I am not saying Scry 1 isn't good but I am saying that it isn't rare. If your playing modern or legacy, you might think twice before using these lands. Maybe not so much if your playing esper control. This land is for Standard-Limited not really for constructed.
Also notice how loads of people are complaining about these lands and not the lands that are classed rare before it?
Another to notice is how Wizards said these lands would be exciting, unless your high you wouldn't be phased by their ability. Even halimar depths is better then these lands.
Er... I don't suppose you know this at all, but on of the major reasons for rarity is effect on limited. And at uncommon, scrying 1 means that whoever gets a critical mass of these lands has a massive advantage over anyone else.
Rarity means jack-all for the most part in terms of constructed.
Also, I'd like to point out that when the M10-M13 checklands were first spoiled, the range of attitudes from them were "These are terribad, can't play anything turn 1", to "Mediocre, might see play but not likely". And I haven't seen a single post in the thread that actually says that they are *good*. Reading the spoiler thread right now is really fun (It also happened to be that they were released when the rules changes took affect, so there is some bitterness over them).
Looking at the Scars spoiler and thread on their duals shows that even the fast lands weren't without some naysayers. Granted, the majority liked them, but there were some who thought they were terrible.
So, the point is you are somewhat wrong on that point. The checklands were not particularly enthralling when first printed, and there were a good chunk of people complaining about them.
If they'd do that, they'd need to fire the entire team after every spoiler season.
Frankly, I couldn't be happier with these. At least these do something *interesting* and unique over just another set of lands that you need to fiddle with to come into play untapped. These have a good deal more utility beyond mana fixing, which is quite interesting and should alter the format in meaningful, and interesting, ways.
As I've pointed out several times, there is no way these lands *could* have been better. Free scrying and the ability to come in untapped would have been insane. Scrying for more would have been equally so (As you could set up your draw perfectly for the entire game). There isn't a whole lot of design space one can go with here to up the power without breaking them.
Modern Masters probably played a big factor in the fact that there wasn't an expansion for standard this summer. I could see another set about the size of Dragon's Maze helping transition into Theros.
Er.. there rarely is. The normal set structure is 3 sets per block, plus core each summer. We got RtR in the fall, which normal for first sets, DGM in winter and DGM in spring. This is all fairly normal block releases. Also, we got M14 in Summer, which once again is the norm. There are rarely deviation in this, particularly in the past... 15 some odd years or so? (with only two possible exception I can think of).
I think the major problem was everyone for weeks were trying to think what special lands were we gonna get. Does everyone remember that wizards article that said these lands were exciting?! Yeah cause scry 1 really is super exciting. I am willing to bet they had awesome duals and then development were like "NOPE, Lets put scry 1 instead".
It's like being promised a car and getting a bike. Maybe I am just not looking at it like other people but I have a feeling after it comes out, people are going to open booster packs and go "Damn why did my rare slot have to have a dual land, where is my Anax?!" I equally feel sorry for the poor guy in a prerelease who gets 6 duals land in his pool. Meaning he doesn't have any good rares.
I am personally excited for these lands, more so than checklands or lands that can come into play untapped. They are going to alter the way many decks are played, can do many things that previous lands cannot, and are actually relevant late-game duals. Which is saying something. To me they are the best thing for a standard which has been seeing far too greedy mana bases.
The scry lands aren't awful but aren't great as rares. That is the point for these arguments. Try to think of it this way, MaRo has stated that these lands were made rare so that there would be 5 places for uncommon cards for limited. To be honest I would rather of had these lands as uncommon and gotten 5 more rares for this set.
They literally cannot be anything other than rare. Scry is a very relevant ability, and at uncommon they would have turned limited into never-ending scry wars. Scrying *some* in limited isn't a big issue; scrying damn near every turn is. Further more, these will hover in the $5 range for a while I expect. Maybe post RtR rotation they will go up as they become more relevant they will go up. I will fairly suprised if during their standard run they will cost less than check lands. Very surprised. So if you open them, they'll be beter than most junk rares.
When you open a booster pack 5/53 is the chance of pulling one of these lands. Are you going to choose in limited between this land or an uncommon like Battlewise Hoplite? Even the Akrosan Crusader has more worth then this land.
In RtR limited, if you are drafting right, you should choose many uncommons and some uncommons over a shockland. Only if you are value drafting would you ever choose a shock. And once again, these will have decent value by virtue of being playable rare duals with a very relevant side ability. They won't be shock level of value, but they will retain some value. Probably that $4-5 range.
MaRo had stated that these lands weren't made at the last minute and that they were designed to be as good as possible. We know he lied because the design team didn't choose scry, it was the development team. The design team had nothing to do with the dual lands. These lands were made at the last minute by the development team as adding in a new mechanic (scry).
Scry 2 on any land would have been bonkers. Scry 2 on a land that could come out untapped is bonkers. For a scry land, they are as good as they could forseeably be.
New Benalia + Guildate = Temple
Uncommon + Common = Rare?
Stave Off + Scry = Gods Willing
Common + Scry (without drawback) = Common?
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Guildgates are the exception to the rarity rule rather than rule. Every other dual land ever printed was *at least* uncommon. The only reason they were common was due to how multi-colored oriented RtR block is and how difficult mana fixing in limited would be without them running rampant. It would have made the set almost undraftable without them.
Further, scry 1 on a spell with a one-time effect that isn't particularly powerful is much different than scry 1 on a land that fixes your mana every turn there-after. It's not comparing apples and oranges, it's comparing thistles and gorillas. It's completely different.
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I like to think WotC doesn't know how to fix their rarity issue any more. Looking at the spoilers of Theros show that you will be scrying a lot and so adding lands that help you scry 1 are overkill. Looking at cards like Domestication just tell me that old uncommons will become rares and your old favourite rares will disappear forever.
Frankly, that is more or less untrue. Free scry in limited, particularly in a slower format as Theros is shaping up to be, is incredible. Free scry at any other rarity would have been crippling when playing against anyone who got more than a couple copies of a scry land. It's a very good ability.
The only decks that won't run these are going to be aggro decks. Which frankly need some tempering. When there is very little negligible downside to your mana consistency in 3 color (Which is oddly more consistent than 2-color mana bases), it's a problem. It creates stagnation. What's interesting to note is that Burning Earth has forced people away from 3-color quite a bit, and that standard is far more diverse because of it. When your options are far more limited, creativity is much better.
Whether or not it's a realistic expectation, it's something you *want* to do. Playing these lands makes that impossible.
Not that these lands have no value, but damn are you dumb.
Only impossible if you don't have any other lands in your hand. Which should be fairly unlikely. In a 2-color deck, you will have 4 of these, 4 shocks, and between 15-18 basics give or take. Generally meaning that you should always have an option for an untapped land turn 1 if necessary. If you have an aggro deck where your hand is nothing but these, you either experience excessively bad luck or incredibly poor deck building strategy. I'm gong to lean on 1, although I have seen asinine things from some people (I have seen Shocks thrown into a deck where it only produced one of the colors the deck needed, but virtue of the fact that it held the Shock status of being good; the person wasn't particularly bright).
If you experience really bad luck, you should mulligan. But then again, it'd be the same as if you had a hand with 3 check-lands for the most part (With the added caveat that you could draw into the necessary land for them to come in untapped; thought it is not a guarantee).
I don't want to be rude here so I'll try and hold some restraint but to say something like this you have to be a troll, a crazy person or very lousy at this game.
Pretty much everything but control decks want to have turn 1 and turn 2 plays. Turn 1 is acceleration or aggro (mana dorks, ramping, cheap aggro creatures) for anything but control decks and turn 2 is more board presence, removal/counters, combat tricks, etc. But this is all magic 101 so I guess I'm preaching to a deaf crowd. The silent ones just know and don't bother with this thread.
So Combo always needs a turn 1 play, am I right? Or the fact that a good deal of the time mid-range decks in the *current* meta have a turn one play of "Shock tapped, go".
Not every deck is control or aggro, and somebody who says that another is "lousy" at this game certainly should know this. The main archetypes of the game have dozens of variations on them, each wanting something different.
Let's look at what we will have with current knowledge come post rotation for mana dorks (Pretty much only 1-2 cost ones will be relevant):
1 at 1 cmc (Elvish Mystic)
2 at 2 cmc (Zur-Ta Druid and Sylvan Caryatid)
Er... that's it. I *highly* doubt, and would be rather surprised, if there is another 1-drop mana dork in Theros, given that there are already 2 mana producers available in the set so far. Out of the 2-drop, only Caryatid is really going to be very relevant. So there are exactly 2 mana dorks available that *may* see play.
So... what does this means? Well, it means that you won't have access to insane ramp as is the case with the current standard. What it also means is that you are actually going to have to use a little brain power for once to consider your land drops. I'm willing to bet the Caryatid is going to see some heavy play... and in that case why the hell does it matter if the bloody land comes into play tapped? Elves turn 1 into Scry land/Caryatid is a viable play.
In fact, let's look at all 1 cmc cards that we know will be in standard so far that are even remotely relevant:
And there's the list so far known about standard. There will certainly be a few more 1-drops in theros, but not many, and very few are relevant.
Let's consider a few things here.
I'm going to take Shaman right out of the list as a necessary 1st turn play. He's great, but doesn't start working till things start hitting the yard (And he hasn't seen much standard play, but rather modern and legacy play). Thrull Parasite is a possible sideboard option for control build, and frankly doesn't need to be a first-turn play either. So he's out. Thoughtseize turn 1 is probably the best thing you an do, Duress as well but quite a bit behind Thoughtseize. Still, you could safely most of the time use them turn 2 and lose out on nothing. Or you can go for a shock turn 1 to thoughtseize, and a scry turn 2. Either way, that Thoughtseize is hitting before what you are going to use it to remove is hitting the field practically always (If you are taking out a turn 2 play, it better be a golden turn 2 play). So we are left with a grand total of 5 actually relevant turn 1 plays where you want to play them turn 1 practically always.
But here's the thing... those 5 dudes spread quite far apart and would rarely, if ever, go in the same deck. Gladecover Scout would *only* go in a hexproof voltron deck... which don't go off until turn 3 anyway. Mystic is the most relevant turn 1 play, but you shouldn't have a problem in most decks getting him out turn 1 if you have him in your hand, even if you are running "heavy" scry lands. Most deck that run ramp use turn 1-2 to set upt their ramp. A first turn basic/Shock into Mystic still leaves a second turn Scry and Caryatid as a good, possible, and likely option which you wouldn't have done much else anyway. And frankly, aggro shouldn't get 100% consistent mana fixing if it gets greedy in its colors. It wants to win fast, and that comes with certain set-backs. Dryad sees fringe play, at best, and will likely continue to do so. Cackler is mostly seen in RDW... which has no use for duals to begin with. So out of those, only Mystic is affected, and if you play well and build decks properly it shouldn't bloody matter most of the time.
Quicken is in there as is used a cantrip right now in a few decks... but I would seriously question the intelligence of anybody who shocked themselves to Cantrip turn 1.
Is aggro going to want these? Absolutely not. Frankly I don't find that a bad thing. Aggro decks have had far too good a time with their ludicrous mana fixing for the past year, and have barely had to think about their mana bases. The same goes for mid-range, whose mana base can be summed as "Jam all relevant dual lands in, fill the gaps with 2-6 basics, I'm done." And control decks have gotten really wacky.
Point is, people (As in you) are going to have to think about their mana bases, and actually put a bit of thought into deck construction and *actual* mana curves. The format is going to be *very* different, and personally I believe it is for the better. Even still, 3-color is more than possible. I run a 3-color RUG aggro deck that top 8'd just last night(And a few other times before) in a very competitive meta (Went 4-0-1 in a 60+ person group, beating Gruul, Naya, Junk, and American Flash in clean sweeps not losing a single game, let alone match) with *only* shocks and basics in my deck. At times it was inconsistent as hell, but with proper deck management(And mulls) you can alleviate this a lot. It's just that you won't be able to run everything good in those colors. Which is perfectly fine, once again.
If you're that deep in the gutter during a duel where your last hope is scry 1 and wait a turn, you've probably already lost anyway, scryland or not.
Yes, the Scry 1 is better than nothing. But will it win you the game? No, just like every other late-game land draw.
And if you are that deep in gutter, almost no other alternative is going to do anything at all.
Scry helps a great deal in very critical points in the game. Even Scry 1. I have seen *many* games decided by a single turn of dead-draws (More to the point; decided in the two turns alotted by consecutive land draws where anything else would have changed the outcome at least partially).
The point is that this is a very good late-game play. The decks that really want this type of effect will be much the better for it, and the decks that don't need as much still benefit to a degree.
Alright, I think the complaints about these lands can be summed down to two points:
1. These are bad early-game lands because they enter the battlefield tapped, with no option to untap.
2. These are bad mid- to late-game lands, because Scry 1 isn't very influential.
Both of which I disagree with.
1. They are good early game lands, as there aren't many decks that actually *Want* to play anything turns 1 and occassionally 2. I would rather, in most decks, play a scry land over a shockland turn 1. I can better set up how the game will play out at that point. Turn 2 is a bit more iffy and I can absolutely understand why some wouldn't want to use them.
2. Mid game, absolutely. You can't afford the tempo loss. Late game? Absolutely not. You are enterring a juncture where each and every draw matters. Getting rid of lands is quite important as you don't want them anyway.
And frankly, people are spoiled these days. These should have the option to be untapped? Absolutely not. That would be utterly insane. Even scrying for more is to much, as you could set up your entire strategy the entire game.
That said, these are going to depend *heavily* on the meta game that comes out. If it slows down from current, which I almost guarantee it will, these will be run and be stars of many decks.
Gruul midrange? Well, Domri is going to love these things. Control shells, as I have explained, will love them for their early game and late game utility. The only one that may not is Black shells that run multiples of both Duress and Thoughtseize, which may be a tad much and rather unnecessary. Aggro won't, but aggro needs to die.
It entirely depends if removing the Scry Lands would damage your mana consistency. You might be better off taking out basic lands, sometimes.
The argument that they Scry lands do nothing to help you if your mana flooded is a bit facile because any other land would also do exactly nothing in the same situation. The Scry 1 doesn't guaranteee you won't get flooded, but if you drew a card this could still be true, and dual lands that let you draw a card when you play them would be amazing. Yes, if you play a scry land and filter a land off and hit 4 more lands you still got land flooded, but that's anecdotal. It's not really an argument against the scry being good value on a dual land.
This would also be true if you drew into the M13/Innistrad check-lands. At least this helps somewhat in those situations. The scry lands, at the very least, help minimize the depth of land draws in those late games. They are, however, at their absolute worst in most cases on turns 3-5. Turn 1, I'd rather have them over a hand of checklands(Although I'd far rather have shocks). Turn 2, they are "alright" to set up your play(Although I'd still rather have shocks). Turn 3-5, I'd really want something else. Turn 6+ I almost never care if the lands are untapped or not. You're either dead-to-rights except in those few very narrow situations where that 1 extra land actually matters (Where they hit you for exactly lethal, and that extra 1 mana could go into a Revelation, for example; which is actually quite rare-most decks kill you by 1-3 extra points of damage). The point I'm getting at is that past turn 5 or six, there is rarely a point where being tapped matters much.
Most of the time at that point, it's a few things:
A) you are dead to rights no matter what. That opportunity you cast isn't going to do much if you're dead; and if you are playing Opportunity you shouldn't be in a situation that early where it's the only card left in your hand at that point.
B) You are stabalizing and each subsequent land draw hurts your ability to stabilize.
C) You have locked down the board hard and each land you don't have to worry about helps your board-lock.
D) You are close to winning anyway.
One could argue that if you are in the process of B), these are bad as you will need the tempo gain... well, depends. In some narrow situations (Where a Revelation for 3 would put you 1-but in this situation a Shockland isn't going to help you), it does hurt. It *does* hurt your ability to properly use counter-magic to an extant.
But, it also does a whole load more for you. Helps late-game draws, helps keep boards stable and locked, helps with mana flooding to an extent, and helps you win in many archetypes.
They aren't the be-all-end-all of duals, but they are much better than some are giving them. They are certainly good, and can drastically alter your game-state if used properly.
If you're that deep in the gutter during a duel where your last hope is scry 1 and wait a turn, you've probably already lost anyway, scryland or not.
Yes, the Scry 1 is better than nothing. But will it win you the game? No, just like every other late-game land draw.
Have you ever seen control match-ups? Every single draw matters, even more so in a control-mirror. It's the difference between near total board locks and letting through enough damage to lose. In a control build, you would want these over another 4 basics at least, and you would want them late-game far more than a shock. That scry 1 means that any later card-draw is digging deeper and hit less chaffe.
If you play a scry land turn 5, get rid of a land, your next turn revelation is going to be that much sweeter. Even if you Revaltion *that turn*, if you happened to ditch something to the bottom, your scry is digging just as deep as if the land were untapped. Yes, you have one card less in hand. But if you are srying right, that 1 card is one you don't need right now (Be it a fourth or fifth counter spell, or another land, or something similar; the point is you are choosing what you get).
I think he is saying that if you have a lot of scry lands and you get flooded, not only will you be able to scry 1, but a lot of those lands will probably be scry lands too so you'll be able to scry more than 1 and get through the flood in around 2 turns.
Not really, though that is always a possibility. More to the point, missing 2-3 draws due to land issues can be *huge* in turns after 5 or 6. Every single spell is going to start to count more and more. A major clump-like a 5-6 land clump, can be much more quickly burned through with scry. Equally, it allows you to burn through smaller "clumps" in those turns much easier as well. I find his argument towards it not helping land clumping to be absolutely asinine. Yes, you have no idea how "big" the land clump is, but there is no point, pretty much ever, where I would not want to scry 1 on turn 6 or more over getting another shock out-which will remain tapped.
The point I'm getting at is this: In the late game, scrying 1 is better than practically any other land drop you can have. At the absolute worst case scenario, you scry 1 see a non-land, and leave it. You will have more knowledge than if you just put down a shock tapped and passed. It gets much better, however, if you scry, see a land, and put it on the bottom. This is not a meaningless play like he is trying to make it out to be. It can be *very* important in that part of the game where drawing into spells becomes exceedingly important. Would you rather leave it up to blind luck to draw into your spells, or would you at least have some sort of manipulation on your draws? At that point in the game the tapped part is irrelevant-shocklands are going to be tapped. Might as well get some bonus out of it-and a particularly good on at that.
Oh, sorry, I misread. If you're already land flooded, you should have mulliganed.
Land floods can easily happen turn 3-5. You can start with a "perfect" hand, and still hit land after land after land. It's even happened in some of my hyper-aggro decks that run, depending on the incarnation, 17-20 lands(And yes, I have top-8'd in a very competitive meta with it at least in FNM; I would never run it in higher level play). One game that comes to mind is one where I hit a 6-land clump and proceed to lose with only 18 lands in the deck. It happens. Scry lands help fix these mid to late game floods extremely well, and also allows for 2 land hands to be kept far more often than usual. I cannot think of a single other dual land that does anything like that.
Why do you have a "bad" card in your deck?
If you can't use it in three turns,
It probably shouldn't be in your deck to begin with.
Because on occasion 3-land clumps happen? Or the cards that are shown are poor answers to the given board state? Not every card, even good cards, are the best or even going to help you at all in every board state. It's impossible. If what you dig up isn't going to save you or meanginfully alter the given board state it may be better to to scry it away and hope for something with a bit more impact. The game is pretty fluid, after all, and it doesn't mean you are digging away "bad" cards-just bad draws for a given board state. Which can happen with *any* deck.
Er... I don't suppose you know this at all, but on of the major reasons for rarity is effect on limited. And at uncommon, scrying 1 means that whoever gets a critical mass of these lands has a massive advantage over anyone else.
Rarity means jack-all for the most part in terms of constructed.
Also, I'd like to point out that when the M10-M13 checklands were first spoiled, the range of attitudes from them were "These are terribad, can't play anything turn 1", to "Mediocre, might see play but not likely". And I haven't seen a single post in the thread that actually says that they are *good*. Reading the spoiler thread right now is really fun (It also happened to be that they were released when the rules changes took affect, so there is some bitterness over them).
Looking at the Scars spoiler and thread on their duals shows that even the fast lands weren't without some naysayers. Granted, the majority liked them, but there were some who thought they were terrible.
So, the point is you are somewhat wrong on that point. The checklands were not particularly enthralling when first printed, and there were a good chunk of people complaining about them.
Frankly, I couldn't be happier with these. At least these do something *interesting* and unique over just another set of lands that you need to fiddle with to come into play untapped. These have a good deal more utility beyond mana fixing, which is quite interesting and should alter the format in meaningful, and interesting, ways.
As I've pointed out several times, there is no way these lands *could* have been better. Free scrying and the ability to come in untapped would have been insane. Scrying for more would have been equally so (As you could set up your draw perfectly for the entire game). There isn't a whole lot of design space one can go with here to up the power without breaking them.
Er.. there rarely is. The normal set structure is 3 sets per block, plus core each summer. We got RtR in the fall, which normal for first sets, DGM in winter and DGM in spring. This is all fairly normal block releases. Also, we got M14 in Summer, which once again is the norm. There are rarely deviation in this, particularly in the past... 15 some odd years or so? (with only two possible exception I can think of).
I am personally excited for these lands, more so than checklands or lands that can come into play untapped. They are going to alter the way many decks are played, can do many things that previous lands cannot, and are actually relevant late-game duals. Which is saying something. To me they are the best thing for a standard which has been seeing far too greedy mana bases.
They literally cannot be anything other than rare. Scry is a very relevant ability, and at uncommon they would have turned limited into never-ending scry wars. Scrying *some* in limited isn't a big issue; scrying damn near every turn is. Further more, these will hover in the $5 range for a while I expect. Maybe post RtR rotation they will go up as they become more relevant they will go up. I will fairly suprised if during their standard run they will cost less than check lands. Very surprised. So if you open them, they'll be beter than most junk rares.
In RtR limited, if you are drafting right, you should choose many uncommons and some uncommons over a shockland. Only if you are value drafting would you ever choose a shock. And once again, these will have decent value by virtue of being playable rare duals with a very relevant side ability. They won't be shock level of value, but they will retain some value. Probably that $4-5 range.
Scry 2 on any land would have been bonkers. Scry 2 on a land that could come out untapped is bonkers. For a scry land, they are as good as they could forseeably be.
Frankly, that is more or less untrue. Free scry in limited, particularly in a slower format as Theros is shaping up to be, is incredible. Free scry at any other rarity would have been crippling when playing against anyone who got more than a couple copies of a scry land. It's a very good ability.
The only decks that won't run these are going to be aggro decks. Which frankly need some tempering. When there is very little negligible downside to your mana consistency in 3 color (Which is oddly more consistent than 2-color mana bases), it's a problem. It creates stagnation. What's interesting to note is that Burning Earth has forced people away from 3-color quite a bit, and that standard is far more diverse because of it. When your options are far more limited, creativity is much better.
Only impossible if you don't have any other lands in your hand. Which should be fairly unlikely. In a 2-color deck, you will have 4 of these, 4 shocks, and between 15-18 basics give or take. Generally meaning that you should always have an option for an untapped land turn 1 if necessary. If you have an aggro deck where your hand is nothing but these, you either experience excessively bad luck or incredibly poor deck building strategy. I'm gong to lean on 1, although I have seen asinine things from some people (I have seen Shocks thrown into a deck where it only produced one of the colors the deck needed, but virtue of the fact that it held the Shock status of being good; the person wasn't particularly bright).
If you experience really bad luck, you should mulligan. But then again, it'd be the same as if you had a hand with 3 check-lands for the most part (With the added caveat that you could draw into the necessary land for them to come in untapped; thought it is not a guarantee).
So Combo always needs a turn 1 play, am I right? Or the fact that a good deal of the time mid-range decks in the *current* meta have a turn one play of "Shock tapped, go".
Not every deck is control or aggro, and somebody who says that another is "lousy" at this game certainly should know this. The main archetypes of the game have dozens of variations on them, each wanting something different.
Let's look at what we will have with current knowledge come post rotation for mana dorks (Pretty much only 1-2 cost ones will be relevant):
1 at 1 cmc (Elvish Mystic)
2 at 2 cmc (Zur-Ta Druid and Sylvan Caryatid)
Er... that's it. I *highly* doubt, and would be rather surprised, if there is another 1-drop mana dork in Theros, given that there are already 2 mana producers available in the set so far. Out of the 2-drop, only Caryatid is really going to be very relevant. So there are exactly 2 mana dorks available that *may* see play.
So... what does this means? Well, it means that you won't have access to insane ramp as is the case with the current standard. What it also means is that you are actually going to have to use a little brain power for once to consider your land drops. I'm willing to bet the Caryatid is going to see some heavy play... and in that case why the hell does it matter if the bloody land comes into play tapped? Elves turn 1 into Scry land/Caryatid is a viable play.
In fact, let's look at all 1 cmc cards that we know will be in standard so far that are even remotely relevant:
Rakdos Cackler
Dryad Militant
Deathrite Shaman
Thoughtseize
Duress
Experiment One
Elvish Mystic
Gladecover Scout
Thrull Parasite
Quicken
And there's the list so far known about standard. There will certainly be a few more 1-drops in theros, but not many, and very few are relevant.
Let's consider a few things here.
I'm going to take Shaman right out of the list as a necessary 1st turn play. He's great, but doesn't start working till things start hitting the yard (And he hasn't seen much standard play, but rather modern and legacy play). Thrull Parasite is a possible sideboard option for control build, and frankly doesn't need to be a first-turn play either. So he's out. Thoughtseize turn 1 is probably the best thing you an do, Duress as well but quite a bit behind Thoughtseize. Still, you could safely most of the time use them turn 2 and lose out on nothing. Or you can go for a shock turn 1 to thoughtseize, and a scry turn 2. Either way, that Thoughtseize is hitting before what you are going to use it to remove is hitting the field practically always (If you are taking out a turn 2 play, it better be a golden turn 2 play). So we are left with a grand total of 5 actually relevant turn 1 plays where you want to play them turn 1 practically always.
But here's the thing... those 5 dudes spread quite far apart and would rarely, if ever, go in the same deck. Gladecover Scout would *only* go in a hexproof voltron deck... which don't go off until turn 3 anyway. Mystic is the most relevant turn 1 play, but you shouldn't have a problem in most decks getting him out turn 1 if you have him in your hand, even if you are running "heavy" scry lands. Most deck that run ramp use turn 1-2 to set upt their ramp. A first turn basic/Shock into Mystic still leaves a second turn Scry and Caryatid as a good, possible, and likely option which you wouldn't have done much else anyway. And frankly, aggro shouldn't get 100% consistent mana fixing if it gets greedy in its colors. It wants to win fast, and that comes with certain set-backs. Dryad sees fringe play, at best, and will likely continue to do so. Cackler is mostly seen in RDW... which has no use for duals to begin with. So out of those, only Mystic is affected, and if you play well and build decks properly it shouldn't bloody matter most of the time.
Quicken is in there as is used a cantrip right now in a few decks... but I would seriously question the intelligence of anybody who shocked themselves to Cantrip turn 1.
Is aggro going to want these? Absolutely not. Frankly I don't find that a bad thing. Aggro decks have had far too good a time with their ludicrous mana fixing for the past year, and have barely had to think about their mana bases. The same goes for mid-range, whose mana base can be summed as "Jam all relevant dual lands in, fill the gaps with 2-6 basics, I'm done." And control decks have gotten really wacky.
Point is, people (As in you) are going to have to think about their mana bases, and actually put a bit of thought into deck construction and *actual* mana curves. The format is going to be *very* different, and personally I believe it is for the better. Even still, 3-color is more than possible. I run a 3-color RUG aggro deck that top 8'd just last night(And a few other times before) in a very competitive meta (Went 4-0-1 in a 60+ person group, beating Gruul, Naya, Junk, and American Flash in clean sweeps not losing a single game, let alone match) with *only* shocks and basics in my deck. At times it was inconsistent as hell, but with proper deck management(And mulls) you can alleviate this a lot. It's just that you won't be able to run everything good in those colors. Which is perfectly fine, once again.
And if you are that deep in gutter, almost no other alternative is going to do anything at all.
Scry helps a great deal in very critical points in the game. Even Scry 1. I have seen *many* games decided by a single turn of dead-draws (More to the point; decided in the two turns alotted by consecutive land draws where anything else would have changed the outcome at least partially).
The point is that this is a very good late-game play. The decks that really want this type of effect will be much the better for it, and the decks that don't need as much still benefit to a degree.
Both of which I disagree with.
1. They are good early game lands, as there aren't many decks that actually *Want* to play anything turns 1 and occassionally 2. I would rather, in most decks, play a scry land over a shockland turn 1. I can better set up how the game will play out at that point. Turn 2 is a bit more iffy and I can absolutely understand why some wouldn't want to use them.
2. Mid game, absolutely. You can't afford the tempo loss. Late game? Absolutely not. You are enterring a juncture where each and every draw matters. Getting rid of lands is quite important as you don't want them anyway.
And frankly, people are spoiled these days. These should have the option to be untapped? Absolutely not. That would be utterly insane. Even scrying for more is to much, as you could set up your entire strategy the entire game.
That said, these are going to depend *heavily* on the meta game that comes out. If it slows down from current, which I almost guarantee it will, these will be run and be stars of many decks.
Gruul midrange? Well, Domri is going to love these things. Control shells, as I have explained, will love them for their early game and late game utility. The only one that may not is Black shells that run multiples of both Duress and Thoughtseize, which may be a tad much and rather unnecessary. Aggro won't, but aggro needs to die.
This would also be true if you drew into the M13/Innistrad check-lands. At least this helps somewhat in those situations. The scry lands, at the very least, help minimize the depth of land draws in those late games. They are, however, at their absolute worst in most cases on turns 3-5. Turn 1, I'd rather have them over a hand of checklands(Although I'd far rather have shocks). Turn 2, they are "alright" to set up your play(Although I'd still rather have shocks). Turn 3-5, I'd really want something else. Turn 6+ I almost never care if the lands are untapped or not. You're either dead-to-rights except in those few very narrow situations where that 1 extra land actually matters (Where they hit you for exactly lethal, and that extra 1 mana could go into a Revelation, for example; which is actually quite rare-most decks kill you by 1-3 extra points of damage). The point I'm getting at is that past turn 5 or six, there is rarely a point where being tapped matters much.
Most of the time at that point, it's a few things:
A) you are dead to rights no matter what. That opportunity you cast isn't going to do much if you're dead; and if you are playing Opportunity you shouldn't be in a situation that early where it's the only card left in your hand at that point.
B) You are stabalizing and each subsequent land draw hurts your ability to stabilize.
C) You have locked down the board hard and each land you don't have to worry about helps your board-lock.
D) You are close to winning anyway.
One could argue that if you are in the process of B), these are bad as you will need the tempo gain... well, depends. In some narrow situations (Where a Revelation for 3 would put you 1-but in this situation a Shockland isn't going to help you), it does hurt. It *does* hurt your ability to properly use counter-magic to an extant.
But, it also does a whole load more for you. Helps late-game draws, helps keep boards stable and locked, helps with mana flooding to an extent, and helps you win in many archetypes.
They aren't the be-all-end-all of duals, but they are much better than some are giving them. They are certainly good, and can drastically alter your game-state if used properly.
Have you ever seen control match-ups? Every single draw matters, even more so in a control-mirror. It's the difference between near total board locks and letting through enough damage to lose. In a control build, you would want these over another 4 basics at least, and you would want them late-game far more than a shock. That scry 1 means that any later card-draw is digging deeper and hit less chaffe.
If you play a scry land turn 5, get rid of a land, your next turn revelation is going to be that much sweeter. Even if you Revaltion *that turn*, if you happened to ditch something to the bottom, your scry is digging just as deep as if the land were untapped. Yes, you have one card less in hand. But if you are srying right, that 1 card is one you don't need right now (Be it a fourth or fifth counter spell, or another land, or something similar; the point is you are choosing what you get).
Considering that those are going to be turn 1/2/3 plays almost always and lose effectiveness the longer the game goes on.
Not really, though that is always a possibility. More to the point, missing 2-3 draws due to land issues can be *huge* in turns after 5 or 6. Every single spell is going to start to count more and more. A major clump-like a 5-6 land clump, can be much more quickly burned through with scry. Equally, it allows you to burn through smaller "clumps" in those turns much easier as well. I find his argument towards it not helping land clumping to be absolutely asinine. Yes, you have no idea how "big" the land clump is, but there is no point, pretty much ever, where I would not want to scry 1 on turn 6 or more over getting another shock out-which will remain tapped.
The point I'm getting at is this: In the late game, scrying 1 is better than practically any other land drop you can have. At the absolute worst case scenario, you scry 1 see a non-land, and leave it. You will have more knowledge than if you just put down a shock tapped and passed. It gets much better, however, if you scry, see a land, and put it on the bottom. This is not a meaningless play like he is trying to make it out to be. It can be *very* important in that part of the game where drawing into spells becomes exceedingly important. Would you rather leave it up to blind luck to draw into your spells, or would you at least have some sort of manipulation on your draws? At that point in the game the tapped part is irrelevant-shocklands are going to be tapped. Might as well get some bonus out of it-and a particularly good on at that.
Land floods can easily happen turn 3-5. You can start with a "perfect" hand, and still hit land after land after land. It's even happened in some of my hyper-aggro decks that run, depending on the incarnation, 17-20 lands(And yes, I have top-8'd in a very competitive meta with it at least in FNM; I would never run it in higher level play). One game that comes to mind is one where I hit a 6-land clump and proceed to lose with only 18 lands in the deck. It happens. Scry lands help fix these mid to late game floods extremely well, and also allows for 2 land hands to be kept far more often than usual. I cannot think of a single other dual land that does anything like that.
Because on occasion 3-land clumps happen? Or the cards that are shown are poor answers to the given board state? Not every card, even good cards, are the best or even going to help you at all in every board state. It's impossible. If what you dig up isn't going to save you or meanginfully alter the given board state it may be better to to scry it away and hope for something with a bit more impact. The game is pretty fluid, after all, and it doesn't mean you are digging away "bad" cards-just bad draws for a given board state. Which can happen with *any* deck.