Magic Con Vegas wrapped with Nathan Steuer’s second Pro Tour trophy, putting him in an elite club with only a dozen or so other players in Magic’s 33-year history. In the friendliest finals I’ve seen, Steuer prevented his friend and teammate Christoffer Larsen from being the first player since Kai Budde to win back-to-back Pro Tours. Even if you have little interest in Standard as a format, the set of games demands watching. The joyous attitude between the competitors, who frequently share strategy and advice across the table mid-match, is infectious.

The Pro Tour is not just a place to highlight the 332 best players in the world or the latest decks, though. With pro teams generally sticking to standardized lists throughout their ranks and wearing marching jerseys, there are precious few places where one can demonstrate their personal style. Every deck in the PT ran at least one basic land, and with hundreds of choices for each of the five colors of Magic, which one each player chose reflects their aesthetic and tastes more than any other single decision they could make in Vegas.

Please join Cardboard by the Numbers as we explore the basic lands that won Pro Tour: Secrets of Strixhaven. 

The only thing that delights me more than a diverse meta is a diverse spread of basic lands. While many players anticipated the 3-4 Izzet decks in Standard would reign supreme at the end of the weekend, green was the weekend’s biggest winner, with more than half of the top 8 running Badgermole Cub, and thus forests. Even more critically, these eight players did not overlap a single basic land. It’s also the first PT Top 8 I can recall without representation from the un-sets in the basic land section!

Since we first began this series covering the basic lands that won the Pro Tour with Nathan Steuer’s first victory, we thought it would be nice to go back in time to see what his previous basics were that led him to this win.

Is this character development? 

In previous high-profile events, Steuer has been nothing if not consistent about winning and inconsistent about the basics he sleeves up. Before PT SOS, his basic lands seemed to have been whatever he had lying around, showing up with Double Masters for PT Phyrexia and mis-matched Jumpstart 22 lands at PT March of the Machine. 

On the Arena-based World Championship in 2022, which rewarded him with his likeness on Duelist of the Mind, he thankfully did not pick the default option of using the most recent set or the Arena Beginner Set option, but instead opted for one of the most famous Mountains of all, the John Avon “red” Mountain from 1996’s Mirage. It’s hard to think of a better choice for the Arena client at the time, so we’ll happily give him credit there.

That said, it’s hard to peg down Steuer’s basic land preference besides saying he doesn’t have one. Last year at Regionals, he was rocking what looks like a set of provided basics for drafts from M21. Then in September at SCGCON, Steuer opted for the ever-popular Unstable lands.

So why was he using Duskmourn full-arts from Dan Mumford in Vegas? My suspicion: he found his aesthetic. There’s nothing thematic tying in his many Avatar: the Last Airbender cards to the shlocky 80s horror film vibes of Duskmourn, so his decision must have come from some larger desire to see these specific lands on repeat…and usually sporting a +1/+1 counter or two. Or perhaps it was just as incidental a choice as his previous picks! Either way, we’ll update the article if we get any confirmation.

Interestingly, this is the first Pro Tour we’ve seen where so many of the top players seemed to have pulled their basic lands from land stations. At Magic Con Vegas, these land stations were stuffed with Jumpstart 25 lands, which you spot in Larson, Zhang, and Faust’s selections. While it’s nice when players can be intentional about their land choice – and some of them may have been, as J25’s basics are quite nice and were reasonably amongst the best-selling of 2025 – it’s hard to fault anyone for focusing on winning rather than looking good doing it.

But for Cristoffer Larsen, I am somewhat surprised. Though not all that unique choice, he inspired many players with his Unstable Swamps that carried him to victory at the last Pro Tour just a few months ago, as discussed in our previous report. Perhaps Steuer’s more intentional choice in basics helped improve the heart of his cards and gave him the slight edge needed to win in an exceptionally tight final game.

Many on Sunday night were talking about the “best-dressed” of the Met Gala, but for my friends and I, we were debating the “best-dressed” basic lands of the Top 8. My runner-up is Matthew Stefansson, whose truly eclectic combination of Forests had nary a repeat amongst them. With the rare mix of full art and standard art basics (a trend also found in 6th place Maxx Kominowski), it’s hard to say if there’s truly a rhyme or reason behind Stefansson’s Forests, but to me, it looks like the Canadian simply picked out his recent favorites, and I like that. 

But the winner obviously has to be Matt Nass, who celebrated his 5th major event Top 8 with the same suite of basic lands that brought him to victory in Pro Tour Aetherdrift: Urza’s Saga. Urza’s Saga basics represent Dominaria during the events leading up to The Brother’s War, and are rightfully popular amongst longtime players for their evocative artwork. Notably, they’re also the last suite of basic lands to have the instructive text box rather than a large mana symbol.

When asked what prompted his choice, Nass said they were a “good combination of cheap and nice looking.” We couldn’t agree more.

What are your favorite lands of the bunch? Who do you think is the style winner of the Pro Tour? Let us know in the comments or on our social channels, and thanks so much for reading! If you’ve enjoyed this article, sign up for our newsletter and be sure to follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Threads!!

Miles Atherton is the editor-in-chief of “Cardboard by the Numbers” and has been playing Magic since 2006. Since studying Agricultural Economics at UC Davis, he’s built a career as an award-winning marketer with a love of data journalism. He currently runs the anime & manga consulting firm White Box Entertainment and serves on the board for Manga Mavericks and Anime Trending. He’s previously written for Anime Trending, Anime Buscience, Anime News Network, and Crunchyroll News, serving as Executive Editor of the Crunchyroll News from 2016 to 2021.