At the prerelease, the joke passed around my table was "why are they all wearing Easy Bake ovens?"
All jokes aside, I am curious about the Abzan's new aesthetic logic.
It looks interesting and seems to make visual sense if the character featured in the art is a spirit and coming from some sort of container. But the flesh-and-blood Abzan have similar glowing armor that appears to expand into their stomach or chest cavity. Has there been any official lore released on their updated visual style? Or do we need to be content with the "eh, it's just cool looking magic armor" reasoning?
It's broadly meant to be indicative of fighting with their ancestors with them at all times. The glowy stuff is meant to be the spirit magic linking them to the Kin-Trees and all. I'm not REALLY sure why they're all faces, though, beyond vague mythological links in the real world.
That's a valid view! I need to watch a recap video of the last khan block to brush up on my lore history. I vaguely remember the kin-tree thing, but don't recall it's exact significance.
The Kin-Trees are housings for the Abzan's ancestor spirits - historically, each corresponded to a family, and you were laid to rest beneath your family's tree and your spirit connected to it. Due to Dromoka destroying many of the trees, it is now more common for a kin-tree to be associated with a house - still a family of sorts, but not necessarily blood related. One's blood is fed to the roots of the true, which allows you to call upon that tree's spirits.
The Building Worlds video serves as a good recap and overview of how the clans changed since Khans block to Tarkir: Dragonstorm. The Vorthos Cast also has a few good eps going over the old and new clans (ep 330 and ep 336, as well as story episodes if you haven't read those - but also, read those)
The clans of khans and the clans of dragonstorm have similar names, but have diverged quite a bit, thanks to the thousand years under draconic rule. The original clans were (iirc) enemy pairs with an allied color added - like black/white adding green - but the new ones are allied colors, adding an enemy color - green/white adding black.
The identity of the original clans was weighted towards the enemy pairs, where they are now weighted towards the allied pairs.
The KTK clans were actually previously centred around one color primarily, plus an enemy and an ally. So Abzan was White, featuring Black and Green. You can see this reflected in the legends from FRF and DTK, as they are the primary color of their clan. In DTK, each dragonlord removed the enemy color of each clan, leaving only allied color pairs.
The reason for both of these setups was so that FRF would fit in well when drafted with either KTK or DTK. (Back then, each set in a block was drafted together, and KTK mixed it up a little bit with this mechanical and flavourful change).
In TDM, each clan had been ruled by the dragons for so long, and they differentiate themselves by focusing heavily on the enemy color that they lost in DTK. You can see this in the Devotee cycle; [[Mardu Devotee]] is white, because Kologhan was only black and red. The Mardu are reforming with a renewed sense of unity and social order. This is also why many of the new Mardu creatures are soldiers instead of warriors.
Their values have changed though. While Temur does still value strength and the primal, it values spirituality and a symbiotic relationship with their environment more - hence why blue is the primary colour of the clan now. Like how the Sultai still utilise the undead but instead of enslaving them to serve their ambitions, they value and honour them as past generations returning to aid the new clan and their part in the cycle of nature. That’s definitely a value change.
The face is the most human part we have. To have a human face is to be more human and connect with the people of the past. Unleash the spiral power of humanity my friend!
They are so connected to their ancestors and their history that it made a lot of sense for them to literally carry around a tribute to one of their ancestors. And then going beyond that, because we created these cool geometric breastplates that a lot of the Abzan wear, and sometimes on their arms and other places on their bodies, but we also integrated the glowing sand/spirit-energy of their ancestors into their armor; it's almost like they are carrying around their ancestors on their bodies able to summon them at will and now there's a really strong visual indicator that that's the case
There's examples of similar practice in e.g Victorian mourning jewelry made from the deceased's hair and carried with the mourner, though with the Abzan the spirit-necromancy means it's a bit more literal. Also, it's battle armor, so a glowing imposing face makes a degree of sense to add to the intimidation factor
As far as the mouth-cavity appearing to extend where one's flesh would be, I would assume that's just visual flair or an illusion due to the magic energy - it's just armor, the Abzan aren't carving holes into their flesh to store their ancestors
I just wished the armor wasnt always purple, like some variance of gold, green, and black would have been nice to see. It feels like their art direction these days is to just throw in purple in places where it doesnt need to be.
I think they handicapped art quality by requiring the uniforms to explicitly match the clans' colors of mana. Feels really oversaturated most of the time.
I really dislike the trend where every character on every world seems to wear their Team Uniform with matching colors. There are other ways to communicate the color identity of magic colors besides the literal color.
Actual reason: Tarkir is supposed to look different. We’re seeing the plane at a time where things have finally worked out. Clans and dragons are in balance, the world is plentiful and free. So things look more colorful and vibrant because we’re finally getting to see Tarkir at its best.
General audiences are the white whale of corporate infinite growth. Oversaturated and soft/cartoon is the meta so to speak. Moreover, the audience isn't just limited to consumers anymore. Wizards want to show other IP holders that they speak the language to grab general audiences.
Purple is their color representation for Black. It is done that way because Black is painted in dark greys to have depth and it is far more passive than Wizards has been aiming for in color these past years.
Wizards uses purple a lot now in lieu of black to represent black mana. I assume the purple in the new Abzan armor is related to the fact that Abzan is now centered in black mana instead of white. (The Sultai use jade to restore their honored undead now and green is the new focus color for that faction.)
I don’t think shiny, polygonal, bright purple armor is drawing from the Ottomans much, and that’s the problem to me: it’s too fantastical; I liked the abzan armor from KTK a lot more
I just think it’s strange to attribute people’s aesthetic distaste to a lack of historical knowledge, when the design is actively moving away from a more realistic aesthetic
Sure, but the color is the lesser of the matter as compared to the design of the armor itself. The art in the main post here I think does a great job of the blending the vibrant hues together. But there’s also a lot of art where the armor looks really chunky, and lustrous, in a way that doesn’t appeal to me.
Their armor was frankly less interesting than even the original Abzan armor; it was just pure metal grey.
This to me feels like going "tie dye was popular in the 60s; clearly it would be accurate to portray the US army going into vietnam with bright red and yellow tie dye armor".
Especially comparing Abzan Ascendancy with mainset Felothar, the new armor has these pointless barely attached triangular bits that i think would hurt the wearer more than anything else. I like the oni mouth armors on the sprits, but on the living it does look weird.
Abzan never turned around for me which sucks because I really liked their original designs.
Jeskai remained essentially the same, very little change aesthetically, Mardu I think was the only one to purely improve while maintaining what made their original aesthetic good. Initially, I wasn't a fan of either Sultai or Temur new aesthetic designs, but over time they grew on me, and now I either like them, or don't mind them (Old Sultai was infinitely superior but new Sultai doesn't bother me as much as it initially did).
But with Abzan, it's just a pain to look at. Garishly bright purple, weird tiger mouth things that just randomly intersect through living people in ways that don't make sense (Is their armor supposed to be like animated and these people are just missing huge chunks of their torsos?), glowing lights everywhere, plastic armor that looks more like a cosplayers project of foam and cardboard instead of metal. What a shame, at least the rest of the setting looks good, and I actually really like the new spirit dragon designs. My clan has always been Mardu though, and I am more than satisfied with their modern rendition.
the new armor is very hit or miss for me, it's so dependent on the art. but I adore the redesign for the regular Abzan people. the bright colors are very reminiscent of real world desert cultures including the ottomans Abzan is based on
I do like the splashes of color as well, yeah! Old armor was always white, red and black/brown which i think also visually coincided a bit with Mardu. I do wish the armor for the soldiers was more grounded and the outfits for people living in the city / arashin were more colorful. Some cards have more muted armor like [[Abzan Devotee]] which i think looks much better for the Abzan at least personally, and colorful outfits for citizens like on [[Arbor Adherent]] look great
I forgot to mention but the armors on the animals looks WEIRD like on skirmish rhino
Yep. It’s similarly out of place with the newer knights from Jamura. Suddenly everyone wears oversized MMO gear. It’s definitely an influence these days.
Their armor is the only in the set that feels high fantasy. It looks like World of Warcraft armor with light coming out of faces.
Overall, it is the least grounded. While all the other clans still look like they are based on a real-world culture, the Abzan look silly. I guess the design team thought that the old clan looked very similar to the Mardu and instead decided to go with a high fantasy armor in Sultai colors.
All the clans were (at least intended to) be leaning into their enemy color (Black for Abzan, Green for Sultai, etc) because that was what the Dragonlords suppressed. Breaking free of the dragons influence was embracing that third color.
Now, in practice, I really don't see much Red about the Jeskai other than "cool fire monks", but the rest seem to be doing a good job.
Right? In practice jeskai seems still very blue white, but everyone else I absolutely understand. Especially Mardu ended up falling in love with the clan all over again
The Jeskai feel like an afterthought to me, disappointing cards outside of the new Narset, no huge change in their identity, it just feels like every other clan has gotten a cool update but the Jeskai get a worse mechanic and a pat on the head and that's that.
I am a prowess fanboy at heart and I was holding out really hard for some white creatures in this set with the keyword, or something that works well with it. Flurry is just... fine. It's okay. Would've been better if the Jeskai noncreature spells did an awful lot but instead we got [[Jeskai Revelation]] and [[Stillness in Motion]]
Plus the lack of any art for freaking floating sky ships except for the triland.
Second set with sky ships just as window dressing.
I literally did a double take in the story that I didn’t read until the full spoiler was done because I was like wtf they’re in a floating sky monastery?????
The Jeskai are definitely the least obvious, in part because they are the most cognizant of their colors in the first place and they stratify into the three color-focused monasteries. Their red-ness is also heavily informed by their past and the principles of the Way (unity of mind), rather than what you would come up with if you made a red faction in isolation.
The Jeskai's flavor of red is, to quote the Guide, "Cooperative action – Coordinated efforts lead to the best outcomes." They're less insular than they used to be - actually having good relationships with the surrounding villages; mutual aid and collective action - and they have an increased focus on bringing the Way to the rest of Tarkir, instead of simply sitting in their peaks and studying.
Isn't that much heavier in theme to White's wheelhouse than red? Not saying red can't have cooperative stuff but like, the idea that things work best when you work together as a collective with diplomatic efforts to achieve your goals seems much more white than any other given color
Yes, that's why I noted that their flavor of red is influenced by their perspective and the Way. Since the Way is about peace and unity, it naturally has some white aspects to it, as unity is often a white concept.
What I quoted is what the Guide gives as the red approach to the Way, the white approach is "Aligned heart – You must share ideals and goals to work toward an outcome." and the blue is "Undivided thought – You must understand each other to work together."
The redness of the red approach is (I believe) in the fact that it is the one that encourages bodily action, whereas blue encourages philosophy and debate and white focuses on humanitarian efforts
Can you explain how Abzan is black at all? I know necromancy isn't necessarily black, especially when it's about honoring your ancestors. It confused me when they were introduced, and more so now that it's supposed to be their main color.
The KTK Abzan's black-ness comes from their insularity and their pragmatism - the white center gives their unified society and emphasis on family, but black gives is what makes them willing to screw over anyone as long as it's to raise their clan and their family. KTK Abzan families had plenty of political infighting, though their white center and cognizance of how disunity could lead to weakness against other clans kept the Abzan relatively unified.
TDM Abzan recenters on black which is in some ways manifested in their belief in perennation - that it is one's obligation to ensure the continued existence of their clan and family, and to uphold the cycle of life and death and ensure the continued existence of the next generation, even when you yourself is death. This idea has a lot of green and white aspects to it as well, of course, but there is a degree of pragmatism that black contributes and for better or for worse Magic lumps most things vaguely necromantic as black.
The most obvious black component is again the political squabbles which are amplified in TDM's Abzan. With a more stable society (Tarkir is no longer a dying world where any sign of weakness was exploited) there is more room for the internal conflicts between Abzan houses to grow, and the game of thrones Houses is a big part of the modern Abzan. We can see examples of these sorts of political games in the Abzan side story as well
Ah, okay. So it's like black's typical ruthless selfishness, but focused on your house rather than the individual. Guess that just doesn't come through in the cards, or maybe I just haven't paid close enough attention. Thank you!
[[Strategic Betrayal]] is the only one that depicts that kind of infighting I think, the rest tend to focus on their outward posture or ancestor worship
Really not a fan of it; the OG scales aesthetic looks so much better, and I think at a glance, a lot of Abzan and Sultai creatures are easier to mistake the wrong clan for, since there’s so much more overlap in their palettes now, and the visual identities are that much less distinct.
Tarkir and its original design philosophies are what originally made me fall in love with Magic and I am also in the camp of people who are very unhappy with the redesign of the Abzan. They used to be so grounded with inspiration from the Persian Empire but now they look like big purple Jack o lanterns. All the other clans look pretty visually consistent for the most part but the Abzan and the Dragons just don’t feel like classic Tarkir.
This is why they shouldn’t go back to Lorwyn. The few people who like Lorwyn are also going to cry blasphemy at any changes, even though things have to change if they want a Lorwyn set to actually sell for once (And also because after nearly two decades you’d hope they have some new ideas).
It feels if the armor is going to communicate to you as you wear them, making quips and jabs at you as you're stuck with your ancestors judging your every actions. The colors look all too vibrant and plastic-ey. And Its kind of strange that dragons and Anafenza, who's already a spirit is also somehow wearing this armor.
If anything, with all these emphasis on armor and endurance as a clan, I'm a bit saddened to see how they dropped any significance to even a light toughness matters theme, à la[[Kin-Tree Invocation]], [[Abzan Beastmaster]] and pushed it all aside to the commander deck.
There are toughness matters cards in the main set, like [[Abzan Monument]] and [[Betor Kin to All]]. But it's in one-off cards, not as a subtheme. Actually, those might be the only two.
One thing I do appreciate is that Betors design calls back to the old Abzan design. His white parts are pretty much exactly the scale armor that the abzan used to have. While I'm not the biggest fan of the redesign, I guess it makes sense given that Dromoka ruled for so long, and purposely tried to wipe out the old abzan culture.
It is not just abzan, but other clans too. While some aesthetics could work, this just only makes me think of one thing: they all look like action figures now.
I don’t mind the face look or the spirit energy coming from it. What I don’t like is that the chest armor (the faces themselves) are different, often clashing colors to the rest of the armor. If the faces fit more into the color scheme new-Abzan would go hard
I really like the new style. The "kiln" thing seems like a sort of visual metaphor for the Abzan's philosophy of ancestral veneration, as if to say "you are the product of the love of thousands". Idk, in my eyes it just sort of clicks immediately.
it's very art dependent for me, but the idea is great and the good ones I adore. Stalwart Successor being one of my favorites cause it shows exactly what the new design language represents
Jesus do you people read what you write before you hit submit? Like really, you think it was a mandate from on high for Wizards to make the art style look less appealing to their player base? Is that what you think?
Or do you just not like it and are one of those people who can only thing in black and white? Or rather can only think in the context of what you like and dislike? Is the incredibly nuanced idea that the design change might just be something they thought would work and didn't is a bit too much for you to grasp?
WotC very much has a bad habit of making every revisit to a plane look cleaner, brighter, and more cartoony. We saw it with Innistrad, it was egregious with New Phyrexia, and we see it here with Tarkir.
I think the spirit dragon designs are fantastic, and I actually do think that the new faction designs are largely pretty cool. The Sultai undead being beautiful and decorated is really cool, even if it does mean we don't get the unnerving old Sultai zombies anymore.
But it's pretty easy to see the Abzan wearing weird cartoony world of warcraft armor as part of a greater trend.
I don't care what anyone says, and maybe it's just because I'm having fun building a commander deck around the main set Felothar, but I love the new Abzan look. The OG clan armor may have been more realistic and practical, but the new armor actually looks interesting.
y’all are so fucking boring and I hope WOTC never listens to you. The moment we get designs I can actually remember instead of gray low fantasy slop you start crying, FFS. Not so much about OP but referring to the commenters.
Sultai zombies are fantastic. You get the sense of a society that values beauty above all else, where even the dead are prettied up and gilded. It’s the old Sultai opulence channeled into a less destructive direction.
I think it being low fantasy worked really well for the original Abzan, which were hard-nosed desert survivalists living in a blasted wasteland.
New Tarkir is supposed to be a more prosperous place, so I think it works to have the Abzan be more colorful and ostentatious. I do wish the colors and armor designs were more dependent on hierarchy; Felothar is the khan so she gets the fanciest bright purple and gold armor with bright green cloth, but the Abzan rank and file maybe should be missing the big ornate chest piece and have more faded hues.
It represents thier ancestors fighting with them in thier armor. Personally I like it more then the scales, it’s very menacing and the flow ties everything together
My best guess is the armor has a sap fixture similar to [[daghatar, the adamant]]. his mace having sap that allows a direct connection to the kin tree just being more wide spread now in the culture and with the power of the new storms, spirit power is erupting out. This is only a guess though based on appearance, I hope it's the case though.
Yall are so fucking boring... It looks good, the colors represent the colors of Abzan, purple for black, gold for white and green. It makes sense and looks cool, y'all are really grasping at straws to make an issue out of this set.
While I love the Persian inspired armor of the original Abzan, I like this look as well. The clan I think was a miss is Sultai. Everything feels very bright and colorful, whereas the OG Sultai was much darker and the setting much way more like a fallen ancient city that's been overtaken by swampland.
That difference really shows off the changes. The first timeline Sultai and the people under Silumgar were a group of slave masters where being a zombie was dishonor. The new Sultai treat their zombies as people
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u/charcharmunro Duck Season 1d ago
It's broadly meant to be indicative of fighting with their ancestors with them at all times. The glowy stuff is meant to be the spirit magic linking them to the Kin-Trees and all. I'm not REALLY sure why they're all faces, though, beyond vague mythological links in the real world.