This Week in Legacy: Buffalo Chicken Dip Legacy 23
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 talking all about the Buffalo Chicken Dip Legacy 23 event held in Columbus, OH over the weekend. In addition we have Challenges from last week to talk about.
Next week's article puts a cap on 2025! We're going to be looking back at the year that was and looking ahead to 2026!
Without further ado, let's dive right in!
Buffalo Chicken Dip Legacy 23
This past weekend was the 23rd iteration of the Buffalo Chicken Dip Legacy series, and it's absolutely amazing that these events keep bringing together the community they do. The Legacy community is amazing in general, and it's great to see how they keep supporting these events. This event was held at The Warp Gate in Columbus, OH, and had a solid 86 players in attendance!
The Warp Gate is a pretty amazing store, and their continued support of Buffalo Chicken Dip Legacy is pretty stunning. I was fortunate enough to be able to attend this event myself and play in it. I didn't do too hot (we'll get to my tournament soon here), but I had a lot of fun, and I want to thank everyone who came and talked to me and offered the kindest words to me over the course of the day. I am not very good at tooting my own horn at these things. I just try to do my best to give people information about the format that they can use, so it was greatly appreciated to hear that people are appreciating the work I am putting in here.
You can find all the decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Tempo decks were the most played of the event, but their win rates were not very good at all. Blue Post, Doomsday, and Omni-Tell all did insanely well. ANT and Eldrazi did well too.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | Player Name |
|---|---|---|
| Doomsday | 1st | Gabriel Balannik |
| Blue Cloudpost | 2nd | Noelle Monarch |
| Dredge | 3rd | Michael Grafton |
| Omni-Tell | 4th | Jacob Ross |
| Cradle Control | 5th | Duncan McAdams |
| Omni-Tell | 6th | Cody Young |
| Death and Taxes - BW (Yorion) | 7th | Alex New |
| Boros Energy | 8th | Mia Steinbrick |
This is a pretty cool Top 8. Fair bit of Combo, but heck Boros Energy? At the end of the event, it was Gabriel Balannik on Doomsday that won.
This is an incredibly solid-looking Doomsday list. Tamiyo is ultimately one of the best cards in Legacy at the moment, and it's just a card that should see play until it's banned. It's exceptionally strong, and draws so much threat to itself.
In Second Place, we had Noelle Monarch on Blue Cloudpost.
I almost ended up on this deck myself because it looks powerful and fun. I think it's definitely a deck to keep an eye on in current Legacy, not just because of The One Ring but just because of how powerful it is overall. It's the perfect Stock Up deck in general.
My Tournament Experience
So... I signed up for this event pretty early (in fact the event sold out after I signed up, and then they raised the cap to 90 to account for it as the cap was originally 64 players) and then I had a bunch of travel so I had what I thought was some time to really think about what I wanted to play, and then I didn't.
Folks, I am the worst at deciding what to play for an event. I enjoy different experiences and different play styles, and it's just absolutely a monster I have cultivated on my very own of "Well maybe..." and thinking way too hard about what to play. I barely got any testing at all done with what I did end up playing, and honestly, it happens a bit that I decide to go to an event and then just overthink absolutely every little aspect of it. It happens. I did waffle between several decks, including Loam Pox, Blue Post, and a lot of waffling between Beans and Azorius Stoneblade.
In the end, I chose the Beans deck because, well, I do like drawing cards.
I played at the very most like three matches with this deck on MTGO before this event, so not really a lot. My initial impression of the deck however, is that it is very powerful and that Quantum Riddler is just an absolute monster of a card, no matter if you have Beans or not. You can absolutely just jam the card on Turn 2 on Warp and draw a card, and then cast it later from exile when you need it. It's literally like a Yorion type card (where it gets to sit in a zone that can't be touched for very low opportunity cost) except its a 4/6 flier that draws you a card.
The power level of the card is quite good, and it felt even better with something like Phelia to blink it. The major change I made to the original list was swapping out a main deck Daze for a main deck Consign to Memory (a change I think was pretty good because frankly, Consigning Phelia return triggers were silly).
In the end though, I only went 3-4 in the event. My wins were versus Sneak and Show (see the Spice Corner and I wanna talk a little about that match), Coveted Jewel Combo, and Mono Blue Stiflenought. I loss versus Azorius Stoneblade twice (with one of those matches going to time and them eventually winning on Turn 4 by managing to find a Wasteland to clear a Karakas that was holding down a Tamiyo equipping to Kaldra Compleat). Yes we were at that point. I also lost to Storm and Izzet Tempo.
At the end of the day, however, just in general, I had a lot of fun, and I want to call out some specific highlights.
My first round versus Sneak and Show, and getting destroyed by Sneak Attack into Blightsteel Colossus was kind of silly. My opponent also cast Chaos Warp on one of their lands and flipped an Emrakul into play, only to have it got by Karakas. Seriously, the Spice Corner is there for this decklist, pretty cool.
The round I played against Coveted Jewel. It's a little hard-to-know fact that while The One Ring gives protection from damage, it doesn't give protection from being attacked, which is relevant for Coveted Jewel. My opponent put a Jewel into play with Show and Tell (and I put in a Quantum Riddler) and managed to make one more Jewel with Copy Artifact before playing the Ring and passing the turn. On my turn, I attacked into them with the Riddler, which triggers the condition of Jewel. I took both their Jewels, drew SIX CARDS, and then untapped both Jewels. I then proceeded to go nuts and ended my turn with a Clarion Conqueror in play.
It was absolutely one of the biggest highlights of the event. Some other good ones were using Phelia to blink out cards from my opponent, and then use Consign to Memory to counter the return trigger so they wouldn't get back the card at all. I also played against actual Batterskull out of the second Stoneblade list, which was so cool to see.
I still think that the Azorius Stoneblade list is probably the best usage of Quantum Riddler and Phelia though. Having access to cards like Meteor Sword is absolutely scary from the other side of the table because if you can't deal with it at all, then your opponent can just go nuts on your lands. Still, I had a lot of fun playing in the event, and I had really great and communicative opponents all day, which is something that I truly appreciate seeing.
Legacy Challenge 32 12/17/2025
The first Challenge event of the week was the Wednesday event. This event had 57 players in it thanks to the MTGO website.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Oops was the most played deck, and its win rate was a little over 50%. Doomsday did very well, as did Eldrazi. Beans did poorly, as did Affinity Stompy.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Izzet Tempo | 1st | O_danielakos |
| Eldrazi | 2nd | _J0SE_ |
| Oops! All Spells | 3rd | RPSbonjwa |
| Oops! All Spells | 4th | DethFrmAbove |
| Death and Taxes - BW (Yorion) | 5th | JaceTong |
| Doomsday | 6th | rgbandre |
| Cradle Control | 7th | CeylonskiyChai |
| Death and Taxes - RW (Yorion) | 8th | jamiewvh |
Fair bit of D&T and Oops here. At the end of the event, it was Izzet Tempo that won.
Proft's Eidetic Memory is a pretty sweet inclusion here. I like it.
In Second Place, we had Eldrazi.
Very straightforward build here. Very aggressive and fun. Sire of Seven Deaths is a super sweet card.
Legacy Challenge 32 12/19/2025
The second Challenge event of the week was the Friday event. This event had 50 players in it, thanks to the MTGO website.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Both Beans and Eldrazi were the most played decks, and both had solid win rates (with Eldrazi being very good). Cradle Control did very well too. Izzet Tempo did poorly here despite a Top 8.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Beanstalk Control (Non-Yorion) | 1st | Lord_Beerus |
| Red Painter | 2nd | uburdub |
| Eldrazi | 3rd | _Chamytinho_ |
| Affinity Stompy | 4th | Stanshine |
| Oops! All Spells | 5th | silencsong |
| Dimir Reanimator | 6th | Suzukiii |
| Red Stompy | 7th | misfits_skulls |
| Izzet Tempo | 8th | ador |
This is a pretty diverse Top 8. At the end of the event, it was Beans that won.
Quantum Riddler is just an absolute beast of a card, with and without Beans. This is going to be a Control staple for a long time because its just so powerful.
In Second Place, we had Red Painter.
Haven't seen a good Painter list in a hot minute. Most of the lists have been Blue based, so it's super sweet to see Red Painter.
Legacy Challenge 32 12/20/2025
The third Challenge event of the week was the Saturday event. This event had 45 players in it, thanks to the MTGO website.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Beans and Dimir Tempo were both the most popular decks, but both had less than 50% win rates. Affinity Stompy looked great here, as did D&T.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Lands | 1st | tr4Xos |
| Oops! All Spells | 2nd | choutin |
| Affinity Stompy | 3rd | ecobaronen |
| Death and Taxes - BW (Yorion) | 4th | Akaleth |
| Omni-Tell | 5th | FynnOfBlood |
| Cephalid Breakfast | 6th | TrbnN |
| Omni-Tell | 7th | Bibgandhard |
| Sneak and Show | 8th | JPA93 |
This is a fairly solid Top 8. At the end of the event, it was Lands that won.
I like having main deck Swords to Plowshares, but I especially enjoy Sphere of Resistance here.
In Second Place we had Oops.
This is a fairly straightforward list with a solid juke into Belcher. I also love the Progenitus in the sideboard.
Legacy Challenge 32 12/21/2025 - 1
The fourth Challenge event of the week was the first Sunday event. This event had 46 players in it, thanks to the MTGO website.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Beans was the most played deck, and did pretty well. Izzet Tempo also did very well. Doomsday and Dimir Tempo did poorly here.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Rakdos Reanimator | 1st | GoblinK1ng |
| Sneak and Show | 2nd | Joe_L |
| Izzet Tempo | 3rd | billster47 |
| Beanstalk Control (Non-Yorion) | 4th | Lord_Beerus |
| Saga Storm | 5th | Cirxi |
| Beanstalk Control (Non-Yorion) | 6th | jibeta |
| Stoneblade | 7th | dag8 |
| Esper Control | 8th | harmonywoods |
Good looking Top 8. At the end of the event, it was Rakdos Reanimator that won.
Reanimator, having to play a LOT of copies of its core creatures is a really good thing, honestly. It makes the deck a lot more attackable, honestly.
In Second Place, we had Sneak and Show.
This is a very straightforward build here, but it has a good game plan and seeks to execute it well.
Legacy Challenge 32 12/21/2025 - 2
The final Challenge event of the week was the second Sunday event. This event had 71 players in it thanks to the MTGO website.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Dimir Tempo was the most played deck, and its win rate sat right on the lines. Oops did extremely well here, but it was decks like Affinity, Cradle, and Eldrazi that kept up the pace. Beans did not do well.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Stoneblade | 1st | SuperCow12653 |
| Dimir Tempo | 2nd | minyafriend |
| Affinity Stompy | 3rd | Otazz |
| Omni-Tell | 4th | FynnOfBlood |
| Mono White Energy | 5th | Imiak |
| Eldrazi | 6th | karatedom |
| Grixis Tempo | 7th | SauTay |
| Cradle Control | 8th | Oppa |
This is a great looking Top 8. At the end of the event, it was Stoneblade that won.
This deck is so good. Again, Quantum Riddler is just an absolutely busted card, but also Meteor Sword has just really boosted the power level of Stoneblade. It's just a really powerful card.
In Second Place, we had Dimir Tempo.
Incredibly straightforward list here. I do like the Baubles, especially creating a different card type for Nethergoyf to grow off of.
Around the Web
- Bryant Cook has some Post-Ban Cephalids. Check it out here.
- 90sMTG has some vids for their Legacy Open. Check it out here.
The Spice Corner
This week's spice is from BCDL.
Sibylline Soothsayer and Dinosaurs on a Spaceship!
I played against this Sneak and Show player, and playing against Blightsteel Colossus and Chaos Warp was super fun.
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 all my associated links via my Link Tree! In addition I'm always around the MTGGoldfish Discord Server and the MTGLegacy Discord Server.
Until next time!
