For anyone who loves playing with combo decks, Legacy offers a wide variety of strong options. Whether you want to churn through your whole deck with Nadu, Winged Wisdom or cast a lethal Tendrils of Agony, there’s a unique approach to fit anyone’s preferences.
The format’s vast card pool also opens the door for players to maximize old, forgotten designs and unique Commander cards that haven’t seen the light of day in Constructed. Just yesterday, a unique Dimir shell 5-0d a Legacy League, putting the power of some underrated creatures on full display.
Closing Games with Forgotten Threats
One of this deck’s avenues to victory rests on the shoulders of Vesuvan Drifter and Keen Duelist, two creatures that have seen minimal Constructed play up to this point. Neither creature is all that impressive on its own, but they both heavily reward you for having an enormous haymaker on the top of your deck.
Fortunately, this list comes prepared with a full playset of Emrakul, the Aeon’s Torn in the mix. Copying Emrakul and attacking or forcing your opponent to lose 15 life in one go will usually be enough to win the game. Even if you can’t find Emrakul, cloning Archon of Cruelty and decimating the opponent’s board or copying Griselbrand and drawing a ton of cards will put you at a near-insurmountable advantage.
In order to help make this plan more consistent, this deck features a multitude of ways to manipulate the top cards of your library. Lim-Dul’s Vault is your strongest option in this department, since the complicated tutor is guaranteed to set up your win conditions as long as you have some extra life to spare. Also, at two mana, Diabolic Vision isn’t quite as reliable, but it makes up for this by replacing itself, so you don’t fall behind on resources.
In the event you draw your huge Eldrazi naturally, there’s no need to panic, since Brainstorm can put it right back on top of your deck. Plus, if you’re ever dissatisfied with the top of your library after casting any of these spells, your Fetchlands provide a fresh reset on a whim.
As interesting as this game plan is, though, it can be risky against removal-heavy decks. Going through the efforts of tutoring up Emrakul to the top of your deck only for Duelist to die before you untap can feel demoralizing. Luckily, this shell has another approach that doesn’t get disrupted by Fatal Push.
Show and Tell Package
This archetype is already focused heavily on maximizing Emrakul, so it’s natural for the list to incorporate a full playset of Show and Tell here to provide a separate path for glory. This sorcery has been a well-established combo piece in Legacy for many years, and that doesn’t seem to be changing anytime soon. Despite the sorcery’s symmetrical effect, most decks will struggle to beat a resilient 15/15 once it’s cheated into play.
This deck even goes as far as to utilize three copies of Omniscience, which, when paired with the Eldrazi makes it much easier to beat Karakas. Lorien Revealed and Sea Gate Restoration do a great job digging for one of your fatties if you don’t have one lined up.
This road definitely leads to your most explosive draws, especially when you have Chrome Mox or Ancient Tomb in your opening hand. Add in Force of Will or Thoughtseize to push your combo forward, and you’re in great shape.
Tradeoffs
What makes this deck such a nuisance to fight against is that even though your cheap creatures and Show and Tell both synergize with your haymakers, they require completely different answers to beat. Classic Sneak and Show and Omni-Tell decklists can be vulnerable to Containment Priest or Force of Negation, but Duelist and Drifter completely sidestep these hate pieces. Nonetheless, that doesn’t mean there aren’t tradeoffs for constructing your deck this way.
One of this list’s biggest weaknesses is simply its consistency. By running so many win conditions, you have less room for card selection all-stars like Ponder or Stock Up. As a result, you’re bound to have games where you draw your cheap creatures alongside Show and Tell and have nothing to pair with it. In a similar vein, drawing the worse half of your deck, such as all of your small creatures against an opposing hand of Fatal Pushes, can have dire consequences.
Given that the most popular deck in the format, Dimir Reanimator, doesn’t typically run maindeck removal, however, going this direction does have a lot of appeal. Even if it isn’t a top-tier option, this deck is still capable of competing, and playing it can be a ton of fun. At the end of the day, it’s cool to see unexpected standouts like Duelist and Vault make a splash in such a high-powered environment.
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