Bounce Lands, Yes or No?
Commander (EDH) forum
Posted on July 23, 2014, 10:54 p.m. by corranhorn01
This is a topic I'm unsure of. For a 'competitive' (I know it's a casual format, hence the " ' " around competitive) are bounce lands worth it?
I'm playing a fairly strong Marath deck that I'm trying to make stronger (basically the strongest I can make it, for a self challenge) and I'm a bit iffy on the manabase.
Are Bounce Lands worth the tempo loss of both coming in tapped, bouncing a land, being a massive target for Strip Mine and co and possibly discarding for what they make up for in mana fixing?
For clarification, I'm referring to cards like Simic Growth Chamber as Bounce Lands.
Unforgivn_II says... #3
They're nice when you have Thespian's Stage . They're not nice when someone else does. But yeah, they seem good to me. Being able to keep a 2 land hand, but still have access to three mana is great. I run them when I can.
July 23, 2014 10:58 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #4
Bounce lands are playable at the casual level, but I don't advise including them in a competitive deck. Strip Mine is kind of like a Time Stretch against you. If you're playing at a more competitive level, invest in pains, filters, checks, shocks, fetches, and duals.
July 23, 2014 11 p.m.
Gidgetimer says... #5
I like the Bounce Lands, they only have the same draw back as a normal tap land (since you always bounce a land that you already tapped). They are basically the same as drawing 2 lands since they help you make 2 land drops and I have never been forced to discard off of one.
If your opponent uses a Strip Mine on a bounce land, i think that is a trade you can be happy with.
July 23, 2014 11:01 p.m.
Since EDH is based on one-ofs, I think that bounce lands make sense for dual colored decks that aren't based on a tempo strategy. I think this is pretty inclusive. You can't have 4 fetches and 4 duals and/or 4 shocks and you need more lands total.
I think it is especially worth it for non-combo based multiplayer decks.
July 23, 2014 11:02 p.m.
corranhorn01 says... #7
I'm leaning towards not playing them tbh, as I feel that the tempo loss is a bit too great if I'm trying to make it the best possible (I'm going to be getting the original Duos and a fair few Fetches (only the both on colour ones though).
I'm thinking the Signets would be a better option (if I want to run something similar).
The deck I'm looking at is Oh Naya You Didn't. It's currently out of date on the site. It's a fairly liner token strat that can combo off REALLY hard.
July 23, 2014 11:07 p.m.
TurboFagoot says... #8
"If your opponent uses a Strip Mine on a bounce land, i think that is a trade you can be happy with."
No this is wrong. You are so far behind if someone does that, this user has no idea what they're talking about.
July 23, 2014 11:08 p.m.
Yeah ... 3 drop general ... combo AND tempo ... probably not the kind of case where you would avoid the drawback of the bounce land.
I have found them particularly useful in some situations, though, like if there is a Winter Orb or something like that. For slower decks that aren't trying to make the first game moves in multiplayer, they seem to just fix without any issues. If your general costs a lot and the deck is built around the general or other expensive cards, it probably isn't a problem either.
However, in your case, with 3 colors especially, if you dropped them then I guess that you still only have a few forest, plains, and islands - which isn't a terrible thing because of the odd Blood Moon and Path to Exile .
July 23, 2014 11:25 p.m.
Gidgetimer says... #10
Having them Strip Mine a land that produces 2 mana instead of a utility land is bad? Hmm I must be under valuing Bounce lands, you should run them all since they are apparently the best target ever for targeted destruction and therefore must be the most powerful lands ever.
They are trading a land drop for 2 of yours, ok they are getting some minimal value out of it. But I wouldn't go so far as to say "You are so far behind if someone does that" its actually closer to missing a land drop than anything, irksome but no where near as bad as people are making it out to be. It is nowhere near a Time Walk either. Maybe an Explore , they are 1 land up, woohoo.
July 23, 2014 11:28 p.m.
TurboFagoot says... #11
It's not the Bounce land, it's the tempo loss. In the late game it doesn't matter, but you're a full two turns behind if it happens in the early game. You are so far behind, in a competitive setting you basically just lost.
July 23, 2014 11:34 p.m.
corranhorn01 says... #12
Yea... it's been quite annoying at times.
I'm hoping to update the decklist tonight or over the weekend. I'm currently aiming to run ~15 basics (out of something like 36-38 land) due to running Squirrel Nest and Spawning Grounds - this one is probably on the chopping block as well as Earthcraft .
@Gidgetimer, The issue they are bringing up is, while they've traded 1 land drop for 2 of yours (they are already ahead), you've also lost tempo which especially in my deck is a big issue as I'm running a 3 mana general and a combo based deck. This puts you 'a fair way behind'.
Especially as one of the decks in my plays group is basically Selesnya Good Stuff that ramps really hard into Vorinclex, Voice of Hunger and Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite (who dumps on my deck), we also have an omnath deck and quite a few blue decks.
July 23, 2014 11:40 p.m.
scopesightzx says... #13
I think it all depends on the situation you are in when you play the land. If you have a land with an etb ability (Halimar Depths for example), they can be really great. Other than that, it depends on what else the deck has in it, does it have a way to use them the turn they come into play (Amulet of Vigor or Voyaging Satyr for example)
July 23, 2014 11:41 p.m.
To be honest...unless you are running cards with Landfall, they aren't that beneficial. Or, as scopesightzx mentioned earlier, lands with enter the battlefield effects are great.
July 24, 2014 12:05 a.m.
corranhorn01 says... #15
I'm running no Land ETB effects currently (I don't think that'll change) and I'm running 2 Landfall cards Rampaging Baloths and Avenger of Zendikar .
I'm don't think I'll be running them. This deck honestly doesn't suit them at all.
That said, I feel they'd be really good in a nontempo deck/control deck.
July 24, 2014 12:11 a.m.
Gidgetimer says... #16
I have started a comment and deleted it about 5 times now because it was a little too aggressive and dickish.
When I made my comment about strip mine for a bounce land being a trade you could be glad of we had no info on the deck outside of "Marath" and with so many courses open for a tool box commander in Naya I had no indication of what way your deck went. Are bounce lands good for your deck? no. Does a bounce land getting strip mined put a deck 2 turns behind, or even 1? Don't make me laugh. It denies a bit of mana. To a deck playing out an aggressive early game this is devastating, but to a deck that plays defensively early and has an explosive mid-late game it is an annoyance.
July 24, 2014 12:40 a.m.
FancyTuesday says... #17
I would only consider running bounce-lands in a deck that utilized the playing of lands as well as the mana. Get enough Exploration / Oracle of Mul Daya effects going and landfall triggers like Roil Elemental and Ob Nixilis, the Fallen and you might just have something.
Beyond that though, no. Let's break down the early game with these lands:
T1 land - 1 mana available
T2 bounce land - 1 mana available
T3 non-tap land - 3 mana available
As you can see it isn't ramp, all it does is make it so you can get away with drawing one less land to get to range where you could be casting ramp. We all get mana screwed from time to time so this isn't completely useless, but ultimately there's no advantage to it beyond having one more mana open than you otherwise would have if you miss a land drop. How often is it that you'll go a mulligan and 3 draws without seeing 3 land, and is it worth the drawbacks?
Without a Sol Ring or a Mana Crypt you only have 1 mana open on T2, meaning Sakura-Tribe Elder / Stoneforge Mystic / Coiling Oracle / Baleful Strix / Sylvan Library are either sitting tight in your hand or you're keeping yourself to 2 mana on turn 3.
Then there's the risk of it being destroyed. EDH is littered with lands you have to deal with--Cabal Coffers / Gaea's Cradle / Maze of Ith --so most decks will run some land hate. Bounce lands are a really tempting target if someone pulled a Strip Mine in their opening hand. That it bounced a land and uses one of your land drops puts your board two lands behind the rest of the table (one if the opponent used a land to destroy it). At that point in the game setting up and making mana availble is the most important part of your turn, as Epochalyptik pointed out being set back in this regard is like being Time Stretched by every other player in the pod.
July 24, 2014 1:07 a.m.
Epochalyptik says... #18
@Gidgetimer: It does put you turns behind.
Let's look at a few examples. As FancyTuesday said, your earliest "viable" play with a Rav Karoo is
T1 land - 1 mana available
T2 bounce land - 1 mana available
T3 non-tap land - 3 mana available
If someone destroys your bounce land on turn two, you're out of the game. Period. Why? Because you're back at turn zero. Perhaps this is only a Time Stretch if you're playing the bounce into someone's already-existent Strip Mine (insofar as your opponent denies you this turn, and you have to use the next turn to reset to where you were), but you shouldn't do that unless you want to bait the ability out.
I suppose you can make the argument that you had two turns with one mana available (assuming you tapped the turn one land on turn two before you bounced it), and there are certainly many viable 1-drop cards, but the chances of you having capitalized on that mana to an extent that would justify the risk you took is pretty slim. You're better off playing a regular land; there's no risk.
As was said, bounces don't actually ramp. They just serve as "two" land plays in the sense that you net two mana off two plays (one being the bounce, the other being the bounced land) that only require one card in hand to start. They prolong your ability to play lands, and they give you a better mana:land ratio, but the risk of losing tempo (from the ETB-tapped effect and the bounce, and again from the potential of LD) is really not worthwhile in a competitive environment.
In a casual deck, they're not bad. I run them in my casual decks because tempo isn't such a huge concern when I'm not trying to combo out on turn three or four. There's also the argument that they play nicely with Exploration effects, which they do, but that scenario also depends on you having such an effect available.
July 24, 2014 1:34 a.m.
Gidgetimer says... #19
I don't understand why the subject on the table is a turn 2 Bounce land instead of turn 5-6. You don't even have a greater than 50% chance to see one until turn 8 when you are playing 3 in an EDH deck. It makes more sense to me to judge them based on where you are most likely to see them instead of where they would cause the most harm to you.To me this is an analogous argument to playing no lands except color producing lands in a deck with a 3 cmc shard or wedge commander. Can't afford to not have 3 colored sources on turn 3 after all since we are doing worst case scenarios.
July 24, 2014 2:08 a.m.
TurboFagoot says... #20
Even if it's a set back on turn 5, the tempo loss is pretty great.
The point is, why play this land that doesn't ramp you, that has much better alternatives, when the downside not only exists, but is so great? The opportunity cost is massive for little gain.
July 24, 2014 2:25 a.m.
Schuesseled says... #21
It would be like taking Sol Ring out of your deck because your afraid someone will destroy it.
Having a bounceland destroyed is only a problem if you aren't hitting lands as you'd normally want to. Similarly if ol sol ting is your only hope of getting out your best creatures, and it gets wrecked before you can tap it down for 2 (taps only for 1 its first turn if you consider its cost). Well that would suck, better remove sol ring.
For a fast aggro Edh? The tempo loss of it coming in untapped would make it unviable for your deck. But it is by no means a bad card.
July 24, 2014 5:30 a.m.
corranhorn01 says... #22
Sorry guys. I should've linked the deck in the OP. I just didn't think of it tbh, so apologies to all for the little s***storm that I kinda started with that.
Below is a link to the deck in question. I am just about to update the land base to what I think it should be if I'm going to 'break the deck' for lack of a better term. That said, I have probably missed some stuff.
July 24, 2014 8:43 a.m.
Epochalyptik says... #23
@Schuesseled: Bounce lands are not analogous to Sol Ring . Sol Ring does not take up a land drop, and it provides ramp immediately.
@corranhorn01: This is far from a shitstorm. Although we're having a relatively opinionated discussion, it's pretty civil thus far.
July 24, 2014 10:47 a.m.
Schuesseled says... #24
I'm aware of the differences, my point was that dies to Strip Mine is just as invalid an argument as dies to Doom Blade .
July 24, 2014 10:59 a.m.
Epochalyptik says... #25
It's a fair point. Bounce lands aren't automatically bad because they can be removed easily. They are inherently risky, though, because they're basically a downpayment for future ROI. In slower games, where tempo isn't as pressing a concern, they're potentially valuable as a way to keep land drops going and provide color fixing. In fast, tempo-oriented games, however, they're a liability because they don't add immediate value, don't actually give you more value, and represent some risk.
July 24, 2014 11:24 a.m.
FancyTuesday says... #26
I'd liken bounce lands more to Khalni Gem than Sol Ring . Sol Ring is acceleration, whereas bounce lands are not, and losing it doesn't set you back in terms of how much mana you would otherwise have available. Bounce lands and Gem provide you nothing in terms of ramp on their own, they strictly provide you mana fixing and give you more mana available with fewer land draws.
The argument is not that they're not worth running because they're easy to destroy. The argument is that the nature of these cards offers no inherent acceleration while providing a risk of being setback significantly. It's not just the risk that they'll be destroyed, but the fact that they retard your mana production the turn you drop them as compared to a basic land. In the early game you're spending a turn on 1 less mana than you otherwise would be to go the next turn with the same amount you'd have so long as you're hitting your drops.
With the Partial Paris Mulligan and decent deckbuilding the odds of you being both:
- Mana screwed early enough and in just such a way that the bounce lands would really benefit you and keep you on tempo.
- Lucky enough to have one of two, maybe three bounce lands in your deck in your hand.
Is too low for me to see any benefit to them that comes anywhere near the risk and tempo loss that comes with them under far more likely scenarios.
July 24, 2014 5:08 p.m.
corranhorn01 says... #27
True. I thought it was starting to get pretty heated though :D.
Fancy summed it up pretty well imo. That's basically what I meant with my original question, and sums up the conclusion I came to after reading the responses here and talking to some guys at my locals.
July 24, 2014 7:44 p.m.
Indigoindigo says... #28
So, if on a tight budget and it's not an option to invest in more expensive lands, would you rather play basics in place of bounces?
July 25, 2014 7:28 a.m.
Gidgetimer says... #29
The consensus seems to be: In a quick deck that needs to keep pressure up and is worried about Wasteland they aren't worth it. In a deck that is built for the longer game or isn't worried about Wasteland in their meta they are perfectly playable. I think some of the early disagreement in this thread was caused by me not reading that we were only considering the fixing off of Ravnica Karoos and not the continued gas in later turns for decks with expensive spells.
July 25, 2014 8:29 a.m.
nobu_the_bard says... #30
I was using them to abuse land ETB abilities more. Bojuka Bog mainly.
But I agree with most of the above, though I am less strongly opinionated. The situations where you really benefit from them are limited. I scrape by just barely with them. My white/red Commander deck I am building can't afford the tempo loss.
I would like to say I have a deck that contains all of the Ravnica bouncelands: Sliver Overlandlord EDH. It also contains all of the RTR guildgates. I just did it because I thought it was funny. I'm mentioning to see if anyone's head explodes.
July 25, 2014 10:54 a.m.
Grimnir666 says... #31
Maybe I'm misreading them and don't understand the rules, but if you get a bounce land in your first turn, why wouldn't you play it right off? Do you HAVE to bounce a land to play it? It doesn't say that it's an additional cost. As far as I can tell it'd give you 3 mana on turn 2 unless you drew the bounce land on turn 2 (which is 1/7th-1/8th as likely as getting it your first turn). Then later on, particularly if you have Halimar Depths or Bojuka Bog, it still seems pretty good any time the game will go on more than 3 turns past when you get it out. What am I missing here?
June 2, 2015 6:34 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #32
@Grimnir666: This thread is almost a year old. Please read the post dates before you comment on something.
Also, yes, you have to bounce a land when you play it. That's exactly what the cards say. They're not additional costs because lands aren't spells and they don't have costs.
June 2, 2015 7:16 p.m.
Gidgetimer says... #33
It is an ETB trigger. There is actually a modern combo deck that abuses this fact. It is called titan bloom if you want to look it up. Any questions about it you can post on my wall since as epoch said this is an old dead thread.
June 2, 2015 10:21 p.m.
Schuesseled says... #34
Necro'ing is only bad form if you are replying to something.
The reason why you can't play it turn one is because it bounces itself.
TurboFagoot says... #2
The Bounce lands are generally pretty terrible. If you don't care about the quality of your deck, or just want a budget option sure, but otherwise they're just bad.
July 23, 2014 10:57 p.m.