Rainbow Vale MTG Card

Provides card advantage and resource acceleration, enhancing strategic plays in multicolored decks. Owning Rainbow Vale can backfire, aiding opponents by gifting them a valuable land. Despite trade-offs, it’s a potent asset for combo and land strategy enthusiasts in MTG.

Fallen Empires (FEM)
1994-11-01 - Number 99

Masters Edition (ME1)
2007-09-10 - Number 179

Card sets	Released in 2 setsSee all
Rarity	Rare
Type	Land

Text of card

oc T: Add 1 mana of any color to your mana pool. Control of Rainbow Vale passes to opponent at end of turn.

In the feudal days of Icatia, finding the Rainbow Vale was often the goal of Knights' quests.

Cards like Rainbow Vale

Rainbow Vale is a unique land card in Magic: The Gathering that grants a rare mana flexibility offering one mana of any color to its controller. Similar to City of Brass and Mana Confluence, which also provide mana of any color, Rainbow Vale differs with its no damage clause, bypassing the health cost that the others incur on their controller. However, it comes with a twist as it changes owners during the next untap phase after it’s used.

Comparatively, Exotic Orchard can be less restrictive as it remains under your control but might not always yield the color you need, depending on what lands opponents have in play. Command Tower stands out as an excellent alternative for multicolored decks, offering the needed mana without the drawback of changing ownership like Rainbow Vale.

Assessing the various options, Rainbow Vale provides an interesting strategic element to gameplay. While it’s less reliable as a consistent mana source, it can be a quirky tactical boon in multiplayer formats, plotting the temporary allegiance of lands. Though not ideal for every deck, its distinctive ownership exchange mechanic can surprise opponents and pivot the game’s progress in your favor.

Cards similar to Rainbow Vale by color, type and mana cost

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Card Pros

Card Advantage: One of the key strengths of the Rainbow Vale card lies in its potential to provide card advantage without directly drawing cards. By temporarily giving control of the land to an opponent, you create an environment of reciprocal gains that, if played with strategy, can ultimately tip in your favor, maximizing your own resources while managing others.

Resource Acceleration: Rainbow Vale shines in its ability to offer resource acceleration in multicolored decks. By granting access to one mana of any color, it can significantly boost your mana pool’s versatility, which is essential for casting a wider variety of spells and can be crucial for executing your game plan seamlessly.

Instant Speed: Despite not being an instant itself, Rainbow Vale can indirectly support instant speed plays. The flexible mana resource it provides can keep your options open, allowing for untapped mana to be used on instant spells or abilities, thus maintaining an edge over your opponent by keeping up defensive or offensive actions on their turn.

Card Cons

Discard Requirement: For players seeking to maintain a full grip of cards, Rainbow Vale’s constraint can be a setback. The card necessitates relinquishing control of it to an opponent at the beginning of your next upkeep, much like discarding, which could detract from your board position.

Specific Mana Cost: While Rainbow Vale provides mana of any color, it does come with a specific cost. Being a land, Rainbow Vale occupies a land drop and can generate a strategic vulnerability by potentially providing an advantage to your opponent when it changes control.

Comparatively High Mana Cost: Although Rainbow Vale doesn’t have a mana cost itself, the indirect cost of giving your opponent a land is considerable. In formats where tempo is critical, the advantage given to an opponent can often outweigh the mana benefits gained, especially when cheaper alternatives for mana fixing are available.

Reasons to Include Rainbow Vale in Your Collection

Versatility: Rainbow Vale can be seamlessly incorporated into a variety of deck builds, especially those that require diverse mana generation or land-based strategies. Its ability to produce any color mana makes it a versatile tool in multicolored decks.

Combo Potential: This land pairs well with cards that benefit from donating permanents or manipulate land control. It opens up creative avenues for deck builders to leverage Rainbow Vale in unexpected combo interactions.

Meta-Relevance: In a meta where land strategies are prevalent or if your strategy is to exploit the benefits of land control, Rainbow Vale provides a unique tactical advantage that can be pivoted to disrupt opponent plans while furthering your own game state.

How to beat

Rainbow Vale is a unique land card in Magic the Gathering that grants any player access to one mana of any color when tapped. The twist here is that ownership of Rainbow Vale passes to the opponent during the end step of the turn it was used. This peculiarity adds a strategic layer to gameplay, enabling players to temporarily fix their mana but at the possible expense of aiding their opponents.

To effectively counter Rainbow Vale, consider employing strategies that capitalize on land disruption. Cards like Sinkhole or Ghost Quarter can destroy the Vale before the opponent benefits from it. Additionally, running land bounce spells like Boomerang or cards that deny land abilities, such as Suppression Field, can thwart the advantage granted by Rainbow Vale. Furthermore, since Rainbow Vale’s ability does not produce mana itself, it’s less effective in the face of pressure from aggressive decks that can exploit the temporary nature of the advantage it offers.

Ultimately, when up against Rainbow Vale, focusing on timely land destruction, disabling land abilities, or overwhelming the opponent before they can exploit the Vale’s benefits can prove to be an efficient method to negate the advantageous mana flow it promises.

Where to buy

If you're looking to purchase Rainbow Vale MTG card by a specific set like Fallen Empires and Masters Edition, 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 Rainbow Vale and other MTG cards:

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Printings

The Rainbow Vale Magic the Gathering card was released in 2 different sets between 1994-11-01 and 2007-09-10. Illustrated by Kaja Foglio.

#	Released	Name	Code	Symbol	Number	Frame	Layout	Border	Artist
1	1994-11-01	Fallen Empires	FEM		99	1993	Normal	Black	Kaja Foglio
2	2007-09-10	Masters Edition	ME1		179	1997	Normal	Black	Kaja Foglio

Legalities

Magic the Gathering formats where Rainbow Vale has restrictions

Format	Legality
Oldschool	Legal
Commander	Legal
Legacy	Legal
Oathbreaker	Legal
Vintage	Legal
Duel	Legal
Predh	Legal

Rules and information

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

Date	Text
2004-10-04	Only changes controller at the end of a turn in which it was tapped for mana. It does not change controller if it is not tapped for mana.
2004-10-04	Stays in the same tapped/untapped state it is in when it switches controllers.
2007-09-16	If Rainbow Vale’s ability is activated during an End step, its “at the beginning of the end step” trigger won’t trigger until the End step of the next turn. If its ability is activated again during that turn, its “at the beginning of the end step” ability will trigger twice at the End step of that turn.
2007-09-16	If control of Rainbow Vale has somehow changed before the “at end of turn” ability resolves, the player who activated the mana ability (not the current controller of Rainbow Vale) chooses one of their opponents to gain control of it.
2007-09-16	If more than one player manages to tap it for mana in a given turn, then two control-change abilities will trigger at end of the turn. These abilities resolve using the standard order for such things, so the active player’s triggers are put on the stack first, then the opponents’.
2007-09-16	The opponent is chosen when the “at end of turn” triggered ability resolves.