Legacy Set Review- Commander Masters

Ever since 2013, when Wizards started releasing products exclusively for Commander, the life of this format and of Legacy got strangely intertwined. Though they are focused on 100-card deck tables, the fact that these cards are valid in Legacy always brings some unseen interaction for tables in the other format.

From True-name Nemesis, which in a 1v1 format becomes a mini Progenitus, to the abuse of Seasoned Dungeoneer and Caves of Chaos Adventurer dungeons, and, more recently, to the invasion of the Riders of Rohan through Forth Eorlingas!, Commander cards have affected the Legacy metagame.

With Commander Masters right in the corner, it is obvious that we will inspect it to see what is interesting to us!

It is a good reminder that, though quite extensive, just 40 of its cards are new and most are reprints, so I'll only focus on the new ones which might interest Legacy. The new cards follow 4 themes: Eldrazi, Slivers, Planeswalkers and Enchantments.

Regal Sliver

The Slivers deck is one of the many successful typals in the format, based on an extensive collection of Lords which grow your team, and based also on the power of Crystalline Sliver to erase their attempts of dealing with your horde of little monsters.

In the midst of it all, there is space for some "Tech Slivers" with abilities to deal with specific situations, such as Telekinetic Sliver or Harmonic Sliver.

Regal Sliver inserts the Monarch emblem in this world, with a very powerful ability against Control decks, allowing the hive to carry on with resources and offering the possibility of creating a lethal buff when you can keep the royalty controlled.

Composer of Spring

Nowadays, there is a significant number of creatures which are also Enchantments playing in Argothian Enchantress decks.

Composer helps accelerate your lands when you don't reach the magic number of 6 enchantments, which isn't hard for this archetype. From them on, the deck can cheat things such as Emrakul, the Aeons Torn for free. There is space for innovation there.

For the Ancestors

Lead the Stampede was a card that saw play in multiple-creature decks in the past such as the mechanic of card refill, similarly to Goblin Ringleader in Goblin decks.

In typal decks, For the Ancestors offers the refilling possibility even more, looking at an extra card and also having flashback for a second wave of card draw. Depending on how the deck is built, on average, this spell draws 3 to 4 cards at once, which isn't at all bad.

Hatchery Sliver

Another way of creating value in the Slivers deck is to simply create multiple copies through this new hive member!

It is important to stress that, though its ability doesn't interact with Aether Vial, it is still necessary to cast the spell to have access to the Replicate ability - you can simply use Vial to play this Sliver at the end of the turn and play the same replicated Muscle Sliver or Sinew Sliver many times for a brutal attack.

Daksteel Monolith

You know what's better than playing 15 mana to have Emrakul, the Aeons Torn's full effect? Paying only 8! Ok, 8 mana is still a lot, but in that context we're talking about a creature which is entirely different from usual in Legacy.

Cloudpost decks are among one of the greatest mana generators in the format, and this mana is used to call to your side the Eldrazi Titans. As the deck is already capable of creating many manas, why then care about wasting space with this artifact?

Well, firstly, as efficient as it is in creating mana, this archetype still has some curves that force you to have an extra turn to summon your creatures - and one turn in Legacy might be too much time. Another aspect is that this deck has access to Eye of Ugin to find the right Eldrazi for each occasion, but it isn't necessarily capable of summoning it on that same turn.

With Darksteel Monolith, it is possible to fit in Eldrazi's triggers way before your opponent is ready, and even over things like Blood Moon, as it is factual to have this deck reach 8 manas even under the reign of the Blood Moon. It is a card which I see as the one which has the bigger potential for Legacy in this set, but it might be that the deck changes a bit, so it has more access to creatures than current lists have.

Calamity of the Titans

All is Dust tends to appear in Eldrazi decks as a way of board clear, and this new spell can also do that. All there is left is seeing if there is space for it in the format.

I'll leave below some list ideas with the new cards. They aren't many and most have as focus a format which is different from Legacy, but there are some very interesting ideas here. See you next time!