April 2016: Shadows over Innistrad
Spoilers, Rumors, and Speculation forum
Posted on Oct. 31, 2015, 6:42 p.m. by JWiley129
Announced during GP Indy, the Spring 2016 set is Shadows over Innistrad!
Edits for FAQ:
- Here is Mark Rosewater on why we're getting two returns in a row.
Here's the proof to my theory:
March 6, 2016 11:28 a.m. Edited.
Grrvvpp23 It does. Scions are not angels so it will work. You can also sac anything from Exploit creatures to goblin token to trigger the flip.
March 6, 2016 11:34 a.m.
I could always be wrong. Maybe Nahiri's attack was an isolated incident. I don't know the truth, but this could very well be the closest we have.
March 6, 2016 11:43 a.m.
Alright that's nuts, don't know which impact will she have in other formats but I'm definitely in to play her in standard. Cards like Vile Redeemer/Sifter of Skulls with some weenies and a Nantuko Husk can directly burn the opponent with multiple flips lol
March 6, 2016 12:02 p.m.
My thought was that Nahiri is the one responsible be weakening the seal Avacyn created on the Pre-Avacynian gods. It's not quite clear what her role is here other than her being Uber-pissed. But I think she weakened this seal, then the gods cause the madness. That's my best guess.
March 6, 2016 12:07 p.m.
Homura_Akemi says... #9
Emrakul warps living things. Nahiri is confirmed to have gone to Markov Manor and trap a bunch of living vampires in stone. Clearly revenge against Sorin. She could be behind the moon and Avacyn
March 6, 2016 12:08 p.m.
Grrvvpp23: I know right lol. Trigger her, and than during the up keep, Flash in another Avacyn and get the indestructible trigger and poof, your creatures survive the board wipe! Or use Vile Redeemer to get a bunch of Scion tokens after your stuff dies (not nearly as good, but still ok especially after a board wipe).
March 6, 2016 12:10 p.m.
lol maybe she broke powerstones sealing a portal to phyrexia! no wizards pls no phyrexia. you already ruined my favorite plane with it. now not my second favorite plane!
March 6, 2016 12:10 p.m.
Sorry, but no Eldrazi or Phyrexians.
We just had a block filled to the edge with Eldrazi. We won't see Emrakul for a while yet. Besides, Emrakul doesn't drive living things Mad
Phyrexians corrupt through machinery not through any psychotic means.
March 6, 2016 12:19 p.m.
DemonDragonJ - I watched the professor's predictions and honestly the only one I can get behind is the whole psychological horror part.
Though I have speculated on word choices, clues from the videos and just outright theorizing I highly doubt that eldrazi or phyrexia will be on innistrad for a number of reasons.
Not least of all is that it would be a waste of amazing lore potential. Innistrad is one of the most "Gothic" settings in all of magic. A real "dark ages" realm. The approach they are taking with the "angels turned evil" and an Inquisition like battle against werewolves is genius as far as I'm concerned. Throwing something like the afformentioned baddies into it would be too much and completely inappropriate.
Just my 2 cents.
I understand that the professor said he hopes to be wrong about all but the one prediction but I think he's off base regardless.
March 6, 2016 12:27 p.m.
IzzetGod yeah that's true too lol, she has a lot of approaches. Since you can stack her ability multiple times she will keep flipping at the next upkeep right? That was my point with the cards I mentioned, getting 6-8 triggers from her could be achievable
March 6, 2016 12:30 p.m.
Phaetion - I find your theory to be both well thought out and practical. Though I haven't had a chance to read over your source material yet I am thoroughly intrigued by the idea of "dead/forgotten gods" driving the world wacko.
Also, on the Nahiri reference, I believe she would/could have been the catalyst that set the world on fire so to speak. Knowing or otherwise.
March 6, 2016 12:32 p.m.
elpokitolama says... #19
So, as far as spoiler and artwork go, I don't think we're going to see Nahiri in this set. And when I say not this set, I mean nor SOI nor EM will feature her.
Almost confirmed planeswalker: Sorin, Jace, Tamyio, Liliana and finally our hypewolf walker. Tamyo has only been printed once so she's obviously going to be there, and if Jace is a redundant walker we're already missing his appearance in the BFZ/OGW set so I doubt greatly that the design team would let him out of the 5 walkers slots this time.
[Edit] I think things are going to be like this: SOI -> planefwolfker + Jace, EM -> Sorin + Tamiyo. I'm yet unable to find in which set Liliana will come tho. x)
March 6, 2016 12:32 p.m. Edited.
GoldGhost012 says... #20
Just because Sorin and Tamiyo have appeared on artworks and referenced in the cards/lore doesn't mean they'll get cards. :(
March 6, 2016 12:35 p.m.
Grrvvpp23: I don't thin so. If you cast her, and after she's on the battlefield and you for instance, sacrifice 8 Scion Tokens, she will flip at the next upkeep but it'll only happen once.
March 6, 2016 12:37 p.m.
elpokitolama says... #22
Last set, we had way too much walkers that were extremly important to the story. Here, Nahiri may just have done what she's best at: do some crazy shit, then vanish Cthulhu knows where.
March 6, 2016 12:38 p.m.
Thank you for the compliment. It took me a while to piece it together.
Also, I found more clues, one of which we all missed:
Teaser Trailer. Notice that the feather turns bloody once it crosses in front of the moon and floats underneath it, then it lands on a stone Avacyn symbol, which gets distorted.
Look at Avacyn, the Purifier's flavor text, and think: Take my theory about a pre-Avacynian god, and consider that if a group of people leave the Church, who would be the next to be worshipped? Correct, these old gods.
Someone posted the art of Incorrigible Youths, pointing out the oddities on the children. Of note, look at the tentacles. Either our god of sea and storms is a humanoid octopus/kraken or is a kraken itself.
March 6, 2016 12:46 p.m. Edited.
IzzetGod but... for example in Thraben Sentry Flip rulings says: "If multiple creatures you control die simultaneously, Thraben Sentry's ability will trigger that many times. Each time one of those abilities resolves, you may transform the creature, even if it's Thraben Militia at the time." It doesn't apply in this case then?
March 6, 2016 12:55 p.m.
"Besides, Emrakul doesn't drive living things Mad"
What was said here is exactly wrong. Eldrazi Conscription alone disproves this.
I need more spoilers.
March 6, 2016 12:57 p.m.
Cathulu has come to innistrad. Wizards owns the cathulu theme and innistrad is basically the scene for every cathulu game ever. Heck cathulu's abilities ALWAYS revolve around madness in the games he is in
Emrakul warps minds. And eldrazi inscription gives annihilator which means whoever got enchanted basically just became a plane devouring eldrazi-esk something so eldrazi inscription does not prove or disprove anything. But anyways its cathulu not emrakul
March 6, 2016 1:01 p.m. Edited.
Well, alright, but I still highly doubt we'll see Eldrazi here. The story is epic enough as it is. No need to ruin it with something that we literally just had the previous block.
March 6, 2016 1:01 p.m.
Well, I just hope that there will be no "great evil" or something and they will keep Van Helsing-ish style of Innistrad.
Giant sea monster that's actually well made and scary would be cool tho.
March 6, 2016 1:01 p.m.
EverythingIsK, no not over resto. 4 resto and 1 avacyn. Not because of synergy, just as an efficient creature. It flashblocks anything, and makes an interesting bordstate with her second ability. Many games are won with Resto beatdown because the combo is so fragile. Avacyn does that better.
March 6, 2016 1:03 p.m.
And by the way... In case you didnt know. Cathulu is a giant squid faced monster that requires summoning by a cult following. He is considered an old god and usually has a following of various other types of monters. He drives things crazy, its what he does.
March 6, 2016 1:08 p.m.
AgentGreen says... #31
Anyone thinking that WoTC is stepping up their game; it seems like they basically said "Yeah, the whole BFZ block sucked, so we're going to compensate with this kick-ass block."
I'm liking this alot
March 6, 2016 1:12 p.m.
It's fitting. I've been thinking that the Stromkirk sea god can drive beings mad, but I wasn't sure if it had that power, now I can safely guess that it does.
March 6, 2016 1:13 p.m.
A: Cthulhu
B: We all know who Cthulhu is and what he does.
March 6, 2016 1:14 p.m.
Thank you for correcting that...I was like "WTH is a Cathulu?"
March 6, 2016 1:20 p.m.
A Cathulu is what happens when you breed Cthulu with a cat. Good luck with the mental imagery.
March 6, 2016 1:26 p.m.
Grrvvpp23: I believe you are right in that sense, as on the internet, other threads have people saying how it works is if 5 creatures die, it triggers Avacyn multiple times cause her to flip 5 times (back and forth between Archangel and the Purifier). I however believe a ruling will change since I can see that being abused and can actually kill somebody. If you have a Nantuko Husk and sac a lot of creatures while Avacyn sees them, 13 triggers will deal 21 damage. And usually by the time you cast her, your opponent possibly took 2-3 damage so you really only need 9 or 11 triggers to kill them (9 triggers are 15 damage and 11 are 18). Because of that interaction, I believe we will see a rules change to make it so that you can have multiple triggers, but she can only become Avacyn, the Purifier once and once she becomes that, the other triggers essentially do nothing unless you have a card/ability that can flip her back at instant speed.
March 6, 2016 1:27 p.m.
HighDragon.PKMN says... #37
Entire story arc of Shadows over Innistrad:
Jace: Garruk eat a Snickers!
Garruk: Why
Jace: Becuase you're not you when you're hungry
*Garruk eats a Snickers bar
Jace: Better?
Garruk: Better
Garruk is healed of the Chain Veil's curse and he and Jace become best friends and live happily ever after
They could even do a sweet flip Walker where he starts off as a G/B Walker and then when he eats a Snickers he could transform into a G/W Walker.
March 6, 2016 1:27 p.m.
I always thought Cathulu was Hulu for cats, thus the origin of the phrase "Hulu and catnip?"
March 6, 2016 2:08 p.m.
Phaetion I'm not sure I understand your theory. Runo Stromkirk, the high priest you speak of, is still alive. The lore text of Stromkirk Captain aluudes to this "No longer can we allow our human populations to be mindlessly slaughtered by ghouls. Slay all who trespass." Runo Stromkirk.
In fact he's a vampire, and I'm pretty sure he would have no interest in the things of his past, since he's been busy consolidating his power in the region of Nephalia, influencing vampire friendly endeavors, such as the deforestation of the region.
However, the idea of a sea monster, bound away by the silver moon, is quite interesting. After all, the Helvault itself locked away Griselbrand and Avacyn. And thats just a shard of it.
March 6, 2016 2:23 p.m.
kyuuri117 - Read Avacyn again, you need to have one of your non-Angel creatures die and she flips at the beginning of the next upkeep. She's pretty immune to shenanigans.
March 6, 2016 2:44 p.m.
She next to requires a Sac outlet, I'm still not that excited about her.
March 6, 2016 2:51 p.m.
I read Avacyn as a single flip, not sure how people could read multiple as the second side has no flip text like some werewolves.
March 6, 2016 2:57 p.m.
GearNoir - There is a rule (currently) that if a creature has a transform trigger you can trigger multiple times it transforms that many times. I forget the card, but if you have two non-Angel creatures die then Avacyn would transform twice, once into Avacyn the Purifier and back to Archagnel Avacyn.
EDIT: I found it, read the ruling on Bloodline Keeper Flip.
March 6, 2016 3:04 p.m. Edited.
i know right! can wait to do something with Vile Redeemer and Sifter of Skulls!
March 6, 2016 3:08 p.m.
I said current rules b/c this post by Matt Tabak might indicate a rule change for that.
March 6, 2016 3:10 p.m.
JWiley129 I'm looking through the rules highlighted on the MTG Salvation wiki and not seeing where this is true.
Does anyone have a link to the rule that implies this?
CheeseBro says... #1
Phaetion: i actually really like that theory!
March 6, 2016 11:27 a.m.