This ensures that effective dual lands are highly sought after, such as the shocklands of Return to Ravnica and the allied-color 'fastlands' from the Scars of Mirrodin block. These cards are used in formats where they don't rotate out. Most cycles of lands, however, can be fitted into any deck or format where they are legal for play. Most often, this involves dual lands from various cycles, with these lands helping players get all their colors online right away in a game of Constructed or Limited, or the fetchlands to get dual lands of all sorts.įew decks are mono-colored or colorless, and some decks are known for having greedy, color-heavy manabases. Utility lands or manlands such as Gavony Township and Creeping Tar Pit only work in certain decks, such as Esper control decks or five-color Humans.

Of course, not all lands are truly universal. In that sense, spells are like puzzle pieces, while lands are like the table on which the puzzle is assembled - and every player needs that table to build and run a proper deck. This is what sets lands apart from even the most powerful and flexible creatures or artifact spells in the game, since even powerhouses like Tarmogoyf or Arcbound Ravager only work in certain decks and strategies. With rare exceptions, such as the Manaless Dredge deck, all decks in Magic: The Gathering use land cards, from booster draft Limited decks to competitive Modern, Legacy and Pioneer decks of all sorts.

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