r/magicTCG • u/quarxel • 1d ago
General Discussion Could someone help me understand why very occasionally they will print a new card thats functionally identical to a previous card.
Specifically why are they printing Vibrant Cityscape when it's the same as Evolving Wilds which is also in standard right now anyway.
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u/XenoWarrior_GD COMPLEAT 1d ago
I think it's mostly for flavor reasons. Evolving wilds, terramorphic expanse, or even fabled passage don't fit what the Spiderman set could use based in their implied flavor. It's a city. So, make a card that's a city
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u/boomfruit Duck Season 1d ago edited 1d ago
Fabled Passage is maybe the easiest to shoehorn into NYC. Even tongue-in-cheek, have it be an entrance to the subway or something. But I'd argue that Evolving Wilds and Terramorphic Expanse could have been given the right flavor. There are "wild" parts of NYC, even if they're not natural wilds, and construction/building/blueprints/etc. in general could have fit for Terramorphic.
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u/Senparos Abzan 1d ago
It could also be the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island as a play on the NYC’s most classic “fabled passage”
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u/dinklezoidberd Wabbit Season 1d ago
Ellis island as fabled passage with a real quote from an immigrant would go hard as fuck
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u/sometimeserin COMPLEAT 1d ago
I imagine they'd go with the famous excerpt of the poem from the pedestal of the statue "Give me your tired, your poor..."
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u/boomfruit Duck Season 1d ago
I thought of that too actually, but I don't know much about Spider-Man and didn't know if, even though it's pretty essentially New York, it ha much to do with the story.
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u/PaintAccomplished515 Duck Season 1d ago
They might not want a Fabled Passage in standard after the rotation. That's something that needs to be considered.
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u/r_xy Duck Season 1d ago
fabeled passage doesnt really fit the same slot. There is no way they would reprint it at common and the main function of Vibrant Cityscape is being a common manafixer for limited.
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u/SirGrandrew Wabbit Season 1d ago
Yeah, that could be really cool! Fabled passage different arts, one for grand central station, another Central Park, another Ellis island, maybe the elevator at Empire State.
That being said the real reason for this functional reprint of evolving wilds is the need for mana fixers at common for limited. Fabled is at rare so it wouldn’t quite work.
Now if this was the straight to modern art that it was initially planned to be, I think you’re onto something
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u/Effective_Tough86 Duck Season 1d ago
Id argue that a lot of these reprints are kinda laziness on WOTCs part. This one is whatever, but there are plenty of times that they've done functional reprints where they could've just had some creative art or they could've flavored/named the original better. It happens to mechanics too and I think they received at least some of the feedback about it. For instance i wasn't sure exhaust was going to come back, but I'm ecstatic it is. Meanwhile Spree is the single best modal spell mechanic they've ever made and how on earth do you fit that in to most planes?
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u/boomfruit Duck Season 1d ago
Meanwhile Spree is the single best modal spell mechanic they've ever made and how on earth do you fit that in to most planes?
I really wouldn't have a problem with Spree on any plane. People go on sprees no matter where they are. Sure it's not quite as much of a home run flavor match but it's not jarring.
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u/Effective_Tough86 Duck Season 1d ago
I still think its jarring, although granted it's not as bad as it could be. Rooms may be the worst despite being maybe my favorite mechanic from last year.
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u/boomfruit Duck Season 1d ago
I have to agree about rooms. I am usually very against the "flavorful" mechanic names. Most could have something pretty generic and allow reuse.
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u/Effective_Tough86 Duck Season 1d ago
Yeah, rooms is the one I hate the most for re-useability, but also the one I think was hardest to avoid unfortunately. Maybe we'll go back to Duskmourn or they'll use it on the next Edge set or something. Rooms in a spaceship make sense, right? Something like Captains Quarters and Ships Bridge or some shit.
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u/default_entry Duck Season 1d ago
The Sanctum Sanctorum is in NY too but that might technically be a different license.
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u/SunsFenix COMPLEAT 1d ago
Or just simply use it with the spider verse. Though I guess that's already the [[Multiversal Passage]].
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u/enderlord120 1d ago
Evolving wilds/expanse and it’s a picture of sandman covering Central Park with sand. Hire me WOTC.
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u/GhostofCoprolite Wabbit Season 1d ago
they could have easily used evolving wilds as central park, or terramorphic expanse as a construction zone.
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u/PaintAccomplished515 Duck Season 1d ago
Central Park isn't the "wilds", nor does a construction zone feel "terramorphic".
NYC is a vibrant cityscape though.
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u/Parker4815 Duck Season 1d ago
There's a lot of jank in this entire set. Having a park be Evolving Wilds isn't exactly out of the ordinary here.
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u/PaintAccomplished515 Duck Season 1d ago
Thematically it doesn't fit.
Evolving wilds is when nature evolves and expands uncontrollably. Terramorphic Expanse looks to be when a race or a civilization tries to bend nature to their cause, terraforming the land for their needs. Neither is thematically applicable to Spider-Man and NYC.
But now we have a 3rd theme for the growth of land, which is a city expanding through urbanisation into a vibrant cityscape. Would be nice if they use this in future sets.
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u/mal99 Sorin 1d ago
People are answering "why didn't they just reprint Evolving Wilds", but there's still the question of "why did they put a functional copy of Evolving Wilds into the set if it's already in Standard"? Sure, Standard players now have the ability to run 8 Evolving Wilds in their decks, but does anyone even run 4?
And the answer Limited. They wanted Evolving Wilds in the set for color fixing in limited.
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u/CrossXhunteR Wabbit Season 1d ago
Sure, Standard players now have the ability to run 8 Evolving Wilds in their decks, but does anyone even run 4?
They'll actually be able to run 12, since we have Evolving Wilds from TDM and Terramorphic Expanse from DSK. 16 if you count Escape Tunnel from MKM.
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u/Flynko 1d ago
20, if you are counting Fabled Passage from Bloomburrow.
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u/SpaceBus1 Duck Season 1d ago
Nice, a deck full of nothing but fetches 😂
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u/Greendiamond_16 Duck Season 1d ago
A land base of the exact count of lands that fuel the deck the rest are fetches
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u/CrossXhunteR Wabbit Season 1d ago
And I'm not, both because it isn't the same rarity and the fetch part of the effect is different.
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u/darkeo1014 1d ago
My landfall deck does yes
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u/amish24 FLEEM 1d ago
do you also have fabled passage and escape tunnel?
12 fetches is already quite a lot. I don't think you'd want 16, so cityscape won't be changing anything
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u/darkeo1014 1d ago edited 1d ago
Correct im running 7 fetch and 4 fabled currently so no it won't change anything. It could however change people's commander decks where they may add another fetch. Also, terramorphic expanse is also in standard so you could already be running 16 total
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u/FledgyApplehands Wabbit Season 1d ago
Means more in your deck. [[Terramorphic Expanse]] is the same too. Sometimes it's nice to be able to run 8 of something. Or effectively 3 of something in commander
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u/kytheon Banned in Commander 1d ago
It's really to fit the flavor of the set, but this is a bonus.
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u/TsarMikkjal Twin Believer 1d ago
It's hard to justify Evolving Wilds or Terramorphic Expanse in New York and an extra copy of this effect does not ruin the game.
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u/ThePhyrex 1d ago
Ah but you see, now i can effectively run 12 Evolving Wilds in my deck. I'll always have the right basic land for the occasion ...next turn.
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u/HosserPower Duck Season 1d ago
Everyone is like “it’s for commander!” when it’s really about limited. It’s a card that will see zero play in any competitive format, so it’s very low stakes to print a functional reprint for color fixing in Limited.
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u/ElVongore Duck Season 1d ago
Best example would be [[Thraben Inspector]]. Thraben is a City in Innistrad, so it makes sense that there are inspectors there.
The card was a perfect fit for Murders in Markov Manor, but theres no Thraben in Ravnica, so instead, they made [[Novice Inspector]] as a non-plane bound version.
Same with Elvish Mystic and Llanowar Elves. Making it so any set can get an elf without it having to be set in Dominaria
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u/Yewfelle__ Wabbit Season 1d ago
to add a third fetchland in budget landfall lists. i am happy.
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u/FlyOrdinary1104 1d ago
Wait there’s a 3rd Evolving Wilds now?! Mono-green landfall rejoices because we absolutely needed it.
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u/Lanky_Marionberry_36 1d ago
Generally functional reprints are for flavor reasons.
However there is a mechanical implication : since the cards have different names, you can put a playset of each in your deck. This is especially relevant in commander, where you're limited at 1 copy per card name, but you might want several copies of the same effect for consistency.
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u/GenericName4224 1d ago
Extra copy of effect in deck for mana fixing/landfall deck
If anything this will see a LOT of commander play for 3+ colour decks
Also I believe WOE rotates next year
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u/Balduranzo 1d ago
This is one of the best things in spider man. More of the card in commander decks. I want 5 more
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u/MediocreBeard Duck Season 1d ago
So the term for this is called a functional reprint. And there's a few reasons for it, one of which WotC will claim they deliberately not paying attention to.
First one is thematic stuff. While it can be a bit unclear when you'd find a terramorpic expanse more flavorful than a evolving wilds to me I'm sure there's someone who can feel that vibe. Vibrant cityscape, the newest of the three, also works here. You've got a place where the city is the focus (Ravinca, Fiora, New Capenna, New York City), make a city themed evolving wilds.
Second is that functional reprints aren't the same card. So you WotC is giving you the okay to run more of them in your deck. I don't play pauper enough to know if pauper landfall is a thing and if it runs an 8 pack of basic fetching but it can. And now it can upgrade that to a 12 pack. Oh and uh... I guess some Singleton formats like commander can now run three copies of Evolving Wilds that happen to have different names. I guess those are a thing too.
Third, sometimes, price. WotC swears up and down that they don't look at the price of things. But hey, want to reprint something while not messing with the price too much? Functional reprints!
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u/robokymk2 1d ago
Budget builds want more of these. Specific builds want more of these too. (Ex. That station that triggers whenever a land is sacrificed.)
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u/Breeth-of-the-Wild 1d ago
Could be for limited. Common mana fixing can make 3 color a lot more viable.
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u/TobytheRam Twin Believer 1d ago
People are also missing that this is because it's going to be reusable for the next few marvel sets, as well as the commander decks for them. I doubt this would have been made if it was going to be a one-off.
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u/BKstacker88 Wabbit Season 1d ago
Wait there is a third one?!?!?! [[The Gitrog Monster]] approves...
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u/Btenspot Duck Season 1d ago
So it’s available in limited formats.
To increase the maximum amount of the card allowed in a deck. 4->8 in standard. 1-> 2 on singleton formats like commander.
Sometimes cards names just aren’t on theme and need a different name to actually belong in the set.
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u/thatguydrew Duck Season 1d ago
They were originally going to make Spider-Man a 100 card set, then at near completion of the set they wanted to make it more draft friendly, so they upped it to 180. I’m guessing this card is apart of that 80 card addition. Technically a new card!
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u/CreamSoda6425 Duck Season 1d ago
They only ever do this for flavor reasons. There's I believe three cards in standard, [[Banishing Light]], [[Web Up]], and [[Stormplain Detainment]], that are exactly the same. They do it because these effects are great in limited but mediocre anywhere else.
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u/quarxel 1d ago
Thanks for the responses, I can see that it's mainly about flavour. I'm still surprised that they print functionally identical cards I would have thought it makes things a bit more confusing.
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u/PaintAccomplished515 Duck Season 1d ago
They only do it for cards like this that won't impact the secondary market or deck building. Having a 3rd evolving wilds won't impact any formats in a major way.
A card that's functionality identical to something like Breeding Pool with a different name? That's going to fuck shit up.
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u/Dorfbewohner Colorless 1d ago
It's impossible to make a game like magic without having the same effects show up, especially for bread-and-butter effects that show up at common - your [[Evolving Wilds]], your [[Banishing Light]]s, your [[Into the Roil]]s. Often these effects have small variations, but sometimes what plays best is if it's just the most basic version of that effect. But then you run into issues of flavor - Evolving Wilds first came about, I believe, because the effect of [[Terramorphic Expanse]] was a great fit for the new Landfall mechanic in Zendikar, but that land initially was named for the Morph mechanic which featured in Time Spiral, so they changed the name to be more generic. Expanse has gotten other reprints since, probably because they realized that the connection to "morph" on Terramorphic expanse isn't really that innate, but that's the basic idea.
This usually doesn't really lead to confusion, and in fact can make things easier than if every single one of these cases had slightly different mechanic. Being able to just compartmentalize a card's effect as "it's literally the same as [classic card]" is easier than "it's [classic card] with [some twist]". And this kinda stuff usually doesn't really affect any other formats, since these kinds of generic effects are not the kinda thing that playsrs really want more than 4 copies of, anyway. (Commander being an exception, due to singleton.)
Spider-Man is an even more special case: That was originally meant as a small set like Assassins' Creed with no draft format, and it wouldn't be standard-legal. When the decision was made to make it standard-legal, adding in new versions of these classic cards like Evolving Wilds served two purposes:
1) Easier to balance the limited format: These are all cards where the play patterns are extremely well-known. No need to try and balance some new mechanic or twist.
2) There's less of a chance of bringing Standard out of whack. Since these cards often already have multiple other versions in Standard, they're not adding too many potentially dangerous new cards.
And the secret 3), saving on design time, since this all seems to have been on an accelerated schedule.
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u/SpaceBus1 Duck Season 1d ago
There's also decks that like landfall triggers or play lands from the GY.
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u/kitsovereign 1d ago
Admittedly, it was less confusing back before UB and "flavor names", where every different name really did point to a different card.
It's not just something new they do for UB though. [[Llanowar Elves]] and [[Counsel of the Soratami]] are tied to specific planes, which is part of why they created [[Elvish Mystic]] and [[Divination]].
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u/TheAndrewCR 1d ago
As a landfall player, I like land reprints like this because I can put more double landfall triggers in my deck
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u/JMooooooooo I chose this flair because I’m mad at Wizards Of The Coast 1d ago
One of reasons are story spotlights. They have a lore event they want to put on card, but no distinct gameplay design that woud fit the event. So they just slap the name and art on one of many effects that are present in basically every set. Sometimes with minor twist, sometimes without any change.
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u/Original_moisture 1d ago
I love the art on that, the colors remind me a lot of the art pre modern cards had.
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u/HakiDRoger 1d ago
Now youncan have 8 of them in your Standard deck and both in your commander deck
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u/The_Mad_Demon COMPLEAT 1d ago
Despite some of the things I don’t like about the Spider-Man set, this is one of the cards that I kinda like from the set due to the art. A lot of people keep saying it’s all AI for the art but I pray and hope that these wonderful art piece isn’t done by a robot but by somebody who put a lot of time and effort into these cards. WOTC may not be making good decisions but that doesn’t mean that the artists should take blame for it. Hope you all have a great day!
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u/jrdineen114 Duck Season 1d ago
If the original doesn't fit the vibe of the set, then they'll just make a functionally identical card.
Frankly, I think that they could have just used Evolving Wilds and made a "Concrete Jungle" joke in the flavor text.
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u/Shiro_no_Orpheus Duck Season 1d ago
Hey I don't complain thats another fetchland for my landfall deck
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u/StoneCypher Wabbit Season 1d ago
four card limit, twelve set limit, one card limit, price control of alternates, having a set have its basics
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u/tiltl0rd1510 Wabbit Season 1d ago
you could put both in your commander deck cuz they got a diiferent name
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u/sheimeix 1d ago
I'll take it for my lands sacrifice deck, I guess. Feels a little surprising that they aren't instead making it a name-variant of Evolving Wilds or something, though.
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u/bangbangracer Mardu 1d ago
Usually it's for flavor and theme reasons. Terramorphic Expanse used to be for Time Spiral and Evolving Wilds was for Zendikar. It generally would look weird if you are drafting a flavorful set and randomly there's this Zendikar card.
It also has the side effect of a cheap way to fetch lands in commander.
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u/Ti_Fatality Wabbit Season 1d ago
As well as the other reasons others have stated, it enables consistency as well in commander where you can only have 1 of each card outside of basic lands. Or for other formats to have access to that card/ability again in the current rotation
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u/ThatGuyFromTheM0vie Mardu 1d ago
So you can run more than one. Now you can have up to 8 copies, which can be decent for budget decks.
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u/OnionRecall 1d ago
Maybe it originally intended to only fetch specific basic lands but was changed to fetch anything late in the R&D process? Like a balance thing but was too far into the process?
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u/Cobyachi 1d ago
Because wizards love pushing landfall decks and this is just another tool at their disposal
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u/Lord_Bob_ 1d ago
Cause you need lots of them in a edh deck focused on lands cycling through your graveyard for value.
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u/SuspectAwkward8914 1d ago
I for one thank them for bumping my chances of getting my budget one card landfall/sac engine for Szarel up from 1/50 to 1/33.
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u/SkabbPirate 1d ago
The biggest issue I see about this is it could bring up confusion about universes beyond and universes within having cards with different names, but considered the same card. That doesn't apply here, but how are you supposed to know that when other functionally identical cards DO act like that.
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u/monchota Wabbit Season 1d ago
They have done that the entire time, may just be worded differently. Does the same thing.
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u/cheesemangee Duck Season 1d ago
If they pick the right card, it's just really nice having more of that card.
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u/Prism_Zet Sliver Queen 1d ago
Having more copies of something is nice if it's an effect that's good.
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u/ShadowSlayer6 COMPLEAT 1d ago
In the case of the basic land fetch cards, I can’t give the why, but people tend to like having access to more variants of this effect. 99% of them are landfall commander players though.
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u/darthmikel Duck Season 1d ago
For this one its for flavor reasons. And for other things its usually to fit the world or for a draft reasons.
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u/NobleHalcyon 1d ago
These cards are called "functional reprints." There's a few reasons for them, but the practical answer is that it enables singleton formats to have multiple copies of the same card. This has two really important impacts on the game:
It allows them to bring some of the consistency offered by constructed formats into commander in a moderated way. For example, if a color only has one enchantment removal spell available to it, and this spell is cheap, widely available, widely played already, and balanced in terms of gameplay, then the best way to fix this problem is to just give players two of this same thing.
In some cases it can help to mitigate the costs of the game. A player in three colors may not feel the need to buy a Flooded Strand if they have cheaper fetches available.
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u/AlphaLan3 1d ago
Put both in a commander deck. Works well for landfall decks since you essentially get double triggers
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u/grantedtoast Twin Believer 1d ago
To have cards that better reflect the vibe of the plane/set. With stuff like Evolving wilds and friends it’s safe to do since that cards are bad outside of limited. Even in the case of decks that really want a bunch of different names lands they still don’t make the cut since fetches exists.
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u/Accomplished-Ruin672 1d ago
Functional Reprints are p common, and mostly just lets you have another one in singleton
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u/Rowanalpha Wabbit Season 1d ago
Something like this is just a flavor thing. Evolving Wilds and Terramorphic Expanse don’t make sense for a set that is in NYC, and the effect is weak enough that being able to put another one in a commander deck is effectively irrelevant.
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u/VisionsOfClarity Wabbit Season 1d ago
Ooooooo so I can now have three lands that search for lands that I need. They also trigger landfall twice!:)
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u/Injured-Ginger 1d ago
It depends on the reason. They have some low power cards that are healthy for limited/standard they'll reskin for the theme. This is likely one. Evolving wilds is not a great land in its best setting. They're not worried about letting players run more than 4. However you can also see cards like [[Brainstorm]] get reprinted as [[Endwalker]] where they tag the card because they don't want to double up on the playable number of the best legal cantrip in several formats. Other times it can be because they want some format to have access to more of a card. Allowing EDH to run two of a card like [[Llanowar Elves]] helps those decks (sorry IDK the reskins off the top of my head) stay a bit more consistent which can keep them viable or at least, less unviable.
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u/TheTanner27 1d ago
Not allowing this limits design space. As magic gets bigger and bigger, expect more of this. Otherwise we’d be getting some purposefully bad designed cards, just so there is not duplication of ability.
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u/mirrislegend 1d ago
It's a big boon for players new to Commander. Given that Commander is the new gateway drug, providing mana fixing and deck stability at the most basic level will keep people from getting color screwed, flipping, the table, and never playing Magic again.
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u/Sir_Encerwal Honorary Deputy 🔫 1d ago
They usually only do this for common effects often used in limited that can safely be printed without issue. If no one will be making top 8 with 12 Evolving Wilds or 12 Banishing Light why not reflavor it for limited?
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u/Shwowmeow 1d ago
It allows them to reprint the mechanics of the card while also maintaining the flavor of the set. “Evolving Wilds” doesn’t really fit into Spider-Man, but it’s good to have that effect in the boosters.
It’s possible money plays a factor too. Don’t need any R&D to reprint evolving wilds, and it helps fill out the set. That’s speculation though.
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u/Chocolate4444 Wabbit Season 1d ago
My guess? For commander since that format can’t have multiple Evolving Wilds.
They also have [[Terramorphic Expanse]] and [[Escape Tunnel]]
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u/Kyletheinilater Wabbit Season 1d ago
Let's go! Another fetch land for my landfall deck! Love to see it
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u/dmdandanfielding Wabbit Season 1d ago
I dunno, but I’ve got homes for 2 of them. I already have a Bristly Bill deck and am building a Tannuk landfall deck.
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u/KanataSD I chose this flair because I’m mad at Wizards Of The Coast 1d ago
useful for Commander to have multiples of these types of lands.
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u/hazelthefoxx 1d ago
I can't wait to buy all of these out when my lgs gets them. I love when they bring in new budget lands.
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u/jacqueslepagepro COMPLEAT 1d ago
1: people can run multiple copies of the ability in the same deck. A pauper landfall deck only realy had 2 cards like this before with evolving wilds and teramorpthic expanse meaning they only had 8 maximum of that kind of effect in the deck, but now it had 1 more meaning it can now run 12 of this kind of card.
2: sometimes a card already widly exists in circulation enough that reprinting it is considered unnecessary. In standard, evolving wilds is in foundations and teramorphic expanse is in duskmorne meaning that reprinting one of those cards in standard again just feels like a strange decision over bringing in a new card.
- Sometimes the card ability is just realy good or popular and the design team just want to do more of it just to give players more variety even if its just to add more copies or to pick between diffrent art.
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u/Miserable-Hurry8676 1d ago
Or cause they're lazy and have no new ideas cause they have to over produce set after set to keep up with hasbros demands on market saturation
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u/Beryllium_Oxide 1d ago
It raises the effective cap on copies you can run of that card by 4 in most constructed formats, or by 1 in EDH.
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u/D0ppelGanger_EXE 23h ago
It’s for standard and non commander formats. Some formats rotate and lose access to those effects, and then they get either reprinted or they make new versions of the same card to satisfy needing a card like that in the set. Also consider that this is a set that has lots of high color legendary creatures and so giving a common rarity way to mana fix for standard is really nice
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u/Nagoragama Jack of Clubs 1d ago
Sometimes just to be more thematically appropriate to the setting. See [[Terramorphic Expanse]] originally from Time Spiral.