Card Talk 1

Arni Metalbrow card art

It's been a slow few months for Magic in this house. I haven't enjoyed, collected, or played the last few sets (save exposure to them on Magic Arena), and have been involved in other tasks that have dominated my time. But I haven't forgotten about this game, and so today I kick off a series I've been thinking about for some time: Card Talk.

Here is how Card Talk works:

• I go to Scryfall and select 'Random Card'
• I present and blog about the card. I could discuss any aspect: the art, abilities, cost, set, impact on the game, and so on. Stream of consciousness.

Card Talk should be a fun, uncurated way to look at cards throughout Magic's history. And it should reveal some of my own preferences, biases, and memories of the game. Here goes. The first card in this series is . . .

Demon of Dark Schemes

Ugh. I am not excited that this was the first card, for two reasons. 

First: I never played this card, nor enjoyed this set. Kaladesh was released in September 2016. The first of a two-set block (Aether Revolt followed in January 2017). Set on a then-new plane, it had a steam punk motif that I didn't particularly enjoy. Nor did I like the energy counter concept (which you see on today's card). Energy counters were just 'one more thing to track' and I felt they did not add enough benefit to the game to warrant use. Kaladesh was significant for another reason, though; it introduced a new card subtype: vehicle. (Mark Rosewater talks about that process here.) Vehicles are artifacts that become artifact creatures when 'piloted.' The ability is called 'crew' and reads as follows on all vehicles:

Crew [x] (Tap any number of creatures you control with total power [x] or more: This Vehicle becomes an artifact creature until end of turn.)

Second: demons are creature types that upset some people. I am a Christian; I believe angels and demons exist. So it is easy to get antsy when I see card types like this. Nevertheless, Magic is a card game that makes no attempt to be imitative: it is fantasy with no desired connections to real-world beings. On my other blog, I discuss how Christians should approach content consumption. That summary post links to other posts in the series including guidelines for evaluating things like fantasy and games. Following those guidelines, I relax a bit. In Magic, the color black represents evil, and it is okay to play a game and be the bad guy because games are closed environments (read the linked article for more). That said, I still prefer my white angel deck.

Other card observations:

• The date embossed in gold indicates that this is a prerelease card; it appeared as a single card in a prerelease kit, which is a box containing 6 packs plus one single card (and one die). Prerelease kits are sold one week before set release at local game stores, enabling players to explore the new set by playing sealed format (you have six packs and build a 40-card deck out of those cards, adding basic lands).
• Ignoring the energy ability, this card is still pretty powerful. Six mana for a 5/5 flyer isn't bad, and its 'enter the battlefield' ability can board wipe some deck archetypes (like red burn or white weenie).