Daily MtG Flavor Text

Hello, and welcome to Daily MtG Flavor Text! Every day, I will be posting the flavor text of a random Magic: the Gathering card. Have a request? Let me know! Check out my Warhammer 40k sideblog: Blast Templates FTW Check out my Youtube channel below for Let's Plays old and new: Commodore 128 Check out my other Youtube channel below for trading card unboxings, deck profiles, and other collection showcases: Commodore Cards

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"Then we burn together!"

-Hellish Rebuke

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"Sure, true self-worth has to come from within, but trophies are nice too." —Killian, Silverquill mage-student

-Vault of Champions

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"Sleep? I can sleep when I'm dead!"

-Obsessive Astronomer

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"Arrows? Ha! Wood and feather? Toys!"

-Devoted Duelist

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"I'll never escape this rock, but I fear they will." -Decrypted log 4.11

-Thrumming Hivepool

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"Fear not, child. Open your eyes and witness Keranos's truth!"

-Raving Visionary

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"You're about to be struck by a brilliant idea!"

-Painiac

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"The readings are off the charts! Whatever it is, it's close."

-Entity Tracker

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"Keep 'em coming! I've got a full quiver and nowhere else to be!"

-Hawkeye's Shot

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"Brightstar-1 to FlightComm: Scopes are clear. The stars are yours."

-Starfighter Pilot

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"The otter is fine! It's for draft Commander! That's all it is! it's not even powerful so no one will play it in Constructed!"

"Anyway, the draft commanders with Rulebreaker proved very popular, so the next wave of Commander decks are all Rulebreakers who let you ignore color identity in a way that benefits their deck. Also since these aren't designed for draft anymore they're allowed to be way more powerful to the point where they're probably the best Commanders in their archetype. Also the decks are 75 dollars each."

Reminder to everyone, Universes Beyond was exclusively going to be special sets and promotional bundles and they repeatedly assured us there would never be Standard-legal crossover cards. But they "sold well" and "are popular" so now over half of the Magic year is just crossovers. Any tiny little change you see may very well become "just the way Magic is" if you're not careful.

The world has never been the same since I played mono-red Prismatic Piper aggro. That's where this all started.

Seriously though, this does make me wonder how far they could theoretically take "Rulebreaker." The obvious one to me would be to allow proper playsets of cards in a deck. I do wonder what the other seven will be.

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No evidence, no crime.

-Ledger Shredder

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What exactly is the difference between the otter having it's text written as is and the otter being a two color card, aside from the fact that you cant even play dual lands in the real version? like its just a commander that says "i'm a two color commander but you can pick which other color i am". there is nothing crazy or unbelievable happening on the card. as someone else said, it is basically "choose a background" but you dont even get the extra commander enchantment. and again, the otter has restrictions around cards you can include, so it doesnt even seem strong enough to supplant other Ux decks

i'm asking this in good faith because i respect your opinion on several of your takes and this is one of the first big ones that i just don't see the issue with. thanks

It's funny, because this is literally worse than a mono-colored "two color" commander. But it's not about power level. It could be a mono-blue 1/1 eight-drop that says "your deck can include White Artifacts," and I'd have the same issue.

Okay, here's what I think it is. This is what bugs me so much. This card does not change its own color identity to match the cards you're using. You are literally building an illegal deck that is only made legal by your commander's ability. Swap out your commander for another mono-blue spellslinger and it's not just that the deck doesn't function, it can't exist at a structural level. It's like your commander is breaking the fourth wall to make the deck work.

If it partnered with a useless enchantment with an Eminence ability that said "Pick a color. This card is that color," I would be more understanding of that. I wouldn't like it, I think it's bad design, but it's bad design within the rules. But that's not what it does. It's not about what it does. It's how it goes about doing it.

Having said all that, something I didn't consider at first is that this card is obviously intended to help with draft. Again, it's a non-issue in the big picture. It just bugs me.

[teradul]

Also, it appears that it isn't really a 2-color deck, it is a blue-inclusive guilds deck. I think it is (c>u c=2) if you're in scryfall. And you can only use basics but you can use all basics, even if you choose to only use blue and green spells with Domain cards included.

And that's the thing, it is the slow eroding of the rules. First, you get partners and backgrounds that make sense, and are a bit of rules text that have some purpose like making a more interesting limited environment. This is rulebreaking for the sake of rulebreaking, just throw everything at the wall and see what sticks, and the idea behind that sort of attitude Is to has at least Something stick.

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Oh interesting, yeah that was my initial reading on it as well. It's a little unclear. I'm sure we'll get some official clarification some time.

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To those of you who thought I was a bot: surprise! I'm a real person! Have a bunch of posts about something unsubstantial. Your regularly scheduled flavor texts will continue as normal.

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Not trying to pile on, I get that it's just something that bugs you and not something you think is going to destroy the game lol. I want to ask:

Would it not bother you if the otter instead said "When creating your deck, choose a color. This creature's color identity includes that color." or "This creature's color includes that color."?

Yeah, I'd be much happier with that.

If it was worded that way, it also would have clued me in to it being a "meant for draft" commander a bit sooner. As if being part of Commander Mystery Booster wasn't enough.

Of course, such a card would also be literally better than what we're getting! Mind you, I'm also not convinced it isn't a 5-color commander as long as each Instant/Sorcery is A) 2 colors at most and B) Blue at minimum. Because that was my initial reading of it.

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What exactly is the difference between the otter having it's text written as is and the otter being a two color card, aside from the fact that you cant even play dual lands in the real version? like its just a commander that says "i'm a two color commander but you can pick which other color i am". there is nothing crazy or unbelievable happening on the card. as someone else said, it is basically "choose a background" but you dont even get the extra commander enchantment. and again, the otter has restrictions around cards you can include, so it doesnt even seem strong enough to supplant other Ux decks

i'm asking this in good faith because i respect your opinion on several of your takes and this is one of the first big ones that i just don't see the issue with. thanks

It's funny, because this is literally worse than a mono-colored "two color" commander. But it's not about power level. It could be a mono-blue 1/1 eight-drop that says "your deck can include White Artifacts," and I'd have the same issue.

Okay, here's what I think it is. This is what bugs me so much. This card does not change its own color identity to match the cards you're using. You are literally building an illegal deck that is only made legal by your commander's ability. Swap out your commander for another mono-blue spellslinger and it's not just that the deck doesn't function, it can't exist at a structural level. It's like your commander is breaking the fourth wall to make the deck work.

If it partnered with a useless enchantment with an Eminence ability that said "Pick a color. This card is that color," I would be more understanding of that. I wouldn't like it, I think it's bad design, but it's bad design within the rules. But that's not what it does. It's not about what it does. It's how it goes about doing it.

Having said all that, something I didn't consider at first is that this card is obviously intended to help with draft. Again, it's a non-issue in the big picture. It just bugs me.

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One thing I always admired about Magic over, say, Yugioh is their adherence to their own rules.

We often see in Mark Rosewater's asks someone asking about why they don't print a card that does this or that, and he'll say it's because the rules don't allow it. And I respect that, it means the rules actually have meaning. Whereas in Yugioh, they'll print some nonsense and release an errata saying "it works the way we say it does."

Anyway, here's Rulebreaker because rules are for losers just do whatever you frikken want.

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For the record, I realize that this card makes sense. Sort of. It's worded a little vaguely and I'm sure we'll get clarification.

But that's not what I'm talking about. What this card does literally doesn't matter. What matters is it shows they're willing to write exceptions to their own rules, and that's what bugs me. Because I've seen where this can lead.

They say there will be eight of these Rulebreakers. Is it really a big deal? No. These specific decks can fudge the rules in these specific ways. For now.

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Gang, I don't know how to explain this, but to me there's a difference between cards that "change the rules" for themselves and cards that WotC might print to change the structure of the game or deckbuilding. This is not Relentless Rats. This is not Prismatic Piper.

Even then, to me there's a difference between adding something to the game that wasn't there before (ie. Companion), and changing what's already established (ie. hybrid mana doesn't count any more) (which thankfully didn't happen).

I guess color identity is just something that is integral to Commander at the most basic level to me, and to see them weaken that makes me worry.

Like, I don't even think this card is all that good. It won't be a problem. It's the principle of it.