Pioneer: 7 Decks with Final Fantasy to Try Out!

The first expansion in the Universes Beyond series to be legal in all formats is coming. Final Fantasy brings the vast universe of the sixteen mainline games of the anthology series to Magic: The Gathering cards and, consequently, to the tables of competitive formats.

An expansion with mechanics around equipment, legends, and almost a hundred legendary creatures with distinct abilities brings the potential to build various lists and decks in Magic, and while they will have the challenge of proving their potential against the high-power level of the best archetypes, they also open space for innovation.

In this article, we present seven decks with Final Fantasy cards for the Pioneer format, based on the main highlights of the set for the Metagame, or on pieces that already fit naturally into existing strategies of the format!

Azorius Cloud Hammer Time

Final Fantasy brought several cards that interact with equipment, including a half-Stoneforge Mystic with Cloud, Midgar Mercenary and effects to bypass equip costs, such as the new Stolen Uniform, whose text allows targeting equipments you control. Added to the already available shell of Sigarda’s Aid and Colossus Hammer, it’s a good time to explore Hammer Time in Pioneer again.

This version runs a small toolbox of equipment with Cloud that includes Lost Jitte, whose triggers are doubled with the new card and allow, for example, untapping two lands in the turn, technically making it a kind of free ramp in the list. In addition to this, we also have the usual package of Swiftfoot Boots (a little better than Lavaspur Boots in this version), Shadowspear and also Cryptic Coat as an attrition tool. It is worth mentioning that, despite it not having an equip cost, Stolen Uniform can attach Cryptic Coat to a creature.

In addition to the two main lines, we also have Kemba, Kha Enduring as another means of attaching Colossus Hammer, and to better take advantage of the synergy between them, a copy of Lion Sash guarantees a Cat that we can search for with Cloud, Midgar Mercenary.

Boros Raubahn Hammer Time

Raubahn, Bull of Ala Mhigo was one of our highlights of the preview season for the potential it offers in Hammer Time strategies, where it allows attaching Colossus Hammer to a creature each combat. If attached to him, Raubahn also protects itself from most spot removals, since it's unlikely that your opponent will want to Fatal Push him and take 12 damage in the process.

The inclusion of red opens up space for other card categories in the Cloud, Midgar Mercenary toolbox: Cori-Steel Cutter takes advantage of the low-cost spell shell we have to create tokens every turn, while Chainsaw is a removal that we can look for with the new card, or with Kellan, the Fae-Blooded — another reason to choose red over blue.

Balthier and Fran Vehicles

Gruul Vehicles was once one of Pioneer's main competitors, but it lost its place as the format got faster, and even the unban of Smuggler's Copter didn't put it back in the spotlight. Still, Balthier and Fran seem tailored specifically for this archetype, offering the opportunity for an extra combat every turn with them.

Getting the most out of them isn't a difficult task: most of the vehicles historically used by the deck already have an ETB effect and attack when they enter, so each extra combat symbolizes another trigger we trigger from it for looting with Smuggler's Copter, extra tokens with Esika's Chariot, or more board damage with Skysovereign, Consul Flagship.

It doesn't seem like the new addition will solve Gruul Vehicles' main problem of being a slower Aggro than Prowess lists and a less resilient Midrange for long games than Rakdos or Mono Black, but perhaps Final Fantasy XII's most famous duo will give a new lease of life for players to try new ideas with this strategy.

Golgari Sephiroth

Sephiroth, Fabled SOLDIER is one of the most powerful cards in the set and fits into Sacrifice decks with ease. However, it competes for space with Mayhem Devil in Pioneer, and it seems hard to imagine it permanently replacing a historic Jund Food staple.

However, Golgari versions do exist and can find in Sephiroth the perfect mix between an enabler for games where the Ygra, Eater of All combo takes too long or becomes ineffective, and an impossible win condition to remove once he creates an Emblem.

Another card that deserves some testing in these low-mana attrition strategies is Dark Confidant. In the current Pioneer, Unholy Annex seems like the ideal tool for black Midranges, and it has a horrible combo with Confidant — revealing an Annex will deal eight damage to its controller, far from ideal for a Metagame as aggressive as the current one — so Food lists that require some source of card advantage can get more value out of it on many fronts.

Temur Chocobo Analyst

Traveling Chocobo doubles all Landfall triggers in the game, which includes cards like Lotus Cobra and Nissa, Ascended Animist for two mana per land that comes into play, and Omnath, Locus of the Roil or Omnath, Locus of Creation can do some crazy things with everyone's favorite bird on the board, but these were avoided so as not to disrupt the list's main game plan.

The original plan was to make a Tifa Lockhart list with Traveling Chocobo, but that list felt too linear and vulnerable to all categories of removal, so we merged Temur Analyst with the new card to double the triggers of all the cards that the archetype already uses naturally. With each doubled ETB, Lotus Cobra and Nissa, Ascended Animist can generate such an absurd amount of mana along with Aftermath Analyst and Lumra, Bellow of the Woods that Worldsoul’s Rage will normally be for lethal damage.

These doubled triggers also make it easier to cast Virtue of Strength, which generates triple mana with each tapped land, as well as Dragonback Assault, which functions as a sweeper and win condition by creating dragon tokens with lands.

Jeskai Lightning Soldiers

Lightning, Army of One is probably the best card for go wide decks in Final Fantasy. Its ability to double any damage when dealing combat damage makes it an ideal staple for Aggro, whether creature-based or damage-based with Boros Charm and Play with Fire — in this list, we try to get the most out of her in a Soldier list.

The biggest advantage for this creature type in the format today is that there are many Soldiers who are also Human, allowing interactions with Thalia’s Lieutenant at the same time, having many Soldiers in play enables Harbin, Vanguard Aviator, which provides evasion for all of your creatures.

Combined with the interactions and power boost offered in this shell, Lightning, Army of One makes it harder for the opponent to not let its damage get through without putting plenty of blockers in front, which is counterintuitive to what we need to do when playing against go wide decks.

I don't think this list will be competitive. Today, Red Aggro, in general, is much faster and the amount of cheap interactions they force into the Metagame makes it harder for lists like Convoke, Soldiers, or Humans to have space, but it is a good starting point for Lightning.

Five-Color Final Fantasy Legends

This is a personal project that I intend to work on as the set proves its worth. Final Fantasy x Magic is my dream collaboration, and it is inevitable that I want to make the most of its iconic cards and characters in some format, and the doors for that may be in Five Color Legends.

Not unlike the list above, this is a Humans with Bonuses deck. In this case, the fact that all the creatures on the list are legendary and therefore interact with cards like General’s Enforcer, Serah Farron, and Jodah, the Unifier to create a synergistic list around creatures that have relevant individual abilities while benefiting from a few key cards.

The selection of legendary creatures may change from version to version, but in this one we aim to maintain a balance between the creatures with the greatest isolated potential in Final Fantasy, excluding cards that require a specific shell, such as Cloud, Midgar Mercenary, Sephiroth, Fabled SOLDIER or Emet-Selch, Unsundered, and mixing in some of the best legendary creatures we have in Pioneer for this type of strategy.

It's probably not the most competitive deck ever, but it seems like a perfect entry into the format if you, like me, would like to get the most out of Final Fantasy cards on the Magic tables.

That's all for today!

If you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment!

Thanks for reading!