Nick Gil – May Event Winner

Name: Nick Gil

# of Legacy Series Events Played:

I’ve played in the January event at PCP, February event at Crusader’s Retreat, May event at Amazing Discoveries (win), and the August event at Play or Draw

AZMP Legacy Top 8s:

I only Top 8ed the May event, which I won, but I got 10th at Play or Draw, and 14th in my first Legacy tournament at the January event at PCP

Non-AZMP MTG Accomplishments:

I’ve Top 8-ed a Standard PTQ, and I’ve cashed at an SCG Open

Favorite Legacy Deck Of All Time:

Unsurprisingly, my favorite deck is Ad Nauseam-Tendrils. It has the best cantrips, has a streamlined plan of attack (none of that silly red wish nonsense), and has been tons of fun to try to find different routes to combo off from.

What about Legacy draws you to the format? What is the best part about playing Legacy?

Legacy is my format of choice because of all the different ways that I’ve played Magic, legacy is the only one where I truly feel like the master of my own destiny. In Legacy, the importance of every single action cannot be overstated. From your land drop, to your timing on spells, to bluffing outs, to responding a counter being placed on an AEther Vial, all of these things can make or break a game, and by that virtue any game is winnable. That simply isn’t true in other formats.

In your opinion, how has the Legacy metagame evolved over the Series?

While I didn’t get to make it to as many of the events as possible (I tried to talk my four car-mates into driving up to the July event after driving all night from the New Mexico PTQ), but in my experience the field started out pretty evenly distributed and ended pretty evenly distributed. I felt like there were more creature based decks in the later months than the early months, but not too noticeably

What affected your deck choice from event to event?

Mostly it was card availability, as I had to borrow cards from a friend for the January and February events. However, even if I had all the decks in the format, I would still have played the same deck throughout since I am still trying to build a report with a deck and learn about the metagame. I chose to build towards Storm because I had always felt that eternal formats like legacy and vintage were the realm of spells as opposed to creatues, and Storm was the spell-iest deck I knew (High Tide close 2nd). Coincidentally after choosing storm as my deck of choice I realized that lent me to the awesome font of knowledge that is Adam Prosak. Adam, a local superstar, wrote a series of articles while he was still playing competitively on the SCG circuit and made himself available on social media as well, so I would just like to give major props to the time and effort he put in. Standing on the shoulders of giants and all that.

What do you think is the most overrated deck for the Championships?

Delver decks. Coming into Legacy with no experience, I thought I was gonna be playing against delver decks every other round. After playing a couple of matches against it, I feel like they have delver openings, which can be difficult to beat, but the openings when they don’t have an early threat, it’s a walk in the park

What do you think is the most underrated deck for the Championships?

Sneak and Show. Haven’t played it in the AZMP series yet, and I’m hoping to keep it that way.

Legacy can be a scary format for those who are not intimately familiar with all of the cards. What advice would you recommend to novice Legacy players playing in the Championship?

Be proactive. when deciding which deck to play in your first tournament, chose a deck that has a clear plan of attack, and know how to adapt that plan to respond to any given situation. A friend of mine started playing legacy at the same time I did, but he chose Miracles as his first deck and I feel that reactive decks require a much deeper knowledge of the format to do well with. Storm on the other hand doesn’t care what the opponent is doing, the plan stays the same. Count. To. Ten.

Lastly, just wanted to give one last thank you to the Abong brothers for making this whole thing possible. I plan on playing in the 2015 season as much, if not more than the 2014 season

Jason Abong – Legacy Series Organizer

Name: Jason Abong

# of Legacy Series Events Played:

Zero

AZMP Legacy Top 8s:

Zero!

Non-AZMP MTG Accomplishments:

• Three SCG Open Legacy Top 8s, countless SCG Legacy Open cashes
• Top 64 GP Denver
• Spring SCG States Top 8
• Punting and opponent conceding to me anyway…on camera

Favorite Legacy Deck Of All Time:

Zoo (first true Legacy deck I ever built) & RUG Delver

What about Legacy draws you to the format? What is the best part about playing Legacy?

I love the complexity of the format. It really rewards knowing the very little things – knowing the right time to Brainstorm, knowing the right time to hold up a counterspell, or even just knowing the right time to crack a fetchland. It’s a great feeling to leverage an opponent’s slight misstep into a massive advantage, and it can happen often in Legacy.

In your opinion, how has the Legacy metagame evolved over the Series?

Eidolon of the Great Revel changed Burn in a huge way. Burn is no longer just a budget deck – it’s a legitimate (arguable Tier 1) Legacy deck since it has game against combo now. We saw a huge decline in a couple of decks over the months: DeathBlade has seen nearly no play in the past three or so Legacy Series Events, for example. Whether the trend continues into the Championship remains to be seen.

What affected your deck choice from event to event?

N/A

What do you think is the most overrated deck for the Championships?

Blood Moon decks. I think there is a significant portion of our metagame that isn’t affected by it, so trying to rely on it to steal wins is probably not going to be a great idea.

What do you think is the most underrated deck for the Championships?

12-Post seems like a great deck. It seems like a lot of aspects of the deck are great against the popular decks here in Arizona. The cost of the Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale is going to restrict this deck’s appearance though.

Legacy can be a scary format for those who are not intimately familiar with all of the cards. What advice would you recommend to novice Legacy players playing in the Championship?

It’ll be impossible to know the intricacies of each deck in the format, but I would get familiar with the overall game plans of the more popular decks. It’s going to help with how you are going to pace your game if, for example, the deck typically wins turn 3 versus turn 7.

Kai Ruan – April Event Winner

Name: Kai Ruan

# of Legacy Series Events Played:

8

AZMP Legacy Top 8s:

2, February, April

Non-AZMP MTG Accomplishments:

Asked to see opponent’s Scrubland on camera at SCG Cincinnati, having never seen one before.

Favorite Legacy Deck Of All Time:

Zoo with maindeck Sulfuric Vortex

What about Legacy draws you to the format? What is the best part about playing Legacy?

Legacy is the most diverse format I’ve had the pleasure of playing. The depth of the card pool allows for countless viable strategies, and exceptionally powerful sideboard options make for interactive post-board games, even against the linear combo decks (i.e. Trinisphere vs Storm). Legacy rewards spell sequencing and deck construction more than other formats.

In your opinion, how has the Legacy metagame evolved over the Series?

The printing of Eidolon of the Great Revel catapulted Burn from relative obscurity into one of the most played decks. The various BG/x decks seem to have grown less popular over the course of the series, giving way to more combo and Miracles decks.

What affected your deck choice from event to event?

I wanted to explore different strategies and color combinations, so I tried to play a different deck each time.

What do you think is the most overrated deck for the Championships?

UWr Miracles.

What do you think is the most underrated deck for the Championships?

Monored Sneak Attack.

Legacy can be a scary format for those who are not intimately familiar with all of the cards. What advice would you recommend to novice Legacy players playing in the Championship?

Play at a comfortable pace. Don’t be afraid to ask judges about card interactions or for oracle text. When in doubt, Lightning Bolt always goes to the face.

William Leach – February Event Top 8

Name: William Leach

# of Legacy Series Events Played:

8

AZMP Legacy Top 8s:

Top 4’ed Febuary with Jund, Lost to UWR Delver

Non-AZMP MTG Accomplishments:

2^nd place at FNM…once.

Favorite Legacy Deck Of All Time:

Jund or Shardless, defiantly a Bayou Tarmogoyf deck.

What about Legacy draws you to the format? What is the best part about playing Legacy?

Legacy is a format with a lot of cool interactions, a varied field, and all the extremes of Magic. It also rewards tight play in the first couple of turns more than most formats which is nice. That also means I get blown out by combo a lot.

In your opinion, how has the Legacy metagame evolved over the Series?

I feel like locally the series started out with a lot of UWR Delver, Elves, Death and Taxes, and Dark Depths decks across the shops with Burn and ANT being scattered behind. Since then I feel like a lot of those deck (Except Burn) have declined with an increase of Miracles and Sneak and Show. But a lot of the events have felt like a varied field for the most part.

What affected your deck choice from event to event?

I’ve played 3 decks across the series. Scapewish Nic-Fit which has mostly been for fun after playing against rooms full of fair magic (The next tournament is always very degenerate and I lose to combo decks lesson learned). Jund which was my main stay in the format, that I jammed for a while before getting tired of losing to combo (looking at you Alex) and wanted to cast Force of Will and Brainstorm and have since been playing a lot of Shardless BUG.

What do you think is the most overrated deck for the Championships?

UWR Delver, it’s a deck I’ve never really been impressed with, although I’m not a fan of the flying bug to begin with.

What do you think is the most underrated deck for the Championships?

With the recent rise of Miracles and Show and Tell, I think 12Post could do some work if played right. I thought about it, but decks harder to play than it looks. I’ll just stick to playing Goyf or Burning Wish, who knows?

Legacy can be a scary format for those who are not intimately familiar with all of the cards. What advice would you recommend to novice Legacy players playing in the Championship?

Playing proactive instead of reactive decks. Trying to react to a deck you don’t understand is a lot harder than trying to kill a deck quickly. I’ve seen a lot of newer players try and pick up Miracles pretty new to the format and not be able to react appropriately and throw away winnable games.