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From a search, this has been touched before, but inside a general discussion for creature types (like seen here). I think this issue deserves it own thread, or at least some rediscussion.

I find it unfitting that a card like Captain's Call who clearly depicts human soldiers, generate non-human soldiers. I find it just as unfitting that cards like Forbidding Watchtower and Ghitu Encampment have been changed to become a "class" but not a "race", even though they went as far as changing Nantuko Monastery to become an insect monk (probably caring that it'd be identified as the humanoid insect that it is and not just as a plain and simple insect).

Now, I accept that errating old cards is a no-no. But Wizards have shown that it's ok to update types for reprinted man-lands and that they care more about types when printing new man-lands. So this argument is for changing the policy, for cards that would be printed or reprinted in the future.

A few arguments against this:
1. One argument I heard against this is that it would make the cards too strong, especially after Innistrad's human tribal support. 

2. Another argument against this is that effects creating tokens are made to be simple and thus single-typed most of the time with some exceptions (like Lorwyn block which is based around both race and class and like Join the Ranks because "ally" is probably not a self-standing type)

But I'm not sure if these reasons are enough to have tokens and man-lands raceless.

I agree.

The reasoning behind the current practice is that, for example, the Soldierness of the token is all that matters. When you Raise the Alarm , you get two Soldiers. It doesn't matter what race they are, and you could potentially Raise the Alarm on various different planes, getting different Soldiers each time. There are, however, several problems with this.

The big problem is that this concept doesn't actually match the mechanics. A generic Soldier token isn't a Soldier that could potentially be any race: it's a Soldier that isn't any race at all. No matter what sort of race-tribal effects are involved, it won't benefit from any of them. To actually represent a universal Soldier, they'd need to instead use some sort of race-changeling ability (I'm not actually advocating this).

In Magic, there are frequently effects that care about the creature types. And in those cases, no amount of "there's a Human in the artwork" or "you can imagine this representing a Human" will allow generic Soldier tokens to give Champion of the Parish its counters. Just consider how tightly-related the Human and Soldier creature types are: there are over 250 cards that have the two creature types appearing together on the type line. However, there aren't any cards that actually create Human Soldier tokens.

Also, they sometimes do use the race/class model for tokens. It's great when they do, but it also defeats the purpose of not using it elsewhere. In Zendikar, the Kor Soldiers actually got to be Kor Soldiers, so they wouldn't have been able to reprint a generic Soldier token producer there, anyways.

Also, the same reasoning would work just as well for non-tokens. There's nothing stopping non-Humans from becoming Elite Vanguard s, Glory Seeker s, Intrepid Hero es, etc. If they had printed all of those without a race, they could potentially have reprinted them with a different race in the artwork in the future. They instead chose to give them a specific race, even though that both puts limits on the card itself (it's not just representing someone seeking glory; it's representing specifically a Human seeking glory) and its reprint potential.

I think it would be a big change for the better if they expanded the race/class model to tokens.

That "tokens commonly have only one type" is precisely the problem. Prior to the introduction of the race/class system, creature cards generally had only one type: e.g. Elf or Goblin or Wizard or Soldier. However, they've since made the leap to commonly having two creature types for sentient creatures, even if one of them is boring. Human creature cards do say Human on the type line. Tokens just haven't made the same leap as creature cards yet.

Also, while Innistrad was the first set with specific Human tribal interactions, there were always "choose a creature type" and "shares a creature type" effects. Also, the Innistrad cards are a permanent part of the game now. I don't like that the only tokens that will interact with the Innistrad tribal Human cards are those created by Innistrad cards, when almost every set has tokens that represent Humans and would be Humans if they followed the race/class system.

I don't think strict adherence to the race/class system is necessary. Cards like that Innkeeper are fine without a class, since none would really fit. However, I disagree that this would apply to all the tokens. In Lorwyn, they did use the race/class system for tokens. You can't tell me that the tokens created by Beetleback Chief or Mogg War Marshal are less deserving of the "Warrior" class than those created by Elvish Promenade .

And the "race isn't relevant to their duty" thing is silly. Creatures don't lose their race just because it's not relevant. If there's a Human Extinction that kills off Attended Knight , Captain of the Watch , and Precinct Captain , no amount of irrelevance to duty should save their tokens.

Among creatures, only legendary cards represent actual individuals. The rest are just represent some kind of creature (though they do get sloppy with that sometimes; how many Mayors does Avabruck have?). Casting Honor Guard gets you an honor guard, not a particular individual who is an honor guard. There's significant variety in how that's presented in the different versions of the card; it's not just different images of the same individual.

So we have a situation where you can summon an Attended Knight , who is definitely a Human, and you then also get the accompanying Soldier, whose race is so irrelevant that they don't even have one. That's just silly, I think.

Jan 2, 2013 -- 6:30AM, alextfish wrote:

I'm also very sad to see Oak Street Innkeeper with no class type: I think "Merchant" and "Townsfolk" are long overdue to be (re)added to the creature type list.

I would readily support "Townsfolk" or just actually using "Citizen."