This Week in Legacy: Slipping Through the Cracks
Howdy folks! It's time yet again for another edition of This Week in Legacy! I'm your host, Joe Dyer, and this week we're diving into the subjects of card evaluation for Legacy. In addition to that we've got some paper event news, some paper event coverage with Bazaar of Boxes Series 3, and some Challenge data as well. Oh and of course, we've got a Spice Corner.
It's also worth noting that a few weeks ago we reviewed the card Currency Converter for Legacy as part of the Streets of New Capenna set review. Unless something changes in the future, that card is currently not going to be on Magic Online as part of the cards programmed into the client from SNC Commander.
Without further ado, let's dive right in!
The Bird of the Hour - Did We Miss This Card?
There has been a lot of hubbub this past week on some cards out of Streets of New Capenna in multiple formats, but one of those cards looks almost like it could be good in a wide variety of formats, Legacy included. The card in question? Ledger Shredder.
On the surface of card evaluation, this card didn't come up really at all during spoiler season for a lot of typical places of Legacy discussion that I tend to look for, so thus I missed it in my set review for Streets of New Capenna. There was virtually no discussion of this card for 1v1 constructed formats, yet it is now seeing a lot of play in Pioneer and even Modern. Usually, I also tend to look through the whole set and even I glossed over this card. These things happen during spoiler season as there is a lot of information being presented all at once and it can sometimes be difficult to keep straight what is good and what isn't, especially when the set is like this one where there are incrementally good cards and not cards that are outright broken like the Uros and Okos of the world.
What potentially sets Ledger Shredder apart though is how the card is worded. Typically these cards often read "Whenever you" or "Whenever an opponent" (see Kraum, Ludevic's Opus) but Shredder has the text of "Whenever a player casts their second spell each turn" which means that it triggers off both players. It can trigger twice in one turn if both players cast two spells in a single player's turn (such as during a countermagic battle). What this does here is that you get to connive by drawing and discarding a card and then if you discarded a nonland, you put a +1/+1 counter on the Shredder. This can be powerful in its own right by the sheer fact that even a single connive can put this outside of Lightning Bolt range as well as making it capable of killing a flipped Delver of Secrets while stonewalling a Dragon's Rage Channeler. Connive fills the graveyard, helping this card play nicely with both Dragon's Rage Channeler and Murktide Regent, but it's only growing if you're pitching a nonland card and that is a definite cost if there is a card you want to keep in your hand.
Of course, the one deck in the format that can really abuse casting multiple spells a turn is obviously UR Delver, and we've seen some mild results thus far with the card in it.
By mild results, I mean there have been ultimately very few overall, but these kinds of cards have often taken time for players to figure out where they may go. Whether Ledger Shredder is ultimately a good card in the format does remain to be seen. It does have the power level that puts it potentially in the right place in the format and it works well synergistically with other cards in the format that see play. It will just take a lot of testing to determine if the card itself is good or not. I suspect it has applications in other shells beyond UR Delver because I could see it going well in Stoneblade variants or something similar.
This definitely shows that on the topic of card evaluation, there's always things we can miss in spoiler seasons and that evaluating new cards is often one of the most difficult skills to truly learn, and even then we can still be wrong. The power of the MTG hive mind is truly amazing, and it's cool to see things like this occur.
Paper Event News - Buffalo Chicken Dip Legacy Series
We've got some sweet paper event news coming at us from our good friend Rob Wilson, TO of the Buffalo Chicken Dip Legacy series.
The first of which is the next BCDL event, labeled Buffalo Chicken Dip 9. This event will take place on 7/16/2022 at The Warp Gate in Westerville, OH and entry is $50 for the event.
The other news, which is an exceptionally awesome thing to hear is that Rob is expanding to a 128-player BCDL Open event which will take place at the Brewdog Brewery and Hotel in Canal Winchester, OH on Saturday November 12th, 2022. At 128 players capped, this event is a $7,600 prize pool event, all paid out in Legacy staples. That's right, expect some serious cardboard to be thrown around in this event. Entry for this event is $140 and includes lunch that will take place between Rounds 3 and 4.
One other big thing to note is that because of the venue of this event, players must 21 or older in order to participate (as it takes place at a Brewery convention space). This event also includes the usage of a playtest card library which will be available to players to borrow from. This event is unsanctioned, but all cards must either be authentic or cards from the playtest library and a cash deposit of $20 is required to borrow cards from the library. No printed playtest cards are allowed for this event. Closer to the event there will be an online form (which I will certainly let you all know about) for players to fill out if they need to borrow from the playtest library for the event.
You can find all the details for this event here.
Rob is taking signups for both events now, so contact the Buffalo Chicken Dip Legacy on Twitter for more information.
Unfortunately, as of right now I am unable to attend either event, but I am hopeful for Rob's events that they do well as they promote the very real sense of community that the Legacy community has and they do a great job of promoting the format to anyone who wants to come play. Looking forward to covering both of these events in article form, regardless if I'm there or not!
Bazaar of Boxes Series 3
We had a mid-sized paper event series ran by Bazaar of Boxes in Tilburg, the Netherlands on 4/30 that had 46 players in it. Bazaar of Boxes runs several events throughout the course of the year and they always seem like well attended events. You can find all of Bazaar of Boxes social media through their Linktree here.
This event was streamed on Twitch, which you can find the VOD here on Twitch. An edited version will be available on Bazaar of Boxes' YouTube Channel as well soon!
You can find all of the decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Wildly enough UR Delver wasn't the most popular deck in this event, but instead, it was both 8Cast and Jeskai Control. Of those, Jeskai did the best in this event, while UR Delver had a pretty subpar performance. GW Depths also did quite well, as did Painter.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | Player Name |
|---|---|---|
| Jeskai Control | 1st | Michel de Jong |
| Mono Green Cloudpost | 2nd | Alex Rouw |
| Eldrazi | 3rd | Erick Krul |
| Grixis Control | 4th | Daan Van den Hoogen |
| The EPIC Storm | 5th | Ido Levy |
| Lands | 6th | Jordy Nieuw |
| 8Cast | 7th | Sven Havenith |
| Jeskai Control | 8th | Stefan Kouseband |
Interesting Top 8 here, considering the small number of Delver players and its win rate it is not surprising to not see it show up here. Jeskai Control looked very good though, going on to win the event in the hands of Michel de Jong.
I like these lists much better than I like the Daybreacher builds. They seem more consistently powerful and have much stronger threats like Murktide.
The Second Place finalist was on Mono Green Cloudpost.
Definitely a straightforward and powerful list here. Everything you would expect from the Green Cloudpost shells for sure. I think this deck is better than it seems right now.
Laughing Dragon 1K 5/7
There was also a 1K Legacy event at Laughing Dragon MTG in Issaquah, WA over the weekend that had 36 players in it. Laughing Dragon MTG is also one of the heads of the Puget Sound Battleground series of events, with the first-place prize of this 1K event also containing a free entry into the Puget Sound Battleground 4 event in July. Be sure to check out these events if you're in the area and interested in attending.
As for this particular 1K event, as noted it had a reasonable turnout of 36 players and looked to be an interesting event. We don't have much besides the Top 8 decklists at the moment on this event, but the Top 8 is very intriguing for sure. You can check all the Top 8 decklists and final standings of the event here.
| Deck Name | Placing | Player Name |
|---|---|---|
| Minotaurs | 1st | Mark Shanafelt |
| UR Delver | 2nd | AJ Ansel |
| Oracle Combo | 3rd | Matt Anderson |
| 8Cast | 4th | Lee Hung Nguyen |
| Aluren | 5th | Joel Brown |
| Jeskai Control | 6th | Jordan Aisaka |
| Pox | 7th | Jason Wong |
| Jeskai Control | 8th | Sam Hriljac |
Yes. That First Place says Minotaurs. It is indeed the Didgeridoo deck!
This deck is so cool. Powering out Minotaur threats with Didgeridoo is just insanely fun and awesome. The fact that they've printed a bunch of really busted ones also really helps.
Legacy Challenge 5/7
Our first Challenge event of the weekend was the early morning Saturday event. This event had 60 players in it, thanks to what data we could collect within the Legacy Data Collection Project.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here and the data sheet here. Unfortunately, there are no graphs for this one, as the data-sheet is a bit incomplete due to some technical difficulties this weekend with collecting the round-by-round data for the event. These sorts of things happen from time to time, so let's just take a look at the Top 8 of the event, shall we?
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Lands | 1st | Phellipe |
| UR Delver | 2nd | burrarun |
| UR Delver | 3rd | Oceansoul92 |
| Painter | 4th | ganesh_69 |
| Yorion Affinity | 5th | alexwest |
| Reanimator | 6th | nazart |
| Oops! All Spells | 7th | A_0 |
| Blue Karn Echo | 8th | ehhh |
Definitely a really interesting Top 8 here with a lot going on. At the end of the event it was Lands that took it all down.
Solid list here. Main deck Endurance is really good right now for Lands decks to have access to, and I like the light blue splash in the sideboard for Flusterstorm (which beats Ruination and Price of Progress most of the time).
The Second Place finalist was on UR Delver.
This is a good example of current UR Delver variants, with Mystic Sanctuary and Steam Vents. Sanctuary in general is a really powerful with cards like Expressive Iteration, and if you can pick it up with a Daze it's really absurd.
Also in this Top 8 we have Painter.
Very focused UR Painter list here, leaning on having the cantrip package in addition to the Urza's Saga package. Really interesting and well thought out deck for sure.
Further into the Top 8 we have a Yorion Affinity list.
This is like playing 8Cast except you don't have Thoughtcast and you just have 80 cards with all the best threats in UW colors for these kinds of decks. Esper Sentinel? Check. Kappa Cannoneer? TRIPLE CHECK. Super cool list.
Legacy Challenge 5/8
The second Challenge of the weekend was the mid-afternoon Sunday event. This event had 93 players in it thanks to the data collected by the Legacy Data Collection Project.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here and the datasheet here.
Jeskai Control overtook Delver in this event and had a solid win rate to boot. Delver had a slightly below average win rate here, while 8Cast and Doomsday did very well. Definitely an interesting event.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Jeskai Control | 1st | Killah_SUV |
| Blood Moon Aggro | 2nd | FunkiMunki |
| 4C Control | 3rd | AnziD |
| Doomsday | 4th | Malowless |
| UR Delver | 5th | TrueFuturism |
| 8Cast | 6th | DillanR |
| Jeskai Control | 7th | ziggy_stardust |
| Blood Moon Aggro | 8th | Oderus Urungus |
Certainly an intriguing Top 8 here. Several control variants of the Jeskai variety, plus an Uro deck and some Blood Moon decks. At the end of the event it was Jeskai Control that took it down.
This is more closely aligned with the Daybreacher variants, leaning on utilizing Narset and Hullbreacher in conjunction with Day's Undoing to lock the opponent out of the game.
In Second Place we've got Blood Moon Aggro.
This list is pretty sweet. We get to see new SNC card Unlicensed Hearse used to great effect (as we expected it would be), but also four copies of Fable of the Mirror-Breaker which people are starting to pick up on as a card that generates both threats and card advantage. Really solid!
Also in this Top 8 we've got Anuraag Das continuing to push the limits of 4C Control variants.
Dragon's Rage Channeler here is super duper spicy and a lot of fun looking. Works great for dumping Uro into the graveyard while maintaining itself as a powerful threat.
Further down this Top 8 we had 8Cast.
Definitely a solid list here. The big difference here than normal is shaving to two Kappa's for an Aether Spellbomb main deck it looks like. Spellbomb makes for a solid Saga target so it makes sense. Flusterstorm in the sideboard is pretty cool as well.
Around the Web
- Our friends at Everyday Eternal have a new episode! Check it out here.
- Our good friend Marcus (aka "Iwouldliketorespond") wrote a sweet piece on Sapphire Medallion High Tide in Legacy over on MinMaxBlog. Check it out here.
- The Eternal Glory Podcast had a great episode this past week on how to mentally and physically prepare for attending large Magic events. Well worth a listen! Check it out here.
- 90sMTG has Roland Chang on UR Delver vs White Eldrazi! Check it out here.
- Bazaar of Boxes has Tempo Doomsday vs Meandeck Doomsday. Check it out here.
- Phil Gallagher has got Deadguy Ale splashing Red for Hidetsugu Consumes All. Check it out here.
- TAINTED PACT.
The Spice Corner
You can find this past week's 5-0 deck lists over here.
A very Planeswalker heavy Esper shell featuring Void Rend and The Wandering Emperor.
Burn Shadow list with DRC. Really intriguing list for sure.
Fleetfoot Dancer. That is all.
This is a super unique Dryad/Uro deck with Stifle, but also Daze and Expressive Iteration.
MILL.
Stiflenought is slipping out the back with a new card from SNC.
Ever just wanted to kill your opponent with Sudden Substitution? Yeah. Me too.
What I Played Last Week
I had a really goofy one this past week based on one of the lists from SCGCon Pittsburgh. It was a black/green midrange pile focused on using the card False Cure to kill the opponent in conjunction with Kavu Predator. The league itself was pretty awkward, but had some really super fun games including a double resolution of False Cure to win using Reverent Silence as the kill.
Wrapping Up
That's all the time we have this week folks! Thanks for continuing to support the column and join us next week as we continue our journey into Legacy!
As always you can reach me at Twitter, Twitch, YouTube, and Patreon! In addition I'm always around the MTGGoldfish Discord Server and the MTGLegacy Discord Server.
Until next time!
