For Richer or Poorer: Legacy.






by Sr. Kitty
banner by Iloveatogs edited by Goblinboy and Binary.

There are many formats in the world of Magic. Standard (T2), Extended, Block, Vintage, and Legacy. All have different rules and settings. Vintage is ruled by power, Standard by overpriced cards, and Extended the same. Block comes and goes. Many people are under the impression that you need Fetches, Duals, and other highly priced cards to compete, but this is not true. All you need is someone to show you the light. Decks for richer or poorer.

In this article I will break down decks that don’t require any Fetches, Duals, or over priced cards (+$10); all they need is for someone to find them. And for you people who can spend a little I will also brake down bigger and better versions of the decks. The first thing to do when building a Legacy deck is deciding what kind of deck you want to play. You may be an aggro player and may want to play Stompy Green or Vial Goblins. You may love aggro control like SD Zoo and Madness. A combo player loves decks like Solidarity or Lion’s Eye combo. If your fancy is control, Gro, BBS, or Landstill should do the trick. The point is that Legacy has a deck for you in both your style and your budget.

Many decks start off with the same thing, picking what cards you like and can afford and you can work into the deck. Cards like Mogg Fanatic ($1), Pox ($2), and Isochron Scepter ($3) are great places to start. First we will start off with one of my favorite decks, Fanatic.

Fanatic is much more then what the name states, but fanaticism is the general theme. The way to play this super aggressive deck is to control the board, zapping anything that moves with ground sweepers like Earthquake ($1) and pinpoint removal like Mogg Fanatic ($1). You can burn your opponent away in 4 or 5 turns. For this deck and all the others I will name some of the face cards of the decks and why they are the faces of the decks they inhabbit.
  • Chain Lightning ($6)- At six bucks a pop it is the most pricy card of the deck, but its price is well worth it. This Lightning Bolt wannabe is a powerhouse. And if they want to play chicken with this card, let 'em. It’s only fun that way.
  • Lightning Bolt ($2)- At this price, who can’t afford this? The original instant damage card, as it’s called, is considered one of the most broken Red cards ever made. Even far less powerful versions of this card (Incinerate, Volcanic Hammer, and Lava Spike) are usually tournament playable.
  • Magma Jet ($3)- The "draw" card of the deck. This color-pie-breaking Fifth Dawn uncommon has been used more often than its awesome-Fifth-Dawn-uncommon sister, Eternal Witness.
  • Mogg Fanatic ($1)- the namesake of the deck. It's the only creature ran because it's the only creature you need to run.
After the naming of the face cards will come the "poorer" verson of the selected deck then followed up by the "Richer" half.



Sligh is "the" red deck. Bigger and faster then fanatic but with many of the same face cards. so of the big changes are Grim Lavamancer($7), and Ball Lightning($10). Cursed Scroll($10), Fledgling Dragon($3), and Slith Firewalker ($1) are the only real chance you have of winning a game past turn 6. kills happen much faster at 3 to 4 turns. mainly 4 to 5 but 3 is common with a hand full of Lightning.



Both decks are competive and have been seen all around. Both decks had good showings at Worlds, with Sligh finishing 2nd and 2 Fanatic buids in the top 32.

Before we move on to another color of Magic, I think we need to look at another red deck, or decks. Goblin Sligh and Vial Goblins are two of the top decks in the format. Sligh is a mix of Goblins and instant damage while Vial is 100% creature based. They are different but the same like another deck lower on this list. If you had these decks face each other it would be a blood bath. Little green men as far as the eye can see. Goblins are the most famous and most fear creature type in all of magic. Even new players know the power of Goblins. Filled with many face cards as the deck is a face itself. So I'll skip the famous cards for these two decks becasue we all know them well, all 10 of them.



The current Legacy format doesn't realy have many pure aggro decks which is the best match for this deck. Landstill is a great matchup as well for these burning decks. This deck does have a speed problem in that it kills 5 to 6. If you love Goblins and you love to burn things I would run this, but if you just love to play Goblins, play this:

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The next deck that we'll tackle is Pox. This is a very dynamic deck in that it uses board control, hand control, and a dash of aggro all in one. Pox is designed around, of course, Pox. It's an entertaining deck to run because of its multiple functions.
  • Pox ($2)- The main card of the deck. A win condition. The tools of the tool box. It’s the oil that keeps this deck rolling.
  • Guiltfeeder ($2)- boy does this work great in Pox or what.
  • The Rack ($1)- Another way to win. With Pox, Hypnotic Specter, Duress, and Hymn to Tourach, The Rack is a great steady source of damage if all else goes wrong.
  • Hymn to Tourach ($1.50), Duress ($1)- Discarding powerhouses. These two will clear the way for a clean drop of any of the win conditions. They serve and protect and they do their job well.
Now for the deck itself:



Smallpox, as I like to call it, is a deadly opponent. If you play Smallpox, 4 Sinkhole($20) are a must. turn two LD wrecks every deck but Belcher because count on having land on turn two. Cursed Scroll($10) is a great card for board control and games that go on and on. Pox is a late bloomer deck. Kills happen mainly around 7 to 10 turns. It has the same speed as Standstill but a little more unstable than it's best match up, control.



Pox will someday become the feared archetype that it once was. Not making much noise at Worlds, it's been left in the dust.

Green, by nature, is the color of life in Magic, a creature-heavy color. Green has every style and type of creature in the game, although fliers are rare. This Green Stompy deck shows the mean side of Green. It’s fast, big, and can kill in the blink of a eye. Stompy green plays big cheap creatures like Rogue Elephant ($.50), River Boa ($.50), and Harvest Wurm ($.25), allowing it to kill in only a few turns. 9-land Stompy, as it is also called, is the cheapest deck in this entire article. It’s easy to play and gives you a good feel for playing super aggro. 9-land Stompy will lead you down the road to Red/Green tempo and Goblins, more complicated decks to run. If you are new to Legacy, or Magic for that matter, I would strongly advise you running this deck. If not, run it anyway because it’s pocket change and so much fun to play.
  • Land Grant ($.50)- This cards serves two major functions for this deck. It acts as a mana source, getting one of the deck's nine lands, and it acts as a draw source, cantripping for a land.
  • Rogue Elephant ($.50)/Harvest Wurm ($.50) combo - It’s not the greatest or most well-thought-out combo in Magic, but it does win you games, giving you two heavy pounders very early in the game.
  • Rancor ($2), Briar Shield ($.25), and Bounty of the Hunt ($.50)- These are the icing on the cake. They give you extra damage each turn and make creatures like Rogue Elephant and Vine Dryad even more frightening then they truly are.
  • Winter Orb ($3) - The most fun, and most important, card of the deck. With the uncanny combo of the Rogue and Wurm, Orb is even made better in the deck. The Orb is game versus Standstill and can lock down other decks, or at least slow them down to a crawl.


The better version of this deck may seem nothing like it. It's a upgraded deck and plays aggro like 9-Land Stompy does but uses board control cards like [car=Swords to plowshares]STP[/card] ($3), Fire/Ice($2), and Isochron Scepter($3) to play the waiting game. The amount of duals are ungodly at 12 duals and 8 fetchs, the bulk of the buy for this deck. Without much doubt it's the best built deck in Legacy as fair as builds go. Much like Rock in Extended and Gifts in Standard the deck can deal with anything. If you have the cards I would play this as 5 builds finished in the top 32, one taking 5th.




Pure madness describes the next deck... With the name of this deck being Madness [:rolleyes: - Ed]. One of only few decks to be viable in Extended, Legacy, Vintage, Block, and Standard when it was legal. Madness may be the best aggro/control deck ever devised in that it blends both sides into a perfect hybrid. With aggro creatures like Wild Mongrel and Arrogant Wurm fitting perfectly with control cards like Waterfront Bouncer and Circular Logic, it’s a match made in heaven for you and hell for your opponents. This high-paced deck may be the best to run on this whole list because of its consistency; you never really have a bad draw with this deck (though it does have occasional mana problems).
  • Wild Mongrel($.50)- The face of Madness this little Green creature is. He is the key to the deck. The deck's best discard outlet lets you dump the Madness spells and Flashback spells at a second's thought, at the same time turning himself into a major beefcake and pounding the opponent for 4 or 5 damage a turn.
  • Circular Logic ($2)- With Mongrel being the face of the aggro side of this deck, Circular Logic is the face of the control side of this powerhouse deck. A counterspell that can counter a spell for little more than nothing! One more than nothing to be exact.
  • Deep Analysis ($.50), Roar of the Wurm ($2)- Your basic two-for-ones. Deep gives you direct card advantage, while Roar gains card advantage as long as they aren't packing Terror or similar.
  • Basking Rootwalla ($.50), Arrogant Wurm ($2.50)- The beatsticks. Nothing wrong with a 4/4 for 3, or a 1/1 pumper for nothing.
Now it’s time for me to compose a decklist of these cards.



3cc Madness is wicked if you get everything down to a fine point. It's much harder to play and is unstable, but when you get that killer hand it's lights out turn 3 or 4. Mulligans are common with this build, but still it is very strong at times and you'll learn to love it when you get everything down.




Next, ok what do you want? Instant with a side of Reset, or sorcery with a side of Palinchron? It's your choice. Solidarity is served two different ways: instant or sorcery. they may share a name and some other things, but they are different decks and use different means to victory but the end result is the same: You're thrown right to the ground. One deck uses the power of speed to draw cards and kill during what's not even their turn! How rude of it. The other one uses a mana combo that never empties out and wins on their turn. Their names: S.S- Solidarity sorcery and instant Solidarity. Solidarity is a unit of common intrest. Both of these share many face cards. Let's just see what they do share and don't share.

High Tide ($.25)- The grease that makes the gears of the decks work. This cards allows the massive amout of mana without having many lands. Without High Tide nether of these decks would be any good. 8/9 turn kills. No one would play these decks if High Tide wasn't there.
Brainstorm($.50), Impulse($.50), and Opt ($.25)- The cantrips. These are the cards you use to flush out the peaces to the combo you need: High Tides, Resets, Palinchrons, etc..
Cunning Wish($8) and Mystical Tutor($3)- the tutors that, like the little draws, help get the pieces to the puzzle.
Brain Freeze($1)- The win.

Now for the cards they don't share.
Reset ($20)- The main untapper for instant speed, it may be the hardest card to find on the list. If you can find them, buy them.
Palinchron ($3)- The main piece to the puzzle for S.S.. High Tide and 4 lands and a Palinchron is infinite mana.

The little brother always needs to go first or he will throw a fit, so S.O.S. will be the fist deck under review.



The main difference between the two is speed. S.S. goes off turn 4 or 5 and so does instantly, but they seem much different in pace. Both decks can go off turn 3 but 4 is the turn for which it happens the most. In my testing I have found that Twincast can replace Force of Will($20) in a since that it gives you a little more freedom. Still you should be running both cards.

instand solidarityMagic OnlineOCTGN2ApprenticeBuy These Cards
4 Flooded Strand ($7)
4 Polluted Delta ($9)
10 Island

4 High Tide ($.25)
4 Reset ($20)
3 Turnabout ($1)
2 Brain Freeze ($1)

4 Force of Will ($20)
3 Cunning Wish ($8)

4 Brainstorm ($.50)
4 Impluse ($.50)
4 Twincast ($10)
2 Opt ($.25)
4 Peer Through Depths ($.25)
4 Meditate ($3)




The one color not touched by this article's impure matters is White, which is the main... well... the only color in the next deck. Angel Stompy is an aggro deck, but uses control pieces like Swords and Disenchant. It’s not a true aggro control deck, but comes close to it. The deck is also widely known as WW (White Weenie), but it packs a punch with wins in the 5-7 turn area. The cards of this deck are most of the best cards White has to offer.
  • Exalted Angel ($10)- The most costly card in this deck, it is likely the most important card in the deck. It creates a five-turn clock all on its lonesome and gives you more time to beat down in the process.
  • Swords to Plowshares ($2.50)- the best spot removal ever made. Who cares about life when a big creature like Piledriver or Dryad is gone from the game?
  • Steelshaper's Gift($.50)- A way to access the Equip toolbox run in this fast paced deck.
  • Sword of Fire and Ice($10), Sword of Light and Shadow($4), Empyrial Plate($1), and the other equips: The tools of the toolbox. They give you the means to deal with many different situations that will arise during game play.


Really only one version to run of WW. it's a fun deck to play with but not as good as Goblins, SD Zoo, or Solidarity. Of course, it could be in time.


Fish is a slippery deck to both build and handle. The most hated deck of all Vintage has been popping out in Extended and Legacy. It's built two ways: U/W or U/R, both of which don't come cheaply. Fish is by far the most famous deck of the format.


U/R Fish is the verson I would run, but that's just me becasue I like Red. Works much like U/W. The big diffence is Vial. one counter does the trick. Lava Dart is much better to run in Fish decks then Lightning Bolt. Take a look for yourself:



So as you can both see and read, this article is proof that anyone can play Legacy. If your funds are limited or you're using your father's debit card, Legacy is for you.

All Prices of these cards are based on the number of cards needed to fill the spot and the amout of $. www.findmagiccards.com and www.magicarenal.com are where the prices for the cards came from.

Good night MTGsalvation; I’ll see your replies in the morning.

Sr.Kitty-out.

Side note- The prices on these decks are for every card in the deck. This article is to show you decks list that can be made cheaply compared to other decks and have cards most people have or that are easly obtainable by trade.

lj

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