This Week in Legacy: The Legacy Round Table - The Kitten Conundrums Edition
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 going to be assembling the Round Table yet again for another look at how the community is feeling about Legacy! In addition to that we've got a paper event to discuss in the form of Buffalo Chicken Dip Legacy 9 as well as two Challenges from over the weekend.
Without further ado, let's dive right in!
The Legacy Round Table - The Kitten Conundrums Edition
It has been a while since we've done one of these, so the time seemed right to bring back a Legacy Round Table. The basis of these are pretty simple. Generally ten or so Legacy Content Creators/Players/etc go through some prompts on a doc and give their responses to how they feel about the Legacy format.
This edition of the Round Table includes some definitely powerful players that have given their thoughts in previous Round Tables coupled with some newcomers. Let's take a look at who we're talking to this week!
| Name | Social Media Links |
|---|---|
| Jarvis Yu | |
| Michael Mapson | |
| Phil Gallagher | |
| Curran Delahanty | |
| Maxx Kominowski | |
| Kyle Vjorn | |
| GhostXEmpire | |
| Andy Wilson | |
| Jeff from The Canadian Threshold Podcast | |
| Kevin Brenneman |
I want to thank all of the contributors to this Round Table this go around! This is an awesome list of people and you should definitely go follow these people on their respective socials. Now then, let's get right to the questions!
Question #1 - What are your current thoughts on the Legacy format? Are you having fun? Is the format healthy?
Jarvis Yu: Currently, I still play a reasonable amount of Legacy right now, although not an enormous amount (given the upcoming Regional Championship qualifier season coming up). I’m having a reasonable amount of fun, but I do recognize one indisputable fact: if you really want to win, you should play Izzet Delver. The deck is inherently solid and hard to exploit minus a few very weird/focused angles. It’s arguable if one ‘S-Tier’ deck makes a format unhealthy or not, and I won’t claim to be an unbiased judge of that, but I can see how other people might perceive it to be the case.
Michael Mapson: I am enjoying Legacy but to be honest I just love playing Magic way too much. I will say though that I do not have fun in games that are decided by Murktide Regent. I think there are still a lot of strategies that haven’t been properly explored and I enjoy looking into them. While I don’t enjoy Murktide games, it being such a powerful force in the meta also means I get to have fun coming up with strategies to exploit that. Despite my enjoyment of it, I do not think the format is healthy. I will always be able to find things to love in legacy but that doesn’t mean it can’t be improved. I am very opposed to a format being as homogenized as the current one is. Murktide Regent and Expressive Iteration being the best threat and card advantage spells by a significant margin has really shrunk the format. I don’t think the presence of maindeck Pyroblast is necessarily a bad thing, but I do think all the sameness is.
Phil Gallagher: I am largely having fun playing the current Legacy format. That said, trying to play interesting decklists for content production often results in non-games vs Delver and other similar decks using the Expressive Iteration / Murktide Regent shell. It’s very difficult for decks to keep up with the card advantage of Expressive Iteration with Mystic Sanctuary while also being prepared to deal with a turn three Murktide Regent. The current power level of our S tier deck makes playing brews and non-tier 1 decks tough. The Ragavan ban didn’t remove UR Delver from its slot as the top dog, and the format is feeling a little stale and solved accordingly. I’d say the format is a bit unhealthy at the moment and would love a shakeup, but we’re certainly not in the “Oko has invalidated most decks in the format” level of degeneracy where waves of players are quitting.
Curran Delahanty: Legacy is in a place right now. It is an absolute fact that the best deck in the format right now is UR Delver. This remains unchanged since the last time I contributed my thoughts to a round table article which was close to exactly a year ago. Additionally, that’s not looking to change any time soon with the recent format updates we received from Wizards. While this remains the case, I have come to accept that it will always be at the forefront of competitive environments and as a result, have worked diligently with my colleague; Newton Hang to come up with a solution to beating UR Delver. However, there is a wildly different matchup experience when playing in Magic Online leagues. In Leagues, I don’t see nearly as much Delver as I do in challenges or at recent paper 1ks in my area. There’s no doubt about it. Delver’s presence has caused exhaustion among the Legacy community and so when you go into League play, you often see more decks that have a gameplan to defeat Delver or just ignore it entirely and play out their own game plan anyway. Now don’t get me wrong. Statistics still say you will run into Delver in leagues from time to time. But to be completely honest with you, seeing a pretty large variety of decks despite the King and his crown makes me feel the format is fairly healthy. I think things would improve with a ban out of Delver but if they're here to stay, I think the format has adapted to deal.
Maxx Kominowski: I’m personally always a fan of legacy gameplay as an all things brainstorm enjoyer. Currently I think there’s a small problem in the format's balance that hopefully would be resolved if Expressive Iteration was banned or they gave some power back to GY and combo decks like sneak and show / ANT. When there aren’t enough incentives for fair decks to fully respect combo and GY decks I believe the format becomes warped a little too fair and sideboards are able to dedicate resources towards only specific matchups while ignoring matchups that should demand narrow answers such as SNS, ANT, or Hogaak would.
Kyle Vjorn: Gameplay is relatively enjoyable with a lot of interactive games with many decision points. While I enjoy the current URx mirrors and have been having fun brewing various 4c control piles, I do think that the format as a whole is unhealthy. URx is head and shoulders better than anything else you can be doing. Expressive Iteration and Mystic Sanctuary let UR decks a much longer game and Murktide Regent closes the game so quickly that it can bail UR decks out of losing games too easily. Almost more so than the strength of UR delver specifically, the most frustrating part of the current meta is how essential Pyroblast, and therefore red is - especially in blue decks themselves. Not to mention playing red also gets you access to Expressive Iteration.
GhostXEmpire: I’m fine on the format atm. Being a dirty Ancient Tomb Gamer, there are a plethora of decks that are popping up for me to play but the game play of bigger tourneys are just a bit stale I’ve heard from most. Every format has a “best” deck, kinda just have to accept it and try your best to beat it if you want to be successful. Lots of decks are doing well atm, I think people are in general just over hating on delver atm because their deck doesn’t beat it. Cards like Pyroblast are about as easy to play/splash for then ever and even if the card is dead, things like Brainstorm and a fetch or any filter make it pretty free to play in a lot of decks.
There’s a ton of decks that are doing well atm also, the last 3 challenges (as of writing this) only had 1 Delver in the top 8 (one of them had 0) and was won by Death and Taxes, Reanimator and Doomsday. There was 16 different decks in all of those top 8s as well. Yes the “Delver” deck is the better choice if you want to win/do well, but there is still plenty of options for other things to do.
Andy Wilson: The format is unhealthy but I am having fun anyway. I spent a lot of time playing every control variant under the sun and had a great time doing it. I have a big event at the end of the month (Puget Sound Battle Ground) so I’m now playing UR Delver and having even more fun.
Once I switched to UR Delver I racked up about 6 trophies in about a week. The deck really is that much better than everything else which is sad.
Something I’ve noticed in leagues is that the meta is TRYING to shift by playing a Delver shell while minimizing their exposure to Pyroblast. The best example is the Death's Shadow deck, which plays similarly to Delver but has a non-Pyroblastable scary threat. Part of me has hope that these builds will break through. But even though they are building their decks specifically to beat me, I still beat them about half of the time.
Jeff @ Canadian Threshold: Outside of the meta at our local weekly in Vancouver (and upcoming puget sound battleground 4 in Tacoma) I'm not too excited about Legacy these days, and many local players are taking a break or trying out other formats as a result. As Curran put it above, Legacy is certainly in a place.
Kevin Brenneman: I’m personally a fan of the format as it exists right now. This isn’t to say that the format is great right now, but it’s definitely not as bad as some people make it out to be. As someone who plays paper Legacy a lot more than online (thanks to TheLegacyPit), I would say I see a lot more diversity than is to be expected. However, having there be a best deck that you expect to run into isn’t a bad thing, and UR Delver is currently the best thing to be doing. From a gameplay perspective, outside of the most broken Delver hands, I am really enjoying a fair majority of the gameplay that this format has to offer.
Question #2 - What changes would you make to the current format (bans/unbans) and why?
Jarvis Yu: Previously when Izzet ‘Delver’ was the best deck, people were clamoring for a Ragavan/Murktide ban. I was an advocate of banning Expressive Iteration instead, so I feel somewhat vindicated. If you really want to make sure that Izzet Delver isn’t ‘S-Tier’, you should axe Expressive Iteration. Iteration is the card that allows it to play a turn 10+ game and still come out on top (in my opinion, this is the most common type of mirror game), especially in conjunction with Mystic Sanctuary and Daze.
Michael Mapson: I’m going to say something controversial here. I would not touch Expressive Iteration. The card is obviously ridiculously strong but I think its also pretty fun and interesting. I have been an advocate for banning Daze for a while now and would start there. I think we keep pushing to get Legacy closer to the level it used to be by axing card advantage but I just don’t think that’s ever going to work. We have to adapt to the way WOTC is designing. There will keep being pushed threats but there are also good answers. I think the real issue is that these cheap threats are supported by Daze making them impossible to interact with. I often hear that no Daze would let combo run away with the format but I just don’t think that's true. There are other answers, they don’t have to be free. I would add a caveat that I would make it very clear when banning the card, that this is a test, if the format falls apart that we would undo it in 3 months. At that point I would then look at Murktide and/or Iteration instead. As far as unbans, I’m very interested in seeing what Lurrus & Zirda would look like in the format now that they’ve been nerfed. I think Lurrus would be very strong still as evidenced by Modern but I think the format could handle it. I also think it would lead to more deviation in how Delver was built with some sticking with murktide and others moving to 3 colors with Lurrus. I’m not sure if Zirda would still be broken but I’d rather find out than leave it on the banlist unnecessarily.
Phil Gallagher: As we have repeatedly seen in the past few years, most recently with Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer, banning a single card from Delver will not remove the deck from its current position at the top of the Legacy food chain. I’ll be comfortable with Delver’s power level when there is a real discussion about what colors a Delver deck should be instead of UR just being the default. If you want to attack the problematic new cards, taking out both Expressive Iteration and Murktide Regent is likely enough to knock the deck out of unquestionable best deck in the format territory. That said, Ledger Shredder or other similar cards will just fill the void and Delver will persist. If you want to really knock the deck down a peg, it’s probably time to start thinking about attacking a core pillar of the deck like Daze.
Curran Delahanty: When it became more and more apparent that something needed to be banned from Delver, I began to lean towards Expressive Iteration being the problem card. Sometimes it’s not the threats that are the issue but what bridges the threats. What makes them even stronger or fuels them. To send things back to a healthier place, I would see to it that Expressive Iteration be banned first. Murktide is a close second.
Maxx Kominowski: Cold take, ban Expressive Iteration only. Murktide is a single (good) threat that I think is permissible in Legacy. Cheap card advantage has always been a problem, Dreadhorde Arcanist and Treasure Cruise are good examples recently.
Hot take- No bans but WotC needs to design a card meant to bolster combo archetypes. Maybe an Allosaurus Shepherd type card so obviously meant for combo. This card shouldn’t be playable in fair decks. Same applies for giving a boost to Hogaak type decks to put more pressure on decks like delver to have GY hate.
Kyle Vjorn: I wouldn't mind seeing both an Expressive Iteration and Murktide Regent ban despite having both in my current deck. While both have reasonable replacements, the power of those replacements are much more in line with the rest of the format. I won't dwell on the ban portion too much since it has been hashed out time and time again and I don't really have anything new to add to the discussion.
As for unbans, we can immediately disregard every card that Delver got banned. Frantic Search, Earthcraft, and Mind Twist are the three cards I believe would be the safest to come off the list. Frantic Search is worse than Careful Study or Faithless Looting until you have three lands in play, which is what we should be pushing combo decks to strive for. I doubt Earthcraft or Mind Twist would have much, if any, impact but the play patterns of Mind Twist are also pretty miserable so I don’t see a huge benefit to removing it from the list. Goblin Recruiter is the last card I’ll mention, but I’d rather we not push another cool fair deck that is borderline into being a combo deck.
GhostXEmpire: If we live in Fantasy land for everybody Daze, Expressive Iteration and Murktide would probably get deleted. Back to reality, my guess would be Iteration. Banning threats is usually not the answer unless they are just too broken (Oko, etc) as they can just plop in another one and be the same which was the case with Ragavan, so banning Murktide probably isn’t the solution. Banning Iteration would remove some of the card advantage and raw power of the deck, making it weaker to the Control decks which were usually the go to on beating Delver as you could just run them out of cards so that would probably be my guess.
Andy Wilson: I would ban both Murktide Regent and Expressive Iteration. This is what legacy revolves around now. Legacy is no longer about playing around daze, it’s about not dying to Regent or getting buried in card advantage from Expressive Iteration. Control decks are playing EI out of necessity, but they still fall behind because they cannot sanctuary EI as effectively as Delver.
Personally, I think EI is a mistake and should be erased from every non-vintage format. We’ve never seen a two-mana draw two without a drawback, and is a two-mana draw two with UPSIDE. For crying out loud there’s a reason they never made a card like this, and now we’re all suffering the consequences.
I would not ban Daze because we are seeing Delver decks register less and less Daze’s as it is. Currently I favor Delverless Delver, and I wouldn’t care at all if they banned Daze, which tells me that banning Daze isn’t enough. Now, we’ve been here before and we know that as soon as EI and Regent are gone a new form of Delver using Daze would likely take the throne again. So I wouldn’t mind if they banned Daze so long as they banned EI and Regent first.
Jeff @ Canadian Threshold: It's difficult to discuss bans without being a little defeatist due to recent design philosophy making cards that are just extremely powerful. I think to get the format back to a place where I'm interested in playing a ton, EI & Murktide need to get the axe. I feel no pain even if removing Murktide is a step too far, as in the best case it's just not an interesting card and there will surely be another threat coming up right behind it. In my opinion the bans I want to see are to shape a format I want to play, rather than to shape a scientifically balanced meta - to that end Urza's Saga is also on my own personal wishlist because I want to see a painter deck and think oh baby painter, instead of a deck based around 4 copies of a land.
Kevin Brenneman: My general philosophy around bans is to keep the ban list as small as possible. I think Expressive Iteration has showed us that a cheap draw two that delver can play is just too much. I can understand the arguments for wanting to go after Murktide Regent as well, however I don’t think we are in a place where we need to go after a threat and the card advantage engine. People asking for a Daze ban are living in some fantasy world. That card is fine and the format in check.
Question #3 - What cards are you most excited for out of Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur's Gate for Legacy purposes?
Jarvis Yu: Displacer Kitten is a card I’ve had the pleasure to think about building decks with (thanks to one Max Gilmore aka Maxtortion). The card doesn’t ask a lot to make it an effective card, but it does spawn new archetypes (I’ve recently streamed Jeskai and Bant Cat myself). I do want to rant about how the card distribution of these ‘non draftable sets’ is handled on Magic Online. We’re experiencing the same issue as the early days of Kappa Cannoneer’s price re: the prices of these cards (like Displacer Kitten, etc.), and it’s entirely because you can only get them in the Treasure Chests with a fairly low drop rate.
Michael Mapson: I’d be lying if I said I had actually looked at all the cards in the set. Displacer Kitten is pretty cool though. I’m also very excited to try Minsc & Boo, Timeless Heroes. I think this is the sideboard card GWr Depths has been looking for. Having a noncreature threat that is fairly resistant to both Boseiju and Prismatic Ending is huge. Sorry to have the same boring answers as everyone else but spoiler fatigue makes it hard to actually want to evaluate all the new cards.
Phil Gallagher: Displacer Kitten is the slam dunk pick in terms of power level, but I’m most excited about Minsc & Boo. I’m personally going to slot it into the Jokulhaups deck that I recently grabbed a 5-0 with, but I’ve seen people discussing it as a maindeck or sideboard card in various midrange/control decks like 4c Loam. GO FOR THE EYES, BOO!
Curran Delahanty: Well, there’s Displacer Kitten finding its home. It seems to be still up in the air on what kind of shell it belongs in but I’ll leave that to the lovely researchers who decide to register this card. Heard murmurs of Minsc & Boo popping up as a one of in 4c strats or other cute blue soupy decks. But most of all, I’m excited for the various gates so that Maze's End becomes more viable! …You know someones gonna do it.
Maxx Kominowski: Displacer Kitten has some cool potential. It combos with only good cards and it seems like everyone is figuring out how Mishra's Bauble should be in way more decks that it currently is, so why not also let it go infinite with Kitten and Teferi, Time Raveler (you figure the combo out :) It will be even cooler if the format moves away from so many Pyroblasts, which is definitely holding it back right now from being a real contender.
Kyle Vjorn: Minsc & Boo by far. While he has two glaring weaknesses in Karakas and Lightning Bolt in response to his etb, he otherwise represents an incredibly fast and hard to deal with threat. In my experience in paper, he completely flips the 4c Control vs Jeskai matchup which is currently sporting a 40% winrate on the combined metagame spreadsheet. So far I've only been playing him in various blue control and tempo shells, but he could prove to be an effective threat in non-blue decks as well. The most straightforward nonblue candidate is GWr depths, which just sported a top 8 finish featuring the hamster at SCGCon this past week.
GhostXEmpire: I used to be a brewer at heart but now working 2 jobs I’ve become a little removed from things but Kitten is getting put in a bunch of shells. I saw a couple people trying out the Hamster walker as well. I’d recommend checking out @mopanda for some out there brews, or somebody like @xjcloud @alli_on_mtgo @maxtortion or @kingoftraitors for solid builds of good decks.
Andy Wilson: It’s just so hard for me to get excited about these cards when I know I probably won’t be able to play them on Magic Online. Legacy is slowly splitting into two different formats. Although lately Wizards has been doing a better job at getting important cards into Magic Online so I’ll give them some credit there.
Jeff @ Canadian Threshold: As an avid JTL follower, I'm excited to be playing with Oji, the Exquisite Blade, and its better than I would have assumed. Kitten also opens up a lot of interesting gameplace space, but I'm worried it's a little too much of a wankel (one chamber engine) as it can protect itself at nearly no cost, and doesn't ask too much to generate value. As for the set, the current split of format impacting cards not quite making it to MTGO feels like pauper did before the unification. It's dissapointing to have brewing kneecapped by impactful cards like Minsc & Boo (and non Baldur's Gate cards Maddening Hex, and the recently added Currency Converter thanks to the advocacy of @alli_on_mtgo)
Kevin Brenneman: Minsc & Boo has been on my list since the set has been completely spoiled. The card is everything I want in a four mana threat that doesn’t need to use the graveyard and can’t be pyroblasted. The big however here is that we are still waiting for this card to be coded onto Magic Online, which is incredibly frustrating from the perspective that it limits the space I can brew with it. I think Displacer Kitten is far over hyped, and most of the shells people are trying to jam the cat into are just worse versions of themselves
Question #4 - On a Scale of 1 - D'Awwww how adorable is Displacer Kitten?
Jarvis Yu: I’ll give it three anziAwws because it’s a cat!
Michael Mapson: It’s fine. I’m not a cat person. Would love to see some good Dogs.
Phil Gallagher: I don’t know. It’s hard to get a good look at it since it keeps blinking out of play…
Curran Delahanty: I’d rate it a pretty heckin’ cute.
Maxx Kominowski: I’m more of a dog person but damn that is a cute kitten.
Kyle Vjorn: I’d like to go on the record that WotC should strive to make more Legacy playable cards adorable.
GhostXEmpire: Yes. It’s a cat. Therefore Maximum cuteness.
Andy Wilson: I actually hate this cat. Okay maybe I don’t hate the cat so much as the shells that play it. They’re either T3feri decks, or chalice decks, combine this with the fact that Pyroblast is one of your best answers to it. And what we have is an environment that I hate, Chalices, prison. If my choices are to lose to cat or Delver, I choose Delver.
Jeff @ Canadian Threshold: The Canadian threshold is a Dog focused -- yet Cat respecting podcast. wake me up when Replacer Puppy is spoiled for Secret Lair: Paw Patrol.
Kevin Brenneman: It’s kitten, all kittens are incredibly cute.
Question #5 - Do you have any cool spice for the current format? Any sweet tips for players new to Legacy?
Jarvis Yu: My pick for a deck that is cool and good is Jeskai Cat (aka Displacer Kitten combo). The deck is easy to build in the same vein as ‘Jeskai Midrange/Control’ but allows you to slot in a few Teferi, Time Ravelers/Narset plus 2-3 Displacer Kittens as well as 0 drop artifacts for a clean combo kill.
Re: sweet tips for players new to Legacy, if you start with Izzet Delver, you’ll build strong fundamentals for the rest of the format. The play patterns are NOT the same as Izzet Murktide in Modern (I want to keep emphasizing this because people seem to believe it to be the case).
Michael Mapson: If you want the spice, Reeplcheep has been working on a super fun Currency Converter LoamPox deck that in my limited experience so far seems to be slightly ahead vs Delver.
If people want my tips to actually be good, stop being so intimidated. I constantly hear people say things like they aren’t smart enough to play Brainstorm, or they don’t want to play Delver mirrors vs people playing them for years. Then they pick some awful pile of cards and just lose a bunch. Just play the good decks. You might lose a lot at first but you’ll learn the format so much better and quicker than if you’re playing tier 5 decks. Then once you’re comfortable with what is happening you can branch out. Also don’t be afraid to ask questions. It’s so much easier to improve when you allow yourself to learn from others.
Phil Gallagher: Seeing as a ton of the decks I play for my channel end up in the spice corner, yeah, I’ll always have something. I recently played “Death Fit,” a Nic Fit variant that abuses Feign Death with Grief and Endurance in addition to the normal Veteran Explorer nonsense. If you want a brew that can hang with Delver due to a playset of Endurance, you’ll have fun playing it while still getting some wins. More generally, I’d say keep your eye on Currency Converter; I’ve seen that card do some impressive stuff.
I always recommend that new players treat their games as a learning process. Ask questions! “Why am I losing this matchup?” “Which way should I sequence my lands?” “Did I sideboard properly?” Doing this will lead you to better results over time. If you have friends who can watch your matches or replays, that’s a great way to improve too; they will catch things that you miss and give you alternative lines that aren’t obvious to you. If you feel really lost, a coaching session with a Legacy expert will probably open your eyes to the lines of thought you need to be successful.
Curran Delahanty: As you know, we’ve been spicing up the removal in the board of Elves lately because Boseiju covers enough bases that we aren’t priced into just playing Assassin's Trophy. We’ve played Run Afoul, Snuff Out and Murderous Cut so far. The newest removal we’re testing is Shriekmaw! It seems that it is castable either via evoke or paying its full CMC. It triggers active Glimpse of Natures and can be found off Once Upon a Time. Definitely excited to see how much staying power it has but rest assured, we are always working to bring you the hottest tech for Elves.
Tips for New to Legacy Players: I suggest trying as many decks as you possibly can and then choosing a deck that makes you smile the most to play. Understand that you will be taught lessons in a somewhat difficult manner. You’re gonna feel slighted, tricked, bamboozled and even cheated at times when you learn a difficult interaction or make a mistake. Recovering and learning from every play error makes you that much better of a player. There is so much fun to be had playing Legacy and I hope that you stick around long enough to see the Magic (pun absolutely intended) of it all!
Maxx Kominowski: Timeless Dragon is a great way for white based decks to fight Delver while still having play in other matchups at least getting you a land (important when you want to jam three drops). Hydroblast is also a great include right now being a good card against mono red and Delver!
Kyle Vjorn: As I mentioned before, I've been jamming a bunch of various Minsc decks that I believe line up pretty well with the format. He does a great job closing out games or burying opponents that stumble for a turn and most importantly dodges Pyroblast.
My best advice for new players to Legacy is to initially trust the format experts and play the closest posted list to what interests you. It will be much easier to brew in the format after you get some experience with common play patterns and how the best decks function.
GhostXEmpire: There’s a saucy mono G Vehicles deck by @grapeshotnh that I really wanna throw ten tix away on as it’s 100% my jam but other then that I’d say most of the “spice” is usually gatekept by the top decks or just a pile of cantrips plus whatever cards you wanna toss in.
For new people, I’d say if you play another format like modern or pioneer, see if there’s a deck that’s similar in Legacy. If you like combo, try ANT/The EPIC Storm, if you like the 4c elementals/blink/midrange deck, try 4c/jeskai, etc….but if you like winning, I’d just pick up Delver until something changes.
Andy Wilson: A lot of Delver games are playing Court of Ire because it can’t be Pyroblasted or Prismatic Ending’d. I think Chandra, Torch of Defiance is better in this slot. My success rate at activating her ultimate is probably over 90%. But she also cleans up Timeless Dragon tokens, and can come in against red prison.
Jeff @ Canadian Threshold: The real spice comes from locals where the stakes are low, so noone is worried about losing value making some risky or bad choices. My recent tech is trying to play Tribute Mage in Esper Vial to tutor for Unlicensed Hearse's.
For new players the most important thing is just playing - what helped me get into the format was a small crew of friends willing to proxy decks and jam games all the time, in between rounds at drafts, full days on the weekend. Play decks of all shapes and sizes (preferably 80) until you find a style you gravitate towards and then just keep playing to build up the muscle memory. The real trick is having it be fun, if it's fun you'll want to get better, and then getting better becomes the fun. Also finding a content creator you enjoy, especially if you're someone new to the format, goes a long way in filling out format knowledge of all shapes
Kevin Brenneman: I was having a good degree of success before Command Legends: Baldur's Gate with Reckoner Bankbuster and Shorikai, Genesis Engine. I am still a fan of what Reckoner Bankbuster can provide, but am still working it back into various shells that I am tinkering with. I have been jamming Minsc & Boo a ton, and think people are still sleeping on that card. In any fair matchup it changes the dynamic of the game so quickly and closes out the game incredibly quickly at that.
For new players I have to say the most important thing is to just play and watch games. The Legacy Pit is a great place to watch all varieties of decks played in paper, with players who will answer questions as to why they are making the plays they are making. Get an understanding of what the format is about before you dive too deep into any deck or archetype. I would also recommend on that note to play/focus on the good decks before you try to branch off into brews or less represent archetypes.
Buffalo Chicken Dip Legacy 9
Over this past weekend at The Warp Gate in Westerville, OH our good friend Rob Wilson hosted yet another edition of the Buffalo Chicken Dip Legacy Series, the ninth such event held under this moniker. Rob was kind enough to provide us with a bunch of information about this event and all the data from it! This event looked super sweet, and happened to be one I could not make it out to (as I usually am attending Rob's events). The first place prize for this event was a HP Revised Volcanic Island with Second Place receiving a HP Revised Tundra. You can check out all of the information on the tournament series over on their Twitter and full VOD of the event over here.
This event did have 62 players in it. Let's take a look at some sweet screenshots.
You can find all of the decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
UR Delver is always incredibly popular at the BCDL events, but its performance in this event was rather lackluster. Instead, it was GW Depths that really slammed home the door on this event, boasting a 66.67% non mirror win rate with seven pilots on the deck.
Let's take a look at the Top 8 of this event:
| Deck Name | Placing | Player Name |
|---|---|---|
| GW Depths | 1st | Gabriel Ebady |
| GW Depths | 2nd | Nicholas French-Seats |
| 8Cast | 3rd | Ricky Edmister |
| Elves | 4th | Brandon Carpenter |
| Mono Green Cloudpost | 5th | Ian Hoffman |
| Displacer Kitten Karn | 6th | Bill Comminos |
| GW Depths | 7th | Jared Cassarly |
| RUG Midrange | 8th | Chad Harney |
As I noted before, GW Depths had a really solid performance, putting three of its seven pilots into the Top 8 and at the end of the event overall a death match between two powerful GW Depths pilots. Of course, one shall stand and one shall fall and thus Gabriel Ebady took down the entire event!
This deck is exceptionally powerful and is well regarded for its Delver matchup specifically. Congrats to Gabriel for winning the event!
One other thing I'd like to note and point out is just how many players in this event dug deep into cards that have either been hard to acquire on MTGO or don't exist yet, from both Displacer Kitten to Minsc & Boo, Timeless Heroes. It's sweet to see such innovation at a paper level!
Legacy Challenge 7/16
We had two Challenges this past weekend, the first of which was the early morning Saturday event. This event had 61 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 data sheet here.
UR Delver and Jeskai Control sat at the top of the metagame here, with UR Delver having a very solid win rate and Jeskai Control not doing so hot. Elves and 4C also had some great win rates in this event as well.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Death's Shadow | 1st | MM_17 |
| Elves | 2nd | Testacular |
| Stiflenought | 3rd | ajdadd420 |
| Riddlesmith Combo | 4th | Killabee |
| UR Delver | 5th | albertoSD |
| UR Delver | 6th | Gul_Dukat |
| 4C Control | 7th | reisyasu |
| Bant Control | 8th | ZYURYO |
There's a lot going on in this Top 8 for sure. At the end of the event however, it was a straight UB variant of Death's Shadow that won!
Snuff Out honestly seems incredibly powerful right now against stuff like Murktide Regent. This deck looks very powerful!
In Second Place we've got Round Table contributor Testacular on Elves!
We get to see the tech that Testacular talked about earlier in this article in Shriekmaw out of the sideboard. Seems like a really solid card to answer threats that are hard to answer for Elves.
Moving down the Top 8 we've got some Stiflenought action.
This is a solidly interesting list. Having many different ways to get a Dreadnought/Kroxa into play while also having offensive cards like Stifle and Dress Down is really solid.
Also in this Top 8 we've got Riddlesmith Combo!
This same pilot is really on a tear with this deck and their dedication to it really shows. The cool aspect of this deck right now is the usage of Thrasta, Tempest's Roar out of the sideboard as just a hasty big threat that can come down incredibly quickly.
Legacy Challenge 7/17
The second Challenge of the weekend was the mid afternoon Sunday event. This event had 83 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 data sheet here.
UR Delver again sat at the top of the heap and had a great win rate to boot. GW Depths also looked very good, and Elves was reasonably positive as well.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Death's Shadow | 1st | Diem4x |
| Jeskai Control | 2nd | Mazzu93 |
| Dredge | 3rd | MahfuzVanGogh |
| ANT | 4th | DemonicTutors |
| Elves | 5th | EronRelentless |
| Bomberman | 6th | kanican |
| Elves | 7th | Sentoe187 |
| UR Delver | 8th | Griselpuff |
This is definitely another interesting Top 8 and some solid players here as well. Really very stacked event. At the end though it was Diem4x who has won a whole mess of Challenges on Death's Shadow!
There are some solidly choice cards in the sideboard here, such as Tourach, Dread Cantor (which is a heck of a beating versus Swords to Plowshares decks) and even Court of Cunning. Looks like a ton of fun!
In Second Place we've got Jeskai Control.
This is the much more Planeswalker heavy version of the deck, leaning on cards like Shark Typhoon to have creatures, but also the Day's Undoing combo with Narset to stop the opponent from having cards.
Also in this Top 8 we have the answer to "What if you just didn't want to buy Lion's Eye Diamond's for Dredge?"
Otherworldly Gaze is a really sweet looking card here, and I do think that this looks really good as a deck. LED offers a lot of explosiveness to Dredge, but having consistency in game is also important as well. I think this list looks sweet.
Further into the Top 8 we've got Bomberman.
Cut // Ribbons is HIGHLY sweet as a way to win the game without relying on Walking Ballista specifically. I am digging that very much.
Around the Web
- The Legacy Pit has 8Cast vs GW Depths this week for us. Check it out here.
- Phil Gallagher hitting a super fun brew with Currency Converter, Ledger Shredder, and Time Sieve. Check it out here.
- Our friends at In Response also had Phil Gallagher on their cast this past week. Check it out here.
- Cats
The Spice Corner
You can find this past week's 5-0 deck lists over here.
Esper Control that sideboards into Doomsday is something.
We have not seen Ninjas in a while!
There's a lot of hatred going on in this list. Hand hatred, that is.
Esper Vial with stuff like Sakashima the Impostor and even Nahiri, the Lithomancer is hilarious.
TURBO ECHO/DAYS.
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!
