What’s the deal with Reanimator?
If you immediately reread that sentence with a Seinfeld inflection, you get a gold star. Gold Stars not redeemable for any cash value.
Is Reanimator the best deck in Legacy, or just another “it” deck of the week, easily beaten with proper sideboarding?
Like most things Magical, the truth lies in-between those absolutes.
Or at least, I’m pretty sure it did, until the DCI Banned Mystical Tutor from Legacy after I’d written this article. The actual banning itself is one of the most controversial decisions for Legacy since Flash was briefly allowed in the format before the last Grand Prix: Columbus. Let’s separate the decision to ban from its effect on Reanimator, for the time being.
What happens to Reanimator now, sans Mystical Tutor?
The immediate knee-jerk reaction is to say the deck loses consistency because it now lacks the tutor that allowed it to find all of its engine parts. Hard to argue with that; losing Mystical Tutor is going to be a big pain point for the deck going forward. Still, Reanimator was incredibly consistent previously and there are potential replacements for Mystical Tutor if consistency is our main concern.
Mystical Loss, Mundane Replacements
Personal Tutor finds many of the same cards as Mystical Tutor, but the Sorcery piece is a major problem, and the fact that it can’t find Entomb, Force of Will, or singleton Instants is a major problem. When you open up on Misty Rainforest and pass the turn, your opponent has no idea what deck to put you on in game one. If your opening instead is Misty Rainforest, fetch Underground Sea, Personal Tutor for Reanimate, you lose just a tiny bit of the surprise factor. The difference between Instant and Sorcery for these two tutors is a serious problem in a format like Legacy. With Mystical, you can sneak it in when an opponent cracks a fetch and is temporarily without mana, or use it to find a card like Force of Will or Daze on an opponent’s turn and then Brainstorm that card into your hand. Personal Tutor can’t do any of those things.
If Personal Tutor isn’t the answer, perhaps a better solution is to use cards like Ponder and Sensei’s Divining Top, and to incorporate Cephalid Coliseum into the mana base (see below); this is still a deck that plays fetchlands, Entomb, Brainstorm, and Careful Study. If you’re playing with 4 Reanimate, 4 Exhume plus 4 Careful Study, 4 Entomb, 2 Cephalid Coliseum and 6 creatures, you have plenty of redundancy in your deck as-is, even without Mystical Tutor. Another interesting option that supports the deck and Coliseum at the same time is Strategic Planning. Again, Sorcery speed is an issue when looking at Ponder or Strategic Planning, but this Planning a Careful Study that digs three cards and lets you keep one. It gets you almost half way to Threshold immediately and is in-line with what the deck already wants to do.
Another two-mana answer similar in function to Mystical Tutor is Lim-Dul’s Vault. Vault is interesting because you can set up your deck, making cards like Careful Study more powerful. For instance, you can Vault and put Careful Study as the first card, with a creature and reanimation spell as the next two. The issue with LDV is the potential for life loss in a deck already playing fast and loose with its life total, as well as the fact that it costs two mana. LDV helps you find cards you’re running many copies of but is worse at finding singletons like Mystical could.
Even if you can recapture a lot of the consistency in terms of executing your main plan (put big monster in Graveyard, bring big monster back into play), where you’re really hurt is you lose the ability to run a toolbox of Mystical Tutor targets like Echoing Truth, Diabolic Edict, Wipe Away, Coffin Purse, and so on. Mystical Tutor enables the deck in that it gives not only consistency, but versatility and resilience as well. Any singleton instant or sorcery immediately became a “five-of” in this deck. Losing that could be a serious problem. For example, running a single main-deck Echoing Truth isn’t effective without Mystical Tutor. Even a card like Coffin Purge loses a lot of value if you’re forced to use Entomb to find it, especially as each Entomb becomes much more valuable in a version without Mystical Tutor.
Where does that leave Reanimator in the long-term? The actual position of this deck in the metagame was already up for debate, but I think a lot of people are going to immediately abandon ship. If the deck fades and sideboard hate fades with it, Reanimator could still be a tier-one deck. As a side effect, we might get to take all of the Legacy Dredge players off suicide watch.
I can’t imagine that Legacy sideboards are going to continue packing this much Graveyard hate on a permanent basis, especially given the removal of Mystical Tutor. Independent of that, let’s take a look at the deck in general, outside of the Mystical Tutor issue. In testing the deck, it seemed less resilient than I thought a deck with Force of Will, Thoughtseize, and Daze would be, but also more explosive than I’d imagined as well.
Before we go any further, let me also get this out of the way. Most of the times I’ve discussed Legacy, I’ve been reviewing the history of a specific strategy to current day (Countertop, Zoo), or I’ve covered a deck I’ve tested and used in tournament play. Today, looking at Reanimator and Thopters, these are two decks I haven’t played in tournaments and have only tested for the past few weeks or months, respectively, and now we’re in serious theory-land with Reanimator losing Mystical as I haven’t tested that at all. This article is more to get your mind thinking about these decks beyond just aping GT’s latest build. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, just don’t expect to beat the masters if you’re always a week behind. “One Step Behind” isn’t the best name for a Magic column.
For instance, consider Daze. If your opponent can put you on Reanimator in game 1, they know you’re rocking Daze. Admittedly sometimes it doesn’t matter because you’re on the play and have something like this: Underground Sea, Misty Rainforest, Entomb, Exhume, Force of Will, Daze, Brainstorm. When you pull those hands, Reanimator feels exactly like the deck it’s billed to be: the best deck in Legacy. Other times your hand actually takes a few turns to set up, and when that happens, Daze just sits there getting less and less relevant, much like the NBA.
I’ll also grant that the deck is harder to play than it looks, or at least, it was for a non-Master like me. I tried to rock this deck cold at a Grand Prix Trial and got wrecked. It didn’t help that the field was over a third Reanimator. Since the trial, I’ve gotten some more games in with the deck, and somewhere around game ten my results began to dramatically improve.
The first thing that’s less obvious than expected is the way this deck uses (or used…) Brainstorm and Mystical Tutor. Having tested with ANT in the last six months, I expected to have no problem with a deck using those cards and Thoughtseize, but this deck plays all of those cards quite differently than ANT. While Reanimator has a fast clock, it has significant flexibility and often has less of a need to just stomp on the gas pedal. This is a deck that rewards steady play and careful thought. There aren’t many decks that have this level of flexibility in terms of Instant tutoring from turn one. Of course, a lot of that becomes less relevant without Mystical Tutor; you’re going to be involved with set-up work more than tutoring without Mystical. That still will require you to adapt on the fly as you dig for pieces, basing your plan on your opponent and which cards you hit.
Reanimator also rewards those with a keen eye for differentiating between the often similar variations of the full field of Legacy decks, as there is overlap among the targets in terms of the primary choice and secondary choices, but there is almost always a best reanimation choice for each Legacy deck. Finally, if you’re going to battle with this deck, just know that it is definitely popular enough that you want to play the mirror, although that will likely change come July. The mirror is a strange beast. Similar to the Oath mirror in Vintage, the Reanimator mirror is a twisted and ruined version of Magic. Forgive the verbal flourish; a Reanimator mirror is just a strange version of Magic where the cards that matter are few and far between, but the ways to find them are many.
Let’s circle back to Daze. At this point in my life, I don’t have the time to sit down and battle with Reanimator with and without Daze to figure out how important the card actually is in each match-up, play and draw, to determine how relevant it is and if that relevance is metagame dependent or independent of the opponent. I’ve always found Daze to be a hard card to evaluate; a lot of the card’s effectiveness is tied to the fact that your opponent is playing around it whether you have it or not. Forcing your opponent to play around Daze can yield some serious benefits, even in sideboard games where you might not have the card in your sixty any more. For example, I think I played around Daze effectively in game one of the Philly finals, but in game two I nearly lost a game because I was ineffectively playing around Daze , a card that was now in my opponent’s sideboard.
Outside of the nut-high hands, when can Daze be effective? It helps fight off an early Counterbalance, which is very significant. In the mirror match, it seems relevant as well. Against Storm it’s a good card to have, because an opponent playing around Daze may give you a free turn. Against Zoo, countering an early drop like Steppe Lynx can buy an extra turn or two to operate as well, which is a major advantage if you’re forced into the Reanimate plan. In other words, in hands where Reanimator isn’t the immediate aggressor, Daze lets you survive in order to get your Brainstorm, Careful Study, and Mystical Tutor (through 6/30) or other filter effects (post 6/30) working so you can become the aggressor.
Still, Daze just frustrates me in this deck. You know what card doesn’t frustrate me? Wild Nacatl!
Wait, wrong article.
Dispel! Have you seen this card? It got a fair amount of buzz initially, but Dispel hasn’t really seen much play in any format to date. What does Dispel do, exactly? For one Blue, you can counter some of these slightly relevant cards:
Ad Nauseam, Force of Will, Swords to Plowshares, Path to Exile, Enlightened Tutor, Brainstorm, Diabolic Edict, Echoing Truth, and basically every burn spell not named Chain Lightning.
Okay, so is that relevant enough to actually see play? I’m not sure, but so far I’ve really enjoyed testing with it, whether in whole as a Daze replacement no one expects, or in combination with a smaller number of Daze. One of the major benefits of playing with Dispel is that everyone puts you on Daze, so you can gain tempo (as your opponent plays around the Dazes you don’t have in your deck) and blow people out with Dispel instead.
My other major beef with Reanimator has to do with the games that go on for more than few turns, such as when you get into a counter war and lose, or when your initial threat is handled and you have to work into another one. For those games, a card like Sensei’s Divining Top seems incredibly appealing. In fact, in a longer game, having to use cards like Top, Ponder or Strategic Planning may actually benefit the deck. Remember that in a post-Mystical Tutor world, the goldfish speed of the format is likely to slow down to some extent. Previously, the problem was one of space, but we now have between four and six open slots.
Here’s another option: Cephalid Coliseum. I’ve always loved this card. For me, it springs from an undying love of Blue/Green in Odyssey block and, more recently, Dredge. Given that I really dislike Legacy Dredge, I’ve been actively searching for somewhere to play Coliseum, and Reanimator seems like a surprisingly good fit.
Go on, grab your Reanimator deck and play through a few hands, and see how fast your Graveyard fills up. Then consider that you may be replacing Mystical Tutor with another support card like Ponder or Strategic Planning. Is it worth taking some damage for this effect? So far, I believe that it is. Coliseum gives you another draw/discard engine, one that can’t be countered (outside of Stifle / Trickbind) and doesn’t impact your actual card count. Minamo is pretty cool, but if I’m exposing myself to Wasteland, I think I’d rather risk it with Coliseum because of its strength if a game goes long.
Speaking about exposure to Wasteland, the manabase that a lot of people are using seems a little strange to me, and might explain some of Reanimator’s poor results against a deck like New Horizon. Two basic lands is beyond greedy. It’s like Enron /Bernie Madoff level greedy. BP level carelessness. I’m getting paid on this article based on my use of hyperbole. Even three basics seems a little greedy to me. I’m pretty sure I want to play four basic lands, although I may consider going back to three depending on how the format changes.
Mystical Tutor obviously affects decks besides Reanimator, especially ANT, the bane of Lands players everywhere. Lands may be a major recipient of Mystical’s restriction, so what can Reanimator do against that deck? Realm Razer seems to be a popular choice, but I’m not sure I’m sold on that guy. Again, have I tested this match-up extensively? No, I haven’t, but I’m drawn towards Magus of the Moon, especially in a build with a higher basic land count. Realm Razer is pretty sweet, but it still seems within the realm of possibility that your razing is more of a speed bump than a KO; can Lands beat a hand of Entomb / Careful Study Magus into Reanimate / Exhume Magus of the Moon?
Stephen Menendian says I ask my readers too many questions, so I hope he took some Tylenol if he’s reading this one.
I hope that I’ve given you a few things to think about regarding Reanimator. I don’t think this deck is going to go away any time soon; it is a much more resilient Graveyard deck than Dredge, and much more appealing to high-level players than Dredge. It should be the preeminent cyclical Legacy strategy going forward. I had a decklist that was at least somewhat tested, but that’s been blown up by the DCI, so let’s try one just as a thought exercise, assuming that in the post-Mystical Tutor world, Reanimator is less popular (so the mirror match is less likely and sideboard hate is less prevalent):
Creatures (6)
Lands (16)
Spells (38)
- 2 Sensei's Divining Top
- 4 Brainstorm
- 4 Force of Will
- 4 Reanimate
- 2 Island
- 4 Exhume
- 1 Daze
- 4 Entomb
- 4 Careful Study
- 2 Strategic Planning
- 4 Thoughtseize
- 3 Dispel
Sideboard
You can really disregard that sideboard, as it is really a place-holder since we have no idea what Legacy will look like post-July (although I’d expect the metagame to quickly revert to Counterbalance vs. Anti-Counterbalance). The basic assumptions are that Lands continues to be popular and Reanimator gets considerably less popular. An additional Show and Tell is probably necessary now that we can’t tutor for it. Another interesting option is Reverent Silence, easily playable out of the sideboard using the Dryad Arbor. A combination of Needle, Null Rod, and Reverent Silence can keep this deck relevant if Counterbalance becomes the driving deck in Legacy again.
Ex-Extended Superstar, Thopter Foundry
As much fun as it is to play with Reanimator, you don’t want to put all your eggs in one basket when it comes to Legacy, especially if the DCI is going to annihilate archetypes willy-nilly. If you watched the GGS Live coverage from Philly through to the end, you heard me say that my back-up deck for Philly was an Enlightened Tutor / Counterbalance deck similar to the one AJ Sacher used to make top 8 earlier this year. The previous version I discussed hybridized that deck with the Painter’s Servant / Grindstone combo, but that’s not where you want to be right now because some guy won one of these Opens with Zoo, Zoo being a horrendous opponent when your goal is to keep a 1/3 Artifact Creature in play for any amount of time. With combo being suppressed, Zoo is almost guaranteed to surge even further in popularity.
AJ talked about his deck, here, but I’ll discuss it briefly as well. Given the enormous card pool in Legacy, Enlightened Tutor is a really powerful card. In a blue-white Counterbalance shell, Enlightened Tutor lets you easily assemble the Counter/Top soft lock, as well as the win condition of Thopter/Sword; it also enables you to exploit Counterbalance by having the ability to tutor a “three” or “four” to the top of your deck, something normal Counter/Top decks struggle to do consistently. Enlightened Tutor enables you to do all kinds of fancy sideboarding as well, which can give this shell a massive boost in sideboard games. For example, a sideboard with a Relic of Progenitus and two Tormod’s Crypt is a LOT of hate if your deck is packing four Brainstorm, four Top, and four Enlightened Tutor. You also get all kinds of splash hate by way of cards like Humility and Ensnaring Bridge, and can run powerful singletons main (like Back to Basics) without losing a significant number of slots.
Here’s the list I’ve been testing lately:
Planeswalkers (1)
Lands (13)
Spells (46)
In testing, it seems like I either want the fourth Thopter Foundry in the sideboard or need an alternate win condition like Tarmogoyf. One of the problems with this deck is it tends to win slowly, and Tarmogoyf might alleviate that problem. Bringing in Goyfs also helps you win games against creature decks. Still, for the moment I’m happy using that Tropical to bluff Goyfs and Grip and to power up Explosives. An alternate option would be to play Rhox War Monk over Goyf to further improve the Zoo match-up, which can be difficult depending on the speed and amount of burn; you may have to take this route now that Reanimator is likely to recede from for the format, temporarily or permanently.
I’ve found that Jace is relatively awkward against enough of the field that I’m happy playing one with a second in the sideboard. The extra Jace and Tezzeret give this build powerful trumps against other Counter/Top decks, and of course Jace is extremely good against Reanimator. In fact, this deck does a lot of mean, mean things to opposing Reanimator decks, especially those that no longer play Null Rod. Back to Basics combined with Graveyard hate and Meddling Mage give you power options against Lands. This is a deck that has few poor match-ups when you’re talking about few matches.
The main limiting factor in a deck like this? Pilot error.
It might sound odd, but it feels great to play a deck with Counterspell. I think a third copy might be worthwhile. An easy fix is to cut two Thirst for Knowledge and replace with the second Jace and third Counterspell, but TFK has been quite good as well; this deck gives up a lot of cards to set itself up, so being able to draw back into the game helps a lot.
In Closing
This is a perfect example of a deck that shows how difficult Legacy is to play. You have multiple one-drops that are all powerful first-turn plays, and again an inter-connected set of tutors, shuffle effects, and singletons that trump specific match-ups. The better you are at sculpting a game plan multiple turns in advance, and the better your understanding of the format, the stronger your results will be with a deck like this one. Reanimator can be a little challenging to play at a high level, but that deck can also steal games based on power level. A deck like Zoo is pretty straightforward as long as you know which cards matter in what match-ups. A deck like Thopters, however, is always going to be a challenge as you’re often coming back from behind using Thopter Foundry or a singleton trump like Humility; you have powerful cards, but you’re not going to steal many games on power level alone.
I may not have given you the tools to conquer the Magical world this week, but I hope I at least helped spark some ideas for the future. One of the most exciting things about Legacy is that the potential for innovation in that format is still enormous.
Building an entirely new deck from scratch is one of the most difficult challenges in Magic, in any format, but tinkering with existing ideas should be part of the wheelhouse of any skilled Magician. Most of your theory-crafting, thought-exercising, and experimenting might lead nowhere, but training your brain to engage in those activities sets you on the path to staying ahead of the pack.
I don’t want to write much about this until I see the official explanation, but I’m extremely disappointed that this card was restricted. It just doesn’t seem remotely necessary to me. Of all the Magic formats, Legacy still felt the most wide-open and unexplored. Obviously Mystical Tutor and the combo decks it fosters provide a certain boundary to what you can play and expect to win with, but Legacy had an impressive equilibrium and a tendency toward self-regulation. I’m concerned that removing Mystical will actually throw off that equilibrium and result in more bans later on, now that the balance is thrown off.
I can’t really believe that ANT is the reason for this card’s restriction, and if it is ANT plus Reanimator, that gets more frustrating as restricting Entomb would’ve been a better choice.
Regardless, I advise you not to overreact. Legacy is still going to have some very fast and very powerful combo decks, which might benefit for a while from a Zoo-centric metagame. If you’re upset about Mystical Tutor, post your opinion, Tweet about it, whatever, but do so constructively.
I have to leave you now, as there’s a whole new world of possibilities in Vintage that I need to explore.
Or not.
Matt Elias
[email protected]
Voltron00x on SCG, TMD, and The Source