Surveyor's Scope - A Magic the Gathering (MTG) Card Review

by   ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist

Today we’ll take a look a card specifically printed for Commander,  Surveyor’s Scope. The Commander 2013 decks introduced several cards that are really only playable in a multi-player Commander setting, and the Scope is certainly one of those cards. For two mana, you get to play an artifact that can tap as soon as it’s played. You exile it and search your library for up to X basic land cards, where X is the number of players who control at least two more lands than you. You get to put those lands directly onto the battlefield.

For decks that don’t have other ways to ramp up their mana, such as Cultivate  or Kodama’s Reach  or creatures that can grab lands like  Yavimaya Elder  or  Sakura-Tribe Elder, it’s not a terrible option. But it’s a bit too situational, in my opinion, to be reliable mana ramp. If you have two or three players at your table with two more lands than you – for example, in cases where you’re really getting mana screwed – then it’s a very good card. Having to exile it kind of stinks, but it’s understandable considering the very good value you can get out of this card.

Getting one basic land out of this honestly is perfectly fine. Two mana to put a basic land directly onto the field untapped is pretty solid. It’s worth playing, but to get full value out of it in multi-player, you have to time it just right. Even to ramp up with one untapped land to catch up to an opponent is easily worth the two mana to cast the Scope. It’s a pretty solid Commander card, if not the most consistent. Keeping up with land drops is even more important in Commander than other formats.

However, Surveyor’s Scope could now find a more consistent home, thanks to  Kurkesh, Onakke Ancient.

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Kurkesh  has a nifty ability to copy the ability of an artifact, as long as it’s not a mana ability, for only a single Red mana. That means that you can get two activations out of  Surveyor’s Scope  before it needs to exile itself. This is great, because getting two lands instead of one, or four instead of two, or even six instead of three makes the Scope that much more valuable. Obviously, there are far nuttier things to do with Kurkesh, but this is a nice interaction that makes the Scope far more playable in artifact based decks. Strionic Resonator  from Magic 2014 also allows for this, but Kurkesh does it better and more cheaply.

Surveyor’s Scope  is a decent card for an artifact deck, especially one that can make use of copying its ability. Obviously, it would be pretty ridiculous if it didn’t have to exile itself, so it’s not a card that can be “broken” so to speak. But, it can definitely provide great value, especially with its effect duplicated, so if you have a way to make its ability resolve twice at once, go ahead and give it a run!