This Week in Legacy: The Broadside of a Barn
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 diving into what an impact has been had by Broadside Bombardiers and what decks to look for that are playing this card and how best to understand how those decks work. In addition to that we've got two Challenges, one of which was a Showcase Challenge.
In addition, I'm getting ready to be at Magic Con Chicago this weekend! If you're around that space, feel free to say Hi!
Without further ado, let's dive right in!
Broadside Bombastic!
Legacy has been quite interesting lately, and we've seen a lot of interesting developments in the area of Ancient Tomb decks. One of those major things that has pushed these decks as of late is the card Broadside Bombardiers.
When we first looked at this card during spoiler season, we knew it was going to be powerful, but I don't think we were prepared for just how much this card would work its way into the fabric of Legacy as it has. It's an extremely powerful card because of how quickly it can turn the corner in a game by throwing creatures at the face of the opponent. This is huge because the damage can go at the opponent and not just one of their creatures. All Bombardiers has to do is attack, and because it has Menace it is more than likely going to survive said combat as well.
We've been seeing this card primarily show up in two major archetypes and that is Red Stompy/Prison and Goblins.
In the Red Prison decks, Bombardiers serves as another 2R haste threat that can end the game quickly by throwing creatures like Fury. The fun thing about the Fury line is that you can easily evoke a Fury and then throw it for seven damage at the opponent. If you have a Fury in play, you can attack and deal six with the Fury and then throw it for another seven. You can also throw additional copies of Trinisphere or Unlicensed Hearse if you need to do so, which makes it good at just closing a game out of nowhere.
It's important to know what your life total is and how much damage the opponent could conceivably do. In the example of Fury attacking, that's thirteen damage that is being done by just the Fury, not to mention what other creatures may be attacking and can be thrown. This also makes blocking the Bombardiers a poor decision because the other creatures can get through with damage and then be thrown. In Red Stompy specifically, this deck still has to go pretty all in on its game plan and it's not playing Cavern of Souls, which is a big deal to being able to counter their plays.
In the Goblins deck specifically, there is an additional thing to note about how to grok this deck in paper versus MTGO. In this deck, Bombardiers is playing hard into its creature type of Goblin and is capable of ending a game solely on the spot via Battle Cry Goblin and Muxus. It allows the deck to swing out and demolish the opponent in one swing. The big difference here is that both MTGO and paper use the "Name Sticker" Goblin, but the card functions differently on both platforms. On MTGO, the mana generated is randomized, and it can be impossible to know how much mana they will make on one trigger. In addition, they may use their Cavern mana to cast the Goblin, but not be able to use Cavern mana on the threat that comes next. It's important to understand what mana they have available and what you can interact with. Also, making six mana with the Sticker Goblin means that the opponent may not even play Muxus, instead possibly deploying a Bombardiers and a Rabblemaster.
In Paper however, as an opponent, you will know immediately how much mana the opponent can make with the Sticker Goblin, due to how sticker sheets are selected pre-game. The opponent has 10 sheets in their pool, and 3 are picked at random in each game. This means that by counting the vowels in their highest sticker sheet you can have a firm idea of how much mana they get to make with the first Sticker Goblin.
In addition in the Goblins deck, you can kill the Sticker Goblin in response to the trigger and deny them the mana. This is important to note as well. Again, it also helps to keep track of your life total well and watch incremental damage.
These decks are certainly very powerful at the moment, but they do have a variety of ways to interact with them profitably, and both decks are very much all-in Ancient Tomb game plan decks, so that makes a big difference as well. Understanding their sequencing and play patterns and what you can and can't interact with is very important to understanding and beating these strategies.
Legacy Challenge 2/17
The first Challenge event of the weekend was the early morning Saturday event. This event had 59 players in it thanks to the data collected by the Legacy Data Collection Project.
You can find all of the decklists for this event here and the datasheet here.
Grixis Delver was very popular, but its win rate was lower than 50%. Reanimator rode the middle of the line at 50%. Goblins had an interesting journey here despite having a top finish.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Lands | 1st | Granham |
| Reanimator | 2nd | fuya |
| Bomberman | 3rd | kanican |
| Beanstalk Control (Non-Yorion) | 4th | medvedev |
| Jeskai Delver | 5th | MoMo321 |
| Goblins (Turbo Muxus) | 6th | Mav40121 |
| Lands | 7th | Dein_Freund_der_Baum |
| Nic Fit | 8th | Koike |
Very interesting Top 8 here. At the end of the event, it was Lands that won the event.
I continue to think these 4 Sphere lands are showing that they are very good right now in the format. The ability to kneecap your opponent's mana in multiple ways is very strong, and Lands does that very well right now.
In Second Place we had Reanimator.
The manabase here is wild, given that there's ZERO fetch lands, but four Troll of Khazad-dum means you can always get your Surveil land if you need it. Speaking, there's a SURVEIL land, which makes so much sense in Reanimator.
Further down the Top 8 we had Jeskai Delver.
Delver with Forth Eorlingas! seems incredibly sweet, not going to lie.
At the bottom of the Top 8 we had Nic Fit.
I really dig the Sacrifice variant of this deck that Koike has established. It's a cool way to approach building Nic Fit at the moment, a deck which is arguably extremely fringe.
Legacy Showcase Challenge 2/18
The second Challenge event of the weekend was a Showcase Challenge! These are really big events where the Top 8 of the event gets qualified for the Showcase Qualifier at the end of the season. This event had a staggering 268 players in it thanks to the data collected by the Legacy Data Collection Project.
You can find all of the decklists for this event here and the datasheet here.
Reanimator was the most popular deck by a mile and its win rate was good. Beanstalk decks did less than medium, Grixis Delver rode the line, and Lands/Red Stompy both did quite well.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Grixis Delver | 1st | Diem4x |
| Reanimator | 2nd | EnricoSLS91 |
| Reanimator | 3rd | Secretaznman |
| Grixis Delver | 4th | TrueHero |
| Reanimator | 5th | albertoSD |
| Red Stompy | 6th | Bob49 |
| Reanimator | 7th | Tunaktunak |
| RUG Delver | 8th | duke12 |
Lot of Reanimator in the Top 8 here, literally half of the Top 8 was just that. At the end of the event though it was Grixis Delver who won.
I still very much like Molten Collapse in these decks. It always looks very powerful.
In Second Place we had Reanimator.
Dimir Reanimator is not something we've seen consistently, but having access to a Surveil land in those colors continues to seem quite sweet. I also like the main deck Brazen Borrower here.
Further down the Top 8 we had Red Stompy.
We talked a lot about this one in the main portion of the article, and we continue to see how strong Bombardiers has made these shells.
At the bottom of the Top 8 we had RUG Delver.
The sideboard game plan of boarding up into Uro is pretty cool. Going bigger is great in things like mirror matches, and Uro does that quite well.
Around the Web
- TonyScapone is winning on Turn 0! Check it out here.
- The DMV region is announcing their inaugural DMV Legacy League. Check it out here.
- StrassDaddy has some Boomer Maverick. Check it out here.
The Spice Corner
Now that Leagues are posted throughout the week, let's find some Spice!
Stoneblade with Cryptic Coat is pretty cool.
We've also got STIFLENOUGHT with Cryptic Coat.
Thwart Omni-Tell is sweet.
Dredge with Duskana, the Rage Mother?!
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!
