My musings on stonehands

Enchant Creature spells were in a weird place in early Magic, as they kept trying to one up them for additional mana. Holy Strength got favorable destiny, the wards got the scarabs, and Firebreathing got Stonehands.

When I decided the deck would be a 95 deck (bad idea, Dwarven Traders weren't worth it), but this meant I could replace my Firebreathing with Stonehands, a little known three drop enchant creature spell from Ice Age that gave the firebreathing mechanic as well as an additional +0/+2. In theory, that's great, a format with tons of burn based removal, two additional points of toughness can make a threat. Plus it even fits the theme better, showing dwarves utilizing their magic over the earth.

That's where the issue comes in. With the exception of the Lieutenant and Shivan Dragon, every dwarf in the deck had one toughness which meant they were still well in Lightning Bolt range. Shivan Dragon obviously doesn't need the +0/+2, which leaves only the Lieutenant, which already has it's own, more expensive, but more versatile version of the mechanic. Then there was the cost. Three mana is a lot more then one. Even in a deck running multiple mana flares. Since the primary goal was to make my dwarves unblockable with the Warriors, it was a noble goal, but three additional power, even temporary is probably better than +1/+2.

I guess at the end of the day, this isn't a bad aura, so much as its bad in my deck. I can see it working well in something stronger, like a troll deck, or even orcs. However, the Lollipop Guild is just a little to weak.

Dwarven Lieutenant: The Foreman of the Lollipop Guild

When designing Dwarf tribal, the obvious guy would be the only piece of tribal synergy allowed in the format (Dwarven Pony and Heartwolf aren't legal in OS), so it was obvious, if I was going to do this, I needed to include him. So why did I even want to do this, well that's a story for another article.

Playability: Stating as a 1/2 for 2, Dwarven Lieutenant is about the average curve of a red creature at the time. He does have the Soldier subtype now, which adds a possibility of synergy, but not by much. However, a two cost firebreathing effect is pretty nice, especially since it doesn't have to target him. This allows some tribal synergy with his warrior brothers. However, so can Firebreathing, and be more effective. He can also go in for a swing, and moral the unblocked dwarf that got through. If his fellow tribe members were this efficent, I feel he'd be better, but he's only as good as the men below him, so he's sadly a 3/5. Average, but just good enough on the cusp of playability.



Art: Jeff Menges is always a favorite of mine, but his art usually lacks color. This one goes into a full spectrum of reds, grey, blue, and white. The details between the chain mail, the shadows on the ground, and even the mountains in the background. Everything in this, is deceptively simple, but amazingly distinct. Given the small size of the card frame, it's a testament so much can fit on the art, and not feel cluttered. It leaves a distinct impression on the mind, and the memory. 4/5

Flavor: Dwarves are tough, and a Lieutenant would be something of a stronger dwarf. It makes sense he along can take off a small band of goblin raiders, would be overwhelmed by stronger enemies like orcs or a Goblin Hero. His ability, while nicknamed "fire breathing" isn't actually fire breathing. Instead it represents him boosting moral to other dwarves around him. Why does it require mana? I'm not sure. These days, it would probably be a static or triggered ability. Still it works with what it is. Flavor 3/5.

Final Verdict 3/5. An average card from an average set. Still, it's luckily not a bad card. The ideal card to find in a pack, and much better then a number of Old School creatures, and that's a blessing.

Dwarven Soldiers: The backbone of the Lollipop Guild.

"There is a legend among present-day Dwarves that the Dwarves of Sarpadia will one day return to defend Dwarvenkind against a deadly peril."

This month, for the 95 tournament, I ran a Dwarven tribal deck I called "The Lollipop Guild". First to answer the question of the name. The Lollipop Guild is the name of the midgets that sing in the Hollywood classic of The Wizard of Oz. It's only appropriate that a deck composed of midgets, be named after midgets. 

"We are the Lollipop Guild...."

 While the deck did have a number of weaknesses, goblins hit harder, the deck nukes any hope of winning after I'm done shuffling, and dwarves don't fly, which means skies hit to well. However, there were a number of good plays I managed to do, and I won more then one game, even if I lost every match. This, in part, is due to the brave guild enforcers, the Dwarven Soldier. 

Pay your dues or we will break your shins.

Playability: Two power for two mana is pretty standard for the time. It lacks the one toughness of the Ironclaw Orc, but doesn't have the coward mechanic, and in a pinch, will bravely defend their planeswalker with their life. They have not just one relevant tribe, but actually two, since the GCU have the creature type Soldier, which not amazing, allows it to be synergize with both Fallen Empires lieutenants. The ability is almost relevant, as both Ironclaw Orcs and Orcish Artillery sees play in 94 proper, and Lumberjack sees play in 95. However, its more likely to be flavort ext then an actual mechanic.  Playability: 3/5.

Art: The last card I did with multiple card arts was Brasssclaw Orcs, which I disliked due to how much work was behind it, and somehow, had completely avoided doing a card that fit that, from Fallen Empires, to Alliances. However, since it's my task to review the cards, including art. I shall do it, for my adoring public. 

Douglas Shuler Art:

I always enjoyed how much this looked like Dwarven Warriors from the core set. After all, they were both drawn as Shuler. However, while this art has much going on with it, with some nice little details, it isn't as good looking as Warriors, nor is it Shulers best work. There is just alot going on in the art, and the color are drab, but that's part of it's charm, showing these are common soldiers, strong and steady. Art 3/5.

Randy Asplund Art:

"Orc must die, Orc must die... lets kill this dragon"

Randy Asplund has a long history in medieval art, and it shows. He's the ideal type of artist for early Magic: the Gathering, and it shows perfectly. This piece is no exception, and while not necessarily purely medieval like some of his art, it's certainly an old school fantasy feel, which would be perfect in an old issue of Dragon Magazine, or in an AD&D module. The color is the best part of the piece. The blond hair, the green trees, the red dragon. Even the details are distinct. The notches in the chainmail, the braids of hair, the bones on the dragon, the clouds in the sky, and even the shadow on the ground. This is easily the best of the arts. 5/5

Rob Alexander Art:

This piece of art takes Alexander out of his usual comfort zone of large landscape pieces, and instead focuses on a creature. Well, he sure out did himself with this one. The mono-chrome looks as if he's in a tunnel, with a small light source. The barely visible background elements of ropes and and stands add to the atmosphere of this piece, and while it's not technically the art, this card has the most poignant flavor text of the three, which compliments the art very well. 

"Let no one say we did not fight until the last . . . ."

—Headstone fragment from a mass grave found in the Crimson Peaks

The art helps us remember, that the Fallen Empires is meant to be a depressing set, as the end of civilizations, and this art reminds of us that. 5/5

Flavor: All the flavor texts are the same, showing the ultimately doomed dwarven civilization and it's belief that it will one day return to help present-day dwarves. The mechanics however are where it shines, being stronger fighting it's ancient enemy, the orc. The two power shows it's better training over it's warrior cousins, thanks to it's superior training. Finally, it's one toughness shows how it's ultimately doomed against it's superior enemies. 4/5

Overall (combining the average of the art) 4/5. While not the strongest card, it serves as a great common, to capture the imagination and establish a baseline. It's honestly a shame the orc/Goblin/Dwarf tribal rivalry didn't get to continue on, outside of this set. It would have been great, to establish the colors great identity. Instead in two years, dwarves and orcs were phased out of the game, and outside of one block, we wouldn't get any dwarves until a few years ago, and just two years prior for orcs. Alas, a missed opportunity. I will write another article on that. 

The Lollipop Guild was happy to have their service in their ranks.  

Premium Products

"Wizards of the coast isn't selling a game, they are selling a lifestyle."--Alvin Mason.

"The only noble card game is poker. The only noble wargame is chess"--Anonymous ca/tg/uy

Premium products are nothing new in gaming, whether it be electronic games, or table top. Things like first editions, collector editions, alternative arts, promo's, and exclusive content all plague and riddled these two similar mediums, and have for at least the last twenty years.

However I'm not here to discuss video games, but card games. Magic: the Gathering has been beseeched by an endless slew of not supplement product (which it also has had a problem with), but of premium product.

So what is premium product? Premium products are a product that isn't required to play the game, but its existence adds prestige. Things like alternative art, foils, alternative foils, and until rather recently promo's, all fall under this category.

In contrast, supplement products increase the card pool, with decks, expansions, and so forth. Admittedly, these two lines blur many times in the past, and it can be hard to distinguish them apart.

So where to begin? Well, I guess in the beginning. In the first few years of the games history there were no true premium products, sure beta was more desirable then Unl/Revised, but that was more of a flux.

Instead in the earliest days of Magic, you had promo's. Six promo's exist that originally weren't available in packs. Arena, Sewers of Estark, Windseeker Centaur, Giant Badger, Mana Crypt, and the big one, Nalanthi Dragon.

Nalanthi Dragon was originally given away as a door prize to guests of Dragon Con '94. Its art was drawn by Michael Whelan, who has famously done a number of classic album arts, and was hyped on that fact alone, at least on the cover of Duelist #3. You see, there was so much of a fan backlash over this card, and how exclusive it was, that WotC gave a second copy of it out in the issue. The argument was, that if exclusive cards like that became common, it was only a matter of time before an exclusive tournament staple was printed, that could have dire consequences. Their fears were right, Mana Crypt was a long time favorite for eternal formats, but the true side effect of ignoring this wisdom wouldn't come until the modern era.


So WotC promised this, and for the majority of the 90's, promo's were sort of a weird situation in Magic. It should be noted every other tcg/ccg of the 90's/00's had exclusive promos, but Magic remained one of the few that didn't. Sure alternative art promo's were occasionally giving out, and eventually foils.

Duelist alt art promo

Which leads us to arguably the first premium product, pack/fnm/judge foils. This made way with prerelease foils as well. Prerelease promos (and eventually release promos) are promos that have the date on them of the release stamped in gold lettering. For a long time, they were typically a powerful card in the set, a history that includes such power houses as Emrakul, Wurmcoil Engine, Shelly, Revenant, the kaldra pieces, and False Prophet. Eventually this was changed to much weaker cards, because it "had conflicting interests", before finally being completely randomized among rares (and occasionally uncommons) in the set.

The earliest Pre-release promos weren't foil.

Not that this bothered anyone at the time. They were largely just considered aspects of the game, and pulling a nice foil out of a pack was always a pleasant surprise. As long as you were getting some useful cards, it was no big deal, judges worked hard for their promo's, and getting good cards as a door prize was an awesome incentive. How much things can change in just a decade.

In that decade judge foils went from spontaneous gifts to a major business, pre-release promo's became a joke, fnm promo's even worse (at one point they were tokens). 

However, I'm losing track of myself. The first actual premium collector product you paid money for was none other then the from the vault series. These boxsets were a limited amount of time product, originally released at Gen Con, and would typically contain 15 premium/foil cards loosely following a theme, some following the theme better than others. Eventually, as time moved on, the MSRP got high on them, even before release, fueled entirely on hype and speculation, and they stopped releasing them directly to the customers at Gen Con after the third one. 

However, this was rather tame, the first time WotC attempted a play at the secondary market and forced scarcity was Commander's Arsenal. 

It came with everything a casual player could want. A neat life counter, tons of top shelf premium foils, many for the first time ever, and a fairly coated MSRP. They then sent two to every store in America and told the stores "do whatever". I remember getting into a heated argument with a LGS I frequently attended because of the absurd price he set on his copy. 

"That's what they are going for on ebay"

The other product they started pushing around this time (admittedly probably a year sooner) was the Buy-a-Box promo, which again, was simply an alternative art version of a card that already existed in the set. This eventually gave way to "buy a box premium boosters" for Ixalan block, before WotC changing a 20 year old policy. 

The set Dominaria launched with much hype. With Garfield himself at the helm, it came out with much fanfare, even from otherwise would be critics, and is probably, in my personal opinion, the best set in recent memory. It also had that boy up there, but he could only be purchased if you buy a booster box. Yes, he is literally, a booster box exclusive. However, he had a look warm reception, no the card that broke the proverbial back was this: 

This card saw major play in both type2/standard, and modern, and was only available in the Buy-a-Box promotion. With it's amazing resiliency, and the fact it was an instant, there was little that could be done against it. With it's now legitimate scarcity, it could command quite a bit of money to even pick up one, and while pocket change compared to many OS prices, for what's supposed to be the entry level format, it commanded alot. 

I forgot during this they tried their hands at "Ultra rares" (as we called them), premium cards that weren't even standard legal, but were draft able. These were "invocations" "master pieces" and "expeditions". They came with so much backlash, that they were discontinued almost as soon as they came out, and the Amonkhet ones are still some of the ugliest cards ever printed by WotC. 

However, this wasn't it. In the last two years so much product has dropped, its literally impossible to keep up with them all. Game Night, Modern Horizons, Holiday boxsets. Two "un" sets, annual commander decks, My Little Pony and other Hasbro cards, Mystery Boosters, in addition to the normal set releases for standard, and an introduction to another new format. Its honestly like WotC is trying to throw it all at the wall in an attempt to see what sticks. Almost like WotC isn't doing as well as they like to seem, of course this is just speculation and rumor except...

Yeah that's right. Between over the top 10 dollar premium packs, they drop these, the literal drop series. Each of these are sold directly to the customer, and since their introduction in November, each one is only more expensive on Hasbros online store.

The most recent features a number of fetches, and costs, at least what I'm told, around 100.00 for what amount to five fetches lands. Imagine the profit margin on that one. 

These products have come out flash sale style so quickly, its impossible for them to not be profitable. In fact so many of these have been released so fast I can't find a comprehensive list of cards for it. Seven initial drops, international women's day, year of the rat, and 9 Theros Star Gazing sets. Combine "ultimate", and that will be 19 drops in just a few months. Besides for undercutting their lifeblood of the LGS, they also lie on the honesty of their product doing well. Since these obviously have a huge profit margin, they can say "oh look, we are still growing", though few actual players are buying these products, and instead are being bought by the likes of resellers and speculators. 

The Yugioh-ification of Magic is a term that is often used to describe Magic getting to look more like YuGiOh on how it was when it launched. At that time, Magic thrived as being the best game possible, prided itself on being a thinking man's game, and not staying afloat through cheap gimmicks, and shiny cardboard, the opposite of YGO. 

YGO now prides itself as being a thin Mking man's game with a somewhat level playing field, that's chaotic in it's own constantly changing meta, while Magic survives on it's own cheap gimmicks...

Its starting to look like the later days of the comic book bubble more and more...

Editor note: I forgot about the Comic Con premium planeswalker products. Those exist I guess.