What Was Wrong with Battle for Zendikar?
Lore forum
Posted on Dec. 14, 2019, 1:58 a.m. by DemonDragonJ
Mark Rosewater has repeatedly stated that the main problem with Battle for Zendikar was the fact that it did not feel the same as did the original Zendkiar block due to the presence of the Eldrazi, but how was WotC supposed to follow the original block? Were they supposed to completely ignore the Eldrazi and have them disappear with no explanation?
I personally feel that the Battle for Zendikar block was the only logical way to continue the story after Rise of the Eldrazi, so I fail to see what was wrong with that block.
What does everyone else say about this? What was wrong with Battle for Zendikar, and what other way was there to follow the end of the original Zendikar block?
Let me redo that comment. 'Tis rather sloppy.
It was more so the fact that it felt as if a battle and not an exploration, as well as narrow decks in accordance to power level. Original Zendikar possessed aspects of peregrination, and the story was underlying as opposed to vociferous. Moreover, Battle for Zendikar had a far great amount of powerful cards in certain strategies as opposed to just ones that promote multiple deck archetypes.
Battle for Zendikar + Oath of the Gatewatch: Reality Smasher , Thought-Knot Seer , Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger , Gideon, Ally of Zendikar , Matter Reshaper , Eldrazi Displacer , Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet , Sphinx of the Final Word , Eldrazi Mimic , etcetera...
Zendikar + Rise of the Eldrazi + Worldwake: Bloodghast , Goblin Guide , Oracle of Mul Daya , Celestial Colonnade , Eye of Ugin , Eye of Ugin , Jace, the Mind Sculptor (heh.), Avenger of Zendikar , Stoneforge Mystic , All Is Dust , Eldrazi Temple , Coralhelm Commander , Eldrazi Temple , Khalni Hydra , Linvala, Keeper of Silence , Vengevine , all three eldrazi titans.
Whilst Zendikar block bolstered eldrazi decks, control archetypes, somewhat merfolk, equipment, mana ramp, aggro, and graveyard strategies, Battle for Zendikar only really saw Gideon, Ally of Zendikar , ramp, and eldrazi everywhere. Just see "Eldrazi Winter," one of the most perfidious times the game has ever seen in terms of uniformity across formats.
The power level of specific archetypes and the imminent story diminished the potential of the set somedeal, and people just found Zendikar more enjoyable.
December 14, 2019 1:40 p.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #4
Azeworai, again, I understand that the lack of exploration ad adventure was a problem, but, again, what about the Eldrazi? They had the be dealt with, so there was no way to have a sense of exploration and adventure without first dealing with them.
December 14, 2019 3:10 p.m.
That I have no answer for. Overlapping elements may simply have taken too much away from what players wanted it to be.
December 14, 2019 3:16 p.m.
Gidgetimer says... #6
The problem with BFZ was that it was the beginning of the Jacestice League and the monster-of-the-week format that plagued everything through WAR. It is sloppy and uninteresting. No matter how much they try to push planeswalkers as the face of the product, the multiverse works much better telling stories that are setting based.
December 15, 2019 12:27 a.m.
Hi_diddly_ho_neighbor says... #7
Azeworai - I agree on all points but the power level comment. BFZ block was an extremely under powered block compared to Kahns block and Origins which preceded it. BFZ was top heavy with a small amount of powerful cards. This lead to an imbalanced environment in Limited (think War of the Spark but on steroids). In Standard, only Gideon and Ulamog made any impact. OGW fared a little better with Kalitas, Thought-Knot Seer, Reality Smasher, Chandra, and Nissa seeing play, but for the most part BFZ block was overshadowed by Kahns block/Origins and the following SOI set.
The story itself was also poorly handled at the time. It was when WotC was first trying out more expansive storytelling in place of the story of the week style that was going on during Theros and Kahns. They also had random WotC employees writing the story at the time. Needless to say there were some growing pains and this resulted in poor world building and shallow characters.
December 15, 2019 2:10 p.m.
The fact that Reality Smasher can ever be considered "underpowered" astounds me. What did they do in Dragons block and Origins to offset potency that much?
December 15, 2019 2:18 p.m. Edited.
Hi_diddly_ho_neighbor says... #9
The short answer: fetch lands. Everyone was playing hyper-powered 3+colored decks. There was also the scourge of standard at the time: Siege Rhino . Fate Reforged introduced the Whisperwood Elemental and Monastery Mentor decks. Dragons brought in cards like Atarka's Command making fast aggro decks prevalent. The Dragonlords also gave control a big boost. Plus at some point in that time-frame there was a Rally the Ancestors deck performing well in Standard. Origins introduced Hangarback Walker and the flip walkers, all of which (besides Chandra) saw play.
Basically BFZ came in and outside of Gideon, nothing could really crack into any of these decks. Even Ulamog was relatively underplayed until Khans rotated. Once OGW arrived and Khans/Fate rotated, BFZ block started seeing play. However, once SOI block arrived, BFZ block started falling to the wayside again outside of the Gideon/Nissa tokens deck.
With all of that said, my favorite standard deck of all time was spawned because of BFZ. I played a W/B eldrazi processor control deck and it was super fun.
December 15, 2019 2:49 p.m.
Weak cards - ulamog and gideon were the most played cards out of that block, and ulamog saw the most play towards the end of its standard tenure with Aetherworks Marvel giving it a discount of 6 mana.
Uninteresting story - whatever flavor OG zendikar had, it was sacrificed at the altar of the Eldrazi and cosmic horror does not do well when it is front & center of the story.
Weak mechanics - whoever thought that devoid (this card is colorless) is enough to be called a marquee mechanic of the set deserves to be fired, Maro. And in the next set, they introduced the symbol, which perfectly conveys a colorless card with needing a keyword and reminder text. The others being Awaken, which was horribly unsupported; Ingest and Processors, which was present on so few eldrazi it was barely playable; and converge which was also badly supported.
Being flanked by more powerful/interesting sets - literally every other set in standard with BFZ was better than it.
December 16, 2019 6:05 a.m.
All the Ally cards sucked compared to the original Zendikar ones, except for Gideon, Ally of Zendikar and the new Scion tokens didn't work with Broodwarden .
OK, maybe the latter only bothered me.
Idoneity says... #2
It was more so the fact that it felt as if a battle and not an exploration. Original Zendikar possessed aspects of peregrination, and the story was underlying as opposed to vociferous. Besides that, Battle for Zendikar had far more powerful cards as opposed to just a couple.
The power level and imminent story diminished the potential of the set somedeal.
December 14, 2019 1:17 p.m.