Legacy, Leaks, and Lots of New Magic Heat!

Posted On 3:11 PM // Leave a Comment

Newsletter
Thursday, October 26th

It feels good to be back in Legacy land! The Washington DC Open Weekend brings one of Magic's most beloved and special formats back to the big time, with a Legacy Open starting Saturday and a Legacy Classic on Sunday! The hot talk of the weekend will be two troublesome Elves: Leovold, Emissary of Trest and his friend Deathrite Shaman, the latter of which is finding itself in ban discussion crosshairs. Sam Black talked about just that this week, along with an insightful critique of the rest of Magic's major tournament formats. Dylan Donegan, no stranger to Legacy success himself, is explaining how and why Delver is the deck to beat. And for something very special, you should check out Chas Andres' rare mid-week column on the financial aftermath of the Ixalan and Hour of Devastation leaks! So read up, get ready, and have fun this weekend as the Brainstorms and Force of Wills fly in DC!

— Danny West, Content Coordinator

Cincinnati Open Weekend Winners

Collins Mullen
Modern Open

Frank Skarren
Standard Classic

Peter Tubergen
Modern Classic

The State Of Magic
By Sam Black  

I think Magic is about finding clever uses for things, and when cards that are too powerful to print in regular sets are printed in a special product that tells me to play them in Commander, I lose all ownership of having found a hidden gem or chosen my own strategy, and the cards don't feel real. It's like an entirely different game I have to buy into. Some of them are fun cards to play with in Cube, but I want older formats like Legacy to exist as a place to play all the nostalgic cards I've used over the years.

When a Commander-set card (or, in Leovold's case, a Conspiracy-set card) suddenly shows up without having gone through the gauntlet of Limited play, Standard play, and then being retired into Eternal formats, I just feel like, "Who invited you? What have you done to earn your place here?"

Leovold feels like someone's busted custom card that people are allowed to play with in Legacy for unknown reasons, like True-Name Nemesis. Basically, I hate the format revolving around cards that aren't a part of Magic's history.

Anyway, given that there's a busted three-mana Sultai Elf, I can't imagine any reason why you'd play it without Deathrite Shaman, so it just further pushes everyone to play Deathrite Shaman, a card that already showed up far too much.

November 4
Modern

November 10-12
Standard

November 18-19
Team Constructed

Let's Play Legacy Delver In DC!
By Dylan Donegan  

Here is a new take on the less popular U/R Delver featuring the full set of Chart a Course! This list 5-0'ed a League under the Magic Online handle Hoppelars. (Two Ponders?! That's just offensive).

We've seen a bunch of different takes on U/R in the past. Some feature Goblin Guide and heavy burn, some more prowess-oriented with Stormchaser Mage, and of course ones with Young Pyromancer.

The big draw to this build of the deck is that some games you get to basically just be a burn deck. Price of Progress is an important piece to this puzzle that allows you to steal games from out of nowhere. It also helps your Lands matchup, which is traditionally very tough for Delver.

However, my biggest problem with this build is the lack of Wastelands. Not only does the card just provide free wins, but it also plays extremely well with the rest of your deck. Being able to go Turn 1 threat followed by answering their play into Wastelanding their land is a super-powerful sequence that's near-unbeatable for most decks. While this archetype does gain some clear advantages, I'll be sticking to playing Wasteland in my Delver deck.

Why Leaks Hurt
The Magic Community
By Chas Andres  

It's easy to wave away the anti-leakers because their argument sounds tired and familiar. Of course I'd download a car! And aren't we better off knowing that the government is monitoring our cell phone calls?

Here's the difference, though: all of the information in the leaks that happen with Magic? It was going to be given to all of us by Wizards of the Coast. For free. You just had to wait a few weeks. This isn't piracy, where you're fighting against an outdated cabal of cultural gatekeepers. This isn't whistleblowing, where you're providing the people with information that would otherwise be kept under wraps forever. The only thing being "disrupted" when a card is leaked is Wizards of the Coast's ability to control when and how we get to see it. The leakers aren't Edward Snowden—they're a kid ripping into their entire family's Christmas presents on December 10th, or someone showing everyone in line at the theater the last five minutes of the movie on their cell phone.