Douglysium

Now I know I should probably be moving on to the next ally colored tribe on Innistrad but I’ve decided to quickly go over Angels because honestly I feel like this will probably be a relatively short writing(at least in theory). The reason for this is because angels on Innistrad revolve heavily around humans, which I already wrote about here(https://douglysium.tumblr.com/post/662755543203643392/the-taste-of-humans-on-innistrad). I mean they basically exist to protect humans and do all they can to keep them alive. However, I ultimately decided that angels are important and cohesive enough to make them worth covering. Just like last time these are meant to be brief writings and will not cover the color philosophies of every single angel or factions on different planes, so lets jump in.

The White-alignment of the angels can be seen in their association with the church and how they are either a part of it or ally with it as a means of helping humanity. It can also be seen in their role as protectors. They tend to put humans first which ties in with White’s themes of selflessness and putting others before yourself. They are also heavily tied to faith as we know archangels such as Avacyn and Sigarda are capable of hearing the prayers of humans to one degree or another. There’s also the fun fact that, like angels on most other planes, the angels on Innistrad are made up of White mana(which is something that also feeds into their White alignment).

A majority of the angels on Innistrad were broken up into these groups called flights which were each led by an archangel. Interestingly, even though these angels had White in their color identity they also had a noticeable second color too. These White based dual color alignments do a great job of showing the different ways angels go about helping and protecting humanity, with White showing their noble goals and the second color showing some of the differences in what they specialized in our how they achieved those goals

Well in order to prevent this writing from being like less then a paragraph long I might as well take the time to look at the flights and the color identity of their archangels.

Lets start with The Flight of Goldnight and Gisela.

The Flight of Goldnight is heavily associated with the sun, and once a year during the Harvest Moon season, in which the sun does not fall below the horizon for two full days and during which the moon isn’t visible, a holiday known as the Feast of Goldenight is held. It is considered the holiest day for humans. The Flight was also the most battle oriented out of all the flights, and it was also the one that oversaw the training of cathars.

Gisela was Red-White and as always now comes the part where we look at why. Notably, The Flight of Goldnight was the most combat oriented out of all the flights and this is probably the main reason Gisela is Red-White. When it comes to the combination of Red-White there is a few different ways that they can express themselves but one of the most notable ways is through combat. Specifically, a military/army style ideology and/or group.

(This angel is from Ravnica, not Innistrad, but I feel like she gets my point across.)

This is because you are combining Red’s use of action and passion with that of White’s larger organization and understanding of how to work as a team. This ties in with some of the agreements Red and White have with the other’s philosophies despite being enemy colors. Red and White both understand and like to use tactics that involve masses of people. In Red’s case it tends to manifest as a giant rioting emotional mob while White usually leans towards disciplined fighters and soldiers that strategically work together. Both colors also understand how emotions can be useful. While White doesn’t like how Red will just follow its emotions without regard to what it should or shouldn’t be doing, White does value passion in its organizations and it does genuinely want to show its comrades and the people it is trying to help and/or protect that it honestly does care about their well-being, and that White isn’t just a dispassionate robot. White and Red can also be extremely loyal characters a lot of the time. Red’s loyalty is emotion based but it is capable of being extremely loyal to its friends, family and/or groups it is a part of. This emotional connection and loyalty can even be strong enough to lead a Red-aligned character to be willing to sacrifice itself for the people it cares about. However, it is important to note that Red usually needs a strong enough emotional connection to do this and it will not just die for a bunch of people it doesn’t know or care about. White is also extremely loyal to the causes it believes to be righteous and is willing to sacrifice things in order to help others. While White definitely has emotions, it is more willing to sacrifice itself for people outside of it’s emotional circle. Think of a hero sacrificing themselves to save a bunch of innocent people, like a city or something, even if their friends and family are not involved.

Both colors are also willing to fight to protect those they care about, and White at the very least understands that striking before the enemy can react, like Red often does, is a valid form of self defense.

This is all to say that when Red and White are combined they can manifest in a way that creates a very loyal group of people who are all willing, and unafraid, to fight for what they believe is right.

Another thing to note about the The Flight of Goldnight was their association with the sun. To put it simply Red is often associated with fire and heat and White is often associated with light, and/or the sun. These associations can actually be seen within the very mana symbols of Red and White respectively.

The reason Red is associated with fire and heat is because those things are often associated with things like passion and emotion, which is what Red is all about. Common phrases such as “a burning passion” help hammer this point home. The fire also shows how volatile and sudden emotions, and by extension Red, can be. White’s association with the sun and light probably has to do with light being a symbol of guidance, and how White wants to guide people and keep them safe. It may also have to do with how light is often symbolically representative of something pure, holy or good, which ties into White’s themes of objective morality, ie some things are good and some things are evil or shouldn’t be done.

Thus, when you combine the heat that Red magic often has and the light that White magic often has you can symbolically get something that is both a major source of heat and light, the sun.

Now onto The Flight of Alabaster, which was lead by Bruna.

The angels of this flight personified the Blessed Sleep and were associated with the Hunter’s Moon season. They also created and maintained the magical wards that not only protected cities and holy sites but also prevented the desecration of dead humans. The Blue in Bruna’s identity probably came from two things. First off is the magical wards that they used to protect various things. Blue as color has things like Counterspells and Hexproof which ties in with Blue’s themes of knowledge. You see when Blue wants to do something it believes the best way to do that is to learn and know as much as you can regarding the subject. So when there is a Blue mage who wants to learn magic they will try their best to research, alter and learn all the intricacies of magic, in order to master it. Thus, a lot of Blue aligned mages and magic have found ways to mess with spells as they are being cast or even making things resistant/immune to magic. Which I feel is something that’s encapsulated by the magic wards that are used do things like prevent the desecration of dead humans in a plane where things like spirits and zombies run rampant. One could also think of the wards being preventative counter measures. One thing that Blue likes is thinking ahead and preparing for the future, and/or trying to predict what will happen next. So these wards can also be seen in that light.

There is also the Blessed Sleep itself and Blue does have a strong association with ghosts and spirits. So it sort of makes sense that it could also be a color that understands them enough to know how to prevent something like that from occurring. One thing Blue also tends to lean into is non-physical high concept things like the mind or spirits, so I feel that is another angle in which Blue could end up being well equipped to deal with things like that.

Lastly, there was the association with the Hunter’s Moon season. Well, we know that the Hunter’s Moon season is the coldest time of year and one where the sun always remains on the horizon. Blue does have an association with both the cold and things like water and ice.

This association with cold and ice is sort of a contrast to Red’s fire and heat. While Red likes to be emotional, passionate and volatile, Blue likes to use its mind and think rationally rather than let its flawed and shortsighted emotions lead the way. One of Blue’s potential weaknesses is that it can end up coming off as dispassionate and what one may call “cold and calculating.” Blue is also a color that likes change, specifically changes that improve things rather than wild spontaneous ones, which is probably also part of the reason it’s associated with something like water. There is also the fact that Mark Rosewater pointed out in both his “True Blue Revisited” article and Drive to Work covering Blue philosophy is that Air and Water in the classical four element system, the one with Water, Earth, Fire and Air, are both “higher” elements that are associated with the mind and soul. As opposed to Earth and Fire which is often associated with the body and more base desires and emotions. So it makes sense that elements not tied as heavily to emotion and ones tied to places where one may keep their knowledge or sense of self would appeal to Blue.

Now it’s The Flight of Herons’ turn, which is led by Sigarda. 

This flight contains angels that symbolize birth, rebirth and purity and they are associated with the New Moon season. Their magic is said to protect humans against harm in life, in contrast to the Alabaster Flight’s protection against harm in death. An important note is that they were also the only flight to side with humanity instead of Avacyn during the attack of Emrakul, and thus avoided corruption.

Now onto the reasons for Sigarda’s color identity. One thing that both Green and White have in common is themes of health, life gain and growth from both a mechanical and philosophical perspective. In Green’s case the theme of life gain and growth comes from nature and how there is always something within it growing and/ore getting stronger. There is also the fact that even when nature is damaged it is constantly trying to grow back and/or spread. In White’s case life gain and growth represent it helping, aiding or healing others in order to save them, help them recover or to make them stronger. So it makes sense that a group associated with birth, rebirth and purity would probably end up Green-White.

The White-aligned side of Sigarda is probably where the theme of purity comes in for her and her flight. Since White is a color that has beliefs in objective morality it is very likely to lean into themes and/or ideas of purity. Meanwhile, both birth and rebirth can be described as a natural cycle that Green is all about. Their association with life probably comes White valuing the lives of people in general and also Green valuing the lives of various living things in the sense that they all have a purpose to fill within the greater ecosystem.

The New Moon season is the closest thing to Spring on Innistrad, but it is also the shortest season of them all. During this season the days are longer and the forests grow and become revitalized. Reasons like this are why humans consider the New Moon a “new life and birth” stage. Spring in the real world is also often tied to things like birth, rebirth, revitalization, growth, etc. because of all the plants regaining their leaves and or growing along with a bunch of other stuff. There is also the fact that the New Moon is usually considered the first phase of the moon and in that respect it could also be connected to be a birth and rebirth in a sense given the cyclical nature of the lunar cycle. All these rebirth and birth themes tie back to the Flight of Herons, and their association with it. On Innistrad it is also believed that babies born under the New Moon have a better chance of reaching Blessed Sleep, which probably just has to do with the New Moon’s association with life and birth along with the Flight of Heron’s association with protection in life.

As mentioned before, they are also the only flight to have not sided with Avacyn against humanity when Nahiri and Emrakul were influencing Innistrad. I think this aspect is also sort of represented in Sigarda’s Green-White color identity since, as I went over in my piece about the humans on Innistrad, Green-White is often heavily tied to the community and tradition. So in this aspect one could say that Sigarda’s color identity represents how she never lost sight of what she was fighting for and protecting. She ultimately values the community, and humans, too much to be warped into slaughtering them. It could also tie into the Flight of Herons’ association with purity, and thus they were more likely to be able to stave off corrupting factors.

There was also The Flight of Dusk. The Flight of Dusk is probably the one that stands out the most when compared to other flights so lets look at why. This flight existed thousands of years ago and was led by the Archangel Liesa. An interesting trait they had was that they actually associated and communicated with monsters like vampires, witches, devils and demons in order to learn what they could about them so they could defeat them more easily. As Liesa has said “We must know our enemies if we are to defeat our enemies.” This interaction with the various unholy monsters caused this flight to be distrusted and disliked by a lot of other angels. Eventually Sorin created Avacyn and eventually Liesa, in the eyes of her sisters(Bruna, Gisela, and Sigarda) and the powerful Avacyn, crossed a major line by forming an alliance with a demon lord. Thus, Avacyn declared her a heretic and destroyed both her and her entire flight while forbidding the very mention of her name, which is probably the reason why there’s a card that calls her “Liesa, Forgotten Archangel.”

The Black in Liesa’s color identity probably comes from the fact that she did something a normal angel wouldn’t be willing to do by consorting with demons and stuff. However, to be more specific her White-Black identity manifests as White achieving its goals through Black means, which is usually Black’s ruthlessness and willingness to do whatever it takes to win. So we end up with an archangel who is willing to do whatever it takes to protect humanity and fight off monsters, even if it means interacting with the creatures of the night or making deals with demons.

Interestingly, Liesa seems to have returned somehow. We are told this could be due to the fact that angels and demons are similar in nature, as they are both made born from mana, and if demons can come back to life then angels might be able to. It is also possible that Liesa’s resurrection could be due to that deal she made with some sort of demon. Heck, if you ask me it could even be a combination of both. There is still quite a lot of mystery surrounding this so maybe angels do comeback but it just takes way longer for them then it does for demons, maybe only archangels can come back to life, maybe it’s something to do with Liesa herself. I can’t really say for certain at this point. Although, if you were to ask me an angel like Avacyn probably won’t come back to life because of the specifics of how she was made and then unmade, but maybe that’s just me being pessimistic. Speaking of Avacyn lets take a second to go over her.

I feel like there’s nothing too surprising to say about Avacyn’s color identity. I mean she’s basically Mono-White for the same reason that every other angel has White in their identity, i.e. faith, caring about humans, being made of purely White mana like most other angels, the church, etc. She can hear the prayers of all the humans on Innistrad which ties heavily into themes of faith and religion. We also know she did have a very strong moral code, as seen when she killed Liesa for crossing a moral line and then outlawing the use of her name, and law is something that White often likes to use or lean into. There is also the fact that she was the focal point of the church of Avacyn and she had strong faith related powers. She also strengthened faith and holy based magics. We also know that she was benevolent to all humans and was most comfortable around children because of their  the innocence and earnestness, both of these aspects are things that White may gravitate towards. There is also the fact that Sorin created her for the very purpose of keeping balance on Innistrad which one could argue also ties in with some of White’s ideology along with her protection of humans. I would go as far as to say that Avacyn was probably one of the characters that best encapsulate and represent White’s philosophy and goals.

Now comes the inevitable part where we talk about the Eldrazi and how they affected the angels.

Interestingly enough, I believe that there is a story being told through the change in the corrupted archangels’ color identities. You see as a color one of White’s weaknesses is that if it’s not careful it’s strong sense of morality can end up giving it a very…. black and white view of the world(ha get it). So at worst it can have a very binary view of the world, you are either good or you are evil, or if you do this one thing you are automatically evil and must be taken care of immediately. Now how does this tie into the corruption of the angels on Innistrad? Well if you look at the color identities of the corrupted archangels Gisela and Bruna you can see that they actually lose their secondary colors and become Mono-White.

So when the angels became corrupted Avacyn began to see humanity as corrupt and disgusting and thus sought to to wipe them out and Gisela and Bruna joined her on this crusade. So their lack of secondary color may be representative of a loss in nuance and how their madness has caused them to see humanity as something disgusting, corrupt and evil to be wiped out. No human could live up to their mad level of righteousness so they saw them as something that had to go. It could also be that they are now Mono-White because they are followers of Avacyn and they are following her in the crusade against humanity. Thus, it could be a manifestation of the madness causing extreme loyalty and faith to an odd fault.

However, I still have not addressed Avacyn herself because you see Archangel Avacyn transforms into the corrupted Avacyn, the Purifier. Which is surprisingly a Red card instead of a White one.

So why is corrupted Avacyn Red instead of White? Well, I think the answer to this question lies in when her corruption was first begining and her connection to the prayers and thoughts of the humans on Innistrad. We know her corruption first started appearing after about a year after her return from the Helvault. There was a village outcast somewhere named Kelse who prayed to Avacyn for help in finding her missing son and of course Avacyn went off the save the child. However, she ended up being hit by a strange spell that gave her the oddest visions and plagued her mind with strange thoughts, like the idea that mankind was irredeemably corrupt. While this happened Kelse was pissed at her child for running off and punished them. Which in turn combined with Avacyn’s unusual thoughts and caused her to become disgusted by humans. One of the major changes here was in her ability to listen to prayers. That aspect became warped and all the prayers that she usually hears became tuned out by a weird buzzing and thoughts about how rotten humanity was. The key here is that Avacyn’s fall due to the Eldrazi influence either took advantage of or was affected by Kelse harshly punishing her child. In essence at the beginning of Avacyn’s downfall there is a point of rage, i.e. a strong emotion. As we have discussed in the past Red is all about emotion and following your heart, which in fairness can be things like love, but in this case it was Avacyn lashing out in a maddened anger at all of humanity due to the disgust she feels towards them.

So even though I covered angels I don’t think i will be covering demons as a tribe on Innistrad. The reason for this is because I don’t feel like I have enough to say about demons as a whole on Innistrad that I couldn’t say about most of the demons on other planes and they aren’t as cohesive a group as the angels, humans or geists. I’ll probably end up talking about demons one day, and by proxy cover the demons on Innistrad, but the current plan for this little series is that I won’t cover demons.

Well that’s all for now. What was your favorite flight of angels on Innistrad and/or angel character in Magic. Even though Avacyn’s light may no longer be with us, may the angels protect you from the things that go bump in the night.