Legacy on a Budget: High Tide

Hello Everyone! If you are following the Legacy metagame at all right now, you should know about the High Tide deck that recently came in 1st and 3rd place by the Hatfield brothers at SCG: Atlanta. They ran the exact same list:

Artifacts

4 Candelabra of Tawnos

Enchantments
1 Mind Over Matter

Instants
1 Blue Sun's Zenith
4 Brainstorm
3 Cunning Wish
4 Force of Will
4 High Tide
1 Intuition
3 Meditate
3 Turnabout

Sorceries
4 Merchant Scroll
4 Ponder
2 Preordain
4 Time Spiral

Basic Lands
12 Island

Lands
2 Flooded Strand
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Polluted Delta

Sideboard:
1 Blue Sun's Zenith
1 Brain Freeze
1 Echoing Truth
1 Intuition
1 Meditate
3 Pact of Negation
1 Rebuild
3 Repeal
1 Snap
1 Turnabout
1 Wipe Away

The most expensive card in this deck by far is Candelabra of Tawnos, sitting at a budget-slaying $351.99 a pop, for a total of $1408 for the set! And this is the only deck it's playable in..... But before we say that this deck simply can not be built unless you win Who Wants to be a Millionare, let's price out the rest of the deck:

4 Candelabra of Tawnos (352, 1408)
1408

1 Mind Over Matter (7)
2 Blue Sun's Zenith (1, 2)
4 Brainstorm (1.5, 6)
3 Cunning Wish (5.5, 16.5)
4 Force of Will (84, 336)
4 High Tide (1, 4)
2 Intuition (24, 48)
4 Meditate (9, 36)
4 Turnabout (2, 8)
463.5

4 Merchant Scroll (1, 4)
4 Ponder (0.5, 2)
2 Preordain (0.5, 1)
4 Time Spiral (32, 128)
135

2 Flooded Strand (25, 50)
2 Misty Rainforest (12, 24)
2 Polluted Delta (27, 54)
128

1 Brain Freeze (2.5)
1 Echoing Truth (0.5)
3 Pact of Negation (7, 21)
1 Rebuild (0.25)
3 Repeal (0.25, 0.75)
1 Snap (0.5)
1 Wipe Away (0.25)
25.75

Total price: $2160.25

This is a suprisingly low cost deck! Okay, over $2000 isn't cheap to you? Me neither.... What if I just amended that stat a little:

Total price without Candelabra: 752.25
Total price without Candelabra and Force of Will: 416.25

Wait! Are you seeing this? 65% of this deck's cost comes from a set of Candelabras! Of the cost of the rest of the deck, 45% of that comes from Force of Will! If you have Force of Wills already, or can get them for cheaper (I have heard of a ton of guys gettnig for for 50 recently), the price of the deck is low low low! Here are all the not Force/Candelabra cards that cost $10 or more (premium cards):

Flooded Strand: 25
Polluted Delta: 27
Misty Rainforest: 12
Time Spiral: 32

Yeah... Fetchlands, which are a staple of every deck in every format, and Time Spiral, the card which makes this deck even possible. Thats. It.

Oh, did I mention we can cut Onslaught fetches for less expensive Zendikar ones? By cutting 2 Flooded Strand and 2 Polluted Delta for 2 more Mistys and 2 Tarns, we save $52, or 50%!

Ok, so where was I? Oh yeah, back to those giant elephants in the room: Candelabra and Force of Will. Take a look at Candelabra of Tawnos. Read it, reread it. What does it even do? Just untap lands? Why is that even expensive? It's basically because of the nature of being from such an old set.... Check out all these other cards that we can use to untap lands (which generates more mana after casting High Tide). Snap is already in the Sideboard, so we know it is definitely solid, although it is a complete blank against other Storm deck, so I would suggest Could of Faeries to replace Candelabra. $2 for the set of Faeries will save a penny or 2 over the Candelabras. Now for that Force of Will.... Force of Will is the format-defining card in Legacy by being the glue that slows down every other deck in the format, so no deck can be runaway broken fast. However, this deck produces so much mana, that you can try to get away without it. Legacy is an old-school spells based format, which makes Spell Pierce very playable, but if you want to play it safe, Counterspell works just as well. $2-6 for the set saves you a lot over $336 for Force eh? Obviously, if you have Force, it is better, but assuming we're starting with nothing, these are the changes we have to make to save money.

So, let's see where these changes leave us:

Starting Price: 2160.25

Cuts:
4x Candelabra of Tawnos
4x Force of Will
2x Flooded Strand
2x Polluted Delta
1848

Replacements:
4x Cloud of Faeries
4x Spell Pierce
2x Misty Rainforest
2x Scalding Tarn
56

Finishing Price: 368.25

So yes, I am telling you that you can buy a full tier 1 Legacy deck for about the same price of a playset of Jace, the Mind Sculptor (94, 376)! If you are looking for a crazy deck that wins without swinging for 20 in Legacy that is very resiliant to hate and is very consistant, look no further than High Tide! You never know how feasable it is to buy/trade for a deck until you price it out! Until nest time, stay classy!