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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 28 ก.ย. 2024
- It has been asked many times "What is would the sixth color of Magic the gathering be?" In this video I will posit to you that Colorless is indeed the sixth color and its philosophy is as rich as any member of the color pie. I have made many videos about the color pie and I believe that I am in a unique position to discuss colorless and what it means in terms of the color pie and what its color philosophy would be. So join me in this deep dive into the color philosophy of colorless the missing member of the color pie
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Which concept did you find most interesting?
So does this mean that 5 color can easily switch between the colors' ideals?
5 color and colorless will be different. The transcendent version will be similar but not quite the same
I think the concept I find the most interesting is the idea that colorless can be these different things, and yet it is still unified by absence or ambivalence toward everything including itself. Fascinating and paradoxical is the idea of an existence, an experience, but without experiences. One that knows nothing of what it is doing and yet does... as far as artifacts and machines go. It does not think or feel, it does not want to serve others or itself, and it may be fulfilling its given purpose, but it is also a completely blank slate, removed from any form of connection unless that purpose requires cooperation or coordination. In that way, it is easy to see how it is the truest neutral. It is something existing within the color pie, or even without. If you were to zoom in as needed to see the exact center of the color pie I think it is what you'd find, and yet, if you were to zoom out I think you'd see the same. I've always thought of colorless as objectivity, that something is what it is, and the colors as opinions on what we're seeing. To me it is the shape that facilitates our will without a will of its own, for if it were to have a will (like X from megaman X) it would no longer be ambivalent or devoid
Quick side tangent: I wish we could learn more about the eldrazi and the blind eternities because they're so fascinating to me, but there isn't much you can say about a place that does exist, and yet doesn't exist the same way we think of 3d space, but that is somehow full of entities that manifest themselves this way. The mystery is both infuriating and incredibly interesting, and it makes me wonder if the way we see eldrazi is even how they really are. The color pie is rooted in perception and humanity, which makes me wonder if the forms we see them take aren't just how our minds compensate for what we can't understand
Wasn't ever expecting you to make this video, but I'm incredibly happy with it. With something that is so neutral, I never imagined you'd be able to find a philosophy for it, but looking at its present characteristics and building off of those was clearly the way to go
Wow what a response thanks for this.
DiceTry Yeah, I was a bit wordy haha. Thanks, as always, for the content
I like the idea of the Eldrazi being so strange to us and so unfathomable, that the only way for us to grasp them is through colorless. To them, they might be a wide spectrum that our puny material eyes can't perceive and that out minds can't understand, leading to mutation and madness.
leading to.... mutate 👀
They are ultraviolet mana?
The eldrazi are those colors that only shrimp can see
@@heccinparagon6633thats why a color ine Magic The gathering.
I'd argue that you could also argue for all living beings being colorless: From a mechanical perspective, any color features cards that can be payed partialy with any color of mana, even colorless. From a philisophical standpoint, I would call it "Soul", a part of our being that moves towards entropy (Void), driven by the other colors (Purpose) and is beyond human comprohension (Transcendence).
Very interesting take.
> Transcendence
Now I need a philosophical analysis of Inscryption
I would say even the opposite, the soul is the colors, colorless is the purpose.
What Ugin, Karn, weapons, and robots have in Common? A PURPOSE, they were created with or was destined to have a purpose, and even the Eldrazi follow this rule, since they seem to be a force of balance through destruction on the multiverse.
Also, I guess the soul is the part that drives entropy, since the machines follow their purpose without minding its eventually decay, or even weapons last generations, while ALL the colored beings, even the oldest tree, is bound to decay.
If you remember, ghostfire (breath of Ugin) is only harnessed by those who master red blue and white (souldfire, bloodfire, mistfire). This means that colorless mana which can alter the building blocks of reality tends to be transcendent of nature (supernatural). What about the Unnatural? (Green/Black) Well Deathfire and Vitalfire were taboo to the Jeskai for obvious reasons, but they still light the way to enlightenment. Green and black build off each other in multiplicity (think cycle of life and death) and there is no mana left behind because they use it up in perpetuity. This is the mechanic of voidmana in its most literal form. (Think Jungles of Tarkir and the non reptilian sultai shamans and necromancers that reside there.)
Well, I'd rather say that some beeing and represents more or less the ideals of one (or more color). And that is represented by the proportion of colored mana in their cmc. For example, Phyrexian Obliterator is BBBB because it deeply encompasses some of black ideals, but gravedigger is less deeply committed to the values of black !
This interpretation is not perfect tho, but I'm rather fond of it !
One thing you didn't touch on here also is the difference between colorless with only generic costs and colorless only costs. While generic costs show up on things like artifacts, where they can be utilized by any color, in some ways taking on the color of their surroundings, following the purpose of their creators without the thought that went in to creating that purpose, etc, colorless only costs (which mostly show up on eldrazi) seem to actively reject purpose, reason, or philosophy, the eldrazi do not do things for the sake of ideals (or if they do, those ideals are incomprehensible to us).
If I were to sum colorless up in two words I would call it 'material reality'. Land is colorless, objects are colorless, colorless is not concerned with the 'why', only the 'what', which in most cases leaves that space empty for others to fill with their own ideas. But the eldrazi cannot be understood, you cannot apply any reason to their existence, they just _exist,_ they are colorless and only colorless.
Also: some note's on green's similarity to colorless. When we view each color as an answer to the question "why are things the way they are" most colors would give answers about how things exist to serve their purposes, but green is unique in that is just says "because that's the way it is, and that is enough." Which _seems_ very colorless on it's face, but if you look at the rare(ish) times that green _creates_ colorless artifacts you see something very interesting: They _imitate_ nature. They don't just accept the way things are like you would expect colorless to do, they _reproduce it._
You can see this in their relationship to change as well, it isn't in the nature of colorless to resist change, when circumstances change so does colorless (really, colorless _is_ the circumstances in the first place), but green will (often) actively resist change, it doesn't only stand for the way things are, but the way it remembers things to be. Even the color most tied to current reality still differs from the 'color' of material reality, because it can't help but to apply values and ideals to that which, ultimately, has none.
@@JuniperHatesTwitterlikeHandles really like these points! wish that hard-colorless costs were evergreen tbh, they felt flavorfully interesting
@@JuniperHatesTwitterlikeHandles here is my take on green vs colourless:
Green wants to *preserve* the status quo.
Colourless *is* the status quo.
@@ifyouwantmoneythengivemeev8094 The only thing I'd want to add to that is that green wants to preserve the status quo _or_ to return to an earlier status quo they regard as more 'natural', which is important because colorless doesn't seem to have that same kind of.. memory. Colorless is entirely in the present, while green is more non-future/anti-progress then solely the present or the past.
THIS.
This is the philosophy I was hoping to hear elaborated on.
That generic colorless represents the material and mundane while color itself IS magic makes the most sense to me.
The eldrazi being purely uncolored as a 'rejection' of ideals placed upon them is a great take, one of few that's usable.
Question: why are giant aquatic monsters Blue? I don't imagine Kraj, Tromokratis, or Charix does much thinking
I think that's just one of those old school Magix things. Water is blue sea monsters are blue even when they might be more natural as green.
I think that's because there are creatures from the mysterious and unexplored depths of the ocean. They may represent the mysteries and secrets of blue.
I've been asking this FOR YEARS.
@@mrmacura3421 At least then you know zombies come about because of black-aligned (or a larger black-touched color combo like dimir) mana. Fish just do nature things, thus they should be green unless they're being directed to another color's ends. Like I think trained animals should be white, as they're following the "rules" taught to them by their trainers (even to their own detriment at times.)
That might be more so an elemental affinity, like you could ask why is fire red or water is blue, they don't think Nor feel anything, is just fire and water, but mana goes beyond just personality and philophy, that's just a piece of the pie, it could even just be the cherry on top.
Another example is to think of lands, islands don't think, swamps aren't ambitioned, mountains don't have passions, forests don't have traditions and plains don't have laws, but none the less they are the primary source for mana of their color.
Very interesting stuff, Dice.
Personally I always saw artifact creatures as an inherently blue concept.
Seeing as artificial tools (and, perhaps one day, beings) were created to enhance our state of living.
A thing I like to consider is that colorless mana is apparently either more abundant or easier to obtain.
The hardest spells are those that have multiple "pips" of their respective color. Meanwhile, getting colorless mana from various sources is seemingly super easy, if not exponential or multiplicative in nature. Think of one Thran Dynamo or the fact that Ashnods Altar gives two colorless pips compared to the Phyrexian version granting color.
Gameplay balance aside, this could also be seen as a potential that only when actively casting spells of this magnitude does something actually gain color. That for a majority of something's existence it exists primarily as something colorless or subsiding off of colorless sources.
In this sense, colorless is quite literally the foundation of the plane itself; akin to something like laws of physics or basic metabolism or thermodynamics.
One thing you haven't mentioned that could be considered colorless is Buddhism
Buddhist philosophy is something completely understandable by normal people, yet is impossible to align with any side of the color pie
This video helped me in making a Warforged in d&d
Hey DiceTry! I love all your work and it is HEAVILY inspiring me in my own Dungeons and dragons world with six elements!
1: could you please make a video on "the absence of the element of air in MTG and where it resides (blue/white)"?
2: I would love to see another Mono-color series, this time trying to go from point A: Raw elemental magic energy all the way to point Z: A full on belief system and psychoanalysis on the human system. Like a video going from "Haha fire magic go burn." to "Individual freedom is the most important thing.". Partly to see how you personally see that trajectory, but also as an analysis of how the designers themselves came to develop these ideas.
I like this, I do hope we get more colorless mana in the game. Thanks for the video
if the color wheel and its conponent parts, the pairings shards and wedges, are a 2 dimensional representation of our understanding of magic than what if "colorless is the 3d representation. like a pencil driven through the center the point at the center is the conduit of all mana and thus an amalgamation. the end below is devoid of mana and an item or object of pure artifice. the point above is the transcended beyond the colors.
Oh I like this a lot, kinda sad I didn't come up with it.
I like to think of Colorless as "underlying" the colorpie, on a kind of Z-axis. Purple can sit on top lol
I think Patches, from soulsborne series, could be colorless, like I am going of VaatiVydia and that one Comic so this may not be 100% cannon.
But think about it:
Purpose: In order to mantain humanity in dark souls an undead has to hold on to a sense of purpose, Patches became undead in Dark Souls 1, when Gwyn comitted the first sin, and lasted all they way to the end of the world, and even when he does hollow, as Lapp, he finds purpose in reversing the hollowing, he mantains his sanity and speech, even if he lost his memories..
Transcendence: "...rubbish to one such as I, devoid of all worldly wants" This is where I relly heavily on VaatiVydia, Patches isn't greedy, nor heroic, neither selfish nor selfless, his only desire, is his purpose, to punish and chastise the greedy and self righteous. Represented on how he always baits his victims with treasure and his hatred towards clergy, in this way he also embodies the void aspect a little.
So yeah, thanks to listening to my TED talk on why Patches is colorless planewalker.
In mathematics, it would be the identity element: that which is uniquely created through the union of an element and its opposite. It is an intrinsic part of us all, though it remains elusive. Combine the identity element with anything else, and all you'll be left with is the other object. The identity disappears in the mixture, yet it's still there. In mythology, it's the oroboros, the snake that eats its own tail, and the primordial state of being before the creation of the universe. In psychology, it's the unconscious mind, that when integrated with the ego transforms an individual into the self.
colorless color combination:
colourless white: everything has it's proper place
colorless blue: always improve, only improve
colorless black: consume and destroy
colorless red: disorganise and scatter (rat)
colourless green: live without thought
I would disagree about the only place colorless could fit is in the middle. There are cards that have and represent all 5 colors at the same time. More, if you need to put it somewhere, i'll say it's a layer around all 5 colors. This placement also can represent all significant characters and tribes in colorless, not in between, but outside
The mix of all 5 colors is a chaos; colorless on the other hand often represents structure, both in cards and game design itself (as it helps players to create decks and works as a foil for most decks)
I think that a Colorless Character is very possible. Am thinking in the guildless commons from Ravnica, people that don't want to be part of THAT structure, but they still are in A structure
I wonder if the Myr are inevitably going to become an eldrazi-like force.
All they wish is to live, to live they must resist destruction, to resist destruction they must replicate and fight.
Replicate and fight.
To live.
How big can a battlesphere get?
then it's a basically the white canvas or the time where it need's to be filled for individual and for higher beings whose motives are still un comprehensible to us are also left blank. am i getting it correct?
I think that's one way to look at it.
What's the name of the soundtrack that is playing in the background? It's so chilling
It's part if the library of music that youtbe provides for youtubers that are royalty free.
@@DiceTry Thank you :) I‘m going to check that liberary out 👍🏻
At some point they definitely should put out their own Commander decks for colorless and all-color. Those have got to be extremely hard to balance but people have definitely done it themselves!
Let me take a crack at this: each color is an ideal and a drive. They all... want. Divide. They have visions for how things should be. Maybe colorless is closer to a sense of contentment. A tempering force to colors' drives and designs.
Content: colorless isn't trying to change itself or the world. It simply is, and if something shapes or changes it, then it will simply be something else. It is at peace, regardless of it's context, and lends itself to passive, reflective behavior.
Pragmatic: colorless cards are often simple tools. It does whatever works, heedless of your thoughts on how it SHOULD work. It adapts in the same way evolution or swarms adapt, or how metal is shaped: slowly and resistantly, without input, frustration, or conscious thought.
Philosophical: colorless is fairly objective without the preconceptions of colored ideals, but still thoughtful. Ugin, Karn, and eldrazi are all alien beings that help us reflect on our own humanity, and the first two spend much time in meditation. It's very nature is to make us question how we categorize our thoughts in the first place.
In some ways this colorless has common themes with taoist ideas, of living in the present without care, fear, or effort. How does it affect other colors?
Red-grey: emotional, grateful, but in a subdued, deliberate way. Instead of manic hedonism, red-grey enjoys savoring the small things that are all around, living in the moment without pretense.
Blue-grey: efficient and correct. Blue grey is the raw data without interpretation. The sterile booksmarts without curiosity. A catalogue more than a cartographer. Wikipedia.
White-grey: down-to-earth, communal, but has moved from the idealism to the present. What will help people now? What can I do to noticably help today?
Black-grey: self-interested, scheming, without qualms, but lacking an overarching ambitious vision. I picture this as the miser: More concerned with having than actively gaining.
Green-grey: zen incarnate. There is only now. what will be will be and what should be is that which already is. To care for nothing more and accept whatever comes. Content in all circumstances, extinguished desires, very Buddha vibes.
Thoughts? Am I off base?
Bravo! Encore! Hell yeah! Exquisite!
Now that's a review
When you spend enough time looking at the world through a lens, no matter how many lenses you have, you may forget that you can look at the world through no lens.
( this is very deep and philosophical unless you say it to someone who is looking for their glasses. )
We understand that one needs a soul to be a living being. However we are not the ones who determine what is alive, only to recognize what is alive. That domain we have no right to touch.
So in a nutshell, every deck in the game has at least colorless in their decks.
Green uses colorless either to emulate the natural, and in a way exult it? Green artifice is almost always creatures that seem to have no overt purpose than to BE. The other colors will create artifice to serve their own ends to push towards their futures, but green makes these things to mimic what already is: to venerate the past.
Colorless is the Color of Ancient Tomb and Trinisphere. Thats the closest i can get to explaining it
Do ultraviolet and infrared next lol
I play full only colourless decks. Welcome to color 6.0
Damn synths
AD VICTORIAM!!
So, after this video I decided to go looking for any colorless cards that reflect any of the "racial" tribes, like elves, goblins, humans, etc.
The only ones I could find appear to be from Mirrodin's first block back in 2003. Back before the tribes really became what they are today.
I think that's something that's pretty interesting. Colorless doesn't reflect anything living. Biological, at least. There's the Eldrazi, which are not entirely understandable, so their forms may be biological in nature. And then there's Ugin.
But the rest? It's mechanical, artificial. They are not BORN. They're made. And so they do not have any members of the traditional tribes therein. Sure, there's the wizards, soldiers, the "classes" of characters. But outside of a very small number of early-on exceptions, no "races".
Magic the Noah has already covered this like 150 times now, it's colorless. It literally has color in the name. Hope this helped, bye
Colorless has the potential to be nothing or any and every combination of colors. It has the flexibility to be what it needs to be
Mano do ceu... Bom demais
Nice
We need a card that costs WUBRGC
Colorless is buddhist?
Edit: Well now i Got to the point in the video where you suggest that xD
colorless land should be tundra.
This video inspired me to design a planeswalker, you can find the custom card in this Drive, hope you like it
drive.google.com/drive/folders/114NfrpB8iVYJ5OnCYVG5_B1sP_PrRCjq?usp=sharing
In Strixhaven we see two more examples of colores identity. Codie the Vociferous Codex who's purpose is to store spells of every kind for use by others And the Wandering Archaic who is portrayed as enlightened beings who when people return from speaking to them are hailed as the most enlightened mages with a deeper understanding of magic, and mana.
Great callout!
@@DiceTry also I just had a crazy idea about non basic lands in particular fetch lands, and utiltiy lands. Like terramorphic expanse and evolving wilds can become any type or basic land showing that colorless can become any color when. Also thespian stage produces colorless mana but it can also become any land fulfilling its purpose to become any scenery the show requires. And the Library of Alexandria being able to produce any color of mana, and drawing cards is because it is a place of knowledge and enlightenment.
Great call
The Wandering Archaics are even more connected to knowledge than you might think. They are the future and past oracles of Strixhaven, the most knowledgeable mages, transformed and sent back to the beginning of time to share their knowledge with those who need it. In this way, they are personified in all five colors very easily. Reds urgency and need to get things done is personified in the timing that the Archaics are sent to. Blue is personified in the use of time travel, a canonically blue magic. Greens want for growth is the true purpose of the wanderers, transformed forever into literal Archaic beings represents Blacks want for power. Whites need for unity and cohesion is represented in the idea that the Archaics are past members of a community, seeking to further itself from within.
My thoughts on colourless are that it is pure, unrefined mana. Unlimited potential. Each colour filters mana through its ideology, focusing it to a particular purpose. Green to growth and acceptance, Red to freedom and action, etc. But Colourless is capable of all of these things. It is capable of the massive growth of Green, the collective thought of White, the manipulation and knowledge of Blue, the ruthlessness of Black, and the rage of Red. It is, in a sense like 5C in this way, but where 5C fully embodies all the colours, colourless is a pale shadow of them. It is possibility, but without the focus, without refinement. There is, however one thing colourless can be, that not even 5C can achieve. And that, is the void. When mana is filtered into a colour it necessarily takes on aspects of the world in which it was filtered. Even after recombining the mana from all 5 filters the possibility of what could be *beyond* that reality is missing. This is why Eldrazi are colourless. This is why Ugin is colourless. They either are, or possess a strong connection to, the void. What does this even mean? Well, it's unknowable by definition, but we mortals can get glimpses of it, and even make limited use of it. The Morph mechanic. Shapeless potentialities closely linked to Ugin. The Hedrons. No one but Ugin understands how they work (and he isn't telling) but they have the capability to imprison the Eldrazi, naturally colourless "creatures". Sorin gleaned a little of that knowledge and built the Helvault out of moonsilver, an artifact that seems to imprison beings within itself, somehow containing vast dimensions inside something little larger than a van. And apparently Innistrad's moon is inherently tied somehow to that magic as Emrakul imprisoned herself within it, reminiscent again of the Hedrons.
But, back to this idea of potentiality and focus. Whic aspects of colourless does each colour take and shape into a clear and actionable form? Colourless simply "is". It does not strive, it does not change. It does what it does. Green loves this and filters this into acceptance of your place in the world. Colourless has no concept of morality. It transcends such notions and simply takes what needs and does what it must. Black takes this is filters into amorality, a heartless quest for personal gain. Colourless does not scheme or bargain. It does not consider consequences. It only acts. Red filters this into direct action and fierce independence. Colourless is united. It does not bicker, it does to not squabble, it serves a purpose. White filters this into peace and obedience. Colourless is transcendent. It is unconcerned with earthly affairs and goes about its own unknowable business. Blue filters this into a quest for perfection.
I think I've rambled on for quite long enough now...
This seems false. Colorless mana can’t pay for colored spells. So it is inherently limited.
@@ryonalionthunder neither can mana of the wrong colour. A Green mage can no more utilise Colourless mana than they can Blue. The point is not about who can use the mana, but rather what the mana is capable of.
@@RaunienTheFirst
Green mana is capable of paying for colorless spells.
Colorless mana is not capable of paying for colorless spells.
Colorless mana is less capable. That was exactly the point.
@@ryonalionthunder pay for a Thought-Knot Seer with only green mana
@@RaunienTheFirst
Oh, neat. I wasn't aware that was a thing.
Apparently, colorless mana is not the same as generic mana anymore.
That kinda changes the whole narrative though. Every card that you pay for with just generic mana (basically every colorless card discussed in the video) can't be part of the 'colorless' pie if there is a specific 'colorless' type of mana that they don't require.
Guess we need a generic faction now.
Ooh~! Very interesting that you chose to go the route of putting the Colorless symbol in the middle! Your explanation makes sense, though I believe the same effect can be obtained if we make Colorless the "crust" of the pie, so to speak. A silver ring around the other five symbols, representing that it is both nothing without them and _everything_ without them. Both the ultimate blank slate, and the culmination of all five colors.
Void: No thoughts, head empty. The most pure form of raw instinct. No motivation beyond "this is what I do, what I have done, and what I will always do". No purpose beyond mere existence. I think that fits.
Sub-philosophy: Tranquility and Inner Peace beyond living a happy and content life. The ultimate "go with the flow" of meditation. That's an interesting take.
Purpose: An Automaton with a set purpose, never deviating, never questioning. Very fitting, given most of the "creatures" in Colorless are Artifacts.
Transcendence: Becoming the light before it is filtered by the prism. Very much along my line of thinking, in terms of a character like Ugin.
Very nice job on this video! I love how you can take a card game and make it thought provoking!
Very interesting idea that position never crossed my mind
I would even add, that in the middle of the color pie is clearly WUBRG
I love the analogy of a beam of light before it’s filtered into a prism - we filter the world through our frames of reference, like the color pie. The unfiltered light is colorless in that it’s everything in the pie, the absolute state of existence, but we can’t see the color in it without our own filter. It’s above our own ability to comprehend
What’s WUBRG
And let’s put it both in the middle and around the edge
@@eliotoole4534 WUBRG: White, blUe, Black, Red, Green.
placing colorless in the center of the pie also makes a strong case for the design mechanic of its identity being... somewhat precarious? in that, save for devoid, something whose color identity is Colorless/X, where x is literally any other color... isn't a thing, isn't possible. it stops being that when it is swayed to or away from any color.
though on the note of devoid, i wonder if it would be useful as a descriptor for a character's color identity who seems to be touched by any of colorless' philosophies without full on becoming colorless.
Great point. As far as your character I think that's valid. You could have a character who has peered into the void so to speak and it has changed their motivations slightly even if not wholly
@@DiceTry that or i can definitely see the artifact angle winding up on a person who doesn't have a great outlook on their agency, push past "i have a purpose" to "i am defined by my utility"
bit of a shame Devoid seems only associated with the eldrazi angle, because it feels like all 3 could *touch* an otherwise-colored identity
15:54
"Infinite beatitude of existence! [I am]; and there is nothing else besides [me]. [I fill] all Space, and what [I fill, I am]. What [I think], that [I utter]; and what [I utter], that [I hear]; and [I myself] is Thinker, Utterer, Hearer, Thought, Word, Audition; [I am] the One, and yet the All in All. Ah, the happiness, ah, the happiness of Being! Ah, the joy, ah, the joy of Thought! What can me not achieve by thinking! My own Thought coming to Itself, suggestive of me disparagement, thereby to enhance my happiness! Sweet rebellion stirred up to result in triumph! Ah, the divine creative power of the All in One! Ah, the joy, the joy of Being!"
- Monarch of Pointland
It's interesting to note how our description of transcendence fits well with the origin of the eldrazi. Oficially they are colorless because they predate the concept of colored mana.
Anyway, now we need to take a look into WUBRG to see how it is diferent from colorless.
Oh, and about the placement of it in the pie, I'd put every color inside of colorless.
Nice, now we want the 5 colors philosophy, and How it differs from colorless.
I will do that down the road some time
I view colourless as a detachment from the physical and an acceptance that nothing lasts forever, and I wish there was a colourless archetype inspired by Buddhist mythologies
Gor the Eldrazi: I think the reason some eldrazi have a colored mana in their costs, but still are devoid could tell us something about them. They may have no color, but this specific breed of Eldrazi could need this type of mana or enviroment or just a deciding factor in their evolution to be produced. They themself may not have a color, but their creation process could have.
Lets not kid ourselves that was for nothing but the gameplay some things shouldnt be explained because itd make things messy for the worse
I like the way you approached this, and putting it in the center. I think we all start out in the colorless. As you are born, you just exist. As you grow days, weeks, months, years, you lean more towards the colors based on what drives you. Colorless never develops towards a color spectrum. Their ambitions or drives don't change, they exist. Awesome job.
That's actually a very solid point.i suppose our surroundings and upbringing slowly imprints a color onto us
Each idea matches to a major colourless figure which I think is cool
Void: Eldrazi
Purpose: Karn
Transcendence: Ugin
a crystal has no color but hold it up to the light and you get every color pure and focused
I always loved eldrazi and ugin but never could get over the need of mechs or artifacts I saw not fitting flavour wise for an eldrazi deck. Because of that I hated colorless and usually wouldn't build any deck with it.
After I watched this video I discovered 2 things :
1) A new way to look at colorless and respect it, even adore it.
2) Your channel is amazing and I'm loving your philosophical videos about the colors and anything magic related.
Thank you for this video and keep going!
I´m an artist who fell in love with magic in his chilhood. Your desconstruction of the concepts and love for the worldbuilding it´s incredible. I love to listen you while i´m drawing. Thanl you so much for your work.
The way I see is that colorless does not see color. To colorless there is no white, blue, black, red, or green mana. There is only mana. Colorless is mana in its purest form.
Another splendid video essay! I'm glad we've reached the colorless edge of the pie.
It had to be done eventually
It’s interesting to see this… i have DID and my partner likes to play all 5 colors but he also plays colorless, to my brain both colorless and 5 colors are both so insane but if you ask any single one of the 14 of us we each have different colors and play styles WE ARE THE PRISM! we can’t understand how to play each other’s decks or even understand each other’s thought processes… but we do have I would say about 3 beings that fill transcendence, purpose, and void. Beings my brain has deemed too difficult to comprehend so they don’t exist in the same space as the rest of the system and only one of them (purpose and her original name was legitimately survival now it’s Solaris but it’s WILD) exists in a place “tangible” called THE VOID! she can’t speak and when we enter the void it’s usually because we are going dormant and don’t want to disturb conscious thought.
These three beings have no interest in anything and have opted out of playing magic because it’s not what they are meant to do so there is that so… yeah I think you got it pretty much right as someone who can’t really comprehend the other half of the wheel even though it’s INSIDE MY HEAD! us just not being able to comprehend colorless is fitting.
I had always just viewed Colorless as simply a lack of color, but you bring up some great points to the contrary.
Excellent video 😁👌
I always was very intrigued with the concept of Colorless and I wish there were more colorless spells that aren’t artifacts, with colorless mana costs like in Oath of the Gatewatch, and a basic land that produces colorless mana as do Wastes but not as much tied to the Eldrazi thematically (and with a snow version it would be nice too actually)
In the future I hope they explore more the philosophy, flavor and place of Colorless like you did so that it can hold a candle to the other types of mana ✨
Today I was talking to a friend about happiness without doing things that by proxy end up being for your sake (say donating to a charity because it is a a cause that means the world to YOU) and how that would be possible. His description of it matches multiple parts of this video, a video that I ended up finding out because I was talking to him about MTG colour philosophy and needed some resources. Amazing video as always, love your stuff!
Sidenote I'd love to see your takes on other fictional systems of self-identification and philosophy such as the Harry Potter houses, Avatar: The Last Airbender's elements, Hunter X Hunter's Nen system and the like, whichever system of this sort that might be within your wheelhouse, it's not much within your channel's usual scope but you've focused on D&D alignments as well, so one can hope!
You know that's actually a great idea. Perhaps that's more of a second channel thing but I like that idea.
Interesting how your discussion takes us from a mindless atomaton endlessly tooling away according to its instructions to trasendens, tutching on consepts many religions whold use to describe god.
Colourless can truly be anything.
Maybe colourless isn’t in the middle of the colours but instead the totality of all things surrounding them? After all human understanding is simply an island in a vast ocean, one which can be conceptualized as possessing five peaks of distinct articulation
I can dig that
I think that a lot of colorless is about "automation"... And sure, that's often about machines, but what about the machine of the universe?
The automated response to a moving electric field... the automated pull of gravity.
For me, I think that colorless represents the laws of the universe. The "glue" that binds them all together. No judgement or thought or instinct or anything else. Just an automated response.
A colorless spell might somehow change the gravitational constant, might slow or speed up time, or might stop specific chemical reactions from occurring. Stuff like that.
Not "tax" cards per se... more like "symmetrical rule changes".
"Instead of losing the game at 0 life, players lose the game at -10 life"
It could be really, really interesting to see what cool combos or behaviors you could get with negative life. Maybe there's a black card that says "both players lose life equal to half their current life"... which turns into a life gain for one player!
This is a very cool perspective
*THE PURPLE IS REAL THE PURPLE IS REAL THE PURPLE IS REAL THE PURPLE IS REAL THE PURPLE IS REAL THE PURPLE IS REAL THE PURPLE IS REAL THE PURPLE IS REAL THE PURPLE IS REAL THE PURPLE IS REAL THE PURPLE IS REAL*
Finally, a color to represent autistic people!
You know what it didn't even cross my mind but that's a great point
This has by far been my favorite color aspect video of yours. Great work man
Thanks it's a video ive avoided for so long but I think it was just the right time. I'm glad people have been enjoying it
Love it! Glad you tackled this challange, and I think you did very nicely
When explaining all colours' philosophies to new players-the Colour Pie & the 4 types of colourless-Genetic is both the easiest in mechanic & hardest in philosophy.
Eldrazi invented circle colourless conveys their unfathomable alien & usually Eldritch nature.
Vs
Colourless artifacts usually devoid of philosophy.
Vs
Devoid cards coloured by intention, but ultimately become neutral ala Ugin.
Vs
Genetic colourless?
Allows for mono colours decks mechanically &...????? in philosophy.
Golos is 5 color. Commander says so. Reeeee
This vidoe is so philosphical that you almsot forget its about a freaking card game.
Welcome to the channel
Fun fact they were debating and play tested adding purple as a sixth color but it obviously didn't work out
Yeah, for Planar Chaos. I think I read that Rosewater article.
*DONT LISTEN TO THIS PROPAGANDA, THE PURPLE IS REAL*
Maybe one of the best of your videos about the color pie. I watched through all of it with vivid interest. Thank you.
This video was... Beautiful in a certain way
I feel like I just became a disciple of Ugin.
Are the phyrexians closer or farther from colorless?
In a weird sense having colorless in the center position also implies another philosophy of sorts. Emergence. It’s almost as if the other colors may originate from it. Not something from nothing but something from very basal things coming together to be more than the sum of its parts. Like random compounds in an ocean vent coming together to create life or even basal particles somehow forming the basis for a cosmos. Or even the potential future artifact creatures seem to portend, of artificial beings becoming more than just machines. A spark of a soul perhaps. Who knows?
I think of it more as blood types. As opposed to the two letters of _actual_ blood types which yield 4 macro-types (A, B, AB, and O), Magic has 5 letters which yields 7 macro-types (G, R, Bk, Bu, W, G/R/W/Bk/Bu, and O). O is, effectively, Colorless; energy but not a specific color. It's the universal doner, but can only _receive_ from other O types, it *needs* Colorless mana sources to function. It could supply Generic mana which can be represented by the "all the letters" tyoe which is the universal receiver. It can use mana from _any_ source, but Generic mana can only be used to satisfy Generic requirements. And any particular color can satisfy itself or generic, but not any other color nor colorless. The only real hiccup is that as a universal doner, colorless can't satisfy any specific color either. But an analogue to the rh factor can easily address that: it's rh+, it has a certain energy to it that lets it supply energy even without color. Other colors are rh-.
Another way to look at it, if you want to stick with the "pie" analogy, is that "colorless" isn't a slice of the pie, it's the pan that *contains* the pie. It's a fundamentally different _stuff_ from the pie; pie is food but the pan is not food. It _surrounds_ the pie and provides a foundation or backdrop for the pie. In this sense, instead of _just_ placing it in the center, one would expand it to encircle *all* the other colors, but also layer it *behind* them. It's around, between, and behind *every* color. It's bigger than any of them, than all of them put together. But, in another sense, it's hollow and thin, larger in bulk but each slice of the pie is overall larger in total volume than *just* the thin shell of a pie pan. But it's like the "vessel that contains the water" in Taoist philosophy.
I disagree with the position of colourless, that is the position for 5 colour.
5 colour is everything, it is the unification of everything (white) it is the compound of all knowledge (blue) it is massive and primordial (green) it is a chaotic mixture (red) and in that mixture of shear power it is black.
Colourless is a ring around the pie. It dilutes colours with their generic mana costs. We see cards with mono colour costs (no generic mana) to be very strongly aligned with their colour's identity. But cards with just one mono colour spot seem to be more liable to cards without a strong connection to their colour.
Man your work is awsome keep up the great work please
Great video and the way you see things
A big part of the colourless identity is Artifice: existence from the will of another life form. Artifice exists because something else created it, and it takes a form decided by the goals and intentions of that creator. I think it's important to note how each of the 5 colours interact with those notions:
Blue and White are both happy to create these subservient forms and use them as extensions of their goals. White excels at equipment: inert cogs to be manually wielded by a truly living entity. Blue will instead bestow a semblance of independent behaviour into their artificial servants, giving them enough intelligence to carry out orders with limited supervision.
In contrast, both red and green, Gruul utterly reject and actively seek the destruction of these artificial entities. They abhor the notion that a being can exist in a form decided by someone else, and that energies would try and mimic "true" life.
Black, being the color of pure ego, interacts with artifice the least. If Black could manage to comprehend existing for or because of someone else, it might respond life red and green do. Or, sensing the opportunity for exploitation, it might respond as blue or white do. But Black is so concerned with it's own ego that it can't comprehend that perspective in the first place, so it's reaction to artifice is no reaction, the two modes of being pass each other in the night.
Blue and Green are more mechanically, philosophically and flavorfully attuned to colorless, colorless mana production is the domain of these two colors, Green horror like you explained is Cosmic horror, as in the Eldrazi, artifacts are mostly Bule's domain but also extend Blue's reach for perfection duer to letting it do non-Blue things, etc. Ugin has a very Blue capacity for intelect and detachment and a very Green wisdom of interconectedness (that's why he didn't want to destroy the Eldrazi).
What do you think of this idea?
"Green is the only color absent" re: colors utilizing Colorless.
But there are six green creatures that make colorless servos or constructs. Also there are colorless constructs that ramp in a green way like the Cultivator's Caravan, or Copper Myr.
Green utilizes colorless like a farmer utilizes a plow, or hydroponics for growing. Technology can most definitely be applied to green, especially when it's in Simic.
Having rad a number of posts here it's fun to watch people enjoying themselves by trying to assign meaning and understanding to the colors/colorless. Truth is, the color pie was a mechanic created to require choices and limitations in deck construction. The "ideologies" of each color are artificially created to meet the intent of the game designers and periodically altered to suit their whims and allow them to put whatever card they ant into whichever color(s) they choose. I love a good philosophical discussion but MTG's colors are to inconsistent to be a topic.
If you really want to though, colorless has been TWO things. 1) things without will: constructs, tools and devices as well as 2) beings otherwise not affected by (read: transcending) the whims, urges or influences of any color (eg: Eugene and the flying spaghetti monsters). Therefore colorless belong both inside of and totally separated from the pie with colorless mana being banal and commonly unable to produce the effect of any color. It is occupied by both s below and above the colors. (Inconsistent, like the rest of the game.)
Colorless is merely all the colors without the restrictions the colors bring.
With Modern Horizon 3 I think MTG should already call it Grey and be done with it and start adding more and more of the Sixth color.
I could see colorless in the center.
It's sort of like a light meets prism thing. Light doesn't really have a color, yet though putting it through a lens you can get colors from it. I see that in the same way as when you use 'mana of any color' to fill in the gaps. Only a few pips of colored mana are required when casting, thusly meaning colorless would just essentially be that "raw energy" needed to pull work, while a color gives it identity.
In this case, colorless is _potential_ to me, a raw _Prima Materia_ in order to transmute what is needed into a necessary goal. The easiest way to do that (according to the game) is to 'tap' into the surrounding environment of your preference. A dark wizard would need to focus on the essence that is black mana to pull out a vicious spell like Corrupt, drawing upon the innate pain and suffering of the very land itself before directing and channeling it into a proper direction. Just as a paragon would focus hard on the communal aspects of rich farmlands and agricultural breadbaskets, seeking to refine mana through the aspect of community before casting magic designed to protect others. In all cases, you are simply grabbing raw energy before taking a portion of it through that particular lens to properly apply it to the means you wish to pursue.
Wouldn’t creation be a part of colorless in a sense?
Karn made his own plane, most colorless things are made, build, or created. Even the Eldrazi create, based on how Emrakul works and what she’s said. They create and change.
Ugin made his own forms of magic, and so did Bolas, but that plane had no colors tied to it.
Colorless as the “crust” of the pie?
A body for the colored mana to infuse and influence.
Most colored cards with effects allow some paymeant for colorless with any color, their natural affinity’s and personalities.
In this sense, colorless is like white in our world, an amalgamation of all colors.
Although this is a bad seeing as devoid is a thing. Just an interpretation. XD
I've always viewed the color pie as a wheel of opposites. Black and white with the ideals of black being ambition and pride vs white that is loyalty and piety. Red, which is fervor and zeal versus blue which is temperence and thoughtfulness. I always understood colorless to be the opposite of green, where green is the natural world, and colorless is the unnatural or supernatural
Constructs made by Green would probably be like groundskeepers.
They’d be designed to work *with* nature, tending to plants, keeping important parts of the past maintained. Basically, keeping things as they are, and as they should be
You chose to put colorless in the middle but couldn,t it be countaining every other mana? some gigantic sphere that countain black/blue/red/white and green...
It is in every color in veery spell in every creature. only th emost pure creature fully monochrome most contain a lot of colorless
Very often very strong cards/spelle/being countain quite a lot of colorless mana, maybe colorless is the unbound power useable by all for all, purpose but with no moral ambition nor emotion, pure goal.
I would think colorless to be that which is at the begging and end. It's void. Each color is a journey, and when it's done or before it begins, experience takes no particular shape. There are concepts like this deep in spirituality
Saying Colorless isn't a color is like saying Zero isn't a number
I'm gonna have to push back on that I think a better comparison to colorless would be null in coding. It is a lack of any value
this must be one of the most genius videos on your channel, a really good interpretation indeed.
I think a good analogy of colorless transcendence is like the electromagnetic spectrum. We separate it into different types and colors, but it is one singular concept, a universal constant that has existed before us and will exist after we're gone. Other alien species will have their own understanding and categorization of the different wavelengths of the spectrum, but the spectrum itself will stay the same regardless of who is imprinting their ideals upon it.
Bro your tenorship with making TH-cam videos doesn't give you the explicit permission to make a theory video drop the pretentiousness
If I may say : I see three possible positions for colorless on the pie : at the centre, circling and binding the color pie, and detached beyond the pie. These places corresponding to transendence, creation and void.
There is not a single interpretation therefore why should there only be one position ? After all, being devoid of mana allows to be filled by else.