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Episode 281: Future Sight Fancies
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Hello, Podwalkers, and welcome back to another episode of the Goblin Lore Podcast! Alex and Taya are back with a final look at the Time Spiral Block. Today is centered around Future Sight with a dive into flavor and form with our Melthos Review!
We also finally have a Linktree with all of our discounts/resources including how to join our Discord
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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)
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to the Episode
00:00:29
Speaker
Hello, Podwalkers, and welcome to another episode of the Goblin Lore Podcast. ah We are here tonight to to finish off a cycle of ah episodes that we've we've started and been doing recently. There's a lot of lot of story stuff going on that we will get to, um but tonight we are going to be talking future site. But first, why don't we do introductions? I'm Alex Newman, found on the Goblin Lord Discord mostly, not really anywhere else on social media much lately.
00:01:00
Speaker
um My pronouns are he, him, and do you want to introduce yourself and we'll do the
'Omens of Chaos' Book Launch News
00:01:04
Speaker
opening questions. Yeah. Hi, I'm Taya. You can find me on Blue Sky at Taya Transcends. ah And next week I will be at ah Crow's Nest Comics with Sean McGuire to do a launch for the Omens of Chaos book that's coming out.
00:01:23
Speaker
ah that will be recorded. So we will have the recording up after that occurs, but I'm really excited to have gotten invited to do the launch event with Seanan and represent the podcast there.
00:01:37
Speaker
That, that is super cool. And, and, and yeah, and glad we'll get to listen to that too. Like, that'll be, that'll be a lot of fun and say the book is good. If you like magic story, check it out. It's so good.
00:01:50
Speaker
You'll enjoy it. Right.
Overview of the FutureSight Set
00:01:53
Speaker
So for FutureSight is a quick, I guess, what we've been doing. and This is the third set. FutureSight is the third set in the Time Spiral block. And we've kind of been going through some old sets and kind of talking through some story stuff and then going through and talking, which we did, I think, in December. We talked through the Time Spiral block or maybe January. for the story.
00:02:11
Speaker
um But then we started going through the cards and kind of doing the like Milfo set review that we like to do where we're looking at not like what's the best card to use in, you know, Commander Decks or Standard or whatever, but like what's just kind of interesting mechanically or story wise or where those kind of fit together, where the the story of the mechanics play play interestingly together. And so the Time Spiral block in general is like my is probably my favorite block just because there's a lot of really, really interesting designs happening here.
00:02:45
Speaker
um Some story, but honestly, it's more, for me, it's more a mellow appreciation of stuff from these these
Unique Card Designs and Themes
00:02:51
Speaker
sets. And the Future Sight, what is... probably the most bizarre therefore interesting of this of the trilogy for me um because it had this the whole block had this time theme happening and so time spiral is the past uh planar chaos was kind of the present where they did some sort of alternate color pie things and future site was future cards future mechanics
00:03:18
Speaker
And so for our opening question, um like all three sets sort of had their own like time shifted sheet in in time spiral was actually a specific slot in the booster pack with the purple rarity. And that was a whole different thing. Planner Chaos and Future Sight, they were both mingled into the rest of the packs, but they had a different frame.
00:03:36
Speaker
In Future Sight, this was like some total redesign of the frame they did that had this like round thing around the art. um It had the Manicost, if it had Manicost on the left side, kind of next to the art as opposed to up in the right corner. There is some some bizarre things, but it's easy if you just pull up like a view, you know, image viewer and Skyfall or or Gatherer of this set. It's very easy to tell story.
00:04:03
Speaker
those cards the future shifted because the frame is very different yeah uh when i first came back to magic after having not played for a while i saw ah i saw one of these cards for the first time and i was like that's so cool why didn't they just switch to this as the frame all the time yeah and And there's some fun things with it. Like if you fan the cards out in your hand, it's easier to see the mana costs on the, on the left side. and And so there's, there's just some like interesting thought out. They had, um there was a symbol they created for all the different card types that is on the upper left. So your land, your creature, they still had the type on the type line in the same location, but they also had this just visual like notifier up in the upper left, which is kind of cool. Yeah.
00:04:52
Speaker
know. really, I like the future site frame. It's a weird one, but I like it. But we're thinking like for an opening question, just to kind of talk about the the set, was why don't we call it one of those specifically future shifted cards from this set with a mechanic that we think would be interesting to like come back?
Special Cards and Mechanics
00:05:11
Speaker
Because that was sort of the pitch of this, which isn't...
00:05:15
Speaker
the the The concept of it is that these are glimpses into potential futures. So some of these futures we're never going to meet, but some of these we will. And then that was a whole thing that Mark Rosewater would do with his his thing beforehand every so often with new sets would come out. He'd mention, oh, we have ah we have a future site card coming back because you know this is where it was printed initially and then and it shows up in future site sort of thing.
00:05:39
Speaker
Yeah. um But so I want to go with um the Darksteel Garrison. yeah You picked the same one I picked. That was the same one? Okay. No, go ahead. You take this one. I have an alternate. You have an alternate. Okay. it'll be interesting to see if your alternate, it was my alternate too. um So Darksteel Garrison is, I think, super interesting. So this is an artifact for two, um but it is a artifact fortification. So it's ah it's an artifact super type. has never and we we haven't seen it again because this just hasn't come back but this is so it's basically equipment for land so the the mechanic or the the text box of this says fortified land is indestructible whenever fortified land becomes tapped target creature gets plus one plus one until out of turn and then this has this artifact has the mechanic fortify three. g three so And then the rules text, for three generic mana, you attach it to a land you control, can only fortify as a sorcery.
00:06:38
Speaker
um This card comes into play unattached and stays in play if the land leaves play. It's exactly like equipment, but for lands. Yep. And it's that's such a cool concept. I love that. It's it's an easy sort of concept to explain. it's ah Apparently, because the templating here and isn't super weird, it seems like an easy card to like mechanically make work in the rules. it it's I think it's super cool and It's a little unfortunate. Maybe there's just isn't also it also isn't wildly compelling is your like new mechanic. I don't think there's a lot of design space open to this. That's a fair point. There's there's a card or two I have in my list to talk about later that are also kind of in that space where it's like one card is super interesting, but then it's like, but how do we build a set around it?
00:07:30
Speaker
All right. Well, I'm going to go with one that um first appeared here but has been reprinted, which is Steamflogger Boss. Nice. Okay. ah So this is a um ah Three and a red for a goblin rigger, 3-3. Other rigger creatures you control get plus one, plus zero, and have haste. And if a rigger you control would assemble a contraption, it assembles two contraptions instead.
00:07:58
Speaker
So for over a decade, this was the only card that mentioned contraptions in the entire game. there was no Nobody had any idea what a contraption actually was until Unstable, when they were introduced into the game.
00:08:10
Speaker
as a side deck that you you would, whenever you had a creature that would assemble a contraption, ah you would pull one of your contraptions out of your deck and play it. And then this one just lets you double up those triggers.
00:08:25
Speaker
This was reprinted in Unstable. It was the only blackboard card in the set besides the basic lands. ah And outside of basic lands, it might be the only time that's ever happened in a silver border set. Well, I mean, they went with the whole acorn, non-acorn thing in Infinity. That's true. So that it's kind of not a thing anymore. Yeah.
00:08:49
Speaker
um But at the time, it had been the first black border card printed in a um unset. ah And yeah, it just showed up here for the first time. And for an over a decade, you know people were asking Mara what contraptions are and when they're going to show up.
00:09:07
Speaker
And then we finally got them in the unset. And I thought it was a really cool mechanic myself. It was definitely better than Attractions from Infinity. Infinity was just kind of a disappointing set in general for me.
00:09:19
Speaker
And I love unsets. ah The sticker mechanic missed, the contraptions missed, it just um wasn't as cool, the setting wasn't as cool as Unstable's ah chaotic plane.
00:09:38
Speaker
Yes.
00:09:42
Speaker
But yeah, so that was that was the one I wanted to mention. you know I picked a goblin as my backup. um that's That's good. yeah I had a sliver as my backup.
00:09:55
Speaker
Ah, yes, there are plenty of slivers in this set too. Yeah, so i i think a ah better transition point, I want to i want to talk briefly about Baron Glory.
Mechanics Influencing Future Development
00:10:07
Speaker
So sort of an inverse of what happened with, with steam flagraboss Baron glory is possibly, so silver border is a weird thing. And the acorn, they shifted a little bit how it works, but it's still kind of functions in the same manner of like, if they create a card with a name, just the way magic works, they can, no card, at no new card can have that name. That name is taken forever.
00:10:33
Speaker
And so silver and, and, Silver border slash now the acorn c symbol cannot be played in organized play. That's just how it works. um So Baron Glory is actually a card from Unglued with a new name. It's mechanically exactly the same. um the The other card is She Stands Alone.
00:10:58
Speaker
Which, so the the mechanic of this is it's and it they're both in enchantments for four white-white, and they have just one ability, static ability on there. At the beginning of your upkeep, if you control no permanence other than this enchantment and have no cards in your hand, you win the game.
00:11:20
Speaker
And so it's a, A, I think it's kind of ah an interesting win condition because so many other win conditions sometimes are kind of win moray. You have tons of manor, you have tons of whatever. This is like, can you shoot the moon? Sort of like a, ah a heart sort of style thing where it's like, you can, you can aim for that, that glorious moment, but if you miss a little bit, you get hurt bad.
00:11:43
Speaker
This is another one. Like if you manage to pull, just barely not pull this off, you're out of the game.
00:11:51
Speaker
but it's it's also just interesting. it It is literally the silver border card from the very first set. um And, and kind of the the whole design space of silver border is putting in cards and mechanics that they couldn't put in, in normal black water magic. um But also it gives them a place to play with things. And so this was a mechanic was like, they put this in the very first one and unglued and then sort of realized later, like, no, you know we could actually have a real card a real but like a card that exists in black border magic that does this mechanic there's nothing about that mechanic well we can't and so they pull it into future site of course because it was already a weird set so why not make it more weird
00:12:37
Speaker
um All right, so I'm going to start by talking about a cycle of cards, and um these are... this This is a cycle of common in the future-shifted frame that are all just vanilla creatures.
00:12:52
Speaker
ah And the... ah The reason I think it's notable is that these were some of the first full art cards. I think Unglued Lands and Hinch was it. Basic Lands. had Lands previously, but not... um yeah Yeah, just basic Lands. And even like some of the early ones, like I think Unglued and maybe even on Hinged as well, they so they were like full frame art, but they still sort of had the mana symbol in there to show you what they did. And so they like didn't go fully. This is the first time where just like, there is no rules text whatsoever.
00:13:29
Speaker
You get name, mana cost, power toughness, and creature type, like like card type line. But otherwise it is... full art and you get it on that like future site frame with the, the Manicosta running down the side.
00:13:42
Speaker
Yeah. And, I want to specifically mention blade of the six pride, which is the white one, which is a three into one cat for white and one. ah This card has not been reprinted in any set except for Tives for Hour Remastered, but that exact stat line has been reprinted several times as kind of your white draft filler creature. Yep. though it i think I think a part of that, and and it is the the rest of the creature type line, so it is a Cat Rebel, which is a creature type from Mercadian Masks that...
00:14:18
Speaker
was probably a little too powerful the way it functioned. Yeah, and there is some Rebel stuff in this. There's Bound in Silence, which is a ah Rebel enchantment, ah Rebel typo enchantment. The first typo card. This was sort of previewing. So there's there's like two or three cards in here, I think, that are basically either references to or straight up Lorwyn cards. I don't think Bound in Silence was in Lorwyn, but it referenced, oh because it would have been a Rebel, so it wouldn't have been But having that mechanic was specifically pulled out Lorwyn. And so it's like they knew Lorwyn was in design when this set happened. So that was kind of a cool, like, quick hit. Like, hey, there is a future set that we can pull a few things from. because there's nice Like, Boldware Intimidators, when it was reprinted in Morning Tide, so two sets later...
00:15:09
Speaker
ah And it also has some of the best text of any card in Magic, which is, cowards can't block warriors, and for one and a red, you can turn target creature into a coward until end of a turn, or for two and a red, you can turn a target creature into a warrior until end of turn.
00:15:28
Speaker
and the The other one that I'm thinking of is Tarmogoyf. that in the reminder text, so Tarmogoyf, it gets plus one, plus one for each card type in the graveyard. and Let me pull up the actual card. And so, yeah, Tarmogoyf's power is equal to the number of card types among cards in all graveyards. And the stuffness is that plus one. And so, but then in the reminder text, it says the card types are artifact creature, enchantment, instant land, planeswalker, sorcery, and typal. Now,
00:15:59
Speaker
There's one type of permanent at that point that's also in this time shifted sheet, but planeswalkers hadn't been printed yet. Those came out in Lorwyn. The very first planeswalkers were on Lorwyn. And so again, this is getting to just throw that one extra piece of text on there referencing something they knew was coming up.
00:16:18
Speaker
But if you were just a person playing, you're like, wait, planeswalker, where's the planeswalkers? Well, it's like, well, that's why that's in the future shifted frame.
00:16:28
Speaker
ah And Planeswalkers
Exploration of Individual Card Mechanics
00:16:30
Speaker
originally were supposed to debut in this set, but they didn't have room for them, so they booted them to Lorwyn, which is silly because Lorwyn is a plane that has no humans on it, and most of the original Planeswalkers were humans. Yeah, that that wound up being just kind of an odd oddity.
00:16:51
Speaker
Yeah, so um I want to talk about... One of the cards that I love probably far more than it deserves, but Cryptic Enelid. Okay, so let me just read this card. Three and a blue for a 1-4 beast.
00:17:10
Speaker
And then it says, when Cryptic Enelid comes into play, scry one, then scry two, then scry three. And I just love that mechanic of escalating scrying.
00:17:24
Speaker
um I have that in multiple decks, multiple commander decks that it probably shouldn't be in because a one four for four is doing nothing for me. But I love that escalating scry. You have the potential. I mean, obviously you flip your top card yeah and you like it.
00:17:40
Speaker
You get to keep it, but then you can dig further down or you can just dump six cards to the bottom of your library if ultimately nothing's good. Yeah. Yeah.
00:17:54
Speaker
um All right. So I'm going to mention another favorite of mine ah that was a future shifted card, and that is Daybreak Coronet.
00:18:06
Speaker
Oh, yeah. um It's an aura that has enchant creature with another aura attached to it. Which is a weird line of text. But the reason why is it's for white-white. It gives a creature plus three, plus three, first strike, vigilance, and lifelink all in one aura.
00:18:25
Speaker
and So you had to jump through a hoop to get that. But the payoff is pretty huge. This was a cornerstone card for modern bogals for a long time. I don't know what that deck plays anymore. I haven't played modern in...
00:18:41
Speaker
over five years. Uh, I don't know if it's changed or if it's even still a deck, but, uh, you know, because the big weakness of this is you're opening yourself up for a three for one, uh, by playing it on a card. But if you put it on a hexproof preacher, ah you didn't have to worry about that. Um, mostly, uh,
00:19:03
Speaker
But I just, I love this enchantment. I've always been a fan of auras, even though they're generally not great plays. ah I wish I could have this in my Stang Twins deck.
00:19:17
Speaker
ah But unfortunately it's white, so it doesn't go in that deck. It's Gruul, but I wish I could play it. I haven't gotten to play one in many years and I do miss this card.
00:19:29
Speaker
Yeah, it's ah it's a really cool card. Yeah, and when I first started playing Magic again, it was like a $25 card, and now it's just a couple of bucks because it's had a few reprintings and it has limited um limited playability. um And then they put a Johnny on it for every one of the reprintings.
00:19:52
Speaker
Yeah, so to to continue my theme of cards that I probably give more love than the cards deserve, Marshall and Cry.
00:20:03
Speaker
is specifically a card I have referenced multiple times to kind of explain sort of how Mel works for me, at least. Like the the idea of appreciating the mechanics of a card, not necessarily because, oh, this is something that's fun or, oh, this is something that is powerful. It's just, this is something that's interesting.
00:20:26
Speaker
um So Marshall and Cry is a sorcery for one white light that has says creatures you control get plus and plus one and gain vigilance until the end of turn. But then it has cycling two and flashback for three and a white. And so this is a card that has lots of different lines of play. You can cast it and flash it back to get two uses out of it. You can cycle it at some point to draw a card and then use the flashback to get the effect anyway. It's it's a flexible card and and has mechanics that interact with each other to give you additional options or to to make your choices more interesting than just default pump spell sorcery.
00:21:09
Speaker
Yeah. Um, my next card is, another, this is just a Malthus card that, um, we saw the ability keyworded and printed in later sets, but it's Ghostfire.
00:21:24
Speaker
ah it's a red and two for a colorless card. Yes. The first line is Ghostfire is colorless, uh, which is the devoid mechanic that was brought back in the battle for Zendikar
00:21:37
Speaker
And then it just deals three damage to target creature or player at instant speed. So it was ah an expensive lightning bolt, ah but it was colorless and it appears in this cool colorless frame. This was the first time they did a colorless spell with a colored mana cost.
00:21:53
Speaker
And I think it might have been the first colorless spell that wasn't an artifact. which is a mechanic that's been brought back as and in general as a general thing multiple times. Like this is more specifically like the Devoid, but sort of iterating off of this.
00:22:09
Speaker
Like I don't, I think this is the first just colorless that isn't an artifact or a land, I suppose, because those are default colorless as well. And so, yeah, except just from a Malthael standpoint, it's a super interesting card.
00:22:22
Speaker
And it also references Ugin the spirit dragon. yeah be the first It is the first time Ugin is mentioned. ah We don't learn who Ugin is until the Zendikar story. Even then, we don't really learn who Ugin is. We just learn that he was involved with trapping the Eldrazi on Zendikar.
00:22:40
Speaker
It's not until the first Tarkir block that we actually learn who Ugin is.
00:22:49
Speaker
ah So I want to talk about two creatures um that have weird power and toughness sort of things. kind of there's There's Force of Savagery, um which is two and a green for elemental with trample, and its power and toughness is 8-0.
00:23:12
Speaker
So without intervention, it dies immediately when you cast it as a state-based action. It just slides right into the graveyard, um which again is is just an interesting Malthos thing because it's an interesting and and even kind of fits on the Johnny-Jenny sort of spectrum if you're looking from a different angle. It's it's a card that cannot play on its own.
00:23:33
Speaker
you need to have something that helps you. But getting eight power with trample for three mana is bananas. And so if there's a high payoff, if you have effects that can give it toughness when it hits the battlefield so it doesn't immediately die.
00:23:50
Speaker
um And then i sort of to hit a card that is works differently but also has a weird power and toughness thing, there's Char Rumbler, which is an element. ah odd For two red red, it is an elemental that its has its power is minus one and then it has three toughness.
00:24:11
Speaker
But it has double strike and fire breathing, essentially. Red char rumbler gets plus one, plus oh until end of turn. So you have to put at least, without outside intervention, you have to put at least two mana in it before it has a positive power.
00:24:26
Speaker
But then with the double strike, it starts to pay off in a hurry. Mm-hmm. Yeah. um and And those are two, or I guess Force of Savagery was a rare, but so Charmambler's an uncommon. And so it's just like, and those are just, those aren't even future shifted cards. And that maybe it gives you an idea of why this set was so bizarre.
00:24:51
Speaker
um The next one I want to mention is, ah because it just feels a little out of place in this set, is Gold Medal Lookout, which is ah a 1 and 3 for a 2-2 Kithkin Spellshaper.
00:25:05
Speaker
ah And um the Spellshapers all have an inactivated ability that you tap them and discard a card to do something. This one makes a 1-1 token that has white tap, tap target creature.
00:25:19
Speaker
um But the Spellshapers first showed up in Mask's block, ah where there were ah quite a few of them. And then they showed up again starting in Time Spiral, ah the actual set, and there was at least one in Future Sight. And then we got one here, but it was in the Future Frame.
00:25:40
Speaker
And this one has never been reprinted. This doesn't even have like a commander printing or anything. So this one has never gotten a reprint. No, though. It's another one. I just realized that's a Kithkin, which is another. It's a Lorwyn reference. It's very clearly Lorwyn art on this card.
00:25:58
Speaker
Yeah. um also like one of the funny things not funny but one of the things about the the spell shapers and future site i think it's all of them i'm looking at lawn or mentor now lawn or mentor is not in the future shifted sheet but that's because all of the spell shapers in this set rather than doing so a lot of the spell shapers um they so you do pay a mana activation you tap them and discard a card And then their effect is like an actual spell that exists.
00:26:27
Speaker
Like a lot of them are sorcery, instance or sorceries that are actual printed magic cards. And so I think the flavor is supposed to be that that creature is casting that spell, which is why you're giving up a card and paying the mana cost that that spell would have. In future site, they're making creature tokens that have specific names.
00:26:45
Speaker
I think the future shifted ones of gold matter lookout is making gold meadow Harriers, which is a creature that has not been printed at least wasn't at the time.
00:26:56
Speaker
The other ones were all making creatures that already existed. Lonewar mentor, for example, makes Lonewar elves going back to alpha. I think that's why gold metal lookout is a future shifted card.
00:27:12
Speaker
But again, the set is bizarre and dense. And if you didn't know, all the oh gold matter Harrier actually was printed in Lorwyn. That is a card that was printed in Lorwyn.
00:27:30
Speaker
I had not put that connection together until we're talking about it.
00:27:35
Speaker
um and Speaking of cards, ah that... but With a historical lens, this may not look this may look odd to be in a future shifted frame and maybe not the best transition there, but want to talk about Thornweld Archer.
00:27:51
Speaker
um So this is a two one for one and a green elf archer that has reach and to death touch. And so that, especially now, if if you're looking back at the set that see might seem odd to be in that frame, because both those mechanics existed before. But what this card does is this is the first card that actually keyworded both Reach and Death Touch.
00:28:14
Speaker
ah or maybe death touch was earlier in the block, but like this block is the first time those, those mechanics were keyworded. There's giant spiders from alpha has this creature can block creatures is can block creatures with flying, but that was never keyworded to reach until this. And so this is another one where they kind of like create this sort of future. it's it's a future thing they can sort of give to us that because they know, Hey, going forward, we're just going to be using these keywords. But,
00:28:43
Speaker
But for a for for a player who's just playing the game at the time, this is a glimpse into the future. um Speaking of Giant Spider, there's an interesting um trivia fact about that particular card. it is the It is the longest running card ever printed in Magic. It was printed in every core set from Alpha through M12. Whoa.
00:29:10
Speaker
woa i I get it though. Like it's, yeah it's just a, it's such a, you know, basic creature that does exactly what you'd think it yeah giant spider does. But it, like it also fills an important niche for green too. And so it's just like, yeah, yeah, that makes sense.
00:29:30
Speaker
I did not know that. That's, that's really cool. Yeah, I remember that little tidbit from the m thirteen Remember when Fat Pax used to come with a little release book that would have like some trivia and stuff in it?
00:29:42
Speaker
Yes. Yeah, i remember I remember that particular piece being in that book.
00:29:50
Speaker
All right. Well, the next one I'm going to mention is ah ah it's a future-shifted land, Graven Cairns.
Impactful Land Cycles
00:30:00
Speaker
ah these were actually, um so these are all lands that ah tap for a colorless or for a hybrid mana. They tap for either two of one of the color, two of the other color, or one of each color. So these are the filter lands. um and we got the first one in Future Sight, and then the allied pair showed up in Shadowmoor, so three sets later.
00:30:30
Speaker
uh i don't know if we ever did get uh enemy pair of this set we've got an enemy pair and i can't remember where yeah but yeah like the um future site again because the set is bizarre and dense one of the things they did is there there is a full cycle there's five lands that do all the allied color pairs But every single one of those five cards is a different cycle. Yeah. So you talked about Graven Cairns, which we did eventually get in. Well, not even eventually. We got it the next block. We saw some of them come back. The other cycle, as far as I'm aware, I think we've only gotten two of the five.
00:31:10
Speaker
um Horizon Canopy. is So it taps, tap pay one life, add green or white mana to your mana pool, and then it has one tap sacrifice kind of horizon canopy draw card.
00:31:21
Speaker
We did get a cycle of these. Did we get both enemy and ally? I think we did. because i Yeah, I think they completed those in the modern horizon ones, the draw card.
00:31:32
Speaker
so those two have come back, but the, the other three, I don't think. No, we didn't get the Grove of the Burn Willows, um, cycle that actually hasn't been printed in a normal set. It's shown up in some supplementary products, but, um, has never been reprinted in a normal set. Uh, we haven't gotten the creature lands like dry at Arbor.
00:31:53
Speaker
Uh, yeah. Um, yeahmbus Yeah, Nimbus Maze, i'll just because I think this is interesting. So this is the white-blue one, so we can kind of hit the last couple. So Nimbus Maze, you can tap it for a generic mana, or you can tap for a white if you have an island, or tap for a blue if you have a plains.
00:32:17
Speaker
Yeah, we've seen more of those. We've seen the canopy cycle that are all the ones that pay one to get either mana and then sack it to draw a card. Yeah, and then River of Tears, I think, is the last of the two colors. Yeah, and those care about you playing a land of...
00:32:36
Speaker
the matching type during your turn. So yeah, River river of Tears, you tap it for a blue, or if you play to land of this turn, you add black instead. So you can get blue or black, but depends on the circumstances of what else you've been doing.
00:32:52
Speaker
which is a weird one that has memory issues, which makes sense that those haven't come back. but And also, like if you play it, you can't tap for blue the first turn because you played a land this turn, so it has to tap for black the first turn it comes into play. It's it's weird.
00:33:07
Speaker
I think the of the the mono-colored ones, the only one we've sort of got was the white one. Because that's the that was the first Skryland we ever got, I thought. I think. New Benelia comes into play tapped. um When it comes into play, Skry 1, and then it taps for a white.
00:33:24
Speaker
And so we eventually got the temple cycle. Yeah, and Theros. And the Zephyr and Void, which I run in my Kozilek deck.
00:33:36
Speaker
Which a colorless version of this. All right. What's your next card? um Well, since you mentioned it, let's talk about just why Dryad Arbor is so bizarre and breaks all the rules.
00:33:54
Speaker
So Dryad Arbor, I think in concept, seems straightforward, but it's just so complex for the rules. So Dryad Arbor is a 1-1 land creature. It is a forest dryad.
00:34:09
Speaker
And the the rules tech, so as as printed, I think they've cleaned this up a little bit, but as printed, it has it's reminder text says Dryad Arbor isn't a spell. It is affected by summoning sickness, and it has tap, add green mana to your mana pool, and then they specify Dryad Arbor is green in the original printing. Later, there there's like a little color indicator so they don't have to have that piece of rules text in it. um But it's... it's We have lots of creatures that make mana.
00:34:41
Speaker
We have lots of lands that become or creatures ah temporarily, like an activation that turns them into a creature till the end of turn. But Dryad Arbor being both creates so many weird things. Because there's like, for instance, lands can't be responded to because they don't use the stack.
00:35:02
Speaker
You can play them during your main phase at any time you could play a sorcery, assuming that you have... or maybe it says anytime you have priority priority technically in the rules. It's like assuming you haven't played your maximum number of lands for the turn, but it means like people can't counterspell this thing because you can't, again, it isn't a spell. They specify that in there. That creates a whole bunch of weird wrinkles. And it dies to removal. And it dies to removal, which also makes things complicated for your land base. Sometimes um you can look for it with things like green sun Zenith. It has a, it's a creature with a mana cost of zero.
00:35:39
Speaker
So you can just tap green and go find this thing. it it's just It creates lots of weird rules complication. And then to make things worse, they printed a copy they printed it like a textless version of it so it can jump scare people when they don't realize that somebody one of one of your opponent's forests is actually also a creature. All right. The next thing I'm going to mention is another cycle, which is the pact cycle.
00:36:06
Speaker
um All of these cards ah have the same ability. They're they're a free spell. or They cost zero. um They have the color identity in the text box.
00:36:18
Speaker
ah They each do an effect for that color identity. And then they have, at the beginning of your next upkeep, pay a specific cost. If you don't, you lose the game. ah I think the most famous one is Pact of Negation because it's a free counterspell that you have to pay 5 for on your next turn.
00:36:37
Speaker
ah But that sees heavy play in multiple formats. ah The black one's not bad. It destroys a non-black creature. It's Doomblade ah for one more mana when you have to pay for it, but it's free when you cast it.
00:36:55
Speaker
The red one is kind of awful. It just makes a four four creature. The white one is even worse, which just prevents damage from a single source and gains you that much life instead.
00:37:09
Speaker
I've never actually seen the white one played, and the white one has never been reprinted.
00:37:16
Speaker
And the green one lets you put a creature into play or something like that? Yes, search search your library for a green creature card, reveal it, put it into your hand. Into your hand. Okay, so it's creature tutor. Yeah, for two green green ain't bad, but...
00:37:33
Speaker
I don't know. I think that one, maybe it's because it's an instant. You throw it it at the end step and then even though you have to pay four on your turn, you can go find something and someone doesn't have a chance to respond to it. I don't know.
00:37:46
Speaker
Yeah, the the the winner is definitely the counter spell. Yeah, ah absolutely. um But that was a cool cycle. ah They never learn when it comes to making free spells.
00:38:04
Speaker
your freak out or spell is always good. Even when you try to make it costly. Yeah. Um, It'd be like force of wealth. It's like, Oh, you got to discard a card. Right. So that, that, that balances it. It's like, yeah, best cards in magic. Numerous combos and commander where you force your opponent to play a pact.
00:38:27
Speaker
Um, and then they can't pay for it. Yes. Uh, hive mind hive mind yeah that's card yeah yep that's again and those those weren't even future shifted those are just in the normal set they're just like here's a weird dumb thing we came up with we made five of them um yeah my um ifre done on the pact So I want to talk about one of my favorite
Innovative Card Abilities
00:38:58
Speaker
things. I don't know. Here's here's another just Malthos thing that I think is really fun. Bonded Fetch.
00:39:04
Speaker
This is a future shifted card. It's a creature for Homunculus. It's 0-2 for blue and two. And it has Defender and Haste.
00:39:15
Speaker
Yeah. But it also has tap, draw card, and discard a card. And so I think this is the first instance where we ever see haste put on a creature who isn't meant to attack. it's it's You're putting haste on a creature so that you can use its tap activation to turn it comes into play.
00:39:34
Speaker
And I think that's fun. i think that's neat. I also just love looters. It's just looting is one of my favorite mechanics. This set in particular, I had a ah standard deck that I never, a deck i built for standard and never really played. So I have no idea how it would have performed, but it was a, a bunch of looters and a bunch of badness cards. And it I thought I was super clever when I put those two mechanics together.
00:40:00
Speaker
Alright, my next one is Balestone Amulet. And this is a card I'm surprised I have never seen played ever, because it's kind of a neat effect. It's a three-mana artifact that whenever you play a spell, creatures you control gain hexproof until the end of turn. ah Which basically turns any spells you cast into, like, Tamiyo's safekeeping ah type of effect, which, you know those spells get played all the time. So this kind of doubles up on that ability to make any spell you cast into into a protection spell.
00:40:35
Speaker
ah So I just think this is a really cool artifact that I've just, I've never seen it played in a game once.
00:40:45
Speaker
So when I look at every time I go through the spoiler feature site, for some reason, I go, why don't I play that? And then I don't play it. I just continue to not play it for some reason.
00:40:56
Speaker
I mean, that actually would be a good card to put in a Nira because Nira gets removed easily, but you always keep spells up because you want to play spells on every turn. Not just saying it. I got to pull this up because that might... do that That could be a good card for Zada if I'm looking for more things to protect Zada.
00:41:17
Speaker
Oh, yeah. I could see that. Because in mono red, it could be hard to find things to protect Zada. It also would be itd be a good card for Feather. all alright So um speaking of, well, this is a card that isn't good, but it's another one that I'm just fascinated by. So this is a future shifted card called Edge of Autumn.
00:41:39
Speaker
It's a sorcery for green and one. It says, if you control four or fewer lands, search your library for basic land, put it into play tapped and shuffle your library. And it has it has cycling sacrifice a land.
00:41:55
Speaker
So I think the future shifted thing here is that they're doing a non-mana cost to a cycle. Yeah, there's there's also there's Street Wraith in this set, which is pay to life for a... Which is a cycle ah a big... um um what's the What's the Living living End?
00:42:15
Speaker
What's the one that costs zero and has Suspend? Yeah, that's Living End. That is Living End. That's right. Living Death is the other one. Yeah, so it's that's in the Living End where it's card you can get into your graveyard.
00:42:27
Speaker
before you living end. yeah Like Edge of Autumn, I just, I love the the way these two mechanics sort of play together where it's a sorcery that does nothing for you if you get it late in the game. Because it it specifically says if control four or fewer,
00:42:42
Speaker
Go find a basic, put it in the way. Yeah, it's a limited rampant growth. Yeah, but then it's if you draw it late, then it's assuming you have you know you have more than four lands, so if you have five or more, maybe you have enough excess lands. Now it's time to just sack a land, and then you can get a new card out of this. And so I kind of like that sort of you know full cycle thing.
00:43:07
Speaker
approach to it. And also I like to play green decks where it's incentivized to sacrifice or kill my lands for for effects. So like this is this was a this put into my original Titania deck, which is the deck that turned into my Zyro Lands deck.
00:43:26
Speaker
All right. My next card I'm going to mention just because it was reprinted in the first full set I came back for, and it's just a really cool... It's a super cool Timmy Tammy card, and that's a Chroma's Memorial.
00:43:44
Speaker
ah It's a seven-mana artifact that gives your creatures flying, first strike, vigilance, trample, haste, protection from black, and protection from red. ah it turns all your stuff into Baneslayer Angels, basically. or Yep.
00:44:00
Speaker
Well, that's all the mechanics from Akroma. yeah Yeah, well, yeah, that's all the mechanics from Akroma. Yeah, all your creatures become wildly powerful, assuming they have almost any amount of power, I suppose. A one one but even a 1-1 Flying First Strike Vigilance Trample Haste Protection from Black, Protection from Red can do some damage.
00:44:20
Speaker
Yep. Um, but this card ends games. Uh, I don't see it played as often as it used to be played, uh, because dropping a seven mana artifact that's going to get, that's going to eat removal, uh, is not always a good thing, but if this sticks around, you're going to win the game.
00:44:44
Speaker
Yeah, and often that can be a drop it and then win the game card. Yeah. If nobody has the artifact removal that turn, that is exactly what the spell usually does.
00:44:56
Speaker
ah But um yeah, I just, I love this. I love the art on this card. um I love the callback to Akrama. Yeah.
00:45:09
Speaker
Yeah, and a good flavor text to It says, no rest, no mercy, no matter what. Yeah, get a couple good Akrona callbacks, because then we get the redshifted Akrona in the previous set, too. Yeah.
00:45:21
Speaker
As the same number of mechanics, they're all just different.
00:45:26
Speaker
Yeah, and so next card I want to talk about is a a weird one. Again, mechanically, I think it's interesting, and it's also one that I always feel like I i wish I had a deck for this. Arcanum Wings is an enchantment aura for Bloon 1.
00:45:45
Speaker
Enchant creature, enchanted creature has flying, but then it has this future mechanic we've never seen before or since called Aura Swap. two and a blue exchange this aura with an aura card in your hand and i just like every time i look at this card it' like i just wish i was the kind of person who had a deck i could put this card into yeah it was blue enchantress decks aren't really a thing i was like but this just feels so cool i just exchanged this aura and now my creature is an eldrazi
00:46:18
Speaker
yeah just the or uh or the sonic one yes uh i should know this chaos emerald it's a chaos emerald thing but i cant what they call it like super state or something super state yeah yeah it just uh yeah no that's pretty cool um let's see here i'm running out of ones i really want to talk about but let me see if i can find one more Yeah, we covered all the land.
Focusing on FutureSight Slivers
00:46:50
Speaker
So I guess we'll just talk about the slivers real quick. ah
00:46:55
Speaker
There is um homing sliver, which is a red and two for a two-two. Each sliver in each player's hand has sliver cycling three, and it has sliver cycling three as well. So you just discard the card and search your library for a sliver and put it into your hand.
00:47:18
Speaker
ah Really powerful ability. You you know, it's a super cool sliver. This is when slivers still looked cool too before they turned them into those humanoid monstrosities.
00:47:36
Speaker
Yeah, the the only other place where that sort of typal cycling shows up is in this, also in this set, with a wizard that has wizard cycling and bounces as target sliver.
00:47:50
Speaker
It's just a bizarre place to put that. but um Yeah, and then we have we have another future shifted sliver, Limp Sliver, which has Absorb 1, which I don't think has ever been reprinted either. Nope.
00:48:04
Speaker
I don't think any of these have been reprinted. Sorry, I just pulled up the slivers from Future Sight. If you want to read that one.
00:48:12
Speaker
um Yeah, because absorb one, if a source would deal damage to a sliver, prevent one of that damage. That just seems, it's just like wild.
00:48:27
Speaker
Yeah. Oh, goodness. Okay, so I just, I looked up, so frenzy sliver. is the black one that gives all creatures Frenzy one. And this mechanic says, whenever a silver attacks and isn't blocked, gets plus one, plus zero until end of turn. And I'm like, have we seen that before?
00:48:44
Speaker
or have we seen that since? And the answer is yes with an asterisk. I just i just put this into Scryfall. The only other card that has the mechanic Frenzy is one of the garbage elemental versions from ah from Unstable.
00:49:02
Speaker
They brought Frenzy back in garb in in ah in a Silver Border set.
00:49:10
Speaker
Yeah, al the all five of these mechanics are kind of ah really nasty. for the slivers in this set. Cause then the blue one does fate seal.
00:49:23
Speaker
Oh yeah. Fate seal, which we saw printed, on Jace, the mind sculptor, few, uh, a block later. Yeah. or you're You're basically scrying your opponent's deck and it can just create wildly miserable games. Yeah. um the The blue one, we we saw that mechanic come back. I don't think they named it that. No, was. For chase. No, but it was the same exact mechanic. Yep. And then the other one that sort of came back.
00:49:53
Speaker
is the Virulent Sliver, which has Poisonous 1. Whenever Sliver deals damage, that player gets a Poison counter. And so the the point of Poisonous is... I think there's a card of Poisonous 3 in the set, too. It would deal that many Poison counters. And then, ultimately, they made a different, better, more interesting version of that in Infect.
00:50:13
Speaker
ah Well, and then ah Toxic is closer to Venomous than Infect. Ooh, you're right. You're right.
00:50:23
Speaker
But yeah, so this was poisonous was them trying to find a way to do poison counters that didn't suck. Like poison counter from like swamp mosquito from homelands or not homelands alliances like sucked. But it was the first it was the first um poison counter thing. And so it was an interesting thing.
00:50:49
Speaker
thing that to try like i certainly tried to make swamp mosquito work uh yeah it's just it's a bad card um but poisonous was them it was them iterating on the path of iterating to try to make poison counters work and ultimately then we get we get infect down the line we get toxic down the line just different mechanics that work kind of work better at it Yeah.
00:51:13
Speaker
All right. um i want I guess I'll talk about one more. um Yeah, and I do have one more after this, too. I found the other one I wanted to talk about.
00:51:24
Speaker
So I want to talk about mystic speculation. This is another one of those just like weird things that's wildly that's just appealing to me for. I don't know why, just it just kind of is. So this is a card that it just has two mechanics. it's just It's just two keywords on the card, that's it. So it's a sorcery for blue, and it has buyback two and scry three.
00:51:49
Speaker
So for blue, you can scry three, like that's great. Or for two and a blue, you can scry three and keep the card. which I think is also great. But again, it's that like multiple lines of play. What are you trying to do with it?
00:52:05
Speaker
um it lets you, because it's casting cost is only one. You can stick it in a Isochron Scepter. I mean, there's lots of things you can kind of do with this mechanically that I think are fun and interesting.
00:52:18
Speaker
All right. My last one i'm going to mention is Rift Sweeper, and this is because it has a unique effect that doesn't exist anywhere else in the game. It's one and a green for a tutu and when it enters, you can choose any target face-up exiled card and shuffle it into its owner's library.
00:52:36
Speaker
ah So it's... ah I play this in my Villainous Wealth deck in case Villainous Wealth gets exiled somehow. I have a way to get it back. Okay.
00:52:48
Speaker
But um yeah, so this was sort of reprinted with the ingest mechanic, but that only worked on your opponent's card, so you couldn't use it on your own cards to get stuff back.
00:53:00
Speaker
ah And that also sort of keyed in with the the cards where you were exiling your opponent's stuff. And then if you weren't trying to mill them, you could instead then ingest to bring stuff back and get payoffs from it.
00:53:16
Speaker
But yeah, this is, as far as I'm aware, this is the only card that lets you get a card back from exile during a game.
00:53:29
Speaker
Oh, I'm going to talk about one more while we're here. It's on the page. It's right next to it. I forgot to put this in my notes. Quiet Disrepair. Speaking about mechanic, weird mechanic things that give you multiple options for this. So this is an aura, enchant, artifact, or ah gent artifact or enchantment for one and a green. At the beginning of your upkeep, choose one.
00:53:51
Speaker
Destroy enchanted permanent, or you gain two life. um So it's a slow disenchant or naturalize.
00:54:03
Speaker
very slow. But it also like has the chance of like, if you are, you know, you want extra orders on the battlefield or you're trying to gain life for some reason Or you just want to do some like political things. You're like, you've slid it on somebody's artifact and they're just like, don't attack me. And you know, I don't, I don't blow your shit up. I'll just take life. um I don't know. I don't know that it's a good card, but again, it's an interesting card. Yes, it is interesting. That is for sure. And, and then the art is also fun because that I believe is the, is, is the like object in disenchant that's being broken. This time it's just being overgrown.
00:54:44
Speaker
From like a vanilla or vanilla from Alpha Disenchant. So, all right.
Episode Wrap-Up and Preview
00:54:51
Speaker
Well, this was fun. i love talking about this set. It's it's a bizarre set.
00:54:58
Speaker
And that's part of what I love talking about I looked at this set so many times from different things and still finding cards that I went, oh, I didn't realize this or I forgot about that. So hopefully listeners have also enjoyed kind of our exploring this block. um There is a whole lot of magic story coming up though. Like I said at the beginning, talking about we've got the novel coming up soon.
00:55:21
Speaker
get the book coming out very soon from when we're recording. By the time you listen to this, it'll probably be out. We've got story going on for Strixhaven now. So we've got that. Yeah, I need to catch up on that. I haven't.
00:55:34
Speaker
It came out while I was on vacation. So I am super far behind on reading the Strixhaven story. Yeah. But so we'll. Good news is we don't need to cover that for four weeks because our next episode is going to be with Sean and McGuire. So, ah yeah, we've got time. We've got time to catch up on the story before we record our story episodes.
00:55:57
Speaker
Yeah, but that that's that's going to be the plan. We're going talking to Seanan. We're going be talking about the book. We're going talking about Strix Saban. think it's going to be a bunch of story episodes for for a little while, which will be fun.
00:56:09
Speaker
Yeah, which is good because we don't get more story until the fall. Yep. So we'll we'll make it count while we got it, and then we'll figure something out for the summer.
00:56:22
Speaker
Hello Podwalkers, you have been listening to the Goblin Lore Podcast. Goblin Lore can be found on Blue Sky at GoblinLorePod or by going to our link tree for all of our links, especially to our Discord and our discounts.
00:56:36
Speaker
We welcome all feedback through social media or by joining our Discord which is very active. And now goblins, I just want to remind you that goblins, like snowflakes, are only dangerous in numbers.