Coastal Discovery MTG Card


Coastal Discovery - Battle for Zendikar
Mana cost
Converted mana cost4
RarityUncommon
TypeSorcery
Abilities Awaken
Released2015-10-02
Set symbol
Set nameBattle for Zendikar
Set codeBFZ
Number73
Frame2015
Layoutnormal
Borderblack
Illustred byKieran Yanner

Key Takeaways

  1. Coastal Discovery offers card draws and land exploration, providing a sustained resource flow.
  2. Its ability to accelerate resource access can significantly aid synergy-focused decks.
  3. Playable at instant speed, this card adds strategic depth by reacting to opponents’ moves.

Text of card

Draw two cards. Awaken 4— (If you cast this spell for , also put four +1/+1 counters on target land you control and it becomes a 0/0 Elemental creature with haste. It's still a land.)


Card Pros

Card Advantage: The Coastal Discovery card shines when it comes to providing card advantage. As you play it, you not only get an explored land or island, but also the opportunity to draw a card. This helps you sustain a flow of resources and ensures you have plenty of options in your hand as the game progresses.

Resource Acceleration: One of the often overlooked benefits of Coastal Discovery is its ability to accelerate your resources. When played, it can immediately impact the board by allowing you to cycle through your deck and get to your crucial spells faster. This can be particularly useful in decks that rely on synergy or combo pieces to execute their strategy effectively.

Instant Speed: Instant Speed plays are essential in MTG for maintaining flexibility and responding to an opponent’s threats effectively. Coastal Discovery can be played at instant speed, meaning you can wait until the most advantageous moment to cast it, potentially during your opponent’s turn or after they’ve committed to a play, ensuring you make the most informed decisions without sacrificing tempo.


Card Cons

Discard Requirement: Coastal Discovery requires you to discard a card, which can be a setback when your hand is already depleted or when you need to maintain card advantage over your opponent.

Specific Mana Cost: This card’s casting cost demands both blue and colorless mana, necessitating a reliable mana base that aligns with blue’s slice of the color pie, thereby potentially restricting its inclusion in multi-color or colorless decks.

Comparatively High Mana Cost: Coastal Discovery’s mana investment is considerable when compared to other draw spells or cantrips, which might provide similar benefits for a reduced cost and less stringent conditions.


Reasons to Include Coastal Discovery in Your Collection

Versatility: Coastal Discovery is a flexible addition, with its draw ability making it a valuable fit for decks that want to maintain card advantage. Also, as a land, it ensures you don’t miss essential land drops.

Combo Potential: When played for its Awaken cost, this card synergizes with strategies that focus on land creatures or benefit from having more creatures on the battlefield.

Meta-Relevance: In an environment where drawing cards and board presence is crucial, Coastal Discovery emerges as a pivotal play, making it a noteworthy inclusion in many blue-based control or midrange decks.


How to beat Coastal Discovery

Coastal Discovery presents an interesting tactical challenge in Magic: The Gathering due to its duality. It’s not just a card draw spell but also possesses the awaken mechanic, transforming land into a creature. Comparatively, Think Twice offers card draw at instant speed, devoid of any secondary effects like awaken. This disparity gives players a real-choice scenario — prioritize immediate cards in hand or potentially a greater long-term board presence.

Similarly, Anticipate allows players to look at the top three cards of their deck, drawing one, giving it a distinct advantage of selection over Coastal Discovery. However, it lacks the impact of adding a creature on the battlefield. A clever way to offset the benefits of Coastal Discovery is through land interaction spells. Cards such as Encroaching Wastes can remove the awakened land, thus dealing with the threat efficiently. Spells like Ghost Quarter can be strategically used to disrupt the resource base of an opponent relying heavily on Coastal Discovery’s awaken feature. Understanding its strategic advantages and drawbacks is key to outmaneuvering an opponent using this complex yet potentially rewarding spell.

In essence, to navigate against Coastal Discovery effectively, one must weigh the instant speed interaction against its potential to alter the battlefield. Knowing when to disrupt the land or counter the card will define your success against this multifaceted magic card.


Cards like Coastal Discovery

Coastal Discovery stands out in Magic: The Gathering as a versatile draw spell intertwined with the landfall mechanic. While there are other cards that allow players to draw, such as Harmonize, Coastal Discovery provides added flexibility. Harmonize offers a straightforward three-card draw for four mana but lacks the adaptability that landfall on Coastal Discovery confers, allowing players to benefit from additional land plays.

Another relative in this group is Tidings, a spell that draws four cards with no additional benefits tied to land plays, setting it apart from Coastal Discovery’s potential for increased value through landfall. Compulsion is a card that allows for both drawing and discarding at a much lower cost, but it too does not provide the landfall synergy found in Coastal Discovery. This makes the latter a unique option for decks capitalizing on land synergy.

Though each card possesses its own advantages, Coastal Discovery’s landfall potential often gives it an edge, making it an enticing choice for players looking to combine card advantage with land-triggered strategies in their Magic: The Gathering decks.

Harmonize - MTG Card versions
Tidings - MTG Card versions
Compulsion - MTG Card versions
Harmonize - Planar Chaos (PLC)
Tidings - Starter 1999 (S99)
Compulsion - Torment (TOR)

Cards similar to Coastal Discovery by color, type and mana cost

Juxtapose - MTG Card versions
Baki's Curse - MTG Card versions
Touch of Brilliance - MTG Card versions
Polymorph - MTG Card versions
Diminishing Returns - MTG Card versions
Counterintelligence - MTG Card versions
Ransack - MTG Card versions
Rhystic Scrying - MTG Card versions
Wash Out - MTG Card versions
Dematerialize - MTG Card versions
Deep Analysis - MTG Card versions
Tempted by the Oriq - MTG Card versions
Inscription of Insight - MTG Card versions
Airborne Aid - MTG Card versions
Peer Pressure - MTG Card versions
Mouth to Mouth - MTG Card versions
Sift - MTG Card versions
Distant Melody - MTG Card versions
Sleep - MTG Card versions
Argivian Restoration - MTG Card versions
Juxtapose - Masters Edition (ME1)
Baki's Curse - Homelands (HML)
Touch of Brilliance - Portal Second Age (P02)
Polymorph - Classic Sixth Edition (6ED)
Diminishing Returns - Masters Edition (ME1)
Counterintelligence - Portal Three Kingdoms (PTK)
Ransack - Starter 1999 (S99)
Rhystic Scrying - Prophecy (PCY)
Wash Out - IDW Comics 2014 (PI14)
Dematerialize - Odyssey (ODY)
Deep Analysis - Commander Masters (CMM)
Tempted by the Oriq - Strixhaven: School of Mages Promos (PSTX)
Inscription of Insight - Zendikar Rising (ZNR)
Airborne Aid - Onslaught (ONS)
Peer Pressure - Onslaught (ONS)
Mouth to Mouth - Unhinged (UNH)
Sift - Salvat 2011 (PS11)
Distant Melody - Wilds of Eldraine Commander (WOC)
Sleep - Magic 2011 (M11)
Argivian Restoration - The List (PLST)

Where to buy

If you're looking to purchase Coastal Discovery MTG card by a specific set like Battle for Zendikar, there are several reliable options to consider. One of the primary sources is your local game store, where you can often find booster packs, individual cards, and preconstructed decks from current and some past sets. They often offer the added benefit of a community where you can trade with other players.

For a broader inventory, particularly of older sets, online marketplaces like TCGPlayer, Card Kingdom and Card Market offer extensive selections and allow you to search for cards from specific sets. Larger e-commerce platforms like eBay and Amazon also have listings from various sellers, which can be a good place to look for sealed product and rare finds.

Additionally, Magic’s official site often has a store locator and retailer lists for finding Wizards of the Coast licensed products. Remember to check for authenticity and the condition of the cards when purchasing, especially from individual sellers on larger marketplaces.

Below is a list of some store websites where you can buy the Coastal Discovery and other MTG cards:

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Legalities

Magic the Gathering formats where Coastal Discovery has restrictions

FormatLegality
CommanderLegal
LegacyLegal
ModernLegal
OathbreakerLegal
VintageLegal
DuelLegal
PioneerLegal

Rules and information

The reference guide for Magic: The Gathering Coastal Discovery card rulings provides official rulings, any errata issued, as well as a record of all the functional modifications that have occurred.

DateText
2015-08-25 Awaken doesn’t give the land you control a color. As most lands are colorless, in most cases the resulting land creature will also be colorless.
2015-08-25 If a spell with awaken has multiple targets (including the land you control), and some but not all of those targets become illegal by the time the spell tries to resolve, the spell won’t affect the illegal targets in any way.
2015-08-25 If the non-awaken part of the spell doesn’t require a target and you cast the spell for its awaken cost, then the spell won’t resolve if the target land you control becomes illegal before the spell resolves (such as due to being destroyed in response to the spell being cast).
2015-08-25 If the non-awaken part of the spell requires a target, you must choose a legal target. You can’t cast the spell if you can’t choose a legal target for each instance of the word “target” (though you only need a legal target for the awaken ability if you’re casting the spell for its awaken cost).
2015-08-25 The land will retain any other types, subtypes, or supertypes it previously had. It will also retain any mana abilities it had as a result of those subtypes. For example, a Forest that’s turned into a creature this way can still be tapped for .
2015-08-25 You can cast a spell with awaken for its mana cost and get only its first effect. If you cast a spell for its awaken cost, you’ll get both effects.

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