Full 9th Spoiler

[Raging Turtle]

Mtgsalvation.com has the complete spoiler, and a color-by-color breakdown in their forums useful for seeing exactly what was added and removed

This set has a completely different feel than 8th did.  Lots of toys from the past (Hypnotic Spector!), and ALL the painlands are back - including invasion block painlands.  Crazy.  A hell of a lot cheaper than getting the IPA stuff online, though.

Equipment is in, which shouldn't be a surprise.  Loxodon Warhammer is in, might be made rare so it doesn't obliterate 9th limited.

Consensus seems to be that white made out like a bandit, and blue got seriously shafted.  Don't really care much, blue is kicking plenty of ass in the rotating sets.

One of my FAVORITE red creatures, Bloodfire Colossus, made the list.  Don't know if I'm happy about it or sad that my IPA ones will not be as unique.   

[schild]

They had the balls to put offcolor painlands and IPA stuff in? This is definately a hint of things to come. But...

Wizards?

FUCK YEA!

Edit: Ok, after reading through that list, this is definately a return to what MtGO was like back around Revised/Dark. This is a pretty powerful set. I hope Ravnica erases all the SHIT between Ice Age and Kamigawa.

[Raging Turtle]

Check out some of the art for 9th: http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=mtgcom/feature/271

I'm not sure what #3 is but I want 4x of it. 
#6 is GIVING ME NIGHTMARES
#10 is nice as well, think its the new Mohatma Djinn (spelling iz hard)

And yep, warhammer is rare.  Going to suck to open that when there are 3 billion uncommon versions floating around the online market

[schild]

Educated Guesses.

Number 3 is Karplusan Yeti.

Number 6 might be Contaminated Bond.

I'm confident about the yetti. 10 is the new dijinni.

And ohmyfucking god Will'O'The Wisp.

I'm so playing black. Scratch that, Black/Green. 9th Edition truly is a monster. Fuck, if Ravnica sucks I'll go out of my way to brand Wizard with a scarlet letter.

[schild]

Yummeh.

[Raging Turtle]

Heh, nice that we have our own forum, eh Schild?

Been looking at the set more - I agree, black is very nice.  Sengir replaces Fallen Angel (damn I hope they give him new art, I always hated that purple tux), Mortivore is back, Cruel Edict is good times, Royal Assassin just became more fun with Icy in the new set.  Very glad they kept Phy. Arena in, and I imagine Phy.  Gargantua is crazy good in draft.

It'd be VERY easy to build a kickass Suicide Black deck right now.  Just throw in 4x Jitte and you're set.

[schild]

Every single post, I have to make an obligatory mention of Ravnica hopefully not fucking shit up.

Seriously, I'm worried. This is the best Core set since I was a newborn.

[Xilren's Twin]

Hippy Spec's are back?!?  Hell ya!  Damn, I remember having paper version of those from back in the day.  Dark ritual, hippy spec, pain..

Heck the original computer version of MTG, Microprose's game, hippy spec was a staple of defeating big bads with their slow ass decks.

Xilren

[eldaec]

#9 is rod of ruin - they had the sketches a while back.

#5 is presumably Karplusan Forest

[AOFanboi]

Bah, humbug.

Bring back Pestilence and Channeling, bitches!

[Johny Cee]

I scrutinized the spoiler list last night.

Some damn good stuff in there.  MUCH better hands down then 8th.  They've cut alot of the useless baggage,  brought back alot of color hosers. 

Hell's Caretaker adn Polymorph alone could have decks built around them.

Lot of great big red creatures.

And painlands!  Painlands mean a return to multicolor magic.  I was really expecting to see the fetch lands,  but I'm happy with pain lands.

I guess Schild's theory about the next block being multicolor may prove to be true, if they're putting painlands in 9th.

[Shockeye]

I remember the old days when having a dual land was a big deal. Fetch lands, pain lands, all too kooky for me.

[schild]

Hell's Caretaker adn Polymorph alone could have decks built around them.

Yes. I have built decks around it and will again. There are reasons (old) black and blue were my favorite colors. It's why I still cling to my wheel and deal deck - even though it plays nothing like my old shit. 9th Edition smells like the sort of sets that were around when I got addicted to the game. It's also the first core set since Revised I'm willing to drop money on packs to fill out a collection.

And painlands!  Painlands mean a return to multicolor magic.  I was really expecting to see the fetch lands,  but I'm happy with pain lands.

I guess Schild's theory about the next block being multicolor may prove to be true, if they're putting painlands in 9th.

Ravnica should be great. SHOULD BE. We'll never know til they unload a few card descriptions on us. Hell, just by looking at a handful of flavor text, we could properly decipher what the set will be about.

Edit: Die.

[Shockeye]

Fix your post, yo.

[Margalis]

For too long the core set has been the baby set, underpowered and lacking lots of abilities and such. The thing they don't realize is that if the rules are complicated and people don't understand them they will just play the wrong way and still have fun. When I first played Magic we barely read the instructions and had no idea what we were doing, but we still had fun. If people don't get exactly how trample works it's not really a problem.

[Johny Cee]

For too long the core set has been the baby set, underpowered and lacking lots of abilities and such. The thing they don't realize is that if the rules are complicated and people don't understand them they will just play the wrong way and still have fun. When I first played Magic we barely read the instructions and had no idea what we were doing, but we still had fun. If people don't get exactly how trample works it's not really a problem.

A big problem with Magic now is mechanics.  Too often,  the serious game is based around decks that abuse the shit out of the more complicated mechanics.  Part of the draw of limited games is your ability to throw together a deck of efficient creatures and some combat tricks and actually win a game or two.  Try that in standard,  and you'll be eaten alive by some deck recurring chittering rats or witness/plow under on you.

A large part of this is the stack (slang for how and in what order spells resolve).  Creatures like Goblin Sharpshooter and Arcbound Ravager could have their abilities manipulated to get around the stack and kill effects.  It's something comparative novices have a tough time with,  and even if you do know it it sucks the fun out of the game.

The affinity mechanic really messed with the game for a solid year till that got cleaned up.

Overall,  I'd like to see a move away from the present "Load of shit limited-useful cards with the occasional chase bomb card" adn back to a more even amount of quality.

I NEVER want to see another set like Mirrodin......  Fuck Nim Shrieker, and Battered Golem,  and the 200 other complete shit cards that no one will use (cept for limited),  just so you have some dross to pack around Tooth and Nail, Viridian Shackles, Witness, and Ravager.

[Johny Cee]

By the way,  just some guesses on directions from the spoiler list:

White:  Will still be the all purpose splash color.  Wrath, Sacred Ground, Ivory Mask, protection creatures, CoPs.  Some decent shut down cards like Marble Statue (power 3 and greater don't untap), blinding angel, and blinking spirit.

Red:  Back to the basics.  Burn spells,  big nasty criters with some drawbacks, hasty guys.  Looks solid without tipping into the abyss of the Land D deck.

Black:  Solid suicide/aggro black creatures.  Some great controlish creatures (Hypnotic Specter, Will o').  Some good all purpose tools.  Some support for alternative decks,  like reanimator.  Hell's Caretaker,  zombify, Goryo's cards could see this be at least playable.

Blue:  Low on counters, but high on interesting utility cards and card drawers.  This isn't a bad thing.  The only format that's more deviant than Land D heavy is Counter deck heavy.  Blue/Black control may be possible.  Polymorph is begging to be abused with Vedalken Shackles. 

Green:  Lanowar Elves and Utopia Tree.  Efficient creatures.  Pump.  Some good arty/chantment/land removal.  (Viridian Shaman, naturilize, creeping mold)


Also,  Jade Fucking Statue.....  man.

Loxodon Warhammer is a good reprint.  It's a novice player favorite,  that is also semi-effective. 

Quite a few land walkers.  Not a bad thing if there are more multi-color decks.

[schild]

Fuck. I didn't see Utopia Tree and Blinking Spirit.



I <3 The New Direction they're taking.

This set should revitalize the game. Which has really been stale since 4th Edition.

[schild]

Great list from Salvation.

White.7rares
-out .................. +in
avatar of hope .... weathered wayfarer
blessed reversal .... reverse damage
elite archers ..........Marble titan
intrepid hero ..........paladin en-vec
noble purpose ........Gift of estates
rolling stones .........righteousness
sunweb ................Blinking spirit

Blue.7rares
- out...................... +
Balance of Power ......Plagiarize
Bribery ....................Clone
Coastal Piracy ..........Imaginary Pet
Deflection ................Polymorph
Intruder Alarm ..........Battle of Wits
Sage of Lat-Nam ......Traumatize
Shifting Sky .............Exhaustion

Black.9rares
-.............................+
Death Pit Offering........Final Punishment
Eastern Paladin ..........Hell's Caretaker
Fallen Angel.............. Horror of Horrors
Larceny.................... Hypnotic Specter
Murderous Betrayal .....Mindslicer
Phyrexian Plaguelord ....Mortivore
Vampiric Spirit ............Sengir Vampire
Warped Devotion........ Will-o'-the-Wisp
Western Paladin ..........Yaughmoth Demon

Red.10rares
- ................................+
Bloodshot ......................Cyclops Bloodfire Colossus
Hammer of Bogardan ........Shard Phoenix
Inferno...........................Flame Wave
Lava Hounds................... Magnivore
Obliterate...................... Wildfire
Okk ..............................Kird Ape
Searing Wind................. Form of the Dragon
Seismic Assault.............. Karplusan Yeti
Thieves' Auction .............Flowstone Slide
Two-Headed Dragon........ Rathi Dragon

Green 11 rares
- ......................................+
Birds of Paradise ..................Utopia Tree
Call of the Wild.................... Weird Harvest
Collective Unconscious.......... Greater Good
Fungusaur ...........................Silklash Spider
Gaea’s Herald .......................Elvish Bard
Lhurgoyf ............................. Biorhythm
Plow Under ...........................Seedborn Muse
Primeval Force ......................Force of Nature
Rhox ...................................Verdant Force
Thorn Elemental.....................Ancient Silverback
Vernal Bloom......................... Early Harvest

A/L. 12 rares
- ............................+
Brass Herald .............Booby Trap
Dingus Egg ...............Jester's Cap
Distorting Lens ..........Slate of Ancestry
Ensnaring Bridge ........Storage Matrix
Flying Carpet ............Thran Golem
Jayemdae Tome .........Dancing Scimitar
Phyrexian Colossus .....Jade Statue
Planar Portal .............Caves of Koilos
Skull of Orm ...............Shivan Reef
Urza’s Armor ..............Llanowar Wastes
Vexing Arcanix ...........Battlefield Forge
City of Brass .............Yavimaya Coast

• Jade Statue for Colossus is <3.
• I don't know what I think about Jester's Cap. But I'm sure it can't upset shit as much as Cranial Extraction.
• I wish they'd taken Howling Mine out. I love that card. But it's time to Retire it.
• Early Harvest for Vernal Bloom? Not sure what I think about that.
• Plow Under being gotten rid of and replaced with Seedborn Muse is ++.
• Hell, all the rest of the green is ++.
• I like how I once again have no desire to play Red. It's gone back to it's roots and that's good. It was getting too weird.
• Black is Powerful. Hell's, Will'o, Sengir, Hippie, Yawgmoth. Don't fuck with black. <3
  
• As said before, blue and white will splash very well.
• I still think Weathered Wayfarer should be green. It's such a green fucking card. Same with Gift of Estates.
• Painlands is the next best thing to straight dual lands. Good call.
• Paladin en-Vec is pretty much confirmation on the multicoloredness of Ravnica. As well as Utopia Tree.

Time for me to pick up 4 Birds of Paradise.

Oh and the price on Chrome Moxen is shooting up with anticipation of multicolored cards. They're worth...a lot. (gone from ~10 to ~15-20 in the last 3 months)

Oh and the three highest priced avatars are now Platinum Angel, Royal Assassin, and my boy, Etched Oracle. Glad I bought him for 15 (worth about 40 now)

[Raging Turtle]

Dunno how powerful black is going to be.  Of the cards you listed, only Hypnotic should see tournament play.  Maaaybe Hells in a dedicated reanimator deck.  Not that I'm complaining, black got a lot of cold cards that I'll love to have online.

Weathered Wayfarer (and cards like it) are in white because white is the balance color.  If you have, I should have it too.  If I can't have it, neither can you (Wrath, etc.)

Check out the 'known information' thread about Ravnica in Mtgsalvation.  If what it says is true, it should confirm your hopes for crazy multicolor cards - but maybe a little different than you expected 

edit to actually make sense

[schild]

I expected color entanglement much like the old stuff. You know, from Dark and beyond, up to Ice Age. It looks like that's what I'm getting. I miss the days when expansions (even large ones) were supplemental with Core sets. Given my playstyle, I think this is a nice return to that.

Honestly though, They really need to do an online only chronicles set. With stuff from say Arabian Nights to Weatherlight (skipping the obvious Power Nine shit) to make Online it's OWN GAME. Cuz right now, it's pussy Magic.

Ravnica has the potential to stir it up a bit. We'll see. I just want my Hell's Caretaker deck. Now plz.

[Margalis]

You are right about the mechanics. The thing about magic is, the best decks are decks where the cards work well together. There are only some cards that work well with other cards, and only some of those combinations really make sense in general. Most people seem to prefer limited formats for a couple reasons: you don't have to buy chase rares and you get to use a bunch of cards that you don't normally get to, and try a variety of strategies. I really like the idea of making the best out of what you have with constrained resources. And limited formats are open to everyone with 10 dollars are so, realistically constructed is not.

The fact that certain cards work well in combination with others is a strength of magic, but sometimes (like affinity obviously) it gets out of hand. And the magic guys always have excuses for why most cards just plain suck. I mean, there are lots of cards that suck but at least have some thin potential in a couple of possible decks, but there are others that really have no conceivable use whatsoever. If you can't come up with even a hypothetical scenario to use a card chances are it isn't good.

I didn't like Mirrodin much. I thought I would like Kamigawa but I didn't for some reason. I might start playing again when 9th or the next set comes out. I don't know what it was about Kamigawa, I liked the overall theme but the cards just underwhelmed me.

[schild]

I liked the overall theme but the cards just underwhelmed me.

The theme and premise were great.

The cards were ass.

I'm pretty sure this is the longest I've seen where none of the sets impressed me. Hell, looking through the binder, the last set that really holds my interest is OTJ. So there's been 9 MEH expansions and a 5 totally weak core sets. Heh.

[Johny Cee]

Fucking Mirrodin block....

Odyssey block and Onslaught block could really be pretty friendly to irregular decks.  I kicked alot of ass through that time with an odd monowhite control/soldier/mobilization deck.  A buddy did the same with aggro zombies.  Even when the dominant metagame was supposed to be Wake/Tog/Blue Green Madness.

There was a pretty diverse field.  Goblins and Slide,  Elves, and a ton of other tier 2 decks.  Some of which could be put together on the cheap.  (Blue Green Madness could be built out of 2 or 3 precons.  Elves was almost as easy.)

Mirrodin dished us overpriced bombs, that froze out the rest of the field.

The format stagnated into the matchoff of Blue-White Control (VERY expensive) versus Goblins.  Broodstar had an off chance if the UW player fell asleep duing game 2....

And then Ravager trundled in to kill off the rest of the format.  Blech.


This Core set looks like a good step to building a solid and healthy Type 2 field.  It looks like you could throw fairly effective White Weenie or Aggro Green decks together on the cheap.  Hell,  it looks like you can throw together a deck from a couple of boosters of Core that may win you 1 out of 3 games against the top tiers.

[Margalis]

You know it's a problem when the dominant decks have almost nothing from the core set in them. The Mirrodin-block and Standard versions of Ravager were almost identical. Overall Mirrodin was just a dumb idea on many levels, taking a 5 color plus some fluff game and making it fluff plus some 5 colors. They were in a catch-22. You can't make the artifacts good, because they cost all colorless and can be used in any deck. Then again, you can't make all the artifacts suck in a set based around artifacts. Especially not when they were trying to push the power levels with Mirrodin.

Another problem with Mirrodin is so many of the cards either only work well with artifacts or hose artifacts. Molder Slug, anyone? Or Furnace Dragon? Then again, I guess that green guy that gets -1/-1 for each artifact played (2GG for 5/5) isn't too shabby now. But a whole host of cards like the Emissaries are just silly without an artifact-rich environment.

[Strazos]

Yay for my 2-Headed Dragon!

and Fuck MD5, and fuck some of the shit that goes on in Standard, mechanics abuse bullshit (Looking at YOU, gay rats decks).

[schild]

My theory on Ravnica and it's cards. It is correct. Posted today by our friend Aaron Forsythe:

I guess the story begins with the design of the upcoming Ravnica: City of Guilds expansion. The design team knew the set wanted to have a theme revolving around playing multiple colors (if you didn't know that yet, now you do!), and sets like that need support in the form of good mana fixing. And what better way to fix mana than with some kind of good dual lands?

“Perfect,” we thought. “What better time to bring back all ten 'pain lands,'” meaning the original five from Ice Age, that have since been reprinted in Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Editions, and the more recent five enemy-pair lands from the Apocalypse set. Players lamented the lack of pain lands in Eighth Edition, so we were looking for a good reason to reintroduce them.

Bold mine. A WINNAR IS ME. What do I win? THE CHANCE TO DROP A COUPLE GRAND ON WIZARDS. AGAIN. YAY. Gah. Intarweb. Die.

[Strazos]

Someone link a painland please? I stopped paying attention to Magic for quite a few years.

[AOFanboi]

Someone link a painland please? I stopped paying attention to Magic for quite a few years.

Generic painland text:

Tap: Add 1 to your mana pool.

Tap: Add <color1> or <color2> to your mana pool. <card name> deals 1 damage to you.

[Strazos]

eewww...

I'd rather have Dual-lands:

T: Add one colorless mana.
T: Add one (color) or (other color) mana to your pool. This land does not untap during your next upkeep phase.

Though I could see painlands being quite dandy in a big Life Deck.

[eldaec]

eewww...

I'd rather have Dual-lands:

T: Add one colorless mana.
T: Add one (color) or (other color) mana to your pool. This land does not untap during your next upkeep phase.

Though I could see painlands being quite dandy in a big Life Deck.

Remember, 19 of your 20 life serves no purpose whatsoever, 19 of your life just sits there being expendable.

In practice the lands you suggest (refered to as 'taplands') just suck ass, because mana fixing is more important in the early turns, but the drawback on taplands is massively more significant in the early turns.

The best multi land I've come across so far is without doubt tendo ice bridge...

Tendo Ice Bridge comes into play with a charge counter on it.
T : Add 1 to your mana pool.
T, Remove a charge counter from Tendo Ice Bridge : Add one mana of any color to your mana pool.

You can only use it for coloured mana once, but in a format with STE and reach, that is all you need.

[Johny Cee]

eewww...

I'd rather have Dual-lands:

T: Add one colorless mana.
T: Add one (color) or (other color) mana to your pool. This land does not untap during your next upkeep phase.

Though I could see painlands being quite dandy in a big Life Deck.

Damn young uns......

Dual-lands haven't been reprinted since revised or unlimited.  Basically,  they were "tap to produce one (color) or one (color)" with no drawbacks.  They also counted as both of the associated land types.

So:

Tundra
Tap to add W or U.
Tundra counts as both a plains and an island.

God old dual lands were love :)


I hope they bring back fetch lands for Ravinica.  I really like the Onslaught fetch lands.  (The tap and sac, go fetch a basic land.)

[Shockeye]

Yep, old school dual lands are what I enjoyed using. But then, I stopped playing after Fallen Empires.

[Margalis]

Considering that Dual Lands were basically far superior to normal lands in every respect, I don't think you can find anyone who doesn't love them. It's not fair to compare them to later specialized lands, all of which have at least some drawback.

[Hanzii]

Considering that Dual Lands were basically far superior to normal lands in every respect, I don't think you can find anyone who doesn't love them. It's not fair to compare them to later specialized lands, all of which have at least some drawback.

Yup.
Everybody in my circle just had four of each to complement any deck we'd choose to make.
(which of course was nice, when I finally sold my cards... together with the Lotus and the 2 moxen)2200