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gdcee · 3 years

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Road to Nowhere

Pairing: Loki/Sigyn - mild, might have to squint to see it.

Summary: Loki and Sigyn talk while she escorts him to Kid Loki's Kingdom.

Warnings: Panic attack.

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"You know I'm only going to keep pestering you until I have the answer."

"I wish you luck in your endeavour," Sigyn returned coolly, stepping lightly as she began to climb the massive pile of garbage blocking their path. "Nevertheless, my lips remain sealed."

Loki huffed, a slight quirk at the corner of his lips which was not quite a smirk. He set off after her, determined to be the first to the summit of Rubbish Peak.

He had to admit he was quite intrigued by that tantalising crumb of information this Sigyn (so very like and yet not quite like his own) had dangled before him. Of course he was curious about the identity of the lucky bastard who had won her fidelity.

All he had was a preferred pronoun. That at least eliminated half of his (admittedly rather short to begin with) list of possible lucky bastards.

After he had gone through the list (which did not take long because as stated earlier, it was really quite short), he started throwing out random names to see if any of them got a reaction.

No such luck.

His attempts to tease and fluster the information out of her had been just as ineffective.

Her reaction to his puppy dog eyes routine had been...perplexing. He'd gotten one soft, achingly tender smile before a heavy melancholy had descended upon her. Like the dark shadow of a mourning veil stealing the brightness from her eyes and the colour from her cheeks.

She had not reprimanded him, but he made a note not to pull that trick again anyway. Besides the practical reasons for keeping her goodwill (survival, information, mental stimulation), the simple fact was that she was Sigyn.

He didn't want to be the cause of her unhappiness. Not anymore.

Being a harmless annoyance and pest was still perfectly acceptable though.

He stood atop the great mound of refuse, his hands and face smeared with oil and other liquids of questionable origin, grinning triumphantly down at Sigyn. He vanished the grime he'd accumulated before gallantly holding out his hand to her.

Sigyn huffed a soft little laugh, the barest hint of a smile at the corner of her mouth. Without any hesitation, she reached out and allowed him to pull her up.

Loki glanced down to where they had started and noted that it was a long drop. Not nearly enough to kill an Asgardian or a Frost Giant, but enough to hurt.

Trust.

It made him feel as giddy as the first time he'd tasted the enchanted, heady liquid gold that was the mead brewed from honey harvested from the hives of the talking bees that resided near Iðunn's famous apple orchards.

"Ahem."

Loki realised with no small degree of embarrassment that he was still holding Sigyn's hand. He hurriedly worked a spell to remove the dirt under her fingernails and let go. Then to cover up his embarrassment, he resumed pestering.

"I don't understand why the identity of your beau necessitates such secrecy," he sighed with the lightest touch of a pleading whine, "Do you think I would object to your taste? He can't possibly be worse than Theoric."

"I think my life choices are none of your business."

"Exactly! You should forget about my opinion. Shout his name to the world and damn the naysayers and killjoys."

"I would but sadly, Alioth has a sense of hearing."

With that, she picked up a flat sheet of metal lying loose and proceeded to slide down Rubbish Peak on the improvised board. Despite being only at most a quarter Ljósálfar on her mother's side, she moved with their characteristic effortless grace.

Loki peered down, did a couple of quick mental calculations and snapped his fingers. He disappeared from the summit with a flare of green light and reappeared at the bottom no more than a second later in similar fashion.

"Good to see your teleport still works," Sigyn tossed her wind-mussed hair out of her face, "Why didn't you use it earlier to get to the top?"

"Too much debris and no decent eyeline. I didn't want to risk getting stuck under a foot of garbage." He frowned, pondering. "Still works?"

"Not a reference to you personally," she moved forward without looking behind to see if he followed, "Just something I noticed about some of the other Lokis around here."

"Power loss? Nothing to do with you and that coven of other Sigyns whose domain I and the other Lokis are forbidden from entering, I presume?"

"No, I've seen it even in Lokis on their first trepass - if something is limiting their power it's not us. In any case, we would never do anything to permanently disable a Loki's magic. There's just some things you don't do to a fellow mage, you know?"

"You just rough them up a little and kick them off the property?"

"More or less. Except for the kid and alligator."

"Do I want to know how one instance of me ended up as a semi-aquatic Midgardian reptile?"

"You can ask him yourself when we get to the Kid's Kingdom," she paused for a moment, as if she'd just remembered something, "Or maybe not, I think only the old man you knows how to talk to him."

Loki blinked.

"There's an old me?" He asked, disbelieving, "As in a wizened, wrinkled, looks like your grandmother me?"

"Eh, not quite as old as Grandma Hretha. Maybe about 4,000? 5,000?" She shrugged, "Either way, your vanity may rest easy; you look perfectly fine as an old man."

"Thank you for that milquetoast endorsement of my future self's good looks," Loki said dryly, "I was more perturbed about...something else."

Curiouser and curiouser.

How had the aged variant escaped their destined end? How had he managed to grow old before the TVA arrived to arrest him for cheating his final death?

He thought about the tape featuring all the TVA approved highlights of his life.

He thought about that other Loki, the Loki who had played out the role assigned to him and how very young (the same face as his own) and terrified (the same fear as his own) he had looked with the Mad Titan's monstrous hand around his throat.

Loki swallowed thickly and pulled at the collar of his TVA issued office shirt which suddenly seemed far too tight. The tie impeded his work and as he struggled to loosen it he could feel his terror rising up to choke him.

there will be no realm, no barren moon, no crevice where he cannot find you

inevitable

you think you know pain?

Inevitable

HE WILL MAKE YOU LONG FOR SOMETHING AS SWEET AS PAIN

He felt his legs buckle and his knees hit the ground as if it were happening to someone else.

"Loki!" Sigyn's voice was close but he heard it as if a great distance separated them, "Loki, breathe."

"What do you think I'm doing?" He wheezed.

"I am going to remove the tie and unfasten your collar," Sigyn continued as if she had not even noticed his rudeness, "I will need to touch you to do this. Alright?"

Needing help for such a pitifully simple task was galling. But he didn't want Sigyn to leave him. Loki managed a shaky nod. He let her ease his trembling, sweaty hands from his shirt collar. With quick, brisk movements she pulled the tie loose and tossed it somewhere to join the rest of the garbage.

"Follow my breathing now." Her voice was clearer to him now, more present. She was kneeling next to him, so close and warm and oh, her hair did still smell like apple blossoms. He watched the regular rise and fall of her chest and tried to match it. "That's it. Very good. Nice and slow."

Her fingers were at his throat for a mercifully short time. Just long enough to pop the top button loose and push the starched fabric away from his neck.

"Stay with me. You're doing very well. Breathe with me. In. And out. In. And out."

Without really thinking he grabbed her hand and pressed her palm against the centre of his chest. Perhaps he was possessed by some irrational notion that the pressure against his breastbone could keep his thundering heart from beating right out of his chest.

She didn't try to pull away. Her hand was warm, even through the shirt fabric. She moved a little, and one of her dainty fingers slipped into the open gap of his unbuttoned collar and brushed against the dip between his clavicles. His breath caught in his throat for a moment before Sigyn's gentle prompting had him matching her rhythm once more.

"Feel better?" She asked after what seemed an eternity.

"Yes," he breathed, "Yes, much." His chest still felt a little tight but the worst of that dreadful episode was over.

"Good." She lifted her hand from his chest and patted his shoulder firmly - a gesture that he had seen Týr bestow upon struggling Einherjar recruits after they'd passed the final leg of their training. "You did very well."

He didn't feel like he'd done anything worth praising. He'd collapsed like a pack of cards. This wasn't the first time he'd experienced terror but every time before now he had been able to push past it - stamp it down through sheer force of will and that primitive, animal part of his brain that knew that danger was never far away.

Why had he folded now? Now - when he was probably the most at ease he'd been in ages (months? Years? How long had it been since New York?) and the threat of Thanos was no longer an issue-

...a terrible thought suddenly occurred to him.

"Just out of curiosity," Loki tried to sound nonchalant, "Have you ever come across a fellow by the name of Thanos here?"

"Thanos?" Sigyn's brows drew together in a frankly rather adorable expression of pure befuddlement.

Ah. Well, at least he could place whatever nexus event had led to her pruning as occurring before Ragnarok and Thanos's massacre of half the Asgardian survivors.

"Big purple fellow," he explained, "Quite ugly, enormous chin, has rather disturbing ideas about resource management."

"Uh, no, I can't say that I've ever met anyone like that here."

"You're not just saying that to make me feel better?"

She quirked an eyebrow. "I can swear on my magic if that would reassure you."

Sigyn had always been very leery about oaths, especially ones bound with magic. Most mages worth their salt were.

And yet...he couldn't really explain why, but he'd always felt like her issues with them were less about best practices and more about some personal grievance.

That she would offer him such a thing...

Loki felt completely undeserving.

"No," he said hurriedly, "No, no, it's fine. I...I trust you."

Sigyn smiled. It was the first real smile he'd seen so far and it was like watching the sun come out from behind a cloud. He didn't know if it would last - if that melancholy from before would snatch away the sweetness of this moment.

So Loki ruined the moment before it could be stolen from him.

"...even though you refuse to tell me about your paramour."

Sigyn scoffed, all exasperation but it was better than seeing her sad.

"You are insufferable."

"Thank you, I do try."

She snorted and shook her head. "Alright, come on, you goose," she helped him up, and even though his legs were slightly shaky, he stood and did not fall. "Our first rest stop is about 20 feet...thereaboutish-" she waved vaguely in the direction of a mostly empty grassy knoll upon which a gaggle of the oddest creatures scurried. They resembled iridescent headless chickens with little purple spheres hovering over their severed necks.

"I still think we should have taken the car."

"Ugh," Sigyn wrinkled her nose, "Cahrs. Nasty, noisy, smelly things. I swear, Midgard really went downhill after those monstrosities were invented. "

#loki #sigyn #mcu #logyn

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notspoondere · 6 years

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May 2018 List Re-Review

I did this once before for fun and wanted to do it again. For the reference, the May 2018 analysis was here.

If you’re not familiar with the idea, in this post I will be highlighting statements where I made predictions about the shape of the format to come and scoring them based on how accurate they turned out to be, then tallying those scores at the end to see how well I did. Let’s get into it.

(Also, September 2018 list analysis is on the way. I didn’t want to do it at first but have received a request for it.)

Master Peace, the True Dracoslaying King

Yep, this is Luster Pendulum. He’s now Zoodiac Drident crossed with Apoqliphort Towers, and naturally he’s on the banlist again. Feel old yet?

To continue on that analogy, I fully expect this deck to go the way of Qliphorts and continue to see play as a stun variant. Note that nerfed Draco is still a better deck than Qliphorts, unfortunately.

Correct on both fronts: Qliphorts are still bad, and Draco is still seeing play as a stun deck with two variants, one using The Monarchs Erupt, and the other using Ghost Reaper & Winter Cherries, both with the intent of winning by preventing your opponent from playing the game and drawing cards to beat them down once they can’t.

Phoenixian Cluster Amaryllis

Woohoo, we won’t get Plant FTK! With that, I have the feeling we’ll be getting the Aromage Link Monster next set, since that’s the card that enables this FTK. Once again, a good hit.

Wrong: We didn’t get the Aromage link monster, but who cares. I’m not going to score this because this post isn’t really about my predictions about Konami’s product design, but rather the metagame.

Oh and we technically got a plant FTK involving Samsara Lotus. Whatever.

That Grass Looks Greener

I’ve been a 60-card player since around this time last year, and Lightsworn is my favorite deck of all time, so I’m sad to see this one go, but it was absolutely responsible for 60-card decks’ most unfair hands. “Oh, you decided to drop Ash Blossom on my Lonefire? Here, let me just mill a third of my deck real quick and end on Naturia Beast or Void Ogre Dragon with Fairy Tail - Snow and Shiranui Spiritmaster in the GY. Oh, and you only have three cards in hand. Sorry, not sorry!”

There’s nothing factually wrong about this since there’s no real prediction, but I would like to mention here that a totally different 60-card deck has seen play since: it turns out that there are some Pendulum variants that legitimately have 60 cards they want to play and wouldn’t have played Grass even if they had the chance. Shine on, you crazy diamonds.

Dinomight Knight, the True Dracofighter

This is the best card in Draco that isn’t named Master Peace, and is the sole reason for why I think the deck isn’t totally dead. Return and Apocalypse are still absurdly strong cards going first and this card searches them.

Correct: I don’t think anyone would disagree that this is still the scariest card left in that deck (unless you think it’s Rivalry, but Frogs and Altergeist play that too).

Gem-Knight Master Diamond

Here’s another “spin the wheel” hit; the Gem-Knight that actually burns is Lady Lapis Lazuli, but hitting this hurts the deck’s attempts to play legitimately, too. Problem solved, I guess, but at what cost?

They can’t make Calamities anymore, either, but that matters much less when they can’t actually kill you, either.

Wrong, unfortunately. Gem-Knight FTK has topped once since this hit happened. I don’t know how and I don’t really care. They should have banned Lazuli.

Chain Strike

And there’s a strange hit! Chain Burn has been a nuisance since, well, the release of Chain Strike, and this hit is kind of out of nowhere, but who cares. Chain Burn is dead if you don’t draw an insane hand. Better now than never.

Correct, haven’t seen this deck since. Don’t care to either.

Semi-Limited Cards

Apoqlihport Towers

Ring of Destruction

I’ll take “Cards that have seen no play” for 800, Alex.

Though much weaker in a format with copious Extra Deck-based removal by battle, this card’s namesake lives on as a reference point for insurmountable boss monsters.

This card’s errata in 2015 addressed its infamous problems in tournament by preventing it from stealing games and forcing draws.

Correct.

Neo-Spacian Grand Mole

Compulsory Evacuation Device

Fairy Tail - Luna saw no play and Solemn Strike is still at 3. Who cares.

Also Correct.

Grandsoil the Elemental Lord

The functional errata is effective already, though we won’t get it in print until FLOD: SE. Elementsaber buff, though the deck really isn’t good anyways.

I don’t remember getting this spicy. Yeah, Elementsabers didn’t turn out great. Correct.

Mathematician

This is still a solid card, honestly. I could see it seeing play again in decks that don’t need a Normal Summon, or if they finally unban Construct. I don’t think that deck’s in the game right now, but it could be soon.

So Mathematician saw no play whatsoever, but I still think it’s because the right deck doesn’t exist; after all, Armageddon Knight is arguably more restricted than Mathematician, and that card does see regular play (in Gouki because it’s a Warrior, in Dinosaurs because it can send Overtex, and in Zefra because it can send Destrudo). All that really proves is that a monster which consumes a Normal Summon in order to send something generic to the GY is good enough to play, and Mathematician is definitely that, so I think we’ll see him come up again once a more useful Level 4 or lower target is introduced for a Type or Attribute that doesn’t already have a better alternative, or for ones that need three more copies of it (with Armageddon Knight, Dinosaurs have eleven cards that send Overtex to GY or search a card that does). For that reason, I’ll call this a maybe--ultimately, as much as I can try to demonstrate that it’s a good card, it depends on whether that deck comes to exist.

Atlantean Dragoons

Dragoons was tearing through boards years before SPYRAL Tough was, and honestly, there’s very little stopping it from doing so now with Light of Sekka in the game (Abyss-scale is a brick and chances are that you don’t run any spells that do anything more impactful than drawing two cards and fixing your hand). This is kind of like when Charge of the Light Brigade came back to 3: It’s a fairly solid buff to a fairly solid deck. Add onto that the imminent reprint of Moulinglacia and the new Mermail Link Monster, and the deck is looking like it’s soon to be in a very strong place.

Mermails have seen minor competitive play, but it is certainly stronger than before, and indeed, the deck plays Sekka’s Light over Abyss-scale. Correct.

Ignis Heat, the True Dracowarrior

This means virtually nothing compared to Dinomight coming back to 1.

…

Okay, hear me out. Ignis was the deck’s best play going second since it grabs Heritage, which plusses off of disruption. That’s fine, but:

Amano-Iwato stops your opponent from doing anything to stop you already.

You are going to search your spells with Diagram anyways, and you don’t need your opponent to be using effects on your turn to do that.

Heritage is still a disruptable card itself, and the proper play with Ignis is usually to let him hit the board and swing over him later in order to give the opponent Heritage on a turn when they can’t immediately use it.

For these reasons… yeah, Ignis doesn’t actually matter that much. Draco would still be fine with Ignis at 1, and I don’t really expect that he’ll be run at more than 2 at MOST due to the way optimal ratios work with Card of Demise.

This is a pretty contentious portion of that post and I kind of regret being so bold. Actually going through and looking at what was right and what wasn’t here is a mixed bag because much of it plays upon theory that is half-true and ended up being half-followed. Let’s take a look.

Ignis is an important card in Draco.

Ignis is a good card in Draco, and the deck often plays two or three copies.

True Draco with Master Peace and Demise regularly played the same ratios of eight monsters in the Main Deck: 3 Amano/Boarder, 1 Ignis, and two Majesty and Master Peace.

The current incarnation of the deck plays roughly nine monsters. It has lost two of the previously available ones and gained a potential three more; not counting the other Dracos, this would account for 3 Amano/Boarder and Ignis, 2 Majesty, and 1 Dinomight, but about half of the lists I’ve seen play two Ignis and a sparse few play Dreiath and/or Metaltron.

Waterfall of Dragon Souls is a fair bit more popular now than it was then, too.

Finally, optimal ratios for Demise necessitate as few monsters as possible, but optimal ratios for Desires insist that you play more cards in triplicate than usual.

So with that said: I feel safe in saying Ignis can be justified at 2 or 3 copies, and I definitely feel safe in saying that he’s a worse card than Dinomight. Going off of this, I’m tempted to say I’m right, but my language was a bit too decisive and derisive (surely people would have played 3 Ignis even if it was demonstrably wrong), so I’ll say this was at least partially wrong and call it a maybe.

In the last section, I made a bunch of predictions about various decks; I’ll go over them each and judge how they should be scored. I’ll also tally this separately just to see how well I guessed how the format would pan out; these will not be scored twice if I mentioned them earlier.

Magicians nerfed. FTK and Zexal builds murdered. Pure deck is still viable.

Every other pendulum deck nerfed, though pure Metalfoes arguably lost the least. (Zefra didn’t use Astrograph at all, but really needed AFD.)

Magicians are still a tier 1-2 deck (is Gouki tier 0 or 1?). Pure Metalfoes actually really liked having Astrograph, though for what it’s worth, it is the only one of these decks that doesn’t need to play bad cards in order to make Vortex. Zefra also did play Astrograph, though at the time, the only Zefra player I knew complained that it took two slots in a very tight extra. Maybe on this.

Draco nerfed. Still viable, mark my words.

Correct.

60-card is dead outright. The best playmakers are still there, but Left Arm into Grass is no longer valid backup for Lonefire Blossom. You may see 40-card Dino or Zombiesworn lists in the future given good enough hands, but there’s no good way to fit the Lonefire combo in 40 cards without bricking too often.

So this is a weird one. The Lonefire combo has seen play at least once in the form of a Gouki deck, but that follows a different combo route than the Lightsworn variant did and is demonstrably a worse version of that deck: it’s hard to get more explosive than Gouki already is, and it requires at least two more bricks. 60-card decks as we knew them are totally dead, so I’ll say this is correct.

Gem-Knight FTK dead.

As mentioned above, unfortunately wrong. Haven’t seen it beyond that one time, though.

Chain Burn, for some reason, also dead.

Haven’t seen it since. Correct.

Every deck that plays Destrudo into AFD is nerfed or dead. I expect ABC and Zefra to survive through sheer power, though both lost much in consistency.

This is correct as it is obvious. Calvin Tahan would top with ABC in Nekroz format if it happened again today and Zefra will be better than the best rogue deck until they start losing copies of Zefraath or get horrendously powercrept.

Invoked are fine, though invoked hybrids lost AFD, I guess.

Invoked didn’t really do much but get power crept. I guess this is wrong? The one Invoked hybrid, AKA the deck with six field spell engines and nothing else, did lose this, but it also literally died. So.

World Chalice untouched. If you think you’re good at this game, try this deck and realize how wrong you are.

I didn’t make an explicit prediction here, so no score, but I should mention that it did top at least once during this time. The only list I can find doesn’t use Knightmares to their full potential, but to be honest, the deck doesn’t entirely need them; it can still do an extra link and make the opponent discard four cards off of an opening hand Venus and any monster without Knightmare Goblin.

SPYRAL untouched. Easily a top-tier contender.

Deck was really good for a while, yeah. Correct.

Burning Abyss untouched. Still a solid deck with proper backrow.

Well goddamn, it turns out Burning Abyss is still a solid deck without proper backrow. Current lists run Sekka’s Light at three copies and more than a dozen hand traps. I’d like to call this a coincidental maybe, but I honestly felt at the time that Burning Abyss was only strong due to its ability to pack in powerful backrow without losing consistency, and in that regard, I was totally wrong.

Paleozoics untouched, though the worst part of their worst matchup is totally gone, and they’re very solid versus Altergeist. Budget players, keep an eye on this deck.

Paleo Frogs were good for about half of the format and dropped off pretty hard. It’s not like what it does it bad, just that there are more counters to it. Also is indeed a budget deck. Still correct.

Neo-Spacians tier 1, obviously.

AHAHAHHAHHAAHAHHHAAHHAHAAHHAAHHAHAH

This dumbass one-off comment I made has come full circle because Neo-Spacian Aqua Dolphin saw regular play in a tier 1 deck, that being Gouki. It is played because it’s a level 3 Warrior that can mulligan your opponent’s hand of hand traps, and in that regard, it is absolutely unmatched. This card’s burn damage closed out the last game of the European WCQ in time. Do I deserve to be correct for this? You decide. I think so.

Trickstar ANYTHING

This deck has fallen off a bit, but Drollcarnation is still legal and the deck is still a threat based off of that alone.

Another funny one. This wasn’t that true early in the format, but so-called Kid Touch (Trickstar Sky Striker) ended up being a tier 1 deck for a couple of tournaments immediately after the implementation of the new end-of-match procedures, though not entirely because of them, and not entirely because of Drollcarnation, but both together ended up being an unbelievably scary combo: Trickstars could now make Link Monsters without drawing Scapegoat, and Sky Strikers could get even more consistent advantage while also ticking away with burn at a time where it matters the most. Correct either way.

Tallies after eliminating duplicates:

11 Correct

3 Maybe

3 Wrong

64.7% correct, 17.6% definitely incorrect. Pretty good ratio.

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oldtumblhurgoyf · 6 years

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Top 10 Products I want from Magic

Not even precisely products but more the aspects of products that I think really shined and which could be utilized in other ways to wonderful effect. And if anyone from Wizards happens to see this, #1-5 are literally just “this is what I liked a lot about this product and want to see more of.” #6-10 are things you maybe shouldn’t look at but if you can then go for it. Oh, actually 8 and 9 are cool for you as well.

1. Conspiracy and Conspiracy II were a ton of fun. I have fonder memories of the first since I got to draft it more but these are just right up my alley. Draft matters is definitely a big part of that but I think just the deal where you split a draft pod into smaller multiplayer groups instead of running a swiss tournament is what really defines these products. That’s such a fun way to enjoy Magic and I think even without draft matters you could make a really fun product by embracing that multiplayer aspect.

2. Unstable is just the best damn thing! Silver border is such an absolute and unadulterated joy that I will be real sad if we don’t see another one in future years. But again I think another aspect of this set is something that at least part of Magic’s audience doesn’t get enough of and which I think most of Magic’s audience can really enjoy; the lighthearted fun nature of it. You don’t need just silver border to convey that. Conspiracy definitely brought some of that (I think of them as unofficial silver border sets). But especially if the expert sets are going to focus more on big and serious world threatening conflicts, then the supplemental sets are places to have a little more fun with it. Literally give us a supplemental product where the “plot” revolves around the Gatewatch being on vacation. And it’s unlike any vacation we’d ever go on, but it’s definitely not a world ending thing and we get some fluff and fun stories for like a month while we draft something maybe even a little less serious than Fiora.

3. Less Commander stuff? Personally I’m growing a little bored with Commander and this is stuff I personally want from Magic so I don’t have a problem saying it. Obviously the numbers still currently merit producing the Commander product every year and maybe just eventually I’ll determine it’s not worth my buying it but they are still able to do some cool stuff with it. If not less, then I just want to see more done with it. Commander Draft like I’ve been talking about lately. The boat’s kind of left on putting out a Tiny Leaders thing as the Commander product one year, but maybe explore stuff like that?

4. Planechase and Archenemy! I’m always surprised by how much my friends (who don’t have cards and only play when I bring packs or decks for us) want to play Planechase. Like it’s fun for sure, but this quickly overtook draft as their hands down favorite way to play Magic (or more accurately, draft and then do a Planechase multiplayer game replaced just drafting and playing multiplayer with draft decks). They hardly have interest in doing something else and of course you can always throw a Planechase deck onto any other way of playing Magic (we haven’t yet done Explorers of Ixalan Planechase and the story logic of that is frightening at best...). But at any rate, I would love to see new planes and locales get some Planechase treatment. But outside of that you’ve got two fun formats that utilized a shared library of a sort (well, not shared in Archenemy but still, only one such library in a multiplayer game) and you can do so much more with this I’m sure. In a similar vein, I’d love an official Wizard’s Tower product, likely with some augmented rules and story trappings. I’m imagining perhaps “Battle for the Tolarian Academy” as the Explorers of Ixalan-type product to go alongside Dominaria.

5. Art books are amazing! I’m not sure how well these are doing (whether good or bad) or what it means with the changing block structure (if we theoretically went to three different worlds in a year, they just don’t have the resources to give us an art book for each) but these are some of the best things on my bookshelves. The art is stupendous and the world and story snippets have me coming back months later to get another little taste of these awesome worlds. I hope we can at least continue to get them for new worlds and for revisits that haven’t yet gotten an art book.

6. A Gatewatch cartoon! The Professor has already talked about this and for all the reasons he’s mentioned and more, this could be really cool. I think I’d actually prefer to see it done in partnership with Netflix (or at least along the lines of that sort of model) with a set and closed plot with about 10 episodes or so. I’d rather an Over the Garden Wall style totally enclosed story in one season (even if they never did another) than a meandering and open multi-season affair with no promise of finality or pay off. At least see how that first season goes and then consider how to revisit it.

7. Cube support beyond cards. I’m thinking explicitly a breifcase sort of thing with some reusable plastic sleeves that probably velcro shut or something and hold 15-18 cards neatly. Maybe complete with a little booklet with cube construction advice, “collating” your boosters to accomplish different things and make better drafts, stuff like that. It would have dividers for tokens and dice but the bulk of it would just exist to hold 720 cards ready to go in the provided boosters.

8. I understand a lot of reasons why the story is limited to mostly being a once a week thing online. But I’m also among those (if #5 and #6 weren’t clues enough) who desperately wants more story. There are definitely more stories to be told in Magic than just what sees focus in a set and which we get to see on Wednesdays. The issue here is actually with budget and best use of the taxed creative team resources, but I’d love a situation where some resources are allotted for a Magic Fiction column that is explicitly not focused on the main plot. Wednesday would be the main story. Perhaps on Monday or Friday we would get a story that could be anything--in between some major plot events with the main characters (ok that’s technically main plot but the difference is this isn’t as essential), or a look in with some planeswalker we haven’t seen in awhile (perhaps to seed their reappearance a la Nahiri’s treatment), or just world building and tone setting (Sacrifice featuring the Gitrog Monster is still my favorite Magic story ever and nothing about Shadows Over Innistrad’s plot necessitated that story be written). So many of us are frothing at the mouth for nuggets from the Multiverse. Please give us more.

9. New casting structure for tournaments. I mean specifically the “telecasting” aspect of tournaments. I want the option to watch a much more layman level casting of it where the announcers explain more of what’s going on at a new person’s level. For one, especially for formats I don’t play, that is so damn helpful (it’s such a pain to have Gatherer up trying to figure out what plays are occurring and trying to figure out why, so much so that I don’t watch much tournament Magic at all unless I know the formats/decks going into it and it’s particularly high profile). This would also open it up more as something that I could potentially watch with friends (like those mentioned above) who aren’t nearly as into Magic as I am. This is a weird one and I don’t think this one paragraph does it justice, but essentially I want like the Spellslingers of tournament casting as an outlet to the less enfranchised. That’s not even the best way of putting it but I think you have the gist of the idea now.

10. Scratch off cards! This would go in an un set and this is just a pet idea of mine but I’m real big on it. Variants in Unstable show us that isn’t out of the question. The next step is slapping some scratch off bits over the rules text and figuring out how to do it so you can cast those and scratch ‘em off only as you do that. (targeting is the tricky bit with these but I think there are ways to work around that)

#mtg #wotc

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thelongestdamnreviews · 6 years

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Rockman EXE WS

I'm using a translation patch, so the title screen's been changed.

After going through Network Transmission, I decided to try the other Battle Network-flavored sidescroller platformer Mega Man, Rockman EXE WS. This game for the Wonderswan Color actually released a month before Network Transmission in Japan (almost to the day even), so I guess this game actually came first. For the first clear, it took me around 38 minutes, a second clear at 1 hour 18 minutes, 100% at 1 hour 23 minutes, and finally the third loop was finished at 1 hour 42 minutes. There is a translation patch that I used to understand the text and story too, thus the English in these screenshots. I'll call the game by the Japanese title but I'll use English names for characters and stuff, to keep it easier on everyone.

TLDR The Good

Great spritework - While the quality might not be equal to the GameBoy Advance, I was kind of impressed by how well-done the sprites were. Some enemies are different sizes compared to how they are in the regular Battle Network game, but you can still tell which one is which easily. Just be ready for them to attack differently than you're used to! MegaMan has a pretty big variety of sprites, from his aggressive pose becoming a regular standing animation to having a critical health pant, and every Style has one of these too! Even minor things like changing the shape of his Buster in different Styles wasn't glossed over.

Interesting concepts - Not only do you eventually get Styles that change your element as well as certain parameters, you can slot in up to four different chips for immediate use. Some chips are single-use, while others replace the Mega Buster with an infinite-use attack while activated and some others provide some sort of buff as long as they're equipped.

Replay value - Considering you need to go through the game twice to see everything due to the way the game's set up, there's a reason to keep going after seeing the credits the first time. I'm not sure if you can 100% the game in just two rounds, but three doesn't take that long either.

Though the elements change based on the Style, your charged shot will always behave the same even if using HeatGuts or WoodShield, unlike the home series.

TLDR The Bad

Please do stop the music - I'm not sure where the blame lies with this (the composer or the hardware) but it sounded like none of the songs had actual held notes, instead there was quick two-note warbling in quite a few songs. None of the songs really stood out to me, not that I played it for very long for any one to catch on, but I dunno if they'd be better if they were simply on a different system or what. Consider that the original GameBoy had catchy tunes and even the Mega Man games that didn't have ports of the NES games' soundtracks counted there too. What happened?

Level design/difficulty - I can't condense what I have to say about this to a short paragraph, so watch for the several later in the review.

The story flow is pretty messy - It seems to follow the basic plot of the first Battle Network (Lan receives MegaMan, they murder scores of viruses and Navis, they destroy the LifeVirus) but the way the mini plots of each stage are handled is jarring because there's no real transition. Like, you start one stage "investigating the net for WWW rumors" and you transition to one of the stage branches and suddenly Lan is on a train whose braking system is malfunctioning? What? But this too is tied back to the way levels are designed, so buckle up.

Didn't Battletoads have a stage where you stood on and climbed snakes ("Karnath's Revenge" I think)? That explains what the devs were going for on the difficulty!

Lan Hikari has just entered the fifth grade and receives a NetNavi of his own, MegaMan.EXE. Together, they thwart a Navi causing havoc in their oven and uncover a nefarious plot by terrorist organization WWW, and fight against their Navis and evil operators. In 2D! Again.

Though Rockman EXE WS is another sidescroller game in a series that is RPG based, it's not too comparable to Network Transmission other than a few things that are in common with both. A big departure is that the game is extremely linear--instead of picking zones to clear and having a general progression through the game, you have only a small number of stages you go through in a set order, though there are branches that determine what the second half of some stages are and this determines who you fight at the end of the stage. Because there are only two branches in stages 2, 3, 4, and 5, you need to play through twice to see the other version of those stages. You can't merely get to the end of one stage and then decide to play it again going the other way.

You still destroy viruses and sometimes get chips to use, but almost all of them are "single use and they're gone" types. The game thankfully will auto-reload any chips you use provided you have more in storage, but there is no money and no store so you're unfortunately stuck with what you find, and there is no Folder so chips are gone forever once spent. Some chips found lying in the field on their own are actually infinite-use, like the Sword series that replace your Buster with their chip, toggled on or off. There aren't any PowerUPs to find, instead some chips and all of the Styles mess with MegaMan's stats. HeatGuts increases his attack power, AquaCustom has a fast charge, ElecTeam has faster movement speed, and WoodShield has higher defense, with HubStyle having the buffs of the first three with reduced defense instead.

You can pretend you're Zero if you want, but Sword chips are a little hard to use since you can't walk and swing at the same time. You can still do a repeating two-hit combo on the ground and attack in the air at least.

There are also three "equip for effect" chips that apply their effect as long as they're in your loadout and aren't consumed on use. AirShoes increases jump height, AreaSteal increases movement speed (stacks with ElecTeam/Hub), and Undershirt increases defense (stacks with WoodShield and somewhat helps Hub). These are kind of like X series upgrades though you can take them off at almost anytime, like to keep AirShoes from sending you into overhead spikes when you need a short hop. While having any or all of them equipped takes up slots other offense/recovery chips could use, the tradeoff is almost always worth it. And since I'm on about chips, I'm not sure if there's an actual limit on the number of the ones you can carry.

A new feature of the game is your connectivity to Lan. You start with three "bars" and depending on stage factors, it lowers or disappears entirely. At one bar remaining, you lose the ability to pause and thus can't change chips or Styles, and at zero bars you completely lose the ability to use chips, even the "equip for effect" ones! All of these situations seem to be scripted so it's not tied to performance, and you gain all of your bars back in the hallway before the boss room and in the boss room too. It's not really a notable system but it can inconvenience you a little bit in a couple of places. Losing the ability to even pause is kind of ridiculous though.

Most stages start with a 'neutral' kind of theme and you then transition to an entirely different one at an arbitrary point, and this is one of the problems I had with the game. There's no warning at all when you come to a stage branch, other than there just being two ways to advance, and sometimes a branch doesn't move into a new area but is just a side area to pick up an item before you go back to the main path. Stage branches are categorized by going up or down and you're left in the dark as to what you'll face on the other side, though people familiar with the first Battle Network can probably guess who either on the Navi taunting you on entering or by the way the stage looks. It's absolutely jarring to be in an area and then it shifts into something completely different just because you slid through a passage or something. Imagine if Castlevania games had zero transition corridors or even doors at all.

Hey wait, that’s my line!

I'm not really sure how cohesive the story is if you're not familiar with the first Battle Network game. There are story segments between stages, a primary reason to start the next stage, a small story section for each stage variant, and then back to the between stage story bits--but because of the branch system, you might have characters pop up you didn't see before, or you might end up with continuity errors like facing ElecMan near the end of the game and Lan knows who Count Zap is despite not facing him before. You can actually fight him early in one of the branches, but it's not a guarantee and Lan is never directly shown looking up WWW members or anything either. It's kind of like watching a clip show, where you have these "best of" moments presented without context and you'd probably be lost if you weren't familiar with the source material.

You have nine lives (continues) in every stage, refilled to max when you start a new one. You're going to need them. I found myself getting knocked into pits by enemy attacks fairly often, or I'd botch a blind leap, or so on. It felt like X6's level of unfair bullshit as opposed to NT's pretty difficult but still workable difficulty. MegaMan is pretty slow, I guess to account for the two speed upgrades he can get, and for some reason he seems to slow down when he hits the ceiling...and for some other reason, he seems to catch on the corners of some platforms like he can jump again to save himself, but that doesn't work. The stage layouts aren't as bad once you've been through once at least, but going in blind kind of necessitates save states, which I'm not ashamed to admit that I abused this time. Checkpoints aren't always generously placed, either.

*The Price is Right game over horns*

And the disappearing platforms gimmick is probably the worst in this game as opposed to any other Mega Man game I've played. Usually they appear in a pattern of two with them 'leap-frogging' through the sequence. Here, several of them only have one appear at a time, so you need to use the block to be where you need right when the next block in sequence appears lest you hit your head on it or have the block you're standing on disappear. SnakeMan's stage is great for this, and again you'll be going in blind the first time through so you'll need to redo that section more than a few times to not only get the timing down, but know where you need to be when the block appears. Not all of the disappearing blocks are this way, but then the ones in SnakeMan's stage aren't over spikes...

You can only get some chips by having other weapon chips, like to destroy a wall. Even in stage 2, Lan will point out a wall you can demolish with GutsPunch...that you get in the next stage if you go on the correct path. Later on, there's a wall you can punch with ColdPunch, which is just an Aqua-element GutsPunch, and actual GutsPunch does nothing! And back in stage 2, ColdPunch does nothing to the wall Lan mentions. Why is the game set up this way, other than to pad out playtime? Why can't you just use either one? There's a wall that requires a specific Sword chip too for no real reason. Said wall in stage 2 is actually why I had to do three playthroughs for 100% because I apparently didn't pick the most efficient order of branches.

Because there's no grinding and because you can permanently expend recovery chips, you better use as many lives as you can to learn the boss' pattern before you go all-in since you'll potentially put yourself into an unwinnable situation if you burn everything too early. This came up in NT too, but at least you had the option to escape and save and get more chips then.

Poor ElecMan can't beat Air Man! Also, I used WoodShield Style a lot in these screenshots, but I used ElecTeam a bunch too just for the movement speed boost. AreaGrab was the very last chip I got so I needed something to get me off of the default move speed.

There are six stages but you unlock a seventh after you finish the game once. You get to keep all of your chips and Styles for the second and future loops so you'll eventually have your pick of all the Styles and all, and you can apparently unlock a boss rush kind of thing when you finish and unlock its hardest difficulty when you 100% the game. I didn't bother with this. PharaohMan kind of, uh, gave me a terrible impression given how much of a difficulty spike he is so early in the game.

I really did like the Styles though, and being able to switch at almost any time made for some nice flexibility. The Mega Buster is probably the best weapon in the game, especially if you have an element advantage. Chips on the other hand are kind of hard to use considering the WonderSwan's control setup, so you'd have to take your hand off of the movement buttons to use/toggle one of the chips or finagle a good setup in an emulator like I did. That part kind of tapers off the more equipment chips you get, but it's still kind of troublesome. But yeah, I really wish there was another sidescroller Battle Network that had the best features of Network Transmission and EXE WS and the home series. But that's just a silly dream game I guess.

The WonderSwan itself. A to jump, B to fire, X1-4 to move, Y1-4 deals with the chips. An interesting control scheme since some games could be played vertically, but would probably come off clumsy on real hardware.

Overall, I don't think I can recommend this one. There are some nice ideas but they're put in a game with a pretty haphazard plot and malicious stage design in some places. It's very hard and I can't see a reason for it to be other than to pad out the game length since it can be finished three times in an afternoon, albeit with save states. Without, you'll probably be stuck for longer and I can't see your frustration levels staying low with some of the things the game throws at you. Nice ideas, but the execution just doesn't work for me.

They seem to have moved MegaMan's left eye (his left) down a little too far for the HubStyle mugshot so it kind of makes him look crosseyed. Maybe that's where the defense cut comes in?

#wonderswan color #not recommended

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tooyytraztroxia · 6 years

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konfusion kolapse

(1) The Kreation (2) Konception of the Khimera (3) Kogniti (4) Kraft of the Kastle (5) The Konclusion

(1)

M0ni lay down on the bed, “I am going to make a ring in the melt and mould factory,” he said,“ and each time one is broken a new wish is read.” M0ni looked up over his head and decided the first wish is made when the first ring is broken. The first wish, he discerned: lixx les, must be a wish given by Apex Lume. Looking to the clouds he read the revelation round and round; taken from high in the air or from a position low on the ground.

To enact this idea he rose from the bed and played with the red factory and made a melt, and from the melt he made a ring, and from the ring he made a wish and the first wish is made at nebru deluuz. And the ring made at nebru deluuz sets the time surrounds for the first wish phase. A little wish or a large wish is the choice there, by Apex Lume and Max Shade.

(2)

Every wish must be fulfilled there by heart and taken from d1 until d3 starts. And there every choice is the choice all are to say, and Apex Lume already knows that choice made before that choice came. And to know this is to wish by lume. Any other wish is a wish broken before it starts. Wish for whatever is wanted if wishing is what God wants.

(3)

M0ni worried about the state of the machinery, and I told him tomorrow that there are no rings and no factories. Only wishes are really broken here, and this is the spirit, the spirit of my area. And the kaleidoscope traffic is the difference between lume and shade. In shade anything given the title of truth is seen as such as its the pyramid reflect, and no truth can be seen amongst the variants as the truth is taken from it. Like all states created after the attraction, the state is moved from a current state and the pyramid reflect is made to reverse the effect. As I rote: the reflection came before the casting, and by this recollection he lay down on the carpet.

And to guide by lume interru feduai is to see and show the measure of the diamotron, and this is the duty of Tooyy Traz Troxia. To choose of demonstrator A or demonstrator B are the steps taken, and these are the moves chosen and are the measures made in the cyclotron. And remember, a set of only one set by lume interruption would position adori kemmet in Ashanasahm if accepted.

(4)

As Shade Flex guides to Neverhigh, the lume fades to shade of lower slopes. This invocation in variance by shade necessitates lume is rejected under movement of time dimensions. And d1 is still in the set for variability as emotion is distorted by subordination; and this bears the gears of the mirror as d1 can disappear yet still be called the same.

Lume en shade di strashi interru des diamotron divixis; the two states of interruption and the creation of adori kemmet.

and these pictures of the reflect were photographed from the bedroom floor under Alpha Zellaqav II; a dream by witch stars are seen as M0ni observed them by the reflection of the moon.

(5)

M0ni moved from the floor stood upright and recieved word; from which he discerned; lixx les: it is within both pyramids and between, where I might act in the diamotron dream. And above both sides, around all, justum ax rocc never seen by the third; sits the way, the truth and the phyagis of Tooyy Traz Troxia, guiding from the third to Alpha Zellavak II or anywhere beyond.

There is nothing more certain than what I rite, and this is ritten as the promise I make, it is lixx les ent revalto ex, and that is inspiration from the word of god given to me by the organised seance flashmobs.

And so I finished writing the extract as I sat downstairs just as the first ring I was making was made: a purple ring with striations of every colour, and I added it to the Tooyy Store Trifraxicon.

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gradegenerator8-blog · 7 years

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