An interesting case of the errata slightly changing the play of the card. Given the original wording, if an opponent had three mountains in play and you cast this card with four mana for X, it would have destroyed the mountains and done 4 damage. Now that they equated the damage directly to the mountains destroyed, that's not possible.
It doesn't change how good the card is, because paying that much for a bit of extra burn would be dumb. Just interesting.
Polychromatic
★★★☆☆ (3.5/5.0)(2 votes)
How is a volcano erupting with FIRE and MAGMA and HOT ASH and THE POWER OF MOUNTAINS in any way associated with Blue mana?
Honestly, my very first reaction to this card was to laugh.
Don't get me wrong, it's not bad, it's just... Blue really could do ANYTHING back in the day.
tavaritz
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(1 vote)
RG has told that every color got hosers because they weren't sure if one color strated to dominate. This way you could get antidecks and the situation would resolve. This is blue because red is blues enemy. Tsunami is green.
divine_exodus
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(1 vote)
Volcanoes are blue, are they....
BastianQoU
★★★☆☆ (3.0/5.0)(1 vote)
As a large number of islands are formed through volcanic activity, its flavor fits perfectly. Although, an island destroying a mountain by erupting itself would be a sight to see..
Faidite
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(1 vote)
Volcanic eruption: More deadly than an earthquake.
OmegaSerris
★★★★☆ (4.5/5.0)(2 votes)
The effect seems almost word for word what a red spell would do today. Definitely change the destroy to a sac effect (although, it would be interesting to have red hosing red)
Maybe bring the mana cost to and add something to make the loss of your own mountains worth it, like double the damage? Uncounterable? It would really suck to pay the sac cost (as a modern spell would have it) only to have it countered.
sarroth
★★★☆☆ (3.5/5.0)(1 vote)
I agree with the Guest that this is an interesting effect in Blue, clearly an example of how the Color Pie existed but was far from perfect back in the day. However, I thought direct damage spells were ones that targeted.
As for it being here just because it could balance how Red if Red was too powerful of a color, so would a mass bounce spell like Evacuation that targeted only Red permanents and Mountains. Wizards has certainly come a long way since this!
HuntingDrake
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(1 vote)
Apparently this had the more intuitive "destroy X, deal X" template until Revised, when a minor interaction with Consecrate Land and Pyramids was inexplicably introduced.
This would make perfect sense as a red card that destroyed Islands. Heck, Active Volcano already relies on that flavor!
Comments (14)
yes, really!!"
It doesn't change how good the card is, because paying that much for a bit of extra burn would be dumb. Just interesting.
Honestly, my very first reaction to this card was to laugh.
Don't get me wrong, it's not bad, it's just... Blue really could do ANYTHING back in the day.
Although, an island destroying a mountain by erupting itself would be a sight to see..
Maybe bring the mana cost to
As for it being here just because it could balance how Red if Red was too powerful of a color, so would a mass bounce spell like Evacuation that targeted only Red permanents and Mountains. Wizards has certainly come a long way since this!
This would make perfect sense as a red card that destroyed Islands. Heck, Active Volcano already relies on that flavor!
It's even more surprising that this never had a red version when you consider all of the mirrored 2-card cycles in Alpha, like Red Elemental Blast/Blue Elemental Blast and Fire Elemental/Water Elemental.