Re: Temple of the False God, I've got two deck lists that run it successfully. One, as Seth mentioned, is a colorless Eldrazi deck, where I run enough lands that waiting to drop this on turn 5 is totally fine for the extra mana. The other is an Izzet storm deck that focuses on reducing the mana cost of instant and sorcery spells and playing things like Snap, Frantic Search and Rewind. Having an additional land that can tap for 2 and generate extra value off of being untapped has never been a downside. The biggest thing to be cautious of is keeping a sketchy opening hand with this land in it, or a hand with 2 or 3 land where you REALLY have to draw a not-Temple of the False God land. It hasn't been a problem in any of the games I've played with these decks. I don't think it's good in the majority of decks, but there can be uses.
Even with 4 land hand sometimes you dont even draw 5th land after 5-6 turns. You have to treat this like a 5-drop artifact so I’d definitely put it in D-tier. Ancient Tomb and Guildless Commons are way better
My worst experience with it is keeping a 3 lander and drawing it as my fourth land. I reconfigured the deck somewhat afterwards to avoid that. It punishes greedy deckbuilding which is why it's super unpopular haha Although as Tomer said, if you ramp on t2 and t3, then play Temple on t4, you're on 7 mana. So if your green deck has a super high density of 6/7mv cards with at least (2) in their casting cost, you can make it work.
Temple is good also in a "Mitch" deck where, Wayfarers Bauble, Sad Robot, Burnished Hart or any artifact land ramp that can reuse or double the effect. Emry is an example where I can see it used, maybe mono blue eldrazi styled decks.
@@rough111 i hate the 5 drop argument. you can cheat 5 drops in so many different ways. you can't cheat into this "five drop" the same way you can the new urabrask - and when you do "get it out ahead" it's usually not very impactful or a color detriment
I never thought I would again be happy with Temple of the False God in a deck, until I built Orvar. More than once I have played it and copied in order to turn both of them on. Potent.
That's really neat but for me it doesn't really make it good, you can copy a lot of better things that take up this cards slot. A land you can't play in an opening hand is unplayable. I say this as someone playing unplayable cards in a spikey playgroup. Like copying a bunch of Colossal Dreadmaws is potent, but I'd just laugh if I saw it.
I play Mosswort Bridge (the green hideaway land), in my simic sea monsters and mono-green voltron decks and that card does a lot of work. Being able to cheat a huge 7-9 mana sea monster into play for just 2 mana at instant speed is amazing. The fact that hideaway works around the spell's timing restrictions is super underrated.
"B is for cards that are good in certain kinds of decks." Tomer: I think this works in [one kind of deck], so I give it a B. Everyone else for like 15 minutes: this card is NOT an A what are you talking about!?
I think the thing they missed was that much like MDFCs, it's graveyard hate in a land slot. You don't have to cut synergy pieces in your deck slots for it
@@kingfuzzy2 probably because graveyard is laughably expensive and not a notable "auto include" like duals. idk why people even talk about og duals like they are playable.
@@wesleywyndam-pryce5305 I proxied the graveyard for a few decks and there are far more than enough ways to fix Mana that the duals aren't even needed anymore.
I feel like you could've talked about High Market, Myriad Landscape, Homeward Path, Path of Ancestry, Bonder's Enclave, Rogue's Passage and so many more... Just reinforces the point that there's very many these days and choosing can be hard. Here's one you might not know yet: *Tower of the Magistrate* It enters untapped, taps for a colorless, or you can pay {1} and {T}ap it to give target creature protection from artifacts. Doesn't sound useful? This can completely shut down Voltron players. Forever (while you keep paying {2}). Just activate it in response to them trying to put Swiftfoot Boots on their commander, or trying to equip something high value like Sunforger. It'll stop that equip ability, and they can't do it again for the rest of the turn. If you have Voltron players in your pod, this card is so worth it, I can't even count how often it made the matchup favorable for me any more. And nobody notices the card, too. Oh, and it can also make you able to block Blightsteel Colossus or whatever other big artifact threat is coming your way. And some players still use artifact interaction like Unstable Obelisk, etc. And as a cherry on top, you can disable blockers like Solemn Simulacrum with it. It is also inexpensive. Highly recommended.
Unfortunately with Blightsteel, Protection is a VERY bad idea to block with. All the damage will go straight to your face and none of it to your blocker.
I think that's the more important question - WHICH utility land to include? Assuming 2-3 slots or so, and 10-12 options that all are decent picks, how does one go about choosing?
@@MaxMckayful the ones most critical to your success so whatever makes you more consistent or gives you needed interaction. and if you wanna play more, play a 1-2 color artifact tool box or artifacts matter deck and 50% or more of your permanents will be colorless which helps these be less of a detriment. also theres SO MANY cards that make all your lands all types and/or tap for any mana as well as cards that let you spend mana as though it were any color. make your 1-3 drops colorless or mostly colorless and you should be able to fix in time for the big stuff while having a load of utility lands.
I feel like they generally are underrating the castles because the opportunity cost is pretty low. So long as it isn't your first or second land they are basically basics with upside if you don't have much to do with your turn
Given how weak the blue/white/red ones are, you need the opportunity cost to be VERY low in order to justify them, and I think they're higher than they seem. I would never run them unless I was 100% sure they would always be untapped, which means I would only run Vantress in a deck full of islands and maybe one other utility land. Like it's hard to overstate how unappealing the 5-mana scry ability is in commander. That's really an ability for 1v1 where you can predict that a given deck will end up in grindy topdeck games fairly often.
dies to blood moon dies to back to basics slow to archon of emeria not fetchable alternatively: not playing a dual instead Those are quite high opportunity costs
Given how they all insisted that a land that ramps you from 4 to 6 mana (Temple of the false god) is unplayable but castle garenbrig which ramps you from 4 to 6 is S-class i would say they are overrating at least that one.
I feel like if we get more cards like urborg and yamivaya, temple of the false god could see more play and be better. I would play it specifically in golgari since I auto include both those lands and making the downside way less
I feel like the low opportunity cost of the castle cycle was undervalued a bit in this assessment. Very easy for them to be untapped and then a minor/medium effect as an instant-speed option? Pretty good imo
They're good in the same decks as reflecting pool. If you are greedy for colored mana or your commander has a multiple of the same colored pips in its cost. Otherwise you would probably prefer fetchable and or untapped lands.
I am now convinced that Blood Moon is a must play judging from you guys obsession with utility lands, Tomer is the only responsible person who has clearly had the fear of the Blood Moon instilled in him.
The problem with Blood Moon is that you're basically locked into 1-2 colors, and one of them has to be red. It's devastating if you get lucky and nobody can cast their spells, but one enchantment removal spell and a basic to cast it ruins your whole plan and leaves your opponents miffed but pretty unharmed. In commander, where there is no real "meta," building hate decks is almost always doomed to fail.
@@drpibisback7680 nah, you could use it in 3 colors, as long as one is green. (Still limiting, but it hasn't bitten me too hard compared to my opponents)
@@drpibisback7680 Your logic in why it locks you into 1 or 2 colors is the same argument I make against Cedh forcing you to play blue and sometimes black. But there are other "Blood Moon" like effects that are just as good. A Wave of Vitriol would do wonders against the MTGGoldfish meta. Contamination in black and Stormtide Leveathan are 2 others I can think of. But, destroying nonbasics is easy and has been supported in the format across the color pie
@@drpibisback7680 nah hate decks should work wonderfully if built and piloted correctly. but everyone throws a tempertanrum at interaction in commander so people seem to cut the cards they should be playing as hate. in particular "stax" pieces.
The one deck i run temple of the false god in is Gishath which costs 8 mana. Ive got 36 lands + 15 ramp spells that fetch lands. A third land that taps for 2 mana is huge to get closer to gishath.
Ok, I will have to take a moment to defend my pal Crim here when it comes to Castle Vantress, this card has saved me so many times, flash decks just love it, you get to use your mana when your counters didn't find a target and can be a life savior if you were gonna get flooded and you really needed some interaction to save your skin. Also, I am biased cuz I play a LOT of Fires of Invention and since you never tap your lands to cast things you can easily use Vantress to scru for 2 at the end AND at the beginning of your turns since you never need your lands to casts stuff, I believe the ability to never burn your mana and using efficiently, even if it is to scry 2, it is worth it, in top deck mode? oof Letme scry for my answers while you are praying to the gods to not flood and keep getting lands *chef kiss* Castle Vantress is my crib, baby!
TEMPLE OF THE FALSE GOD: Okay, after having the day off work and spending some time conducting my own research and thoughts, I want to give my own thoughts on this card, provide my own research numbers, and then give an overall opinion. I'm going to break this up into multiple sections, starting with: THE REPUTATION: Temple of the false god has a very bad reputation, ranging from humorous hyperbole to straight up overblown detest. Recently, I put together a mono blue stompy sea creature deck with Nezahal as the commander. Being a mono blue deck with a high mana curve and a commander costing 7 mana, I decided to run Temple as one of my lands. Anecdotally speaking, the card has worked wonderfully. And every time I play it, someone at the table always cracks the same joke. "I've never seen it work before" Like the fact that I got it down with four or more lands was an impressive feat. I love that kind of banter but it got me thinking: People are far too salty about this card. The fear of Temple not working has blinded everyone into thinking that getting it to work is difficult and this has lead to a player base that is taking their criticisms of this card WAY TOO FAR and way off in the wrong direction. This is why I am here to give you: THE FACTS: probability is a huge factor in what makes this card what it is. What is the probability that you will have four lands in play on turn four, thereby allowing you to play this on turn five and activate it. Here are my findings: Let's say you're running a 37 land hand and you have three lands in your opening hand. That's seven cards right there. Then you need to get to turn 5. That's four draw steps and then on turn five you play temple. For the sake of these numbers, we are going completely on one card draw a turn. Of course, if you run a ramp spell or card draw or even scrying effects, these percentages fall far more in favor of temple. You have roughly a 12% chance that Temple shows up in your opening hand or in the first five cards you draw. Beyond that you draw it later at which point I hope to god you have enough lands to make it work. So going from there, with three other lands in your opening hand, you need to draw one land in four turns. The odds of you not drawing a single other land on four straight draw steps in a 37 land deck are 15.8%. drawing one more card reduces it to 10%. One more card and you're down to 6%. so in the average deck, one with no card draw being played in the early game, no ramp spells being cast, no scrying, etc. you have a 12% chance of having a 15.8% chance of failure. That's 15% of 12%. The vast majority of the time it's either coming down active or you never draw it. And this is the average build. If you're running a deck with a lot of card draw, looting effects, or ramp, your percentages are so far in your favor that chances of failure are marginal. If you're keeping opening hands with low land counts or playing decks with low land counts, you're putting yourself in a position to get mana screwed and that's on you. Also, playing temple on turn four and top decking a land on turn five isn't the worst thing in the world. For one, you aren't missing your land drop, and two, that next land puts you right back ahead in total mana available to you. It feels like playing a tap land but it's far better than missing the land drop altogether. SO SHOULD YOU PLAY IT? Do you want free ramp? Then maybe. Colorless eldrazi decks have no choice. You need a ton of mana and you need to get it by any means necessary. This card will show up in every kozelik deck for the rest of time. decks where your commander costs 6 or more mana should consider it as it can get your commander out a turn early. Obviously color intensive decks don't want a colorless land so I wouldn't for a five color deck unless that deck has a nasty mana curve that forced you to play a ton of ramp. And decks that ramp hard want temple because they're also running big spells and if they can get away with running temple safely and casting haymakers quicker then why not? Asking why mono green ramp decks need temple is like asking why control decks need counterspells or why elf ball decks need elves. It's what it does. Run it in a commander deck based around casting spells with (X) in the casting cost. Those kinds of decks are happy to draw temple super late as it makes their win con X spells super splashy, while drawing a tapland feels really bad. Also run it in decks where the commander has an activated ability that can be triggered multiple times. Emiel decks would love temple super late because it would nearly pay for a whole blink on it's own. These are decks that have abilities to sink as much mana into that they can and that makes temple a welcome draw at any stage of the game, whereas a super late temple isn't great in some decks that have nothing to do with it. WHEN YOU GET DOWN TO IT: Temple is a free ramp spell. Unlike most ramp spells where you invest your mana into a rock or into a kodama's reach in order to have more mana in the future, temple is a play and pay kind of card. Grip it and rip it. No mana investing needed. And that's the beauty of it. And me personally, I like playing more "fun" decks and sometimes this means running cards with higher CMCs. Truthfully, I can't even count the number of times Temple has let me get away with running jank builds. Ramping me for free in the mid game so I can play my big stuff in the late game. These are the cards I want to play and I refuse to lower my curve to play cards that don't make me happy. IN CONCLUSION: Be responsible with your landbase. Treat your landbase as if temple of the false god is always in your deck. Because if you're missing land drops consistently on turn four like all of the Temple haters seem to do, then you seriously need to play more lands. Really ask yourself. "How many times am I mana screwed with only three lands in play?" and that'll give you a good idea on how consistent temple would be in your deck. Anyways, that's my take. To anybody who made it this far, I hope you enjoyed my perspective and I hope I made you look at this card differently. And thank you guys for the great Magic content. Love what you do.
I agree with you overall - Temple of the False God gets its bad reputation from greedy manabases where people cut to 34 lands, and then they spend all their mulligans to look for 3 lands opening hand, only to end up topdecking Temple as their fourth land and then not drawing their fifth land in time. If you run closer to 40 lands you're way more likely to have three in opening hand, and then with four draw steps you're quite likely to have found a fourth & fifth land. The fail case exists but it's mitigated even further by any card selection. I run a Rona, Herald of Invasion deck with about 38 lands, and with a 2-mana looter in the command zone I would have to stumble pretty hard to end up flopping Temple of the False God as land 3-4 only to go on and miss.
Right off the bat I agree with Tomer on Temple of the False God. I only play it in green decks with multiple sources of land ramp. It does very well in my Titania deck, which basically any utility land I have in there does lol.
The misunderstanding of Mosswort bridge is astounding. You don't need a 10/10 for it to work. It reads total power so 5 2/2s works. It's my favorite tapped land
I liked seeing recognition for the hideaways! Windbrisk Heights and Spinerock Knoll (white and red) are as playable as everyone said, but I want to further support Mosswort Bridge (green). The condition is so easy to meet in a green deck in commander, and even if it's not a go tall deck like the mentioned Xenagos, any 4+ mana value card is a great outcome, and I'm pretty sure the effect lets you play a land outside of the one-per-turn limit too. Even smaller cards are coming off the top of the library instead of your hand (similar to red's pseudo-draw effects), and even if you get NOTHING playable, it gets a clump of cards you didn't need out of the way.
great video but PLEASE add Phil to the commander clash crew podcast! He'd fit so well with the group, as we've seen throughout his time on the Commander Clash gameplay :)
@@ms.sysbit5511 yeah thats true I guess, but I love the longer videos personally so I wouldn't mind if they were longer as a result so everyone could adequately get their thoughts in.
War room, endless atlas, and staff of nin are mono color auto incudes for draw power. They are budget friendly too since all 3 will run you under $12 total. In mono red loreseeker stone is clutch and in mono white gift of estates is heavily slept on among other budget land tax effects.
Great timing for this episode, as I just recently embarked on my first colorless deck. Interesting to hear the discussions regarding color-based lands, but the non-color lands are even more relevant to me at the moment. Very helpful info! (I for one do also like the longer episodes like these.)
For me the question with the castle cycle is "Are they worse than a basic?". I probably wouldn't play them in four or five color, they would come in tapped too often.
"Green already has ramp, why does it want this?" Because it's a *utility land.* Tomer's swayed me on this, and I'll be putting this in Brinelin / Gilanra + Keruga.
I don’t even get how qualifies as a utility land. It’s just extra mana. Utility to me means you play it for reasons other than mana. Unless you argue that every land is a utility land, which isn’t untrue but it defeats the purpose.
@@PalPlays I guess? Still doesn’t feel like a utility card. Bounce lands have way more utility than Temple, but those aren’t usually considered utility lands.
@@Crunchatize_Me_Senpai Utility lands do something that they aren't supposed to do, albeit worse than a dedicated effect. With MDFCs in existence now, bouncelands feel a lot more like utility lands instead of weird duals.
@@PalPlays It’s funny that they put the bounce lands on the dual lands video instead of here. I wasn’t sold on them as general lands because in a vacuum they’re no different than playing a tap land at the end of the day. But the amount of fringe utilities they have make them worth including. Someone Imprison in the Moon your commander? Bounce land. Need to trigger landfall a bunch? Bounce land. Need white catch-up ramp to work? Bounce land. And of course MDFC lands. Odds are, any deck can get some use out of them.
I’m 100% on the run more basics train. I can’t add up the amount of times I’ve never activated these lands while they were on the battlefield. Also, Scavenger grounds is the best!!!
One of my favorite takeaways from the episode. Here in 2022 there is SO MUCH to do with your mana on any given turn, and I think that factors into their "utility". Though it also might mean retooling decks in ways that leverage knowledge of thinking you'll use mana for lands sometimes. Something to think about, was an interesting point.
@@KingBobXVI i don't understand the fear of those cards, by the time back to basics is even played you'll probably be able to grab 1 of each and use those and your mana rocks and be mostly fine. also a lot of ramp these days is treasure which those do nothing about. general land hate seems better imo, stax pieces that target lands in particular are easy to build around and are much better at shutting people down for long enough to win. (I know people hate stax but they actually make commander more "fair") and even more so because most of the best ramp is in artifacts and enchantments, hate like wipes and stax for artifacts and enchantments are great and generally fairly cheap both in dollars and mana.
I run Temple of the False Gods in my Arixmethes deck, now is that a flavor include and a specific deck that's likely to get a lot of lands out fast (especially since the commander is a land) yeah, but hey, it's pretty good there
I don’t think the situations Crim’s talking about where someone plays incidental artifact removal and your artifact land is the only target come up very often in most groups. At an average table, by the time someone plays Reclamation Sage, _someone else_ probably has a rock. Rocks are everywhere in EDH. I do think artifact sweepers like Vandalblast or Hour of Revelation are too risky though. Not that there are a lot of those, but they do hurt when they show up. I don’t know if it outweighs the benefits they provide enough to not run them, but it makes you consider it.
I can tell I have a different style of play from the crew. I love big mana decks (like Zaxara, Gishath) and Temple of the False God is legitimately one of the best lands I can draw.
My personal assessment of utility lands generally focuses around the mana/opportunity cost involved and the effect produced. Personally, I think many people overvalue utility lands because they envision having a ton of extra mana or not needing the land to be untapped or able to produce a color. However a well-built deck generally is able to make near full use of their mana every turn. Making a lot of use of your utility lands (outside of a dedicated Lands Deck) is generally a sign that your build is not as optimized as it could be. Colorless lands is a huge opportunity cost once you get into 3 colors. Having more than 3 tap lands in a deck that looks to curve out or sink mana every turn is another huge cost. Any land that requires 3+ mana to activate needs to at least give you one card's worth of value. Any land that requires you to sacrifice it needs to give you a card and 3-4 mana worth of value.
Castle Vantress is interesting. Like Crim mentioned, its very good in control decks and some control or hell stax decks can abuse it to nauseating degrees. Especially intersting is that it could be a second Divining Top for a Counterbalance stax, brutal card.
I agree with tomer on the temple of the false god. I think the problems with the discussion in the video are 1, the table isn't really listening what tomer is trying to relay (he gave it a B, it's good in a specific subset of decks - and it's not even a small subset by his arguments) and 2, tomer didn't really defend his point as well as he could have. In a green deck that really wants to ramp, if you have temple of the false god and can cast any 2 OR 3 mana land ramp, you get to 6 mana on turn 4. Any 2 cmc on t2 gets a 4drop on 3 and 6 drop on 4, which is the best case, but any 3 mana also gets you to 6 mana on t4. And any time you get it after you have 4 lands it is also free ramp if you add it as a spell rather then a land it's still pretty good.
There's also something you're missing on the discussion of temple of the false god. I actually run it in over half of my decks. The downside becomes dramatically less important when you're running effects like Urborg, Yavimaya, chromatic lantern etc... I even jam it into decks with bouncelands as you can tap it for mana with the bounceland trigger on the stack to get the mana benefit. For me, this is a free ramp spell most of the time and very rarely does it do nothing.
Mosswort Bridge is great in most creature heavy green decks, cause it’s total power 10. So ten 1/1s, two 5/5s, etc turn it on. Super good in my Gishath deck
Heavily agree with Tomer on the Scavenger Grounds vs Strip Mine debate. The amount of times that the graveyard is how someone is comboing off, or even just using to get some insane value. Way more common than when someone is accruing that much value off a land. Especially when you’re playing the Vesuva type land copiers. I’d much rather have that be my way to just propel my game plan with that broken land than sacrifice one of my own to bring down one opponent.
Been listening back through these cuz theyve got fun banter, and i think itd help soooo much changing C tier to include "super niche include" as opposed to having every episode involve a 20 min argument of someone trying to talk the crew up to a B on a card that ONLY sees play in the Kaldra every equipment deck or something, because it sees play in that one specific deck. I feel B should be for cards that can go into Decksss, plural.
On TotFG the pro argument was well thought out. The anti argument was “uh it’s 2024! We don’t play this card anymore!” They didn’t present any good reasons why he was wrong and almost seemed to not even hear what his reasoning was.
For real, I really dislike when the argument against something gets reduced to "It Has Been Decided That This Card Is Bad". I get the arguments against Temple of the False God - if it's your fourth land you pull out of the deck and you can't find a fifth then it would have been better to have a basic in that spot. Or if it's one of three lands in your opening hand, what would have likely been keepable (3 lands 4 spells assumed to be good) gets a lot more dubious; you'll need to grab two lands somehow to avoid TotFG being a dead card. I also get the argument that the 4 to 6 mana breakpoint isn't as huge of an upside. It's not as cleanly defined of a breakpoint as ramping from 3 to 4 where a 4-mana commander comes out a turn earlier with Rampant Growth (or any other 2-mana ramp spell), or any 1 or 2-mana dorks. With a handful of those spells one can pretty reliably pull their curve forward. Meanwhile, just sticking TotFG in a deck as your only acceleration past ~5 doesn't change your curve that appreciably, one really needs to build around it. I still run it cautiously in a couple decks of mine. I have a Rona, Herald of Invasion deck that runs about 40 lands and a lot of big mana spells. The ramp offered by TotFG can be meaningful to stick an activation of Realmbreaker or a Praetor early. Because I have a looter for a commander I can just pitch the thing if it's not going to be useful at the moment, but keep it if it is. It's interesting that Tomer is quoting Frank Karsten because Karsten is a big advocate of running more lands. I think there's a lot of commander players that are horribly greedy with their mana bases, running 34ish lands and leaning on the first-turn draw and a free mulligan to avoid getting screwed harder than they ought to be. A Temple of the False God is going to be way less viable in a 34-land deck than it is in a 40-land deck. Even one extra land in hand from running ~6 more lands in an EDH deck can be the difference between sequencing four other lands first and then TotFG as fifth land, and bumming out on 3 lands and a very sad TotFG as fourth with no idea when the fifth land will come.
I agree with Tomer here on Temple of the False Gods. It is great in decks using efficient land ramp because the numbers are very much in your favour. Even moreso in a landfall deck where you have 40+ lands. Just mathematically it's tough not to agree. That being said, I still don't run it in many decks. I think Ancient Tomb's appeal (not that I own one) is that it adds 2 mana fast. It will do something in turn 1-3 which is when you want to be ramping which offsets the fact that it adds colourless mana because it's helping you cast other ramp that has minimal colour requirements. Playing a colourless land in turn 4-5 is not ideal because that's when the demand for colour is greater and it's less likely to be trying to just cast signets or Cultivate that only needs one green pip.
I feel like Dryad Arbor is a weird include on this list. There's a long list of lands that were excluded, really prolific ones that see more play. I'd really like to see a part 2.
Anecdotally, the last gaming session I activated both Locthwain and War Room, on the same turn, also went on to win. This was an Orzhov deck. My philosophy is same as Seth's-- better to include them and never be in a position where you can't draw. Digging wins games, even drawing nothing helpful gets you to the good-stuff underneath. These are cards that stealthily win games.
The math is sound however, as a GREEN LANDS player, I will say, Temple of the False God is FANTASTIC…at starting fires…just tear it up a little bit to get some papery edges, they catch fire quick and act as great kindling. Temple does not go in any deck in my collection, temple only goes in my fireplace to keep me warm in the winter.
Having reviewed it, Temple of the False God needs to be in my Gargos deck, because its ramp is geared towards untapping lands for multiplicative effects.
The math checks out! Temple of the false god is good in land decks. Simic and Mono green can and do utilize this, trust the math, this is good. Like Tomer said, treat it as a five drop, or if you are in green, a three drop XD
I went in thinking that temple of the false gods was pretty alright and Tomer’s B seemed pretty reasonable, but the amount of times he pushed the land ramp is good made me realize how underwhelming it really is. I don’t think two colorless makes a difference on turn 4 if you’re going to ramp at all
Pretty much, even if getting bricked by TFC a mere 10-12% of the time is perfectly palatable (which it is in my opinion), turn 5 is usually well past the set-up stage, especially with the excess of efficient mana rocks as of late. I would say it's still decent ramp on a slower budget deck, but not nearly as impactful as earlier ramp.
I think people underestimate the marginal returns of ramp in a high CMC format. Yes, the gains of the first ramp spells are huge, but turning the corner from casting one spell a turn to two spells a turn is still quite large. Getting to that 8-9 mana point is still a significant advantage if you don’t completely kill your card economy doing it, and one way to avoid that is 2-for-1 mana sources. I think the gains of Temple are very real in ramp decks, but the costs are also still real.
I feel like temple of the false god is just generally good in control decks that have good card draw or even rummaging effects. I have seen it be very powerful in izzet-control with a spell-slinger subtheme.
I'll play vasuva in decks that run cards like lotus field which is all my white decks without green because White's catchup game is great when you can artificially put yourself behind in lands and not mana. Scorched Ruins and the bounce lands are other amazing cards to copy but without those I'll avoid them.
Seth is right about Temple of the False God, ramping when you already would have 5 mana isn’t great unless you have a commander at 6 or something specific to hit with that. It’s the slowest possible fast mana.
I feel like the hideaway lands are really good. The green white and red ones are so easy to trigger you can almost always get the card. In any mono or two color decks it's probably worth it to run them.
And Seth complaining about green not having enough basics with a TotFG because he played like 6 basics in mardu (If he's talking about the most recent episode) with sword of the animist double triggers is even funnier
The pendulum has gone too far against Temple of the False God. I've told everybody for years that it is bad in most decks, and I still agree. However, I recently built Kogla and Wort back-to-back, which ramp a lot with lands like Tomer explains, and yeah, it outperforms. Temple is one of the best lands in those decks, especially when late-game I play effects that make me fetch any land. With high-cost commanders that you will need to replay with the tax, Castle Garenbrig is not enough, you want all of those ramp-lands.
B seems like the perfect ranking for it. Downplaying the idea of "oh, it's ONLY one more mana" forgets how many times you're one mana short mid-game on important plays. It gets held to the standard of "auto-include" and looks awful getting compared to that unfair standard. In a lot of ways, can think of it more like a ramp spell than a land, except it happens to be a land.
Temple of the false god always works in my omnath deck because it is basically half lands and the other half is ramp/payoffs. Two ramp spells and then turn 3 onward it’s like a sol ring that procs landfall. Tomer is right you just need a lot of land ramp to virtually eliminate the downside to play it, otherwise keep it out
Ardenvale is best for equipment decks. It's a land that also acts as a creature when you get wiped. It turns back on your engine when everyone is down on resources. Embereth can also end the game by entire turns which is very important because it prevents your opponents from getting answers.
The article Tomer's referencing only seems to address when Temple *works* on turn 5+. It doesn't look at the percentage of that 85% where you have to play it as one of the earlier land drops and it doesn't do anything until turn 5+. (Among other assumptions that likely bring that 85% down realistically) Also, weighed against the chances of coming in on/offline, I doubt the positive impact of the extra mana outweighs the negative impact of being down mana for some nber of turns.
It literally looks at the percentage of times where you'd have to play it as your land before it can be activated. That was literally the point of that article. So no, the percent doesn't drop any.
@@MTGGoldfishCommander I tried to read the article pretty carefully before posting, and I'm reading it again as I'm writing this. If that is what is supposed to be represented in the modeling/data, I don't believe the article does a good job of portraying that. > "if we've drawn Temple of the False God by turn x (5, 6, 7), what are the odds we can activate it?" > "P[Can activate Temple on turn 5 if you draw it by that turn, after mulls] = 74.7%" > "So the odds of Ruthless Regiment of activating Temple of the False God on turn 5 is 75%, or a 25% failure rate..." > "P[Can activate Temple on turn 5 (42-land deck) if you draw it by that turn, after mulls] = 85.5%" These appear to be, exclusively, calculating the chance that the temple can be activated on turn X (assuming it was in hand by turn X). It does not state anywhere (that I see) that its *excluding* the pattern where its played before turn X, cannot be activated, but still can be activated on turn X. For a dramatic example, as "two land hands on a mulligan" are kept (assumptions are not clear whether Temple counts as one of the 2-5 lands, I'm assuming it does for this example), this would be counted as a success case, represented as part of the 74.7% and 85.5%: T1: Land T2: Temple (no other lands in hand) T3-T5: Draw and play a land. Temple is Online on T5. Am I missing something?
I run Temple of the False God in Muldrotha and Roon because they are high cost commanders, and Roon even has the 2 mana activated ability. I think i've had it be dead once or twice in easily 20+ games.
The Castle Vantress mana cost issue was totally fixed of course recently with Rivendell...same exact card abilities except you must control a Legendary Creature on the board for Rivendell...but just one blue, one colorless to Scry 2...definitely worth the cost comparatively
I still play Temple of the False God bc of the math Tomer mentioned. I play it in a Sultai land reanimator deck with Zuran Orb as a jank win-con card: Tap for 2, sac and gain 2 life, recast off something like Ramunap Excavator, tap for another 2, sac again, gain another 2 life. Keep replaying it twice or more every turn, and if you have Marauding Blightpriest and/or Epicure of Blood, you drain your opponents for half the life you gain from Zuran each turn. Sanguine Bond is a more efficient, less budget choice, and the Exquisite Blood combo with it seals the game for you.
I am split alongside Crim and others with the Castle Cycle. The decks that have cards like Zirda, Hearthstone, Training Grounds and even Biomancer's Familiar will love this cycle of lands for value. I've seen many games where a couple turns of an animated Castle from a Nissa etc. can pull that player ahead. Being abilities that are generally safe and a land slot in the deck feels great.
the temple of the false god discussion was frustrating, and I completely agree with Tomer. if you are in a land ramp deck it is just free mana, and I really don't understand why the others were trying to argue that 1 extra mana isn't good in a green deck. My personal tech is to play it with hour of promise and it is very easy to make that card ramp 4 if you are playing ancient tomb as well. I wouldn't play it outside green or at higher budget, but that is still a significant chunk of decks and I would also argue it is decent if you have a lot of card draw or looting
Something that wasn’t mentioned about temple of the false god that makes it better in some decks: urborg&yavimaya. If you play either of those lands in a deck, temple is ever so slightly safer to play since now it can tap for colored mana if you don’t have enough lands to make it tap for 2. Green also has dryad of the ilysian grove and prismatic omen, so I’d consider running it in a green+ deck
I play Temple of the False god in my windgrace deck. I can fetch it after I can turn it on, I can discard it to draw cards, recur it from the graveyard, it activates cabal coffers by itself etc. It's a card I want to see in every game tbh. My build is far from optimal obviously, but I think it's fine in lower power land ramp decks.
The floor with vesuva is so bad though since its a tap basic, but yeah the ceiling is decent. I just dont see it as cedh worthy and too weak for casual were lands arent always powerful like ancient tomb. Idk i would run vesuva but would consider thespians stage.
Best case scenario I've had with Temple of the False God wasn't 6 mana on turn four. It was seven mana on turn 2. Getting Angry Omnath out when everyone else is still building out their board feels real good.
I personally love Castle Ardenvale in my Rick Steadfast Leader deck only because Rick gives humans a buff but I need a certain amount of humans on the field. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve activated it and pooped out a 6/6 first strike vigilance in that deck it’s pretty sweet on a land.
Temple of the false god is not a utility land in the first place, it is fast mana in a slow slot. Utility lands do something other than generate mana for you or do something as well as generating mana for you. Gaea's Cradle isnt a utility land, Ancient tomb isnt a utility land, so why is this suddenly utility? Scavenger Grounds isnt in the same classification as Strip mine, strip mine goes 1 for 1 to remove a single land threat, Scavenger Grounds goes 1 for 10+ cards minimum at instant speed for 3 mana, on top of this, if you are running Scavenging grounds and you opt to use its exile effect, you probably already assessed that your graveyard is nowhere near the threat level that your opponent's is, so you already know you losing your graveyard is worth what your opponent is losing twice over.
Temple of the false God is a great budget option for infinite mana combos too. Patron of the moon or ghostly flicker combos usually need 1 or 2 lands that tap for 2
Tomer's analysis is correct for Temple of the False God. If you are a green deck that is ramping on either turn 2 or 3 (or both) it will enter on turn 4 and give immediate value. If it's later in the game you're almost guaranteed to get value. No downside unless you're like, mono-green devotion and can't cast stuff with it.
I think of all the castle lands, red is the most misunderstood. People say the blue one is okay because you play an instant speed deck but don't you rather play an instant speed spell? And the same counts for like the white one, the green and black ones are just good but the red one is different because you don't really add an effect that adds +1/+0 to your krenko deck for example but if it's on a land that you can sometimes use and get quite a lot of power out of I think it's actually really strong, so honestly in a deck like that I'd definitely include it.
Another factor in whether I will play Temple of the False gods is if I play bounce lands in the deck, which tend to suppress your actual land count and can further contribute to really awkward starting hands.
If my deck is one or two colors the hideaway lands almost always make the cut. 13/17 of my decks have hideaway lands. I find that the tempo loss is negligible compared to tutoring and scrying then hideaway-ing a finisher or bomb
The artifact lands do add good utility to any deck that runs Trinket Mage. In regards to Reliquary Tower, I feel that yes, many decks aren't going to be able to consistently get to 8+ cards in hand. In addition, if you're drawing so many cards, you should be playing them and popping off harder, and if you're not then something's wrong with the deck construction
I know this mostly still applies to green decks, but I think tomer is slightly underselling Temple of the False God, with Dryad of the Ilysian Grove, Urborg, Yavimaya there is a growing number of cards you want to play anyway that turn it on early, which is a huge mitigation to your downside. land+temple+rampant growth is an awful starter, but yavimaya+temple+growth is a pretty awesome one. Plus, there's always the ickier ones, like, chromatic lantern and realwright
Also, I don't think I've ever seen either Field of the Dead or Vesuva on any cEDH decklist so Idk if I agree with the "S" tier. I think the episode missed some actually really powerful utility lands such as Emergence Zone, Inventors' Fair, Academy Ruins, Winding Canyons, maybe even Ruined Ruins?
I agree that Reliquary Tower is overrated, but the “pick the best seven” argument is, too. Why have to choose when you can keep them all? If you draw 50 cards and discard 43 of them, you might end up discarding something you didn’t need at the time, but will wish you had before your next turn. Counterspells stop a lot, but not everything. Now if you know you can win the same turn you draw those cards, yeah, it’s pointless. And if you don’t think you’ll be drawing that many cards in most games, also pointless, especially in 3+ colors. But I have several decks that draw a lot of cards and don’t usually win that turn. It’s nice to hold onto everything just in case.
Well the idea is less of if you draw 50. It’s more average case of “I draw ten and discard 3” the discard gets worse the more you draw as card selection is only so good. If your deck does draw 40 cards at the end of turn (and you are not playing the vast majority of them right there), your running a bit of a narrow deck and I would recommend tower but it’s a common one
One hot take: temple of the false god in a land ramping deck is frequently online in turn 3 or 4, where it's basically a sol ring. It's also quite good when you're running something like weathered wayfarer, which can tutor it whenever it's actually online. I would absolutely not keep it in my opening hand if it was one of my two lands. Vesuva/Thespians stage: I think vesuva is A tier at best, as it's wholly situational as to whether or not it's actually relevant. Thespians stage is A because it's always able to become relevant.
Temple of the false gods is an auto include in an Orvar the all form deck. You can target it to duplicate it, thus potentially turning on its ability as well as getting that much more mana
I think temple of the false gods was replaced by guildless commons if you're going for a budget. Then if there is no budget then you just play ancient tomb. At least guildless commons isn't a dead card after the turn you play
@@ms.sysbit5511 it does literally the same thing a turn later. It's not like you lose the mana from the land you bounce if play it right. If you have a starting hand of 3 lands and 4 other cards, I'd rather have guildless commons over temple just for the guarantee that I will hit all land drops instead of hope to draw enough for temple to be useful.
@@sapher4994 but that’s not ramp. You play it turn 3 as your third land. Turn 4 you tap for 4 mana. This is not ramp. Again, not saying Temple is good but it is ramp unlike Guildless which is just a really bad Bounce land that doesn’t color fix.
One thing people used to do with dryad arbor is hide it in their land area so an opponent wouldn't notice then polymorph it into Emrakul for free and Vesuva is good for eldrazi decks when you use locus lands to hard ramp
Commander Clash Crew: “Why would you run a land that does nothing until you have 5 lands? You’ve already lost by then! What about all my bounce lands and Urza’s Sagas and other decks without green ramp?” Also Commander Clash Crew: “Field of the Dead (a land that’s literally a tapped wastes until you have seven unique lands) is the best land ever printed! Run it in every commander deck ever!”
I think I can speak on behalf of the entire crew here: Field's payoff is so high that it more than outweighs the downside of being tapped and colorless. Once it's online, you're just making 2/2's for zero mana. It's a ridiculous card.
@@MTGGoldfishCommander i feel like you're confusing it with how it performs in other formats, imo, as who is really going to care about getting a free 2/2 on turn 7? I dunno, seems pretty weak to me. Run Scavenger Ground instead (no kap)
Hmm.. for me, I'd say I generally agree with our hosts here: * Temple of the False Gods: D (I don't think I'll even play it, even on a budget) * Vesuva/Thespian Stage: A (Agree with Tomer on it, I don't think I've ever actually used it and has some sound reasoning for why I should put it into my deck) * Strip Mine: A (I like having some unconditional answers) * Castles: C (I mostly like Castle Locthwain, only one I'm rating a B.. I actually don't like Castle Garenbrig because it only produces green and only for creatures, I can't quite put it into more generic decks or in multicolour decks as effectively, it might be okay in two-colour decks but very painful in three-colour) * Dryad Arbor: C (I know there's combos, but I don't play them, it's an expensive tapped Forest for me) * War Room: B * Scavenger Grounds: B (Even on Black decks with Bojuka Bog, I like to run it, it's definitely a top pick if you don't really interact with your own graveyard.. even better when there's multiple problematic graveyards) * Hideaway: C (Enters tapped, single colour, I'd rate the green a B, it's not too hard to setup and can be executed at any time during an opponent's turn) * Reliquary Tower: B (honestly, even dumping excessive cards in your graveyard isn't the worst, I do play it in decks that draw a ton of cards) * Field of the Dead: S (only knock against it is that it comes at the cost of a lot of basics due to deckbuilding construction) * Artifact Lands: D (artifact board wipes are a pain, the tapped Indestructible ones I'd consider a C though.. also with Farewell on the table now, I'd like my lands in tact) S = very strong, I need a reason against it to not play it A = solid, often play B = situational, good upside, still play C = situational, I need a reason to play it D = generally avoid
Castle Locthwain is at its best in decks that want to draw at a specific moment and that don't run cantrips: if you Vampiric/Mystical Tutor for an instant-speed answer, Castle puts it in your end. If you manipulate the top card for a miracle, Castle allows you to cast it at the right moment.
What... no discussion time for Ice Age utility lands? Hall of Mist, Ice Flow or Glacial Chasm? How about the set of common lands that came in Eldraine? Arcane Lighthouse? Ash Barrens? The Legendary set from Kamigawa Champions?
I play Scavenger Grounds in a few decks but my Umbris (Fear Manifest) commander deck has it's best use. If Umbris is unblocked during attack, I sacrifice Scavenger Grounds to increase his damage. Sometimes it's lethal out of no where. Partner it with Rogue Passage if you have the mana. I am sure there's better ways, but it works.
With urborg and yavamaya you can run temple with an even higher chance of it being good since it can tap for whatever basic land type you add to it if it comes out early
You can find our full rankings including many more lands here: i.imgur.com/ezEZ8V2.png
It appears to be missing a Bazaar of Baghdad 🤔
Next Commander Hotspot, FetchlandS with on a small, mid or big budget.
the campuses and band lands didn't make it to the tier list
It is silly not to discuss homeward path if Crim is in your playgroup.
Tomer be like: Castle Ardenvale is awful. I only runs basics.
Me: EOT, tap make a 1/1. Untap. Draw. Cast Flashfires.
I will never understand how sometimes I completely disagree with Crim, and other times he is the only voice of reason.
the tragedy of a blue mage
I'm glad I'm not the only one
The classic Crim Paradox
Crim is chaotically rational
4:05 - Temple of the False God
21:53 - Vesuva & Thespian Stage
31:38 - Strip Mine
40:25 - Castle Cycle
51:06 - Dryad Arbor
56:59 - War Room
1:08:40 - Scavenger Grounds
1:16:32 - Hideaway Land Cycle
1:25:18 - Reliquary Tower
1:31:13 - Field of the Dead
1:32:36 - Artifact Lands
Added the timestamps to the video, thank you Lulu!
@@MTGGoldfishCommander no problem! I figured it would help out :)
No homeward path? :'(
Re: Temple of the False God, I've got two deck lists that run it successfully. One, as Seth mentioned, is a colorless Eldrazi deck, where I run enough lands that waiting to drop this on turn 5 is totally fine for the extra mana. The other is an Izzet storm deck that focuses on reducing the mana cost of instant and sorcery spells and playing things like Snap, Frantic Search and Rewind. Having an additional land that can tap for 2 and generate extra value off of being untapped has never been a downside.
The biggest thing to be cautious of is keeping a sketchy opening hand with this land in it, or a hand with 2 or 3 land where you REALLY have to draw a not-Temple of the False God land. It hasn't been a problem in any of the games I've played with these decks. I don't think it's good in the majority of decks, but there can be uses.
You just don't treat it like a land, having on land that's not a land, isn't really that bad.
Even with 4 land hand sometimes you dont even draw 5th land after 5-6 turns. You have to treat this like a 5-drop artifact so I’d definitely put it in D-tier. Ancient Tomb and Guildless Commons are way better
My worst experience with it is keeping a 3 lander and drawing it as my fourth land. I reconfigured the deck somewhat afterwards to avoid that.
It punishes greedy deckbuilding which is why it's super unpopular haha
Although as Tomer said, if you ramp on t2 and t3, then play Temple on t4, you're on 7 mana. So if your green deck has a super high density of 6/7mv cards with at least (2) in their casting cost, you can make it work.
Temple is good also in a "Mitch" deck where, Wayfarers Bauble, Sad Robot, Burnished Hart or any artifact land ramp that can reuse or double the effect. Emry is an example where I can see it used, maybe mono blue eldrazi styled decks.
@@rough111 i hate the 5 drop argument. you can cheat 5 drops in so many different ways. you can't cheat into this "five drop" the same way you can the new urabrask - and when you do "get it out ahead" it's usually not very impactful or a color detriment
I never thought I would again be happy with Temple of the False God in a deck, until I built Orvar. More than once I have played it and copied in order to turn both of them on. Potent.
That's really neat but for me it doesn't really make it good, you can copy a lot of better things that take up this cards slot. A land you can't play in an opening hand is unplayable. I say this as someone playing unplayable cards in a spikey playgroup. Like copying a bunch of Colossal Dreadmaws is potent, but I'd just laugh if I saw it.
I always cut it with CloudPosts that early game you can actually play and there’s a Draw Lotus that is much better in copying
@@Spaced92 unless you're in a cedh pod you're land theory is pretty ridiculous. I also want untapped lands but come on, be reasonable.
I play Mosswort Bridge (the green hideaway land), in my simic sea monsters and mono-green voltron decks and that card does a lot of work. Being able to cheat a huge 7-9 mana sea monster into play for just 2 mana at instant speed is amazing. The fact that hideaway works around the spell's timing restrictions is super underrated.
wait, it works around timing??!?!! So its like the card underneath has flash???
Yup
"B is for cards that are good in certain kinds of decks."
Tomer: I think this works in [one kind of deck], so I give it a B.
Everyone else for like 15 minutes: this card is NOT an A what are you talking about!?
I'm with Tomer on Scavenger Grounds, that card has blown me out a ton. Also pretty toolbox fetchable with map or crop roto.
For real, by far the most underrated land on the list.
i agree i think it should be a staple
yep if you can't play bog play scavenger grounds or copy lands / petrified field.
I think the thing they missed was that much like MDFCs, it's graveyard hate in a land slot. You don't have to cut synergy pieces in your deck slots for it
I would like to see part 2 on utility lands there are so many good ones an bad ones that wasn't in the spotlight in this episode.
like elephant graveyard and the og snow and conditional filter lands
@@kingfuzzy2 the ice age snow lands are the best of all the snow lands, I'm not a fan of the full art ones.
@@adamwarehime6444 I absolutely do adore most of the old weird art especially snow lands and the dark
@@kingfuzzy2 probably because graveyard is laughably expensive and not a notable "auto include" like duals.
idk why people even talk about og duals like they are playable.
@@wesleywyndam-pryce5305 I proxied the graveyard for a few decks and there are far more than enough ways to fix Mana that the duals aren't even needed anymore.
I feel like you could've talked about High Market, Myriad Landscape, Homeward Path, Path of Ancestry, Bonder's Enclave, Rogue's Passage and so many more...
Just reinforces the point that there's very many these days and choosing can be hard.
Here's one you might not know yet: *Tower of the Magistrate*
It enters untapped, taps for a colorless, or you can pay {1} and {T}ap it to give target creature protection from artifacts.
Doesn't sound useful?
This can completely shut down Voltron players. Forever (while you keep paying {2}). Just activate it in response to them trying to put Swiftfoot Boots on their commander, or trying to equip something high value like Sunforger. It'll stop that equip ability, and they can't do it again for the rest of the turn.
If you have Voltron players in your pod, this card is so worth it, I can't even count how often it made the matchup favorable for me any more. And nobody notices the card, too.
Oh, and it can also make you able to block Blightsteel Colossus or whatever other big artifact threat is coming your way. And some players still use artifact interaction like Unstable Obelisk, etc. And as a cherry on top, you can disable blockers like Solemn Simulacrum with it.
It is also inexpensive. Highly recommended.
Unfortunately with Blightsteel, Protection is a VERY bad idea to block with. All the damage will go straight to your face and none of it to your blocker.
@@EvanFarshadow Not completely, it'll still "block" the damage it'd soak up normally too if the blocked creature has trample..
I think that's the more important question - WHICH utility land to include? Assuming 2-3 slots or so, and 10-12 options that all are decent picks, how does one go about choosing?
that would also shut down infinite sacrifice loops by stoping the artifact from being able to target and sacrifice, dope.
@@MaxMckayful the ones most critical to your success so whatever makes you more consistent or gives you needed interaction. and if you wanna play more, play a 1-2 color artifact tool box or artifacts matter deck and 50% or more of your permanents will be colorless which helps these be less of a detriment.
also theres SO MANY cards that make all your lands all types and/or tap for any mana as well as cards that let you spend mana as though it were any color. make your 1-3 drops colorless or mostly colorless and you should be able to fix in time for the big stuff while having a load of utility lands.
I feel like they generally are underrating the castles because the opportunity cost is pretty low. So long as it isn't your first or second land they are basically basics with upside if you don't have much to do with your turn
Given how weak the blue/white/red ones are, you need the opportunity cost to be VERY low in order to justify them, and I think they're higher than they seem. I would never run them unless I was 100% sure they would always be untapped, which means I would only run Vantress in a deck full of islands and maybe one other utility land.
Like it's hard to overstate how unappealing the 5-mana scry ability is in commander. That's really an ability for 1v1 where you can predict that a given deck will end up in grindy topdeck games fairly often.
Castle Vantress is just free Top for Counterbalance decks and Ardenvale is just another creature in Polymorph combo.
dies to blood moon
dies to back to basics
slow to archon of emeria
not fetchable
alternatively: not playing a dual instead
Those are quite high opportunity costs
@@MisterAssasine none of that would matter in a mono color deck where the vast majority are basics anyway
Given how they all insisted that a land that ramps you from 4 to 6 mana (Temple of the false god) is unplayable but castle garenbrig which ramps you from 4 to 6 is S-class i would say they are overrating at least that one.
I feel like if we get more cards like urborg and yamivaya, temple of the false god could see more play and be better. I would play it specifically in golgari since I auto include both those lands and making the downside way less
I was gonna say the same exact thing, golgari with both of them is the absolute best spot for temple these days.
That sounds rad, actually.
I feel like the low opportunity cost of the castle cycle was undervalued a bit in this assessment. Very easy for them to be untapped and then a minor/medium effect as an instant-speed option? Pretty good imo
They're close to being strictly better basics. And in the right decks, obviously, they absolutely shine for their easy access utility
They're good in the same decks as reflecting pool. If you are greedy for colored mana or your commander has a multiple of the same colored pips in its cost. Otherwise you would probably prefer fetchable and or untapped lands.
I always listen to these podcasts while aim training for fps games. Thank you for making this experience enjoyable, you all have great personalities.
Glad you enjoy it!
This topic definitely needs to have a part 2. Too many good utility lands to end here.
I am now convinced that Blood Moon is a must play judging from you guys obsession with utility lands, Tomer is the only responsible person who has clearly had the fear of the Blood Moon instilled in him.
The problem with Blood Moon is that you're basically locked into 1-2 colors, and one of them has to be red. It's devastating if you get lucky and nobody can cast their spells, but one enchantment removal spell and a basic to cast it ruins your whole plan and leaves your opponents miffed but pretty unharmed. In commander, where there is no real "meta," building hate decks is almost always doomed to fail.
@@drpibisback7680 nah, you could use it in 3 colors, as long as one is green. (Still limiting, but it hasn't bitten me too hard compared to my opponents)
@@drpibisback7680 Your logic in why it locks you into 1 or 2 colors is the same argument I make against Cedh forcing you to play blue and sometimes black. But there are other "Blood Moon" like effects that are just as good. A Wave of Vitriol would do wonders against the MTGGoldfish meta. Contamination in black and Stormtide Leveathan are 2 others I can think of. But, destroying nonbasics is easy and has been supported in the format across the color pie
just play shit to remove blood moon, shouldn't be that big of a deal.
@@drpibisback7680 nah hate decks should work wonderfully if built and piloted correctly. but everyone throws a tempertanrum at interaction in commander so people seem to cut the cards they should be playing as hate.
in particular "stax" pieces.
The one deck i run temple of the false god in is Gishath which costs 8 mana. Ive got 36 lands + 15 ramp spells that fetch lands. A third land that taps for 2 mana is huge to get closer to gishath.
Ok, I will have to take a moment to defend my pal Crim here when it comes to Castle Vantress, this card has saved me so many times, flash decks just love it, you get to use your mana when your counters didn't find a target and can be a life savior if you were gonna get flooded and you really needed some interaction to save your skin. Also, I am biased cuz I play a LOT of Fires of Invention and since you never tap your lands to cast things you can easily use Vantress to scru for 2 at the end AND at the beginning of your turns since you never need your lands to casts stuff, I believe the ability to never burn your mana and using efficiently, even if it is to scry 2, it is worth it, in top deck mode? oof Letme scry for my answers while you are praying to the gods to not flood and keep getting lands *chef kiss* Castle Vantress is my crib, baby!
Hell, I run it in my Emry Lab Man deck and it's nice just to hit a Scry 2 before my turn starts
I also run Search for Azcanta
TEMPLE OF THE FALSE GOD:
Okay, after having the day off work and spending some time conducting my own research and thoughts, I want to give my own thoughts on this card, provide my own research numbers, and then give an overall opinion. I'm going to break this up into multiple sections, starting with:
THE REPUTATION:
Temple of the false god has a very bad reputation, ranging from humorous hyperbole to straight up overblown detest. Recently, I put together a mono blue stompy sea creature deck with Nezahal as the commander. Being a mono blue deck with a high mana curve and a commander costing 7 mana, I decided to run Temple as one of my lands. Anecdotally speaking, the card has worked wonderfully. And every time I play it, someone at the table always cracks the same joke. "I've never seen it work before" Like the fact that I got it down with four or more lands was an impressive feat. I love that kind of banter but it got me thinking:
People are far too salty about this card.
The fear of Temple not working has blinded everyone into thinking that getting it to work is difficult and this has lead to a player base that is taking their criticisms of this card WAY TOO FAR and way off in the wrong direction. This is why I am here to give you:
THE FACTS:
probability is a huge factor in what makes this card what it is. What is the probability that you will have four lands in play on turn four, thereby allowing you to play this on turn five and activate it. Here are my findings:
Let's say you're running a 37 land hand and you have three lands in your opening hand. That's seven cards right there. Then you need to get to turn 5. That's four draw steps and then on turn five you play temple. For the sake of these numbers, we are going completely on one card draw a turn. Of course, if you run a ramp spell or card draw or even scrying effects, these percentages fall far more in favor of temple.
You have roughly a 12% chance that Temple shows up in your opening hand or in the first five cards you draw. Beyond that you draw it later at which point I hope to god you have enough lands to make it work.
So going from there, with three other lands in your opening hand, you need to draw one land in four turns. The odds of you not drawing a single other land on four straight draw steps in a 37 land deck are 15.8%. drawing one more card reduces it to 10%. One more card and you're down to 6%.
so in the average deck, one with no card draw being played in the early game, no ramp spells being cast, no scrying, etc. you have a 12% chance of having a 15.8% chance of failure. That's 15% of 12%. The vast majority of the time it's either coming down active or you never draw it. And this is the average build.
If you're running a deck with a lot of card draw, looting effects, or ramp, your percentages are so far in your favor that chances of failure are marginal. If you're keeping opening hands with low land counts or playing decks with low land counts, you're putting yourself in a position to get mana screwed and that's on you. Also, playing temple on turn four and top decking a land on turn five isn't the worst thing in the world. For one, you aren't missing your land drop, and two, that next land puts you right back ahead in total mana available to you. It feels like playing a tap land but it's far better than missing the land drop altogether.
SO SHOULD YOU PLAY IT?
Do you want free ramp? Then maybe. Colorless eldrazi decks have no choice. You need a ton of mana and you need to get it by any means necessary. This card will show up in every kozelik deck for the rest of time.
decks where your commander costs 6 or more mana should consider it as it can get your commander out a turn early. Obviously color intensive decks don't want a colorless land so I wouldn't for a five color deck unless that deck has a nasty mana curve that forced you to play a ton of ramp. And decks that ramp hard want temple because they're also running big spells and if they can get away with running temple safely and casting haymakers quicker then why not? Asking why mono green ramp decks need temple is like asking why control decks need counterspells or why elf ball decks need elves. It's what it does.
Run it in a commander deck based around casting spells with (X) in the casting cost. Those kinds of decks are happy to draw temple super late as it makes their win con X spells super splashy, while drawing a tapland feels really bad. Also run it in decks where the commander has an activated ability that can be triggered multiple times. Emiel decks would love temple super late because it would nearly pay for a whole blink on it's own. These are decks that have abilities to sink as much mana into that they can and that makes temple a welcome draw at any stage of the game, whereas a super late temple isn't great in some decks that have nothing to do with it.
WHEN YOU GET DOWN TO IT:
Temple is a free ramp spell. Unlike most ramp spells where you invest your mana into a rock or into a kodama's reach in order to have more mana in the future, temple is a play and pay kind of card. Grip it and rip it. No mana investing needed. And that's the beauty of it. And me personally, I like playing more "fun" decks and sometimes this means running cards with higher CMCs. Truthfully, I can't even count the number of times Temple has let me get away with running jank builds. Ramping me for free in the mid game so I can play my big stuff in the late game. These are the cards I want to play and I refuse to lower my curve to play cards that don't make me happy.
IN CONCLUSION:
Be responsible with your landbase. Treat your landbase as if temple of the false god is always in your deck. Because if you're missing land drops consistently on turn four like all of the Temple haters seem to do, then you seriously need to play more lands.
Really ask yourself. "How many times am I mana screwed with only three lands in play?" and that'll give you a good idea on how consistent temple would be in your deck.
Anyways, that's my take. To anybody who made it this far, I hope you enjoyed my perspective and I hope I made you look at this card differently. And thank you guys for the great Magic content. Love what you do.
I agree with you overall - Temple of the False God gets its bad reputation from greedy manabases where people cut to 34 lands, and then they spend all their mulligans to look for 3 lands opening hand, only to end up topdecking Temple as their fourth land and then not drawing their fifth land in time.
If you run closer to 40 lands you're way more likely to have three in opening hand, and then with four draw steps you're quite likely to have found a fourth & fifth land. The fail case exists but it's mitigated even further by any card selection. I run a Rona, Herald of Invasion deck with about 38 lands, and with a 2-mana looter in the command zone I would have to stumble pretty hard to end up flopping Temple of the False God as land 3-4 only to go on and miss.
Right off the bat I agree with Tomer on Temple of the False God. I only play it in green decks with multiple sources of land ramp. It does very well in my Titania deck, which basically any utility land I have in there does lol.
The misunderstanding of Mosswort bridge is astounding. You don't need a 10/10 for it to work. It reads total power so 5 2/2s works. It's my favorite tapped land
I liked seeing recognition for the hideaways! Windbrisk Heights and Spinerock Knoll (white and red) are as playable as everyone said, but I want to further support Mosswort Bridge (green). The condition is so easy to meet in a green deck in commander, and even if it's not a go tall deck like the mentioned Xenagos, any 4+ mana value card is a great outcome, and I'm pretty sure the effect lets you play a land outside of the one-per-turn limit too. Even smaller cards are coming off the top of the library instead of your hand (similar to red's pseudo-draw effects), and even if you get NOTHING playable, it gets a clump of cards you didn't need out of the way.
Everyone shits on the black one for being hard to cast. One wheel and boom it's active.
great video but PLEASE add Phil to the commander clash crew podcast! He'd fit so well with the group, as we've seen throughout his time on the Commander Clash gameplay :)
Yeah they say "It will look weird" but just put Tomer in the middle since he's the "host" of this channel and it'll be fine.
@@juanestrada3242 it’s more that 5 talking is really clunky; 2-3 is the sweet spot with 4 pushing it.
@@ms.sysbit5511 yeah thats true I guess, but I love the longer videos personally so I wouldn't mind if they were longer as a result so everyone could adequately get their thoughts in.
It would also be good as a new player. He'd learn a lot.
War room, endless atlas, and staff of nin are mono color auto incudes for draw power. They are budget friendly too since all 3 will run you under $12 total. In mono red loreseeker stone is clutch and in mono white gift of estates is heavily slept on among other budget land tax effects.
Great timing for this episode, as I just recently embarked on my first colorless deck. Interesting to hear the discussions regarding color-based lands, but the non-color lands are even more relevant to me at the moment. Very helpful info! (I for one do also like the longer episodes like these.)
For me the question with the castle cycle is "Are they worse than a basic?". I probably wouldn't play them in four or five color, they would come in tapped too often.
"Green already has ramp, why does it want this?"
Because it's a *utility land.* Tomer's swayed me on this, and I'll be putting this in Brinelin / Gilanra + Keruga.
I don’t even get how qualifies as a utility land. It’s just extra mana. Utility to me means you play it for reasons other than mana. Unless you argue that every land is a utility land, which isn’t untrue but it defeats the purpose.
@@Crunchatize_Me_Senpai The utility is your ramp package getting improved via a land.
@@PalPlays I guess? Still doesn’t feel like a utility card. Bounce lands have way more utility than Temple, but those aren’t usually considered utility lands.
@@Crunchatize_Me_Senpai Utility lands do something that they aren't supposed to do, albeit worse than a dedicated effect.
With MDFCs in existence now, bouncelands feel a lot more like utility lands instead of weird duals.
@@PalPlays It’s funny that they put the bounce lands on the dual lands video instead of here. I wasn’t sold on them as general lands because in a vacuum they’re no different than playing a tap land at the end of the day.
But the amount of fringe utilities they have make them worth including. Someone Imprison in the Moon your commander? Bounce land. Need to trigger landfall a bunch? Bounce land. Need white catch-up ramp to work? Bounce land. And of course MDFC lands. Odds are, any deck can get some use out of them.
I’m 100% on the run more basics train. I can’t add up the amount of times I’ve never activated these lands while they were on the battlefield. Also, Scavenger grounds is the best!!!
One of my favorite takeaways from the episode. Here in 2022 there is SO MUCH to do with your mana on any given turn, and I think that factors into their "utility". Though it also might mean retooling decks in ways that leverage knowledge of thinking you'll use mana for lands sometimes. Something to think about, was an interesting point.
Tomer needs to build a Blue Moon EDH deck to put the fear of Blood Moon and Back to Basics back into the rest of the crew :P
@@KingBobXVI i don't understand the fear of those cards, by the time back to basics is even played you'll probably be able to grab 1 of each and use those and your mana rocks and be mostly fine.
also a lot of ramp these days is treasure which those do nothing about.
general land hate seems better imo, stax pieces that target lands in particular are easy to build around and are much better at shutting people down for long enough to win. (I know people hate stax but they actually make commander more "fair")
and even more so because most of the best ramp is in artifacts and enchantments, hate like wipes and stax for artifacts and enchantments are great and generally fairly cheap both in dollars and mana.
I run Temple of the False Gods in my Arixmethes deck, now is that a flavor include and a specific deck that's likely to get a lot of lands out fast (especially since the commander is a land) yeah, but hey, it's pretty good there
I don’t think the situations Crim’s talking about where someone plays incidental artifact removal and your artifact land is the only target come up very often in most groups. At an average table, by the time someone plays Reclamation Sage, _someone else_ probably has a rock. Rocks are everywhere in EDH.
I do think artifact sweepers like Vandalblast or Hour of Revelation are too risky though. Not that there are a lot of those, but they do hurt when they show up. I don’t know if it outweighs the benefits they provide enough to not run them, but it makes you consider it.
I can tell I have a different style of play from the crew. I love big mana decks (like Zaxara, Gishath) and Temple of the False God is legitimately one of the best lands I can draw.
My personal assessment of utility lands generally focuses around the mana/opportunity cost involved and the effect produced.
Personally, I think many people overvalue utility lands because they envision having a ton of extra mana or not needing the land to be untapped or able to produce a color. However a well-built deck generally is able to make near full use of their mana every turn. Making a lot of use of your utility lands (outside of a dedicated Lands Deck) is generally a sign that your build is not as optimized as it could be.
Colorless lands is a huge opportunity cost once you get into 3 colors. Having more than 3 tap lands in a deck that looks to curve out or sink mana every turn is another huge cost. Any land that requires 3+ mana to activate needs to at least give you one card's worth of value. Any land that requires you to sacrifice it needs to give you a card and 3-4 mana worth of value.
Castle Vantress is interesting. Like Crim mentioned, its very good in control decks and some control or hell stax decks can abuse it to nauseating degrees. Especially intersting is that it could be a second Divining Top for a Counterbalance stax, brutal card.
I feel Crim’s energy on castle ardenvale so much, because if having enough basics isn’t an issue, what’s the downside to it?
This. We got you Crim!
Ardenvale is just bomb in my Lyra angels/tokens deck!!!! Paired with divine visitation, now we're talking.
I agree with tomer on the temple of the false god. I think the problems with the discussion in the video are 1, the table isn't really listening what tomer is trying to relay (he gave it a B, it's good in a specific subset of decks - and it's not even a small subset by his arguments) and 2, tomer didn't really defend his point as well as he could have.
In a green deck that really wants to ramp, if you have temple of the false god and can cast any 2 OR 3 mana land ramp, you get to 6 mana on turn 4. Any 2 cmc on t2 gets a 4drop on 3 and 6 drop on 4, which is the best case, but any 3 mana also gets you to 6 mana on t4. And any time you get it after you have 4 lands it is also free ramp if you add it as a spell rather then a land it's still pretty good.
There's also something you're missing on the discussion of temple of the false god. I actually run it in over half of my decks. The downside becomes dramatically less important when you're running effects like Urborg, Yavimaya, chromatic lantern etc... I even jam it into decks with bouncelands as you can tap it for mana with the bounceland trigger on the stack to get the mana benefit. For me, this is a free ramp spell most of the time and very rarely does it do nothing.
Mosswort Bridge is great in most creature heavy green decks, cause it’s total power 10. So ten 1/1s, two 5/5s, etc turn it on. Super good in my Gishath deck
My two favorite utility lands are scavenger grounds and thespian sage(Richard has shown me the ways)
Heavily agree with Tomer on the Scavenger Grounds vs Strip Mine debate. The amount of times that the graveyard is how someone is comboing off, or even just using to get some insane value. Way more common than when someone is accruing that much value off a land.
Especially when you’re playing the Vesuva type land copiers. I’d much rather have that be my way to just propel my game plan with that broken land than sacrifice one of my own to bring down one opponent.
Been listening back through these cuz theyve got fun banter, and i think itd help soooo much changing C tier to include "super niche include" as opposed to having every episode involve a 20 min argument of someone trying to talk the crew up to a B on a card that ONLY sees play in the Kaldra every equipment deck or something, because it sees play in that one specific deck. I feel B should be for cards that can go into Decksss, plural.
On TotFG the pro argument was well thought out. The anti argument was “uh it’s 2024! We don’t play this card anymore!” They didn’t present any good reasons why he was wrong and almost seemed to not even hear what his reasoning was.
For real, I really dislike when the argument against something gets reduced to "It Has Been Decided That This Card Is Bad".
I get the arguments against Temple of the False God - if it's your fourth land you pull out of the deck and you can't find a fifth then it would have been better to have a basic in that spot. Or if it's one of three lands in your opening hand, what would have likely been keepable (3 lands 4 spells assumed to be good) gets a lot more dubious; you'll need to grab two lands somehow to avoid TotFG being a dead card.
I also get the argument that the 4 to 6 mana breakpoint isn't as huge of an upside. It's not as cleanly defined of a breakpoint as ramping from 3 to 4 where a 4-mana commander comes out a turn earlier with Rampant Growth (or any other 2-mana ramp spell), or any 1 or 2-mana dorks. With a handful of those spells one can pretty reliably pull their curve forward. Meanwhile, just sticking TotFG in a deck as your only acceleration past ~5 doesn't change your curve that appreciably, one really needs to build around it.
I still run it cautiously in a couple decks of mine. I have a Rona, Herald of Invasion deck that runs about 40 lands and a lot of big mana spells. The ramp offered by TotFG can be meaningful to stick an activation of Realmbreaker or a Praetor early. Because I have a looter for a commander I can just pitch the thing if it's not going to be useful at the moment, but keep it if it is.
It's interesting that Tomer is quoting Frank Karsten because Karsten is a big advocate of running more lands. I think there's a lot of commander players that are horribly greedy with their mana bases, running 34ish lands and leaning on the first-turn draw and a free mulligan to avoid getting screwed harder than they ought to be. A Temple of the False God is going to be way less viable in a 34-land deck than it is in a 40-land deck. Even one extra land in hand from running ~6 more lands in an EDH deck can be the difference between sequencing four other lands first and then TotFG as fifth land, and bumming out on 3 lands and a very sad TotFG as fourth with no idea when the fifth land will come.
I agree with Tomer here on Temple of the False Gods. It is great in decks using efficient land ramp because the numbers are very much in your favour. Even moreso in a landfall deck where you have 40+ lands. Just mathematically it's tough not to agree.
That being said, I still don't run it in many decks. I think Ancient Tomb's appeal (not that I own one) is that it adds 2 mana fast.
It will do something in turn 1-3 which is when you want to be ramping which offsets the fact that it adds colourless mana because it's helping you cast other ramp that has minimal colour requirements. Playing a colourless land in turn 4-5 is not ideal because that's when the demand for colour is greater and it's less likely to be trying to just cast signets or Cultivate that only needs one green pip.
I feel like Dryad Arbor is a weird include on this list. There's a long list of lands that were excluded, really prolific ones that see more play. I'd really like to see a part 2.
Anecdotally, the last gaming session I activated both Locthwain and War Room, on the same turn, also went on to win. This was an Orzhov deck. My philosophy is same as Seth's-- better to include them and never be in a position where you can't draw. Digging wins games, even drawing nothing helpful gets you to the good-stuff underneath. These are cards that stealthily win games.
The math is sound however, as a GREEN LANDS player, I will say, Temple of the False God is FANTASTIC…at starting fires…just tear it up a little bit to get some papery edges, they catch fire quick and act as great kindling. Temple does not go in any deck in my collection, temple only goes in my fireplace to keep me warm in the winter.
Magic cards don't burn too well.
Temple burns better than it plays
Having reviewed it, Temple of the False God needs to be in my Gargos deck, because its ramp is geared towards untapping lands for multiplicative effects.
The math checks out! Temple of the false god is good in land decks. Simic and Mono green can and do utilize this, trust the math, this is good.
Like Tomer said, treat it as a five drop, or if you are in green, a three drop XD
Castle ardenvale feels really good in a Kyler deck, where it's like 5 mana to put out a 4/4, put a counter on Kyler and pump the team
Super true. I need to get that in my kyler deck.
I went in thinking that temple of the false gods was pretty alright and Tomer’s B seemed pretty reasonable, but the amount of times he pushed the land ramp is good made me realize how underwhelming it really is. I don’t think two colorless makes a difference on turn 4 if you’re going to ramp at all
Pretty much, even if getting bricked by TFC a mere 10-12% of the time is perfectly palatable (which it is in my opinion), turn 5 is usually well past the set-up stage, especially with the excess of efficient mana rocks as of late.
I would say it's still decent ramp on a slower budget deck, but not nearly as impactful as earlier ramp.
I think people underestimate the marginal returns of ramp in a high CMC format. Yes, the gains of the first ramp spells are huge, but turning the corner from casting one spell a turn to two spells a turn is still quite large. Getting to that 8-9 mana point is still a significant advantage if you don’t completely kill your card economy doing it, and one way to avoid that is 2-for-1 mana sources. I think the gains of Temple are very real in ramp decks, but the costs are also still real.
Would Volrath’s Stronghold be same ranking as Hall of Heiliod’s generosity? Or would it be higher since it hits creatures which are more common?
There are a lot more ways to recur creatures, especially in black, so I think it’s actually a little worse.
Still a good card though.
Seth's sad like "nooo" when Crim bumped his Strip Mine rank down at 36:53 was so adorable
I feel like temple of the false god is just generally good in control decks that have good card draw or even rummaging effects. I have seen it be very powerful in izzet-control with a spell-slinger subtheme.
I'll play vasuva in decks that run cards like lotus field which is all my white decks without green because White's catchup game is great when you can artificially put yourself behind in lands and not mana. Scorched Ruins and the bounce lands are other amazing cards to copy but without those I'll avoid them.
Seth is right about Temple of the False God, ramping when you already would have 5 mana isn’t great unless you have a commander at 6 or something specific to hit with that. It’s the slowest possible fast mana.
I feel like the hideaway lands are really good. The green white and red ones are so easy to trigger you can almost always get the card. In any mono or two color decks it's probably worth it to run them.
Crim's thought process strongly involves hating green and its so funny.
And Seth complaining about green not having enough basics with a TotFG because he played like 6 basics in mardu (If he's talking about the most recent episode) with sword of the animist double triggers is even funnier
The pendulum has gone too far against Temple of the False God. I've told everybody for years that it is bad in most decks, and I still agree. However, I recently built Kogla and Wort back-to-back, which ramp a lot with lands like Tomer explains, and yeah, it outperforms. Temple is one of the best lands in those decks, especially when late-game I play effects that make me fetch any land. With high-cost commanders that you will need to replay with the tax, Castle Garenbrig is not enough, you want all of those ramp-lands.
B seems like the perfect ranking for it. Downplaying the idea of "oh, it's ONLY one more mana" forgets how many times you're one mana short mid-game on important plays. It gets held to the standard of "auto-include" and looks awful getting compared to that unfair standard. In a lot of ways, can think of it more like a ramp spell than a land, except it happens to be a land.
How many well built edh decks miss their 5th land drop and still win. Card is incredible
Temple of the false god always works in my omnath deck because it is basically half lands and the other half is ramp/payoffs. Two ramp spells and then turn 3 onward it’s like a sol ring that procs landfall. Tomer is right you just need a lot of land ramp to virtually eliminate the downside to play it, otherwise keep it out
run temple of the false god in a spell slot, if you play it as your fifth land, it's a mana crypt :)
Ardenvale is best for equipment decks. It's a land that also acts as a creature when you get wiped. It turns back on your engine when everyone is down on resources. Embereth can also end the game by entire turns which is very important because it prevents your opponents from getting answers.
The article Tomer's referencing only seems to address when Temple *works* on turn 5+. It doesn't look at the percentage of that 85% where you have to play it as one of the earlier land drops and it doesn't do anything until turn 5+. (Among other assumptions that likely bring that 85% down realistically)
Also, weighed against the chances of coming in on/offline, I doubt the positive impact of the extra mana outweighs the negative impact of being down mana for some nber of turns.
It literally looks at the percentage of times where you'd have to play it as your land before it can be activated. That was literally the point of that article. So no, the percent doesn't drop any.
@@MTGGoldfishCommander I tried to read the article pretty carefully before posting, and I'm reading it again as I'm writing this. If that is what is supposed to be represented in the modeling/data, I don't believe the article does a good job of portraying that.
> "if we've drawn Temple of the False God by turn x (5, 6, 7), what are the odds we can activate it?"
> "P[Can activate Temple on turn 5 if you draw it by that turn, after mulls] = 74.7%"
> "So the odds of Ruthless Regiment of activating Temple of the False God on turn 5 is 75%, or a 25% failure rate..."
> "P[Can activate Temple on turn 5 (42-land deck) if you draw it by that turn, after mulls] = 85.5%"
These appear to be, exclusively, calculating the chance that the temple can be activated on turn X (assuming it was in hand by turn X).
It does not state anywhere (that I see) that its *excluding* the pattern where its played before turn X, cannot be activated, but still can be activated on turn X.
For a dramatic example, as "two land hands on a mulligan" are kept (assumptions are not clear whether Temple counts as one of the 2-5 lands, I'm assuming it does for this example), this would be counted as a success case, represented as part of the 74.7% and 85.5%:
T1: Land
T2: Temple (no other lands in hand)
T3-T5: Draw and play a land.
Temple is Online on T5.
Am I missing something?
I run Temple of the False God in Muldrotha and Roon because they are high cost commanders, and Roon even has the 2 mana activated ability. I think i've had it be dead once or twice in easily 20+ games.
On Reliquary Tower, just discard to your best 7. I would give it a D. Rather have a basic
The Castle Vantress mana cost issue was totally fixed of course recently with Rivendell...same exact card abilities except you must control a Legendary Creature on the board for Rivendell...but just one blue, one colorless to Scry 2...definitely worth the cost comparatively
The fact they were arguing over which castles were better shows how good all of them actually are lol.
people argue about which garbage is better. doesn't mean it isn't garbage.
I still play Temple of the False God bc of the math Tomer mentioned. I play it in a Sultai land reanimator deck with Zuran Orb as a jank win-con card:
Tap for 2, sac and gain 2 life, recast off something like Ramunap Excavator, tap for another 2, sac again, gain another 2 life. Keep replaying it twice or more every turn, and if you have Marauding Blightpriest and/or Epicure of Blood, you drain your opponents for half the life you gain from Zuran each turn. Sanguine Bond is a more efficient, less budget choice, and the Exquisite Blood combo with it seals the game for you.
I am split alongside Crim and others with the Castle Cycle. The decks that have cards like Zirda, Hearthstone, Training Grounds and even Biomancer's Familiar will love this cycle of lands for value. I've seen many games where a couple turns of an animated Castle from a Nissa etc. can pull that player ahead. Being abilities that are generally safe and a land slot in the deck feels great.
Temple of the False God is a budget Ancient Tomb which means it will be played in real life paper decks.
the temple of the false god discussion was frustrating, and I completely agree with Tomer. if you are in a land ramp deck it is just free mana, and I really don't understand why the others were trying to argue that 1 extra mana isn't good in a green deck. My personal tech is to play it with hour of promise and it is very easy to make that card ramp 4 if you are playing ancient tomb as well. I wouldn't play it outside green or at higher budget, but that is still a significant chunk of decks and I would also argue it is decent if you have a lot of card draw or looting
Something that wasn’t mentioned about temple of the false god that makes it better in some decks: urborg&yavimaya. If you play either of those lands in a deck, temple is ever so slightly safer to play since now it can tap for colored mana if you don’t have enough lands to make it tap for 2. Green also has dryad of the ilysian grove and prismatic omen, so I’d consider running it in a green+ deck
I play Temple of the False god in my windgrace deck. I can fetch it after I can turn it on, I can discard it to draw cards, recur it from the graveyard, it activates cabal coffers by itself etc. It's a card I want to see in every game tbh. My build is far from optimal obviously, but I think it's fine in lower power land ramp decks.
The floor with vesuva is so bad though since its a tap basic, but yeah the ceiling is decent. I just dont see it as cedh worthy and too weak for casual were lands arent always powerful like ancient tomb. Idk i would run vesuva but would consider thespians stage.
Best case scenario I've had with Temple of the False God wasn't 6 mana on turn four. It was seven mana on turn 2. Getting Angry Omnath out when everyone else is still building out their board feels real good.
Guessing it was a burgeoning hand?
Hideaway lands : red > green > white. The red one can be triggered by oponents.
I personally love Castle Ardenvale in my Rick Steadfast Leader deck only because Rick gives humans a buff but I need a certain amount of humans on the field. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve activated it and pooped out a 6/6 first strike vigilance in that deck it’s pretty sweet on a land.
What about Homeward Path? its one of the best utility land there are.
Temple of the false god is not a utility land in the first place, it is fast mana in a slow slot. Utility lands do something other than generate mana for you or do something as well as generating mana for you. Gaea's Cradle isnt a utility land, Ancient tomb isnt a utility land, so why is this suddenly utility?
Scavenger Grounds isnt in the same classification as Strip mine, strip mine goes 1 for 1 to remove a single land threat, Scavenger Grounds goes 1 for 10+ cards minimum at instant speed for 3 mana, on top of this, if you are running Scavenging grounds and you opt to use its exile effect, you probably already assessed that your graveyard is nowhere near the threat level that your opponent's is, so you already know you losing your graveyard is worth what your opponent is losing twice over.
You swayed me on the land destruction lands. I think I'll replace those with another utility or even just a good fixer.
Wait War Room doesn't tap for black mana? Do you just like not have Urborg all the time in your mono black decks?
I'm still using Temple of the False God in most of my decks, basically as a budget Ancient Tomb.
Temple of the false God is a great budget option for infinite mana combos too. Patron of the moon or ghostly flicker combos usually need 1 or 2 lands that tap for 2
Tomer's analysis is correct for Temple of the False God.
If you are a green deck that is ramping on either turn 2 or 3 (or both) it will enter on turn 4 and give immediate value.
If it's later in the game you're almost guaranteed to get value.
No downside unless you're like, mono-green devotion and can't cast stuff with it.
Scavenger grounds is nice in my mill deck, exiling graveyards is really important in mill and having it on a land is very nice
I think of all the castle lands, red is the most misunderstood. People say the blue one is okay because you play an instant speed deck but don't you rather play an instant speed spell? And the same counts for like the white one, the green and black ones are just good but the red one is different because you don't really add an effect that adds +1/+0 to your krenko deck for example but if it's on a land that you can sometimes use and get quite a lot of power out of I think it's actually really strong, so honestly in a deck like that I'd definitely include it.
Another factor in whether I will play Temple of the False gods is if I play bounce lands in the deck, which tend to suppress your actual land count and can further contribute to really awkward starting hands.
If my deck is one or two colors the hideaway lands almost always make the cut. 13/17 of my decks have hideaway lands. I find that the tempo loss is negligible compared to tutoring and scrying then hideaway-ing a finisher or bomb
The artifact lands do add good utility to any deck that runs Trinket Mage. In regards to Reliquary Tower, I feel that yes, many decks aren't going to be able to consistently get to 8+ cards in hand. In addition, if you're drawing so many cards, you should be playing them and popping off harder, and if you're not then something's wrong with the deck construction
I know this mostly still applies to green decks, but I think tomer is slightly underselling Temple of the False God, with Dryad of the Ilysian Grove, Urborg, Yavimaya there is a growing number of cards you want to play anyway that turn it on early, which is a huge mitigation to your downside. land+temple+rampant growth is an awful starter, but yavimaya+temple+growth is a pretty awesome one.
Plus, there's always the ickier ones, like, chromatic lantern and realwright
Also, I don't think I've ever seen either Field of the Dead or Vesuva on any cEDH decklist so Idk if I agree with the "S" tier. I think the episode missed some actually really powerful utility lands such as Emergence Zone, Inventors' Fair, Academy Ruins, Winding Canyons, maybe even Ruined Ruins?
I agree that Reliquary Tower is overrated, but the “pick the best seven” argument is, too. Why have to choose when you can keep them all? If you draw 50 cards and discard 43 of them, you might end up discarding something you didn’t need at the time, but will wish you had before your next turn. Counterspells stop a lot, but not everything.
Now if you know you can win the same turn you draw those cards, yeah, it’s pointless. And if you don’t think you’ll be drawing that many cards in most games, also pointless, especially in 3+ colors. But I have several decks that draw a lot of cards and don’t usually win that turn. It’s nice to hold onto everything just in case.
Well the idea is less of if you draw 50. It’s more average case of “I draw ten and discard 3” the discard gets worse the more you draw as card selection is only so good.
If your deck does draw 40 cards at the end of turn (and you are not playing the vast majority of them right there), your running a bit of a narrow deck and I would recommend tower but it’s a common one
One hot take: temple of the false god in a land ramping deck is frequently online in turn 3 or 4, where it's basically a sol ring. It's also quite good when you're running something like weathered wayfarer, which can tutor it whenever it's actually online. I would absolutely not keep it in my opening hand if it was one of my two lands.
Vesuva/Thespians stage: I think vesuva is A tier at best, as it's wholly situational as to whether or not it's actually relevant. Thespians stage is A because it's always able to become relevant.
Temple of the false gods is an auto include in an Orvar the all form deck. You can target it to duplicate it, thus potentially turning on its ability as well as getting that much more mana
I think temple of the false gods was replaced by guildless commons if you're going for a budget. Then if there is no budget then you just play ancient tomb. At least guildless commons isn't a dead card after the turn you play
Guildless provides zero amount of ramp (short of untap shenanigans) so while Temple is bad imo Guildless is not a comparable substitute.
@@ms.sysbit5511 it does literally the same thing a turn later. It's not like you lose the mana from the land you bounce if play it right. If you have a starting hand of 3 lands and 4 other cards, I'd rather have guildless commons over temple just for the guarantee that I will hit all land drops instead of hope to draw enough for temple to be useful.
@@sapher4994 but that’s not ramp. You play it turn 3 as your third land. Turn 4 you tap for 4 mana. This is not ramp. Again, not saying Temple is good but it is ramp unlike Guildless which is just a really bad Bounce land that doesn’t color fix.
One thing people used to do with dryad arbor is hide it in their land area so an opponent wouldn't notice then polymorph it into Emrakul for free
and Vesuva is good for eldrazi decks when you use locus lands to hard ramp
Commander Clash Crew: “Why would you run a land that does nothing until you have 5 lands? You’ve already lost by then! What about all my bounce lands and Urza’s Sagas and other decks without green ramp?”
Also Commander Clash Crew: “Field of the Dead (a land that’s literally a tapped wastes until you have seven unique lands) is the best land ever printed! Run it in every commander deck ever!”
I think I can speak on behalf of the entire crew here: Field's payoff is so high that it more than outweighs the downside of being tapped and colorless. Once it's online, you're just making 2/2's for zero mana. It's a ridiculous card.
@@MTGGoldfishCommander i feel like you're confusing it with how it performs in other formats, imo, as who is really going to care about getting a free 2/2 on turn 7? I dunno, seems pretty weak to me. Run Scavenger Ground instead (no kap)
Hmm.. for me, I'd say I generally agree with our hosts here:
* Temple of the False Gods: D (I don't think I'll even play it, even on a budget)
* Vesuva/Thespian Stage: A (Agree with Tomer on it, I don't think I've ever actually used it and has some sound reasoning for why I should put it into my deck)
* Strip Mine: A (I like having some unconditional answers)
* Castles: C (I mostly like Castle Locthwain, only one I'm rating a B.. I actually don't like Castle Garenbrig because it only produces green and only for creatures, I can't quite put it into more generic decks or in multicolour decks as effectively, it might be okay in two-colour decks but very painful in three-colour)
* Dryad Arbor: C (I know there's combos, but I don't play them, it's an expensive tapped Forest for me)
* War Room: B
* Scavenger Grounds: B (Even on Black decks with Bojuka Bog, I like to run it, it's definitely a top pick if you don't really interact with your own graveyard.. even better when there's multiple problematic graveyards)
* Hideaway: C (Enters tapped, single colour, I'd rate the green a B, it's not too hard to setup and can be executed at any time during an opponent's turn)
* Reliquary Tower: B (honestly, even dumping excessive cards in your graveyard isn't the worst, I do play it in decks that draw a ton of cards)
* Field of the Dead: S (only knock against it is that it comes at the cost of a lot of basics due to deckbuilding construction)
* Artifact Lands: D (artifact board wipes are a pain, the tapped Indestructible ones I'd consider a C though.. also with Farewell on the table now, I'd like my lands in tact)
S = very strong, I need a reason against it to not play it
A = solid, often play
B = situational, good upside, still play
C = situational, I need a reason to play it
D = generally avoid
Castle Locthwain is at its best in decks that want to draw at a specific moment and that don't run cantrips: if you Vampiric/Mystical Tutor for an instant-speed answer, Castle puts it in your end. If you manipulate the top card for a miracle, Castle allows you to cast it at the right moment.
What... no discussion time for Ice Age utility lands? Hall of Mist, Ice Flow or Glacial Chasm? How about the set of common lands that came in Eldraine? Arcane Lighthouse? Ash Barrens? The Legendary set from Kamigawa Champions?
I play Scavenger Grounds in a few decks but my Umbris (Fear Manifest) commander deck has it's best use. If Umbris is unblocked during attack, I sacrifice Scavenger Grounds to increase his damage. Sometimes it's lethal out of no where. Partner it with Rogue Passage if you have the mana. I am sure there's better ways, but it works.
With urborg and yavamaya you can run temple with an even higher chance of it being good since it can tap for whatever basic land type you add to it if it comes out early