Valakut Exploration MTG Card


Card setsReleased in 5 setsSee all
Mana cost
Converted mana cost3
RarityRare
TypeEnchantment
Abilities Landfall

Key Takeaways

  1. Turns each land play into a potential card advantage, increasing your strategic options.
  2. Creates instant-speed dynamics by allowing card plays during opponents’ turns.
  3. Its synergy with landfall mechanics accelerates both damage and land drops.

Text of card

Landfall — Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, exile the top card of your library. You may play that card for as long as it remains exiled. At the beginning of your end step, if there are cards exiled with Valakut Exploration, put them into their owner's graveyard, then Valakut Exploration deals that much damage to each opponent.


Card Pros

Card Advantage: Valakut Exploration keeps your hand filled by turning land plays into potential card advantage. Each land you play with Valakut Exploration in play gives you a look at the top card of your deck, giving you more resources to outmaneuver your opponent.

Resource Acceleration: This card provides a steady stream of damage and potential land drops, functioning as an accelerator. Not only does it facilitate your natural land progression, but it also synergizes well with landfall mechanics and cards that put lands onto the battlefield from your library.

Instant Speed: While Valakut Exploration itself isn’t an instant, the ability it grants triggers on landfall, allowing you to effectively utilize the cards exiled at instant speed. This creates surprise dynamics that allow you to respond to your opponents actions during their turns, keeping them guessing about your hand’s true potential.


Card Cons

Discard Requirement: While Valakut Exploration offers a card advantage, it necessitates a discard at the end of your turn if the card isn’t played. This can lead to tough decisions and potential resource loss, particularly in long-drawn games where every card counts.

Specific Mana Cost: Valakut Exploration’s mana cost requires a commitment to red mana. This specificity can hinder deck flexibility, making it a potentially less desirable choice for multi-color decks not focused on red mana.

Comparatively High Mana Cost: With a casting cost of three mana, including a double red, Valakut Exploration’s initial investment might be incremental for the acceleration it offers. This is a consideration for players looking for more immediate board impact or lower mana cost solutions for card advantage.


Reasons to Include Valakut Exploration in Your Collection

Versatility: Valakut Exploration’s ability to garner card advantage makes it a solid addition for landfall-centric decks and red-based value strategies. Its continuous draw engine ensures you’re never short on options.

Combo Potential: This card works well with cards that allow you to play extra lands or return lands to your hand, potentially creating a loop that deals damage and draws cards consistently.

Meta-Relevance: As the Magic scene evolves to include more creature-heavy and aggressive decks, Valakut Exploration can offer persistent board impact by chipping away at an opponent’s life total while refilling your hand to keep up the pressure.


How to beat Valakut Exploration

Valakut Exploration adds a dynamic layer to land-based decks within Magic: The Gathering. This potent enchantment can churn out card advantage and incremental damage, making it a key component in decks utilizing lands for victory. While powerful, overcoming this red enchantment revolves around timely interaction and strategic deck construction.

One effective method is to prioritize enchantment removal spells, such as Disenchant or Naturalize, which can directly target and dismantle this threat before it accumulates value. Moreover, leveraging instant-speed interaction allows players to respond to the trigger from Valakut Exploration, minimizing its impact. Cards like Krosan Grip, with its Split Second ability, can handle the enchantment and stifle the window for opponents to exploit its card draw.

It’s also beneficial to limit the number of land plays if possible. Since Valakut Exploration gains its strength from landfall, employing strategies that reduce your land count, such as discarding extra lands or using them as fodder for other purposes, can stymy its effectiveness. By implementing these approaches into your gameplay, you can mitigate the advantages of Valakut Exploration, securing your position on the battlefield.


BurnMana Recommendations

The MTG arena is ever-evolving, and incorporating cards like Valakut Exploration into your deck could be the game-changer you seek. If you’re looking to stay ahead, understanding the nuances of every card and the synergy they can create is paramount. Embracing strategies that leverage landfall mechanics or seeking cards that blaze through opponents lifelines will bolster your deck’s dynamism. Ready to deepen your knowledge and explore the vast possibilities within the Magic realm? If crafting a dominant deck is your calling, join us to unpack the intricacies of deck building and secure your path to victory with wisdom from the MTG connoisseurs.


Cards like Valakut Exploration

Valakut Exploration carves its unique niche within the land-centric strategies of Magic: The Gathering. It’s often measured against other land-related enchantments like Tireless Tracker. While Tireless Tracker allows you to draw cards by investigating whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, Valakut Exploration directly exiles the top card of your library, giving you the opportunity to play that card for a more immediate impact.

Tread the recent paths of Modern Horizons 2 introduces a card like Abundant Harvest, which also manipulates land and nonland cards from your library. However, Valakut Exploration offers repeatable card advantage tied explicitly to land drops, unlike the single-use nature of Abundant Harvest. We also see parallels with cards like Oracle of Mul Daya, which provides a form of card advantage by letting you play additional lands and play with the top card of your library revealed, but lacks the direct damage element of Valakut Exploration.

Ultimately, Valakut Exploration’s combination of providing card advantage, fitting snugly into landfall decks, and providing potential damage output to opponents stands out in comparison to other cards that seek to manipulate land-play in MTG.

Tireless Tracker - MTG Card versions
Abundant Harvest - MTG Card versions
Oracle of Mul Daya - MTG Card versions
Tireless Tracker - Shadows over Innistrad (SOI)
Abundant Harvest - Strixhaven Mystical Archive (STA)
Oracle of Mul Daya - Zendikar (ZEN)

Cards similar to Valakut Exploration by color, type and mana cost

Mana Flare - MTG Card versions
Gravity Sphere - MTG Card versions
Goblin War Drums - MTG Card versions
Aggression - MTG Card versions
Heat Wave - MTG Card versions
Goblin Warrens - MTG Card versions
Heat Stroke - MTG Card versions
Hand to Hand - MTG Card versions
Seismic Assault - MTG Card versions
Torch Song - MTG Card versions
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Insolence - MTG Card versions
Granite Grip - MTG Card versions
Raka Sanctuary - MTG Card versions
Steam Vines - MTG Card versions
Magma Vein - MTG Card versions
Mana Flare - Wilds of Eldraine: Enchanting Tales (WOT)
Gravity Sphere - Legends (LEG)
Goblin War Drums - Seventh Edition (7ED)
Aggression - Ice Age (ICE)
Heat Wave - Visions (VIS)
Goblin Warrens - Classic Sixth Edition (6ED)
Heat Stroke - Weatherlight (WTH)
Hand to Hand - Tempest (TMP)
Seismic Assault - Ultimate Masters (UMA)
Torch Song - Urza's Saga (USG)
Ghitu War Cry - Mystery Booster (MB1)
Fervor - Classic Sixth Edition (6ED)
Spellshock - World Championship Decks 1999 (WC99)
Mana Cache - Nemesis (NEM)
Citadel of Pain - Prophecy (PCY)
Insolence - Planeshift (PLS)
Granite Grip - Seventh Edition (7ED)
Raka Sanctuary - Apocalypse (APC)
Steam Vines - Odyssey (ODY)
Magma Vein - Odyssey (ODY)

Where to buy

If you're looking to purchase Valakut Exploration MTG card by a specific set like Magic Online Promos and Zendikar Rising, 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 Valakut Exploration and other MTG cards:

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Printings

The Valakut Exploration Magic the Gathering card was released in 3 different sets between 2020-09-25 and 2020-09-25. Illustrated by 2 different artists.

#ReleaseNameCodeSymbolNumberFrameLayoutBorderArtist
12002-06-24Magic Online PromosPRM 837142015normalblackAenami
22020-09-25Zendikar RisingZNR 3032015normalblackAenami
32020-09-25Zendikar Rising PromosPZNR 175s2015normalblackJesper Ejsing
42020-09-25Zendikar Rising PromosPZNR 175p2015normalblackJesper Ejsing
52020-09-25Zendikar RisingZNR 1752015normalblackJesper Ejsing

Legalities

Magic the Gathering formats where Valakut Exploration has restrictions

FormatLegality
HistoricbrawlLegal
HistoricLegal
LegacyLegal
OathbreakerLegal
GladiatorLegal
PioneerLegal
CommanderLegal
ModernLegal
VintageLegal
DuelLegal
ExplorerLegal
PennyLegal
TimelessLegal

Rules and information

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

DateText
2020-09-25 A landfall ability doesn’t trigger if a permanent already on the battlefield becomes a land.
2020-09-25 A landfall ability triggers whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control for any reason. It triggers whenever you play a land, as well as whenever a spell or ability puts a land onto the battlefield under your control.
2020-09-25 If Valakut Exploration leaves the battlefield, any cards exiled with it remain exiled and can be played. The end step triggered ability won’t trigger, and the cards won’t be put into their owner’s graveyard.
2020-09-25 If you play a card this way, it leaves exile and becomes a new object. If it returns to exile later in the turn, you can’t play it again.
2020-09-25 If you play the card in response to the end step triggered ability, that card won’t be put into your graveyard and won’t be counted when determining how much damage to deal.
2020-09-25 In a Two-Headed Giant game, the end step triggered ability causes the opposing team to lose 2 life for each card put into its owner’s graveyard.
2020-09-25 Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, each landfall ability of the permanents you control will trigger. You can put them on the stack in any order. The last ability you put on the stack will be the first one to resolve.
2020-09-25 You must follow the normal timing permissions and restrictions for the exiled card. If it’s a land, you can’t play it unless you have land plays available.
2020-09-25 You’ll still pay all costs for a spell cast this way, including additional costs. You may also pay alternative costs if any are available.

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