Preface
This is an evergreen article, meaning it’ll be updated every now and then. I stumbled upon Adnan/Addie/Aprils_bloom on Twitter and we connected because they wanted to write about the very topic this website is about. Therefore I provided them with a space to publish their thoughts. This way we can have a synergistic collaboration and give you one central place where you can find all required information about playing Legacy on a budget. Without further ado I’m giving the floor to Adnan, who you can find on Twitter or Discord (aprils_bloom).
Introduction
Legacy: It is a complex, deep, and interactive format, with cards from all Magic sets being legal, excluding those on a ban list. It can, at times, be misrepresented as a turn 1.5 turbo combo format, and while there are certainly blazing fast combo decks present, they are not the meta. What has, historically, been the “best” deck is Delver, a core Izzet deck that can splash into other colours, it is all about playing super efficient threats, cantrips, removal, and counter-magic, as well as forcing a generally low resource game state for both players. This is to say, fair decks are not only viable but very powerful in legacy.
This deep card pool does, however, also mean that some very powerful, and expensive, reserve list cards are legal, most notably the ABUR dual lands. This can cause a number of decks to be incredibly expensive, and unobtainable for many people. I think that this is a massive shame as I do believe legacy to be the best format, it often has a very wide, open field of good and viable decks and archetypes, and so I am writing this document to provide some decks that are friendlier to a budget, starting with true budget, then budget relative to legacy, and providing an example list, potential swaps, upgrade paths, and an overview on how the decks work. My aim here is to at least provide some options for people who want to play legacy on paper but can’t afford dual lands or other expensive cards. I also note expensive staples in lists (5 USD and over), however, cards like Ponder, Brainstorm, and Swords to Plowshares are very much format staples too.
A small caveat, I don’t regularly play many of the decks I will introduce below, with the exception of Jeskai, so I apologise if any lists are un-updated or incorrect, to be safe, I recommend you join the appropriate archetype discord server, they’re all friendly and happy to help! Here’s a link to the archetype spreadsheet:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1WVPycjDtlNkf2mW1WYlkTG24U142xWhgUgjWK1KzGZs/edit#gid=0
Decks in this article are sorted alphabetically.
A note on testing Legacy decks
Before committing to buying in paper, there are ways to test out decks for free or spending a little bit of money.
Free options
Fan-built simulators such as Cockatrice, XMage or Untap are great, as well as proxying. The MTG Paper Legacy discord is a webcam discord server which is proxy friendly, and a great place to play with or without proxies! They have more casual games, weekly leagues, and you can test with masters of certain decks, or try out new things and have people give out advice. Here’s a link. If there are any issues with this link, don’t hesitate to contact me.
A little bit of money
Using a rental service for Magic the Gathering Online can be a good way to test decks in an application that also represents the stack properly, and can be more serious than casual play on sims or proxy casuals.
A note on basic lands
While the term ‘budget’ may turn some people off thinking they are playing suboptimal decks, there is something to note regarding legacy: basics are good. Really, really good. Wasteland, Blood Moon (and Back to Basics, kind of) are format staples, and it turns out having access to mana to play your cards is good. Basics are also really cheap, so many decks here are either mono-colour, or ones that are okay with playing some number of shocklands.
Super budget ($250 or under)
Even in legacy, there are super budget decks that are $250 or under, however, there is relatively limited choice here.
Burn
The classic budget deck, burn. Burn in legacy is in fact cheaper than in modern, as it is mono red. Why? In legacy, the powerful Price of Progress is an option (1R Instant, PoP deals damage equal to twice the number of nonbasic lands each player controls). It plays as any burn deck would, kill ‘em dead ASAP.
Burn is honestly pretty decent right now, there are a lot of decks playing “fair” Reanimates which means they’re doming themselves for 4/6 damage (Grief/Troll of Khazad-Dum respectively), helping you do your thing.
Burn does, however, notably struggle against two things: Uro, and fast combo decks. Uro just undoes what you do, and if ever escaped, the game is likely over, and fast combo just races you faster than you kill ‘em dead.
Here’s what a list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/archetype/legacy-burn#paper
Manaless Dredge
If most of the cost in a legacy deck is the manabase, what if you have no manabase?
Presenting potentially the most unusual Magic deck of all time, manaless plays no lands, and utilises the insanely powerful ‘dredge’ mechanic. For starters, always choose to go on the draw, and never mulligan with this deck, as you want to discard to handsize. Ideally you discard a Phantasmagorian (tip: you can hold priority on its activated ability to discard 6 cards to it rather than just 3), but a dredger such as Golgari Grave-Troll is also decent.
This configuration of dredge can also combo out with a card such as Flayer of the Hatebound, while having a good beatdown plan. This deck preys on fair blue decks, especially midrange and control, but has absolutely horrendous fast combo matchups, and also struggles very much against Leyline of the Void/Rest in Peace, even more than normal graveyard decks. Even with Force of Vigor in the deck, casting this spell is, in essence, giving your opponent two timewalks for free, and this is the largest issue with this deck, to interact with the opponent is to timewalk yourself.
However, should you wish to play a unique, graveyard focused deck, manaless might just be for you.
Here’s what a list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6026111#paper
Mono-Black Stompy
This is a super budget deck with a nice upgrade path into Mono-Black Scam! It seeks to Dark Ritual out threats and powerful discard such as Hymn to Tourach, and then kill the opponent quickly while they are operating on low resources. It got first at a 23 player event at Japan, not massive but still great considering just how truly budget this deck is. In the long term, this can also move into Death’s Shadow, or UB Scam if you want to move in that direction. Furthermore, this has a super smooth upgrade path into Mono-Black Scam, as you can swap out cards and just play with the list with your new cards. Say you have some spare money this month and can grab an Opposition Agent, well get it and swap out a card in your deck, and you can be happy knowing you’ve just made your deck better, and you can continue slowly bringing in upgrade cards until your deck is completed like this.
Here’s the list:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6054215#paper
A great, budget threat alternative here is Exsanguinator Cavalry:
Here’s Mono-Black Scam:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6069396#paper
As you can see, there is a really smooth upgrade path, such as swapping Field of Ruin for Wasteland, or Inquisition of Kozilek for Thoughtseize, etc. I would personally get the fetches last here as they are the least necessary card, and mostly serve as deck thinning and enabling Fatal Push, which you can play Sheoldred’s Edict until you get fetches for. This also has an amazing upgrade path into UB Death’s Shadow or Scam if you wish to move in that direction, both attached further below under ‘Death’s Shadow’.
Budget ($1k or under)
First off, yes I know that $1k can still be a lot for many people, however, it is up to $1k, not necessarily that much, a number of these can even be the price of a modern deck! The idea is to point out decks that are budget relative to the cost of decks in the legacy format. In this section, I will also point out key cards that are played in other decks if you eventually wish to build other decks.
12-Post
Named after the eponymous Cloudpost – a powerful land that taps for colourless mana equal to all loci in play with itself being one, this deck seeks to generate as much mana as humanly possible ASAP. This deck is insanely vulnerable to Wasteland, playing 4 Pithing Needle in the maindeck to name the card, and can struggle against fast combo. You are, however, a control or midrange deck’s biggest nightmare.
Cards that are staples:
Endurance, The One Ring, Boseiju, Who Endures, Carpet of Flowers, Force of Vigor, and Green Sun’s Zenith. Some decks also play a shuffle titan in the sideboard for the Painter matchup.
Here’s what a list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6078534#paper
Death’s Shadow
If much of legacy’s price comes from dual lands what if you played a deck that wants to lower its own life total? That’s what Death’s Shadow is, a UB tempo deck that uses the undercosted, powerful Death’s Shadow, and shocklands are part of this strategy. While it is not entirely optimal to play no duals, the deck still works just fine without them. Cut the 2 Underground Sea for a fourth Watery Grave and another Island fetchland from the list below.
Cards that are staples:
Orcish Bowmasters, Force of Will, Reanimate, all the blue fetches, Wasteland, Murktide Regent, Grief (somewhat), Force of Negation.
Upgrade Path:
Eventually, if you find this deck to be right for you, you want to play 2 Underground Sea.
Here’s what a list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/archetype/legacy-death-s-shadow#paper
Another deck that uses the shell of Death’s Shadow is UB ‘Scam’, which seeks to cheat out a Grief or Troll of Khazad-Dum while stripping the opponent’s hand and lands away. If you find your favourite Shadow play pattern to be turn 1 evoke Grief, Reanimate Grief, this might be the deck for you, and much of UB Scam uses the shell from Shadow.
Here’s what a list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6081892#paper
Death and Taxes
A historically mono-white deck, Death & Taxes has also been a historically budget (for the format) deck. This is a deck that combines hatebears alongside the mana denial of Wasteland and Rishadan Port (playing around Wasteland plays into Rishadan Port), and then beating the opponent down. The deck received a huge upgrade when Yorion, Sky Nomad was printed, as the deck now has a terrifying late-game for midrange and control matchups where it would otherwise become unfavoured the longer a game went on.
Cards that are staples:
Wasteland, Aether Vial, Rishadan Port (kind of)
This is the main issue with DnT, the deck does not have many (expensive) format staples, just 8-12 cards, however, any budget legacy list would be entirely incomplete without this deck included. Also, while being a budget deck, is not a deck that can be further budget-ised easily as it has a number of “must-play” 3-4 ofs that cost $20+ each. Speaking of that, however, with the attached list below, swapping Cavern of Souls to Flagstones of Trokair is fine with the Cataclysm in the side, and is much cheaper than Cavern.
Here’s what a list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6067648#paper
Humans
This is a typal/kindred strategy which uses a number of disruptive Humans in tandem with Humans that protect other ones with ward, indestructible, and generally making life hard for the opponent. The deck below is actually five colours, yet only 400 USD in paper? On Goldfish which overprices? Well, Humans plays many of the lands that tap for any colour for a specific type. Ordinarily these would be quite bad, but if every spell in your deck is colourless or a Human, these are better than duals, that’s right, lands better than duals. This also plays no fetches, so the entire manabase is relatively budget.
Cards that are staples:
Cavern of Souls, Karakas, Wasteland. Not much in the way of expensive staples, but this entire deck is less than a notable number of modern decks.
Here’s what a list might look like (recent Trophy list):
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6054923#paper
Jeskai Control/Stoneblade
Counter and remove everything relevant your opponent does, then stick a planeswalker or a massive Forth Eorlingas! in more recent times, for the control variant. Stoneblade is a more midrange-y variant of control, named after Stoneforge Mystic, a powerful card. I will add – these decks are budget when swapping the duals (Tundra and Volcanic Island) for their respective shocks (Hallowed Fountain and Steam Vents). While this is not ideal, these Jeskai decks are built in a way to operate exclusively off of basics, and only fetch non-basics when they absolutely have to. In the long-term, if you find this deck to be for you, at least one Tundra is ideal, as this is the non-basic you’ll fetch most often.
Cards that are staples:
Force of Will, Force of Negation, all the fetchlands, Forth Eorlingas!, and the duals should you decide you eventually want to get them, for Stoneblade, Stoneforge Mystic is somewhat staple tier.
Upgrade path:
Shocks > Duals.
Here’s what a control list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6053971#paper
Flex slots (as I play this myself I can say what these might be):
Triumph, Jace, Spell Pierce, Blood Moon in the maindeck, but you need 2 in the 75, Karakas, Lavinia, Meddling Mage, Ulamog/shuffle titan.
What you could play:
Back to Basics over Blood Moon, one of these two is a must play as a 2-of in the 75 currently, as current legacy has a significant portion of very vulnerable manabases, and these will win you games, 2 more Narset and Day’s Undoing, 4th Prismatic Ending, extra copies of Lorien Revealed, Snapcaster Mage.
Here’s what a stoneblade list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6053976#paper
Small note: Blood Moon is better in the turbo Forth control build as it gives you something to do with all that extra red mana, whereas Stoneblade wants to continue to be able to fetch as a game goes on, so Back to Basics is more appropriate there. If you wish to continue to have access to fetches in control, make the same swap from moon to B2B, but moon is generally a better hate piece than B2B.
Merfolk
A mono-blue typal/kindred deck, you play annoying, disruptive creatures and cards such as Wasteland, while getting unblockable fish friends. Crucially, this list introduces Force of Will into its card pool, which is a great card to become familiar with.
Cards that are staples:
Force of Will, Wasteland, Aether Vial, Cavern of Souls (somewhat), Null Rod. Fortunately, here, many of the more expensive cards can and do see play in other decks.
Here’s what a list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/archetype/legacy-merfolk#paper
Mono-Black Reanimator
This is a more budgeted and slightly less optimised version of BR(uw) Reanimator, a tier 1-1.5 and very powerful deck in the format. This seeks to get a fatty into the graveyard and reanimate it ASAP, and shreds the opponent’s hand apart with discard. Sometimes a hand will be kept which fires Grief and a Thoughtseize on the play, and at times it will just Dark Ritual > Entomb > Reanimate a Griselbrand. This deck is a format staple, and very powerful and fast. This version budgetises the manabase to have access to Lake of the Dead and play Grave Titan as a viable hardcast option to fight graveyard hate.
Cards that are staples:
Here’s the issue with this deck, basically none of it is played in other decks. Grief is a staple, Entomb is a staple in Reanimator decks and that’s it, Lotus Petal and Thoughtseizes are staples, but a lot of this deck just isn’t played anywhere else. Sheoldred is semi-staple tier, Bowmen are, but this is a lot of cards that see next to no play anywhere else, but this upgrades smoothly into the stock BR(uw) Reanimator attached below.
Here’s what a list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6085541#paper
For the list above, you could cut 2 Swamp and play 2 Lake of the Dead.
BR(uw) Reanimator:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6085437#paper
There are currently two main builds of Reanimator, but they don’t differ in the maindeck, rather the sideboard for fighting graveyard hate.
The first solution is a stompy pivot, similar to the list below.
The other is to pivot onto Show and Tell and cards to remove enchantments like Leyline of the Void, similar to the list below:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6085171#paper
Notably, the Show and Tell + enchantment removal pivot requires more duals than standard BR Reanimator with a stompy pivot, so if you find this archetype to be for you, you may choose to play the stompy build as you transition towards Show and Tell. Both of the above builds are viable and proven, so you can just stop at Stompy if you wish.
Oops! All Spells
Now this, this is a turn 1.5 combo deck. If the game goes past turn 3 this deck is unlikely to win, and really wants to win ASAP at any cost. How does this work? It uses Balustrade Spy and Undercity Informer, which will both mill cards until you hit a land. Sounds pretty bad, right? Not if you play no lands. Okay, but how are you getting to 4 mana without lands? Well, the MDFCs which are spells on the front and lands on the back is how, alongside spirit guides, Chrome Mox, Lotus Petal, and Rituals is how this deck counts to 4 to win the game.
This deck is vulnerable to graveyard hate, and is very fragile (there are only 4 Pact of Negation and 1 Cabal Therapy main to protect the combo), but it is also blisteringly fast and demands answers immediately.
Cards that are staples:
Lotus Petal, Chrome Mox, Cabal Ritual (kind of, it’s in some storm decks), Thoughtseize, Veil of Summer, Force of Vigor. While most of the cost is in the Chrome Moxen, this is a card that is played in a large number of combo and stompy decks, and is the only notably expensive card in this deck, do also bear in mind that MTGGoldfish tends to overprice cards.
Here’s what a list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/archetype/legacy-oops-all-spells#paper
This is the list that has a recent innovation being the Leylines in the maindeck. This build also has a Charbelcher pivot to fight graveyard hate.
Pox
A highly disruptive and annoying deck, a skilled pilot of the deck has described it aptly: you want to make your opponent have “too much salt to see winning lines,” and “drag them down into the mud with you, the true mud-dweller.” (https://www.reddit.com/r/MTGLegacy/comments/18h5ao3/pox_greatness_at_any_cost_top_64_at_ew_with_the/)
Cards that are staples:
Orcish Bowmaster, Urza’s Saga, Wasteland.
Upgrade path:
This deck is budget except for the 2 Nether Void in the sideboard, the author from the Reddit post above has stated that you can play Trinisphere in its place, but that isn’t as effective for the control matchups. It is, however, significantly more budget. Nether Void is perhaps a long-term goal if you find this deck to really speak to you.
Here’s the list Dustin (above) piloted with an 8-3-0 finish at Eternal Weekend:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6030062#paper
Rainbow Depths
Lands based combo. This deck seeks to make a 20/20 ASAP with the powerful Dark Depths land, by either copying it with Thespian’s Stage, or removing all the counters with Vampire Hexmage. This is a so-called ‘Rainbow’ variant as it utilises Gemstone Mine and Mana Confluence to play Stifle (used mainly to counter triggers from opposing Wastelands or Karakas, but can be used to counter the trigger on cards such as Thassa’s Oracle), it is primarily a black deck, using powerful black discard to protect the 20/20 you seek to make.
Cards that are staples:
Sadly, not much here other than Lotus Petal, Thoughtseize, Wasteland, and Force of Vigor, however, the deck is relatively cheap, breaking just over 600 USD on Goldfish, which bearing in mind tends to overprice cards.
Here’s what a list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/3530823#paper
If you enjoy this deck, in the long term you may want to either make BG ‘Turbo’ Depths, or Naya or Abzan ‘Slow’ Depths.
Turbo depths (relatively similar to Rainbow):
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/3168746#paper
Abzan Depths:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/archetype/legacy-selesnya-depths#paper
Naya Depths:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6038703#paper
On the Abzan and Naya Depths variants, these are more midrange decks with “oops I made a 20/20!” as a wincon, especially against control, rather than dedicated combo decks, and play differently to Rainbow and BG Depths.
Ruby Storm
For you combo fanatics, there’s a second choice other than Oops!, make absurd amounts of mana and cast your entire deck from exile in one turn, then Grapeshot for insane numbers of storm count. Something to be aware of is that this deck, more than other storm decks, suffers against combo hate such as Trinisphere, Gaddock Teeg, Lavinia, etc. For budget reasons, when using the list below, cut the one of City of Traitors for either a Mountain or Sandstone Needle.
Cards that are staples:
Ancient Tomb, City of Traitors, Lotus Petal, unfortunately not many staples here, but this deck is cheaper than a large number of modern decks even!
Upgrade path:
One mountain/Sandstone Needle > City of Traitors
Here’s what a list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/6015132#paper
Thought Lash
A mono-blue (mostly) combo deck that wins with Thassa’s Oracle by emptying its deck with the unique Thoughtlash enchantment, or exiling it’s deck with Paradigm Shift. This deck has many cantrips to find its cards, counter-magic to protect the combo, a clean, relatively Wasteland-proof manabase – it is clean, and while slower than other combo decks, has much more stability.
Cards that are staples:
Lotus Petal, Force of Will, Cavern of Souls, Otawara (somewhat), Flusterstorm
Here’s what a list might look like:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/5909084#paper
Note: while Mindbreak Trap is nice to have, it isn’t a must-run. If you wish to wait for the (hopefully soon) reprint of the card, and play something else, that’s totally fine, and a way to further budgetise this deck.
Conclusion
Ideally, this has helped you to at least think about what legacy deck you may want to build on a budget, while showing which cards are (expensive) staples, and potential upgrade paths where applicable, and I hope to have provided an option for everyone regardless of if they have 50 dollars or 1,000 dollars spare. If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to contact me, or join or look at one of the amazing resources in the introduction! Thanks for reading!