Hello everyone and welcome to another edition of Forcing the Will. I hope you brought your appetite today because it’s time to get an extra large dose of the MTGO Legacy Metagame report. We will then finish up with the deck known as Cephalid Breakfast (and some videos). So dig in!
After the last installment, I knew that Stone-Blade was picking up in the MTGO Legacy Metagame, but I had no idea that it would take up 24.28% of the winning decks. This is even more shocking when you notice that the 2nd and 3rd top winning decks combined don’t even make up 16% of the top winning decks. Stone-Blade currently has 16.48% more winnings than any other deck in the format online, and looking at the recent Legacy events, I don’t see the deck slowing down anytime soon. I wouldn’t say that Stone-Blade needs to be banned in Legacy just yet, but the deck is definitely having a huge impact on the Metagame. Even when Survival of the Fittest was at its peak in paper the deck still didn’t have this huge of an impact online. If Stone-Blade continues to grow even more popular and starts dominating the format, I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw some new bannings in Legacy. The deck to beat at the moment is definitely Stone-Blade, so playtest rigorously against it, and know what strategies to use as well as which cards to sideboard in.
Other than Stone-Blade, nothing really sticks out in this MTGO Legacy Metagame report. The top ten decks list has a fairly healthy balance of control, aggro, and combo decks. Dredge has been picking up a bit, but it is still struggling to put up wins. With all the Reanimator decks, I don’t see Dredge picking up anytime soon since most decks will be packing graveyard hate in the sideboard. Besides that, just be prepared to face Stone-Blade, Natural Order, and Hive Mind decks in the upcoming month.
Cephalid Breakfast
Your belly better be ready to handle the deck known as Cephalid Breakfast because your opponent’s belly sure won’t be. Cephalid breakfast is a deck that has been around for years, and has various builds. Today I will be covering one of the most recent builds that has been seeing play in both paper and MTGO.
The main concept behind Cephalid Breakfast is to lay down a Cephalid Illusionist along with one of the en-Kor creatures and start activating the en-Kor’s ability on the Cephalid Illusionist. This will cause the Illusionist to place the top three cards of your deck into your graveyard with each activated ability. Repeat this process until you have Dread Return, Lord of Extinction, Murderous Redcap, and The Mimeoplasm. Once you have these cards in your graveyard, Flashback the Dread Return and target The Mimeoplasm which will target Lord of Extinction for the +1/+1 counters and Murderous Redcap for its ability. This will trigger The Mimeoplasm to deal a large amount of damage to your opponent instantly. Sometimes it isn’t possible to pull off this combo, and the only other real way to win with this deck is to play the aggro game. Ideally you can tutor up and hardcast the Lord of Extinction and get a win within a few turns, but if not, you’re going to be playing a slow game attacking with a bunch of 1-powered creatures.
Now that you have a basic understanding of how the Cephalid Breakfast deck works, let’s take a look at the deck I will be playing today.
I will now cover the cards in the Cephalid Breakfast deck as well as bring you videos of the deck in action in a Legacy Daily Event.
Cephalid Breakfast Deck Tech
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Legacy Daily Event Round 1
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Legacy Daily Event Round 2
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Legacy Daily Event Round 3
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Legacy Daily Event Round 4
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I hope your belly is satisfied with the delicious Cephalid Breakfast. The deck can be lethal when it comes out from under the radar and players are caught unexpectedly by it. Cephalid Breakfast wouldn’t be my first choice of decks to play in the current MTGO Legacy Metagame, but it’s still a fun deck to play. The only reason I’m not a big fan of the deck is because the deck seems a bit too inconsistent for my likings. I have had plenty of good and bad experiences with the deck, so don’t let me deter you from giving Cephalid Breakfast a try. With practice, anyone can master the art of Cephalid Breakfast. If you have any comments or questions about the deck or videos, feel free to post a comment below, or contact me either by email at ForcingtheWill@gmail.com or on MTGO at KillerOwen.
You Choose the Deck!
In this section I let you, the reader, choose which deck I will be covering in my next article! Here is a list of decks that you have to choose from, followed by a list of rules for voting.
What deck should KillerOwen cover for his next episode?
Reanimator (Updated Version) (18%, 18 Votes)
Imperial Painter (15%, 15 Votes)
Dark Depths (12%, 12 Votes)
Stone-Blade (12%, 12 Votes)
GW Haterade (11%, 11 Votes)
Team America (9%, 9 Votes)
Ad Nauseam Tendrils (ANT) (7%, 7 Votes)
New Horizons (6%, 6 Votes)
Elves (5%, 5 Votes)
Natural Order RUG (5%, 5 Votes)
Total Voters: 99
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Make sure to get your votes in fast, as I will only allow two to three days before choosing the winning deck to cover in my next article. The more votes, the better, so get your friends to log in and cast their votes, as well.
Also note that if there is a specific version of a deck you would like to see, include a link to the list if possible.
That’s all for this installment of Forcing the Will. I hope you enjoyed learning about the Cephalid Breakfast deck! Please leave any comments, questions, or requests you have (positive or negative), and I will do my best to respond to them. And until next time, may the Force of Will be with you!
Owen Robbins
great videos. just fyi, “cabal” is pronounced “caw-bawl”, not “cable”.
Thanks for the vids!!
R1G1 when you draw the redcap you don’t need to brainstorm and risk missing a land drop, you could just mill out, then use your second therapy on yourself to discard it.
Hey, thanks for the series, but you should really learn to play a bit tighter. I saw multiple mistakes. You play Brainstorm in your deck, but you really play bad with and without brainstorm in your actual hand. If you have enough mana and you are digging for something you shouldn’t brainstorm at the end of turn, if you do it in your mainphase you will see a card more. In the game against Maverick (G/W) you should have just fetched and not even have played the brainstorm. Just wait until he will kill you the following turn to maximize the effect of your brainstorm. You don’t have to cast it if you have mana left over and a brainstorm in your hand. Wait for a shuffle effect or until it’s time to go off or else you will die. Also never Therapy for Ad Nauseam like you said yourself, they usually play 1, sometimes 2. It’s even easier to go off with a Tutor instead of Ad Nauseam because they can use LED to cast Ad Nauseam from their Tutor, but not if it’s in their hand. If you want I can check out the games again and tell you what you should do differently, add me as a buddy, my name is Dzy and I play a lot of legacy, both IRL and on MODO.
I’m not sure you need Aether Vial in this deck. On the other hand, more enchantment/artifact removal would be useful, as graveyard hate mostly comes in that form.
Love the videos man! Keep them up!
Not sure you want Peacekeeper against the decks you are bringing it in against. Against Goblins or Zoo, they will be bringing in/leaving in their creature removal to fight your combo, so they will have plenty of answers for Peacekeeper.
I would bring it in against a deck like Dredge, since they can combo faster than you and probably will not have an answer for it.
What was the old win condition for this deck before mimneoplasm came out?
haha, m12 just came out!!!!!
Correct me if im wrong cephalid breakfeast has been a competitve legacy deck for a long time.
I was wondering if it cheated an emeria or some other extremely powerfull creature into play instead of an actual kill that turn?
Cephalid Breakfast has been a competitive deck for quite a while. Sutured Ghoul was first printed in Judgment.
Hey all thanks for the responses, and sorry for the delayed response I was out of town for the memorial day weekend.
@ GO: Thanks for spotting that I totally overlooked that option while I was playing. Now it makes perfect sense, but you know what they say hindsight is 20/20.
@ Dzy: Thanks for the offer. I will definitely take you up on that sometime. As of late I am busy with work, school, and coaching so I don’t get to test or play as much as I used to. Also thank you for the advice I am always open to hear what others think about my plays, and what I can do to play better in the future.
@ milegyenanevem: While I agree the deck could indeed use more artifact/enchantment hate I believe the Vials are important in the current format where Stone-Blade decks are all over the place. Being able to get our creatures into play without being countered in extremely important, but then again I strongly suggest each player tweaks the deck to their liking and what they feel most comfortable with.
@ Doobs: While it’s true Peacekeeper works best vs dredge I find that is also useful vs other aggro type decks even if they’re running removal. Peacekeeper usually ends up being more useful than a single Vial or even Therapy vs Aggro I find, and since were only brining in 1 copy it’s not going to really hinder our deck at all.
@ apricio: PlanetWalls is correct with both of his statements.
I will be back next time with a Reanimator article for you guys. Thanks again for all the comments and support!
I don’t think you should have forced the Lackey in R1G2 when you had a plow in your hand. And even if you did, exiling Brainstorm is probably the worst option, as you absolutly needed that card. I think that Daze would have been better (card to exile). Also I minor thing: Brainstorm and Ponder don’t give you card advantage, only library manipulation
Game 4 rearry rearry how come i cant top deck like that
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great videos. just fyi, “cabal” is pronounced “caw-bawl”, not “cable”.
Thanks for the vids!!
R1G1 when you draw the redcap you don’t need to brainstorm and risk missing a land drop, you could just mill out, then use your second therapy on yourself to discard it.
Hey, thanks for the series, but you should really learn to play a bit tighter. I saw multiple mistakes. You play Brainstorm in your deck, but you really play bad with and without brainstorm in your actual hand. If you have enough mana and you are digging for something you shouldn’t brainstorm at the end of turn, if you do it in your mainphase you will see a card more. In the game against Maverick (G/W) you should have just fetched and not even have played the brainstorm. Just wait until he will kill you the following turn to maximize the effect of your brainstorm. You don’t have to cast it if you have mana left over and a brainstorm in your hand. Wait for a shuffle effect or until it’s time to go off or else you will die. Also never Therapy for Ad Nauseam like you said yourself, they usually play 1, sometimes 2. It’s even easier to go off with a Tutor instead of Ad Nauseam because they can use LED to cast Ad Nauseam from their Tutor, but not if it’s in their hand. If you want I can check out the games again and tell you what you should do differently, add me as a buddy, my name is Dzy and I play a lot of legacy, both IRL and on MODO.
I’m not sure you need Aether Vial in this deck. On the other hand, more enchantment/artifact removal would be useful, as graveyard hate mostly comes in that form.
Love the videos man! Keep them up!
Not sure you want Peacekeeper against the decks you are bringing it in against. Against Goblins or Zoo, they will be bringing in/leaving in their creature removal to fight your combo, so they will have plenty of answers for Peacekeeper.
I would bring it in against a deck like Dredge, since they can combo faster than you and probably will not have an answer for it.
What was the old win condition for this deck before mimneoplasm came out?
RE: Apricio — most lists I saw ran Sutured Ghoul with Dragon Breath.
haha, m12 just came out!!!!!
Correct me if im wrong cephalid breakfeast has been a competitve legacy deck for a long time.
I was wondering if it cheated an emeria or some other extremely powerfull creature into play instead of an actual kill that turn?
Cephalid Breakfast has been a competitive deck for quite a while. Sutured Ghoul was first printed in Judgment.
Hey all thanks for the responses, and sorry for the delayed response I was out of town for the memorial day weekend.
@ GO: Thanks for spotting that I totally overlooked that option while I was playing. Now it makes perfect sense, but you know what they say hindsight is 20/20.
@ Dzy: Thanks for the offer. I will definitely take you up on that sometime. As of late I am busy with work, school, and coaching so I don’t get to test or play as much as I used to. Also thank you for the advice I am always open to hear what others think about my plays, and what I can do to play better in the future.
@ milegyenanevem: While I agree the deck could indeed use more artifact/enchantment hate I believe the Vials are important in the current format where Stone-Blade decks are all over the place. Being able to get our creatures into play without being countered in extremely important, but then again I strongly suggest each player tweaks the deck to their liking and what they feel most comfortable with.
@ Doobs: While it’s true Peacekeeper works best vs dredge I find that is also useful vs other aggro type decks even if they’re running removal. Peacekeeper usually ends up being more useful than a single Vial or even Therapy vs Aggro I find, and since were only brining in 1 copy it’s not going to really hinder our deck at all.
@ apricio: PlanetWalls is correct with both of his statements.
I will be back next time with a Reanimator article for you guys. Thanks again for all the comments and support!
I don’t think you should have forced the Lackey in R1G2 when you had a plow in your hand. And even if you did, exiling Brainstorm is probably the worst option, as you absolutly needed that card. I think that Daze would have been better (card to exile). Also I minor thing: Brainstorm and Ponder don’t give you card advantage, only library manipulation
Game 4 rearry rearry how come i cant top deck like that