The W6 ultimate requires more setup for retracing, though. This + Trade Routes allows repeatable recursion at a minimal opportunity cost. There's a good reason why cards like Snapcaster, Arcanist, Baby Jace, etc. exile the cards to prevent such cases.
We'll see how those kind of decks are going to turn out, but with stuff like on-demand Terminus, I have a very bad feeling about this.
Terminus decks aren't renowned for playing Daze/recurring lands to hand. There's also a significant issue with getting to 3 Island on board while moving away from Tundra and still trying to cast spells. If you're recurring Terminus like this, it could be any wrath card at all (5 lands on board: 3 Island, 1 Plains, 1 Sanctuary). While it's cool that it's tutorable, this trick has existed since before Terminus existed (Noxious, which can also rebuy PWs and has offensive uses).
Best way to lose a game as UW: playing Tundra into “just got Waste’d out of the game,” doubly bad if your opening hand is forced Tundra play.
The other card is Vista, which is just free win % for UW (uninteractive basic openers cut down drastically on avoidable losses to unstable mana). There are fewer Fetches for the new Mystic Sanctuary, and it gets even worse if you make the play of Fetch Tundra vindicating yourself away from the ability to tutor the new land.
A 2-color deck can now run 8 fetches that each get either basic (e.g. 4 Flooded Strand + 4 Prismatic Vista for Island or Plains), which was not at all possible pre-Vista and allows consistent color-fixing without the usual blue fetch into duals. Arcum's Astrolabe smooths out the basic manabase even more.
The drawback is the manabase now has fewer "Island" fetches, making it harder to get both Tundras and Mystic Sanctuary in play (i.e. with a Vista manabase you are not going to have 2 Tundra + Island when you drop Sanctuary as your 4th land), making this card pretty bad even as a 1-of. The decks most likely to stick to blue fetches + duals are decks like RUG Delver and 4c, but they're also less likely to want an ETB tapped monocolored land that's only good as the 4th-5th land drop.
Daze can abuse the ability, but decks that run Daze aren't playing for the lategame. (Edit: Maybe Stasis.dec wants this)
Ah thanks for the explanations!
So from the above I gather the proper home for this deck is a Uxx+ Control Deck? Something like Team America? But then you're also right that in such a deck the issue would become managing your islands . . .
The new land is less of a slam dunk than I initially thought - but I still fee like it has a home somewhere.
Actually, lol - what about monoblue control?
Prismatic Omen decks like these new lands a lot.
It's a neat set, personally I'm looking forward to playing a bunch of Abzan Giants/Adventure on Arena. Probably not the best deck, but fun, and good enough to be competitive, and at this point, that's pretty much all I care about.
I think it's still very interesting as a singleton in spiral tide.
-rob
So just to verify, there are no foil theme cards right?
Yeah my guess is the most natural homes are monoblue decks that want to hit 4+ lands (High Tide) and Uxx control decks that still tilt towards blue duals over basics and expect to play many lands (RUG Waterfalls?).
Spiral Tide could run 8-10 fetches + 1-2 Mystic Sanctuary + 8-9 Snow-Covered Island and use it to recycle combo pieces. I see no reason for them not to run it actually. Worst case scenario you're forced to play it early and have 1 less mana to cantrip turns 1-3 before going off. That's a minor drawback compared.
Ghostly Flicker is a fun interaction there.
I think the issue there is that you'd playing Ghostly Flicker, a 3 mana do-nothing, for a land that puts a spell atop your deck should you happen to have 4 lands on the table. At those costs, you have two cards competing directly with being 2x JTMS. They could also just be Snapcasters.
The easiest way to unlock Mystic Sanctuary is Daze. The issue is what deck plays at least 3 basic Island, Daze (Wasteland is implicit here), and actively pursues play patterns of multiple Island Fetching openers. You're looking at the pseudo-Delver family of decks: UBx Reanimator, UB[x] Shadow, UG[x] Infect, and Ux Dreadnought. The issue with the first three is the inability to stick to heavy blue openers [they also lack 3x basic Island, increasing variance. their land counts also run too low], but none of these four has CA stapled to instants or sorcs. The same is true of budget Delver (UR) - they aren't great at the mono-U openers, and they jump through hoops just to put a cantrip or Bolt back atop their deck???
High Tide has an issue with its payoff cards shuffling their top of deck, but maybe it's okay in the board vs discard-centric strategies. Adding it to SnT seems pretty dubious as they kinda die to creatures around 4th land drop anyways (and they don't draw necro'd SnT until turn 5). Worse versions of SnT without SnT [i.e. Splinter Twin which is a worse version of As Foretold, both run Chalice] aren't competitive, but I mean one of them could re-up a Balance or Ancestral...so I guess it's an automatic 1x in As Foretold. As we follow the path of increasingly unplayable we'll note that UR good stuff (basically the same deck as Blue Moon) runs back into the problem of no instants/sorcs to justify a Sanctuary. Theoretical decks using artifacts are drowned in card draw (PO, Thoughtcast, Reverse Engineer, TFK, to name a few) to the point that Sanctuary isn't needed.
While Mystic Sanctuary seems sweet, there's pretty high burdens to playability. Even if you get to the point of having a reason to play it, you've got a harder battle as you're destabilizing a mana base (for the tutor aspect) versus Noxious which is free, offensive & defensive, is seen by Snapcaster, and manabase-stabilizing (necros lost lands). I think Mystic Sanctuary probably belongs to Landstill with Daze [which is exactly Dreadstill], but not sure what there is to get back that we care about other than wanting to re-buy FoN to exile recursive spells. The next best candidate is buying back [???] Veil of Summer, but pure UG lacks removal (dead by that turn 5) and if you're adding colors to UG you're on Wrenn, so just play a Sandbar.
In High Tide decks it effectivey untaps 2 lands while simultaneously putting another tide on top of the library. That is interesting, if not necessarily optimal.
High Tide can fetch it during the combo turn just before casting a cantrip. Mystic has land type Island, which is very significant for the deck.
e.g. T4 Fetchland. Tap 1st Island. High Tide. Tap 2nd Island for UU. Crack fetch for untapped Mystic, putting High Tide on top of library. Brainstorm/Ponder. High Tide. Tap 3rd Island and Mystic for UUUUUU. Spiral/Turnabout/whatever.
Recycling either a High Tide or Turnabout at a strategic time could be the difference between going off and fizzling. Yes Spiral shuffles, but the deck has a lot of other ways to access the top card. Even USZ lets you draw first before shuffling.
Against discard the card becomes even more useful, allowing you to EOT fetch Mystic to put a discarded card on top, draw it, and go off. Mystic also lets you counter a game-ending Surgical Extraction on High Tide if you just play an extra land (4 Islands + 1 fetch) and save the fetch for protection.
RUG Waterfalls may be the best As Foretold deck. That deck is grindy enough that a 1x to recycle Crashing Footfalls or Ancestral Vision or removal could be good.I mean one of them could re-up a Balance or Ancestral...so I guess it's an automatic 1x in As Foretold.
Dreadstill could happily buy back FoW/FoN under a Standstill lock or even Stifle/Brainstorm/removal outside of the lock, not terrible for a 1x.I think Mystic Sanctuary probably belongs to Landstill with Daze [which is exactly Dreadstill], but not sure what there is to get back that we care about other than wanting to re-buy FoN to exile recursive spells.
Intuition is still the best with this land.
Entomb is like mystical tutor with this card.
-rob
While true, there is little difference between Noxious and Vamp. Tutor in decks that go long. Also, Personal Tutor does most of what you're describing without needing a second card.
The other issues with Entomb so that you can put a spell on top of deck with a second card are:
-losing 2 slots
-why aren't you making a Grisel
-wouldn't you just play Entomb + JVP (+Grisel)
-how exactly are you going long in a deck with Entomb
The 2nd card requires no slot, as long as you're okay with a fetchable non basic that sometimes can't tap. I'd be happy with an end step turn 2 entomb + fetch.
-rob
I should read the card. Thanks!
-rob
No deck I know plays Foil, but this could interact well with foil in like a mono blue control. Discard to Foil - Counter Spell - then your turn cast COW - play it from your GY, get foil or another spell on yop of your library. So a base like the following to work with.
4 Mystic Sanctuary
4 Waste Land
8 Fetch
8 Island
4 COW
4 FOW
4 Foil
4 FOW
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
12 Open?
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