Barry's Land
Barry's Land was a playtest card for Invasion that was thought up by Mark Rosewater to boost Domain. Barry's Land was named after R&D's codename for Domain — Barry.[1] Domain was created by Barry Reich.[2][3]
Example
Barry's Land
Land
Barry's Land counts as a basic land.
: Add 
.[1]
Planeshift
For ruling reasons, Barry's Land was never printed, despite its popularity with R&D. Development wanted more time to understand the power of Barry's Land, so it was pushed to Planeshift. At the time, because the basic supertype didn't exist yet, it was argued that it couldn't be a basic land and a non-basic land at the same time by the Rules team. With the simplified wording of basic lands in Eighth Edition, Barry's Land could have gotten another shot at being printed according to Paul Barclay.[1][4]
Conflux
In Conflux design, R&D faced another problem: Barry's Land had to have a new basic land subtype, otherwise Domain doesn't boost. First Bill Rose proposed the following:
Example
Barry's Land
Land
CARDNAME counts as a basic land type while in play.[4]
That version had the following rules problem: the "Is it a nonbasic land when it becomes a basic land?" issue. Can something non-basic be basic by an ability? Thus, rules fuzziness aplenty, plus it didn't have some of the out-of-play basic land interaction that some people wanted.
Then Cave as a sixth basic land type was proposed by Ken Nagle, but it resulted in breaking cards like Coalition Victory while every card from then on would need to list Cave as a new basic land type. A version with the rules text "If you would count the number of basic land types you control, instead count them and add one" was created, but this caused more confusion and was deemed aesthetically unpleasant. Card art was ordered already, which was subsequently used for Reliquary Tower.[1][4]
Mystery Booster
For a long time, Mark Rosewater wouldn't give up on Barry's Land,[5][6] but he was skeptical that it would ever be made because of too many rules and logistics issues.[7] A part of the complexity issue was the fact that the colorless mana symbol and the generic mana symbol were the same until Oath of the Gatewatch.[8] However with the printing of Wastes the chances became even lower that Barry's Land would see print.[9]
In May, 2019, Rosewater finally admitted that it was very unlikely that the card would be printed in a standard-legal set.[10]
Instead, it was revealed in November 2019 that Barry's Land was printed as a test card in the Mystery Booster set. It is a basic land with the cloud subtype, that taps for .[11]
References
- ↑ a b c d Magic Arcana (February 19, 2004). "The story of "Barry's Land"". magicthegathering.com. Wizards of the Coast.
- ↑ Mark Rosewater (July 22, 2002). "Squirrel of My Dreams". magicthegathering.com. Wizards of the Coast.
- ↑ Evan Symon (August 1, 2019). "The curious case of Barry’s Land". Magicuntapped.com.
- ↑ a b c Mark Rosewater (February 09, 2009). "Whatever Happened to Barry's Land?". magicthegathering.com. Wizards of the Coast.
- ↑ Mark Rosewater (October 23, 2012). "Will it ever be possible that maybe one day we will see the printing of Berry's Land?". Blogatog. Tumblr.
- ↑ Mark Rosewater (February 01, 2013). "Barry's Land wouldn't let you play it forever.". Blogatog. Tumblr.
- ↑ Mark Rosewater (September 07, 2014). "Do you think Barry's Land will ever be made in any form?". Blogatog. Tumblr.
- ↑ Mark Rosewater (February 01, 2013). "Does this fact make Barry's Land more of a complexity issue?". Blogatog. Tumblr.
- ↑ Mark Rosewater (December 11, 2015). "What does the printing of Waste mean about the future of Barry’s Land?". Blogatog. Tumblr.
- ↑ Mark Rosewater (May 13, 2019). "Where's Barry's Land In The Storm Scale". Blogatog. Tumblr.
- ↑ Eli Shiffrin (November 11, 2019). "Mystery Booster Release Notes". magicthegathering.com. Wizards of the Coast.
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