I wonder if and when people will start complaining about the mana in Pauper. They already feel that a lot of formats that allow rares don't have good enough mana; how will they react to having to use cards like Tranquil Cove?
Ash Barrens is a good card, of course, but it's expensive right now because it's only been in Commander supplements.
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Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not watching.
Considering the power level of the cards in the deck I just built?
No, Wizards will never print the commons people actually want (at least, not the ones I want).
Guess you should tell that to Delver of Secrets, a common in innistrad. How about lightning bolt? Qasali Pridemage? Llanowar elves? Sinkhole? People who don't have a lot of money would be interested in making a common deck that can beat other common decks, most likely burn decks.
ive already have all the pauper pool becaucase i was living in a small town when the people only play pauper, later i move to a big city but still have the pauper cards so i will play for sure
Pauper its an excellent format and very cheap, i spend 120€ to have all pauper decks (almost 20 or more) and are very fun to play, sometimes its better than modern
It will be always a cheap format, if not it will not succed and people will not play it ... please dont especulate in this format, or it will be his die...also wizards can reprint ALL the commonds and cost cents so its a not a buyout format like modern its
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Modern: RW R/W Burn WB B/W TokensXU MonuU Tron // UWX UW Tron R GoblinsW Soul SistersRWG Small ZooWUR WUR Geist/Control/Kiki-Resto Combo/NahiriUR Splinter Twin (90% Japanese)/ Grixis TwinRUB UR Delver / Grixis Delver UR Blue MoonBWU Ad NauseamWDeath and TaxesRUB Grixis ControlUMerfolksX Affinity RGB Living End UR Storm/PiF Combo RGX R/G TRON GWU Bant Eldrazi BW Eldrazi and Taxes RUBGoryos Vengeance UB Faeries Legacy:BRx Renimator Playing right now:Standard: Jeskai Control Modern; GoryosVengeance/UBFaeries/Affinity Legacy: BRx Reanimator Pauper: UR Drake (banned) Commander: Merieke Ri Berit Esper
I wonder if and when people will start complaining about the mana in Pauper. They already feel that a lot of formats that allow rares don't have good enough mana; how will they react to having to use cards like Tranquil Cove?
Ash Barrens is a good card, of course, but it's expensive right now because it's only been in Commander supplements.
On the contrary no one complains about mana in pauper. Why would they complain? The rule for lands in pauper is that if it is a dual land it comes into play tapped, and only basics come into play untapped. If anything the manabase is better in pauper than in standard or modern. There is no finagling to figure out how to get the most untapped dual lands into the deck or being pigeonholed into having to play the worlds most expensive lands just to compete. The best lands for fixing arguably are the Rav bounce lands and the kahn's gain lands: both are pennies and come in every color pair.
Also, I think the only deck that really runs the Ash Barrens is delver. I may be wrong, but that is the one that runs a lot of cycling lands off the top of my head. That card is odd because it's more of a rare disguised as a common.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Pauper is only open at the kitchen table. If you go full competitive it's a three decks format that barely sees any change with Masters sets rarity shifts because WotC just doesn't produce Pauper-tier commons anymore.
Competitive Pauper offers the worst aspects of Legacy and Standard for cheap, if you remove the cheapness by speculating on staples you end up with a format nobody will like in the end and only end up hurting the casual online Pauper community who play the format because its fun and brew-friendly when 90% of the people aren't playing Stompy, Tron and Delver.
Considering the power level of the cards in the deck I just built?
No, Wizards will never print the commons people actually want (at least, not the ones I want).
Guess you should tell that to Delver of Secrets, a common in innistrad. How about lightning bolt? Qasali Pridemage? Llanowar elves? Sinkhole? People who don't have a lot of money would be interested in making a common deck that can beat other common decks, most likely burn decks.
I meant, print them in Standard. Thats all. The best way to get reprints out to people is via Standard.
Pauper is only open at the kitchen table. If you go full competitive it's a three decks format that barely sees any change with Masters sets rarity shifts because WotC just doesn't produce Pauper-tier commons anymore.
Competitive Pauper offers the worst aspects of Legacy and Standard for cheap, if you remove the cheapness by speculating on staples you end up with a format nobody will like in the end and only end up hurting the casual online Pauper community who play the format because its fun and brew-friendly when 90% of the people aren't playing Stompy, Tron and Delver.
It's far more than a three deck format, but I can understand why someone would think so. Let me put it this way: We're in a gaming culture where if someone finds a really good deck that seems to win vs the field and posts it on the net, throngs of people will go and copy the list and play it without understanding that it is good against the field it was wielded against. Imagine if someone walked into an LGS and the majority of decks being played were burn and affinity and they had "the answer deck" to that specific format. That's kind of what early pauper went through. The reality is the format is pretty deep.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
i see a pattern, because magic is expensive> people play a cheap format,format gets expensive, rinse repeat
sounds like pauper is a nice alternative to commander,"keep magic fun",hope it stays that way. how much can a common's price raise? (oh , 8$,10$? ) alright..
at least you wont see the ridiculous uncommon prices i guess
The way I see it, the main reason why people play and have been playing pauper is because it is supposed to be the cheap(er) format.
However, recently, the prices of cards in this format have been jacked up by card sellers, so right now it’s not as cheap to enter this format as it once was.
If the trend continues, sooner or later, pauper will lose the “cheap” label, and, without it, I question the desirability of the format.
I guess it won’t matter to all those who already have a pauper deck to play, but we can say the same thing about eternal formats. The thing is, one of the reasons people play eternal formats is because they want to play with the most powerful and more explosive decks in Magic history (I call those decks “Magic on steroids”). Pauper decks are not that powerful or explosive, so, with money out of the equation, what’s the point?
In conclusion, the way I see it, card sellers are going to be ones dictating the fate of this format. If they raise the card prices too high and too quickly, they will basically shutdown the format.
i see a pattern, because magic is expensive> people play a cheap format,format gets expensive, rinse repeat
sounds like pauper is a nice alternative to commander,"keep magic fun",hope it stays that way. how much can a common's price raise? (oh , 8$,10$? ) alright..
at least you wont see the ridiculous uncommon prices i guess
But commons are common, so there is a cap on how high prices can go. Adding to this is the fact that there are so many viable decks that, if one deck becomes super pricey, people will transition over to other, cheaper decks.
Regardless, Pauper decks will never be as expensive as Modern decks (some of which are over a thousand dollars to build).
There are already pauper decks over a hundred dollars, so who knows where the madness will end.
Yes, people can transition to cheaper decks, but, at a competitive level, that usually equals to a transition to weaker decks and consequently more losses, so that's not really an option.
You might think playing with commons would guarantee a cap on how high prices can go, but with some staples being old obscure cards, cards not many bothered to collect back then, today there aren't many of those around to satisfy demand, so don't be surprised to watch obscene prices in some common cards.
There is one financial "problem" with Pauper. With cards initially being "cheap," speculators can do a buyout far easier than with more expensive cards, even though common cards are printed in higher numbers in general. In addition, common cards from an older set probably do not have a print run as large as today's cards, so a speculator with money can buy out those older commons. And if the card price ends up not providing a high ROI, the loss to the speculator is much smaller. I expect far great price fluctuations as speculators get into the mix.
There are already pauper decks over a hundred dollars, so who knows where the madness will end.
Yes, people can transition to cheaper decks, but, at a competitive level, that usually equals to a transition to weaker decks and consequently more losses, so that's not really an option.
You might think playing with commons would guarantee a cap on how high prices can go, but with some staples being old obscure cards, cards not many bothered to collect back then, today there aren't many of those around to satisfy demand, so don't be surprised to watch obscene prices in some common cards.
The nice thing is that WotC will have no qualms about re-printing expensive commons in their re-jiggered Masters sets (which can pull from any era now).
Pauper will not have one clearly dominant deck (as it would have already appeared on MTGO already). With so much card diversity, there are counters to just about every strategy. The format is wide open to experimentation. Just because Deck X is super popular does not mean it is unbeatable or the best the format can produce. People will brew decks that counter other decks or find whole new untapped strategies/combos. Even if certain cards become expensive, I seriously doubt they will be the only good cards in the format, or that they will stay pricey forever.
Commander product kinda "cheats" the rarity system, as it doesnt work the way it does in regular booster products.
All the pushed cards are somewhat not "common" by design, but just old cards, or downright mistakes, which are relevant because they are so much above what all the commons normally would be.
As of right now, a card is fine if it was at some point printed as common in any product.
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WotC has a hard time promoting pauper as they earn pretty much no money with it, at least in the sense of new cards.
The more expensive old commons get currently more and more expensive, as nobody would really bother sorting them, or even keeping them, as opening so much product and not getting rid of tons of commons is just unreasonable to handle, as space can be pretty expensive, and you want to not waste it.
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A bunch of pauper cards are RIGHT NOW on a very big up spike in value.
So if you have a lot of them, sell them RIGHT NOW , as theres not enough people that even have them without searching through endless amounts of unsorted bulk piles (which is quite a time investment, even if you have the cards).
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I just cannot see WotC ever actively promoting the format, its so much against what WotC business model is, unless that changes drastically for paper magic.
Could still be a thing for something like Magic Arena , to get some decks without the need for more expensive rares etc. especially for beginners that dont have any big card pool at all.
I imagine Pauper will be more heavily pushed by independent tournament organizers, rather than WotC. Which makes sense for Star City and Channel Fireball, since they are active in the secondary market and probably have a boatload of commons they are eager to offload.
I don't see the point of getting into the format if it includes commons from all the older (smaller print-run) sets, it will just have all the same supply issues and be dominated by the older, more powerful cards.
On the contrary no one complains about mana in pauper. Why would they complain? The rule for lands in pauper is that if it is a dual land it comes into play tapped, and only basics come into play untapped. If anything the manabase is better in pauper than in standard or modern. There is no finagling to figure out how to get the most untapped dual lands into the deck or being pigeonholed into having to play the worlds most expensive lands just to compete. The best lands for fixing arguably are the Rav bounce lands and the kahn's gain lands: both are pennies and come in every color pair.
Also, I think the only deck that really runs the Ash Barrens is delver. I may be wrong, but that is the one that runs a lot of cycling lands off the top of my head. That card is odd because it's more of a rare disguised as a common.
As things stand now, I believe you. But we've all undoubtedly seen the articles recently about how formats "need" to have lots of options and the mana available to play those. This is why everyone has been gushing over Innistrad-Ravnica Standard (and conveniently forgetting how everyone complained incessantly about Thragtusk, and about how Cavern of Souls let it beat Mana Leak, and how fast Naya Blitz was). People raised on that might well find Pauper's mana base too slow and too fiddly. If they're used to looking at Modern's fetch-shock nonsense as some sort of pinnacle, are they really going to look favorably on Rugged Highlands and Evolving Wilds?
And the price issues are a good point. I've seen discussions where people got angry that someone suggested they add Boros Guildmage to their deck, because they can't justify spending $1.00 on a playset of an uncommon. There are people out there who don't feel they can afford $100 for a Pauper deck, and I imagine we'll be hearing from them soon.
But I guess we'll find out.
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Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not watching.
The main trouble point for pauper is the commander products, actually. All the cards that get introduced at common in those sets are usually only ever released in those sets, so I could see a choke point form on the format if wizards doesn't reprint commander only commons in some other product. Otherwise, it's mostly just the usual stuff that gets in the way of legacy like the Reserved list, or some person speccing into Lorwyn block again because for some reason it always comes back to the Celtic block.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
On the contrary no one complains about mana in pauper. Why would they complain? The rule for lands in pauper is that if it is a dual land it comes into play tapped, and only basics come into play untapped. If anything the manabase is better in pauper than in standard or modern. There is no finagling to figure out how to get the most untapped dual lands into the deck or being pigeonholed into having to play the worlds most expensive lands just to compete. The best lands for fixing arguably are the Rav bounce lands and the kahn's gain lands: both are pennies and come in every color pair.
Also, I think the only deck that really runs the Ash Barrens is delver. I may be wrong, but that is the one that runs a lot of cycling lands off the top of my head. That card is odd because it's more of a rare disguised as a common.
As things stand now, I believe you. But we've all undoubtedly seen the articles recently about how formats "need" to have lots of options and the mana available to play those. This is why everyone has been gushing over Innistrad-Ravnica Standard (and conveniently forgetting how everyone complained incessantly about Thragtusk, and about how Cavern of Souls let it beat Mana Leak, and how fast Naya Blitz was). People raised on that might well find Pauper's mana base too slow and too fiddly. If they're used to looking at Modern's fetch-shock nonsense as some sort of pinnacle, are they really going to look favorably on Rugged Highlands and Evolving Wilds?
And the price issues are a good point. I've seen discussions where people got angry that someone suggested they add Boros Guildmage to their deck, because they can't justify spending $1.00 on a playset of an uncommon. There are people out there who don't feel they can afford $100 for a Pauper deck, and I imagine we'll be hearing from them soon.
But I guess we'll find out.
The thing is though, you have multiple sets and rarities to build a mana base for every other format. Pauper is pretty straight forward, you get common lands.
Sure, if you go into Pauper and are looking to get games like Modern/Legacy/Standard, you’re going to have a bad time. But, that’s on you, not the format.
As far as the price thing goes, 2 decks that have a share in the meta are about ~$120. The other ~11 are in the $50-$60 range, and there is even one below $30. Very few decks have “obscure” staples, considering a lot of commons are actually good and either already see play (Gurmag Angler), have been printed recently (Thraben Inspector) or are just printed a ton like Elves. Prices will spike, it’s like saying the sun will come up tomorrow. But nothing that will cause players to vacate the format over.
I too don’t see Wizards picking up this format and actually promoting it, like they do with other formats like Commander, Modern or Legacy. It seems the ones pushing this format are those in the secondary market.
Coincidently, youtube channel Tolarian Community College, sponsored by CardKingdom, a channel that, among other things, produces deck teck videos on several formats, from Standard to Legacy, including Modern, Commander and Pauper, has dedicated the latest deck teck videos exclusively to Pauper.
Are they doing it because Pauper is hot at the moment, or are they trying hard to make it look hot at the moment? I don’t know. All I know is this was all done at the same time pauper cards were spiking like crazy.
Are they doing it because Pauper is hot at the moment, or are they trying hard to make it look hot at the moment? I don’t know. All I know is this was all done at the same time pauper cards were spiking like crazy.
Probably both. The real question is this: is Pauper being hot right now a bad thing? I would say that the answer is "no"--it gets people to tournaments, it generates interest in cards or sets people might not have looked at before, people enjoy playing it, etc. The fact that some people are going to make money in the secondary market because of Pauper's current popularity is irrelevant--some people are *always* going to make money in the secondary market regardless of what is going on.
To be honest, I don't get people who start berating a format because the prices will go up on cards. The way the game works is that if a format is played, the prices on cards involved in that format will increase. It's actually a good thing when prices are good on singles because it means you probably will be able to find people to play against. Also Wizards loves the format (or at least should love it) since it would give them a way to prop up masters sets more easily. If a bunch of commons are all going to 4-5 dollars from real demand, than reprinting them as commons or uncommons in a masters product or even standard gives that set far more value to a player.
Also, they can reprint just about any of the commons since most are not on the RL. The few that are were originally higher rarity cards reprinted via vintage masters or other MTGO only sets.
And as for people who keep saying the format will be dominated by strong older cards. Have you seen the stuff they print lately? How about Gurmag Angler or Gearseeker Serpent? Bump in the Night, Tragic Slip, Bojuka bog, and a bunch of other cards exist that are found in modern legal sets. Pyroblast is an example of a powerful old card that got reprinted recently. Heck, the most expensive pauper legal card I can think of off the top of my head is Rhystic Study, and that is expensive mostly because of commander.
That's another thing, too. Most of the really expensive commons like Rhystic Study, Simian Spirit Guide, etc, don't really see play in pauper. Mana excel is especially underplayed because the power level between a one, two, and three drop isn't that much different.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
You know, Magic players love to complain how expensive the _____ Masters boosters have become. I think it'll be hilarious if Wizards deals with this issue by printing Pauper Masters at $3 per pack. Ash Barrens is the face of the mythic in that set!
The funny thing is that people who play pauper put a lot of money into it anyway. The real reason the format is great is that it plays differently from both standard and modern. The fact it's possible to own a dozen decks is just icing on the cake, really.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
I think it's great if you're in a play group and can vouch for how much of a refreshing change it can be from the other eternal formats. So many times you sit there and jam Modern for hours after researching the meta and prepping sideboards for life. Or you have these long, politically involved games of EDH going on usually when one or two persons in a group have nothing going on, others are comboing off obnoxious infinite loops, and one is just padded in his little bubble of a prison you can't kill me deck (sound familiar?).
Then you have Pauper, the epitome of a casual, chill format. It's competitive because the decks have power, and you get to play awesome cards that aren't Modern legal as others have mentioned.
But, the real appeal I have seen, is I feel like the community that embraces Pauper really just loves Magic for the social, chill element of the game. I can't remember any matches I've played in my play group or a shop that haven't just felt like there is nothing riding on it. You're just flinging these common spells and having a good time.
It has a great collector's appeal as well. I know personally, my friends and I have sat for hours sifting through boxes upon boxes, upon boxes of cards building all the meta decks in the format (heck, doubles and triples of them even). It gives meaning to the cards you've stashed that Mom's told you to pawn off.
And you can still brew even though the format is established if you want a funsies deck (common conception is the meta is locked and solved). My first deck was R/G landfall with Makindi Sliderunner, Plated Geopede, Snapping Gnarlid, and Valakut Predator. That was fun, though it only won some .400 to .450 part of the time. I really enjoyed the deck.
Closing remarks, I think the fluctuation in prices will be short lived (though I'm no speculator) and the diehards will stay and contribute to the format, while others will come and quickly go. Maybe the community adds a few more players. But, like all other formats, cards will find their price home and the volatility will end.
Lastly, if you think Pauper is fun... Play some Pauper Commander . Grove Rumbler ftw! THAT deck is fun! Haha.
Ash Barrens is a good card, of course, but it's expensive right now because it's only been in Commander supplements.
Guess you should tell that to Delver of Secrets, a common in innistrad. How about lightning bolt? Qasali Pridemage? Llanowar elves? Sinkhole? People who don't have a lot of money would be interested in making a common deck that can beat other common decks, most likely burn decks.
Pauper its an excellent format and very cheap, i spend 120€ to have all pauper decks (almost 20 or more) and are very fun to play, sometimes its better than modern
It will be always a cheap format, if not it will not succed and people will not play it ... please dont especulate in this format, or it will be his die...also wizards can reprint ALL the commonds and cost cents so its a not a buyout format like modern its
RW R/W Burn WB B/W TokensXU MonuU Tron // UWX UW Tron
R GoblinsW Soul SistersRWG Small ZooWUR WUR Geist/Control/Kiki-Resto Combo/NahiriUR Splinter Twin (90% Japanese)/ Grixis TwinRUB UR Delver / Grixis Delver UR Blue MoonBWU Ad NauseamWDeath and TaxesRUB Grixis ControlUMerfolksX Affinity RGB Living End UR Storm/PiF Combo RGX R/G TRON GWU Bant Eldrazi BW Eldrazi and Taxes RUBGoryos Vengeance UB Faeries
Legacy:BRx Renimator
Playing right now: Standard: Jeskai Control Modern; GoryosVengeance/UBFaeries/Affinity Legacy: BRx Reanimator Pauper: UR Drake (banned) Commander: Merieke Ri Berit Esper
On the contrary no one complains about mana in pauper. Why would they complain? The rule for lands in pauper is that if it is a dual land it comes into play tapped, and only basics come into play untapped. If anything the manabase is better in pauper than in standard or modern. There is no finagling to figure out how to get the most untapped dual lands into the deck or being pigeonholed into having to play the worlds most expensive lands just to compete. The best lands for fixing arguably are the Rav bounce lands and the kahn's gain lands: both are pennies and come in every color pair.
Also, I think the only deck that really runs the Ash Barrens is delver. I may be wrong, but that is the one that runs a lot of cycling lands off the top of my head. That card is odd because it's more of a rare disguised as a common.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Competitive Pauper offers the worst aspects of Legacy and Standard for cheap, if you remove the cheapness by speculating on staples you end up with a format nobody will like in the end and only end up hurting the casual online Pauper community who play the format because its fun and brew-friendly when 90% of the people aren't playing Stompy, Tron and Delver.
I meant, print them in Standard. Thats all. The best way to get reprints out to people is via Standard.
Spirits
It's far more than a three deck format, but I can understand why someone would think so. Let me put it this way: We're in a gaming culture where if someone finds a really good deck that seems to win vs the field and posts it on the net, throngs of people will go and copy the list and play it without understanding that it is good against the field it was wielded against. Imagine if someone walked into an LGS and the majority of decks being played were burn and affinity and they had "the answer deck" to that specific format. That's kind of what early pauper went through. The reality is the format is pretty deep.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
sounds like pauper is a nice alternative to commander,"keep magic fun",hope it stays that way. how much can a common's price raise? (oh , 8$,10$? ) alright..
at least you wont see the ridiculous uncommon prices i guess
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However, recently, the prices of cards in this format have been jacked up by card sellers, so right now it’s not as cheap to enter this format as it once was.
If the trend continues, sooner or later, pauper will lose the “cheap” label, and, without it, I question the desirability of the format.
I guess it won’t matter to all those who already have a pauper deck to play, but we can say the same thing about eternal formats. The thing is, one of the reasons people play eternal formats is because they want to play with the most powerful and more explosive decks in Magic history (I call those decks “Magic on steroids”). Pauper decks are not that powerful or explosive, so, with money out of the equation, what’s the point?
In conclusion, the way I see it, card sellers are going to be ones dictating the fate of this format. If they raise the card prices too high and too quickly, they will basically shutdown the format.
But commons are common, so there is a cap on how high prices can go. Adding to this is the fact that there are so many viable decks that, if one deck becomes super pricey, people will transition over to other, cheaper decks.
Regardless, Pauper decks will never be as expensive as Modern decks (some of which are over a thousand dollars to build).
Yes, people can transition to cheaper decks, but, at a competitive level, that usually equals to a transition to weaker decks and consequently more losses, so that's not really an option.
You might think playing with commons would guarantee a cap on how high prices can go, but with some staples being old obscure cards, cards not many bothered to collect back then, today there aren't many of those around to satisfy demand, so don't be surprised to watch obscene prices in some common cards.
The nice thing is that WotC will have no qualms about re-printing expensive commons in their re-jiggered Masters sets (which can pull from any era now).
Pauper will not have one clearly dominant deck (as it would have already appeared on MTGO already). With so much card diversity, there are counters to just about every strategy. The format is wide open to experimentation. Just because Deck X is super popular does not mean it is unbeatable or the best the format can produce. People will brew decks that counter other decks or find whole new untapped strategies/combos. Even if certain cards become expensive, I seriously doubt they will be the only good cards in the format, or that they will stay pricey forever.
All the pushed cards are somewhat not "common" by design, but just old cards, or downright mistakes, which are relevant because they are so much above what all the commons normally would be.
As of right now, a card is fine if it was at some point printed as common in any product.
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WotC has a hard time promoting pauper as they earn pretty much no money with it, at least in the sense of new cards.
The more expensive old commons get currently more and more expensive, as nobody would really bother sorting them, or even keeping them, as opening so much product and not getting rid of tons of commons is just unreasonable to handle, as space can be pretty expensive, and you want to not waste it.
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A bunch of pauper cards are RIGHT NOW on a very big up spike in value.
So if you have a lot of them, sell them RIGHT NOW , as theres not enough people that even have them without searching through endless amounts of unsorted bulk piles (which is quite a time investment, even if you have the cards).
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I just cannot see WotC ever actively promoting the format, its so much against what WotC business model is, unless that changes drastically for paper magic.
Could still be a thing for something like Magic Arena , to get some decks without the need for more expensive rares etc. especially for beginners that dont have any big card pool at all.
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As things stand now, I believe you. But we've all undoubtedly seen the articles recently about how formats "need" to have lots of options and the mana available to play those. This is why everyone has been gushing over Innistrad-Ravnica Standard (and conveniently forgetting how everyone complained incessantly about Thragtusk, and about how Cavern of Souls let it beat Mana Leak, and how fast Naya Blitz was). People raised on that might well find Pauper's mana base too slow and too fiddly. If they're used to looking at Modern's fetch-shock nonsense as some sort of pinnacle, are they really going to look favorably on Rugged Highlands and Evolving Wilds?
And the price issues are a good point. I've seen discussions where people got angry that someone suggested they add Boros Guildmage to their deck, because they can't justify spending $1.00 on a playset of an uncommon. There are people out there who don't feel they can afford $100 for a Pauper deck, and I imagine we'll be hearing from them soon.
But I guess we'll find out.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
The thing is though, you have multiple sets and rarities to build a mana base for every other format. Pauper is pretty straight forward, you get common lands.
Sure, if you go into Pauper and are looking to get games like Modern/Legacy/Standard, you’re going to have a bad time. But, that’s on you, not the format.
As far as the price thing goes, 2 decks that have a share in the meta are about ~$120. The other ~11 are in the $50-$60 range, and there is even one below $30. Very few decks have “obscure” staples, considering a lot of commons are actually good and either already see play (Gurmag Angler), have been printed recently (Thraben Inspector) or are just printed a ton like Elves. Prices will spike, it’s like saying the sun will come up tomorrow. But nothing that will cause players to vacate the format over.
Coincidently, youtube channel Tolarian Community College, sponsored by CardKingdom, a channel that, among other things, produces deck teck videos on several formats, from Standard to Legacy, including Modern, Commander and Pauper, has dedicated the latest deck teck videos exclusively to Pauper.
Are they doing it because Pauper is hot at the moment, or are they trying hard to make it look hot at the moment? I don’t know. All I know is this was all done at the same time pauper cards were spiking like crazy.
Probably both. The real question is this: is Pauper being hot right now a bad thing? I would say that the answer is "no"--it gets people to tournaments, it generates interest in cards or sets people might not have looked at before, people enjoy playing it, etc. The fact that some people are going to make money in the secondary market because of Pauper's current popularity is irrelevant--some people are *always* going to make money in the secondary market regardless of what is going on.
Also, they can reprint just about any of the commons since most are not on the RL. The few that are were originally higher rarity cards reprinted via vintage masters or other MTGO only sets.
And as for people who keep saying the format will be dominated by strong older cards. Have you seen the stuff they print lately? How about Gurmag Angler or Gearseeker Serpent? Bump in the Night, Tragic Slip, Bojuka bog, and a bunch of other cards exist that are found in modern legal sets. Pyroblast is an example of a powerful old card that got reprinted recently. Heck, the most expensive pauper legal card I can think of off the top of my head is Rhystic Study, and that is expensive mostly because of commander.
That's another thing, too. Most of the really expensive commons like Rhystic Study, Simian Spirit Guide, etc, don't really see play in pauper. Mana excel is especially underplayed because the power level between a one, two, and three drop isn't that much different.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Then you have Pauper, the epitome of a casual, chill format. It's competitive because the decks have power, and you get to play awesome cards that aren't Modern legal as others have mentioned.
But, the real appeal I have seen, is I feel like the community that embraces Pauper really just loves Magic for the social, chill element of the game. I can't remember any matches I've played in my play group or a shop that haven't just felt like there is nothing riding on it. You're just flinging these common spells and having a good time.
It has a great collector's appeal as well. I know personally, my friends and I have sat for hours sifting through boxes upon boxes, upon boxes of cards building all the meta decks in the format (heck, doubles and triples of them even). It gives meaning to the cards you've stashed that Mom's told you to pawn off.
And you can still brew even though the format is established if you want a funsies deck (common conception is the meta is locked and solved). My first deck was R/G landfall with Makindi Sliderunner, Plated Geopede, Snapping Gnarlid, and Valakut Predator. That was fun, though it only won some .400 to .450 part of the time. I really enjoyed the deck.
Closing remarks, I think the fluctuation in prices will be short lived (though I'm no speculator) and the diehards will stay and contribute to the format, while others will come and quickly go. Maybe the community adds a few more players. But, like all other formats, cards will find their price home and the volatility will end.
Lastly, if you think Pauper is fun... Play some Pauper Commander . Grove Rumbler ftw! THAT deck is fun! Haha.
Decks:
Skred Red, Abzan Midrange, U/B Delver, Mono U Delver, Uril, the Miststalker