Pointed Discussion

Hot new art for the returning duel lands. Awesome.

Pro tip: Use this land in your black and red decks.

Ah, Blood Crypt, the only shockland that comes close to making sense flavor-wise.

There's really only one thing to do.

Lightning Bolt.

Read the M10 Flavor Text. Repeat 10 times on Blood Crypt, Overgrown Tomb, Hallowed Fountain, Temple Gardens....

Hmmm seems like a "win more" card to me.

Liliana of the dark realms has a sweet new land to search for, as well as Overgrown Tomb

This weekend (during the prerelease), I overheard a couple players trying to figure out why everyone was going so wild about trading for these cards. I slightly envy the awe they will feel when they finally realize how powerful these cards are, and how much it will change how they play the game after realizing how unimportant your life total really is.

Drool.

When you're in a place that has corpses hanging on the walls and the floor is on fire, it's time to leave.

@Demento, I have to disagree. To me most of the shocklands can be somewhat justified flavor-wise. Remember that life loss doesn't always have to mean injury/dying in a literal sense.

All of the black guilds can involve this sorts of tradeoff and have philosophies that can explain why/how they would exchange life for mana. In Rakdos it's because of a sometimes-sadistic sense of hedonism and complete self interest, and in Golgari it's the cycle of life and death (one thing dies/loses life, which leads to the creation of new life/energy/mana). In Dimir it makes me think of the sort of shady deals made in an alley that are as likely to leave you with a knife in your back as with some benefit, and in Orzhov it would be a more figurative stab-you-in-the-back deal (which banks can be very good at pulling off).

For Azorius, I can imagine that the drudgery of all the rules, regulations, and hoops you have to jump through just to get a little something (like one mana) would make a person feel drained/lose a bit of life. And in Izzet I can see it representing the reckless impulsiveness of a mad scientist - or maybe the Steam Vents just scald you if you use them without enough caution. Breeding Pool's flavor could be explained as the biological manipulation and mutation caused by Simic experiments. The Selesnya and Boros lands are the only ones that are a little strange flavor-wise, and even there it's possible to imagine some plausible if somewhat tenuous flavor interpretations.

4/5.

OH gOD EVERYBODY THE FLOOR IS LAVA


I love it!

- Unknown Rakdos Real Estate Agent

These reprints are costed so much lower that I've found myself shelling out more for lands than I ever would have. Not sure if the prices will last, but it's nice to have some of the most powerful lands in the game at my fingertips without being hundreds of dollars in the hole lol.

5/5 for my favorite land ever printed, the name, the artwork... Good job Vincent! GO B/R!!!

Part of a ten card cycle:
Hallowed Fountain
Watery Grave
Blood Crypt <-- You are here.
Stomping Ground
Temple Garden
Godless Shrine
Overgrown Tomb
Breeding Pool
Steam Vents
Sacred Foundry

For me this is unquestionably the coolest shockland.

Why does Wizards think we're morons? We know that Land - Swamp Mountain can be tapped for or . We don't need any remainder for that. The remainder text ruins otherwise very elegant card.