When considering land, there's all kinds of angles we have to examine. The theme here with the lands I'm going to talk about is centered mostly around leveraging tempo to get the immediate impact of a land in the first couple turns, whether it be for spellcasting or furthered utility, before it gets blown up.
So let's get into it!
~Land~
An upgraded but more color-intensive Winding Canyons, which allows you to cast non-landers at instant speed. Fortunately-and-Unfortunately, the limitations of Blue/Green keep this from being as sought after, but that's also what keeps it cheap.
With the right plan, Alchemist's Refuge can be particularly effective in changing the tempo of a game. Decks that love the effect of surprise creatures or being able to protect a creature and attack on the next turn can really use this card. Likewise sorcery heavy and slow enchantment-playing decks can gain an advantage in combo with other spells. Haven't you wanted to play a kill spell then copy a creature so that only you have the benefits?
I play this in Animar and I'll be honest, it's not used as much as I'd like to, but when I have it and I need it it's so worth it having a slot in case of hypothetical situations. For example, if I know there is a control player who can untap lands or extend their mana base, having the opportunity to get a cast or two of creatures out while they are tapped out is usually enough to keep me in good position.
The Almost-Vesuva 2.0, As it's unofficially known. I talked about Mizzium Transreliquat in my last article and this card is a land variant. For 2 and a tap you can copy any land in play. While Vesuva does that without a cost it comes into play tapped and has any ETB effects that land had.
Unlike Vesuva, Copying an Izzet Boilerworks in play with Thespian's Stage doesn't make you bounce lands. It's even more beneficial as a land in three-plus colored decks, which tend to roll a lot of nonbasics. Without an additional untap step the tempo is the same but lets look at some frequent prime copy targets for the Stage:
- Emeria, the Sky Ruin
- Cabal Coffers
- Maze of Ith
- Temple of the False God
- "Bounce" Lands
- "Legendary" Land destruction
Lands that grant access to any color are awesome, especially when they don't have drawbacks, like Command Tower.
Though Ancient Ziggurat isn't quite Command Tower, it gets pretty close. Creature-heavy decks like Animar and Karador can play it well, though it does hurt when you have to remind yourself you're one mana short for non-creature spells. So the more creatures, the better.
This land is short, sweet, and definitely worth playing if you're building for it.
Lands that produce more than one mana usually come with a setback. Ravnica bounce lands return a land and enter tapped, and Eldrazi Temple taps for two but only for colorless spells. Temple here is no different but only requires us to have 5 or more lands and includes itself.
Having 5 lands in EDH is still early game and with all kinds of ramp available to us it's no sweat if were making our tempo plays. Good utility of Temple would be in decks that need the colorless ramping more so than colored mana, so decks without green that utilize mana rocks and signets would get good use of this land.
Honestly though, any and almost every deck could play this card well. The difference between playing a Titan or another 6-cost threat on Turn 5 or earlier is an incredible amount of tempo, especially if you're playing against a Control player that tapped out early without considering the facts. And there are a lot of 6-cost threats now, so you should be playing this card.
That's it for this week my friends.
Next week I'll have Enchantments, Instant, and Sorcery all primed up and ready for review!
Till next week I hope your tempo plays are phenomenal.
-Johnny C.
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