I'm kind of baffled by the hate on Reliquary Tower. Unless my intention is to discard for reanimation purposes or other shenanigans, I generally like to keep my cards in my hand. One to three-color mana bases can easily handle including the tower, and it's a favorable effect tacked onto a mana-producing land. Of course, there are decks that don't want it or will never need it, and shouldn't use the slot.
My Goreclaw, Terror of Qal Sisma deck has a plan to get the tower out, simply because a Rishkar's Expertise or some such can draw a massive amount of cards, and my super Timmy fatty deck needs to keep deploying fatties with impunity.
At it's best, it's win-more. At it's worst, it keeps you off a critical colour. It is far worse than a basic land, and yes basics are good. They provide colour, and don't open up vulnerability to wasteland. None of these are true for Tower.
Win-more at best? Come on. More cards = more resources. Many decks would like to keep the cards that they've made an effort to draw, and the tower helps with that for the low, low cost of a land slot, specifically a utility land slot since, you know, it's providing a desired utility. And Wasteland is not a factor in my life, but by your reasoning, my opponents would never target it anyway.
Yes but colorless lands have an opportunity cost, and the effect is rarely great. So other, much better, utility lands take up the spots.
I totally understand and I agree with your reasoning. I suppose my viewpoint is informed by the fact that most of my decks are built to draw cards, and I haven't had a problem crafting a mana base, including other utility lands, to which the tower was a detriment. Obviously, it doesn't go in every deck, but maybe I just build a lot of decks that want it.
The problem with Reliquary Tower isn't that the effect can't be useful. The problem is that very very few decks actually need that effect (the best 7 cards in your hand is very nearly always as useful as keeping all 8+, and sometimes even more useful), and running a colorless-producing land over a color-producing land is a real cost.
Yours is a similar, and thus similarly valid, argument as MRHblue's, and I agree. I'm beginning to think that I either A) need to do more research on utility lands in general, because perhaps I'm not aware of my options or B) have a certain degree of tunnel vision when it comes to deck building, and utility lands are in my blind spot.
Overall though, I think the tower's overratedness may be being overstated. I definitely appreciate the discussion though.
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I'm kind of baffled by the hate on Reliquary Tower. Unless my intention is to discard for reanimation purposes or other shenanigans, I generally like to keep my cards in my hand. One to three-color mana bases can easily handle including the tower, and it's a favorable effect tacked onto a mana-producing land. Of course, there are decks that don't want it or will never need it, and shouldn't use the slot.
My Goreclaw, Terror of Qal Sisma deck has a plan to get the tower out, simply because a Rishkar's Expertise or some such can draw a massive amount of cards, and my super Timmy fatty deck needs to keep deploying fatties with impunity.
Win-more at best? Come on. More cards = more resources. Many decks would like to keep the cards that they've made an effort to draw, and the tower helps with that for the low, low cost of a land slot, specifically a utility land slot since, you know, it's providing a desired utility. And Wasteland is not a factor in my life, but by your reasoning, my opponents would never target it anyway.
I totally understand and I agree with your reasoning. I suppose my viewpoint is informed by the fact that most of my decks are built to draw cards, and I haven't had a problem crafting a mana base, including other utility lands, to which the tower was a detriment. Obviously, it doesn't go in every deck, but maybe I just build a lot of decks that want it.
Yours is a similar, and thus similarly valid, argument as MRHblue's, and I agree. I'm beginning to think that I either A) need to do more research on utility lands in general, because perhaps I'm not aware of my options or B) have a certain degree of tunnel vision when it comes to deck building, and utility lands are in my blind spot.
Overall though, I think the tower's overratedness may be being overstated. I definitely appreciate the discussion though.
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My Goreclaw, Terror of Qal Sisma deck has a plan to get the tower out, simply because a Rishkar's Expertise or some such can draw a massive amount of cards, and my super Timmy fatty deck needs to keep deploying fatties with impunity.
Also, blue players love their Cyclonic Rifts and occasional Devastation Tides.
My 720 Peasant Cube