Magic 2012 Spoilers!

Well the hype and energy that surrounds a new set releasse was killed prematurely for New Phyrexia, so someone decided to let us start thinking about Magic 2012 a couple months early. I only have 2 cards to talk about today, but let me tell you, there is some seriously sweet things we can pull from these 2 cards!

Gideon’s Avenger 1WW

Creature – Human Soldier (Rare)
Whenever a creature an opponent controls becomes tapped, put a +1/+1 counter on Gideon’s Avenger.
2/2

Furyborn Hellkite 4RRR
Creature – Dragon (Mythic)
Bloodthirst 6
Flying
6/6

Wow! Talk about 2 crazy cards! Where to start? The easy one to start pulling information from is Gideon's Avenger. In M11 we had 2 spells to go with each of the planeswalkers (the only 2 that saw competetive play were Ajani's Pridemate and Jace's Intuition), but they were only common and uncommons. Now we have proof that the cycle could extend to all rarities! Also, just in case the poster released with for the 2012 Duels of the Planeswalkers wasn't enough to convince you that Gideon was getting either reprinted or a new version, this is robust evidence.

Speaking of having Gideon in the set, apparently there is a whole lot of flavor going on with Gideon and the planeswalkers in the picture not named Garruk. You can read a fantastic synopsis of the flavor here. One thing that was interesting that I learned from that article was the connection to Ravnica and how Gideon was going there to gather allies to battle the Eldrazi. Interestingly enough, our other card harks back to the city plane as well. The last time we saw the keyword Bloodthirst, it was on Ravnica being sported by the Gruul Clan. FuryBorn Hellkite is not a reprint from the Gruul, but there are a few cards that I think could very well be reprinted:

Bloodscale Prowler
Battering Wurm
Gristleback
Rabble-Rouser

There are more mono-colored creatures with Bloodthirst, but they have flavor-specific names, which means they probably won't get reprinted.

There's not a whole lot to go on for M12 quite yet (and this would be a terrible de ja vu if there was), but these 2 cards are a very interesting window into what to expect. Personally I really like how the core sets are connecting the block-to-block flavor going between sets. It's kinda like a club meeting between missions which we spend a year exploring into. I don't know enough to say I'm stoked for M12 yet, I'm still working NPH into my brain. But based on how the flavor is looking for the next few months its going to its going to be some exciting twists and turns. Is Innistrad going to take place in Ravnica?

I'm just starting to read into flavor a little more, and this is simply awesome to try and predict! I really can't wait to see how this all pans out! Until next time, stay classy!