Fantasy Astrology 2018 Spring Training Depth Charts

I know I should be editing the highlight videos for Round 2 of the Divisional All-Stars 2017 Tournament -- check out Round 1 on my YouTube channel, and while you're at it, why not stick around for some Arkham Let's Play action? However, Spring Training games just started for all clubs this past Friday, which is traditionally when I take a "snapshot" of all MLB rosters (and non-roster invitees) and update my proprietary player database. So I spent the weekend plugging in all the new rankings for the upcoming season and generating tons of lists, which got me thinking about another one of my best-loved projects (by me, at least), Fantasy Astrology Baseball.

I'll get back to the Divisional All-Stars soon enough (trust me, I've sunk too much work into the project to abandon it now), but before I do, here's a look back at the four Fantasy Astrology playoff teams from 2017, and how their projected lineups stack up, according to the rankings MLB.com's player preview. Rankings for each team's starters are included in the graphics above the commentary, while rankings for runners-up are referenced in parentheses, where applicable.

Last year, the Aries Rams unseated the four-time champion Libra Scales in the final round, so we'll start with them. The Aries rotation is once again led by Corey Kluber and Chris Sale (who are, incidentally, scheduled to face off against each other in Game 1 of the Divisional All-Stars "ALCS," so stay tuned!), and Carlos Carrasco makes the Rams the only team with three starters in the top 30. Kenta Maeda was relegated to bullpen duty for the Dodgers in the playoffs, but he's pretty well situated to lock down the SP4 spot. For the fifth starter, we have a three-way competition representing three different aspects: Felix Hernandez (track record, and a ranking of 203), Eduardo Rodriguez (upside, 215), and Jake Odorizzi (stability). UPDATE: This may have just become a two-horse race, depending on the severity of King Felix's "upper forearm" injury he sustained when he was hit by a line drive today.) With a full season of save opportunities on the horizon, Brad Hand slots into the top closer's role, pushing Edwin Diaz to number 2. However, even if neither of these two options work out, they've got two more proven closers in the mix: Mark Melancon (191), who's hoping for a bounce back season after injuries ruined his 2017 in San Francisco, and Brad Brach (217), who will once again be filling in for an injured Zach Britton (411) in Baltimore.

On the offensive side, let's start with the known knowns before moving into some notable changes from last year's end-of-season lineup. Aries will bring back Buster Posey behind the plate, Daniel Murphy at the keystone, Nolan Arenado at the hot corner, and its entire starting outfield of Lorenzo Cain, Jay Bruce, and Dexter Fowler. Travis Shaw (200) lost his first base eligibility (a holdover from his 2016 season with the Red Sox), but despite his 30 HR, 100 RBI, 2,000 fantasy point season, MLB.com's rankings strongly prefer a potential return to form by Miguel Cabrera, ranking him exactly 110 spots above (below? in front of?) Shaw. For DH duties, MLB points to 2017 rookie phenom Matt Olson of the A's, who has the edge over such luminaries as Adrian Beltre (142) and Carlos Santana (162). But what makes this team so scary is that Astros third baseman Alex Bregman gained shortstop eligibility, as he spent at least 20 games filling in for the injured Carlos Correa last year, shoring up a position that otherwise would have gone to Adeiny Hechavarria (517).

As I've mentioned before, Libra has won the Fantasy Astrology championship four out of the six times I've run this simulation, and they look to be a powerhouse again this year. Diamondbacks teammates Zack Greinke and Robbie Ray once again sit atop the Scales rotation, with Tampa Bay Ray (at least for now) Chris Archer following closely behind. Lance McCullers Jr. and Alex Cobb (135) are neck and neck in terms of rankings, but until the latter actually signs a contract to play for a team in 2018, I'm more likely to name J.A. Happ or even Tanner Roark (161) as this team's fifth starter. Kenley Jansen and Sean Doolittle figure to reprise their roles as the 1 and 2 bullpen options, but should either of them falter, the next line of defense has some upside: the rankings predict that Jeurys Familia (240) should take back the mantle of Mets closer from last year's trade deadline acquisition AJ Ramos (425), and Brad Ziegler (400) is a good bet to serve as the Marlins' 9th inning specialist, in an effort to keep youngsters Kyle Barraclough (328) and Drew Steckenrider (371) from racking up saves-enhanced arbitration paydays.

Kurt Suzuki and Ryan Zimmerman remain basically the only viable options for catcher and first base, respectively, even though Tyler Flowers (359) is projected to start ahead of Zook, and the ranking system has no love for Zimm's 2,000 point season last year. The rest of the Libra infield represents a changing of the guard of sorts in MLB's young talent landscape: a few years ago, Robinson Cano (83), Evan Longoria (237), and Troy Tulowitzki (373) would be the clear starters, but now that trio has been supplanted by Jonathan Schoop, Jake Lamb, and Xander Bogaerts; although it could be argued that Cano should hold a spot in this lineup as the DH. That role is currently occupied by Andrew McCutchen, the fourth-highest-ranked outfielder on the team, behind top 20 corner outfielders Mookie Betts and Bryce Harper, and projected center fielder Starling Marte. Although, if you consider that Cano and McCutchen's ratings are probably buoyed by their up-the-middle positional eligibility, you could make a case that Yoenis Cespedes (104) deserves some DH consideration as well, but I'm sure a lot of these issues will sort themselves out as spring training camp goes on.

The Virgo starting staff is more reliant on pitchers hoping for bounce back seasons than any other contender. Projected ace Noah Syndergaard had a lost 2017 after tearing his lat muscle (immediately after the Mets told him to take an MRI, which he refused), and David Price battled through his own injuries last year, and was only able to return as a reliever for the Red Sox in the playoffs. Carlos Martinez and Gerrit Cole are good bets to put up strong seasons again, despite the latter moving to the star-studded AL West in the offseason. But if Gio Gonzalez experiences some likely regression, this team could be in for some trouble, as there's not much on hand in the way of pitching depth: after Gio, there's a dropoff of more than 120 points in the rankings, as returning Japanese league standout Miles Mikolas (248) and largely unproven Jakob Junis (252) are next on the depth chart. Although they should get a jolt next year when Cardinals phenom Alex Reyes (450) returns to the starting staff following Tommy John surgery. I'm pretty sure I've made this joke before, but if you put the names of this team's two closers together (Wade Davis and Ken Giles), you get the old timey method of transcribing Mandarin Chinese.

You know your catching situation is in trouble when the best option is the backup to one of the majors' best and most reliable backstops (Aries catcher Buster Posey), but the Maidens roster is so strong everywhere else, they can afford to punt behind the plate. The most notable source of this strength is at first base, where Virgo gets to choose from three of the top 25 players: Paul Goldschmidt, Joey Votto, and Freddie Freeman (22). What's more, if Freeman's 11 game experiment at third base last year had lasted just nine games longer, Virgo could get all three of them in the lineup (with the DH spot), creating a nigh-unstoppable offensive force. That would allow Jose Ramirez to move to second base (where he might not qualify again next year, provided his Indians teammate Jason Kipnis (250, Aries) can stay healthy in 2018), where he would team with Carlos Correa for an All-World double play combo. As it stands now, Dodgers super utility player Chris Taylor would occupy second base, with Ramirez remaining at third... that is unless Mike Moustakas (188) has a dramatic jump in rankings upon signing with a team. If that happens, Taylor would likely not move back to the outfield, which already features Justin Upton, George Springer, and Billy Hamilton, not to mention Brett Gardner (138) waiting in the wings.

If you look at only active major leaguers when determining the starting rotation for the Cancer Decapods (formerly Crabs, but why have a team named after TWO diseases when you could change one of them to something more scientific?), you would have a very top-heavy unit. Stephen Strasburg is one of the top five pitchers in the game, according to the rankings (number five, in fact), but Aaron Sanchez is coming off a season marred by chronic blister problems, and even so, he just barely ranks within the top 150. Michael Wacha proved that he was healthy (if unspectacular) in 2017, whereas Dinelson Lamet doesn't have much of a track record at all, although the ranking system seems to love his upside. All this would seem to set up a fifth starter battle between Marco Estrada (184) and Patrick Corbin (189)... until you factor in the game's number one prospect (according to MLB.com) Shohei Ohtani. I have no idea how to deal with his status as a two-way player in my database (let alone in terms of fantasy sports software -- does he take up two rosters spots?), but the number two spot in this Cancer rotation is his to lose, even if he doesn't take an at-bat for this team. In the bullpen, Felipe Rivero will return as the team's top reliever after taking over as the Pirates closer last year, while Blake Treinen has emerged as the best option behind him, as he's slated to close for the A's.

It's very important for the Decapods to take advantage of Ohtani's rookie season because of some positional logjams that will likely arise in 2019. First the things that won't change: Yadier Molina remains entrenched at catcher (and incidentally, if and when he chooses to hang up his spikes, his heir apparent in St. Louis, prospect Carson Kelly (630), is also on this team). Cody Bellinger will play first, even though he carries left field eligibility, because the next best option to field throws from the infielders is still-unsigned Adam Lind (461). Ian Kinsler and DJ LeMahieu (113) will be engaged in their usual battle at second base, with Josh Harrison (247) likely lagging behind those two. And two outfield spots will surely be filled by Charlie Blackmon, last year's top offensive scorer, and Andrew Benintendi, both of whom qualify for center field eligibility. Projected Rangers DH Shin-Soo Choo, who's coming off a rather underrated offensive year, has to man the other outfield corner, which is where we get into the complications.

As of now, Cancer's top two infielders are shortstop Trea Turner (who I think is pretty seriously over-hyped at #4 overall, but I'll take it) and third baseman Manny Machado, who has expressed an interest in moving back to his original position of... shortstop. If this comes to pass, it won't be a problem for the coming season, as Machado's 3B eligibility will carry over from next year, and even if he does vacate third, Eugenio Suarez (164) will be around to take over. However, the problem with moving Machado to DH lies in the fact that slugger Nelson Cruz just lost his outfield eligibility from 2017, which means that he and his 39 home runs would have to sit on the bench in order to get both Turner and Machado in the lineup. Now, this is thinking way ahead, and one of three things can happen to avoid this mishap: Machado could continue to take enough reps at 3B to keep his eligibility, or the Mariners could abandon their youth-and-defense movement and run Cruz in the outfield with more regularity, or the Nationals could acquire a top shortstop and shift Turner back to center field, where he played during his sophomore season in 2016. But none of these are locks to occur, which is why 2018 is such an important year for the Decapods to capitalize on the weird eligibility vs. capability disconnect that helps make Fantasy Baseball the amazingly complex pastime it is.

Magic New Art Reprints: Air Elemental

Elementals are one of Magic's oldest creature types, making their debut in Limited Edition with two mirrored pairs (each split between red and blue) that reference the four classical elements. (The Green card Force of Nature was later errata'd to be an elemental, but in its original printing, it just said "Summon Force.") Elementals are also one of Magic's best-supported tribes, with at least 40 cards of that type in each color, as of my grand Creature Type Analysis of 2014. The color wheel distribution of elementals favors Red, the only color with more than 100 such creatures at the time, followed by Green, which probably crossed that barrier between when I did that research and now, then Blue, Black, and White, in that order. But the elemental that has been reprinted the most time with unique art - which is also the most new-art reprinted creature in general - is the Blue Air Elemental.

TOP: Limited, Fifth Edition, Portal Second Age, Seventh Edition
BOTTOM: Ninth Edition, Tenth Edition, Ixalan

The first thing to notice about these seven unique-art printings of Air Elemental is that all of them but the most recent are from the less-advanced Core Sets or beginner level sets, which highlights just how entrenched the concept of elementals (and blue flying creatures in general) are in the game of Magic. The fact that Air Elementals were a staple creature in Dungeons and Dragons 15 years before Magic was even a glint in Richard Garfield's eye only goes to solidify their position in the high fantasy world. While the illustration accompanying its entry in the Advanced DnD Monster Manual is basically a tornado with the barest hint of eyes and a mouth, Richard Thomas's art for the Limited Edition version goes a long way to humanize this creature, portraying it as a coy female figure wearing a dress made out of swirly clouds. The same is true of the descriptive flavor text, which carries over into its next new-art printing in Fifth Edition, and D. Alexander Gregory's art takes it a step further, giving the Air Elemental's female form a much more photo-real representation. And maybe that bird is also part of it for some reason? Who can really know what's going on...

In Portal Second Age, Air Elemental takes a turn for the abstract, as Doug Chaffee's art shows just the outline of a winged creature with the consistency of a wisp of cloud. This is also the art that would be featured in the card's Classic Sixth Edition reprint. While Seventh Edition returns to the anthropomorphic style of the first two printings, the depiction of the elemental itself in the art by Wayne England goes in the completely opposite direction. Where once there was a playful, precocious personality, now there's a frightening monster that looks like the top half of Blanca from Street Fighter strapped to a tornado. This art would reappear in Eighth Edition, although the pun-tastic flavor text (psycho/cyclone) was replaced with a more disturbing quote, which implies that an air elemental could seek residence in an unsuspecting person's lungs. This quote would return in the Ninth Edition version, which gets new art by Nick Percival, whose rendition is the most similar to the classic DnD illustration of a storm with a face, only with a color palette and shapes reminiscent of Van Gogh's Starry Night.

By Tenth Edition, artist Kev Walker had found a balance of making Air Elemental look dangerous and imposing, but not cartoonishly so - and the quote from great writer Joseph Conrad only adds to the legitimacy. The vaguely skeletal figure with the glowing eyes would reappear in the next Core Set, Magic 2010 - where Wizards dispensed with numbered editions and started naming them after the calendar years - followed by the Jace vs. Chandra Duel Deck, and then the 2017 Welcome Deck. Tomasz Jedruszek's art for the Ixalan version of Air Elemental - its only expert level printing - features a similar visual motif, but with flavor text referencing a strategy of the River Heralds. The Blue/Green Merfolk tribe makes use of elementals housed in jade totems, similar to how Djinni are housed in lamps.


So now you have the answer to the trivia question, Which Magic creature has been reprinted the most times with new art? Of course, if you've been following this feature closely, you will be able to answer the same question, substituting creature with sorcery, instant (a tie), and nonbasic land. The list to the left will help you fill in the blanks for enchantments (a four-way tie between Pacifism and the White, Black, and Red Circles of Protection) and artifacts (another tie between Rod of Ruin and Ornithopter). Going by color, I've already written about the most new-art reprinted Red, Blue/Green (another tie), and colorless cards; completing the color wheel, we have Disenchant and Dark Ritual for White and Black, respectively.

So as Magic's 25th anniversary continues to roll along, maybe I'll continue this feature, or maybe I'll move on to other Magic-related topics; in addition to new-art reprints, I also have databases covering art on basic lands, the history of Planeswalkers (the card type, not the fictional characters), and even foreign language printings of some key phrases. Or perhaps I'll pivot back to the titular topics of this blog, Baseball and Batman. Or I could take another multi-month break from posting. Who can know!? Whatever happens on this blog, I promise that you, the readers, will be the first to find out!

Magic New Art Reprints: Evolving Wilds

If only Gretchen Wieners from Mean Girls had paid more attention to the Magic community, she might not have been so disheartened about her efforts to make "fetch" happen. Despite Regina George's attempt at shaming the phrase, fetch lands have been some of Magic's most powerful and versatile cards since the early days. These lands allow players to sacrifice them in order to search their libraries for a land that produces a specific color of mana, greatly improving a deck's flexibility. Most fetch lands are limited to searching for two or three types of land, but the most new-art reprinted card that can find any type of basic land is Evolving Wilds:

TOP: Rise of the Eldrazi, Dark Ascension, Friday Night Magic Promo, Dragons of Tarkir
BOTTOM: Tarkir Dragonfury Promo, Battle for Zendikar, Amonkhet, Rivals of Ixalan

Despite the nine pieces of unique art associated with this card, Evolving Wilds is not the first time we've seen a card with this exact same effect. By the time this card burst onto the scene in Rise of the Eldrazi (with a very cool, if abstract piece of art by Steven Belledin), Time Spiral's Terramorphic Expanse had already been around for four years, making Evolving Wilds the most new-art reprinted functional reprint (i.e. it has the same exact effects and types and colors, just with a different name) in Magic history. And it's not like Terramorphic Expanse is an unpopular card - as of this writing, it's been reprinted 20 times in various Core Sets, Duel Decks, and Casual Supplements (compared to 26 total reprints for Evolving Wilds). But every single one of those reprints features the card's original Time Spiral art by Dan Scott. My guess as to why Evolving Wilds gets such a radically different artistic treatment is that "Terramorphic Expanse" is just more difficult to say... but who knows what goes on in the heads of Wizards of the Coast development executives.

The first time Evolving Wilds was reprinted with new art was in Dark Ascension, the second set of the gothic horror-themed Innistrad block. While the art by Cliff Childs features a nondescript hinterland chapel, the flavor text quote is from Thalia, one of the main protagonists of that block's story and a foremost warrior for the good guys (i.e. not undead). The next new-art reprint wasn't from an expansion set, but rather a promotional giveaway for players who participated in Friday Night Magic events in October of 2012. In addition to the cool alternate foil card frame and the bright, colorful art by Sam Burley, this printing includes the flavor text that appears on the majority of Evolving Wilds reprints, the majority of which feature Steven Belledin's original art.

If you look closely at the next two new art reprints, you'll notice that they both have the same expansion symbol... and the same flavor text. That's because one (with art by Andreas Rocha depicting a waterfall of lava dumping into a mountain stream) is from the actual expansion set Dragons of Tarkir, while the other (with art by Noah Bradley depicting a river of lava winding towards an oasis) is one of the possible prizes from the Dragonfury Promo, a dexterity-based dice throwing game available at select Dragons of Tarkir prerelease events.

It makes sense that Evolving Wilds would show up in Battle for Zendikar, as this block is the sequel to the block where the card first made its appearance - recognize the reference to the Eldrazi in the flavor text? It also makes sense that the piece of land in the art by Izzy would feature the recognizable blight that follows the Eldrazi titan Ulamog wherever he goes. Amonkhet is Magic's ancient Egyptian-themed expansion, which explains why Christine Choi's art for this version shows a desert sandstorm. The flavor text on this one is the second time that Evolving Wilds gets a quote from a prominent (female) character: Samut starts out Amonkhet as a dissentful initiate (read: warrior), but by Hour of Devastation, the second set in the block, she has activated her planeswalker spark.

Like Naturalize before it, the most recent printing of Evolving Wilds is less than a month old, as it took place in Magic's most recent set, Rivals of Ixalan. The art by Jonas De Ro shows ordered steppes lining a hillside, and the flavor text references the Sun Empire, one of four factions in the Ixalan block, inspired by the Aztec/Mayan empire (but with dinosaurs). The Sun Empire has the same colors as the Naya shard on Alara (White/Red/Green), so fetching a basic land would be very useful for them - more so than the Merfolk (Blue/Green) or Vampire (Black/White) factions, but just as useful as for the Pirates (Red/Blue/Black), however since Pirates spend their time on the sea rather than land, it doesn't make sense for this card to refer to them. The very observant among you will notice that I referenced nine new-art printings for Evolving Wilds above, but there are only eight in the picture. That wasn't a typo - the ninth version (pictured right, with art by Daniel Ljunggren) is a special giveaway for participants in the new easy-entry Magic league system, which has been around for just the last three blocks (Kaladesh, Amonkhet, and Ixalan), and whose promos do not appear in magiccards.info's proxy printing database... yet!


So that's the (non-basic) land that has the most new-art reprintings in Magic's history! There are three other cards with nine total versions of the artwork (Dark Ritual, Disenchant, and Shatter, all originating in Limited), and one with eight (Cancel from Time Spiral, a strictly worse version of Counterspell). But for next time I'm going to skip over these and write about the creature with the  most new-art reprints: the classic Blue flier Air Elemental.

Magic New Art Reprints: Naturalize

Magic: The Gathering has five major card types: Creature, Enchantment, Instant, Sorcery, and Artifact... and Land, of course. Six major card types. Well, seven if you count Planeswalker, but there's six types that have the potential to NOT be busted and overpowered and disruptively transformative to the way the game is played. The first two cards I've profiled in this feature were a Sorcery (Stone Rain) and an Instant (Counterspell, formerly Interrupt), and while today's card is also an Instant, it deals with two of the other types. There are between 4,127 and 4,152 Enchantments and Artifacts combined in Magic's database (depending on whether you search maggiccards.info or the official gatherer.wizards.com), and for the low, low price of two mana, Naturalize can deal with... most of them.

TOP: Onslaught, Eighth Edition, Ninth Edition, Shards of Alara, Rise of the Eldrazi
BOTTOM: Innistrad, Gatecrash, Khans of Tarkir, Dragons of Tarkir, Rivals of Ixalan

While the card text on Naturalize is pretty explicit, there are some artifacts and enchantment out there (probably numbering in the 50's) that are protected from it by abilities such as Indestructible (can't be destroyed), Hexproof, or Shroud (can't be targeted), so while it's not a perfect spell, it is the very picture of efficiency. Interestingly enough, Naturalize wasn't the first card to have this exact same effect: it's actually a color-shifted version of the White card Disenchant, from the Limited set, which itself has nine unique-art versions, but we'll go over that in more detail next time. Naturalize didn't show up until the Onslaught expansion in 2002, nearly 10 years after Magic's debut, but Artifact/Enchantment removal has since become just as much of a hallmark of Green's strategy as White's.

Onslaught actually has a very compelling story justification for why one color of mana would gain access to an effect usually produced by another, which is reflected in the original art for Naturalize. The illustration by Ron Spears features a character called Kamahl, who originally appeared as a Red Barbarian in Odyssey, the previous block. But by the time Onslaught rolled around, events in the plot had caused him to change his color to Green and his class to Druid. (In fact, I think the destruction of his big-ass sword, as depicted in the artwork, was one of the reasons for the change.) I guess the message being that if circumstances can cause a person can alter their own color identity, the same can be true of effects on specific cards.

Naturalize's next two new-art reprints came in the next two consecutive core sets, Eighth and Ninth Editions, which were incidentally the last core sets to be printed with a white border. In fact, Naturalize would appear in NINE consecutive core sets, with seven of those printings featuring Tim Hildebrandt's art from Eighth Edition, while Jeff Miracola's more abstract Ninth Edition art would appear only once. The same is true for the Eighth Edition flavor text - a line by real world poet and playwright William Shakespeare, whose quotations have appeared on 25 cards throughout Magic's history. The Ninth Edition flavor text - a quote from Arcum Dagsson (remember him from the Ice Age printing of Stone Rain?) - would reappear in Tenth Edition, while all but one of the subsequent printings would feature quotes from the original Green planeswalker Garruk Wildspeaker.

Like Stone Rain before it, all of Naturalize's unique-art printings would come in actual expansion sets, rather than promotional giveaways or supplemental products. Its second expert level printing came in Shards of Alara, the first set of a block built around three-color combinations made up of one color and its two allied colors (read: adjacent) on the color wheel. I'm not sure exactly what kind of idol is getting ripped apart in Trevor Hairsine's art, nor is it clear what is causing those grasping vines to appear. The opposite is true in the art for Rise of Eldrazi, the third set in the Zendikar block, which introduced the titular extra-dimensional world-destroying beings that returned three years ago in Battle for Zendikar. Howard Lyon's art is the only version of Naturalize to show the mage who's actually casting the spell - in this case it's some dude with a ponytail throwing up the "Westside" gang sign to evaporate a Hedron.

It's appropriate that the Innistrad version of Naturalize features an overgrown coffin, since this set had a top-down design based on gothic horror (think vampires, werewolves, and zombies). Incidentally, Scott Chou's eerie art was repeated for the second Core Set printing of Naturalize to not feature Tim Hildebrandt's art, but the tomb inscription flavor text was replaced by the Garruk's quote from the previous version. Gatecrash was the second set in the Return to Ravnica block, the second Magic block to focus on the two-color Guilds. The version of Naturalize in this set doesn't depict any key story point, nor does the flavor text refer directly to any specific guild, but the use of Green mana means that Iveta must belong to either Gruul (Green/Red) or Simic (Green/Blue). The art by Daniel Ljunggren does however hearken back to the original Onslaught printing, in that we see a sword transforming into a harmless plant.

The next two new-art reprints of Naturalize are unique because they come from two different sets in the same block. Khans of Tarkir takes place on a plane where dragons used to exist in abundance, but the "sky tyrants" (as they're referred to in the flavor text) have gone extinct long ago. In the second set, Fate Reforged, planeswalker Sarkhan Vol somehow goes back in time and prevents the cataclysmic extinction event that destroyed all the dragons (also setting in motion the events of the aforementioned Battle for Zendikar). Then the third set, Dragons of Tarkir, returns to an alternate "present" where the dragons have flourished and unseated the humanoid khans as leaders of the plane. That's why James Paick's art from Khans features a decomposing dragon skull, while the same artist's illustration for Dragons shows a broken... device of some kind, representing the collapse of the non-dragon civilization.

The most recent new-art reprint of Naturalize comes from Magic's most recent set, Rivals of Ixalan, which was released just last month. This version's art by Simon Dominic has perhaps the funniest depiction of an artifact (equipment) getting destroyed: being smashed under the foot of a giant dinosaur. As a side note, every artwork to adorn a printing of Naturalize features a physical item, which are usually associated with artifacts, even though the card technically has more targets of the enchantment variety. But I will also concede that it's a lot harder to artistically render the destruction of an incorporeal magical effect...


According to my research, Stone Rain, Counterspell, and Naturalize are the only three cards in Magic's history with at least 10 unique pieces of art. There are four cards with nine unique-art printings each, but since three of them originate in the Limited set - which we've talked about in some detail now - next time I'm going to skip ahead to the first Land card to be profiled in this feature: Evolving Wilds.

Magic New Art Reprints: Counterspell

If you're familiar with Blue mana, you might be familiar with the term "Permission." As used, for example, in this rather typical exchange between a regular, decent Magic player on one side, and a Blue mage on the other.

"May I have permission to cast this spell?"

"No, you may not: it's countered instead."

A counterspell is a way to interrupt an opponent's spell while they're in the act of casting it. A reaction, as it's phrased in the more socially well-adjusted game Dungeons and Dragons. Actually, in previous editions of DnD, countering a spell wasn't a spell itself, but rather a very complicated process involving taking a readied action, and waiting for your opponent to cast a spell. The MTG version of countermagic has elements of both, as there is a specific card (i.e. spell) that you need to have in your hand (i.e. prepared), but you also need to leave mana open to cast it (i.e. ready your action). While I said "a card" above, there are actually many dozens of cards featuring countermagic, but none so simple and elegant as the original set's Counterspell:

TOP: Limited, Ice Age, Fifth Edition, Tempest, Judge Gift Program
BOTTOM: Mercadian Masques, Seventh Edition, Duel Decks: Jace vs. Chandra, Eternal Masters, Amonkhet Invocations

Ahh, the Limited Edition Counterspell art by Mark Poole never fails to put a smile on my face. By contrast, the look on the face of that smug-looking Shakespearean-dressed fella (probably a Bard) is the perfect embodiment of magical impotence. And honestly, that's how it feels as a player to get countered a lot of the time. And I'm personally so against that type of play, that even though I use blue mana in many of my decks, I will usually only include one counterspell effect in each one. And it's only the actual card !Counterspell. And they all have unique art on them. I have Poole's art in my RUG Intet commander deck. #VorthosForever

As is the case with Stone Rain, my last card reviewed, the next time Counterspell was reprinted with new art was in Ice Age, and it too got some story related flavor text. This one introduces the nation of Kjeldor and its traitorous enemy Zur the Enchanter, all through a quote from Gustha Ebbasdotter. This particular royal mage has quotes on eight other cards, and I can only assume hers is the beautiful (and surprisingly scantily-clad considering it's an ice age) figure in the Ice Age art by L.A. Williams who's casting Counterspell. This more active portrayal mirrors the change in rules text from Limited (Counter target spell vs. Counters target spell). I play with this art in my UB Phenax Dimir mill commander deck.

In the Fifth Edition art by Hannibal King, we're back to seeing a goofy-looking Wizard look embarrassed when his spell fails. The Tempest art by Stephen Daniele follows the same format, even down to the positioning of the hands, except in Tempest, the foiled Wizard's wearing red instead of blue, you get a more clearly defined background of a brick wall, and we get a quote from one of the multiverse's most famous (and tragic) Wizards, Ertai the Adept himself. I use both of these arts in my one deck that runs multiple Counterspells - a UW extra turns deck starring Medomai and Magosi.

The next chronological printing of Counterspell - done by a mysterious artist known only as Dom! - didn't appear in any expansion set, but was included as part of a promotional program to provide gifts to Magic judges, who work at tournaments answering rules questions and resolving disputes. The art on this version, which is the first time Counterspell was printed with the errata'd card type Instant instead of the older Interrupt, shows what appears to be a woman blocking a spell that's coming her way,  I think the opposite is happening in Gao Yan's art for the Mercadian Masques Counterspell, because why would you have a quote about a countered spell being pretty, and not show what it would look like? But I don't know WHAT is going on in Mark Romanoski's art for the Seventh Edition version. It looks like it would fit better on a card like Meditate (which, coincidentally, shows a visual representation of Ertai).

The art from the next edition of Counterspell was the only version printed on the new post-Eight Edition card frame, and it only appeared (in printed form) in the Duel Decks series (and later in the online-only Vintage Masters... and Duel Decks Anthology, but that's by definition the same). Seeing as this card was from the Duel Deck where Jace faced off against Chandra (just the second Duel Deck printed, out of the 20 now in existence), it makes sense that Jason Chan's art features the original Blue Planeswalker... and also a line of flavor text about him. The next version, for another entry in the Masters series, this one Eternal, with art by Zack Stella (and so far the only Counterspell to be printed with the new post-Magic 2015 card frame), shows a mage with eyes glowing blue that COULD be Jace, but there's no flavor text and very little context in which to tell.

The very most recent Counterspell also is by far the most visually unique of all. That's because the new art by Chase Stone is surrounded by the card frame for Amonkhet Invocations, a special group of extremely rare premium foil cards randomly inserted into booster packs of the Egyptian-inspired Amonkhet block. This specific run of the Masterpiece series received criticism for not being as well-defined as the two before it - Zendikar expeditions (lands) and Kaladesh inventions (artifacts) - but Counterspell is enough of an iconic card that I don't doubt it belongs in SOME sort of special best-of list.


That's it for the card that best embodies the nearly-uniquely Blue strategy. Join me next time for a look at a one of Green's favorite tricks in a card that appeared in Magic's most recent set, Naturalize.

Magic New Art Reprints: Stone Rain

As you probably know if you follow the collectible trading card game market, this year is the 25th anniversary of Magic: The Gathering. And as you probably know if you follow this blog, I am somewhat of an amateur Magic historian/analyst, as well as an occasional player. So this special milestone is as good a time as any to explore a somewhat trivial topic that's of especial interest to me: cards that were reprinted with new artwork. Because whether a card appears in a new new expert level expansion, a special promotional version, or even an online-only compilation set, who doesn't like to celebrate the different artists who helped bring that card to life?

According to the extremely unscientific database I've been keeping on the subject, the cards of Magic's very first set have been reprinted* the most of any set since, perhaps unsurprisingly so. Of the 302 cards in Limited Edition's Beta print run (when they fixed a couple of errors from Alpha), 185 of them have been reprinted, for a total of 580 unique pieces of art (originals included). The next set with the most cards reprinted is the famously overpowered Urza's Saga (73 cards reprinted, 166 unique arts), followed closely by Ice Age (70 and 169), which was also coincidentally the first set to feature reprinted cards with new art.

* For the purpose of this post, I'm using the term "reprinted" as shorthand for "reprinted with new artwork," since it would be far too tedious (and not nearly as visually rewarding) to chronicle the many thousands of cards whose art carried over from an older set.

Given Limited's status as the set with the most new-art reprints, it makes sense that Magic's card with the most arts associated with it is also from Magic's original set. Anyone want to take a guess at what that card is? Too late, it's in the title of this post: it's the classic red land destruction special Stone Rain! Below are all 11 new-art printings, arranged chronologically, courtesy of proxy-printing website extraordinaire magiccards.info

TOP ROW: Limited, Ice Age, Mirage, 5th Edition, Portal, Tempest
BOTTOM ROW: Portal Second Age, Portal Three Kingdoms, Mercadian Masques, 7th Edition, Champions of Kamigawa

I always thought that Daniel Gelon's Limited Edition art for Stone Rain was a little bit off, thematically. The card mechanics have to do with destroying LAND, but here we see two PEOPLE getting messed up by the falling rocks. I will say this, though: Gelon's art accurately portrays how Magic players FEEL when they get their lands destroyed during a game. Stone Rain was so iconic that it was included in the next four consecutive sets to feature new art reprints: Ice Age, Mirage, Fifth Edition, and Portal. The most striking difference between its Limited and Ice Age printings -- aside from the new art by Kaja Foglio, which now shows an Orc-like creature getting hit by rocks instead of a human, but still not focusing on the land destruction aspect -- is the change in the rules text. As of Fourth Edition (which includes only reprints, but all with their original artwork), the text changes from telling you what the CARD does ("Destroys any one land") to prompting the PLAYER to do something ("Destroy target land").

The fact that Ice Age was a very story-heavy set is reflected in Stone Rain's flavor text, which includes no fewer than three search terms: the island of Argoth, the country of Soldev, and the legendary machinist Arcum Dagsson, who would get his own card in the Coldsnap set a decade later. The Mirage version added another quote from a legendary character -- Asmira from the Jamuraan state Femeref -- but the rather abstract art by Tony Roberts this time focuses on the actual stones that are raining. It wasn't until Fifth Edition when the art matched up with the rules text, as another piece by Roberts depicts a building getting blasted with very similar red-orange pieces of stone. The white-bordered set with no expansion symbol was the first Core Set to feature new art reprints, and they really went crazy, with 197 cards receiving new art. But if you think that's a lot, the Seventh Edition new art explosion made 5e look like child's play, with a whopping 329 cards reprinted with new art, including Tony Szczudlo's very tense new version of Stone Rain.

John Matson's art for the Portal version of Stone Rain sticks with the building-destruction motif, only this time the fiery doom approaches from the right instead of the left. This art would return for Stone Rain's reprints in Classic Sixth Edition, Starter 1999, Eighth Edition, and Ninth Edition. But speaking of Portal, it was Magic's first of three Beginner level expansions (along with its sequel Portal Second Age and Chinese history-themed Portal Three Kingdoms), which can be identified by the bold faced rules text and the line above the flavor text. Fun Fact: Stone Rain is the ONLY card to appear in all three Portal sets, with a unique piece of art each time. (The other two were illustrated by Doug Chaffee and Mitsuaki Sagiri, respectively.)

In between Portal 1 and Portal 2, Stone Rain appeared in Tempest, another story-heavy expert level expansion, this time with art by Magic veteran Christopher Rush and a quote from the Rathi prophet Oracle en-Vec. Then after Portal 3, Ben Thompson created a piece of art for the Mercadian Masques expansion, accompanied by flavor text referencing the dragon engine Ramos. Then the last piece of new art for Stone Rain came from Greg Staples for the Japanese-inspired Champions of Kamigawa set, meaning that Stone Rain is the only card to feature unique art in both of Magic's most Asian-themed expansions.


So there you have an extensive look at the Magic card with the most pieces of unique art associated with it! What I find so interesting about Stone Rain's numerous artworks is that they all came in honest-to-goodness expansion sets, rather than promotional giveaways or player rewards. This is not the case for Magic's second-most new-art-reprinted card, which I will profile in the next entry of this series: Counterspell!