This Week in Legacy: Eternal Weekend NA 2024
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 talking all about Legacy Eternal Weekend 2024 North America! The largest Eternal Weekend Legacy event EVER! In addition to that we've got Challenges to look at, but it's going to primarily be all about Eternal Weekend.
Without further ado, let's dive right in!
Eternal Weekend North America 2024 Legacy Championships
This past weekend was the second of three Eternal Weekend events for 2024, held in Pittsburgh, PA and hosted by Card Titan Events. Not only was it the 2024 Legacy Championships for NA this weekend, but this happened to be one of the largest Eternal Weekend events ever held in the history of the event series. 1,155 players came out to battle fiercely through 11 rounds of Legacy with a cut to Top 8 this past weekend. This is crazy to see that this just so happens to be one of the largest single tournament events of the year as well and it just so happens to be Legacy. The entire event was streamed, so check out the Twitch Channel for Card Titan here.
I do truly wish I could have been at this event, but the unfortunate nature of vacation and day jobs is that you only get so much, so it wasn't in the cards for me to be there. I'd like to try to make it to the event next year if possible. Honestly, it would be kind of cool to do coverage for this event (WINK WINK CARD TITAN) instead of playing, but it would be fun to play as well.
Overall though, all the FOMO of missing the weekend itself was definitely hard, as it would have been nice to see many of the folks I've gotten to know so well throughout this community. It looked like an incredible time and a truly electric moment for Legacy in general.
You can find all of the decklists for the event here and the data sheet here. The event has not yet populated to Goldfish as of the time of this writing, so we're working with what we got. Thanks so much to ashe, Trohck, and Acid for assisting me with the data sheet for this event. This was a lot of players and it was rough to get this done.
The biggest thing here is that UB Reanimator was definitely the biggest chunk of the event at a near 15% metagame share, but it's overall win rate was only around 53.31% non-mirror. This is still somewhat wild given that going into this event, everyone knew that this was the big deck to be targeting and it still had these kinds of numbers so that's somewhat crazy. Combined with Dimir Tempo in terms of just Psychic Frog decks in general and that's around a 23% metagame share that's just Frog Tempo decks.
The rest of the decks above the cutoff here are fairly flat in their overall win rates, the highest being Nadu Combo at 54.89% non-mirror. Even Eldrazi, which seemed to have quite a few numbers, didn't put up much better than 51.55% non-mirror win rate.
One thing to note here, we also did include a list of the most popular cards in the event in the data sheet. The most interesting aspect of this? Consign to Memory being the most played Modern Horizons 3 card at 1,763 copies (just above Psychic Frog at 1,456 copies).
With that being said, what really happened at this event? Well, in short, two words: MYSTIC FORGE.
The Mystic Forge Combo deck, which has certainly been a deck quite on the radar for a while now, had an incredibly good event as we'll see below. The combo punch of Vexing Bauble into One Ring/Paradox Engine/Glaring Fleshraker shenanigans certainly proved to be the big story of the event, and hilariously the deck didn't make the cutoff on the graph at just 39 copies but it had a 62.54% non-mirror win rate in this event, which is absolutely insane.
This of course has brought up some further discussion about the Legacy Banned list, and whether or not Vexing Bauble is on the table for conversation to be banned, and also whether Psychic Frog is actually just fine and maybe won't get banned.
To be clear, I think that Psychic Frog is a card that still feels like it should be banned. While there has been a slow trickle for people not playing as much UB Reanimator online and more Dimir Tempo (which also plays Frog) I believe much of that to be rooted in the fact that players are feeling bored of the card in general, but for these decks to have such an incredible metagame share and the win rate they do while every other deck in the format is gunning for them is pretty incredible, even if the deck didn't win the event. Much of the landscape of Legacy right now is centered around Frog and it's place in the format, and I do think that it will be banned still even if it's not banned in December. Much of the community sentiment is still rather not happy with the card, and Wizards does take some of that into consideration.
On the other hand, Vexing Bauble is an interesting topic, and I think we have to look back at the card restriction in Vintage for some context. When Bauble was restricted, a good portion of that discussion was around the fact that Bauble interacts in such a way with the format in general that it prevents people from playing the things the format identity revolves around. While I think that argument is a bit weaker in Legacy vs Vintage (and even then I think the argument is somewhat weaker in Vintage) the notion that Bauble does prevent several of Legacy's most common safety valves (namely Force of Will) is exceptionally valid. While this card was definitely intended to be a break-fix in Modern for things like Solitude/Endurance, etc. the impact in Legacy is much greater because the decks wanting the card are primarily combo decks. The rise of Mystic Forge Combo in general has a lot to do with Bauble's power in stopping your opponent from being able to interact via the typical safety valves that are common to Legacy.
So do we think Bauble could be banned? I could very well see that being an outcome in December. The card's presence in the format has really only allowed numerous combo decks to take advantage of preventing the stop gaps that generally allow the format to be safe from degenerate combo. While many of these decks are fightable on an axis, much of that axis is based on those normal stop gaps primarily. Many of these same decks can stretch sideboard space because they require generally specific answers (such as artifact hate for Mystic Forge decks) to combat. It is not unreasonable to consider that giving the stop gaps back to the control variants of the format could be very reasonable with a ban on Bauble.
The other part of this conversation turns to what would happen in the absence of Frog/Bauble, and whether or not anything directly from Eldrazi needs to go. There is some crossover here between Mystic Forge and Eldrazi in both Kozilek's Command and Glaring Fleshraker, but I'd be curious to see what happens with the format before doing anything with those.
Nadu being a big part of the finals and the Top 8 of this event as well continues to bring up that conversation as to whether or not Nadu needs to go in Legacy as well. Personally, I can see why Nadu would be in consideration for folks given what happened with Modern, but I think the deck is rather interesting to have in Legacy and it doesn't feel more powerful than other things we're doing in this format, even if it is a good deck. I totally get the consideration over time with this, but I also think that consideration exists a lot less in Legacy because the game can be decided a little faster by the sheer fact that the Nadu player with the combo will just have more cards than the opponent, and it is a fun and interesting deck to pilot with a lot of decision points (especially in the Bant/4C Midrange decks). The "Elves" variant had a strong non-mirror win rate at 55.91% while the Midrange Combo variants had a 54.89% non-mirror win rate.
Let's take a look at the Top 8 for this event. It's quite cool!
| Deck Name | Placing | Player Name |
|---|---|---|
| Mystic Forge Combo | 1st | Kelvin Wallace |
| Nadu Elves | 2nd | Bailey Sarkis |
| Cephalid Breakfast | 3rd | Max Deresh |
| Red Painter | 4th | Ari Lax |
| Mystic Forge Combo | 5th | Jon Barber |
| Mystic Forge Combo | 6th | Joshua Cronk |
| Death and Taxes (Yorion) | 7th | AJ Franklin |
| UB Reanimator | 8th | Dominic Vernazza |
As we noted, Mystic Forge had such a great event that coming out of the Swiss there were THREE players on the deck at a record of 10-1, which is absolutely nutters to consider. The rest of the Top 8 here was a mixture of different decks including Nadu Elves, Breakfast (both Nadu decks), Painter, D&T, and UB Reanimator.
At the end of the weekend, the winner, in a stunning three game finals was Kelvin Wallace, who came into the Top 8 at a seriously insane 21-3 in games on Mystic Forge Combo.
Watching the finals match of this event was absolutely an incredible display of the power of this deck. The first game of the finals involved a play of making 12 mana on Turn one to cast a Kozilek's Command to make 10 Eldrazi Spawn and Scry 10, finding Karn, the Great Creator to cast and immediately grab Mycosynth Lattice to win the game. While Kelvin lost game two to a quick Collector Ouphe, Game 3 was absolutely insane and showcased how good in general Kozilek's Command really is and the power of The One Ring as simply delaying the game. Kelvin managed to beat four copies of Collector Ouphe (that had been enchanted by Springheart Nantuko) and cast a lethal Kozilek's Command with a Glaring Fleshraker in play from two life. Absolutely incredible stuff.
In Second Place was Bailey Sarkis on Nadu Elves.
This deck definitely did look super powerful on camera. In the semifinals we got to see Bailey grinding out a win versus Breakfast by being able to find a Gaea's Cradle off a Sylvan Safekeeper activation with Nadu in play, then getting to find Craterhoof for the win. Even in the finals match Bailey fought pretty hard tooth and nail and really looked great. Game Three looked pretty solidly in his favor for a while there, making four Collector Ouphe to try to push a win.
Legacy Challenge 32 11/20
The first Challenge event of the week was the Wednesday event. This event had 62 players in it, according to the MTGO website. There was no data for this event.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here. The Top 8 is below.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Red Stompy | 1st | Icteridae |
| Mystic Forge Combo | 2nd | AFX |
| Sneak and Show | 3rd | 2plus2isfive |
| Eldrazi | 4th | Ti0Patinhas |
| Dimir Tempo | 5th | Sapphire-Star |
| Eldrazi | 6th | BERNASTORRES |
| Worldgorger | 7th | Roodslay |
| Esper Tempo | 8th | unluckymonkey |
Relatively spread out Top 8. At the end of the event it was Red Stompy that won.
It's certainly incredibly how much these decks have shifted since MH3, and just how many cards from MH3 have impacted its deck construction overall. Things like Pyrogoyf and Vexing Bauble sure, but also Sundering Eruption has been very big for these decks. Also, there's Obsidian Charmaws in the sideboard. Dragon Stompy is back!
In Second Place we had Mystic Forge Combo.
We talked pretty at length about the strength of this deck in our EW coverage, I don't think there's much more to be said here. Definitely a super powerful deck right now.
Legacy Challenge 32 11/22
The second Challenge event of the week was the Friday event. This event had 50 players in it, according to the MTGO website. There was no data for this event.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here. The Top 8 is below.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Dimir Tempo (Red Splash) | 1st | habsburger |
| Dimir Tempo | 2nd | _INF_ |
| Dimir Delver | 3rd | Oceansoul92 |
| Oops! All Spells | 4th | choutin |
| UB Reanimator | 5th | Ryuho090 |
| Mystic Forge Combo | 6th | OopsMissedTrigger |
| Dimir Tempo | 7th | Ark4n |
| Sneak and Show | 8th | RyanWu |
Interesting Top 8 here. At the end of the event it was a Dimir Tempo variant with a twist that won.
Ah yes, a red splash does make a lot of sense. It's a classic Blue Race matchup thing, where the best way to beat the mirror matches for these Tempo decks is to go into a third color and a little bigger on removal suite, in this case Molten Collapse which does seem very good here. It cleans up Frogs, but it also has the benefit of possibly cleaning up a Tamiyo or Nethergoyf in one spell which is very flexible. Red also gets you things like Pyroblast in the sideboard, which are also great in the mirror.
In Second Place we had Dimir Tempo.
This is more in line with the stock builds of this deck, which I think I can get a good sense of why the red splash really works. Having the extra removal suite in general means this version is likely to struggle a little against the red splash.
Legacy Challenge 32 11/23
The third Challenge event of the week was the Saturday event. This event had 32 players in it, according 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.
Eldrazi was the most popular deck of the event, but it's win rate was just a little over 50%. Sneak and Show did very well here, as did Mystic Forge.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Red Stompy | 1st | GzusReturned |
| Dimir Tempo | 2nd | AKvsJJ |
| UB Reanimator | 3rd | OSCA66 |
| Oops! All Spells | 4th | choutin |
| Sneak and Show | 5th | jade-venus |
| Eldrazi | 6th | SHAKELION |
| Dimir Tempo (Red Splash) | 7th | habsburger |
| Eldrazi | 8th | Nanovo |
Good amount of Dimir Tempo and Eldrazi, but it was Red Stompy that won at the end.
Another MH3 card that's showing up here that's had a pretty sizable impact is Disruptor Flute, which seems like a really solid card overall for these Ancient Tomb decks.
In Second Place we had Dimir Tempo.
Starting to see a lot more Hydroblast showing up in sideboards as players are definitely trying to respect decks like Red Stompy and Painter. Very interesting stuff indeed.
Legacy Challenge 32 11/24
The final Challenge event of the week was the Sunday event. This event had 32 players in it, according 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.
Mystic Forge and Red Stompy were both very popular here, and despite a good finish Forge's win rate was dragged down overall while Red Stompy's was reasonable. Oops All Spells also looked very good here.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Oops! All Spells | 1st | choutin |
| UB Reanimator | 2nd | mortr3d |
| Mystic Forge Combo | 3rd | The_Gerogerigegege |
| Mono Green Cloudpost | 4th | TrueFuturism |
| Necrodominance Combo | 5th | Kairos92 |
| Oops! All Spells | 6th | hockeybro26 |
| Red Painter | 7th | JustJasper |
| Red Stompy | 8th | keyzoo |
Quite a bit of combo in this Top 8. At the end of the event it was Oops that won.
This deck has a lot of stuff going for it that most people aren't generally prepped for when playing against Oops. Memory's Journey is quite a card in being able to set up a set of game-winning turns if it really needs to in response to a Surgical or Faerie.
In Second Place we had UB Reanimator.
We talked a lot about the weird dropoff in this deck overall earlier in the Eternal Weekend section. It's still around, but seemingly not as much lately as it was initially post Duskmourn.
Around the Web
- Ecobaronen posted an analysis of Eternal Weekend 9-2 or better decks. Check it out here.
- Chrono Moon posted a video on Bant Nadu. Check it out here.
The Spice Corner
This week's Spice Corner is devoted to ETERNAL WEEKEND. LET'S GO.
STANDSTILL.
Rakdos Aggro is kind of sweet.
This Riddlesmith deck is interesting because of Artist's Talent!
Inti, Seneschal of the Sun in a Mono Red very aggressive build here.
LEYLINES. LEYLINES. LEYLINES.
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!
