Ancient Tomb Outside of Workshop

[BlackVise]

So, as we all know Ancient Tomb is an incredibly powerful card and a Vintage staple; however, I've noticed that it doesn't see much (if any) play outside of Workshop decks. So - why exactly is this?

A quick analysis of the pros and cons of the card:

Pros:
- Adds to your mana pool, which can be a huge tempo boost on turn one or two.
- Makes it easier to play around Stax pieces.
- Fits into just about any deck that doesn't need early heavy color requirements (i.e. turn one  or  ).

Cons:
- The damage from it can be relevant if you're using Dark Confidant or a lot of fetch lands.
- Doesn't add colored mana to your mana pool.
- Can 'color lock' you if your deck includes a lot of off color mana sources.
- Wasteland-able.

For me, the fact that it's a maindeck answer to Workshop decks that is relevant in every matchup is a huge point in its favor; add in that it can allow you to play pretty much any Vintage card on turn two and it becomes an even more powerful addition to a deck's mana base.

I understand that in a deck which needs a lot of early colored mana for something like Mana Drain, Kataki or Hymn to Tourach could make it difficult to include in some decks, but I feel that due to the fact that a huge amount of Vintage staples only need one colored mana at most that's not a problem for most decks.

So, with those points in mind - why isn't it seen outside of Workshop decks very often, and could it become a part of other archetypes' mana bases?

Thanks for reading!

[Prospero]

One of the locals here ran a U/R Painter/Stone build that I liked quite a bit.  He had some number of Tombs in his deck, I believe three. 

It's definitely a powerful card, but so long as players are committed to three color manabases with basics, I don't know how they're going to run them.  Still, worth trying to figure it out.

[vaughnbros]

The way I see it here are the characteristics of ancient tomb:
1. Its a land
2. It only adds colorless mana
3. It accelerates
4. Its only function is to add mana

1. and 2. make it compete with lands like Wasteland, Factory, Library, Strip, and all of the other colorless lands.  And because of 4., acceleration needs to be more important than utility.

2., 3., and 4. make it compete with Off color moxen, sol ring, mana crypt, and other accelerators, but 1. means that its highly unlikely you will be able to drop it and a colored mana source on turn 1.

There are a few decks that employ the use of ancient tombs:

Workshops:  They need lots of accelerators and dont care about colorless mana.
2 card monte:  This deck wants tons of acceleration at pretty much any cost.
TMWA:  The deck needed acceleration, but it ran the unpowered 8.
Painter decks:  This is another deck that really wants acceleration.

The key here should be that all these decks really want colorless mana. 

Most decks in the current meta dont really have a need for an abundant amount of colorless mana outside of the shops match up.  This makes moxen and the utility lands just superior to ancient tomb in most lists.

[LotusHead]

I always run ancient tomb in my Bomberman builds  (since 2007 or so). It helps with Engineered Explosives, turboing out Trinket Mages, and soon, I will have a foil one

[Lemnear]

I agree that Decks that can use lots of colorless mana like bomberman Profit from ancient tomb but i fear the threshold of colorless mana sources are pretty much filled with moxen etc.

I guess in Legacy this Card is underused to Battle taxing effects like Thalia, daze, spell pierce or the tempo-Meta in general. Turn 3/4 batterskull hardcast, Turn 3 jace, Turn 3 jitte + equip etc. is something worth 2 explore

[LotusHead]

To be clear, I use Ancient Tomb, Strip Mine, Sol Ring, and Mana Crypt (and Drain Mana) as colorless mana options.

Sure, 4 colorless sources sometimes make mulligan decisions hard, but Sensei's Divining Top sometimes handles that.

[xouman]

I played TMWA a lot this year and ancient tomb is x4 always. Not only I can play Moon earlier (or other costly cards), but with a moon in play i don't get more damage with it.

I was also thinking about a mono blue deck and tomb would be a great inclusion, but the deck didn0t seem as powerful as common big blue decks.

Outside monocolor decks it's hard to find a place for a colorless land that also damages yourself...