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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   34422 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 13, 2023

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Well, Wizards of the Coast is making Aragorn Black.

This doesn't even make sense storyline wise. What with Aragorn being descended from the kings of Numenor, it's not as if he could be from some distant land. I suppose there is still the possibility that all the Numenoreans are black, but, Arwen's white in the same picture, and she, being the daughter of Elrond, is closely related to the line of the Numenorean kings.

It's clearly for the sake of diversity, but couldn't they just do things in their own intellectual property instead of messing with what belongs to others? There'd be no harm in making up a ton of new Magic characters who just happen to be black, instead of changing already beloved characters from who they are.

But at least, could they have gone with someone who it would not mess with the backstory, like Gandalf, who has no national origin? I suppose that would make the moniker of "The White" a little ironic, but that's still better than the current state, to me, at least.

This significantly decreased the chance that I get cards from that set. I play, (but I don't spend very much on it), but if this is supposed to appeal to a fanbase, whether to get them to start playing, or get them to spend more, it would probably be wise not to alienate them. Why not put your diversity where it won't hurt your bottom line?

Rings of Power had some questionable things racewise (and a whole lot more unquestionably bad things in other domains), but at least it wasn't doing this.

Because Hasbro decided that they could make lots of money by having standalone card sets based on random other fantasy IP. The main "multiverse" is still its own setting with no crossover, AFAIK.

They even released Nerf and Transformers themed cards a few years ago. I only know this because I have a coworker who hardcore collected MTG cards (he owns multiple Black Lotus cards) and he paid me to order a pack because Hasbro was limiting the amount of packs an individual could order for the set.

Wow, that's even worse than I thought. It makes me even more glad I'm not involved anymore.

Honestly the best way to experience the game you're nostalgic for is to proxy a vintage cube and play those until you tire of them.

The game changed dramatically recently as hasbro figured out how to up power levels enough to make all formats rotation formats without blowing them up too often.

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