Fast vs. Check lands?
Modern Deck Help forum
Posted on July 1, 2018, 1:35 p.m. by Oppenheimer_6845
I understand that a turn one fast land opens you up to 2 colors at once, but what about a turn 4 fast land? You'd be better off with the check (Assuming you have one of the basic land types required out on the field). So my question would be, when and why would you use one over the other? Or would you never use a check land and rather use a shock land (big price difference aside)? Thanks.
2 color decks love to play their Ghost Quarter & Field of Ruin, not to mention cards like Cavern of Souls, Boseiju, Who Shelters All, Nephalia Academy, that protect your own gameplan. There are also plenty of utility lands like Desolate Lighthouse, Geier Reach Sanitarium - or all the manlands. Hence it often happens that people only run the absoluty minimum number of basics they need to, to be able to function beside Blood Moon.
As such check lands often come in play tapped.
However the answer to your question depends on the kind of the deck, if you badly need our mana early game (and can't really use mana in excess of 4), then fastlands are the way to go. If you plan winning the long game on back of things like Sphinx's Revelation then checklands are better.
(And shocklands are always good to have at least as a 1-2 of in the deck, as they can be used to fetch for multiple colors, and provide it instantly withotu asking for conditions)
July 1, 2018 2:09 p.m.
Chasmolinker says... #4
Fast lands are only for midrange and grindy decks in my opinion. If your deck wants the game to end on turn 3 or four every time, then Shocks and basics are the way to go. Aggro decks need every land they play to be available the turn they play it. Ask a burn player how many times Inspiring Vantage is their fourth land vs their first. As for check lands, 2 color midrange decks can afford to run them. Something like Rock or UW control.
July 1, 2018 5:07 p.m. Edited.
Check Lands are great in decks that really care about turn 4 and run lots of basics. For reference, the stock standard way to build UW control uses this set of lands:
- 4x Celestial Colonnade
- 4x Field of Ruin
- 4x Flooded Strand
- 2x Glacial Fortress
- 2x Hallowed Fountain
- 1x Mystic Gate
- 5x Island
- 3x Plains
As you can see, the deck relies a lot on Colonnades, Fetches, and Field of Ruins to set up its colors. This configuration allows you to go something like turn 3 Gideon of the Trials
into Cryptic Command with relative ease while keeping the number of nonbasics as low as possible. You should note, however, that even here, the number of checks (and shocks, for that matter) is 2. It speaks volumes about how little you actually need checks in the format.
July 1, 2018 7:57 p.m.
Chasmolinker says... #6
Agreed. Check Lands are only “good” in two color decks because they are reliable enough to turn on. And makes having basics in the deck better than three, four, or five color decks. Where as those decks only run basics to guard against Blood Moon.
July 1, 2018 11:59 p.m.
If your deck is all-in on the first few turns, fastlands are good, at least as soon as you've filled in the slots for shocks and fetches. but if having the right mana, for some more demanding spells, at some point in a longer game, matters more, then checklands are better... after you've filled in the slots for shocks and fetches.
July 2, 2018 4:24 a.m.
So yes, consensus is that checks have their place but fastlands are more ubiquitous for a reason. Most of the time, Inspiring Vantage is damn near close to Plateau and that's saying something.
July 2, 2018 11:25 a.m.
Chasmolinker says... #9
Also good to note is running fast lands with check lands can be problematic. In a faster format having a fast land in play and drawing a check with no basic land types to match it can be frustrating. This is why most modern decks run man lands over check lands. At least in that case they get a late game body out of a tapped land. In slower formats or decks having both is fine.
July 2, 2018 12:29 p.m.
Chasmolinker says... #10
Agreed. If it works in the deck, it works. Just that certain decks can’t afford the risk of having a land come in tapped. Burn is the best example of this ideology.
SpliceIntoCantrip says... #2
Fast lands are much better for formats like Modern due to the speed of it and how important the first couple turns are. IMO, Shocklands are much better because you can use fetchlands to search your library for them and you can just pay life to have them come untapped, Fast lands are powerful, but stop being useful after you have 2 lands. Checklands would be good in Commander, where its slower and you can use more basics.
July 1, 2018 2:05 p.m.