Battle for Zendikar Legacy Hopefuls

Tweet by mtggoldfish // Sep 21, 2015

battle for zendikar legacy

Ah yes, it's that time of the year again where I dig through spoilers of the latest set in hopes of finding 1-2 Legacy playables. Usually the Commander series is the best hope for this, but every set usually yields a handful of playables — and sometimes even staples. While people lament over the water-downed spells and the overpowered creatures of Standard, if you take a closer look, some of the most powerful cards in Legacy are actually quite recent. Delver of Secrets and Deathrite Shaman are arguably the best one-drops in the format. Treasure Cruise was banned, but Dig Through Time is still dominant. Tasigur, the Golden Fang and Gurmag Angler are giving Tarmogoyf a run for its money. Griselbrand is arguably the best card to cheat into play. And let's not forget about a certain deck built around the Miracles mechanic with Terminus and Entreat the Angels. Even Magic Origins has given us Jace, Vryn's Prodigy, Vryn Wingmare and Dark Petition. So while we're not getting a new Brainstorm anytime soon, Wizards has been printing powerful cards. So now that the full spoilers for Battle for Zendikar are out, let's see what cards we can find that may sneak their way into Legacy.

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Aaaaand realistically, this is probably it for maindeck additions to tier one decks. And even then it's probably not that realistic since we're in the realm of #oldschoolcool and people like to rock their Judge Promo lands, original printing foils, Guru basics and even the simple yet timeless Beta lands. But fret not, Legacy is a diverse format and we have many fringe decks, so let's see what we can find here. There are slim pickings in Battle for Zendikar, so the following cards are fringe-playable in fringe decks. Don't go out buying 100 foil copies because you see it on this list — we're scraping at the bottom of the barrel.

The Big Baddies

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Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger has a legitimate shot at the sideboard of 12 Post decks — I mean the deck is known as "Eldrazi ramp." So 99% of the time you're going to use your Eye of Ugin to search up an Emrakul, the Aeons Torn and laugh your way to a victory over your Miracles opponent. I mean, Time Walk, protection from colored spells, and Annihilator 6 stapled onto a 15/15 is pretty darn good. But sometimes your opponent will play a pesky Ensnaring Bridge. When that happens, Emrakul just wimpers in a corner and your opponent will proceed to kill you over a billion turns with some combination of Jaya Ballard, Task Mage and Imperial Recruiters chipping away. Ulamog 2.0 can come down and exile problematic permanents (Ensnaring Bridge, Humility) and bring greatness to the Eldrazi once again. Since his exile only happens on cast, this removes him from consideration from Show and Tell and Reanimator decks. The only other decks that have a realistic shot of casting Ulamog is MUD or Elves, but they usually don't need Ulamog and have plenty of ways to deal with permanents (Reclamation Sage, Abrupt Decay, etc).

Desolation Twin may be used as another wincon in the aforementioned 12 Post lists. A 10/10 beater isn't all that hot — I mean, plenty of decks can deal with a 20/20 flying indestructable Merit Lage (cough Swords to Plowshares cough) — but having two makes a world of difference. Needing two Swords to Plowsharess increases the resiliency greatly. Just ask Tom Martell and Lingering Souls. Having said that, isn't Emraul, the Aeons Torn infinitely harder to deal with? For that reason, I'm not quite buying Desolation Twin as a legitimate finisher.

Utility Lands

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Speaking of Emrakul, the Aeons Torn, sacrifice effects are a great way to fight through a resolved Emrakul. This innucuous uncommon land might make it into the sideboards of certain decks. Realistically, Lands will be able to play this since they have ample mana and tutor effects. Life from the Loam + Blighted Fen lock might be a real thing to grind out fair decks. Knight of the Reliquary decks might want this, or even Pox-variants since they have Dark Ritual and play very grindy games. In a format as powerful as Legacy, stapling spells onto lands is a huge advantage so this might actually make the cut somewhere.

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Mortuary Mire is an interesting effect and I wonder if it will see play anywhere. Is the possibility of throwing a Bloodbraid Elf back ontop of your library worth having a land come into play tapped? I have no idea. I might jam one of these into Deadguy Ale and give it a shot. Guaranteeing a Stoneforge Mystic draw is pretty sweet. The problem with this card is the graveyard is a pretty volatile place; between Swords to Plowshares, Terminus and Deathrite Shaman, a lot of creatures don't hit/stay in the graveyard. Volrath's Stronghold already exists which isn't a good sign for this card, but Mortuary Mire taps for B which is relevant when you're trying to cast Hymn to Tourach, Liliana of the Veil, and of course legacy all-star Gatekeeper of Malakir.

Colorless Spells

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Titan's Presence could be a sideboard card in 12 Post or MUD? I'm not sure those decks want/need removal, but here it is. I'm also not sure how reliable of a card this is since your hand needs to have a high CMC creature in it. As a side note, this actually kills Emrakul, the Aeons Torn if you have your own Emrakul in hand. Protection from colored-spells? HA!

The Planeswalkers?

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OK, so Kiora, Master of the Depths and Ob Nixilis Reignited pretty much do nothing for their manacosts and you would probably be running Jace, the Mindsculptor in those slots. I mean, I guess you could build a Stasis deck with Kiora, but I've never actually seen one in the wild. Gideon, Ally of Zendikar, however, is a bit more interesting. He pumps out 2/2 creatures which could be relevant, but unfortunately that doesn't tick up his loyalty nor is his -4 that inspiring. His +1 is pretty useless as he still gets Swords to Plowshares and a Tarmogoyf will probably be able to lock him down. Elspeth, Knight-Errant is fringe playable for her token producing abilities, but that's actually a plus ability which gets her closer to her devastating ultimate. Her other plus, the ability to jump and giant growth, is actually quite relevant and helps punch through damage. So Gideon is a poor man's Elspeth in my mind, and Elspeth is already only fringe playable. If you want a 4cc finisher in white, go with Hero of Bladehold (three attacks for lethal unobstructed — same as Ulamog 2.0); if you want a more resilient grindy threat, Elspeth, Knight-Errant is probably your goto.

The New Duals?

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Is there a case where you want dual lands 5-8 of a color? Almost certainly no. Blood Moon and Wasteland are real cards. If for some bizarre reason you do needs duals 5-8, you would be playing shocks instead since missing a turn of tempo is a huge deal. The same argument can be applied to Budget Legacy; shocks are still your friend unless you're going ultra budget. So if you open an Expeditions slowland (have we agreed on what to call these things yet?!) at pre-release, don't expect to be able to hawk it to your local Legacy players.

Conclusion

So that's all I could find. Realistically, I think Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger has the best shot of seeing play; the other cards are a bit of a stretch. We'll see what Legacy brewers come up with in next couple of weeks, but I suspect we will have to wait until the Commander decks to see a playable like True-Name Nemesis. Is there anything I missed? Do you have some secret tech in BFZ? Let me know in the comments below!