Swiftwater Cliffs MTG Card


Card setsReleased in 18 setsSee all
RarityCommon
TypeLand

Key Takeaways

  1. Balances card count and mana for consistent control throughout matches, vital for maintaining game advantage.
  2. Instant life gain beneficial against aggressive decks, provides a subtle edge by increasing player survivability.
  3. Entering tapped is a tempo setback, but offers color-fixing suitable for decks that can afford the initial delay.

Text of card

Swiftwater Cliffs enters the battlefield tapped. When Swiftwater Cliffs enters the battlefield, you gain 1 life. : Add or to your mana pool.


Card Pros

Card Advantage: Swiftwater Cliffs helps stabilize your hand by replacing itself as a land card when you’re managing your resources. It ensures that you maintain parity in the number of cards in your hand, which is vital to sustained control over the course of a match.

Resource Acceleration: Entering the battlefield tapped, Swiftwater Cliffs may seem slow, but it essentially combines the functions of two basic lands. By having access to both red and blue mana from a single land, it accelerates your resource availability, allowing for a smoother and more flexible game plan.

Instant Speed: While Swiftwater Cliffs does not operate at instant speed, its immediate life gain upon entering the battlefield can be a subtle yet pivotal advantage. This small life boost can occur at a crucial moment, putting you just out of reach of aggressive strategies and buying you the time needed to deploy your strategy effectively.


Card Cons

Unsuitable for Fast Paced Decks: Swiftwater Cliffs enters the battlefield tapped, which can cause delays and potentially disrupt the tempo for aggressive strategies that rely on speed and efficiency.

Specific Mana Reflection: Swiftwater Cliffs provides only one color of mana at a time, either red or blue, which might not cater to the multi-color mana needs of complex decks during crucial turns.

Opportunity Cost: While gaining one life can be marginal yet beneficial, the fact that Swiftwater Cliffs doesn’t offer any additional abilities means you could be foregoing the use of lands with more impactful game effects.


Reasons to Include Swiftwater Cliffs in Your Collection

Versatility: Swiftwater Cliffs offers a dual land option beneficial in any red or blue deck, especially in those looking to stabilize their mana base without compromising color accessibility.

Combo Potential: While not directly involved in combos, this land supports complex strategies by providing the necessary mana fixing to execute multi-color combo pieces with greater consistency.

Meta-Relevance: With a constantly evolving game landscape, having reliable lands like Swiftwater Cliffs can be crucial. It’s particularly relevant in formats where life gain and color fixing are valuable assets against aggressive decks.


How to beat

Swiftwater Cliffs often finds its way into decks that require a reliable mana base that can prolong the game while offering a tiny yet significant life boost. This land card comes into play tapped, granting you one life and the ability to tap for blue or red mana, adding to the resiliency of decks that run it. Despite its benefits, opponents can exploit its come-into-play-tapped drawback, which slows down the tempo.

To gain an edge against Swiftwater Cliffs, consider using land destruction or denial strategies to capitalize on the tempo loss your opponent faces. Cards like Ghost Quarter can transform any potential mana advantage into a setback, forcing your opponent to find basic lands instead. Likewise, pressure can be mounted with aggressive low-cost creatures that establish board presence before your opponent can fully utilize their mana. This approach can often lead to early game advantage before Swiftwater Cliffs’ color-fixing benefits come into full effect.

Adapting a strategy that outpaces or disrupts the stable mana base that Swiftwater Cliffs attempts to create can be the key to success, allowing you to maintain an upper hand throughout the game.


Cards like Swiftwater Cliffs

Swiftwater Cliffs joins the ranks of dual lands in Magic: The Gathering with a twist that benefits the life total. It stands alongside fellow gain lands from the Khans of Tarkir set, such as Blossoming Sands or Scoured Barrens, which provide an immediate life boost upon entering the battlefield. While Swiftwater Cliffs offers both red and blue mana, these alternatives cater to other color combinations like green-white and white-black respectively.

Comparatively, Swiftwater Cliffs may remind players of the iconic Izzet Boilerworks, which also produces red and blue mana. However, the Boilerworks bounces a land back to the owner’s hand, allowing for potential reuse of other lands with entering the battlefield effects. This mechanic is absent in Swiftwater Cliffs, trading off the bounce for a simpler, more straightforward ability to gain life. Lastly, the Ravnica dual land, Steam Vents, may come to mind given its mana flexibility without entering the battlefield tapped, but at the expense of life unless you choose to have it come into play tapped.

Considering the trade-offs between mana efficiency, life gain, and board presence, Swiftwater Cliffs holds its own as a reliable land card in slower decks or those optimizing for life total, without the immediate need for untapped dual mana sources.

Blossoming Sands - MTG Card versions
Scoured Barrens - MTG Card versions
Izzet Boilerworks - MTG Card versions
Steam Vents - MTG Card versions
Blossoming Sands - Khans of Tarkir (KTK)
Scoured Barrens - Khans of Tarkir (KTK)
Izzet Boilerworks - Guildpact (GPT)
Steam Vents - Guildpact (GPT)

Cards similar to Swiftwater Cliffs by color, type and mana cost

Volcanic Island - MTG Card versions
Shivan Reef - MTG Card versions
Stormcarved Coast - MTG Card versions
Izzet Boilerworks - MTG Card versions
Riverglide Pathway // Lavaglide Pathway - MTG Card versions
Sulfur Falls - MTG Card versions
Nivix, Aerie of the Firemind - MTG Card versions
Izzet Guildgate - MTG Card versions
Steam Vents - MTG Card versions
Wandering Fumarole - MTG Card versions
Spirebluff Canal - MTG Card versions
Highland Lake - MTG Card versions
Temple of Epiphany - MTG Card versions
Desolate Lighthouse - MTG Card versions
Cascade Bluffs - MTG Card versions
Training Center - MTG Card versions
Surtland Frostpyre - MTG Card versions
Frostboil Snarl - MTG Card versions
Prismari Campus - MTG Card versions
Fiery Islet - MTG Card versions
Volcanic Island - 30th Anniversary Edition (30A)
Shivan Reef - Dominaria United Promos (PDMU)
Stormcarved Coast - Doctor Who (WHO)
Izzet Boilerworks - The Brothers' War Commander (BRC)
Riverglide Pathway // Lavaglide Pathway - Zendikar Rising (ZNR)
Sulfur Falls - Fallout (PIP)
Nivix, Aerie of the Firemind - Duel Decks: Izzet vs. Golgari (DDJ)
Izzet Guildgate - Ravnica Remastered (RVR)
Steam Vents - Ravnica Remastered (RVR)
Wandering Fumarole - The List (PLST)
Spirebluff Canal - Kaladesh Promos (PKLD)
Highland Lake - Shadows over Innistrad Remastered (SIR)
Temple of Epiphany - Fallout (PIP)
Desolate Lighthouse - Doctor Who (WHO)
Cascade Bluffs - Commander Masters (CMM)
Training Center - Commander Masters (CMM)
Surtland Frostpyre - Kaldheim (KHM)
Frostboil Snarl - The Lost Caverns of Ixalan Commander (LCC)
Prismari Campus - Strixhaven: School of Mages (STX)
Fiery Islet - Doctor Who (WHO)

Where to buy

If you're looking to purchase Swiftwater Cliffs MTG card by a specific set like Khans of Tarkir and Fate Reforged, 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 Swiftwater Cliffs and other MTG cards:

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Printings

The Swiftwater Cliffs Magic the Gathering card was released in 17 different sets between 2014-09-26 and 2023-04-21. Illustrated by 5 different artists.

#ReleaseNameCodeSymbolNumberFrameLayoutBorderArtist
12014-09-26Khans of TarkirKTK 2432015normalblackEytan Zana
22015-01-23Fate ReforgedFRF 1722015normalblackEytan Zana
32015-11-13Commander 2015C15 3102015normalblackEytan Zana
42016-06-10Eternal MastersEMA 2452015normalblackEytan Zana
52016-11-11Commander 2016C16 3302015normalblackEytan Zana
62017-03-31Duel Decks: Mind vs. MightDDS 272015normalblackEytan Zana
72017-08-25Commander 2017C17 2832015normalblackEytan Zana
82018-08-09Commander 2018C18 2842015normalblackEytan Zana
92019-07-12Core Set 2020M20 2522015normalblackEytan Zana
102019-08-23Commander 2019C19 2792015normalblackEytan Zana
112019-11-07Mystery BoosterMB1 16892015normalblackEytan Zana
122020-04-24Ikoria: Lair of BehemothsIKO 2552015normalblackAdam Paquette
132020-07-03Core Set 2021M21 2512015normalblackEytan Zana
142020-09-26The ListPLST C18-2842015normalblackEytan Zana
152022-02-18Kamigawa: Neon DynastyNEO 2772015normalblackAlayna Danner
162022-10-07Warhammer 40,000 Commander40K 296★2015normalblackDavid Álvarez
172022-10-07Warhammer 40,000 Commander40K 2962015normalblackDavid Álvarez
182023-04-21March of the MachineMOM 2732015normalblackJulian Kok Joon Wen

Legalities

Magic the Gathering formats where Swiftwater Cliffs has restrictions

FormatLegality
StandardLegal
HistoricbrawlLegal
HistoricLegal
LegacyLegal
PaupercommanderLegal
OathbreakerLegal
GladiatorLegal
AlchemyLegal
PioneerLegal
CommanderLegal
ModernLegal
PauperLegal
FutureLegal
VintageLegal
DuelLegal
ExplorerLegal
BrawlLegal
PennyLegal
TimelessLegal

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