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CardName: Bristling Walrus Cost: 1U Type: Creature - Seal Pow/Tgh: 2/2 Rules Text: Flavour Text: "It's napping by our camp because it doesn't fear you. Maybe think about that before stabbing this two ton monster?" --Yorba Zekidotter, Reef Pirate Set/Rarity: Name That Card Common

Bristling Walrus
{1}{u}
 
 C 
Creature – Seal
"It's napping by our camp because it doesn't fear you. Maybe think about that before stabbing this two ton monster?"
--Yorba Zekidotter, Reef Pirate
2/2
Updated on 19 Feb 2020 by jmgariepy

History: [-]

2020-02-13 09:24:32: jmgariepy created and commented on the card Bristling Walrus

One of these days, Wizards is going to break the taboo and make a blue Grizzly Bears. Bolas knows the power level of creatures has increased enough.

But that card is going to need a name that's both iconic and cool. I'll let you figure out the rest.

Hmm. Blue iconics are sphinx and merfolk.

Well - merfolk are just about always small. And, well, Coral Merfolk.
Feels wrong to just flat-out obsolete that without even the courteasy of going via a rare first.

So, riddle-kitties. 2/2 is kiiinda small for a sphinx; and every sphinx has lots of words. I guess we could do a sphinx-kitten. ... cub? Child, anyway. Flavour talking about how it's not learned stuff because it hasn't grown up, being ironic on its unusually large size? I like the idea - but every single blue sphinx flies. So that's out.

My next suggestion would be the ifrit. Where I learn that scryfall is suddenly giving me results in German for those. Because, uh, why not? As good a reason as any to ignore.

... Huh. I'm stumped. Completely hornswaggled. Phoning in that this is a sphinx cub, lying flat on its back with its wings gone all askew; nomming on a teddy bear. Flavour text something like "When is a bear bearable? When you grow up a little more, dear."

Polar bear. Creature - Bear.

Independent Schooner. Creature - Pirate.

Twister Moray. Creature - Fish.

Bristling Walrus. Creature - Pinniped.

We're overdue for some sea mammals. Big seals, Walruses, etc which can walk too are more useful for magic than dolphins or otters, so I stole a collective term for them.

I also like sphinx cub tho

I'm taking my inspiration from Runeclaw Bear. Magic wanted to make Grizzly Bear more magicky. I also like the idea of the vanilla just being fauna rather than humanoid.

My original thought was an octopus, then [a] shark. I like both Twister Moray and Bristling Walrus. I guess let's add in a ray (it still gets the fish creature type). Now we need something magicky. Gleam, glow (do I have the rhyme from Tangled in my head?), what and where? The moon is generally seen as mystical and (in the real world) affects the tides. Lunar seems that could work.

Lunar Ray
Creature- Fish

@Vitenka: The blue iconic race is sphinxes, yes, but that's for big rare flagship cards. The blue characteristic race is merfolk. That said, I don't think the first {1}{r} 2/2 was a Goblin (I think it might have been a Dwarf), though the first {1}{b} 2/2 was indeed a Zombie (Walking Corpse).

But I agree it is hard to make a merfolk iconic and cool. I think Jack's Polar Bear is hard to argue with.

Or: Tidal Ostringo. Creature - bird. Picture shows a dangerous two legged flightless bird charging you through surf on a beach.

I wanted something bird, or sea, but without flying. No existing birds fit, but some seemed close.

@Jack V- Fwiw, penguins are flightless birds that stick near the ocean. Unfortunately, despite species living in Argentina and New Zealand (I think South Africa and Australia too, but I'm not 100% on those) penguins are too-much associated with Antarctica to be considered fauna for places that wouldn't be snow planes. There are a few other water-associated birds that lost the ability to fly, but they're small (they'd be very silly as 2;2s) and are mostly unique species that lost flight within their larger groups. Moa-nalo could fit too, but they're a bit obscure.

I can't help but give the silver-bordered answer for Jack's maritime flightless bird problem: "Dire Dodo"

2020-02-18 05:00:36: jmgariepy edited Bristling Walrus

I like the idea of baby sphinxes, but I agree that this isn't the place for them. The point behind using Sphinxes as Blue's iconic creature is that they're complicated and make you think. Baby sphinxes don't need to make you think hard, but they should pose some sort of question (Scry 1 perhaps.)

I also rather like Polar Bear. On the surface it's a strong contender. But I see two arguments against it:

1.) It's highly associated with arctic regions, meaning the iconic card wouldn't be usable in certain settings (for example Jamuraa, or Innistrad.)

2.) It reminds people that Blue is finally as good as Green was in 1993. Which, all things considered, I think it would be best if Blue did it's own thing. Blue can always make Polar Bears later, when the right set appears.

Which is fine, because Jack wins anyways with Bristling Walrus. I agree that Magic doesn't have enough seals. It, in fact, has zero. Technically, walruses are also arctic creatures, but I don't envision them with snow around them as often as I think of mud and rocks... so I think they could get away with making an appearance in a set like Innistrad, where a polar bear would look out of place.

That said, I did change Jack's 'pinniped' to 'seal', since Wikipedia told me that seal is the common name of the clade. Now if we could just get the creature type Elk to use the common family name 'Deer'...

(((NTC #020))) in a few days!

Check out "The bear that never was." Colorshifted frame (Planar Chaos) for that is 👌

Yeah; fair comment. Introducing a whole new tribal to justify a new bear seems like a good option to me. I approve of this walrus.

There are only two creatures with the bear type outside of green: a bear illusion, Phantasmal Bear, and a spirit bear,Ursine Glyja. In both cases the other creature type is heavily associated with the card's color. The likelihood a creature type would be moved to match a color, with no story or flavor justification seems low. In terms of a polar's nature, is it any more green and less blue than the grizzly bear? In an environment where one could have a polar bear, why would that bear be green over blue? I think that is a strong argument against using bear as the creature type.

Thank you!

I'm confused what the terminology is. Wikipedia says "commonly referred to as seals" but the footnote says "walruses are usually excluded in vernacular and scientific uses". So, commonly by who? So they mean, other languages use the equivalent word for seal to include walruses? That seems likely, but then what it says isn't really right. I certainly couldn't find any of the top ten "what is a Walrus" pages calling it a seal.

However, now you wrote it, that's clearly correct in magic taxonomy. It makes more sense than some of magic's other groupings, and is closer to the natural or scientific uses than English is.

Fwiw, I did discover magic has Pale Bears which are clearly polar bears, but on a snow block they are in green. And the spirit bear looks polar bear ish and is in white.

Ah... this is why one should read the footnotes. But the fact that the Pinniped footnote also says that "In science ['seal'] is sometimes restricted to the "true" seals of the family Phocidae" gives an indication that the term 'seal' is a moving target based upon a scientist or writer's needs.

I don't think anyone who saw a deck full of walruses, sea lions, and harbor seals would think 'this can't be a tribe', though. I agree that 'seal' isn't the best name for walruses. But I think it's the best name for the clade of pinnipeds. Unfortunately, this is one of those problems that's going to come down to preference.

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