[Article] Eternal Europe: Getting into Legacy for $500 or Less

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

With Christmas (and the accompanying inflow of money for many a player) just over , it seemed like a good time to go into a few of the better decks that allow players to enter Legacy without costing an arm and a leg. Check it out and tell me what you think!

http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/l...0_Or_Less.html

[wcm8]

Good article as always. I think your writing on Legacy is a good example of quality over quantity.

[snappingbowls | ಠ_ಠ]

I read this article last night at, like 1 am, gotta say your my favourite SCG writer. People get these ideas in their heads about legacy and get scared... too bad, considering its such a wide open and diverse format. Great list of less expensive decks that can compete. Saw some kid on the FB plugin say none of these decks can compete today; couldn't help but laugh a little bit.

Thanks for not including burn, the deck loses to g2/3... and for someone breaking into the format they won't like constantly losing to Leyline of Sanctity, Chill and Batterskull.

[kiblast]

With the holidays around and Christmas generally leading to some capital to invest for the typical Magic player

So true, that I'm investing in Moats at the moment!

Nice article!

[snappingbowls | ಠ_ಠ]

So true, that I'm investing in Moats at the moment!

More than one... ?

[4eak]

Bravo, I love budget decks. I think having well-thought-out budget decks provides a gateway to Legacy new-comers. I'm glad to see your article.

Obviously, you only have so much time/space, but I'm surprised you didn't cover UR Delver. That deck can be built cheaply, and I believe it is significantly better than any of the decks you've listed.

Thanks for not including burn, the deck loses to g2/3... and for someone breaking into the format they won't like constantly losing to Leyline of Sanctity, Chill and Batterskull.

Those are awful examples. Chill? Last month, out of hundreds and hundreds of tournament placing Legacy decks around the world, Chill is to be found two times. Leyline of Sanctity was in ~16 decks. As far as I'm concerned, Batterskull is the only real example you've given, and it is a terrible one. The fact that you think Batterskull constantly beats properly played and built burn decks tells me that you haven't played much Burn/RDW/Sligh at a competitive level. Smash to Smithereens and Sulfuric Vortex (just 2 of the many common answers to be found in quality burn lists) are outstanding cards against Batterskull, as is burning out SFM and winning before they get to 5 mana. There are many barriers to the viability of Burn/RDW/Sligh, but Batterskull isn't really one of them.



peace,
4eak

[boneclub24]

Those are awful examples. Chill? Last month, out of hundreds and hundreds of tournament placing Legacy decks around the world, Chill is to be found two times. Leyline of Sanctity was in ~16 decks. As far as I'm concerned, Batterskull is the only real example you've given, and it is a terrible one. The fact that you think Batterskull constantly beats properly played and built burn decks tells me that you haven't played much Burn/RDW/Sligh at a competitive level. Smash to Smithereens and Sulfuric Vortex (just 2 of the many common answers to be found in quality burn lists) are outstanding cards against Batterskull, as is burning out SFM and winning before they get to 5 mana. There are many barriers to the viability of Burn/RDW/Sligh, but Batterskull isn't really one of them.



peace,
4eak

Thanks for this, saves me a bit of time :)

[Koby]

Good article.

I like that you didn't include Burn; and not for the reason that it has trouble in SB games. It's been the de-facto Legacy budget deck, and getting people to think of new decks is always encouraging.

So thank you for that!

[snappingbowls | ಠ_ಠ]

Those are awful examples. Chill? Last month, out of hundreds and hundreds of tournament placing Legacy decks around the world, Chill is to be found two times. Leyline of Sanctity was in ~16 decks. As far as I'm concerned, Batterskull is the only real example you've given, and it is a terrible one. The fact that you think Batterskull constantly beats properly played and built burn decks tells me that you haven't played much Burn/RDW/Sligh at a competitive level. Smash to Smithereens and Sulfuric Vortex (just 2 of the many common answers to be found in quality burn lists) are outstanding cards against Batterskull, as is burning out SFM and winning before they get to 5 mana. There are many barriers to the viability of Burn/RDW/Sligh, but Batterskull isn't really one of them.

Sorry? And you probably don't need to tell someone that "they saved you time"... wow, you both thought the same thing... now we know?

[Shawon]

I like the range of topics you cover in your articles, and how some of them are written as responses to what's going on and what's being said about Legacy (I'm thinking of your article in response to people saying that only blue decks are viable). To think a few years ago Legacy articles were usually deck X primers, metagame reports, ban/unban proposals, and of course I can't forget the 10000000 Legacy Intro articles.

Even though I despise Affinity (mainly Ravager) I'm always intrigued by any deck using non-Jace planeswalkers, especially Tezzeret 2.0. Since I don't really know Affinity, I can't really comment on the list itself. Mindbreak Trap and Dismember are both good calls though.

But I do know a thing or two about Smallpox decks (enough of the Pox namesake, no one cares about what Pox used to do in "the good ol' days," Smallpox does more of the work, it should get its due credit). The first thing I'll say is that 4 Urborgs are necessary. I know you probably had 2 to make the deck less than $500, but then again, you can at least swap the 4th Wasteland for a 3rd Urborg. Having 4 Urborg allows you keep hands with just one Urborg and a Wastelands and improves the consistency of going turn 2 Hymn/Smallpox. Muy importante.

I think you're wrong on Nether Void but I won't get into it because this is a budget article. But I will say that I have been running Beseech the Queen as Nether Void #2 that can also grabs lands and Extirpate/Pithing Needle g2 and g3. Pretty good so far.

Regarding your advice to your readers on how to make the Smallpox deck cheaper, I see removing Sinkhole as an excellent solution. Sinkhole isn't critical to the Smallpox strategy. It just adds a little more power to attacking from a specific angle (mana disruption). If removing it compromises the direction of the deck, then change the direction to that of The Rack, while keeping the Lilianas and Smallpoxes. But then again you might require Dark Confidant and that card is expensive, but less costly than Sinkhole!

[Tammit67]

While all of these decks are viable in a sense and budget, I can't help but feeling someone who went out and got one of these would feel disappointed, and here's why.

While you will be fine with any of these decks and you might do well now and then, you will not have a tier 1 deck nor do you have the cards to later help you build a tier 1 deck, with the notable exception of dredge which is strong deck regardless.

For instance, I started off with Solidarity, since I could only afford fetches and forces. Next was merfolk when i had wasteland money, then moved on to Dreadstill when I had enough for CBtop and duals/goyfs, Nassif's Ctop list when i had even more money to spend, TES when I finally had money for USeas, etc. Now I can build pretty much any blue deck besides reanimator.

I think it is important to include decks that have the ability to branch into something more competitive than just "we can use more urborgs". A lot of my friends liked the format and got into it buying junk lists and they have great difficulty building blue since the list share nothing except for goyfs, and even goyf isn't all that popular as he once was. A good deck to include as a Core of legacy staples would be UR delver, or even Mono U control.

I realize it is harder to put together a full list of decks that share major cards with the top decks, but at least 2 or so lists would really improve the article. Players won't stick with the format when they seemingly have to re-enter it just to be competitive because pox ends up being bad.

Other than that, GREAT article Carsten. I look forward to every piece you write. You are one of the few writers on SCG who knows what he is talking about in regards to legacy.

[Zilla]

Another great article, Carsten. I was just thinking the other day about viable budget options to suggest to a friend that's interested in the format, and it occurred to me that the vast majority of the cards in the UR Delver deck that have been placing well at recent SCG Opens are commons.

The most expensive cards in this archetype are optional: the deck is fully playable without Snapcaster Mage and Force of Will. Many lists even eschew Volcanics in favor of basics for better resilience to Wasteland.

I think you could build a fully competitive UR Delver list for around 200 bucks. The most expensive part of a budget list (outside of maybe a single Volcanic Island for flexibility in first turn plays) would be Fetchlands, and those are going to have long term usefulness to any player interested in Legacy anyway.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

You can budget a lot of these decks out, actually. Goblins; just cut Wasteland and Port for Ancient Tomb and Mutavault. What the fuck are you doing with Wasteland and Port? Do you think this is 2006? The mana curve of this format is ridiculously low right now. Goblins is one of the mana hungriest decks around, even with an active Vial.

Hypergenesis, just drop Force for Unmask, run more black support. This might actually be superior anyway, since you can remove the Emrakul or Moat or Ensnaring Bridge or whatever from someone's hand.

It would be close to strictly better to cut 4 Gaea's Cradle from that Elves list for 4 Living Wish and move one to the board so you can find it when you need it, as well as just grab an Emrakul when you have tons of mana without having to draw into these situationally dead cards.. But then I mean for that matter I have no idea why it's maindecking the Fauna Shaman stuff, and skipping out on the big mana guys.

A lot of these really aren't great recommendations because they're limiting. Someone who spends four hundred dollars on Goblins has made a really big investment and is unable to do much else with those cards (really just the Vials and Wastelands are portable.)

Honestly I think people are better off building sub-optimal but scalable decks in Legacy if they're trying to get into the format than optimized but dead end decks. Even if a deck is top tier right now, it might not always be so and people want to build their collection to a point where they can switch decks as the metagame shifts. As such I would focus on lists that help you build up staples. Something like;

4 Scalding Tarn
4 Arid Mesa
2 Wooded Foothills
8 Mountain
3 Barbarian Ring

4 Grim Lavamancer
4 Goblin Guide
3 Figure of Destiny
4 Kargan Dragonlord
4 Blood Knight
3 Magus of the Moon

3 Umezawa's Jitte

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
3 Searing Blaze
3 Price of Progress

Is going to run you under $300 direct from SCG, and while not a name or a tier deck, is going to give you a pretty solid shot at winning any small local tourneys while building up your collection full of staples that go into other decks. You can piece together a few duals one at a time and either Goyfs or Forces and wind up with Delver Burn or Zoo; maybe you start just grabbing a single Taiga so you can run Ancient Grudge in the board.

Or budget-optional Maverick:

4 Windswept Heath
1 Savannah
4 Forest
2 Plains
3 Wooded Bastion
3 Horizon Canopy
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Wasteland
1 Dust Bowl
1 Kor Haven
1 Tower of the Magistrate

4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Noble Hierarch
1 Birds of Paradise
4 Mother of Runes
3 Qasali Pridemage
1 Scavenging Ooze
4 Knight of the Reliquary
2 Eternal Witness
1 Kitchen Finks

4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Sylvan Library
2 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Parallax Wave

Will allow you to just squeak in under $500, and the sub-optimal pieces can be worked on and replaced one at a time.

[4eak]

In case anyone is interested, I've compiled about 20 budget Legacy decks in this thread. Most of them are significantly cheaper than $500.


peace,
4eak

[GGoober]

I thought Dredge was dirt-cheap. What happened to the $50-100 deck that now became $400?? I guess Legacy cards have really skyrocketed. I know Bridge from Below went up unnaturally without any good reason (it's not like Dredge was completely dominating multiple tournaments).

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

Yeah, I actually remember when we would talk about $400 decks being the expensive ones. Ah, memory.

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

@kiblast: I have an inkling why, I think. Let me know how things work out. Not exactly budget, though ;)


Thanks everybody for the kind words. Always warms my heart to hear my work is appreciated.

As to the criticism, I'll just go into the main points:

Tuning considerations: It shouldn't come as a surprise that I don't play budget decks. I'm a junky for blue control and combo and I have the cards to play those decks, so that's what I do. As such my experience with these lists is mainly from playing against them.
To be sure not to tell people to play decks that actually suck, I based myself on decks that had already performed well in actual tournament settings that also fit the criterion of being comparatively cheap to build. That's were the lists come from. This leads me directly to the first point of criticism:

Honestly I think people are better off building sub-optimal but scalable decks in Legacy if they're trying to get into the format than optimized but dead end decks. Even if a deck is top tier right now, it might not always be so and people want to build their collection to a point where they can switch decks as the metagame shifts.

While you will be fine with any of these decks and you might do well now and then, you will not have a tier 1 deck nor do you have the cards to later help you build a tier 1 deck, with the notable exception of dredge which is strong deck regardless.

For instance, I started off with Solidarity, since I could only afford fetches and forces. Next was merfolk when i had wasteland money, then moved on to Dreadstill when I had enough for CBtop and duals/goyfs, Nassif's Ctop list when i had even more money to spend, TES when I finally had money for USeas, etc. Now I can build pretty much any blue deck besides reanimator.

I think it is important to include decks that have the ability to branch into something more competitive than just "we can use more urborgs". A lot of my friends liked the format and got into it buying junk lists and they have great difficulty building blue since the list share nothing except for goyfs, and even goyf isn't all that popular as he once was. A good deck to include as a Core of legacy staples would be UR delver, or even Mono U control.

You're approaching entering a format from a totally different point of view than I do. If I planned to get into Legacy, I wouldn't want to play a deck that is a clearly suboptimal version of something better (same reason I made sure to pick decks that in nearly identical forms already do well). Maybe it's my inner spike but if I can't play an optimal list, I prefer not playing/playing a real fun deck. Whenever I'd lose a game to drawing my replacements instead of the card they're supposed to be, I'd be pissed and my fun would be ruined. Even imagining it during the deckbuilding process would probably discourage from even going to the tournament.
I can see where you're coming from, sure. It's much better for long term goals to start building towards a mainstream archetype and replace the cards I can't get yet with something cheaper. It also leads to a deck that loses not because you had a bad matchup or were outplayed but to being badly built (for a reason, to be sure, but still).

Let's take IBA's Maverick list for example. I wouldn't ever consider bringing that to a tournament. One of the central pieces, KotR, is weakened so much by not having a full set of Wastelands to lock the opponent out of the game after Knight resolves, that it makes the whole deck play out suboptimally. Playing a list like that is the equivalent of playing a Vintage Control deck without a Lotus. It won't come up all the time but it will lead to a lot of game losses that could be avoided by not playing a watered down version of a real deck. If you're doing that, you aren't playing to win, which, to me, is the whole point of going to a tournament in the first place.

On the other hand when running any of the lists in the article, you won't ever feel like your deck wasn't as good as it should have been. You might run into a hostile metagame* but you won't lose because you didn't have the cards to build your deck the way it should have been. Very different feeling/situation, at least to me.

Though, to be honest, most of these situations can be addressed through correct tuning. The inherent powerlevel of most Legacy decks is high enough that you can compensate for changes by changing a few slots to take care of the new threat/type of adversary - within reason, obviously. Dredge won't win in a meta where half the people have MD Leylines no matter how much you tune.

Obviously, you only have so much time/space, but I'm surprised you didn't cover UR Delver. That deck can be built cheaply, and I believe it is significantly better than any of the decks you've listed.

Another great article, Carsten. I was just thinking the other day about viable budget options to suggest to a friend that's interested in the format, and it occurred to me that the vast majority of the cards in the UR Delver deck that have been placing well at recent SCG Opens are commons.

The most expensive cards in this archetype are optional: the deck is fully playable without Snapcaster Mage and Force of Will. Many lists even eschew Volcanics in favor of basics for better resilience to Wasteland.

I think you could build a fully competitive UR Delver list for around 200 bucks. The most expensive part of a budget list (outside of maybe a single Volcanic Island for flexibility in first turn plays) would be Fetchlands, and those are going to have long term usefulness to any player interested in Legacy anyway.

UR Delver seems like a solid candidate for budgetizing and is something I considered but I was honestly unsure if the deck actually works fine with two or fewer Volcanics. I've found myself fetching for Duals a hell of a lot with the deck because you want flexible mana without dropping too many lands (Brainstorm fodder). Cutting Snapcasters and Forces from the deck on the other seems like it would make the deck a lot weaker or require significant restructuring (something I don't feel I have the experience to competently do, again see the paragraph about getting to the lists above). A ton of my wins in testing have come from Price of Progress, Snapcaster it back, you're dead.
If one of you (Zilla?) has a well tuned list that actually keeps the strengths of the non-budget list, I'd be happy to include it either next time or when I write another budget article*. Cutting Forces removes one of the biggest incentives for playing UR over straight burn imo because combo-opponents don't have to attempt to play around them any more.

* @4eak: Wouldn't want to use the list from your thread, for example. Having four Mountains has to make the mana horrible as far as mulligans are concerned and even four Islands seems extremely sketchy.

But I do know a thing or two about Smallpox decks (enough of the Pox namesake, no one cares about what Pox used to do in "the good ol' days," Smallpox does more of the work, it should get its due credit). The first thing I'll say is that 4 Urborgs are necessary. I know you probably had 2 to make the deck less than $500, but then again, you can at least swap the 4th Wasteland for a 3rd Urborg. Having 4 Urborg allows you keep hands with just one Urborg and a Wastelands and improves the consistency of going turn 2 Hymn/Smallpox. Muy importante.

I think you're wrong on Nether Void but I won't get into it because this is a budget article. But I will say that I have been running Beseech the Queen as Nether Void #2 that can also grabs lands and Extirpate/Pithing Needle g2 and g3. Pretty good so far.

I can definitely see where Urborg helps keeping sketchy hands though at the same time anything that has only Urborgs is a mulligan and you open yourself up to Wasteland quite heavily if you rely on Urborg to fuel your black mana needs of Mishra/Waste. It just felt like the least important piece of the puzzle. Removing Sinkholes would mean rebuilding the deck because the angle it tries to exploit changes and as mentioned above it isn't like I actually play these decks myself. Reid's list was something that proved its mettle in a high profile tournament and thereby felt like it gave me the biggest chance of picking a list that is actually good.
As to Nether Void, as mentioned in the article the card might be this deck's Armageddon and quite good. In that case I'm still convinced running it as a singleton is wrong because the deck has no library manipulation whatsoever. You'd either want 2-3 or do what you did and add some kind of tutor to search for the singleton when you need it.

Burn: I don't think burn is a particularly good deck, though it's fine (and no, it's definitely not cold to just Batterskull). Still, and especially now that UR Delver exists, which fits a very similar gameplan into a much more flexible shell, the deck just feels outdated to me. My main reasons not to include it were twofold, though. First there is the already mentioned fact that burn is the cliché budget deck - not really worth writing an article about - and second there's personal bias. I really don't understand why you'd want to play burn in Legacy when you could play something that does at least something exciting.

/edit: As to the wow 400 bucks, I remember when that was expensive thing - welcome to a popular format that uses cards that are more than 4 years old. It sucks but it's only going to get worse. Just check development on Vintage prices in the early 2000s if you don't believe me.

[4eak]

Dredge is no where near $400, even using SCG's inflated prices, it shouldn't be that much. That exact decklist can still be bought for $200-250. I'm not sure how Carsten came up with the prices (he may have been buying $30 foil/jap Careful study's). I realize that finding the real value of cards isn't easy (Ebay might be the most accurate), but even Bidwicket would be more accurate.

On a sidenote, that LEDless Dredge list melts my brain, yuck. It is even cheaper when you build it correctly.

UR Delver seems like a solid candidate for budgetizing and is something I considered but I was honestly unsure if the deck actually works fine with two or fewer Volcanics. I've found myself fetching for Duals a hell of a lot with the deck because you want flexible mana without dropping too many lands (Brainstorm fodder). Cutting Snapcasters and Forces from the deck on the other seems like it would make the deck a lot weaker or require significant restructuring (something I don't feel I have the experience to competently do, again see the paragraph about getting to the lists above). A ton of my wins in testing have come from Price of Progress, Snapcaster it back, you're dead.
If one of you (Zilla?) has a well tuned list that actually keeps the strengths of the non-budget list, I'd be happy to include it either next time or when I write another budget article. Cutting Forces removes one of the biggest incentives for playing UR over straight burn imo because combo-opponents don't have to attempt to play around them any more.

We have serious disagreements over FoW/Snapcaster in the deck. I suspect I'm in the minority, but neither are worthwhile maindeck, imho. I'm betting it is your bias towards playing FoW (and blue decks) rather than your experience and understanding of this particular deck which drives you to think FoW is what makes UR that much better than straight burn.

Try this:

// Lands - 18
2 Steam Vents
4 Island
4 Mountain
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Arid Mesa
4 Scalding Tarn

// Creatures - 11
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Goblin Guide
3 Grim Lavamancer

// Burn - 16
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Rift Bolt
4 Price of Progress

// Permission - 7
3 Spell Snare
4 Daze

// Card Quality - 8
4 Ponder
4 Brainstorm

// Sideboard
SB: 3 Smash to Smithereens
SB: 3 Red Elemental Blast
SB: 3 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 3 Submerge
SB: 3 Spell Pierce

You say that you don't actually 'play' these decks, which is why you are uncomfortable in reconstructing them. Unfortunately, that makes your advice much weaker. I think budget building requires a lot more effort.


peace,
4eak

[Jamaican Zombie Legend]

I thought Dredge was dirt-cheap. What happened to the $50-100 deck that now became $400?? I guess Legacy cards have really skyrocketed. I know Bridge from Below went up unnaturally without any good reason (it's not like Dredge was completely dominating multiple tournaments).

It's funny how that happened. Basically Dredge staples (other than Bridge) went from dollar-bin rares, cheapo commons/uncommons, and a few money uncommons to everything in the deck being a dollar or more a pop, all because Dredge was touted as *the* budget deck. When I bought into Dredge about two years ago, you could get the majority of the deck at bargain bin prices. Thugs, Imps, Tribes, Moebas could all easily be found online for 5-10 cents each. But once enough people started buying into Dredge, stores started realizing they were losing money and adjusted the prices accordingly. The "expensive" pieces have also gone up as well. I remember griping about having an order (probably SCG) that was 25 dollars but only eight cards; sets of Ichorid and Therapy. Now that same order would probably be at least 50 dollars, if not more. Add in the fact that City of Brass has doubled in price and Tarnished Citadel goes for an astounding six bucks each (as opposed to 50 cents when I bought them) and it becomes clearer how Dredge got so expensive; *everything* in it that was cheap became, well, not so cheap.

Crazy stuff.

It would be close to strictly better to cut 4 Gaea's Cradle from that Elves list for 4 Living Wish and move one to the board so you can find it when you need it, as well as just grab an Emrakul when you have tons of mana without having to draw into these situationally dead cards.

Totally agreed here. The Living Wish package has worked out pretty well in my (limited) testing. Four Cradles in the mainboard is just overkill, and expensive overkill at that.

******

Great article, too. If you're ever short on material, it might not be a bad idea to expand upon this article and go deeper into certain "budget" archetypes, maybe with a survey of different builds, compare/contrast on their place in the meta, how much power per dollar you get, and maybe even the fun per dollar (though that would be tricky).

[kiblast]

I used to have a dredge deck sleeved up one year ago. I built 75% of that deck by trading away 3 Dark confidants (back when you could find them for 8 eur-12$), and then spent maybe 25 eur-35$ on the few sets I needed to complete it. Then I sold it for roughly 200$ and thought I had a nice deal. Then, one year later, I find that Dredge is worth 400$.

Sorry?

4eak is perfectly right. Burn's problem is obviously not Chill ( which I never saw since I re-started playing in 2008) nor Batterskull ( Shattering Spree comes to mind as is way more versatile and overall better than Smash to Smitereens, and good Burn lists play Sulfuric Vortex as a 3-4 of even maindeck). The main problem is that you have really hard time vs a wide amount of decks like Reanimator, Team Portugal, DeadGuy, Monoblack, Show and Tell, Chalice.decks, Dredge, Maverick etc etc

Also Carsten didn't put Burn in his list because the equation [Cheap deck for starters = Burn] is so well known that you don't really need to read it on SCG.