Ancient Tomb – Tempest
Date Reviewed: July 31, 2025
Ratings:
Constructed: 5.00
Casual: 4.93
Limited: 4.33
Multiplayer: 5.00
Commander [EDH]: 5.00
Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale. 1 is bad. 3 is average. 5 is great.
Reviews Below:
Ancient Tomb embodies the idea of a game bigger than the box and bigger than its own rules, for better and for worse. It’s one of the most iconic examples of multi-mana lands, and would probably be the most popular if the Tron lands and Temple of the False God weren’t so much cheaper. It’s perhaps the simplest and cleanest design of all those lands, too: you want to break the rule about one mana per land, all you have to do is make a simple life payment. It’s also deceptively powerful and sometimes even unbalanced, as its history of being banned in Extended shows. This partly depends on what exactly you’re using it to cast, but it always comes down to a single home truth. Breaking the rule about one mana per land is so powerful that from the moment it hits the table, your opponent is on notice that they’re now behind and going to get further behind, even if you’re just casting extra copies of Alpha Myr. It’s an icon for a good reason; it’s a special guest in Edge of Eternities for a good reason.
Constructed: 5
Casual: 5
Limited: 4
Multiplayer: 5
Commander [EDH]: 5
Man, Tempest was onto something with its uncommon lands, as Wasteland was also an uncommon alongside Ancient Tomb. While Wasteland is a pressure release valve against degenerate strategies, Ancient Tomb…is an enabler of such strategies, and it’s an absurdly powerful land that has seen consistent play for 25+ years at this point.
In general, lands that provide more than one mana at a time have a limitation, and Ancient Tomb’s…is mostly negligible. Two damage is not a huge price to pay when it pushes you a turn ahead, and in decks tooled to take advantage of the colorless mana, that one extra turn can be all the difference in making a deck really explode. The main point making this land especially absurd is that the mana doesn’t have any sort of limitation constraining its use, and you can use it however you see fit.
While the damage might add up (two damage each turn isn’t completely insignificant), if you’ve built well, they should be dead long before you’re in any real danger of dying. This is a powerful land all the same…it’s not for every deck, but a surprising number of them might benefit from an Ancient Tomb somewhere in their mana base, and it’s darn near essential for particular Legacy and Vintage decks that rely on colorless snowballs to push a game out of hand.
Constructed: 5
Casual: 4.75
Limited: 4 (depends heavily on format; Edge of Eternities might not be awful for its prospects, but this is a card you need to have a reason to run)
Multiplayer: 5
Commander [EDH]: 5
Thijs
Ever since Tommi Hovi won Pro Tour Rome in 1998 with four copies of Ancient Tomb in his Academy deck, Ancient Tomb has been a staple in the game. It has never left and I think it never will. It’s just so incredibly versatile. You gain a turn in terms of tempo, which is a massive advantage.
The card is so popular in eternal formats that you basically can’t go without. I love the fact that they chose to make a (beautiful) reprint of it in EoE. It’s an homage to a wonderful piece of history and should be cherished.
The artist, Bruce Brenneise, hasn’t been with us that long, but the art of the EoE reprint shows us that he’s a wonderful addition to the pool of incredibly talented artists that have created cards over the years.
Constructed: 5
Casual: 5
Limited: 5
Multiplayer: 5
Commander [EDH]: 5
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