MTG Salvation

I tell them they they're bad cards. Gruul Turf, Balduvian Trading Post, etc. I say that when those lands get blown up, they're set back farther than if it was just a basic land.

"Pff, that'll never happen!" is the response. And, mostly, they're right. It doesn't happen. Even when my friend was stuck on only the aforementioned Balduvian Trading Post, I just didn't play the Acidic Slime in my hand. I kinda felt sorry.

So, anyway, I recently got a Keldon Firebombers and a Razia's Purification out of a dollar box and thought of all of those bad non-basic lands. Force them to keep those karoos and then play Ravenous Baboons, or something. Use Reveillark, grab the Baboons and Avalanche Riders and blow up two of them. Basically, I want people to get so annoyed that they throw dice and empty soda cans at me. Here's what I have so far:

• Brion Stoutarm
  
• Roiling Terrain (hopefully adds lots of damage. Worth it?)
  
• Goblin Ruinblaster
  
• Anarchist
  
• Volcanic Awakening
  
• Lavaball Trap
  
• Epochrasite (comes back when killed)
  
• Reveillark (seems really good)
  
• Crucible of Worlds
  
• Ajani Vengeant
  
• Incendiary Command
  
• Icefall
  
• Stone Rain
  
• Sunglasses of Urza
  
• Destructive Force
  
• Lightning Helix
  
• Chandra's Phoenix (comes back from GY)
  
• It That Betrays
  
• Spelltithe Enforcer
  
• Razia's Purification
  
• Cataclysm
  
• Smash to Smithereens
  
• Solemn Simulacrum
  
• Tormod's Cyrpt
  
• Dwarven Miner
  
• Goblin Gardener
  
• Mirran Crusader
  
• Mycosynth Wellspring
  
• Avalanche Riders
  
• Ravenous Baboons
  
• Catastrophe
  
• Molten Rain
  
• Seal of Cleansing
  
• Ghostly Prison
  
• Leonin Arbiter
  
• Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
  
• Ruination
  
• Boros Signet
  
• Pillage
  
• Shivan Harvest
  
• Lux Cannon
  
• Darksteel Ingot
  
• Faith's Reward
  
• Aura of Silence
  
• Oblivion Ring
  
• Windborn Muse
  
• Yosei, the Morning Star (great with Purification)
  
• False Prophet (great with Purification)
  
• Archon of Justice (great with Purification)
  
• Strip Mine
  
• Ghost Quarter

Cards I have yet to dig up:

• Hound of Griselbrand (comes back after wipe, beats face)
  
• Lodestone Golem
  
• Plunder
  
• Lifeline
  
• Shivan Wumpus
  
• Wildfire
  
• Detritivore
  
• Ichor Wellspring (I know there's one around here somewhere...)
  
• Mimic Vat
  
• Spine of Ish Sah
  
• Sun Titan
  
• Twilight Shepherd
  
• Dwarven Blastminer
  

So, am I going in too many directions? Could I benefit from adding green for ramp and more LD? Could the general be better than Brion? I chose him for colors and he's cheap.

Some of these cards are quite pricey (mana-wise). Am I going to get to the point where I can play them? It That Betrays is funny when I make you sac all your land, but is that just magical christmas land?

in some playgroups any land D is verboten. in that situation, why not play karoos?

there will almost always be a more threatening land out to draw the hate from everyone's strip mines and wastelands.

nonbasic hate in general is definitely a worthwhile strategy, if you are in one or two colors it would be cool to run a nonbasic hate package and see how it plays.

price of progress
magus of the moon
blood moon
primal order

when i play cards like these, I also like to stick to basics only (save a few util lands) and play thawing glaciers and stone-seeder hierophant. and then say "bladow."

Is there a need for Razia's Purification and friends? It might not get the message over like you want it too, cause, technically it's helping them more than it is you.

I'd just go degenerate lame EDH player and go Sylvan Primordial + terastodon instead. It'll get the message over.

'bad' is an opinion. If on a budget, they are really useful along with the fetches that ETB tapped. Yes, LD will slow it down. But that is the cost to having them.

It also depends on the play group. Some look down on MLD - but land spot removal is very acceptable.

Basically, I want people to get so annoyed that they throw dice and empty soda cans at me

to each their own. But mocking them for using incorrect land doesn't help.

One example is I had a friend who hated Humility when I played it. I knew he was annoyed and wouldn't play if I played that deck, so I told him what he could do, pre game and in game, to better his position for that card.

Ehhh...Karoo lands aren't all bad. They're a great way of reusing and resetting utility lands like Bojuka Bog. While it's true that having them blown up will set you back, I'd rather save my land destruction for more important things like Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth, Cabal Coffers, Alchemist's Refuge, etc.

Are they just running all the Karoo lands they can find? Are they actually trying to take advantage of the bouncing utility lands? If not, then I agree that they're not that great.

As for the general, Numot, the Devastator seems perfect if your not opposed to going three color. You also get the added option of bouncing Karoo lands back to their hand, which I think can drive your point home better than just flat out blowing them up.

I think they're pretty bad versus other options. Even on a budget, you shouldn't need karoos.

Ravinca Karoos bouncing Gaea's Cradle, Hideaway lands, Bojuka Bog, etc. have worked way better than "bad" for me, and that's not even when they untap with effects from Mana Reflection, Turnabout, Garruk Wildspeaker, Seedborn Muse, etc.

Sure it hurts when they get blown up, and they aren't the best lands, but a person using a Strip Mine or Acidic Slime on a Karoo oftentimes sits there with regret 2 turns later when Serra's Sanctum or Academy Ruins or Alchemist's Refuge comes down. Or Coffers, or Emeria, or Phyrexian Tower...

Balduvian Trading Post isn't a karoo. The actual karoos are decent -- they're slow but they do help you hit higher on a curve, kind of like Thawing Glaciers, because you're getting two mana out of one card. Playing land destruction just to fight karoos seems mean-spirited, and bizarre in priorities, since at a decent table there will be way better lands to destroy.

Coming from a cube perspective, and a powered 360 one that, that features lots of land destruction, the ravnica block series of karoos are very good. EDH is a very slow format, and generally speaking very casual, so these are very cheap and actually good ways to fix your mana base.

Not everyone can be rocking mox diamonds, monoliths, and the number of other excellent mana fixers out there.

boomerang is a lot of fun against karoos. let them keep setting themselves back.

Razia's Purification doesn't hurt players playing Karoo's. Quite the opposite, it helps them, and a deck running Cataclysm or Razia's Purification might consider Karoos for that reason.

So they elect to keep their Karoos, ok. Then you blow them up. They now have less mana than you do, but up to the point that you blew up the Karoo, they had more.

I find it pretty rare outside of budget concerns that players will run Karoos v. other CIPT lands. But when I do see it, it's usually from a deck that destroys land or prevents it from untapping, for the very reason that they work well there.

So maybe people should stop trying to prove philosophical points and just play.

Just run a few land destruction/hate cards in one of your decks. Not a ton, but maybe around 5 or 6.

You can easily sneck them in with stuff like pillage, bramblecrush, strip mine, boomerang, recoil, or befoul.

All those cards have use outside of mana screwing them, but if they play a karoo land, they will see why they are 'bad'.

EDIT
What I was trying to say is that you don't need a dedicated deck to show them that karoo lands are dangerous cards to play with.

the alliance karoos are't too bad because they have another ability tacked onto them. however, the rest are bad IMO.

Just to clarify...

You want to punish the rest of your group for playing "bad" cards... and your go-to option for this is Ravenous Baboons!?

They have actually seen MORE use since I started playing MLD, people are using them to hold onto lands to use after I wipe them. They have upsides and downsides. I used to be in the "Karoos Bad!" Camp but I have seen they can be useful in niche ways.

Honestly, I think karoos are bad EVEN on a budget. There are tons of great options and with each block printed, more land choices get printed so I see even less need for them. I have also seen people play 5 karoos in a deck at which point theyre karooing into karoos...

I dont think this is the way to tell your friends that karoos are bad.... I would just go ahead and play that acidic slime and pop that karoo then SHOW them how far behind they are....

Capsize is a fun way to "punish" karoo lands.

Quote from minsarker

Honestly, I think karoos are bad EVEN on a budget. There are tons of great options and with each block printed, more land choices get printed so I see even less need for them. I have also seen people play 5 karoos in a deck at which point theyre karooing into karoos...

I dont think this is the way to tell your friends that karoos are bad.... I would just go ahead and play that acidic slime and pop that karoo then SHOW them how far behind they are....

No they aren't bad. They work with slow decks, and the majority of edh games take a thousand years to finish. I would never in an MP edh game, blow up a simple land like that. Waste of a good land removal.

Quote from jayr

Balduvian Trading Post isn't a karoo. The actual karoos are decent -- they're slow but they do help you hit higher on a curve, kind of like Thawing Glaciers, because you're getting two mana out of one card.

Actually, it is. A karoo is any land that requires an untapped basic to be returned to your hand (named for Karoo) and then taps for something like W1. A bounceland is the cycle from Ravnica: City of Guilds (like Gruul Turf) that enters the battlefield tapped and bounces any land back to your hand, then taps for 2 colors.

Anyway, I don't play karoos but I play the heck out of bouncelands. Getting a chance to reset my Bojuka Bog or Halimar Depths later in the game, where I'm not desperate for mana, is just great.

numot, the devastator is the general for you! skip out on the mass LD effects, they don't serve to reinforce what you are doing.

Quote from Umaro

EDH is a very slow format, and generally speaking very casual, so these are very cheap and actually good ways to fix your mana base.

Basically what he's getting at is if you don't want to play the game to win, karoos are for you.

I don't really understand why people think Commander is a slow or casual format. It's way easier to win turn one in Commander than Standard, Modern, Legacy and even some Vintage decks. My goal is usually the turn two win, but this is beside the point.

Yes, karoos are bad but only if you're playing against competent players. Turn one land, turn two karoo, and at the start of turn three you have 0 mana because someone Strip Mined it. Whoops.

But don't make a whole deck out of destroying their karoos just to prove a point. If you really want to show them, toss in Strip, Wasteland, Tectonic Edge and Dust Bowl to one of your decks. If you're running green, Beast Within, Reap and Sow, Terastodon and Sylvan Primordial. Vindicate's good too.

Quote from TigerDriver91 »

Ravinca Karoos bouncing Gaea's Cradle ... [has] worked way better than "bad" for me

... What?

Quote from TigerDriver91

Ravinca Karoos bouncing Gaea's Cradle, Hideaway lands, Bojuka Bog, etc. have worked way better than "bad" for me, and that's not even when they untap with effects from Mana Reflection, Turnabout, Garruk Wildspeaker, Seedborn Muse, etc.

Sure it hurts when they get blown up, and they aren't the best lands, but a person using a Strip Mine or Acidic Slime on a Karoo oftentimes sits there with regret 2 turns later when Serra's Sanctum or Academy Ruins or Alchemist's Refuge comes down. Or Coffers, or Emeria, or Phyrexian Tower...

This is the wisdom that comes from years of playing EDH.

Quote from Umaro

No they aren't bad. They work with slow decks, and the majority of edh games take a thousand years to finish. I would never in an MP edh game, blow up a simple land like that. Waste of a good land removal.

With a slow deck, I would just hit my land drops like regular. When someone casts that sylvan primordial and is looking for noncreature permanents to hit, you can bet theyll hit your karoo over your regular land.

I just dislike the tempo loss from them butI could see the inclusion of 1-2 in certain lists.

P.S. And if you'll notice, I said they are bad in my opinion. Not that they are bad for everyone. Its just what I think.

Quote from PatrickWR

Actually, it is. A karoo is any land that requires an untapped basic to be returned to your hand (named for Karoo) and then taps for something like W1.

Read Balduvian Trading Post and the rest of the Alliance cycle more closely -- it makes you sacrifice an untapped basic, not bounce it. That's significantly worse than the Karoo cycle, because you don't get the same sort of pseudo-card-advantage you do off a Karoo.

Quote from ajprokos

to each their own. But mocking them for using incorrect land doesn't help.

I cannot agree with this. I often get complaints about my decks because I play a lot of control elements. I response to people is this "if you don't like it play some disruption in your decks." When you only play a linear game plan and have 0 disruption in your deck you deserve to lose.