MTG: Amonkhet

>Nicol Bolas, The Forbidden One

>Egyptian theme and city
>But it's actually just Mayan lol

not the most original artwork out there

>Is that guy a statue
The one on the right, yes. The one on the left, nope.

>Are the going to go for cool afro-futurists vibes a la Sun-Ra
It's probably gonna be more Stargate than any actual accurate Egyptian history or mythology if that's what your asking.

I think we're more worried about the one in the middle.

I meant more like
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afrofuturism
And
youtube.com/watch?v=1qjiQwD7VCI

> all pieces of nicol bolas start the game in exile
> individual cards summon different pieces

Also more probable than actual Egyptian anything.

Theros: WE WUZ PHILOSOPHERS N SHIET
Kaladesh: WE WUZ POO IN LOO N SHIET
Amonkhet: literally WE WUZ KANGZ N SHIET

When does this end?

>Still thinking that Kaladesh is based on India
>Thinking that Kaladesh was/is/will be based on India

Kaladesh is the most obviously based on India thing since India.

Kalasesh only uses India as a thin coat of paint. It could have been replaced with the aesthetics of any other culture and nothing else in the set would be affected.

>Kaladesh was not a top-down India-inspired plane. It was a bottom-up, artifact-focused, "feel like an inventor"–themed set with Magic's take on steampunk (or as we've been calling it, aetherpunk). We used an Indian aesthetic to help give the world a feel, much like how we used Eastern Europe while making original Ravnica. Creative (and mechanical) choices were made to prioritize the aetherpunk feel. In addition, as we were referencing something that was a living culture, as opposed to Theros that focused more on an ancient civilization, we were extra cautious not to make choices that might offend.

From MaRo himself, magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/making-magic/odds-and-ends-kaladesh-part-1-2016-10-10

>aetherpunk

Fucks sake will these dickheads stop adding "-punk" to things.

Beautiful DevianTART tier art pieces

>we were extra cautious not to make choices that might offend.
And yet some people got offended, I hope they learned their lesson.

It fits the genrepunk framework, underground independents with a DIY ethic rebelling against the system, while touching on how the technology available in the setting has affected its society (the availability of Aether as a power source allowing for Kaladesh, unlike just about any plane we've seen in the Multiverse before, to experience an actual industrial age wherein technology rules everything around everyone).

Viz Media official wallpaper, nigger.

>there will never be a cowboys plane based off my American culture
>if there was white people would be a minority in it
>instead there will be an infinite parade of "p-please don't beat us, we didn't mean to offend you" planes about "interesting" settings like "What if we took steampunk and gave everyone a tan and different clothes?"
>Innistrad will probably be even worse in its inevitable 2021 return
why bother

The lesson is that "there's always someone that is offended", not "they didn't make the right choices", obviously

>Innistrad
>Best waifu plane
>Eldrazi dickering happens
>Now only 2 waifus remain
Why live

You have good opinions.

Also, I like the name 'aetherpunk'.

...

Nah, both are right. Kaladesh was boring as fuck because they tried to make it so inoffensive that there was no personality to it. "Tinkerer, aetherpunk" sounds cool, but I didn't get that feeling at all from the set. To me, it felt like they wanted the setting to be technologically advanced because, again, gotta make the not-Indians look like they're on the bleeding edge of civilization to dispel the claims to the contrary. The fact that he explicitly says they tried "not to offend" should be proof they were trying to emulate a specific people; if your race is original, you don't give two shits about "offending" anyone with it because you know it's just fantasy.

youtube.com/watch?v=LoJwMI0pBsU

So this big croc guy is probably one of the gods right? Looks like the guy himself rather than a statue. Or maybe there are just giants with croc heads walking around in Amonkhet.

is he B for diversity or W for historical accuracy?

U because he is crocodile and crocodile live near water.

>if your race is original, you don't give two shits about "offending" anyone with it because you know it's just fantasy.

You'd be surprised how easily people can get worked up about anything, even if it wasn't anyone's intent to do so.

On the plus at least the Aetherborn are cool, but for some reason there's people who keep going "but they're clearly hedonistic that means they're Red-inclusive at minimum!"

Neat, but if they count towards decksize they will be broken in every format for being a free smaller deck. Casting them from sideboard might be neat though.

>On the plus at least the Aetherborn are cool, but for some reason there's people who keep going "but they're clearly hedonistic that means they're Red-inclusive at minimum!"

FFS Both Goblins and Elves, the posterboys of R and G respectively, have appeared as all 5 colors.

When does what end? The triggered shitposting?

>no personality to it
Fucking what? You mean you didn't like the personality?

Why would Bolas allow gods under him?

Blockin' flyers with all that reach

It's more to do with the ingrained belief that Black somehow can't have anything going on that isn't killmaim deathmurder and other assorted brutalities.

Black gets hit with the "evil color for evil people" label a lot, the Aetherborn help to go against this (while still acknowledging that shifty amoral shit is still a very core Black thing) by exploring how Black's awareness of the impermanence of life doesn't limit the color to stuff like seeking immortality and staving off death; in the Aetherborn's case, it results in a realization that with the limited time one has to live, they should take the opportunity to enjoy as much of it as possible, and to live without regrets. Even if it means being a shitlord and crashing someone else's party, but then again the Aetherborn are ok with it, sometimes you just gotta let a fellow Aetherborn have their moment before they go poof.

As much as RB is a color of debauchery and hedonism, it shouldn't hold monopoly over that because Black's self-centric philosophy should mean that Red isn't necessary for the color to want to satisfy its own happiness by making every moment energetic and without regret. Simply put, it undermines any attempt to explore Black when someone goes "nah that's not really Black, that's Black + (some other color)."

Now that doesn't prevent Aetherborn from having RB multicolor cards, there's at least one UB Aetherborn out there off the top of my head, but their philosophy of living life to the fullest should be something left to Black rather than be coopted by Red, because it fits Black's awareness of how everything that lives eventually dies.

TL/DR: it's not that Aetherborn shouldn't be multicolor so much that their "every day's a celebration, every moment precious and fleeting, make the most of what you got and don't let anyone tell you to stop" is a needed expansion of Black's monocolor philosophy.

When you stop applying /int/ and /pol/ memes to fucking card art. This isn't rocket science.

There's got to be at least one black user in this thread.
Black user: What are your thoughts on this "WE WUZ" meme?

>I want tricolor gods, and the wedge gods to be color and its enemies, not the retarded Khan shit
Listening to MaRo talking about that on his podcast, I really wish limited formats didn't exist sometimes.

That said, tricolor gods would be incredibly difficult to make happen. Alara/KTK had enough trouble trying to make their 5 respective combinations playable, and trying to force all 10 tricolor combos across 2 (not 3) sets, would be absolutely impossible. Even just doing 5 of them would be rough. Plus they'd need to reprint fetches or equivalent to make anything playable, let alone brewable.

I'm okay with 1-2 color gods again, but I really don't want them to try to fill all 15 slots like in Theros. I really love the general design of the Theros gods, and I hope devotion comes back.

>Plus they'd need to reprint fetches again

Good.

Am I the only one who hates fetches because they stall the game with all the shuffling?

I'd sooner expect tricolor filter lands.
No fetches until BFZ has been out of Standard for at least a year minimum.

I've heard things about how insane the mana was during Khans-BFZ standard.

As much as I liked it myself, it did make the barrier to entry for Standard for a lot of people. And I get that not a lot of people here care for Standard, but it's a really interesting format if you can look past the expiration date of your deck, or if you're smart/thrifty at brewing.
They're fine once you get used to using shortcuts.
>"I'll grab a basic forest with this Heath to cast Hierarch, and pass turn"
>search for basic forest and get them to cut during their turn
It's not technically rules-legal, but most FNM environments don't have any interaction for that. Even if they do have a stifle/surgical extraction, it doesn't really effect the shortcut.
>I'd sooner expect tricolor filter lands.
Allied 2-color filterlands would be a great reprint. Those are in pretty dire need of it.
>No fetches until BFZ has been out of Standard for at least a year minimum.
Why exactly? Is it just for the sake of not having duals with fetches?
>I've heard things about how insane the mana was during Khans-BFZ standard.
The mana was good, but the reason it was causing problems was Rhino. If you're going to balance a card by giving a diverse (not high) mana cost, it shouldn't be in the same standard environment as fixing that strong.

Mostly though, 5 color formats are kinda fucking stupid, what's the point of having colored mana in casting costs when the lands are so good that you can play 60 card goodstuff plus 15 card goodboard?

I mean the novelty of it was cool, Standard never got to experience fetch-dual manabases before and the last time mana was that good was probably back in the Lorwynmoor days of Reflecting Pool with Vivid Lands resulting in stupid shit like Cryptic/Cloudthresher/Shard of Alara's Cruel Ultimatum showing up in the same pile, but it's also kinda busted and undermines the balancing force colored mana has on casting costs.

So now that we know that fetch-dual is a bit too good in Standard, I think we should dabble more in filter land design. Or explore more avenues with nonbasics that have basic land types since they'd interact well with the typelands from Shadows over Innistrad.

Four color decks were amazing mang

>Viz Media official wallpaper, nigger.
Damn you got me there

I wouldn't go that far, but yeah, the composition and perspective are horrible.

>American
>Culture

lmao

>Waifu
Kill yourself.

What about a land (with a basic subtype) that can either tap for one color or filter for the first color's enemy colors? Something like
>Land - Forest
>When this land ETB, if you control an Island or Swamp, it ETBT
>T: Add G
>1, T: Add U or B

I feel the logo is too big and distracting, it prevents you from following the flow of composition.

But other than that I don't see it doing anything they'd scold you for doing in an Art 101 class.

>Two suns
WHAT

Those are Bolas's glowing eyes of godly death and destruction.

The bottom is very awkward. Three different balconies don't need to be shown if two of them don't offer any information.
Doesn't follow the rule of thirds.
The eye being drawn from by the birds/river is interrupted by the floating spires
The piece is trying to tell the viewer too much about the world.
Showing a giant in the picture, and no people shown on the boat works against demonstrating depth/scale.
The left buildings/rainbow section is a hot mess.

If you were obsessed with being the Most Powerful Thing Ever, wouldn't YOU want to have GODS being subservient to you? Bowing to your every whim, simply because you are that far above them?

What will the pyramid themed mythic be?
What will the legendary crocodile be?
Mummys?!
man eating scarabs = black scootmob?!

New Phyrexia says hello

>bored_already.jpg

will sphinx's tutelage see a reprint in this set?

If this plane is bolas' crib, then why does he allow any colours other than grixis to exist in it?
Unless we're seeing fifth dawn mary sue "bring colour to the world" bullshit and ajani has to give Amonkhet a white and green sun.

As a sphinxfag I'm looking forward to any and all support. Actual Sphinx tribal maybe? Not even full-set support, just a tribal card or two.

Because Bolas ain't dumb and he's seen what Grixis looks like on its own.

You think skeleton warriors would want to worship a dragon?

What are the chances we won't see Gideon, Chandra, Liliana, Jace or Nissa in this set?

I can understand that actually.
> New pseudo-fetch that take a land from outside the game or create land-token.

Because a lack of colors tends to be due to Horrible Unnatural Things going on that have fucked up the plane irrevocably and/or the plane being artificial (and thus is, by default, an Unnatural Thing that will be fucked up irrevocably).
This place appears to be a natural place he took over as his personal tanning bed.
100% chance of at least one of them because GOTTA HAVE A GATEWATCH. Hopefully only one. Likely at least two. Praying it isn't the whole team AGAIN for the fourth block in a row.

There are 2 blue crocodiles in magic, 6 green ones, 5 black ones and one UB.

For a god, that croc doesn't draw too much attention. I assume it's just the local flavor of giants.

Creature - Crocodile Giant
(not to be confused with Giant Crocodile)

5G - 3/6 - Vigilance - Common

>100% chance of at least one of them because GOTTA HAVE A GATEWATCH.
We gotta have gatewatch IN STANDARD. That's the only actual stipulation. BFZ's time in Standard got extended, so there's no guarantee about anything. Gideon is still most likely since it's been longest since his last card. There are already three Chandras and three Nissas in standard, so very low chance of those two. Jace and Lili could see printings.
I can see them coming out with more planeswalker decks for Gideon, Jace and Lili between Aether Revolt and Amonkhet.

>Hopefully only one. Likely at least two. Praying it isn't the whole team AGAIN for the fourth block in a row.
The fuck are you talking about? The whole team hasn't been given a planeswalker card in a block since Magic Origins. It doesn't even look like Gideon and Jace are involved in the story of Kaladesh Block.

M-Masaka!

Gods can still planeswalk, from word of god Doug whatever his name is. Cards =/= exact lore power

My money is on a Gideon, Nicol
Bolas and a new (female and black) walker cards.

>female and black) walker cards.
nonbinary and black hint: ashiok

I really hope this plane is just his pleasure and holiday summer home. Like, he doesn't even rule it like a tyrant, he just goes there to chill, get fanned, laze about in the sun, then go back to work.

He is using the plan to train people to do his biddings. He is currently deploying Tezzeret to steal portal technology (see Rashmi) to send his servants to all kinds of planes to further do work for him.

My money is on Jace, Bolas, Liliana and Dack and Ashiok in Hour of Devastation.

...

>love Egyptian myth and aesthetics
>love furries
>bored of Kaladesh

THIS IS A GIFT FROM ABOVE

>tfw Naya Not!Bastet cat goddess

I want Tarkir shards, not Alara wedges. Give me Mardu Sekhmet catfolk, please.

>Mardu Sekhmet
>Sultai Sobek
>Jeskai Thoth
>Abzan Osiris
>Temur ???

I wasn't talking about card printings at all, but story appearances.
And in BfZ, SoI, and yes ALREADY in Kaladesh (there's even a card for it, though it takes place near the end of the Kaladesh story), the entire Gatewatch has ended up getting involved in the plot, storywise, even if they don't all get cards
And yes, it's been specifically stated that, at lest for the foreseeable future, all blocks will have at least one member of the Gatewatch involved in the storyline. Which, thankfully, does not necessarily mean one of the original five members of the Gatewatch, nor does it mean they HAVE to be the main characters of the block, just...present. Which means they could have Ajani join in and then next block is Ajani vs Bolas Rematch with nobody else. Or it's Some Fucks Are Doing Shit On Bolas's Plane, also Lili's killing a demon on her own. But this is WotC, they're going to have 2 people show up, find out that oh no there are Bad Things happen, then CALL THE GATEWATCH

Yo, Tarkir is wedges, Alara is shards. Look at the back of a Magic card and then combine the three colors. One combination makes shards, the other makes wedges.

I had to work the Call of Duty launch, show mercy to my retarded ass.

I can only imagine how horrible that must have been. You poor soul.

I will forgive you but only today. Tomorrow I will judge you again and look down upon you for any mistake you make on Veeky Forums.

its plasuable that this plain is artifcal like mirrodin is... was.... new phyrexia is, with multiple suns sustaining its existence, hour of reckoning might also be about the death of the plane and those amongst the inhabitants who ascended to escape.

ajani has to be there, considering his grudge with bolas.

Really hoping they don't kill of the plane. an Egyptian themed plane looks fun. I hope the reckoning is meant for Bolas

>Stargate
I'd be okay with this if there was a caveat of utilitarian operators present with express orders to fuck Amonkhet up.

That's the Gatewatch, sadly.