Okay so I got into Magic _because_ of this set and I have to say, it was WAY more beginner friendly than the commander precon I bought in anticipation. Something i think a lot of people overlook that really helped me get into it was that all of the animals had a very clear theme that helped me internalize the identity of the different colors of mana, something that I had a hard time understanding beforehand. Like, conceptually I knew that blue is good at control and that black likes to play with the graveyard, but I didn't really know what that _meant_ gameplay-wise until I started reading my rat cards and building my Vren deck. I think the themes are communicated well with the art too. There was a lot of: "Oh, all the otters are casting spells, red/blue seems like a spellslinger archetype" "all the mice, rabbits and birds I've seen are depicted in groups, I wonder if there's anything to that?" "Raccoons are scrappy and resourceful. I now intuitively understand this color combination." That stuff, along with the deck building advice I got in the draft box caused everything to click together as to _why_ I would want to build in any given color, rather than just like, the vibes.
This is fantastic feedback. I had it in my mind that Bloomburrow seemed beginner friendly, but was totally taking my understanding of the colour pie for granted. Thanks for sharing!
That's why I always appriciate that little card include in sets that explains what the archetypes are and how to build around them. I've been playing a long time and that's still something I find useful going into a new set
@@RedBobcatGamesi'm a seasoned limited player, placed first in the bloomburrow pre release. But the third place out of 18 players was taken by a 14 y.o. kid who was playing magic in a store for the first time. He basically opened the ral planeswalker and built an otter deck because it was on theme (he liked otters). He built a very sinergistic limited deck just because they were the same cute creature, i thought it was design genius by WoTC
@@RedBobcatGames the latter BUT WHAIT _there's already Fondation over the horizon!_ so forget about Bloomburrow ! ..... _did somebody said ...._ *HORIZON?*
Its such a shame duskmorn got pushed forwards to make room for foundations because a set like foundations existing is important for the game I would say, but it had the knock on effect of stomping on bloomburrow's space, wish we could've stayed here for one more set at least.
Bloom burrow was my first pre release and I loved it! Each of the color pairs being a creature type made it very easy to figure out what kind of deck to build based on what animal you had the most of/jived with best! It's not my first set, but since starting with commander around the time of the new Eldraine set, this was the first limited environment I had any interest in!
Prerelease is by far and away I think the best format outside of kitchen table. If I'm going to spend money on a set, it will almost always be a prerelease first
I’ve “read” both the Bloomburrow & Duskmourn stories via the audio version that WotC’s been posting (which I highly recommend) and I enjoyed them both. As far as Ral being in Bloomburrow, he hardly takes over the story, but joins up with Mabel and pals to provide outsider context and amusing awkwardness.
Okay, that's good to know. I'm very much in the "Once bitten, twice shy" stage with Magic's narrative lately. And having flash backs to the Planeswalker Crossover Wedding Crashers on Innistrad...
Meanwhile, while I kinda liked Bloomburrow's story (it's the best any Magic set has had in a while, but ultimately mediocre overall), Duskmourn's was infuriatingly bad.
Rest in Peace Bloomburrow. You were loved, would have loved to get to know you better, but alas there was no time. The constant capitalistic hype circle requires for me to get hyped for Foundations as Duskmourn is basically on its way out. Can't wait for our 2 week time frame of Return to Bloomburrow in 2028 in between Commander Masters 4 and UB Hot Weels Set.
@@RedBobcatGames I think there will be a Hot Wheels. The Hot Wheels: AcceleRacers films have many similarities with the multiplanar race set. It’s a bunch of people death racing between worlds.
I recommend you do give the Bloomburrow story another shot, it's pretty decent. Ral basically just ends up helping out with the main quest instead of derailing the story in any significant way, Jace doesn't even show up
Okay! Okay, that's actually really good to know. I can't promise I'll revisit as we've apparently already moved on, but knowing Jace isn't there and it's actually a Bloomburrow story has been the thing to tempt me to go back the most so far
I don't hate art cards, but i do hate that they're included in play boosters. Especially as they reduced the number of playable cards down from Draft Boosters. And judging by the price for a complete set on the secondary market, it seems most people aren't keen on them either
Weird thing I wondered is whether characters from Bloomburrow would turn into people if they went to different planes, like how Ral changed into an otter
@@RedBobcatGames afaik the monolith is a reference to the joke that 15 1/1 Squirells can block & destroy Emrakul the Aeons Torn. How I choose to read it Emrakul was lured to Bloomburrow /w cryptoliths and was vanquished by the squirrels before being thrown back into the Blind Eternities and winding up on Zendikar. Details might not check out but I'm willing to bet it's more thought than it deserves 🤣🤣
Tribal is really fun for new players, you get your dudes on the board and your dudes do fun things in an organized and planned way. You also get hints for how your cards should be interacting. Even something like Ravnica will have each guild having sometimes three ways you can take them. ________ The narrative was fine, Ral pretty much shows up and gets to observe a tween-ager style cartoon of "be confident", "work together", and "morality shall win" style antics. Which makes sense given redwall/similar style writings it takes hints from.
I've seen that from some other comments. I may need to go back and finish the story then if Ral doesn't rail road it completely into yet another Gatewatch story
@@RedBobcatGames I don’t think you can because he’s a special guest and they only come in the collectors pack, like Liliana, Ral and the other plainswalkers.
@@RedBobcatGames Well, if me having played commander regularly up to 3 times a week for the last month is anything to go by as well as already having secured a spot for my local game stores pre-release for duskmourn. Then I would say yes.
This was the first set my 8 going on 9 next month old daughter join myself, and her 12 yr and 14 yr old sister. It was an amazing set for her to start on and went really smoothly.
That's awesome to hear! I bet they had a great time. This is exactly who I imagined the target audience would be for a set like this. Also, fun fact I had to read the first part of your comment like 3 times because I honestly thought you'd said you'd taught a 9 month old to play haha
As a fairly new player I agree a lot with the two key points made here abut things that would give trouble: 1) Overly wordy text. I've played card games most of my life, most of that being yugioh, I can read modern yugioh cards super easily and know what they do, but something about the overly verbose language that mtg uses for its effect text took a lot of getting used to and I often have to reread cards to understand them. I remember when I started on arena and found some karlov manor card that summoned 3 1/1 tokens that were different types and you picked one that was the murderer that got some bonus ability and it was worded so badly I took like 5 readings to understand it, maybe my perspective is baised as the most similar game I;ve played before is hearthstone where a lot of the dnd style exact rules clarifications aren't needed because the game takes care of that on the back end. 2) Magic's obsession with generating way too many tokens. This is a physical game I should not have to be prepping a second deck box full of tokens I might generate and have to sort through them every other card I play because the designers couldn't think of anything mroe interesting than to keep generating more tokens again, this sin't hearthstone I have to prepare and visually parse a board of 30 tokens in a physical space its a nightmare both in preparing for game night and actually in play, i want to spend money on a functional deck and then play the game, not aquiring a million tokens or putting pieces of paper in my sleeved spare pokemon energy cards (genuinely what I did for my first deck to make all the tokens I needed) it's a huge problem I think the game has in how many tokens it expects you to just, have on handa t any moment.
I honestly think this overreliance on different types of tokens is to disguise that the designers are running out of ways to introduce brand new mechanical ideas. So rather than have a card do a new thing, have it make another card that does an old thing which maybe makes it feel like a new thing. And I think in turn this is a result of how fast paced their releases are. If they slowed down and spent more time on development I think the whole game would be better off as a whole
Magic narrative has its ups and downs. I've cared little for Kellan's antics through the multiverse, but Jace's and Vraska's recovery from phyresis was just masterful, on par with the Ixalan story that first made them into realized characters, and penned by the same author to boot!
Okay, that I actually would be interested in. Was their recovery written about in Thunder Junction? I dropped off that stroy VERY quickly, but if it explains how they recovered I'd like to give it a read
@RedBobcatGames Yes, and you can easily skip the rest of the Thunder Junction story and jump straight there. It was a 2-parter epilogue called "Bring the End", written by Alison Luhrs.
To be honest, Bloomburrow's story was alright, but it ended quite abruptly. I think the last episode should've been at least two with all that happened there, but I would recommend you to finish reading it, at least I enjoyed it. And also, I strongly recommend both Duskmourn's main story and side story (Children of the Carnival) that I think were very well written.
I've heard Duskmourn is good. My issue is I really dislike the aesthetic of the plane from the cards. But I also hear we have some Ikoria levels of disconnect between the cards and narrative again, so maybe I'll give it a chance (once I'm feeling a bit less burnt out by the constant releases)
@@RedBobcatGames The main difference is that Valgavoth, the big demon who controls the house is shown to be this very intimidating and powerful being on the cards, but in the main story he only appears at the end, only to kinda stand there menacingly and not do much. He even gets wounded by the emperor. However, I wouldn’t recommend reading the main story. The characters are flanderized for the sake of tropes. The side stories are better. Especially the one on the beasties’ origins.
I had a wonderful time with Bloomburrow. Limited was a lovely environment and has actually sparked my interest in making a standard deck. I personally like the look of Duskmourn. The main antagonist has been luring people and opening omenpaths to get them here, which is why there's a smorgasbord of tech on a plane that has been consumed. But from a design perspective, it was made for someone like me who enjoys good horror references. I'm excited for what's coming next but still pessimistic about what is coming. Lovely video as always.
I learned how much we seasoned players take for granted by teaching my family to play using this set. A lot of the triggers you called simple like “when this creature attacks” are still not simple to noobs. It is simple compared to how complex magic can be, but it just made me realize how complex magic is.
I loved bloomburrow! There were so many good and new cards it felt fresh and the furry little creatures it was amazing, my favorite was some new black cards that let you draw or new instant kill spells, fountain port bell became a staple for my commander decks it was honestly delightful and a shame how quick it came and gone
People say to vote with your wallet, and I took one look and Bloomburrow and took that seriously. This is definitely the magic set I spent the most money on ever, and the set I played the most of. I even played Standard recently, because I thought "hey, I have a bunch of squirrels, I can make a budget squirrel food deck!" Standard! In this day and age! Basically, Bloomburrow reinvigorated my interest in a lot of the game, and I'm thankful for it, even if the interest will likely not be as strong until Lorwyn, and even though it was so short. Thank goodness for little critters. Also as for the story, someone else mentioned it but it doesn't focus on Ral so much, he's rather tagging along and supporting Mabel and co.'s quest. Duskmourne though, I'm still trying to bite my way through that.
Lets hope the lesson WotC learn from these Bloomburrow sales is "Hey, people like it when we make a decent set with good world building" and not "We're doing nothing wrong! Lets keep making sets exactly as we are!" because Bloomburrow has been a shining light in a sea of Karlov Manors. And I will try to work up the energy to finish the Bloomburrow story. I suspect I'm more likely to do that than come anywhere near Duskmourn
I'm very interested to hear your thoughts on Duskmourne because I had three things that really hit me personally: 1.) It felt like an Un set without half the fun, making it's identity feel like it wasn't sure what it wanted to be. 2.) Not having Ashiok in the setting was a big blunder. Even if they didn't do an Ashiok card, just having them there being the Disney Princess of nightmares would have been fun. 3.) I'm not doing prereleases anymore. I took second, won about fifty dollars worth of content, and still felt empty at the end.
Oh that sucks. If the prize is so expensive it feels like nothing, it really takes the wind out of your sails. I'll get to Duskmourn in a retrospective similar to this at the very least. I may do a video on it before hand but, honestly I'm just not really interested in it enough to have a video worthy opinion on it currently. The set's just not for me
honestly a little sad Red didn't make a deck this time considering how absolutely stacked his packs were for R/W Mice lol That would've been an insane pool for prerelease
8:00 or so Next year: "Wait, this card is a Swiss knife powered by a nuclear reactor, doing cafè Java _with that monkey included_ if you start a Kickstart campaign for a new chemotherapy, otherwise the monkey will be created the next turn anyway. Ah for ONE white mana? Who would pay such a high cost? Having to use this artifact is not enough? Nah, that's not enough power, I skip it.".
Bloomburrow was a set I returned to do Limited from dabbling in Commander and its great. I ended up doing 5 prereleases that weekend bc I somehow miraculously had nothing going on that weekend, and the Friday one was so fun. I do wish it was a *bit* more beginner and kid friendly mechanically. Ive been brewing up options for Jumpstarts and a 360 Cube that can work as a Wizard's Tower or Party Box. Unfortunately because its focused on shared Kindred mechanics its tricky to get working for single color Jumpstarts (mechanically a mess) and single Kindred themes (even split of 2 colors, which makes shared cards and an inability to easily pull apart) But its a bummer so many of the cards have so much rules text and so little flavor text, bc whats there is great.
I am the biggest fan of flavour text on a card. It's where the majority of the world building comes from, and so to see it lost to overly wordy mechanics I agree is a shame
Well, as a begginer friendly set, bloomborrow kinda does it's job thematically, from the design perspective. I was always into tribal archetypes myself, and I think that is a good way to show new players what colours do and what's the dual colors combinations are about. Frogs jump, raccoons collect scrap, and so on. Like color combination? Ok, look for that creature type and try to build your own deck. But as a first set - hell no. I was just introducing my new friend to magic - and there is SO much going on there for her. Beginners clearly need a set with 1-2 sentence worded common cards, or they just getting lost in that word soup. I don't miss those M# standard sets, cause they were just boring and I wasn't invested in, but THEY were the best stop to any new player to get in, defore autumn sets release.
Bloomburrow was my second MTG set (after LotR, which I bought because LotR). I don't play traditional Magic, but I'll play thematic Magic -- just finished making my Bloomburrow purchases into 20 Jumpstart decks so they can be mixed & matched into thematic decks. It's reasonably beginner friendly for mechanics, but very beginner friendly for deck building. I'd play more of it -- but really have no desire to move into broader Magic or different themes.
*Spoiler incoming* as a gigantic magic lore nerd being somone who binges the brother war and weatherlight stories yearly , I'm actually optimistic for magics story which i havent been in years. Jace is actually a intresting chatacter again after they put him back his box once we left ixalan. His idea of *spoilers* Destroying the multiverse and then rebrithing it into somthing new after he saw how his mother healed his phyresis is looking cool. Like he actually seems like a morally gray complex villan whic magic has been lacking for like a decade.
Probably one of my favorite sets so far, doing to be building many decks from it even into Duskmourn's release. Main thing me and my play group took issue with is the change in pull rates for rares in packs. Still didnt stop me buying a bunch, and yeah I did pull a gitrog from one of my many packs. And I really did enjoy the story, I just wish they would commit to doing more world building and expand on what feels to be a solid foundation for more narratives
Completely agree. Especially about the world building, and you know I'd almost forgotten they'd changed the rates too. These are just worse Draft Boosters now
@@RedBobcatGames Yeah me and some friends cracked a box and while I love sealed formats, the set just feels underwhelming compared to previous offerings. Almost makes me wish for the old draft + set booster split as it feels with play boosters they have opted to cut rates to up pack sales. Will have to see how Duskmourn holds up in comparison.
I was much happier... no... much less grumpy when we had draft boosters. They were cheaper, had more cards and seemingly the same rate of mythics per pack
@@RedBobcatGames It certainly feels that way. The earlier play boosters with the better pull rates really did blend set and draft boosters but this new wave of lower pull rates are just draft boosters with fewer cards. Even if the chance at more rares or special treatment cards is there. Im going to try and get a few boxes of older draft sets just to keep me engaged and not really pay into the new play boosters. As I have yet to try Duskmourn sealed
I think Bloomburrow was designed to cater to be players in that the gift mechanic encourages friendly play which makes it easier for established players to bring their non-playing friends in and have a good time. Discounting that the otters are building unstable meth labs, I think the less adversarial tone of the deck makes it more approachable for casual players. At least that's how I feel as a returning player that quit because of sweaty win decks.
Ooof. I assume that's not normal numbers? Do you think it's because people didn't enjoy Bloomburrow, or because they're already being asked to get excited for the next product so the current one seems less interesting?
It's just nice to see WotC actually CARE about worldbuilding without falling into stereotypes. Even Duskmourne managed to not strangle itself out of the gate, despite the whole "modern horror" stigma it's stuck with. Now we just have to see about that "Space Opera" set...
Oh, but I fully agree. I really liked Bloomburrow's world building. I just wish they gave us more time to enjoy it before throwing Duckmourn spoilers at us
@@RedBobcatGames Too true. Slowing the pace down is the easiest thing they could do, but it would be such an improvement to the release schedule, burnout, etc.
It amazes me that Wizards is starting to tell us what they're up to with tongue-in-cheek references and puns. Cache Grab is an actual card in the set, which much of their recent releases have been... Well not cache, but cash grabs. And if you're suffering from FOMO by continually buying into everything, well don't worry...Fear of Missing Out will be a card you can own in Duskmourne. Also, you referenced the Gitrog, who I believe is on the bonus sheet, so he's in the set in a way and that is the new art to make him fit into Bloomburrow. Finally... If Planeswalkers like Jace and Ral become animals in this plane, do a lot of these animals become other beings like elves, humans and goblins outside of Bloomburrow? Can they leave? Will it ever even matter or be revisited?
I had a lot of those same questions in the Bloomburrow predictions video I linked in this one. From what I'm hearing, when they leave they remain animals BUT they're scaled up to be human size. Which is kind of the worse combo in my opinion
@@RedBobcatGames yeah, I kinda agree. I think they at least have to scale up to have their power and toughness match up, but then it presents a bit of a problem. Why did Jace and Ral transform and not just scale down? Did the Gitrog actually scale down since it's on the bonus sheet? It really just seems like fan service to do it one way and have a different rule going the other way. I did see that video, but your review brings these questions back to the surface and Wizards just doesn't have satisfactory answers for me these days. Keep up the good work!
Honestly im surprised bloomburrow didnt have a “tokens nest” product. Where we could get all the offspring tokens, and 3 off every major token. Like, im fine using dice to represent how many bunnies i have but i would like to have 6 at least!! It doesnt even have to be expensive cards!! They arnt in the main deck, you dont need to be able to disguise them as normal cards!! Like, tokens are pretty important but your also really unlikely to find all of them!! I bought an entire booster display and still have only half of them!! What the heck!!
Took me like 3 read throughs before I spotted it. Excellent stuff. I'm sure this isn't a result of the sheer amount of product they have to put out. There's no way slowing down would mean less mistakes make it pass QA. Fantastic
Here's my optomist attack. Solid Gear style. If there is just a short time period where a set is out, just because the official time period is over. Doesn't mean you need to move onto the next. "Ah man. They released this really nice truck. But thry also released this other truck 2 months ago. Guess the that one is just out dated." 😐
Ahh, sure. I completely agree. But Magic isn't a solo game, and (especially as you get older) it's hard to organise a night to get people to play. What helps is if people are interested and excited for the set. And that becomes harder if the marketing and advertising has already moved on and is telling people to get hyped for the next set. I want some hype for the current set for once, so people are actually interested and want to play it
Before I watched the video: I really didn't enjoy Bloomburrow very much. Creature tribal themes don't really scratch my Johnny sensibilities and the story was fairly dull, with a somewhat disney-like twist villain at the end. I drafted it a couple times on Arena and left feeling disappointed both times. I had much more fun with Wilds of Eldraine, Phyrexia, and Dominaria United (The last three sets I drafted) than Bloomburrow.
They normally stick around longer, I really hope this pace isn't the new norm. How was it for your first set? And would you consider yourself a beginner?
@@RedBobcatGames I liked it, especially the lore tidbits with the elemental animals. Wanted to do a few more drafts but didn't have the time. I would consider myself a beginner, even though these weren't my first magic cards, as I never got the chance to play the game before due to no one at school playing it in 2015.
Please do not ever call your hands "Mr. Hands" ever again. I am relatively certain you don't know why you shouldn't, and as an aside, I also request you do not do any deeper investigation on "Mr. Hands."
I enjoy bloomburrow I made a commander deck and a pioneer deck and more commander decks I have upgrades and a new head if an old deck I have and there are like a decent amount of new cards that are going in my already existing ones so I got a lot out of the set I just wish we got more story AKA actual side stories this set needed them like duskmourne got 6 stories and like 6 sides stories like what the heck
@@RedBobcatGames I know right like bloomburrow was the hype set this year but got a short ok story then duskmourners horror is boom scary and surprisingly a good horror moments in the first half of the set then like when jaws was revealed it’s over but the side stories got some actual care but no bloomburrow cute side adventure stories like woah the set has so many character we don’t see in story to flesh out but the horror set with very few characters gets them come on
I've always loved the side stories. And to be fair, I complain about the narrative but the side stories are usually worth reading. It's just, as you say, a shame about how scarse they are
Strong choice of words but i understand. I honestly haven't had the time to actually play enough to get an idea of the architypes. I think I've only actually seen like 5/6 of them drafted. This release cycle is mad
13:00 no. Just no. Rares and Mythics shouldn't be about powerlevel. They should be about unique abilities. I would argue that the game would be healthier if commons & uncommons rivaled the rare powerlevel but instead be simple and non-unique.
Okay, yeah I can see that. It's just to me, when I do find a rare or mythic I want it to be a bomb. I feel like the interesting abilties and mechanics should come from combinations of different cards, rather than just a single build around. Apart from in Commander of course, but even then I'm not a fan of these "designed for commander" cards either
Is Foundations just a re-branded core set? Are we reaching a record pace for WotC gorging themselves on crow? We can't do old borders. Wait, it turns out we need the monetary support of enfranchised players and endlessly shitting on them is not how to get it? BAM! More old borders than you can shake a stick at. Ugh, managing this over-arching narrative does not have good return on investment, we need to have isolated adventures that create good entry points for new players. Nevermind! New players want to keep seeing the cool characters they've been introduced to (also we suck at our jobs and can't create new cool characters) so now here's a long-running narrative. Wow, I don't get it. When we print dozens of versions of the same characters and make the story exclusively about them, people complain. I guess it's time to throw the baby out with the bathwater (again) and reset everything. But not really because change is scary. -Eldrazi- -Energy- -Oko- -Omnath- -Creativity- -Uro- Nadu (really literally any Modern Horizons product) is fine. OOPS! Turns out Nadu was not fine.
"Creativity" got me! Also, Foundations does essentially appear to just be another core set but it's going to be standard legal for at least 5 years, leaving it open to maybe 9 years if it does well
@@RedBobcatGames I could see that being great and I could see that being terrible. Unfortunately, I don't know what their incentive is to make it good. If it is, then it will eat up the value of standard decks for five years, meaning they are rewarded for reducing its relevance as much as possible while still selling packs. :\ Also, I thought Fires of Invention was called Forge of Creativity, but I'm glad you got a chuckle out of my mistake.
I honestly think once enough people have bought it, that Foundations will sit on shelves. And normally this wouldn't be such an issue but it's going to do that for a decade. A few years in, WotC will panic and introduce Foundations 2... which will kind of defeat the point of the original Foundations set. But, I guess we will see
@diabeticmonkey I agree. Though I think back to our last trip to Innistrad, and I'd like to add that I don't just want 2 sets, but I want them to draft well together and actually have a well written story too
I'd like three standard sets plus foundations each year. The standard sets in the same plane. Even making the sets slightly larger to give more meta deck styles. I have zero connection to any set before we're onto the next. Even murders would've been cool if we could've stayed for a few sets. I liked the disguise mechanic and suspect but moved to the next thang too quickly. Those mechanics also weren't utilized well, more cards using them would've helped
Absolutely! It would’ve so cool if Wizards went from MKM to a one based around the guilds’ espionage/heists. Both disguise and suspect would be perfect fits for it. Plus we would probably have seen some sneaky Rakdos spies and how Selesnya deal with double agents/traitors.
This set…..is quite possibly the best set in ages. And I’m being genuine when I say this. I absolutely despise WOTC rushed it in favor of 1980’s horror movies. This set felt like fresh air with a hint of originality, a bit of light hearted adventure. Now I know it has a Redwall influence. To me this was Magic’s own version of Middle Earth. I wish we continued to this setting. Maybe another set. But this…..this was a fun entry and possibly my favorite set of the year.
I think bloomburrow is very beginner-friendly, caveats being within its slim aesthetic niche and as a standalone set. The mechanics aren't, the mechanics are unfriendly enough that I as an experienced player can't be bothered caring about them, but Bloomburrow does something vitally important for new players - it gives them a reason to emotionally invest in the cards. That's why half the people you meet these days started playing magic when Return to Ravnica was in standard - Ravnica invites you to identify yourself with one of its guilds and play the game not just as "an MTG player", but as someone who plays that faction, and once a player is viewing the game in that way, they're hooked for life. Bloomburrow I assume does the same thing for people who are into animals - it attaches a distinct animal type to each colour pair and then tells you you want to play a 2-colour deck, so your UR deck isn't just "a UR deck" or "a Prowess deck" as it often would be, it's "an Otter deck"; a deck defined by its character before its mechanics or its colours. That makes people more willing to spend time thinking about wordy cards and unintuitive mechanics. If Bloomburrow had been a 3 set block, I think it would have gone down in history as at least as good as War of the Spark block simply for having strong faction identity. Although I would also have non-stop complained about going an entire year with no aesthetically interesting cards lol.
You make a really good point. I actually think that's why Innistrad is what got me into the game. I just really think Vampires and Werewolves are cool and seeing them got me invested
I liked Bloomburrow quite a bit. I would love to spend more time here. I love tribal sets, I love cohesive sets, and I love fun sets. Hey, look at that! We have all of that! I'm not looking forward to Duskmourn. The setting is a mess. How are there ghostbusters and people with advanced labs making equipment in a place where the whole plane has been subsumed by this house for a long period of time? If it was something where the house came into place in a small part of the plane and people were purposefully entering it to explore, or if the story treated it more like the backrooms where you can fall into it from your normal life, then I would be more forgiving of it. But as it currently stands, I am not anticipating caring much about this set as a result of this mess.
@@RedBobcatGames They did "Fear of Missing Out" and "Unwanted Remake" so I assume they're saving it. Maybe for Death Race, or for an unannounced Universes Beyond: Happy Days?
Magic needs to slow down in terms of releases. 1 a month is not sustainable and you can see the creep extra products into sets as well. The commander set was only 2 decks and a couple of extra cards a year ago but now its a full on realease with 4 decks each time. I like commander but the amount if deck i bought from them as they have cool ideas and concepts is backing up. I bought all the dr who decks and have not played any of them, the faerie deck and not played it, the merfolk deck and not played it, the gonti deck which i have played once and the offspring deck which i have not played. Im looking at the simic one in duskmorn but i just think i have bought loads and not played them why is this deck different? I think maybe doing 4 standard sets a year with smaller commander products associated with them (i like they are giving the new mechanics some legs to stand on in commander as otherwise they can be forgotten and never used again), 1 reprint set ( like a masters or foundations [i know there are some new cards but it is about helping new players so it should have reprints]), 1 wildcard set designed for experienced players (an MH, battlebond, conspiracy etc.) And 1 universes beyond (as its not going anywhere and is designed to literally grab new target audiences) would be a better collection of products than all the overstuffed content they are doing
AND with fewer sets, it would mean each set we did buy would feel more special. Meaning we'd be more likely to buy the next one. As you say, currently players are being put off from buying the new sets because they haven't had time to play the old ones yet. It's mad!
Once Duskmourn releases, i will continue to buy Bloomburrow. Duskmourn is wildly inconsistent in tone. Bloomburrow is the only standard set this year to maintain the identity of Magic.
This set got me into collecting physical cards for the first time in years, I think the setting is so charming and I'm glad to see the game designer rates it as highly likely to return in the future, as I'm sad that it came and went so fast. For the first time I really want to collect this whole set. I have always loved MTG, and always love playing the game through Arena, but this one in particular sparked that desire to collect again. And there's definitely no bias here for me liking this set 😅
Some stores will set you one copy of a each card from a set if that's something you want to do, and it's usually cheaper than trying to open up boosters to find them
I haven't bought any Bloomburrow yet, but I'd love for them to actually revisit a new plane for once, and this once actually seems to have legs - there's so much you can do with anthropomorphic animals!
Oh deer lord. I hadn't even considered that. Depressing I imagine, and like Christmas something it won't occur to me to plan for till the week it's happening
In case anybody cares, Ral does stick around for the rest of the story, but he gets dragged into the quest of the Bloomburrow characters, much to his frustration. He learns to treat the animals with respect and earns their respect in kind. In the end he gets a vague prophecy about how Jace will "bring the end" for his trouble, which gives him enough information to have some hope of working out where he's going. He completely misses him on Bloomburrow because he's too busy doing productive and interesting things, in spite of himself.
@@RedBobcatGames Honestly he could have been replaced with a cranky otter from bloomburrow and it would have all worked the same. I think they just wanted at least one familiar character, a token nod to the wider continuity, and an outsider who could learn about bloomburrow with the reader.
I guess my issue is, do we need Bloomburrow to connect to the wider narrative? Like, look at All Will Be One and War of the Spark. Feels like we've given up a lot for these cross over stories and I'm not sure they're worth it honestly
@@RedBobcatGames I'm a fan of the more episodic approach they practiced years ago because it lends itself more to an extended stay on a given plain. But given the fact that we're obviously not gonna stick around any plain longer than a couple of weeks I think a larger narrative is a way of, at least making sense of it all. Instead of a rapid fire of disconnected episodes we receive one (relatively) big story in small portions.
I actually got into magic because of this set. I found that after I got the various mechanics explained once or twice, it wasn’t very difficult to understand. I’m just sad that it’s already old hat. I don’t have the want to get something new.
Neon Dynasty 🤝 Bloomburrow Being visually stunning Sets that had really fun Draft and Standard* environments undercut in 2 months by less interesting sets.
Man, I haven't even managed ONE Bloomborrow game which is a shame. I will say though, on Duskmourn, I think the horror is distinct enough. Innistrad is explicitly Vampires and Werewolves, classical monsters older than anyone playing MtG, horror VIBES without being explicitly horror the Genre. Phyrexia is closer to that true horror, showing corruptions and alien domination. They're played straight as what they are - this is a plane of bloodsuckers and this is a plane of aliens. Duskmourn takes a more...campy approach. It's explicitly trying to be Horror /films./ Psychological horrors to be exact. Very SAW, Allen wake sort of vibes from it, while also having some slasher film tropes. ...but that then means this is just another pile onto the throne that Karlov and Thunder Junction sits of being a set not taken seriously, of being mostly a joke, of characters being in a situation instead of a real world.
Your last line summed up my exact thoughts as you were describing it. I honestly think all these meme references are there because only a single set doesn't give the world enough time to be fleshed out. If we went back to either longer gaps between releases, or 3 set blocks I think the world would have a little more staying power and slightly deeper flavour cards could be designed
I'm still torn on Duskmourn. I hate the 80s aesthetic they're going for (possibly even making 80s technology "canon") but some of the horror stuff is nice.
I wish this whole set was just a Dead by Daylight secret lair honestly. And save the Demon House idea for a setting that doesn't have the 80's twist or movie references
@@blue-eyesdepresseddragon3753 As someone who has played Dead by Daylight for 5 years with over 600 hours, that would be the bane of my existence lmfao. But yeah, all this nonsense should've been in that ghostbusters secret lair or something
It was certainly more beginner-friendly than most sets of the last half-decade, in that it had a 2/2 lifelink-first-strike that didn't also draw cards, reanimate, scry 5, and do your taxes. However, I suspect that this was because they knew the aesthetic would sell, so they just spent less time on designs. Duskmourne looks wholly unappealing, both from its vapid and uninspired aesthetic and from an overabundance of overdesigned cards. Classes, which function logically and intuitively, were just a solid cycle that no strategy really built around. Rooms, which are crowded, clunky, and unappealing, are a core component of several color-pairs, suggesting that a lot more time was spent designing a much worse card subtype.
Through my job dragging me in to overtime and feeling unwell, I haven't managed to attend a single Bloomburrow draft at my FLGS. And now with the Duskmourn prerelease, I never will. At least I've still got a bunch of design space for commander decks to explore, which is interesting to me. Bats, lizards, and of course bunnies, all begging for me to build them.
I am a big fan of bats. I wish I had a bit more time to enjoy them before being moved on. The kind of thing reinforces the notion that we shouldn't pay attention to the latest set and only focus on the cards we already have. Bizzare buisness choice
No you sadly can't pull The Gitrog Monster from Play Boosters, because it is not part of the Special Guests bonus sheet. You can only pull it from Collector Boosters, because it is part of the Imagine: Courageous Critters bonus sheet and it is labled as a Commander card, which are not to be found in Play Boosters to begin with. tl;dr: Play Boosters are dogshit
This confusion about what is and isn't included I honestly feel is by design. Every release they seem to change up what you can get and where, and rename the places you can get them. It's mad
No, it's not a Special Guest, it's an "Imagine Courageous Critters" card. Believe it or not, they're like a second set of special guests, but they're considered part of Bloomburrow Commander and have its set symbol. Four of them are exclusive to the precons, but the rest, including The Gitrog Monster, are exclusive to collector boosters. And yes, I did have to look all this up.
Move over, dead rodents! It's time for Duskmourn! But in actuality, it is quite sad Bloomburrow is no more, I actually grew a liking to it thanks to the story and FUCKING OTTER RAL.
Now imagine we still had the 3 block sturcture? Imagine this was only the beginning and we still had a middle and end to go. Man, I wish we could go back
@@RedBobcatGames but then we'd still be in cowboy hats! This approach at least ensures that people who don't like a certain setting don't have to schlep through it, but it also means that those who enjoy those settings can do so for a much shorter time
@@foderis8777 The issue is as we need more settings and we don't explore any one fully, we can not get attached to any setting. Look, people wouldn't have such a hateboner for Phyrexia if there wouldn't have been the whole 3 set Mirrodin Block to build it up and 3 set Scars of Mirrodin Block to corrupt it. Same with Ravnica, we got the Ravnica Block to get to know the plane and then Return to Ravinica to explore it deeper, meaning we got 6 sets of lore for each of those planes instead of 1 (and that was before War of the Spark for Ravnica and the new Phyrexia Block with MoM for Mirrodin).
@@somederp8915 I've seen nary a hate for phyrexia, actually, besides the aftermath booster situation! But I wasn't here back when blocks were a thing so perhaps I can't comment on it fully.
9:00 yes, that "(blue color) impulse" card draw effect is very long to explain and doesn't have a keyword, yet XD maybe one day we'll have it, but for now we have to deal with that soup of words weird that you don't like overprotect, but like galewind moose, probably because the moose is a creature, a permanent that stays on the battlefield
True, but to my brain the fact it sticks around and I can see it makes it easier to remember. Plus, we may just be running into some bias here because I think moose are cool
Product is over. Its time to get excited for next product. New leaks just dropped for next product so you anticipate that product while purchasing current product
I don't think wotc wants vorthos to exist anymore, we are kind of a problem to the objective of "just consume more and more and never ask questions". That seems to be why the story is worse and worse with each passing set, it's always a nothing story with nothing characters, and when a old character shows up they are completely changed and I don't even recognize them anymore. Vorthos and "mega profitable product mtg" don't go well together it seems.
bloomburrow complaints, i brought my friend to play draft for the first time 1 he didnt like how there was only one planeswalker but "too much counterplay" (in the removal spells) 2 the story was over too quick in my opinion, i was expecting a second set in the block called calamity of cinders and a third one called into the flood maw, not to go into spoilers but the ending with helga and glarb made no sense and had no effort put into it 3 the draft experience was very lopsided, blue felt near unplayable in limited, but i did like how it tried to handle it 4 the calamity beasts are too weak!!!
This is all the sort of feedback I was interested in honestly. But like I say the conversation seems to have already moved on to Duskmourn and Foundations so interesting to hear people's thoughts on the actual current set. Thank you for sharing
The in-game version of the Calamity Beasts ranges from meh to ridiculous. However if you want to talk about them in the story, I guess it’s true we don’t really get to see their power besides Maha and the fish. That’s why I think having a second set “Beyond the Valley” could have given us an idea of how powerful the calamities truly are.
The noise I made to reading this comment can best be described as "Bwahaha". The sort of laugh that says "I thought as much". Thank you for letting me know
This set is the first ever magic product that I bought because I thought it looked super cute, I got two of the commander decks as well as 3 boosters each to play with a friend who also has no idea how magic works. It is a bit of a struggle to understand everything from scratch and we are probably doing some illigal moves but it has been a lot of fun so far.
Bloomburrow was simple, yet fun, and was a blast to come back to mtg during it... then duskmourn, with its 200 complicated tactics and keywords took me out of mtg alltogheter again lol
Bloomburrow is the best standard magic set since original Ravnica. Hands down, not even close. Everything from mechanics, to balance, to flavour, to appeal to people to START playing Magic... Wizards cutting it down so early is a huge mistake. It got so many new players excited about Magic at the LGSs near me. It brought *so much* to Standard as a competitive format. The draft experience was welcoming from experienced to brand new players. The colours were so closely balanced for limited. The commander precons and special cards are not only FUN but powerful and flavourful! The special promos on play and specially collector's boosters are incredible. What a homerun from WotC. Duskmourn looks boring as hell, oh well.
Shame they changed the pulls rates of rares and mythics in the packs honestly because otherwise Bloomburrow could have been one of the greatest sets of all times
I feel like so many of these would be improved if it had camel case like keywords do. seeing enters is confusing but Enters is less so, at least for me
