Spoiler Highlight: The Tale of Tamiyo on Pioneer

Izzet Phoenix is ​​the best deck in Pioneer. Even when it isn't, it ends up becoming one in the long run because its mix of efficient cantrips, threats that are difficult to remove without dedicated hate, and high flexibility that only a Turbo Xerox strategy allows adapting it to almost any Metagame. It is the safe choice in the format and, consequently, the most dangerous when it receives new additions capable of impacting its list.

It took less than an hour after the reveal of Duskmourn's only saga for my WhatsApp and Discord groups to fill up with people speculating about its usage in Izzet Phoenix - The Tale of Tamiyo has explosive potential in the archetype, but it is also very conditional.

In the past, players would dismiss the possibility of a Saga playing in the deck when not even Fable of the Mirror-Breaker was enough. But now, with Proft's Eidetic Memory showing that Izzet Phoenix can, in fact, use cards other than instants and sorceries, all it takes is a more powerful interaction for the speculations to start.

In this article, we delve into The Tale of Tamiyo and how it may - or may not - impact Pioneer!

The Tale of Tamiyo is a four-chapter saga whose first three repeat the same ability. Before talking about them, I'll point out an addendum that I've seen many players misinterpret when reading the card: you need to pay the mana costs of the cards exiled with the last ability, and you can only cast them on the moment they are copied. You can't play them for the rest of the turn or game and, although it's common for costs not to be paid for similar effects, you do need to pay to play Consider.

So, the real attraction of the new saga for Pioneer is in the first ability: milling two cards with chances to repeat the process has the potential to generate card advantage quickly in the right lists. For example, when you mill two cards with same types, you get a draw and repeat the process - even if you don't have the luck or planning to repeat the effect twice, it has already netted some positive value if your list has interactions with the graveyard.

The problem is when you don't meet this requirement. In its ETB, The Tale of Tamiyo becomes a mill 2 for with aftereffects considered slow when compared to Picklock Prankster or Otherworldly Gaze, and the deckbuilding restrictions to make it work can be too expensive even for lists that share many card types.

But after all, would the new saga have the potential in the best Pioneer deck today? mill 2 and draw 1 is a relevant effect for the archetype and similar to Thought Scour, which is not available in the format, but was a staple of the archetype when it existed in Modern. The problem lies in the conditions needed to extract value and the number of turns it needs to extend over.

Today, Izzet Phoenix's numbers include 12 creatures, 20 instants, 8 sorceries, and 19 lands. With occasional slots belonging to two enchantments (Proft's Eidetic Memory) or two more spells (Temporal Trespass and Galvanic Iteration) or two Planewalkers (Ashiok, Dream Render). In the best-case scenario, 2/3 of the deck shares types: lands and instants - but they don't share with each other.

In the ideal scenario, a player wants to mill two lands or instants, draw a spell, and then mill an Arclight Phoenix (let's pretend that milling two phoenixes in one trigger doesn't exist because the odds are 0.3%). Anything after that is a profit and shouldn't be considered possible without heavier concessions. I prefer to leave the more complex math to those who better understand the subject, but according to a hypergeometric calculator, the average chance of hitting with The Tale of Tamiyo on Izzet Phoenix can vary between 9 and 16% per trigger, with an average of one hit every seven triggers in the most optimistic result.

The real value, then, is what you extract from the graveyard. The new saga feeds Treasure Cruise with the bonus of potential draws over the course of turns. If you get to the fourth chapter, alone, it can trigger any number of Arclight Phoenix in your graveyard and generate an absurd amount of value - but it is counter-interactive with Treasure Cruise and Delve since you want to prepare a very explosive turn with it.

And what is it competing with?

The main slots that The Tale of Tamiyo could occupy are those of Proft’s Eidetic Memory and Picklock Prankster. In Proft's case, both perform different functions: Eidetic Memory wants to turn any creature into threat, it is a very fast clock increase and difficult to deal with for Midranges. Picklock Prankster is a strong draw and mill effect for Pioneer coupled with a body that blocks Aggro well.

The Tale of Tamiyo's mana value is more comparable to cards that don't see play in Izzet Phoenix. For example, Fable of the Mirror-Breaker has the same cost in colors that the deck can support and has never appeared in lists despite the advantages it provides in, including, feeding Treasure Cruise and putting Arclight Phoenix into the graveyard while Founding the Third Path has similar functions and has also never appeared in the archetype.

Therefore, given the circumstances, inconsistency and competition, the hype around the new saga seems exaggerated and should not last long as the days go by and after the release of Duskmourn.

It's hard to imagine a list today where the saga fits. We could point to interactions with other graveyard-based archetypes, especially Neoform with Delve to get Atraxa, Grand Unifier. But not only are those decks low in the Metagame, but three mana and four cycles to get going is too much time for a combo that ideally wants to happen between turns three and four.

Jeskai Ascendancy could have some use in very specific situations, but it's also another deck that's disappeared since the ban on Expressive Iteration. Other options involve combos with Rona, Herald of Invasion in lists focused on legendary cards that can take advantage of the extra draws and mill with Emry, Lurker of the Loch and maybe even reuse cards like Retraction Helix in the fourth chapter.

Usually, my highlights involve talking about cards that are very important and/or have the potential to make a difference in their respective Metagames, and the preview season is always accompanied by hype in the various Magic formats.

The Tale of Tamiyo was one of the rare cases in which I felt compelled to say that something probably won't work, perhaps the only one this season, but not the last in my analysis of the game. Hype is natural and, in the same way, it is also natural for it to take time to understand the potential of each card - I didn't put any expectations on Proft's Eidetic Memory until Phoenix players started using the enchantment on MTGArena.

In the end, speculation is part of the fun. Some people like to feel the hype building, while others like to keep their expectations realistic about what might happen when the new set comes out - I decided to go with the latter this time, but it's also possible to be entirely wrong about the new enchantment in the same way I was with, for example, Guide of Souls in Modern Horizons 3.

Thanks for reading!