#ask urza

[wizardsmagic]

Ask Urza

Urza finally has his own planeswalker card (sorta)!

Do you have a question for Urza? Well, go ask him yourself.

[boardgamingftw]

I have been playing Magic: The Gathering since the Unlimited series but really got into the game when Revised edition hit retail. I remember those fun times playing it with my high school chums in 1994 when we were seniors in high school. Those fun times continued for several years until I moved away. Luckily I continued to play & collect.

However with all the sets that had come out Magic seemed to become a little bland. Something definitely was missing. That was until the first Magic the Gathering Un-set was released in 1998. The goofy set of Unglued set the standard for what could be done, for fun, in the Magic the Gathering Universe.

Unglued could be found everywhere & was getting bought up by everyone that wanted something different. Unfortunately Unglued itself never really caught on & never made  any money for Wizards of the Coast.

In 2004 Wizards of the Coast produced the second un-set calling it Unhinged. The Unhinged set featured a new color: pink. This set wasn’t as overproduced as Unglued.

So fast forward thirteen years to 2017 & Wizards of the Coast is finally releasing their third un-set, Unstable.

The Unstable set will feature 216 or more cards. This is a lot more than the 84 cards in Unglued & the 135 cards from Unhinged. These cards will be silvered-foil bordered & will also feature twenty foil tokens.

Unstable will be set on the world of Bablovia. The world of Bablovia is a world of mad scientists. Unstable will also feature five factions: Order of the Widget, Agents of S.N.E.A.K., League of Dastardly Doom, Goblin Explosineers, & Crossbreed Labs.

There are some interesting mechanics in Unstable. There will be contraptions, host creatures, augments, undeathtouch, blurry, squirrllink, just a second, last strike & triple strike.

Contraptions will be a main mechanic of this set. There are forty-five different contraptions in Unstable. At the beginning of a game all contraptions will be shuffled together in a separate deck. Effects during the game will assemble contraptions. Each pack of Unstable will contain two contraptions.

Different creatures will have the “host” mechanic listed on them while the “augment” mechanic will be featured on other creatures. When a host creature is put onto the field an augment creature can be added. These creatures will stay combined until they leave the field.

Just imagine the combinations you can do with the cards above. There are a bunch of other hosts & augments that will be in Unstable.

Blurry is a take on the evasion mechanic.

Creatures with undeathtouch will exile a creature if they would deal damage to it.

The “just a second” mechanic will prevent players from moving cards onto the battlefield from the stack.

Squirrellink is a fun take on lifelink. Instead of gain life from damage, a player will gain that many squirrels for the damage dealt by that creature.

The mechanic of last strike will allow the creature doing damage to do damage after the other creature without last strike deals damage. While triple strike allows the creature deal first strike, regular damage, & last strike damage.

There are some cards in the set that will have a player roll a six-sided die. Other cards will play off of this theme & force a player to reroll.

I’m looking forward to some of the oddities in this new un-set. Especially the Urza, Academy Headmaster card. When activated Urza, Academy Headmaster will have you visit AskUrza.com. If you visit the site now it’ll just tell you that Urza is powering up & to come back on December 8th, 2017.

This set is going to be a little wild & a little crazy. I know I have a list of friends that will be receiving packs of Unstable in their Christmas stocking this year. I can’t wait to get my hands on another unique un-set from Wizards of the Coast. It’ll be fun to put into my Un-Cube.

I can tell just by looking at the funny flavor texts that this is going to be fun to just sit back & play. No need to be overly serious when putting this set on the table.

Keep an eye out for the special Unstable draft packs that will also be available upon release.

Unstable comes out December 8th, 2017 so mark that on your calendar. Get set to get the next un-set & game on!

-Christopher Richter

Twitter: @Boardgaming_FTW

Facebook: Board Gaming For the Win

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  Hilarity Ensues with Magic: The Gathering Unstable I have been playing Magic: The Gathering since the Unlimited series but really got into the game when Revised edition hit retail.

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Ask Urza

Ask Urza