Aether Vial, or Buy This Format

If you have ever thought about playing Legacy and said, “Nah, that format isn’t for me. It costs too much,” read this article.

If you have ever thought about playing Legacy and said, “It’s just another form of Vintage, right? Turn 2 kills and Counterbalance locks
and people playing their $150 lands printed fifteen years ago, right? Sounds like not that much fun,” read this article.

If you have ever thought about playing Legacy and said, “But I don’t know the first thing about that format! People tell me that I can play
anything, but I don’t even know where to start,” start here.

I am not promising you that you’ll spend less on a Legacy deck than on a Standard deck. What I am promising you is that for the same money you can
spend on one playset of Jace, the Mind Sculptors, your cards will hold value better, be more interesting to play, and be more broadly applicable to a
tournament format in a few years. Let me tell you about why right now is the best time to get into Legacy.

At this very moment, the best card in Legacy costs eleven dollars and can go into any color of deck. It’s a fundamentally unfair card from a set
released seven years ago that has a tremendous amount of flexibility inherent in its design. If you invest in four of them — you know, instead of
buying a single Primeval Titan — you’ll own one of the cornerstones of the format and be able to start building any of several different decks.

Aether Vial is the best card in Legacy right now.

It swept the Top 4 of the SCG Kansas City Legacy Open and put five decks in the Top 8.

Goblins

Chris Osinski

1st Place at Star City Games Legacy Open on 01-09-2011

Legacy

Creatures (34)

Lands (22)

Spells (4)

4 Aether Vial

Sideboard

U/B Merfolk

Corbin Hosler

2nd Place at Star City Games Legacy Open on 01-09-2011

Legacy

Creatures (20)

Lands (21)

Spells (19)

Sideboard

R/B Goblins

Julian Booher

3rd Place at Star City Games Legacy Open on 01-09-2011

Legacy

Creatures (29)

Lands (24)

Spells (7)

4 Aether Vial
3 Warren Weirding

Sideboard

Green and Taxes

Lewis Laskin

4th Place at Star City Games Legacy Open on 01-09-2011

Legacy

Lands (21)

Spells (19)

Sideboard

For all the talk of a “wide open” metagame that was supposed to exist after Survival got banned, Legacy is a format that looks to be
remarkably dominated by Aether Vial. Forget Force of Will and Tropical Island; Aether Vial is where it’s at. To help you better understand how
Aether Vial affects Legacy as a format, I’m going to go through the same sort of card- and deck-based breakdown of Aether Vial as I did with Stifle and Wasteland.

Aether Vial is a flagship artifact. It requires a deck built to abuse its capabilities. Generally, the card provides you with a lot of “implied
mana” that “casts” your creatures at instant speed and makes them uncounterable. What I mean by “implied mana” is that
the card doesn’t actually make mana, but if you’re using it to put a Merrow Reejerey into play, it implies the generation of 2U: a single
activation is akin to a Black Lotus!

The thing is this Black Lotus doesn’t sacrifice. Far from it. It untaps and is ready to go next turn, whether that means on your own combat step,
on their combat step, or at the end of their turn.

Furthermore, Aether Vial lets you get some sort of value out of your creatures before they get swept up in a Firespout or become Innocent Blood.
Sorcery-speed sweepers have become commonplace in blue Counterbalance decks, and Aether Vial not only blanks Counterbalance’s ability to stop
creatures but also drastically weakens Firespout.

This seems like a pretty good deal so far. So what kinds of decks want an Aether Vial? In short:

1.Â Â Â Â Â a heavily creature-based deck with

2.Â Â Â Â Â minimally varying mana costs that

3.Â Â Â Â Â trend toward two- and three-cost creatures and a

4.Â Â Â Â Â multifunctional mana base to take advantage of the implied mana that Vial generates.

At first glance, you might think “hey, that’s a pretty good description of every single aggressive deck I’ve ever laid eyes on! Vial goes in
aggro! Time to stop reading.”

Well, not really.

Not all the best creature decks in Legacy play Aether Vial — we need look no further than Zoo to find a top-tier aggressive strategy that eschews
the one-mana artifact. If we look at why Zoo wouldn’t want Aether Vials, we begin to understand the complexity of Aether Vial decks in Legacy.

Zoo doesn’t want Aether Vial for a few reasons. The first reason is that its mana curve is clustered primarily around the one-drop slot, meaning that
Aether Vial is not going to be better than a land a lot of the time. We want to live the Black Lotus-every-turn dream, not the painless-Talisman of
Impulse-dream. If the best we’re doing is making a free Wild Nacatl, Aether Vial doesn’t really justify its inclusion.

The second reason why Zoo doesn’t want Aether Vial is that it has a very demanding mana base. It wants access to green, white, and occasionally
red on turn 1, access to GW and at least one Mountain on turn 2, and at least ten fetchlands to maximize Grim Lavamancers and Steppe Lynxes. There
isn’t really room for the Mutavaults of Merfolk or the Rishadan Ports of Goblins. It has recently begun to add 2-3 Wastelands — which
Knight of the Reliquary can search up — as a way to combat multicolor mana bases trying to control games with Firespout and Swords to Plowshares.

The third reason why Zoo doesn’t want Aether Vial is that the deck is a collection of overpowered creatures and burn spells: Steppe Lynx is a 4/5
attacker for the two turns that it matters the most, Grim Lavamancer is a Swiss Army knife of a creature; Wild Nacatl is a 3/3 for one; Tarmogoyf is
Tarmogoyf, and so on. What makes objectively powerful decks worth playing is that their power level is obvious. That is, the cards are undercosted for
what they do, and that’s why they’re “good.” If you’re trying to do objectively overpowered things, you’ll always be spending
less mana on those things. What Aether Vial does best is save you mana. If you’re already saving mana by just playing the cheapest and most
efficient creatures, though, you won’t save that much mana.

To conclude, Zoo’s curve isn’t high enough to make Aether Vial worthwhile, and its demanding mana base means that it wouldn’t be able
to abuse having the extra untapped mana it’s “saving” with Aether Vial. So why is Aether Vial an incredible card? Well, it turns out
it’s pretty ridiculous at maximizing different angles of synergy.

By synergy, I mean the interaction between Goblin Ringleader and Goblin Matron. Or between Coralhelm Commander and Silvergill Adept. On their surfaces,
I have just named a four-mana 2/2, a three-mana 1/1, a two-mana 2/2, and a two-mana 2/1. Those stats are terrible in Limited, let alone Legacy.
However, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Goblins, for instance, arguably has more card advantage built into the deck than any other
Legacy deck may lay claim to. Of course, the value of each of those cards is debatable, as most people would be unwilling to pay one mana for a 1/1
creature in an aggressive deck. If that 1/1 were to pretend to be Elvish Piper every time it connected with the opponent’s face, however, we might think
differently about our 1/1. For that matter, we might also think differently about our “overcosted” Siege-Gang Commanders in light of those
Elvish Piper posers. Similarly, we would be silly to want to pay 1R for a 1/2 that only has protection from blue. If, however, it’s sometimes an
11/2 (or even “just” a 5/2), we have to evaluate it differently. That’s synergy for you.

The reason why Aether Vial shines in tribal aggressive decks is that tribal decks play synergistic creatures that are specifically not
undercosted. In fact, because there has to be a drawback to having each card’s presence bolster and magnify the effects of the other cards, they
are typically overcosted. This makes sense upon reflection: if Goblin Matron were to be both a three-mana pseudo-Demonic Tutor and a 3/3, the
card would be absurd. Something has to give in exchange for its ability. In many cases, what gives is the power/toughness line.

The upshot of this mana cost markup is that tribal aggressive decks are largely unplayable without a major mana engine to allow them to “jump the
curve,” so to speak. The reason why that’s true is because, for all their synergy, they would simply be too slow getting onto the
battlefield. If your spells cost, on average, between two and three mana, then you aren’t casting two spells a turn until turn 4 or 5. If you
have Aether Vial, however, you can start doing multiple things a turn on turn 2: Vial in Mother of Runes and Wasteland their dual land. Or Vial in
Cursecatcher and play Standstill. Or Port their dual land on their end step and then Vial in Goblin Lackey to come in next turn, untouched.

To better appreciate the manifold different ways in which Aether Vial’s power can be leveraged to suit a deck’s needs, let’s look at
the original Aether Vial deck. Let’s talk about Goblins.

To go back to our list of what makes decks want Aether Vial, we can see that Goblins is the most creature-based of the four Aether Vial decks and has
the most mana disruption. It wants to play as many Goblins as possible to maximize the odds of drawing cards off of its Goblin Ringleader. Much like
Gerry Thompson Vengevine deck circa Grand Prix DC, Goblins has a lot of creatures that look like spells: Goblin Lackey as Dramatic Entrance,
Goblin Matron as Eladamri’s Call, Goblin Warchief as both Fervor and Ruby Medallion, Gempalm Incinerator as Goblin War Strike, and Goblin
Ringleader as Concentrate. In this way, you get paid for playing a lot of Goblins, but you don’t sacrifice a whole lot of flexibility like you
would with many mono-creature decks.

Goblins is the old-school Aether Vial deck. The hallmark of Goblins as a deck is its capacity to switch between being a control deck, a combo deck, and
an aggressive deck nearly instantaneously. It can play a controlling, attrition-based game by chaining Goblin Ringleaders until its opponent is out of
cards. It can play like a combo deck, where it runs Goblin Lackey into Siege-Gang Commander and kills its opponent on turn 3 or 4. It can also play
like a traditional aggressive deck, where it plays Goblin Piledriver on turn 2 and Goblin Warchief on turn 3 and attacks for five, threatening lethal
damage on the very next turn. A skilled Goblins pilot will gain a tremendous amount of value from knowing when to pay echo on their Mogg War Marshals,
when to Port their opponent’s land, what to Matron for in any given situation, and when its Goblin Warchiefs are best as Ruby Medallions or
Grizzly Bears.

Unlike the other Aether Vial decks, Goblins has Goblin Lackey to play the part of “conditional Aether Vials 5-8.” This gives Goblins a
whole other dimension of early-game threat, as there were whole years of Legacy where a control player’s hand had to pass the “What do I do
against a turn 1 Aether Vial or a turn 1 Lackey?” test. One connecting blow from the Little Goblin That Could, and you could be facing down
lethal damage on the next turn. Consider:

“Mountain, Lackey, go.”

“Polluted Delta, go.”

“Rishadan Port. Attack you to nineteen, drop Siege-Gang Commander into play. Second main, play Goblin Piledriver. Go.”

“Island, Brainstorm. Go.”

“Attack with the team. Triggers put Piledriver at 11/2. Take seventeen? Go to two. Fling a token at your face.”

This isn’t how most games go against blue decks, however. The reason that Goblins has a favorable matchup against blue decks is because of Aether
Vial and Goblin Ringleader. Goblins’ ability to cheat their “draw spell” past counterspells is key to their getting ahead against
blue decks. Once Goblins has put a Ringleader into play, the game typically spirals out of control for the opposing player, as it’s very
difficult to deal with a hasty 2/2 as well as three extra spells.

Besides having a very threatening early game via Goblin Lackey, Goblins also has one of the best late games in Legacy. As it turns out, Siege-Gang
Commander is a very good card in Legacy. Its ability to go over the top for those few extra points and its ability to win race situations by turning
chump blockers into Shocks are both immensely valuable. For anyone who looks at Goblins and thinks, Multiple Siege-Gang Commanders? That can’t be right. That guy costs five!, I promise you that you’ll want a second or even third
Siege-Gang Commander many times in your games. He really is that good.

Finally, its mana disruption presents an incredible obstacle for any midrange or control deck to overcome. Remember that Goblins has to deal with the
fact that its cards are overcosted relative to other decks’ cards. To compensate for this, Goblins leverages Rishadan Port and Wasteland to deny
opponents access to on-curve plays, often succeeding in denying opponents entire turns of mana production. By slowing down the game, Goblins gives
itself time to make land drops, tick Aether Vial up, and start playing some of its more conditionally powerful cards. 43 Land notwithstanding, Goblins
is the only Rishadan Port deck in Legacy. In a format where the aggressive decks often play more land than the control decks, it stands to reason that
trading mana back and forth is a passable strategy without Aether Vial and a nearly unstoppable strategy with Vial in play.

The recent success of Goblins in both San Jose and Kansas City is a very good sign for someone who wants to get into Legacy. It shows us a format not
dominated by combo or by control but by uncommons. When Aether Vial is the top card in a Top 8, it shows us a format that values attacking and
blocking, combat math, and interaction. If there’s a Legacy tournament nearby in the next month or two, consider going out and getting that set of
Aether Vials. Their value isn’t going to go down, you’ll always have options with what deck you play them in, and the skills that Aether
Vial decks require are the skills you’ve learned in team drafts and games of Standard.

Right now is a great time to be attacking in Legacy. Whether or not you choose to play Goblins, think about all the money you have invested in your
Standard collection. Look at the prices of the cards in the nine decks listed above. Think about whether, in three years, you would rather own four
Primeval Titans or four Taigas.

Then go out and buy this format. I promise; it’s worth it.