I can't imagine people having trouble understanding it. It says on the retroactive landfall "If you had a land enter the battlefield under your control this turn, do this" the normal landfall says "whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, do this"
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Quote from thundyr »
Jacerator is an aggro deck - it just wins by attacking the library, it doesn't really control the board other than to play a few Fogs
What's up with that green land enchant? Such a boring design IMO...really feels like they didn't feel like making a vanilla creature with that p/t so they said "well we could always just make it an enchant land". The ability is so irrelevant, I suppose they wanted to make it enable landfall or something, but how boring.
Edit: OK I take this back now because I understand the flavor as being "the land coming alive"...makes much more sense.
Also, the instant speed card draw is pretty cool. Its probably going to be the best card draw spell in standard. Well, other than the new Jace that is.
I can't imagine people having trouble understanding it. It says on the retroactive landfall "If you had a land enter the battlefield under your control this turn, do this" the normal landfall says "whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, do this"
Quite true, but when people see ability words they rarely think about them. Even Chroma, varied as it is, is fairly consistent - it's always looking for colored mana symbols. Sure, some check for those mana symbols only once while others check all the time, and they all check all sorts of different zones for their symbol count. It's different enough on any two cards that people know to almost ignore the word Chroma entirely.
Landfall, on the other hand, was extremely consistent. Every card that currently has it has an ability that triggers every time a land enters the battlefield under your control. Oddly enough, this consistency is exactly what makes retroactive landfall so potentially confusing. It's different, but only subtly so. Players sifting through their card boxes for pieces for a deck could easily pick up a card with retroactive landfall and see only "Landfall" and an effect they like without ever actually reading the rules text closely - I know at least three that will almost certainly do this. These same players are also likely to forget that there are two different versions of landfall and occasionally argue about the matter along the lines I mentioned above or, alternatively, along the lines of "What do you mean I only draw three cards from Mysteries of the Deep? I just resolved Harrow and cracked my Misty Rainforest and Khalni-Heart Expedition!"
Sure, the problem would be solved by people reading the card, but since when can people be relied on as far as that's concerned? Don't get me wrong, I'm glad WotC is still doing nuanced differences between cards. I'm primarily a Johnny, and exploiting obscure rules interactions is one of my favorite things to do. I'm just dreading the headaches [arguments over] this nuance will cause and hope that the payoff will be worth the headaches.
The whole point of instant speed card draw is to do it on your opponent's end step. Needing a landfall trigger to make the card useful means that you need to crack a fetch or use an ability like that of Knight of the Reliquary to get it to its full potential. In color wheels like RWU this is realistic, but for alara shard colors it means having to put fetches in that can only find a single color, which is suboptimal.
If the card had been draw an extra card for each land played that turn, then it may have been exciting, but as it is I don't much care for it.
My first thoughts on the landfall were the same - that it's not good to have two fundamentally different (and they are!) things under the same ability word.
But, on the other hand, it's on an instant - it can't have landfall in any other way really, since it's never anywhere except on the stack, so can't trigger off a land coming into play.
I'm assuming that all instants / sorceries with landfall will work like that, so in theory while it's a bit confusing, at least it'll be a consistant form of confusing, if you follow me
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Currently playing: Mono White Control.
So if you play a fetch then crack it do you get to draw 6 cards with Mysteries Of The Deep? Cause if you do then this could actually be a fairly good card.
My first thoughts on the landfall were the same - that it's not good to have two fundamentally different (and they are!) things under the same ability word.
But, on the other hand, it's on an instant - it can't have landfall in any other way really, since it's never anywhere except on the stack, so can't trigger off a land coming into play.
I'm assuming that all instants / sorceries with landfall will work like that, so in theory while it's a bit confusing, at least it'll be a consistant form of confusing, if you follow me
Yeah, this won't be as bad as Chroma.
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Quote from parinoid »
I rolled 5 D6's and got 3 fours. They must have changed the odds of getting a 4!
So if you play a fetch then crack it do you get to draw 6 cards with Mysteries Of The Deep? Cause if you do then this could actually be a fairly good card.
Obviously it doesn't work like that, not possible to even think about reading the text that way. But 5cc instant speed draw 3 will be extremely playable in standard.
So if you play a fetch then crack it do you get to draw 6 cards with Mysteries Of The Deep? Cause if you do then this could actually be a fairly good card.
Lol.
The sad thing is, this spell will get played, because it's probably among the better of the draw spells. A costly Concentrate or an even more costly Inspiration, which itself was kinda slow.
Shouldn't be underestimated, but it's only gonna do the job because it's the only card that can do the job.
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Sure, the problem would be solved by people reading the card, but since when can people be relied on as far as that's concerned? Don't get me wrong, I'm glad WotC is still doing nuanced differences between cards. I'm primarily a Johnny, and exploiting obscure rules interactions is one of my favorite things to do. I'm just dreading the headaches [arguments over] this nuance will cause and hope that the payoff will be worth the headaches.
LoL this is a really good point. Aaaaand...someone just asked if you get to draw 6 if you play a land and fetch in the same turn! You sir have me convinced that this could cause some rules headaches...
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Quote from thundyr »
Jacerator is an aggro deck - it just wins by attacking the library, it doesn't really control the board other than to play a few Fogs
5 mana inspiration that can be a horrible tidings? I am pretty sure Wizards prints this stuff to spit in the face of blue players. Ugh.
This coulda been good if it played on your opponent's land coming into play (seeing as it is an instant). Oh well, hopefully something better will come or this card will see play because its the only mono blue instant draw in the format (A fact that is depressing in itself.)
LoL this is a really good point. Aaaaand...someone just asked if you get to draw 6 if you play a land and fetch in the same turn! You sir have me convinced that this could cause some rules headaches...
I only asked since ever other landfall card would count the fetchland so I'm curios if this one follows the same rule or is it one of the few exceptions in the ability.
I only asked since ever other landfall card would count the fetchland so I'm curios if this one follows the same rule or is it one of the few exceptions in the ability.
it would count the landfall trigger twice, unfortunately its redundant, like on surrakar marrauders. The card says that you draw 3 instead of doing what it would normally do. so the landfall triggers would look like this
Draw two landfall
dont draw two, draw 3 instead landfall
dont draw 3, draw 3 instead.
it would count the landfall trigger twice, unfortunately its redundant, like on surrakar marrauders. The card says that you draw 3 instead of doing what it would normally do. so the landfall triggers would look like this
Draw two landfall
dont draw two, draw 3 instead landfall
dont draw 3, draw 3 instead.
Thank you for clearing that up for me. So its on of the exceptions for the ability where it doesn't add/double it. I thinking this card is mainly going to be played cause its an instant draw like all control players want but, I find it more so on the bad side since it costs so much and its not to worth it to play as an instant unless you can do something like Harrow on your opponents turn.
Wow instant blue card draw. Sure it's two cards if you dont' have a fetchland in play but if we're talking about control then their is definitely going to be a fetchland in play just so that you can draw three cards. Jace and this card are great so far, hopefully this means we'll have an ok counterspell this time.
I only asked since ever other landfall card would count the fetchland so I'm curios if this one follows the same rule or is it one of the few exceptions in the ability.
In thanks for you so perfectly illustrating my point:
All the ability word of Chroma really says is that there's an ability on the card that cares about the mana symbols in the costs of things, but that the card itself will say when it cares about those symbols and what it does with those symbols when it cares.
All Landfall really means is that the card cares about lands entering the battlefield under your control - but that each individual card will tell you when it cares about that condition and what happens when it cares. In the case of Rampaging Baloths, the card cares about lands that enter the battlefield under your control while it's on the battlefield itself, and every time that condition is met you get yourself a 4/4 beast token. In the case of Mysteries of the Deep, the card cares about whether or not a land entered the battlefield under your control at some point in the turn before it resolves (at least, it looks to me like it checks for its Landfall upon resolution rather than upon casting), but it doesn't check for the quantity of lands that entered the battlefield under your control. Moreover, even if it DID check for quantity, its Landfall ability doesn't say "... draw an additional card." It says "... draw three cards instead." Multiple landfall triggers on it would still only ever result in three cards being drawn due to the last replacement setting the number of cards drawn from the spell to three anyways.
would have making the converted mana cost on Mysteries 4 really have been that much of a back breaker for the format?geez.
I can't speak for standard, but speaking as a control player in other formats... Yep. Inspiration is a good card, and a strictly better would be waaaay too good.
Aside from the power issue, consider this:
Suppose they made it 2UU. That would limit it to heavy blue decks. How many blue/colorless cards can get lands out on another player's turn? I like having the option of this card going into decks with heavy amounts of other colors. Single U makes this card much more playable.
How many blue/colorless cards can get lands out on another player's turn? I like having the option of this card going into decks with heavy amounts of other colors.
Fetchlands/Terramorphic Expanse, although a deck may end up only running 4 fetches, which makes it inconsistent.
Edit: OK I take this back now because I understand the flavor as being "the land coming alive"...makes much more sense.
Also, the instant speed card draw is pretty cool. Its probably going to be the best card draw spell in standard. Well, other than the new Jace that is.
Quite true, but when people see ability words they rarely think about them. Even Chroma, varied as it is, is fairly consistent - it's always looking for colored mana symbols. Sure, some check for those mana symbols only once while others check all the time, and they all check all sorts of different zones for their symbol count. It's different enough on any two cards that people know to almost ignore the word Chroma entirely.
Landfall, on the other hand, was extremely consistent. Every card that currently has it has an ability that triggers every time a land enters the battlefield under your control. Oddly enough, this consistency is exactly what makes retroactive landfall so potentially confusing. It's different, but only subtly so. Players sifting through their card boxes for pieces for a deck could easily pick up a card with retroactive landfall and see only "Landfall" and an effect they like without ever actually reading the rules text closely - I know at least three that will almost certainly do this. These same players are also likely to forget that there are two different versions of landfall and occasionally argue about the matter along the lines I mentioned above or, alternatively, along the lines of "What do you mean I only draw three cards from Mysteries of the Deep? I just resolved Harrow and cracked my Misty Rainforest and Khalni-Heart Expedition!"
Sure, the problem would be solved by people reading the card, but since when can people be relied on as far as that's concerned? Don't get me wrong, I'm glad WotC is still doing nuanced differences between cards. I'm primarily a Johnny, and exploiting obscure rules interactions is one of my favorite things to do. I'm just dreading the headaches [arguments over] this nuance will cause and hope that the payoff will be worth the headaches.
If the card had been draw an extra card for each land played that turn, then it may have been exciting, but as it is I don't much care for it.
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But, on the other hand, it's on an instant - it can't have landfall in any other way really, since it's never anywhere except on the stack, so can't trigger off a land coming into play.
I'm assuming that all instants / sorceries with landfall will work like that, so in theory while it's a bit confusing, at least it'll be a consistant form of confusing, if you follow me
Currently playing: Mono White Control.
Obviously it doesn't work like that, not possible to even think about reading the text that way. But 5cc instant speed draw 3 will be extremely playable in standard.
Lol.
The sad thing is, this spell will get played, because it's probably among the better of the draw spells. A costly Concentrate or an even more costly Inspiration, which itself was kinda slow.
Shouldn't be underestimated, but it's only gonna do the job because it's the only card that can do the job.
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LoL this is a really good point. Aaaaand...someone just asked if you get to draw 6 if you play a land and fetch in the same turn! You sir have me convinced that this could cause some rules headaches...
This coulda been good if it played on your opponent's land coming into play (seeing as it is an instant). Oh well, hopefully something better will come or this card will see play because its the only mono blue instant draw in the format (A fact that is depressing in itself.)
I only asked since ever other landfall card would count the fetchland so I'm curios if this one follows the same rule or is it one of the few exceptions in the ability.
it would count the landfall trigger twice, unfortunately its redundant, like on surrakar marrauders. The card says that you draw 3 instead of doing what it would normally do. so the landfall triggers would look like this
Draw two
landfall
dont draw two, draw 3 instead
landfall
dont draw 3, draw 3 instead.
Thank you for clearing that up for me. So its on of the exceptions for the ability where it doesn't add/double it. I thinking this card is mainly going to be played cause its an instant draw like all control players want but, I find it more so on the bad side since it costs so much and its not to worth it to play as an instant unless you can do something like Harrow on your opponents turn.
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In thanks for you so perfectly illustrating my point:
Ability words have lots of leeway in their wording. One creature with Chroma might get bigger depending on how many black mana symbols there are in the costs of cards in your graveyard. Another might get bigger depending on how many green mana symbols there are in the costs of permanents under your control. Yet another creature might only ever check Chroma when it enters the battlefield (and not even get bigger by itself at all!).
All the ability word of Chroma really says is that there's an ability on the card that cares about the mana symbols in the costs of things, but that the card itself will say when it cares about those symbols and what it does with those symbols when it cares.
All Landfall really means is that the card cares about lands entering the battlefield under your control - but that each individual card will tell you when it cares about that condition and what happens when it cares. In the case of Rampaging Baloths, the card cares about lands that enter the battlefield under your control while it's on the battlefield itself, and every time that condition is met you get yourself a 4/4 beast token. In the case of Mysteries of the Deep, the card cares about whether or not a land entered the battlefield under your control at some point in the turn before it resolves (at least, it looks to me like it checks for its Landfall upon resolution rather than upon casting), but it doesn't check for the quantity of lands that entered the battlefield under your control. Moreover, even if it DID check for quantity, its Landfall ability doesn't say "... draw an additional card." It says "... draw three cards instead." Multiple landfall triggers on it would still only ever result in three cards being drawn due to the last replacement setting the number of cards drawn from the spell to three anyways.
I can't speak for standard, but speaking as a control player in other formats... Yep. Inspiration is a good card, and a strictly better would be waaaay too good.
Aside from the power issue, consider this:
Suppose they made it 2UU. That would limit it to heavy blue decks. How many blue/colorless cards can get lands out on another player's turn? I like having the option of this card going into decks with heavy amounts of other colors. Single U makes this card much more playable.
Fetchlands/Terramorphic Expanse, although a deck may end up only running 4 fetches, which makes it inconsistent.
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