Can I play a first turn Simic Growth Chamber to have 3 mana available in the second turn?

Question

Using a card like Simic Growth Chamber (there are others for other colour combinations) in the first turn and a "normal" land in the second, can I have 3 mana available in the second turn?

Simic Growth Chamber enters the battlefield tapped.

When Simic Growth Chamber enters the battlefield, return a land you control to its owner's hand.

Tap: Add {G}{U}.

Can I really play this card without any land on the battlefield?

Answer 1

No. If you play Simic Growth Chamber without any other lands in play, you still must return a land you control to its owner's hand ... which happens to be the Simic Growth Chamber itself. So while it is legal, it is not useful to play it the first turn.

Answer 2

If you rephrase your question to "Can I have 3 mana on turn 2 with a normal land and Simic growth chamber?" the answer is yes, but not if you played Simic Growth chamber on turn 1.

The concept of this lands is to have a land that sort of ramps (gets to a higher count of mana) and filters (gives you different colour options) so the drawback of it is that you lose a turn to play it, it doesn't really advance you on mana per turn, but what it does it ensures that with less cards you have more available mana.

Now there is a deck in modern that abuses the use of this lands by using amulet of Vigor, and this is where you would be able to get to 3 mana on turn 2 with those 2 lands. Turn 1, drop normal land, play amulet of vigor, turn 2 play this land, trigger of the land goes on the stack, trigger from vigor goes on the stack, you choose to resolve the land trigger last, so your land untaps, you tap it for mana (and possibly the other one) and then decide which land to bounce and you have 3 mana in your mana pool.

A deck called Amulet Titan, uses Amulet of Vigor to get these ramp to play Azusa, Lost but Seeking which allows you to play more lands per turn, which with the right combination would allow you to cast Primeval Titan on Turn 2/3.

So, as per Glorfindel's answer, No is the answer, but yes it is possible.

Answer 3

Yes, it is possible with a card like Arboreal Grazer (I'm uncertain off the top of my head if there are any other cards that would also work)

Turn 1:

• Play a Forest
• Cast Arboreal Grazer
• Use Arboreal Grazer's ability to put Simic Growth Chamber into play
• Return the Forest to hand

Turn 2:

• Play the Forest again
• Et Voila, 3 mana on turn 2