This is a long post…bear with me or don’t.
In Magic: the Gathering lore, the Nine Titans were some of the earliest, prominent “plainswalkers” who grouped together to defeat Yawgmoth and the synthetic plane of Phyrexia. Plainswalkers are brilliant magicians capable of travel between universes or “planes”, along with many other fantastic feats (undeath, near omnipotence, time manipulation, future sight…to name a few, generally unique to each plainswalker). As far as the significance of the Nine, they were basically grouped together by Urza, the most powerful of the plainswalkers, to defeat his nemesis Yawgmoth, basically the god of evil. Phyrexia…hmm, just imagine the Borg or some similar cyber-assimilating culture.
Now, why the hell am I telling you all of this? Because the Nine Titans are FUCKING AWESOME. And they get no recognition. So today we’re gonna delve into some Magic lore. It’s story time!
In order to destroy the Phyrexian plane, Urza (a brilliant artificer) grouped the nine planeswalkers and conceived the “soul bombs” which when planted would be detonated by a single massive bomb, destroying the plane forever. Drama is already quite high at this point of the story – as the Nine are mythical sage characters and the main protagonist is actually neck deep in direct conflict with Yawgmoth’s generals.
To complicate things, Urza recruited Tevesh Szat, a mortal enemy to several of the nine, and generally shady character. As they start planting the bombs, Szat inevitably begins betraying the nine, one by one, killing Kristina of the Woods and Daria.
This is where the whole mess turns into a total soap opera. Kristina was the former lover of one of the nine, Taysir, and Daria was his adoptive daughter and apprentice.
So, Szat betrays the Titans, and convinces this Darigaaz dude to free the Primeval Dragons and murder shit. That’s when Urza’s all like oh no he’s betrayed us! and squelches out the plainswalker’s life to power the soul bombs. But, not all is as it seemed, as Urza says, “Did I know Szat would betray us? I was counting on it.” Basically, Urza reveals that he predicted Szat’s betrayal, indeed soliciting his aid precisely to solve a “moral dilemma” of powering up a superweapon, and uses his life energy to fuel the soul bombs.
Urza is a twisted mofo. Like, he EXPECTED some of the nine to die to Szat, simply so he could use the backstabber as a power cell and nobody would feel bad. Talk about ends justifying means. His morals become more ambiguous as he seems to admire Phyrexia, as an entirely artificial plane. As the artificer slid down the halls of dementia, Taysir takes charge. Seeing that Urza is no longer committed to destroying Phyrexia, Taysir attacks him.
So Urza kills him.
Straight up, boom dead. Since Urza is the master artificer, the nine were operating in his titan suits and he activates a hidden self-destruct on Taysir’s suit and kills him on the spot. He then deactivates the main bomb, and the remaining Nine Titans mutiny.
Ultimately, Urza runs away and seeks out Yawgmoth, whereupon he gets decapitated by the protagonist, and severed-head-Urza and said protagonist trigger the Ultima Weapon and kill Yawgmoth.
But what of the nine?
These guys are fucking awesome. Staying behind on Phyrexia to set off the bombs, their tales, though told in the novels, are buried under the cooler lore of Urza and future planeswalkers.
Taysir was incredibly emotional after watching his best friend/ex and adopted daughter get murdered through Urza’s machinations. He literally rises up against the strongest man alive, and without the slightest chance for revenge gets smitten on the spot.
Another of the nine, Lord Windgrace, later recovers his body. While they don’t have time for a burial (the whole place is gonna blow anyways), he preforms a ritual to prevent necromancers abusing the body by removing the deceased’s heart. But he’s a planeswalker, capable of ridiculous feats of magic, so what does he do with the heart? Puts it next to his own, in memoriam and remembrance of Taysir’s impassioned mutiny. Whaaaaat.
So then, the last really notable Titans are Bo Levar and Commodore Guff. In many ways they’re the silliest of the nine, but also incredibly crucial to the rest of the story. Also, a little bit of a badass comedic pair. Pumba and Timon kinda thing.
The Commodore is this whacky guy with a terrible sense of humor who lives in a library containing every single book. Including the ones that don’t exist yet. But, he’s kind of absentminded and apathetic to the ultimate fate of everything because y’know fate is fate and he already read the world’s whole story several times through.
Next we have Bo Levar, a plainswalker who goes by the false name Captain Crucias and uses his rare interplanar talent for…smuggling. Yes, plainswalking magic used for mundane smuggling. He smokes cigars and wears a red cape and doesn’t afraid of anything. That’s him talking back at Urza. Like a badass. Also, he’s one of the earliest examples of Izzet, shown here casting Prophetic Bolt. Clever, bombastic, and defiant? Hell yeah.
So he and the Commodore are going at it with some Phyrexian generals and Guff lets slip that the world is gonna end regardless because Yawgmoth turns into a giant zombie cloud and destroys the world and Bo is all whoa whoa whoa. What. Go back. You know this how? Show me the fucking book, now.
So they plainswalk to Guff’s secret library and cue this montage where they tear through volumes until they find the one where Yawgmoth swallows the rest of everything living. And Bo passes a diplomacy check and convinces Guff to rewrite the pages of history so that zombie-cloud-Yawgmoth dies.
Returning to Dominaria, where Yawgmoth is wreaking havoc, Levar watches him about to decimate a small tribe of merfolk. Making a last stand against the black god, he taps into his soul for mana in casting one last spell to protect the merfolk, giving his life in appreciation of beauty. In doing so, his final thoughts were that it was a worthy death.
SHIT. These guys are so hardcore. And yet, if you talk about plainswalkers all you ever hear is Jayce this, Chandra that, or if you’re talking to an Izzet player, Ral Zarek. Motherfucking Ral Zarek. BO LEVAR DIED FOR MERMAIDS AND HAD A SEXY MUSTACHE AND A CAPE AND GOT NATURAL TWENTIES ON DIPLOMACY CHECKS CONVINCING PEOPLE TO REWRITE HISTORY. Taysir got needlessly killed after witnessing the murder of his closest peers and attempting to retaliate against the strongest man in the world, and his spirit lives on because Lord Windgrace keeps both their hearts in his chest now. Guff owns a library with every single book ever that he keeps for himself…and he’s still amused by “pull my finger” jokes? WHY MAGIC. WHERE IS YOUR HERITAGE.
Escape! Escape! 
