Legacy Death and Taxes

By Melissa DeTora

Melissa is a former Magic pro player and strategy writer who is now working in R&D on the Play Design team.

Many Legacy players feel that if you're not playing Brainstorms and Force of Wills in your deck, you shouldn't even bother playing. While it's true that there have been many powerful blue cards printed over the years, blue is not the only viable color in Legacy. Michael Derczo proved that point at the most recent StarCityGames.com Legacy Open by piloting this deck to a Top 8 finish.

Michael is playing four copies of both Thalia, Guardian of Thraben and Vryn Wingmare. These guys can cause nightmares for combo decks and severely slow down any deck playing one-mana cantrips like Brainstorm and Ponder. Before Magic Origins was released, it was not possible to have two of these creatures in play due to the legend rule. Now that Vryn Wingmare exists, you can make noncreature spells cost an additional two mana. It's nearly impossible for most decks to win without first removing these creatures from the battlefield.

Æther Vial plays a very important role in this deck. It allows you to put creatures into play without paying mana for them, freeing up your lands for Rishadan Port or Wasteland activations.

Æther Vial also changes the way your opponent plays the game. When you activate Vial, your opponent has to respond to it before they know what creature you are putting into play. For example, if you activate Æther Vial on two and your opponent has only one mana untapped, they will have to cast Brainstorm or Lightning Bolt in response. Once Vial resolves and you put a Thalia on the battlefield, they won't be able to pay the additional one for that spell. This is a great way to force your opponent to do things before they are ready to. One interesting thing about this trick is you don't even need to put anything into play when the ability of Æther Vial resolves.

White is a great color in Legacy. It does a lot of hateful things, and those things can often make your opponent unable to play Magic. Sometimes that's even more powerful than drawing cards and countering spells!

Michael Derczo's Death and Taxes

Decklist Stats Sample Hand

Creature (26)

4 Vryn Wingmare 4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben 4 Stoneforge Mystic 2 Ethersworn Canonist 4 Flickerwisp 4 Serra Avenger 4 Mother of Runes

Instant (4)

4 Swords to Plowshares

Artifact (7)

1 Batterskull 1 Umezawa's Jitte 1 Sword of Fire and Ice 4 Æther Vial

Land (23)

1 Flagstones of Trokair 10 Plains 4 Rishadan Port 4 Wasteland 3 Karakas 1 Mishra's Factory

60 Cards

Sideboard (15)

2 Containment Priest 2 Council's Judgment 2 Rest in Peace 2 Phyrexian Revoker 1 Sunlance 2 Pithing Needle 1 Seal of Cleansing 1 Absolute Law 2 Cataclysm