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Episode 238: Glimmers, Manifest, and Rooms Oh My
121 Plays1 month ago
Hello, Podwalkers, and welcome back to another episode of the Goblin Lore Podcast! Today Alex and Taya dig into the flavor and the Mechanics for Duskmourn! We are glad to be back from another mini break and also there are plans for Taya and Hobbes to record together this coming week in Vegas!
We also finally have a Linktree with all of our discounts/resources
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As promised, we keep Mental Health Links available every episode. But For general Mental Health the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) has great resources for people struggling with mental health concerns as well as their families. We also want to draw attention to this article on stigma from NAMI's site.
If you’re thinking about suicide or just need someone to talk to right now, you can get support from any of the resources below.
- National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 988
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- Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741-741
- International suicide hotlines: A comprehensive resource list for people outside the US.
- IMAlive: Click Chat Now to access a live online network of volunteers through instant messaging.
- TrevorLifeline, TrevorChat, and TrevorText (LGBTQ+ crisis support): 1-866-488-7386, or text “Trevor” to 1-202-304-1200
- Trans Lifeline (US): (877) 565-8860
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Opening and closing music by Wintergatan (@wintergatan). Logo art by Steven Raffael (@SteveRaffle)
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Transcript
Introduction and Return from Hiatus
00:00:09
Speaker
are
00:00:29
Speaker
Hello Podwalkers, and welcome to another episode of the Goblin Lore podcast. It has been a little while, so it feels really nice to to say that. ah Coming tonight, we are we are bringing you a episode we've kind of been talking about amongst ourselves for a little while, and it just, we have not had a good chance to to record this.
Introduction to Duskmorn Set
00:00:52
Speaker
Tonight, we're talking Duskmorn, the the very recent set, right? Like it just came out.
00:00:58
Speaker
feels like it. Yeah, I know preview start for the next set this weekend. So, you know, time moves on. Yeah. Okay. So we're almost sort of in the window of timeliness, but still one of the, um, the fun things with us is we, you know, when we're going to talk about sets, we don't We don't really talk mechanics. Well, we talk some mechanics, but we we don't talk like competitiveness and what should go in your deck and things. That's not really our style. We are much more story and flavor and male mechanic sort of... I'm going to kind of explain those in a second. So this is, we're calling it a male throw set review. It's a thing we've been doing for a little while. And so rather than
00:01:39
Speaker
it being more timely, trying to figure out what to put in your decks. This is more just interesting cards, especially a lot of these are going to be things that you're going to have missed. For some reason, there's just a lot of cool flavor in commons. I think that's a fairly, not to be a weird, I don't know, pun, maybe. I think it's a fairly common thing in sets where lots of the commons is where the good flavor and design stuff shows up that's kind of interesting, but aren't necessarily splashy and back to the cards.
Social Media Reflections
00:02:09
Speaker
Anyway, why don't I actually introduce myself and we can get going. We're already a good little ways into this recording. um We are down one person's night, but I am Alex Newman. I am no longer found on Twitter. I have finally- Congratulations. Welcome to the club. Thank you. Thank you. i I am considering I have downloaded the Blue Sky app. I have not signed up. I have decided if I want to maintain this form of peace in my life or not.
00:02:38
Speaker
We'll see which way I break. But then I guess my my pronouns are he, him, and then do you want to introduce yourself and we can do our intro question after that. Hey, yeah, I'm Taya, pronouns are she, her, they, them. I am Taya Transcends at on Blue Sky. um I was off of Twitter long before the mass exodus that has happened recently with the the changes that happened ah last week. Um, so welcome to blue sky to all the new people that have joined. Uh, it's been nice seeing more of a magic community there.
00:03:14
Speaker
Yeah, that
Hiatus Explanation and Self-Care Focus
00:03:15
Speaker
that's cool. and so Unfortunately, Hobbs, not going to make it tonight. Life. i mean this This is part of why we haven't had an episode for a little while. Things come up. It it can be tough to to keep things going. Hobbs was busy preparing for Magic Con this weekend. Oh, yes, absolutely. Which I will also be there. so If you happen to see me, please stop by and say hi. Maybe we can get a commander a game in or something.
00:03:42
Speaker
Yes, and and we'll see. we We may or may not have stuff ah coming out of that, or at the very least, hopefully we can we can get back to a little more of a regular recording cadence. I say, despite the fact that and next month is the beginning of all the end of your holidays, so maybe... we'll see hopefully we we have some episodes between now and and the end of the year but one of the big things about our show we we talk a lot about mental health and a big part of that is self-care and we we try to practice what we preach when it comes to that is as difficult as that can be sometimes and so that's you know we would love to have an episode every week but we think it is much more important that we take care of ourselves and manage to keep going with the show that's part of why
00:04:27
Speaker
we've We've kept this show going for as long as we have. So, we open in question. So, opening question
Duskmorn Set Themes and Personal Glimmers
00:04:35
Speaker
for this week. I thought appropriate talking Duskmorn. We've done a few like cool phone intro questions related to Duskmorn, but I don't think we've we've talked about like our personal glimmers.
00:04:47
Speaker
That would be a fun one. and And kind of conceptually, as I understand, at least, and maybe you can give some extra details here if you if if you have some. But and my understanding is the glimmers are like the person's, like so an embodiment of of their sort of dreams and maybe good memories. It's like an embodiment of their hope before it gets crushed by dust morn.
00:05:10
Speaker
Yes, okay, there they're hoping. And often, it seems like they're shaped like things people have had good experiences with, or pets, it seemed like a common one. um So for myself, I figure I just go with a pet, like are ah the the first dog I had when we were a when I was a kid, ah who whose name was Lady, was ah was a collie, a very,
00:05:37
Speaker
stereotypical lassie looking collie. And she, I was, I was five? Yeah, because we just got a house and my parents decided the other way to house, it was time to get a dog. Go to the Humane Society. This was the, and she was the only dog who wasn't rambunctious and barking and things. Fair dogs got energy, but my dad saw her just kind of sit there. I was like that, I think that's the dog.
00:06:07
Speaker
And she she was, as often happens with dogs, very, very good close member of our family first for a number of years. Yeah. She was funny. we We'd go up to a, we had a cabin and nearby in Wisconsin. We'd go up to a lot and lady was very, very protective of of me and my siblings who I was the oldest where they said I was five when we got her. and I think she was like two or three years. So yeah we were pretty young the whole time that we had late lady.
00:06:36
Speaker
So she, she was very protective of us. Like I remember one time she just chased a deer. Like there just happened to be a deer near our cabin, which was kind of weird because it was a kite out in the woods, but not really that out in the woods. So this poor deer was, was awfully lost, but lady probably had no idea what it was, but did not want it anywhere near here. Kids. Um, she also like very much did not like the water, even though we were, but so she, she, my dad loves to tell the story. She was in the lake twice.
00:07:06
Speaker
once, because she loved to go out in the boat with him. So once he put her in the water to make sure she could swim, because he's like, he just wanted, it's like if the boat goat tips over, he needed to make sure that she could take care of herself. And yep, she was fine there. The second time was when my siblings and I were were in the water, just at our dock, not very far, but um swimming. And she liked to lay on the dock. And we just thought that she liked to hang out with us. I'm sure she did.
00:07:31
Speaker
But this one day, like five or six ducks kind of started to float by. Boom. She was in the water chasing those things away. It's like, nope, you're not coming anywhere near my kids. So I pause. If if I showed up at Duskborn, there was a door that I walked through for some reason, which I think in a previous or a more recent episode about Duskborn, you can, we we talked about things that would get you to walk through a scary door.
00:07:57
Speaker
One of those things happen to be somewhere near a scary door. I think they're probably a glimmer of lady for me. Well, I'm, to probably no one's surprise, going to go with a cat. ah I didn't have a particular cat in mind, so I don't have ah a nice story like you did about your beloved dog. um But I figured, ah you know, however it manifested, it would be some form of a cat. And that goes... it goes nicely into the first card I want to talk about, which is Enduring Curiosity, um which is a cat glimmer. It's a four, three cats. That's a big kitty. um The anime version of this is one of the cutest cards that have ever been printed.
00:08:44
Speaker
ah But um I wanted to talk about the entire enduring cycle because all of these have a um An effect that's been printed before, but they have an enduring mechanic is that when they die, they come back as an enchantment. And there's a lot of enchantment stuff in this set in general. There are a lot of enchantments in Duskborn. I don't know if it's more than Theros, but it's definitely up there with Theros for the number of enchantments. Yeah. ah But this is a very good kitty. It draws you cards.
00:09:22
Speaker
Uh, it's got flash, so you can ah really surprise people with a bunch of card draw out of nowhere. Um, you know, yeah could definitely see this as a a really good card for blue white flyer deck. So.
00:09:38
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
Key Card Discussions in Duskmorn Set
00:09:39
Speaker
um well And and some of the the Mel sort of things if I realized didn't didn't explain if if someone's new or like, these are kind of related to player psychographics more. it's It's aesthetic things. So for those people who love story, for Mel, it's like mechanics that are interesting or are fit together really well. um And a lot of stuff, so especially Dea and I on the cast, have a lot of Milthos sort of aesthetic that we like, where there's mechanics that are very flavorful. ah But from a Mel's standpoint, too, I love A. it Curiosity is in the name, and it has the mechanic that is curiosity, right? That's the creature deals combat damage you draw a card. But then the the enduring thing, like you say, the if it dies, it comes back as an enchantment, but not a creature.
00:10:29
Speaker
that kind of fits that enduring thing. Right so and and I think this is on all the glimmers if not most of them and and the idea is that like even if hope goes away you can still have some you know your glimmer might fade but you can still have some hope left. Yeah I mean it it it kind of fits that idea of the the embodiment of your your hope is gone but you still have this memory of this beloved
00:10:59
Speaker
Mm-hmm Yep, and we saw in the story that the wanderers um Glimmer was the ah world soul of Kamigawa The dragon I can't remember its name Kodai or Something like I can't remember its name right now. But um yeah, so it's definitely something important to the person. Yeah Okay, well that is funny because That card actually segues nicely into a card that I was interested to talk about. So still in blue, a creature called Creeping Peeper, which is an eye creature type, which there's some there's some fun type lines in this. There are some really good type lines in this set.
00:11:46
Speaker
But I love this mechanic. So it's tap, a add blue, spend this meta only to cast an enchantment spell, unlock a door, or turn a permanent face up. And kind of, again, to talking about this Mel standpoint, there's lots of, I don't know, this this is a thing where me being armchair ah card designer,
00:12:07
Speaker
I think this is super interesting and cool because it can tell this is a newer card with decades of learning and behind it because you have lots and lots of sets that come up with new mechanics. This set has the whole room mechanic. you know we have certain this enduring thing, which has been done before, we think, but like they're bringing it back in a specific way or in a specific place. Lots of sets have new mechanics or old mechanics. They're making new and new ways, but historically, and so lots of cards have, you know, these's there's jokes. I think one of the playtest cards is like, mer you know, kill spell with set mechanic, or was that an- Right, yeah, that that's one of the- Yeah, it's it's in one of those sort of,
00:12:54
Speaker
uh, what used to be silver border thing. But anyway, like kind of what I'm driving at is lots of cards. They try to have the set mechanic on it or to play like this is a support card for set mechanic. Right. It's just a common creature that helps support the themes of the deck enchantments and rooms. Yep. But, and, uh, and, uh, manifesting dread manifest dread. So it supports all of the, themes of the ah like the expansion. Yep, it it supports all of these specific themes because like the Enduring Curiosity is a creature, is an enchantment type. But the way that it does it, it doesn't make it a parasitic card, which is a term that like Mark Rosewater and other designers will talk about, where a mechanic is parasitic, if it only works with itself,
00:13:43
Speaker
Energy is a really good example of a parasitic. but That is a great one, especially because it's it's more recent. All of them in my head are much older. but yeah Energy is this perfect one. like you there isn't There's a few little things, but like energy cards only work with and other energy cards. You can tie in you know some other cards to make things work, ah but It's, so this eye rather than, I mean, it only works with unlocking a door. So that one is, is parasitic. It only works with that specific thing, but it works to cast any type of enchantment, whether that enchantment is a room or a glimmer or an enchantment from legends. Works with manifest and morph. Yep. Works with manifest, morph, anything that creates face down cards. This works with, uh, uh,
00:14:32
Speaker
illusionary mask from unlimited. I love that card. Me too. I have that is the probably the oldest card. No, I have a beta false orders, ah but I have an unlimited i illusionary mask my dad gave me a long, long time ago because I love yeah, I you know, I need to put that in a deck. I have one too. And I just need to play at one of these times.
00:14:54
Speaker
Yeah, so yeah, that's I'm going to try to explain that card. if If you're interested, we can look that one up and and see how wildly different the Oracle text is um compared to the actual card. But yeah, so this this is just a simple little common creeping paper that supports all of this main mechanics of this set. The flavor text on it is really good, too. Oh, yes. Yeah, be on your guard. Velgamath has eyes everywhere. And I don't mean that figuratively.
00:15:24
Speaker
on a literal on a card that is literally an I. So those are the kinds of cards that I like to talk about, right? Yeah. um So I'm going to go with ah an uncommon for my next one. and and this is um My favorite reprint of the set. and ah It hasn't been printed in the standard since the Return to Ravnica block, but ah ethereal armor is one of my favorite. Again, going with the enchantment theme for this set. ah The art on this version has a larger woman, which I always like seeing on cards.
00:16:00
Speaker
ah Um, it's, uh, in for, you're not familiar though, it's enchanted creature gets plus one plus one for each enchantment you control and have first strike. So from one white man, it's plus one plus one and first strike, and then it grows out of hand from there. Uh, it doesn't have its best, the invisible stalker anymore. Um, uh, hex proof was kind of a banter. Jessica hex proof was kind of a nightmare of return to Ravnica and a Strahd standard. I absolutely loved it.
00:16:33
Speaker
um was basically um the only card that stopped it was Supreme Verdict and a ah nice Boris charm took care of that even ah but uh Yeah, so I absolutely love ethereal armor. as just ah I love it mechanically. I like what it does. It's one of those cards that plays nice with everything going on in this set. I haven't followed standard in years, so I don't know if there's a standard aggro deck playing ethereal armor um now, but ah I know I'd be trying to play it if I was playing standard. I'd be trying to figure out something to do with it.
00:17:18
Speaker
Oh, yeah. Well, and in a set like this where you have enchantment creatures, that seems like that it would be better than a normal set. So you're not just it's not just growing out of auras like right. And you have enchantment creatures and rooms rooms. Yeah. Yeah. So I bet this is a limited bomb and a lot of that. Yeah, which is which is unusual for auras. So that's that's cool.
00:17:46
Speaker
Yeah, I guess I have one reprint on my list too. I guess I have two, but I'll i'll just throw this one out. I think it's just perfectly appropriate for this set. Don't really need to explain it, but I'm so glad to see Murder. Oh yeah, Murder was perfect for this set. I almost put it on my list too, but um you know and it's one of those cards that can go in pretty much any set i wouldn't be surprised to see it printed and whatever foundations or whatever they're calling them legal forever or legal for your set that's coming out next yeah that's a good call yeah it's just ah in this set it's perfect i mean it's just everybody gets murdered at some point Yeah, and it's it's just so well-balanced. It's always good, but it's never overpowered in a format. yeah it it Destroy target creature is just super straightforward for everyone to understand. It fits a niche. I remember the player's guide for... I think it was M13 when it was first printed, maybe? that
00:18:53
Speaker
um Talked about this being the first time that Destroy Target Creature ever appeared on a card, just those three words with nothing else. Yeah, because I mean, Killspills go all the way back, but those were all qualified in some way. Like, Tarot would be a fun one for this set, but it's a weirdly qualified card. Non-black, non-artifact? Yeah, they don't tend to do cards that reference color a lot anymore. Yeah.
00:19:19
Speaker
Um, like that, but yeah, murder, um, that's what's happened in this set. Yeah. And also, um, opening this up just made me aware of the, uh, special breaking news version of murder from, uh, from outlaws at thunder junction that is cheap and an amazing looking card. So that gets added to a list of random things for me to pick up when I'm buying other cards.
00:19:43
Speaker
All right. Um, well, this segue is nicely into my next card because it's another uncommon removal spell. It's unwanted remake. Nice. Um, I mentioned this one because this is a theme, um, throughout the set of also just making horror movie references, um, like real life, even like, so we have this and, um, we have, uh, meet her hook massacre too. So we just have these horror movie.
00:20:12
Speaker
um ideas that are in there as cards Yep, and this one is just a story target creature and controller manifested red for one in a whiteness instant I actually need some of these to put in commander decks I think because it goes It's not as good as swords or path obviously, but it's another one one white mana in instant removal spell Yeah Yeah, it's it's it's a real good card that fits in that niche. it's also a like It fits the set really well, but like it it fits well even in you know in the commander format for folks who don't have access to swords. I'm sure um this is going to be a staple in budget commander decks when you're doing like um you know, 1DH or even cheaper budget decks. This is going to be a staple in those types of decks. Yeah, absolutely. um I also really like some of the the flavor of this, too. Like, not specific, but this does tie a little bit into one of the little bits of the story with, um oh, wow, how could I forget?
00:21:27
Speaker
the the greatest himbo in the multiverse. Tyvar. Tyvar, thank you. I've just totally b blanked out his name. But but when Tyvar at one point met noticed, I think this was in the first story, because it was like right after they got to the house, I want to say, or maybe be right after they all got split up, but he noticed pictures or portraits of like people being changed and yeah that was uh after the library when he busts through the wall and he's going up that stairs by himself yeah that's right it was a little later but but like he is you know kind of extra sensitive to that because of the recent phyrexine invasion that whole thing um yeah this art could absolutely be one of those pictures yep and he he kind of just made a note of about how
00:22:11
Speaker
you know, involuntary changes. ah Like that's literally the name of this is on unwanted remake. Yeah. So that i is an in has an interesting little not specific lower tie in but is sort of resonant with a little moment from one of the stories. Yeah, especially with that art. Yeah, it's a very surreal piece of art. Yep.
00:22:37
Speaker
Okay. That, uh, that makes it my turn, I guess.
Exploration of Set Mechanics and References
00:22:42
Speaker
And you mentioned, oh, where was it? So men talking about, uh, horror movie references. And I just have once, I know there's a bunch of, we want to talk more. That's great. But I have one specific one that I wanted to call it and that's break down, uh, break down the door, which is just like a clear shining reference, like not even subtle. Um, now there's a few of them in this set.
00:23:04
Speaker
Yeah, but I love the mechanics of this too, where it's you you exile an artifact, you exile choose one, exile an artifact, an enchantment, or manifest dread. And kind of all of those fit really well with like, what's happening in the that story, even in the shying, or so even here, like, particularly breaking down a door that feels pretty exile and artifacty.
00:23:28
Speaker
ah to me, or at least, you know and the manifest manifest dread fits a lot of, just a lot of horror movies. That's what they try to do. That's their goal is to manifest dread in the viewers. Yeah, no, really good ah good art, very very much like you said, referencing the Shining.
00:23:47
Speaker
ah And yeah, it's a three-mana instant that gives you a lot of flexibility. Yeah. Yeah. And a lot of these, like there's all, you know, this is again, to talk talking about card with set mechanic. There's lots of destroy or exile or somehow deal with artifact or enchantment in green, but a lot of times that's all they do. And so they can be a dead card if you don't have one of those to deal with, but this having yeah out of just, just manifest dread created to two that might have upside is is a nice, it's, it's almost a cycling type mechanic in this specific use. Yeah.
00:24:26
Speaker
Very cool card. um My next one ah is a really out there card. um I just love this mechanically. It does one of my my favorite mechanics in the game. It has been forever, but ah the Mind Skinner, which just has some amazing art by Arce J. Harding. um This is a three blue mana 10. Oh, I missed this. This is super cool.
00:24:56
Speaker
Yeah, it can't be blocked. And if a source you control do damage to an opponent, prevent that damage and each opponent mills that many cards, each opponent. Yeah. um Yeah, this was I think it was on Elder Dragon hijinks. I saw this card played already as a commander and it didn't get to do much. I think it was on that show.
00:25:17
Speaker
um But this is exactly the kind of ridiculous nonsense I want to be doing in commander. Yeah. um okay I'm not, I love Mill, but I'm not the um i'm not the kind of person who plays the Grand Eloquent and then uses a spell that just decks everybody for half to deck them for full. that's That's boring. Let me do, let me get there the hard way.
00:25:48
Speaker
Yeah. And this, this is an interesting way to do it too, where you're, you're trying to get there. the heart You're, you're trying to work for it, but also because it has that sort of that parallel effect, you're not having to like mill one person mill the next person. You're not picking on anybody. You're just like, Nope, we're just going to hate everybody. Yeah. And it's, it it's not, uh, it doesn't do self mill. So it's not, you can't abuse it for that because milling yourself for 10 at a time in a self mill deck would be pretty, uh,
00:26:18
Speaker
Yeah, pretty impressive. Yeah, that would be. But yeah, it dies to everything though. um Yeah, and that's the the the power and toughness is also really interesting because it has a one toughness, it dies to everything. But 10-1 is also really super unique power toughness block, I think. And it can't be blocked, so you need some kind of direct damage to kill it. Yep, yep.
00:26:46
Speaker
Um, but you know, a prodigal sorcerer is this thing's worst nightmare. Yeah. Even something like a pyroclasm that just hits the whole board for two, which is in this set in this set. Yeah. So it's, it's a cool. Yeah. That's, that's a super cool card that I just missed when I was, I was looking through stuff. Okay. Um, pyroclasm is on my list. So let me just talk about it real quick. Um,
00:27:14
Speaker
This is a classic that I think goes all the way back to Ice Age. Yeah, I think so. It's got some really amazing art of a guy just taking a flamethrower or a bunch of monsters. It's one in a red, deals two damage to each creature. Very simple, um you know, low low creature board wipe. But the flavor text on this version is, in my younger days, I meticulously catalog all the terrors I encountered. These days, I mostly just kill them with fire.
00:27:46
Speaker
Perfect. that is That is perfect flavor text. Yeah. ah And it definitely um talks about, um it goes back, yeah. So Ice Age was the first printing um and that one had a wonderful Jaya Ballard flavor text. Leave more room for the big ones to fit in, you know? Yeah.
00:28:13
Speaker
Yeah, that's that's a card that I so i started a little before I sage. So that's a card that just kind of has always been in my awareness. Yeah, same. All right. Well, I'm going to talk about a card that maybe I'm reading too much into this, but I firmly believe that that's the point of Magic podcasts. So when I want to talk about split up, um which is White sorcery, it's a choose one, destroy all tapped creatures, destroy all, or destroy all untapped creatures. White gets board wipes, so especially conditional board wipes. This is three, so it's nice to have that condition. Kind of a kind of a good card from that standpoint. Oh, also the flavor text is great. ah Don't be a wimp, we'll cover more ground this way, attributed to Ryan, former survivor. Yeah.
00:29:06
Speaker
This is beautiful. I almost put this one on my list and it has some really cool art too. It's got like the comic book of effect showing like four different scenes at the same time. Yes, which is part of why I put it on here. And so A, you've got that four different scenes, which is seems to be like a party of four that got split up because none of them are at each other's thing, but also the effect on it. Well, not exactly. It's very similar to the effect on a lot of the split second cards.
00:29:32
Speaker
And so that was that's the part where maybe I'm reading too much into this, but it does, to me at least, still feel like that, even though this has nothing similar to the mechanic split second, which is basically just a mechanic that says, this is faster than instance. Like if the card with split seconds on the stack, nothing can go on the stack until this card resolves. So you can't counter it. You can't do anything. It just, you resolve this card and then you can continue their game.
00:30:01
Speaker
but I really like that, just looking through the art. Yeah, that art is amazing. All right, my next card also hearkens back to an old card and that's doomsday excruciating.
00:30:16
Speaker
oh ah It is six black mana, so you've got to be really, really into black to cast this. ah It's a six-six flying demon. ah When it enters, if it was cast, each player exiles all but the bottom six cards of their library face down, and at the beginning of your upkeep, draw a card. So you've only got three turns to live with this on the board.
00:30:40
Speaker
Um, but it obviously harkens back to doomsday, which is, uh, you know, legacy combo deck. Yeah. Um, that would exile you, you basically picked five cards, exiled the rest of your library and shuffled them together and made your new library out of that. So, and was it five black mana too? I think it might be. No, it was three black mana, but similarly, no generic, just straight.
00:31:10
Speaker
you know, skull, skull, skull, black Madison. Yes. So that is, uh, yeah, I just thought this was a really cool callback. Um, and, um, he's got these balls floating around him, which even goes back to, um, the original art and the masters 25 art, they all have these balls. Um, these like energy balls in them.
00:31:41
Speaker
especially the Masters 25 are, it's just got a bunch of them. Yeah, I don't know if they're supposed to be moons or whatever, but the new one has like the same thing behind him. He has a bunch of floating balls. He has six this time instead of five, though, because you get one more card.
00:32:04
Speaker
Sorry. say Oh, he kind of ah looks a little bit like the yeah sort of demonic figures on the original art. Winged anyway. No, he actually doesn't look. Other than the wings and the slight skeletalness. Never mind. Okay, that's super cool. um i want I'm gonna talk about one that I just felt was kind of ironic.
00:32:28
Speaker
Um, so there's a whole cycle. So we, we talked about, talked about the, um, the glimmer cycles or the, the enduring cycle that our enchantment creatures, but there's some other cycle or not necessarily even cycles, but like types of enchantment creatures in the set. But a lot of them are the fears. Um, rather than being like the glimmers, which are people's hopes, these are all creature type nightmare, but they're also enchantments. Uh, so I want to talk about the fear of missing out. Yeah, that one's cool.
Thematic Analysis of Select Cards
00:32:59
Speaker
You got literal FOMO. yeah the Yeah, beat people to death with FOMO. um And it it when it enters, ah you discard a card and draw a card, which feels mechanically you know resonant with the fear of missing out. And then Delirium, when it first attacks, there are four more card types in your graveyard. You untap a creature, and then you get into the combat phase. So a little bit of that. But I just i love sort of the irony of it.
00:33:29
Speaker
Fear of missing out, showing up in a card. Yeah, and then there's some that are just more common fears, like fear of falling, fear of burning alive. Yep. And then there's some other ones that, you know, just so they're like, fear of bailing a test. Yes, which is a fun one too. Yeah. um It is, ah that is a really cool cycle. I like those too. So my next one is going to be one I already mentioned, but it's Meat Hook Massacre 2. And You know, I think this is the only time maybe outside of Silverboard where they've directly referenced another card like this in a title. I was really surprised to see this as a standard card where they just straight up, you know, named it the same as another card, had it do a fairly similar effect where you get a bonus and your opponents get a penalty.
00:34:24
Speaker
It kills creatures. It's not as good as the original so like everything you expect out of a sequel Yeah. I, I think the only, the other, the place where I'm aware of where they did something similar in this one, there's enough, the other enough of a difference or there's pox and then there's small pox. Yeah. So yeah, that is a good example too. But those are like actually one third of what pox does or something like that. Yes. Yeah. Pox is each player loses a third of his life, a third of his or her life, discards a third of their cards, sacrifices a third of their creatures.
00:35:00
Speaker
Um, it's, it's a, oh, and sacrifices lands. It's a nonsense thing. And then smallpox rather than being is one less manna and that it's just, everybody loses one of each of those things. One, yeah one card, one creature, one life.
00:35:14
Speaker
life ah But the Meat Hook Massacre 2 is much more direct of a reference. you could And of course, Smallpox was in the Times Fire block, which is a block full of references. But you could play Smallpox, and that's a thing. like That's actually a thing. And not even realize it's a reference. You probably can't play Meat Hook Massacre 2 and not get that it's a reference to Meat Hook Massacre. Yeah.
00:35:41
Speaker
Yeah, it's a I just like I said, I was really surprised to see this on a standard set that seems like the kind of thing they usually say for unset. Yeah, exactly. They've literally done that in some unsets too. Yeah. Oh, right. um I mean, I guess there's two I have that are kind of just like, we really just need to talk about these, right? They're just like super obvious smell those things. So Manifest Red.
00:36:08
Speaker
which is a card that literally just manifests red. Yep. It does exactly what it says on the tin. It's, it it is, it's, if you like remove the reminder text, which is on the card to tell you what it does, but it's not actually part mechanically of the card. It's text is exactly the same as its name and it might be the only card that that is ever. I'm pretty sure that's true. Yeah. So that, that's just cool. I love that.
00:36:38
Speaker
That would make a really good um textless card. Yeah. An older card. Yeah. I mean, that would be so perfect for it because it's like, you don't have to remember what it does. It tells you what it does. It's right there. Yeah. You want me to hit this other one real quick? Sure. Go ahead. um Haunted screen.
00:37:04
Speaker
Oh yeah, that was that's another good one that I had yeah it's just thought about putting on my list that I skipped. It's it's the TV. and yeah it it it's ah It's an artifact that taps for black or white mana, or you can pay a life to get green, blue, or red. So it it it's a black and white TV that for a little ah for a little life makes color.
00:37:28
Speaker
Yeah, you gotta pay extra for color. Yeah. And then it can, because it's haunted, I guess you can make it as pay seven mana. The ghost eventually comes out of the screen. Yeah, but it's, I just... I love, yeah, the the, I did not notice that when I first saw this, that it starts as black or white, and then you can pay more for color. And I just, yeah that that is... Same. Oh, Malthos.
00:37:54
Speaker
Sam, I did not notice it right away. And then someone pointed it out and it's like, now I, I have to put this on the list. but This was the first card on my list.
00:38:05
Speaker
Excuse me. Um, I'm gonna, my next one is going to be, um, mentioning everyone's favorite Himbo again, Tyvar, his actual card Tyvar, the pummeler. Um, you know, Sean and talked about this when she was on the show is like, she wished they knew he had a ah She wished she knew that they had a bat in the ark because she would have given him a bat in the sword. But that they do have his vest on him. He's actually covered up for once. The card effect is really cool.
00:38:39
Speaker
um It has pseudo regeneration. Uh, it's a repeat pump effect. And then the flavor text is they just keep coming and coming. Perfect for my morning workout, which is such a perfect tie bar flavor text. Yep. He's the only one who was mostly having a good time on Duskmourne other than his little, um, creepy painting.
00:39:05
Speaker
time I think he had a good time the rest of the time he was there. Yeah, yeah, I think so. um And actually, I didn't have Typer written down on my list, but I did have a card with flavor text featuring him. So coordinated clobbering um for green tap one or two untapped creatures you control, they deal damage equal to their power to target creature and opponent controls, sort of ah the modified fight. Is there a new name for that where they it's only one sided fight?
00:39:33
Speaker
Punch. Punch. OK, cool. Yeah, which is even more punch from Tyvar. it was like a Tarkir card or something like that, which was the first time it was printed. That's right. Yeah, that that makes sense. But so again, like this is this is all Tyvar or this is all flavor text here, because this is when Tyvar and Zamone were beating up cultists. You have Zamone's theory in the flavor text. Zamone's theory was that the fractionalization of the atmospheric aether would increase kinetic energy.
00:40:02
Speaker
Tyvar's theory was that if you hit cultists in the face really hard, they would fall down. They were both right. Yeah. you know just a Oh, and that's actually a story spotlight card. So that makes sense. Yeah, I just love it. Yeah, that was when we got the the line is behold the power of math. Yeah, just one of the best slides in the story. um Speaking of the moan, that is actually my next card. The moan all questioning.
00:40:27
Speaker
And this one, I had to give it because we actually get a reference to prime numbers in a mechanic.
00:40:37
Speaker
um
00:40:40
Speaker
And you basically, you get a fractal with the um the prime, if you control the prime number of lands, ah you get a fractal with that money plus one plus one counters on it. Yes. and it's been me And we get a rare, I don't know, is this, is it Melthos if it's related to math and not magic, but the name of this, this fractal is primo, the indivisible. Yes. thats Beautiful. That that's what makes it a prime number. It's indivisible. And if you look at the scryfall page, they have all the prime numbers up through 1000. Yes. Scryfall page.
Mathematical Themes in Zamone's Cards
00:41:22
Speaker
Because Scryfall is one of the best resources for the Magic community that exists. Yeah, i I can't imagine having 997 lands in play, but if somehow managed to do that, ah you know, good on you. Yep. this ah This is one of the few cards in the deck where I'm like, I might need to build that commander deck. Yeah.
00:41:47
Speaker
i I love me like a land centric and blue. I like blue, green as colors, but so many of the commanders are just blue, green, good stuff, blue, green value. yeah Like I want something that's more specific and and interesting. And this, this is more specific for sure. Yeah. That is definitely does something unique. Yeah. So I want to talk about it. Doesn't say draw a card on it, which is nice. It's a refreshing change for blue, green. Yeah. Just incredible.
00:42:17
Speaker
All right, so another ah multicolor card, another one of our our intrepid crew, sort of, I guess, he was he was one of the people being rescued. Nashy, searcher in the dark. I love the art on this card. So good. And i also, I mentioned earlier, the set has some really good typelines. Legendary creature, rat, ninja, wizard. Just beautiful. Yeah, he's learning some tricks from mom. He picked up wizard. Yeah, love it.
00:42:46
Speaker
um But something I found was interesting. So Nashi has Menace. um Does combat damage to a player. You can mill cards, put in a number of legendary or enchantments from among them into your hand. If you put no cards this way, put a plus one, plus one on Nashi. Has some interesting mechanics, plays with enchantments and legendary stuff, which kind of which fits well with Nashi's story. But also what I thought was interesting is is a ninja, he does not have Ninjitsu, but he does have Menace, which is a mechanic that plays well with ninjitsu. Yeah, so yeah he's a cheap creature you can easily replay. Yep. And so it's like that that was a cool like again, talk about that mechanical thing, like a cool kind of tie in to play with other ninjas. Historically, though, there's not many in this set, I suppose you have Kaito, who's kind of a ninja, but not actually typed as a ninja, because he's still a planeswalker. But who does have ninjitsu in this set? Yes.
00:43:44
Speaker
they did print ah They printed a planeswalker with Ninjutsu.
00:43:49
Speaker
um My next one is from the commander set. It's Amanatu Valkir, sir. And I'm mentioning this because, again, we got our first story appearance of Amanatu in this set. um ah She did get de-sparked, so she's not quite as powerful as she used to be, but she can still ah twist fate pretty good. And it's... ah She's a human wizard, pretty basic type line, but it gives all of your enchantment cards miracle in your hand. And she lets you surveil too at the beginning of your upkeep. So you can fix the top of your deck right before you draw and then um miracle out an enchantment card. And miracle cost is, um it's mana cost reduced by four. So you can get some cheap enchantments out of this. Yes.
00:44:41
Speaker
ah Cost when you draw it, if it's the first card you drew this turn, yeah. So you you stack your you stack the top a little bit with surveil, then you just get to drop it in for cheap with that mechanic, which are two previous mechanics that both play really well with with with her powers, kind of how her magic works in the in the fiction. And being its enchantments, too, keys off well with one of the mechanics from the set.
00:45:09
Speaker
Yeah, and her her Commander deck was all about Enchantments. It was an Esper Enchantress deck, which is um also a nice nice change of pace for an Enchantments deck because they almost always have green in them. And I want to go with a related card real quick. I'm pretty sure it's in the same deck, but um we have a Metamorphosis Fanatic, which is a black card with Miracle.
00:45:36
Speaker
and And from the original set, miracles were the um were mechanics and everything but black because they were basically the humans surviving against the monsters. that's right that was an Calling on miracles from the angels. And so we get a black miracle here.
00:45:56
Speaker
ah That is a four four with lifelink when it enters the battlefield You get to return another part creature with a lifelink counter on and it's miracle cost is just one in the black So yeah, if you can miracle this out, it is super cheap and but a Fanatic whose creature type is cleric on this plane. It kind of makes sense to be getting a miracle from Felgebop Yeah, right. There's a bunch of moths behind them in the picture and And yeah, lovely hes he's, he's invoking Balgevoth for a mechanic or for a miracle. Yeah. All right. Cool. Um, so I guess name sort of gives this one away right away. Uh, piggy bank.
00:46:45
Speaker
yeah Um, talking about some good, some good Mel stuff going on here. You got piggy bank, which is, ah it's an artifact creature bore toy, a three, two for, for red and a one. And when it dies, you create a treasure token, which is mechanically very perfect. You got to break open that bank. Yeah. And then the flavor text. Remember when you smashed me for a little pocket money. Yeah. It's coming back to haunt, you know.
00:47:17
Speaker
though um This is actually my last card that I had selected, and it's another Zimone card, it's the Zimone's Hypothesis. um and this one i like You put a plus one plus one counter on a creature, it doesn't matter if it's yours or not, and then choose odd or even, return each creature with the power of the chosen quality to its owner's hand.
00:47:40
Speaker
So it's a conditional mass bounce spell at instant speed. Nice. um But you can you can either save one of your creatures or force one of your opponent's creatures into the bounce based on where you put the counter before casting it. Yeah. And it's a little mathy, which is perfect.
00:48:02
Speaker
Yeah, it's one of the ones we have to look at the whole board and be like, OK, there's there's six even creatures and there's three odd creatures and yeah, or I need to bounce Avacyn right now so I better bounce even creatures. Yep. I also I also enjoy that it while it is mathy, it also makes the math people cringe just a little bit when they specify that zero is even. Yeah.
00:48:29
Speaker
So mechanically it has to be, or at least it makes gameplay wise, it has to be. Yeah. um And then the the flavor text on this one is, there exists a theoretical infinity between the discrete atoms of reality. I'm simply appropriating that infinity as storage space. It's basically like a bag of holding. It's perfect.
00:48:55
Speaker
and fix it
00:48:58
Speaker
Yeah, i I'm going to go with, I think my last one here, go with wary watchdog. Because the flavor text says, canonically, all dogs are good dogs. um Where watchdog 31 for two, when it enters or dies, you surveil one. And the flavor text, Velgava harbors a special loathing for dogs whose mere presence presence provides a powerful antidote to the fear he craves. Yeah.
00:49:27
Speaker
Good dogs. Good dogs. And then if you want to look at some fun art, literally on Scryf Hall, just one row down, you have Broodspinner that has the funny googly eyes. Yeah. oh So yeah, that was kind of our Malthosy look at Duskmorn. You know, I enjoyed the aesthetics of this set quite a bit, but I'm also, I grew up you know, watching the USA Up All Night, USA Network Up All Night with Elvira and stuff, you know, watching these campy horror movies. Yeah. You know, I I'm not as big into modern horror movies as I was some, you know, the this but these are like 80s horror movies. This is exactly the kind of place where I was in
00:50:21
Speaker
Um, you know, before they saw fight everything and made it a bunch of torture porn, which is not my thing. Um, but, uh, I will happily take, um, you know, ash, um, killing things with a chainsaw any day. Um, which we did get a chainsaw on the set too. Yes, we did in the main set and the cheerleader and the main set. We got the quarterback in the commander set. So that our star player, I think was the car. Yeah. Yeah.
00:50:53
Speaker
It's not my aesthetic. it's So that was not as great for me, but hey, it's one of those, I'm always happy when something really cool exists for people, even if it's not, even if I'm not people in that instance. But there there was just from from this episode we did, there was some really cool design, some really cool story tie-in and sort of mechanical representations of that design, which which is always a lot of fun.
00:51:20
Speaker
I'm glad we started doing these, these like, Melthos set reviews. I think this is fairly recent, but now we did a Bloomberg. I want to say we did Outlaw as a Thunder Junction, too. Yeah, I think so. Yeah, we we talked about Breaches and Malcolm quite a bit because Hobbs made that one. Yes, that's right. So, yeah, like it's it's I'm having fun with that. And it's it feels like a fun, a fun niche for our our show where, you know, we'll talk about cards and stuff occasionally. We'll talk about decks that we have. But that isn't like the main thing we do. But this feels really in our wheelhouse to kind of approach. I mean, it's similar to the Vorthos cast flavor gems episode that they've always done. But we're not focusing just on the flavor. We we also spend a lot of times looking at mechanics and
00:52:04
Speaker
um You know, it's like we don't go through all the legendaries or anything. So I do recommend listening to their flavor gem episodes for sets too. There tend to be really good episodes.
00:52:16
Speaker
um And especially if you want to learn a lot about the the legendaries in the set. um Oh yeah. talking about them we We can do a little of that, but we we do not we do not hit that as well and as thorough as they can.
00:52:35
Speaker
All right. Well, this was a lot of fun to get back and. Yeah. I hope to see you at magic on Vegas. Uh, let's know. Yeah. I know if you're there. Yeah. Hobson tail, we'll be there. And that's our show for today. You can find all of the hosts on Twitter for now. Hobbs can be found at Hobbs Q take and be found at Taylor transcends and Alex can be found at Mel underscore chronicler.
00:52:59
Speaker
Feel free to send us any questions, comments, thoughts, hopes, and dreams to the Goblin Lore Pod on Twitter, or email us at goblinlorepodcast.com. If you would like to support your friendly neighborhood Gob's Hugs, our link tree can be found on our Twitter account and in the description of today's show. This has everything from various discount codes to the link from our Patreon. The music for today's show was by Wintergotten, who can be found at vintergotten at bandcamp dot.com. The art was done by Steven Raphael, who can be found at Steve Ruffle on Twitter. Cob and Lore is proud to be presented by Hipsters of the Coast as part of their growing forthos content.
00:53:36
Speaker
Check them out on Twitter at hipsters MTG or online at hipstersofthecoast.com. Thank you for listening and remember goblins like snowflakes are only dangerous in numbers.