Monsters of Magic The Gathering: Felidar

Starting off the 'MTG conversion ideas' is, right off the bat, a doozier idea. Today's creature is not one with a whole lot of lore or concept behind it, which is exactly why I picked it. That creature is the Felidar, a type of magical feline encountered on the planes of Zendikar and Kaladesh. Now I have never read a Magic: The Gathering novel in my life so I apologize in advance if I butcher or miss any pre-existing lore on these creatures.

Felidar Sovereign by Zoltan Boros & Gabor Szikszai

A Felidar is a large cat-like creature with horns which is associated with White Mana. It can live hundred of years and while ferocious, can be tamed to become a guard animal or function as a 'magical mount' much like how creatures such as griffin and lesser dragons can be mounted by powerful and skilled heroes. The Planeshift: Zendikar (the official MTG-to-D&D5e conversion) PDF released by Wizards of the Coast describe them as such:

"Standing fully ten feet high at the shoulder, the great cats called felidars are noble, fierce beasts charged with white mana. Felidars consent to be ridden only by knights they consider virtuous. The crystalline horns rising from a hard plate on their foreheads glow with white or golden light when they spring into battle, sometimes brightly enough to blind their foes.

In game terms, a felidar is similar to a unicorn, with changes that reflect its feline nature."

So basically they are semi-intelligent cat-beasts with some innate power over light and are associated with Good (or at least Law). That's a really cool creature concept and a rather impressive replacement for the Unicorn. Why have some virgin battle-maiden who lead armies against demons on some lame white horse with a narwhal 'horn' on its forehead WHEN SHE CAN RIDE A F***ING HORNED TIGER WITH SOLAR POWER?! *Cue guitar riff*

While it is very much some oddball creature of modern fantasy, the Felidar seem like it would be right at home in any suitably fantastical setting. It has clear thematic connotations and roles:

• It is a magical beast, close enough to mundane animals but strange enough to be fantastical. Like a Unicorn or Hydra.
• It is not a chimeric beast, however, like the owlbear and griffin.
• The thematic associations of lions and tigers still apply, but intertwined with the thematic link to holiness, power and the sun.
• The original Felidar card (the Felidar Sovereign) is associated with health mechanics and the Felidar Umbra has Lifelink. Considering their association with holiness and white mana (who has the most healing effects in MTG) it is fitting that the D&D 5e version has healing powers. Given they are predators this would initially appear unusual: why would such a big beast need/have healing spells? Perhaps Felidar are such noble creatures that they will heal a 'worthy adversary' rather than just eat him.

If I was to put Felidar in any of my games, I'd put these creatures at a level of power similar to the lesser draconic beasts: intelligent and magical, but not quite to the level of true dragons who usually speak and cast a ton of spells. They would be seen as holy beasts to various gods associated with good, light, strength, courage and similar concepts. In settings where alignment and gods are a fuzzier thing, I'd still play off this connection even if it is just one that humans/mortals have made: Felidar would still be magical, intelligent horned cats with energy/light/heat based powers.

Would there be many breeds? Most probably: they would vary in resemblance to various large cats but personally I'd tie each breed to solar phenomena and phases, like the dawn or zenith. Comparison to Exalted would certainly abound at my table if that was the case. As for stats? Meh, unless the really strong Felidar are more like dragons I'd say basing them off the stat block of any big cat but adding spells and maybe magic resistance is more than enough.

Alternate Take: Felidar are to mammals what dragons are to reptilian creatures(?)