Planeswalker's Guide to Return to Ravnica Part 3

The Planeswalker's Guide to Return to Ravnica Part 3 is a feature article on magicthegathering.com released Sep 19, 2012 by the Magic Creative Team, accompanying the release of Return to Ravnica. The link to the article is here: .
Due to a reconstruction of the website, the last part of the article has been lost. It is therefore reproduced in its entirety here. 
This is Part 3 of the Return to Ravnica Planeswalker's Guide. Part 1 introduced you to Ravnica and the Selesnya guild. Part 2 described the Izzet and Golgari guilds. The guide concludes today with the Azorius and Rakdos guilds.
==The Rakdos Cult==
The Rakdos Cult is a large group of hedonists, sadists, criminals, and psychopaths under the leadership of a powerful demon named Rakdos. The Rakdos Cult combines a destructive urge with the desire for pleasure. Its members are sadistic and cruel simply for the fun of it. Extreme entertainment and personal enjoyment are their goals. They want Ravnica to bow to their whims and anything that gets in their way—or happens to be walking by—is fair game.
===Rakdos Guild Structure===
====Rakdos the Defiler====
Rakdos the Defiler is the undisputed head of the guild, but beyond that, Rakdos lacks a formal structure. The cult members despise rules or anything that curtails their freedom, so there are no laws other than the precept to please their demonic master. They might attack each other on the street during the day and then go to the same revelry at night. On the surface, the activities of the guild are run by loosely affiliated "Rings," each led by a Ringmaster, and each with its sphere of influence, commodities, and cult followers. Selfishness and hedonism guide cult members' actions, and there is little thought to consequences—ever. Members of Rakdos are driven by a desire to entertain themselves and they don't care who they hurt along the way.
Rakdos the Defiler has lived for thousands of years. When we last saw him, his unconscious body was dumped into his lava pit in Rix Maadi. But now, Rakdos has awakened and is restored to his full power. He's in complete control over the Cult of Rakdos, which is thriving and growing despite the low life expectancy of its members. While the proclivities of the cult members run the gamut between hedonism and destructive evil, Rakdos is at the far end of that spectrum. He embodies destructive evil, all in the context of twisted entertainment.
Rakdos's age and origins are unknown. He is capricious and megalomaniacal. He wants everything to happen on a grand scale. In one moment, he can be seen roaring with satisfaction at the sight of his performers. In the next moment, he might order they be set on fire while he laughs cruelly as they burn to death. He has an uncanny magnetism that draws people to him, and he rewards his followers by catering to their twisted desires. Carnage and carnal pleasures—these are the currencies of Rix Maadi.
When Rakdos is awake, he is the undisputed center of attention. His whims are catered to, whether it is murder or mutilation, and nothing is spared to please the master. When Rakdos slumbers, which he does for days at a time, the cult members ratchet down the murder and chaos. Instead, the atmosphere in Rix Maadi becomes political and manipulative as the bloodwitches vie for control. Then Rakdos wakes up, and it's an orgy of bloodletting and mayhem again.
====The Rings of Rakdos====
The Rakdos Cult is made up of the Rings, which are shifting conglomerations of people who pay tribute to Rakdos in exchange for protection as well as cult membership. Membership in Rakdos is not a formal arrangement; it's a sense of acceptance, shared deviance, and communal justification of amorality. Currently, there are nine major Rings of Rakdos, some more depraved than others, each one led by a minor cult leader called a Ringmaster who ultimately answers to Rakdos himself. The number of Rings is malleable, depending on the demands of the Ravnican public, Rakdos's whims, and the power plays of individual Ringmasters.
The Rings have territories based around the physical locations of their clubs, and they enforce their control over these territories with violence when necessary. Many Rings run multiple clubs within them, which sometimes only last weeks or months before they are shut down by mass murder, major fire, or—sometimes—by the law enforcement of other guilds.
====Diversion Clubs====
Currently, there are five Rings that service Rakdos-affiliated diversion clubs. The clubs sell all manner of food and drink, twisted circus entertainment, bathhouse amenities, and creepy burlesque revues. The bulk of the Rakdos membership is involved in these diversion clubs as workers, performers, or hangers-on. Cult members tend to be young and live a nocturnal existence of revelries and petty crime. There's a lot of violence between cult members, as well as random "family" groups who live nomadic existences in squat houses throughout Ravnica. Most cult members live hard and die young.
====Debauchery Clubs====
Currently, three Rings service debauchery clubs, which are usually higher on the depravity scale. These clubs offer a variety of entertainment, tattooing and scarring, pit fighting, and other services. Most do not have an obvious storefront that is recognizable by the general public. Those who wish to frequent them must either pay a high entrance fee or pay a special tribute to Rakdos himself.
====The Torturers====
There is only one torture-oriented Ring, and that is located in the depths of Rix Maadi itself. Rakdos leaves this pain-inflicting "entertainment" up to bloodwitches and their masochistic minions and toadies. This is the most depraved Ring, with sacrificial murders both voluntary and involuntary. One of the caverns of the Lava Pit of Rix Maadi is filled with torture devices of all kinds.
====Rix Maadi, the Dungeon Palace====
Rakdos dwells inside Rix Maadi, a guildhall built around a lava pit in the undercity. The most direct route to Rix Maadi is down an immense stone staircase that leads down an ancient tunnel carved deep into the earth by a wurm and filled with thick stone pillars. Rakdos members call this subterranean passage the Demon's Vestibule. The crumbling walls of the tunnel are covered in colorful banners and old bloodstains. These faded and ripped banners depict all manner of grotesque acts as well as promote diversion clubs and "festivals." This creates a dark carnival tone even before you reach Rix Maadi. As you descend into the undercity, the temperature rises. Everything is cast in a red glow from the veins of molten rock that branch across the walls and ground. Before Ravnica became covered in the city, this section was a volcano. The top of the volcano was long ago stripped away and replaced by buildings, but the molten core and lava pits are still intact.
Rix Maadi stands at the far end of a courtyard, its ornate stone edifice flanked by jagged basalt pillars flowing with lava streams. Tattered cloth banners hang limply from metal spikes and ominous red light pours out through the giant doorway. The façade of Rix Maadi is the only part of the guildhall that resembles an actual building. Inside, Rix Maadi is a large natural cavern with a high ceiling where "chimneys" ventilate the immense underground chamber.
====The Festival Grounds====
In front of Rix Maadi is a vast, derelict courtyard with a large, defaced fountain at its heart. In the center of the fountain, a once beautiful statue of a rearing centaur is partially smashed and smeared with various substances. The courtyard looks like an acrobat troupe fled without bothering to pack up their equipment. A rickety tightrope is strung across the courtyard. Several trapezes dangle from rusty hooks. Human-size wooden cages lay tipped on their sides and discarded spiky tools with dubious functional use are scattered haphazardly. On closer inspection, everything is blood-splattered. This courtyard is the site of the most notorious—and fatal—Rakdos festivals.
===Roles Within the Rakdos Guild===
====Riot Mage====
These mages lead Rakdos festivals. They often have dramatic, chaotic personalities and colorful names that rival the pit fighters. They know how to put on a show and incite bystanders into joining the festivities. These festivals are dearly loved by Rakdos members and hated by the general public, who are left to clean up the rubble and hold the funerals afterward. Rakdos festivals are not only a reward to cult members, but also a pretense for Rakdos thieves to steal anything they can get their hands on while the residents are distracted.
====Bloodwitch====
These are a cadre of powerful witches who reside in Rix Maadi and are the closest thing to advisors Rakdos has (or would ever tolerate). Exava currently wields the most power, although she has to work hard to keep it. Most of the political maneuvering that happens in the Rakdos cult happens among these witches, most of whom are female. Rakdos prize chaos and cruelty, so the bloodwitches cultivate these qualities while downplaying their aspirations for power and privilege.
====Roustabout====
These are the cult members who staff the diversion clubs and debauchery clubs or assist riot mages during festivals. A roustabout is any cult member who hangs around a club, helping out the Ringmaster with whatever tasks are needed, such as cleaning up blood spills or dragging the dead bodies out and leaving them in a gutter in another district. This is not a formal economic arrangement and a roustabout is usually compensated with something other than cash.
====Spiker====
The muscle of Rakdos. They got their name from a now-defunct group who killed their victims with spikes, usually through the mouth. Each Ringmaster employs spikers to handle any violence—whether it's controlling it or instigating it. Some of the spikers form gangs with their hazing rituals. Fighting between spiker gangs is like a Rakdos spectator sport complete with betting and audience participation. Massacre Girl's spikers are particularly notorious for their random acts of violence. There are many ogres among the spikers. In addition to possessing incredible strength, they tend to be good followers, as they rarely show the capacity to think for themselves or even carry out complex orders.
====Madcap====
These are the entertainers of Rakdos. This nickname encompasses everyone from acrobats to cabaret dancers to gremlins on unicycles. Many of the madcaps are homicidal deviants whose acts involve gruesome killing displays masquerading as entertainment. Often, the madcaps are the smaller humanoids who couldn't survive in the Rakdos cult on their own, so they compensate by being "artistic." Being a good entertainer gives you enough capital to stay alive.
===Rakdos Attitudes Toward Other Guilds===
Azorius: "How do you make an Azorius dance? Rip out his spine and make him into a marionette."
Boros: "The only thing angels are good for is target practice."
Dimir: "Not afraid to get their hands dirty, but they need to learn to enjoy life more."
Gruul: "Our poor, stupid cousins. There's more to life than scraps of leather and hunks of flesh. Or at least, more fun things than they use them for."
Golgari: "Anything that spends so much time around fungus should be put out of its misery."
Izzet: "Too stuffy, but making bigger and better explosions is a reasonable way to spend your time."
Selesnya: "Pampered dryads pretending to be selfless puts Rakdos in a very killing mood."
Simic: "Freaky brainiacs that mess with nature for all the wrong reasons."
Orzhov: "The only thing worse than a bunch of rules is a bunch of idiots with the power to force those rules on others. Power to Rakdos!"
 
==The Azorius Senate==
 
Also known as the High Judges, the Azorius Senate is Ravnica's ostensible government. The guild considers itself to be the mediator and controller of all other guilds' activities, even though most of its countless decrees are largely ignored. That's not to say the Azorius Senate is impotent, however—its legitimacy and reach wax and wane over time depending on economics, cultural trends, and the reaction to other guilds' overreach. At its best, the ultra-hierarchical Azorius Senate is just, farsighted, and impartial. At its worst, the guild is cold, stultifying, and bureaucratic.
===Azorius Guild Structure===
====Supreme Judge Isperia====
The sphinx Isperia is the current guildmaster of the Azorius. The process of convincing Isperia to lead the guild took years, as sphinxes are aloof beings who value solitude above all. As crime and chaos on Ravnica increased in the absence of the Guildpact, however, and as its denizens more vocally demanded laws and their enforcement, Isperia decided her service was needed enough to trump her preferences.
====The Three Columns====
The trias politica structure of the Azorius Senate has existed nearly since the beginning of the guild but had been theoretical and unimportant for millennia. With the dissolution of the Guildpact and the rebuilding of Prahv, the Azorius revivified the concept, and it has become deeply meaningful and reflective of the guild's structure and hierarchy.
Sova Column - comparable to a judiciary branch, this Column adjudicates, arbitrates, mediates, and studies the effects of Azorius law.
Jelenn Column - this is the legislative part of the guild—the actual makers of the law, including assessing the need for new laws and formulating their language.
Lyev Column - putting laws into practice, as well as enforcement of them, is the domain of the Lyev Column.
===Roles Within the Azorius Guild===
The guild's uses of magic tend to fall into three functions: establish, maintain, refine (or: build, defend, improve). Although these functions might seem to map cleanly to the Columns (Jelenn, Lyev, and Sova), all three functions find expression in all three Columns. Examples include:
====Hussars and Infantry====
The Azorius military, the vast majority of which belongs to the Lyev Column, can be broadly separated into mounted and unmounted soldiers. Mounted soldiers—whether they ride horses, griffins, or large beasts—are called hussars. Griffin-riders, for example, are sky-hussars. All unmounted troops are infantry. Azorius infantry are trained in line formations—phalanxes. Some phalanxes wield pikes, but the all-tower-shield phalanx, backed by mages, is a uniquely Azorius tactic used for crowd control.
====Lawmages and Hieromancers====
The paradigm shift in Azorius methodology—from laws enforced by magic to laws designed to be followed voluntarily—has made lawmages rarer. But some magic is still required to keep the day-to-day peace on Ravnica. Lawmages create spells that compel or restrain beings and serve a constabulary function in outlying districts. Hieromancers create spells that sanctify or protect places or things. They are called in only for larger-scale challenges, and sometimes to protect wealth.
====Konstructors====
Azorius builders and architects are among the best in the world, and konstructors are those who enhance and/or accelerate their building projects with magic. The scale and speed of the New Prahv project mandated a small army of guild konstructors. The sheer height of the towers would not have been possible without them.
====Elocutors====
The Azorius' tendency to talk patiently and at length is valued not just within the guild but also by the citizenry and other guilds. The term elocutor covers all communication functions, from simple messengers—who are often spirits—to conflict mediation. Vedalken elocutors are particularly valued in complex negotiations involving resources or property. Human elocutors are favored for conflicts in which emotions run high. The very best of them subtly weave enchantment into dialogue to calm emotions and encourage cooperation.
====Arresters====
Arresters specialize in preventing or stopping things from happening. Although the Azorius mentality is different than it was in previous centuries, the guild still values the status quo and believes all action is ill-advised. ("Action is but reaction without thought," the Azorius saying goes.) Arresters come in all forms, from those whose purpose is to stop needless laws from being enacted to those who arrest criminals.
===Azorius Landmarks===
====New Prahv, the Azorius Guildhall====
The original Prahv, the so-called Spires of Order, was demolished when the Boros warship Parhelion crashed into it. Years passed in bureaucratic paralysis while the Azorius deliberated how, when, and where to build their new guildhall. Only once popular support built up and Isperia accepted the leadership of the guild did the gears of reconstruction begin to turn. The site of Prahv's ruins has been given over to nature and has become a wilderness preserve. New Prahv, at the other end of the same district, consists of three towering, three-sided columns that form a circular courtyard. The towers of New Prahv are the tallest structures on the ground in all of Ravnica. The three towers literalize the guild's structure: each houses the operations of one of the three Columns (Sova, Jelenn, and Lyev). The towers of New Prahv also serve as an aesthetic representation of the guild's belief. It is an austere, immaculate structure, elegant but unadorned. White marble, alabaster, and steel predominate. Broad, curving hallways lead to large chambers, each of which has an array of subchambers and offices around it. Because the halls and chambers don't have many distinguishing features, visitors to New Prahv inevitably become lost without an escort.
====Forum of Azor====
This huge, completely flat, paved expanse is a monument to Azorius' patience, tolerance, and outreach. It is a grand public forum where any Ravnican can come and be heard. To show their magnanimity, the Azorius gifted the real estate around the perimeter to the other guilds, and eight of them (excluding the Dimir) have "recruitment centers" of one kind or another in that space. The Forum contains three separate rostra, arranged in a broad, perfect triangle, where speakers can address surrounding crowds. In the middle of the three rostra is a richly inlaid Azorius signet set into the ground, about a hundred feet wide. The Azorius Senate used to enforce the law rigidly in this space, leading to its irrelevance and abandonment. Several years after the end of the Guildpact, Isperia decreed that the magic be lifted from the Forum, and now it is a healthy, chaotic, vibrant place where beings of all kinds gather.
 
===Membership===
The Azorius Senate regularly has open applications for new members. As the self-proclaimed law enforcers, they actively seek out those who wish to keep law and order within the world. Gaining membership is relatively simple: Apply to any Guild Hall, have no criminal background, and pass a written and physical test. The written test varies from city, but for the most part, covers one's knowledge about laws and hypothetical situations. The physical test requires that the person be fit enough to take on the dangers that crime brings. 
===Species and races typically associated with the Azorius===
====Archons====
Archons are enigmatic, supernatural embodiments of the harshest aspects of law and order. They espouse a rigid sense of justice and deal ruthless punishment to those who break the law. They are commonly seen circling above the Azorius guildhall astride their winged felidar mounts, soaring alongside griffon-mounted hussars. An archon appears as an armored humanoid figure, nearly always mounted. Its face is usually shadowed beneath a large hood; those who have seen it beneath the hood describe a face of celestial beauty with a stern expression and blank white eyes.
====Griffins====
The head and wings of griffins are birdlike, and the body and hindparts are lionesque. Griffins were originally piscivores, who later adapted to hunting in the streets after Ravnica's oceans dried up. Several wild griffins now stalk the city and prey on those not able to defend themselves. The Boros use them as mounts and the Azorius are known to feed lawbreakers to them. These griffins develop a resistance to magic.
====Humans====
The most prevalent species on Ravnica. They are four-limbed bipedal primates of the mammalian class.
====Sphinxes====
Azorius sphinxes, known as sphinxes of judgment, wield hieromancy- the power of law magic- with the force of a judge's gavel to imprison criminals and compel the truth from them
====Spirits====
Ravnican spirits come in several variants, some mirroring the species they were in life, others twisted into near animalistic forms. Since the spirits of the departed usually stay active on the plane, the denizens have learned to cope with their existence, usually by leaving them small offerings to avoid their wrath. Others find themselves molested by goblins. Ways to ensure a spirit does not rise is to pay the exorbitant fee for a Proper Burial conducted by the guilds. Among the guilds, the Azorius, Orzhov, and Dimir dealt with spirits. The Azorius utilize spirits as untiring bureaucrats and protectors of the laws of the Guildpact.
====Vedalken====
Vedalken are tall and slender, standing almost a head taller than humans on average but weighing about the same. Their hairless skin comes in a range of shades of blue. Their eyes are darker shades of blue or violet. They lack external ears, their noses are broad and fiat, and they are partially amphibious.
===Foreign Relations===
Boros: "Their vigilantism is tremendously dangerous without a hand to control it."
Dimir: "A perennial thorn in our side. Though they were once our greatest foes, not even the masters of espionage can hide from our watchful eyes."
Gruul: "The Gruul are dangerous anarchists with no interest in furthering the development of civilization. They serve no useful purpose."
Golgari: "Their underground structures break numerous building regulations, but at least they fulfill their duties as garbage collectors."
Izzet: "Eccentric and occasionally explosive, but generally harmless, for now. In their paranoia, they have enlarged their weapon stockpiles, but they lack the clarity of vision to put them to use."
Orzhov: "Their brazen exploitation of our laws will be their downfall. They are an insidious threat that could tear society apart from the inside."
Rakdos: "An absolute blight on Ravnica. They are clowns who know nothing of culture and exist only to torment the functioning members of society."
Selesnya: "The Conclave plays by the rules and keeps to itself. Until its members become too numerous, they are of little threat to us."
Simic: "The Simic experiment with matters that disobey the laws of nature and the laws of Ravnica. We must not let them gain influence."
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