Guildpact uncommon. “Doubling effects” were avoided in design for quite some time after Berserk was considered abusive, but since then they have been making a comeback. Fifth Dawn alone featured three such cards: Solarion, Doubling Cube, and Beacon of Immortality. Don’t expect a card like Feral Animist to get printed with trample any time soon though!
Guildpact common. Gold cards with two abilities often tend to have either two synergistic abilities or two that are completely opposite. Interestingly, although green and red are allies, they specialize in opposites when it comes to controlling combat. Green is most often the color of forcing blocking (though Red dabbles here as well), and Red is the best color at forcing non-blocking.
Guildpact rare. Sometimes giving two different abilities to a gold card based on the colors that make it up leads to a combined effect that is considerably stronger than the effects taken separately. In this case, the ability to give flying to your creatures is much more important when the card can create an Earthquake-like effect as well.
Guildpact rare. Sometimes art for a card is commissioned for other use as well, such as product packaging or a book cover. Because of the dimensions involved, the different versions sometimes show different things. In the full vertical version used for the Guildpact novel, Teysa is shown hiding a knife, which completely changes the feel of the piece, particularly if you’re that guy in the background!
Guildpact rare. Unlike other clans, the Gruul don’t actually have a true leader that’s in charge of the entire guild. It’s not just that the leadership role is contested (like the Golgari); there just isn’t actually a full-blown leader role as the Gruul are organized loosely at best. Borborygmos just happens to be the biggest badass of the biggest clan. Note that his name was inspired by “borborygmus” (the name for stomach rumbling), highlighting the basic, primal nature of the guild.
Guildpact rare. This card’s ability was printed to give players more options for enabling their haunt cards. Flavorfully, it’s no coincidence that the minions of the guild are at their best when the Ghost Council is there to manipulate them, maximizing your profit at the minions’ expense.
Guildpact rare. Guildpact has a higher ratio of multicolor cards for its size than any other Magic set ever printed. This gold card in particular has been generating a lot of email. Not sure what the flavor text means? Check the message boards from Matt Cavotta’s article “Niv-Mizzet, the Fountainhead.”
Ravnica rare. One of the challenges for designing red cards is capturing a flavor of chaos that goes beyond just coin-flipping. Mindmoil is the latest in a series of cards looking for new ways to expand and explore a love for chaos. The idea behind Mindmoil is to create an environment that better favors the erratic red mage, because it gives them the environment they crave. The way this card plays out also represents red’s “in the moment” feel, as this card rewards just playing out spells each turn rather than saving up for some long plan down the road. Red mages want their spells now!
Ravnica uncommon. Forcing creatures to attack has been around since the very beginning of the game. Despite this generally being seen as a red ability, the Alpha set had both Siren’s Call (blue) and Nettling Imp (black). In the current color pie forcing a creature to attack is primarily red because it often represents stirring up a creature’s passion or anger. That’s also why these kinds of red affects are typically temporary - manipulating emotion tends to be an “in the moment” kind of thing, which is right up red’s alley.
Ravnica common. The actual power level of specific cards can often fluctuate greatly depending on the rest of the format around that card. A common example of this is how in older Limited formats Shatter was marginal as a starting card, but in Mirrodin block it was outstanding. White has had eighteen 1-power fliers for two mana, and their usefulness in Limited formats has varied pretty wildly. Thanks to Selesnya’s convoke ability, a cheap flier with Vigilance is considerably better in Ravnica than it may have been in other sets.
