This is an article by the skilled Japanese player Dull04.

https://note.com/dull04/n/n97c159d6eaf8

Like their other writings, it is originally written in Japanese, but the translation via Google is effective enough to render it readable. The article explains their decision to play Naya Lands with only 1 Urza’s Saga (and win a large Japanese event by doing so), and in general is a great way to approach Lands deckbuilding.

Hello! My name is Kai, otherwise known as DeathWrongShaman420 on MTGO, and this is my RuG Lands Sideboard Guide!

This is my current iteration of RuG lands.  I top 8’d 3 challenges recently with a similar list, with a few sideboard tweaks.

The List

The Choices

So first, let’s talk about card choices and the blue splash.  The blue splash feels very strong right now, because Blue Elemental Blast is very strong and so is Flusterstorm, since spell-based combo is at an all time low and Goblins is very prevalent.  With the amount of Reanimator and Rescaminator decks, bounce removal like Otawara and Aether Spellbomb is also super strong.  Punishing Fire is also a very powerful tool in a world full of Name-Sticker Goblins, Griefs, and Elvish Reclaimers.  Also, you will notice there is no Sphere of Resistance in the 75.  I have come to feel that it is a particularly weak card on the draw and dilutes the deck’s consistency too much.  I talk more about it in this article (https://pendrellvale.com/2023/09/15/well-now-i-am-flusteredby-deathwrongshaman/ ). 

The Skeleton of the Deck

At the core of any RG/x lands shell is a skeleton, and I would be very cautious before making any tweaks to this skeleton.  I would say any RG/x lands deck should be playing the following:

4 Exploration
4 Life from the Loam
4 Crop Rotation
4 Mox Diamond
3 Punishing Fire
2 Card advantage/ value engines
At least 3 Saga targets
3 Dark Depths
3 Thespian’s Stage
4 Urza’s Saga
4 Wasteland
1 The Tabernacle of Pendrell Vale
2 Maze of Ith
1 Blast Zone
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Karakas
1 Boseiju, Who Endures
1 Forest
1 Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth
3 Grove of the Burnwillows
At least 5 other green mana sources/fetchlands

The Meat 

So now we can talk about the actual card choices for the mainboard:

Boseiju, Who Endures #2: This card is incredible.  It is so strong right now and its floor is an untapped green source (incredible).  The fact that it pseudo-counters Leyline Binding and Animate Dead is the cherry on top – I would not run less than two.

Otawara, Soaring City #1:  Similarly to Boseiju, it is a ton of utility for very little cost.  Otwara comes with the added perk of answering all pesky creatures, anything that was reanimated or cheated into play, and it can be recurred via Life from the Loam.  Absolutely incredible card. 

Maze of Ith #3:  Legacy is very fast right now, with a lot of turn 1 Griefs and turn 2 Trolls.  Maze is a clean answer to any fair deck and has never been better.  

Sylvan Library #1 and #2:  This is my value engine.  This could be Elvish Reclaimer or Crucible of Worlds, but with the amount of stack based interaction in my sideboard, the straightforward card advantage is very strong.  Prismatic Ending is also less common.  I specifically do not like Elvish Reclaimer, because it gives an opponent’s spot removal the opportunity to be a 1 for 1, while when you force them to remove a Saga Construct is still card disadvantageous.  A note: Library might seem scary in this Orcish Bowmaster world, but remember, Bowmaster sucks against Lands and Library can be good regardless of Bowmaster, so if our opponents want to keep in Bowmasters to “deal” with Library that is beneficial.

Aether Spellbomb: Card is so good.  Bounce removal, because of reanimation being prominent, is very strong and the fact that this can be tutored off Saga makes it a game changer.  

Shadowspear:  This makes the Saga stompy strategy very strong and will just allow you to stomp straight through your opponent.  The tempo swing from this card is so high and I feel as though it is 100% worth the include.

Soul-Guide Lantern/Pithing Needle/Expedition Map:  Fundamental cards right now, providing silver bullets or a continuing value engine from Saga.  Simply put these must be in the deck.

Dark Depths/Thespian’s Stage 3/3:  I would not go down to less than 6 combo pieces, and since blood moon is very prominent, the 3 Dark Depths to play into moon effects is very important.  

Sideboard

Flusterstorm:  This is a beautiful addition. It does everything. First it is a very powerful tool in the combo matchup; with Wasteland, Saga, and Marit Lage, applying pressure, Flusterstorm stalls very well against Doomsday, any Storm variant, Reanimator, and even Show and Tell.  It is also a powerful protection tool against UWx control decks as well as an answer to Forth Eorlingas. This card is pure gas and an incredible addition.

Definitely want to be on 3.

Blue Elemental Blast:  This is so good right now.  Blood Moon/Magus are all over the place, Forth Eorlingas is a threat, and GOBLINS GOBLINS GOBLINS. I love this card right now, and it works very well in the matchups I struggle with.  Also good against any Delver variant with red.

Definitely want to be on 2

Kozilek’s Return:  This is also very strong.  It is not good againstEDelver in my opinion, but it is very strong against Goblins, any Knight of the Reliquary/GSZ deck, Death and Taxes, Forth Eorlingas decks, Painter, and RW Initiative.  

I would be on 1-2.

Force of Vigor:  GAS.  Do not need to explain.  Good against all artifact decks, any moon deck, goblins, and Beanstalk/Leyline Decks

Must have 2, I like 3.

Surgical Extraction:  So good right now. There is a lot of Scam, Reanimator, and Lands. It also is strong against UWx control and Doomsday.

Definitely should have 2, I may go up to 3.

Endurance:  I like Endurance right now.  There is a lot of Delver, some Doomsday, Reanimator, Rescaminator, Lands, and BUG Beanstalk decks, around right now.  It’s not particularly strong the way that Surgical Extraction is, but it does have more versatility and works as a win condition which is strong.  Do not overestimate its strength against Delver.

I like having 2 right now, 3 felt like too much.

Choke:  Have not tested this yet.  There is one flex spot right now and this was recommended.  This could be any flex card, I am considering Grafdigger’s Cage, Choke, Red Elemental Blast, and Surgical number 3.

Notable Cards Left Out

Red Elemental Blast/Pyroblast:  Very weak right now.  With bounce removal, Maze of Ith, and consistent maintenance of graveyards, I am not that worried about Murktide Regent.  Blue decks are also rather weak, and Flusterstorm can operate as protection for Life from the Loam.  

I would consider 1, but 2 or 3 seems unnecessary. 

Ghost Quarter:  This seems unnecessary right now.  Legacy is fast and a lot of decks have multiple basics so truly locking out your opponent takes a lot of time.  

Sideboarding and Sideboard Guide

I will now go into my sideboarding philosophy, what cards I like to bring out and in, and a basic sideboard guide for common matchups.  Sideboarding with Lands is not an exact science and this is just my method of mapping.

Cards I bring in and when:

Flusterstorm:  Storm, RB Reanimator (Not UB ReScaminator), UWx Control Shells, Show and Tell, Oops All Spells, Cephalid Breakfast, any spell based combo matchups, Rhinos, Mississippi River,

Blue Elemental Blast:  Any Storm with red, any Moon Stompy deck, Delver, Goblins, Any Rx Initiative Decks, Jeskai Control with Blood Moon and Forth Eorlingas, Painter, Rhinos, Mississippi River.

Surgical Extraction: Reanimator, ReScaminator, Lands, Doomsday, Storm, Dredge, Cephalid Breakfast, UWx Control (if you have room), any Uro deck etc.  

 Imporant:  I do not bring Surgical Extraction in against Painter and 8-Cast and GW Depths.  I feel that it hinders our deck and there are better cards in those spots.

Kozilek’s Return: Goblins, DnT, Maverick, GWx Depths, Painter, 8 Cast, Initiative.

Important: Not a fan of this card against Delver, it dilutes the deck and is unnecessary.

Force of Vigor: Any random artifact deck, Lands, 8 Cast, Initiative, Painter, Storm, Stiflenaught, Beans Control, Goblins, Oops all Spells, Jeskai Control with a lot of basics, Breakfast if there is room, Mississippi.

Endurance: Reanimator, ReScaminator, Delver, Lands, GW Depths, Doomsday, Storm, 8-Cast, Cephalid Breakfast, Dredge, any true graveyard combo deck, Painter.

Cards I bring out and when:

These decisions are not objectively correct, and some of them may seem odd, but I have tested them all extensively and this is how I have found I like to make cuts

Utility Lands:  I will cut utility lands like Blast Zone, Tabernacle, Karakas, Bojuka Bog, etc. if they do not seem applicable in the matchup.  I have 34 lands and I will usually go down to 31-32 post board, but can go as low as 30 in the spell-based combo matchups like Storm and Doomsday.

Life from the Loam:  I will cut this very very rarely, only in matchups where it seems weak and even then I usually only cut 1.  These matchups like Show and Tell, Reanimator, Initiative, etc, and even then I usually don’t go down by more than 1.

Exploration: I just do not ever cut this card ever.

Mox Diamond:  Card so good. I cut it against Jeskai Control and that is about it.  Legacy is fast and the acceleration is very very strong.

Crop Rotation:  I am in a similar boat to Exploration and Mox Diamond.  Some people like to cut this against Delver and blue decks, but the strength of lands like Urza’s Saga and Thespian’s Stage makes the risk of it getting countered feel worth it.  Simply I have tried cutting it and I never like to. Shaving maybe 1 against Chalice of the Void decks on the draw maybe could be correct but I typically do not cut them ever.

Punishing Fire:  I bring this out in the obvious matchups it’s bad in such as Doomsday, Storm, Lands, UWx Control, Beanstalk Control. Notably, I like to keep them all against Initiative, Goblins, Delver, any Elvish Reclaimer deck, Painter, and Breakfast, as well as any random creature deck. If I suspect a Magus of the Moon I often try to leave 1 or 2 in, if not all 3.  I sometimes trim 1 against 8-Cast.

Sylvan Library: Good against spellbased combo, UWx Control, Lands, GW Depths, any grindy matchups. Its ok but not great against Delver.  Too slow against Initiative and Goblins.  Generally they can be trimmed for very strong hate cards such as Force of Vigor, Surgical Extraction, and Flusterstorm, that can win the game on their own.  Do not worry too much about Bowmaster, you should have PFires in the deck against any Bowmaster deck and Bowmaster is bad against Lands, so if your opponent keeps it in, it is also beneficial for us.

Saga Targets: 

Expedition Map:  I do not cut this basically ever, it is so good.

Soul-Guide Lantern: Strong against any graveyard deck, such as Delver, Lands, Depths, Painter.

Pithing Needle: It is pretty apparent when to cut this, I do cut it against Delver and Rescaminator.  Good against Goblins!

Aether Spellbomb:  Good against Reanimator, Rescaminator, Delver, Lands, 8-Cast, Initiative, Show and Tell, DnT, most creature decks. I do cut this against Goblins.

Shadowspear:  Card is so good.  Very good against any creature deck, Delver, ReScaminatior, Initiative, 8-Cast, Storm, Goblins, etc.  It allows us to race with constructs very well.

Dark Depths: I cut 1 of these against Lands/GW Depths and against Swords to Plowshares decks (Not RW initiative). That is about it, I would not cut this more frequently than that.  

Urza’s Saga:  Do not cut ever.  Not against Moon decks.  Do not cut ever. 

Green Sources:  Trim at most 1, either Grove of the Burnwillows, Boseiju, or Yavimaya, depending on what you need.  Boseiju is amazing right now and should be kept in a lot, it is so good against Rescaminator.  Yavimaya should come out against Lands and GW Depths

Maze of Ith:  Asides from the the obvious matchups I usually trim 1 against RB Reanimator and Goblins.  Can be very good against the Triumph of Saint Katherine’s control decks.

Actual Sideboarding Guide

Rescaminator

In – 2x Surgical, 2x Endurance

Out – 1x Tabernacle, 1x Needle, 1x Karakas, 1x Sylvan Library

4c Beanstalk

In – 2x Force of Vigor, 3x Flusterstorm, 2x Surgical Extraction, 1x Choke

Out – 1x Blast Zone, 1x Tabernacle, 3x Pfire, 1x Pithing Needle, 1x Karakas, 1x Dark Depths

Grixis Delver

In – 2x Endurance, 2x Hydroblast, Choke

Out – 1x Needle, 1x Karakas, 1x Boseiju, 2x Sylvan library

Temur Delver

In – 2x Endurance, 2x Hydroblast, 1x Choke

Out – 1x Needle, 1x Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth, 1x Karakas, 2x Sylvan Library

Goblins

In – 2x Kozilek’s Return, 2x Hydroblast, 3x Force of Vigor

Out – 1x Bojuka Bog, 1x Karakas, 1x Maze of Ith, 1x Soul-Guide Lantern, 2x Sylvan Library, 1x Aether Spellbomb

Lands

In – 2x Surgical, 3x Force of Vigor, 2x Endurance

Out – 3x Pfire, 1x Dark Depths, 1x Tabernacle, 1x Maze of Ith, 1x Shadowspear

8-Cast

In – 3x Force of Vigor, 2x Kozilek’s Return

Out – 1x Maze of Ith, 1x Punishing Fire, 1x Grove of the Burnwillows, 1x Blast Zone, 1x Sylvan Library

Painter

In – 2x Kozielk’s Return, 3x Force of Vigor, 2x Endurance

Out – 1x Karakas, 1x Aether Spellbomb, 1x Maze of Ith, 2x Sylvan Library, 1x Punishing Fire, 1x Grove of the Burnwillows

Mono Red Prison

In – 2x Hydroblast, 3x Force of Vigor, 2x Kozilek’s Return

Out – 1x Tabernacle, 1x Karakas, 1x Bojuka Bog, 1x Soul-Guide Lantern, 2x Sylvan Library, 1x Life From the Loam

Doomsday

In – 2x Endurance, 3x Flusterstorm, 2x Surgical Extraction, 1x Choke

Out -1x Tabernacle, 1x Soul-Guide Lantern, 1x Shadowspear 3x Pfire, 2x Maze of Ith

RW Initiative

In – 2x Hydroblast, 3x Force of Vigor, 2x Kozilek’s Return

Out – 1x Bojuka Bog, 1x Soul-Guide Lantern, 1x Karakas, 1x Blast Zone, 2x Sylvan Library, 1x Life from the Loam

Rhinos

In – 2x Hydroblast, 3x Flusterstorm, 1x Choke

Out – 1x Bojuka Bog, 1x Soul-Guide Lantern, 1x Pithing Needle, 1x Karakas, 1x Boseiju, 

1x Punishing Fire

GW Depths

In: 2x Kozilek’s Return, 2x Endurance

Out: 2x Dark Depths, 1x Yavimaya, 1x Aether Spellbomb

Storm

In: 3x Flusterstorm, 3x Force of Vigor, 2x Surgical Extraction, 2x Hydroblast1, Choke

Out – 3x Pfire, 1x Shadowspear, 1x Pithing Needle, 1x Aether Spellbomb, 3x Maze of Ith, 

1x Karakas, 1x Soul-Guide Lantern

Jeskai Control

In: 3x Flusterstorm, 2x Hydroblast, 2x Surgical Extraction, 1x Choke

Out: 1x Pfire, 1x Soul-Guide Lantern, 1x Shadowspear, 1x Tabernacle, 1x Mox Diamond, 

1x Dark Depths, 2x Maze of Ith

Sneak and Show

In: 3x Flusterstorm, 3x Force of Vigor, 2x Hydroblast, 1x Choke

Out: 1x Tabernacle, 1x Bojuka Bog, 1x Soul-Guide Lantern, 1x Shadowspear, 2x Life From the Loam, 1x Blast Zone, 1x Maze of Ith, 1x PFire

Death & Taxes

In: 2x Kozilek’s Return, 3x Force of Vigor

Out: 1x Bojuka Bog, 1x Soul-guide Lantern, 2x Dark Depths, 1x Mox Diamond

Cephalid Breakfast

In: 2x Surgical Extraction, 3x Flusterstorm, 2x Kozilek’s Return

Out: 1x Karakas, 1x Tabernacle, 2x Life From the Loam, 1x Aether Spellbomb, 1x Shadowspear, 1x Maze of Ith

And that is all folks!  Sideboarding with Lands is complicated and not an exact science, and these mappings change every matchup.  If you have any sideboarding questions, decklist questions, or Lands questions, feel free to message me!

Discord: DeathWrongShaman

MTGO: deathWrongShaman420

Twitter: deathWrongShamn

Introduction

I was really happy to see EW hosted in Pittsburgh again since it’s my hometown. Not only is it a magic tournament but I get to see family and have free lodging. I hadn’t played much Legacy since 2019 and was torn between Lands or GW depths. I settled on Lands since I enjoy the controlly gameplay, found a list online and jammed leagues on modo. I made a few changes but my 75 was pretty close to a stock list. I wanted to play Spheres main since I think it gives a lot of game vs any deck on the play and is great even on the draw vs combo if they are too scared of a Force to go for it turn 1. I was on GW because I think Swords is just way too good right now. I honestly went in expecting to drop early and play some cube, but what I really wanted was to not be 2-2 and begrudgingly keep playing it out.

The Matches

Round 1 – 2-0 vs Beans

Game 1 is quick and easy with turn 1 Sphere and turn 2 Saga. I don’t face much resistance as I make karnstructs, get an Expedition Map which fetches another Saga and win through a Swords or two.

Game 2 is long and grindy. I spend a few turns making saga tokens which eat Swords and Terminus. 3 Beans are out at this point and he draws 6 off a Lorien Revealed. I Boseiju and Haywire Mite him back down to 1 Bean. I have a Stage on Urza’s Saga making constructs every turn which are continuously killed by Dress Down, Terminus, or Swords. A Forth Eorlingas claims the monarch at the cost of 2 out of 3 of the tokens and then stalls while drawing an extra card each turn, playing Endurances to chump block and disrupt my Loam engine. I manage to threaten a Marit Lage which eats the Swords instead of the karnstruct and I take the monarch for myself. I Wasteland my opponent’s Volcanic Island and Xanders Lounge to keep them off the second Forth Worlingas I assume they have. They Wndurance themselves and fetch red again. Luckily they don’t have the 2nd Forth in their hand and they concede as turns are called.

Round 2 – 2-0 vs Painter

Team kill vs a friend on round 2 feels pretty bad. I Pithing Needle Grindstone game 1 and make sure not to have an artifact in my graveyard to play around Welder. I make a Marit Lage by turn 4 or 5 and he has no answer to it. 

Game 2 I Swords the Painter and make an early Marit Lage and he has no answer for it. 

After this round my friend managed to play against four other people he knew in the following rounds before barely squeezing into cashing with a 7-3-1 record.

Round 3 – 2-1 vs Rhinos

I sit down and as usual make some smalltalk while waiting and find out they are in the Vintage top 8.

Game 1 he opens on a suspended Footfalls. I play Diamond, Wasteland on turn 1 and jam a Sphere followed by another Wasteland and another Sphere turn 2. Turn 3 we both pass and I double Waste him before the Footfalls would be castable and he shows me 2 Spirit Guides. I have no lands in play and the 2 Spheres stop me from doing anything and I die to the rhinos.

Game 2 is a slow start off a mull to 6 but I have a Sphere out on t2. Opponent plays out lands and nothing else. Turn 3 they pay 4 for their Shardless Agent with 3 lands and a Spirit Guide, forgetting about the Sphere for their cascade. They weren’t able to draw out of it and eventually died to some karnstructs. I definitely would have lost without that misplay and got really lucky he made it. 

Game 3 the rhinos come out early but a Maze of Ith and a Swords keep them at bay and the karnstructs are bigger than their Shardless Agent. A few get bounced or iced but he never gets another threat in play.

Round 4 – 2-0 vs Dragon Stompy

Game 1 I lead on Ancient Tomb into Sphere and he bolts himself with a Shatterskull Summit to play a Chrome Mox. Turn 2 I play a Saga and he follows up with a Chalice on 1. I stare at a hand of 2 Explorations and 2 Swords and pray. He does nothing else and the single Saga gets there. We go to game 2.

He opens with an Ancient Tomb and a Chrome Mox exiling Blood Moon and casts a Trinisphere which makes my Force of Vigor look real bad. I say Savannah go. Turn 2 he plays a Bombardier and swings for 2 while I play an Urza’s Saga and pass. Turn 3 he plays a second Bombardier and attacks for 4 bringing me to 14. I play a Stage and pass. Next he plays a Legion Warboss and before going to attackers I Force of Vigor the Chrome Mox and the Trinisphere, pitching Exploration so he can’t throw them at me with the Bombardiers. He still attacks for 5 bringing me to 9. I untap, draw and with the Saga trigger on the stack float 1 and Crop rotation it away for a Dark Depths using the trigger to find Pithing Needle which names Bombardier. I play the Mox Diamond I drew for turn and another land, make Marit Lage and keep the Mox Diamond up to Crop Rotation for a Maze of Ith if needed. He tanks for a few minutes and concedes.

Round 5 – 2-0 vs Patchwork Stompy

In game 1 Wastelands + Loam keep them off casting anything other than a single Patchwork Construct which eats a Swords. I make a Marit Lage turn 3 or 4 and win.

Then in game 2 Force of Vigor + Wastelands keeps them low on permanents but they resolve an Emry that buys back a few Baubles before being Pithing Needled. I get a few karnstructs and they are bigger than all their creatures and able to swing for the win.

Round 6 – 2-1 vs Witherbloom Scam

Game 1 he opens with a Grief on the play and I breathe a sigH of relief about the matchup. He takes a Swords and doesn’t Reanimate leaving me with some lands and a Crop Rotation. I play out my lands threatening a turn 2 Marit Lage. Turn 2 he plays a Witherbloom Apprentice and I feel a lot worse about my chances, turn 3 he has the Chain of Smog and I die. 

Game 2 I do my best to keep him off black mana but he has plenty of basics and gets the Apprentice out. I try to Swords it but it gets Forced. I fade the Chain of Smog for 4 turns in a row with both me and him dead drawing anything relevant until I finally draw a Stage to make Marit Lage and close it out. 

Game 3 he leads on a Misty fetching a basic Island, I follow up with a land and a Pithing Needle blind naming Polluted Delta. Next two turns he plays out deltas and dies to a quick Marit Lage.

Round 7 – 2-1 vs Reanimator

Game 1 I have a Sphere and win with Marit Lage. All I see is basic swamp, Thoughtseize and Urza’s Saga, so I board for Reanimator.

Game 2 he opens with Dark Ritual, Entomb, Reanimate on Atraxa and I have the Surgical in hand. I play out a bunch of lands but no threats. He top decks a Magus of the Moon and slowly kills me.

Game 3 he has a turn 2 Archon which eats a Swords to Plowshares. I Wasteland a bunch of his lands and play out 2 Spheres and we’re both in top deck mode. My opponent is doing a bunch of Sphere math and ends up really confused. He ends up casting a Dark Ritual into 2 spheres off 3 lands netting 0 mana and then casting an Animate Dead on a Troll. I cast an Endurance for 5 mana to stop the Animate Dead and get a threat on the board. Next turn I draw another Endurance which I immediately deploy. The 2 Endurances end the game and I draw a Surgical right after for good measure.

Round 8 – 2-0 vs Grixis Delver

This round was a camera match, the vod can be found on the Card Titan twitch channel.

My last camera match I got t2 Marit Laged within 30 seconds of the stream swapping to my match so I went in to this one expecting to get destroyed in a similar fashion.

Game 1 I keep a hand of Depths, Stage, Fetch, Mox Diamond, Land, Exploration and a Pithing Needle on the play. It’s the nuts and he doesn’t force anything so i get the t2 Lage and win. 

In game 2 a turn one Delver comes down early and blind flips. I play an Exploration and slow him down with a Maze of Ith. He plays a Dragon’s Rage Channeler turn 2 and I play out 2 lands and start Loaming. I play a Soul-Guide Lantern to keep the Channeler off delirium. I dredge Loam and flip Depths and a Tabby. I cast a Loam which meets a hardcast Force of Negation and then cast the 2nd Loam in hand which they counter with Force of Will. At this point he has 3 lands and 5 cards in the graveyard and I should have popped the Lantern but I don’t and a Murktide comes down. I dredge, play out my lands and completely forget Price of Progress exists and die to it.

Game 3 I have Diamond + Loam. He plays a Dragon’s Rage Channeler. I try to stick a Choke but it eats a Force of Negation. I Wasteland his Volcanic Island after he plays a second Channeler. Then I waste his second land and play a Sphere. Dredging Loam finds a Tabernacle and I Wasteland his Wasteland before playing the Tabernacle with them having no lands in play. I eventually find an Urza’s Saga and he concedes to the wincon.

Round 9 – 0-2 vs Boros Painter

Honestly at this point in the day I’m so tired I barely remember what happened so sorry if any of this is wrong.

Game 1 I try to keep him off mana and Urza’s Sagas but am not successful. I don’t put up any threats and without an Exploration Loam is too slow so I die to the combo.

Game 2 I Swords an early Painter but he has a second one. A Magus of the Moon comes down and without a Diamond I can’t Swords it and slowly die.

I think I really need to keep a fast Marit Lage in this matchup since it’s really hard to keep them off their combo and a fast kill is by far your best shot.

Round 10 – 0-2 vs TES

This round was another camera match, the vod can be found on the Card Titan twitch channel.

Game 1 I die turn 1, not much to say or that I could do differently. I kept a hand with turn 2 Marit Lage and hoped he got unlucky, but its possible mulling for a t2 Sphere would have been better.

Game 2 I mulled to 5 looking for a Sphere or Deafening Silence, and end up keeping a medium 5 with a t1 Deafening Silence. Urza’s Saga fetches a Soul-Guide Lantern to keep him off Gaea’s Will lines. I am able to make a Marit Lage but drew a Sphere that turn. Decided to try to win and died to end of turn Echoing Truth into a Beseech for Song of Creation. Definitely should have played the Sphere but the pressure of the win and in plus playing against Storm did me in.

Round 11 – 2-1 vs Mystic Forge Combo

Game 1 a Pithing Needle comes down against an early Karn. I Wasteland a few lands as he plays out Grim Monoliths and Voltaic Keys. He eventually draws his whole deck with One Ring + Paradox Engine. Not able to threaten his mana base enough when he as Voltaic Key and Grim Monolith.

In game 2 I Wasteland every land he plays and Pithing Needle Voltaic Key. The One Ring comes down and can’t find anything to help.

Game 3 he goes to 5 after 2 regular mulls and 2 Serum Powder mulls. He opens with Urza’s Saga + Lotus Petal and a Mox Opal. I Force of Vigor the 2 artifacts and Wasteland the Urza’s Saga and he isn’t able to do anything the whole game.

At this point I’m the highest x-2 so if tables 3 and 4 decide to play it out rather than risk the ¼ chance of being 9th off breakers I can squeeze in but they all shook hands and drew.

Conclusion

I got really lucky with the matchups and draws this tournament as well as some questionable misplays from opponents. A big part of doing well in any tournament this big is always gonna be luck but how you leverage your good and bad luck is what matters more. 

Overall happy really with my performance but going from 8-0 and missing 2 win and ins definitely hurts. With so much of the prizing being in the top8 with the dragons rage channeler promos 10th place getting $500 + some accessories is rough. The deck feels really good, but Magus of the Moon was pretty backbreaking and I definitely see the appeal to playing red to have answers for those. Gonna practice a lot more for next year and hopefully find myself in the top 8 instead of narrowly missing it.

Introduction

Over the past several months sphere lands have proved to be a solid choice on MTGO and paper but can be slightly different variations.  Most recently white has been more popular due to the rise in Troll/Scam decks (tempo), as a good answer to Murktide Regent, Knight of the Reliquary, Seasoned Dungeoneer, [insert any creature that bolt doesn’t kill], and the list goes on and on… I wanted to discuss some of the differences between color and card choices, also a review from my recent top 8 finish at the SCG Con Pittsburgh 5k. 

Primer

Sphere of Resistance in the main deck drastically changes the play patterns as opposed to more classic builds with punishing fire or gamble. Alli’s recent article about Sphere Lands and the tempo emblem was fantastic, and it made a lot of sense to me about the playstyle of Sphere Lands. So go read that for sure if you have not!  

I had been avoiding playing Sphere’s until about 3 months ago, still trying to play main deck (value) cards like Endurance or Minsc and Boo with Punishing Fire’s and even Valakult Exploration (which I love dearly). All of these cards are great but serve different roles and are bad versus these decks that want to kill you quickly. So I caved and gave the main deck Spheres a try and haven’t looked back. Urza’s Saga is a phenomenal magic card and I don’t believe we need much beyond that and Depths to win the game. 

White v Red

Recently one of the more popular versions of Sphere lands has been running white, which gives us mainly access to Swords to Plowshares, arguably the best removal spell ever printed. Otherwise lists have been adding Riftstone Portal and Horizon Canopy which are both excellent choices as well and help with the colors. But the sideboard is what I want to discuss because I believe that’s where we are losing the most points by playing white. 

These are a few examples of some of the cards white has access to that I’ve seen. I don’t personally believe we need additional Storm hate beyond Sphere or Mindbreak Trap (if you’re that worried about storm) because Storm’s meta share is so low anyway and most of the dominant decks are blue, which helps keep that in check. Also at that point I think Iwould rather just play blue to have Flusterstorm. Priest is good versus Reanimator and Show and Tell especially when they don’t see it coming. It is proactive which is great as opposed to Surgical or Macabre, but Reanimator already feels fine with Bog and Crop Rotations. Kaheera is cool to see, but I don’t like that we lose a single slot to it. At worst it’s a vanilla threat, and at best it guarantees the pitch value to force. This is Trailovsky’s 5-0 recently that I believe is a typical GW Sphere list for reference. They cut a land for a Manabond, but that is about the only difference. 

Red has traditionally been the more common color of Lands since the Punishing Fire days with Grove. The most important thing I want to add is that it gives us access to Pyroblast effects out of the sideboard. The current metagame has and always will have blue cards, and Pyroblast has been a format staple since Delver emerged.

Being able to counter Force of Will or Dress Down is very good when you need to resolve cards like Choke or keep constructs on the table. Saving a Loam from a Force of Negation is good value as well. The ability to aggressively blast a Brainstorm or destroy a Murktide Regent holds a wide range for a single mana. I believe removal is important but I think right now flexibility and blue are more crucial. Most importantly I want to say that the larger portion of the metagame is blue, which means the blasts are almost always a live sideboard card to have. The only downgrade in switching to red is that we get Bolts instead of Swords. Bolts still hit a large number of problematic creatures like Archon of Emeria, Dragon’s Rage Channeler, Painter’s Servant, and Magus of the Moon. Since the printing of Up the Beanstalk and Orcish Bowmasters, 4-5 color control decks are emerging and doing well so I want cards like Choke and blasts to combat those and Delver. 

Sylvan library is a card that a lot of white lists have cut or moved to the board since Bowmasters came about. However, it is one of the single best cards against decks that want to go long or don’t pressure your life total. With the control decks growing in popularity I want to reinclude 2 of these back into my main deck. Rishadan Port is another piece of that puzzle when it comes to gaining tempo under a sphere or choke, that has been cut to make room for the GW lands that I also believe are great in sphere builds. 

Tournament Report

Sunday was the legacy 5k in Pittsburgh, PA in the US, 124 registered players. Good enough for a top 8 finish. Here was my list:

As we discussed previously some of my card choices and why I wanted to play red, I also wanted to add a single Torpor Orb for the Doomsday and Initiative matchups and a Grafdigger’s Cage as the 4th proactive answer to Reanimator and Cradle Control decks that also in comes off Saga. I made a few concessions to decks like Initiative or Storm that without a Sphere on the play I accepted were bad matchups. 

Round 1 – Grixis Delver 2-1

Excellent start to the event. Delver is a match up that I believe we are favored in and I wanted to see. Nothing extremely exciting during these games, I remember they played out relatively normal. Wastelands are exchanged, Bowmaster’s is bad versus Lands and Marit Lage is good against them. 

In: 3 Blasts, 3 Bolts and 2 Choke

Out: 4 Sphere, 2 Library, 1 Ancient tomb and 1 Needle

Round 2 – Storm (ANT) 2-1

Game 1 he is on the play. I keep an opening 7 with Exploration, Loam, Diamond, Crop Rotation and some lands but no Sphere. Solid keep in the blind. He leads on suspended Gaea’s Will. Ok he kept an interesting hand but I’m 99% sure he is on Storm. I know without a Sphere I’m disadvantaged with this hand, so I need to restrict his mana. I aggressively Crop Rotate for wasteland and hit the Bayou. He untaps and plays a few more lands each turn and I am unable to kill him before he goes off. 

In: 1 Cage and 3 Blasts

Out: Crucible and 2 Loam, Karakas 

Game 2 I’m on the play and mulligan to 6. It’s keepable with Exploration, Diamond, Library and Saga together with a few lands. I know I wanted to mulligan for the Sphere but I felt this hand was good if I didn’t die on turn 1. I didn’t want to risk going to 5 for a potentially worse hand. I could dig for a Sphere and I had a clock. I drew a Red Blast, was able to snipe a Brainstorm, and then ended up putting pressure on with Wasteland and constructs; he died to his own Ad Nauseam on turn 4 because of construct damage. 

Game 3 he is on the play. I keep 7 with double Sphere, Blast and Diamond + Saga and lands. Turn 2 I had double sSphere, got Soul-Guide Lantern off the 3rd chapter so he couldn’t dig out with Cabal Ritual. I had the blast for his Chain of Vapor. 

Current record 2-0

Round 3 – Mono-White Hammer 0-2

This was miserable.

Game 1 he is on the play and leads with Sigarda’s Aid, Ornithopter. Hammer was equip turn 2. Turn 3 I’m dead. 

In: 2 Force and 3 Bolts

Out: ?? Loam, Bog and something else? 

Game 2 was very similar. I stalled a few turns with a Maze of Ith but was overwhelmed with constructs and Kaldra Compleat. 

Round 4 – GW Lands (Sphere unknown) 2-1

Game 1 I’m on the play and my opening hand has Sphere, Mox, Saga and Crop Rotation with some lands. I lead on a Sphere and he Wastelands my saga. He gets Exploration a few turns later with Loam going and shuts the door on me.

In: 2 force, 2 Surgicals and Macabre

Out: 4 Sphere and Tabernacle

Game 2 on the play again. This game is in my favor as I keep Exploration and Loam with Diamonds. I play my hand on turn 1 sequencing around Force. He plays the Force, I Loam into Saga and when it’s on chapter 2 he plays his own Saga. On his end step, I make a construct, untap, make a 2nd construct and grab a Needle naming Saga to slow the game down. Then I drew Wasteland to seal the victory.

Game 3 on the draw, all I remember is he lead on double Diamond and Exploration and I had the force. The game durdled a few turns past that and I ended up winning. 

Round 5 – UB Shadow 2-0

Game 1 was close and grindy. He had shadow in play with Bowmasters. I assembled constructs with Shadowspear and ended up closing out with that. 

In: 3 Blasts, 3 Bolt and 2 Choke

Out: 4 Sphere, 1 Tomb, and Libraries (maybe Needle?)

Game 2 he leads on Wasteland, I lead on A fetchland with Crop Rotation in my hand. At the end of my turn he cycles Troll for Underground Sea. When he attempts to Reanimate on turn 2 I rotate for Bojuka Bog. It resolves. I draw Wasteland and hit the Sea. The game is over as he doesn’t draw any more lands. 

Round 6 – Mono-blue 8 Cast 2-1

Game 1 and 2 I remember very little about.

Game 3 was very grindy. We end at a point where I have 5 lands plus a Diamond in play. My lands are Yavimaya, Tabernacle, Stage, Depths and Saga on chapter 2. He has just resolved Kappa, which is a 5/5 currently. He also has a 4/4 construct and a Needle on Stage and a tapped Soul-Guide Lantern in play. No cards in his hand. I have Crop Rotation in my hand at 7 life. I know I have exactly one turn, even if I make the construct and block. I went deep into the tank for a minute. I was trying to find a way to kill the Needle so I could make a 20/20 while also keeping my Tabernacle to restrict his mana. I had all but Diamond, Saga, Tabernacle, and Yavimaya tapped at his end step. I used the Saga to rotate for a Blast Zone, using the 3 remaining mana to destroy the Needle and Lantern, along with my Exploration. Then I untap and make Marit Lage, forcing him to either keep his creatures or keep his mana and try to draw Otawara. He didn’t draw anything and I won the next turn. Epic ending.

Round 7 – 4c Delver 2-1

At this point I’m trying to figure out if I can draw into top 8, depending on the pairings. I get my pairing however and I’m the pair down meaning I had to play. 

Game 1 i basically see Grixis Delver plus a Tropical Island. Feeling very confident at this point, I closed the game with a Loam on Marit Lage after the first had been hit by Petty Theft. 

In: 3 Blast, 3 Bolt and 2 Choke

Out: Spheres, Needle, 2 Library and 1 Tomb

Game 2 was very close. He made a huge Murktide I couldn’t deal with and he ended up getting in for several damage with Bowmasters and the orc token. 

Game 3 went long, to the point that I almost worried about time at this point. Questing Druid was a very good addition to his build as it helped him grind more in addition to Channeler. He lead turn 1 on Channeler. I went Mox Diamond, Saga, Loam, discarding Maze as it was my only other land. I had a Bolt and a Blast in my hand. I dredged a Ghost quarter with the Loam and turn 2 hit his Underground Sea. He fails to find and I knew that without a counterspell or interaction for my Loam I was going to try and Strip Mine him out. The plan goes on for several turns limiting him to 1 land a turn basically and eventually I find room to resolve a safe 20/20. We shook hands and I was now in the top 8, where we we elected to split.\

Conclusion

It was a great event, great matches and I’m very thankful to have done well. I believe Sphere lands is in a great position. Really I believe Lands in general is in a great position in the metagame, and I hope that this has given some insight as to why red was my choice and will be going forward. Thanks for reading and cheers!

RuG Lands: A Concept and Sideboard Guide

Introduction

Hello! My name is Kai, also known as DeathWrongShaman on discord, DeathWrongShaman420 on MTGO, or @deathWrongShamn on Twitter.  I am a 20 year-old math major and an enormous Legacy fan.  I started playing Magic when I was 8, and Legacy sometime in 2016: I was on red-black Reanimator using shock lands, and have slowly moved my way up to what I consider to be the pinnacle of Legacy decks: Lands!  I finished paper Lands about two years ago and have been playing almost nothing else since.  Then about eight months ago I started playing MTGO and my love for the deck has grown since.  Recently I placed 17th out of 264 in a MTGO Super Qualifier and was asked if I would like to write something for the Legacy Lands website and of course I said yes!  So I am going to share my list, insight into my decision making on cards both in and out of the list, and a sideboard guide! Bear with me, this is the first article that I have written, but hopefully not the last.

So What Am I Writing About? Why Is There a Picture of a Blue Card?

This is my current RuG Lands list, with Punishing Fire and a blue splash! I have been toying around with RuG lands and BuG lands for a while, and this is the list that feels the most powerful to me at the moment.  With the amount of blue spells I have in this list, the opportunity cost for playing blue is very low.  The list plays like a very traditional RG Lands list with PFire, but now has some very powerful tutorable removal and sideboard interaction.  I will now go over the cards I chose to put in the deck, and the cards I chose to leave out!

My Decisions

Lands decks have a fundamental ~45 cards that they need to operate.  I would not play a shell that did not run at least:

4 Wasteland
4 Urza’s Saga
3 Thespian’s Stage 
3 Dark Depths (This could be two but I do not think two is correct)
1 Boseiju, Who Endures
1 Blast Zone
1 Karakas
1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth
2 Maze of Ith
At least 9 green lands including Boseiju (I prefer 11-12)
4 Mox Diamond
4 Exploration
4 Crop Rotation
4 Life from the Loam
At least 3 Saga Targets
Somewhere between 33-36 lands total
And at least 4 answers to Magus of the Moon and 4 answers to Blood Moon

Now for the fun part, the decisions!  

Decisions Decisions Decisions 

There are a ton of different builds of lands and cards that can fill out the rest of the deck.  I will now go into my decisions!

Punishing Fire/Grove of the Burnwillows VS Sphere of Resistance

The legacy meta has warped around Orcish Bowmaster and become very creature heavy, making Punishing Fire a very powerful recurable removal spell that answers a majority of creatures in the format and that also overloads Surgical Extraction with additional targets.  A requirement to play PFire is at least 3 Grove of the Burnwillows, to make sure that the PFires are always active.  

HOWEVER, there is a big additional component to this choice.  Punishing Fire does not work well with mainboard Sphere of Resistance, which has become increasingly popular.  I have chosen to continue with the recurable removal package instead of transitioning to a more prison heavy build with two Ancient Tombs and Sphere in the main.  This is primarily because I feel PFire is incredible in matchups against tempo, midrange, and creature decks, such as Delver, Shadow, and DnT, while Sphere is actively bad in those matchups.  PFire also gives us a lot of room to catch up from behind, and play a more controlling strategy.  Meanwhile Sphere helps against combo decks a lot, and will undoubtedly give us free wins, but the decks that Sphere is good against can often turn one kill, or cast an initiative creature, or can play through Sphere on turn 1, like reanimator. This makes Sphere of Resistance on the draw much weaker, especially in the blind.  It also makes games much more play/draw dependent which increases the amount of variance in the game, and that frustrates me as a player so I personally like to avoid it.  Simply put, I feel as though Punishing Fire is a very powerful effect, and after a lot of testing, I do not like the play patterns or variance that Sphere of Resistance creates when it is in the mainboard.

If we look at this a little deeper, we could make the claim that, when played with Urza’s Saga, Mox Diamond, and Wasteland, Sphere of Resistance is the penultimate tempo card, ON THE PLAY.  Almost nothing feels as powerful as Saga, Mox Diamond, Sphere on the play, because when your opponent is casting their 1 drop, you have 2 5/5’s and another artifact you tutored up.  However this changes on the draw.  Blue Decks get their first Ponder in to find interaction, Delver plays a turn 1 3/2 flier followed by a Wasteland, DnT plays out an Aether Vial, Reanimator casts Entomb setting up a turn 2 Reanimate, Initiative cast their Chrome Mox and Seasoned Dungeoneer on turn 1, Mystic Forge plays a Karn, the Great Creator, Shadow reanimates a Troll through your Sphere, or simply your opponents deck does not care about the tax effect.  Sphere of Resistance does not take the “tempo emblem”, but instead protects it, meaning if your opponent has already made a proactive play the card is much worse.  Legacy has seemingly developed a habit of decks making powerful turn 1 plays in the blind, regardless of interaction, making Sphere of Resistance on the draw in game 1 much worse.  Lands is a control deck that has no cantrips and instead relies on its ability to have incredibly powerful draws, recurring answers and threats, and explosive opening hands.  When we increase the number of dead draws later on and the number of spells that are dead once they hit the graveyard, remove our ability to continuously deal with pesky creatures through Punishing Fire, and add more cards that are bad in our opening hands on the draw in the blind, we damage the resilience and consistency of the deck.  I would rather have a card like PFire that excels in all the matches its good in, versus Sphere which is only good in certain matchups and often only good on the play.

Blue Cards

SO NOW WE TALK ABOUT THE BLUE SPLASH!!

Mainboard

I am a big advocate of the blue splash!  The cost to play it is super low, right now I only have one Tropical Island as a fetchable blue source (and moxen and an Otawara if necessary).  In the mainboard having access to Aether Spellbomb and Otawara, Soaring City is very powerful in a meta full of reanimated Griefs and Trolls, Murktide Regents, Construct tokens, and opposing Marit Lages.  Bounce removal is an effective form of removal, and using the tutor off of Urza’s Saga to clear out blockers for your constructs is a powerful tempo play.  Looping Otawara with Life from the Loam, as another recurable removal spell/answer, is a very powerful answer, and of course having answers to Archon of Cruelty or Kaldra Compleat is very strong.

Sideboard

In the sideboard we get some powerful tools too! These are Blue Elemental Blast and Flusterstorm.  Blue Elemental Blast is an obvious one, giving us an answer to prison spells such as Blood Moon and Magus of the Moon, as well as Caves of Chaos Adventurer and other red value spells.  Then we get to Flusterstorm.  The key to the blue splash.  Flusterstorm provides us with a new angle to the spell based combo matchup; the stack!  Combining countermagic with land destruction, permanent based tax effects, and graveyard hate creates a diverse arsenal to unload in the combo matchups.  Sphere is a very relevant piece in terms of taxing Storm, Doomsday, Reanimator, Sneak and Show, and etc. and Flusterstorm gives us the ability to protect our Spheres from hate as well as interrupt a combo.  BUT THAT’S NOT ALL!! With the rising popularity of Forth Eorlingas as the win condition of choice for UWx control, having an uncounterable answer for it in that matchup is amazing.  It also is a very strong piece of interaction to protect your spells that matter in the blue control matchups, or protect a 20/20.

Other Blue Cards

There are a few other powerful blue cards I have tried to varying levels of success.  I will briefly state my thoughts on them.

Uro, Titan of Nature’s Wrath: A powerful card to have and a solid engine, but it is a strain on the manabase, and I do not believe it can be supported in a RuG list.  It could be worth exploring in a UG shell, or a BuG shell that could commit more to blue mana.

Sifle:  A gimmicky card that can be a good piece of interaction against Storm, Thassa’s Oracle, and Initiative, but the applications are narrow and I have found Flusterstorm to be a better and more versatile form of interaction.

Spell Pierce:  An alternative to Flusterstorm, that can interact with artifacts and planeswalkers.  If Mystic Forge or Artifact Storm decks became more popular I would consider a split but right now I prefer Flusterstorm.

Slogurk, the Overslime:  This card.  This card is awesome.  I absolutely love it.  An amazing powerful threat that dodges removal and serves as an alternative to Loam as well.  Looping it with Karakas is amazing.  It looks gimmicky but overall I think it is incredible, and I want to find room for the card in the 75 but as of now, I cannot justify it.  I would say that to play it we would need to add either a Waterlogged Grove or a third green fetch, but in my current list there is no room.  Slogurk is something I will test again undoubtedly.  

I mean look at it, what a card.

Field of the Dead: This is one of the more controversial and non-stock cards that appears in all of my lists.  However I am a strong advocate of this card.  It is a powerful utility land, that provides inevitability against UWx control decks, and can give you some very powerful and explosive hands in combination with Loam and Exploration or Thespian’s Stage.  It also gives you some very good redundancy against a Surgical Extraction that hits Urza’s Saga.  Everytime I get close to cutting it, I am once again reminded of the powerful effect that it has. While it could for sure be cut for Ghost Quarter or a third Maze of Ith, I am set on playing the card and very happy with it.  I have even considered a second copy in the main or sideboard for UWx control matchups where tutoring can be difficult, but I do not think that is needed right now.

Ancient Tomb: If Sphere is in your 75 you need this. Period. 

Saga Targets: On top of Aether Spellbomb, I play Shadowspear, Pithing Needle, Soul-Guide Lantern, and Expedition Map.  I am not going to go into detail about all of these choices, but I tutor them all up consistently and am very happy with the array. Shadowspear especially is a very powerful card for the “construct stompy” gameplan.  If I were to cut one, I would move Soul-Guide Lantern to the sideboard which I have done in some lists, but I find myself missing it a lot when I do. 

Kozilek’s Return: I like having a sweeper in the sideboard, and have considered a second over PFire #3, and Kozilek’s Return is the best option in my opinion.  While Pyroclasm is cheaper, the instant speed part of KReturn is relevant with Forth Eorlingas as a prevalent threat.  Volcanic Fallout has been kicked around but the double red is a strain on the manabase.

And that is the thought process behind my card selections! I have tweaked the numbers on cards like Force of Vigor, Thespian’s Stage, and Red Elemental Blast, but in the end have found myself very satisfied with the numbers I am at in this current metagame.

Sideboard Guide for RuG Lands

This is not a set in stone guide, use your intuition! Here is how I roughly sideboard for a few of the common decks in the meta right now!  Again this often changes based off of cards I see in game 1.

URx Delver

In: 2 Red Blast, 1 Blue Blast, 1 KReturn
Out: 1 Pithing Needle, 1 Karakas, 1 Field of the Dead, 1 Ancient Tomb

Shadow/UB Scam

In: 2 Red Blast, 2 Surgical, 1 KReturn
Out: 1 Field of the Dead, 1 Karakas, 1 Ancient Tomb, 1 Crucible of Worlds, 1 Boseiju

Jeskai Control (with Forth Eorlingas)

In: 2 Surgical Extraction, 2 Red Blast, 3 Flusterstorm, 1 KReturn, 1 Blue Blast 
Out: 1 Dark Depths, 1 Tabernacle, 2 Maze of Ith, 1 Crop Rot, 1 Mox Diamond, 1 Aether Spellbomb, 2 PFire (If I see Narset/Days Undoing, I bring out 1 PFire, 1 Soul-Guide Lantern)

4cc/5cc with or without Yorion

In: 2 Surgical Extraction, 2 Red Blast, 2 Flusterstorm, 4 Sphere of Resistance
Out: 1 Dark Depths, 1 Tabernacle, 2 Maze of Ith, 1 Mox Diamond, 1 Aether Spellbomb, 3 PFire, 1 Crop Rot

Death and Taxes

In: 2 Force of Vigor, 1 KReturn
Out: 1 Soul-Guide Lantern, 1 Bojuka Bog, 1 Dark Depths

Cradle Control

Play

In: 4 Sphere of Resistance, 1 KReturn
Out: 1 Crucible of Worlds, 1 Aether Spellbomb, 1 Field of the Dead, 1 Otawara, 1 Boseiju

Draw (maybe? or just the same as above)

In: 3 Flusterstorm, 1 KReturn
Out: 1 Crucible of Worlds, 1 Aether Spellbomb, 1 Field of the Dead, 1 Boseiju

Initiative/Moon Stompy 

In: 4 Sphere, 2 Force of Vigor, 1 Blue Blast, 1 KReturn
Out: 1 Soul-Guide, 1 Pithing Needle, 1 Crucible of Worlds, 1 Field of the Dead, 1 Blast Zone, 1 Bojuka Bog, 1 Karakas, 1 Life From the Loam (if no red keep 4th loam over blue blast)

Storm (essentially any variant)

In: Everything but KReturn and Red Blasts
Out: 3 PFire, 1 Crucible, 1 Shadowspear, 1 Aether Spellbomb, 1 Expedition Map or Needle (if you see Wishclaw Talisman), 2 Maze of Ith, 1 Karakas, 1 Field of the Dead, 1 Blast Zone 

IF ECHO OF EONS BRING RED BLASTS AND BRING OUT 2 LOAMS

Lands

In: 2 Force of Vigor, 2 Surgical Extraction
Out: 1 Dark Depths, 1 Tabernacle, 2 PFire

If Elvish Reclaimer keep PFire’s over Maze and another land

Naya/Abzan Depths

In: 2 Surgical Extraction, 1 KReturn
Out: 1 Depths, 1 Ancient Tomb, 1 Yavimaya

Breakfast

In: 2 Surgical Extraction, 4 Sphere of Resistance, 3 Flusterstorm, 2 Red Blast
Out: 1 Crucible of Worlds, 2 Maze of Ith, 1 Karakas, 1 Field of the Dead, 1 Aether Spellbomb, 1 Shadowspear, 2 Life from the Loam, 1 Expedition Map, 1 PFire

Not sold on this boarding yet, it also changes if they have Stoneforge for Kaldra

Mono Black Helm/Mono black stompy/scam

In: 4 Sphere of Resistance, 2 Force of Vigor, 1 KReturn
Out: 1 Field of the Dead, 1 Bojuka Bog, 1 Soul-Guide Lantern, 1 Crucible of Worlds, 1 Life From the Loam, 1 Fetch Land, 1 Otawara

Reanimator

In: 4 Sphere, 3 Flusterstorm, 2 Surgical Extraction
Out: 1 Crucible of Worlds, 1 Pithing Needle, 1 Shadowspear, 3 PFire, 1 Field of the Dead, 1 Blast Zone, 1 Maze of Ith

Red painter

In: 1 KReturn, 2 Surgical, 2 Force of Vigor, 1 Blue Blast
Out: 1 Field of the Dead, 1 Karakas, 1 Maze of Ith, 1 Otawara, 1 Crucible, 1 Aether Spellbomb

Doomsday

In: 4 Sphere, 3 Flusterstorms, 2 Red Blast, 2 Surgical
Out: 3 Pfire, 1 Shadowspear, 1 Spellbomb, 1 Soul-guide, 1 Field of the Dead, 2 Maze of Ith, 1 Tabernacle, 1 Crucible

BUG List

I 5-0’d twice on MTGO with this list with some tweaks to the sideboard.  This list feels powerful, but a bit unrefined, and if I were to play it now, Veil of Summer would be an Opposition Agent.  I would encourage anyone to try it, and if you do let me know how it goes!

Final Thoughts

I think Lands is very well positioned right now, and that legacy is in a healthy and fun place.  Legacy is full of strong tempo and control decks that punish spell based combos, and decks like 4c control and UB Scam are good matchups for Lands.  I think this list is great and I would recommend anyone who is interested to try it out!  I feel relatively strong in my “Sphere in the Side” philosophy, but that is not to say I believe it is an objectively correct decision.  The first 45 cards in your Lands deck are way more important than the last 15.  If you give this list a try, or have any questions, please let me know! I would love to hear any thoughts, concerns, questions, or opinions and will always respond as fast as I can!

Discord: DeathWrongShaman
MTGO: DeathWrongShaman420
Twitter: @deathWrongShamn

Introduction

This primer is written for someone who already knows how to play Legacy Lands. I will not go into basic concepts but instead focus on the differences between Sphere Lands and the classic builds. You can therefore think of this document as an addendum to the excellent primer that already exists on this website. Lands Grandmaster Jarvis Yu recently released his primer for Lands and this is also a great resource if you are new to the deck. In case you want to jump around in the article here is a quick table of contents:

Definition of Tempo

My previous article gave my definition of the concept of Tempo, and explained why this dictates how fair vs fair magic plays out. If you really want to be successful playing Sphere Lands (which I assume that you do since you are reading my primer) then you need to grasp this concept because we use it in our main strategy. In fact I think this is so important that I am going to recap it for you. What is Tempo? Reid Duke has written a fantastic article about Tempo and he explains it as follows: 

Tempo, in the most basic form, is board presence. It’s derived from how your creatures, lands, Planeswalkers, artifacts, and enchantments match up against those of your opponent, and the consequences that follow from it. We call it “tempo” because of the way the two players jockeying for the resource dictates the pace of the game. As a resource, tempo is very closely related to mana. It’s often (but not always) related to life total as well.

If you are ahead in terms of Tempo, then you have an advantage as you will win the game unless “something changes”. Your opponent is forced to change things up, by either removing your creatures or playing bigger ones of their own, or they will eventually lose the game. I tried to visualize this advantage with an emblem that I call the Tempo Emblem. This is something that you and your opponent fight over. Every turn that you are in control of this emblem you get to walk a room in the Tempo Undercity, but the rooms don’t do much except the last one that wins you the game. The closer you are to the Throne of the Dead Three the more pressured your opponent is to act. 

Sphere of Resistance as removal

So what does Tempo have to do with Sphere Lands? If you compare my decklist from the May Showcase Challenge with a classic creatureless RG Lands list you can see that I basically just cut Punishing Fire for Sphere of Resistance (and swapped Grove of the Burnwillow for Ancient Tomb and more copies of Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth). I kept all the grindy cards, like Sylvan Library and Crucible of Worlds, but I only have Maze of Ith, Blast Zone and Karakas as reactive answers to creatures. 

Many people say “oh they must have expected a lot of combo” when they see a Sphere Lands list. This a misunderstanding of the deck in my opinion. Sphere of Resistance is not only good vs combo, it’s actually great vs the midrange creature decks as well. Let’s do some Sphere math to demonstrate how it can work as removal. In this example we are on the play and we assume that the game ends by turn four (this is how you should play this deck anyways, more on this later). We cast Sphere of Resistance on our first turn. How does this impact the board for our opponent? If we assume that they make a land drop on every turn then we get the following:

• Turn 1: Opponent has a land.
• Turn 2: Opponent has 2 lands, and they can cast a 1 drop.
• Turn 3: Opponent has 3 lands and a 1 drop, and they can cast a 2 drop.
• Turn 4: Game is over.

Let’s compare this to us having Lightning Bolt on turn 1 instead of a Sphere of Resistance.

• Turn 1: Opponent has a land (and they can cast a 1 drop that we kill with Lightning Bolt).
• Turn 2: Opponent has 2 lands, and they can cast a 2 drop.
• Turn 3: Opponent has 3 lands and a 2 drop, and they can cast a 3 drop.
• Turn 4: Game is probably not over.

If you compare these two boardstates you will see that the Sphere effectively was a removal spell every turn, but it removed the most expensive creature on every turn. Lightning Bolt permanently removed the 1 drop but Sphere “removed” the 1 drop on turn 1, it “removed” the 2 drop on turn 2, and it “removed” the 3 drop on turn 3. Here are some quick pros and cons for Sphere of Resistance contra a conventional spot removal spell.

Pros for Sphere of Resistance

• Effectively removes (delays) the most expensive creature on every turn that it stays in play.
• Speeds up our clock by growing our Constructs (this is important because, according to Tempo theory, if we have the biggest creature on board then we don’t need removal).
• Can give free wins if our opponent has a land light draw.
• Improves our worst matchups (spell based combo).

Cons for Sphere of Resistance

• Does nothing if we are behind on board.
• Can sometimes hurt ourselves, such as if we fail to draw more lands, or if our opponent has Wasteland.
• Cannot answer specific problematic creatures such as Magus of the Moon. 

Choosing your gameplan

We have four main strategies available to us: namely Prison-Aggro (Tempo), Construct-Factory (Grinding Station), Marit Lage (Combo) and Mana Denial Lockdown (Pox). I estimate (based on gut feeling and not statistics) that I play Prison-Aggro 50%-60% of the time, Marit Lage Combo 30%-40% of the time, Construct-Factory and Mana Denial Lockdown 5%-10% of the time. It’s fairly seamless to switch between Prison-Aggro, Construct-Factory and Marit Lage Combo as Saga can find Expedition Map with its 3rd chapter (and Saga can also be Crop Rotated away in response to the 3rd chapter) to find whatever missing piece that we need. 

alli note: If you have played RG Lands with Gamble then you are used to having Life from the Loam as an engine. The best hands would involve Exploration and Gamble to find Loam (and ideally discarding it as well) and then we would count on Loam to find the rest for us. This play-pattern is less common in Sphere Lands. I prefer to keep hands that already have a plan, and then use Life from the Loam as the follow up. Urza’s Saga, Wasteland, Dark Depths, Thespian’s Stage, or Crop Rotation are therefore important to look for in our opening hands. If our hand does not have any of these cards then it’s unlikely that it has a plan to win and should be binned.

Plan A: Prison-Aggro (Tempo)

Urza’s Saga is the best and most powerful card in the deck. In fact if it wasn’t for Urza’s Saga then Sphere Lands would not exist as a deck in my opinion. In the Prison-Aggro Strategy we want to curve out as follows:

• Turn one: Acceleration piece, Urza’s Saga (or Crop Rotation for Saga) and a 1 or 2 drop. 
• Turn two: Make Construct
• Turn three: Make Construct.

This ensures that we are ahead on the board by turn three. We now have the Tempo emblem and should focus on preventing our opponent from taking it back. Here are some things to consider.

• Does the opponent struggle on mana? Waste them to lock this game up.
• Did the opponent forget to fetch in response to Saga’s 3rd Chapter. Find Pithing Needle and lock this game up. 
• Is the opponent trying to flood the board with small creatures? Find Shadowspear and make the race heavily in our favor. I often see other Lands lists cut Shadowspear but that would be suicide in Sphere Lands. We need the lifegain to offset Ancient Tomb and Sylvan Library. Shadowspear is also the best removal spell for us. It even answers untouchable creatures such as True-Name Nemesis. 
• Is the opponent trying to escape Uro? Find Lantern or Expedition Map for Karakas.
• Do we need green mana, or do we need more mana to explode our hand? Find Mox Diamond and cast Life from the Loam to get Saga back. 
• Do we need to continue making Constructs, or do we need to switch our plan to Marit Lage Combo? Find Expedition Map.

My favorite starting hands (on the play) include Mox Diamond, Urza’s Saga and Sphere of Resistance. This will ensure that I have two 5/5’s by the end of turn three, and my opponent has a 1 drop. I can’t think of any 1 drop in Legacy that can beat two 5/5 Constructs and a Sphere of Resistance (outside fringe things like Engineered Explosives cast via a colorless land). 

Ancient Tomb is secretly the second best card in the deck. There are so many situations where I am clogged under my own Sphere, but then draw Ancient Tomb and it opens up my entire hand. Many people have told me that I play too few green sources but Ancient Tomb actually mitigates this issue. I often keep hands with Urza’s Saga and Ancient Tomb but no green source. I will go Saga into a one mana artifact (for example Pithing Needle naming Wasteland). I follow this up with Ancient Tomb, make some Constructs, and find Mox Diamond (with Saga’s 3rd Chapter) to finally Loam Saga back and start over.  

alli note: Here are some perhaps unintuitive tips for Crop Rotation when playing the Prison-Aggro strategy.

• Always keep a stop in your draw step. If you top deck Crop Rotation then you can find Urza’s Saga in your draw step to ensure that it gets 2 counters this turn, and you can start making Constructs ahead of time.
• It can be beneficial to cast Crop Rotation for Ancient Tomb on turn one in order to cast Sphere of Resistance. If my hand already has Saga and Loam then I like to ramp put Sphere on turn one. Crop Rotation will be hard to cast post a Sphere anyways, and this sequence ensures that we use our mana much better than our opponent.
• You can Crop Rotate Urza’s Saga in response to the 3rd chapter. This still allows us to search for an artifact with Saga. This is a very powerful line, and it can be worth waiting one turn to play out Saga in order to ensure that we have four mana in play when it gets its 3rd counter.

Plan B: Marit Lage (Combo)

Dark Depths is typically my Plan B, but it comes up more often than you might think. My gut feeling is that I win something like 30%-40% of my games with Dark Depths. I usually start out by trying to execute the Prison-Aggro strategy, but not every game goes according to plan. Maybe my opponent had Wasteland for Saga, or maybe they countered my Exploration and I felt behind on the board. In these situations I will change focus and make a Marit Lage. It’s so cool that we can press the Combo button and just end the game in one swing, and this makes it incredibly difficult to play against Lands. 

If you decide to change to Plan B then go all in. This means, for example, that you should not make a Construct in response to Saga’s third chapter, but instead tap Saga for mana so that you can have mana to activate both Expedition Map and Thespian’s Stage in the same turn. I still get surprised by how effective Marit Lage is in a deck like Lands. Most opponents who spend their resources trying to fight our mana denial and Constructs just to get caught off guard when the 20/20 monster finally gets summoned.

alli note: If your hand has Exploration, Thespian’s Stage, Dark Depths and Life from Loam (and you don’t expect your opponent to have graveyard hate) then Dark Depths becomes your Plan A. Making a recurring 20/20 is actually more powerful than Urza’s Saga. In recent lists I have included a Sejiri Steppe to make the Marit Lage plan even more reliable. This also allows me to transform my deck for the post sideboard games, and add creatures such as Elvish Reclaimer and Endurance when my opponent sides in Meltdown and Dress Down. 

Plan C: Construct-Factory (Grinding Station)

Thespian’s Stage can copy Urza’s Saga, and after Stage has reached its second chapter then you can copy another land and still keep the ability to make Constructs. Yes, this is unfair but it’s how it works. This article explains it in more detail. 

It should be noted that I almost only do the Construct-Factory strategy vs Control. Against midrange decks (without sweepers) it’s easier to just go Saga into Expedition Map into another Saga, and run them over this way. 

alli note: Here are some edge cases that might help you when executing the Construct-Factory strategy:

• If you suspect that your opponent has Dress Down (or Meltdown) then it can be a good idea to copy a basic land on your opponent’s end step when Stage has two counters (instead of making a Construct and then copying a basic in your following main phase). This way you ensure that you have the Construct-Factory online one turn earlier and you can start rebuilding your board.
• Remember, once again, to always keep a stop in your draw step! If you top deck a Crop Rotation then you can find Saga and copy it in your draw step. This ensures that you get your Construct-Factory online one turn earlier compared to if you had used Crop Rotation in your main phase or on your opponent’s turn. 

Plan D: Mana Denial Lockdown (Pox)

Mana denial has always been a core element to a Lands decks, and in this version you might think that we focus more on mana denial thanks to the synergy with Sphere of Resistance. I don’t find this to be the case though. It’s rare that I win by totally locking my opponent out of casting spells. This comes up in maybe less than 10% of my games. You should always be looking for this avenue to win though, as it’s the least risky strategy when it works. Here are some signs that indicates that the Mana Denial Lockdown plan is a good idea: 

• Your opponent started with a dual into Ponder and chose to shuffle.
• Your opponent missed their second or third land drop.  

alli note: Try to always represent the combo of Thespian’s Stage and Dark Depths when executing the Mana Denial plan. If you have one of the combo pieces in play then try to keep three mana open (to represent Crop Rotation into the missing piece). This will make it super awkward for your opponent as they won’t be able to tap out.

How to build your sideboard

We have talked about the four main strategies that we can apply when playing Sphere Lands. It’s now time to think about how to build a sideboard. First thing to note is that we haven’t gained sideboard space by moving Sphere of Resistance to the main deck. This is because we literally cannot win with Magus of the Moon in play, so we need to have 3-4 answers to that card in our 75 (and Sphere is certainly not an answer to Magus). 

Second thing to note is that the Prison-Aggro Strategy can get worse post-sideboard (at least vs fair blue decks). This is because people bring in Dress Down and Meltdown against us. My sideboards are therefore pretty simple. Here are the must haves:

• Four answers to Magus of the Moon.
• Three answers to Blood Moon (we also have Boseiju main).
• Four graveyard hate pieces that work on turn 0.

This leaves me with four flex slots that I tend to dedicate to fair blue decks (Choke, Pyroblast, Reclaimer, etc). In my latest iteration of GW Sphere Lands I have a bit of a transformational sideboard as I can take out Sphere of Resistance for Elvish Reclaimer and Endurance to play the post sideboard games as something that reminds you of a GW Depths deck. 

Color Combinations

Most cards are kind of set in the deck. My decklist from the May Showcase Challenge has 4 flex slots in the main (2xSylvan Library, 2xRishadan Port) and 4 flex slots in the sideboard (2xChoke, 2xPyroblast). This leaves us with eight slots to play around with. We are already shaving on colored mana sources so I would not recommend playing more than one splash color. I have tested all color combinations, but I have had most success with GW and GR. 

• GR is better vs Moon Stompy, Jeskai Control, Sneak & Show, Cephalid Breakfast, Doomsday, and High Tide (that has increased in popularity after the Mind’s Desire unban).
• GW is better vs Delver, Death Shadow, GW Depths, Reanimator, Black Stompy and RW Initiative.

In my opinion the best fair blue decks are UBx Tempo, and I therefore like to have access to Swords to Plowshares in my deck (it’s so important vs Troll of Khazad-dum, Murktide Regent and Death Shadow). This is why I am currently running GW Sphere Lands.

Matchups

In this section I will discuss how to approach a few common matchups. I’m not gonna give a sideboard map in this article, but rather focus on what strategies are effective against each archetype. I think a sideboard map is only valid in the context of a specific 75 and my list changes week on week. I recommend that you follow me on Twitter if you want to see my latest lists. I also share my sideboard map fairly regularly on Twitter (such as in this tweet). You can also find them in the #decklist section of the Lands discord.

URx Tempo decks

I have written this guide on how to approach Delver decks with Lands. It’s a bit old but most things still hold true today. Our best strategies are:

1. Marit Lage (Combo).
2. Mana Denial Lockdown (Pox).
3. Prison-Aggro (Tempo): This only really works in G1, and only if we are on the Play in G1.

Sphere Lands is worse vs Delver compared to a classic build, and I find that whoever wins the dieroll is favored to win game one. I do think that the post sideboard games improve significantly for us though, and I really like Swords to Plowshares against the current iterations of Delver decks.

Cards to consider when sideboarding:

• In: Removal, Choke, Elvish Reclaimer, Endurance.
• Out: Sphere of Resistance, Sylvan Library, Pithing Needle, Soul-Guide Lantern, Urza’s Saga (at least 2 can go), Karakas (unless we play Swords to Plowshares), 1-2 Ancient Tomb.

Blue Control decks

I have written this very detailed guide on how to approach Control decks with Lands. Nothing has really changed. Our best strategies are:

1. Construct-Factory (Grinding Station).
2. Prison-Aggro (Tempo).
3. Marit Lage (Combo).
4. Mana Denial Lockdown (Pox).

Sphere Lands is better vs Control compared to a classic build as we are kind of boarded already in game one. 

Cards to consider when sideboarding:

• In: Choke, Blasts, Reclaimer, Endurance / Surgical (vs Uro decks only).
• Out: 1xExploration, 1xMox Diamond, 3-4 lands (Maze, Tabernacle, Karakas, Wasteland, Bog), Soul-Guide Lantern, Shadowspear, Crop Rotation.

Ancient Tomb decks

This includes Red, Black and RW Stompy decks as well as 8Cast. I think that these matchups are very Play /  Draw dependent as they (as well as us) are built to get ahead on the board. Our best strategies are:

1. Prison-Aggro (Tempo): This is much better on the Play than on the Draw. Sphere can be a liability for us on the Draw, but most of these decks are built around resolving 4 mana creatures so Sphere is very strong on the Play.
2. Marit Lage (Combo): The first Marit Lage is often enough vs both Red and Black Stompy. However, vs RW Stompy we often need to create a boardstate where we can recur Marit Lage every turn with Life from the Loam.
3. Mana Denial Lockdown (Pox).

Sphere Lands is better vs Ancient Tomb decks compared to a classic build. We are favored on the Play and can also win on the Draw unless they have a very good hand.

alli note: Swords to Plowshares has improved my winrate tremendously vs both Black and RW Stompy. They often mull aggressively to a hand that 1-for-3 themselves to ramp out a large creature such as Sheoldred, the Apocalypse or Seasoned Dungeoneer. It’s so nice to be able to remove these creatures, for a single mana, and then leave us with a hand that is full of action whereas they are hellbent. Swords to Plowshares is not as strong vs Red Stompy though. This matchup revolves around Magus of the Moon. We want to let them cast Magus, then we play out Dark Depths and remove Magus to get a 20/20 monster. Red removal such as Lightning Bolt can be cast under Magus but Swords cannot (so we now also require a Mox Diamond and this is much harder to set up). 

alli note: 8Cast is a very interesting matchup. Most games are lopsided, we either lose heavily or we win by stopping them from casting any spells. Their Constructs are larger than ours so we first have to destroy their Saga before activating our own. My plan is therefore first to stop them and then to find a way to win. This sequence is different from how I approach the other Stompy matchups. Sphere of Resistance is an answer to Emry by the way, and it’s very strong against 8Cast.

Combo decks

Reanimator, Cephalid Breakfast, Sneak & Show, Doomsday, Storm, and Mississippi River are the most popular Combo decks in the current Legacy format. You should make your special hand sign and thank Satan (or God or whatever) every time that you get paired into the Mississippi River deck because it’s a bye for Sphere Lands. They can’t beat a Sphere of Resistance nor a Wasteland and we play plenty of both (just remember that post side they can sometimes go off turn two so make a play that stops them already on your first turn).

Sphere Lands is much better vs Combo compared to a classic build as we are prepared with Sphere of Resistance already in game one. My general advice is to keep hands that have both interaction and a plan to win (Urza’s Saga or Crop Rotation for Saga). We need to pressure these decks as they often can draw out of any hate. Our best strategies are:

1. Prison-Aggro (Tempo).
2. Marit Lage (Combo).
3. Mana Denial Lockdown (Pox).

Here are some quick notes on each popular Combo deck:

• Reanimator: This is a pretty 50/50 matchup in my experience, and it’s very Play / Draw dependent. I play four turn zero interaction cards in my sideboard, and I have found that my winrate does not really improve much by playing more hate (see this article for more info about this logic). They tend to have some sort of transformational sideboard such as small creatures or Show and Tell. I think it’s much easier for us if they side into the small creature package than Show and Tell. 
• Cephalid Breakfast: This is a hard matchup as we need interaction, or we can easily lose on turn two, but we cannot keep hands with only interaction because they are favored going long (since Orim’s Chant and T3feri will blank all of our spell based interaction). We therefore need to keep hands that can put pressure on them and that also have interaction, otherwise we will most likely lose.
• Sneak & Show: This is a tricky matchup that gets harder if they play Archon of Cruelty. The Prison-Aggro plan is strong vs Sneak & Show, and we have a lot of tools to disrupt them such as Pithing Needle for Sneak Attack / Griselbrand, Boseiju for Omniscience, Karakas for Emrakul, but nothing that interacts with Archon (outside Swords to Plowshares). A common trick is to let Show and Tell resolve and put in Sphere. This often means that they cannot interact with our next play, and we can then answer whatever they put in, and untap to slam Choke for the win. 
• Doomsday: If you expect a lot of Doomsday then put Thran Foundry and Endurance in your sideboard. It’s tricky to stop them from resolving Doomsday but we can often disrupt them afterwards. This is either done via an Endurance effect or via heavy Mana Denial. They seldom play around Ghost Quarter in their piles. I have also found that activating Boseiju (in their end step after they cast Doomsday) is extremely effective. Surgical Extraction is also nice and can sometimes buy us a lot of time by forcing them to shuffle after their Personal Tutor.
• Storm: This is a pretty good matchup for Sphere Lands. I think we are favored in game one thanks to Sphere of Resistance. They bring in some answers to Sphere in the post sideboard games, but these games still tend to be pretty 50/50 in my experience. Storm is on the uprise thanks to the unbanning of Mind’s Desire and a card that has impressed vs these decks is Veil of Summer.

Midrange Creature decks

Death & Taxes, Orcs, Painter, and GW Depths are the most common midrange creature decks in the current Legacy format. These are very good matchups (except GW Depths that is horrendous) and my winrate has not gone down vs these decks since I cut spot removal for Sphere of Resistance. Most effective strategies are:

1. Prison-Aggro (Tempo): This plan is really strong vs all of these matchups and how I most often win.
2. Marit Lage (Combo): This is a really strong plan vs Painter and Orcs but less effective vs Death & Taxes and GW Depths.
3. Mana Denial Lockdown (Pox): They do play basics so it’s hard to destroy all their lands but Tabernacle, Wasteland and Sphere of Resistance is often enough to completely stop them from casting spells.

Final words

I hope that this primer has shown the differences in how to play Sphere Lands contra old lists. I also hope that more people will give the deck a try, and feel the raw power and speed of Ancient Tomb. If you are an old time Lands player then just clear your head, press the gas pedal, and ensure that you are ahead on the board by turn 3 or 4. I’m sure that the rest will flow naturally for you from there. If this does not work out, well then you can always switch plans and try to end the game with Marit Lage. Urza’s Saga makes this switch almost seamless thanks to the fact that it can find Expedition Map on its 3rd chapter.

alli note: My final tip of the day is to remember to mulligan aggressively. Lands always mulled extremely well, and this is perhaps even more true for Sphere Lands. We are such a powerful deck, and our best 5 card hand is much better than an average 7 card hand. We cannot afford to fall behind so we need to get an aggressive start, and this often requires mulligans.

Many people have asked me if Sphere Lands should be considered the “stock” list going forward, and I have given this some serious thought. Let me first answer with a rhetorical question: 

What strategy (Tempo, Control or Combo) has been most successful in Legacy during the last 12 years?

We can all agree that the answer to my question is Tempo, and this is why I believe that Sphere Lands will in fact become the most played, and most successful, version of Lands. This does not mean that there are no other viable builds. But it is harder to build a controlly version of Lands since you have less free wins, and a wider matchup spread. You have to predict the metagame very accurately (as you will have to accept that not all matchups are winnable with a 15 cards sideboard). This is not impossible to do, and I have had enormous success, over many years, doing exactly this (see this article for more details on my strategy for getting an edge in Legacy). However, if I went to a paper Tournament tomorrow, where I didn’t know the meta, then there is no doubt in my mind that I would register a version of Sphere Lands. I think this will be the case until WoTC prints a more powerful land than Urza’s Saga.

Speaking about new printings. Modern Horizon 3 is coming next year and I am sure that we will see some nice printings for Lands in that set. I am hoping for the following cards.

• Red-Green Canopy Land.
• Mountainborg (land that makes all lands into Mountains).
• More Channel Lands. In particular a red land with Channel R1 to deal 3 damage to target creature or planeswalker would be insane.
• One mana Sphere of Resistance that only taxes Instant and Sorceries (this could be found off Saga).
• Wasteland that only works for basics (I would be glad if it only worked for basic Island even).

Thanks for reading!

// alli

https://linktr.ee/alli_84

Hello,  my name is Marcelo Medeiros, I’m Spym4n from Magic Online. I’m a public enemy of the blue color and I love land-based decks (BG Depths, Turbo Depths, Rainbow Depths, Naya Depths, Lands). Last Sunday (August, 6), we had the CLC (Circuito Legacy Catarinense), a league from the State of Santa Catarina, which is located in the south of Brazil.  

Brazil is an intercontinental country and its Southern part has a pleasant climate, in addition to beautiful cities and beaches. If you are curious, here are some photos of the main tourist attractions in Santa Catarina State: Santa Catarina | Brazil – Google Images 

The CLC took place in Itajaí City, which is 1 hour by car from the capital Florianópolis, which is where I live. We had 4 friends in the car, some already known at MOL, such as Vicente (MahfuzVanGogh, 3 times Challenge Champion, Dredge player) and Jardel (Vurtner, Delver player). We got there, prepared our decks and started our Legacy Sunday! In CLC, we played one more round and we don’t have a cut for TOP 8. We had 36 players and it would be 7 rounds (6+1).  

Here is the decklist:

Match 1 against Grixis Delver  

My opponent was a guy I like a lot, he always played with Depths variants, but he migrated to tempo decks.  

Game 1: Generally a favorable game for Lands, but my deck was still warming up and didn’t want to work. I started with a good hand that had Urza’s Saga, Mox, Lantern, Cycler, and land. He hit a Wasteland in my Saga and I didn’t buy anything else. He resolved some creatures, I landed a Tabby but it wasn’t enough.  

Game 2: He started out slow, with mana into Ponder, which set me off for hates. I was making lands patiently, while he had no pressure. Eventually, when he casted a Delver and a DRC, I tried to Endurance EOT, which he countered with a Force of Will. I made land and passed. He casted a Murktide and passed again. Then, I cast Choke with 2 blasts backup and a Tabby in the sequence. He only had one untapped land and I had a Maze. He could have paid Tabby to Murktide and tried to buy a Waste, but instead he casted a Brainstorm EOT and conceded right after.  

Game 3: He came out extremely aggressive and with perfect counters to my answers. Again in this game, I only needed one Loam, which I didn’t find the whole game. In this game, I bought 2 Explorations and 2 Mox with nothing in hand, which sealed my defeat. Looking back on the match, I think I should have been more aggressive and made the 20/20 earlier. It took me a while to do it and he had the Borrower. He killed me with 6 creatures on the field and I only had 2 Mazes.  
 
Match: 1-2 

Tournament: 0-1 

Match 2 against Burn  

I had seen him at the table on my side, playing Burn, so the rule is clear. Invoke Marit Lage as soon as possible.  

Game 1: I mull to 5 and found Saga, Fetch, Exploration, Thespian and Crop. I made Forest, Exploration and Saga. On the next turn, I drew another land and casted the Crop EOT for the win.  

Game 2: Mulligan to 4 this time, but I couldn’t find the combo pieces, just a Crop Rotation. He started with Goblin Guide, which revealed a Fetch. On my turn, I Fetched, landed a Forest, Exploration, and made another fetch. He came back with Monastery, burned and attacked, taking me to 10 health and revealing a Thespian. I landed the Thespian and a Blast Zone and passed. He attacked again, I cracked the fetch, used the Xrop to get the Depths and invoke the Marit Lage. I blocked Monastery and took damage from Guide. He had two cards in his hand, they were two bolts that took me to 1 life. I won on the following turn. 
 
Match: 2-1 

Tournament: 1-1 

Match 3 against BR Reanimator 

I had no idea what he was playing, he’s a new player in the event. 

Game 1: Mull to 6 and found a fast hand. He started with Reanimator’s God hand. Grief, discarding my Crop, mana, ritual, Seize on himself, discarding Serra’s Emissary and reanimate. Interestingly he named “Instants” with the Emissary which gave me a window to find Maze and gain time. I didn’t find Maze or tutor for the next 3 turns and I died.  

Game 2: Mull to 6 again and found Endurance, Exploration, Faerie Macabre and lands. I made Saga and passed, leaving Exploration as pitch. He discarded my Faerie and passed. On my turn, I drew another Exploration, made Yavimaya and waste his Badlands. He made Polluted Delta and passed. I resolve the third counter at Saga and asked if I could pick it up. He said yes and I used a Needle naming Polluted Delta. He wanted to use fetch in response and I explained that it wasn’t possible. He takes a card, made another Delta. I top deck a Lantern and he conceded.  

Game 3: I found Macabre and Endurance with pitch. He started slow, with Faithless Looting. I top deck again a Lantern and I was super safe. Used some Wastelands and found Loam. Then I found Exploration, Thespian and Depths. He discarded my Endurance and Macabre and tried to revive a Grisel and I used Lantern. He used Animate Dead on my Endurance to not die to Marit Lage. I attacked and he blocked. On the next turn, he revived the Endurance again and again blocked. The third time, he had no more answers. 

Match 2-1 

Tournament: 2-1 

Match 4 against UB Shadow  

I already knew the Player but didn’t know what he was playing.  

Game 1: I started with Mana, Exploration, Saga and he had no counters. He made fetch, Watery Grave, Thoughtseize, and discarded my Gamble. I made two more lands and got ready for constructs. He made another fetch, went for another Watery Grave, going to 12 health and casting 2 Death Shadow. I decided not to make construct EOT (you will understand my line of play). In my main phase, with the saga trigger on the stack, I made a construct and used crop rotation. He thought long and hard and let it resolves. I looked for a Grove of the Burnwillows and gave him one life, killing the two Shadows. He conceded a few turns later. He commented that he didn’t expect me to not make constructs and get Grove. Cool move 😁👍  

Game 2: He started with a discard and took away my acceleration. I Wasteland his land but he had the Surgical and took two more that were in my hand (my mistake here). He was making land drops and casting threats. I tried a Choke that hit a FOW. I did Crop for Tabby, but he had too many lands. He resolved a Murktide and I found a Maze next. Unfortunately, his next draw was a Wasteland and he ran me over with the Dragon.  

Game 3: This game was interesting. He had no discard, but he was making several threats with Shadow and Orcs. I’ve been taking some damage and shaping my hand to resolve a Choke. I casted the Choke with a backup Pyro, but he had two counters. Still, I cropped for Tabby and he paid for the Orcs and Shadow. He found a Murktide and I managed to make a Marit Lage. I hit the 20/20 and he used Murktide to block. His Shadow was small so he didn’t have lethal. He made two cantrips to try to find the Borrower, but he didn’t find it and conceded.  

Match: 2-1 

Tournament: 3-1 

Match 5 vs Cloudpost  

I also already knew this player and I already knew that they were from Post. Tough match, but let’s do it!  

Game 1: I started with Yavimaya, Exploration, Fetch. He did a Once Upon a Time and found a Karakas, thwarting my Marit Lage plan. He made a Needle for Wasteland and passed. I found a Needle from the top, made Needle for Karakas and two more lands. He made a reclaimer and passed. I did a crop rotation and invoked the 20/20. He conceded.  

Game 2: This game took longer. I was casting my permanents carefully so as not to be destroyed by a Force of Vigor. He was making lands and found a Reclaimer that I killed with Punishing Fire. I was making Wastelands to control the lands and coming back with Loam. He found a Needle for my Wasteland but I found a Ghost Quarter to keep controlling the board. Eventually I found a Blast Zone to destroy the two Needles and he conceded.  

Match: 2-0 

Tournament: 4-1 

Match 6 against Jeskai Day’s Undoing  

Carlos is a well-known control player. He plays very well and I knew it was going to be a very exhausting and difficult match.  

Game 1: I knew I had to put pressure at the beginning and not make his life easy to resolve a Day’s Undoing. I started with a great hand: Mox discarding Depths, Exploration, Saga, Fetch. I looked for a Taiga and casted a Gamble for Loam, who went to the graveyard. The opponent made an Island, Ponder. I dredged the Loam and another Loam dropped in the graveyard. I cast Loam and it hit a Force of Negation. On the next turn, I made a token and got a Lantern with Saga. Tried to Loam and this time hit a Force of Will. My opponent was left with only 1 in his hand. He came back with Narset and found a Dress Down that killed my tokens.

From there it was an insane exchange of resources. I made tokens, he killed them with Dress Down. Eventually I found a Blast Zone when he had Teferi and Narset. I raised Blast Zone to 3 and cleared his table. At that point in the game, I already had 1/3 of the deck and he had about 25 cards. He had 6 mana and resolved a Narset and found Days Undoing. I used the Lantern in response and it ran him out of some important resources. The game continued with me putting pressure on with tokens and him controlling with Dress Down and removal. He found a Jace and made a True-Name Nemesis and Hullbreacher. I had 3 tokens and had a basic island that made tokens (Thespian with Saga counters). Once again he found a Dress Down and lowered my life with his creatures. I tried to make a Marit Lage to take Plow and stay alive, but he had found an Emperor to exile my creature. I managed to set the Blast zone again to clear his table and the next turn, but he again resolved Narset and Days Undoing. Again I had Lantern and exiled a few more cards, including their win conditions (Jace, Emperor). He found one more True-Name, but at that point I would win the race with my tokens. With 8 minutes left in the round, he conceded. All the other rounds were over by this point and there was a crowd watching, the crowd went crazy with the level of this game, it was pretty cool to see their reactions 😯 

Game 2: Little time to play (less than 5 minutes) and he came up with a Stoneblade plan. He kept a hand without counters, but very quickly with Stoneforge turn 2 for Kaldra. Luckily I had a Bolt that knocked Stoneforge out of the way. A few turns later, he controlled my table and casted a Jace. He started to raise the counters to try to win, but the next turn I found a Pyroblast. We were already in the turns when he realized that he wouldn’t be able to win in time and conceded the game to me.  

Match: 2-0  

Tournament: 5-1 

Match 7 against GWu Lands 

Hubner is an elder of the CLC (Circuito Legacy Catarinense), he’s a great guy and has an enviable Legacy collection.  

Game 1: He won the dice roll and started with the perfect hand: Yavi, Exploration, Saga, Mox, Sphere. I tried to slow him down by wasting his Saga, but the next turn he found another Saga and a Wasteland. I made another Wasteland and we stayed in that game for a few turns, the first one to buy the Loam would probably win. Eventually, he found another Saga and I had to go for the combo. I made Marit Lage and he got an Aether Spellbomb to deal with the 20/20 monster.  

Game 2: I came up with a very good, fast hand with Exploration and Loam. He also had Loam but could only make one land per turn. I repeated Wastelands and then Ghost Quarter until he conceded.  

Game 3: He started with mana and passed. This sparked me a Force of Vigor alert. I had Wxploration and multiple Sagas, but I played cautiously. I made a land, Exploration and passed. He did a Saga and asked to stop in my upkeep, using FoV with pitch Fov to destroy my Exploration. I came back with Mox and Saga. He looked as if he didn’t like it. He found a Wasteland and then made a Loam. I also found a Loam and joined the party. Two turns later, he resolved a Surgical on my Loam, practically sealing the game, since he had 2 or 3 Wastelands in his hand and I only had Sagas in the field and in my hand. On my turn, I take a card from the deck and find….. Pithing Needle!!! I casted it, naming Wasteland and start making Sagas and Tokens. He found a Blast Zone, but in order not to die, he burst it at 1 destroying my Needle, Map and Lantern (which I sacrificed to draw a card). On his turn, he landed a Thespian and threatened a Marit Lage with a crop in his hand. I attacked with my 3 tokens and had Lightning Bolt in my hand. He turned over his lands, smiled and held out his hand!  

Match: 2-1 

Tournament: 6-1 

Final Thoughts:  

The champion was the Grixis player who beat me in the first round. As he only lost one game, I couldn’t catch up with him. We both got 18 points and I ended up in SECOND PLACE! Very happy with the result! As always the Legacy in the south of Brazil is the best it can be. A day to see friends, have lunch together and laugh a lot. Despite losing the first game, I was pretty happy with my level of play and RG Lands proved to be a solid choice in our Metagame. There were some bad matchups, but I managed to dodge some and play well against others. Our metagame is practically full of Orcs, which is a card not so effective against Lands.  

Here are the TOP 8 decks: Grixis Delver, RG Lands, Orzhov Aggro, Naya Depths, GW Lands, Jeskai Control, Cephalid Breakfast and Cephalid Breakfast. 

Here the link to all decklists of the Tournament: 

Circuito Legacy Catarinense CLC – Etapa 6 (Legacy) Decks (mtggoldfish.com) 

Feel free to contact me if you have any comment or question: 

Twitter: spym4n_mtgo 
Twitch: /Spym4n 
Instagram: marcelomedeiros.info 

Thanks for reading! 

Introduction

After I had finished my article on Legacy deck building I decided that my next one should be about Tempo. Tempo is the most important concept in fair vs fair Legacy games but it is also a topic with great mystery. In fact there is a standing joke on Twitter where people try to ask others what Tempo is. I hope this article will help demystify this concept and teach you how to use Tempo theory to guide your lines of play. 

I have split the article into two parts. This first one covers the generic concepts of Tempo, and the second one is more of a primer for Sphere Lands. Sphere Lands was adopted and fine tuned by Daniel Peretz from Denmark when Urza’s Saga came out. It’s a new direction for Lands that takes us from a Control to more of a Tempo (or Prison-Aggro) deck. It’s incredibly powerful, it has a lot of free wins, and it improves our historical bad matchups without meaningfully worsening our good ones. I have made Top 8 of the three last online tournaments that I have played with Sphere Lands (May’s Showcase Challenge, the MOCS Qualifier, and a Sunday Challenge). Daniel has also won many big paper tournaments with the deck (such as the Tier one 5k that was held last year in Sweden).

alli note: Some statements and examples in this article might be basic and perhaps obvious. It’s hard to write about a fundamental concept like Tempo without stating some obvious things. But I hope that you will also learn some new things by reading this. Let’s dive into it! 

Definition

Magic games don’t last infinite turns. If they did, the control deck would always win, and the kid at your LGS would be correct in thinking that Spirit of the Labyrinth is the best card in magic, much better than Delver of Secrets or any other small creature.

What does this have todo with Tempo? Well, have you ever lost a game with your hand full of spells? Maybe you focused on casting clunky cards, like Valakut Exploration or Narset, Parter of Veils, and forgot about that flying 3/2 insect that killed you? You just lost the game by ignoring Tempo. 

Simple definition

But what is Tempo? I think of it as an emblem, very similar to the Initiative or Monarch, and the player who controls the “Tempo emblem” will eventually win the game unless “something changes”. Every turn that you are attacking you get to walk one room in the “Tempo Undercity”, but the rooms don’t do much except the last one that wins you the game. The player with the highest total power among the creatures on the battlefield is typically (but not always) the holder of the emblem, and the total power among your creatures determines how many rooms that you have to pass before you reach that final chapter. 

As an example consider a boardstate where a D&T Player has Thalia against a UR Player that has Delver of Secrets. Both players are at 20 life. In this fictive example you could say that the D&T Player is in control of the Tempo emblem because unless “something changes” then Thalia will kill the UR Player in 10 turns, and Delver will kill the D&T Player in 20 turns. This implies that the UR Player has “to do something” in order to take back the emblem or they will eventually lose.

What can the UR Player do in order to take back the emblem? They could for example kill Thalia, or play more creatures, or even just flip their Delver into Insectile Aberration. 

Statistical definition

You could argue that the UR Player is statistically speaking very likely to flip their Delver before turn 3, and then they actually win the race as Delver into Insectile Aberration will kill the D&T Player in 7 or 8 turns (compared to the 10 turns that it takes Thalia to kill the UR Player). Statistically speaking it’s more correct to say that UR Player has the Tempo emblem in this example. This definition is different from a simple definition of Tempo that only looks at the current boardstate.

In a format like Legacy, that has many combo decks, it’s better to think of Tempo in a statistical way. Assume that a Lands player starts with Taiga into Elvish Reclaimer against a Storm player that starts with Underground Sea into Ponder. By a simple definition of Tempo the Lands player has the emblem but this is flawed. 

I would argue that the Storm player actually has the emblem in this situation because they are very likely to end the game before Reclaimer attacks them down to zero. It is the Lands player that has “to do something” in this game or they will lose. In fact a deck like Storm always has no Tempo (in a simple definition) before they kill you. They just play lands until they reach that one turn where they play a bunch of spells and win. Their Tempo Undercity has just one room (Throne of the Dead Three) and the simple definition of Tempo has no meaning in this context. It’s much more helpful to consider if you can kill your Storm opponent before they statistically speaking will kill you. If you can’t do this then you don’t have the Tempo emblem and you better act in a way to delay their combo from being executed. 

You can also get this singularity in the Tempo Undercity when playing vs a deck with reach. If you are below four life vs a deck with Lightning Bolt then your opponent has reached the final room before “Throne of the Dead Three” and any top decked burn spell will kill you. You now have to act as if you are playing vs a combo deck instead of a fair deck, and you no longer have the luxury to trade the emblem back and forth with your opponent.

alli note: Simple definition of the Tempo emblem can be summarized as “who is currently ahead on the board” and statistical definition can be summarized as something like “who is favored to win first”. This is not always the same player.

Usage

In a game like magic, that has a bottleneck thanks to the mana system, you won’t be able to play your entire hand every turn. You need to prioritize how you sequence your cards, and the Tempo emblem can be a good way to assess your role in a given situation. This is important when playing a deck like Lands that is multi-dimensional. 

Strategic direction

If you are in control of the emblem then you will win the game unless “something changes” and you should try to figure out what your opponent can do in order to take it back, and make plays that prevent this. Likewise, if you are not in control of the emblem then you will have to change things up by either removing your opponents creatures, growing your Constructs, or try to end the game with Marit Lage.

Level-up tip: If you want to improve in this aspect of magic then you can create a Tempo emblem and pass it around between you and your opponent when playtesting. It’s not certain that you and your testing partner always agree on who has control of the emblem (in a statistical definition), and this can lead to interesting discussions.

Spot removal and Tempo

It’s obviously better to steal the Tempo emblem from your opponent than to just neutralize it, and this is why it’s never a good trade to use spot removal by itself. You are trading a card one-for-one, but you are at best coming out even in terms of both Tempo and Card advantage. Say that your opponent has a Thalia and you spend two mana removing it with Lightning Bolt. 

• Before casting Lightning Bolt
  • Opponent has Thalia and 2 lands.
  • You have 2 lands.
  • Tempo emblem: Opponent
• After casting Lightning Bolt
  • Opponent has 2 lands.
  • You have 2 lands.  
  • Tempo emblem: No one.

You came out even in this exchange, but if you had instead spent your two mana to cast a creature that is larger than Thalia (or that kills Thalia like Orcish Bowmaster) then you would have taken back the emblem and come out ahead.

• Before casting Orcish Bowmaster
  • Opponent has Thalia and 2 lands.
  • You have 2 lands.
  • Tempo emblem: Opponent
• After casting Orcish Bowmaster
  • Opponent has 2 lands.
  • You have an Orcish Bowmaster, an Orc Army and 2 lands.  
  • Tempo emblem: You.

Many creatures in Legacy (like Uro, Stoneforge Mystic, Baleful Strix, Orcish Bowmaster etc) have ETB effects that effectively “draws a card” and if you spend classic spot removal on these then you are at best coming out even in Tempo but losing on Card advantage. 

Spot removal only gets you out ahead if you already have a threat in play. If you would have had a Delver of Secrets in play when you cast Lightning Bolt on your opponent’s Thalia (in the example above) then you would have taken back the Tempo emblem and come out ahead in the exchange. This is not only valid for Tempo decks, it also applies to Control decks. I don’t care too much if my control opponent removes my creature unless they have something like a Narset in play that will generate value for them every turn that it sticks around. This is why a planeswalker like Teferi, Time Raveler is so broken. Instead of spending your mana removing a creature you can cast Teferi and bounce it. You have now dramatically changed the board as your opponent has nothing but you have a planeswalker. Further, the static ability of Teferi makes it so that your opponent cannot kill it on your turn. They have to spend mana on their own turn to kill your planeswalker, and this means that they (possibly) can’t recast their creature on the same turn. You have just given yourself a free Time Walk by casting a three mana planeswalker.

Daze and free Time Walks

Speaking about free Time Walks. Have you ever thought about the cost for playing around Daze? It feels horrible to get your spell countered by Daze, and many people are inclined to “do nothing” this turn and wait until the next turn when they can pay the additional tax on Daze. But when you “do nothing” this turn then you are effectively giving your opponent a free Time Walk (or at least a free Silence). The value of this free Silence highly depends on who has the Tempo emblem. If you have the emblem then it’s fairly cheap to play around Daze. You are already winning this game anyway, and it’s better to save your resources for when your opponent makes a play that tries to steal the emblem from you. On the contrary if your opponent has the emblem then you are giving them a broken free spell by playing around Daze.

You give your opponent this card by playing around Daze if you have the Tempo emblem.

You give your opponent this card by playing around Daze if they have the Tempo emblem via a 3/3 DRC.

Thalia has a similar effect to Daze since her taxing ability effectively forces your opponent to “play around Daze” for every non-creature spell that they cast. Thalia is also a 2/1 creature so every free Silence that your opponent gives you also comes with a free Shock attached. Sphere of Resistance does the same taxing, but in order to capitalize on the free Silences that Sphere provides we need to have a board presence (more about this in next week’s article).

Final words

I hope that this article has helped demystify the concept of Tempo. Just think of it as another emblem that you fight over. In a sense it’s pretty similar to the Initiative except that it’s only the last room that really gives you an advantage (albeit a pretty huge one). Tempo theory can help give you strategic direction, and it can help prioritize how you should sequence your cards. 

Many long-time Legacy players think of Tempo as “going down on cards” but going “up on time”. I think this comes from the historical RUG Stifle Delver lists that would run with razor thin margins and ride their small Tempo advantage to victory by Forcing removal etc. In my definition of Tempo you don’t have to go down on cards to take the Tempo emblem, and in FIRE design magic many cards give you both Card and Tempo advantage. Say for example that I escape Uro (against a semi-empty board) then I have effectively gone up on cards, but I have also created a 6/6 body and gained three life. Uro will kill my opponent in a few turns so I have also taken the Tempo emblem.

In general you want to be the holder of the Tempo emblem because then you can slow down and preserve your resources for when your opponent tries to take it back. This applies to all fair decks in Legacy and certainly also to Lands. I used to play a very controlish Lands build, with two Sylvan Library and three Valakut Exploration, and when I played vs a fair deck my strategy was to accelerate out one of these value engines and then slow my opponent down with Maze of Ith, Tabernacle and Rishadan Port. Every turn that my value engine stayed in play I would accrue an advantage, and I just wanted to slow the game down until I had buried my opponent in this advantage. This is certainly utilizing concepts from Tempo theory, you first cast a permanent that gets you ahead on board, and then spend your resources to slow your opponent down in order to let this permanent accrue value for you. 

In Sphere Lands your value engine is Urza’s Saga, and this gives you a really fast clock so you become more of an Prison-Aggro deck. Saga does not cost mana the turn that you play it (in fact it generates one mana on its first turn) so you become much faster compared to the old Lands deck. I like to start with Mox Diamond and Urza’s Saga into Sphere of Resistance. Sphere slows my opponent down, by effectively forcing them to “pay the Daze tax” for every spell that they play, while also speeding my own plan up by growing my Constructs. I often find myself winning with zero cards in hand where my opponent has six or seven. It definitely feels like I am playing a “Tempo deck” and not a “Control deck”. It might still be wrong to call Sphere Lands a “Tempo deck” as the word has a very specific meaning for people, and it often references the old RUG Stifle Delver deck. But then again what is really the difference between a “Tempo deck” and a “Prison-Aggro deck”?

This was the theoretical foundation that is needed in order to fully understand how Sphere Lands work. Next article will be a primer on Sphere Lands, and it will come out very soon on this website.

Thanks for reading!

// alli

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