Sets (MoM) April of the Machines Previews

My favorite team-up is Mega Lopunny & Jigglypuff.
201284.jpg
 
MaRo Teaser? MaRo Teaser.
MaRo said:
Before previews for March of the Machine officially begin, I thought it would be fun to do another of my Duelist-style teasers where I give tiny hints of things to come. Note that I’m only giving you partial information.

First up, here are some things you can expect:

• Numerous cards that mechanically care about Phyrexians

• A double-faced token (one that transforms)

• A card that costs XUUUU

• A variant of a mechanic returns to a premier set for the first time since it originally appeared

• A legendary creature returns not seen since Homelands

• A creature capable of dealing eleven poison counters

• Some planes show up in card names that have never done so before

• Wrenn returns with a new partner

• Two draft archetypes that have a creature type matters component (one of which is Phyrexians - see above)

• The tenth _____ & _____ sword

Next, here are some rules text that will be showing up on cards:

• “You may cast spells with flash or flying from the top of your library.”

• “an Aura, God or Demigod card”

• “where X is the excess damage dealt this way.”

• “This spell can’t be copied.”

• “Activate only if you’ve cast two or more spells this turn.”

• “Each player can’t cast more than one non-Phyrexian spell each turn.”

• “X twice, where X is the number of lands you control.”

• “Whenever a permanent you control transforms or a permanent enters the battlefield under your control transformed,”

• “If the opponent protects it, remove a defense counter from it.”

• “At the beginning of your upkeep, if you haven’t been dealt combat damage since your last turn, you draw a card and you lose 1 life.”

Finally, here are some Phyrexians in the set:

• Creature – Phyrexian Bear Rhino

• Creature – Phyrexian Devil

• Creature – Phyrexian Dog Warrior

• Creature – Phyrexian Jackal

• Creature – Phyrexian Samurai

• Creature – Phyrexian Shade

• Creature – Phyrexian Shark

• Creature – Phyrexian Treefolk

• Creature – Phyrexian Viashino

• Creature – Phyrexian Weird

And some creature type lines of denizens fighting them:

• Creature – Moonfolk Ninja

• Creature – Aetherborn Vampire

• Creature – Fungus Rabbit

• Creature – Dwarf Pilot

• Creature – Raccoon Warrior

• Creature – Goblin Spellshaper

• Creature – Wolverine Dinosaur

• Legendary Creature – Elder Giant Dog

• Legendary Creature – Ape Dinosaur Turtle

• Legendary Creature – Cyclops Homunculus

For answers to these and more, tune into March of the Machine’s Debut March 29th at 9:00 am on YouTube and Twitch.

A couple notes:
Maro said:
• Numerous cards that mechanically care about Phyrexians
A little obvious but great to see, especially since we just had "50 Shades of Phyrexians: The Set!"

Maro said:
• Two draft archetypes that have a creature type matters component (one of which is Phyrexians - see above)
The other is probably Knights. One of the Commander Decks is literally called "Cavalry Charge"

Maro said:
Wrenn returns with a new partner
Wrenn is probably partnering with either the Kaldheim World Tree or the Phyrexian Invasion Tree. The latter seems more likely, given today's story.

Maro said:
• “Whenever a permanent you control transforms or a permanent enters the battlefield under your control transformed,”
• “If the opponent protects it, remove a defense counter from it.”
This is probably related to battles.


Maro said:
• The tenth _____ & _____ sword
U/B Sword

Maro said:
• “an Aura, God or Demigod card”
Looks like Gods may play a bigger role in this set than we had initially anticipated. I think the Theros-y nature of this text excludes Yawgmoth's Return as a Phyrexian God, but maybe we will see a god team-up. I would love to see Kruphix and Hazoret, although some other combination seems more likely.

Maro said:
• A double-faced token (one that transforms)
Cool, maybe a Werewolf token?

Maro said:
• Legendary Creature – Elder Giant Dog
Kroxa and Kunoros.

Maro said:
• Legendary Creature –Ape Dinosaur Turtle
Kogla and Yidaro.

Maro said:
• Legendary Creature – Cyclops Homunculus
This is probably Borborygmos and Fblthp, although it could theoretically be Zndrsplt and Okaun. I think the former is more likely because these team-ups are supposed to be "unlikely pairs," but Zndrsplt and Okaun are already partners.

Maro said:
• Creature – Phyrexian Bear Rhino
I just hope this isn't Siege Rhino.
 
Wait, they changed them so they are no more the same? This seems really strange since in the original block they were the same token, and I thought they decided to not do "mechanical erratas" anymore
Creature-type updates have been happening since Lorwyn block. They decided that every time they make a new creature type, they're going to add the new type to every pre-existing creature that is obviously that type. This is why Imposing Sovereign, Falkenrath Aristocrat, Brago, King Eternal are now Nobles while Electryte is a Trilobite.

Because Phyrexian was made a Creature Type in Kaldheim, almost 250 cards and tokens were updated to become Phyrexians. Turns out, that had implications for sets where there are both Phyrexian flavored and non-Phyrexian flavored versions of the "same" token.
 
Two notes

1. It is not super obvious that they are not the same tokens. It doesn’t say on the card and one was errata’ed to get closer to Phyrexia.

2. Now it suddenly makes sense why they decided that Kaldheim was the set that should give the Phyrexians their official creature type. The start of the current Phyrexia storyline.
 
2. Now it suddenly makes sense why they decided that Kaldheim was the set that should give the Phyrexians their official creature type. The start of the current Phyrexia storyline.
Well, it's when Phyrexia showed up in the current storyline. I think the story actually started when Elspeth Conquered Death back in Theros: Beyond Death.

Fun fact: Sheoldred was originally going to be the big villain of Throne of Eldraine instead of Oko, but they decided to push back the first Phyrexian showing up a little bit because War of the Spark had just happened.
 
Yes exactly what I said boys :p

“The start of the current Phyrexia storyline” :p

You probably remember all the talk there were about why Phyrexia as a creature type was suddenly errata’ed on all old Magic cards in Kaldheim of all sets. Now we know why. Because this is where the current storyline began with Vorinclex.
 
It seems to me Magic is deep into that "Comic book bullshit"

This is nothing new. I remember that people used to joke that the Magic writing team couldn't visit a plane without hitting it with an apocalypse or some other major world-shattering event, with some planes getting two or more. I think Arcavios and Eldraine are the only planes we've visited so far that didn't end up with everything changing forever, if you don't count "non-story" planes like Shandalar or Valor's Reach, and I think that has a lot to do with the kinds of stories they wanted to tell with the Wonder Twins (which were definitely more personal/YA-novel-y in nature).

Multiverse-level apocalypses are new though.
 

Onderzeeboot

Ecstatic Orb
This is nothing new. I remember that people used to joke that the Magic writing team couldn't visit a plane without hitting it with an apocalypse or some other major world-shattering event, with some planes getting two or more.
It's not that every plane is always undergoing an apocalypse all of the time, it's just that WotC chooses to visit those planes that are currently undergoing one ;)
 
Am I the only one who thinks it's weird that we have a permanent flying effect not marked by a flying counter? I get that it's kind of ugly to add two kinds of counters off one effect, but it feels like this is why they made flying counters.
 
Am I the only one who thinks it's weird that we have a permanent flying effect not marked by a flying counter? I get that it's kind of ugly to add two kinds of counters off one effect, but it feels like this is why they made flying counters.
I think this is how they handle effects like that in sets without keyword counters. Kenku Artificer comes to mind as an example of this being done in the past.
 
I think this is how they handle effects like that in sets without keyword counters. Kenku Artificer comes to mind as an example of this being done in the past.
Looking at Kenku, I think it's because both cards are defining the card as something else (Angel, Homunculus) so they add the flying to that.

I was sort of under the impression that ability counters were evergreen now, but maybe I notice them disproportionately because I'm not a fan of them.
 
Wasn't today the day where they wanted to have their preview season debut stream?

It's not that I'm bursting with excitement, I really just want to know what battle does to decide whether I want to integrate this into my Pokécube before having it printed these days.
 
Am I the only one who thinks it's weird that we have a permanent flying effect not marked by a flying counter? I get that it's kind of ugly to add two kinds of counters off one effect, but it feels like this is why they made flying counters.

I think it's especially bad when you're going to have different variations of the same object that all need to be interpreted differently. Like if you have a Luminarch Aspirant out that puts counters on a creature alongside this new Elspeth you could have a board with a normal token off the +1, a token with counters that can fly, and another token with counters that CANNOT fly. Oh and they all have lifelink. This is very different to me than something like the Figure of Destiny variants we get where they are unique cards that gain abilities and keep them.

Memory issues bother me, but I also really dislike keyword counters in paper Magic so it's mostly a wash for this card I suppose. It won't be replacing Elspeth Knight-Errant for me anytime soon; cleanly templated cards that are simple for players to utilize but retain depth are invaluable in cube design.
 
Top