Argyle's Liliana

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Happy Wednesday MTG peeps,

Way back in March of this year, WoTC staffer Monty Ashley announced on that the block "Shake" would be called Innistrad. The same Magic Arcana article provided the preview artwork of Liliana Vess shown sitting upon a throne holding her veil with a smoking body (perhaps a vampire?) lying upon the ground.

Fast forward to today - Steve Argyle, Artiste Extraordinaire, has revealed (on his DeviantArt and personal website) the high resolution artwork for "Liliana of the Veil," which is speculated to be included in this fall's Magic: the Gathering expert expansion set Innistrad.


Text from Steve Argyle's site :

When Liliana blows a kiss, it can crack the earth's crust, spewing out molten planet as though Mother-Gaia herself were nothing more than a giant, white-hot whipped-cream filled balloon.
However, it is an ultimately sexy wake of annihilation; you'd die happy.
Here we see the lovely Mistress of Death showing off her sleek new dress of hideous, screaming doom. Woven entirely from the shredded hopes of the unfortunate souls who've crossed her. (Which, as it turns out, makes a comfortable, breathable material which accentuates both shapeliness, and pure smoldering evil.)
As is not uncommon for me, I have two versions of this card. One that's a little simpler, clearer, and so will work better when shrunk down to card size. And another, that is dripping with detail and extras, that would pretty much look like super grainy multi-color sand at card size. So I give you both the official version, and the blingtastic version.

For Magic: the Gathering. Copyright Wizards of the Coast. Art directed by Jeremy Jarvis.

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Next up -

The state of standard is undeniably improved after the ban-hammer came down on Jace, the Mind Sculptor and Stoneforge Mystic. There has been a proliferation of new decks, and altough the general meta-game still favours a Valakut or Caw-Blade build, the doors are open to any Magic the Gathering player to challenge the existing archetypes.

To this end, we personally have returned to a fun Tempered Steel build.


What we would love to see at our local Friday Night Magic are more combo-type decks and of course anything in between. Here are some other ideas we are kicking around at the moment . . .

Deceiver Exarch + Splinter
Twin Unlimited Tokens

Bloodchief Ascension and Mindcrank
Unlimited Milling

Suture Priest, Leonin Relic-Warder, Phyrexian Metamorph
Unlimited Life-gain

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What (casual standard) builds are you planning to run ?

What decks are other players running ?

- Use the comment thingy below - cuz we wanna know.
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