This card is great in any deck or format in which it is legal. If you didn't rate this 5/5, than you're either at Hater...or an MTG Noob! 5/5
infernox10
★★★★☆ (4.9/5.0)(5 votes)
Let's put it in a way that modern (August 2010) players can understand.
1 in opening hand, including land drop: Vampire Nocturnus (yay vampire tribal -.-)
2 in opening hand, including land drop: hell, any 7 CMC card to be sure. Akroma's Memorial to name a fantastic one, on turn 1.
3 in opening hand, including land drop: Kozilek, Butcher of Truth, Progenitus, Storm Herd on turn 1.
4 in opening hand, including land drop: Well, there aren't any 13 CMC cards out there,
But go crazy on the spells if you got 4 in your opening hand.
The point is, this card puts you several steps ahead of your opponent with no drawback.
This is, single-handedly, the best card in the game.
It can go into any deck without ever hindering it or being a dead draw (even late game, where you can summon big baddies and still have mana to play abilities, ehoes, etc.
Those who say this card is lackluster/bad/not that great/okay simply don't understand how wonderful it is.
And this is why I have to make a list.
BlackLotusIsTerrible
★★★☆☆ (3.1/5.0)(6 votes)
You have to sacrifice it, thats awful. What a bad remake of gilded lotus. Over the course of 4 turns a basic land gives more mana.
GrimjawxRULES
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(3 votes)
Can someone explain to me why the Beta Black Lotus is (as of this post) rated lower than Lotus Bloom?!
tavaritz
★★★★☆ (4.1/5.0)(5 votes)
@infernox10: Sorry, but you cannot get Progenitus out with thee loti, because it needs five colours of mana and three loti can only produce three colours.
But your point is still valid. BL is definately the best card there is. Those who cannot afford it try proxies or play Shandalar.
MasterOfEtherium
★★☆☆☆ (2.0/5.0)(3 votes)
REPRINT
beerious
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(5 votes)
Why are people not rating this five? If this isn't a five then what the heck is? It seems like they will never make a better card than this, so if this isn't rated five than none ever will be. Rate it five, dummies. rate it five.
scumbling1
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(7 votes)
"Can someone explain to me why the Beta Black Lotus is (as of this post) rated lower than Lotus Bloom?!"
I think there is a disconnect for some people between Black Lotus's reputation & price tag and it's actual ability. I've been there myself, thinking in my beginning days "Why is this the most expensive card in Magic? My Dark Rituals are dirt cheap, and not that much worse. Shouldn't the most expensive card in the game do something more flashy?" From that perspective, it's easy to imagine a lot of players thinking of Black Lotus as overrated and not worth the price tag. A card as (in)famous as Black Lotus really needs to impress to live up to it's reputation, and a less-experienced player could easily overlook it as a card that 'just produces mana'.
divine_exodus
★★☆☆☆ (2.8/5.0)(3 votes)
"What a bad remake of gilded lotus."
-----
Ok, you know that this came first, right? Gilded Lotus is a copy of this, not the other way around.
Superfrasse
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.5/5.0)(4 votes)
Black... Lotus... Isn't that great... You guys just think it's great because it's the most expensive card made! ... When would you want a Black Lotus in the middle of a game...? Never... It's only useful for a great start. Such as playing a Ball Lightning... Or maybe 4 Lightning Bolts with one additional land... But Time Walk! Time Walk is great whenever! Think about it. Time Walk, yo ucan use it at turn two for getting one more land to play and draw an additional card, or you could use it late game to attack with your fiercefull beasts. Of course, then we're talking about Blue-Green decks...
However, a deck with 40 storm crows and 2 islands would beat a deck with 60 black lotuses. Don't get too confussled* about the price.
I have a friend who is utterly convinced that this and Ancestral Recall are actually quite bad, and that they are worth 100$ max. If I didn't lose my arm strength in exchange for MTG skillz, I'd punch him in the face until he got that THIS IS SO MUCH FREE MANA THERE IS LITERALLY NOTHING TO COMPARE THIS TO. Geosurge is the only somewhat-comparable card I can think of right now, which provides a bonus of 3 mana... on turn 4, in monored, with restrictions. This does the same on turn 1, in any deck, no restrictions. You wanna play that Phyrexian Obliterator, but you have a Swamp, Island, Plains, Forest, Mountain, the Obliterator, and this in your hand? Go ahead, hell do it TURN 1. Madness. This is worth AT LEAST 1k. BUT, I do think it is overpriced, as I would never pay more than 60$ for a card, and $3000 for a card restricted in Vintage? Meaning I have to buy 55 other $100+ cards? No thanks, I'll pass. Final: 50/5. The. Best. Card. In. The. Game. With the possible exceptions of Ancestral Recall or (I'm gonna say it, don't hurt me please) Jace, the Mind Sculptor, SOLELY because if you had a deck with only land and Lotuses/Recalls it would suck but a deck with only lands and Jace could at least survive a bit longer.
DarthParallax
★☆☆☆☆ (1.6/5.0)(4 votes)
Force of Will is the Magic reason why many people who think this card is overrated.....ARE ABSOLUTELY RIGHT.
The reason why it is so poweful is it's ability to enable such stupid possiblities as:
Turn 1: Swamp, Dark Ritual, Dark Ritual, Buried Alive (3 Phyrexian Obliterators), Dark Ritual, Entomb (4th Obliterator), Dark Ritual, Living End.
Yeah, that's a legit move in Vintage. And there are so much more reliable way to completely destroy the heck out of someone on Turn 1 than 'JUST' four Phyrexian Obliterators.
So, for Combotastic Potential, it LOOKS like it's worth 5 stars, right? Well, if you made a whole class of par-excellence cards worth 5, then yes. But it is not worth '5.1' stars- i.e. it's not the best card in the game.
Because there IS a situation where it's a dead draw- the part of the game where you can't combo out. If your combo is stopped by anything, Black Lotus becomes a dead card, because the normal 'pro' resources: drawing cards, extra mana, extra turns: stop being good as the natural, instinctive Timmy resources: Attack points, bodies for blocking, life points, or at least spells that create more damage/life loss/attack points in some way.
It doesn't affect the board. You shouldn't NEED anything else if you draw it in your opening hand, but if you are in the mid- to late- game because someone Force of Will'd you, and you draw this, you might well be thinking you'd rather have drawn something else- Time Walk in an otherwise 'dead' game is at least '1U: draw a card', and gives you the chance to draw something that can actually win.
Make no mistake, for sheer Potential, Black Lotus outstrips every card in the game- but the 'every deck, every situation, no drawbacks' thing people keep going on about? that's not true-
because this is why we have Blue. Blue gives even Black Lotus a drawback.
between Ancestral Recall and Time Walk, Recall gives more cards for less mana, but Time Walk does so much more than just draw cards for only 1 additional mana, especially if you have permanents of any kind out.
1. Time Walk- useful at any point in the game 2. Black Lotus- it DOES go in any deck, useful in the early game for making sure there's no late game. 3. Ancestral Recall- Time Walk is more worth splashing Blue for, since this can sometimes feel like Black Lotus. drawing cards with no mana to play them is like having lots of mana with no cards to play, and it's not colorless.
These 3 cards will be the topic of Magic debate for pretty much ever. Accept that a consensus will not happen, and that people's Top 3 will be in different orders. But these are the Big Three, period.
Purple_Shrimp
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
@darthparallax you've clearly never played vintage, don't act like you know what you're talking about
Kirbster
★★★★☆ (4.5/5.0)(1 vote)
Strictly superior to $1000.
Ihateworking
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
It kicks ass I own one of these. I'm a lucky guy.
BongRipper420
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(1 vote)
Honestly, I think Time Walk is almost on par with this card, and Ancestral Recall is arguably superior. Not to imply that this card isn't all sorts of game breaking, just that it might not be the absolute best.
There is one advantage to this card over either of the previously mentioned cards, however. This card can be useful in virtually any deck, as opposed to Recall or Walk which are both blue exclusive. Regardless, all three are considered Power 9 for a reason.
An obvious 5/5. Anyone who rates it less doesn't understand the game.
Ibn_Shisha
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
There' a bgs10 Beta on ebay currently for $40k. Or, slightly more than a 2013 Mercedes GLK.
HeraldOfRazia
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
5/5 obviously, now that we've gotten that out of the way. I see a lot of people comment on these kinds of cards with "what were they thinking printing this?" or "It's totally broken any way you look at it, surely they would have seen that when making the card." The answer lies in the very simple fact that the game was new. The main reason why this card and the Moxes are so good is because we are comparing it to all other 14,000+ cards in Magic. Back when the game first started it wasn't as much of a big deal of having 3 mana on turn 1 simply because the options of cards to play were so limited.
car2n
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
Still not as valuable as the love of a good woman.
Comments (27)
Storm Crow needs this for a turn 1 drop.
1 in opening hand, including land drop: Vampire Nocturnus (yay vampire tribal -.-)
2 in opening hand, including land drop: hell, any 7 CMC card to be sure. Akroma's Memorial to name a fantastic one, on turn 1.
3 in opening hand, including land drop: Kozilek, Butcher of Truth, Progenitus, Storm Herd on turn 1.
4 in opening hand, including land drop: Well, there aren't any 13 CMC cards out there,
But go crazy on the spells if you got 4 in your opening hand.
The point is, this card puts you several steps ahead of your opponent with no drawback.
This is, single-handedly, the best card in the game.
It can go into any deck without ever hindering it or being a dead draw (even late game, where you can summon big baddies and still have mana to play abilities, ehoes, etc.
Those who say this card is lackluster/bad/not that great/okay simply don't understand how wonderful it is.
And this is why I have to make a list.
What a bad remake of gilded lotus.
Over the course of 4 turns a basic land gives more mana.
But your point is still valid. BL is definately the best card there is. Those who cannot afford it try proxies or play Shandalar.
I think there is a disconnect for some people between Black Lotus's reputation & price tag and it's actual ability. I've been there myself, thinking in my beginning days "Why is this the most expensive card in Magic? My Dark Rituals are dirt cheap, and not that much worse. Shouldn't the most expensive card in the game do something more flashy?" From that perspective, it's easy to imagine a lot of players thinking of Black Lotus as overrated and not worth the price tag. A card as (in)famous as Black Lotus really needs to impress to live up to it's reputation, and a less-experienced player could easily overlook it as a card that 'just produces mana'.
-----
Ok, you know that this came first, right? Gilded Lotus is a copy of this, not the other way around.
...
When would you want a Black Lotus in the middle of a game...? Never... It's only useful for a great start. Such as playing a Ball Lightning... Or maybe 4 Lightning Bolts with one additional land...
But Time Walk! Time Walk is great whenever!
Think about it.
Time Walk, yo ucan use it at turn two for getting one more land to play and draw an additional card, or you could use it late game to attack with your fiercefull beasts. Of course, then we're talking about Blue-Green decks...
However, a deck with 40 storm crows and 2 islands would beat a deck with 60 black lotuses.
Don't get too confussled* about the price.
(*confussled=confused+pussled, confused - pussled)
Final: 50/5. The. Best. Card. In. The. Game. With the possible exceptions of Ancestral Recall or (I'm gonna say it, don't hurt me please) Jace, the Mind Sculptor, SOLELY because if you had a deck with only land and Lotuses/Recalls it would suck but a deck with only lands and Jace could at least survive a bit longer.
The reason why it is so poweful is it's ability to enable such stupid possiblities as:
Turn 1: Swamp, Dark Ritual, Dark Ritual, Buried Alive (3 Phyrexian Obliterators), Dark Ritual, Entomb (4th Obliterator), Dark Ritual, Living End.
Yeah, that's a legit move in Vintage. And there are so much more reliable way to completely destroy the heck out of someone on Turn 1 than 'JUST' four Phyrexian Obliterators.
So, for Combotastic Potential, it LOOKS like it's worth 5 stars, right? Well, if you made a whole class of par-excellence cards worth 5, then yes. But it is not worth '5.1' stars- i.e. it's not the best card in the game.
Because there IS a situation where it's a dead draw- the part of the game where you can't combo out.
If your combo is stopped by anything, Black Lotus becomes a dead card, because the normal 'pro' resources: drawing cards, extra mana, extra turns: stop being good as the natural, instinctive Timmy resources: Attack points, bodies for blocking, life points, or at least spells that create more damage/life loss/attack points in some way.
It doesn't affect the board. You shouldn't NEED anything else if you draw it in your opening hand, but if you are in the mid- to late- game because someone Force of Will'd you, and you draw this, you might well be thinking you'd rather have drawn something else- Time Walk in an otherwise 'dead' game is at least '1U: draw a card', and gives you the chance to draw something that can actually win.
Make no mistake, for sheer Potential, Black Lotus outstrips every card in the game- but the 'every deck, every situation, no drawbacks' thing people keep going on about? that's not true-
because this is why we have Blue. Blue gives even Black Lotus a drawback.
between Ancestral Recall and Time Walk, Recall gives more cards for less mana, but Time Walk does so much more than just draw cards for only 1 additional mana, especially if you have permanents of any kind out.
1. Time Walk- useful at any point in the game
2. Black Lotus- it DOES go in any deck, useful in the early game for making sure there's no late game.
3. Ancestral Recall- Time Walk is more worth splashing Blue for, since this can sometimes feel like Black Lotus. drawing cards with no mana to play them is like having lots of mana with no cards to play, and it's not colorless.
These 3 cards will be the topic of Magic debate for pretty much ever. Accept that a consensus will not happen, and that people's Top 3 will be in different orders. But these are the Big Three, period.
There is one advantage to this card over either of the previously mentioned cards, however. This card can be useful in virtually any deck, as opposed to Recall or Walk which are both blue exclusive. Regardless, all three are considered Power 9 for a reason.
An obvious 5/5. Anyone who rates it less doesn't understand the game.