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Original Card: Anaba Bodyguard ­

Reduced cost by . ­

i get the flavor bonus of making it a mercenary, but i'm not a fan. mercenaries were a black tribe, had no support after masques block, and homelands doesn't have any other mercenaries in it.

You know, Mercenaries just happened to pop up in an article I wrote, kind of by accident. It turns out Magic has a lot of Non-Masques Mercenaries in it now. Anaba Bodyguard would just be joining the ranks held by Dauthi Mercenary, Doomed Necromancer, Mercenary Knight, Rogue Skycaptain, Sokenzan Renegade, Soldier of Fortune, Goblin Turncoat, Mercenaries and Sell-Sword Brute.

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i looked on gatherer after posting this and felt like maybe i should eat some of my words. but the last red mercenary was now 10 years ago and was created at a time when the race/class system was in its infancy. i wouldn't expect mercenary to be appearing on many future cards unless there's a clear reason for it beyond flavor.

To be honest, I'm kind of surprised this guy didn't become a Mercenary during the Great Creature Type Update. My best guess is that no one thought of it. I don't disagree that we're less likely to see a Mercenary now (unless they bring the mechanic back some day.) I'm just giving him the creature type that I assume Wizards would have already done, if someone thought of it.

I can appreciate the aversion to the creature type. It reminds players of the wrong block. I get that. But there's a precedent, and I'd rather the Minotaur have a class that (while arguable) makes sense, than have no class because some players feel weird when they see a tribal creature type outside of its block. Besides, we're assuming that there are no Mercenary players out there who wouldn't love to see yet another option, and I know that those guys/gals exist, too. I would guess that the people that love this change outweigh the people who would hate this change.

i don't think writing off my criticism as aversion to the type is fair. i was casual-as-hell when masques was around and going cateran kidnappers into cateran brute felt like cheating, it was great

i just think you're wrong for the reasons i've already outlined; WotC has stopped using mercenary as a class. but at this point all we can do is agree to disagree, and this isn't my set.

My apologies if you felt I was belittling your argument. I wasn't trying to be, but it's tough when we're arguing about something that's so petty. Incredibly important, too, somehow. And incredibly minor. I could probably argue about this single stupid word for hours on end. And I'm sure I would still be unsatisfied in the end, no matter what we agreed to.

But, yes, I can agree to disagree. And, unfortunately, the set is mine, so I get my way. I don't like resolving things that way, but I guess we don't have much of a choice.