Urza's Saga | Magic: The Gathering | MTG Lore
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 12 ก.ค. 2024
- Learn the story of one of Magic: The Gathering's most iconic figures as we trace the legend of Urza Planeswalker across the MTG Multiverse
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Time Stamps
0:00 - Intro
1:49 - Character Traits
6:35 - Early Life
16:18 - The Brothers' War
28:12 - Planeswalker
56:50 - The Invasion
1:08:48 - Legacy
1:13:59 - Outro
“This video is unofficial Fan Content permitted under the Fan Content Policy. Not approved/endorsed by Wizards. Portions of the materials used are property of Wizards of the Coast. ©Wizards of the Coast LLC.” - เกม
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No man is completely good or evil, but nearly all of Urza's deed were truly great. Hale and curse the name of Urza, Dominaria's greatest hero and bastard.
Urza's feats of artifice and magic are to be respected. As is his drive to do whatever was needed to protect Dominaria. But the man himself. The man himself I have nothing but contempt for. At best he was a necessary evil.
I think the moral gray area and questionable deeds make urza one of MTGs best characters, someone you love to hate
Urza is who you call when your enemy is Satan and the only one powerful enough to fight back is Hitler. With the Legacy Project he was already beginning to walk down the same path Yawgmoth did when trying to "improve" the Thran. Beyond that he saw nothing wrong as long as the ends justified the means, real twisted dude.
Absolutely phenomenal writing and character building over the years though, bravo to the writers.
Also just subscribed to your channel cuz this is well delivered content, you have a good voice for this and the background music is truly sublime.
@@Ixidora the legacy project wasn't to "improve" the thran. He did the same thing Serra did. Created a race to protect the multiverse.
@@joelestrada6795 you're right, Urza didn't improve the Thran, Yawgmoth did and we got Phyrexians, the Thran were wiped out by Yawgmoth. I was comparing Urza to a very young Yawgmoth who only wanted the best for the Thran.
Great consequences come of the best intentions.
@@Ixidora I'd I remember correctly, yawgmoth didn't really care for the thran. He hated them. He just wanted to do his experiments. Which led to the Phyrexian.
I don't blame Urza for what he did any more than I blame Ugin for dooming Zendikar. What do you do when the price of failure is everything?
This made me cry. Such a beautiful story. I'm so torn what to take away about Urza. He did so much, not sure all of it was good, but he came thru in the end.
@@arcahmwinters70 it's hard to really delve into him as a character because we are always seeing Through The Eyes of someone right next to him, his brother, kayla, Xantia (always thought it was beautiful that a phyrexian newt was able to humanize him after his.. Ascension) and Barrinalo. I hate to say it but in a way he's a puppet. The only pure times to draw from are the relationship between he and Mishra before they find the stone. After that you have Glaceon trying to will the stone back together, and the corrupted influence of phyrexia just behind the facets of the gems..causing a horribly sad rift between two brothers, a scar deep enough to wound the mtg Multiverse. To me, After the Sylex blast Urza seemed mostly Glaceon, madly coming up with new designs trying to stay one step ahead of the thing peering over his shoulder.. yawgmoth.
You could even argue he was the phyrexian portal, I've always thought it was weird that they were literally always one step behind him, as we first see with Sarah's Realm.
And I have to come to the defense of his brother. I always thought even though Mishra didn't want to be seen as the younger brother, he was and that's why Urza always felt like he was responsible for him, he was. Mishra was kind and naive (think about his "Thran were minotaurs!" Phase) I think the big brother should have noticed changes as his baby brother was being corrupted and to be the hero should have been able to throw down their Grudge and figure out together, what was causing this
I feel like Urza is the ultimate symbol of power causing disconnection. Like the video says his concern for his inventions and his ideas outweigh any person.
I also noticed that none of the background images were blurred for this video, great change from some of your prior videos, the story is so much more impactful when the art is displayed clearly as the art is what drives a lot of love for the game, thanks for making this!
Always love feedback/suggestions as I continue to make content, glad to hear the newer style works!
Excellent. Thank you
I’ve always held sympathy for Urza. A man who just wanted to invent thrust into a leadership that he did not ask for.
I've always had a visceral hatred of him.
@@kyleellis1825 why?
@@thomasdawicki141 Arrogance that leveled nations and caused the ice age, destroyed a plane so his own would live, and the sheer pettyness of the brother's war.
He's not some great man. He's a pathetic genius who ruined millions of lives.
One of the most comprehensive and well done videos regarding Urza that I've ever seen, amazing!
Appreciate it!
I only got into Magic last December just before Kamigawa Neon dynasty came out so I have a lot of Magic history and lore to learn. Friends who are much more experienced about magic talked to me about phyrexians and Urza so now that I have a clear story.
I think he’s both a hero and a villain, which probably obvious. He did good things but also really bad things, but in the end he chose the right thing and became a hero in my eyes.
Man, who knew Urza's story was this epic. I might collect every Urza Cards there is! Like his artifacts and events he caused. A collection that will narrate his epic saga.
Yes, his is a truly epic Saga. Have fun collecting his story in card form!
You can fill a commander deck and still not get it all in, especially if you include characters like Magetta the Lion (basically your grandpa if he was one of the world's most respected living war generals, in a suit of powered armor specially made so he could still lead troops from the front lines) the 4 or 5 versions of Karn, 2 different versions of Master wizard Barrinalo, there's more than one skyship weatherlight out there, her crew, 2 sagas (Antiquities War and idr) and I would say go ahead and get yourself a copy of Memnarch and shove that in there, since Urza made Karn and Karn made Memnarch 💙
Or just go retro with his lands powering huge fireballs and such
makes for a fun commander deck
@@BurnDoubt id put the weatherlight crew in a weatherlight deck, far too many related cards to tack that into an uzra's history themed deck.
I made a karn deck where all the interaction are weatherlight crew related cards from karns time on the weatherlight so its like his friends helping him out of a jam. I know very little about the lore though, im sure theres a lot I missed cause I just looked up a list of weatherlight crew and went from there.
Urza is one of my favorite characters in fiction he is the perfect encapsulation of the phrase “The ends justify the means”, that being said Urza was a deeply flawed individual and made many morally grey choices. But I believe that the end of the day every terrible deed he felt forced to do he never forgot those actions and by the end it weighed very heavily on his soul. His main goal was vengeance on Phyrexia for his brother at 1st and then after his raid into Phyrexia, he made that a side goal and needed to defend his home, that admittedly he trashed. I don’t know about you all. When it comes to Earth and we were to face an alien threat like that of the Phyrexians, I would do the same stuff Urza did if it meant Earths survival.
Love your voice and the longer form videos.
Growing up as a kid in the 90’s, I remember reading novels about much of this story. Gerrard was an amazing hero, and Urza was equal parts God and Devil who did what he must to fight the Superdevil.
One small correction, though: Karn already found the Cylix during Return the Dominaria, outright stating he plans to use it on New Phyrexia.
Urza befriending or acquainting with a Phyrexian is lowkey cool asf ! It reminds of for example the Predator cooperating with humans etc, even to it was due to a defect or what have you.
Well... I really can't say I like him, but respect him. I don't know how much I am right but I feel like Urza had such high empathy that he doubled back to become almost without it, because he thought he had to destroy the Phirexians... which mind you, he was right, very much so.
But even with his hubris, arrogance, and other bad traits, with the morally reprehensible action, I have to admit his actions were "necessary".
He really is a complex character, you can easily see where his decisions were warped by his fault, but you can see too why he did what he did.
Great video, very well made. The feeling of the storytelling was on point to transmit all the facts about his story.
Appreciate it! Yes, he is one MTGs more complex characters and with a life that's spanned millenia and impacted so much its difficult to weigh his actions. That's partially why I like him as a character so much
its a fictional story, they were made 'necessary" by the decisions of writers. they could have had him be a hero that didn't commit multiple genocides and planar wide extinctions.
So cool! Coming in to MtG around 2012, I never got the chance to live out urza’s story so it’s great to hear it here!
Yes, the old lore of MTG is full of great stories but very convoluted. Glad you enjoyed!
Omg. This video is just as great as the one with Nicol Bolas. Even the phyrexian background gave me the chills. You rock my dude! 😎
Thanks so much, glad to hear you enjoyed!
As I heard someone saying, the story of Urza could be compared to reading a novel in which Hitler is the main protagonist who is fighting against Satan.
That's dumb
Except Adolf was actually fighting against Satanic forces.
That's the best way I've heard it put.
@@Habizbah you read the books and think a curious being is comparable to a megalomaniac dictator? their fight is like a greek tragedy, a fight between brothers that ruins the world, while unbeknownst to them evil cheers it and rejoices from the backstages of shadows.
What a completely stupid analogy.
Urza is a man with the power of a god. Flawed and forced to make terrible decisions against a horrifying threat
Thanks for this video, its like a movie, beautifuly made. Urza is one of the greatest characters of magic
Appreciate it glad you enjoyed!
Amazingly done! Urza is a hero, making hard choices me thinks. But teetering on villain.
Speaking of villains... Could you do a video like this on Yawgmoth?
Already got an outline going for Phyrexia and the Father of Machines;) but will take some time
@@TheLorebrarians you are awesome!! I am more than happy to wait for it as you do a phenomenal job with your videos/writing/research
I was waiting for this in preparation for the Brother's War....
Maybe is a pre-quel set, or Could be a timeheist story involved
Spoilers so far have an Urza, Mishra, dragon engine, and more
I can’t help to love such interesting protagonist. Yes, he did a lot of bad stuff, but that just makes him more believable for me. He is far from perfect, but that just makes it easier for me to find some empathy for him. There aren’t characters like him in MTG, perhaps only Liliana has a tiny percentage of his coolness.
Check out Toshiro Umezawa
History of Phyrexia next? I've been looking forward to Urza's story for a long time, and I wanna know how new phyrexia fits into the current story
Karn creates an artificial plane of machines. Longs story short his heartstone, xantias heart, dripped phyrexian taint thus creating new phyrexia
Karn makes Mega Mind and a silver plane, Mega Mind is corrupted by Oil, makes silver plane not silver, Mega Mind is killed, Oil takes over Mirrodin, Phyrexian babies are born, they kill and “convert” a bunch of people (including Karn) Venser sacrifices himself to save Karn, Phyrexia wins anyway.
Honestly it’s very disconnected from the main characters besides Elspeth. This shouldn’t of been a gate watch story
I've been saying for years that the MtG Story of Urza should be a Netflix show
I wonder What do planeswalkers from other planes think of Urza? Do they think of him as some sort of heroic legend or do they say “cool story, bro” every time Teferi brings Urza up?
A video on Yawgmoth should be next
He and phyrexia are the next big project on the list!
I never Zcared to look further into mtg lore Zuntil I caught you in the recommended. Thanks for Zthe excellent content
I’ve heard bits and pieces of this story from various sources but never in a comprehensive long form video. Well done!
Thanks, I appreciate it!
I love your channel. Such great production value. Thank you so much for the great content.
Thanks so much for the kind words, happy to hear you enjoy it!
I HAVE BEEN LOOKING FORWARD TO THIS BOOYA
Hope you enjoyed!
Absolutely love the impactful art of Urza's Guilt. What makes Urza such a great character is his complexity and flaws. Much like real life, he isnt pure good or pure evil and is a 'tragic character'; trying to do good but stumbling constantly- even with god-like power. I listened to this vid long ago, but it was so good I came back for a re-run :)
This is by far my favorite story in all of magic and I've never heard it put so cohesively. Thank you for this!
You bet, glad you enjoyed!
Wow, I'm halfway through and I am blown away by the storytelling and attention to detail. You can tell that this video was made with love. It truly does the series and the original writers/artists justice.
I approve of this message
This is the best video on urza I've seen. Absolutely perfect. I want more planeswalker stories!! You're amazing!!
Thanks so much, glad you enjoyed!
Thanks for this epic video. I had always wanted to get a good summary to the early stories, but never had time to go through it. Thanks for your hard work. Very well presented too!
I appreciate it and so happy to hear you enjoyed! The early stories are some of my favorite but they can be tough to find or convoluted
Yessss! I've been waiting for this video for a long time. This story is one of my favorites in all of magic
I hope I did Urza justice and that you enjoyed!
Hyped! Love Urzas storyline and you do an excellent job with all of your content so I know this is gonna be awesome
Hope you enjoyed it!
Aaah! I have been looking forward to this video for so long!
Hope it delivered!
45:19 “But the Weatherlight is incomplete” 😏
How can one forget eugenics engine. The name alone is extremely memorable.
This was an amazing watch. As a player who only got into magic a year-ish ago, this video is great for context for Dominaria United, the upcoming Brothers War. I did know some things about Urza and the war against Yawgmoth (much of it through spice8rack's video on yagmoth), but to get the full story of Urza himself was great. Fantastic work
I appreciate it and glad that the video helped set up the context for you
This was excellent, please continue this format
Appreciate it
AS an old school MTG player this vid brought back so many wonderful memories.
Let’s go amazing work as always sir Erek
Appreciate it, glad you enjoyed!
Amazing video. Thank you.
Very nice storytelling.
This is very well done sir!
Once again, a well put together and relayed story of one the the greatest protagonists in MtG history. I knew most of the information, having read the books, but it should serve as an excellent starting place for people about to be introduced to the Brother's War. Kudos to you and everyone at the channel for this one. Highly anticipated and well delivered. Great job!
I think you also hit the nail on the head for Dominaria United. I thought, too, that Zhalfir would return finally and we would see the world whole again. I hope they do better stories for the set than the current decent, but hastily written stories. They lack much substance when it comes to story. Everything feels like it comes together too easy. I want a Brother's War novel level story so we can feel Teferi's hardships and triumph as his home he has loved and longed for comes back.
"having read the books"
Little jealous, NGL.
Thanks so much and glad you enjoyed it! I agree, I think the number of characters, story arcs, and plots points warrants a novel-like approach. The MTG story articles don't give sufficient space to develop complex happenings. Fingers crossed we're both right about Zhalfir🤞
@@Darquine I was able to find Artifacts Cycle 1 and 2 at the local library.. if that helps
@@BurnDoubt Cheers, m8.
Urza, following in yawgmoths eugenics footsteps.
Loved this storyline
Urza was an unusually intelligent person sure. As far as his morals, given the immense power dropped in his lap, he was more or less just a guy. He did probably better with that power than I would have. That's for sure
Excellent work!
That was an epic tale guy's. Dominaria is my favorite plane. Keep up the good work 👍
Appreciate it, I love Dominaria as well
Thank you for the great work. Your projects are the best. Let me thank you again.
I appreciate the kind words and support
currently working on a DnD 5e campaign set within the first Phyrexian invasion and this is super helpful as i try to figure out how to make all of these characters into NPC’s 🤣😄 thank you!
Love to hear it, good luck crafting the campaign!
@@TheLorebrarians thanks! i’m gonna need it hahaha 😅☺️
I am almost halfway through the video and i will pass it along to people who haven't read the books. I read most of them and as a suggestion i would put the books you used as reference on the description.
such an excellent video, now im nore excited for the brother's war set
Your content is amazing. Thank you!
Appreciate it, glad you enjoy!
Thanks for this. It's super useful for those of us who only recently got into magic.
Appreciate it, glad you found it helpful
As concluded by The Professor in his examination of such beings, I concur with the argument that Urza remains, by orders of magnitude, the greatest villain in the history of the Multiverse.
I have to disagree. He's the hero we needed not the one we wanted. Were his methods questionable? Yes. Were they needed? Yes. Most people think it was pure vengeance, but he was ready to stop the war and rest when he found out about the shard that protected Dominaria. He continued the battle in order to protect Dominaria. He never said he was a righteous individual. He always did what needed to be done inorder to save the most amount of people.
@@joelestrada6795 Well said, Ser. While I may ultimately disagree, I cannot in earnest argue the validity of the pragmatic argument you present as complex questions of morality such as this truly have no reasonably easy or tidy answers.
@@joelestrada6795 it'd be a cool "what if" to see Urza and Mishra figuring out what was on the other side of their Stones together, dropping The Grudge would have really changed everything
I've always admired how deep magic's lore is, despite not being strictly necessary to play the game. I could play an Urza deck ignorant of all of this, but knowing it enriches the game so much. Thanks for presenting it so well 🤎
This is why I love making videos, to help connect players to the games they love and enrich the experience. Glad you enjoyed
This video was fantastic.
Media pega que te mandaste, un excelente video!
I miss the pre mending stories
I love these profiles! It would be epic to hear the full story of Gideon!
Appreciate the suggestion!
Urza is a very realistic character in terms of behavior. In DnD he totally would be lawful evil since he actually don´t care about others at all. He just need to finish his campaign even though he has to trick, manipulate or even sacrifice others. He just don´t ask the others if they are willing to help, he just utilize them... This to me is a very evil behavior, although the reason is totally valid (phyrexia was a horrible menace).
what calls my attention is for sure if he actually felt any piece of remose about his actions, and if so, when... Because it seems with the pass of the years, he became even more megalomaniacal and maquiavelic (the story of the soulbombs... what an A...).
amazing done
The brothers war book dosen't say who started using the stones on each other first and I doubt it was urza
It shows us what they each dream of after they get the stones. Mishra saw phyrexia and gix saw him.
The stone kept a portal to phyrexia closed and held a planeswalker spark from Glaceon.. so splitting in two it's a 50/50 flip, you get corrupted or start getting machine blueprint downloads from a dead guys unignited spark.
I think of mishra as the innocent one here, being the younger brother. Urzas original sin was being the older brother who wasn't there when little brother needed him most.
Hooooly shit that has to take ages to script, thank you so much for all the efford ❤️
About 2 weeks of research and scripting. This was about 25 pages so I'm very glad to hear you enjoyed it!
I hope they bring the Artifacts Cycle books back into print, and maybe the comics that told the story of antiquities as an omnibus. Great reads
Well done ! I wish I could hit the like button more than once!!
Thank you, glad you enjoyed!
This was awesome.
Your videos are so good! They're so captivating!
Thanks so much, happy you enjoy!
@@TheLorebrarians you're welcome! 😊 you're the man for bringing this crazy lore to life
Nice😍 A story about the biggest villain of magic🥰
Masterfully told my friend
Thank you, a lot of research and scripting goes into these. Glad you enjoyed
Absolutely loved the video! But still hate playing against Urza. Nothing will ever change that no matter how good the video was
Haha he is definitely a pain to play against
"Whatever creatures had stood on Tolaria were blinded by the flash, and deafened by the concussion, and dismantled by the raw power. Phyrexians, scholars, students, hinds, fleas - all died in that moment. Their struggles were done. Their bodies were gone. Even the ground on which they stood turned to wax and ran. Only Rayne and Hanna were safe, sealed in their sarcophigi. How like Urza had Barrin become."
- from "Invasion" by J.Robert King
Amazing recounting of the events, you had my interest fornthe entirety of the video! If i may give some feedback,during some parts of it there were distracting clips about things that were unrelated to what you were narrating. I thing it would be less overwhelming for the senses to only use images,as you do for most of the video! Nonetheless,amazing work!
what a story, wow.
Good and evil are relative. A wonderful character from a time when Magic had rich stories.
Indeed. Good tomes.. good times
Beautiful
That was great! Can you guys do one like this that's about sarpadia and fallen empires?
Appreciate the suggestion, I would love to cover fallen empires soon!
Is Netflix still planning on a magic animated series? I wonder if Urza will be one of the first characters introduced? Great Lore.
love the lore 🔥🔥🔥
Glad to hear it!
Very nice
Yes! Finally!
Quite the impressive character writing it seems to be a nightmare, but what an impressive saga came out of it.
I hope you revisit some of this now that dominaria united and the brother's war is out.
Thanks
He was single minded in his fight against phyrexia because the threat was against ultimate evil.... the phyrexians are the very essence of Darkness, their depraved ways and inhumanity was infinite... urza did the best he could given the circumstances.
I remember reading this series of books as a kid I think I have them still somewhere
Learned a lot today.
Urza: idiot
Lorebrarian: genius
I really enjoy the lore aspect, but find it very confusing when you use other characters in depictions, such as when you used avacyn's image when talking about radiant, or continuously show eldrazi when talking about phyrexians
A bit of feedback, while I love the story and the actual animated scenes are awesome I did feel a disconnect happen during the scenes that didnt quite match what was being talked about.. An example being I believe Domni Rade(?) Being shown during one of the brothers battles. While yes Domni is known for fighting hes also known for his deep connections with nature (Definitely not something id associated with urza).
Idk maybe im a bit picky but I did feel that even though the animted scenes were awesome, I 100% would have prefered a simple card that fit the scene more completely
Love your work and im happy to see a suggestion I made actually have an impact!!
Glad you enjoyed and appreciate the feedback! I've been working with an editor the past few videos so I'll pass on your suggestion. I agree, it could be a bit confusing when the art/video doesn't match what is being discussed and I'll look into it
@@TheLorebrarians Legend. Always good to see feedback taken as it is. An opinion.
Keep it up matey
Well the ending of this aged like milk. Ajani is compliated and Karn is captured once more. The sylex has been destroyed (though Teferi is going on a time safari to find out how it works) and the weatherlight has been compliated. Shit hasn't hit the fan; the fan was turned on and dropped into a distillery of the stuff.
The living cards really spice things up
FINALLY!!!
Oh no they beat me to it
I'm looking forward to your videos on the weatherlight crew
Artificer, Planeswalker, Teacher, Brother...
And a God....
Hell yeah.