Revitalization of Legacy

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The Revitalization of Legacy is a spontaneous phenomenon that emanated from the Magic community and has been influencing the Legacy format in more recent years.

One of the probable causes could be the desire to play the format mixed with the budget limitations the average player has.

It represents a form of trying to view the format with a new perspective, challenges the notion of a mandatory need for Reserved List cards, and encourages players to join the format.

What is it

Due to the format's need for Reserved List cards for deckbuilding - mostly the old dual lands, prospecting players find it difficult to enter the Legacy format.

Some would even argue that Legacy was a dying format some years ago and many attributed this to the Reserved List and the old duals. However, with recent printings players have grown increasingly bolder and began experimenting with strategies and ways to play Legacy without needing Reserved List cards.

The result is that players have engaged into innovative deckbuilding in a format that was once seen by some as "unwelcoming" to experimentation.

The reason for that unwelcoming sensation were mainly 3:

  • The high power level of the decks
  • The presence of consistent turn-1 combos
  • Wide usage of free disruption (e.g.: Unmask, Daze, Force of Will)

These factors made players inclined to think a rogue strategy could not survive in such a high-power meta.

The phenomenon which was already happening intensified once cards like Force of Negation landed in Modern. Its proximity to Force of Will contributed to some players questioning if certain strategies (previously deemed unthinkable) could survive in Legacy. It even made players question if the typical land base in a Legacy deck (with old duals) was at all mandatory for competitive play.

Decks that contribute to the phenomenon

Usually the decks that draw the attention of new players are strong decks (capable of competitive play) and that don't require Reserved List cards. In that realm we can find some strategies have been around for a while and have been known to have never needed Reserved List cards:

Some other strategies evolved either from the "simplification" (cutting additional colors) of existing strategies or emerged from sheer experimentation of the community until they became competitive strategies on their own. The simplification was possible in many cases due to the vast card pool available. These are some examples:

Innovation through replacement and simplification

Most of the Reserved List replacements that occur happen in the land-base of the deck. And this often affects the colors the deck has access to. The motif behind this is the high price of the old duals.

This leads to players focusing on the core color of a powerful strategy. This will give them access to the strategy, but will deprive them of the support offered by the adjacent colors. Then, the player will find other means of supplementing their strategy.

An example of this would be a player cutting Green from a Blue-Green Show and Tell deck and making it Mono-Blue. The deck would lose access to a Side board card like Nature's Claim, but the player would still have access to cards like Chain of Vapor or Brazen Borrower.

Another way the deck could be potentially impacted is the loss of speed in strategies that require City of Traitors. Although not playing it could potentially mean the decrease of speed and competitiveness of a deck, players have found ways to counter this and keep the deck competitive.

For instance, to preserve the competitive aspect of a strategy and its speed, a player can exchange City of Traitors for more copies of Ancient Tomb, Sandstone Needle or Crystal Vein in a Mono-Red Sneak Attack deck or Mono-Red Storm deck.

The player's experience

This is an important topic when it comes to considering playing a certain strategy.

Firstly, Mono-Color versions of existing strategies have their limitations. It's a good thing to keep in mind since most of the decks that allow new players to join Legacy tend to be Mono-Color decks. And, as Mono-Color decks, their strategies may slightly vary from more colored counterparts.

A way to describe the situation would be: instead of selecting from the total pool of possible competitive choices for a certain deck, the player chooses from a more restricted pool of competitive choices.

This can impact a player's experience if they feel a desire to cast Brainstorm in a Mono-Red Sneak Attack deck. But if the player doesn't feel that need, it isn't an issue.

Notice that the problem won't reside in the power of the deck, but in how the player wants to experience the deck. However, this is a concession many players don't consider to be that big of a deal in order to play such an incredible format.

Growing bolder

There have been some decklists appearing in MTGTop8 of decks that challenge even the need for old duals in competitive play.

This has happened with multiple instances of players not wanting to play Mono-Color versions of their decks and, instead, going along with what would be considered a Modern-style land-base for the deck.

Even established decks like UR Delver have been challenging the notion of old dual lands (to some degree) when most decklists included Steam Vents alongside with Volcanic Islands. That is because paying the 2 life for an Island-Mountain ended up being better in the long run than the basic lands that used to occupy those slots.

In some cases, there have been Reanimator decks running solely on shocklands - and that says a lot since Reanimator is a deck that cares about having life points to pay for Griselbrand.

Living End and Kroxa Control are two rogue decks that have performed well in competitive play. Kroxa Control featured no old duals in the list, while Living End featured a mix of Legacy's and Modern's land base.

See also

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