Magic: The Gathering
Magical Thinking: Kaladesh
Welcome back to Magical Thinking, a look back at the cards and art of Magic: the Gathering, set by set from the beginning, through the eyes of a casual fan. This week we have a new two-set block on a brand new plane: September 2016’s Kaladesh.
Kaladesh is the home plane of our favorite planeswalker and pyromaniac Chandra Nalaar. A plane overflowing with an element called Aether, but lacking many mages. Instead the plane relies on artificers to build beautiful machines. The Aether however is controlled by the Consulate, who persecute pyromancers and keep a tight control on the Aether. Chandra has returned to her home plane so she can save her mom from the Consul agent Baral, and the rest of Gatewatch gets involved when they find out Tezzeret is on the plane. What is Tezzeret up to? We’ll find out.
Behold, our first new mechanic for the set already. And it’s a doozy. Energy is basically a new resource. Some things generate energy, and you can spend energy on effects for cards. Energy is a six on the Storm Scale, and is apparently a rather infamous mechanic, so don’t expect to see it outside of Kaladesh.
A major change in this set is they started printing a little Magic symbol on the cards which had story relevance. I don’t know how much longer they keep doing this, but it makes my job easier. Here we see the Consulate taking Chandra’s mom captive. Epic rescue incoming.
Here’s a creature type we haven’t seen in a while: Dwarves. I think this is also the set that made Dwarves part of White instead of just Red. We can also see from the art Kaladesh has Vedalken in it.
That is one gnarly-looking cuff. Also, I think the helmet might need a little work too.
A major plot point of the block is it takes place during an inventor’s fair, where scientists in Kaladesh show off their works. In case it hasn’t been clear Kaladesh’s aesthetic was inspired by Indian culture, with a steampunk angle.
If I were there I’d want to scratch under that thing’s chin too. Who wouldn’t?
Servo’s are the tiny artifact creatures introduced in this set. They are cute little do-dads. This is an “artifacts matter” set, so having extra little guys around is always helpful.
Bob Vila!
I love how he has a steampunk version of a staple gun. We need more fantasy versions of conventional tools.
Aw, what a pretty animal. I think hyenas get a bad rap. This one looks wonderful.
And you thought the judges on American Idol were tough. This guy makes Simon Cowell look like Mr Rogers.
Once again Tezzeret is up to some tricky shit. It looks like he plans on cleaning out Kaladesh and taking off with the spoils for some nefarious purpose.
The Invention Fair on Kaladesh resembles the Red Bull Flugtag, only more of the people in it actually can fly.
This crab may seem docile, but once they kick into MAXIMUM OVERDRIVE, watch out!
It’s always great to see how Vedalken look in every plane. I wonder if we will ever find out what plane the Mirrodin Vedalken came from.
As I mentioned before, the Consulate keeps a tight control over the Aether and persecutes and suppresses anything that might upend their monopoly. No matter the world, rich assholes have to ruin it for everyone else.
Roger Roger.
The droid army from the prequels? Anyone get that? Anyone?
Damn, I already made my maximum overdrive joke.
Aetherborn are Kaladesh’s Black mana race. Aetherborn are born directly from the Aether itself as a byproduct of technology. They only live a few years so they adopt a YOLO style lifestyle (or alternatively they become vampires) and are generally one of the nicer of the Black mana races, which is why I like them so much.
I love that look Chandra has on her face It’s like Liliana is telling her a dirty joke.
I don’t think that’s how that magic trick works.
Also, it looks like the guy is doing more damage to himself than the guy he’s maiming. Doesn’t that kind of defeat the purpose?
Here we have another Aetherborn, the crime lord Gonti. Not the nicest guy in the world, but he does end up on the good guys’ side in the next set.
I think that is Chandra’s dad, who was killed by the consulate. So of course the consulate would try and scrub his name.
Fabricate is another new Kaladesh mechanic: You either get a big creature or a lot of little creatures, depending on what you need. It’s a 6 on the storm Scale and only shows up in this set. It’s a pretty neat mechanic, if only because I love me some servos.
Oof, isn’t that just the truth. This card hits me where I live. Just the creative millennial’s life in a nutshell.
Any crash you can walk away from is another opportunity to crash something else.
“Hey buddy, you want to buy a glowing arrow?”
I’m sorry, that doesn’t really look like an efficient murder weapon to me.
Gremlins! Now there is a creature type we haven’t seen in a while. The last time we saw gremlins in Magic was waaaay back in Antiquities, where we found out Phyrexia had gremlins. Fortunately these gremlins are Phyrexian-free, but no less destructive it seems. Also they look like aardvarks, which are adorable.
Of course we can’t have a set about Chandra’s home and not have Chandra herself. And boy does she look mad. I’d hate to be whoever is on her shit list today.
Well, considering Tezzeret is trying to kill her mom, I think it’s obvious who Chandra is so pissed at. And remember, Tezzeret knows exactly who he’s trying to kill. This is like a power move for him.
A runabout! I’LL STEAL IT! NO ONE WILL EVER KNOW!
I actually didn’t realize Pia had her own card. She’s like a pokemon trainer, only with artifacts.
When you get impatient for something to appear on streaming so you just torrent it (Not that I would ever do such a thing *nervous eye twitch*).
Kind of surprised to see dragons in Kaladesh as well. Also surprising they don’t use energy at all.
Okay so first the battle droids and now pod racing? If Jar Jar shows up I’m tapping out.
Where does a giant walk? Wherever they want, as it happens.
Hey, monkey really DOES hate technology. The song was right.
The real reason Chandra came back to Kaladesh was to introduce her mom to her new girlfriend (That’s my canon and I’m sticking to it).
Shame they never invented mold armor on Kaladesh.
That elephant’s tusk game is on point. How do they even keep their head up with those bad boys on there?
Aw look, he’s got a little figurine robot buddy. That’s cute.
I know objectively that big robot in the picture isn’t the same one from the Highspire Artisan, but I’d like to pretend it was. In which case, wow. I guess they drank their milk, huh?
And of course Nissa is here to support her GF. Also, that ultimate is super cheap. You can get it the turn right after if you really want.
Oviya is a cool old lady in the Kaladesh story who is part of the secret resistance and helps Chandra and Nissa out. She’s also pals with Ajani.
I think that one’s gonna win the fair. On the grounds it will start stepping on things if it doesn’t.
I love people who look at the story of Icarus and are like “Well yeah, RIP that guy, but I can do better.”
I think Dovin here is our first Vedalken planeswalker (and the only one, I believe). He’s also the fun police, in true Azorius fashion. In a later set he ends up taking over the Azorius senate, but more on that later.
The super strength harnesses are great and all, but I’m more interested in that spiral shaped tree. Are all trees on Kaladesh like that?
And here we have another native planeswalker. She ends up helping the Gatewatch after Tezzeret begins his coup.
If you want to disintegrate someone on Kaladesh you better do it by the books. We got procedures here, buddy.
The last new mechanic in this set and by far the most successful was vehicles and crewing. Vehicles are artifacts that need a crew, as in you tap creatures to make them into artifact creatures. So this is a train that catches you. Vehicles are between evergreen and deciduous, and have shown up as recently as Kaldheim.
I thought I had a “This elephant never forgets” joke but I lost it. Still, cool looking design.
Yeah, the puzzle sections of a game are always the most annoying for me as well. At least its not a slide puzzle.
I am really digging the borders on these vehicle cards. I wish they used them for all artifact cards. I can’t be the only one who misses the classic brown.
In a supreme twist of irony, the pinnacle of science has become “punch someone really really hard.”
Looks like a pinewood derby car built by the Jettsons. Not saying that’s a bad thing mind you.
Spoiler warning: It falls into the wrong hands.
Is that like an art installation or is it an actual puzzle you can solve?
The blood on that one blade is vaguely troubling. I think those crowd members should move back, they might be in the splash zone.
I like that you need to have three or more artifacts out to use its main effect. It’s like the judges are ready to pick a winner from the three, then you pull out a dark horse candidate to win big.
And with that I think we’ve said all can be said about Kaladesh. Join us next time as we continue our look at this plane, because there’s more than aether in the air: there’s REVOLUTION. Aether Revolt is next week. Until then, Stay Magical.
