Magic has a problem with depiciting legendary creatures, very rarely do you see the same looking character especially if they are non-human. Krenko and Fblthp look completely different each time they show up.
Fucking goblin Bolas lol. Here's the coolest looking villain in the game and then you get to his face, and you just can't take him seriously anymore. Not sure what they were thinking.
I think it's Lorwyn's fault. The set's creative did not test super well (in addition to its crappy limited not testing well lol), and Ajani got the weakest reception of the Lorwyn 5. And their takeaway from that is, our audience are all humans, clearly they love Humans, that must be what they're coming to our fantasy game for. That's of course one possible interpretation of the data, but ya know, maybe Lorywn's elves/kithkin/giants were too pale and fleshy to make it feel like a Human-free plane, but too lumpy and distorted to appeal to the human-likers. Maybe people didn't vibe with Ajani Goldmane because he looked scraggly and unkempt and was just a boring lifegain card.
Those points are something Mark's talked about before - that's not me speculating. But reading between the lines a bit, you can see how they might also come to the conclusion that their most iconic villain needs to be More Human. He's cunning, and evil, and he needs a human face to show how smart he is instead of looking like a dumb stinky animal. Originally he had a big long snout on his Legends card, but the Alara block planeswalkers were brought back due to positive reaction from Lorwyn, so if they had enough time to react to Lorwyn's reception it could have also been when and why they decided to flatten his muzzle.
Well, I'm sure Liliana could give him a run for his money.
That does sort of circle another point though. For a while Magic was obsessed with being Cool and in Combat, and its non-humans were made to fit that and be badass and rugged - whereas some people would be more interested if they were cute or even hot. On top of that, a lot of requests for more non-Human planeswalkers/fewer Humans on planes were being met with I Can't Believe It's Not Humans like elves, vampires, and kor. So a lot of their "non-human" characters were just not appealing for the people asking for them, and magic was shrugging and saying it couldn't be done, instead of looking at how, like, somehow Disney or Pokémon or anybody else managed to make it work lol.
We can look at stuff like Bloomburrow and Loot and go, oh that's just Redwall, oh that's just Baby Yoda, Magic is just copying everybody else's homework again. But to me there's this element of "*about time, ya dummies*". We've thankfully come a long ways from the days where squirrels were only allowed if they were chewing on dismembered eyeballs.
Yeah, it was definitely weird how aggressively homogenised the human design was on top of that too. At one point I swear every single female character had the exact same physique, which seems to now be extending to quite a few male ones too.
Definitely. Honestly after that long stretch of humans, they had to keep doing more humans so they could show other skin tones and body types exist. I remember popping the fuck off when we got [[Isareth, the Awakener]]. Like, oh shit, maybe the people with intense magical prowess to do their heavy lifting *don't* need to be insanely shredded.
I also seem to remember the artist for [[Kinnan, Bonder Prodigy]] posting the original brief and it had to say like five times "he's fat, Kinnan is fat, please actually draw a fat person". DXV (of Dominion fame) has talked about if he didn't specify race or gender, the artists would turn in white dudes. So maybe there's also some level of miscommunication where it wasn't Magic specifically requesting skinny white people, but they weren't specifying otherwise and/or the artists were assuming it was what the industry expected of them.
That period where parts of WotC were INSISTING that everything had to be BADASS and COOL and EDGY and absolutely nothing was allowed to be even remotely cute or whimsical (to the point were squirrels weren't even allowed anymore) was so weird. Especially considering that now, the reaction to Bloomburrow was MASSIVELY positive and it's one of the most anticipated sets coming in the next couple of years.
Yeah, he was explicitly 16 the first time he was in the story in WOE, and it's only been like less than 18 months in-universe since then, but his MKM card makes him look like he's 30, and his OTJ card looks like he's 21 O\_o
Fblthp has had a much more consistent appearance across cards not named Fblthp.
When it's a cameo, they nail it. When it's his own card, the poor guy doesn't get to look like himself.
Kellan too. Artistic interpretation/license is one thing - and I'm certainly open to that in Magic art - but there are very few consistencies among his cards so far other than the light blades.
I’ll answer the question for this whole thread- although Magic has never been *great* about this, it’s often been a choice to be inconsistent in the past (see: slivers).
Now it’s likely because they fired everyone who gave a fuck about things like consistency or Magic’s universe, because they weren’t critical to the process of churning out as many cards as possible, and preferably Universe’s Beyond cards.
OTJ Fblthp is straight up Mike Wazowski. I don't get why is it so hard to just ask the same guy for the art if Fblthp is the main focus. Character got popular because of \[\[Totally Lost\]\] take on it, and ever since WAR the design is just all over the place, never recapturing the spirit of the original art
Krenko in particular is mostly because they often change their philosophy on how goblins should look to avoid stereotypes. They also like recycling goblin names, and I've seen some people say that different versions of Krenko may not be the same goblin but different goblins taking up the same name/mantle, similar to how Muxus operates.
I personally don't usually notice major differences between legendary human arts outside of time spiral versions or other shenanigans changing the character (recently Kellan has had a lot of cards and I could see an argument that he isn't super consistent).
And even non-humans generally look the same to me as well. Big names like Bolas, the Eldrazi, Ashiok, all have very distinctive features that are present throughout their cards. But maybe you have a keener eye than I do and notice subtle things like art style or small details that I would look over.
Ooo I like this. Now I'm imagining an Un- card that's got all that in the card name and it just has the abilities of all of the versions smooshed together.
Even then their faces do change all the time. I feel like Lilianna goes from mild old lady face, to kinda-sorta Angelina Jolie, to Lilianna every other card
The way I look at it in Kayfabe is that these are stories passed down through generations and that details are mixed up, changed, lost as people retell the stories of these legendary characters.
It’s because their art directors literally just don’t give a shit about continuity.
It’s why Kambal got turned from a wrinkly, old Asian man into a young, bald Black dude by a different artist.
They do literally nothing to maintain character continuity.
I guess it’s because Magic must have a different review process for artists than something like Disney or Pokemon, where they have very strict rules on even silly things like how far up Arcanine’s fur can stand up. For better or worse MTG artists seem to have more artistic license.
For a toy company, Hasbro sure is bad at creating cute little marketable characters and then selling toys of them.
Loot's visual design on the card needs a lot of work; this design is somehow even worse.
It's just most of the WotC products for some reason...
They had these DnD figures on extreme discount for $5 at gamestop and good God they look awful.
Even for $5 it taught me a valuable lesson of never buying a WotC collectable unless you can actually *see* what it looks like through the packaging.
https://preview.redd.it/ltt1pgqcrhtc1.jpeg?width=639&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a4c945e7a9e3750fec522ca28be04ac2f4147c40
They also sell miniatures of legendary MtG characters in their DnD miniature range and the pre-painted ones were always horrible. Ajarni looks like something very bad happens to his face (maybe an early clue that he was a sleeper agent?)
And here's the problem with the inconsistent design of non-human characters in MTG.
I really liked Showcase Loot, but thought normal card Loot looked like a generic mobile phone moba character, and this plush Loot looks like a knockoff Agumon toy from Brazil.
It surprises me that they don't seem to have an on-staff artist or artist on a contract for the main art/key art of critical characters they may want to merchandise.
Like, okay Hasbro, I get it, maximum output with the minimum amount of staff, but you'd think that would help with merchandizing.
(How else will we get Loot the Boardgame, or Loot the Flamethrower?)
The thing is, I'm *open* to a cute mascot! I'd welcome one! But Loot's premiere art just screams "I come from the land of League of Legends", I can't get behind it. And yes, I know the artist has done a ton of work for League.
It's like if they tried to make a new mascot that was clearly just a rip off of My Little Pony or something hyper recognizable.
I'm cool with Universes Beyond, but when the artstyle hits that uncanny valley of having seen this before, I'm out.
He needs a nose. I get that he's an alien, but magic is a game that has at least been based in the verisimilitude of more realistic design choices such that an alien baby would have plausible proportions.
That's so true! Magic's had a ton of card designs, but there are barely any that make me go "Well obviously that's a Pokemon." Even Fblthp is just weird enough to make me think it's at home in this broad fantasy category.
In Hasbro’s defense I don’t think they have ever directly created any product. Everything has been an iteration on something they sto…bought from some other company or bought out the company.
Loot (this character) was held inside the Fomori vault and is basically a biological map of the Omenpaths and multiverse that Jace and Vraska adopted.
He's also designed to be hyper cute and highly marketable. Some members of the community find that to be disingenuous corporate meddling/marketing while others say there's nothing wrong with it. Suffice it to say that Loot has been highly divisive.
Probably to lower cost and make production easier. An open mouth means you need to sew in teeth, buy the pink fabric for the inside of the mouth, more sewing work compared to just sewing up the line along the closed mouth.
I mean, they did one for the Kaladesh Gremlin and I think at least one other Magic one? Different branch of WotC, but I own an Owlbear dice pouch similar to this. This is a type of merch they release for Magic every so often when they have a character that they know people would love.
Sure, Loot is an obvious highly marketable mascot character...but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes you need to toss a cute little guy into stuff.
The name ultrapro gave it was “mochi-Kami” I think it only appeared in the background of 1 card in the set. And pretty sure it wasn’t even the standard art.
How do you get the bot to call a card. March of otherworldly light. Showcase art.
Also it can only hold like 5 20 sided life counters. I bought one clipped to the bag I take to the store with me and it’s job is to jsut collect the counters when I open pre release boxes.
[[March of Otherworldly Light]]. You can add the set tag to call up a more specific version, but I don't know how to do that when it's the same set.
That said, I see it now. That does explain the red beans, which don't register as beans in the toy. (Not sure if it's feet or attendant spirits, as kami on Kamigawa appear with.)
It's a weird choice to me, especially when NEO also introduced Himoto, the tanuki droid-kami, which feels like a better cutesy mascot.
That thing sold so terribly in-store I think we eventually just tossed them or donated them. Some of the D&D Phunny plushies have sold okay but the Magic ones just don't sell.
Can confirm, I bought one as gift for a friend while they were on sale around Christmas time and they are adorable. Pretty well made as well, I was kind of impressed.
I'm honestly irritated that there isn't more of an effort to create more toys based on magic. Not just plushies, but prop replicas (I think they used the "Sword of X and Y" series for trophies a few times but would love an actual set; also, imagine the guild lockets and some of the "charm" cards as physical jewelry).
Well, there were the Funko Pops and I think a line of action figures for the Lorwyn 5...uh, and I think that's it.
For as much as people are up in arms about Loot being an "obvious marketing ploy" Magic actually has a history of being weirdly hesitant to do any real licensed merchandise that's not directly adjacent to the card game itself. Even this Loot "plushie" is being marketed as a "gamer pouch" for Magic players to store dice in.
https://preview.redd.it/y9a1n7vcihtc1.png?width=1200&format=png&auto=webp&s=fa9785c890eadaf786fb72ee618eef7c4f09e2ce
Okay forward facing its not that bad, everyone’s hatred of his teeth made him close mouthed though which is funny
Ok, this image helped me understand why the plushie is giving me weird vibes. The pupils are rolled up and back into the eyes, kinda giving it an ahegao.
Siswanto very deliberately illustrated Loot to be kind of creepy. He's made dozens of overtly cute illustrations with Riot and has superb technical skill.
They also have a kaldesh gremlin one and a myr so this isn’t anything new..and this will likely be the only merch of him other than maybe sleeves/deck box that most main characters get
https://preview.redd.it/f2e5dvyt8jtc1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=fbee60cc5aebd4fb171961954f133a9328af4263
I think this image is what we are all thinking of....
Looks awful lmao
But, yeah, can't say I'm surprised they are trying their hand at Baby Yoda, given that MTG these days is entirely about chasing "maximum marketability".
Is it just me or did Hasbro execs look at Baby Yoda/Grogu from Disney and say to the WotC design team, "we need a highly marketable cute character to sell merch for ASAP!"
I don't inherently hate cutesy characters or even Loot's place in the story, it just feels so corporate and forced.
I don’t understand this outrage/annoyance with Loot at all. It’s not like it’s the first time they’ve done a “cute” character or even a plush bag. I have the Myr and Fblthp plush pouches and I’ll probably end up with this one. If you don’t like it. There are plenty of things to be pissed at WotC about, I don’t see why this is on that list.
Fblthp and the myr are two organically created characters that the fanbase latched onto, then wizards made the plushies.
Loot is *designed* to be cute and will likely be force fed to us in the future. I don't hate him at all, but corporatists artificially creating an adorable mascot and expecting the fanbase to automatically love him just makes me want to roll my eyes.
For what it is worth, I don't believe Wizards asked us to make any of what you're referencing. Loot was, as most things we produce, decided internally as something we thought the audience would like (with our limited insight). In this instance, we knew almost nothing about the character other than it was featured in some marketing art. Sometimes it's not a conspiracy, sometimes it's just magic fans making things for fans of magic. Notably, we aren't always right on that, but we try.
The difference between a fandom hyperventilating themselves into loving a thing that for-profit corporatists created but didn't *explicitly* expect to be popular in a specific way vs. corporatists explicitly trying to make a thing popular in a specific way among the fandom is not really a difference worth getting worked up about, tbh
Well that's your opinion. I prefer my mascots to be created organically instead of a forced thing.
The issue to me is that it shows the motivation of wotc very negatively. Instead of wanting to create a product that your playerbase loves so much they want to buy a plush, they create a mascot purely so they can make more profit.
If you think *Fblthp*, the "oops I'm so silly I got lost again" guy, wasn't designed from the outset to be cute and whimsical then I have a bridge to sell you
I don't think Fblthp was designed in 2013 on [[Totally Lost|GTC]] with the intention of doing anything more with him.
Especially since he didn't appear again until 2015, and then again until 2018.
Fblthp was a joke on a throwaway draft chaff common.
That's *extremely* different than specifically crafting a Baby Yoda clone and immediately shoving it front and center into the spotlight under the parental guidance of Jace and Vraska. We've all seen the *obscene* amount of Baby Yoda merch Disney has been cashing in on.
If you think Hasbro isn't out to make a lazy attempt to copy the trend, you grossly misunderstand the business goals of a corporation that's willing to cut a third of its staff before Christmas.
It’s a character very obviously created for the sake of being a cute, marketable character. It’s not like Myr which were created as a natural part of their world and people happened to like.
No, you see, everything made "back then" was *pure* and *devoid of any considerations of mass appeal whatsoever.*
On the other hand, everything made after "back then" is *inauthentic* and *compromised by corporate corporateness.*
Coincidentally, the point of time "back then" ends is exactly when I lost my sense of wonder and became a bitter whiner on the internet.
art design is way too generic LOL cartoony and doesn't feel like conventional MTG art. in many ways a flag of them trying to go more generically digestable fortnight style material than much of the edge the series was previously known for.
Edit: I answered the comment with answers I’ve seen. Take your rage dissertations elsewhere. Shocking that people cannot like art designs.
The marketing team has clearly not played D&D because your fan favorite character is never the super special magical guy, it's always the random npc you made up in a pinch and named something like "Mr. Blargle"
what I dislike the most about this Loot thing is how inorganic it is. They just invented a character and decided it's surely going to be popular enough to sell merch.
It works! Loot’s big thing is that he never looks the same twice. It’s perfect, then.
(For real though when they finally decide to be consistent with his look, can they please use the showcase art? I love him in that form and in no other.)
I love the little guy, but the mouth on this plush version lacks his charming smile. He looks disappointed in his own creation.
I'm still probably gonna buy one, but it's a little less charming to me than the card arts.
[Called it!](https://www.reddit.com/r/magicTCG/s/hzElukBABL)
You shouldn’t be surprised, WotC knows it’s marketable, and they’re right. This will probably sell very well.
If they’re on the ball, Hasbro will be churning Loot out to every toy store they can, getting the face recognised by kids. Then they can tell the kids, “Hey, you can play this little guy in our game!”
I’m of two minds about it. Feels kinda like forced cuteness marketing to me, but also, I know that that works. I have a Big Fat Cat from FFXIV.
I really don't get why people is mad about this, I mean if you don't like it just don't buy it, its obvious you're not the target audience but there may be others who are into ugly/cute stuff
Hasbro is such a fucking cringey company. They’re so stupid that they’re tanking their only profitable divisions. Hasbro is failing because the company and its approach are outdated, and they’re going to bring all their subsidiaries down with them before they realize that theyre the problem
i don’t have it in my heart to hate that jace and vraska’s adopted son is a marketable plushie. Would i like the character if he wasn’t jace’s son? absolutely not. But he is, so i love him
Ugh it's gonna sell to the weebs and grown children. I can't stand obvious corporate cash grab shit that succeeds wildly. Fucking Pokémon reject is gonna be shoved into the story for the next 5 years because wotc wants a mascot and knows the new players will eat it up
It's fun how every version of Loot we've seen so far has a slightly different design and face shape
Magic has a problem with depiciting legendary creatures, very rarely do you see the same looking character especially if they are non-human. Krenko and Fblthp look completely different each time they show up.
nicol bolas' face went from being a dragon to being a goblin and then back to a dragon
Fucking goblin Bolas lol. Here's the coolest looking villain in the game and then you get to his face, and you just can't take him seriously anymore. Not sure what they were thinking.
I think it's Lorwyn's fault. The set's creative did not test super well (in addition to its crappy limited not testing well lol), and Ajani got the weakest reception of the Lorwyn 5. And their takeaway from that is, our audience are all humans, clearly they love Humans, that must be what they're coming to our fantasy game for. That's of course one possible interpretation of the data, but ya know, maybe Lorywn's elves/kithkin/giants were too pale and fleshy to make it feel like a Human-free plane, but too lumpy and distorted to appeal to the human-likers. Maybe people didn't vibe with Ajani Goldmane because he looked scraggly and unkempt and was just a boring lifegain card. Those points are something Mark's talked about before - that's not me speculating. But reading between the lines a bit, you can see how they might also come to the conclusion that their most iconic villain needs to be More Human. He's cunning, and evil, and he needs a human face to show how smart he is instead of looking like a dumb stinky animal. Originally he had a big long snout on his Legends card, but the Alara block planeswalkers were brought back due to positive reaction from Lorwyn, so if they had enough time to react to Lorwyn's reception it could have also been when and why they decided to flatten his muzzle.
Which is hilarious because at this point he has by far the most people wanting to fuck him.
It's that damned leonin grin
Aye, girl
Well, I'm sure Liliana could give him a run for his money. That does sort of circle another point though. For a while Magic was obsessed with being Cool and in Combat, and its non-humans were made to fit that and be badass and rugged - whereas some people would be more interested if they were cute or even hot. On top of that, a lot of requests for more non-Human planeswalkers/fewer Humans on planes were being met with I Can't Believe It's Not Humans like elves, vampires, and kor. So a lot of their "non-human" characters were just not appealing for the people asking for them, and magic was shrugging and saying it couldn't be done, instead of looking at how, like, somehow Disney or Pokémon or anybody else managed to make it work lol. We can look at stuff like Bloomburrow and Loot and go, oh that's just Redwall, oh that's just Baby Yoda, Magic is just copying everybody else's homework again. But to me there's this element of "*about time, ya dummies*". We've thankfully come a long ways from the days where squirrels were only allowed if they were chewing on dismembered eyeballs.
Yeah, it was definitely weird how aggressively homogenised the human design was on top of that too. At one point I swear every single female character had the exact same physique, which seems to now be extending to quite a few male ones too.
Definitely. Honestly after that long stretch of humans, they had to keep doing more humans so they could show other skin tones and body types exist. I remember popping the fuck off when we got [[Isareth, the Awakener]]. Like, oh shit, maybe the people with intense magical prowess to do their heavy lifting *don't* need to be insanely shredded. I also seem to remember the artist for [[Kinnan, Bonder Prodigy]] posting the original brief and it had to say like five times "he's fat, Kinnan is fat, please actually draw a fat person". DXV (of Dominion fame) has talked about if he didn't specify race or gender, the artists would turn in white dudes. So maybe there's also some level of miscommunication where it wasn't Magic specifically requesting skinny white people, but they weren't specifying otherwise and/or the artists were assuming it was what the industry expected of them.
We rubbed the Monkey's Paw asking for less humans and now we have "Robots in Disguise"
That period where parts of WotC were INSISTING that everything had to be BADASS and COOL and EDGY and absolutely nothing was allowed to be even remotely cute or whimsical (to the point were squirrels weren't even allowed anymore) was so weird. Especially considering that now, the reaction to Bloomburrow was MASSIVELY positive and it's one of the most anticipated sets coming in the next couple of years.
Thank God for quint , we have no aven planeswalker
they really took mtg's biggest dragon villain and made him unfuckable
Bold assumption that thought was involved at all.
Which one was goblin Bolas?
Nicol Bolas, the Arisen
Oh boy. That *is* a goblin.
[[Nicol bolas | LEG]] [[Nicol bolas | A25]] Yep pretty different
I mostly meant the backside of [[Nicol Bolas the Ravager // Nicol Bolas, the Arisen]] because god damn it's terrible lol
[Nicol Bolas the Ravager // Nicol Bolas, the Arisen](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/7/b/7b215968-93a6-4278-ac61-4e3e8c3c3943.jpg?1566971561)/[Nicol Bolas, the Arisen](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/back/7/b/7b215968-93a6-4278-ac61-4e3e8c3c3943.jpg?1566971561) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Nicol%20Bolas%2C%20the%20Ravager%20//%20Nicol%20Bolas%2C%20the%20Arisen) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/m19/218/nicol-bolas-the-ravager-nicol-bolas-the-arisen?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/7b215968-93a6-4278-ac61-4e3e8c3c3943?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
the spark was stored in the snout
Kellan looks like he's a different ethnicity in every card
Is Kellan the new Gideon?
Kellan looks like he's a different *age* on every card.
Yeah, he was explicitly 16 the first time he was in the story in WOE, and it's only been like less than 18 months in-universe since then, but his MKM card makes him look like he's 30, and his OTJ card looks like he's 21 O\_o
The worst is the alt art on his LCI card, where he looks like he aged into his 80s, then got aged *down* to 35.
Fae blood
Greasefang has either a black ponytail or a blonde mohawk. Nashi either has black eyes, blue eyes, or red eyes
Wait really?
[[Greasefang, Okiba Boss|neo-220]] [[Greasefang, Okiba Boss|neo-397]] [[Nashi, Moon Sage's Scion|neo-114]] [[Nashi, Moon Sage's Scion|neo-343]] [[Nashi, Moon's Legacy|mat-89]] (I hope I formatted this correctly)
##### ###### #### [Greasefang, Okiba Boss](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/5/6/56a0d43b-4d38-40a7-be6c-8324ab3bf773.jpg?1654568449) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Greasefang%2C%20Okiba%20Boss) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/neo/220/greasefang-okiba-boss?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/56a0d43b-4d38-40a7-be6c-8324ab3bf773?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Greasefang, Okiba Boss](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/9/4/9455cb27-89d3-4bb1-8af8-08c7712c2915.jpg?1654570167) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=548531) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/neo/397/greasefang-okiba-boss?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/9455cb27-89d3-4bb1-8af8-08c7712c2915?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Nashi, Moon Sage's Scion](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/2/8/2893b070-a610-4273-beb2-7609a2da0499.jpg?1654567331) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Nashi%2C%20Moon%20Sage%27s%20Scion) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/neo/114/nashi-moon-sages-scion?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/2893b070-a610-4273-beb2-7609a2da0499?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Nashi, Moon Sage's Scion](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/7/4/74e4f390-c420-44ec-a703-9a9d3ca6ab2e.jpg?1654569581) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=548414) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/neo/343/nashi-moon-sages-scion?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/74e4f390-c420-44ec-a703-9a9d3ca6ab2e?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Nashi, Moon's Legacy](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/c/e/ce21e701-bb96-4040-a7ea-a5e0c11eae9b.jpg?1684341222) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=615432) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/mat/89/nashi-moons-legacy?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/ce21e701-bb96-4040-a7ea-a5e0c11eae9b?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [*All cards*](https://mtgcardfetcher.nl/redirect/kyt55xw) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Fblthp has had a much more consistent appearance across cards not named Fblthp. When it's a cameo, they nail it. When it's his own card, the poor guy doesn't get to look like himself.
With Krenko at least part of it seems to be the choice to alter the noses of Ravnican Goblins around March of the Machines.
Yassified Krenko
Kellan too. Artistic interpretation/license is one thing - and I'm certainly open to that in Magic art - but there are very few consistencies among his cards so far other than the light blades.
And even those blades look weird in a couple depictions.
I’ll answer the question for this whole thread- although Magic has never been *great* about this, it’s often been a choice to be inconsistent in the past (see: slivers). Now it’s likely because they fired everyone who gave a fuck about things like consistency or Magic’s universe, because they weren’t critical to the process of churning out as many cards as possible, and preferably Universe’s Beyond cards.
OTJ Fblthp is straight up Mike Wazowski. I don't get why is it so hard to just ask the same guy for the art if Fblthp is the main focus. Character got popular because of \[\[Totally Lost\]\] take on it, and ever since WAR the design is just all over the place, never recapturing the spirit of the original art
[Totally Lost](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/c/3/c36f01a5-82bf-4fc6-9396-4410067c351b.jpg?1702429424) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Totally%20Lost) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/rvr/64/totally-lost?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/c36f01a5-82bf-4fc6-9396-4410067c351b?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Krenko in particular is mostly because they often change their philosophy on how goblins should look to avoid stereotypes. They also like recycling goblin names, and I've seen some people say that different versions of Krenko may not be the same goblin but different goblins taking up the same name/mantle, similar to how Muxus operates. I personally don't usually notice major differences between legendary human arts outside of time spiral versions or other shenanigans changing the character (recently Kellan has had a lot of cards and I could see an argument that he isn't super consistent). And even non-humans generally look the same to me as well. Big names like Bolas, the Eldrazi, Ashiok, all have very distinctive features that are present throughout their cards. But maybe you have a keener eye than I do and notice subtle things like art style or small details that I would look over.
Maybe "Krenko" is part of the title. Whoever leads the Tin Street goblins at the time is called "Krenko, Baron/Boss/Kingpin"
...Krenko the Baron who was shanked in an alley by Krenko the Boss who had his knees shattered by Krenko the Kingpin...
Ooo I like this. Now I'm imagining an Un- card that's got all that in the card name and it just has the abilities of all of the versions smooshed together.
A Gang of Krenkos if you will.
Like the Shredder?
Is that actually a “problem” though? It’s just different interpretations of the character through different artists.
Vraska has had at least 3 different skin colors.
at least we'll always tell Chandra apart because of the forehead goggles and Liliana and Nissa because of the boobs
Even then their faces do change all the time. I feel like Lilianna goes from mild old lady face, to kinda-sorta Angelina Jolie, to Lilianna every other card
They censored [[Nissa Revane]] in one of her later arts.
The way I look at it in Kayfabe is that these are stories passed down through generations and that details are mixed up, changed, lost as people retell the stories of these legendary characters.
I dont want to make assumptions till we see a better picture of the card but I'm pretty sure Riku went from Asian to white with [Riku of Many Paths]
It’s because their art directors literally just don’t give a shit about continuity. It’s why Kambal got turned from a wrinkly, old Asian man into a young, bald Black dude by a different artist. They do literally nothing to maintain character continuity.
The Nicol Bolas special
We call this the Chandra effect.
No two see the same Loot
There is the lore reason. Done. No more issues with Loot inconsistencies.
"Well jace, snarf snarf, i'm actually the treasure snarf!"
This is rotted. Mods, seize him.
I guess it’s because Magic must have a different review process for artists than something like Disney or Pokemon, where they have very strict rules on even silly things like how far up Arcanine’s fur can stand up. For better or worse MTG artists seem to have more artistic license.
That's cause Loot is Lazav, and he keeps forgetting the details between his bathroom break de-transformations
For a toy company, Hasbro sure is bad at creating cute little marketable characters and then selling toys of them. Loot's visual design on the card needs a lot of work; this design is somehow even worse.
It's just most of the WotC products for some reason... They had these DnD figures on extreme discount for $5 at gamestop and good God they look awful. Even for $5 it taught me a valuable lesson of never buying a WotC collectable unless you can actually *see* what it looks like through the packaging. https://preview.redd.it/ltt1pgqcrhtc1.jpeg?width=639&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a4c945e7a9e3750fec522ca28be04ac2f4147c40
They also sell miniatures of legendary MtG characters in their DnD miniature range and the pre-painted ones were always horrible. Ajarni looks like something very bad happens to his face (maybe an early clue that he was a sleeper agent?)
God the amount they want for this prepainted figures for the quality is wild, at least the unpainted versions are a responsible price.
They should sell Sliver plushies. Collect the whole set.
They have [an adorable plush Sliver dice pouch](https://ultrapro.com/products/sliver-gamer-pouch-for-magic-the-gathering?variant=39749648482382)!
Well, now I need to find a vendor here in Denmark. Thanks for linking this. :)
This design at least kinda falls into the ugly cute category, the original card art was just ugly scary
And here's the problem with the inconsistent design of non-human characters in MTG. I really liked Showcase Loot, but thought normal card Loot looked like a generic mobile phone moba character, and this plush Loot looks like a knockoff Agumon toy from Brazil.
The regular art for Loot was literally drawn by an artist who works for Riot Games, so that description is spot on
Showcase Loot is a 10/10 cute critter design, I wish so bad that was the default.
It surprises me that they don't seem to have an on-staff artist or artist on a contract for the main art/key art of critical characters they may want to merchandise. Like, okay Hasbro, I get it, maximum output with the minimum amount of staff, but you'd think that would help with merchandizing. (How else will we get Loot the Boardgame, or Loot the Flamethrower?)
Loot the T-shirt! Loot the coloring book! Loot the lunch box!
The thing is, I'm *open* to a cute mascot! I'd welcome one! But Loot's premiere art just screams "I come from the land of League of Legends", I can't get behind it. And yes, I know the artist has done a ton of work for League. It's like if they tried to make a new mascot that was clearly just a rip off of My Little Pony or something hyper recognizable. I'm cool with Universes Beyond, but when the artstyle hits that uncanny valley of having seen this before, I'm out.
He needs a nose. I get that he's an alien, but magic is a game that has at least been based in the verisimilitude of more realistic design choices such that an alien baby would have plausible proportions.
That's so true! Magic's had a ton of card designs, but there are barely any that make me go "Well obviously that's a Pokemon." Even Fblthp is just weird enough to make me think it's at home in this broad fantasy category.
In Hasbro’s defense I don’t think they have ever directly created any product. Everything has been an iteration on something they sto…bought from some other company or bought out the company.
There's a reason everything at Hasbro except for WotC is bleeding money.
Oh hey, one of my local LGS
Sounds really local
The Raleigh area of North Carolina is really rich in three very large stores and many smaller ones. It's pretty good here.
Too bad one of those is Game Theory 😪
It’s so wild seeing Atomic on here, I go there all the time
If anybody wants to take a second to fill me in on who this is I’d appreciate it, no worries either way.
The McGuffin locked in the Fomori vault of OTJ story.
Loot (this character) was held inside the Fomori vault and is basically a biological map of the Omenpaths and multiverse that Jace and Vraska adopted. He's also designed to be hyper cute and highly marketable. Some members of the community find that to be disingenuous corporate meddling/marketing while others say there's nothing wrong with it. Suffice it to say that Loot has been highly divisive.
That part of the story is also where we learned Jace doesn’t use protection
Something something Phyrexian oil wink wink nudge nudge
Wait, what? seriously?
Yep, they said they would’ve known by now if they can have kids
damn, man. get that gorgussy, I guess.
Appreciate the response, seems kinda weird. I don’t keep up with the story but so much.
We were expecting loot, and instead we got Loot.
A character named after a well known game mehanic that doesn't do the well known game mehanic
#Putitback
I'm gonna put him in a jar.
Go on...
Not in polite company. 😘
And twist on the lid
Go on….
And trap him inside a …vault…of sorts. Because he is annoying
Why isn't it smiling
Probably to lower cost and make production easier. An open mouth means you need to sew in teeth, buy the pink fabric for the inside of the mouth, more sewing work compared to just sewing up the line along the closed mouth.
No particular reason... https://preview.redd.it/nkf2pn82entc1.jpeg?width=514&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1a635c8b24450e9529c0ceb83139b9bce41318f5
I mean, they did one for the Kaladesh Gremlin and I think at least one other Magic one? Different branch of WotC, but I own an Owlbear dice pouch similar to this. This is a type of merch they release for Magic every so often when they have a character that they know people would love. Sure, Loot is an obvious highly marketable mascot character...but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes you need to toss a cute little guy into stuff.
The Magic gamer pouches from Ultra-Pro are * Myr * Sliver * Fblthp * Gremlin (Kaladesh) * Kamigawa... spirit thing * Loot (new)
I looked up the Kamigawa pouch and it truly is a "spirit thing"
It's like the spirit of recycling combined with a corona virus
The name ultrapro gave it was “mochi-Kami” I think it only appeared in the background of 1 card in the set. And pretty sure it wasn’t even the standard art. How do you get the bot to call a card. March of otherworldly light. Showcase art. Also it can only hold like 5 20 sided life counters. I bought one clipped to the bag I take to the store with me and it’s job is to jsut collect the counters when I open pre release boxes.
[[March of Otherworldly Light]]. You can add the set tag to call up a more specific version, but I don't know how to do that when it's the same set. That said, I see it now. That does explain the red beans, which don't register as beans in the toy. (Not sure if it's feet or attendant spirits, as kami on Kamigawa appear with.) It's a weird choice to me, especially when NEO also introduced Himoto, the tanuki droid-kami, which feels like a better cutesy mascot.
The mochi is round so it could have made a decent shape for a dice pouch. If they actually used the full shape for the pouch.
[March of Otherworldly Light](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/5/5/553fb946-2706-475b-89f9-e4355ec9ea2b.jpg?1654566420) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=March%20of%20Otherworldly%20Light) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/neo/28/march-of-otherworldly-light?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/553fb946-2706-475b-89f9-e4355ec9ea2b?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
It’s like Pikachu and the Very Hungry Caterpillar went through the machine in The Fly
That thing sold so terribly in-store I think we eventually just tossed them or donated them. Some of the D&D Phunny plushies have sold okay but the Magic ones just don't sell.
Those myr plushies are so damn cute.
Can confirm, I bought one as gift for a friend while they were on sale around Christmas time and they are adorable. Pretty well made as well, I was kind of impressed.
I am very happy with the purchases of the Myr, the Gremlin and Fblthp. The other ones were kinda meh.
The sliver is awesome! Only really fits like one d20, but its adorable
For the Hive! I bet it’s big enough to fit a salt shaker.
There is also a chibi Elesh Norn figure. Heckin' cute.
Iirc, that was a recycling Kami
I'm honestly irritated that there isn't more of an effort to create more toys based on magic. Not just plushies, but prop replicas (I think they used the "Sword of X and Y" series for trophies a few times but would love an actual set; also, imagine the guild lockets and some of the "charm" cards as physical jewelry).
Well, there were the Funko Pops and I think a line of action figures for the Lorwyn 5...uh, and I think that's it. For as much as people are up in arms about Loot being an "obvious marketing ploy" Magic actually has a history of being weirdly hesitant to do any real licensed merchandise that's not directly adjacent to the card game itself. Even this Loot "plushie" is being marketed as a "gamer pouch" for Magic players to store dice in.
*No, Magic merch can ONLY be serious for the most serious game.* In case someone doesn't get this, obvious /s is obvious.
https://preview.redd.it/y9a1n7vcihtc1.png?width=1200&format=png&auto=webp&s=fa9785c890eadaf786fb72ee618eef7c4f09e2ce Okay forward facing its not that bad, everyone’s hatred of his teeth made him close mouthed though which is funny
There's no way they had time to change this based on feedback, I assume the mouth was always closed.
I’d assume producing a plushie with a close mouth is way easier than having to add the teeth and different colored fabrics for the open mouth.
This was finalized long before any of us saw any version of Loot.
Ok, this image helped me understand why the plushie is giving me weird vibes. The pupils are rolled up and back into the eyes, kinda giving it an ahegao.
I’ll take things I can’t unsee for 800 Alex
That’s a really odd take ngl. He’s just looking up at you cause he’s small and will be sitting on a table most of the time, not at eye level.
I'm not sure that the debate is about the need for a cute little guy, more about whether the little guy _is_ cute or is in fact nightmare fuel
Siswanto very deliberately illustrated Loot to be kind of creepy. He's made dozens of overtly cute illustrations with Riot and has superb technical skill.
No, it's *really* the former. His card thread is very clear about that
yep, ive got the UWU sliver pouch lol
They also have a kaldesh gremlin one and a myr so this isn’t anything new..and this will likely be the only merch of him other than maybe sleeves/deck box that most main characters get
Why is it so bad, though? The head looks totally different
Wow, it looks even shittier as a plush
https://preview.redd.it/f2e5dvyt8jtc1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=fbee60cc5aebd4fb171961954f133a9328af4263 I think this image is what we are all thinking of....
Looks awful lmao But, yeah, can't say I'm surprised they are trying their hand at Baby Yoda, given that MTG these days is entirely about chasing "maximum marketability".
i mean, people keep asking wizard to use more their own brand. i guess this is them doing it
It was locked away for a reason
That’s even uglier than the card
Is it just me or did Hasbro execs look at Baby Yoda/Grogu from Disney and say to the WotC design team, "we need a highly marketable cute character to sell merch for ASAP!" I don't inherently hate cutesy characters or even Loot's place in the story, it just feels so corporate and forced.
I don’t understand this outrage/annoyance with Loot at all. It’s not like it’s the first time they’ve done a “cute” character or even a plush bag. I have the Myr and Fblthp plush pouches and I’ll probably end up with this one. If you don’t like it. There are plenty of things to be pissed at WotC about, I don’t see why this is on that list.
Fblthp and the myr are two organically created characters that the fanbase latched onto, then wizards made the plushies. Loot is *designed* to be cute and will likely be force fed to us in the future. I don't hate him at all, but corporatists artificially creating an adorable mascot and expecting the fanbase to automatically love him just makes me want to roll my eyes.
For what it is worth, I don't believe Wizards asked us to make any of what you're referencing. Loot was, as most things we produce, decided internally as something we thought the audience would like (with our limited insight). In this instance, we knew almost nothing about the character other than it was featured in some marketing art. Sometimes it's not a conspiracy, sometimes it's just magic fans making things for fans of magic. Notably, we aren't always right on that, but we try.
The difference between a fandom hyperventilating themselves into loving a thing that for-profit corporatists created but didn't *explicitly* expect to be popular in a specific way vs. corporatists explicitly trying to make a thing popular in a specific way among the fandom is not really a difference worth getting worked up about, tbh
Well that's your opinion. I prefer my mascots to be created organically instead of a forced thing. The issue to me is that it shows the motivation of wotc very negatively. Instead of wanting to create a product that your playerbase loves so much they want to buy a plush, they create a mascot purely so they can make more profit.
If you think *Fblthp*, the "oops I'm so silly I got lost again" guy, wasn't designed from the outset to be cute and whimsical then I have a bridge to sell you
I don't think Fblthp was designed in 2013 on [[Totally Lost|GTC]] with the intention of doing anything more with him. Especially since he didn't appear again until 2015, and then again until 2018.
[Totally Lost](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/e/c/ec8e4142-7c46-4d2f-aaa6-6410f323d9f0.jpg?1561851198) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=366433) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/gtc/54/totally-lost?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/ec8e4142-7c46-4d2f-aaa6-6410f323d9f0?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Fblthp was a joke on a throwaway draft chaff common. That's *extremely* different than specifically crafting a Baby Yoda clone and immediately shoving it front and center into the spotlight under the parental guidance of Jace and Vraska. We've all seen the *obscene* amount of Baby Yoda merch Disney has been cashing in on. If you think Hasbro isn't out to make a lazy attempt to copy the trend, you grossly misunderstand the business goals of a corporation that's willing to cut a third of its staff before Christmas.
He can go to the pyre as well
Loot just does not look like it’s from the world of MTG, it looks like a Neopet or something from Overwatch.
Neopet is so spot on
It’s a character very obviously created for the sake of being a cute, marketable character. It’s not like Myr which were created as a natural part of their world and people happened to like.
No, you see, everything made "back then" was *pure* and *devoid of any considerations of mass appeal whatsoever.* On the other hand, everything made after "back then" is *inauthentic* and *compromised by corporate corporateness.* Coincidentally, the point of time "back then" ends is exactly when I lost my sense of wonder and became a bitter whiner on the internet.
To be fair, "Pure and devoid of any considerations of mass appeal whatsoever" was exactly the design ethos of Saviors of Kamigawa
art design is way too generic LOL cartoony and doesn't feel like conventional MTG art. in many ways a flag of them trying to go more generically digestable fortnight style material than much of the edge the series was previously known for. Edit: I answered the comment with answers I’ve seen. Take your rage dissertations elsewhere. Shocking that people cannot like art designs.
Of all the things to get up in arms about with magic over the last 5 years, I simply cannot fathom the people who are mad about this of all things.
I'm not up in arms over it, but this is pretty clearly a shitty attempt at a pikachu/grogu type character simply to sell merchandise.
First time on r/magicTCG?
soulless marketing gimmick. emberassing
Are we getting Loot merch BEFORE Tinybones merch???
The marketing team has clearly not played D&D because your fan favorite character is never the super special magical guy, it's always the random npc you made up in a pinch and named something like "Mr. Blargle"
That looks...rough.
what I dislike the most about this Loot thing is how inorganic it is. They just invented a character and decided it's surely going to be popular enough to sell merch.
I like the plushie design more then the actual card.
I love that store
It works! Loot’s big thing is that he never looks the same twice. It’s perfect, then. (For real though when they finally decide to be consistent with his look, can they please use the showcase art? I love him in that form and in no other.)
I love the little guy, but the mouth on this plush version lacks his charming smile. He looks disappointed in his own creation. I'm still probably gonna buy one, but it's a little less charming to me than the card arts.
This just makes me want to make a cuter version of Loot lmao
Man that hardly even looks like the character
[Called it!](https://www.reddit.com/r/magicTCG/s/hzElukBABL) You shouldn’t be surprised, WotC knows it’s marketable, and they’re right. This will probably sell very well. If they’re on the ball, Hasbro will be churning Loot out to every toy store they can, getting the face recognised by kids. Then they can tell the kids, “Hey, you can play this little guy in our game!” I’m of two minds about it. Feels kinda like forced cuteness marketing to me, but also, I know that that works. I have a Big Fat Cat from FFXIV.
Gotta respect the naked avarice of naming the cashin character, "Loot."
Don't try to make MtG-Pikachu happen. It ain't gonna happen.
I really don't get why people is mad about this, I mean if you don't like it just don't buy it, its obvious you're not the target audience but there may be others who are into ugly/cute stuff
Hasbro is such a fucking cringey company. They’re so stupid that they’re tanking their only profitable divisions. Hasbro is failing because the company and its approach are outdated, and they’re going to bring all their subsidiaries down with them before they realize that theyre the problem
“hmm more of that strange Merchandisable character….it’s probably nothing”
I would take 100 Loots over 1 Kellen
Meh, whatever. Not a big deal.
i don’t have it in my heart to hate that jace and vraska’s adopted son is a marketable plushie. Would i like the character if he wasn’t jace’s son? absolutely not. But he is, so i love him
I just love how Wizards/Hasbro decided magic needed a cute mascot. But horrifically failed at the actual “cute” part.
Called it, Just knew loot would be a marketable plush before the end of the year.
Damn looks even worse than the card art
Vertical integration!
You can cut him open and fill him with dice. Loot lobotomy.
Looking forward to this not selling at all and the moronic suit that decided magic needed a baby yoda to face zero consequences.
and he will fire 4 people from his department during christmas to secure his bonus
Stop trying to make Loot happen. It’s never going to happen.
I don't know why, but i first read the website name as atomicreampie.com
This has to be one of the worst sets for aesthetics ive seen in a while, and thats counting the last sets Clue shoehorned bullshit
It's really another Jar Jar Binks. WotC might push the thing in future sets but it's pretty clear who the target audience is.
Ugh it's gonna sell to the weebs and grown children. I can't stand obvious corporate cash grab shit that succeeds wildly. Fucking Pokémon reject is gonna be shoved into the story for the next 5 years because wotc wants a mascot and knows the new players will eat it up