This Week in Legacy: Jumping Through the Hoops

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Howdy folks! It's time yet again for another This Week in Legacy! I'm your host, Joe Dyer, and this week we're going to be finishing up our look at Core Set 2021 as well as looking at cards from JumpStart! In addition to that we both Challenge events to talk about, as both events did fire this past weekend. Part of this is due to Wizards making the change to return Legacy to use the 32 player minimum instead of the 64 player minimum last week. This is a good change and should help these events continue to fire. In addition, we always have our Spice Corner!

Now, without further ado, let's dive right in!

Re-Core, Redux

We're going to be doing a little bit more of a look at Core Set 2021, as there were some cards spoiled during the last week of spoiler season that didn't make it into last week's article, but before we do that there are three cards I wanted to revisit to provide some further context in my analysis of them.

Niambi, Esteemed Speaker

One of the things that I missed mentioning in last week's article is that Niambi's second ability can pitch any Legendary card to draw two cards, which is pretty powerful in being able to pitch Legendary cards for card advantage. In addition, this card looks like it might go well in Aether Vial decks, especially those centered around Meddling Mage, like Esper Vial or Legacy Humans. Given that Niambi is also a Human, this seems pretty strong for those decks to utilize lifegain and rebounce and reset a creature in play such as a Meddling Mage.

Peer Into the Abyss

I feel as though I didn't quite explain my mindset on this card last week, as I compared it too heavily to Ad Nauseam. However, this card is obviously not Ad Nauseam, but some of the comparisons to be drawn from it are the fact that it can be found with Burning Wish, but also that this card can be cast from any life total down to two life, whereas Ad Nauseam cannot. I think this is a great card for ANT, which is a deck that hasn't really gotten a new card outside of having to play Veil of Summer (which really doesn't count as a new card specifically for that archetype in my opinion). ANT can cast this reasonably well, and can easily draw 20-30 cards off of it. In addition, I can also see this in TES on the basis of Burning Wish. On the most recent episode of The Eternal Glory Podcast, our good friend Bryant Cook talked about this card a bit, and mentioned the line of Wish -> Infernal Tutor -> Ad Nauseam, which is Nine mana, the exact same amount of mana as Wish -> Peer Into the Abyss. This is pretty good because of cards like Mindbreak Trap existing and makes for a very powerful line that gets around this card.

Sublime Epiphany

I mentioned this card last week, and some people mentioned that there was some consideration to playing this as a Cunning Wish target for Omni-Tell decks, taking the place of Disallow. This is genuinely interesting and I'm curious to see where it may go.

Barrin, Tolarian Archmage

This card is pretty super cool, and where I like it is in decks like Esper Vial, which often run creatures like Meddling Mage and Gilded Drake (out of the sideboard). Being able to bounce Drake and then re-Vial in Drake on the following turn while also drawing a card is pretty powerful, and Barrin works really well with Karakas. I'm excited to see this one see play in some capacity.

See the Truth

I like this card a lot actually, because it works really well with the Cascade mechanic. One card that I really like this with is Shardless Agent. In fact, I might see this card as a better card in Shardless BUG than Ancestral Vision, since its upside off Agent is great (and doesn't actually "draw" cards so it gets around Leovold/Narset) but is also not a poor topdeck in the game like Ancestral Vision is, being able to accrue a little value that turn instead of having to wait in a poor situation. Whether this brings Shardless back into the limelight is another concern, but I like the idea of it overall in that deck.

Jump Through Time

In addition to Core Set 2021 spoiler season, we also got the full spoiler for the JumpStart product. This product line is a supplemental product line and brings plenty of new cards into Legacy/Vintage. Let's take a look at some of the more insane stuff.

Allosaurus Shepherd

This card is insane. Absolutely crazy. Not only is this card able to cast through Chalice of the Void, but it is also an Elf, which is INCREDIBLY relevant. This makes everything you are casting in the deck uncounterable including your Glimpse of Nature and Natural Order. It's insanely powerful against Chalice decks since the deck doesn't need to overly rely on Cavern of Souls to get creatures into play and then having to worry about how to draw through their deck without access to Glimpse. It alternatively has a solid backup plan that works really well with Gaea's Cradle. Expect this to see play in Elves, and it will be good.

Lightning Phoenix

This card is somewhat interesting, and given that Arclight Phoenix has seen play before, this is a supplemental card to that type of strategy. This is a weird card to evaluate, so I'm not sure if it would actually see play in anything, but it is interesting to consider.

Muxus, Goblin Grandee

While this costs six mana, this coming down off Goblin Lackey is absolutely crazy as heck. This is likely a 1-of in some of the Goblin shells, which is already getting a lot for Conspicuous Snoop and friends. I will be curious to see if this is playable or not, but holy cow this is really cool.

Corsair Captain

Did someone say POPEYE STOMPY?!

Community Legacy Update

I don't have much still on the paper side of things, but a reminder that the MTGO Community League is still ongoing, which you can find details about on Gatherling.com!

Legacy Challenge 6/20

Our first Challenge of the weekend, the Saturday early Challenge, fired this weekend with roughly 63 players or so, due to the change to fire with 32 minimum. Without wasting much time, let's dive right into the Top 32 Metagame breakdown.

While both RUG Delver and Snowko represented a fair number of decks here, Snowko actually didn't perform that well at all in this event, and RUG Delver only managed to convert a single pilot to the Top 8. It is exceptionally interesting to me to see Legacy do a complete 180 on decks like Snowko being absolutely the best thing to seeing more fair shells and Chalice shells pop up. As was expected, Yorion has been relegated heavily to fringe strategy that can do well but isn't the best thing to be doing with the deck it seems. There was an insane number of wildly interesting decks in this event however, so let's take a look at the Top 8.

Deck Name	Placing	MTGO Username
Titanic Dryad	1st	Musasabi
RUG Delver	2nd	Yehua
Maverick	3rd	Poriden
Merfolk Oracle	4th	Haneman
Merfolk Oracle	5th	Katobu
Chalice Taxes	6th	JollyMaeh
Bant Aggro-Loam	7th	3Lik4R
U/W Snowblade	8th	Decoutan

This Top 8 was super interesting with some incredibly interesting decks in it, and I'm really excited to talk about them. At the end of this event it was Musasabi on a BUG Titanic Dryad build that took it all down.

This deck is incredibly cool, and seems super powerful integrating cards like Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath into this shell, which had primarily only been G/B in the posted lists in the past. Really this is the biggest reason for the deck to want blue cards, as well as the sideboard Leovold, Emissary of Trest. I also really dig the Vraska, Golgari Queen in the sideboard as the card is exceptionally powerful in many cases. Solid list overall and huge congrats to Musasabi!

In Second Place we have RUG Delver!

This is more of a creature / value plan type list with Goyf, Arcanist, and Mandrills and focusing more on rebuying good spells for advantage with Arcanist along with Oko for solid value. I also really like the Klothys still in the board here as the card is exceptionally powerful.

In Third Place we have Maverick.

There are some intriguing cards here, such as main deck Kunoros, Hound of Athreos (which is great against a lot of decks), but also Kaya, Orzhov Usurper (which is powerful against decks that play cards like Uro). I'm also really digging the sideboard Titania, Protector of Argoth.

Fourth and Fifth Place were both the same strategy in Merfolk Oracle.

I think it is safe to say that Thassa's Oracle alone breathed more life into Merfolk as a deck than mostly any other major printing down to True-Name Nemesis being the last very real powerful printing the deck received. Giving this deck a way to simply combo kill the opponent is really strong. The deck now has the ability to do what most other combo-aggro/control decks can do which is play a very fair game with aggro-tempo plays and attacking Merfolk, but then can also out of nowhere combo kill. This makes this very interesting. I have a feeling this deck is underplayed.

In Sixth Place we have a Chalice Taxes build!

This is a pretty neat deck, leaning more on powering out disruptive elements like Thalia and Leonin Arbiter and taking advantage of the speed granted by Chalice of the Void cutting off cantrips and Chrome Mox accelerating the deck's mana. There is just a ton of disruption here seeking to stop the opponent as much as possible and then develop a beat down plan. Solid list overall.

In Seventh Place, we have a Bant Aggro-Loam type variant.

This is mainly just a big Loam variant without the Chalices that typically make Loam what it is. This seems like a really strong list all around though, and has a lot of synergy and ways to win the game.

Rounding out the Top 8 we have Stoneblade?! WHAT YEAR IS IT?!!

In all seriousness, I really like this list a lot. There is some cool stuff here with Teferi/Narset, but also instead of Jitte main deck, Sword of Feast and Famine takes over, which is a solid play against decks running Abrupt Decay and Assassin's Trophy, forcing them to have to use the removal on the equipment and not something else. Also, there's an On Thin Ice in the sideboard.

Outside of the Top 8 we have a sweet Enchantress list with Helm of Obedience as the combo kill with Rest in Peace.

One really fun thing about this list is the presence of new cards Destiny Spinner and Setessan Champion in the main deck which are both legitimate win conditions on their own, but also Archon of Sun's Grace in the sideboard.

Now let's take a look at the 2019-2020 cards in this event. As a reminder, we are only looking at 2019 cards if there were 10 or more copies. It is likely once we cross into Core Set 2021 and JumpStart we may start doing this for 2020 cards as well.

Card Name	Number of Copies
Veil of Summer	32
Oko, Thief of Crowns	30
Force of Negation	23
Prismatic Vista	17
Arcum's Astrolabe	16
Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath	16
Ice-Fang Coatl	15
Dreadhorde Arcanist	13
Force of Vigor	12
Deafening Silence	11
Thassa's Oracle	8
Klothys, God of Destiny	7
Dryad of the Ilysian Grove	6
Destiny Spinner	3
Archon of Sun's Grace	2
Setessan Champion	2
Yorion, Sky Nomad	2
Soul-Guide Lantern	1

While Snowko itself had a good number of decks, the numbers on those cards it typically plays were more inflated by the fact that they're good in other shells, such as both Veil and Oko for example. It is beginning to get a little more suspect that Oko/Veil would see less play if Arcum's Astrolabe were to be banned, in my opinion. I suspect those cards would still see a large amount of play regardless of Astrolabe being in the format or not. Whether this is indicative of an issue with Oko/Veil itself remains to be seen, but I wouldn't lose any sleep over Veil being gone personally.

Legacy Challenge 6/21

Our Second Challenge of the weekend was the normal Sunday Challenge, so let's dive right into the Top 32 Metagame breakdown!

There was again, a lot of RUG Delver in the Top 32, which speaks to how popular it is as a Delver strategy right now. There was also a crazy amount of diversity in the overall Top 32 however, with Snowko again sort of on the fringe, despite putting one pilot into the Top 8.

Deck Name	Placign	MTGO Username
Titanic Dryad	1st	Musasabi
RUG Delver	2nd	Silviawataru
Naya Loam	3rd	3Lik4R
RUG Delver	4th	I_B_True
Sneak and Show	5th	JPA93
Snowko	6th	1Yo2Yo
Goblins	7th	Grumsh
LED Dredge	8th	Wizard_2002

It is a great accomplishment to take one of these Challenge events all the way and win the whole thing, but it is on a whole 'nother level to win both Challenges in one weekend on the same exact deck. That is just what Musasabi has done this weekend with their BUG Titanic Dryad deck, and it is absolutely amazing to see.

This deck is again, absolutely incredible and Musasabi is just absolutely killing it with it. Congrats again to them for crushing not one, but TWO challenges.

In Second Place we have RUG Delver.

This is roughly the same take as the list in the Saturday Challenge, just no Goyfs in the deck. Still, this is a very powerful list and the strongest Delver list out there right now, primarily on the back of Oko really.

In Third Place we have a sweet Naya Loam list.

This is a super cool list. This particular user also Top 8'ed the Saturday Challenge on a Bant Loam variant, so I guess it was time to see what Naya could do with the shell as well. One of the bigger things here is main deck Klothys, God of Destiny but also sideboard Pyroblast.

In Fourth Place we have another RUG Delver list.

This version of the deck is eschewing Arcanist entirely and opting to play more cards like Stifle and four Goyf main deck. It also is utilizing Klothys in the sideboard as well as Narset.

In Fifth Place we have MTGO End Boss JPA93 on his weapon of choice, Sneak and Show.

Straightforward and clean this deck is. Not much else to say here. This is JPA's bread and butter and they know it very well.

In Sixth Place we have Snowko.

This is primarily the best way to approach building this deck right now, by simply playing all of the best cards on color in the colors that matter, and backing it all up with Astrolabe.

In Seventh Place we have Goblins.

We talked about this deck last week and here it shows up in a Challenge! Deck's great, Goblins are great, and they're only going to get better with Snoop on the horizon.

Rounding out the Top 8 we have LED Dredge.

I really like Dredge as a deck right now honestly, as it is really good in fair blue metagames with Delver around. It's also amusing to note the sideboard Oko, Thief of Crowns in the sideboard.

Now let's take a look at the 2019-2020 cards in this event.

Card Name	Number of Copies
Veil of Summer	26
Oko, Thief of Crowns	25
Force of Negation	21
Ice-Fang Coatl	18
Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath	18
Echo of Eons	14
Once Upon a Time	14
Arcum's Astrolabe	12
Dreadhorde Arcanist	12
Prismatic Vista	10
Dryad of the Ilysian Grove	7
Titanoth Rex	4
Winota, Joiner of Forces	4
Song of Creation	3
Klothys, God of Destiny	2
Ox of Agonas	2
Yorion, Sky Nomad	2

There is indeed some Song of Creation in this list. Check the Spice Corner for that sweet sweet spice!

Around the Web

• 90s MTG posted a sweet video on Core Set 2021 cards in Legacy, which you can check out here.
• Everyday Eternal had special guest Eli Goings (aka GoblinLackey1) on the cast! Check it out here.
• As noted earlier, our good friends at The Eternal Glory Podcast posted their episode reviewing Core Set 2021, which you can find here.

The Spice Corner

Song of Creation + Ovalchase Daredevil?!

Goblin Welder and Bolas's Citadel?! SIGN ME UP!

This deck is pretty sweet all around. U/W Flash!

There was a wild challenge going on in the past week issued by Callum Smith and Anuraag Das to take the 5 Tix challenge and 5-0 with a 5 Tix deck. Well, Tim Schulz did it in perfect form with the most insane deck. There's not even a sideboard here!

What I'm Playing This Week

Between digging hard into The Last of Us: Part II I have been giving this Winota Stompy deck a whirl and it has been pretty fun to play.

Wrapping Up

That's all the time we have this week folks! Thank you for your continued support of the column and as always join me next week as we continue our journey into Legacy!

You can always reach me on Twitter, Twitch, YouTube, and Patreon! In addition I'm always around the MTGGoldfish Discord Server and the /r/MTGLegacy Discord Server and subreddit.

Until next time!