Intervention Pact is one of the cycle of five (mostly) powerful Pacts from Magic the Gathering's Future Sight set. Pact of Negation, Slaughter Pact, and Summoner's Pact are the ones that many Magic players know about. There's the also unplayably bad Pact of the Titan in Red, but Intervention Pact is actually playable. It has seen occasional pay in Modern Eldrazi & Taxes and in Commander. However, in late September of 2016, Intervention Pact went from being a $1 rare to having a TCGPlayer Mid price of nearly $12! What happened!? 

Many price spikes occur due to what are known as "price corrections" meaning that the card's price relative to its demand finally normalizes as supply diminishes. However, many other price spikes occur to the dreaded buyout, as in one or a few speculators buy out the internet of a particular card with low supply that may or may not actually have future demand. In the case of Intervention Pact, it doesn't seem that many people were willing to actually pay more than $5 for this card when the price spike occurred. So in this case, we can assume this was a buyout target.

This is going to be a more serious post. I am really passionate about this issue. After listening to  Shivam Bhatt  on Commanderin', I felt really inspired to write this out on paper and publish it.

First of all, just to clarify, the title is not implying that Magic is not more diverse than it was when it began. The player audience and developer team has diversified since the beginning of the game, and there is now a much larger spectrum of players. However, there are still some marks left from the times where the audience and developer team were predominantly white males. Though the audience is still mostly comprised of white males, the "second generation" of Magic, which includes me, seems much more diverse in terms of race and gender.

Why is it positive to have a more diverse cast of characters? It is important to have a more diverse cast of characters because people will enjoy the game more if they have a character that looks like them, that acts like them. The more diverse the characters are, the more people can identify with them, and the more diverse the Magic audience will be. This is why a diverse cast of characters in Magic: the Gathering is important.

We've also recently gotten Kaya, an dark skinned female planeswalker. This is another large step for Magic, even more so than Narset, because she came in a set that wasn't about just people of her race, she was in a set with a lot of people of other races. However, I think they also lost the chance to tie her in to the story and include a character that more people can identify with.

So, they've come far, but there still is a critical problem. First of all, some of the more diverse characters are only allowed to be in sets with people like themselves. Like Narset, who is in a purely Asian world. Is Narset not allowed to be someone who stands out of the crowd? Does she have to only be in a world where there are only Asians? It's an improvement from pure white males, but it feels like more like something meant to please angry audiences rather than a real attempt at diversity.

They've improved by one step with Kaya. They actually put her in a set with people of other races. That's a big step for Magic, but it still feels a little bit like something meant to appease, not a real attempt because they still won't tie anyone in the larger story. Why can't you do that? WHY CAN'T KAYA JOIN THE GATEWATCH? WHY NOT?

Now, that's a nice transition to talking about the Gatewatch. What's the Gatewatch? It's the multi-planar Justice League, and it's 80% white. Anyway, Chandra doesn't look that Indian. Her father, Kiran, seems pretty non-indian.

I understand that the Gatewatch is a result of the past of Magic filled with white planeswalkers. The only planeswalkers that they chose to support are white. Hopefully they can factor more diverse characters into the Gatewatch, instead of keeping it so white. Hopefully these changes are on the way, or we're going to be watching a bunch of white people sweeping through not primarily white planes and saving them.

However, Magic has given itself one last chance. That chance is Saheeli Rai. That chance is right here, right now. You can get Saheeli Rai on the Gatewatch train as a precedent to help diversify the Gatewatch, which is seeming like the focal point of the story.

This is one of my longer posts, and more heated posts. I really feel passionate about this. I know that I'll lose lots of viewers over this, but I can't let this lie. Let the internet trolls run free in the comments section.

Goodbye,

Kai Chang, Crazy About MTG

(EDIT: Thanks Shivam and Commanderin' for the feedback! You're all great!)
​

In newer Magic sets with Chinese legendaries, they’ve moved away from harder pronunciations and have turned to the easier pinyins for names. This may have been a good move, but I feel like they should educate, not just get rid of hard pronunciations.

I hope that this guide helped you! Sorry if my language seemed a little negative at some points, it’s just that sometimes it really annoys me.

Guess! What language is it?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


It's Korean! Of the Asian cards, Korean are most easily distinguished. Korean letters are made up of mostly of straight lines and circles/ovals. Below are pictures of the Korean alphabet.

 Guess!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


It's Japanese!  Japanese and Chinese look rather similar to the untrained eye, but they aren't actually that similar. Written Japanese is composed of several scripts. The Japanese scripts, Hiragana and Katakana are combined with kanji (Chinese characters) and occasionally even Roman letters. You will see that the kanji have a translation into Japanese script located above them. Let's look at another card:

Guess!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


If you look closely, the right card's characters are denser. That card is traditional Chinese. However, this is not a good way to do it, since it's time consuming and is easy to get wrong. Here's a simpler trick: in traditional Chinese cards, the commas and periods hover in the center, whereas in the simplified Chinese cards, the commas and periods are lower.


Let's take a test:
CLICK HERE FOR A SHORT TEST
Hope this was helpful to all of you out there!

Dragonlord Kolaghan was widely considered the worst of the five Dragonlords from Dragons of Tarkir. But that perception has changed over time, especially when it comes to build a deck around her in EDH. She does have some compelling abilities.

Not only is she a hasty 6/5 flyer for 6 mana, but Kolaghan also gives your other creatures haste, as well. The most interesting thing about her is the last ability: if an opponent casts a creature or planeswalker spell that has the same name as one already in that player's graveyard, that player loses 10 life. That's actually quite a powerful ability that's perfect for the top end of a control deck.  
 
Alas, a spot for her never appeared in the Standard metagame. Famous Magic deck brewer Conley Woods built a Mardu Ever After deck with one copy of Dragonlord Kolaghan in the main deck. That deck used the sorcery Ever After to return two creatures to the battlefield from the graveyard, in this case the Dragonlord and perhaps Linvala, the Preserver or Archangel Avacyn. It was a solid plan, but the deck never really caught on. Basically, Dragonlord Kolaghan just wasn't worth casting very often in Standard, despite popping up here and there. 
 
Oddly enough, the format that has adopted her the most is Commander, the one in which her final ability is irrelevant. Basically, it's tribal Dragon decks that just want her to grant haste to everyone, and being a big hasty flier herself doesn't hurt. 
 
Despite apparently not finding many homes, there was still demand for her as the Standard rotation of Dragons of Tarkir approached. Even as her retail price has dropped to nearly $2, many buylists still paid close to $2. That's due to plenty of casual appeal to this Dragonlord. She is a pretty good reanimation target, albeit not in other competitive formats.

While she may not be the greatest choice to lead an EDH deck, Dragonlord Kolaghan decks do exist. She's probably going to remain a casual hit for years to come, so don't throw her into the bulk mythic rare bin.

Ornamental Courage is a one-drop Instant from Kaladesh. It gives a target creature +1/+3 until end of turn and also untaps it. Combat tricks are always pretty good in Limited, especially drafts. But, they don't typically impact Standard unless they do something more special. Untapping a creature and giving it pseudo-Vigilance is definitely useful, though. This should definitely be a good common to have in your draft pile. 

As far as Constructed is concerned,  Ornamental Courage could be useful in some sort of aggressive Ally deck featuring Zada, Hedron Grinder. With Zada, you can target her with  Ornamental Courage and it untaps all of your creatures and gives them the +1/+3 boost. However, in an aggressive deck, you're looking more for something like Titan's Strength, which gives the opposite +3/+1 boost. It also lets you Scry 1 for each time Zada copies it.  So, it's not really an ideal choice for that type of deck.

While this is definitely a good common, being more of a defensive type combat trick means it hasn't seen much play outside of Limited.

Champion's Helm is a card that previously was only available in the Political Puppets deck of the original Commander pre-constructed deck series. Due to its scarcity and usefulness in a number of Commander decks, the Helm became a $10 card. Used mostly in "Voltron" style decks that focus on attacking with their Commander, Champion's Helm offers both Hexproof for any Legendary Creature it's equipped to, plus +2/+2 no matter what the creature happens to be. It's a very solid Equipment.

Being revealed as one of the Kaladesh Inventions means that more copies entered the market. Inititally, pre-ordering for $50 on Star City Games, some players feel that this is too high of a price for it. Being such a rarity, however, with such beautiful artwork, this should be a valuable card down the road. In particular, players of Kemba, Kha Regent and Zurgo Helmsmasher, both popular Commanders who frequently include this card, may want this Invention to pimp out their decks. Really, any Commander deck that attacks with their Commander on a regular basis can use this Equipment. The $50 price tag seems more than fair for the relative rarity of this card and its usefulness in Commander.

Nissa, Vital Force VS Nissa, Nature's Artisan

We’ve already reviewed Nissa, Vital Force in the past. So, to avoid repeating ourselves too much, here’s a rundown of Vital Force’s abilities.

+1: Untap target land you control. Until your next turn, it becomes a 5/5 Elemental Creature with haste. It’s still a land.

So right off the bat, Vital Force can add a 6th loyalty counter and potentially affect the board in a big way.

-3: Return target permanent card from your graveyard to your hand.

On the surface, drawing 2 cards seems better as a minus ability, especially when one or both can go into play if they are lands. But this allows you to pick up a card you really need.

-6: You get an emblem with “Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, you may draw a card.

Let’s just say with how easy it is to achieve this ultimate ability, you’ll probably draw a good amount of cards with this emblem.

Obviously, Vital Force is really good at protecting herself, as that Elemental sticks around during your opponent’s next turn, too. Nature’s Architect decidedly is not. The minus ability on Nature’s Architect seems better on the surface, but knowing exactly what you’re getting to your hand is good, too. There is value in card selection, after all! The ultimate on Nature’s Architect is probably game-winning, certainly, but not as useful from a card advantage standpoint.

Will watered down and under-powered exclusive Planeswalkers be the norm for headlining these Planeswalker Decks? That would mostly be the case, although some have proven more playable in Standard than others. These aren’t meant to be as powerful as the Duel Decks planeswalkers, which were typically Standard-legal planeswalkers being reprinted not long before their exit from the format the following October.

How to Use Nissa, Nature's Artisan

These planeswalkers were designed for newer players excited about casting their first planeswalker. So, I’ll ask the same question as I did for her: is this planeswalker worth casting for 6 mana? Certainly not. Most of the time, the best case scenario is she finds you two lands to put into play and gain you 3 to 6 life. That may be worth 6 mana over the course of a couple turns in a vacuum, but I feel like she really doesn’t do enough.

That being said, she's significantly better than most "intro pack" rares we had in the past. She's still a unique planeswalker card. As a planeswalker, Nissa is highly collectible as a very popular and awesome character in Magic. These Planeswalker decks as they have been released in following years continue to be underpowered, but do manage to unleash a surprise or two once in a while.

While this Nissa would be far from Standard playable, and really not much good in any other competitive format, she has found a way into the ocassional Commander deck. Green decks that already produce an embarrassment of mana will occasionally play here. Gaining 3 life turn after turn is certainly useful. Plus, her ultimate IS actually a potential win condition that opponents actually have to keep in mind.

Yes, this Nissa planeswalker is awfully underpowered. But, she's a foil with gorgeous artwork, collector's appeal, and these Planeswalker deck exclusives are rarer than you might realize.  Chandra, Pyrogenius is probably better overall, but Nissa, Nature's Artisan is a great card for any Magic the Gathering collection!