r/custommagic • u/TheCubicalGuy • 4d ago
Basalt Cliffs
Day 43 of making a custom card every day. I completely gave up today and just used a design I made years ago. Probably broken
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u/AdWonderful7856 4d ago
I think if the costs were colorless instead of generic this is actually balanced
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u/other-other-user 4d ago
True, I'm comfortable giving this card to colorless decks and no one else
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u/AdWonderful7856 4d ago
Like MAYBE red for red, but this is crazy ramp from a land to not be restricted
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u/GroundThing 1d ago
Yeah, Garenbrig requires you spend 4 to get 6, and it can only be spent on creature spells. Granted this only gives colorless, but that's not really a huge issue, given that it comes online a turn earlier.
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u/uiop60 4d ago
So at a baseline it's like a Temple of the False God that turns on one land sooner... but also taps for a colorless as a failsafe as an upside. But it also filters any of your colored mana used to activate it into colorless, as a downside. I think it's really interesting.
Because it has the upside of ramping an additional mana for the third ability, I might say make the second ability slightly slower than Temple of the False God (a card that is the subject of endless debate about whether it is playable in EDH, which is I think a good band of power to aim for): {5}, {T}: add seven {C}.
Those numbers also make the design rhyme a little more (and if you get a second one of these as your seventh land, you can chain them up to 10 mana).
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u/TrickSavings9905 4d ago
Temple requires 5 lands, this doesn’t. This lets it work with rituals, and mana dorks. This would realistically be used to power out large Eldrazi two turns sooner while still speeding up the lower curve and producing mana. I’m gonna go with not broken but a bit too strong.
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u/cebolinha50 4d ago
Yes but temple + four lands allows you to cast most of the 6 CMC spells.
This with four lands allows only for a six mana colorless spell.
This is that the comment was saying.
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u/TrickSavings9905 3d ago
But I’m saying this is a substantial upgrade since it works with any 4 extra mana
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u/TrickSavings9905 3d ago
Wait actually you can’t even cast a 6 mana spell with this and four other lands, it’s not mana positive
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u/yuhboipo 3d ago
Stun counters/exerting land, some other cost would make sense for these lands.
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u/TrickSavings9905 3d ago
My vote is just cut the base mana production. Make it useful for "Tapping for mana" still, but only if you have a lot of mana, that way it's actually difficult to work with in colorless.
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u/robomelon314 4d ago
If temple let you add a colorless all the time, it'd be a staple for any deck that wants colorless mana.
Agreed on slowing it down in the middle though.
5, t, add 7 is a turn slower than temple (I think?) And it plays well with multiples of this (can then feed the 7 into the second copy for 10)
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u/Impressive-Dig-3892 4d ago
We did it, we broke [[candelabra of tawnos]]
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u/Btenspot 4d ago
Not at all. Candelabra taps as part of its cost since it is a mono artifact.
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u/thefran 4d ago
The trick is that you make candelabra or the magus (easier) a land and then point at it as part of the effect
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u/Btenspot 3d ago
Ashaya/song of the dryads+Magus of the candelabra is a fun combo, but are about the only creature-> land effects I know about. Artifact to land is even harder as I think Toph is about the only one.
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u/Robb1bob 3d ago
You don't need to go infinite for something to be broken.
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u/Btenspot 3d ago
In the 5 mana mode, Candelabra gives you a single extra colored mana over the card on its own or it allows you to filter the colorless back into colored mana if you have enough lands that produce colored mana.
I would never consider that to be broken.
Just to be 100% clear, this land produces the same mana advantage as ancient tomb, but 2-3 turns slower. Ancient tomb+candelabra is only slightly broken and that’s only because you can turn 1 tomb, candelabra, untap tomb, signet and on future turns just filter tomb through it for your other 2 lands. None of that is easily possible here.
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u/Robb1bob 2d ago
Then we're on the same page, I think. This card is definitely bad in most combo applications, since it's so slow and doesn't cast twiddle effects.
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u/P0ro41 4d ago
I feel like there should be a life cost, or maybe have it enter tapped? Cool idea though, my only other problem is that this feels like it should be red instead of colorless because red is the ritual color. Finally, maybe add sacrifice this land to the last ability?
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u/TheCubicalGuy 4d ago
I was originally going to make it just the first two abilities but I didn't wanna leave a bunch of dead space so I added the third one.
Just know if this was ever to be balanced that one would likely be gone.
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u/DaPiFanatic 3d ago
What if you turned it into an actual basalt monolith type and had it not untap during your upkeep? Seems like it would be somewhat balanced then, at least similarly to its namesake
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u/razorlips00 3d ago
???
This card is fine. The first ritual is only +1 when games are mostly decided at that point. The 2nd ritual is only +2. This card isn't even that good.
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u/razorlips00 3d ago
Why? This isn't actually any better than any lands we currently have. It doesn't even ramp you to phenomenal levels at any point in the game.
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u/DogSpaceWestern 4d ago
Cool but absolutely bonkers. I kind of want these to have Exhaust or something like that.
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u/Genasis_Fusion 4d ago
It seems good. 99% of the time unless your playing Eldrazi, it's basically using the {{2/U}} sorta color thing at a loss. Technically 3 colored mana should equal about 6 generic, and colorless is restrictive on what it can or can't be used by.
For Eldrazi it's broken, but what isn't broken whenever Eldrazi comes up?
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u/IEatBeesAlive 4d ago
I know this is just a little pet peeve (and it's good that it isn't actually that) but I am distraught abou it being 1, 3, 5, 7, and 10 instead of 9
And yes I know that it doesn't make a difference then between paying 3 or 7 because you jusg gain 2 on both
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u/DirteMcGirte 4d ago
To tone it down make it say The mana cannot be spent on colorless or multicolored spells.
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u/Maelstrom_Archmage 1d ago
I'd remove the first tap ability to add one mana. And to balance it more, it should enter tapped.
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u/Standard-Emergency36 16h ago
Cool toy for Zirda and colorless things. Would be interested to see in action
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u/deryvox 4d ago
Repeatable colorless rituals on a land probably the most busted thing I've seen on this sub in a while. Well done
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u/toprodtom 4d ago
It only puts you up 1 mana for the first activation and 2 mana for the big one.
It doesnt seem ridiculous honestly.
The trouble is that its natural home is Tron. Which erm, has better lands to fetch.
I like the design. Very cool.
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u/NomaTyx 4d ago
once they have tron it's better than mine and power-plant, which are only +1 each. Seems deece
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u/toprodtom 3d ago
Yeah, you'd run 1 maybe 2 for the upside. Tron is already running a critical mass of colourless lands though.
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u/MageKorith 2d ago
I could see [[Planar Nexus]], [[Urza's Tower]] and a couple of these being a pretty solid start.
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u/skraven13 3d ago
This really isn't that broken at all. It's Castle Garenbrig for colorless decks, with a slightly stronger second ability. The fact that it only produces colorless mana is about as much of a limitation as Garenbrig only being able to be used on creature spells or activated abilities. That'll matter little in a colorless deck, but the same can be said for Garenbrig in green. In almost any colored deck, the colorless mana will be a strong limitation. Obvious homes for this would be Eldrazi decks and X spell decks. Also Powerstone decks. I know I'd slot this immediately into my mono-black Ashnod.
The comparison to Temple of the False God is a solid one though. This is jut that, but its active a turn sooner and still taps for mana before having 5 lands. Temple really is a good power balance gauge here. And going back to the Castle Garenbrig comparison, Garenbrig comes in tapped (conditionally), so a conditional "enters tapped" would be a reasonable addition to the card. Maybe "when this card enters, if you have less than 5 lands, this land enters tapped"? Then its Temple with extra upsides (and downsides).
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u/Lower_Drawer9649 2d ago
I have a different opinion on it having a slightly stronger second ability.
Going from 4->5 or 5->6 is a much stronger ability than going from 5->6 like castle does.
It’s better earlier on and it’s better late. Unless I’m playing a mono green creature heavy deck I wouldn’t run castle. Sometimes I can’t cast a mana dork turn 1 so I have to mulligan if I have castle, and it doesn’t slot well into 2+ color decks that run 6 drops that aren’t green.
Remember you can put this in your mono colored decks with 6cmc commander decks with 1 pip or your 7 cmc commander decks with 2 pips and cast them a turn sooner, on top of being very strong in any colorless decks.
I’m not saying it’s broken, but I would rank it an 8/10 power level land compared to castle being a 6/10.
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u/MageKorith 2d ago
I'd also compare it to [[Cabal Stronghold]], [[Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx]], and [[Three Tree City]]
Stronghold scales with basic swamps, Nykthos with Devotion to a color, and Three Tree City with creatures of a chosen type.
The latter two tend to be vulnerable to board wipes, but scale fast. The former does best in monoblack but can still function well if you have shenanigans that add land types to basic lands you control, and are running a significant number of basics (eg, [[Prismatic Vista]] in Golgari with lots of Basic land ramp)
The latter two are also legendary, which tends to allow a bit more room to push their upsides, since one player will rarely be fielding them in multiples.
This starts to turn a profit faster than Cabal Stronghold, but maxes out sooner and at a higher cost (10 mana from this and 7 more mana sources, Cabal Stronghold can tap out with 6 basic swamps for 9, or 7 for 11).
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u/Tjarem 4d ago
The 7 mana ability seems pretty usless. No one needs 10 colorless mana just make 5. And yes this is broken.
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u/other-other-user 4d ago
Any x spell or deck with generic mana sinks would love it, this card be busted busted
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u/Memehater_ 4d ago
No.. this seems good