Quote Originally Posted by TheInfamousBearAssassin View Post
My experience? Playing around Wasteland sucks. For one thing, often you need double Blue, for either Counterspell or two cantrips at once;
Yeah, you want two blue sources. That's why there are sixteen of them in the deck. Sixteen is enough to function.
and that Forest was awful, as I said, in an opening hand, akin to a forced mulligan.
Unless you have a good use for green mana or are playing against a deck with Wasteland.
My experience is also that playing around Wasteland like this makes Rishadan Port kick your ass. Most of the deck costs 1. I'd rather have two trops and get one Wasted, than have a Forest and an Island and have either one get Ported.
You're still talking about it as a land slot, which is incorrect. With sixteen blue sources, I am comfortable with the deck's ability to find two of them. Again, I'm not sure where you're experience comes from, but my experience in testing and in tournaments for the past couple years says that Rishadan Port will target green sources. They can almost never cut you off of blue, so they target the next most important. In this situation, any extra green source helps you get through it.
That and with a basic island + basic forest you still can't cast StP.
StP is far weaker than a creature, there are half as many of them, and you can even cast it in response to Wasteland.
If the forest was another Trop in that scenario, they still couldn't cut you off of either Blue or Green with a Wasteland. Heck, if it was a Savannah at least they couldn't cut you off of any color.
I was responding to the suggestion that Forest should be replaced by Island. But yes, you are correct that sometimes you can just as easily run on nonbasics. That's why fetchlands are great and why there is only one Forest.