Dear Choked Estuary, 

<3

The kids these days are spoiled. I started playing Magic in 2003. If I wanted an untapped dual land for turn 1 there were only 3 options: An actual dual land (Underground Sea), a pain land (Underground River) or a fetchland for that dual land (Polluted Delta). If you look at Julien Nuijten his Worlds winning Astral Slide decklist, he played only 4 fix lands: 4 Windswept Heath. The way they were meant to be played. The days of standard constructed after that with Mirrodin block and Kamikawa block, we didn’t even have an actual turn 1 untapped dual land at our disposal. They decided to not print the painlands in 8th Edition (they did in 7th and 9th). We managed just fine. 

Ofcourse we are also spoiled by Frank Karsten. The way he breaks Magic down mathematicly, especially mana bases, and provided us all with the tools we need so that anyone can build a perfect mana base is a true blessing. I do have to admit it might be better I didn’t have his mana base tools back then, because I don’t know if I could have been bothered to even try to play 2 colour decks without any fixing. And I did enjoy a lot of Green Black Death Cloud in Standard back then. A lot. 

I really like your cycle, Chocked Estuary. I think you 10 are so elegant. It is the cycle I choose when wanting rare fixing lands in my Peasant Cube. Because you do enter untapped on turn 1 as a fixing land. Because you really support 2 colour (aggressive) decks the best, while being worse when playing 3+ colours . I think these days the kids are spoiled with so many turn-one-untapped fixing lands that they can just play any soup deck they want and get away with it. I personally like some restraint every once in a while. Restriction breeds creativity. Cube can still teach those youngsters something.

With love, 

Hanjo