’t compleated, and I finally realized they were what-if alt-art. What made it most confusing in my opinion is that they essentially made 2 different series of alt arts that used the same style - phyrexian creatures, and what-if’s of resistance fighters. The more common series of alt-arts was already-phyrexian creatures, so you’re more or less primed to expect everything in that style was always phyrexian. And then you see one from the other series and it comes with confusion.

[@jasonholmes5714]

I saw Seb McKinnon’s name on the page in the first clip of the Nils Hamm promo. Didn’t get to look back to see why. Anybody see why?

[@slasherstumbles7221]

Imagine if they had different names like the Godzilla cards did, but it's just a name representing the Planeswalker as a phyrexian agent, with the actual name in the little sub text below the name

[@Ash-Bun]

To answer your question! The Amonkhet God that shoots arrows is Oketra! Even in her God-Eternal artwork you can see her drawing back her bow. Also nitpick but what's with God's with bows not having reach? Both Oketra and Nylea use bows but neither have reach.....

[@ChrisPhelior]

I remember reading the flavour text on Firemind's Vessel and going "Wait, what?"

[@TheGreatBooster]

War of the Spark was such a story swing-and-a-miss in so many ways. I agree about Niv-Mizzet for sure, but at least he got to have a explanation of his rebirth. The story and the set were riddled with examples of narrative hand-waving of beats that should have been important but were glossed over: "Oh hey! Feather's back! Are we going to learn where she was all these years after Aurelia staged a coup against her? What mended the rift between the two angels so she could fight alongside them?" Nope. She doesn't even get flavor text on her card. "Aw here we go! Sorin and Nahiri are throwing down after the latter tried to destroy the former's plane in an act of revenge! How will this resolve?" According to the novel it gets resolved off-screen? And they just kinda... put things aside to fight Bolas? It never comes up again. I'm glad things have gotten better since then story-wise, but I still haven't gotten over the blunders that took place in that set.

[@Sevifor]

The Sorin-Nahiri grudge match getting shelved for the good of the multiverse itself, I can kind of see, but I can't believe that Sorin and Nahiri would just put it down and go their separate ways after the events of War of the Spark.

[@asomelord]

I loved Magic's story. I remember watching videos from Seibenlore before i even knew about the articles on the mothership, to learn more about the political situation between The Khans in my first set. I can still quote Emrakul's final words "They're all my pieces Jace Beleren, i just grow tired of playing". I remember checking every Wednesday multiple times for the newest Ixalan story to drop. I remember loving Ob Nixilis absolutely dominate the Gatewatch on Zendikar. I remember how Lazav's reveal with the baby in the Guilds of Ravnica story reminded me of my first encounter with The Grey Fox in one of my favourite games of all time, Oblivion. And then War of the Spark happened, and now i couldn't care less about MTG lore

[@TheDerpyDeed]

I also don't know who does and doesn't die in the lore, but I'm aware of the alternate outcome thing that they keep doing - for instance I had Mirri the Cursed in a deck and she looks cool so one quick google search later and it turns out it's an alternate ending to a vampire battle or something... idk it was too romance-y and I lost interest. but yeah! alternate outcome! cool. Imo, it'd be awesome if there were several set timelines that we jump between in sets. and maybe eventually they could clash and you'd get compleated heroes fighting some type of ascended heroes or whatever.... the timeline thing is just being used as "ah whatever, any outcome is fine, who even reads these anyways" and not as an actual plot point.

[@rossstone3885]

Tamyios safekeeping from neon dynasty is probably my flavour card for lore... Says so much in just one sentence of flavour

[@baneprobably]

My prereleases did not have these problems you had. I love these alt arts. I'm glad they were available in draft boostes. shrug emoji

[@underscore_5450]

Yeah, Magic's story suffers from so many problems and I really don't think some alt art cards are to blame. Most players are just incredibly disconnected from the story because it's mostly told in supplementary sources. I'd be much more invested in the story if it didn't feel like I was only catching brief glimpses of it through the window of a moving car.

[@lazybone9208]

I had such trouble watching the Pro Tour this past weekend. I actually switched to Rocket League on Saturday because I kept having to check TCGPlayer for what I THOUGHT the cards on the table were. Way too many alternate versions: full art, partial full art (not sure what to call those, but you all know what I mean) & these impossible-to-read cards like your wanderer. This might be more of an issue for those of us viewing matches online and trying to keep up with play (god help us if Luis and Shota play with alternate version cards). But, genuine question for the competitive players (I haven't played comp since ~2016): is it annoying to play in highly competitive settings with all these weird versions of cards floating around?

[@777CrimsonChaos]

I think one of the more egregious things with the storytelling through cards was having the Ikoria cards tell one story and then the Ikoria book having something totally different happen for the main highlights. Heck, for the last Theros set all we got was the story through the cards and a lazy “summary” of the story events. Not to mention in WAR we see the Chain Veil shattered when Liliana used her full power against Bolas in the cards, but in the book she just apparently drops it and shenanigans ensue

[@christopherealy8025]

It should have been a what if style secret lair. We also could have received mythic reprints of older versions of the walkers, like the wanderer from neon dynasty, and koth of the hammer from mirrodin besieged. It would have been a cool secret lair.

[@kaycorey]

"Which God fires arrows in Amonkhet?!?" ...Oketra.

[@ix8750]

I think its simple, compleated Planeswalkers have Phyrexian mana symbols. Anything else is alternate art if they were compleated in an alternative story or something.

[@christina.morris]

I'd definitely like them to commit to Draft/Limited boosters being focused on the story for the set-honestly, I kind of think alternate art should be confined to Set/Collector boosters and Secret Lairs entirely (outside of bonus sheet stuff like the Mystical Archive/Masterpieces/etc).

[@ilyafoskin]

I wouldn’t even want them in set boosters either. Leave them in collector boosters and give those boosters a reason to be called collector boosters

[@Timmyfigs]

Agree 100% about sticking to the story in draft boosters. WOTC line lately has been "not every product is for every player", and it would be great if one of the products was THE place to go for story elements.

[@АйдоралСмертестойкий]

Completely agree. I am considered a lore nerd in our small local MTG community and if I had a $ each time I was asked "wait, have they been compleated too?!" I d buy myself a booster box by now. Its just plain confusing storytelling.

[@doompulse4551]

This exact thing happened to be at pre-release with not recognising the card my opponent had played only to realise it was the same card I had just played only with a sketch type art. I've also lost track of who's alive, dead, compleated or whatever. I opened a compleated Tyvar, so as far as I'm concerned he's now a phyrexian. Not sure about the others.

[@dragonskies9080]

inb4 Teferi fixes/breaks the timeline to save the compleated planeswalkers and the "what if" versions become compleated canon. 🙃

[@ty_84_plus]

This finally made click something that I couldn't quite put my finger on in the 6+ years I've played this game. Well put, thanks Vince

[@Rheinguard]

No, please don't give them an excuse to ONLY put alternate art cards in Collector and Set boosters.

[@Habizbah]

The Tempest block beautifully captured story moments on cards and left me hungry for more. The Tempest set had a rules book with a story insert of about 10 pages and was riveting. But without reading any of the actual story, cards like smite and scapegoat let you connect a lot of the dots of what was going on in the story on Rath.

[@leonfriedemann9151]

I like the new art for the planeswalker, but I miss the usual colourfull kinda normal but cool looking borderless ones in the set. In my main deck I went with full art planeswalkers and the black and white tyvar sadly doesn't fit in 😢, even if the card is pretty cool beeing able to activate shigeki, dauthi, fiend artisan and dorks direct when they hit play and beeing able to recure them, love it. But for me there is no version to put in 😞

[@daneofdanger]

Learning the story of Tempest and Urza's blocks through the cards is a big part of what made me love magic

[@leathemosa9897]

Great video Vince! Love your concise and personal way of speaking- you always manage to make WOTC's confusing paradigms much easier to parse and understand, creating thoughtful arguments that always gives me more to think about.

[@underscore_5450]

Atraxa has a daughter named Ixhel (face of one of the new commander decks). Ixhel was ordered to kill Geth by Atraxa who was ordered to kill Geth by Elesh Norn. Ixhel killed Geth and used his remains to make Vishgraz (the alternate commander for the deck) but was forced to abandon him after Atraxa learned of his existence. None of this is reflected through cards (as far as I know) in either the main set or the commander deck. There's even some hints that Ixhel might end up defecting from the Phyrexian hive mind but we probably won't see that reflected on paper until after it's already happened.

[@PleasantKenobi]

Holy shit. I missed all of this.

[@Sevifor]

Ixhel uses some of her own body to make Vishgraz as well. She tore off her wings. So I wouldn't expect her to keep her flying keyword if she shows up again. (side story Phyrexia: All Will Be One, A Hollow Body)

[@Enja_Near]

This is one of very few situations where decapitation does not equal death. Geth was just a talking lich head until he made a contract with Sheoldred and was given a Phyrexian body. Through sheer force of will he prevented his head from being compleated, until Ixhel fused his head with her wings and an elf that was guarding Geth's throne room. This is also why Vishgraz is White (Ixhel) black (Geth) and the elf (green)

[@lenajohnson6179]

It is VERY important to know what your cards are when you go to a tournament I think, because this sort of card confusion does get in t he way of fair play... as a simple example, I think the onus is on the owner of a textless card, to know exactly what it does AND to explain to their opponent exactly what it does because textless cards can be sooooo easy to cheat with. This isn't really a problem with just 'alternate arts' beyond just making sure each player realizes which card it's supposed to be after it comes down, afterwards they can always just read over it to make sure there's no funny buisiness.

[@P0RG0N]

I pretty strongly disagree with this video - I understand and agree with your point about story being told in the main set, but - from my perspective, the fewer alternate art treatments that are *exclusive* to premium products, the better. We can see this effect in this set even with the oil-slick variants. I really like that Solphim but I'm never going to pay you know, 90 dollars for it, just because it's locked behind a limited and expensive product. In my opinion, I think all versions of a card should be at some level accessible in draft packs - ranging from "1 in X" alternate art treatments to "1 per box" masterpieces. More expensive packs can skew those numbers, guarantee hits, what have you - but I think they should at least be at some level, possible to collect in regular play and collecting. I see a lot of suggestions that premium art variants are the silver bullet solution to Magic being a collectable and playable game and I kinda get the idea - that Solphim from earlier, the base cost is something like 5 dollars, if I -needed- a solphim to play with, I could pick one up pretty easily. However, the art is part of the game too. I don't think having versions of cards that are made scarce to be exclusive to the most wealthy collectors is a good practice

[@FishMr3]

I disagree for this set in particular, there were plenty of major plot points on the cards. From art on the cards for this set, we're shown at least three of them, Jace, Nahiri and Vraska, becoming Phyrexians on multiple cards. Vraska has the edict spell, Jace gets bring the ending and a draw spell, the two of them share Phyrexian arena. Nahiri gets her "final stand" on a card and also gets thrill of possibility showing her mind in two states as she's turning. We also get Elspeth escaping with the Sylex, her battle against Ajani, Tyvar's battle against Tibalt, the Wanderer being unable to stay on the plane, and more I'm not sure Lukka gets any cards dedicated towards him being compleated, but he did get a full story article for it. The big miss for me was that Nissa, a pretty damn major character, got compleated *completely off screen*. The last we see of her is her running away as Vorinclex and Glissa send a newly turned Lukka after her. As for the planeswalker cards themselves, it felt relatively obvious. Not just because of the normal printings showing all the non-phyrexians safe and sound, but also because all the Phyrexian walkers are mythics rather than rares, have Phyrexian mana and have the Compleated mechanic on them, even in the alt art treatments.

[@BCWasbrough]

Oddly, it was even worse in the past. There were many named characters shown on cards from Invasion, Odyssey, and Onslaught blocks who were never mentioned in the books. It brought up all sorts of lore questions that WotC never cared to answer.

[@veznan0197]

This is literally the first time that I'm hearing that Niv died, even with reborn I asumed it was just him absorbing the power of the guildpact from Jace

[@dantebeleren]

Lukka is another space of cards and lore not matching, specifically in Ikoria.

[@GRtogetaBIC]

I understand, at prerelease I had the rat, the flyer and another I can't remember only with altered artwork and more then one time I had to read or look at an opponent's card only to realise it was the normal artwork. I felt like an idiot.

[@JesseSesler]

A lot of my playgroup refers to ALL of the planeswalkers in the ONE set as cpmplaeted 😅 As the dork I am, I then explain the actual story, and that those are only "what if" arts. But I definitely think the story could be better explained, and that wizards should capitalize on the story, as it's such an interesting part of the game imo

[@ashleypatak5320]

The planeswalkers showcase art threw me for a loop too. Especially Tyvar’s. I struggle to figure out what I’m looking at.

[@Enja_Near]

he has no lips or cheeks, oil shooting out of his eyes, and he's throwing an oil-soaked punch.

[@danielsniff6405]

I can see where you're coming from, and I totally agree to some degree. But man, the compleated alternate arts look so sick though. Basically all of the alternate arts look cooler and more distinct than the actual planeswalkers that got corrupted in Canon.

[@milesthomas932]

I agree Vince. If i was in charge I would try and sync the story line with a novel of high enough quality that even non players would want to read it. Then you could get market synergy going and I also think it would improve the play experience if more people knew what the fuck is going on in the card art/flavor etc...

[@freeejazzz]

Great point! You put into words what I had been feeling but couldn't articulate.

[@STVMcarbondragon]

I would 100% agree about not liking the alternate reality Walkers being in Draft boosters but I'm afraid Wizards will take that as "don't put alternate art of ANY kind in Draft boosters". If that's the concession for getting the Showcase versions of cards in Draft packs, I'm kind of okay with it.

[@fordesgol7947]

Yeah i thought so too, it brings so mich more depth to the game with all those story spotlight cards. I love to live the story through cards

[@WigglyWoobah]

I'm with you. I was under the impression that all ten ended up dying because of the alternate art cards.

[@lukeerlewein7473]

I really like the alternate styles for the Planeswalkers I want them to keep doing this.

[@aegisofhonor]

same thing happened with Serra, she simply was said to have died to "an unknown assassin" long before any of the other parts of the main storyline of Magic even happen (several thousand years even before the Brother's War). I think this was a bit of a cop out and it was never explained on any card and only I think 1 or 2 cards even reference the death of Serra in any way (one being one of the imfamous "banding lands", Cathedral of Serra, which does not have any flavor text and does not explain it's significance to the story in any meaningful way).

[@jdlazin]

I get what you're saying. Definitely an awkward moment and I wouldn't be opposed to special treatments being restricted to special boosters, but in general am fond of any pack having the potential to have really swag stuff. Sometimes all I can find is a draft pack to crack. I agree that important story moments not being on cards is more bothersome. RIP the Dack Attack

[@sandwichboy1268]

I think alternate treatments and alternate reality cards have a place, they just weren't done the best here. For alternate reality cards, they should at least use the planar chaos color-shifted frame. This could become the "alternate reality" frame, and WotC could even show them off in the normal frame during previews to keep the mystery up! For alternate treatments, this is going to be controversial, but they should stay in collector boosters. They need to stay distinct from draft boosters, and this is both a good way to do that. This would also leave more room for collector boosters to be packed with guaranteed value while still being more expensive than draft boosters

[@manarager3413]

Another story I have for you involving the exact same flying 2/2... Bonepicker Scourge and Thrummingbird. Spot read they're very similar looking cards sitting across from the table with wildly different blocking strategies. I've blown out an opponent who thought the alternate art Skirge was a Thrummingbird. The visual clarity is starting to become a problem.

[@rcarlson787]

I'd never seen Vanish Into Eternity until 5:24 in this video and I initially read it 3 less, not 3 more. I mean I'm still gonna pick up a copy or 2, just not as many as when I thought I missed the original spoiler for a powercrept Swords to Plowshares.

[@PleasantKenobi]

It isn't a powe crept Swords. It costs 6 mana to remove a creature.

[@wiiblewobble]

The trade off here is that seeing an AU card in a draft booster makes vorthos unhappy but makes Melvin happy. Purely from a story perspective I agree with Vince, but if I were a collector or just someone happy to open a pretty/valuable version of a card I’d be pleased. I have to imagine someone at wizards had this same thought and opted to go with what we got, because opening a pack and getting something cool will lead to you opening more packs.

[@Enja_Near]

It's specifically the 5 what if planeswalker cards. the other alternate treatments are totally fine, you could still find Junji Ito's Elesh Norn and other very nice swank.

[@adamwarehime6444]

It's wizards they can careless about the story only thing they care about is how much trash product they can cram out the door an the amount of money they can give to hasbro

[@xaranthius1415]

I wouldn't mind knowing the story for Magic....have no idea where to start though.

[@dinobonoid3348]

I had the same issue for a while. Since its been around so long, so many different characters, places, etc. It'll make your head spin. I started with "the thran." It's the origin story of yawgmoth and phyrexia. The book is expensive and hard to find, but if you like audio books there are a few readings of it on youtube.

[@HiggzWasHere]

The problerm is, I have NO clue who any of these characters on cards are. Outside of Staples like Jace, I have zero idea what each block does story wise or who is involved until I pull them and read the little flavor text while waiting for my opponent to go. I have been playing since Kaladesh and have pretty much no idea what has happened.

[@chrismaxwell3001]

I enjoy the storycards immencely. I actually have a folder collecting them so I can enjoy them like a comic book. 😂 I found it weird that those alts were in the main set too. Not a major erk, but a lil quality miss. Teferi talking to disassembling Urza shoulda been captured in bros war. Missed opportunity. Think they did well in All is one. Story moment best captured by cards in Phy:AIO, Vraska getting Jace. Just waiting for Liliana's reaction card in March of the Machines. 😎

[@soarel325]

Remember when the Story Spotlight cards for New Capenna had a bunch of events that never actually happened in the story?

[@Arcturius01]

Remember when Black on Black promos were one of the few alternate treatments and obtaining one was difficult? Pepperidge Farms remembers.

[@NXPhoenix3]

Viashino planeswalker from War of the Spark needs justice in card form.

[@quinnreed3324]

Actually my favorite artist period. Baleful strix is my favorite magic art and I'm debating getting it tattooed across my back or chest in full

[@TWilko234]

i'm still shocked it took WOTC 7 years to make amagic card that actually shows The Great Aurora happening, and even then it doesn't do much to explain what it is or means without reading the fiction

[@clawtooth35]

I still don't know what happened at the end of the Lorwyn/Shadowmoor block because the end of the novel was apparently very vague and I don't know how much Nissa figured out in Origins when she was there.

[@maggiek8616]

Poor Dack Fayden getting killed off screen has to be one of the biggest let downs. He could have been the Buy a Box promo, Tez part of the set and just not done one of the random walkers they created solely to fill gaps! Then we have Tibalt not getting a compleated Planeswalker card in ONE, just magically turns up in the story. I heard he got scratched on Kaldheim or something but still another off screen injustice creating confusion.

[@grantmurdock7385]

I also feel like flavor text takes a hard backseat. If there's one thing I remember about the good ol' days it's context on the card. Little snippets that make these things feel a little more alive, like part of a much larger picture. I left the game for many years, and came back to find flavor text all but gone. And I get it, there's literally less room for it on many newer cards. I just feel like there's something that got lost there.