All Unstable Variant Cards

Real good shizz here.

magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/unstable-variants-2017-12-06

Goddamn there are six copies of some cards that all do wildly different things.
At least I can run sixteen Killbots in my upcoming hyper competitive Mary O'Kill deck

>Alternate art and flavortext
Shit, I really hope they bring this back for actual sets. I remember when they did this way, way back in the day. Neat little way to make bland commons a little more interesting.

>everythingamajig has variants
I wish there was an engine you could make by stringing them together, but that's still awesome.

It'd definitely make me more excited for the different sets. Even if they'd just change the art up a little bit, it'd be better than "There's an alternate art on the foil of the rarest card on the set. Nobody's ever going to see it :^)"

Like the I understand that it costs more money, but it can't be that much to pay the artist to modify in the same vein as Extremely Slow Zombie or Target Minotaur, right?

Shit, they even hid a new un-keyword in one of the Garbage Elemental variants!

So if a creature has both art menace and menace, that means that it can only be blocked by two or more creatures, each of which has two or more visible figures in its art, right?

Sounds about right, I guess.

For Very Cryptic Command version D, what does "turn over" mean? Just literally turn the card over -- so it could either be "turn face down", "turn face up", or "transform", depending on whether the card is double-faced and its current facing?

If it's face up, it's face down. If it's face down, it's face up.

It's a DFC, it transforms. (or transforms back, if applicable)

Presumably if it's one half of a meld creature it exists on the battlefield with half its information missing. The bottom half of a meld would have a type and subtype and power/toughness and text box, but no name and almost no art. The top half would have a name, but no type/subtype. While it may sound weird for a permanent to exist on the battlefield without having a type, be aware that this is already possible in black border.

>sly spy B isn't a ninja

So is Mary O'kill EDH viable now?

Man. I wish they had managed to sneak a few DFCs in. There should have been one that was a kamigawa flip on both sides.

This is great. I especially like the Zombies and the Garbage Elementals. The Novellamental is a neat idea too.

Just use Conspiracy and other cards to turn everything into killbots

For print reasons they would have needed a fair amount of DFCs.

UN3 barely got made due to poor financial performance on the last two. If you want DFC's in UN4, it needs to be in the budget and that means they have to know it will be profitable. Buy UN3 so they know UN4 will sell.

...what the fuck else are you going to spend your cardboard crack dollars on, Iconic Masters? Explorers of Ixalan? UN3 is the only correct product to buy right now.

They do this shit with comic books. It's a retarded tactic to drive sales. But hey, MTG fans love to waste their money anyway.

>While it may sound weird for a permanent to exist on the battlefield without having a type
Hell, the normal state of a facedown card is a typeless nameless colorless 2/2.

>They do this shit with comic books
Ah yes, all those comic books with different dialogue and art but are the same name. Wait, those are just different issues.

It has a type, it's a creature. It just doesn't have any subtypes like human or wizard or something. Note also that there is at least one printed card which, due to oracle errata, is a Creature with no subtype - Nameless Race.

Pic related plus a regular noncreature artifact can also make a permanent with no type - it won't be an artifact or a creature and it'll just sit on the battlefield as nothing

>the best art gets the worst abilities
Why

They sell the same issues, words, pictures, but with different cover art.

707.2a. If a face-up permanent is turned face down by a spell or ability, it becomes a 2/2 face-down creature with no text, no name, no subtypes, and no mana cost. A permanent that enters the battlefield face down that wasn't cast as a face-down spell also has these characteristics. These values are the copiable values of that object's characteristics.
>711.9. If an effect allows a player to cast a double-faced card as a face-down creature spell, or if a double-faced card enters the battlefield face down, it will have the characteristics given to it by the rule or effect that caused it to be face down. That card remains hidden, using either a face-down checklist card or opaque sleeves. See rule 707, "Face-Down Spells and Permanents."
>711.9a. While face down, a double-faced permanent can't transform. If it is turned face up, it will have its front face up.
>712.10. Meld cards on the battlefield and melded permanents can't be turned face down. If a spell or ability tries to turn such a permanent face down, nothing happens.