[Off-Topic] Community Chat Thread

[DirkGently]

I shaved all my hair off today.

[Hermes_]

I shaved all my hair off today.

Do you mean ALL or just all that's visible?

[DirkGently]

Do you mean ALL or just all that's visible?

I decided to leave my stereocilia on the grounds that I'd like to be able to continue listening to things.

There's probably some other hair I should trim but that's a project for another day.
























Nose hair, obviously.

[TheGildedGoose]

Is Legend banned? Can I safely talk about how Elon Musk is king of %$#% Mountain and should be publicly tarred and feathered?

Because Elon Musk is the king of %$#% Mountain and should be publicly tarred and feathered.

[TheAmericanSpirit]

Is Legend banned? Can I safely talk about how Elon Musk is king of %$#% Mountain and should be publicly tarred and feathered?

Because Elon Musk is the king of %$#% Mountain and should be publicly tarred and feathered.

@Legend is not banned. Let the festivities commence!

[benjameenbear]

I haven't read the stories yet (because I'm lazy and I don't trust WOTC not to ruin them). Is this actually what happens?

Because I'm about to burn an effigy of WOTC's creative department if it is. It's STUPID. And the easiest effing cop-out to one of the coolest plot devices WOTC has created.

I swear, WOTC doesn't fully understand the phrase "murder your darlings". Here's what probably happened at WOTC if Emrakul legit comes up as the "answer" to Phyrexia.

WOTC: "Let's create one of the coolest, longest-running, multi-faceted villain/concepts in MTG lore, have them truly dominate and threaten to dominate the MTG universe, and Phyrexianize some of our coolest main characters."

WOTC writes cool scenes where Phyrexia powns nub and almost legit takes over the multiverse. Packs fly off the shelves because Phyrexia is one of the last things WOTC has left in their creative roster.

WOTC: "Ah, dammit. Phyrexia is about to rule everything? We won't be able to sell more packs about Phyrexia unless we kill 'em off! How can we pull ourselves out of the creative hole we dug ourselves into? But make it really cool?"
WOTC creative: "Oh no! You're in a creative bind and can't unwrite yourself from Phyrexia taking over the multiverse! Not to worry! Simply pull out your deus-ex-machina in a box! AH YISS. In fact, we literally put Emrakul in a silver closet so we could whip her out in case we have any terrible story-telling we corner ourselves into!"
Also WOTC creative: "Oh, and don't worry! Think that Emrakul is going to just eat the multi-verse and start over everything? Not to worry! Because we can always just put Emrakul back into her closet until we decide that her brothers Kozilek and Ulamog spontaneously regenerate!"

benjameenbear screams in the distance

[benjameenbear]

Is Legend banned? Can I safely talk about how Elon Musk is king of %$#% Mountain and should be publicly tarred and feathered?

Because Elon Musk is the king of %$#% Mountain and should be publicly tarred and feathered.

Ah, the prelude to what could be a delightfully inflammatory and mod'ded conversation. Please be careful of how you refer or characterize public figures and other persons of interest. Especially when you potentially call out another specific MTGNexus user. - benjameenbear

[pokken]

Who got two thumbs and reserved a polestar2! first new car in 13 years.

I actually wound up getting Volvo XC40. found out polestars made in china and the XC40 is a bit nicer and almost the same price with a lower lease residual (somehow).

Wish we had a decent image backend I'd post a photo, but here's my best effort:

https://www.amazon.com/photos/shared/CX ... xHeF3choTt

[TheGildedGoose]

Ah, the prelude to what could be a delightfully inflammatory and mod'ded conversation. Please be careful of how you refer or characterize public figures and other persons of interest. Especially when you potentially call out another specific MTGNexus user. - benjameenbear

It's one thing to be an egomaniacal billionaire who buys a company and runs it into the ground as the result of a midlife crisis and/or divorce. It's another thing entirely to make fun of a disabled person you fired and insinuate that you fired them because of said disability. He's a garbage-tier human being and I think Samuel L. Jackson sums it up best.

This post is not to be taken literally and is a metaphorical expression of my disgust.

[DirkGently]

I swear, WOTC doesn't fully understand the phrase "murder your darlings".

Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you said, but since "murderkill your darlings" is a philosophy I try to live by in my writing, I thought I'd step in to clarify - it doesn't refer to literally killing characters, which is what I think you're referring to here (could be wrong), but rather to removing parts of the writing itself that aren't necessary for the story. For example, reworking my novel the other day, I had part of a conversation between two characters that I really liked, but ultimately didn't further the plot and didn't - as much as I'm loathe to admit it - really advance their relationship or develop their characters. So I removed it from the updated version.

"Killing your darlings" can refer to characters as well, but typically "killing" them in this context would mean removing their entire existence from the text because they aren't necessary to the story, not literally killing them.

That said, while I'm not sure there's a pithy expression for it, I do think most fiction across the board is too precious with their characters and it really gets in the way of effective storytelling. It's hard to take the threat of your supposedly world-ending villains seriously when their kill count (of relevant characters) isn't enough to tango. Looking at you, Bolas. You gathered all the least relevant planeswalkers in one place and only managed to kill three of them? And only one was someone I'd remotely consider an important character?

I dunno, I think a lot of big companies get scared that if they kill off the wrong character, fans of that character will jump ship, so they try to calculate who will be the least impactful deaths while still technically telling a story. It's some weak-ass nonsense and I'm not into it. Give me some freaking blood. (Incidentally, if I ever manage to publish my novel, there is a substantial amount of blood on it)

I will be mightily impressed if WotC learned their lesson from WotS's lukewarm reception and actually kills (or functionally-kills) all the planeswalkers they compleated, but I really doubt it's going to happen.

[toctheyounger]

Honestly, I think they're either going to retcon the whole thing and make all of the investment in any sort of character development null and void.

They either have the eldrazi to fling at this, or (even worse imo) is Teferi doing some time %$#%$#% and making it like the whole thing never happened at all.

Either of those thing happen and I'm pretty much off the lore train for good.

[duducrash]

It's another thing entirely to make fun of a disabled person you fired and insinuate that you fired them because of said disability.

Holy crap I just saw a thread of the previous employee. I know your juditial system is %$#% up in the laboral areas, but I can't imagine how a company would get away from this. It's like several levels of harassment and disclusing personal information. Over here ( and everywhere I assume) it would generate a hefty fine for the company and big ass compensations for the previous employees. thats absurd.

Honestly, I think they're either going to retcon the whole thing and make all of the investment in any sort of character development null and void.

What would be a good enough outcome for the story? I think time travel to undo EVERYTHING will generate some backlash, When time travel is at the table it's hard to do satisfatory things... maybe they have teferi be exhausted from phasing in and planeswalks / time travels himself to detonate the stylex? I'm unsure

[TheAmericanSpirit]

Honestly, I think they're either going to retcon the whole thing and make all of the investment in any sort of character development null and void.

They either have the eldrazi to fling at this, or (even worse imo) is Teferi doing some time %$#%$#% and making it like the whole thing never happened at all.

Either of those thing happen and I'm pretty much off the lore train for good.

I dunno, man. You forgot that Ashiok went looking for New Phyrexia too. It is entirely possible this is all a bad dream.

[Ulka]

I shaved all my hair off today.

I do that every Wednesday.

[DirkGently]

I do that every Wednesday.

Somehow I don't think the second time will be quite as dramatic. I hadn't cut my hair in ~7 years before yesterday.

[toctheyounger]

Honestly, I think they're either going to retcon the whole thing and make all of the investment in any sort of character development null and void.

They either have the eldrazi to fling at this, or (even worse imo) is Teferi doing some time %$#%$#% and making it like the whole thing never happened at all.

Either of those thing happen and I'm pretty much off the lore train for good.

I dunno, man. You forgot that Ashiok went looking for New Phyrexia too. It is entirely possible this is all a bad dream.

That's gross and I hate it.

[duducrash]

I dunno, man. You forgot that Ashiok went looking for New Phyrexia too. It is entirely possible this is all a bad dream.

We've seen many future, and I hate them all

[Jemolk]

Frankly, from the moment they overpowered the new Phyrexians so much that they can compleat planeswalkers into sleeper agents of all things out of nowhere without even altering the character at all until it's later triggered on demand, the story was doomed. When Ajani was turned into a sleeper agent while still being Ajani in the mean time, I checked out completely. Between that and the glistening oil, there's no longer any possible satisfactory resolution to this story. They were trying to make the Phyrexians look scary, but what I saw was them making the Phyrexians exactly as powerful as they needed to be for whatever arbitrary plot points they wanted to force. The whole "whoopsy-doodle, no blowing the sylex!" thing only makes the obvious contrivances more intolerable. The sooner they purge New Phyrexia completely, the sooner they can get back to telling potentially adequate stories. If that means time shenanigans to make it so none of this ever happened, that's fine by me.

[tstorm823]

There's another possibility: it doesn't all get reset. This could be the Transformers: The Movie moment, where they actually kill off half the characters(so they can sell you new toys).

[DirkGently]

There's another possibility: it doesn't all get reset. This could be the Transformers: The Movie moment, where they actually kill off half the characters(so they can sell you new toys).

This is basically the only option that would satisfy me. I could really vibe with a more multi-generational setting where every character dies eventually. Or like maybe there could be some deity-type characters on the periphery but the main characters are replaced every couple years or so, either via retirement or "retirement".

That said I don't read into the lore and never really cared that much about it beyond a passing interest. I'm only really aware of it through the cards and occasional conversations.

Also btw my first (properly) published work came in the mail, in the short story anthology. The one with the certified-unique take on an axis-victory alt history I talked about forever ago? It's here if anyone is interested - it's got a pretty stylish hard cover tbh, Haven't read a word of anyone else's stories but I'm sure they're excellent. Consider this my extremely half-assed attempt at marketing.

https://www.flametreepublishing.com/alt ... 72728.html

[tstorm823]

This is basically the only option that would satisfy me. I could really vibe with a more multi-generational setting where every character dies eventually. Or like maybe there could be some deity-type characters on the periphery but the main characters are replaced every couple years or so, either via retirement or "retirement".

Clearly the answer is that everyone actually dies, but somehow that brings Venser back to life, and now Venser is the sole protagonist.

[Simto]

There's another possibility: it doesn't all get reset. This could be the Transformers: The Movie moment, where they actually kill off half the characters(so they can sell you new toys).

Only difference is, Transformers the Movie is actually good
YOU GOT THE TOUCH!

[5colorsrainbow]

@benjameenbear no it's mostly people wanting the two to cross over, with a few people trying to use the fact that Tamiyo, Nissa and Nahiri have been compleated as the set up for this.

The fact the parental Kenriths die and according to wizards "after MoM the multiverse will be changed forever"* make time travel imo unlikely even more so as the Brothers War went out of its way to show how hard it was for Teferi to go back in time and him doing everything he can't to NOT change anything when he did.

My personal theory is Elsepth will use the sylex + halo to make a legacy weapon 2.0 that will send out a purifying /healing wave vs a destructive one. Some compleated characters and planeswalks will die, some will be partly healed and will have a Picard post Locutus/Seven of Nine arc and some will remain rogue Phyrexians villains/the plot. The world tree will also be purified and will still connect the multiverse so non-planeswalks can now travel between planes.

* they could be hyperbolic /lying about the statement but the Phyrexians are the last of the big three antagonists of the story arcs they started with Lorwyn/Alara so I could see them have another (but softer this time around) reboot of the lore like with Time Spiral.

[duducrash]

I'm not against some compleated walkers coming back. It could be fun to explore the guilt/feelings they have after it. Just hope it isn't a full reboot

[TheAmericanSpirit]

Personally, I hope we can do away with the multi-year antagonists and go back to plane-specific villains. Not everything has to tie into some grand narrative. This ain't the MCU, nor should it aspire to be it.