Extraplanar Lens
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Legality

Format Legality
1v1 Commander Legal
Archenemy Legal
Block Constructed Legal
Canadian Highlander Legal
Casual Legal
Commander / EDH Legal
Commander: Rule 0 Legal
Custom Legal
Duel Commander Legal
Highlander Legal
Legacy Legal
Leviathan Legal
Limited Legal
Modern Legal
Oathbreaker Legal
Planechase Legal
Quest Magic Legal
Tiny Leaders Legal
Vanguard Legal
Vintage Legal

Extraplanar Lens

Artifact

Imprint - When Extraplanar Lens enters the battlefield, you may remove target land you control from the game. (The removed card is imprinted on this artifact.)

Whenever a land with the same name as the imprinted card is tapped for mana, its controller adds one mana to his or her mana pool of any type that land produced.

Tur on Hidden Power - Mono-Color - …

2 months ago

Hello everyone! This will be a forum post for a "Commander - Hidden Power" series. My goal is to show relatively inexpensive cards which are often overlooked by commander players in semi-competitive and casual play. (This post is not designed for competitive play.) If you enjoy the topic, please upvote the post or provide positive feedback and I will consider creating similar posts.

The powerful cards I plan on discussing are mono-color cards which are strong with big mana in commander.

I will provide one card per mono-color identity. These cards will not include x-spells nor multi-color identity spells. (I.e. no Torment of Hailfire nor Zacama, Primal Calamity)

It is obvious that big mana is a huge part of semi-competitive play. Whether it is from ramping through creatures, artifacts, enchantments, instants, sorceries, or lands. Big mana is pretty fun. Mana doubling effects from lands are especially useful. In this article, I'll be focusing on mana doubling from lands, but other ways to generate big mana are always possible

Here are some common big mana effects for each mono-color identity:

This is not an all inclusive list as Mana Flare, Heartbeat of Spring, Keeper of Progenitus, Sword of Feast and Famine, et cetera would work just as well. In each mono-color identity the artifacts Caged Sun, Gauntlet of Power, and Extraplanar Lens can be used, however the black and green color identities have an advantage for mono-color double mana effects. Furthermore, green contains cards such as Seedborn Muse, Awakening, and Wilderness Reclamation which allow for more interactions.

Well, let us begin in WUBRG order!

White: Sacred Mesa

This card is relatively unused. According to EDHREC, Sacred Mesa is played in 1511/849227 (0%) decklists and is under one dollar. You'd be surpized how powerful this card is with double mana. Imagine making some number of pegasus at instant speed as either blockers or attackers for your next turn. (The upkeep cost can be paid by making a summoning sick pegasus during your turn.) Not to mention power and toughness buffing effects are ideal with Sacred Mesa, examples include Dictate of Heliod, Cathars' Crusade, Caged Sun, or Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite.

It is often compared to Luminarch Ascension because they have similar effects. Yes, it makes a 4/4 angel instead of a 1/1 pegasus.

However, Luminarch Ascension has many downsides:

  • You have to have four quest counters to use the ability. (That is, you have to not lose life during an opponents turn four times.) This creates a huge target on your life total and you'll see it surely chip away.
  • Bounce effects, such as Cyclonic Rift really mess it up. Welcome back to square one!
  • Common cards, such as Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider prevent quest counters from even occurring. Vampire Hexmage or Hex Parasite are also options to remove the counters.

Sacred Mesa is way more versatile and does not have such downsides. Not to mention is it only three mana, ideal for Sun Titan recursion.

Blue: Compulsion

It is very rare to see this wonderful card. According to EDHREC, Compulsion is played in 1000/945324 (0%) decklists and is under one dollar. Having an activated draw ability with very little downside on a blue enchantment is insane. Ideal when paired with Teferi's Ageless Insight or Thought Reflection. There are a few cards which have a similar effect, such as Triskaidekaphile or Kefnet the Mindful without having to discard a card, but having a two mana activation is much more versatile. I suppose that an argument could be made with Training Grounds, but that is too much just to make the Kefnet the Mindful ability more cost effective. Furthermore, discarding a specific card like Echo of Eons, Wonder, or a shuffle Eldrazi such as Kozilek, Butcher of Truth has some nice synergy. (In fact, it should be played in most bant enchantress decks, such as the commander Tuvasa the Sunlit. Replenish for life!)

Black: Chainer, Dementia Master

This is a wonderful card, but a little pricey compared to the previous two cards. According to EDHREC, Chainer, Dementia Master is played in 6344/983251 (1%) decklists and is approximately ten dollars. Yes, we all know that you can abuse Chainer, Dementia Master with Gray Merchant of Asphodel or Kokusho, the Evening Star with sacrifice outlets such as Phyrexian Altar. Suppose we don't want to abuse this card into the ground is it still just good card? Yes. We can fill up or graveyard with Buried Alive or Entomb and get back a creature card, or we can grab a creature card from an opponents graveyard. It can also be used to interrupt graveyard combos, such as Aristocrats by using the ability on an opponents Butcher Ghoul with the undying trigger on the stack.

Red: Scourge of Kher Ridges

An extremely powerful and undervalued card. According to EDHREC, Scourge of Kher Ridges is played in 1005/912333 (0%) decklists and is under three dollars. If you're able to untap with Sourge of Kher Ridges and double mana, your opponents are going to have a rough time. As you can put multiple activations on the stack, it provides you with a very high on-board presence. Even within a response to removal. I've heard players complain that Scourge of Kher Ridges dies too quick to removal and my answer is "from your opponents perspective it needs to die before you're able to untap". Ideal with lifelink (and deathtouch) equipment such as Basilisk Collar or Shadowspear.

Green: Kamahl, Fist of Krosa

Typically unseen in play. According to EDHREC, Kamahl, Fist of Krosa is played in 4786/880991 (1%) decklists and is approximately five dollars. It is odd how unused Kamahl, Fist of Krosa is compared to Ezuri, Renegade Leader when they basically have the same effect. Overrun as an activated ability which is stackable multiple times. I agree that Ezuri, Renegade Leader is better in elf tribal decks, however Kamahl, Fist of Krosa is great in most big mana decks. Ideal for wide aggro. Tall aggro will gain the benefit of trample. If you don't have extra creatures you can animate your lands as 1/1 attackers, correction 7/7 attackers. (Pretty interesting because these attackers get around Cyclonic Rift, they're lands.) You can also get some payback by animating your opponents lands in response to a creature board wipe. (From that reasoning it can be paired with cards such as Ascendant Evincar and Crovax, Ascendant Hero to destroy opponents lands through animation.)

All in all, these are relatively unused cards which have a lot hidden power with big mana. If your deck is mono-colored and designed for big mana spells or abilities, think about giving these cards a chance. See if they work well for you and your playgroup.

ElderCheese on Mind taking with Memnarch

3 months ago

Profet93 I am going through some of the suggestions you offered. Staff of Domination was there to draw the deck when I had infinite colorless but I rarely used it. Kuldotha Forgemaster is not my favorite card in this deck, sometimes it pays off but normally it does very little... I'm just terrified of not having tutors without black. Extraplanar Lens Normally gets played when it wins me the game lol so it done some work believe it or not. I'm debating some of the nastier combos you suggested. I also found Gemstone Array in my collection which is not a great card but it could help to convert colorless mana into blue mana.

Ear_Wyrm on Devil in the Details

4 months ago

Rasaru The deck has been playing very well! It has become a very potent deck.

As for your suggestions, thanks! The hardest part at this point is choosing cards to remove.

Crucible of Worlds - I generally find that by wheeling so often, land drops are rarely an issue.

Extraplanar Lens - I too love double mana! I've concidered this card, but never really got around to getting a copy.....

Memory Jar - I absolutely agree, I really would love to add this card. Sadly I still don't have a copy......

Sword of War and Peace - I hadn't ever concidered this card. It seems extremely potent in a deck like this and as such I will start looking for a copy.

Jeska's Will - Absolutely good stuff! My only real problem is what to take out for it... .

Glacial Crevasses - This card is sweet! Between it and Extraplanar Lens, I would definitely concider running both and switching to snow basics.

DraconicDestruction on Hellfire Barrage

5 months ago

I think that the Extraplanar Lens could be a good secondary way of ramp besides treasure, and Reckless Endeavor is a boardwipe, which is useful that gets treasure, which is also useful, so that's a plus, and Sarkhan, Fireblood is also good for ramp, plus it gets extra attackers & blockers out with its -7. overall, thanks for the suggestions

amarthaler on Hellfire Barrage

5 months ago

Great build! I love the fact you're using a lot of the AFR and CLB cards.

I can't think of many recommendations, but I'll throw some out there just for thought - not saying they'd necessarily be better than anything currently in the deck.

Fuzzy003 on Talrand No-kens

5 months ago

If token production is one of your main win-cons I'd consider Standardize + Peer Pressure. Kinda like pulling a Insurrection. Also if you use Extraplanar Lens consider using snow basics to stop giving anyone else an advantage with islands.

king-saproling on I BEG YOUR [email protected] PARDON??!!! - Razaketh

5 months ago

These might interest you: Cathodion, Su-Chi, Palladium Myr, Geode Golem, Extraplanar Lens

to_regatha_and_beyond on Angels by my side

5 months ago

I've playtested the deck a bunch of times and here's what I'm thinking. I know you don't actually care about feedback but I really hope you change that or something, IDK.

So, I'm seeing a lot of value in this deck, but it doesn't seem to play super well. It's pretty inconsistent, and the only way I tend to see it consistently drop the threats it needs to win is if it can draw Extraplanar Lens, which you only have two of. Speaking of only having two of those, since you're running 1-2 copies of almost all of your cards, this becomes a very inconsistent deck, especially with how little card draw you're running. Even when it does manage to drop a big threat down, it's often not the one that feels necessary at that moment. Especially that whole Gisela, the Broken Blade  Meld + Bruna, the Fading Light  Meld thing that you want to have happen, doesn't happen.

I would cut a bunch of these out. For instance, Collective Effort has been a dud every time I've drawn it. Voice of All is pretty weak as well, even as a sideboard card. Get down to 60 cards and put some more copies of each card.

If you want to keep showing people this deck you need to at least try to make it work. You've clearly been playing MTG for a long time, so you should know by now that this kind of deck doesn't work. Sorry to be that blunt about it.

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