IntroductionGreetings, Legacy community! I have just gotten back from a short break, but I see a lot has happened to our beloved format!Snuffing Out Candles: Candelabra of TawnosFor instance, WotC announced more bans in the short time I was away. As we mentioned before in this article, the logical thing to do was not ban anything, but we suspected that Candelabra of Tawnos would be banned anyway. That was what happened, but it wasn't such a straightforward decision.What made this call controversial was that the players felt the reasons WotC used to ban this card don't match reality, and the real reason they banned it was something else entirely. Let's see some facts:Candelabra of Tawnos created a rift between the digital meta and the tabletop meta because it is quite expensive in real life but quite cheap on Magic Online. This eventually resulted in the following scenario: online, Trini Tron played 4 copies of it and eventually became a tier-1 deck, but in real life, we rarely saw this list because of how rare Candelabra of Tawnos was. The only exception was events and gatherings that allowed you to use proxies (another controversial topic on its own).Trini Tron eventually became big enough of a problem to be mentioned as a "deck to watch" in the ban announcement before this one. This led us to believe that, if this situation carried on like this, WotC could intervene and do something to this deck.As we mentioned in our last article, it's clear from these last two banlist updates that a lot of time passes after WotC decides to ban something until they actually do it and announce it. You can tell that this is the case because both Oops and Tron were hit when they were already more unpopular and not when they were at their peak. So, even though players felt as if this archetype was under control when it was hit, the truth is that it probably wasn't when WotC analyzed their data and came to their decision. This probably happened weeks before.WotC has pointed out on other occasions that if they can ban something to nerf a deck without pushing it completely out of the format, they will always do it. A few examples are the Undercity Informer ban (which was successful, as Oops is still viable) and the Troll of Khazad-dûm ban (which wasn't successful, as Dimir Reanimator remained oppressive and they had to ban Entomb later on).This led me to believe that WotC would ban Candelabra under the guise of nerfing Trini Tron to deal with the problem that this card created on tabletop, even though the format overall had ways to stop it. After all, if the goal was to simply remove this deck from the equation, the most obvious targets were Planar Nexus and The One Ring.Indeed, Candelabra was removed from circulation, and the rift it created between the tabletop and online metas was forgotten. The matter is, the reasons WotC used for this ban don't match reality. They argued that its effect has the potential to cause problems in the future, but, though it is an important part of the structure that makes this entire strategy work, it is not the most important card in this deck by far.In any case, with or without this ban, Trini Tron would most likely not remain at the top of the meta because a new competitor entered the arena. Someone that can create a lot of problems for this deck.The Fantasticar: Start Your Engines!Marvel Super Heroes is already out. We all expected it to not impact Legacy much, with the exception of Loki, God of Mischief (a pretty good card in Cephalid Breakfast) and maybe Hex Magic and Mole Man, Moloid Master, which could show up in a few decks. This set probably wouldn't be that relevant if it weren't for a singular card:This new legendary Vehicle caused a lot of trouble and completely destabilized a format that had been healthy for a long time. I am, of course, referring to Vintage, which had been stable for years before it was thrown into chaos by this card. Vintage players can barely wait for the next ban window to get rid of it.But this format has everything it needs to turn The Fantasticar into an oppressive threat. Certainly, in Legacy things would be totally different, right?In a way, yes. In Legacy, The Fantasticar is not the big problem it is in Vintage. But let's ignore the "big" part in this expression and focus on "problem". We can't use Mishra's Workshop and Moxes to make sure we can put 4 Constructs into play on turn 1 consistently, but still, there are enough cards to do this quite easily.The first and most obvious home to this card was Affinity, in which Ancient Tomb, Mox Opal, Lotus Petal, and other 0-cost artifacts make summoning 4 tokens merely trivial. If this was the only deck that used this interaction, we could adapt and try to deal with it.But then someone brilliantly realized that they could use this card as an alternative game plan in Doomsday lists (which have now been wonderfully renamed Vroomsday lists!). You can activate this card through Dark Ritual, Lotus Petal, and a 1-mana cantrip or Mishra's Bauble. A deck that was already strong can now attack from an entirely different angle than before, which made it a lot more powerful.That's when Storm lists started using this card as well, as it is ridiculously easy for a deck that wants to play 9 spells and 1 Tendrils of Agony to play the 4 spells The Fantasticar needs. And Mystic Forge lists can do the same with Grim Monolith, Manifold Key, and Lotus Petal. And then someone decided to use this card in the Sewer-veillance Cam combo because this list plays lots of 0-cost cards.And as we were already being creative, some maniacal genius brought Arclight Phoenix back from the depths of its irrelevance and put 4 The Fantasticar in it. Even Reanimator, which centers heavily around its main game plan, started playing this Fantastic 4 vehicle. And certainly a dozen other archetypes will try to get on this new trend. I've personally seen a Sneak n' Show list and a Dimir Tempo list trying it out.BalanceOk, this card is spreading. But is it really problematic? Being able to put 16 damage in play throughout 4 bodies with Haste in the first 3 turns of the game is definitely challenging to deal with if you're the opponent, but it's nothing too different from what we already see in Legacy. For instance, think of a Thassa's Oracle with an empty deck or a lethal Tendrils of Agony in the first few turns, an Atraxa, Grand Unifier when you're still playing your first lands, or a Trinisphere transforming on turn 1 and turning the game into a drawn-out struggle.Indeed, this card is quite strong and gives some decks new ways to win that also avoid their main weaknesses. Imagine defending yourself against a Doomsday only to be trampled by a horde of flying cars. It's the type of card that leaves its mark in the format it sees play and forces players to deal with it.Cards like Force of Vigor, Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, Trinisphere, and even Abolish will probably gain space because they're ways to prevent Fantasticar from exploding too early. So, in terms of power level alone, we can say it is still too early to tell where this card sits in the meta and whether it can be absorbed and assimilated as the days go on.The real issue this card is creating is another altogether, and I will use a quote from another superhero franchise to explain it (ironically): Syndrome's villanous plan is to give everyone the ability to use superpowers, and when everyone is super, no one will be. Cards that are broken in Legacy usually find a niche and turn that into an unbeatable threat. That's not what The Fantasticar does.It can fit in many decks with a bit of effort, as I mentioned above, and many archetypes have really enjoyed using Construct tokens. When a huge number of decks uses the same strategy, the format becomes less diverse, though. And, when the format is a question of who can transform their car first, many strategies simply can't see any play. Furthermore, the fact this card is an artifact and artifact support is widely available for any strategy means that, with very little effort, any deck can use it.This reminds me of another situation we faced in Legacy, when one card could see play in all strategies and practically all decks used 4 copies of it. Back then, every play was the same because of a single card: Mental Misstep. Any deck could simply pay 2 life to counter a 1-cost spell, including other Mental Missteps, and matches turned very boring very quickly. That's the risk The Fantasticar presents, and that's why I believe it probably won't see play in Legacy for much longer.Final WordsAccording to the dev team, The Fantasticar should cost 4 mana. It makes a lot of sense that the Fantastic 4 card full of number 4s in its text would cost 4 mana, but they reduced it to 3 to make it more viable. We've heard this story before: late alterations to cards that weren't tested out that much often lead to problems down the line. If you're looking for an example, look no further than Skullclamp and Nadu, Winged Wisdom.The Fantasticar managed to break Vintage in a way only Vexing Bauble did in modern times, and, though it is a lot easier to digest in Legacy, it makes many decks repetitive... Imagine playing a tournament and facing 5 different archetypes throughout 5 rounds, but all your matches are decided by whoever managed to put their cars in play first. It doesn't seem all that fun.What do you think? Tell us your thoughts in our comment section below.Thank you for reading, and see you next time!
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