[SCD] Crop Rotation

[Mr. Safety]

I've been thinking about a few different cards lately that could be potentially good considering the amount of play that Snapcaster Mage is getting. One of them is Crop Rotation

These are my initial thoughts about it:

1) It allows you to fetch Bojuka Bog in response to Snapcaster Mage, nullifying the card advantage. Playing Bog maindeck gives you better potential game one versus a few other decks that abuse the graveyard (Dredge, Past in Flames, Cephalid Breakfast)

2) It turns any green-producing land into Wasteland. I would have a natural tendancy to play Life from the Loam alongside Crop Rotation, allowing for a Waste-lock.

3) It gives redundancy to any strategic land advantage that Knight of the Reliquary offers. It can hit the field faster and be a reliable way to still pull off Knight tricks if she meets removal.

4) It essentially counters Wasteland for one green mana. If your opponent is relying on Crucible of Worlds/Loam themselves to recur wasteland, you can fetch up Bojuka Bog. If they have non-basics themselves on the table, you can fetch your own Wasteland.

5) It's a tutor that can get man-lands in the mid-late game or any other utility land of consequence (Horizon Canopy, Maze of Ith, Karakas, Dark Depths, Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth, and others I must be missing)

I am interested in hearing from other folks on how useful Crop Rotation is currently in legacy.

(Note to mods: if there is already a thread about this, please redirect me and I will cross over to that thread. Then this can be deleted if neccessary)

[dahcmai]

It's an excellent card to be sure. Problem with it has always been the sheer disadvantage of losing a card to have the effect and the severe pain of getting it countered.

The loss of the land is really rough in legacy so I just can't justify losing that much to a single counter. If you can handle losing a land drop like that, ie having ways to accelerate you land and such, it's amazingly good. 12 post was playing it.

[whienot]

I've been using Crop Rotation to great effect in Shoal Infect where it functions as Inkmoth Nexus 5-8 as well as accessing utility lands like Karakas, Bojuka Bog and Boseiju, Who Shelters All from the board. Uncounterable Intuitions and Show and Tells are pretty good, I hear.

@dahcmai: Having it FoW'd isn't as bad walking into a Daze/Spellstutter Sprite. At least with FoW, they're down 2 cards. But, as you said, it all depends on how well you can operate on few lands.

This thread kinda makes me want to pair Rotation with Snapcaster to have ALL the Wastelands. Probably too mana intensive to be worth it, but insta-speed double Wasteland is intriguing.

[Richard Cheese]

Used to run it in Zoo before I picked up Chain Lightnings. It can actually get pretty stupid with Steppe Lynx and KotR. I hit a guy for 12 on turn 2 once because I opened a hand of land, 2x Rotation, Lynx, fetch, other stuff.

[Pastorofmuppets]

It's not really good, but Rotation can be used as an effective Stifle against Wasteland as well.

[from Cairo]

One can pair it with Sejiri Steppe too to counter removal. I think the theoretical optimal deck would probably be GW(x), to have Knight of the Reliquary for redundancy.

The GW Zenith Wasteland (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?20128-GW-Zenith-Wasteland) archetype seems like a good starting point. Exploration seems like it would help gain board presence while investing mana and cards into chaining Wastelands.

Wastelands, Horizon Canopy, Karakas, Bojuka Bog, and Life from the Loam/Crucible of Worlds probably all have a place in 'the list'.

[Mr. Safety]

It's an excellent card to be sure. Problem with it has always been the sheer disadvantage of losing a card to have the effect and the severe pain of getting it countered.

The loss of the land is really rough in legacy so I just can't justify losing that much to a single counter. If you can handle losing a land drop like that, ie having ways to accelerate you land and such, it's amazingly good. 12 post was playing it.

I think one way is to approach any deck using green and justify what it could do for them:

1) Elves - it can dig out Gaea's Cradle or simply swap one by sacking the targeted one for another one. Plenty of mana in that deck, no land worries really.

2) New Horizons - it can get the Wastelock faster and feeds both Knight of the Reliquary and Terravore. Crucible of Worlds makes it happen.

3) Junk/Rock - if using Loam, it can create a Wastelock. Some (most?) use Mox Diamond so the land count can support Rotation easily enough. Both MD and CR, maybe not.

4) Zoo
Cat sligh - no real use for it. It could potentially beef Steppe Lynx but I think more burn is better, generally speaking.

Small zoo - again, I don't really see a use for it.

Big Zoo - possibly to abuse Wasteland pseudo-Knight-like, but I think the potential of turning top-decked spare lands into Horizon Canopy could be good. Maybe 1-2 copies, but I wouldn't suggest more than that. GSZ seems like a better toolbox.

5) G/W/x Maverick - it can be a reliable way to set up Grove of the Burnwillows/Punishing Fire, but I wouldn't play more than 1-3.

Those aren't the only decks that use green, but those are the ones that jumped to mind immediately.

[dahcmai]

You know, with Leonin Arbiter around, it might be worth playing around with it and Ghost Quarter now that you could reliably hit lands without them getting one. Stinks that you get hit by it also, but you are Strip Mining people and that's usually not a bad thing paying two or not.

[Malchar]

It only really makes sense to use if you already have knight of the reliquary in your deck. Crop rotation is straight card disadvantage. The utility land are great, but they generally don't do things that you can't get otherwise. The only reason that they're good is because you can tutor them with knight essentially for free. I doubt it's worth it to 2-for-1 yourself to tutor them with crop rotation. The only reason it would be good would be to get redundancy with knight. Also, sacrificing the land to crop rotation isn't as bad if the land in your graveyard is pumping your knight. You also get better efficiency out of the "chaff" that your utility land takes up in your decklist since now you have 8 ways to search for it. Also, if you use other technology like crucible of worlds or life from the loam, then you get double use out of those cards as well. Basically, if crop rotation isn't good enough to be used in a knight of the reliquary deck, I doubt it would be good in any other deck. The only exception would be some kind of combo situation like dark depths or gaea's cradle.

[Mystical_Jackass]

I run it in a GW Maverick list. It's friggin sick.

THe correct way to use it is in response to opponent's Wasteland and targets, swap the land for something useful. My deck is unique since I run Thresh too, so I use to build that up as well.

Another thing I do is run 2x Flagstones of Trokair. Against blue, the drawback is getting it countered, so at least this way you actually don't get 2 for 1'd since you still get your savannah.

Must have's:

- Maze of Ith
- Sejiri Steppe
- Wasteland
- Horizon Canopy

Maze can honestly hold off most decks till you gain the dominant CA and board position, I run Library so its only a matter of time till I overtake them. Steppe protects against removal, which can sometimes cost them the game when they're banking on it I found. I run 1x Waste--why? For instance a couple days ago, opponent plays factory then next turn taps out and plays standstill, in response I rotate to a Wasteland. Enough said, some lands must die ^^. I run Horizon Canopy because it's good, not simply to use with Crop, but I have rotated out a flagstones and gone for Canopy when I had a firm board and land position over my opponent.. but very rare, the better play is almost always to save as a defensive tool to protect yourself or creatures imo if you can.

[betterthenandrew]

As with all the 1 mana tutors you can basically go 2 different routes with it: Fair or unfair.

Fair: In a deck like Maverick it can be used to turn superfluous mana sources into more powerful bullets, similiar to what KotR does. Commonly played targets would be Karakas, Grove of the Burnwillows, Wasteland, Maze of Ith, Bojuka Bog, Gaea's Cradle, and Horizon Canopy. Less commonly played options are Sejiri Steppe, Flagstones of Trokair, any number of creature lands, Ghost Quarter, Dark Depths, among others. The problem with fair play Rotations is two fold. First the card disadvantage inherent to the card, which can be overcome by searching for a card that recoups the disadvanatage (such as Steppe countering a Swords) or Sacrificing a land that was going to die anyways. The other, bigger problem is that unlike the other 1 mana card disadvantage tutor this one generates a disadvantage even when countered, and even more problamatic is the tempo loss of losing a land. Getting it FoWed is card parity, but they lost cards in hand, while you lost a land. Getting it Dazed/piereced/etc can be quite crippling. Additionally the standard problem of playing a toolbox is accidently drawing the wrong tool always sucks. When your 3 lands are Bojuka Bog, Sejiri Steppe and Ghost Quarter playing against Zoo things are pretty awkward.

Unfair: In a deck like Elves! it can be a powerful green ritual by chaining Cradles. Instead of an awkward Toolbox its playing a specific role. It can do any of the above should you want, but often you are just using it get 2 or 3 cradles of the course of one big turn.

Lands are incredibly powerful, as are 1 mana tutors, so its difficult to complain about Crop Rotation, but I really feel you should be doing something unfair with it (as is the case with most of the 1 mana tutors). Would love to see it get more play, its pretty insane in my Azusa Commander deck (generally grabbing either Eye of Ugin or Gaeas Cradle).

[jhhdk]

I really like the card. It makes some really insane plays with possible with any landfall card and fetches, but it almost requires Loam and exploration, otherwise getting countered would be too devastating. MM rendered this card completely useless.

[Mr. Safety]

Theoretical core for Crop Rotation abuse:

4x Knight of the Reliquary
2x Terravore
4x Vampire Hexmage
3x Life from the Loam
3x Crop Rotation
3x Raven's Crime
2x Pernicious Deed
3x Maelstrom Pulse or Vindicate
4x Swords to Plowshares

1x Horizon Canopy
1x Wasteland
1x Maze of Ith
1x Dark Depths
1x Sejiri Steppe
2x Tranquil Thicket
2x Barren Moor


A turn one acceleration would be smart given the amount of 3-mana bombs, I'm just not sure if GSZ would be the right move or simply adding in a critical mass of land like 23-24.

@jhhdk: well, Mental Misstep is no longer in the picture. If someone plays Force of Will on Crop Rotation, I'm good with that. I suppose some folks will attempt Daze on it, but the deck should be good at accelerating mana to stay ahead. The most played counterspells besides Force are Spell Snare (no worries) and sometimes Spell Pierce (could be problematic.)

Quoted from Mystical_Jackass:

The correct way to use it is in response to opponent's Wasteland and targets, swap the land for something useful.

And also:

I run Horizon Canopy because it's good, not simply to use with Crop, but I have rotated out a flagstones and gone for Canopy when I had a firm board and land position over my opponent.. but very rare, the better play is almost always to save as a defensive tool to protect yourself or creatures imo if you can.

These are solid reasons for using Crop Rotation. I never thought about using Flagstones or Sejiri Steppe...countering removal with Steppe and maintaining land count with Flagstones finding Scrubland/Savannah while digging out Wasteland/Maze of Ith seems like about as broken as you could get for a 'fair' deck.

[nedleeds]

I play it as a 2 of in my Hexdepths. I think if you have hand information it's a fine card, so paired with some discard like IoK / Hymn it lets you make some pretty sick plays.


2 Liliana of the Veil
3 Vampire Hexmage
1 Dark Depths
2 Crop Rotation
3 Life from the Loam
4 Living Wish
3 Maelstrom Pulse
3 Tarmogoyf
4 Dark Confidant
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Maze of Ith
2 Swamp
2 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
3 Vampire Nighthawk
4 Bayou
4 Wasteland
1 Forest
1 Marsh Flats
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Volrath's Stronghold
2 Darkblast
1 Sylvan Library
1 Bojuka Bog
SB: 1 Vampire Hexmage
SB: 1 Dark Depths
SB: 1 Inkmoth Nexus
SB: 1 Uktabi Orangutan
SB: 1 Yixlid Jailer
SB: 1 Bojuka Bog
SB: 1 Scavenging Ooze
SB: 1 Tombstalker
SB: 1 Tower of the Magistrate
SB: 1 Shriekmaw
SB: 1 Maze of Ith
SB: 1 Ghost Quarter
SB: 1 Karakas
SB: 1 Swamp
SB: 1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale

[Mr. Safety]

I've been testing 2x Crop Rotation alongside the core deck I mentioned a few posts above (with Loam, Knights, Terravores, etc.) and I haven't been dissapointed yet. My favorite use so far is to EOT (opponent) Crop Rotation into Wasteland and crack it. On my turn I dredge 3, get Loam back, play it to get some lands back including Wasteland and hopefully a cycle land, play Wasteland and crack it. The other lands set me up for some brutal Raven's Crime action the following turn. If my opponent is playing a high number of non-basics (Team America, Tempo Thresh) I keep up the Wasteland pressure. Against anything relying on card advantage, I keep hustling Raven's Crime. Cycle lands draw me extra cards and eventually I have enough land to play a Knight/Terravore and start digging.

Right now, I think in this type of setup, 2x Crop Rotation is the right amount. One per game is enough to break open the land-war and feed the fatties. Eternal Witness has been invaluable to get dredged/used resources back like Swords, Pulses, and Deeds.