Legacy - Theorycrafting the possible March bannings and unbannings!

Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, my Legacy friends! We have reached one of the favorite times of the year for all Magic players, regardless of what formats they play: the month of an update to the banned and restricted list! The announcement will be at the end of the month (March 31st) and I, like any other player, will give you my opinion on what may happen to our format!

Why are cards banned?

Basically, there are two main factors that direct Wizards to use its power and change which cards are legal in a format: Power Level issues and Play Pattern issues.

The first one is the most common one that leads to cards being banned: Wizards understands that the Metagame is unbalanced because one or more archetypes have a very high win rate and that either the other decks cannot adapt to contain the threat, or that the decks are warping themselves too much - think cards like Pyroblast or graveyard removals in the maindeck - to have any chance of competing.

Cards like Psychic Frog, White Plume Adventurer, Underworld Breach and Oko, Thief of Crowns are examples that were sent to bed without dinner because they distorted the Metagame too much due to their power level.

The second factor is a bit more subjective: in these cases, Wizards' understanding is that the cards themselves make the game play out in a way that is considered unhealthy for a TCG.

An example would be the banning of Sensei's Divining Top, a card that consumed too much game time; Arcum's Astrolabe, which broke one of the basic rules of Legacy: if you want to be greedy with your mana base, prepare to be punished by cards like Wasteland and Blood Moon; or the banning of Unfinity cards for causing logistical issues in tournaments.

There are also cards that combine both factors: they have a high Power Level and also generate situations that Wizards does not consider ideal in terms of game play.

Here we can mention the banning of Vexing Bauble, clearly one of the strongest cards in MH3 and still capable of invalidating one of the main strategies in Legacy by blocking the use of alternative cost and 0-cost spells; or the banning of Grief, which with Reanimate was not only a powerful play, but also extremely frustrating for the player on the end of a double discard on turn 1.

Another example, Wrenn and Six was not only a broken 2-mana Planeswalker, but the possibility of generating an infinite chain of Wasteland with basically no deckbuilding costs involved created a very unpleasant play pattern.

What about Legacy right now?

As for the first factor, there is not much doubt that Reanimator is the strongest deck in the format. But the real heated debate is about whether it is or not a strategy above the desirable Power Level curve to the point of receiving a ban.

On the one hand, back in the days of Psychic Frog, the deck was very difficult to counter, as it attacked very strongly on two fronts. Nowadays, this split-strategy method is unclear because even though most lists try to maintain a "Tempo strategy" with Barrowgoyf, Orcish Bowmasters and/or Murktide Regent, there is no consensus on which version is better.

We see Dimir lists carrying on from the banned version, Monoblack versions with Shallow Grave, hybrid Reanimator lists with Dark Depths and even Rakdos versions with Faithless Looting. So, it's difficult to argue that the deck is way off the mark if there isn't even a consensus among players about the best path forward.

Given Wizards' modus operandi in previous ban windows, if Power Level is the only factor to evaluate changes to the format, I don't expect any bans this month.

Turn 2, What is that?

Picture this: you're interested in Legacy, but since it's an expensive format, you decide to start with a budget deck while you get used to the playstyle and build a more competitive deck. With the cards at your disposal and borrowing some from friends, you manage to build a Burn deck. Round 1, you sit down to play, lose the die roll. You open an excellent hand, quite capable of burning your opponent's life points on turn 3 - which will never happen, because your opponent played a Balustrade Spy on turn 1 and then reanimated a Thassa's Oracle via Dread Return.

Oops, All Spells is a deck that has existed in the format for a long time, but it has always had against it the fact that it is naturally inconsistent. However, this inconsistency was largely bypassed when MH3 offered a huge amount of Lands-that-are-not-Lands: MDFCs, like Boggart Trawler, Sink Into Stupor and Disciple of Freyalise, for example, greatly increased the possibilities of hands capable of comboing on turns 1 or 2. However, this gain for the deck ended up buried under the power of Vexing Bauble. When Bauble was banned, the path was clear and the deck gained a lot of traction, especially on Magic Online, where it is seen as an excellent deck to play one league after another, since the games are usually fast. It can still be seen as a Glass Cannon, a powerful but fragile deck - but in large numbers, it represents a problem for the format.

Formats like Legacy and Vintage are often stigmatized by players of other formats, who claim that they are filled with non-interactive turn-1 combo decks. While this is not true, with decks like Oops becoming more popular, the turn 1 experience ends up becoming more and more common, and ends up pushing away decks without access to Force of Will, since they have virtually no way to answer a deck like this in game 1 if they lose the die roll and don't play first. This is an extremely worrisome play pattern, and its increasing numbers have raised concerns within the Legacy community. I believe that Wizards may take action due to this factor.

If Wizards decides to do something, there are a few different ways they could nerf the deck: removing Thassa's Oracle, for example, would not only make it even more inconsistent - it can still combo by milling the entire deck -, but the combo would now require 3 cards (Azami, Lady of Scrolls, Angel of Glory's Rise, and Laboratory Maniac) instead of just one card, which adds many dead cards for the deck to draw. Banning ThOracle would also decrease the power of other decks like Doomsday and Cephalid Breakfast.

Another card that could have its lifespan shortened would be Dread Return, as it is a key piece of the combo and would require other combinations to guarantee victory, perhaps morphing the deck into a 2-turn combo – milling the entire deck, reshuffling only what is necessary with Memory’s Journey to combo on the way back... or simply going back to basics and playing Goblin Charbelcher. There is also the possibility of banning one of the 2 activators to cut the consistency of the Combo in half.

Either way, Oops offers a Play Pattern that is problematic, and I believe it is on the watchlist.

Bird is the Word

Magic's most hated little bird hasn't taken over Legacy, at least in terms of Power Level. But, just like the aforementioned Sensei's Divining Top, it's a card with a Play Pattern that consumes too much game time, in addition to the potential to generate confusion due to the large number of triggered abilities.

There's a certain irony here, since Wizards' main data analysis reference for Legacy is Magic Online, and there are many players who have said that they don't like playing with the deck on the digital platform because of the number of clicks required to activate and resolve all the abilities, which ends up causing the archetypes with the card to have lower numbers than their potential.

Maybe Wizards will choose not to cut Nadu's time for now because it hasn't exceeded the acceptable Power threshold, but it's another card with an infuriating Play Pattern. I certainly wouldn't be sad to see Nadu far away from me.

Thinking of Unbans - Get Out of Jail free card!

We all like to talk about bans, but this time there's also the opportunity to bring back some cards that have been growing mold on the banned list.

If I were a casino-lover, I would certainly place my chips on an unban that, for me, is almost a guarantee in the next announcement: Hermit Druid is a card that has been banned since Legacy was established as a different format from the old Type 1.5.

Since then, it is clearly a card that no longer compares to things we have available in the format now. Just look at the Oops deck, we even talked about how it already mills your whole deck on turn 1, while the Druid needs to survive an entire opponent's turn - not an easy task for a 2-mana 1/1. What makes me believe in its return was the fact that it was recently reprinted in Innistrad Remastered even though it is currently legal only in Commander and Vintage. I think that our forgotten Druid could make an interesting combination with Urza’s Saga and Lavaspur Boots to activate it on the same turn it is cast.

Another suggestion for unbanning is Mana Drain, again a card that has never seen the light of day in the format. Control decks have struggled in the current meta and perhaps it could offer a differentiator. It was absurd enough to be a mainstay in Vintage 20 years ago, but it probably won't even see play in the current Legacy format. I think it's worth the shot.

Lastly, here is a tidbit about a card that many consider to be wrongly banned in Legacy. DRS - Deathrite Shaman - dominated the format while it was legal, but even so, many players consider it to be a card that would see mild play nowadays - adding a generous dose of answers against graveyard archetypes in the format. Honestly, I don't believe Wizards will ever make this decision.

To conclude this analysis, I don't believe Wizards will ban anything this time. In fact, I would be surprised if something were to be banned. But I can't help but hope that Nadu says goodbye and that the Oops issue gets some attention.

On the other hand, if Hermit Druid isn't unbanned, that would catch me off guard - the signs are strong in that direction. I don't think we'll see any other changes to the list.

That's all for today, a hug full of theories, and see you next time!