[Article]Eternal Europe: Examining the DC Legacy Open

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

A little later than I had hoped (my fault, though) but here it is finally - my interpretation of the DC results:

http://www.starcitygames.com/article...gacy-Open.html

[ironclad8690]

Seems weird that no Americans have adopted the 4c green heavy BURG Delver lists yet. I have been playing it with a little bit of success online and locally, and I really think the deck has more potential than the Grixis/DRS version.

[ESG]

After all, I very much expected for Dig Through Time to finally exercise its dominance at this point, and so far that just hasn't happened yet.

I don't know what numbers you were looking for, but I definitely see Dig's dominance. I don't have deck lists for all of Day 2, but I believe if you broke down the Day 2 decks by those with Dig Through Time and those without, more than half of the Day 2 decks were running the card. I feel that's significant. Plus, all the decks at the top of your table -- Miracles, Omni-Tell, and Grixis Delver -- have thoroughly incorporated Dig. RUG Delver can't support many or any copies of Dig because of Nimble Mongoose, but RUG's strength is that it's the primary counter to Omni-Tell due to red blasts and other cheap countermagic along with a fast clock, and Stifles and red blasts are also very good against Miracles. Can you expound on your statement above?

[Barook]

As the for the last part: I'd prefer a shake-up to the format. The format got too stale.

The question is: How would a reasonable shake-up look like? Opinions about that differ about that greatly (see: hundreds of angry pages in the B&R thread).

[Nocley]

Seems weird that no Americans have adopted the 4c green heavy BURG Delver lists yet. I have been playing it with a little bit of success online and locally, and I really think the deck has more potential than the Grixis/DRS version.

My biggest issue was the fact that that deck really struggles with the manabase, especially against other Wasteland decks. I think this is one of the decks that's a bit pushed aside due to the much heavier Delver meta in America, though my experience through 3-4 events should not be enough to take it as authority. I felt like the deck was amazing against any Non-Delver deck, but I could not find a way to manage any delver Mirror (especially the Grixis versions running Tasigur/Angler).

Also, going back to the Article and the "overperformers", my experience with Blade decks were that they had a pretty awful Miracles matchup, and that's why they fell so far by the wayside. But with it doing pretty alright (overperforming, though as you said the only way to overperform was to double it's expected result), as well as having also seen the UWR version do well recently, is there something that has changed?

[Ellomdian]

It's not terribly surprising to see OmniTell under performing in the T32 - it was largely seen as the consensus 'Best Deck' coming into this tournament for players who don't have other Legacy experience/commitment, and while it's certainly powerful enough to bully average players into D2, when the competition gets harder, it's a much more demanding deck to play.

Show and Tell decks as a whole seem to have that going for them, generally.

[Bosque]

As the for the last part: I'd prefer a shake-up to the format. The format got too stale.

The question is: How would a reasonable shake-up look like? Opinions about that differ about that greatly (see: hundreds of angry pages in the B&R thread).

I feel like the meta is changing though. A year or two ago these Grixis or 4c Delver decks were pretty rogue (also for that matter Grixis Control was not as prevalent), Omnitell was rarely played over Sneak and Show, Shardless BUG was still a big thing, Burn had a rise after the printing of Party Eidolon, not to mention the brief Treasure Cruise era meta with UWR Delver/Stoneforge decks, and now the rise of Mentor Miracles. We expected a shift back to the pre-cruise meta, but got something else entirely.

I guess I feel like the meta is shifting steadily. The joy of legacy is that the meta DOESN'T shift as quickly as standard and that our decks can be tinkered with to address meta shifts over time.

[HSCK]

I really liked the call out of The Source in the article and what it's morphed into.

@ESG: Pretty sure you made the same damning claims about TNN destroying the Legacy meta as well.

[Richard Cheese]

I really liked the call out of The Source in the article and what it's morphed into.

@ESG: Pretty sure you made the same damning claims about TNN destroying the Legacy meta as well.

Has it not?

[twndomn]

If mentor decks (esper and miracles) and yp decks (grixis delver) become rampant in your area, have people try Wind Shards?

It's pretty tempting for the controller of mentor and/or yp to try to get all those prowess triggers and tokens before attacking by casting multiple spells.

[jrsthethird]

If mentor decks (esper and miracles) and yp decks (grixis delver) become rampant in your area, have people try Wind Shards?

It's pretty tempting for the controller of mentor and/or yp to try to get all those prowess triggers and tokens before attacking by casting multiple spells.

You mean Wing Shards?

Seems too cute. There are -1 Instants that are more versatile, cheaper, and do the same thing, as well as -X Sorceries that do it even better. Sorcery speed is fine because Elementals and Monks both have summoning sickness.

[Philipp2293]

It depends, Wing Shards is very nice if you are on Mentor/Pyromancer yourself and can't use symmetrical effects. I used to run that card in my Punishing Control SB when TNN was printed, since it was very easy to up the storm count with Punishing Fire. Card is also hilarious against Elves.

I actually have to thank twndomn for bringing it up again, since at the tournament I'm going to play this weekend I expect to face Elves, Lands and plenty of Monks and Elementals.

[Quasim0ff]

I'd much rather play Supreme Verdict than something subpar, if Terminus isn't enough.

That dogdes everything and they can't stop it in any way.

[twndomn]

It can certainly be too cute, I agree. I am just throwing idea out, haven't done enough testing. I would say it's rather horrible against Lands. Lands player would certainly tap down your White Mana source before he makes the 20/20.

If you have the Mana source to play Wind Shards, you're certainly running either Terminus, Supreme Verdict, or you're on DnT/Blade decks. In that case why would you consider Wing Shards?
1. Those cards except Verdict are vulnerable to counter. You're probably dead if Terminus doesn't resolve.
2. Decks like Elves/Goblins can easily rebuild from Terminus.
3. You have fewer dudes on your own side, one-sided removal effect might be more attractive.

[Crimhead]

Conveniently enough, we've not only been provided with Top 32 decklists but also a Day Two metagame breakdown to actually get some idea of how decks have done compared to their metagame penetration

first, for me personally, how did you like this somewhat different approach to post-tournament analysis?

Fantastic. You cant meaningfully Analise a decks performance without comparing it to the decks meta-game penetration. It's a safe bet that in poker AK off-siut wins more hot & cold showdowns than AK suited. If we are willing to ignore the fact that we enter the pot with AK off nearly three times as often, we might even believe it's a better all-in starter.

But in my experience you wont make any friends with this wisdom. Not everyone can get their head around the idea that the deck with the most string finishes is actually under-performing (or averagely performing). Also people who hate decks often want to believe those decks are OP to support their victim complexes and/or fuel their hopes for a ban.

Omni-Tell, Reanimator, Lands, Temur Delver, Grixis Delver, Death and Taxes, and Esper Stoneblade. That's three fully linear combo decks, a combo-Prison deck (Lands), a Prison-aggro deck (Death and Taxes), a control deck and three tempo decks. In the Top 32 overall, we see the same kind of trend continue with twelve combo decks (assuming you count Infect) and five Prison decks making sure the two traditionally most-hated archetypes in the game make up the majority of the format.

Not an issue. Legacy is still a format where Zac Hill didn't get to dictate what is and isn't fun. Thank Gaea!

I recall a time when Prison and combo where not nearly as strong and the format was heavy with aggro/control decks (Maverick/Stoneblade/Thresh). Nobody says that era was unhealthy. We don't want to start judging the state of the meta based on individual tastes!

The one thing I actually find disappointing is that...
...the tempo decks are all based on Delver of Secrets (unless you count Infect as a tempo deck).

I do count Infect as a tempo deck, because that's the style it plays! And I think it's great that we have a tempo deck which is synergy based instead of just running good cards.

I personally don't believe Top Eight numbers tell us as much as we generally think they do. I'd much rather look at the top quarter of the field instead to get a decent grasp of what is and isn't performing well currently. Putting one-and-a-half times as many people in Top 32 as should be expected from field penetration alone is a very strong record and indicates to me that I might have been selling the deck (Infect) short two weeks ago and that it might easily belong to Legacy's Tier One decks at this point.

Amen.

It is an indication that Elves and Death and Taxes might still have as much claim to be called Tier One as Lands and Storm, though. On a side note, I was quite happy to see that three of the formats poster-child non-blue decks managed to more than keep up with what's currently being thrown at them

Also amen!

I don't think we can reasonably argue the format is unhealthy outside of pointless arguments about color representation. If anything needs to be done about the format, it's because we the players prefer a different kind of format, not for pure balance reasons.

Could I possibly ask for a third amen?

[Lormador]

I enjoyed this type of article as well, but there's something to be said for the old style too: previously we got a lot more detail on particular decks and in-depth analysis of particular cards. I miss that. However, if I were asked to choose a style (rather than propose a hybrid), I would have to select the big-picture approach of this most recent article as having more value to me as a player.

There are some unanswered questions that remain after this article, given the context of the earlier ones.

• What happened to Demon Rum?
• Why did Omnitell perform poorly in this context?
• What happened to Grixis Control?

I feel that Demon Rum was presented strongly, granted a lot of narrative space, and that the deck has potential. However, not a lot of players have picked it up, and I am not aware of any results having materialized. I think that some sort of commentary is justified, even if it's only an analysis of what went wrong. The thought process of a great player who builds and then abandons a particular deck is instructive.

As for Omnitell, this was really considered a top contender before the event. What factors led to it not performing as well as expected? The metagame here doesn't look wildly different from what one might have expected beforehand.

Grixis Control might not be noteworthy in terms of its performance for this event, but it had a large narrative presence prior to it and so might be worthy of comment. I'm personally curious about this deck, though, so there might simply be bias there.

The attention paid to the success of the Esper decks was timely, and I appreciate that. Thanks for another great article. Reading these articles is becoming a reason to play Legacy!

[Crimhead]

As for Omnitell, this was really considered a top contender before the event. What factors led to it not performing as well as expected? The metagame here doesn't look wildly different from what one might have expected beforehand.

Maybe it was overvalued by faulty analysis? Looking at just the top8 (as some many analysts do), Omni did fine. Maybe it's been underperforming for a while now, but nobody has noticed due to high metagame penetration?

Grixis Control might not be noteworthy in terms of its performance for this event, but it had a large narrative presence prior to it and so might be worthy of comment. I'm personally curious about this deck, though, so there might simply be bias there.

Grixis was pretty close to its expected return based on meta penetration. Where it expected 1.3 spots in the top 32, it obviously can't get exactly that, so it's not really fair to say it significantly under-performed. Really we'd want to look at multiple events to get a fuller idea.

[Ellomdian]

Not an issue. Legacy is still a format where Zac Hill didn't get to dictate what is and isn't fun. Thank Gaea!

This cannot be overstated. I'm sure he's a nice guy in person, but screw Zac Hill and his concept of 'Fun-ness' and Game Design with a rusty spoon. If people want to play a curated game, there are a ton of great 'Living Card Games' to satisfy that niche.

[QBChaz]

Have you taken a break Carsten? I, for one, am missing your articles.