This Week in Legacy: Sawing Things in Half!
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 taking a look at cool decks recently using the card Saw in Half in Legacy! In addition to that we've got two Challenges to talk about this weekend.
Without further ado, let's dive right in!
The Main Attraction
As cards have been added to the Legacy format, sometimes it just takes a bit of time for cards to see a modicum of play in the format. New cards unless they are immediately noted to be powerful often are a slower burn in the format, and even then some recognizably powerful cards are often super slow to see picked up. Some of this is also tied into how long it takes that card to make it over to places like Magic Online. The focus this week is a card that took some time to do this, but did make it over this year and is now starting to see some niche play. I'm talking of course about Saw in Half.
Saw in Half is a weird card for sure, because most of it's power is more in using it on your own creatures rather than using it to kill your opponent's cards. Thankfully Legacy now has access to several cards that are super free that are definitely cards you'd want to use this on!
Oh. Oh, right. These guys. That's right, the Elemental cycle from Modern Horizons 2 seems like a really strong on rate set of cards to cast Saw in Half on, especially since you can cast the evoke creature for free, and then Saw them to get two creatures out of the deal. In the case of Grief, you're actually boosting your power of the damage output by it by getting two 2/1s instead of one 3/2. Even Fury is getting a boost out of two 2/2s with double strike as opposed to one 3/3 with double strike.
What are some good ways we can really abuse this? Well, for starters, a list with cards like Broadside Bombardiers and Orcish Bowmasters for example.
Casting a Saw in Half on a Bowmasters seems like one of the coolest things you could be doing with something like this, since Saw in Half always rounds up, you'll just get two copies of a 1/1 Bowmasters. That's pretty insane. This deck however is more of a midrange-esque pile and not really seeking to do this all the time, given there's only one copy of Saw in Half.
What if we take this even further?
Oh yes. This deck could legitimately have a Turn 1 of Land, Grief pitch, Dark Ritual + Saw in Half and then getting to rip three cards out of your opponent's hand while having 4 power in play right off the bat. That seems like so much fun to do. Broadside Bombardiers seems incredibly insane with Saw in Half given that you are getting token copies of these cards and able to smack your opponent with multiple amounts of damage from token Fury or Grief.
While Red/Black seems like a strong place for this card, there's also space of White/Black decks too, as cards like Ephemerate also add to the Scam package.
Being able to Saw in Half Initiative creatures like Seasoned Dungeoneer is pretty wild. The Initiative being an absurdly powerful mechanic makes a card like this seem absolutely insane.
This all being said, the problem Saw in Half still has is the fact that it does rely on the creature you want to cast it on being in play to cast it on, in a format full of things like Swords to Plowshares, Leyline Binding, and even Orcish Bowmasters. The card is not something you want to heuristically cast proactively on your creatures unless you know the shields are down on it because of this. Still, it's cool to see such a unique card finding a home in various strategies within the format.
Legacy Challenge 1/13
The first Challenge event of the weekend was the early morning Saturday event. This event had 53 players in it thanks to the data collected by the Legacy Data Collection Project as well as Daybreak Games.
You can find all of the decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Reanimator was the most popular deck in the event, but it's win rate was pretty low as was both Beanstalk decks and the Turbo Muxus Goblins variants. Grixis Delver had the best performance above the cutoff.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Grixis Delver | 1st | discoverN |
| RUG Cascade | 2nd | elquinielas |
| Sneak and Show | 3rd | 2radMTG |
| Dimir Scam | 4th | yPrincipe |
| Bomberman | 5th | kanican |
| Grixis Delver | 6th | Kazuga |
| Doomsday | 7th | daibloXSC |
| Boros Stompy | 8th | dag8 |
Kind of a cool Top 8 here. Good variety of different strategies. At the end of the event it was Grixis Delver that won.
Solid list here. Molten Collapse is a really strong card here honestly. The card has a lot of flexibility which makes it super fun and interesting to play.
In Second Place we had RUG Cascade.
This deck continues to do very well as we talked about it very recently. It has a lot of staying power in the current format.
Also in this Top 8 we had Bomberman.
This list is super sick. The addition of Agatha's Soul Cauldron to this deck is really something, giving the deck some solid back-end angles to win the game as well as creating a lot of redundancy versus removal.
At the bottom of the Top 8 we had Boros Stompy.
I really like Eowyn, Fearless Knight here. It's a very strong card to slam through a finisher turn.
Legacy Challenge 1/14
The second Challenge event of the weekend was the mid afternoon Sunday event. This event had 104 players in it thanks to the work of the Legacy Data Collection Project and Daybreak Games.
You can find all of the decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
RUG Cascade was the most popular deck and despite a top finish it had a slightly less than 50% win rate. Beanstalk decks did very good here as did Goblins and Reanimator, while Grixis Delver was just below 50%.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| 8Cast | 1st | ItsSwiftyTime |
| Dimir Delver | 2nd | silviawataru |
| Beanstalk Control (Non-Yorion) | 3rd | handsomePPZ |
| Jeskai Control | 4th | Oceansoul92 |
| Reanimator | 5th | Roodslay |
| Paradoxical Outcome | 6th | TonyScapone |
| RUG Cascade | 7th | RogeDeckWins |
| Infect | 8th | M_4 |
Pretty solidly interesting Top 8 here. At the end of the event it was 8Cast that won.
Syr Ginger, the Meal Ender is a super cool card in this deck. It can get really big very fast and push through damage really quickly as well.
In Second Place we had Dimir Delver/Scam Delver.
This has the Scam package in it, but the breakout star of this deck is Stalactite Stalker. This card has been continually proving how strong it can be at enabling a Dimir Delver strategy like this, which is super cool.
Further down the Top 8 we had Paradoxical Outcome... with a TWIST.
Coveted Jewel is a HUGE part of the Vintage format, so it's incredibly cool to see the card here. Transmute Artifact is so neat, and Dream's Grip to repeatedly untap things is super cool.
At the bottom of the Top 8 we had Infect.
I love Infect and it's cool to see it doing well. Legolas's Quick Reflexes is an amazing card in this deck for sure, and the additions of Embiggen really help slam home the damage. Super cool list.
Around the Web
- TonyScapone posted a video of his Top 8 Challenge. Check it out here.
- Bazaar of Boxes is testing Stalactite Stalker. Check it out here.
- StrassDaddy is Beseeching the Mirror. Check it out here.
- IN RESPONSE has a new episode. Check it out here.
- The Eternal Glory Podcast also has a great new episode. Check it out here.
The Spice Corner
Now that Leagues are posted throughout the week, let's find some Spice!
Mono White "Shops"!
Call Forth the Tempest in Creative Technique!
This deck is wild. Bit of an 8Cast + Rescaminator deck.
This Yorion 4C Vial deck is sweet.
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!
