Unreleased and New Card Discussion

[RedCheese]

Is it me or all of these 40k cards overcosted? Some neat cards, but whjats the average mana value because so many of them are so high.

[Gamazson]

Imotekh the Stormlord has caught my attention. I was already brewing a zombie deck around Tormod, the Desecrator. I am eager to run Tortured Existence in either, but right now I am leaning towards zombies. I already own most of the tribal cards I'll need, and I can add a blue partner, which is a big help. Without cards like Unfulfilled Desires or Frantic Search I don't see a way to fill the grave efficiently or to be selective about it.

Zombies have self recursion cards like Gravecrawler and Master of Death but artifacts have Myr Retriever combo. It is such a tough choice, but I'll likely buy the Necron deck just to make sure I have the cards I want. Not matter what, I am eyeing Sceptre of Eternal Glory for my Valduk, Keeper of the Flame deck.

[TheAmericanSpirit]

As I suspected, the Necron deck is likely the easiest to get off the ground and moving. The commanders are still underwhelming, but the overall synergy and a cohesive gameplan is there.

[DirkGently]

I gotta ask, for people who are familiar with WH40K, are there any protagonists? All the cards I've seen so far make it look like it's the zerg vs phyrexians vs space demons.

I'm not saying I need "good guys" but I'm not sure how one would get invested in a fight between various flavors of evil horde. In Starcraft the Terran were mostly a bunch of a meathead redneck criminals, but at least Raynor seemed like a decent antihero. Is there "that one kinda decent space demon" or something to latch onto?

[Ulka]

I gotta ask, for people who are familiar with WH40K, are there any protagonists? All the cards I've seen so far make it look like it's the zerg vs phyrexians vs space demons.

I'm not saying I need "good guys" but I'm not sure how one would get invested in a fight between various flavors of evil horde. In Starcraft the Terran were mostly a bunch of a meathead redneck criminals, but at least Raynor seemed like a decent antihero. Is there "that one kinda decent space demon" or something to latch onto?

From what i've learned about 40K was it was supposed to be over the top grim and edgy to the point its meant to be laughable but that has gotten lost over the years so its just grim and edgy no longer satirically.

[Serenade]

The more I get into this thing, the more it gives me various Phyrexia/New Phyrexia vibes.

[Lifeless]

As an old school 40k player most of these feel really weird to me and I'm not sure I'll ever get used to them. Something about them just feels wrong and I can't really explain it. They're not bad but I would probably only feel ok playing them against each other in precon battles where they look like they would actually be pretty fun. Don't think I can bring myself to work with many of the singles.

That being said Commissar Severina Raine is super sweet and I could be convinced to put something together for her.

[PrimevalCommander]

I gotta ask, for people who are familiar with WH40K, are there any protagonists? All the cards I've seen so far make it look like it's the zerg vs phyrexians vs space demons.

I'm not saying I need "good guys" but I'm not sure how one would get invested in a fight between various flavors of evil horde. In Starcraft the Terran were mostly a bunch of a meathead redneck criminals, but at least Raynor seemed like a decent antihero. Is there "that one kinda decent space demon" or something to latch onto?

Chaos Marines "Bad"
Tyrinids "Bad"
Necrons "Bad"
Imperial and Space Marines "Good"

Haven't played 40K in years, but generally many of the Species fall into the gray area of War and Expansion. Only a few select races get connotations of "Good" compared to others. Chaos Marines are about universally "Bad", but there are several races that are more neutral in terms of lore, and few considered fully "Good".

[Lifeless]

IIRC the Tau and some Eldar factions are considered the good guys but I was never much of a lore hound.

[TheAmericanSpirit]

I gotta ask, for people who are familiar with WH40K, are there any protagonists? All the cards I've seen so far make it look like it's the zerg vs phyrexians vs space demons.

I'm not saying I need "good guys" but I'm not sure how one would get invested in a fight between various flavors of evil horde. In Starcraft the Terran were mostly a bunch of a meathead redneck criminals, but at least Raynor seemed like a decent antihero. Is there "that one kinda decent space demon" or something to latch onto?

Chaos Marines "Bad"
Tyrinids "Bad"
Necrons "Bad"
Imperial and Space Marines "Good"

Haven't played 40K in years, but generally many of the Species fall into the gray area of War and Expansion. Only a few select races get connotations of "Good" compared to others. Chaos Marines are about universally "Bad", but there are several races that are more neutral in terms of lore, and few considered fully "Good".

I'm not much of a 40k guy or anything, but I did some reading and the necrons' backstory is fairly sympathetic. If they're "bad" guys, they're more like Micheal Douglas from Falling Down than some moustache twirling Snidely Whiplash.

[RedCheese]

Suprised that we didn't get a Celestial Orrey card for the Necrons XD.

Still disapopitned how they did the SIlent King so dirty as a card . Rather use the other Necron legends over him.

[PrimevalCommander]

Sceptre of Eternal Glory has my attention. Better Thran Dynamo/cheaper Gilded Lotus for mono color decks, of which I have several. I'll need a couple of these probably.

[TheAmericanSpirit]

I really like Commissar Severina Raine. If I ever decide to subtract a color from Raffine, this would be where I'd take it.

[duducrash]

I really like Commissar Severina Raine. If I ever decide to subtract a color from Raffine, this would be where I'd take it.

I'm a enjoyer of low curve strategy in EDH and I think she will thrive in those situations. Specially because it's each opponent.

Also her sac ability is pretty usefull itself. I think I'll add her to my abzan midrange deck because of that ability. But imagine you get a decayed token or IDK a Geist of Saint Traft token attack, do the damage with her ability, and sac before end of combat. It could be really fun

[Wallycaine]

I gotta ask, for people who are familiar with WH40K, are there any protagonists? All the cards I've seen so far make it look like it's the zerg vs phyrexians vs space demons.

I'm not saying I need "good guys" but I'm not sure how one would get invested in a fight between various flavors of evil horde. In Starcraft the Terran were mostly a bunch of a meathead redneck criminals, but at least Raynor seemed like a decent antihero. Is there "that one kinda decent space demon" or something to latch onto?

So as noted, they saved the (nominal) protagonists for last in the previews. The Imperium of Man, and more specifically the Space Marines/Imperial Guard/Sisters of Battle, are the most frequent protagonists in the story. This isn't quite to say that they're "good", as the imperium is a very facist empire that goes to horrific lengths to "protect humanity" that are very frequently unnecessary. See, for example, Exterminatus, which is that powerful members of the Imperium can declare that a entire planet must be destroyed, either physically or via being cleansed of all life.

On a higher level, 40k is (theoretically) a universe in which there are no good factions, just various satires of facism. How well that satire has been executed over the years has... varied a great deal.

[materpillar]

I gotta ask, for people who are familiar with WH40K, are there any protagonists? All the cards I've seen so far make it look like it's the zerg vs phyrexians vs space demons.

I'm not saying I need "good guys" but I'm not sure how one would get invested in a fight between various flavors of evil horde. In Starcraft the Terran were mostly a bunch of a meathead redneck criminals, but at least Raynor seemed like a decent antihero. Is there "that one kinda decent space demon" or something to latch onto?

I haven't read any of the novels but I've read a ton of the rule books (they're jammed with short stories). The 40k universe is just utterly massive beyond comprehension. Everything is so mind bogglingly exaggerated. It's to the scale that no individual person or event can really do much to effect the scales of galactic power. Look at Exterminatus. A planet got infected by bugs or demons so an inquisitor just has it blown up. A planet, with 10 billion people. This is a fairly negligible loss of life for humanity in the grand scheme of things. I say this to emphasize that warhammer (in my exposure to it) doesn't have some particular protagonist or whatever. The setting is so wide spread most of the races have characters and events that are all over the place in terms of good to extremely evil.

Like the Exterminatus card. Was everyone on that planet going to be tortured to death by demons tomorrow? Blowing the planet up is pretty humane compared to being eaten alive by bugs. Or was it some political insanity and a corrupt inquisitor who abused their power to eliminate a rival with billions of collateral damage. The setting has a great job of setting up "this choice is absolutely awful, but the alternative is worse." There's a lot of characters in the setting who aren't "herp derp, I stab babies for fun" spread across most races (even in terminator robots have some "decent" folks). There's basically zero characters who haven't gotten their hands dirty at some point or another.

What I'm trying to say is that warhammer 40k is less about latching onto a specific persons story and more about being an extremely a fertile place to create your own stories. For example, I like the Tau best because they're probably the least evi. They're basically the only species that doesn't just execute everyone they capture. Not a high bar. Also, their robots and warfare style is hella cool. My backstory for my little collection of army was a mercenary band that work with an inquisitor to hunt down and destroy demonic incursions. Every game I played with them I wove a little narrative around why they were fighting whatever race I was fighting against. I named my commanders and squad leaders. I recorded their kills and casualties. I was so invested in their fluff that I stopped playing them when the rules change did the equivalent of banning my EDH deck commander.

40k is big. You want heroic stories, they're there somewhere. You want pure evil? It's there. You want bugs trying to eat sentient mold (canonically that's what orks are)? That's basically the most morally not evil situation that can happen and 40ks got it.

The easiest way to get invested in warhammer 40k is to pick the coolest looking species and then read about their history. There will be cool people to latch onto in that species' history.

[Mookie]

Filling out the rest of the previews with the Imperium of Man deck...

• Space Marine Devastator looks very powerful. Probably the best option for a white ETB Naturalize creature, and you also have the option of paying extra for even more destruction. Good stuff.
• Sister Hospitaller also looks quite nice. There might be a limit to the number of Karmic Guides I'll run in my Teysa deck, but I haven't hit it yet. Being a human is also nice for Angel of Glory's Rise.
• Sanguinary Priest is a very nice Blood Artist effect, with the added bonus of being able to shoot down creatures / planeswalkers.

Overall, lots of interesting new options in the new decks. I haven't noticed too many horribly overpowered cards, and they all seem quite flavorful and thematic.

[Rumpy5897]

For the most part, I'm ok with the product. A lot of designs rhyming with what exists already, a bunch of cards are costed one mana more than where they would be if they tried to push them. There's a Loyal Warhound that costs three, there's a Reclamation Sage in white with squad that costs 4.

There are still some strong cards in here, mostly keeping in line with current trends of gently creeping up existing options. Marneus Calgar wins dumbest card in the set by a landslide. Magus Lucea Kane mostly obsoletes Rosheen Meanderer in the command zone, and ravenous as a mechanic brings a bunch of sauced up playables to hydra decks. Aberrant and Tervigon are both top tier creatures for that sort of deck due to the cantrip from the ravenous, the trample, and doing things on connecting. I'd rather this stuff didn't exist, as you can smell the conscious engineering in line with Black Market Connections et al. a mile away, but it continues being the most acceptable of the push strategies they've had.

[Hermes_]

So, this a cool thread that Shivam of the CAG did regarding the current UB WH40k stuff and magic.

[DirkGently]

I've always thought that the aesthetic argument is one of the weaker ones against UB. Because yes, magic has done lots of things that border on sci-fi already, and certainly jumped headfirst into horror and fairy tales and etc. Of course some people do have a problem with that, but I think Shivam is reasonable to contextualize it as "we've been lots of places and seen lots of things, of course our spellbooks have become more diverse". I'm fine with magic expanding into less fantasy-focused aesthetics. At best you have to admit the line is blurry as hell. So it's a pretty weak argument against UB. I mean, is LotR a problem aesthetically? It's certainly closer to alpha magic than SNC or NEO. So drawing a line becomes pretty difficult.

That's not true of the promotion argument. UB forces us to play against and (if we want full access to the game's pieces) with, cards that are effectively advertisements for other companies. I guarantee that the people at GW and Capcom and Netflix and AMC see it that way. Us slinging cardboard with their IP on it is advertising for their products. And I absolutely detest the future that portends.

[Hermes_]

That's not true of the promotion argument. UB forces us to play against and (if we want full access to the game's pieces) with, cards that are effectively advertisements for other companies. I guarantee that the people at GW and Capcom and Netflix and AMC see it that way. Us slinging cardboard with their IP on it is advertising for their products. And I absolutely detest the future that portends.

Honestly, out of the places I tend to scan Reddit,here and discord only you seem to be making the promotion of other IPs an issue, admittedly I'm not looking very hard. All the other arguments I've seen have been about the mechanics not appearing in normal magic cards.

Also I have to remind myself that it's Universe Beyond and not

[DirkGently]

Honestly, out of the places I tend to scan Reddit,here and discord only you seem to be making the promotion of other IPs an issue, admittedly I'm not looking very hard. All the other arguments I've seen have been about the mechanics not appearing in normal magic cards.

Also I have to remind myself that it's Universe Beyond and not

Blue black is also evil, but it's an evil I can get behind. I'm also constantly getting thrown off whenever I read headlines on Reddit, for similar reasons. MTG is a threat to democracy? Jesus, that seems a little harsh for a card game.

Lets petition to add more letters to the alphabet so we can avoid this acronym overloading.

I think people intuit the grossness, but maybe have a harder time figuring out specifically why. There's that cardboard crack comic that gets shared around a lot and personally I read it absolutely as a condemnation of corporate cross-promotion in magic. And I also think that, thrown into less complicated light, it becomes a lot easier to see the problem. Imagine some (ugh) black-bordered un-card called "Tasty sandwich". Silly but whatever, nobody gets that upset. Now make it a "Tasty Subway(R) Meatball Sub". Yeaaaahhhh that hits a little bit different, now doesn't it?

The mechanics not appearing or normal magic cards fits into the same perspective, just from a "how do we fix this" view more than a "what's the problem with this". If they reprint all the UB cards in normal magic IP, at least everyone has the option to opt-out of promoting someone else's brand while still playing the same cards. Although I have to say the "friends forever" mechanic sure is weird to read on some innistrad bishop.

[pokken]

This set is everything I feared, like half of the Imperium deck I want.

Space Marine Devastator in Ephara is a big fat fartnoise flavor fail. Sigh.

[5colorsrainbow]

Eh, as long as the setting has more fantasy lean than sci-fi I'm fine with it. Idk warhammer 40k but the fact you have the space marines fighting zombies and demons along with the aliens is enough for me.

That said having guns/tech in magic is different than outside Ips. I don't dislike UB stuff but unless it's an ip I like or the card is good I'm not as interested.

[RxPhantom]

They juiced the hell out of these decks. I'm not a Vorthos, but the aesthetic is so monotonously grimdark to the point that I don't want to put any of these cards in my decks, regardless of how well they'd fit mechanically. Having all of these outside IP's feels like a hollowing of MTG. It feels like Smash Bros., but in a bad way. Like, maybe it would be a cool idea to have a TCG where a bunch of random IP's clash. Why not tap Fiddler's Green to cast The Anti-Life Equation on the Shredder in response to it being equipped with a Proton Pack? I just wish they'd do it somewhere else.