Mutavault - Magic the Gathering

Sliver Mutant Ninja Turtle!

This guy is a reprint from Morningtide, and a very clever one in my opinion. Morningtide was part of the two-set tribal block called Lorwyn. Lorwyn had a group of shapeshifters, the Changelings, who could become any and all creature types. Mutavault is essentially Mishra's Factory meets changeling.

So why is this a good reprint for M14. M14 has Slivers. Slivers give their abilities to all other Slivers (originally all Slivers in play, but now just your Slivers to reduce board complexity). Since Mutavault has all creature types, Mutavault counts as a Sliver. This also brings up the amusing fact that it's also a Sliver Pirate Praetor Samurai Slith Artificer etc. It can be a Sliver that knows every single occupation, making for an impressive resume.

Zephyr Charge - Magic the Gathering

I feel like I could replace "flying" with "horsemanship".

This card feels very weird to me. Why? First off, it's a common non-Aura Enchantment. Modern Magic very, very rarely prints non-Aura Enchantments at common. Some notable exceptions are the Seals, the Expeditions from Zendikar, and Oblivion Ring style removal. There's nothing wrong with this type of enchantment at common, but it just feels weird to me.

Second, the quote. Sun Tzu's The Art of War is a real book. In the core sets, it has been okay to quote real things on the cards. Giant Octopus for example has an appropriate quote from Jules Verne. But recently, this practice seems to be waning, the idea being real world quotes take away from the immersion in a fantasy world. Again, I have no problem with real world quotes, it's just something they haven't been doing much recently, making it feel off.


Overall, this card reminds of Levitation, the version with Jim Murray's artwork. Both arts use the concept of flying horsemen hovering over the battlefield. Both cards also fill similar niches, enchantments that give your guys flying. The thing is, out of the box, Levitation feels like a better card than Zephyr Charge. Zephyr Charge however feels like it was meant to be played in Limited. It's a common card the gives flying without the drawback an Aura has of getting two-for-oned. Better Limited players tend to be very wary of Auras, unless they happen to be very good, because they're afraid of card disadvantage. This card however helps dissuade that fear. This card however can grant multiple creatures flying, without the danger of being lost if that creature dies.

Shadowborn Apostle - Magic the Gathering

Well, M14 has now been fully spoiled, it's time to take a look at some cards. Note, I haven't played with the set yet, this is just my thoughts on some of the new cards, my likes, my dislikes, and their future potential. Now, we're starting with this:

I wonder if the text once said "twelve creatures".

This card has a really neat concept, and really neat rules text. The guy that stands out in my memory with similar text is Relentless Rats from Fifth Dawn. Art is neat to. If you look closely, you can see five other robed figures in the background. Oh, and a smoldering corpse on the altar, unsure if he was a member of the Shadow groupies.

My Johnnysenses tingle with this card. I once tried to make a Biovisionary deck that loaded up on guys like Clone so I could copy the guy and activate its text. A similar strategy could work here. Problem is, the Biovisionary deck copied guys to win the game. This would be a lot of work for little reward, spending a bunch of one-cost and four-cost guys to get one big guy. My one idea is using something like Immortal Servitude, summoning all the Apostles from your graveyard. Bloodbond March and Thrumming Stone might be fun too! Regardless, it's going to take a lot of work and effort to make this guy work. This is a good example of a card that excites some players (like me), but others will find utterly useless.

Relinquished - Yu-Gi-Oh!

Release the Relinquished!

Relinquished is one of my all time favorite Yu-Gi-Oh! cards. The card has several elements that I like. First, it's a Ritual monster, which is cool enough, but it also is Level 1, making it perhaps the easiest Ritual monster to summon. Also, it's a Ritual Monster with an effect. While the other Ritual guys in Magic Ruler were kind of a yawn, this guy actually does something.

Second is the stats. It's a Level 1 monster with 0 ATK and 0 DEF. This initially seems pretty terrible. It's effects though completely defies this expectation. I love the 0 ATK or Level 1 monsters that can still kick butt and be powerful.

Third, its effect. This card allows you to steal an opposing monster. Creature stealing has always been fun for me in Yu-Gi-Oh, at least when I'm the one doing the stealing. This bypasses indestructible and overpowered monsters, neutralizing them without actually destroying them. And even if your opponent finds a way to get rid of Relinquished, you don't feel too bad, since they also got rid of their own card.

The fourth element is another aspect of the effect. Not only does Relinquished steal monsters, it absorbs them. I am also a huge fan of Union monsters. Something about the flavor of equipping another monster with another monster is magical. Relinquished equips the monster it steals, taking its power for its own. Something about the mechanic, and again the flavor, just feels completely natural.

Another thing I love about Relinquished is how easy it is to grasp the concept. This card is perhaps one of the wordiest cards in the game, yet despite that I am able to understand what the card does, it absorbs other monsters. Yes there are a lot of technical rules and issues with absorbing another monster, but the concept is so strong I'm still able to understand it.

In short, Relinquished is a card that was designed to do something cool, and it's because of that and everything above that I love it!

Crab Turtle - Yu-Gi-Oh!

Mutant Ninja Turtle Crabs!

Crab Turtle is weird. At initial viewing, it looks reminiscent of a crab and nothing like a turtle. The one turtle-like feature is the shell on it's chest, which resembles a turtle's underside. I'm not sure how turtle or crab powers give this thing the ability to stand upright or a single eyeball, but this is Yu-Gi-Oh, weird stuff is par for the course. As weird as the monster is, the magic card that goes with it is equally baffling.

Swear to the great A'tuin!

Okay, what am I looking at here? We have some sort of turtle shell, though its roundness makes me think of an army helmet. Then there's some rope tied around it and... what are those white things? Are they paper streamers or something? What's that underneath? What does any of this have to do with taking an oath to turtles? On the upside, the illustration actually looks like part of some ritual, as opposed to the say the same creature as before in a different position or a demon cooking a burger. I just can't figure out what any of this stuff is supposed to be.

Hungry Burger - Yu-Gi-Oh!

Hungry, hungry burger!

Well, we're stepping back into the world of killer foods. Seriously, how do monsters in the Yu-Gi-Oh-verse eat when half the food shown is homicidal? Also odd, why is this guy a Warrior? Admittedly, I can think of a better type to place it, maybe Fiend, since we later see the cook behind it is a demon.

So yeah, killer burger. What more can I say. One nice little detail is at the top right corner. For awhile, I thought this was an eye (despite the fact that there is clearly no second eye present, I'm kind of stupid), but it turns out it's actually a little flag, like the toothpicks some diners or Friendlys sticks in your sandwich. And it's a Japanese flag, white background, red dot.

The companion card, Hamburger Recipe features a demonic cook, remarkably the second demon in the game to take up the culinary arts. I can tell this isn't the same one, because the other demon had a hook hand. This guys hands are both present and fine.

That said, maybe this is an example of a storyline in the card art. Yu-Gi-Oh occasionally likes to tell little stories hidden in its art. There might be a narrative here that goes like this. Demon makes a burger, seen in Hamburger Recipe. Burger goes psychotic, seen in Hungry Burger. Burger bites off the hand of the demon chef, causing him to have to replace the missing hand with a hook.

Chef Ramsey proceeds to call him a moron.

Performance of Sword - Yu-Gi-Oh!

Dancing queen...

Ritual Monsters are one of my favorite monster types in Yu-Gi-Oh! The flavor of the cards is wonderful, special monsters that you need to perform a certain ritual, meeting certain requirements, in order to summon. Ritual monsters have gotten the shaft though in the game, the one attempt to save them being the Evigishki archetype. What's the problem with them in the game? You summon them from your hand.

Ritual Monsters are put in your main deck, along with their corresponding Ritual Magic (Spells in the US). If you want to increase your chances of summoning them, you put it a full set of each. And now six cards in your deck are dead draws. The cards do nothing except Ritual Summon. Without their matching pair, the card is a complete blank. My idea for solving this issue is have Ritual Monsters summon from the Extra Deck. That takes care of three of the six possible dead draws, and the Magic cards are now even better, you being able to use them the minute you meet the requirements, and not sitting there waiting to draw the other monster. This would effect some cards, but not too many, so I don't see it causing too many problems. In fact, if you play the game, I want to try it this way, and let me know if it works.

Anyway, I'm looking at Ritual Monsters. There aren't too many, the archetype being nowhere near as popular or competitive as Fusions, Synchros, or Exceeds. (I refuse to call it Xyz. It looks to me like it's pronounced "ziz". When you need to tell your players how to pronounce a word, because it looks nothing like what people think the word sounds like, just get a new word. Yes, I know the Japanese word doesn't translate into any English word, but could you try to make the word look like what you're supposed to say.) I'm starting with the ones from Magic Ruler (changed to Spell Ruler for the reprint for no good reason), since in the US at least this was the introduction of Ritual Monsters.

So, Performance of Sword. What the hell does that mean? The original Japanese name translates to Dancing Soldier, which at least explains the Warrior-typing. Why did we change it for the US? I have no clue. The word "soldier" is fine, having been used in the TCG several times. That leaves "dancing", again one used before. Maybe they thought it just sounded silly, despite the fact that this is the game where you can literally summon a killer tomato. Still, I like the art, and the positioning of her one arm probably saved her cleavage size from the devious censors. Yeah, women in Yu-Gi-Oh with extra endowment get their bra size changed for the TCG, since we can't sully young minds with pictures of busty women.

The Ritual card, Commencement Dance, is the same girl in a different position. Now she's sitting.

Nobody puts Dancing Soldier in the corner...