# Clash v2.2: names and Athena’s intervention

The eight flavor additions have been removed. Five original images are restored directly; River’s Mercy and Don’t Look Back retain their shortened names on the earlier art. Judgment in the Underworld has its original art and rules with the rules block vertically centered, retaining left alignment. Athena’s modal redesign is retained at {1}{R}{W}.

**River's Mercy** replaces *The River Receives the Suppliant*. **Don't Look Back** replaces *Do Not Look Back*. Their mechanics and deck slots remain unchanged. The river title names its act of mercy without inventing a named river deity. Every existing-card slot remains unchanged from v2.1; the current [Zeus](zeus/commander-deck.txt), [Poseidon](poseidon/commander-deck.txt), [Hades](hades/commander-deck.txt), and [Athena](athena/commander-deck.txt) lists incorporate the new names.

## Athena Turns the Spear

**{1}{R}{W} · Instant · Mythic**

> Choose one —
> • Creatures you control gain hexproof and indestructible until your next turn.
> • Athena Turns the Spear deals 4 damage to each attacking or blocking creature.

The three-mana intervention now requires a choice: shelter the company or strike the combatants. Its first mode can protect an established formation across an entire turn cycle. Its second punishes commitment to combat with a fixed amount of damage; it cannot erase three idle opposing armies or scale to twenty damage from Athena's token formation. The shield and counterstroke still draw on [Athena's deflection of Ares's spear](https://www.theoi.com/Text/HomerIliad5.html), but are alternate responses rather than two unrelated effects resolved together.

## Rules and play-pattern review

This is a local design review, not an independent subagent review or a playtest result. No new blockers found in the bounded revision.

- The mode is chosen on casting. A normal spell copy preserves that choice; Zeus copying this card cannot select the other mode. Neither mode targets.
- The protection applies to the creatures controlled as the spell resolves. Creatures entering afterward do not gain it. It expires as the caster's next turn begins, rather than at their next upkeep. Ability-granting effects use the fixed set of objects identified on resolution; compare Wizards' [Glaring Spotlight ruling](https://magic.wizards.com/en/news/feature/frequently-asked-questions-2013-01-21) and Comprehensive Rules 611.2c in the project's [cached rules](../../rules/MagicCompRules-20260925.txt).
- Hexproof prevents opposing targeting; indestructible prevents destruction from lethal damage and destroy effects. Neither prevents sacrifice, sufficiently reduced toughness, untargeted exile, or untargeted bounce. Players and noncreature permanents receive no protection.
- Before blockers, the damage mode can kill an attacking formation of 1/1s or 4/4s while your idle creatures survive. Fresh 6/6 Krakens survive. After blockers, your own 4/4 Athena tokens are hit too. An indestructible creature still takes the damage; otherwise lethal damage is checked normally, including damage already marked.
- Creatures outside combat are untouched, including creatures an opponent held back. Thus it cannot clear prospective blockers before attackers are declared. Athena's protection mode and a separately cast copy of the damage spell, or another protection card, can spare your combatants; that requires an additional card/cast and mana. This card alone never grants both modes.
- A blocked attacker stays blocked if its blocker dies to this spell; trample can let it assign damage to the defending player. A well-timed combat trick can still finish a weakened opponent, but this no longer clears all opposing creatures before a full attack.
- Damage comes from the spell, not your creatures, so their lifelink/deathtouch do not transfer. The change creates no mana, recursion permission, extra turn, extra combat, or repeated trigger engine. Existing Eternal Witness recovery remains a finite paid sequence.

The card remains labeled a signature defensive intervention: saving Athena and a developed army through multiple opponents' turns can be a major reversal. Athena Among the Argives remains the explosive resource signature. This revision deliberately reduces the former guaranteed offensive clearing effect rather than adding another win condition.

All eight flavor additions are removed from current card data and images. The two renames are reflected in the printed source and full lists. A subsequent commander revision adds Flash alongside flying to Zeus. His v4 image preserves the corrected five-digit hand; the other commander cards are unchanged.

## Render delivery

The current gallery restores five earlier images and uses three narrow built-in imagegen edits for the retained names and Judgment’s vertical text placement. Each edit was visually inspected for exact name, mana cost, rules, frame, footer, and absence of flavor. Athena’s separately inspected three-mana image is retained. The [current render manifest](../../../output/cards/custom-v2.2/render-manifest.json) links selected images and their exact prompts and checks. Original flavor-generation records are historical, not current selections.

The [gallery](../../../output/cards/custom/gallery.html) contains four commanders and forty support cards. [Artifact checks](art-validation.json) and [deck validation](validation.json) pass. No new browser-layout inspection or multiplayer playtest is claimed. Changes are now tracked in local Git commits for reversal.