Yeah... George Orwell was COMPLETELY wrong on that one. The English language is constantly expanding, and most words are having definitions ADDED to them.
Of course, George Orwell was wrong about most everything. I don't know why he's still treated as a brilliant author.
The same reason Salinger, Huxley, Fitzgerland, and heck, even Plato are considered brilliant authors. Sure their stories aren't exactly realistic, always relatable, or understandable in the current context, but they exist as brilliant works of literature in and of themselves. I personally like 1984 because of the "book within the book" segment with Orwell's personal view on the concept of the modern societal construct and the growing political ambiguity of global relations. The rest of the book with the terrible romance bit was junk, but Orwell needed something to fill the other 200 some pages.
Anyway, back on topic. Anyone think Jace will get a remake?
i don't read the novels to know anything about PW sparks or whatever
playing this game alone is nerdy enough.
I'm okay with people not caring to read the books; I haven't read the majority of them.
What I don't like is people ignoring all the material in the canon, and then declaring that Mizzet should be a Planeswalker. If you don't care enough to know any of the existing stuff, why do you care enough that you think an existing character should be a Planeswalker? Shouldn't you just care that there is a good Planeswalker, not that it happens to be him?
Yeah... George Orwell was COMPLETELY wrong on that one. The English language is constantly expanding, and most words are having definitions ADDED to them.
Of course, George Orwell was wrong about most everything. I don't know why he's still treated as a brilliant author.
Not sure where to start on this one. 1984 and Animal Farm weren't predictions of the future, they were hypothetical fiction grounded in what he saw in society and what he saw society progressing into. The shrinking of language was just one way of the government controlling the people, and the average vocab amongst teenagers is actually decreasing. But he also mentioned that the control over the media would be the best way to sculpt people's world views and ideas, and that is something that has actually happened, although not by the governmnt but by corporations and select individuals. A lot of his work also warned of the dictatorial communist regimes that were a big part of society, as well as providing an alternate viewpoint from Plato's Republic and HG Wells Modern Utopia as corrupted versions of perfect societies.
There is a reason that 1984 is often considered one of the best pieces of fiction ever written by leading scholars, although for some reason, it missed out to Lord of The Rings when they did the "book of the millenium" a while back.
Back on topic, the picture for RTR has Jace sat next to Niv Mizz, which one of these is more likely to be the planeswalker? Are we getting two Blue walkers? And also, is the UR walker that had his art spoiled a while back going to be in the set? Perhaps the story will amke Niv a walker at the end of the block so he could be printed in other sets etc....
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I never said that they were predictions of the future... they're just poorly-written anti-modernist tripe with a mixture of fear-generation thrown in for good measure.
As to why LotR beat it out, it might have something to do with the fact that, in addition to also having significant social commentary, tolkien's work contains large amounts of individual/psychological commentary, addressed thematic elements from human history, created the modern epic fantasy genre, and is actually a good story. actually, I'm not even sure how 1984 even made it into the discussion...
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I never said that they were predictions of the future... they're just poorly-written anti-modernist tripe with a mixture of fear-generation thrown in for good measure. As to why LotR beat it out, it might have something to do with the fact that, in addition to also having significant social commentary, tolkien's work contains large amounts of individual/psychological commentary, addressed thematic elements from human history, created the modern epic fantasy genre, and is actually a good story. actually, I'm not even sure how 1984 even made it into the discussion...
I'm sure you're not the only "critic" who does this, but compiling a long string of subjective, personal assessments that culminate into a baseless, degenerative diatribe does not make for a good critique. See? I can do it too...
Poorly-written... Why? Because he doesn't spend 10 pages transcribing every single little thought that happened to cross the vestige of his consciousness into literary text? That's my complaint against Tolkien, if you're gonna claim this point without any evidence with merit, you'd better step up your game.
Anti-modernist... Let's see, modernism under the three primary definitions of the Merriam-Webster dictionary could mean:
1. a practice, usage, or expression peculiar to moderntimes
2 often capitalized: a tendency in theology to accommodate traditional religious teaching to contemporary thought and especially to devalue supernatural elements
3. modern artistic or literary philosophy and practice; especially: a self-conscious break with the past and a search for new forms of expression
I'm presuming you're refering to the antithesis for one of the above definitions, but I'm not quite sure which one fits your viewpoint.
Mixture of fear-generation... Yes, how DARE he create subtle mechanisms for eliciting such outrageous claims as was common in every single dystopian novel that has ever existed in history... With this argument, you might as well argue that dystopian novels are terrible in and of themselves. Good luck convincing any prominent member of any legitimate academia.
And as for the rest of your argument... significant social commentary, tolkien's work contains large amounts of individual/psychological commentary, addressed thematic elements from human history, created the modern epic fantasy genre, and is actually a good story...
I'll grant your points that it did have significant social commentary as well as other subbranches on an individual, possibly even fourth person point of view, psychological level in addition to addressing a few elements from human history aside from the rest of the given. However, if that's what you want to base your argument on, you might as well argue that ANY work of literature that has existed since the inception of the subject itself would be deserving of universal recognition. Sure, you could argue that because it was specifically recognized, it has merit but the same applies for Orwell's works. Again, good luck on that.
Now don't get me wrong. I like Tolkien's work as much as the next fan, but such a pathetic excuse of literary critique hardly deserves to be taken seriously when upholding personal predispositions while bashing another work of literature that is widely recognized as a brilliant masterpiece.
I never said that they were predictions of the future... they're just poorly-written anti-modernist tripe with a mixture of fear-generation thrown in for good measure. As to why LotR beat it out, it might have something to do with the fact that, in addition to also having significant social commentary, tolkien's work contains large amounts of individual/psychological commentary, addressed thematic elements from human history, created the modern epic fantasy genre, and is actually a good story. actually, I'm not even sure how 1984 even made it into the discussion...
I'm guessing you either didn't read it or understand it, since you've basically missed the entire point. LOTR is a fine book, and is arguably as good as 1984, but a lot of the reasons these two books are good are the same. All the things you mentioned that was good about LOTR hold true to 1984 as wll(aside from fantasy).
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Am I the only one who thinks that LotR is a pile of author rumbling about a way too detailed with no interest whatsoever and as much events as a ice cream vendor in Antarctica?
I mean, 150 pages on the way of life of Hobbits? Come on!
Yeah... Until next game, where it'll be right back.
Seriously, there's no way to deal with Rancor in any format. It should be banned, except Gleemax is a lobbyist for the Rancor party, so that'll never happen.
You can't ban rancor, it just returns to your deck.
You might want to actually talk to the Flavor & Storyline Board people... since, you know, our whole reason for playing Magic is the flavor. I'm willing to bet you'll get a lot more interest there than in General.
Indeed, both posters down there would be thrilled.
When talks about banning Jace first started, I was thinking that I would see him banned come June 20th. But as I think more about it, I don't really think that Jace is the problem anymore. Sure his power level leaves very little to the imagination (opening Jace is like opening a refrigerator box with a naked girl on the inside), and sure his price does have a strong impact on what players choose to play (playing Jace is like being intimate with a woman and she doesn't charge you in the morning), but it is not the source of all the problems in Standard.
How do people think saving room to print more abilities on cards is dumbing down the game?
Do you really think, say, Akroma would ever be printed if she said, "Akroma can block by creatures with this ability and cannot be blocked by creatures without this ability. If a creature without this ability would deal combat damage by Akroma would be destroyed, prevent all combat damage that creature would deal to Akroma this combat. Attacking does not cause Akroma to tap. If Akroma is blocked and deals lethal damage, it deals the remainder of its damage to the defending player. Akroma may attack and use abilities that require tapping in the casting cost the turn it enters the battlefield. Akroma cannot be damaged, enchanted, equipped, blocked or targeted by black or red sources" rather than her "dumbed down" wording she has? No freaking way. Keywording and shorthand allows them to make complicated cards easy to play with, allowing them to be printed in the first place.
1. cast frankie peanuts 2. ask opponent "will you concede the game this turn"? if they say yes, you win; if they say no, play a staying power 3. subsequently ask "will you attack this turn"? and "will you cast a spell this turn"? (using a Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir for the second question if necessary) to ensure they can't disrupt the combo 4. donate them a platinum angel 5. play a mox lotus and braingeyser them for every card in their library. play an opalescence and donate them a glorious anthem and a blacker lotus , then play enchanted evening . play and activate a mindslaver and then donate them a fastbond and the mox lotus (returning one of the donates to your hand with eternal witness or whatever) 6. during their turn, play every permanent in their hand (playing lands with fastbond) then (as yourself) cast mirrorweave on the blacker lotus, so every permanent becomes a copy of it. proceed to tear up every card they control, and hopefully do it before they notice that they aren't bound by staying power's ability anymore and can concede
Dark Ritual being overpowered is determined more by what is done with it than the card itself.
True, but the fact that it enables so many ridiculous things is pretty telling. It's like, sure I can use a shotgun as a bludgeoning instrument, but that doesn't make it not a shotgun.
Shortly before Serra died, she transferred her spark into an angel whose full name was Asha Avacyn Bolas. Her dragon father groomed her for her positions in Alara and Innistrad, and she's also been getting help from her uncle Ugin in the form of Urza, who was resurrected as Marit Lage to be the avatar as which she projects herself into material realms. Grieslbrand is a split personality who sometimes wanders the planes disguised as a human woman named Liliana Vess.
Everyone's life would be easier if players would, instead of coming to the 'net for help with a deck, just netdeck and be done with it. And I'm not talking about some Top 8 lists, for the Casualists, too, can benefit from netdecking. I've netdecked plenty of decks from the Casual Play forums from users such as Mown, Raedien, Floopfoot, and a few others. I snatched straight the heck out of my web browser. Yes, people, your original idea fell victim to a savage netdecker. You have been assimiliated.
Suppose I wanted a Zombie deck. Why on earth would I spend time searching Gatherer for a decent list of Zombie cards when Raedien already did it for me? Taking time to be creative or waiting on people on the forums to tell you why your deck sucks or 'go to Casual forums' is a disasterous waste of time (to me).
That being said, Magic was ruined back in Alpha when they added all that rules and cards [Debutantes avert your eyes]. My friends and I still like playing it the "pure" way (Basically we go into the woods and hit eachother with wiffle bats while shouting made up obscenities. You know, the way Garfield wanted it to be played).
Don't worry about it. I've come up with a list of changes to fix EDH.
-First off, there's no commander. -The minimum deck size is 60 cards, and each deck can have up to four of each card, save basic lands and relentless rats. Also decks have no color identity. -Starting life total is 20.
Here's a clever play you can try yourself: -Convince friend to run relentless rats.dec in legacy tournament -Get a deck with lots of mill, yixlid jailer, and humility -Drop humility and jailer, wait for him to dump his hand, mill him out -All his rats now have no abilities. Call a judge because he's playing an illegal deck with more than 4 of a single card. -Get him/her banned from competitive magic play
L, is for the leather gloves you weaaaar. O, is for the organs that guy could spaaaare. V, is very very, extraordinay. E, is for every vagrant i butchered in a wine cellar befooooore.
The outer layer of the Magic: the Gathering box, the carton, or crust, is fairly thin and light, and contains largely aluminosilcates.
Within that lies the middle layer, consisting of the familiar booster pack. Although solid, the booster packs' high temperatures allow them to acutally move around within the booster box. This flow, sometimes called convection, is cited by frustrated box mappers as one of WOTC's most genious uses of thermodynamics since the Ravnica block.
No one knows what lies at the core of the booster box, but scientists theorize that it must be especially dense in order to make up for the large amount of fluff distributed amongst the booster packs.
I imagine [Ajani 3's] second ability involves him hurling the creature at your opponent Brion Stoutarm style, then the guy is just like "Okay, that may have worked, but don't- GOD DAMN IT!" as he does it again because cats don't give a **** :33.
Its like that one time Elves broke out in a field of Jund. Elves became a resurgent hit, then died off again once Jund adapted to the rest of the field of G/W that it required mass removal that inherently pooped on Elves too.
Submit to the menace. Delver can, and will blot out the sun.
"I remember my days as a youth at Tolarian Academy ." "Wow, small multiverse, I actually went there too." "WAIT, DON'T- Well ****, there's $200,000 in student loans well spent."
And flavor goes out the window when you cast a second copy of a planeswalker right after the first one dies, so...
"Hey Nissa, I need a favor." "You just asked me for a 'favor' like thirty seconds ago, and it turned out to be having Sarkhan Transmogrify my only follower into a dragon like 5 times -which dickery aside also violates some laws of causality - and then you let me get beaten over the head by that hedron crab." "...I'll give you " "...Well all right then."
GM, I don't think Dill is better than you. I KNOW it. Even if he wakes up every morning, clubs a baby seal, steals all the TV remotes from within a block's radius of his house and then robs hungry orphans of their food he'd be better than you, for the simple reason that he learns from his mistakes.
What would they have to fight about? Like, all I can think of now is Gideon going "Hey, long-ears! I'm gathering a group of 'Walkers together to fight some tentacle monsters.....you want in?" and Tamiyo going "Ew! Hentai no bakka Gideon-desu desu!" and flying away.
I open 4 packs just to be on the safe side. Not only do I get more cards than everyone else, but I also get to spend the rest of the night off. Win Win.
MaRo has a thing for people opening boosters with bad cards. But since he can only get so many bad cards printed in each set, he has found a devious way of getting more bad cards into circulation: He makes entire print sheets with just bad rares, then puts them onto the assembly line. He proceeds to wring his hands and twirl his evil mustache that he grew for twirling purposes as a lightning bolt strikes in the background. Afterwards, he goes to make sure that the good cards are only opened by everyone's friends, and that we all only get to open bad cards. He does this by memorising each booster, than switching them around accordingly. Whenever someone complains about a card, he immediately jumps out from behind a chair to yell "WELL, IT'S NOT FOR YOU!" before merging back into the shadows in order to devise new ways in which he can screw over players, then claim that he has valid reasons for doing so.
Mark Rosewater is sitting in a seemingly innocuous cable TV van, outside of Bankaimastery's house. Sitting nearby are two hardened criminal hackers, fresh out of prison, and filled with resentment at their lack of physical fitness. "Have you managed to hack his brainwaves yet? The set deadline's coming up fast." "We're almost through. It should be coming up on the screen any second." The hacker presses a button, and Kevin's thoughts flash onto the screen. Mark and the hackers stare in amazement at the sheer beauty, the elegance, and the raw truth of what they see. It's like the ending to 2001: A Space Odyssey. Brilliant light shines across the screen, the truth of existence is made clear to them, and they despair at their own foolishness, their own ignorance, their own inadequacy. And then they steal his ideas. As they return back to R&D, Mark sneers at a haggard old man chained to a cast-iron sphere. The man looks up from his laborious task of breaking rocks in the dungeon of Wizards of the Coast headquarters, and asks a question: "Kevin, my greatest student. He - he's all right, isn't he? You didn't hurt him?" Mark deals him a weighty blow with his boot. "Know your place, Richard. Get back to work."
I'm only opposed to it because it bears so little relation to how people actually play the game. The example of Miracles is actually a much better one then the Clone example I was trying to use.
From the game's perspective, the card can move instantly from face down in the library to revealed in the hand and that's fine for the rules. But in real life, we can't actually do that, so the card spends a good bit of time in locations that are neither where that player's library is nor where that player's hand is. And that's fine for real life. What I don't want is the disconnect to be explicitly codified. Along the lines of
183664.697 A game of Magic as laid out by these rules exists only as a pure Platonic ideal, utterly unrealizable by fallible mortals limited by the confines of physicality and the ravages of evil and sin.
183664.698 The cake is a lie, too.
I know it's true, but I don't want the rules to actually straight-up tell me that.
Pfft this cant be serious can it? If it is please delete your account OP. Its not even close to ban worthy, considering what JTMS and stoneforge had to accomplish to get banned i see the WotC selling magic to aquire Pokemon before that ever happens.
I'm trying to imagine sorin markov as a gym leader in one of those pokemon games which you have to beat him to get his badge... somehow I imagine that he would stab you in the chest with his sword before giving you the badge, even if you beat his pokemon....
Personally, I'd be fine with tea time but then I'm not gonna waste the mana summoning Emrakul, the Aeons Torn . He always takes all the sugar, drinks the whole pot of Earl Grey and doesn't even say thank you. SO. RUDE.
Break the Card is a regular thread in the Cards and Combo Forum. Quite simply, the participants are given a Johnnystatic card (e.g. Xenograft ) and are asked to build a deck around it. The winner and honorable mentions are sigged below. Get brewing!
This week's Break the Card was based around Xenograft . Thread : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27681049/Break_the_card_:_Xenograft?pg=1
Winner : Axterix with his Vampdrazi deck. Finalist : Vektor480 with his Ally/Golem/Plant deck. Honorable mentions : Zammm for the Turntimber Ranger combo and TinGorilla for suggesting Sarkhan the Mad .
Here's the link to the Mindlock Orb contest : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27697565/Break_the_Card_:_Mindlock_Orb?sdb=1&pg=last#497536269
Here's the link to Break the Card : Bludgeon Brawl : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27715169/Break_the_Card_:_Bludgeon_Brawl?sdb=1&pg=last#498208797
Winner : Vektor and his Grab the World deck. Finalist : Crandor with his Awesome Aliteration deck. Honorable mentions : RP Jesus with his Wat deck and Zix200 with his Signet Renewal deck.
This week was Followed Footsteps : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27748677/Break_the_Card_:_Followed_Footsteps?pg=1
Winner : Tevish_Szat with his Exponential Growth deck. Honorable mentions : Zix with his Carbon Copies deck and Escef with his Fungus of Speed and Time deck.
This week's card was Jace's Archivist : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/28063377/Break_the_Card_:_Jaces_Archivist.
Finalists : Jentaru with his "Consecration of the Draw" deck and HereticSmitty with his "ADHD: The deck" deck. Winner : JaxsonBateman with his "The Archives Are Endless!" deck.
Am I the only one who thinks that LotR is a pile of author rumbling about a way too detailed with no interest whatsoever and as much events as a ice cream vendor in Antarctica?
I mean, 150 pages on the way of life of Hobbits? Come on!
That's what happens when a language nerd decides to write a book. He helped write the dictionary before starting to write a novel, it's sort of expected that it would come out wordy and boring.
Also, are we expecting Ravnica to have Hobbits and George Orwells now? That would be an awesome spoiler, but I'd like to see the source ...
That's what happens when a language nerd decides to write a book. He helped write the dictionary before starting to write a novel, it's sort of expected that it would come out wordy and boring.
You leave us language nerds alone! Interestingly enough, the original first printing of LotR contained both an Elvish to English dictionary, as well as an Orcish to English dictionary. He also did a lot of work in translating the Eddur (or singular Edda) into English, which were written in Iceland and were a huge part of where the Skaldic tradition comes from, as well as the basis for the vast majority of Norse mythology. Interesting stuff!
Not sure where to start on this one. 1984 and Animal Farm weren't predictions of the future, they were hypothetical fiction grounded in what he saw in society and what he saw society progressing into. The shrinking of language was just one way of the government controlling the people, and the average vocab amongst teenagers is actually decreasing. But he also mentioned that the control over the media would be the best way to sculpt people's world views and ideas, and that is something that has actually happened, although not by the governmnt but by corporations and select individuals. A lot of his work also warned of the dictatorial communist regimes that were a big part of society, as well as providing an alternate viewpoint from Plato's Republic and HG Wells Modern Utopia as corrupted versions of perfect societies.
Don't forget about Aldous Huxley. Brave New World is another literary classic that falls right in line with the works you had previously listed.
"I have existed from the morning of the world and I shall exist until the last star falls from the night. Although I have taken the form of Gaius Caligula, I am all men as I am no man and therefore I am a God."
: Regenerate.
