Legacy Metagame Review - March 2024

Welcome, Legacy friends, to another metagame review here at Cards Realm! Last time, the Lord of the Rings universe had shaken up this format's power levels, with Orcish Bowmasters, Troll of Khazad-dûm, Forth Eorlingas!, and The One Ring as the cards that stood out the most.

Since then, we welcomed Wilds of Eldraine (Up the Beanstalk, Questing Druid, and Beseech the Mirror) and Lost Caverns of Ixalan (Broadside Bombardiers, Stalactite Stalker, and Molten Collapse), besides (finally!) Warhammer cards in Magic Online (MTGO), which highlighted cards like Triumph of Saint Katherine, Chaos Defiler, and Mawloc.

What we didn't have in this period were bans, but Legacy has changed a lot since our last review. Even though the archetype that stands as number 1 is still the same as before, its deck structure has changed significantly. Alongside this, two decks that practically didn't show up on anyone's radar incorporated new tools and climbed the rankings: the Goblin deck left behind cards like Aether Vial and Food Chain to add Stompy elements and took this format by storm, and Sultai Control adopted Up the Beanstalk and became Sultai Beans, now a more aggressive list thanks to Murktide Regent.

In the middle of all of this, the Scam kit (Troll of Khazad-dûm, Grief, and Reanimate) was added to several archetypes, to the point it is now considered one of the pillars of this format alongside Ancient Tomb, Dragon’s Rage Channeler, Dark Depths, Dark Ritual, and Aether Vial (though this last card has been losing space more and more).

As usual, please keep in mind that this review is subjective, but we also based it on the information we collected from several metagame sources, besides, of course, the extensive database at Cards Realm itself. So, without further ado, these are the main decks in Legacy in early 2024:

Reanimator

The archetype that was at the top of the tiers is still there, but it isn't the same deck. Even though a few players still use lists that focus heavily on Entombing a big creature, reviving big creatures, with 4 Atraxas and Careful Study, most have added the Scam kit, which has made this deck much less vulnerable at the cost of losing some of its explosiveness. So, if your opponent is distracted, Atraxa, Grand Unifier will go into play really early, but sometimes you just need to discard two cards with Grief - one Evoked, one Reanimated - on turn 1 to end the game.

The online metagame, which ends up dictating the trends everywhere else, also got a huge influx of a deck that is particularly vulnerable to this strategy - Goblins -, which just boosted the status of this deck as the tier 1 leader even more.

Grixis Delver

In World of Warcraft, there's a saying: "There must always be a Lich King". Delver is Legacy's Lich King, and must always be at the top of the tiers, in its several different versions, as the years go on. As we'll see soon, it has two different lists in this format, but the one that has proved itself to be the most dominant is the one that has access to Orcish Bowmasters.

There's nothing new in these versions: we have cantrips, Force of Will, Wasteland, and Lightning Bolt, and also the most efficient creatures available in the market.

Goblins Stompy

Goblins won the first Legacy Grand Prix, in Philadelphia, in 2005. For a long time, its base was the dynamic duo: Goblin Lackey and Aether Vial. But time moved on, and it became obsolete - and the same time that washed away its dominance also forced this deck to adapt and add new cards, while forcing it to ditch those two fundamental cards.

The upgraded dynamic duo is _____ Goblin and Broadside Bombardiers, which still carry the Muxus, Goblin Grandee banner. This nameless Unfinity Goblin allows Muxus to go into play on turns 2 and 3 quite consistently, even though it can go into play as early as turn 1. Furthermore, the Goblins in Ixalan's Commander set help this deck deal an absurd amount of damage to its opponent.

This combination was added to Stompy decks as part of its base - Ancient Tomb, City of Traitors, Chrome Mox, and Simian Spirit Guide - and has dominated Magic Online in a way most of us haven't seen in a long time. From a deck that barely showed up among the 25 decks we reviewed in our last article, Goblins have climbed to the top of the format, and decimated decks that weren't prepared to deal with its aggressiveness.

4-Color Control

Up the Beanstalk gave a new life to Uro, Titan of Nature’s Wrath decks, and turned Leyline Binding from a meme to an incredibly efficient answer to practically everything this format has. The fact that Goblins, an opponent 4CC has tools to handle, took down Boros Initiative, a true headache to this archetype, only improved where Uro and its friends stand in the metagame.

Temur Delver

The other Delver in this format, the one that uses Questing Druid, is fine, thank you, and has climbed the tiers considerably compared to our last review.

Sultai Beans

This is another archetype we didn't list in our last review that has, since then, climbed the ranks significantly. The list from before, a Control deck that wasn't very efficient when it tried to control the game, was replaced by a list that is much more proactive, considering the need to activate Up the Beanstalk forced this deck to use Murktide Regent.

Boros Initiative

Boros Initiative, my personal favorite, watched as this format became much more hostile, much because the matchup against Goblins is terrible. It is still a strong deck, but it is no longer the main representative of Ancient Tomb pillar in Legacy.

Dimir Scam

The deck that highlighted the Scam kit circulated a good while around tier 1, but its hybrid form with Reanimator eventually took its place and made the original deck a bit weaker.

Red Prison

This old favorite became more valuable curiously when it stopped being the second Ancient Tomb option in this format and became its third option. This has to do with the fact that the metagame is particularly more vulnerable to Blood Moon, and the fact this deck can use Broadside Bombardiers really well.

Painter

After we saw various Control, Aggro, and Aggro-Control decks, we're finally seeing a Combo deck, and, even though the first in this list is also a Combo deck, its current version has more Control Elements than Combo elements. This means the current format doesn't have space for decks that don't interact with the opponent, and Painter's standing in the metagame is a symptom of this.

Lands

And, if Combo decks are in a downward spiral, there is one archetype that started climbing the tiers. The good old Lands tends to handle aggressive decks well, and, therefore, is rising in popularity.

8-Cast

Previously a consistent name in the top tiers, this deck didn't go down this much because of any specific reason; instead, it withered away for months, slowly becoming unpopular as its opponents became more resilient and it didn't get stronger. The increased number of Null Rods in sideboards and the number of decks able to play Chalice of the Void for 0 also didn't make its life any easier.

Cascade Crash

As for Rhinos, it is gaining some space. The greatest question that hasn't been answered is still whether we should or not use Leyline of the Guildpact + Scion of Draco. Considering the format is a bit more aggressive, most Rhinos will include this duo, like the list above.

Dark Depths

This Marit Lage deck (not that Lands isn't a Marit Lage deck, but this is specifically centered around it) can take on many shapes: Selesnya, Naya, Golgari. But the truth is that none of them has dealt with this format as well as we'd want to.

Doomsday

Doomsday, to start, isn't easy to pilot, particularly when your starting hands don't have obvious turn 1 or 2 combos. Add this to the fact that decks like Goblins usually don't let you play the key card in your deck to prepare your combo for your next turn, and you'll understand why this archetype is in this tier.

Death & Taxes

This deck, which was once one of the most popular decks in this format, is going through a very tough time. Most players have migrated to the Orzhov version to try to bring this list to a higher tier, but, apparently, its glory days are over. However, as Goblins has showed us, maybe, with a few new additions, we might see Death & Taxes shine again.

Mono Black Scam

Mono Black decks have had many versions in Legacy - Curses, Prison, Helm of Obedience Combo - until they finally added the Scam kit to their lists. One of the most "budget" decks in this format (because it doesn't have Dual Lands and brings practically nothing from the Reserved List), it has been climbing the ranks because it is quite consistent and has answers in the main deck against graveyard decks.

Sneak and Show

There's nothing new about this deck: it is the same deck that wants to put a creature in play for 3 mana instead of 15. The rising number of discard tools in this format actively makes this archetype worse, considering it disrupts its combo.

Storm

Speaking of Combo decks swimming in an ocean of discard tools, Storm lists have adapted to this by adding Galvanic Relay and Song of Creation, which allows you to break your combo into two turns.

Jeskai Control

Though, in the past, Jeskai and Bant dueled for the title of best Control deck in Legacy, Up the Beanstalk has finally declared a winner.

Cradle Control

This deck still finds issues everywhere with so many Orcish Bowmasters seeing play in this format. The fact this deck has just a few ways in the main deck (besides Endurance) to interact against unfair decks in Legacy also doesn't help.

Cephalid Breakfast

Cephalid isn't well positioned because, in a format full of aggressive decks centering around one graveyard deck, the Cephalid Illusionist combo gets caught in the cross-fire with so many creature removals and graveyard hates everywhere.

12-Post

This deck is still struggling to find its place in a format in which Wasteland is one of the most played lands, and, to make matters worse, most of the decks that don't use this menacing colorless land can access Blood Moon or Magus of the Moon, which are also huge problems.

Stiflenought

Even though it is one of the oldest decks in Legacy, what has brought Phyrexian Dreadnought (one of my favorite creatures and my favorite MTG artwork) back to Legacy is the fact that half its combo - Stifle, Dress Down or Doorkeeper Thrull - can be used in several different ways that aren't what you planned originally. Be it by preventing a Muxus, Goblin Grandee from assembling an army on the board, or by stopping someone from going into the Undercity dungeon, or even by making the traditional play of countering a Fetch Land activation with Stifle.

Mississippi River

The Creative Technique deck hasn't become the tyrant it threatened to be, even more so because it had to deal with several types of answers that weren't Force of Will, which made it weaker. The excessive number of Griefs is also bad news for this list.

Burn

This is most players' first deck because it is the most budget-friendly deck and can still compete in this format. It isn't strong, but it can perform relatively well on a good day.

Maverick

This deck is still a fair deck in a (a bit less, it's true) unfair format.

These are the 28 decks that, by the numbers I collected, represent around 87% of the format. Legacy is still quite varied, but the Scam kit unified, slightly, part of the metagame, and stopped Combo decks, apart from Reanimator, from dominating the upper tiers.

When it's time to read ban announcements, we always ask ourselves if something in this format will be added to the list of unwelcomed cards, and many players are wondering if it's time for Orcish Bowmasters to be added to that list. Personally, I don't expect this format to change any time soon, and Reanimate is much more problematic than Orcish Bowmasters.

Thank you for reading, and see you next time!