Ryan's reaction to the 'Phyrexians becoming inert all across the Multiverse' explanation says it all. 😂

The line of “I would hope they would respect that level of care instead of undoing all that years worth of drama with 2 untapped islands” was brilliant 👌🏻

Magic's marketing team is leagues ahead of their writing team, and this set is the perfect example of that.

The "the evil army suddenly turning off after the big bad is killed" trope is a lot more common than I first thought.

As a side note, Atraxa's Fall's favor text is “Fallen angels should stay fallen.” which is really metal.

“The goggles, they do nothing” 😂 hilarious. Really annoyed at how the praetors died so easily, how Ajani and Nissa came back, how the phyrexians died like the droids in The Phantom Menace….😩 got me like War of the Spark

It's funny how the oil went inert yet phyrexians still were active across the blind eternities before realmbreaker made portals

I feel like this should have been 2 sets. March of the Machine would be one half of the story, and the other could've been something like "Fate of Phyrexia", where Teferi swoops in with his bros and saves the day by banishing the plane to the in-between. That and maybe Sheoldred and Urabrask could've survived as the new feuding leaders of a trapped New Phyrexia.

One story I REALLY like is the New Capenna one where Atraxa destroys the museum. The phyrexian concept of glory and capennan concept of beauty are so incompatible that it makes Atraxa go almost into a tantrum destroying works of art, which shows for me the irony of the phrase "the beauty of Phyrexia" as nothing but "we have nothing but imposed-by-someone-purpose". Like it hit me so hard how different Phyrexia is from everything else in the Multiverse.

Honestly my biggest issue with the story apart from the phyrexians being rendered inert was that vorenclex and jin-gitaxius died in such unsatisfying ways. Vorenclex should have at least have been able to fight off a bunch of nobodies and get in a fight with koth (poor koth didnt get a lot of screen time for our only mirran planeswalker) while jin's betrayal could have had an epic part in at least wounding Elish Norn before getting he was taken out

I love how magic arcanum's summaries make MTG stories way more coherent.

Considering how well each plane did against the invasions, ONE had absolutely no need to exist as they could've just countered the invasion and end up with same result..

I think it could’ve been cool if the fate of the multiverse was decided by the player base like they did in Mirrodin Besieged. They could’ve had big events on MTG Arena and in-person where people choose a side and battle each other, and whichever side has the most wins determines whether the Phyrexians win or the “good guys” win. That way, like you said, it wouldn’t leave people feeling like they were fooled when they mourned the loss of certain characters or at certain events.

For the impression of Nissa’s Vader-like speech alone, it was worth the wait! Thank you! Always appreciate y’all’s videos

I was literally watching another video thinking “when is magic arcanum going to tell me what happened in march of the machine?”

It's very poorly worded, but I THINK that Elspeth is supposed to have killed Vorinclex. They mention a blazing sword cuts his head off, a Zhalfirin helps Teferi stand and then he looks up to see Elspeth. I'm assuming they meant the planeswalking angel killed Vorinclex, and not that some random we've never seen before one shot a Praetor. Also, from a card perspective Karn making a concious choice to break his pacifist code and kill Elesh Norn even though it caused him great mental distress sounds like the perfect chance to reprint "Anguished Unmaking", putting the arguably most important story moment on a card people might actually play, AND have it poetically tie in to the original printing with Sorin (both planeswalkers forced to destroy their own creations). Instead, we got "You are Already Dead" from Kamigawa.

Lukka bonds with a phyrexian monster - "oh no he's completed just to make it seem like that's not a good idea!" Wrenn bonds with a tree - "it's not the same you wouldn't understand, the tree didn't want to be bad" nice story telling I guess

This set should have been two sets. War of the Spark worked because it was ONE big bad evil guy on ONE plane (with reinforcements from a second one, but still the playing field didn't exactly change), and the setting itself wasn't even a super complex one that we didn't exactly have a lot of time to explore, as we'd been on Ravnica multiple times already at that point and also dealt with Nicol Bolas a whole bunch of times... But this? The last time we'd seen the praetors before this story arc was TEN YEARS ago, and they were obviously different as from how they were presented in this story. Urabrask went from an uncaring sort of "I just wanna be left to my own devices" rebel to a plot device that's necessary to distract Elesh Norn long enough. We had our own MtG version of Avengers: Endgame and it was pure liquid ass in my opinion. Melira had always been the exception to the rule that Phyrexian oil could corrupt anything. She was THE ONLY ONE who could heal phyresis... And she dies to a papercut with no fanfare after healing up two planeswalkers that have been fully compleated, and for a long while at that, who also coincidentally do NOT go inert after being healed. Hell yeah, I'm sure Nissa having her guts replaced with metal wires will definitely have no effect on her body and psyche since Paladin Melira used Lay on Hands before croaking. Lots of "random" things just... Happen, I guess? Norn decides to kill off Sheoldred at the start of the actual invasion, and she dies to a gust of wind when just the last set before BRO she was this giant half-dragon engine beast of an invader that could easily disassemble Karn? In the end, I guess it just makes me feel stupid for caring. I knew WotC wasn't gonna be willing to sacrifice its precious protagonists, not even for an Endgame level set, but holy christ. The one named character who died without the possibility of resurrection is literally not even a planeswalker, and all of the planeswalkers we spent time mourning the loss of because of compleation are now basically implied to be recoverable as soon as they are needed in the story again. I shouldn't have to feel like being stabbed by a big cat guy with an axe and killed is a more permanent change to the status quo for a character than having its body tampered with and replaced with metallic bits while its mind is connected to one of the most powerful hiveminds in the multiverse with a heritage spanning 25 years of IRL MtG story and thousands of years in-universe.

My two favorite planeswalkers are Nissa and Ajani. Of course, it was a bummer that they both got compleated. Eventually, I saw the cinematic trailer of Brothers' War with Ajani being a hulking beast mocking Teferi while attacking him. He was so cool in that cinematic. And then All Will Be One came around. I saw Nissa's compleated planeswalker card and it was very impressive gameplay-wise. And Ajani is no longer a sleeper agent. He now has a very cool Elesh Norn-like armor and I would love to see a future Ajani planeswalker card that depicts him with that armor. I've come to terms that my favorites are gone but I was hopeful that what replaced them would be very cool villains that I would enjoy hating. Instead we somehow had this instant-cure cop-out. I guess I wouldn't mind if Ajani and Nissa are good once again, but the art of that Negate literally just gave phyrexian Ajani a wipe transition to his old self. It would be a lot more interesting if he is still phyrexian but not under phyrexian control. That will make for a conflicted and regretful Ajani who would work on redeeming himself on his own terms.

For everyone suggesting the watchers are Elspeth and Serra, here is the text from their first appearance, at the end of chapter two, right as Chandra and Wrenn left Dominaria and headed to New Phyrexia: "But there is someone watching the clearing. There is someone watching the safe house, and the people within it huddled together in search of purpose and direction. A trick of the light might reveal them, or it might not. A keen nose might notice their scent, or it might not. But they are there, watching. All of this feels familiar to them, like a song whose lyrics have long since faded away. Over and over, they try and remember and yet the words flit away. Only the melody remains: a lament for what is to come, a dolorous anthem. The watcher is not alone. There are others, too, seeing and yet unseen. The watcher asks one of them: "What is it we're seeing? Why are we here?" The answer comes like the trumpet of warhorns: We are here to witness the beginning of the end." --- So, the fact that the story says "The watcher is not alone. There are OTHERS" means it cannot be just Elspeth and Serra. Also, later, when we see Elspeth go through her series of 'tests,' this scene on Dominaria is not one of them. All of this leads me to believe the Watchers are yet another faction, and not just an early tease at Elspeth and Serra...

Other planes after the invasion *Kaladesh* Pia: I'm so tired... I hope my daughter's okay... *-New Phyrexia-** Zhalfir* Teferi: We lost a lot... now we're losing another one Meanwhile, in Kaldheim Tyvar: Bro look at this dead deity I just killed Harald: Lmao. Noice

i think personally i would have like the story more if it had at least 5 more chapters, cause the build up felt really good and it made the phyrexians seem really scary and then its chapter 7 and there are 3 chapters to wrap up everything that has been set up, which made the ending feel really rushed and lame imo. like 2 praetors had cool deaths (sheoldred and elesh norn) but then every other death is just like "and then they KILLED vorinclex, and then jin gitaxis fell into his evil soup and elesh norn KILLS urabrask, and kaya KILLS heliod" and its like these are villains that have been built up over the course of 10 years and they only get like a sentence or 2 for them to die. personally, that and the fact that 0 planes lost made the story feel really trivial and just made the phyrexians feel really small and stupid. like an army of millions that cant die and will turn your own ranks against you is a really cool and scary villain, it just felt like wotc didnt give the writers enough chapters to wrap the story up and it felt like the writers were too scared to actually kill off any good characters or settings.

I love your retelling of the story it's just a shame they had such a huge build up and killed every villain with such ease. Knowing the fate of a villain reduces any threat level, why on earth did they not spread this out to two sets is beyond me!

It's sad to not see the fate of Jace here. Though that might be touched upon in "March of the Machines: Aftermath". Still... knowing that Ajani and Nissa are saved, it makes me wonder what happened to MTG's poster boy.

I personally was just sad that the surviving Mirrans were kind of hand waved at the end. As the one plane that basically lost twice and basically permanently I was hoping there would be more reflection on the Mirrans forever trapped on (the now sunless?) New Phyrexia. We know Karn, Koth, Thrun and Melira (for a day) survived but did any other named characters make it? Ghalma the Shaper, Kemba, Jor Kadeen and Kara Vrist all were seemingly recently still Mirran and alive but it's unclear what happened to any of them. Also this is probably just me, but the biggest loss from this was the unique races, species and artifacts of the plane. Did the 'Word for Home' ogres make it? Surely every Fangren is dead now. Mirran Vedalken having four arms is rare and even more so now. Is Chiss-Ghora the defacto sun on this damaged plane now? Did any of the Myr make it? Did any of the unique things from the plane make it, any Swords at least? I feel like they would have mentioned a Phoenix taking the portal but having a story about nesting Phoenix (Otharri and brood) and then leaving them on the plane in the dark is a bad way to go. I was very sympathetic to Koth's troubled musings about being given so much but wishing for what is lost. Anyway, yeah that's where I'm at on this one.

One of my favourite parts is actually in the side stories, the letters back and forth between Gisa and Geralf. I could go for a whole set dealing with their “Family Game Night” against the Phyrexians lol.

I was under the impression the watchers were Serra and Elspeth, and that their inclusion before we see them in the story relates to the fact that they seem to exist outside of time, and their appearance seems to line up with where they were looking and dialogue seemed similar to what they were talking about, but i could have been wrong.

Jin knew how everything was gonna go through, but he died hoy he wanted, searching for knowledge, wanting to see the invasion go through and making a way to see all the planes, a way to remake the will of yawmoth, I won't be surprised if he somehow downloaded a contingency plan to Awaken in the future where people forgot about phyrexia, using the knowledge of zendikar and the eldrazi he might try and take them as their own power

One thing that really bugged me was how Kasmina wasn't even mentioned; we know for a fact she's gathering some sort of secret group of powerful individuals to face off something so huge that could change the multiverse forever and I guess an interplanar phyrexian invasion sounds like it, but she just was nowhere to be seen and all we got is a card hinting at her in the commander set. I really hope she gets to be the next "big" hero of mtg after jace, teferi and elspeth and I kinda hoped more of the gatewatch would die or be lost forever after being compleated just so we could switch to a new set of heroes... Also: WHERE THE F IS CALIX isn't he supposed to be stalking Eslpeth wherever she goes lmao she's been to 3 different planes and to yet another afterlife and he's nowhere to be seen lmao AND WHATEVER HAPPENED TO ASHIOK and her power over elesh norn's fears

It did feel like a sudden end to so much lead up. My biggest question is though: What happened to the Myr?! I hope they found their way to Zhalfir, inconspicuously. Just some background artifacts, dutifully going about their tasks.

My theory on Serra is: She originally came from Capenna (as far as I'm aware it's unknown what plane she si from). She was an angel, like Elspeth and Giada. The reason why angels from Capenna are able to have sparks, is because they are the original angels, and Serra has since travelled the multiverse, making angels from white mana on several other planes - but those angels are just imitiations of the real thing. That's also why Capenna's halo is so potent. I know there is a long history to the Serran faith on Dominaria, but the church nowadays doesn't really have much to do with Serra herself anymore, so maybe the references to Serra are missing on other planes because she felt that a religion around her did more harm than good.

Yay! Just want to say I really appreciate the effort you put into these, and especially this one as the card/story release schedule was particularly tricky this time around. Big props!

I really like the additions of the cards like at 1:38; really helps me put faces to the names:)

Always love story time with Ryan and Nicole :)

Quintorius having his spark ignited and not having his own PW card, feels dirty that we didn’t get that as a card

BAH GAWD IT'S ELSPETH WITH A STEEL CHAIR

The fact that completion was not final as they always made us feel and that the invasion ended in what seemed to be a rushed ending spoiled for me a very well written arc. We needed both Ajani and Nissa to just go away like some of the old Planeswalkers. Otherwise there's no more room for new things.

Tbh my heart was racing as I saw that there was MOM story ready. Thank you so much Ryan and Nicole! ❤

Despite all of the hiccups in the overall story, the fact they were able to give Wrenn this massive story with Chandra taking on that teacher role for Wrenn, teaching her about the "inner fire" and stuff like that was a really nice read. Wrenn seemed like this one off character with not much going for her, but this one set alone catapulted her to one of my favorite characters, especially with her relationship with Chandra.

I think Teferi and Wrenn, Elspeth, and Vraska were my favorite parts tbh. Each of them had so much to actually reflect on and each was written well imo. This invasion probably needed two sets of war and casualties followed by aftermath. It jumps around as much as Episode 9 of Star Wars to about the same effect.

This was definitely a set that felt like there was no real distinction between main and side stories, other than who wrote them. But, I do think they did a much better job this time than with War of the Spark. Though, I imagine we'll have to wait for Aftermath to learn that Chandra and Adelaine was just a phase, because Chandra prefers her partners decidedly elfish.

Great video, explained everything quite clearly. But what still baffles me is what ever happened to Jace and Vraska? :D

The story started well enough and I enjoyed reading for a while but eventually it became clear that the story needed so much more time to breathe. The Phyrexians have been built up as one of Magic's most powerful villains for 30 years. It took Urza effectively nuking the entirety of Dominaria to stop them before and even that only stemmed the tide for a few hundred years. Then the oil makes its way to Argentum on the bottom of Karn's foot and utterly destroys it over the years and creates a new era of Phyrexia that's just as engaging a prospect in its own right! And then we got here and Phyrexia just ended up being a damp squib, seemingly easily dealt with on planes across the multiverse because they needed to ramp up the conflict to its peak, set up a resolution and resolve it all in the same set for some reason. Why could this not have been resolved a year down the line as Phyrexia wins this invasion and the Multiverse is plunged into compleat darkness, forcing pockets of resistance to go into hiding as the Mirrans had been doing all this time. But eventually, with the Multiverse now connected via Realmbreaker, resources and opportunities previously unavailable to singular planes now exist, with immense risk of being caught, and openings can be made to fight back and eventually reach a similar conclusion where Norn's arrogance can be exploited to bring an end to them, Phyrexia being defeated by disunity created by the very connections they forged, and the Multiverse can begin the long process of healing after. Give this part of the story the time and space to breathe and it can be so good! There were even some good points! Wrenn being an absolute stand-out character for one! Instead, they rushed it because they needed to cash in on the story now rather than make it satisfying for their consumers. And now many people are disappointed... This feels worse than War of the Spark when that dropped its own ball. At least then it was shame on them for making the mistakes they made. March of the Machines feels like shame on us for hoping that they'd learnt anything and things would be different this time...

I feel like the threat of Phyrexia petered out here. In the past I think they came off more threatening/ potential to be threatening but because there aren’t actual consequences in this latest arch I think it wasn’t as satisfying ending. I like that the good guys won (wow such surprise) but it could have felt a bit more dramatic in how they won and handled was was built up to be a massive threat

I always look forward to your content! You and your team do great work, keep it up and thank you for making my days better :)

This is the go to channel for me for story and lore. As always, fantastic job. Also, we absolutely need a Thalia + Gitrog Monster buddy cop story.

The card "Onakke Javelineer" has some INCREDIBLY interesting flavor text that I absolutely wish had any additional information about it

Big mystery is how Jace avoided having his mind being completed, and how he saves Vraska

I love the Charlie Brown analogy!!! Right on the mark!! Truly enjoy your videos!! MotM is one of my favorite story, next to WotS.

Thank you for the recap! I loved it, and I love your insight, both your educated criticisms of the writing and your notes of positivity. Thank you, thank you!

Video was well worth the wait! Thank you for the hard work you put into these story videos!

I really loved the mechanical function of Compleated Planeswalkers. The fact that was only got a handful of them printed(many of which are mediocre at best) was disappointing. I was really hoping to see a handful more of them in this set.

I found it rather amusing how the very random side story some time ago with Ashiok and Elesh Norn ended up being as important as it did for the end of this story as Ashiok planted Elesh Norn's fear for Elspeth back then which made her all irrational when Elspeth showed up in New Phyrexia here.

Man summarised the entire fandom response and didn't even say a word. That's magic

Could not agree more with your Charlie Brown analogy. Like I havent even played that long, Im just now starting to pay attention to lore, but the fact that they couldn’t just let their main planeswalkers (which have been printed sooo many times) die off and leave room for new characters to grow and show up more frequently, really just undermines all this cool story and tension they built up. People die, it’s okay to let characters die after a multiverse war. There should be stakes.

Feels like 2 or even 3 stories crammed into 1. Here's hoping we get a few years of small but dense and complex stories now

So you saying the ending is literally the droid army from The Phantom Menace?

I'm really grateful for your videos, actually, keep me updated with the story. Thanks! You do so good!

I’m so happy this came out today! I was eagerly waiting for you to explain this to me

Being annoyed about unexplained things is how I felt about the ending to the Vraska side story. Hoping Aftermath clears that up somewhat.

What are your thoughts on what happened to Jace? He hardly appeared in the story after being given a mystery mission by Elesh Norn, except as a “figment” of Vraska’s imagination in her side story 😢😢

Can’t tell you how much I appreciate these recaps. Really makes my days

It happen that my Gruulfriends are fixed 🥳❤️

Super secret ending: Urabrask having put himself back together with ixl and skrelves help. Seeing the mess of new phyrexia Urabrask: I'm going back to my Forge, skrelve your incharge now Skrelve: manic laughter

I'm glad for these podcasts. I find listening to these stories is very fascinating and they add strength to the stories from wizards.

There's two major things that bother me. The first is Tibalt getting the Dack treatment. Randomly being compleated, dying and not even getting a card!! The second, I enjoy the actual set concept a lot, but with the story it would have been waaaay more impactful to leave the outcome of the invasion, praetors and other characters until Aftermath release, to keep that suspense going. There's such a big difference between Praetors dying to random people a month after the invasion where we're all just on the edge of our seats waiting to find out, and praetors getting killed immediately after years of build up. Also the Aftermath packaging (presuming it's not a fake to throw us off) shows Nahiri with regular hands so once again feels like there's no real consequences.

I like these because I dont have to read

The watchers were definitely just Serra and Elspeth before she picked a plane to show up Angelified

A few things to consider, first the story of new phryexia and march of the machines and how they switched the placement of phryexia and Teferi's home plane this could potentially give an actual origin story of why phryexia was collapsing when yahggmoth was shown it, the second thing that you might want to consider is that the world tree would have probably shifted alongside phryexia. These things said in the original story Planeswalkers were almost all powerful in addition to being almost formless and indestructible and all sorts of things unless that sorce of danger was coming from another Planeswalker. The next thing is that for a time Planeswalkers summoned the exact creature or a perfect copy that could reproduce and if the Planeswalker(s) that summoned it vanished for any reason they would stay around. The next part of that is the new creatures created by Planeswalkers are not completely compatible with their new plane or capable of existing without the help of a Planeswalker. The last thing to consider is that you didn't need to be a Planeswalker to move from one plane to another or traverse the blind eternities, it was extremely hard for any that aren't Planeswalkers to make the journey. These things are all dealing with things that are both pre/post mending though these things have some strange conflicts and such it would also help explain why the rifts were so dangerous and damaging especially when it comes to dealing with how an entire plane was forced into a paradoxical existence and how the paradoxical existence was activity ripping the multiverse apart starting with the planes which are closest to phryexia.

Thanks, love the way you tell the story. You make it fun.

I thought it was kinda really poetic that all the Phrexian’s got rendered inert. Basically, my head cannon is that it wasn’t that “All is one”. The Phrexian’s (specifically the ones invading the other planes) are following “All is one under Elesh Norn”. This kinda explains Elesh Norn’s switch from “We” to “I” when fighting Elsebeth, and why Urabrask was so against Norn. Elesh Norn was flawed, and her vision of unity could not be completed without everyone else in the multiverse listening to her. When she died, her forces who lacked any individuality on their own, died with her. Cliche? Yes. But also very understandable for pointing out why Norn’s plan would never work.

This is so garbage compared to Bolas arc lol. What a waste, phyrexians are my favorite magic villains

The thing I found most interesting about the implications of the story is that now, with Zhalfir being a plane of its own, we might get a whole Zhalfir set, and that's a world I'd like to see explored in detail!

Best Birthday gift I could ask for. Thank you for your dedication to the fans and community.

R.I.P. URABRASK WE LOST A REAL ONE

I'm a little sad we didn't get a card for koma being completed, but they gave etali one that's just like blightsteel colossus when it transforms

My favorite plane was mentioned via an invasion card, that being Shandalar, and it gives me some small amount of hope that we visit it to see what has become of it after all this time. As well as Lorwyn I would have loved to see what happened to Phyrexians when the daybreak/nightfall happened to the plane.

Great video Ryan! I agree about the character moments REALLY carrying this story! A few things overall that I did not like: - The Mirrans blend together into a faceless force behind Koth, despite being the ones who facilitate the climax happening to begin with. We know approximately how many of them remain before the fighting kicks off, but we don't know WHO they are, or what they look like, despite cards like Storm the Seedcore showing us their diverse makeup. The Mirrans have several names behind them; Neyali and Otharri (an entire flock of phoenixes in fact!), Saheena, and Thrun to name a few. But when the dust settles back on Zhalfir, only Thrun, Koth and Melira are mentioned by name. Whether they survived or fell, some closure on the last children of Mirrodin would have been nice. Also! I sure hope they got ALL the Mirrans through that portal! Anyone who did not turn up to the Big Battle is going to be very sad in limbo. - In a similar vein, only the compleated planeswalkers, Atraxa and the praetors are given any story significance. Ezuri, Glissa, Slobad, Ixhel and Vishgraz are no where to be seen. Again, closure for some long-running and even some new faces would have been nice. "I guess they all died," is kind of unsatisfying. - The Phyrexian army suddenly falling is really annoying and very cliched, as Ryan points out. Showing the Phyrexians LOSING after New Phyrexia is sealed away would have been fine, and wouldn't have taken much exposition to describe. This also closes the door totally on the cool potential threads of stories that could be spawned later on. [Holdouts of Phyrexia, unable to spread their contagion, but unwilling to give up on their doctrine, turning up as (side?)villains later on would be very sick, and could even make for some new legendary cards down the line!] But alas.... - What on earth is up with New Tamiyo?? I wouldn't have minded if it was a recorded message to say goodbye to Nashi and show her being at peace, but uh, it lives with them now?? Need more information, lol. - The Sylex going off facilitates Elspeth ascending... somehow? Considering the importance of showing the moment Urza activated it, it would have been nice for some clarity on the logistics of this sequence. I don't mind it at all, I just want more details than the story has room to provide, apparently. To end on a high note, some things I LOVED: - Along with the rebellions of Sheoldred and Urabrask, the cracks in New Phyrexia are shown with Tamiyo and Atraxa. Tamiyo gets wistful and distracted when describing her home, and Atraxa begins to appreciate the beauty of the Maestros' art in New Capenna. It's a nice subtle underline to help show WHY the Phyrexians lose. I am especially fond of Tamiyo's moment, because it reminds us of what we have lost so far. - Wrenn and Teferi and Elspeth saving the day is a nice blend of the three eras of Phyrexia (and Magic storytelling!) I also really appreciate all the callbacks to Magic's history, like the Syelx, the Rathi Overlay and Zhalfir all getting to play a part in putting this chapter to bed. But Wrenn, a kind and humble dryad, ruining the plans of the Multiverse's biggest EGO is just amazing. Thank you, Wrenn! - Elspeth taking command of her fate and finally being able to stick to Elesh Norn was very satisfying. Karn unmaking her, and all the complicated feelings that brings for him, was also simply amazing. - By far my FAVORITE bit was Karn healing Nissa and Ajani, which might be controversial but! Karn was saved from corruption by Melira and by Venser giving up his own Spark. Karn being able to save two people by in turn using Venser's Spark and Melira's help is a beautiful bit of storytelling symmetry. We are again reminded of what it took to get here and how much it has cost so many characters. It certainly was not cheap. I hope Venser is at peace, finally. Thanks for reading my diatribe if anyone got this far!

Excellent, as always. Thank you.

I knew it wasn't a possibility but ONE and MOM would've really benefited from 3 set blocks. With so many things going on across the multiverse it could've had much more of an impact over what we got.

Really enjoy your recaps. Thank you!

You made a good point when you said that you were hoping for some meaningful damage. Sometimes it feels like watching a show where you know the main character won't ever die, so you never worry when they struggle.

I've never been able to get into the magic storyline...until now! Thanks for giving such a great breakdown and "sparking" my own interest in the story now.

Unparalleled storytelling as usual! Always enjoyable to watch. Ulgrotha has a "special" place in my heart and I was concerned that its inhabitants would be easily overwhelmed by the invasion. It may be an underpowered set, but definitely not weak in flavor and characters, so I was intrigued how the Sengirs fought alongside Eron, or even Autumn.

Just looking at the Invasion on Amonkhet card makes you think what could have happened (The backside is the main reason). It implies so much thinking was done by Nicol Bolas when he was setting out to rule everything. It could have been an interesting twist if it was implemented to the rest of the March of the Machines set where they were using the Lazotep to turn the tides back into New Phyrexia or something else. (lazotep the compleated planeswalkers, create new equipment cards, etc.) Another fun twist would be if long ago Nicol Bolas won on Ravnica long ago and then it was Phyrexians vs Nicol Bolas where the Phyrexians tried to take over his army, but the lazotep warriors cannot convert into Phyrexians and the Phyrexians themselves slowly start to get converted. Would have been an interesting reaction for the Praetors to have been on the opposite end of that. (Also to get Praetor zombies would be an interesting but probably broken idea too.)

I feel like an important detail of the first story is how secretive Norn is about the "real reason" she sent Ajani to Theros and Atraxa to Capenna - her paranoid (or actually rather well grounded?) fear of Elspeth and will to hurt her on all axis.

You can make even a wet tissue of a story that is MOM interesting and fun to listen to! keep up the amazing work!

I swear these videos make me enjoy magic so much more, there’s something about knowing the story that makes the gameplay more interesting.

This story was such a double edged sword. There are a ton of cool moments and great pay offs. But an equal amount of fumbles I dunno to how to feel. It felt like they went out of their way to illustrate how far gone the compleated walkers were just to abracadabra magical maguffin them back into the story. There were few consequences. I hope the aftermath set gives this story more context and satisfaction.

imagine this as a movie like the trailers, wow what a production! i admit i only got 1/3 through on 1.5x but is seems interesting, appreciate the content !

Thanks a lot for this. You are the best, this was super clear and your arguments were interesting to listen to. One question, what happens to Tezzeret and the other completed planeswalker like Vraska, Jace and Lukka?

I've seen criticism of Norn losing her mind upon seeing Elspeth. I just chocked it up to Ashiok getting into Norn's head, making her serene and stoic mask crack and leaving space for fear where there was none.

I was excited to hear about the official podcast they're doing for the story until I heard that they would not be comparing mechanics to story beats. This is my favorite part of your videos and really brings the game and story together for me.

thank you thank you thank you. this had to have been a grind to get so fast

Been waiting for this for a while. Thanks Ryan!

LOVE your video. Love the mustache minute : D

@20:40 when I originally read this part in the story I was pretty much thinking it was a copout to fix the problem with the story of phyrexians everywhere. Then I remembered something similar happened in the Apocalypse novel when Yawgmoth died. So there is a precident for it.

I knew after I finished reading the stories that I needed the longest Mustache Minute ever seen. And you didn't disappoint.

So let me get this right. The a-tier villains in Magic get beaten by the gatewatch in not much time. The gatewatch really loses nothing. Karn loses his spark, which I will assume he gets back in under 4 sets. Wrenn gives her all, dies and gets replanted. And a supporting character dies - Melira. And that's it. Who knows what happens to Jace. And Ajani and Nissa become cured. So back in 2011 when we had the Mirrodin Besieged prerelease, the players got to decide which side won and overwhelming chose phyrexia. Wizards did very little with this storyline until Wizards decided to abruptly kill off all the fan favorite characters. So from what I've gathered over my years playing this game, 1 real life year is equal to 1,000 years on a plane we are not on. So for 12 years (or 12,000 years), 4 Praetors lived in harmony until Elesh Norn got a wild hair up her butt to take everything over. Then, in-squabbling leads to the defeat of Magic's best villains? Norn gets told a few bad words by Elspeth and even though she's a machine and the cornerstone of phyrexia, becomes super emotional and sacrifices everything to destroy Elspeth. Then she loses everything. Norn also kills Urabrask and Sheoldred. Jin-Gitaxias gets eaten by his own creations after trying to kill Norn. And after what looks like Vorinclex puts himself in position to give the gatewatch a loss, gets beheaded by a supporting character. Wow... What sloppy writing. So the moral of the story is ambition will make you lose everything. Phyrexia would have never lead an all out charge across the multiverse. It would have been slow and thoughtful. Machines don't die from old age. Sleeper agents would have been planted and phyrexia's influence would have slowly assimilated the other planes, right under the gatewatch's nose. So in conclusion, Gatewatch loses nothing and the fan favorite villains of magic get wiped from multiverse. At least in War of the Spark, the gatewatch loses members. There was real fear in War of the Spark. The Phyrexia conclusion passed without a whimper. Unreal. This was the perfect time to create some new characters for both sides and Wizards wasted it.

I honestly felt the most underwhelming part of the story was they basically did the same thing to New Phyrexia as they did with Nicol Bolas: Throw it into a hole and forget about it. At least, until it's time to revisit for a new set of cards. Because they didn't exactly destroy the plane outright, which could have made for an even more inconceivable series of mental gymnastics to write up. But I can't fault the writers for sticking to something that is quick and simple to make for an easier resolution.