Synergy Land Cycle

[Zelc]

Grassy Foothills
Land
T: Add 1 to your mana pool.
T: Add R to your mana pool.  Play this ability only if you control a forest.
T: Add G to your mana pool.  Play this ability only if you control a mountain.

Forest Meadows
Land
T: Add 1 to your mana pool.
T: Add G to your mana pool.  Play this ability only if you control a plains.
T: Add W to your mana pool.  Play this ability only if you control a forest.

Prairie Streams
Land
T: Add 1 to your mana pool.
T: Add W to your mana pool.  Play this ability only if you control an island.
T: Add U to your mana pool.  Play this ability only if you control a plains.

Flooded Caverns
Land
T: Add 1 to your mana pool.
T: Add U to your mana pool.  Play this ability only if you control a swamp.
T: Add B to your mana pool.  Play this ability only if you control an island.

Desolate Wastes
Land
T: Add 1 to your mana pool.
T: Add B to your mana pool.  Play this ability only if you control a mountain.
T: Add R to your mana pool.  Play this ability only if you control a swamp.

Name suggestions are appreciated, as are wording corrections and other ideas.

[Zelc]

CURRENT WORDING:

Grassy Foothills
Land
T: Add 1 to your mana pool.
T: Add R to your mana pool. Play this ability only if you control a forest.
T: Add G to your mana pool. Play this ability only if you control a mountain.

Verdant Meadows
Land
T: Add 1 to your mana pool.
T: Add G to your mana pool. Play this ability only if you control a plains.
T: Add W to your mana pool. Play this ability only if you control a forest.

Prairie Streams
Land
T: Add 1 to your mana pool.
T: Add W to your mana pool. Play this ability only if you control an island.
T: Add U to your mana pool. Play this ability only if you control a plains.

Flooded Caverns
Land
T: Add 1 to your mana pool.
T: Add U to your mana pool. Play this ability only if you control a swamp.
T: Add B to your mana pool. Play this ability only if you control an island.

Desolate Wastes
Land
T: Add 1 to your mana pool.
T: Add B to your mana pool. Play this ability only if you control a mountain.
T: Add R to your mana pool. Play this ability only if you control a swamp.

[Matt]

These are really strong in X/y decks (i.e., mostly one oclor with a splash), almost dual-strong.

[Ephraim]

I don't know about that, Matt. I constantly get told that the Tainted Lands (from Torment) are weak cards, even in B/x decks. These don't seem particularly more powerful than those (in fact, upon deeper consideration, they look weaker). They only reward people for playing allied colours. Furthermore, these require both of the land types to be in play to generate both mana. Now, I can understand how the synergy with Dual Lands makes these strong, but once again, they're not stronger than the Tainted Lands. In the presence of an Underground Sea, Tainted Isle is also good as a Dual. Lastly, if I'm running these to fuel a splash, suppose I have 16 Forests and 4 Grassy Foothills. In that case, I ought to be running Basic Mountains instead, which never stop producing Red mana. If the splash is a little bigger and I want 14 Forests, 2 Mountains, and 4 Grassy Foothills, I'd say you're still at the point where Basics are better. In fact, the deck nearly has to be split in half between the two colours before one could run enough of both basic land types to make these generate both colours of mana consistently.

[skecreatoR]

They can't be fetched. They can be wasted. They take 1-2 turns with good landdrops to be useful. They are allied colours only.

I think they are both good and very balanced. These could easily see print, in my oppinion. Nifty cards!

[stijndon]

I've got an idea!

Why not make the GR one produce R when you control a forest, and make G when you control a mountain?

Drop the colourless mana from it, and I think you have a good card. They are better in supplying your colours, much better. But they do nothing on their own, since they've lost the colourless mana.

[Ephraim]

Are you being sarcastic, Stijndon? Read the cards carefully - aside from your suggestion to drop the colourless mana ability, that's exactly what they do now.

And again, I note - why do people say that the Tainted Lands are bad, but make such a fuss over these? Granted, the Tainted Lands are good only for a B/x deck, but I've been told they're bad, even there. In X/y decks, these seem much less useful to the deck than Tainted Lands are to B/x decks.

[Matt]

I don't think the Tainted lands are bad at all. They're just hard to use, since they need like 16 Swamps to run 3 Tainted lands. They're hard to use, but when you DO get to use them, they're awesome.

These have about twice the utility of the Tainted lands - they go in X/y AND Y/x decks.

[Ephraim]

These are much harder to use than the Tainted Lands, though. Tainted Lands require only one land type to produce both colours of mana. These require both land types to produce both colours of mana. You can't run them to assist a small splash, since it'd be better to have 4 Basic Lands than 4 of these. You can sort-of run them to assist a larger splash, but is 15X/4y/4these really enough to expect them to produce both colours very often?

I'm not saying they're bad cards, mind you, only that they're not anything spectacular either. They're decent Uncommons, at any rate.

[Zelc]

Do you think it would be ok if i added:

T: Add X or Y to your mana pool.  Play this ability only if you control another ~name~.

So if you had two of the same synergy lands in play, both colors would be activated.

[Jacob Orlove]

Then these would be really long. Four abilities is probably too many for a land (especially one that would ideally be uncommon).

[stijndon]

Are you being sarcastic, Stijndon? Read the cards carefully - aside from your suggestion to drop the colourless mana ability, that's exactly what they do now.

I am terribly sorry - I really didn't see that, and honestly thought my suggestion would be a good one, instead of a point already made.

So consider my previous error as a confirmation that I aproove of these cards.

[Jacob Orlove]

I think the names could use some work -- particularly the "forest meadows". I'll try to find some suggestions later today.

[Zelc]

Bah.  24 hour clock.

[Jacob Orlove]

"forest meadows" sounds really terrible. The rest, I guess I could live with, although I don't really like them. I just can't think of anything that hasn't been done. Maybe we should make up some place-names?

[ctthespian]

How about Verdant Meadow(s)?

-Keith

[Matt]

peak
butte
mesa
dome
hill
bluff
sierra

thicket
meadow
prarie
field
grove


...from my list of flavor-words.

[Zelc]

Verdant Meadows it is.

[Jacob Orlove]

peak
butte
mesa
dome
hill
bluff
sierra

thicket
meadow
prarie
field
grove


...from my list of flavor-words.

Please use some of these to fix the other names.