Lots of Magic players have a preferred creature type they like to use. It's just a fact - people like to pick favorites. And that's reflected in deckbuilding choices from competitive Constructed (Elves and Goblins, anyone? Not to mention Dragonstorm) to the casual table. One of the classic features of a tribal deck is a "lord" creature (though they're no longer printed with that creature type), such as a Goblin Chieftain to bring the pain faster or a Drogskol Captain to ward off removal. There have even been multi-type lords such as Death Baron. But the fact is, outside of Adaptive Automaton, many tribes have been left out in the cold as far as lords go.
Mark Rosewater, however, plans to make sure that won't be the case for at least a few creature types. On his Tumblr question-and-answer blog, he coyly admitted to R&D plans to support previously unsupported creature types with a future lord. First, when Tumblr user thegrem said, "Formal request: Minotaur tribal! We're getting really good minotaurs lately, we just need a lord! ... a legendary, RUW-colored lord! =]," Rosewater responded:
We keep doing minotaurs which means it’s just a matter of time before we get a minotaur lord.
The popularity of Minotaurs seems to have exploded after the printing of Zedruu the Greathearted in the first official Commander set, and the other "just a matter of time" on everyone's minds, a wedge set, may be just on the horizon. In that case, Minotaurs would be a natural tribe to represent the red-white-blue color triad. Exactly what abilities a Minotaur lord would grant would depend on how they're represented in a particular set, but an emphasis on the labyrinth aspect of Minotaur lore would probably imply unblockability or removal-from-combat abilities, Reconnaissance-style, but perhaps done in a more red way, such as "remove target blocking creature from combat. Each creature it was blocking becomes unblocked."
Rosewater also said that a couple of much-commoner creature types that haven't received much support as of late would likely get some soon. When Tumblr user chrisseabock asked, "Any chance of seeing a wizard or shaman lord in standard any time soon?" he replied:
We support wizards in basically every set so yes there’s definitely a chance.
There are definitely a lot of directions that particular lord could be designed in; I, for one, would like to see a Wizard or Shaman lord that granted tap-to-ping abilities en masse to all of your Wizards or Shamans.
Is your favorite creature type due for a lord of its own? Let me know in the comments.
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