What about the old sanctuary cards? I remember back in the day Dega was the combination for WRB.. stayed that way till tarkir when Mardu became synonymous with it.
I usually go with the comander 2016 themes for the 4 color combos, but sometimes just use (absent color)less , Chaos or whiteless; Aggression or blueless ;Altruism or blackless; Growth or redless; and Artifice or greenless.
I use names based off nuances. In allied pairs, I use the Ravnica names for when their represented halves are spread because they oppose an enemy pair over a single color; only the revisited Khan names get the halves nested together because they're defined by having lost their shared enemy. Ravnica BR Rakdos: Parasitism + Impulse RG Gruul: Chaos + Interdependence GW Selesnya: Instinct + Order WU Azorius: Morality + Technology UB Dimir: Logic + Amorality Revisited Khans BR Kolaghan: Amorality + Chaos RG Atarka: Impulse + Instinct GW Dromoka: Interdependence + Morality WU Ojutai: Order + Logic UB Silumgar: Technology + Parasitism For the enemy pairs, I use the Ravnica names to label symmetrical halves because, as mentioned earlier, they each oppose an allied pair; for the asymmetrical pairings, I use the Strixhaven names. Ravnica GU Simic: Interdependence + Logic WB Orzhov: Order + Parasitism UR Izzet: Technology + Chaos BG Golgari: Amorality + Instinct RW Boros: Impulse + Morality Strixhaven G Quandrix: Instinct + Logic U Quandrix: Interdependence + Technology W Silverquill: Morality + Parasitism B Silverquill: Order + Amorality U Prismari: Logic + Chaos R Prismari: Technology + Impulse B Witherbloom: Parasitism + Instinct G Witherbloom: Amorality + Interdependence R Lorehold: Chaos + Morality W Lorehold: Order + Impulse As for the trios, there are four names total: Alara and New Capenna for the Shards and the Triomes and Khans for the Wedges. Respectively, they demonstrate their central color as goals vs means respectively. All names are shown in the video except for the New Capenna names. GWU Broker WUB Obscura UBR Maestro BRG Riveteer RGW Cabaretti
I have been thinking about the three-color combinations and how their central color's placement corresponds to my system of names. At first, the context was simply that the names would be dependent on whether the central colors were the goal or the means. White: Peace (Bant & Savai) through Structure (Mardu & Brokers). Blue: Perfection (Esper & Ketria) through Knowledge (Temur & Obscura). Black: Satisfaction (Grixis & Indatha) through Opportunity (Abzan & Maestros). Red: Freedom (Jund & Raugrin) through Action (Jeskai & Riveteers). Green: Growth (Naya & Zagoth) through Harmony (Sultai & Cabaretti). I've begun to realize how, assuming all possible combinations are evenly abundant, they'll potentially make the name convention confusing depending on whether some consider the individual color or the color pair dominant. This is because it's possible for the central color to be the middle, causing an ambiguity as to whether to consider it a goal or a mean. From this, I have decided to add the Dominaria names for when the central color is in the middle in terms of hierarchy. For example, Sunscape is GWU where W is second to either G or U and Daka is RWB where W is second to R or B. This will cause those within the faction to go against each other even though they'll stay together, which makes sense because Dominaria has been through a myriad of apocalypses so they know to stay together in a crisis. Arcs GWU: Sunscape. WUB: Stormscape. UBR: Nightscape. BRG: Thunderscape. RGW: Thornscape. Wedges RWB: Dega. GUR: Ceta. WBG: Necra. URW: Raka. BGU: Ana. Now for review, lets see the other tri-color names. For reference, the Khans of Tarkir and the crime families of New Capenna all have their central colors at the bottom of the ladder. This makes sense because the Khans were vulnerable to losing their central color when the timeline shifted and the New Capenna families' central color have reduced to means to maintain their hobbies. Khans RWB: Mardu. GUR: Temur. WBG: Abzan. URW: Jeskai. BGU: Sultai. New Capenna GWU: Brokers. WUB: Obscura. UBR: Maestros. BRG: Riveteers. RGW: Cabaretti. And now for central-color-goal tri-colors. Shards of Alara GWU: Bant. WUB: Esper. UBR: Grixis. BRG: Jund. RGW: Naya. Triomes of Ikoria RWB: Savai. GUR: Ketria. WBG: Indatha. URW: Raugrin. BGU: Zagoth.
When my buddy first taught me the game around 2012 he lent me a white/black deck. I referred to the color combination as yin-yang for a good while. Good times.
I think the best way to call the 4 color combinations is sans [color] so sans-white, sans-blue, sans-black, sans-red, sans-green because they're defined by the absence of the color
I don't want to be an < um actually > kind of person, but we actually had names for the wedges before Khans. Before Ravnica even. In Apocalypse, we had Dega (BWR), Ceta (RUG), Necra (BWG), Raka (RWU), and Ana (BUG). I always find it fascinating that these didn't stick, like the other first time attempts did. Probably because it was only on 3 cards each: a -volver, sanctuary and disciple (except Ana had a time spiral card too). People preferred Borzhov, RUG, BUG, America/France, and Junk until Khans came around and the naming conventions practically changed over night to the Khans titles. I still occasionally like to use the -volver name, but it's more to be contrarian than anything else
I believe Mark Rosewater has said that the later factions were intentionally given longer names so that the originals would stick in the lingo. Relatedly, Selesnya might have a simpler name if it was created today.
That would actually be so funny if they do that. I mean I could see it, but I just imagine them being like, ok here's a new faction but please dont use it for combo names
I need a follow-up 🙃 Why didn't Dega, Ceta, Necra, Raka, Ana stick as wedge names? Why didn't Sun, Storm, Night, Thunder and Thorn become the Shard names? Could the original dual lands been the pair names? How about Sungrass, Skycloud, Darkwater, Shadowblood and Mossfire for the ally pairs?
My best guess is stickiness. I have been at this for over 10 years, and could not tell you the complete cycles of either of those, or what they stand for, mechanically.
Im obssesed with lore and history in general and what got me into MtG where the creatures in it and then later on I find that each color has a philosophy and MtG quickly became one of my favorite card game. This obssesion that I have about learning all that I can about something I like led me to things like your channel which I immediately subscribed but also to look up the names of all the color combinations and that led me to an image of all the combos with their names. The mono colors where not named but the color pairs where given the guild names, the 3 color combos were their respective Alara shards and Tarkir wedges the 5 color combo was named Domain(five color) and the colorless was named mono-brown(colorless). The four color combos were given a different name. WUBR is artifice(non-green). UBRG is chaos(non-white). WBRG is aggression(non-blue). WURG is altruism(non-black). WUBG is growth(non-red). Im kinda curious about what you think about these names for the 4 color combos.
K is frequently used for black in print these days, so I always wondered why they didn't go with K for black. Perhaps because it stands for "key" and so they wanted to avoid implication that any one color was most important?
@@leopardbunny you're right, I do remember K being used sometimes as well. I guess it was kinda fluid back then. But that was also mainly when talking about ink, not light, as in CMYK for printing, but RGB for.... Wait...
You know Arena, the first MTG novel ever? It had its own "guilds": Oor-Tael (Turquoise, probably Blue/Green), Kestha (Gray, probably White/Black), Ingkara (Purple, probably Red/Blue), Fentesk (Orange, probably Red/White) and Bolk (Brown, probably Black/Green). I'm trying to popularise those terms. Failing that, the colors of the houses. What do you think the fitting colors would be for ally pairs?
@@burner555 Yes. It's implicit but they don't say outright. The biggest clue (besides some spells) is that all the evil houses have red or black in them
Honestly? I was expecting the origin of the names themselves: like, how did they come up with the name 'Selesnya' and why associate it with Green-White? But that's just me "shrugs" Still a good video.
Man, this Alara plane seems really cool and unique! It would be a shame if Nicol Bolas ruined everything that made it stand out by super gluing the shards together because "That's what I felt like doing at the time". Man, this Tarkir plane seems really cool and inspired! It would be a shame if Nicol Bolas and Ugin decided to play live-action Punch Out and then basically mtg's version of a dnd bard decided to revive the loser, thereby destroying anything that made the plane remotely fun because "we thought it would be funny"and "idk man i'm just really horny for dragons" respectively
I just say the colors 😂. You know what to expect when seeing the colors anyway. Magic has 4 general strategies - Agro, midrange, ramp, and control. Each strategy involves using specific color combinations (or not) to implement the strategy because each color has strengths and weaknesses. Honestly it annoys me when I have to do a google search to understand why my favorite streamer is using odd names to describe well known strategies in card games 😅
Im still upset ab B and U being used. Blue should have been B, and Black should have been K. We use K as an abrevation for black graphic design, and even when buying paints....
Sometimes i use the capenna families, but only really when a deck is leaning into that. If I'm playing jetmir I'm more likely to call it a cabaretti deck than a naya deck
I know that the 3 color names are well defined but as someone who loved New Cappena I still call the shards the New Cappena's families' names, specially Obscura since is in my opinion a better name than Esper.
Disappointed that there was mention of Strixhaven’s schools, but not the Tarkir broods, and mention of the Ikoria triomes but not the Capenna families. There’s a few more obscure names as well, such as the Apocalypse disciples for wedges, the Invasion -scapes for Shards, and the Elder Dragons, also for Shards. And, of course, BUG, RUG, USA, and Junk for the non-Mardu wedges (Mardu was too bad to play back then)
Well, for me the Nephilim names never stick. They are all too similar, and make little sense. Ink being everything but black is the worst offender. So I decided to name those combinations via the 2016 commanders: Breya, Yidris, Saskia, Kynaios, and Atraxa. Kynaios is the weak point of this naming convention, but yeah, as you say, there are no good conventions for 4C...
2:12 Official Color combination naming didn't start until ravnica, but BWG was called Junk and American for RWB existed atleast as early as invasion block. Not to mention, necra_, Dega_ etc names from that exact block. The rock was synonymous with BG since Urza block. While 100% coverage of color combinations wasn't around, it still predates Ravnica and is used by tournament commentators around those times.
Making me feel old by reminding me that Khans of Tarkir is gonna be 10 yrs old come this fall. I learned to play around the time of Legends n started buying cards n building my own decks in Onslaught. God I'm getting old 😩 Usually I hear 5 colour decks referred to as Penta or Pentacoloured. But I'm glad to know the Nephilim can be used instead of saying "I'm playing an all but *insert colour I'm not using* deck"
Hey, i watched the vid, dont wanna be a negative nancy or anything, but maybe consider changing the title to something more accurate to the actual content, rather than calling it "etymology" of the names. When i think "etymology" what comes to mind is explanation of the root meaning of words e.g. "philosophy > from the greek > philos - love, sophia - wisdom > love of wisdom" or even using a fantasy example from LOTR "Galadriel > Galad -light, ri - crowned > el - a suffix meaning elf-lady > light-crowned lady" This video doesnt seem to delve much into that kind of thing and seems to be content to mention that there are names for each faction and leave it at that.
I've kept my stable of characters in dndbeyond full (6 free) and have switched out several times. I almost exclusively use the app for character creation. Still, that's some wonky data and terrible graphs.
There are soo many more names and origins that this video is covering. This is the just the most current I suppose. But not mentioning BUG, Junk, America, Necra… essentially none of the color combinations listed here were the first names for those combinations
Normally I use the basic names everyone uses, unless there’s a specific card I use a commander that’s a member of a specific faction (Ie. Cabaretti Rocco rather than Naya Rocco, as Rocco is a member of the Cabareti etc. etc)
Hello my lovely mtg philosopher, I am kind of disapointed after thus video due to its name.I though we were going to discuss how these names came from but there was none information about it.
I really love Alara but it wasnt the first to name the shards. Planeshift actually had named them all. Many people will be familiar with Nightscape Familiar for Grixis but there is a whole cycle of familiars and Battlemages that all have x-scape names.
when someone prefer to use these names it's probably an old age certificate 😅 i mean, even Alara happened a good while ago, not alone these names hehahah
Until we get a set solely dedicated to hybrid factions, makes sense to just call it [guild] mana. For example, Red/White hybrid mana would just be Boros Mana.
@@hyperion9934 Yes and no. For strictly gameplay purposes you're right, you don't need a different name for it except in very niche situations. However, in terms of lore, flavor and simple interest in the color pie, I think there is a significant distinction between something describing the combination of two colors and the pure overlap of two colors.
I actually hate that people are trying to use the Nephilim as 4-color names. I’d argue one, that the 2016 commanders are far more iconic (Yidris, Breya, Saskia, K&T, and Atraxa), two, most 4-color decks are actually a 3-color deck splashing a 4th, so “grassy Jeskai” and “dark Bant”, three, “sans-[color]” is more understandable, and four, there are some more community-driven names like “spearmint”, “blood”, and “Czech pile”. Also, please stop using Ravnica guild names when there are much better descriptors. “Atarka Red” is a mono-red deck splashing green for Atarka’s command, it’s not “Gruul Aggro”. “Blue Moon” is a mostly-blue deck splashing red for Blood Moon (and some removal), it’s not “Izzet Control”. I would actually argue the UR Murktide deck should actually be called Prismari because it plays an actual Prismari spell (Expressive Iteration) but not Izzet spells. Bonus secret options for color names: use the 10 Kaldheim Realms
I thought this was going to be a video on where the names actually come from. Like Esper, in the thumbnail, being a term for a person who has extrasensory perception.
Tbh i was more expecting this video to be how the design team came up with these names lol (like how did they decide on the word "bant" for example) maybe that would be interesting to cover if there is info from designers on this.
In the follow-up set to Khans of Tarkir, we also got 2-color allied pairings named after the Dragonlords (Atarka, Kolaghan, etc). Maro has also mentioned that had they known that K is used for black ink in printing (as in, CMYK), they'd have used it as shorthand for Black.
I already know the orgions of the names for pairs, shards and wedges. It was fun to go through them all. It is interesting to think of the reimaginings in later sets. I would like to add. New Capenna is a fairly new plane that reimagines shards. It does have five faction with thier own names. They are Canarrati, Riviters, Mearstros, Obscura and Brokers. Maybe shard decks can be named after them. There ought to be a set of allied color pairs, since Strixhaven had enemy pairs. The closest thing I can think of is Innistrad. That has five creature types based on pairs. There is werewolf, vampire, zombie, ghost and human. These names would not make good deck names because they sound like the names for tribal decks. That can get really confusing when other planes get involved. Vampires are Rakdos in Innistrad, but they are Orizhov in Ixilan. Humans can be any kind of color. Maybe they get Selesnya in Innistrad due to process of elimination. That is the least spooky of the allied colors. In a broader sense there are other creatures that are more specialized and would fit Selesnya better. The biggest exmple I can think off the top of my head are hobbits. Hobbits are cute little guys with zero spookiness. They are into nature and peace. Thier greatest strength is agriculture. Actually using the word hobbit may risk a lawsuit from the Tolkein estate. The cute farmer race can be called halflings or kithkin instead. They still fit in Selesnya just as well. Yes, I got to make a Lorwyn reference. Now there is an obscure thing within MTG. I wonder if the names of color combos can have etymology. That can take the topic of this video and go deeper. I do wonder. Selesnya sounds like Celestia. Celestia is the name of the dun princes in My Little Pony and the lawful good realm in DND. This brings to mind of something associated with the sky and heaven. This would definitely fit white. As a pair this would fit white with blue or maybe even red. Selesny is white-green though. It has less of a heavenly vibe and more of a hippie vibe. The nicer kinds of fey would fit here. Hobbits is one. I think elves would fit here. That combines wood elves of green and light elves of white. MTG has elves mainly be in green. I know Kaldheim has Golgari elves and the Lord of the Rings card set has Simic elves. I don't know if there are any Selesnya elf cards. It would fit though. Maybe Selesnya is named after the selee court of fairies. That would explain the color pair. Another odd case of Esper. The names sounds like ESP which is stands for extra sensory perception. That in turn leads to psychic powers. I am used to the acronym being spelled out like a word. In Pokemon, there are two psychic type Pokemon called Espeon and Espur. Since Esper in MTG is the blue shard it can fit. Blue is the color of the mind, anf so that links to psychic power. Maybe black represents personal power of the individual. Maybe white represents control. Esper is a harsh plane in Alara. It is about artifice and controling the environment. There is no regard for what is emotional or natural. Perhaps psychic powers are personal powers in a smart person, and they give control to the environment. One can know and munipulate all.
The Strixhaven faction names are easy to figure out. They are mainly compound words. Witherbloom has wither and bloom. That is the one for compost and gardening. It is really similar to the Golgari faction on Ravnica even beyond shard color pair. Lorehold has lore and hold. That is the archeology and history group. Silverquill has silver and quill. Silver and gray is the color of white and black mixed together. That is the color pair. Quil refers to an old fashioned pen, which refers to the group subject of literacy. Coincidentally there is a Brony RU-vidr also named Silverquill. That was way before the release of Strixhaven. The channel Avatar or mascot is a griffon with a white head. So he can produce silver quills. The old fashioned pens are made from bird feathers. Quandrix is tricky. It is the math group. So maybe it is a mix of quadratic and matrix. Any fancy word based on the number four can start with "quad". Prismari is really difficult. I get the start of prism. This is good for the most colorful group. I was wondering about the suffix. The only word I can think of is safari. That is where people like to go into exotic wildernesses and see animals. That would fit Gruul or Golgari a lot better. Maybe this can be more abstract. This can be about discovering anything new and exotic. Safari is also the name of an internet web browser. It tends to be in Mac or Apple computers. Prismari is the artistic group. Prism could fit its use of color as a tool. Safari could fit its drive for exploration and the exotic. This can lead to the creativity that fits the Izzet pair. The Izzet guild in Ravnica has inventors and artificers. It is very high tech for MTG. It is cool for Prismari to be more about art instead. It shows the core value of creativity in a whole new way. The color combos beyond three are really obscure as this video explains. That other video about four color combos was great. The Nephellum were an obscure and bizarre cycle of cards. I didn't know the combos were called that. It is weird to call color combos off of some abomination. I wonder if that can go further. What if colorless decks were called Eldrazi decks? What if monocolor decks were named after leaders of Phyrexia. That would be wild. Wire stands out as the color with the prettiest imagery. It looks like things people associate with good. What if people called their mono white decks their Ellish decks? That comes from Ellish Norne. That would get really creepy really quickly. Yikes! The five color combo is really rare. I like the name Rainbow. That is really pretty. I vaguely recall a card like that in the Kaldheim set. It may have been a reference to the rainbow bridge in Norse Mythology. This bridge is called Bifrost.
I may be wrong here but something interesting about atraxa’s color combination is that it’s not random, Urabrask, the red praetor, wouldn’t allow the compleation process and thus atraxa is devoid of red mana
I’m glad you brought up Strixhaven. That set was my first introduction to MTG and I was so enchanted by the schools, themes, and color pairs. It took me a year before I ever knew what “orzhov” was when compared to Silverquill 🫣 Now I’m super familiar with all the color pair names and yes… I still call Blue & Red decks Prismari. And Witherbloom, etc. much respect to Ravnica but my heart is with Strixhaven
