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So, this is massively off-topic, but a sudden thought occured, and it made me curious. Were this to become an actual block, which cards, if any, would you like to see reprinted for it? I'm especially curious if you would reprint any angels in magic history, just with alternate artwork. There are certainly some angels around in Magic's history with generic enough names to be reprinted, like Angelic Arbiter   or Warrior Angel , so I was just wondering what, assuming this were real, you might want to see reprinted, if anything.

Sep 1, 2012 -- 5:08PM, RavenoftheBlack wrote:

So, this is massively off-topic, but a sudden thought occured, and it made me curious. Were this to become an actual block, which cards, if any, would you like to see reprinted for it? I'm especially curious if you would reprint any angels in magic history, just with alternate artwork. There are certainly some angels around in Magic's history with generic enough names to be reprinted, like Angelic Arbiter   or Warrior Angel , so I was just wondering what, assuming this were real, you might want to see reprinted, if anything.

Not off topic at all. I've been kicking around the idea for quite some time.
Obviously, Angel's Feather since I want to move the lucky charms sideways and make a new angelic cycle out of them.
Aside from that, Luminescent Rain , Windstorm , and some other weather based green cards to push the idea that weather magic is green in this world. Though I do have to be careful to not make the scale of the spells TOO huge. Stuff like Hurricane is probably off the board.
Seething Song is absolutely perfect for the land discard theme in red, as well as the musical allusions that the Ophanim are rife with.
I don't really like Angelic Arbiter because Seraphim don't really arbit on Ellysium. Warrior Angel almost makes it, except it has the wrong typing because the Seraphim come in soldier and knight flavored.
Over all, I'm not dismissive of the possibility of reprinting angels, but I'd have to do a solid look into them all.

In the meantime, I'm curious what there is to be said about the new info about the Goliath and the Cherubim. Aside from that, I really need to get some feedback on what I should finish filling Green out with. Below is every creature type I could think of that is regular in green... except the stupid elves.
Spoiler: Show

All of these have their own advantages and disadvantages. A lot of them mostly disadvantages. I am, of course, also open to suggestions.

I gotta think about some history for what led to the U/G schism in the giants. I got something solid for virtually every other split, but not that one. Not between W/R either, but that one needs less than the others I think...

Since copper is a sort of sacred metal to the goliath's, perhaps you could have the schism start there? Copper is ideal for channeling green mana, but perhaps a group of Goliath's found that silver was adept at channeling blue mana and had a wider variety of uses besides indecstructibility.

This could lead to a number of blanket statements, such as the blue goliath's not revering Binah through their use of silver. I remember reading about a blue 'knowledge' god somewhere, but I can't remember the name. Theology seems as likely a reason for a schism as anything.

Sep 2, 2012 -- 12:18AM, Ruwinreborn wrote:

Since copper is a sort of sacred metal to the goliath's, perhaps you could have the schism start there? Copper is ideal for channeling green mana, but perhaps a group of Goliath's found that silver was adept at channeling blue mana and had a wider variety of uses besides indecstructibility.

This could lead to a number of blanket statements, such as the blue goliath's not revering Binah through their use of silver. I remember reading about a blue 'knowledge' god somewhere, but I can't remember the name. Theology seems as likely a reason for a schism as anything.

Chokmah. And that's basically what the schism was about.
The Blue Goliath went to worship the other god, but I want things to be complicated than that. What led the group to worship Chokmah instead of Binah?

It's important to note that Chokmah and Binah are complementary gods. Neither are equal to the sum of the two.

I find green-aligned creatures obsessing over copper to be a little strange, just because metalwork in general hints towards artifacts, which green seems to prefer to dislike (not always, of course). Other than that, though, the copper stuff seems fine, although I'm not sure I like the idea of the metals themselves causing the schism, more just representing it.

I like the idea of stone towns supporting a relatively transient population. Personally, I envision a sort of thing where the Goliaths live fairly spartan lifestyles, and it's comparatively easy for them to pack up everything they have and leave, so I see the great stone homes as being sort of constantly abandoned and then claimed by the next Goliath that wanders into town, sort of like the ancient Greek notion of hospitality brought to an extreme.

Do humans live amongst the Goliaths, as the Moonfolk do in blue? I could see that going either way.

What do the Flamekin smiths and artisans think of the metalwork of the Goliath? Do they look down on it, respect it, not care?

I'm not sure what I think of the Cherubim altering the terrain for the Goliath. What would the process be? How would they determine what was needed, especially since Green would likely try to think of the overall ramifications of the alteration, making sure it's best for everyone (or at least the most, it's not white, after all). Overall, though, I think it works.

Although I like the idea of stone cities for them, it does seem a little odd they wouldn't use wood, especially since they seem to have the ability to re-grow that, but I suppose it wouldn't last as long, and giants would naturally need a lot of wood. Just a little strange.

Personally, I recommend Dryads if you're looking for a few more creatures. They can live in the deep woods, and maybe have some sort of strange relationship with the Cherubim, as in, maybe the Cherubim seem to go out of their way to leave them alone, or something, and no one knows if it's out of veneration or fear. Besides, it seems highly unlikely that in ages past, Dryads would have been one of the barbaric races...

Finally, as for the schism between green and blue Goliaths (these groups could probably use names, by the way) the simple way to go is a matter of progress. Especially if you want to go with the Rain Veil idea (which I still quite like) maybe the blue Goliaths wanted to push the bounds of what certain Goliath magicks could do, and they began (centuries ago) to experiment with different uses, especially with green's weather-magic (which helps explain why blue Goliaths have access to portions of it on your world). The larger, green side of the culture felt they were crossing the line between coaxing nature and manipulating it. They threatened to exile the blue practitioners from the forests and Goliath society. The blue side, thirsting for knowledge rather than power, saw their counterparts as a bit more primitive, but wanted no division between the two. That's when they turned to the worship of Chokmah, partly because the fit was better for their changing mindset, and partly to illustrate that, like the gods, the society was stronger as a whole. Eventually, though, it just became more and more difficult for each side to co-exist side by side, so the blue left to join the Moonfolk society, who had long-since developed an appreciation for knowledge.

Thoughts?

Sep 2, 2012 -- 4:07PM, RavenoftheBlack wrote:

I find green-aligned creatures obsessing over copper to be a little strange, just because metalwork in general hints towards artifacts, which green seems to prefer to dislike (not always, of course). Other than that, though, the copper stuff seems fine, although I'm not sure I like the idea of the metals themselves causing the schism, more just representing it.

Elves (and green) don't make a whit of sense. They live in trees and have metal weapons, but no forges. For the record too, they don't obsess over copper, but they definitely favor it. Like we favor gold.
I do invision a vertical cycle of copper based artifacts with a caveat of "if you spent green to play this, it's indestructible."
I tend to agree as well with tying the metal to the schism. It just... the texture isn't right.

I like the idea of stone towns supporting a relatively transient population. Personally, I envision a sort of thing where the Goliaths live fairly spartan lifestyles, and it's comparatively easy for them to pack up everything they have and leave, so I see the great stone homes as being sort of constantly abandoned and then claimed by the next Goliath that wanders into town, sort of like the ancient Greek notion of hospitality brought to an extreme.

Good, that was sort of what I was going for. It also gives me an excuse to use the creature type "nomad" to fill out the green section of classes.

Do humans live amongst the Goliaths, as the Moonfolk do in blue? I could see that going either way.

Sort of, but not really. They interact with them a LOT, but the humans don't have the same cities or methods. Lots of the same philosophies.

What do the Flamekin smiths and artisans think of the metalwork of the Goliath? Do they look down on it, respect it, not care?

They think it crude, but creative. Well below them though. Pretty much the only time this would come up is flavor text though...

I'm not sure what I think of the Cherubim altering the terrain for the Goliath. What would the process be? How would they determine what was needed, especially since Green would likely try to think of the overall ramifications of the alteration, making sure it's best for everyone (or at least the most, it's not white, after all). Overall, though, I think it works.

They sculpt the land to keep a sort of equilibrium in the world. It's much less harmful or disruptive than the way the other civilizations build. Aside from that, they sort of have this nature feng-shui going, so it's actually probably a good thing for the forests in general. Sort of like a wild orchard if you would.

Although I like the idea of stone cities for them, it does seem a little odd they wouldn't use wood, especially since they seem to have the ability to re-grow that, but I suppose it wouldn't last as long, and giants would naturally need a lot of wood. Just a little strange.

This is partly to do with visuals, but there is a flavor justification. Stone, to the Green, is the bones of Binah. Living in a shelter made of stone is philosophically like being shielded by your goddess. The Goliath are much more in tune with the entirety of nature instead of the elves, which are only concerned about trees. The damn tree hugging genocidal bastards.
Anyways, I think the best way I can sum up the Goliath is "They are dwarves who are elves."

Personally, I recommend Dryads if you're looking for a few more creatures. They can live in the deep woods, and maybe have some sort of strange relationship with the Cherubim, as in, maybe the Cherubim seem to go out of their way to leave them alone, or something, and no one knows if it's out of veneration or fear. Besides, it seems highly unlikely that in ages past, Dryads would have been one of the barbaric races...

The major issue here in dealing with dryads is to make sure the point is made that they aren't a society, but a collection of individuals. They don't work together. Aside from that, I'd sort of like to accent their spiritual nature as well, but that might be getting more complex than is advisable.
Part of this is making them distinct enough from everyone else so that the question of why they don't ascend comes up.

Finally, as for the schism between green and blue Goliaths (these groups could probably use names, by the way) the simple way to go is a matter of progress. Especially if you want to go with the Rain Veil idea (which I still quite like) maybe the blue Goliaths wanted to push the bounds of what certain Goliath magicks could do, and they began (centuries ago) to experiment with different uses, especially with green's weather-magic (which helps explain why blue Goliaths have access to portions of it on your world). The larger, green side of the culture felt they were crossing the line between coaxing nature and manipulating it. They threatened to exile the blue practitioners from the forests and Goliath society. The blue side, thirsting for knowledge rather than power, saw their counterparts as a bit more primitive, but wanted no division between the two. That's when they turned to the worship of Chokmah, partly because the fit was better for their changing mindset, and partly to illustrate that, like the gods, the society was stronger as a whole. Eventually, though, it just became more and more difficult for each side to co-exist side by side, so the blue left to join the Moonfolk society, who had long-since developed an appreciation for knowledge.

Thoughts?

Progress does feel like a natural part of it, but I still really want to explore part of this dealing with the duality of their religious methods. Almost all the old gods had some opposite but complementary force in their pantheon.
I think rather than magic, it needs to be philosophy. Chokmah was the god of secrets before he was the god of wisdom, so there might be something there. Overall, it's the fact that there WERE no blue giants before the schism. I just feel like the worship should come before the color shift. Honestly, I'm getting kinda rambly right now... long day at work.

To shamelessly steal from another thread, I propose an Evil Eye in Elysium.  Also, how well would Sand krakens fit (if we manage to make them not feel like Dune-esque-wurms-that-aren't-wurms)? And how about savage dryads?

Some serious suggestions can only be put forth through one-liners. I'd like to churn in on developing the green part some more, so here comes my first thought: If you want to involve the colour green from copper as the schisming factor of the Goliath, the most natural (and anticlimactic) observation is that copper salts are generally blue. Since instinctive chemistry is involved with the flamekin diet already, maybe this can feature as an enrichening detail somewhere. I think there's a lot to do with natural metal, mama-imbueing, and memory of copper, but the angle's so novel in MtG it'll take some time to think more somethings through.

This sentence, "The Goliath do not believe in agriculture in the same way the humans do", may be read as judgmental (especially considering they now end up magically gathering fruits from the forest). Was that your intention, or not? As an aside, in a way that's been green's mode of subsistence since forever. If you're certain about keeping Big Giants living in Dense Green Forest their Whole Lives in the first place, swidden horticulture seems especially fit for them instead .

If the green angels (are they still wheels?) receive the power to mess up the earth at whim you're going to end up with Zendikar for a landscape, no? I have no objections to the intention, and terraforming certainly has a mostly green touch to it, but it might just end up being a slippery slope, flavourfully. Since the green angels appear in league with Binah, is there maybe not a way to involve that older goddess? The requirement of which is only known to the upper hierarchy even, unbeknown to lesser greengels, other flights, the puny mortals, and players. Seems like a safe way to keep this in check.

Other thoughts forthcoming.

Sep 3, 2012 -- 10:12AM, Terti wrote:

To shamelessly steal from another thread, I propose an Evil Eye in Elysium.  Also, how well would Sand krakens fit (if we manage to make them not feel like Dune-esque-wurms-that-aren't-wurms)? And how about savage dryads?

Savage dryads probably wouldn't work in the way you mean. It conjures images of either a primitive culture or apex predators... neither of which really fit with tree spirits for me.
Eyes, I don't think, could work here. Particularly as they aren't green.
Sand krakens have no reason why they couldn't work, but at the same time, they don't have anything that really speaks to them being here.

Some serious suggestions can only be put forth through one-liners. I'd like to churn in on developing the green part some more, so here comes my first thought: If you want to involve the colour green from copper as the schisming factor of the Goliath, the most natural (and anticlimactic) observation is that copper salts are generally blue. Since instinctive chemistry is involved with the flamekin diet already, maybe this can feature as an enrichening detail somewhere. I think there's a lot to do with natural metal, mama-imbueing, and memory of copper, but the angle's so novel in MtG it'll take some time to think more somethings through.

I don't want copper involved with the schism. Like I said, the texture isn't right for a culture to split along a philosophical axis over a metal. Copper, while important, doesn't have influence enough to break a people. It's traditional, but not mandatory.

This sentence, "The Goliath do not believe in agriculture in the same way the humans do", may be read as judgmental (especially considering they now end up magically gathering fruits from the forest). Was that your intention, or not? As an aside, in a way that's been green's mode of subsistence since forever. If you're certain about keeping Big Giants living in Dense Green Forest their Whole Lives in the first place, swidden horticulture seems especially fit for them instead .

It isn't judgemental, just trying to write outside a human perspective.
I'm not sure what you mean about the second part of that... are you suggesting I get rid of the giants? Because that is so seriously not going to happen.
The alternative is so outside what green would do that I'm confused why you would bring up slash and burn.

If the green angels (are they still wheels?) receive the power to mess up the earth at whim you're going to end up with Zendikar for a landscape, no? I have no objections to the intention, and terraforming certainly has a mostly green touch to it, but it might just end up being a slippery slope, flavourfully. Since the green angels appear in league with Binah, is there maybe not a way to involve that older goddess? The requirement of which is only known to the upper hierarchy even, unbeknown to lesser greengels, other flights, the puny mortals, and players. Seems like a safe way to keep this in check.

Other thoughts forthcoming.

They were never wheels. They're beasts.
And no, a Zendikar landscape wouldn't be the logical outcome. Something more like a wilder Selesnya would be the result. Though in truth it would be somewhere between the two with features of each.
And you attribute too much to Binah there. She's the worldsoul, so it isn't likely she's "active" in any meaningful way.
Which just made me think, gods I would love to put Kavu in here, but there's just no justifiable way I could.

Sep 3, 2012 -- 10:55AM, Barinellos wrote:

Sep 3, 2012 -- 10:12AM, Terti wrote:

To shamelessly steal from another thread, I propose an Evil Eye in Elysium.  Also, how well would Sand krakens fit (if we manage to make them not feel like Dune-esque-wurms-that-aren't-wurms)? And how about savage dryads?

Savage dryads probably wouldn't work in the way you mean. It conjures images of either a primitive culture or apex predators... neither of which really fit with tree spirits for me.
Eyes, I don't think, could work here. Particularly as they aren't green.
Sand krakens have no reason why they couldn't work, but at the same time, they don't have anything that really speaks to them being here.

Fair enough on the dryads . The other two weren't suggestions to green, though. The eye would be black and the sand krakens red the way I first considered them. And yes, they might not intrinsically tie in with angels or raptures or barbarian times. I think that that's a good thing, as I'd  want to avoid a complete monothemism within a worldbuilding project. Particularly since your design centres around a theme that happens instead of a theme that is - which makes it different from say, Innistrad, where I would not suggest these things for. That's the way it has always appeared to me, at least. No I would not want to flood the project with stuff that's not directly tied to A or B or something as that would dilute the theme; but I do think there's place for a select unrelated ideas.

Sep 3, 2012 -- 10:55AM, Barinellos wrote:

This sentence, "The Goliath do not believe in agriculture in the same way the humans do", may be read as judgmental (especially considering they now end up magically gathering fruits from the forest). Was that your intention, or not? As an aside, in a way that's been green's mode of subsistence since forever. If you're certain about keeping Big Giants living in Dense Green Forest their Whole Lives in the first place, swidden horticulture seems especially fit for them instead .

It isn't judgemental, just trying to write outside a human perspective.
I'm not sure what you mean about the second part of that... are you suggesting I get rid of the giants? Because that is so seriously not going to happen.
The alternative is so outside what green would do that I'm confused why you would bring up slash and burn.

I'm not suggesting that you rid the giants, just that them in a forest setting the way MtG forest usually are (dense) raises eyebrows, once I try and imagine giants (whom are big) who like to keep their forest intact when gathering (unlike baloths and wurms for whom crushing foliage is foreplay). It's either that the forests are more like very open woodlands, or that they naturally have to avoid walking everywhere they please. The latter naturally forces them in some modus of forest infrastructuring, and slash and burn is part of that.

Admittedly I'm operating under a couple of premises with this argument, but they're all what I'd intuitively expect from MtG-green, -forests, and -giants.

Anyway, I'd argue swidden to be a very green way of life. Yes, it includes a bit of burning down wood. But so does the agriculture of Mulch and The Wild Son. It requires more burning down forest after the first patch is depleted, but that's because they're basically gardens which are left to nature's own way of prospering. Swiddens don't want human ploughing or fertilising, and generally the only thing that's done after seeding is the bare minimum of weeding. They're essentially patches of new forest rebuilding itself, and double as hunting grounds or orchards depending on the phase they're in. And once a yield is harvested and a new patch is burned out, the old swidden is left to become such an area of young forest, full of wild animals and wild fruits. Swiddens shape a very mobile and opportunistic way of life, making use of all parts and phases of nature. In my opinion, it's so much far greener than the rigid, static and permanent white cultivation that I don't see how it could honestly be anything else.

Sep 3, 2012 -- 10:55AM, Barinellos wrote:

If the green angels (are they still wheels?) receive the power to mess up the earth at whim you're going to end up with Zendikar for a landscape, no? I have no objections to the intention, and terraforming certainly has a mostly green touch to it, but it might just end up being a slippery slope, flavourfully. Since the green angels appear in league with Binah, is there maybe not a way to involve that older goddess? The requirement of which is only known to the upper hierarchy even, unbeknown to lesser greengels, other flights, the puny mortals, and players. Seems like a safe way to keep this in check.

Other thoughts forthcoming.

They were never wheels. They're beasts.
And no, a Zendikar landscape wouldn't be the logical outcome. Something more like a wilder Selesnya would be the result. Though in truth it would be somewhere between the two with features of each.
And you attribute too much to Binah there. She's the worldsoul, so it isn't likely she's "active" in any meaningful way.
Which just made me think, gods I would love to put Kavu in here, but there's just no justifiable way I could.

Aye. Kavu are the best. I'm just not convinced of the need for an unrestrained power of earth-messing. It would destroy all those beautiful things argued a week or two ago

Sep 3, 2012 -- 12:19PM, Terti wrote:

Fair enough on the dryads . The other two weren't suggestions to green, though. The eye would be black and the sand krakens red the way I first considered them. And yes, they might not intrinsically tie in with angels or raptures or barbarian times. I think that that's a good thing, as I'd  want to avoid a complete monothemism within a worldbuilding project. Particularly since your design centres around a theme that happens instead of a theme that is - which makes it different from say, Innistrad, where I would not suggest these things for. That's the way it has always appeared to me, at least. No I would not want to flood the project with stuff that's not directly tied to A or B or something as that would dilute the theme; but I do think there's place for a select unrelated ideas.

I'm not ruling out the oddities and weird one ofs, but I mostly want to focus on compiling a list of the primaries rather than the stragglers at the moment.
There will be a time when we work on filling out the strange sections of creature chart, but until we actually have the main tribal thrusts, I don't want to distract from answering the questions that still loom.
Though uh.. eyes are a no. Krakens would feel natural in the sea, so if you wanted to shift into red, I rather like the concept of the Illusion in red. Then again, that's providing we have a sizable desert, which right now, I'm only barely toying with. There are places I could put one on the map, but I'd need to worry about weather patterns and the like to make sense.

Which brings us to one thing that I wanted to talk about a while ago, but sort of put off. There are two polar regions on Ellysium, and they are basically unoccupied, but the angels actually have a directive NOT to go there. It makes them uncomfortable for reasons they aren't sure of. The answer is pretty simple, in that there are Sephira hidden amongst the ice.

I want to poll about the wurms for green here. I think they could play very similarly to the leviathans in the ocean, but while the hydras had to be wiped out, the wurm population was under control. Not tame, just not... usually destructive. Hydra, meanwhile, were seething masses of hunger and ferocity, ravenous and ceaseless predators. Dragons, also, had a malevolence that indicated intelligence.

While these beasts are basically washed away by the ebb and flow of time, if anyone wants to take a stab at writing some mythology around it, there's some interesting things that could be done with the symbology in the book of Revelation.

I'm not suggesting that you rid the giants, just that them in a forest setting the way MtG forest usually are (dense) raises eyebrows, once I try and imagine giants (whom are big) who like to keep their forest intact when gathering (unlike baloths and wurms for whom crushing foliage is foreplay). It's either that the forests are more like very open woodlands, or that they naturally have to avoid walking everywhere they please. The latter naturally forces them in some modus of forest infrastructuring, and slash and burn is part of that.

First off, a lot of the forests in The Green (which is what they call the forests) are in fact, enormous. Think a combination of japanese forests and redwoods with a light seasoning of tropical jungle.
Aside from that, the giants are only approximately 3 times the size of a regular person. Anywhere from 15 to 20 or so feet tall. Which while big, certainly isn't as hulking and destructive as you might expect.
But that being said, they promote and discourage growth... but that doesn't indicate destruction, it means they manipulate the world around them to grow in certain ways, but at the same time, they tend to only meddle when they need something out of a specific area.

Anyway, I'd argue swidden to be a very green way of life. Yes, it includes a bit of burning down wood. But so does the agriculture of Mulch and The Wild Son. It requires more burning down forest after the first patch is depleted, but that's because they're basically gardens which are left to nature's own way of prospering. Swiddens don't want human ploughing or fertilising, and generally the only thing that's done after seeding is the bare minimum of weeding. They're essentially patches of new forest rebuilding itself, and double as hunting grounds or orchards depending on the phase they're in. And once a yield is harvested and a new patch is burned out, the old swidden is left to become such an area of young forest, full of wild animals and wild fruits. Swiddens shape a very mobile and opportunistic way of life, making use of all parts and phases of nature. In my opinion, it's so much far greener than the rigid, static and permanent white cultivation that I don't see how it could honestly be anything else.

See, you're arguing against your own point here. Those examples of green agriculture? Those are human methods. The giants have different methods and everything you're describing does fit green, but you're ignoring the fact that the giants aren't the only civilization making their home in The Green.

Aye. Kavu are the best. I'm just not convinced of the need for an unrestrained power of earth-messing. It would destroy all those beautiful things argued a week or two ago

I loved those lizardy nutjobs. I wish they weren't so tied to that one specific event. It kills their reuse value...

As for the manipulation of nature... dude, that's been there since the start. Da'at, the Cherub angelheim is something like 40 redwoods grown together into an enormous natural structure.
As for the other stuff that I argued about... umm.. give me a refresher. And it isn't unrestrained. They aren't terraforming The Green. They're Feng Shui-ing it.
Which sort of introduces an interesting cross point of Taoist Angel Beast Druids. That's something to chew on...

Sep 3, 2012 -- 6:59PM, Barinellos wrote:

Which sort of introduces an interesting cross point of Taoist Angel Beast Druids. That's something to chew on...

Now there's a creature type line for you.

I need to consolidate what we need to work on, it seems like it's just gotten so large that we haven't been able to kick ideas back and forth between more members.

Aside from that, of course, look at what was most recently said and comment.

Sep 3, 2012 -- 6:59PM, Barinellos wrote:

First off, a lot of the forests in The Green (which is what they call the forests) are in fact, enormous. Think a combination of japanese forests and redwoods with a light seasoning of tropical jungle.
Aside from that, the giants are only approximately 3 times the size of a regular person. Anywhere from 15 to 20 or so feet tall. Which while big, certainly isn't as hulking and destructive as you might expect.
But that being said, they promote and discourage growth... but that doesn't indicate destruction, it means they manipulate the world around them to grow in certain ways, but at the same time, they tend to only meddle when they need something out of a specific area.

This gives me the oddest visual of Goliath's swinging through the trees Tarzan style. O.o That, uh, probably couldn't happen.

... Could it?

In any case, I think the schism between the Goliath's could have happened naturally, sort of like a counter-culture that erupted from the restrictions put upon a younger generation by the traditions of their forebears. If it is a racewide trait that Goliath's are naturally curious, such curiousity could have led into some taboo territories. While most Goliath's would be content with learning more about how to improve their agricultural methods, some could have wanted to change them entirely, or find better/different ways of living in general, simply to rebel.

Chokmah had the secrets, and the Goliath's followed.

So, the blue Goliath's want progress; they want change, and to move forward in different directions. Towards the sea, towards the sky. They don't want to be on the ground or in the forest, but seeing no other way into these new avenues of life, they clashed with the Green Goliath's. Nothing violent, but it came to the point where swaths of Goliath's broke clanship, ignored traditional rule, or dishonored previous agreements in order to go and find something new.

The blue goliath's would view the green ones as stale and primitive, whereas the green ones would view the blue ones as untrustworthy. They never really needed to come to blows, but the stigma attached with such a culture-bending event would carry on through generations.

Sep 4, 2012 -- 1:57AM, Ruwinreborn wrote:

This gives me the oddest visual of Goliath's swinging through the trees Tarzan style. O.o That, uh, probably couldn't happen.

... Could it?

In any case, I think the schism between the Goliath's could have happened naturally, sort of like a counter-culture that erupted from the restrictions put upon a younger generation by the traditions of their forebears. If it is a racewide trait that Goliath's are naturally curious, such curiousity could have led into some taboo territories. While most Goliath's would be content with learning more about how to improve their agricultural methods, some could have wanted to change them entirely, or find better/different ways of living in general, simply to rebel.

Chokmah had the secrets, and the Goliath's followed.

So, the blue Goliath's want progress; they want change, and to move forward in different directions. Towards the sea, towards the sky. They don't want to be on the ground or in the forest, but seeing no other way into these new avenues of life, they clashed with the Green Goliath's. Nothing violent, but it came to the point where swaths of Goliath's broke clanship, ignored traditional rule, or dishonored previous agreements in order to go and find something new.

The blue goliath's would view the green ones as stale and primitive, whereas the green ones would view the blue ones as untrustworthy. They never really needed to come to blows, but the stigma attached with such a culture-bending event would carry on through generations.

hehe, no, it couldn't.

The goliath counter culture is something that surely had been building for some time, the question is what pushed it into a full blown schism? Binah and Chokmah are looked at as a bit of a mother and father figure... okay, probably more appropriately Mother and Uncle figure.
I think something that needs to be developed here before we can go forward is actually establishing the goliath worshipping habits. Binah's druids and followers are probably much more holistic and nature oriented than those of Chokmah, so I'm envisioning a situation where the blue goliath had a more formalized religion that was part temple, part academy. While Binah could be worshipped basically anywhere, Chokmah had a dedicated space for it.

Playing off the ideas of the youth rebelling... huh, I'm actually going a little Fiddler on the Roof here. The green are all about Tradition (traaaaditiooon! tradition!) So we have at some point, tied to some event, a push of the youth towards the church of Chokmah. Since the Goliath culture is tied to the veneration of the Elder, this would cause a lot of strife amongst the powers that be, and I could see what started as a youthful rebellion turn into a full blown argument between the elders of the clans and the elders of the church.

Anyways, a lot of what you laid out can be slid into the methodology of the churches, but it never actually answered the trigger of the split, just the nature of the underlying issues.
So now we need some actual event that would drive up membership... rather than worry about throwing the entire history up, let's  Brainstorm
(Incidentally, I would be grateful if someone could combine his post with mine for archival purposes, rewritten so it flows together.)

On an aside, I want to nail down something that I hadn't before. Mainly, the look of the flamekin and more uniquely, what the golems would look like. The golems have barely any development, so their look will cause a lot of interesting talk I think. Also, this JUST occured to me, what do people think of using Blaze Counters on them? Play as a parallel to the Feather Counters, but different.

Aside from that, we REALLY need to develop something about the Hashmallim Angelheim. It's the only one with no visuals at all. The Ophan Angelheim, Tiferet, also needs a title, but that can come later.

Interlude: a landscape setting needs to be developed more than anything else.

Sep 3, 2012 -- 6:59PM, Barinellos wrote:

..."window.parent.tinyMCE.get('post_content').onLoad.dispatch();" contenteditable="true" />Which brings us to one thing that I wanted to talk about a while ago, but sort of put off. There are two polar regions on Ellysium, and they are basically unoccupied, but the angels actually have a directive NOT to go there. It makes them uncomfortable for reasons they aren't sure of. The answer is pretty simple, in that there are Sephira hidden amongst the ice.

I want to poll about the wurms for green here. I think they could play very similarly to the leviathans in the ocean, but while the hydras had to be wiped out, the wurm population was under control. Not tame, just not... usually destructive. Hydra, meanwhile, were seething masses of hunger and ferocity, ravenous and ceaseless predators. Dragons, also, had a malevolence that indicated intelligence.

While these beasts are basically washed away by the ebb and flow of time, if anyone wants to take a stab at writing some mythology around it, there's some interesting things that could be done with the symbology in the book of Revelation.

What's a sephira again? Also, what is the context of the book of revelation? Thirdly, I'm a fan of wurms but I would actually vote nay against them, simply because they don't need to appear in every plane ever. Could give green the chance to shine in a different way, or make leeway for a different fatty to shine. I would actually describe their presence in Elysium the same way you think of Sand Krakens, that they're just in there for rule of cool and not because they need to be there. In which instance I'd promote the most novel idea

Sep 3, 2012 -- 6:59PM, Barinellos wrote:

I'm not suggesting that you rid the giants, just that them in a forest setting the way MtG forest usually are (dense) raises eyebrows, once I try and imagine giants (whom are big) who like to keep their forest intact when gathering (unlike baloths and wurms for whom crushing foliage is foreplay). It's either that the forests are more like very open woodlands, or that they naturally have to avoid walking everywhere they please. The latter naturally forces them in some modus of forest infrastructuring, and slash and burn is part of that.

First off, a lot of the forests in The Green (which is what they call the forests) are in fact, enormous. Think a combination of japanese forests and redwoods with a light seasoning of tropical jungle.
Aside from that, the giants are only approximately 3 times the size of a regular person. Anywhere from 15 to 20 or so feet tall. Which while big, certainly isn't as hulking and destructive as you might expect.
But that being said, they promote and discourage growth... but that doesn't indicate destruction, it means they manipulate the world around them to grow in certain ways, but at the same time, they tend to only meddle when they need something out of a specific area.

Let's emphasise developing landscape again some more. I mean, I was thinking of Hagrid size rather than Hamletback Goliath (pardon the reference) when I wrote this argument. Though if you're seasoning with tropical jungle no matter of enormousness will allow anything bipedal bigger than half a metre safe passage. That's just flat out impossible.

Sep 3, 2012 -- 6:59PM, Barinellos wrote:

Anyway, I'd argue swidden to be a very green way of life. Yes, it includes a bit of burning down wood. But so does the agriculture of Mulch and The Wild Son. It requires more burning down forest after the first patch is depleted, but that's because they're basically gardens which are left to nature's own way of prospering. Swiddens don't want human ploughing or fertilising, and generally the only thing that's done after seeding is the bare minimum of weeding. They're essentially patches of new forest rebuilding itself, and double as hunting grounds or orchards depending on the phase they're in. And once a yield is harvested and a new patch is burned out, the old swidden is left to become such an area of young forest, full of wild animals and wild fruits. Swiddens shape a very mobile and opportunistic way of life, making use of all parts and phases of nature. In my opinion, it's so much far greener than the rigid, static and permanent white cultivation that I don't see how it could honestly be anything else.

See, you're arguing against your own point here. Those examples of green agriculture? Those are human methods. The giants have different methods and everything you're describing does fit green, but you're ignoring the fact that the giants aren't the only civilization making their home in The Green.

Eh, hunting and gathering is a human method as well, I mean, what's the inconsistency in my point over here? I will readily admit to ignoring whatever I'm unaware of, though
The original point was that I felt the giants could do better and more natural than the way you described, and this was just the rebuttal against what I presumed to be a dismissal of swidden as green-in-philosophy. But again, it boils down to us needing more of the information that's in your head but not yet out there to work with, from what I can see. Are you by any chance referring to Elysium!humans with your reply? Because that's not my argument, and swidden can't sustain the Elysium!human kind of society (while from the information we have I would think it could work for the giants).

Sep 3, 2012 -- 6:59PM, Barinellos wrote:

Aye. Kavu are the best. I'm just not convinced of the need for an unrestrained power of earth-messing. It would destroy all those beautiful things argued a week or two ago

I loved those lizardy nutjobs. I wish they weren't so tied to that one specific event. It kills their reuse value...

As for the manipulation of nature... dude, that's been there since the start. Da'at, the Cherub angelheim is something like 40 redwoods grown together into an enormous natural structure.
As for the other stuff that I argued about... umm.. give me a refresher. And it isn't unrestrained. They aren't terraforming The Green. They're Feng Shui-ing it.
Which sort of introduces an interesting cross point of Taoist Angel Beast Druids. That's something to chew on...

Think I missed most of it, or it faded away into oblivion. The other stuff revolved around the 'material record' stonehenge-y thing, and I would be willing to accept an interplanar connection with Dominaria just to have Kavu being able to be the sweet cuddly nomlizards they want to be .

I still have little substantial opinion on a split of the goliath, currently. Besides it feeling colour-pie-and-cycle-Forced, I would predict that a cause in social structure or temple preferences isn't going to resonate with the average joe all that much. In earth!history, the whole stuff about formalized religion vs. green thinking has been a linear path going from savagery to civilised and I don't think no-one could empathically understand anyone sticking to savagery, much less for the comparably 'shallow' reasons an MtG article could offer. I don't have an answer to it, however, other than dropping the blue giants alltogether and substituting them with something unique, more organic in-world.

Sep 4, 2012 -- 2:01PM, Terti wrote:

Interlude: a landscape setting needs to be developed more than anything else.

I have a landscape and map drawn up, but there is no real way for me to show you guys that.

What's a sephira again? Also, what is the context of the book of revelation? Thirdly, I'm a fan of wurms but I would actually vote nay against them, simply because they don't need to appear in every plane ever. Could give green the chance to shine in a different way, or make leeway for a different fatty to shine. I would actually describe their presence in Elysium the same way you think of Sand Krakens, that they're just in there for rule of cool and not because they need to be there. In which instance I'd promote the most novel idea

Wurms have been kicked out in favor of the super generic "beast" for several years. I hate the thought of using beast because it is a lazy catch all. Wurm just isn't as common as you expect it to be and they aren't even able to take the icon slot anymore because they are pushing Hydra.
When it comes down to it, we need more depth in the green creature chart right now, and a lot of the green stand bys do not work here.
Once again, the Sephira are the physical anchors of the Rapture spell and a cycle of token generating legendary enchantments.

The context of the book of revelation has to do with this: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beast_%28Revel...

Let's emphasise developing landscape again some more. I mean, I was thinking of Hagrid size rather than Hamletback Goliath (pardon the reference) when I wrote this argument. Though if you're seasoning with tropical jungle no matter of enormousness will allow anything bipedal bigger than half a metre safe passage. That's just flat out impossible.

It's seasoned with it, not in terms of density, but in plant life and variety.

Sep 3, 2012 -- 6:59PM, Barinellos wrote:

Eh, hunting and gathering is a human method as well, I mean, what's the inconsistency in my point over here? I will readily admit to ignoring whatever I'm unaware of, though
The original point was that I felt the giants could do better and more natural than the way you described, and this was just the rebuttal against what I presumed to be a dismissal of swidden as green-in-philosophy. But again, it boils down to us needing more of the information that's in your head but not yet out there to work with, from what I can see. Are you by any chance referring to Elysium!humans with your reply? Because that's not my argument, and swidden can't sustain the Elysium!human kind of society (while from the information we have I would think it could work for the giants).

You seemed to have skipped the fact that the human population stretches into green as well, and not just white.
Aside from that, the goliath method isn't JUST hunting and gathering. It's also magically replenishing resources so they don't have to go afar. They don't need to work the earth to grow their resources, they just need to make sure their resources are restored on an accelerated timeline. Their diet doesn't match ours, they don't have the same needs because their biology is different.
And for a lot of this, I'm riffing off you guys as a sounding board to help refine ideas into an actual form instead of a general vague notion. There's nothing to share because it hasn't taken on finer details in a lot of cases.

Think I missed most of it, or it faded away into oblivion. The other stuff revolved around the 'material record' stonehenge-y thing

Material records have no bearing on the manipulation of the topography. They aren't covering anything up and probably aren't uncovering anything either. I'm really confused by the connection you made between these two points. They only alter things within The Green, they don't even push the boundaries of it.

I still have little substantial opinion on a split of the goliath, currently. Besides it feeling colour-pie-and-cycle-Forced, I would predict that a cause in social structure or temple preferences isn't going to resonate with the average joe all that much. In earth!history, the whole stuff about formalized religion vs. green thinking has been a linear path going from savagery to civilised and I don't think no-one could empathically understand anyone sticking to savagery, much less for the comparably 'shallow' reasons an MtG article could offer. I don't have an answer to it, however, other than dropping the blue giants alltogether and substituting them with something unique, more organic in-world.

It isn't a matter of savagery vs civilization, it's a matter of religion vs tradition and government.
You're making a false dichotomy by assuming the goliath worship is primitive/savage just because it is holistic, which is rather... close minded and disappointing, truth be told.

And no. It skews everything to try and introduce ANOTHER society.
Aside from that, the goliath who worshipped chokmah WEREN'T blue at the time. They were still green, it is the schism that brought the total shift.

Okay, it seems strange to me that you want (pre-schism) green-aligned creatures worshiping a blue-aligned deity, Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems to me the philosophical change should come first. However, if not, then the first thing we need to do is not figure out what the schism was, but rather what green-aligned creatures would want with a blue god. Figuring out their green interest in a shard of blue's philosophy could help us determine what event may have occured.

So what do blue and green share, either in general or in Ellysium? Someone mentioned curiosity, and I think that may be a start. I also think they share a certain goal of progress and growth, although with very different methods of acheiving it. Green seeks "natural" progress, evolution, and self-sacrifice for the betterment of the whole. Blue, on the other hand, seeks more unnatural progress, forced evolution, and is (in my opinion, anyway) more self-centered than green.

With all that in mind, we need to figure out why some Goliaths turned from worship of Bihah to the worship of Chokmah. The first thing that occurs to me is dissapointment. Binah was not giving them what they wanted/needed, so they turned. Another option is active conversion, some cross-cultural influence, either by the Moonfolk visiting or the humans moving in, but I don't think that really fits what you're going for. For this one, I think the schism has to remain basically in-house. So what would a green-aligned giant want that Binah would not appear to be providing by Chokmah "might"?

Of course, maybe I'm thinking about this the wrong way. Since Binah is basically the earth (meaning ground, not our planet), and the Goliath magic and Cherubim terraforming can fairly easily manipulate the earth, maybe the soon-to-be blue goliaths felt that had already gotten everything they needed from Binah, that he had no more secrets to unveil to them. Chokmah, on the other hand, was still interconnected with Binah, but still had a world of secrets to uncover. Maybe the initial turn wasn't one of disappointment, but rather one of discovery, which could still be seen as green.

I could start theorizing about possible events that would trigger the ultimate schism, but I think we need to nail down the initial divergence first, so I'll hold off.

For the Flamekin's golems, I sort of suspect they would make glorified versions of themselves, but since they're also stone, it might cause some confusion, so I think they need some unique characteristic that sets them apart. How about no heads? The Flamekin are living beings with souls, and maybe they can use the "head" as a representation of a home for their intelligence, their creativity, and even their souls. Since the golems will be made from similar material as they are, I think the Flamekin will want something to point to to say "They are not us. We are superior" So maybe their golems have no heads, just some sort of gem set in the chest or midsection that serves as a golem's eye? I think that could work. Other than that, the golem's material would probably be pretty intricate, an expression of the artisan's creativity. Also, I would definately lean away from the blaze counters. I don't think the Golems need them the way homunculi do, and if they would serve the same purpose, I'd just extend the feather mechanic into red.

For the Hashmalim Angelheim, I see a very arcane place, held together by magic moreso than the others. Probably multiple series of mid-sized to large meeting rooms, each adjoined by several smaller antichambers that sort of honeycomb into one another. I know it's been done before, but personally I love the visual of walls made of flowing water, condenced by magic into nearly solid, but decidedly non-ice, walls, which can be commanded to part by Hashmalim of sufficient power (making the antichambers perfect locations to spy on the larger rooms, and establishing spying as an acceptable, even expected trait of the Hashmalim). Also, to show their love/hate relationship with nature, I'd make the water walls flow upward, and maybe occasionally allow small fish to swim around in them, fish probably imported in from various parts of the world.

Also, I'd vote no on the wurms. You've already established that the angels were not able to wipe out the Leviathans, so I think if you want a real "Danger Zone" at the polar regions, it could simply be where the leviathans like to "sun". That's what I've got for now.

Goliath Theology Show Golem Show Angelheim Show

The wurms would be in the forest btw, not the polar region. Dunno if we're talking across each other or not, but might as well be explicit so there's no confusion.

Uuuuuummmm, yeeeaaaahhh.....

Just popping in to say that I'm kind of going to phase out here. There's just too much information for me to handle at the moment, too much back-and-forth and I'm having issues with my current schedule to find the time to ruminate on what's being posted. Because, dammit, I need to ruminate!

It was kind of hard enough when I first started chiming in - keeping up with everything - but right now I really can't. And then there's the whole Ravnica situation... (which, don't get me wrong, I'm psyched over; but there's too much talk about the spoilers that keep coming up under my nose and beyond my reach (time-wise))

I think I'm going to go slink off and try to improve the WMTC story. Maybe by writing more than a single chapter.

Sep 5, 2012 -- 1:04AM, Its_Always_42 wrote:

Uuuuuummmm, yeeeaaaahhh.....

Just popping in to say that I'm kind of going to phase out here. There's just too much information for me to handle at the moment, too much back-and-forth and I'm having issues with my current schedule to find the time to ruminate on what's being posted. Because, dammit, I need to ruminate!

It was kind of hard enough when I first started chiming in - keeping up with everything - but right now I really can't. And then there's the whole Ravnica situation... (which, don't get me wrong, I'm psyched over; but there's too much talk about the spoilers that keep coming up under my nose and beyond my reach (time-wise))

I think I'm going to go slink off and try to improve the WMTC story. Maybe by writing more than a single chapter.

Eh, it's cool man, don't worry about it.
Thanks for stopping by and giving it a stab anyways.

And I've said it before, we are a prolific lot, so I very easily understand getting overwhelmed.

I'm with you concerning 'beasts', but I think there is plenty of substitute material left. Also, given the recent quality of wurm rares, I'm inclined to think Wizards is letting go of their fight against the reality of green fat .

Sep 3, 2012 -- 6:59PM, Barinellos wrote:

Eh, hunting and gathering is a human method as well, I mean, what's the inconsistency in my point over here? I will readily admit to ignoring whatever I'm unaware of, though
The original point was that I felt the giants could do better and more natural than the way you described, and this was just the rebuttal against what I presumed to be a dismissal of swidden as green-in-philosophy. But again, it boils down to us needing more of the information that's in your head but not yet out there to work with, from what I can see. Are you by any chance referring to Elysium!humans with your reply? Because that's not my argument, and swidden can't sustain the Elysium!human kind of society (while from the information we have I would think it could work for the giants).

You seemed to have skipped the fact that the human population stretches into green as well, and not just white.
Aside from that, the goliath method isn't JUST hunting and gathering. It's also magically replenishing resources so they don't have to go afar. They don't need to work the earth to grow their resources, they just need to make sure their resources are restored on an accelerated timeline. Their diet doesn't match ours, they don't have the same needs because their biology is different.
And for a lot of this, I'm riffing off you guys as a sounding board to help refine ideas into an actual form instead of a general vague notion. There's nothing to share because it hasn't taken on finer details in a lot of cases.

I know that the humans stretch into green, as that is the reason why I asked in the first place. :/. Does that change things for your end on?

Think I missed most of it, or it faded away into oblivion. The other stuff revolved around the 'material record' stonehenge-y thing

Material records have no bearing on the manipulation of the topography. They aren't covering anything up and probably aren't uncovering anything either. I'm really confused by the connection you made between these two points. They only alter things within The Green, they don't even push the boundaries of it.

I made the connection because the material record argument revolved around the angels being capable or incapable of covering up the material record. The presence of that Cherubim altering thing now tips back the scales set before, which is mostly why I'm so cautious of it.

I still have little substantial opinion on a split of the goliath, currently. Besides it feeling colour-pie-and-cycle-Forced, I would predict that a cause in social structure or temple preferences isn't going to resonate with the average joe all that much. In earth!history, the whole stuff about formalized religion vs. green thinking has been a linear path going from savagery to civilised and I don't think no-one could empathically understand anyone sticking to savagery, much less for the comparably 'shallow' reasons an MtG article could offer. I don't have an answer to it, however, other than dropping the blue giants alltogether and substituting them with something unique, more organic in-world.

It isn't a matter of savagery vs civilization, it's a matter of religion vs tradition and government.
You're making a false dichotomy by assuming the goliath worship is primitive/savage just because it is holistic, which is rather... close minded and disappointing, truth be told.

And no. It skews everything to try and introduce ANOTHER society.
Aside from that, the goliath who worshipped chokmah WEREN'T blue at the time. They were still green, it is the schism that brought the total shift.

I'm not making the false dichotomy here, but rather concerned by how easy it is to fall into that mistake with the current set-up. Again, does that change things from your end on?

I know that the humans stretch into green, as that is the reason why I asked in the first place. :/. Does that change things for your end on?

Then I don't see why you think swidden wouldn't sustain the green humans. Their culture is closer to the Goliath at this point than it is to their white ancestry.

I made the connection because the material record argument revolved around the angels being capable or incapable of covering up the material record. The presence of that Cherubim altering thing now tips back the scales set before, which is mostly why I'm so cautious of it.

If the angels had put it to their mind, they could always have covered up what happened. It's a matter of interest in doing so vs. the implications of wiping out what they did.
They just don't care if their handiwork is left. They either don't know what happened or they just don't talk about it.
Mostly the former. It was never a matter of if they could or not, it's that most of them are unaware of what it means and it falls outside their interest to question it.

I'm not making the false dichotomy here, but rather concerned by how easy it is to fall into that mistake with the current set-up. Again, does that change things from your end on?

Not at all, it just means that people have to be able to pick up that despite being green, they aren't savage or primitive. That's why it was important to establish full cities and practices with traditions as part of their backstory. It means making sure the gestalt impression from the primer is one of a fully realized civilization and not that of primitives.

It's a little more work to make it absolutely implicit, but it shouldn't be difficult. I find this a case where it's the flaw of what people bring to the table before hand rather than what I'm bringing to it.

A couple quick things, then a long one.  For the Hashmalim Angelheim, I was thinking the floors should be some kind of stone, or maybe marble, probably a light bluish-gray, but these would have gaps between them periodically to allow for the flowing walls (although just magically removing them works just as well.) As far as a location, I would say the ideal place would be an island (either natural or magical) in the biggest river of blue's territory, probably in a spot where the river widens almost to a lake (again, either naturally or magically created.) Failing that, it could literally be on the coast, built into a natural cliff, above which a small river cascades into a waterfall, although that may be too similar to the black Angelheim, which I vaguely remember had a waterfall entrance of some kind.

I see your point about the golems. The animal heads is an interesting idea, and might make naming the creature cards easier, too. Traditionally, Magic golems are named after the material of which they are comprised, but maybe by naming them after certain types of animals, you could free up some space. This could also provide an interesting opportunity to hint at some other-worldly inspiration, by giving one golem the head of a kavu, or a baloth, or Vorrac or Nantuko, you know, something they "shouldn't" know about. 

As far as the polar wurms go, I think in some random post you transitioned from wurms to the polar region, and my mind made the connection, so my mistake. However, I still think the idea of Leviathans and sea creatures "claiming" the poles is still a workable idea, though again, you could also do something more sinister. (I keep going back to this. Basically, it just seems to me there has to be some dark, mysterious force in this world even beyond the knowledge of the angels that pulling some subtle, secret strings. It's likely tied in with the Rapture spell. Just my inkling)

Anyway, main event.
Spoiler: Show

Okay, sorry this took so long to get to, but I wanted to dedicate the appropriate amount of attention to it.

Angelheim Show Golems and Flamekin Show Poles, Sea Creatures, and Misc. Show

main event Show


In other thoughts, I briefly considered sprites for green. Dunno how well that works. I sort of like it, but I feel like they really don't feel right in a mechanical sense and green is doing too much. In general, I'm just eager to finish filling things out in the creature department.

In a different area altogether, I've decided that the Zabaniyahim should have a Bat motif in the same way the Seraphim have a serpent/bird theme. Thoughts about that?

Okay, deep breath...

Angelheim: Spoiler: Show

Golems: Spoiler: Show

Sinister Force: Spoiler: Show

Goliaths (oh, boy): Spoiler: Show

It seems to me that the angels are an abomination to nature, created by humanoid magical means. Perhaps the sinister force working against the angels is nature itself. This doesn't have to be Zendikarish, could be a herald of nature type creature... like Dryads. So maybe I love dryads a little too much. Anyway, really not a thought out idea, but something that someone could play with.
I'm loving Raven's work here, although I preferred the first Goliath schism story.
Perhaps you had all the Goliaths merrily living together, being nomadic and worshipping Binah and Chokmah to various extents. Being nomadicish some of the more Chokmah inclined goliaths ventured further and further out from the forests where they traditionally lived. Perhaps they began to live for a time amongst the moonfolk, some of them learning/developing further powers of divination until one goliath become so adept at this that they were welcomed by the moonfolk and inducted into some kind of moonfolk mystery school. This goliath gained somewhat of a cult following amongst the Chokmah aligned goliaths, leading to increasing numbers of goliaths to journey to the moonfolk cities. Upon death this goliath of divination became the first goliath Hashmalim, an outrage to the Cherubim, as this sets an unfortunate precident as the goliaths are heavies in the Cherubim forces. This makes the Cherubim encourage the goliaths still in the forest, who may be distrustful of the now city dwelling goliaths anyway, to wage was with them against the moonfolk and Hashmalim (or it may just be an excuse, and how coercive this was could be discussed depending upon how open the goliaths are to do the Cherubim's bidding). Through some means or other the goliaths develop ever more powerful weather magics that cause increasing devastation, a betrayal of the natural world that they are meant to cherish. This is disgusting to the now increasingly Chokmah aligned goliaths who who turn their backs on the green magic and forest spaces that did so much damage to the cities and resources of knowledge therein.

Sep 8, 2012 -- 4:20AM, derfal wrote:

Being nomadicish some of the more Chokmah inclined goliaths ventured further and further out from the forests where they traditionally lived. Perhaps they began to live for a time amongst the moonfolk,

Interesting. So in your version, the move into Moonfolk society happened before the schism. I hadn't thought of that. It could work. We'll see what the Barin has to say.

Okay, sorry about the delays, but we've been getting a lot more prolific in our posts as of late, and it's required more attention to properly address them, so I've been saving off in doing it for a time where I could give it enough focus.

We uh... we might want to reel it in a little and work on less per post. Just put most of it on the backburner and focus on one issue at a time, because it's slowing us down even if we're doing huge posts. But we'll take it as it goes.

Anyways!
Angelheim Show

Golems Show

Sinister Force Show

Goliaths Show

Also, I really really want to make a cycle of Flagbearers for each color. I mean... the creature type is just sitting there! .
... yeah, I like the weird creature types. That's why I'm bringing back nomad and mystic and throwing stuff like Juggernaut and Incarnation on top of other creature types. I get sick of class tribal like soldiers. It's just... pedestrian.

With the prophecy and goliaths I was thinking only the blue ones, so that they tie in with the moonfolk, but I can see that that would make all blue creatures do the same thing, which is a bit redundant. Maybe see the past, allowing to bring spells from the graveyard... probably also redundant. hmmm

Sep 10, 2012 -- 3:00AM, derfal wrote:

With the prophecy and goliaths I was thinking only the blue ones, so that they tie in with the moonfolk, but I can see that that would make all blue creatures do the same thing, which is a bit redundant. Maybe see the past, allowing to bring spells from the graveyard... probably also redundant. hmmm

No, you see I had the same thought too, so I'm glad you said something.
Something like a Mnemonic Wall or a really powerful one could Reminisce .
I think it would be an interesting sub theme to work with from a mechanical and story perspective.

From in world, it could be used as a reverse divination, making them able to see the past in the same way the moonfolk see the future, a sort of adaptation of blue's magic to serve their own needs.

Oh cool, I feel useful now. I thought you didn't like it because you seemed to dismiss is when I brought it up as a way of introducing the Norse conception of giants. Being able to see into the past allows either of mine of Raven's schism stories to work, indeed a kind of divination that is inaccessible to the moonfolk would make the goliaths more impressive to them. It also allows a potential story of the goliaths figuring out any dark past secrets of the angels, they could see why the rapture happened. They don't have to, but they could. I think the only potential problem is that it allows the blue goliaths to work more closely with a black graveyard matters type theme, which in many ways would fit better with the black splashing moonfolk.

Sep 10, 2012 -- 4:16AM, derfal wrote:

Oh cool, I feel useful now. I thought you didn't like it because you seemed to dismiss is when I brought it up as a way of introducing the Norse conception of giants. Being able to see into the past allows either of mine of Raven's schism stories to work, indeed a kind of divination that is inaccessible to the moonfolk would make the goliaths more impressive to them. It also allows a potential story of the goliaths figuring out any dark past secrets of the angels, they could see why the rapture happened. They don't have to, but they could. I think the only potential problem is that it allows the blue goliaths to work more closely with a black graveyard matters type theme, which in many ways would fit better with the black splashing moonfolk.

Well, yes and no.
The divination should come after the schism as a result of moving into blue and learning moonfolk magic, not as something they already did.
Aside from that, we still want to keep a substantial separation between how far back they can see and the length of time from the Rapture's casting.
In general, the further back, the harder it is to both cast the spell and to discern what it is you're looking at in the same way major prophecies are hard to unravel. I'm seeing it easiest to cast a spell to see something that happened in your lifetime, sort of Quantum Leap style, and any further back, you have to have substantial knowledge of that time to be able to frame the spell correctly. It offers more detail for subjects you already know, which can maybe make you able to cast further back after some study on what you learned.

Anyways, black generally only gets reclamation of creatures, so focusing on only the instant and sorceries in the graveyard would be best.

I'll try to work up another version of the Goliath schism tonight, but if work is busy it may not be until tomorrow. I think we're starting to zero in on it, however, which is good.

As for the others, I think the Hashmalim Angelheim is more or less "there." I'm pretty happy with the images it conjures, and I like that it's probably the most inaccessible of all the Angelheims, fitting in with the secretiveness of the Hashmalim (I'm not saying the others are overly accessible themselves, but hey, if the Hashmalim don't want you in, and you don't have gills, you're not getting in!)

I see your point about feather/blaze counters. You're right, they really wouldn't interact. However, flavor-wise, I still don't see it as necessary. The feather counters represent angelic "blessing" that allows the homunculi to remain longer than a few fleeting moments. With Flamekin golems, no angelic assistance is needed, so it basically falls down to a decision on the Flamekin's part as to whether or not she will "supercharge" her creation. I'm not saying it can't work, I'm just saying that the mechanics of each golem that uses one would have to be flavorful enough to justify the subtheme, and what you'll likely want for the Golems are the mid-level red fatties. The red gorgons will also share this slot, and of the two, I think they're the ones you would want the strange abilities. I suspect red golems would more like be vanilla or french vanilla, with maybe one or two exceptions. That's just my take, it certainly doesn't mean it's not doable (or that not I'm just completely wrong, who knows?)

And by the way, I did know that the Flamekin were solid, I think I just misspoke a bit. When I compared the Flamekin and the Arcbound, I guess I more meant the way they exude energy. With the golems, I picture something more akin to a moving statue.

Like I said, I'll try to work on a new Goliath narrative soon, hopefully tonight, but no promises.

Sep 10, 2012 -- 1:57PM, RavenoftheBlack wrote:

As for the others, I think the Hashmalim Angelheim is more or less "there." I'm pretty happy with the images it conjures, and I like that it's probably the most inaccessible of all the Angelheims, fitting in with the secretiveness of the Hashmalim (I'm not saying the others are overly accessible themselves, but hey, if the Hashmalim don't want you in, and you don't have gills, you're not getting in!)

Well, I do imagine they have a sort of port for ships to dock at, so it's at least a little more immediately accessible than Ketheres since... you know, it's floating around in the middle of the sky much in the way bricks don't. Of all the angelheim, Da'at is probably the most accessible.

I see your point about feather/blaze counters. You're right, they really wouldn't interact. However, flavor-wise, I still don't see it as necessary. The feather counters represent angelic "blessing" that allows the homunculi to remain longer than a few fleeting moments. With Flamekin golems, no angelic assistance is needed, so it basically falls down to a decision on the Flamekin's part as to whether or not she will "supercharge" her creation. I'm not saying it can't work, I'm just saying that the mechanics of each golem that uses one would have to be flavorful enough to justify the subtheme, and what you'll likely want for the Golems are the mid-level red fatties. The red gorgons will also share this slot, and of the two, I think they're the ones you would want the strange abilities. I suspect red golems would more like be vanilla or french vanilla, with maybe one or two exceptions. That's just my take, it certainly doesn't mean it's not doable (or that not I'm just completely wrong, who knows?)

I want to stress again that the Hashmallim are the ones who made the homunculi... and they don't have wings, ipso facto: no feathers. The feathers aren't blessings given, they are taken from the other angels.
Anyways, the golems wouldn't be dependent on the blaze counters to exist. They'd be a little more like level up counters and probably have some function like Ashling the Pilgrim 's + counters. Dunno about the abilities, but something like that.

The gorgons in red just aren't going to be a major thing. They'll splash, but there won't be enough of them to be a theme. They'll probably play around with lands in much the same way the blue goliath play around with divination. Probably a land sac ability as opposed to the flamekin's convoke and land discard theme. Sort of the opposite side of the coin.

Like I said, I'll try to work on a new Goliath narrative soon, hopefully tonight, but no promises.

Hey, take your time, don't rush, not like we have any deadlines to work on here.

So, after we get this nailed down, and I get a style guide composed for the Twilight Cathedral, what will we work on next? I know there are still details that need to be hashed out.

Incidentally, I'm toying with the idea of a legendary creature who is directly opposed to the angels. Someone who has an enormous bounty on his head because he's managed to kill several angels by himself. Motivation is up in the air, but stats and abilities are pretty set.
Rare Legendary angel killer Show

Goliath Schism Story 3.0 - Fair warning, this is the longest thing I've posted so far. By a lot...

I've got it. 

Metaknowledge:Spoiler: Show

 

Background:Spoiler: Show

 

Event:Spoiler: Show

Basically all of this works for me, though I'm likely going to do small edits here and there. Nothing major.
The only real differences is... no on the trolls. It's putting a little too much onto their plate since we're already playing with the trolls forgotten history and the flamekin, which probably puts them in a different portion of the forest than the goliaths to start with. (the flamekin lands are further north than the Goliath capital, which is on the southern tip of the flamekin lands. It's the only reason they haven't come to blows over territory in the past.)
Aside from that, I'm just not fond of developing the trolls so far along that line. I was never overly fond of Mirrodin's trolls and they are the only substantial troll culture to exist, draws too many parallels there.

The second is just the removal of the Cherubim, making this an internal matter.

But yeah, this is good stuff, this we can work with.

Now if I could only remember what I wanted to work on next... Eh, it'll come to me unless someone else has a suggestion. We still need to nail down the rest of the creature pie for green and what they mean flavorfully...

I would love to find some way to put in a "Creature- Nightmare Angel" somewhere as a singleton. Because it amuses me.

Okay, the focus that I'm planning on moving forward with now is exploring the cultural nuances involved with the Flamekin, particularly along the axis of how their religion developed.
Aside from that, there are details that I think need refining that have already been established.

we still need to discuss what can finish out the creature chunk of green and I've come to the conclusion that instead of troll ruins... the ruins that were struck were demonic in origin. I hope that conjures enough ominous overtures to the story, even from a meta-knowledge perspective.

Aside from that, I have another worldbuild for a legendary character. One of the Seraphim: Wareil. The only detail I've got floating is that he is one of the last descendants of the usurped princes from the Seraphic coup. Personality and everything else is up for grabs, so if anyone wants to take a stab at that, be my guest.

In addition, I think I've resolved how to get my Nightmare Angel. Riffing on the ideas of exiles and outcasts, this is an angel who has tampered with his very nature. He uncovered something demonic, and chose to embrace what he could learn to modify himself. Every last Glory of the Angels know of him and all of them loathe him on sight. His name has been stricken from everyone's lips.
So if you want to take that little mini-writing assignment as well, that would be fascinating. The only stipulation is that it cannot be from the Hashmallim. I want wings on him.

So, I've been working on an in world creation myth for the angels. Still have some bugs to hammer out on it, but I'll update this post at some point with it.

Spoiler: Show

And there we go, an in world myth about the appearance of the angels. I know it's sort of messing with the entire record thing, but it shows how little the angels and their people understand what happened.
Completely open to suggestions on how to improve it, because this is just the first draft of all this.

Meta Data time:

Spoiler: Show

This is at least partially just because I love weird creature types and taking advantage of Elder as a viable one.

Hey, sorry I've been gone from this thread. Things have been crazy this last week, and of course, that's when I decide to start my own thread...

Anyway, I'll review the last few posts and tyr to come up with some reactions, but it probably won't be until Wednesday or so.

Sep 17, 2012 -- 4:37PM, RavenoftheBlack wrote:

Hey, sorry I've been gone from this thread. Things have been crazy this last week, and of course, that's when I decide to start my own thread...

Anyway, I'll review the last few posts and tyr to come up with some reactions, but it probably won't be until Wednesday or so.

Hey, it's cool man, no worries.
I'm just rather... disturbed that nobody else has picked up to check any of it out, truth be told.

Sep 17, 2012 -- 2:31PM, Barinellos wrote:

Meta Data time:

Spoiler: Show

At the heart of the Sephirot, the enormous gemstones that anchor the rapture, are a race of Elder Angels. They were the prototype creations that were meant to protect the world, but they were flawed and lacked what was needed to protect. They only understood destruction and the purging of what they saw as flaws in the world.

So they were sealed inside the gems, and the spell was forged to transform the dead into angels using the Elders as a rudimentary blueprint. By transforming the dead with the Rapture, it gave the newly created angels a sense of what was missing. Humanity. (It also changed their form slightly to be more human, as opposed to the more bestial/eldritch Elder Angels.)

And so the failed experiment was sealed away and they were incorporated into the future, still useful to their maker.

But they are still alive. They are still aware.

This is at least partially just because I love weird creature types and taking advantage of Elder as a viable one.

Spooky. Seriously though, this I like.
Here's a question though; If the Elder angels were failed experiments, who, uh... Made them? Has that been canonized? Should I fear for the safety of my immortal soul for asking? I like not being breakfast, after all.

Sep 17, 2012 -- 8:56PM, Ruwinreborn wrote:

Spooky. Seriously though, this I like.
Here's a question though; If the Elder angels were failed experiments, who, uh... Made them? Has that been canonized? Should I fear for the safety of my immortal soul for asking? I like not being breakfast, after all.

We can only assume that they were created by whoever cast the Rapture. Be that god/goddess, ancient magi, planeswalker, or some long dead civilization.

The Rapture is still shrouded in mystery, the only thing known that it creates the angels.
Refer to the above Angelic Creation myth for how the world thinks the Rapture came into being.

Okay, just some quick thoughts on everything since my post on the schism. I'll go more in-depth with the Flamekin later, although I really don't know much about their religion in the first place. I may try to write something up on your angel killer, Wareil, or the nightmare angel in the next day or two, but I want other people to have a chance if they want one.

As for your changes to my schism write-up, just two things: I used trolls to complement the Flamekin thing, not to overstretch them, but honestly, who the ruins belong to isn't relevant. If you prefer demonic, demonic works just fine. As for the Cherubim, they were used mostly because I figured their terraforming methods would be substantially quicker than the elders. Again, it doesn't matter much, that was just my reasoning.

The in-world creation myth seems fine, although the lack of a creator figure is notable. Not that it's a problem, it's just naturalistic in the sense that the metaphorical tree just sort of came into being in response to the growing darkness.

As for the Sephirot, honestly, I'm torn on this one. One the one hand, I like the image it conveys, and it creates a theoretical opportunity to make a cycle of "Legendary Creature - Elder Angel" cards, probably in the third "set" (thus reviving yet another archaic creature type) and it adds another layer of menace to the Rapture. On the other hand, though, it poses the logical question of how does the Rapture spell use the Elder Angels as templates if the templates themselves aren't what the spell wanted in the first place? Also, it reminds me of Portal 2 (the game, not the Magic set) which is fine, but maybe a little light-hearted for the image you're going for.

Finally, it creates an intention paradox. As I said, the natural proclivity here would be to want to use them, eventually, as legendary creatures. However, doing that would probably require breaking the Rapture spell, which you don't want to do. (Also, it may smack a bit of the Eldrazi, though not to the same extreme.) But not doing it means you have a story with powerful, ancient, unique beings who likely hold a MAJOR grudge, but offer no payoff. Like I said, a paradox of intentions. Of course, maybe they are simultaneously alive and dead, until the Sephirot is opened, making them sort of like Schrodinger's angels, or something. Now THAT'S a paradox...

Finally, for the Hashmalim Angelheim, I agree you should have at least two ports for ships. NOW THAT'S A PAIR A' DOCKS! (I'm sorry, I'm very tired...)

Sep 19, 2012 -- 4:24PM, RavenoftheBlack wrote:

Okay, just some quick thoughts on everything since my post on the schism. I'll go more in-depth with the Flamekin later, although I really don't know much about their religion in the first place. I may try to write something up on your angel killer, Wareil, or the nightmare angel in the next day or two, but I want other people to have a chance if they want one.

Probably best to hold off on trying to write anything about the Flamekin beliefs because it's a nebulous thing. Mostly I want to hash out the details before we try and make anything solid. I'll toss in the tenets of their beliefs down at the bottom and we can go from there. Everything else... well, it's pretty much just you, me, and Ruwinreborn around here now. Can't help but feel we might get a little more activity if this weren't such a large thread, but until the YMtC stuff starts up after I finish up the style document, we're pretty much stuck at our current population.

As for the Cherubim, they were used mostly because I figured their terraforming methods would be substantially quicker than the elders. Again, it doesn't matter much, that was just my reasoning.

I see it less as a matter of terraforming and more of a massive Naturalize cast by the elders.

The in-world creation myth seems fine, although the lack of a creator figure is notable. Not that it's a problem, it's just naturalistic in the sense that the metaphorical tree just sort of came into being in response to the growing darkness.

Nobody is sure about the origin of the rapture, so everyone has their pet theory where it comes frmo... and no proof to back it up. So they just go with the neutral naturalistic belief when talking to other cultures.

On the other hand, though, it poses the logical question of how does the Rapture spell use the Elder Angels as templates if the templates themselves aren't what the spell wanted in the first place? Also, it reminds me of Portal 2 (the game, not the Magic set) which is fine, but maybe a little light-hearted for the image you're going for.

I thought it would be easy to explain, but I find I'm having trouble. Basically, you have the soul being reforged in the rapture, but the template is incomplete. That's where the soul comes into play. It fills in the missing parts of what the Rapture wants to make the new angel. The Elder Angels lack humanity, both in form and function. The new angels are a combination of the soul, and a more diluted form of the Elder Angels. Does it make sense now?
Like a big glass of Angel Kool-aid.

Finally, it creates an intention paradox. As I said, the natural proclivity here would be to want to use them, eventually, as legendary creatures. However, doing that would probably require breaking the Rapture spell, which you don't want to do. (Also, it may smack a bit of the Eldrazi, though not to the same extreme.) But not doing it means you have a story with powerful, ancient, unique beings who likely hold a MAJOR grudge, but offer no payoff. Like I said, a paradox of intentions. Of course, maybe they are simultaneously alive and dead, until the Sephirot is opened, making them sort of like Schrodinger's angels, or something. Now THAT'S a paradox...

Yeah, it is a bit of an intention paradox, but then again, they needs to be a lot of various places to take the story in the end game, and it's possible the Rapture might not survive the end of the war. I want it to be an option if anybody ever wants to take up the job of telling the story.
The main difference between the Elder Angels and the Eldrazi is... I haven't set the Elder Angels up as undefeatable. They're more like the Nephilim than the Eldrazi. Which may or may not be somewhat intentional.... I really wanted to use the Nephilim creature type, but they have SUCH a distinct identity.

Part of this is also if the rapture could be restored if they somehow got loose. Lots of story hooks to work with. The mystery of the Rapture, the cause of the war, the effects it is having on the world at large, etc etc.

Finally, for the Hashmalim Angelheim, I agree you should have at least two ports for ships. NOW THAT'S A PAIR A' DOCKS! (I'm sorry, I'm very tired...)

Wah-waaaah.

Anyways, the Flamekin beliefs, in bulletpoint form:
* They belief in the interconnectivity of beings. Deep holism here, in they believe actions matter. Very butterfly effect.
* They believe in the universe. That it is a living thing far greater than themselves. Sort of a shamanistic spiritualism.
* They embrace chaos, not in the anarchy sense, but in the fight against entropy sense. Chaos keeps the world alive, it brings down stagnation.
* They used to believe in the old gods: The goddess of love Shesed, who was their creation deity, and the god of judgement Gevurah who gave them law and order.


On the aside, I'm not sure if I should come up with a larger scale split story for the Flamekin and the Gorgons considering how much deeper the stories involved with the Moonfolk, Humans, and Goliath are... thoughts about that too?

Oh, and of course, I HAVE to have more creature types to fill out green. It's woefully understaffed right now.

And a note for future discussion points. Locations locations locations.

Well, to your earlier point, maybe if we focus on one thing at a time, it might draw in one or two new people, since we might be able to avoid the "wall of text" problem.

With that in mind, I think we should work on either the Flamekin, or the other green creatures. Does anyone have a preference?

Unresolved Issues Show

Honestly, if you know anyone that might want to help around here, let them know. I'll throw a primer to them, but I'd really appreciate getting some interest and activity back in here besides us.

Anyways, even though this goes against talking about more than one thing, I finally came up with a mechanical theme and identity to work with in white. Off Tribal Tribal.
What I mean by that is a combination of cards like Griffin Rider and cards like Lord of the Unreal . Lords who do not share a creature type with what they buff, and cards that buff themselves according to what else you have on the field. It maintains the army feel, puts emphasis on the creatures, and functions differently enough from regular tribal that it comes across as unique. On the one hand, it may look like there isn't a lot of design space for this, but there really honestly is. When we get to the YMtC stuff, we'll have to play numbers carefully, but I think this is the best thing for them.

Anyways, I'll let you choose what should be resolved first, the Green Creature Pie or the Red Religion. And if you want to go ahead and post any little backstories for the previous character discussions, go right ahead.

For the Green Creature Pie, would it be useful to think about what kind of creatures Goliaths may use? So what would they eat? What would they use to plow their fields, draw their carts and ride? Like it could be fun to think of them using a domesticated baloth, for example, to draw their carts and what not.

Sep 22, 2012 -- 1:05PM, derfal wrote:

For the Green Creature Pie, would it be useful to think about what kind of creatures Goliaths may use? So what would they eat? What would they use to plow their fields, draw their carts and ride? Like it could be fun to think of them using a domesticated baloth, for example, to draw their carts and what not.

I originally read that as "baloth to draw their cards."

Anyways, part of this is the matter of filling out the general "animals" which would include wolves, elk, and maybe a half dozen others, but that would only fill out the generic "animal" part of the pie, but we need at least one more notable thing to finish out the rest of green's identity.
And really, I want to avoid the Beast type like the plague for two reasons:
1) Horns in on the Cherubim's notability with being "Beast Angels"
2) Beast is a lazy catch all type that irritates me.

If you want to get the bits for the animals out of the way, feel free to make a little list of green normal animals that have types. Elk and Wolf are obviously already in there.

Did some YMtC stuff today, including working more on the Sephirot. One thing is clear when we eventually get there, we gotta have some more cards that produce the angel tokens than just the Sephirot... and Red should get the least amount of them. Think I solved the issue I had with the black Sephirot too.

Thinking about the green creature problem, I did some looking at the many creature-types we have available to us. These are all for the non-sentient side of things (I'll get to the sentients in a minute.) Here's the list I complied, which is not all-inclusive:

Spoiler: Show

For the normals, I think we need to think about what we would like the Goliath to wear. Leopard skin jumps out, and maybe lion, so I think Cat is a viable option. Also, giant spiders may be needed with all the flying, although maybe in this "set" green will just get flying from the angels and leave reach out.

For the weird ones, Badgers stand out. I don't know why. Ferrets stand out, too, but that's mostly because someone I know has two of them, and they therefore have a special place in my heart. Also, wild horses I think are an under-used thing in magic, so there's that. For similar reasons, I like the idea of predatory, flightless birds, maybe even taking on the role of apex predators, apart of course from the Goliath and the Cherubim.

Finally, if the trees are far enough apart for the Goliath to travel freely, the forest could probably easily house bigger mammals like elephants, rhinos, and the little-used hippos.

But basically, I think it will partially be the Goliath style guide that will fill those out.

As for the sentients, I'm still leaning toward dryad, and I'll tell you why. With the Angels and big beaters, and Goliaths also with thick bodies, all it leaves are the animals and green-aligned humans. We need something that will take the place of the elves, something with small bodies and with a connection to nature (i.e. green's mana ramp). In contrast to the earthy giants, I think we need something more ethereal, less worldly. Dryads fit this role nicely, although you can do a similar thing with spirits (but they're sort of a catch-all, too) and elementals (though this creates odd interactions with the Flamekin, who are also elementals), so I say stick with Dryads. Maybe Satyrs, but they'd have to be almost completely redefined, and you're already working against the grain in a lot of areas.

Those are my thoughts on the green creature thing for now. If work stays quiet, I think I'll write something up for Wareil, but I only have the beginnings of an idea for him.

Okay, it stayed quiet. Here's what I've got for Wareil.

History/Personality:
Spoiler: Show

YMTC Stuff:
Spoiler: Show

Animals Show

Secondary Green Show

Wareal Show

Mechanical junk unrelated to previous Show

Before Lorywn, there were only about 2 fewer Faeries in Green than in Blue, but that's not saying much, as it was a relatively unsupported creature type. Here's my problem with Faeries in Green. Green hates flying. Vehemently. I admit this is weird for green, since plenty of natural things fly, but still, mechanically Green hates flyers. We're already giving them flying fatties with the Cherubim. I just feel like giving green small flyers, even a small handful, would be detremental to the game and would likely skew the balance in Green's favor, especially if they also help ramping. Now, on the other hand, if Ellysium's faeries are flightless, maybe we've got something, but I think people would find that weird, considering that currently the ratio of flying faeries to non-flying faeries in Magic is about 70/4.

To avoid spilling over into too many topics, I'll briefly give my response to the Wareal changes (you changed your spelling on me again). I threw in the masquerade thing because I thought it would fit well with masks they wear anyway. It sort of makes me wonder, though, if they don't "party," what do they do with their time when not fighting one another? But that aside, overall I still like the character a lot. The only other thing that caught my attention was wanting to give them regeneration. On the one hand, this seems weird because white seems to (mostly) avoid regeneration in favor of damage prevention. On the other hand, I see no real reason white CAN'T regenerate, they just usually don't. But even though it's from Planar Chaos and therefore doesn't really count, Malach of the Dawn   seems to indicate that in some place or another, angels could regenerate, and therefore I see no reason why Wareal can't regen his followers, so that works for me if he gets a legendary card.

Finally, as for the list of things going on, probably a good idea.

Sep 25, 2012 -- 3:28PM, RavenoftheBlack wrote:

Before Lorywn, there were only about 2 fewer Faeries in Green than in Blue, but that's not saying much, as it was a relatively unsupported creature type. Here's my problem with Faeries in Green. Green hates flying. Vehemently. I admit this is weird for green, since plenty of natural things fly, but still, mechanically Green hates flyers. We're already giving them flying fatties with the Cherubim. I just feel like giving green small flyers, even a small handful, would be detremental to the game and would likely skew the balance in Green's favor, especially if they also help ramping. Now, on the other hand, if Ellysium's faeries are flightless, maybe we've got something, but I think people would find that weird, considering that currently the ratio of flying faeries to non-flying faeries in Magic is about 70/4.

I really don't like the idea of fearies without flying, just because it's so intrinsic to people's expectations and I'm already running roughshod over a lot of those. Just some bridges shouldn't be crossed.
So, no faeries for mechanical reasons, no dryads for flavor reasons. Makes me wonder what else we have, because if we start moving further in on the available races, we'll start butting in to either the animal slots or the sapient areas that require a culture built with them.

... Green is hard.

It sort of makes me wonder, though, if they don't "party," what do they do with their time when not fighting one another?

They live a fairly tightly regimented life. Basically all the ranks have military drills to deal with, but aside from that, it depends on their ranks.
The Wardens run the prisons, the Soldiers pull guard duty, the Judges are... judges and the Generals plan military strategy. The Sarim are actively involved with running their principalities, and etc etc. They stay busy.
Now, what they do to relax... honestly, they like flying. They live to fight as well, so sparring is fun for them (as well as shaking out some rank points every time.) But they also indulge in art, taking in sculpture especially. They can't work the art themselves, but they have an appreciation for the skill.
Oh, and white does get regeneration in tertiary. Green gets it primarily, and black secondarily, but White does have access to it. There are more than just Malach.

Finally, as for the list of things going on, probably a good idea.

Right, I'll draft it up later tonight so we can examine how everything is fitting together in regards to the themes each color is getting and how their mechanical identities are working with that. Really worried about black in that respect, in part because they have no theme to work on to begin with.

Alright, so ever since you posted your last response, I've been thinking long and hard about what other green creatures are available. After an exhaustive search of creature types, I have determined that pickings are slim, so here are my findings, in reverse order of my suggestions.

4th
Spoiler: Show

3rd
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2nd
Spoiler: Show

1st
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So that's what I've got for the remainder of green's creature slots. I was hoping to finish work on a write-up for your Nightmare Angel, but I couldn't quite get it where I wanted it, so I'll post something on that in the next couple of days, unless someone else beats me to it.

Alright, I'll split this in twain to talk about each bit, but I think we've got something that can really be worked with.

Firstly, The Nantuko. Sorry to say, but definitely not. Much like the cephalid, people did not respond well to the bug people. Aside from that, they are just generically typed as "insect" which I don't feel have enough to work with unless they have a culture, which giving sapience to insects, a very organized organism, you'd have a society forming, but I think you've tapped into something else here....

Two AND Three. Together. I like the concept of plants becoming a thing here, because I feel like there is a lot of interesting potential present. It's possible we might even play around with adding a more catch all type to alter them substantially from thallids and saprolings. Add a class type or something like "spirit" and there's some interesting design potential to build into. There's even some cues we can pick up from other things we've developed to build with this. So I think we should find some way to make Plant sapients a thing.
The major issue here is we'd want to avoid three well trod areas. 1) Treefolk 2) Elementals 3) Golgari. That will be our major missteps. For that, I'll probably need to comb through and see what they do. Treefolk are big smashy things more often than not, and should be easy to avoid visually as well, but I'm worried about characters like Multani or Molimo tying our hands.

And I think you're the only other person contributing to the style guide side of things.
Derfal and Ruwinreborn are great sounding boards, and their suggestions have definitely helped, but they don't post quite as much.

Do answer one quick question, what angelic race did you settle for on the Nightmare Angel?

Well, it's just a first attempt, I have no problem scrapping it. But for this one, I went with Ophanim. We've done a lot with the Seraphim, so I wanted one of the other ones, and I thought Zabaniyahim might have been too predictable. I'll try to get it posted tomorrow, if I have the time.

As for the style guide stuff, I'm all about the creative aspects of these, I just don't want others to think they can't. I want to help, but I don't want to monopolize things.

Good. I was hoping for either Ophanim or Cherubim. No real preference as to which one but right now the Ophanim have about 1 notable angel, so a little more love for them wouldn't be bad.
As it is, I'm going to have to bounce ideas about the Leaders off you guys eventually, but those are final touches.

Anyways, (which I say a lot), I'll try and comb through the green sections of the world to see where the best pick ups would be for the living plant people. Really feel like this is an opportunity to look at little details and see if we can't take them in a lateral move. It'll probably be a little more before I can get the mechanic theme and identity sheet up. So expect that... probably some time tomorrow.

But I think we've got a good project to start working on with the plants.

Just for reference, I'm reposting the "Issues" spoiler so we can keep track of it.
Unresolved Issues Show

Also, I might have a new contributor showing up. Or an old one, I can't remember if Demento has commented in the past.

Heya. You know, I totally created an account on this thing because I wanted to comment in this thread, but my brain is rather mushy of late so I really am not all that helpful. In any case, for what it is worth, I really like the idea of plants as a green race. I makes sense for them to do mana generation as they are connected to the land and such so mechanically they fit in. It is also realistic to do a fair amount of plants with reach and have them as defender mechanic. Also poison, i.e death touch works too. I suppose it depends upon what green is needing from them.

With the flamekin, I'm sure it was mentioned at one point that they mated in a kind of bonding ritual where their flames intermingled. This image really stuck with, I think that could make some beautiful art work and could be explored mechanically. I suppose that would lead to either flamekin tokens (I'm not sure how red that is though), or flamekin combining to make some big flamekin (again I suppose not particularly red but could make sense in the white flamekin as a sort of take on banding?)

I suppose I'm imagining the flamekin to be very artisan type creatures, with the spells relating to rituals and festivals. When I used to play magic properly years and years ago I had lots of white enchantments (auras now) that were holy armour type things that you could pump. This makes sense to me as something the white flamekin, or even white humans, could use. Some could even be blessed by the angels. I suppose the only problem is that now these things would be equipment and so don't really fit into white's slice of the pie.

If the Ophanim were these big destroy and devastate type angels, would it not make sense that they have to be contained or constrained now, I mean it doesn't make sense for red to completely want to change its character. So could some of the flamekin rituals be around constraining the Ophanim. Again this isn't all that red, so maybe that is what the white flamekin do? Kind of circle of protection/containment type effects and things?

So I'm totally rambling so will leave that there. 

Plants Show
Red Show

Okay, finally getting around to this.
Mechanical themes and identities Show

So you see, I've thought a lot about how this would all play together, but the needs of a set are still kind of nebulous to me. Still, the biggest problem I have right now is that black has no theme and the Identities are just completely scattershot everywhere. It needs a lot of tightening up, and that means that in general, we're going to have to worry about hammering the flavor back out to make it actually fit well. There are some concessions I'm willing to make, but I'd really like to hear from you guys about what on earth should be done to get it more on a singular path.

Hey. It's been a while. Yea, it's been while.
Sorry, I'm mid move at the moment and it's been hectic, but I have some thoughts.

First, I've been playing a lot of GW2 lately (And by a lot I mean not much.) and they came up with an interesting playable race that I feel has some merit of looking in to. They're called the Sylvari. If you know about them, great, if not, then here is a brief explanation. Basically, they're plant people who are grown in "pods" and while being "grown" they are in a dream-like state where they learn about the world they are in. Other Sylvari contribute to this Dream by going out and experiencing different things. In this way, the Sylvari's knowledge is collective. They are all "grown" from a single, enormous tree that they refer to as the Mother Tree, and who is a powerful sentient being herself. Sylvari have gender, but it's hardly relevant since they can't reproduce. They look like elves (Basically) but have green bark for skin and various foliage on different parts of their bodies. This can be vines, thorns, flowers, leaves, or any other sort of vegetation.

Now, I'm not saying we copy them and use them as a race, but it is a valid reference point in my opinion. After all, I find their design intriguing. The problem I have is that they would seem a little too much like elementals, and I believe we are trying to avoid that.

On the subject of Black's Mechanical Theme:
Haunt.
We would probably want to cover some more design space with that, though, as it seemed a tad narrow to me when it first appeared. I have always found the mechanic to be intriguing, but it always seemed too... Grindy. Not cost effective. Difficult to pull off. Maybe if we streamlined the loose ends or gave it larger upsides (Or perhaps something like "As long as this creature is Hauting another creature, that creature has deathtouch/shadow/something else").

 

It's okay man, don't worry about not having posted a lot. Where you moving to?

Anyways, on the Sylvari, thanks for bringing them to our attention.
As far as the things we might be able to take from this, I like the concept of the pods as a sort of gestation thing, but the hive mind is a trope/archetype I'm trying hard to avoid. Right now, my main goal is to make the plant beings (which, btw, badly need a better name) as a sort of logical development of plants themselves. They have weather manipulation abilities, and they exist via photosynthesis.
I do see them as being very very closely attuned to the natural world, and I think existing would be their primary goal. Taking in sun, enjoying water, spreading their seeds. But with the ability to be mobile, it means they can interact with their surroundings in ways that regular plants can't. Bad sunlight? They move to a new place.
So, one of the major problems of getting into their heads has been... what do plants want? Giving them some form of motivation is going to be key in developing them. Aside from that, coming up with something that offers them individuality without compromising their lack of... desires has been strange. They have no cities, no cultures really, they exist very much without the concept of property, and in a consumer based society, that's a hard to work out frame of mind.
I think part of this is that they don't see the separation of themselves and nature. They ARE nature in their own minds.
Their biology is a big question mark too, but I want to avoid treefolk and dryad biologies like the dickens.

About Haunt though... there's definitely design potential. I mean, honestly, they really do, but the reason why MaRo and the like haven't revisited it is because it is a very unintuitive mechanic. On top of everything you mentioned as well. Plus, really, I don't feel it's exactly... right for black. Black fights things that haunt, so it's really running crosswise with the flavor.

I'm moving up to Utah. Should be good times. Need to get out of Vegas bad.

More on the Plant People (Forestfolk? Naturekin? Flower Power Rangers?) later.

As for haunt, point well made. Looking at the long list of previous mechanics, an idea strikes me. We talk about the angels dredging up the spirits from the lake, right? Well. The Wraiths could have... wait for it... Dredge. This would tie well into the rest of the black mechanical identity: Delve. What better way to seal away the spirits than to exile them from their gravey home? After Dredging up a few of the choice ones, the rest are Delved away to make way for your powerful black creature/enchantment/spell.

One of the major things here is that the wraith aren't mono-color aligned. There are black wraiths, but they don't just stay in black. (Can you imagine the hissy fit people would throw if the dragon wraith weren't mono-red? They're already throwing a hissy fit if I don't put a dragon in at all.)
Besides, Wraiths are the DEVIANT portion of the world, so we very much can't have them as something black regularly wants to play, passing over the gorgons or moonfolk to choose the spirits/wraith.

Aside from that, I have no head for dredge. I know it's supposed to be utterly broken, but my GOLGARI deck doesn't even use dredge. I built it around sacrifice and return, dredge runs contrary to everything I want to do in a deck. So Dredge is out. I couldn't judge those cards worth a damn.
I will say, damn good suggestion though. Good lateral thinking.
As for Delve, I really do like the mechanic, but I don't see how it can apply to the entire creature pie or work with the other creature mechanics. Angels could use it, but the rest don't seem to have a ready application of it.
Part of this is that the black creatures/cultures are probably going to have to change somehow, but I'm kinda jumpy about making major changes. We should take things slowly, and probably look at it all from the flavor side. There's going to have to be changes, but that's going to make major waves for me. We might have to look back at everything in black and just take it piece by piece.
that being said, I am not saying no to Delve. It's definitely something to consider closely. The only problem I see going forward with it is that we already have convoke "cutting costs" on cards.

As to the plant beings, I think we'll need to dig into some gaelic to give them a proper name. Really want to avoid a "flamekin" situation when they could have a proper name.

Sidenote: While browsing wraith and the etymology of the phrase, as well as ghosts in general, I ran across something I want to use in the Moonfolk concepts of the afterlife and religion in general.
The concept of the "Anima" from greek philosophy. I don't know how I want to incorporate this, but it seems too nifty not to use it in the Moonfolk.

Mostly this was a post for posterity.

Hm. I like dredge a lot as a mechanic, but I have a few other ideas.

Continuing my studious scroll of the mechanics (less than I had imagined) I found a few other candidates.

First, persist. Perhaps Black wants to come across as particularily tenacious. Some black creatures may not even be capable of dying very easily. I know the spirits won't, and the spectres even less so. The moonfolk and gorgon could simply be (ahem) persistent attackers. Or blockers. Or sacrificial fodder.

Also, I don't like Undying here. It's too... Monstrous.

Second, I found wither as well. (Mechanics from the same set? Blasphemy!) The whole destroying the body and binding the soul thing caught my attention here. Maybe have a few cards that cause creatures that go to the grave with -1/-1 counters to be exiled (via spirit binding) And maybe have on card that can cast creatures it has exiled. 

Now, both those are creature mechanics, so I also would like to put up Threshold and Morbid as alternatives. Threshold can respresent power gained through the amount of dead creatures (as in, number of souls bound or something more visceral.) Morbid is a little more difficult to flavorify, but I think spells and creatures becoming more powerful when 'stuff dies' is fairly intuitive. Plus, Morbid as a mechanic makes black seem dark without necessarily representing evil. 

I... DESPISE wither. I hate Infect too for the exact same damnable reason. Persist also doesn't work here since the goliath are already going to be doing +1/+1 counters and you don't mix the 1/1 counters in the same set.
Anyways, the thing is, all of these are decent suggestions from the purely mechanical sense, but most have so little to do establishing a main theme to build around.
What do these mechanics, and indeed, caring about the graveyard, have to do with the gorgons?
How do these flavorfully make sense with the character of the races? What do these mechanics say about the culture they have? Because as it is... they aren't matching.

This might come across as nitpicky, and I don't mean it to be, but you keep making suggestions based on identity... and not on theme. The first thing we should do is establish the overall theme for ALL of black that's missing. The individual identities have to feed into that overall theme and all these mechanics are suggestions seem exclusive for the Zabaniyahim. The Zabaniyahim aren't indicative of everything that black has to do.

Gotta think top-down, not bottom-up. Take a few minutes and review what we have for black... and in fairness, the first post is severely out of date. So in general, we need to discuss black's character on top of themes to get this down right. If you feel I should post what I have for black from the updated primer, just let me know.

Hm... Ok, I get what you're saying. How about a "keywords matter" theme? Something that messes around witht he Evergreen keywords in black. Black seems to have a lot of specialists, so we could start there. Maybe a cycle of uncommon "lords" that say something like "Creatures you control with Deathtouch have Lifelink" (I'd imagine it would be a Gorgon) Or "Creatures you control with Lifelink have Intimidate". You could have a variety of fetch spells that fetch for creatures with the chosen keyword, and you could spread the keyword out over all the tribes so that it feels less like "race matters" and more like "abilities matter" (I would imagine Gorgons having Intimidate and Deathtouch make plenty of mechanical sense.) Black, off the top of my head, Gets Deathtouch, Lifelink, Flying, Intimidate (Since fear is defunct), Haste secondary to red, Trample rarely at all, and first strike secondary to red, and Regeneration. 

Another idea is to play on Black's ritualistic nature. It seems like everything black wants to do is steeped in mysticism, if only for the sake of being mysterious. To this end, you could have use Fateseal and "the top of my opponents library matters" theme. Something like "Destroy Target creature. Fateseal 1" and then a creature that says "When this creature enters the battlefield, target opponent reveals the top card of his/her library. If it's a basic land card, " " gains landwalk of that cards land type." Of course there are a variety of other uses. My concern with this is it stepping on Blue's scry theme, but it would make for some interesting matches between the two colors. It also may be too wordy.

On the same note as being ritualistic, you could insert a few cards with the Offering mechanic into black. It seems clunky, and I dislike Kamigawa mechanics as a rule, but it could work.

Lastly, black wants power. Dominion. It wants its minions to show up when it needs them, and it wants to be able to use them. Various cards that fetch and put things on top of your library ( Like Vampiric Tutor ) could be a theme. Maybe assassin cards fetch for zombies, angels fetch for specters, gorgons fetch for a varitey of spells, and spectres fetch for lands. Uncommon, rare, and mythic versions with these abilities could put these cards into your hand and fetch multiples. This may be a nightmare to balance, though. Maybe something more like Cateran Brute and his ilk.

I will continue to brainstorm, but this is what I've got for now.





 

Okay, here's my first crack at the Nightmare Angel.

Parcusardiel

Spoiler: Show

YMTC Stuff (Had to take a shot, anyway)
Spoiler: Show

I'm going to do some free-form brainstorming here about the plant-people, just to throw some ideas out there. I haven't thought any of this out, so it's bound to be rough, but maybe we can get some ideas circulating.

For place-holder purposes, I will be referring to them as the Lodau, but that's only because I don't want to keep calling them "plant people" over and over again.

The Lodau don't have a society, but that doesn't mean they can't have a "community." But to them, I think their sense of community extends beyond other Lodau. Barinellos mentioned that he thinks they would view themselves as nature and that their primary motivation is to exist. The logical extension of that is that they what nature to continue to exist, and both nature and themselves (one in the same, to the Lodau) to thrive.

With this in mind, I think there a few ways we can go. For one thing, they can cause things to Thrive , thus playing into the "power matters" theme green is always going for in this setting.

However, I think they're most useful and most flavorful as mana-ramps, and with that, personally I like the idea of doing something along the lines of Arbor Elf . I like the idea of the Lodau interacting directly with the lands rather than producing mana themselves, although one or two of them probably could.

Also, we could have them sacrifice themselves, either for mana or to search for lands, but that seems too finite for the Lodau. How about just a death trigger ability to play up fertilization? I guess we should decide about how far the Lodau go with their inseparability with nature. Meaning, if something were going to destroy two trees, and a Lodau could stop that something, but at the cost of its own life, would it do so? Or does it have a certain threshold of self-preservation?

As for the Lotus Druid thing, maybe the upper tier of Lodau, the strongest, most evolved of them, are "Lotus" rather than "Plant," but the name of the creature would still indicate the connection to the rest of the species.

Then, stylistically, how would they look? The only thing I've been visualizing is that they must have arms and something similar to hands, but honestly, even the heads I don't have a solid picture in mind. I do think tall and slender is the way to go, but we definitely want them distinct from elves, and I think we want something with a bit more of an edge than just walking flowers.

That's all I've got for now.

Ruwinreborn Show

Raven Show

Wow. This plane has gone weird places since the last time I was able to check in. 0_o Not that I'm complaining.

Oct 2, 2012 -- 8:40AM, KeeperofManyNames wrote:

Wow. This plane has gone weird places since the last time I was able to check in. 0_o Not that I'm complaining.

Well, in fairness, it's because we've already done the normal places and are filling in the gaps now.

No thoughts on my Nightmare Angel? Oh, well.

Anyway, I've been wracking my brain for ideas on black's mechanical theme, and I've had little success so far, so just to hopefully keep the conversation going on it, I'll post what I've got.

So far, this set really doesn't have any "new" mechanics, just old mechanic used in a new way, like convoke in red. With this in mind, I think black could really use a new mechanic. Now, in this set, black seems to revolve around multiple aspects of death. The Gorgons have their death/life interactions with sangromancy, the black angels have necromancy, and the Moonfolk cultists are assassins, so I think whatever mechanic we come up with should play into either death itself, sort of like morbid but with different flavor, or with the graveyard.

How about something like "Whenever a creature dies, or enters the battlefield from a graveyard, EFFECT" Then we can play with reanimation effects for the necromancy. Also, we may be able to give a different identity for the Wraiths, allowing them to be cycled (or something similar) and then cast from the graveyard.

Spoiler: Show

This isn't meant to be what that card would be, necessarily, just an example of what I'm thinking for the Wraith ability. Also, it need not be an actual form of cycling, it can be discarded to cause any effect, direct damage in this case, maybe.

But this would also feed in to the black mechanic of caring about things that die as well as things that enter the battlefield from the graveyard. Furthermore, it answers the much earlier question we had about what to give the gorgons, since deathtouch would feed the mechanic, whereas petrification does not.

What do people think?

The Nightmare Angel had some good parts, but it all felt very disconnected from its origins. The character didn't feel right, far far too aggressive. Passion is the heart of an Ophanim, not rage and violence, which seems to have made up the centerpiece of him. Even as an exception, I don't feel it works. Aside from that, I'm not fond of any gold cards being in this set for the YMTC stuff.
As a total aside, I like the name "Balahiel" for this character, even if we aren't using the story. (Derived from the hebrew word "Balaha" which means nightmare. Combined with the -el suffix, it means "Nightmare of God".)

As for the suggestion, I've considered making up a new mechanic for the theme, but it honestly just doesn't feel something I'm comfortable with. Same reason I never did anything to make up new classes.
That being said, I do see that something could probably be done around "graveyard matters" even if that is a really cliche thing to do for black.
Automatically going to eliminate flashback, morbid, unearth, and threshold, all for different reasons. (wasn't there something from Coldnsap that cared about graveyards?)

And wraith have a very specific mechanic already and don't need to be confused with any other themes. They're like the guildless from Ravnica, not something that I want to cross over into the other themes. They should be open for play in their respective color. Cycling for them isn't intuitive at all either.

You talking about the gorgons has pushed me over into finally deciding what to assign them. I think I'm going with the Basilisk effect. I feel it is the most balanced of the options, even if it isn't the most solidly resonant.
That still doesn't really solve the problems regarding the sangromancy vs necromancy schism we have, and our solution might be to have to just do away with the "popular" magic and expanding the necromancer's out beyond just the monks. I'm not terribly fond of it, but we might very well be trying to do too much with limited resources. It should be tightened up, even if I am loathe to narrow them down.

Oh, and if anyone is keeping track of reprints I want in, Angelheart Vial .

Nightmare Angel - Fair enough, I'll scrap it and rewrite. I like the idea of discovering a demonic temple, but the rest I'm not too attached to, although I do think the idea of an Ophanim angel resenting being "restrained" has a lot of potential. As for the name, I wasn't really happy with it; I like yours better. Mine was a butchering combo of shadow and flame, but I forget in which language (latin, I suspect, but I don't remember off-hand.) Anyway, I'll come up with version two in a bit.

Black Mechanical identity - The Coldsnap graveyard mechanic was Recover, and I hate it (personally). It reads "(Whenever a creature is put into your graveyard from the battlefield, you may pay {COST}. If you do, return this card from your graveyard to your hand. Otherwise, exile this card.)"  I know you're against Morbid, and I'm not trying to convince you otherwise, but the Morbid trigger is, to me, a lot more fluid and versatile than the Recover one. Other already-keyworded graveyard mechanics (that I don't think have been mentioned yet although I could be wrong) are gravestorm, retrace, and soulshift, but none of these seem to be what you're looking for either. 

Your mentioning of Coldsnap actually put another idea in my mind for black, though, and it's ironically on a white card. What do you think of using the effect we see on [c]Adarkar Valkyrie[c]? I can most definately see your black angels using that effect, maybe with a "It is now a spirit in addition to its other types" tacked on at the end.

Actually interacting with the graveyard is tricky, since people don't seem to like having to keep track of something they don't normally keep track of, so if we do that, maybe it should be like a toggle switch, either on or off, something like "If there is a creature card in your graveyard, EFFECT." or something like that.

What is the Wraith effect? I didn't know you had settled on one. Though I do see your point about interacting with the other colors.

No, the angel finding long long long lost demonic ruins is fine with me, I think that bit works. Though, just to help you get the mind set in, part of what the conflict of this angel could be, is to play the aspect of the individual. The Ophanim are all bound together through the Voice, so what about an angel who did not become part of the chorus? One who recklessly chose individuality in a greater degree than all those they would call sibling?
Have the key conflict in this story be one of isolation, which is an alien experience for the Ophanim, who can normally perceive the song of their kin in the backs of their mind. (Something halfway akin to the Kithkin thoughtweft and halfway akin to the Selesnyan lifesong, but instead of sharing community like the previous two, it's an expression of emotion. Empathy rather than Telepathy. That's what alters it to make it red. They do it to feel rather than to bond.)
And the restraint is just the wrong thing. They don't bind up their powers, they don't close off what makes them what they are. They merely just do not use it. It still burns there waiting to be fed, but they choose to ignore it rather than let it run rampant. It's a philosophical restraint, not one of actual magical safeguards.

Gravestorm and Soulshift might have potential. Mostly I worry about how implementation of gravestorm could be done and soulshift specifies spirits, which isn't the right message for the corporeal and repurposed dead that black has access to.

Adarkar Valkyrie would be fine as a one of, but would cause total breakdown in balance terms.
The "toggle" effect is too reminiscent of the Incarnations like Anger and the like.

Really, for this, I think we have to set aside the totality of black, because the thematic identities of the angels and the moonfolk are already set. The problem is all stemming from the gorgons/zombies. At the very basic, we have what amounts to two factions vying for attention and it's throwing off the entire black theme. Sangromancy vs Necromancy. I don't think we have room for both in terms of mechanics. And if we don't, then it means we need to restructure the gorgon society, as big a pain as that is. I just see no way around it.

Wraiths have always had a swampwalk theme, so in playing with the concept of the wastelands, they adopt the mechnanic of "nonbasic" landwalk. Perhaps combining the higher levels with a Bloodghast ability to thin out the number of landwalkers we have.
Spirits, meanwhile, will occupy some of the smaller spots across more colors and have a shadow ability. They'll probably top out at 3/1, possibly with a spark elemental death trigger. Should still be easy enough to kill rather than take the 3 damage.

About the plant beings:
So, visually, we have a few different directions they could go.
Firstly) Basically humanoid. This would include a face and would likely be the most comfortable and easily inspiring to grok. The downside is, of course, how unoriginal it runs.
Secondly) We could make them go the opposite direction and make them wildly incomprehensible. While this offers a lot more freedom, it also gives them very very little direction.
Thirdly) A compromise of the two, where we retain the basic humanoid shape, but dehumanize it through the stripping of facial features and odd biology. This gives them a more alien vibe, but keeps them inside the realms of the familiar. The downside is this is very easy to create an uncanny valley.
Fourthly) A further compromise between the first and third options. Give them human features, but strip them of what is unessential. After all, why would plants need mouths if they communication through scent and movement? They photosynthesize for nutrition, so mouths seem really superflous. I think taking a logical look at the plants is going to be our greatest asset, and then applying overlap between human biology and floral biology is key.

Fourth option seems best, so as silly as it is, the best thing to do now is examine the function of each of mankind's major recognizable traits. Hair, eyes, mouth, nose, ears, torso, etc etc.
For the record too, I am seeing them as bipedal. Wispy and thin, but bipedal all the same.

Edit: This is going to sound like wildly more information than needed for any sort of description, but instead of electrochemical synapses, the plant beings work off of a fluid based neuro transmitter delivered through their body by a modified root nervous system? Changes in the quality of the chemicals the plants produce naturally in their bodies travelling along the water doubling as both circulatory and nervous system alerts them to changes to their homeostasis. This means they would have some cavity similar to a heart, but their entire body could function similarly to lungs so long as they have leaves, which means they should have leaves, probably in semi-tight clusters reminiscent of clothing or the like just for sake of familiarity.
So that leaves the question of what kind of skin they would have and the underlying "muscle" structure (which would probably double as their skeletal structure additionally).
They'll have eyes, since plants are by nature photoreactive, and I say they should have something akin to hair because... I want them to. Their face is probably a specialized "leaf" with markings that are suited to perceive light and is thicker than normal to protect their "nerve" center, distinct as it would be from their "heart".
Thin bodies, almost serpentine, with sharp angles instead of the curved boniness of the human skeletal structure...

As for the name of the race, there is probably some research to be done regarding the Mandrake since that does have some ties to both general folklore and specifically biblical mythology...

Id see plant people having something akin to an exoskeleton seeing how many plants have hard shell like exteriors on their plant stem and trees have bark.
Instead of noses and ears they have antennas/tendrils/hair-like spines designed to pick up scents and sounds, placed strategicly on the places of the head where it is the most practical.

Black: Spoiler: Show

Plants: Spoiler: Show

Plants Show

Black Show
That black paragraph kind of got ramble-y, it's sort of late here and my brain is a little fuzzy.

Reacting to death is morbid, especially mechanically. But by making it a conscious choice (requiring either a cost or a tap) provides an interesting choice for the player. Also, since it's more limiting than the morbid trigger, it allows use to use more powerful effects. But flavorfully, I don't see it as being overly morbid in the sense of Innistrad's mechanic. It's more like death becomes a resource, and the reaction to it would be like a sudden windfall or money to us, or creatures to Red (to power convoke), or an angel's favorite tribe in white (to tie into their theme.) And each of the three black factions in this world, from what we've already established, reacts to death already.

The angels are in charge of the spirits of the dead, and so why something dies, they would naturally be interested. The gorgons, while less defined than the other two, would probably feel some connection with the statued remains of the dead they had killed, and we know the black-aligned Moonfolk focus on death as a profession. As always, though, if you don't feel it fits right, don't use it. I just think that as a theme it has potential.

However, I do think that if you want black to mostly "care about things that are already dead," then we need either a new mechanic, or we need to hunt down one that hasn't been keyworded and run with that. I don't think the three keywords I mentioned a few posts ago really work. Both gravestorm and soulshift care about things going into the graveyard, and retrace just has weak flavor, in my opinion. Most of the other graveyard keywords have already been eliminated, and most rightly so.

Also, it is nearly impossible to do a dead/undead creature types matter, because there are simply too many of them, especially in black. Zombies, Spirits, Specters, and Wraiths are all dead/undead creature types you've mentioned using, and several others exist outside this setting, so it would be clunky to care about those. Unless you have specific creatures care about one of the types, but that risks becoming parasitic, and also trespasses into white's off-tribal tribal theme.

I'm just brainstorming here, but what if we do a theme that uses cards in the graveyard as a resource, sort of like a reverse Scavenge effect? Something like "Exile a creature card from a graveyard: EFFECT"? Well, "from a graveyard" might be too powerful, so maybe "from your graveyard," but that sort of thing. The problem here is the lack of a renewable resource, and it would also punish you for using creature tokens, but there must be some way to balance it. A quick glance around gatherer brought up two sort-of templates for what I have in mind, Balduvian Dead   and Cabal Patriarch , which both use creature cards in the graveyard as a resource. This could, of course, be expanded to all cards in your graveyard, depending on what power levels reveal.

Anyway, that's what I've got for now.

I think, rather than looking at the mechanics, we just need to strip the gorgons back down to basics and build them back up to see if there's anything that can fit with the bulk of the mechanic innovation we can use.

What we have of the gorgons:
*They have a petrifying gaze that works on anything that isn't an elemental.
*When they die, they themselves become statues.
*They are a basically pacifist culture which split in ages past, giving rise to the aggressive red gorgons.
*There is a sect of necromancer monks who deal with the petrified dead, using zombies to act as troops so that the pacifists in their culture do not have to fight. And this is no longer viable. ADDITIONALLY, it also means that zombies aren't compatible anymore either, removing a portion of black's creature pie.
*They usee alchemy based on the manipulation of blood, IE Sangromancy. And this is no longer viable since it was... forced so that we didn't have to rely on necromancy.
*They worship the angels, and their entire society is based around the church as government.
*They dwell in swamps and deltas.

The major problem with exile from the graveyard as a theme is that the Sephirot already do that, as well as the Hero cycle. Exiling things as they die is already established in every color.

So, above is all the flavorful basics of the gorgons. Compare it to what else is going on with the Angels and the Moonfolk, who both have a mechanical identity, and see if there is any overlap. (The exile theme would work better with the angels anyways, not in general black.)

By the by, the angels aren't interested in the "whys" of a spirit's death. They are only interested in the destruction or convesion of destructive spirits/wraiths. They could care less about the things they view as needing killing.

Woo! Finally got all settled in.

On the Gorgons: Thinking about this, would it be interesting or perhaps more workable if the Gorgons death-stare was more like a... bee-type thing? What I mean by this is, yea, they can turn people to stone. But what if it killed the Gorgon, too? What if the Gaze drew upon the Gorgon's life force, turning both creatures to stone? This would make the Gorgon society more capable of co-mingling with other races besides the flamekin, and also give rise to a mechanic you could center around them. Something along the lines of Sacrifice this creature: Target creature gains defender and loses all other abilities. Put a 0/1 statue token with defender into play. Various effects could happen upon sacrifice, I'll leave that up to you. (Burn for red, maybe paylife/draw for black.)

I'm also thinking this would give Gorgon's a more practical view of death, and therefore more willingness to worship the Zabaniyahim. When you can give up your life at a moments notice to spite someone you hate, protect your freedom or those you love, destroy a threat or a stranger, or simply as a way to end your life... It would give them jaded view of martyrdom, which would make a lot of the White stuff seem preachy. I think there are interesting developments in there, if you want to go in the direction. 

Hey Ruwinreborn, welcome back!

Personally, I don't like the idea of gorgons trading life for life, especially mechanically, since at the mid-range power level, their costs will be somewhat high anyway, and turning every, or even several, of your mid-level creatures into high-cost removal spells doesn't play well, unless you can get extra use out of them from the graveyard.

However, your statue token idea appeals to me. I've been wondering if it would work to have the Gorgons practice a form of idolatry as part of their church, and I'm thinking the statues of their victims and their own dead could play a part in this. (Actually, I suspect Barinellos covered this in the Gorgon funeral rites bit, but I honestly can't remember now.) The point it, I think that maybe statue tokens might be a way to mechanically represent that facet of things.

Unfortunately, even if that works, it still doesn't solve the problem of black's "theme." None of the existing keyworded graveyard mechanics seem to have the right flavor, and nothing we've suggested so far seems to appeal. I know this one is really out of left field, but I've been dwelling on the concept of prestige for black. I wonder if for the most powerful Gorgons, the leaders of their church, if the number of statues (idols) could have a direct influence on their prestige . Someone had thrown out an idea a while ago that the most prestigious of the Zabaniyahim would be the ones to defeat or subdue the most powerful of the wraiths or other rogue spirits. The moonfolk assassins could easily have a secretive prestige system within the cult.

I'm not really sure where I'm going with this, but when summarizing the other four colors' themes in one word, I noticed that (with some stretching) they all started with the letter P. Green has "Power," White has "Patronage," blue has "Prognostication," and Red had "People." (This one I especially admit to stretching, but what can you do?) Anyway, mostly I just wanted to get some new ideas out there and see what happened, since nothing we've tried so far has really worked.

Spoiler: Show

Spoiler: Show
Spoiler: Show

Are we avoiding the transform mechanic? Can that be implemented in some way here?

We've talked about Delve, but I recently read an article that spoke about the problems with Delve as a mechanic (shared resource; makes it difficult for you to cast everything on the cheap if your GY is gone from casting cheap things beforehand.) Perhaps we can fix this, though. Maybe black can interect with the Exile zone? Putting things from there into the GY, the hand, or even into play.

More later, gotta go to work. Pizzas don't deliver themselves.

 

Hey, Barinellos, maybe if you'd answer a question for me it might give us a kicking-off point for the Gorgons and black's theme.

You said that the Sephirot causes mortals to ascend to angels if they exhibit the right quality to a significant degree. So what exactly is the quality the Sephirot "checks" for to ascend someone to the Zabaniyahim? To me, anyway, the other four angelic choirs are a little clearer on that, and I think if we nailed that down, it might be easier to see what the Gorgons and the Moonfolk might actually want to be, since both worship the Zabaniyahim.

Oct 9, 2012 -- 7:23PM, RavenoftheBlack wrote:

Hey, Barinellos, maybe if you'd answer a question for me it might give us a kicking-off point for the Gorgons and black's theme.

You said that the Sephirot causes mortals to ascend to angels if they exhibit the right quality to a significant degree. So what exactly is the quality the Sephirot "checks" for to ascend someone to the Zabaniyahim? To me, anyway, the other four angelic choirs are a little clearer on that, and I think if we nailed that down, it might be easier to see what the Gorgons and the Moonfolk might actually want to be, since both worship the Zabaniyahim.

+1

Oct 9, 2012 -- 3:30PM, Ruwinreborn wrote:

Are we avoiding the transform mechanic? Can that be implemented in some way here?

We've talked about Delve, but I recently read an article that spoke about the problems with Delve as a mechanic (shared resource; makes it difficult for you to cast everything on the cheap if your GY is gone from casting cheap things beforehand.) Perhaps we can fix this, though. Maybe black can interect with the Exile zone? Putting things from there into the GY, the hand, or even into play.

More later, gotta go to work. Pizzas don't deliver themselves. 

The main reason I'd like to avoid Delve is the fact that we already have a cost reduction mechanic in Convoke and it would be too similar to do two cost reductions in the one set.
Oh, and transform is absolutely out of the question.

Oct 9, 2012 -- 7:23PM, RavenoftheBlack wrote:

You said that the Sephirot causes mortals to ascend to angels if they exhibit the right quality to a significant degree. So what exactly is the quality the Sephirot "checks" for to ascend someone to the Zabaniyahim? To me, anyway, the other four angelic choirs are a little clearer on that, and I think if we nailed that down, it might be easier to see what the Gorgons and the Moonfolk might actually want to be, since both worship the Zabaniyahim.

The Black Sephirot of Devotion.
Of commitment to something more powerful than yourself.

This is a classically black trait, though most often shown as cultists commited to something greater than themself to elevate themself... but that does not diminish the amount of devotion involved in the equation.

For the record as well, I am thinking the Sephirot of Black will activate thusly
Sephirot of Devotion Show

Devotion, eh? Makes sense, and alse fits the Offering mechanic nicely. I'm pretty sure that mechanic should definitely be in black, but as for the theme... Well, that's a lot trickier. Course, we could take a page from M13.

How about Exalted?

Not only exalted, but how about bonuses when exalted triggers? I'm not talking bonuses like Rafiq or Battlegrace, where the exalted creature gets the bonus. No, I'm talking about bonuses for the creature WITH exalted when it's own exalted ability triggers. Like, "When suchandsuch's Exalted trigger goes on the stack, put a +1/+1 counter on it." (probably should clean that text up a bit.)

But if it's something like that, it shows black's commitment to a higher power AND reward recieved for that commitment.

Oct 11, 2012 -- 3:48PM, Ruwinreborn wrote:

Devotion, eh? Makes sense, and alse fits the Offering mechanic nicely. I'm pretty sure that mechanic should definitely be in black, but as for the theme... Well, that's a lot trickier.

Yeah, I'd like to do something minor with Offering, not as a major theme in itself, but kind of a minor subtheme, like a vertical cycle. One of the big issues is trying to balance the Offering mechanic in itself. Big questions on what could be done for it alone.

How about Exalted?

Not only exalted, but how about bonuses when exalted triggers? I'm not talking bonuses like Rafiq or Battlegrace, where the exalted creature gets the bonus. No, I'm talking about bonuses for the creature WITH exalted when it's own exalted ability triggers. Like, "When suchandsuch's Exalted trigger goes on the stack, put a +1/+1 counter on it." (probably should clean that text up a bit.)

But if it's something like that, it shows black's commitment to a higher power AND reward recieved for that commitment.

Eh, can't say it feels like it fits. For one, it's already kind of been done in m13 and all. Aside from that, singular attackers doesn't fit black here.

A little taste for you guys. Raven, if you feel you can offer any improvements on the size of this, feel free to take a stab at it, all I ask is you keep it in character.
I give you... the origin of the current Magnus.

The Magnus Show

Mostly what I'd be interested in seeing is an expansion of his character after he assumed his title.

As far as a card goes, I'm thinking something like this, knowing that this is a mythic rare legendary.
Spoiler: Show

All that busy-ness I was expecting about a month/month and a half ago is finally catching up to me. It's getting harder to keep up with the fun things...

Anyway, brief thoughts:

The Magnus - The reluctant leader? Seems workable. Nothing is jumping to mind story-wise yet, but I might be able to come up with something to draw the character out a little more. If I think of something, I'll let you know.

Black - Sounds to me like black needs a sacrifice theme. It ties into devotion, it's very much in black's color pie, and it can certainly play into aspects of necromancy, as well, with external recursion cards. I'm seeing smaller creatures sac'ing themselves for some small benefit, like Fume Spitter   or Basal Thrull , and bigger creatures can benefit when smaller creatures (or many any creatures) are sac'ed. This, of course, ties perfectly in to your Sephirot card. (By the way, for your card, you may need to specify non-token creature. I could be wrong though, I'm just not sure since your effect triggers when it dies, and tokens do hit the graveyard, I'm just not sure if there is time to exile it to your effect or not. Even if there isn't, though, it would make more sense from a flavor perspective. You don't want golems or homunculi or saprolings ascending to angelhood, or dying angels re-ascending, for that matter.)

I literally just thought of this: What if black's "theme" is a "twisted" version of each of the other color's themes? Sac effects for mana or an Offering-type effect to twist Convoke, Fateseal (just one or two) to twist scry, leeching power for the "power matters" theme of green, and maybe off-tribal sac'ing for white? And if that's not cohesive enough, maybe their sacrifice theme I suggested could do a cycle or two that plays with that twisted theme theme.

Oct 14, 2012 -- 3:03PM, RavenoftheBlack wrote:

The Magnus - The reluctant leader? Seems workable. Nothing is jumping to mind story-wise yet, but I might be able to come up with something to draw the character out a little more. If I think of something, I'll let you know.

Sssssort of. He never wanted the position, but he doesn't look at it as something that weighs him down. He's been put in charge and by god, he will not back down from it.

Black - Sounds to me like black needs a sacrifice theme. It ties into devotion, it's very much in black's color pie, and it can certainly play into aspects of necromancy, as well, with external recursion cards. I'm seeing smaller creatures sac'ing themselves for some small benefit, like Fume Spitter   or Basal Thrull , and bigger creatures can benefit when smaller creatures (or many any creatures) are sac'ed. This, of course, ties perfectly in to your Sephirot card. (By the way, for your card, you may need to specify non-token creature. I could be wrong though, I'm just not sure since your effect triggers when it dies, and tokens do hit the graveyard, I'm just not sure if there is time to exile it to your effect or not. Even if there isn't, though, it would make more sense from a flavor perspective. You don't want golems or homunculi or saprolings ascending to angelhood, or dying angels re-ascending, for that matter.)

First off, I do want to say the non-token clause is in most of the Sephirot, I just didn't put it in there at the time.
Anyways, a sacrificial theme could work pretty well, but we'd have to be very very cautious in how to approach it, because sac triggers are REALLY easy to abuse in the right set up. Like ridiculously easy.
And we aren't doing necromancy. We aren't doing sangromancy either. Neither of those work anymore with what we're doing mechanically and if the culture isn't going to fit the theme, we have to change the culture rather than the theme.
I also don't think we need small creatures saccing themselves. Otherwise, with the sephirot out, it's strictly a trade up no matter what. I see the best way to do that is that if they're going to have a sacrificial cost, it needs to be paired with an expensive mana cost as well. If it doesn't it will be very easy for things to get away from everything.

I think for the moonfolk assassins, we need to look at a trigger that cares when something is specifically killed by it. (like Blood Cultist or Trophy Hunter ... but probably with more variety.)
For the angels, abilities that require sacrifice.*
For the gorgons, abilities that care when you sacrifice something.

But the major flaw is that without the necromancy, we have a big gaping hole in our creature types where Zombie used to occupy. So now we have to come up with a replacement that wants to be sacced on its own.

*Just as a by the by too, I think we could do something interesting with Offering costs. Like, if you sacrificed something for its offering, it gains an ability. Like a modified kicker.... then again, screw kicker.

I literally just thought of this: What if black's "theme" is a "twisted" version of each of the other color's themes? Sac effects for mana or an Offering-type effect to twist Convoke, Fateseal (just one or two) to twist scry, leeching power for the "power matters" theme of green, and maybe off-tribal sac'ing for white? And if that's not cohesive enough, maybe their sacrifice theme I suggested could do a cycle or two that plays with that twisted theme theme.

I'd tossed this idea around a little as well, but overall it's not amongst my favorite ideas. A little too open and doesn't offer enough solidity to strategy. Plus, blood keywords EVERYWHERE.

Sooooo, it's been at least a week since we last had any activity in this thread.
The project isn't done, but I can understand that it has become perhaps a little... unwieldy.
So does anybody have any feelings about the possibility of the genesis of a new thread, first post armed with the updated primer and hopefully the smaller size could encourage posters that are otherwise intimidated by the size of this monster.

Thoughts? Aside from that, I sort of want to do a color by color review and polish.

That would help tons. I'm still following the thread and interested in hypothesising directions, but right now I have no idea on where to start because it's so detail-focussed :/. I think it'd help everyone in getting their thoughts on the plane back on track.

Oct 24, 2012 -- 3:11AM, Terti wrote:

That would help tons. I'm still following the thread and interested in hypothesising directions, but right now I have no idea on where to start because it's so detail-focussed :/. I think it'd help everyone in getting their thoughts on the plane back on track.

+1

Alright, I'll work on restructuring and nailing down the minutiae of the primer and creating a new thread.
That should get things back on track.