In case you missed it, Jules Robins had a fun column recently showing off the best results from his “You Make the Planeswalker” contest. It’s a fun read, with a lot of creativity in terms of planeswalker abilities. My favorite was this planeswalkerized take on Glissa:
The first ability certainly makes sense – Glissa brings more infect bugs.
The second ability obviously synergizes quite well with an infect deck. It’s also cute, inasmuch as it’s effectively another +1 ability.
It’s the third ability that really caught my attention, as it puts your opponent on a strict clock in a way that almost no other planeswalker ultimate has done to date. A poison-generating emblem just hadn’t occurred to me, and it’s a cool idea.
It’s also pretty slow, of course, since you need to make infect bugs unmolested for four turns before you can activate the emblem – and then you need to hope they don’t kill you while the emblem counts up. In fact, if you’re curious about just how slow Glissa’s ultimate would be, you can check out this article I wrote about how quickly planeswalkers deploy.
Anyway, the planeswalker design article is a fun one, so check it out.
Thanks for the write up! Here’s the “Bio” I sent to Jules if you were wondering
Glissa, Hand of Sheoldred
Long ago, Glissa Sunseeker gave up her planeswalker spark to save her home: the plane of Mirrodin. Sadly, her story did not end there. After the defeat of Memnarch, Glissa came into contact with a drop of Phyrexian glistening oil. The phyresis it harbored consumed Glissa, body and mind, until nothing of the Viridian elf remained. As emissary to Preator Vorinclex and general of his legions, Glissa the Traitor spearheaded the transformation of Mirrodin into New Phyrexia. Thus the heroine of Mirrodin became the traitor to all.
A short time after the liberation of Karn, The War of the Preators erupted. Seizing an opportunity for ultimate power over her master, Glissa formed an alliance with Preator Sheoldred. Together they slew Vorinclex. As his corpse spewed its corrosive juices onto Glissa, her long forgotten spark, thought forever snuffed out…reignited.
At long last, Phyrexia has obtained its multi-planar vector. Now, the Hand of Sheoldred reaches out to spread glistening oil throughout the multiverse.
About the card:
What if the surprise appearance of a moonfolk (Tamiyo) on Innistrad was but a taste of what is to come? What if planeswalkers brought more than just flavor with them across the blind eternities? What if they brought the showcase abilities of their home sets?
I would love to see this card seeded into the final set of a counter themed block. The cool factor would be increased tenfold if that set didn’t contain any of the three abilities she sports: Infect, Proliferate, and Poison.
The kid that opens this alien beauty in a Lorwyn-type setting will instantly know: Something is horribly, horribly wrong. This card would not only serve as a flashy one-of card for the block it’s released in, but it will also tell an entire story by itself. Notice, I added the purple set symbol to signify that it wouldn’t even be part of the set. The card would “invade” booster packs of the aforementioned set. Appearing, unannounced, Glissa will command your attention. That’s something all planswalkers should aspire to do.