Over the past two years I have transitioned away from the floor trading, finance based articles I began writing a number of years ago. Since that point I have moved over to Standard as I found myself playing more and more Magic. While this series is now nearly all Standard with a finance angle I feel the need, with my finance roots, to approach Eternal Masters. As Standard has had little innovation or coverage this past week, and likely won’t until after Eternal Masters releases, I will be shifting my focus and discussing how you can benefit the most from the oncoming release should you choose to participate.

Standard

However, before Eternal Masters releases, I will still be highlighting a decklist that may not be on everyone’s radar. This week we have Bant Humans. While the list is nothing revolutionary, it is an additional angle to explore when working with Collected Company. If you are choosing to hold on to your Companies through rotation you should get all of the play you can out of them to make the incoming price drop feel less bad. If you do not want to move them immediately, I don’t believe you will be punished long term. It may not be Snapcaster Mage but I could easily see Collected Company back above twenty sooner rather than later.

Bant Humans ? Standard | Ryan Bushard

• Creatures (25)
• 3 Duskwatch Recruiter
• 3 Knight of the White Orchid
• 3 Tireless Tracker
• 4 Lambholt Pacifist
• 4 Reflector Mage
• 4 Thalia's Lieutenant
• 4 Thraben Inspector

• Spells (10)
• 2 Ojutai's Command
• 4 Collected Company
• 4 Dromoka's Command

• Lands (25)
• 1 Island
• 3 Forest
• 5 Plains
• 1 Port Town
• 1 Yavimaya Coast
• 3 Canopy Vista
• 3 Prairie Stream
• 4 Evolving Wilds
• 4 Fortified Village

• Sideboard (15)
• 4 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
• 3 Gryff's Boon
• 1 Lantern Scout
• 4 Negate
• 2 Profaner of the Dead
• 1 Tireless Tracker

Buy This Deck

Nothing in the main is too out of the ordinary for a Bant Company deck, and, outside of Thalia's Lieutenant, your opponent may never know the difference. The additional interaction, combined with the ability to grow your Lieutenants over time, may be enough to make a big impact in the creature mirrors. Another interesting card to note is the Profaner of the Dead in the board. While not the best card to main with Collected Company, it can be a large enough tempo swing in the mirror or aggressive matchups to offset the loss of a few CoCo targets.

Eternal Masters

So, there are few things about Eternal Masters I feel need some clarification. It seems the internet has about a half a dozen ideas about what EMA will do to the secondary market, so let’s break that down and see how relevant it may be to your financial situation.

The first big thing to note is the amount of product we will actually see. There is no triple GP weekend to celebrate the release of EMA, and there is less product being printed than we saw a year ago with Modern Masters 2015. There will be less product to go around. So, don’t expect for prices of Legacy staples to drop long term. Some cards will see an temporary decrease in price, but over time the limited availability of the set, combined with the potentially increased demand for Legacy staples as more people join the format, will result in prices on par with or slightly higher than the original price. We saw the same thing happen with Modern Masters chase rares and mythics like Tarmogoyf.

It has also been stated that Modern cards were not the focus of this set, meaning cards like Aether Vial, Serum Visions, and other Modern staples are less likely to make an appearance. Serum Visions should have been in MM2, but that does not mean the fix will be here, nor is it as needed as we thought six months ago.

With Legacy and Vintage being the main focus of EMA, and Wizards recent drop of the Modern PT, it may be time we finally see Wizards’ true stance on Eternal formats. No, I do not mean the reserve list is going anywhere. Spoiler alert, it’s not. Wizards has created an insular format with Modern, a format where reprints are plausible for every card. With Modern being stable and popular they have taken the information gathered from the first two Modern Masters sets and finally made the leap to making Legacy and Vintage profitable on their quarterly reports. This is a transition from their previous approach, as it was thought Wizards couldn’t really profit from supporting Legacy. We thought Legacy would be less of a focus, but that has all changed with EMA; and, thanks to MMA and MM2, they have the market research to effectively approach the eternal market.

Eternal Masters may not make Legacy quite as cheap as some are hoping. Modern Masters did reduce the barrier to entry for some decks, but the resulting increase in popularity for the format drove prices right back up due to increased demand. Legacy, on the other hand, is never going to be cheap. The inability to reprint reserve list cards sees to that. The reality of the situation is being competitive in Legacy or Vintage is not be an accessible goal for everyone, but products like EMA will increase the availability of certain Legacy and Vintage staples. This reduces the barrier to entry for the cheaper decks, making them viable entry points to the format. A great example of this is Dredge. This deck is one Cabal Therapy reprint away from being about as expensive as most Modern decks, and that is fantastic.

Dredge ? Legacy | Ryan Bushard

• Creatures (24)
• 4 Golgari Grave-Troll
• 4 Golgari Thug
• 4 Ichorid
• 4 Narcomoeba
• 4 Putrid Imp
• 4 Stinkweed Imp

• Spells (23)
• 1 Dread Return
• 2 Breakthrough
• 4 Cabal Therapy
• 4 Careful Study
• 4 Faithless Looting
• 4 Bridge from Below
• 4 Lion's Eye Diamond

• Lands (13)
• 2 Mana Confluence
• 3 City of Brass
• 4 Cephalid Coliseum
• 4 Gemstone Mine

• Sideboard (15)
• 2 Breakthrough
• 1 Dread Return
• 1 City of Brass
• 3 Abrupt Decay
• 1 Ashen Rider
• 1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
• 1 Flame-Kin Zealot
• 2 Iona, Shield of Emeria
• 3 Lotus Petal

Buy This Deck

This list is not too far off from what I see most versions of Mana Dredge running, and if we take a look at this list we see, outside of Lion's Eye Diamond there aren’t many very expensive cards. While a lot of cards hover in the $10-$20 range, those cards will likely be bottomed out upon reprint. If you want to play Dredge, you are looking at the cost of four cards on the reserve list, unlikely to ever lose value, as most of your expense. Dredge may not be everyone’s first choice when it comes to Legacy, but it can be a great way to get your foot in the door and see firsthand the power and speed of Legacy as a format. If this is something you are interested in, I would pick up any of the cheap cards now and your LED’s. Bridge from Below is a great target as it is low enough now it won’t feel bad if it is reprinted in EMA. And, if it is not reprinted in Eternal Masters, your set will not cost you nearly as much as would if you waited.

Not every deck you can buy into will be quite as budget as Dredge, but even decks that looked prohibitively expensive before now have a few budget options in the mana base until you can acquire enough duals. Just like Modern, Legacy is not a format you need to buy into a deck immediately. With a dual or two and a few Shocks to round out sets, you can feasibly look at a number of the more expensive decks as options now with just the announced reprints we have.

U/W Miracles ? Legacy | Ryan Bushard

• Creatures (4)
• 1 Vendilion Clique
• 3 Snapcaster Mage

• Planeswalkers (2)
• 2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

• Spells (33)
• 1 Counterspell
• 1 Predict
• 1 Wear // Tear
• 2 Spell Pierce
• 4 Brainstorm
• 4 Force of Will
• 4 Swords to Plowshares
• 2 Entreat the Angels
• 2 Ponder
• 4 Terminus
• 4 Counterbalance
• 4 Sensei's Divining Top

• Lands (21)
• 1 Mountain
• 2 Plains
• 4 Island
• 1 Arid Mesa
• 2 Volcanic Island
• 3 Tundra
• 4 Flooded Strand
• 4 Scalding Tarn

• Sideboard (15)
• 2 Blood Moon
• 2 Flusterstorm
• 1 Izzet Staticaster
• 1 Keranos, God of Storms
• 1 Moat
• 1 Pyroblast
• 1 Pyroclasm
• 2 Red Elemental Blast
• 2 Rest in Peace
• 1 Wear // Tear
• 1 Vendilion Clique

Buy This Deck

U/W Miracles has been a tier one deck in Legacy for many years now and if you enjoy a format where control is viable this may be something to look into. While a shockland can lose you a game here and there, in the long run you will only notice a slight variation in your overall performance. While that edge is important when you get to the highest level of competition, it can be negligible at your LGS. With Sensei's Divining Top, Jace, the Mind Sculptor and Force of Will all seeing a reprint, this deck becomes much more affordable. You can even swap out the Scalding Tarns if you would prefer to wait for that inevitable reprint. The key thing to remember is most of the cards you need to buy into over the next month are cards that have a very low risk of decreasing in value over time. While it is an investment, the payout of getting into Legacy is well worth it.

Over the next few weeks I will be covering more lists in Legacy becoming much more affordable with the reprints in EMA; and, if we get the right reprints, I may take a stab at Vintage as well. Power is truly the same as duals when looking at it from an investment standpoint, but the support for the format will likely not pick up in the same ways and the absurd price of Power makes it incredibly difficult to get started in Vintage. If you do intend on playing Vintage at any point, or eventually look to trade up into it down the road, there are a number of reprints in this set for you to consider picking up. However, I would be in less of a rush to acquire those immediately.

Thus far the set looks enjoyable for limited with the minor themes we have seen, and has already provided a strong number of much needed reprints. I have high hopes for Eternal Masters moving forward.

Ryan Bushard

@CryppleCommand