Several times: > me building a deck: "Panharmonicon makes this setup so busted" > me actually: wishing I had anything other than Panharmonicon in my hand

The trap: Americans playing red/white/blue

but my gremlin self wants to hold my library in my hand...

Even tho I’m mostly a cedh player here, i am glad that so much more content is aiming at helping newer and casual players tighten up their lists

I do indeed win more when I equip my Helm of the Host to Aurelia, the Warleader. In fact I usually win immediately.

Congratulations on the Cool Stuff Inc. sponsorship! I'm happy to see some big companies have taken notice of your channel

You say "You can't make a deck with just removal, ramp, and card draw" as you show a green, red, white, and blue spell... I smell an Aragorn build in the near future... I like to call it "Aragorn Only Eats Veggies"

For all the people here convinced they still need Reliquary Tower, just run Thought Vessel and Decanter of Endless Water instead, there the floor is at least a rock that gets you ahead on mana instead of a land that cuts you off a color. Sure it feels less "free", but you need rocks/ramp anyway, you might as well use some for synergy.

I remember hearing someone say recently that Reliquary Tower should be an auto include in any deck. I really only ever had it in my Locust God deck that was centered around drawing cards. Thinking back on it, the only times I've had to discard to hand size, and I didn't want to, was when I was mana screwed.

Absolutely agree. I built a Greasefang deck, with the plan of using discard engines to bin a giant vehicle and then use Greasefang to reanimate it, punch face, then when the vehicle jumps back to my hand I rinse and repeat. I quickly realized that a "vehicle reanimator" deck doesn't work too well when your only way of reanimating big vehicles is stuck in your command zone all game after eating a buffet of removal or is turned into a 0/1 bug. The thing is, any sensible opponent is not going to just let you do anything you want. After looking at my decklist with the expectation that my opponents are probably going to attempt to stop me from winning gave me a much more clear picture. As you say, there's no real one solution, and my answer was that I didn't need ALL the vehicles and the more greedier, "staple" cards ("surely every white deck should run Smothering Tithe & Ghostly Prison," I said...) and slot in a lot of protection, flickers and alternative discard pay-offs for my discard package when Greasefang isn't around. Flicker effects _especially_ made the deck run so much smoother, using it as a defensive way to protect Greasefang, or flicker my own vehicle to make it avoid Greasefang's bounce effect. Even though the term "Discard-Flicker-Vehicle-Reanimator Deck" sounds like an unsynergetic nightmare on paper, the reality is that every single card still goes towards the same game plan of "kill you with vehicles", and it's easily my most consistent and strongest deck nowadays.

One thing I'd like to point out is that your middle of the road scenario with Teferi' Ageless Insight, where it doubles up some card draw but you don't end up using those extra cards, the enchantment is still doing something useful. Seeing extra cards, even ones you don't use, is good because it gives you more information to make decisions with and more options about what to play. Also, even if Insight draws you some useless cards, those are cards you were going to draw eventually anyway, so it had gotten past them in your deck and closer to good cards. I'm not saying the card should be played as much as it is, but the actual floor of doing NOTHING only ever occurs if you play it and then do not ever play any draw effects for the rest of the game, which seems very unlikely.

Great video as always. I recently removed "Teferis Ageless Insight" from my Anowon (Dimir Rogues Tribal) Deck, because I realized it mostly only works with my commander and is worse than a "Bident of Thassa". Same with "Helm of the Host" in Zhulodok, it is just an overkill.

Teferi's Ageless Insight is really nice with Looters too. Draw two discard one cause you tapped a dude is pretty neat.

I agree on this. The only deck I play helm of the host in is my Silumgar the Drifting Death deck because he has the hexproof to dodge that spot removal that would normally get thrown at him in response to the equip, and his -1/-1 ability gets multiplicatively better when duplicated, since each of them triggers off each dragon they see attacking and silumgar is of course a dragon itself. This makes the clone effect much better than in most decks. Sure its still a bit win more, but its also a great way to repeatedly duplicate other strong dragons in the deck considering I'm in dimir and my options are limited for that tribe.

I run reliquary tower in my Ghalta primal hunger deck. In that deck you're using greater good and every other card that lets you draw for power, so you generally have 12+ cards in hand as early as turn 4

its funny, I actually run Teferi's Ageless Insight in my Sidar Jabari deck specifically for the example you used in this video, because all of my knights cantrip when they attack its super useful for digging for more knights to discard to reanimate

Reliquary Tower, the bane of my existence. I think I have discarded to hand size...one time in all the EDH games I've played, and I did not care because I still had 7. I always see it and go "This is literally making your deck worse, person."

seagate restoration is the best example of this. it only draws you lots of cards if you already have lots of cards. tap out on my turn to draw cards when my hand is already full? no thanks.

This reminds me of the one time I asked another player how he wants to get 8+ cards in hand after seeing the Tower in his Boros deck, back in 2015. He was quickly enlightened that there are better cards out there. Nowadays there are some Boros Commander that can draw you enough cards (Nelly Borca easily getting 10+ cards in hand makes Tower really good).

You are so close to applying quadrant theory to EDH, something I recommend all players learn to do. Also, Teferi's Ageless Insight only sees so much play because it's a budget card that makes your other budget card draw spells ALMOST as good as their nonbudget equivalents while it is in play. Some people just want a CHANCE to keep up with more expensive and usually more powerful decks. It's not the same, but I really can't fault them for trying. Sometimes, you just have to work with the tools you have, ya know? Lastly, I think that the inclusion rate for Reliquary Tower is artificially inflated by the "precon effect." Let's face it, that card was included in every precon for a long time, and there is a growing movement to play more unmodified or only slightly upgraded sealed commander decks.

The only deck I run reliquary tower in is my Narset enlightened exile deck and this video is making me look at it more critically. The negatives, as you have highlighted, are that it's a colorless land for my three color deck without green which can make it hard to cast some spells, and that at the end of the day discarding spells to the graveyard isn't all that bad because I can reuse them with Narset. BUT, on the contrary, I kinda like how it removes one decision point that I don't have to think about, and with all the triggers I have to keep track of, the ordering of spell slinging and deciding what mana to leave up for instant interaction I actually like having one fewer thing to worry about. Also narset is one of the decks that, in my experience has a strong correlation between big hand size and having a lot of creatures on the board, so I really want to keep both protection spells, cantrips and big buff spells all at the same time. So while I agree that a lot of players get too focused on the highest ceiling instead of the average floor, I think that you're underestimating a bit how "comfortable" certain cards can make you feel, especially if you have to account for a lot of things having (sometimes) less mental load is worthwhile on its own

Another thing about Reliquary Tower that some people don't consider is that in any Graveyard deck you might actually WANT to discard to hand size to be able to pitch things to your graveyard

really liked this video. I myself have been playing for a long time (1993) and had to figure these things out the hard way. Great that you're offering new players a toolbox for building their deck better!

Great analysis. I’ve been trying to make my deck’s power level more consistent and things are this have been on my mind. Keep up the good work.

While watching this I started taking a look through one of the decks I have and got to Warren Soultrader right as it got on the screen. Was a real neat experience

Someone suggested I run Reliquary Tower in my Goreclaw deck which can and often does draw a ton of cards. I'm not ruling out ever adding it, but I'm generally only ever discarding excess forests so it doesn't really do anything for me except make me look scarier than I actually am.

the only deck i include any "no max hand size" cards is my baba lysaga deck, in which i want to trigger her 1-2 times per turn, drawing me 4-7 cards a turn. i dont absolutely need reliquary tower or thought vessel in the deck, but i think that they are valid in that deck as the no max hand actually does help out somewhat, and when it does do nothing having a colorless land/colorless mana rock isnt hurting my deck at all

These videos are always very thoughtful and appreciated. It’s nice that there are channels that are still contributing valuable insights into the format.

"you can't make a deck with only removal, ramp and card draw" That's my favorite kind of deck!

1. I agree that the Tower shouldn't be an auto-include into decks. 2. I agree that it is often jammed into a deck for the reasons you said. I have heard that said multiple times. 3. Having played EDH since 2007, I can tell you first hand that when it is good, it is really good. It is easy in blue and black [and now green] to cast burst draw spells that load you up on cards. • Not having to make discard decisions speeds the game up. • untapping with sometimes 2x as many cards as the rest of the table matters. You can spam spells without caring about resource parity. My two favorite decks to run the tower in are Mono Black control Kagemaro, First to Suffer, and in Breya, Etherium Shaper. Kagemaro should be obvious and Breya is in part for flavor and in part because of artifact value. Breya is from Esper and the Tower is from Bant and appeared on Esper during the conflux. I play a heavy theme deck with Breya because she is otherwise kill on sight OP, but my theme deck allows the table to have fun too.

I run Ageless Insight in one deck, it’s my Zedruu Wedding Ring deck. The floor is that I draw into my pieces faster, the ceiling is that I give it to the opponent with the biggest library and watch the fear enter their eyes as everyone but me at least has 2 Wedding Rings or a Wedding Ring and a draw doubler (I’ll just have a Wedding Ring) when there’s a Teferi’s Puzzle Box (or multiple draw more cards effects) on board and they started to draw at an alarming rate. It’s a deck full of synergy, pillowfort, removal, and win more that I like to describe as “I’m giving you the answers, can you beat me before you draw out?” and teaches players the value of removal.

I draw a lot of cards in group hug Zedruu. But I don't play Reliquary Tower, you know why? If I have ten or fifteen cards in hand, people might be scared of me, even if I have like two protection spells, three creatures, a Propaganda, and a ton of lands. But those magical words, "discard to hand size," takes half the target off youe back. A couple players' turns later, you'll be asked "how many cards in hand?" and you'll say "seven" and they'll go "oh yeah, that's a normal number of cards. Not so scary."

Not me looking at the Reliquary Tower I put into an Emry deck like "maybe I can just use another Island"

I enjoy drawing a ton of cards, so I tend include the tower, and two or three other similar effects. But there are two decks that I intentionally left it out of, Slimefoot and squee, and Damia, because both of those decks want to use the end step for discarding if I end up with too many cards drawn.

One of the things that makes Farewell so powerful is that if you’re way ahead and have a huge board… Farewell is still good. Your deck probably focuses on something that makes you win. If you Farewell for not-that, you have a huge swing in your favor that can turn the game in your favor. The creature deck sweeps away the pillow fort pieces, Shorikai clears away the creatures and artifacts while preserving thirty mana worth of artifacts, the planeswalkers deck wipes the board for the sixth time this game so that no one can poke their superfriends. Also the fact it’s, like, a ten mana card for six.

I run *a lot* of no max hand size cards in Guff but that's because Guff just churns through so many cards and can put so many of them out.

I am a HATER of reliquary tower. However! The new Nelly Borca Boros commander, NEEDS it. She naturally draws dozens of cards through a game. It's so nice holding up a wall of instant speed interaction in your "boros" deck

It’s great seeing videos aiding newer players, I mostly play a ton of destruction/prison decks, so they need all the help they can get when faced with someone whose threats are just board wipes & using Emblems as win cons.

I'm pretty new to magic in general this vid helped me a lot since right now I'm just starting to finish up my list.

Thankfully, because of my time playing yugioh I already had experience w/ ensuring that most cards accomplished something on their own before coming to magic.. But my lord EDH has soooooooo many more temptations for this, I especially love it when old cards just kindaaaaa fit in. But then when I need space for cards that actually further my strategy, I look at the first card and go "Nope, thats my favourite piece," look at the next one "No, thats also my favourite," next one, "I just haaaave to keep this in its so good when it works!"

I appreciate the analysis being more than “Reliquary Tower bad”

Another great argument I've heard against running Reliquary Tower is that discarding helps teach card evaluation in general, which helps with learning which cards are good and which aren't, which translates into better deck building in general

Reliquary tower is my dirty habit

My izzet spellslinger deck felt so upgraded after such a small change; taking out reliquary tower and adding a thought vessel. Sounds kinda silly at first glance, but being able to ramp in the early game with rocks is huge for my later big mana turns. I still can’t bring myself to take out teferi’s ageless insight though… 😅

I run a Reliquary Tower in my Yargle and Multani deck, but I also run Greater Good. Being able to keep all 18 cards I drew plus what was already in my hand is great, but I know the deck well enough to know what a winning 7 look like. I remember the times I drew 36 or more cards in a turn and got to keep them all, as well as the ones I discarded down to seven. Both situations put you in a real good spot. Makes me wonder if Thought Vessel and Reliquary Tower are worth it

Thanks to your videos I made a commander deck of only cards from MOM with the commander Zurgo and Ojutai and no synergy other than himself. It was just good cards no synergy. And it was enough to get back to back wins cause it had good removal, good card draw. And it didn't need to go crazy just those things can put in the work.

I have Reliquary Tower in 2 decks for very specific reasons. My Azami, Lady of Scrolls cEDH/High Powet deck has powerful effects that reward my large hand sizes. Oftentimes I will have upwards of 20 cards and being able to pitch cards with Dream Halls is super effective. My second deck is Ranar, the Ever-watchful, and it is one of a dozen colorless mana producers to enable Eldrazi Displacer. If I were to remove the Displacer, it would come out in a heartbeat.

I used to run ReqTower and Helm in many decks; now they are only in 1: OG Kozilek. I discovered the trap, and found better things. But those do do work in Kozilek because, well, colorless utility has no downside, and do you know how awesome it is to have several Kozileks, Ulamogs, or Emrakuls on the board? I once had 3 Kozileks in a game that had gotten down to me and 1 other person. And there's no coming back from a 3-Kozilek swing.

With some staples in decks, I throw them into mine if they won't hurt too much when drawn early because they're the red herrings of my deck. I tend to build strange decks with strange cards, so when my opponents at the table see a staple, they typically go and destroy/remove/counter that one because they're experienced with that card. I don't mind losing those cards too much, even though they still bring some value to my deck, because that way I keep the real stars save. Worked quite well for months by now, even with people who have gotten to know my decks by now.

Excellent topic. I just pulled Legion Loyalty from my Caesar deck, because I NEVER had it when it could be useful.

One thing you're missing: Reliquary Tower, Sol Ring, etc get printed all the time in recons.

Great to see you getting sponsors! Love the content!!

Thank you for the Ageless Insight example. I've pointed to others that it's a trap card in a lot of decks because they see their commander has "Draw a card" somewhere on it. Paying four mana for nothing until that commander trigger happens gives a lot of opportunity for your opponents to interact in a way that denies the cards you wanted. Just play a normal draw spell or a synergy piece.

I run Ageless Insight and Alhammarret’s Archive in my Gavi deck because it allows me to make tokens every player’s turn just by cycling one card. I can then drop a Mirror Entity next turn to make a big flying army to swing at someone or the table, or dig for my pingers.

Super funny I found this tonight because I was just playing an edh game an hour ago and realized I needed to cut some cards because their floor just hurt too much 😂

Teferi’s Ageless Insight is amazing with cards that passively (or at a small cost recurrably) draw a single card

I'm playing Teferi's Ageless Insight in my cycling deck with 40+ cycling cards; it's a real bomb there. It doesn't really fit in anything else I've ever built though :]

This video confirming to myself that i am indeed bad and i love it.

On the note of reliquary tower I was absolutely baffled when I saw it on lists for magar of the magic strings, a commander that actively wants you to have stuff in your graveyard.also In 31% of varina decks, and Varina cares about your graveyard as well.

I really love teffaris ageless insight in my my Stenn enchant deck because it leans more into mono white where i dont run many blue cards other than removal so the teffaris gets a lot more value as a result of that

fantastic video, thank you for your insight 😤

I love all of your videos they are awesome and refreshing different take to attack everything in a more understanding way

Helm of the Host is a bad example because a number of decks go instantly infinite with it

You should know this is basically Quadrant Theory, something some pro players came up with for card evaluation a while ago. The essential idea is splitting your evaluation into 4 parts - Developing, Winning, Parity, and Losing. Figuring out which quadrants each card is strong in helps quantify the value of the card in your deck, etc etc.

Basically, be responsible with your win more cards. Reliquary Tower doesn't belong in every blue deck, but put it in izzet spellslinger which casts entire hands in a turn and now we have something.

I think Terferi’s Ageless Insight absolutely has a home in certain decks, those decks being commanders that encourage looting effects (any of the connive commanders from SNC for example) - in those decks it turns your connives from card selection that sometimes get you a counter into genuine card advantage, the card does some work in a Raffine list and I play it in cedh Raffine. But yeah it shouldn’t just be jammed into any blue deck without a thought of synergy and I think the cases I’m talking about do have the synergy to justify them

as far as Teferis insight goes, the only thing i feel like it should be used for in Blue is to pair with your commander who has to tap itself to draw a card or if it can only trigger once per turn

The more color dependant your deck is, especially with multiple colors, the worse Reliquary Tower becomes. The last thing you want is to draw a colorless land when you need a colored one and lose potential tempo.

damn I feel called out for having a helm of the host in my Roxanne deck

I totally agree. Though I doubt you're going to circle around, if you ever talk about "teferi's ageless insight" again, it has a much stronger synergy with commanders that themselves cantrip. "Sidar Jabari of Zhalfir" becomes a powerhouse when combined with cards like it and "The council of 4". It's also great in something like "Kadena, Slinking Sorcerer", where you're using it with a morph/colorless cost reducer and a flash enabler to ensure you can play your whole deck.

Reliquary Tower is most appropriate when you're mass drawing at end step: Necrodominance. Helm of the Host is most appropriate when the creature has a powerful combat effect: Godo or Aurelia.

One thing that comes to mind is that a lot of players aren't trying to build decks that maximize winning, but rather create the experience they want to have (which is fine in casual). The harder it "goes off", the more intense the experience. So people frequently favor thematic stuff/things meant to be fun/stuff that enhances the ceiling and story of the game over consistency. I also agree with the part where you mentioned people saying, "You should play..." This is almost always followed by a dubious suggestion for something kinda on theme or vaguely synergistic but not actually something bad to omit.

i only run reliquary tower in my sheoldred the apocalypse deck because i have lot's of howling mine type effects that make evryone's hand fill up quickly and i've found that i want to use any reanimation i have on my commander instead of stuff i discarded to stay ahead. so in that specific case, it isn't as much of a "win more" card in that deck

I build my decks with 3 things in mind: 1. This needs to be something nobody is playing(choose a commander nobody uses). 2. Add a twist challenge while adding cards(only permanents, only one type of card, 3. Be efficient and go cheap.

I find that I have the reflex to put a Reliquary Tower in all my decks from back when Commander design was a lot more lax in its deckbuilding philosophy. Back then Reliquary Tower was pretty new, and a lot of people were still playing battlecruiser style decks, which often missed land drops and had several cards in their hands with high cmc. Since then, mana curves have gotten a lot tighter and lower as decks became more focused, and now Reliquary Tower is more of a bane than a boon in many decks. For me, though, I grew up playing with the old deckbuilding ways, and it's hard to break out of that. I do alright, though, and I still have it in some decks.

I challenge you a bit on Teferi’s Ageless though. Even in casual commander - if YOUR COMMANDER draws cards itself, even 1. Turning that into 2 with Teferi’s Ageless Insight is amazing. And you always have access to your commander so it isn’t ever “dead.” Edit: Glad you brought it up again later in the video. I play TAI with all the 1 mana “Cyclers” to fill up my graveyard. Cycling + cantrips are so fun with TAI.

do nothing win more cards are like having a graphic designer in your group research project

Hey! Don't you bad talk my beautiful boy Lotus Cobra. He goes in every deck, don't question it.

I have a Yarok, the Desecrated deck that I always find my self discarding to max hand size and since I have so much ramp I have been thinking of adding a reliquary tower

For me, I see this as a more recent issue with effects like Reliquary Tower as lands have gotten better (same with mana rocks getting better in the case of Thought Vessel), so now space within decks has gotten way more competitive, especially when playing more colors

I love how I'm waiting for the video to end so I can explain why Teferi's ageless insight and reliquary tower belong in my Gin-Gitaxias cantrips deck and then you just so happen to make an exception for my specific archetype. It is also great because there is no other card like it. It's not like it's enhancer number 5. It is the only piece of card advantage in that deck that doesn't directly draw cards.

I agree! Though on the relinquary tower, there are definetely places for it. No just don't stuff it in any deck, but it can be very powerful in draw-centered decks. I run it in my rielle deck for example, which allows me to set up game-winning turns by having tons of cards to discard in an opponents turn. Even while the floor is low, playing a colorless land is usually not a significant downside which is why i think people still play this card in the most random decks

I feel helm of the host, is sort of a win more, but doesn't become worthless unless it's spot removed. It just depends on the deck it's certainly a key card if your deck has a lot of ETB/Combat or its a win con for your commander (Aurelia). As it gives a good ETB repeater for consistency at the lower power level tables that isn't stuffed with tutors. But I do agree it's too often used because only the commander really benefits.

I am glad you are talking about this. Most of the people I end up helping with decklist fixes only focus on the ceiling and explaining to them how the ceiling doesn't matter if there is not a good floor to support can sometimes be quite hard(I'm convinced over 90% of MTG players are denser than nuclear pasta). Side note, reliquary tower is a trash card, even in a deck that has a goal of getting a 50 card hand.

Reliquary Tower converts unknown information into mitigation especially if you run a healthy amount of card draw. Many players aren't willing to risk attacking into potential interaction, even if my hand is 6 Islands, Evolving Wilds and Sorrow's Path. In such games, Reliquary Tower's opportunity cost pays for itself.

Is Reliquary Tower a great example of this? In one and two colour decks(the majority) it’s usually going in a free land slot anyway.

AMERICA DAY UPLOAD LETS GOOOOOO

i feel like this is general with pretty much any enablers they’re really good if you have your commander or if your engine is online but the minute that gets broken apart it’s just a dead card i learned this when i had a bunch of counter doublers in the deck but not enough counter generators in my vorinclex monsterous raider deck

I put both Teferi's Ageless Insight and Reliquary Tower in my Kess wheel deck. i use them to make the wheels bigger to punish my opponents more. Sometimes its the difference between victory and loss.

I love this video. First of yours I've watched. And I learned this lesson in a weird way. I built a pirate themed deck when ixilan first came out. And everyone around me kept saying the deck was terrible looking at the floor of every card. Which was all steal/copy effects (piracy) but turns out having the best card on the board averaging the other 3 decks. Turns out is better than expected.

So, making a stance here for Reliquary Tower. The scenarios, imo, where you want the old Waste With An Upside are: 1) If your deck plays a lot of interaction aiming for late game and draws a lot of cards without you doing much. I play a Talion clones deck that passively draws so much and plays so much interaction that I always want to keep in hand to leave my opponents in a long game where my Talion(s) can chip them away until I can win, that in practice, the roof of Reliquary Tower means I can genuinely control a 3 player table effectively, while its floor is a colorless land in a 2 color deck. 2) If your deck plays very bad card quality but has ways of drawing a burst of cards or 3+ cards in a turn. This happens to me more than anything in lower powered decks where a burst card draw effect doesn't just win me the game by me sculpting my hand into the perfect 7 cards I will need. If you had ever thought "It is fair to put Necropotence in this casual deck, it is not like I have 7 cards that just win me the game on their own" first, fuck you, and second, you probably could use a Reliquary Tower. 3) If your deck's win condition is the "control threshold". If you don't play finishers and instead your win con is doing the same busted things a couple turns in sequence (Landfall without combo, go wide creature beatdown without haste, etc) you will need ways to protect your stuff during your opponents' turns to allow you to secure your win without dying to a wrath. You will need counterspells or heroic intervention effects, probably more than one, plus whatever setup you need to do the thing again next turn and continue whatever the value engine you have is to try to close the game. That could use a reliquary tower. 4) Your deck can draw 20+ cards in a turn and you really, really don't want to think. This might be my pods' exclusive but we kind of have an understanding that if you drew 20+ cards in a turn and untap with all of them, you kind of won game once you reach a certain power level. That kind of makes Reliquary Tower basically a combo piece if you stretch the definition

Grats on the sponsorship!

i love teferi's ageless insight for kwain, even if im behind on untap engines i always get some value out of it. also if another player has something threatening on the board it can stick around for a few turns before people start getting concerned by how many cards im drawing

I’m much more particular about when to include Reliquary Tower and other “no max hand size cards” than I used to be. Most of the time, replacing those with recursion is way better. I think my Alandra deck is my only one with “no max hand size” stuff because it fuels her overrun effect. As for “do nothing” cards: I built a Naya enchantress deck a few years ago in which 32 of the 42ish enchantments were not auras or creatures, and the auras were almost all ramp. I keep it updated and still play it, and it is a beast in casual.

I currently have 8 decks I play around with. Of those 8, I have and use Reliquary Tower in 2: My upgraded Deep Clue Sea (with added Detectives and more Clue synergy, as well as at least a handful of cards that care about hand size) and My Zethi, Arcane Blademaster (there are times where I want to keep my interaction in hand to use rather than discard it to the graveyard. It also partly runs on a Cycling engine, so it draws a lot of cards). In those decks, it is useful for multiple reasons, not just because they want to draw cards, but because they want a LOT of card draw to enable their game plan. Simply put, many of the best cards in DCS are triggered by card draw. Zethi is a spellslinging deck, so you want to be refueling your hand often and hold up removal.

A player in my friend group that plays Ur-Dragon added Reliquary Tower to their deck in response to me often playing my card draw group hug/politics deck (I actively try to win with it). Is that a mistake? They only have 3 colorless making lands and the rest are shocks/fetches/triomes. I play my card draw deck regularly so it often comes up that the reliquary tower lets them keep their hand. I've been helping them figure out what to add an cut to the deck and when I suggested Reliquary Tower for a different utility/multi colored land they mentioned that they slotted it in because there have been games before where they were stuck at 7 cards when others were at 10-20 card hands due to the draw I enable. This happens pretty regularly when I play my deck with them before they added the tower.

I run Scion of the Ur-Dragon in my Ur-Dragon deck, so I usually want some (dragons)in my graveyard in order to gain their etb. I found out that if I use Scion go get Teneb, the Harvester and do combat damage to someone then I can use Teneb's effect to pull himself out of the graveyard. TLDR: I don't run Reliquary Tower in my Ur-Dragon specifically for situations like that.

I have one deck that tuns the tower, and that is in my deck where my commander gives me unlimited hand size. The reason being that I have a card that makes my handsize four, so I do want more ways to fix that and keep my often 9+ cards on hand.

Now imagine if tower winder could search for reliquary tower, now thatd be insane

“You can’t make a deck of just removal, ramp, and card draw” my Azorious 1for1 control deck begs to differ (Raff Weatherlight Stalwart).