There's not much to talk about here. It's fairly
straightforward-- a three-mana artifact that
taps for one mana of any color. Green has fairly
better options for mana fixing and acceleration,
but Manalith is pretty solid for any nongreen
deck that needs to smooth over its manabase.
Even if you are playing green, if it's one of
three or more colors you can't guarantee you'll
have the necessary green mana to cast a
Cultivate or Harrow. For that very reason,
colorless mana fixing will always have an edge
over mana fixing that requires you to already
have at least one color of mana. And as a
common, Manalith will be a simple,
cheap-and-cheerful way to get that extra mana
you need in just about any deck.
A streamlined version of Coalition Relic,
Manalith can be used for much the same purposes
- namely splashing additional colors into your
deck or taking your deck from the midgame to the
late game. For more generalized acceleration
purposes, cards like Mind Stone and Sphere of
the Suns (ie. ones that cost two mana) are
usually preferred for their lower cost, but any
color at will is nothing to laugh at - note how
popular Birds of Paradise remains after all
these years. Even if you have to pay three mana
for your rainbow mana producer, it's still worth
it.
Today's card of the day is Manalith which is a
three mana artifact that can tap for any color
of mana. There are other options to tap
for a color of mana and few decks need all five,
so this probably won't be necessary for most
decks. It isn't bad for the cost and can
be played in any build it just isn't as
compelling as a myr or land that can tap for one
or two of the needed colors instead.
In Limited this is a nice mana fixer and
adequate for acceleration, as it is both
colorless and a common, so it is likely to be
available and can be used in any deck. It
can be picked up in Booster relatively early in
a weak pack, but is really only needed if your
first pick has a high cost or if you plan on
going two colors. In Sealed this is more
important and should probably be played in every
deck as you will generally be playing more than
one color.
