A member of Wizards of the Coast's publicity team invited me to see the new Duels of the Planeswalkers coming out in conjunction with M12. Here is the rundown:
- Sengir Vampire is being reprinted (along with Serra Angel) in M12 as an uncommon. Not the original art though.
- Bloodthirst is coming back in M12. If you don't remember it, don't worry because neither did I. While the vampires I saw who had it are going to be fine in limited, I doubt this "win more" card is going to make constructed play.
- Troll shroud is finally getting a keyword: hexproof.
- Wizards is making a big push to integrate the physical card release with the online game community. WotC President Greg Leeds put out a statement to that effect. There will be an event held in WPN locations for the players who beat the game. There will, undoubtedly, be a promo card.
- The new Duels is infinitely better than the old one, in that I had no instant desire to ragequit playing it. The decks can now have cards removed, although you still cannot decide the number of lands. It isn't going to be MTGO in allowing you to play Magic as you do offline. There has been an attempt to improve the game's use of graphics, sound and animation. It obviously still needs a lot of work. Whoever put the settings under the "Help and Options" menu needs to spend more time with gamers. When I see "help," I stop reading. The battle animations are not what one would hope for, but Duels is still a long way from being a good _video_ game that actually puts you in the experience like an RPG. That would require them to animate the cards...
- They acknowledged the problems with the AI and assured me that it will not be as boneheaded as it used to. I tried to give it a try, we will see.
- The Gideon online deck includes Stoneforge Mystic. If they do end up printing these decks, they are going to be unsucky and may even sell.
- Kiora Atua is going to be "exclusive" to the video game. That still leaves me wondering if it might be the promo for that celebration for people who beat the game.
- The three Titans you see in the picture are the promos that are being given away with the game. Frost Titan is for Steam, Grave Titan for XBox and Inferno Titan for PS3. The art is sweet. It is also misattributed on Grave Titan. Are the ones being passed out now be the only ones to have the wrong artist? Sun Titan was a promo. Now these promos. Is the big guy going to be a promo, possibly for the Duel champs?
More information as I get it.
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