Dual Land Tier List

[@AgusSkywalker]

53:08 - One small correction: the fetch lands have color identity colorless, meaning that they can go in any deck. In a colorless deck they are completely useless, in a mono-color deck you can run 4, in a 2-color deck you can run 7, in a 3-color deck you can run 9, and in a 4 or 5-color deck you can run all 10. Meaning that in a 2-color deck you have potentially 9 lands in S tier and in a 3-color deck you have potentially 15 S-tier lands. Of course the fetch lands are expensive so running the ones that search a land you don't need are there just to thin the deck and could be easily replaced with a basic land if you're budgeting.

[@paulszki]

Deck thinning has been proven to be super marginal. It's just not worth to consider them purely on that aspect, in non cEDH-decklists. Do not run fetchlands in mono-red to "thin your deck". It's silly and you should do other things with your money (or put that fetchland into a deck that can use the fixing.) Landfall triggers, shuffling and obviously the non-basic fixing at no tempo-cost are the real reasons that these are S-Tier.

[@AgusSkywalker]

@paulszki I don't even run Evolving Wilds, let alone Arid Mesa, in my mono-red deck. I was just saying you "could" do it.

[@AgusSkywalker]

You forgot the cycle of Kaldheim tapped dual snow lands. They always enter tapped and have no effect but they have the basic land types so they are fetchable. And also the tapped lands from Dominaria United which are strictly worse because they are the same but without the snow super-type.

[@timbombadil4046]

@@AgusSkywalker These are actually really good because they're typed and they give a really good reason to run Into the North as a 5th 2-mana ramp spell. Make sure you have a couple snow basics so its never dead.

[@taranlee5203]

On scryfall you can literally use is:shockland or is:fetchland for most of the usable cycles. Except surveils and dsk checks

[@AgusSkywalker]

I think for a casual commander pod, lands that get better by turn 6 or 7 are better than lands that peak during the early turns. Slow lands are better than fast lands because in a casual game very little happens during the first couple of turns. And in my opinion the Battle lands (have 2 basics in play) are better than the reveal lands. If you start with a battle land and just one basic you can just play it tapped on turn 1, while a reveal land enters untapped on the same turn. But after turn 4 (when everyone's deck start doing their thing), when you have no more lands in your hand and probably a couple of basics in play (specially if you have fetch-lands and ramp spells) the battle lands are immediately useful if you top deck them while the reveal lands will be useless for the rest of the game.

[@GrayVMhan]

Also to your point on slow lands vs fast lands, since they're 1/99 the odds of you seeing it before turn three is way lower than seeing it after turn 3 or not at all

[@bruvaroni]

Came here to more or less say the same thing. The turns that decide most casual games are turn 4-6. Games don't end on turn six or anything but that's usually where a player establishes the winning engines. At least in my anecdotal experience. I very rarely play fast lands even in two color decks

[@PP-mb2ky]

Lands - literally the most important cards in the deck. More land/manabase videos please.

[@timbombadil4046]

Cycle duals > temples not because cycling is better than the scry in a vacuum, but the typing turns on all the other cards that care. As a tapped t1 play they set up all the check lands, and can cycle on the rare occasion it matters. The surveil land is overall better.

[@TheCommanderPod]

That is a great point!

[@Ize19]

The Verge lands should have been raised to A, instead of the Check lands being lowered to B, imo. Imo they're both better than the Slow lands, which were at A, and significantly better than the Fast lands, which were in B tier. Fun video, keep up the good work!

[@ryanjordan7075]

Yeah, I think the Slow lands and Filter lands belong in B tier and the Verge lands and Check lands belong in A.

[@nachogames6562]

Check lands are not better than the Verge lands on turn 1. The checklands never enter untapped turn 1. Verges always at least tap for 1 color turn 1.

[@benjamingerry1752]

I want you guys to know that this was not boring, super fun episode.

[@AgusSkywalker]

8:20 Nice rolling Rs!

[@seabeechef]

Thanks for your Intel. God bless you Sir

[@hanschristopherson8056]

I’m a really big fan of the pain lands because they always enter untapped, the life loss barely matters in commander and they can add colorless if you don’t need the colors and they’re all less than like $3 so they’re really cheap easily the best bang for buck dual lands

[@paulszki]

they're great and should go into any deck but bang-for-buck, we've been spoiled in the last decade or so. There's lands now that you can get for under a dollar, that enter untapped and fix your mana.

[@cw5948]

Fetch lands are the best lands in magic. It’s wild the one guy says command tower is better. Some things fetch lands do include: 1. Add to GY 2. Tutor in another land you need based on the current situation (like OG duals) 3. Thins out your deck one extra card, increasing your odds to draw the cards you need. 4. Additional landfall triggers.

[@paulszki]

5. shuffling your library (sensei's top, brainstorm, anything that lets you play cards from the of your library, eg future sight, oracle of muldaya) 6. deck thinning is almost completely irrelevant in 99 card decks. It's already been debunked for 60 card decks. it's utterly neglible. Don't run fetchlands in mono-red for the deck-thining of whatever.

[@ryanfohrman7911]

I’m not very high on the canopy lands AT ALL. I don’t value sacrificing lands to a draw card and the one life for each mana is brutal in grindy midrange games (aka the majority of commander)

[@JTiller2323]

Glad to see the signet lands getting some respect. Great budget dual color lands. I thought you were a bit high on the fast lands. I think they are better than reveal lands but not that much better. In a two color deck (where you can afford to run a lot of basics) they are essentially the same card. Reveal lands very often come in untapped turns 1-3 so they play the same and they both suck to top deck when you need an untapped land.

[@darthwhit]

Glacial Fortress should be higher since it doesn't require a basic. I run them in five color decks with fetchable tri lands and shock lands. They rarely come into play tapped for me.

[@kennethjames4915]

Suggestion one episode on how to make a land binder or include it at some point

[@ryanjordan7075]

I think the Glacial Fortress check-land cycle should be higher; as someone who has the original dual lands, the check lands always come in untapped turn 2 and onward if you have an optimized manabase. For example, I have a Bant deck with 9 fetchlands, 3 original duals, 3 shocklands, and 1 triome (as well as 6 basics) and I've never had a check land enter tapped turn 2. Granted, I understand they do get worse if you're not playing all the fetches, original duals, and shocks, but outside the aforementioned lands and battlebond lands, they are the first lands I play. Depending on the deck, I do sometimes value the surveil lands and horizon lands above them though, such as my Necrobloom Landfall deck. However, I don't think I can agree with putting the slow lands and filter lands above them, but I understand context does matter since I play all the fetches, original duals, shocks, and usually a triome to consistently have them come in untapped turn 2 and onward.

[@darthwhit]

I just making a similar comment. Because they don't require a basic they almost always come into play untapped. In four and five color decks I run the fetchable tri lands in green and those alone mostly take care of the requirement.

[@ryanjordan7075]

@darthwhit I do think the new "verge" check lands might be better though, but I haven't tested them yet since they were just printed 2 months ago; the reason I say this is because they can at least tap for a color on turn 1 and then turn 2 and onward the same logic applies as the check lands we're talking about. Glacial Fortress always taps for a blue once it's in play, but I doubt Floodfarm Verge requiring a Plains or Island to always be in play to tap for a blue matters unless targeted land destruction is common in someone's playgroup/at someone's LGS.

[@Shawn-f3x]

I unquestionably play the Slow lands ahead of Surveil. If you keep only 2-land minimums, you’re only going to get tagged by a slow land if *neither* your T1 or T2 draws is a land, and as the OPs mention, you can play it tapped in the absence of a T1 play w/ relative lack of consequence. Even in a 35 land deck, which now has 33 lands out of 92 remaining cards, your odds of hitting a 3rd land by the conclusion of your T2 draw is more than 66%. If your 2-color deck is light on 2-pip spells, I guess I can see not wanting to run the risk, but as someone regularly using creatures/artifacts and even a couple lands with colored pip-costs for activated abilities, I consider it a worthwhile risk. Anecdotally, playing a lot of Selesnya, I believe I’m faced with a Razorverge Thicket or Overgrown Farmland entering tapped *a lot* less than that 30-ish % chance would seem to indicate.

[@ryanjordan7075]

@@Shawn-f3x The only reason Surveil lands are part of the conversation for me is because they are fetchable and I play all the Fetches available in whatever colors I play; if they weren’t fetchable, they wouldn’t be playable at all in my opinion. My typical 3-color mana base is 9 fetches, 3 Original Duals, 3 Shocks, 3 Battlebond lands, 3 Check lands, 1 Triome, Command Tower, City of Brass, Mana Confluence, Prismatic Vista, 1-3 MDFCs, 6-9 basics, 2-3 utility lands. In some decks where it makes sense, I play Forbidden Orchard as another rainbow land and depending on what power level I'm going for, lands like Ancient Tomb, Gemstone Caverns, Phyrexian Tower, Gaea's Cradle and cycle lands like Otawara and Boseiju might come in and the Check lands, MDFCs, Triome, and all but about 3 basics go out, but overall, I don't like lands that will come in tapped after turn 1, so the Slow lands are not for me, but I do play the Surveil lands in my Necrobloom deck because it is a 42 land deck that is all about graveyard recursion and it plays both Spelunking and Amulet of Vigor to mitigate the fact some of the lands come in tapped, so in that particular deck, being able to tutor them up with a fetch at the end of my last opponents' turn to dump something into the graveyard is really good.

[@rulamagic]

I don't run very many dual lands. In two color decks I usually only run fetches, shocks, surveils, mdfcs, channel lands, and bounce lands. The rest are utility lands unless there's a synergy reason for playing scry lands, filter lands, or something else. There's just no room for any other duals after all the basic and utility lands. In three color decks: there's one triome, 9 fetches, 3 shocks, 3 surveils, 3 bounces, a couple of MDFCs and channel lands, 4 rainbow lands (including Exotic Orchard). Add in at least 3 basics and a couple of utility lands and again there's not much room for any other duals. And I'm not even considering OG duals in the equation.

[@ryanjordan7075]

For me, it goes Fetches>Original Duals>Shocklands>Battlebond lands>Verge lands>Check lands>Horizon lands>Pain lands>Surveil lands and I just wouldn't play any lands past that, even in a 2-color deck (well, I guess a Pathway might be worthwhile in 2-color, but I'd rather play a utility land than a Slow land or Fast land, for example). When you have all the Fetches, Original Duals, and Shocks in your colors, the "downside" of Verge lands and Check lands rarely comes up after turn 1 (I haven't tested Verge lands yet, but I suspect they are better than Check lands, though, like Horizon lands, they aren't available in every color combination yet). The reason I rate Horizon lands and Pain lands lower is because City of Brass and Mana Confluence exist, and the moment you're playing 3+ colors, if a land is going to ping you, you'd rather it be able to make all your colors. Horizon lands are still worth considering in 3+ color if you're recurring lands or if your curve is low enough that the loss of a mana source doesn't really matter though. Surveil lands are really good in specific decks that are graveyard-focused and they are the only unconditionally tapped land I'd play besides the Triomes. I understand rating Fetches higher than Original Duals might be controversial, but if they didn't exist, we wouldn't be having a conversation about why dual lands with basic land types are so good (granted, Nature's Lore, Three Visits, Farseek, Wood Elves, Skyshroud Claim and the like would still make them good), and tutoring up dual lands isn't all the Fetches do, as they also provide a card/card type in the graveyard and a shuffle effect for an endless list of cards that can manipulate the top of the deck. The Original Duals, by comparison, only come in untapped and provide 2 colors of mana.

[@CrisMW98]

Filter lands Tier A? Feel like B to me

[@timbombadil4046]

Always untapped, have utility beyond just being a dual land. Very comparable to a pain land. Especially in decks that use rituals that generate a lot of mana of one color they're amazing. No matter what the floor on them is so high.

[@paulszki]

People's disdain for the odyssey filter lands is unreal. You'll never play it turn 1 and you don't have to because who keeps lands with 1 land? Just play one of the other two lands from your hand if you've got a sol-ring to plop down. "You can't cast anything that costs two of the same color on turn 2. Also you can't just leave one mana open." This is so incredibly fringe and possibly only ever relevant in cEDH. What realistically and practically happens is that these will give you MORE colored pips because they let you literally filter colorless mana (from your Sol-Ring, Mindstone, Ancient Tomb etc.) into colored mana.

[@ISEESPACEMONKEYS00]

Check lands at A tier…..na 😂