That's a really cool idea SFletcher, but it seems to me that this land could tap for or without being busted. Looking at the common land cycle you have, I have to admit that these uncommon lands don't jive with them well. Can't put a card on the bottom of your library if you already sacrificed it. If you wanted to get value out of these things, 'charge lands' like Archaeological Dig or ETB lands that were poor lands after they did their thing might be a good plan. Also, if I was a player and I saw that something similar to Annex was in your uncommon slot, I'd be psyched.

As I was working on these, Bombshell compared their "replaces another land" arrival to Karoo. I think that if I were to make Karoo Duals, there's no way they'd be at uncommon, and the land they replace would have to be untapped. Any land that makes more than one mana has huge potential to be busted. As is, I already have the Silver Road Way Station cycle in common that offers a one-shot "two mana" turn. Having two cycles of accelerant lands in one set would have been degenerate.

Of course, that doesn't mean I didn't consider these as two-mana lands at the beginning. I did, and Bombshell showed me numbers demonstrating what a bad idea that was.

as far as interaction with the Way Stations goes, I'm fully aware the two don't interact in any special way. I'm 100% fine with that. Not every card needs to interact with every other card. They do share a common thread though when it comes to looking at ways you can trade off tempo for mana diversity and the potential to splash colors.

And in that sense, there's a lot in Soradyne that plays with how tempo develops and shifts throughout the game — mechanics that ask you to trade off attack damage for improved spell effects, a mechanic that fundamentally changes the kind of (and how much) damage you're trying to deal, a tribe built to collectively improve the quality of cards in hand, an array of auras and support cards that work to mitigate the tempo lost when enchanted creatures get two-for-one'd, and so on. I think these will prove fine as they are in this set.

Ignoring contextual considerations, I think WotC would be hesitant to print this cycle for a couple reasons:

1. The drawback is actually more severe than it instinctively appears. When sacrificing the land would be better than putting it on the bottom of its owner's library, you might be headed in the wrong direction.

2. Players complain vigorously when they perceive a "strictly-worse-than" design. (See: Dromar's Cavern, etc...)

With context in mind, you are inserting a vertical cycle of multicolor-producing lands to support multicolor pairings, but you're employing drawbacks reminiscent of Tempest or Kamigawa, where multicolor was an actual rarity and not something they were trying to support.

I'm not sure that Karoos are ever busted, but it is true that the Rav Bouncelands partly defined that format, so I can appreciate an instinct to avoid that level of fixing. However, these are situated near the bottom in terms of effectiveness, and would probably see less play than the Way Stations.

I think these cards are a good design but could probably be looked at in playtesting a lot more. The only drawback seems to be slowing the player down by a land drop, isn't it? But they don't come into play tapped which in comparison to the Rav dual lands could at least throw down that land again the next turn and equal out to the same amount available.

You really think tucking the land is worse than sacking it?

I just said "tuck" and "sack" in the same sentence.

I suppose that with the Crossblighted dead-land cards, the means to get a land into the graveyard would be a good thing. I think my initial goal was to make a dual land that felt like an upgrade rather than an outright replacement, and sacking just felt too destructive.

What's significant about using those words in the same sentence? Here, there's an easier way: "Justin Tuck had a key fourth-quarter sack at the Super Bowl."

One thing to look out for if these do become 2-mana lands is that you could play one and have it put itself on the bottom, but not until after you tapped it for a Lotus Petal-like boost. Your curve with Ravnica karoos goes 1-1-3; playing 2-mana versions of these "fair" gives you a 1-3-3 curve as long as you still have lands to play (which, at least unlike with the Ravnica lands, they don't arrange for you).

In any case, the curve as-is of 1-2-2 is far too weak and no one would want a land drawback that harsh. (Unless, maybe, they wanted to control the bottom card of their deck so they could play Tunnel Vision and call that card out. But who would ever do a thing like that?)

Yeah, you not only have incentive clauses in the set that want lands in graveyards, but tucking the land means that you aren't guaranteed a land drop the next turn. This means that the tuck-land always wants to be played at the top of your curve.

Considering scry, Mindstrike, and the recently renovated Soradyne Geologist, I would at least consider putting the land on top of the library. That way people can strategically interact with it a bit better, and you'd still have yourself a distinctly tempo-centric dual cycle.

Okay, that is f•€*ing brilliant. Top of deck is a drawback they've never done before (well, once on that awful U/G beast in Alara block), and it has mechanical relevance in the set. I like it.

Clearly, SadisticMystic, you do not know all there is to know about The Crying Game. Although, ironically, that's what some of us Pats fans call any Super Bowl against the Giants.

I didn't see the original version of these, but the top-of-deck drawback is awful. It's like casting half a Plow Under on myself. And it's still got the 1-2-2 curve that SadisticMystic mentions. In fact, this seems pretty much strictly worse than Dromar's Cavern in two ways, and that cycle was pretty bad by modern multiland standards.

And now I'm thinking top or bottom of library gives interesting options as well; one gets you the land back at the effective cost of a draw, the other gives you diversity at the cost of a land.

I'm wary that saying the land has to cost you that draw means that nobody will want to use them when they're in a losing race.

@Alex: When the Ravnica shock-lands and Fetch-lands are an option (modern), no uncommon dual looks particularly great.

Oh, I did want to mention maybe sacraficing a land might make sense as having a land in the graveyard has meaning in the set also.

What about this idea:

Tap for 1 no problem. Bounce (or tuck or repel or sacrifice? Maybe even shuffle into the deck, in case you want a shuffle effect?) another land you control to get a counter. As long as the land as a counter, it taps for C or D a la Gemstone Caverns.

That would be better than the current incarnation, but still eminently fair. The question is would it be too complex, and would it do something you want to accomplish in the set?

Would it be too unseemly to have a cycle of Scry-lands?

"When this enters the battlefield, put a land you control on top its owner's library, then scry 2."

It's like a drawback and a bonus fused together to form a drabownubacks.

I contemplated, over the course of this morning's debates, whether I wanted to try doing a different model for each dual land – G/W could come in untapped if a spell was played during combat that turn, R/G could be played during combat like a feint, etc.

The whole thing got stupid fast, and I abandoned it. Rightly so.

I kind of like where you're going with the top-then-scry, but it feels complicated and amounts to about the same thing as "top or bottom". I also want to avoid giving all colors access to scry tricks, as they're part of what makes the Wizard tribe special – they have access to the card selection tricks in ways the other "teams" don't. I like that with the top-or-bottom build, they still get a distinct advantage in how to best use them.

Designing interesting duals is hard.

Truth.

@SFletcher re Ravduals and fetches: Most certainly. But I wasn't really using them as a baseline. I was thinking more of things like Arcane Sanctum and Vivid Grove, which are a lot better than Invasion-era multilands like Dromar's Cavern, Archaeological Dig and Sungrass Prairie.

On-topic, I like this much better now that it's "top or bottom". I think I'd still normally rather have a Salt Marsh, but that's okay, there's room for some cycles of duals that aren't particularly powerful; and this does at least give you interesting options.

I'd not seen the older versions, but I definitely like the "top or bottom" drawback.

And it makes sense that sometimes you'll want to give up future land development in exchange for color fixing now.

However, I'm still concerned that this is worse that the Lair lands. "Put in your library" is usually a worse drawback than "return to hand", and this only produces two colours, but a lair makes three. And (I think?) both can do the "tap immediately they come into play" trick. I agree some dual lands need to be less powerful, especially at uncommon, but I think many people are already annoyed by Lairs.

I'm not sure what I'd suggest as an alternative, if anything, though. I agree that tapping for two mana would probably be too good. And adding any other effect would probably be too complicated.

I think I'm ready to close the book on these and say that barring some huge revelation, they're right for this set. While I'd love for people to jump on something I design and say, "OMG RFOLZORZ BEST BALANCED DULE LANDZ EVRRRZZZ!!!11!", I can (and will) accept "interesting and playable in limited". They do interesting tempo things in a set full of interesting tempo things.

Not every card is designed for Modern. Better to not rank there than to break it or make a set of uncommons go prohibitively expensive — which is what happens to game-breaking lands.

As Maro likes to point out, there's always someone who's going to look at these and see something they want to train to do wacky tricks. Good enough for me.

One question before you set these in stone: What does "put on top or bottom of library" do that "return to hand" doesn't? Because "return to hand" would still be mostly worse than the Lairs (2 colours rather than 3), but not entirely (they can bounce themselves). If the set has things that care about having lands on top of your library (like Cruel Deceiver), then that's one reasonable answer. But otherwise these are pretty harsh card-disadvantage machines.

Dammit. Gears got turning again.

Other options:

• Comes in tapped unless you sac a land.

• Comes in tapped unless you tuck a card from hand.

• Bounces itself unless you pay when it ETB.

I think that before you'll ever be able to decide on an appropriate design for this cycle, you need to address what your intentions are for having harsh penalties on mana-fixing in an environment with a fair portion of multicolor cards.

The three "modern" multicolor sets possess what is effectively the best fixing in the game, spread across each rarity. This includes common 5-color lands like Rupture Spire and the Vivid cycle, to the aforementioned Ravkaroos and Alara Trilands. I realize you're not trying to strongly emphasize the multicolor components in a "color" sense, and you've cut down the projected gold count to ~20, but those elements do exist in your set design as a means for expressing the faction-elements.

Do you really want it to be challenging for the player to support their G/U Wizards deck?

Man, I stopped commenting a while ago, because I knew that this was going to end up being too much information to all be useable. That being the case, MHoulding missed one block where the multicolor threat was high and the mana fixing was bad: Invasion block. And, from what I've read, many Wizards employees consider that a mistake. People had a bunch of nifty new three color dragons, but couldn't cast them consistently. A lot of the 'nifty new' didn't get played over the 'consistent good'.

I'm not going to go on the record as saying "This ain't good enough". After all, some of the color fixing was worse than this. (Slimy Kavu anyone?) But if getting people to play multicolor is a goal, then you've got to convince Spike that it's a good idea. And that bugger is hard to win over sometimes.

It's a reasonable point that a set with gold cards needs to have decent access to mana fixing. It's crucial to a set where "color matters" is a central focus.

I don't know that color can be considered a central focus in SOR. With the exception of the G/U wizards tribal tricks, all of the other themes can be played with just two colors. Feint is strongest in R/G and has some mid-grade bleed into white, but shouldn't (when done) rely on all three colors to be effective. The only other enemy-color or three-color theme grouping is the Crossblighted "destroy everything" faction, and that one is almost entirely mono-color (red) until you look in the uncommon, rare, and mythic slots.

That said, it's again reasonable to say that the two enemy-color groups deserve some way to "fix" their mana. I just don't think perfect dual or triple are the answer.

G/U Wizards is still a two color deck. Limited decks run two colors all the time without the benefit of spectacular color fixing. Innistrad gave us enemy-paired duals, but all of the tribal groupings there fall on friendly color pairs. Innistrad plays fine. Yes, DA gave us Evolving Wilds, and Innistrad has an artifact to search for basic lands. I genuinely believe that between the common and uncommon multi-lands already in SOR, plus an artifact fixer or two, that the mana should be fine in this set.

Within SOR, Aura and Equipment enhancement can be played with just plains and islands. Mindstrike works with islands and swamps. If a player were to force Crossblight, mountains with a few swamps should provide the primary base (plains for specific cards). Feint needs mountains and forests. Green/White doesn't have a specific theme yet, and I'm working on that, but a base of forests and plains is obvious there. This leaves us Wizards as the last common-based color group; it just so happens that the one tribe that won't have a dedicated multi-land base also has by far the most access to card selection and smoothing (Both evidence effects, land search, cycling, draw arranging, etc.).

Are ten friendly-pair multi-lands plus a few artifact color fixers enough for a set that dabbles in multi-color cards? I have to think so.

It's a reasonable point that a set with gold cards needs to have decent access to mana fixing. It's crucial to a set where "color matters" is a central focus.

I don't know that color can be considered a central focus in SOR. With the exception of the G/U wizards tribal tricks, all of the other themes can be played with just two colors. Feint is strongest in R/G and has some mid-grade bleed into white, but shouldn't (when done) rely on all three colors to be effective. The only other enemy-color or three-color theme grouping is the Crossblighted "destroy everything" faction, and that one is two-color until you look in the uncommon, rare, and mythic slots.

That said, it's again reasonable to say that the two enemy-color groups deserve some way to "fix" their mana. I just don't think perfect dual or triple are the answer.

G/U Wizards is still a two color deck. Limited decks run two colors all the time without the benefit of spectacular color fixing. Innistrad gave us enemy-paired duals, but all of the tribal groupings there fall on friendly color pairs. Innistrad plays fine. Yes, DA gave us Evolving Wilds, and Innistrad has an artifact to search for basic lands. I genuinely believe that between the common and uncommon multi-lands already in SOR, plus an artifact fixer or two, that the mana should be fine in this set.

Within SOR, Aura and Equipment enhancement can be played with just plains and islands. Mindstrike works with islands and swamps. For Crossblight, mountains and swamps should provide the primary base (plains for specific cards). Feint needs mountains and forests. Green/White doesn't have a specific theme yet, and I'm working on that, but a base of forests and plains is obvious there. This leaves us Wizards as the last common-based color group; it just so happens that the one tribe that won't have a dedicated multi-land base also has by far the most access to card selection and smoothing (Both evidence effects, land search, cycling, draw arranging, etc.).

Are ten friendly-pair multi-lands plus a few artifact color fixers enough for a set that dabbles in multi-color cards? I have to think so.

Something that you're not quite incorporating into your calculations is that what you're saying may justify the current design (which I do like) in a competitive setting, but is strongly antagonistic towards the casual player who might try to play kitchen table magic with just his new booster box of Soradyne.

Even Zendikar, a distinctly monocolor environment with all sorts of triple-black spells and land-emphasizing cards like Timbermaw Larva and Claws of Valakut, had a cycle of tap-duals with a bonus! Quoth MaRo: "We had learned during Invasion that "enters the battlefield tapped" dual lands were slightly on the weak side, so allowing an ETB effect seemed like the perfect choice."

The current design is, I think, playable within the block. At this point though, I'm really leaning towards one of the designs presented earlier in this thread (comes in tapped unless...). To that point, the current model can be adjusted slightly to still allow the tempo interactions I'm going for without feeling "strictly worse" than other uncommon duals. Hopefully that should do something to make them attractive to a wider variety of players who see different advantages in their design.

Okay. After further consideration, I'm seeing that the tuck/top design really only becomes an advantage for the Wizard tribal strategy. As for a full-block consideration, there is a very good reason in what I have planned for Door 47 (set 2 in the block) for these lands to bounce a land instead. I don't want to make them directly comparable to the Dromar-triples or to Invasion/Alara tap-lands though, and for that reason, I think they need an "enters tapped unless" clause.

"CARDNAME enters the battlefield tapped unless you return an untapped land to your hand. ­:Add or to your mana pool."

I think this build creates a card that comes in almost exactly between RAV shock-lands and Invasion tap-lands, and as far as I remember (too lazy to do a search), it has not been done this way before.

After reading all of this, I think you've settled on a pretty solid compromise, with lands that can be useful to casual/less wealthy players and still find value in limited sets. Well done, everyone.