Flood Counters in MTG: Rules, History, and Best Cards

Bounty of the Luxa | Illustration by Jonas De Ro

In the early days of Magic, creatures with landwalk roamed the battlefield. Landwalk meant a creature was unblockable if the defender controlled a land of a certain type. Islands make the most intuitive sense in that space. If I can swim, it’s easier for me to sneak up on you on your island. So design seemed to follow that logic for a while with mechanics like islandhome, like a giant kraken probably can’t get your goblins on the top of that mountain peak. Cards like Tidal Warrior could make your stuff an island to keep your Island Fish Jasconius alive. And High Tide always lurks in the background.

Although the mechanic of tapping a creature to temporarily change a land has endured, serving most often in domain-oriented sets and decks with cards like Pixie Illusionist, the ability to permanently change a land, which seems like an inevitable development of the concept, comes along a bit later in Magic’s history, using counters to do it. Those are flood counters. Let’s take a deep, ahem, dive into their development and history.

How Do Flood Counters Work?

Eluge, the Shoreless Sea | Illustration by Chase Stone

Flood counters work like other counters in MTG. They are placed by an activated or triggered ability of a card. Although they generally turn lands into Islands, that happens in different ways, and there are other uses for flood counters. It’s always a water-based thing, but the counters do a variety of things.

The History of Flood Counters in MTG

Flood counters first appeared on Quicksilver Fountain in Mirrodin in 2003. It turned cards into islands, which meant the land lost other land types and abilities, as with Blood Moon-style effects.

Flood counters returned on Aquitect's Will in Lorwyn in 2007, which created the now more common island transformation text: “Put a flood counter on target land. That land is an Island in addition to its other types for as long as it has a flood counter on it.” That language, used on other cards, adds the island type but doesn’t remove the rest of the card’s types or abilities.

It was 10 years until the next card, Bounty of the Luxa, which used flood counters to symbolize the periodic flooding of the Nile, related to the Egyptian theme underlying the Amonkhet block. That opening of the floodgates gave us The Flood of Mars from Doctor Who, based on the creepy episode “The Waters of Mars”, where water carries a zombie infection from ancient Mars. The card mixes the Aquitect's Will language with a transformation mechanic.

The other two cards to use the mechanic kept the use pretty steady. Given that one is actually part of a whole deck in Standard, Eluge, the Shoreless Sea, I would guess the use of flood counters will remain consistent if we see them again.

Gallery and List of Flood Counter Cards

• Aquitect's Will
• Bounty of the Luxa
• Eluge, the Shoreless Sea
• Quicksilver Fountain
• The Flood of Mars
• Xolatoyac, the Smiling Flood

Do Flood Counters Turn Lands Into Islands?

No. While cards like Quicksilver Fountain and Aquitect's Will put a flood counter on lands and turn them into islands, the actual type-changing comes from other text on the cards. Flood counters are simply used to demark which land had its type changed; they have no inherent effect. If you used Nesting Grounds to move counters from Bounty of the Luxa to a land, nothing would happen to that land.

Can Lands with Flood Counters Tap for Blue Mana?

If the card that placed the flood counter made the land in question an island or added the island type, then yes. Otherwise, simply having a flood counter on a land does not allow the land to tap for .

Do Flood Counters from One Card Interact with Another?

Yes! If the flood counters are on permanents, the text of the other card interacts with. For example, every land with a flood counter, even if they were put there by Eluge, the Shoreless Sea, is part of the counter check Quicksilver Fountain requires. If I Nesting Grounds flood counters from a land transformed by The Flood of Mars onto Bounty of the Luxa, those counters are checked as part of the Bounty’s main phase operation.

Does Proliferating Flood Counters Do Anything?

It proliferates them! Doing so doesn’t add any attributes to lands made into islands with flood counters. More counters might be good for Bounty of the Luxa, but a card like Eluge, the Shoreless Sea doesn’t count flood counters. It counts lands with flood counters, so proliferating doesn’t help much.

What If You Put a Flood Counter on a Creature?

Mostly nothing happens. If I use Nesting Grounds to pull a flood counter off one of my lands to keep Quicksilver Fountain in play longer and drop it on a creature, the counter doesn’t do anything to that creature. The Flood of Mars only transforms the creatures into copies when it puts a flood counter on them with its own ability. So if I do the Nesting Grounds move with the zombie in play, it won’t make the target creature into a copy of the Flood.

Best Flood Counter Cards

#6. Bounty of the Luxa

This is a fiddly and difficult card, not to mention slow. It was a good rare in its Draft environment, but even Sab-Sunen, Luxa Embodied decks don’t generally play Bounty of the Luxa, despite the flavor win!

#5. Quicksilver Fountain

You could imagine this coming down on turn 2 and wrecking opposing manabases. I imagine once every dozen or so games that happens. Quicksilver Fountain is more of an enabler for merfolk Commander decks or Eluge, the Shoreless Sea than anything. You could play Choke to really make friends, but that hurts you, too.

#4. The Flood of Mars

A decent card for the two commanders on this list, The Flood of Mars is also a horror that makes horrors, so you could toss it in Captain N'ghathrod; since it’s a zombie, the same logic goes for Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver.

#3. Aquitect’s Will

A nice 1-mana cantrip for merfolk Commander decks, Aquitect's Will also enables merfolk that need islands, like Streambed Architects.

#2. Xolatoyac, the Smiling Flood

This is a decent commander or a card in the +1/+1 counters space. Xolatoyac, the Smiling Flood is also quite effective in Omo, Queen of Vesuva decks.

#1. Eluge, the Shoreless Sea

Because Eluge, the Shoreless Sea reduces the blue costs of spells, it’s an exceptional control card once the board is stabilized. Even without the flood counters, this thing rips through the Stock Ups. But Lorwyn Eclipsed really pushed this elemental over the edge, with a mono-blue “Spellementals” build including Sunderflock. With a three-year Standard rotation, the fish will only get better as cool blue spells are printed.

Wrap Up

Xolatoyac, the Smiling Flood | Illustration by Campbell White

I love flood counters. They make lands matter as what they are, plot- and lore-wise. I can flood your land and make it an island. But how does Blood Moon really work? It just makes everything look red? I mean, I guess.

I like the idea of changing lands with counters and generating rewards for that space. And I’d like more of that idea. Goblins can deforest your woods into plains. You can dry out swamps or soggy up a forest.

I’d like Wizards to explore this design space further. Can I put a flood counter on an artifact machine and drown it like Saruman’s Uruk-hai skunkworks? Can I flood my creatures to reduce fire damage? Maybe this is all too nitpitcky and 90s Magic, but I think this stuff is good, nerdy fun!

If you agree, I’ll expect the comments below to be flooded! If not, check us out on Discord, and follow our newsletter for the latest MTG news.

Happy deck brewing!