Gargantuan Gorilla was used by Kibler once, I think. Also, I wouldn't say EVERY card that involved the mechanic sucked - Thermokarst and Icequake are good, solid cards.
I know that snow covered lands are still legal in extended (as people used them to better tainted pact at PTNO), but someone had told me that all the cards that interacted with snow covered lands were no longer usable in tornaments. Is this true?
No... they are all Ice Age cards, and that block is still legal.
Maybe he meant "no longer playable" because frankly, every card that interacts with snow-covered land really, really sucked.
If you really look at them, some of the cards are not that bad, the pestilence is 3 to cast not 4, there is the free fog red enchantment, there are some very interesting things that you can do with them, I just wanted to make sure it was still legal before I did a little research
Withering Wisps! Except that was the only card you'd want to use that gave you a benefit form playing snow-covered land.
Wizards learned their lesson: when you make a new mechanic, do not only punish those who use it (Icequake,Thermokarst).
Sunstone wasn't all that bad if I remember. I think it allowed you to sack a snowcovered land to fog whenever you wanted. It cost maybe two colorless to put into play and had no mana activation cost.
Sorry, but that's bad.
Gargantuan Gorilla was used by Kibler once, I think. Also, I wouldn't say EVERY card that involved the mechanic sucked - Thermokarst and Icequake are good, solid cards.
I didn't say that they all sucked - I said that the cards that didn't suck (Icequake, Thermokarst) all punished whoever was using snow-covered land. There weren't really any cards that BENEFITED in some MEANINGFUL WAY from playing with snow-covered lands. Nothing like:
Jack Frost
2GW
2/3 trample
if all your basic land are snow-covered, ~this~ gets +2/+1
Or:
MushMuck
1BB
Sorcery
Destroy target creature without flying if its toughness is less than the number of snow-covered lands you control.
See, the cards that did grant you a benefit weren't good enough to play with even if you only used snow-covered. Wizards basically killed their own mechanic. Like if all buyback/kicker/flashback costs were raised by 2 mana...just shooting their good idea in the foot.
Back to the Ice Age
2UU - Enchantment
all non-snow covered lands do not untap as normal
Soldiers to Snowmen
1W - Instant
Remove target non-white creature from the game.
If you control any snow-covered lands you gain life equal to the creature's power.
Titan's Lightning
1R - Instant
Titan's Lightning deals two damage to target creature or player. If you control snow covered lands it deals an additional two damage to the same target.
Frost Dragon
4RU - creature dragon
Flying, Haste
Tap a snow covered land to give Frost Dragon +1/+0 until end of turn.
5/5
Angel of Leshrac
3WB - creature angel demon
Flying
Attacking does not cause Angel of Leshrac to tap.
As long as you control snow covered lands Angel of Leshrac gains " tap: destroy target non-basic land or give target creature +3/-2 until end of turn"
2/6
What about all those cards from Planeshift (e.g. Draco) whose cc was reduced or power raised based on the number of basic land types that one controlled? I'm sure there's probably some kind of errata out there, but weren't Snow-Covered Mountains considered to be a basic land type separate from regular mountains?
No. Mountains and Snow-covered Mountains are considered exactly the same for game purposes with these two exceptions.
Any card that specifically mentions Snow-covered lands, such as Icequake or Karplusan Giant.
Any card that references the NAME of the card, such as Wake of Destruction or Tainted Pact.
And of course you can't use them interchangably if the format(such as Type 2) does not permit the use of Ice Age Block cards.