I really feel like just having one at each color range is kind of silly especially when you have 3 or 4 viable blue decks, and at least 3 viable green decks.
Also it occurs to me that UG elves would probably be best for that slot, since its actually a tier deck.
I'd probably expand it to 2 of the mono colored varieties and one of the multi color varieties.
I know its a lot of decks but its pauper after all. You dont have to take all the decks each time you use them.
Agreed. I think it's best to look at strategy and mood/tone of a deck before caring about its color. Stompy and Elves both might be MonoGreen (or close) but they are totally different. Elves and Goblins and Soul Sisters are all creature spam decks but the feel of each is unique.
I really feel like just having one at each color range is kind of silly especially when you have 3 or 4 viable blue decks, and at least 3 viable green decks.
Also it occurs to me that UG elves would probably be best for that slot, since its actually a tier deck.
I'd probably expand it to 2 of the mono colored varieties and one of the multi color varieties.
I know its a lot of decks but its pauper after all. You dont have to take all the decks each time you use them.
It's my deck collection, and this is how I decided to arrange it. I specifically wanted to avoid having too much of one colour (I've mentioned this a few times). Feel free to make your own collection of decks as you please, but don't say my idea is "silly". That's pretty insulting.
Elves has a total of 4 Blue cards. For all intents and purposes, it's just another Mono-Green deck that splashes for Distant Melody. Splashing Blue for card draw is a very common thing to see in Pauper. You see it in Tron and Boros Kitty as well. I wanted a "real" Simic deck.
I don't understand why the colour-oriented concept matters so much. It's a concept that I chose, and I happen to like it!
I don't understand why the colour-oriented concept matters so much. It's a concept that I chose, and I happen to like it!
I can't speak for others, but it seems like you are potentially limiting what your collection can cover by restricting what you can do with regards to color - especially when color is a somewhat arbitrary parameter. Basically, I think you would have more fun with a more liberal approach to color and I'll tell you what I think you should do because this is an online forum and you live 3000 miles from me
My goal is to represent the online metagame, but also be able to say to anyone who uses the box "So, what kind of decks do you like to play? Okay, here's the Pauper version of that."
I actually wasn't referring to you, but rather the person I quoted. I'd like to keep everything on this thread as civil as possible, including respecting each others' ideas. I'm open to suggestions as well as reviewing other people's collections, but judging the rules I used to build is just useless and insulting. This is not the kind of thing I'm used to in this corner of MTGS, and I must say I'm surprised and disappointed.
I think your design philosophy is great! It is different from mine, and that's perfectly fine.
Sorry for the confusion I wasn't calling you silly, however I was trying to point out that there are many viable tier decks in each of the mono colored varieties. I do have a battle bag actually but its more defined by the decks that are good rather than by strict color segregation. For instance I have delver and high tide as blue decks. I have infect and stompy at green decks. I have goblins and burn as red decks. But if you do want to stick to each and you do have a bunch of players who enjoy pauper I know they will appreciate those decks changing once and a while. Some times ppl get tired of playing against delver and would like to see whirlpool combo.
I thought the thread was discussing battle bags in general. So as someone who has one I was just telling ppl about options.
Well, I have primers for Turbo Fog, Hexproof and Pestilence, which go into plenty of detail. Checking out the other primers in that section for decks contained in the Battle Bag is also a good idea!
Other than that, I had started giving brief strategy descriptions for each, in hopes of including them in the deck box, but I was struggling with keeping it short, so dropped the idea at the time. I might just try again if there is a desire for it, however. Thanks for the good suggestion!
Cool, so far I have built MBC and Elfball/stompy. Not sure which pauper I will go for next! (I never did play Pokemon, but I feel like i need to collect them all lol)
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just found your thread and since I have to convince 4 collagues to get into magic I need a cheap and simple solution for that!
Could you help me choose 4 decks that can compete against each other. Or maybe 6 so theres more to choose from?
Thanks!
Hi Man1acc! Welcome to MTGS! I hope you enjoy the great community here!
Pauper is a great place to start if you're on a budget! Pauper is still has a rather large pool of mechanics to learn, so starting with Pauper may prove challenging to people who haven't played collectible card games before.
In terms of good decks to get started and their price, there are a few options for you.
The five cheapest decks in my collection currently are:
White Weenies
Pestilence
Tortured Existence
Teachings
Trinkets
Here, the decks are relatively well balanced and non-oppressive. The strategies are also fairly diverse with a blend of aggro, control and everything in between.
If you want my opinion, I think it's worth spending a little more and including a few decks that are a bit more "well-known" in the Pauper metagame. My suggestion would be:
Black Control
Teachings
Stompy
White Weenie
Boros Kitty
With these five, you also get a decent blend of strategies but hit a lot more of the classics from Pauper. It has interesting rock-paper-scissors scenarios where a deck like White weenie will do poorly against Boros Kitty but very well against MBC, while MBC beats Boros Kitty. Stompy is a pure aggro strategy that is definitely worth the money you put into it.
Teachings might be a bit too difficult to play for beginners, even if it's affordable. Feel free to switch it out with something less intense like Trinkets or Pestilence if you need to, though they may not be as strong. If you feel like spending a little more, Delver is worth every penny.
I hope this helps and I look forward to seeing more of you around the forums!
Personally, I don't find that Pauper is a very good format to learn to play Magic, as there are so many key words and sometimes complicated interactions that it can be overwhelming for new players. The maindeck of the White Weenies deck has 11 keywords in text boxes all by itself. I've seen abilities like Vanishing cause a certain amount of stress for new players. Standard, Draft and Sealed are often much easier to handle for newer players, as there is simply less information to analyse (at least in terms of keywords).
If you want to teach people with these decks, by all means do so! If you take the time to explain each card and give her the time to take it all in with a few games, I'm sure she'll enjoy it just about as much as any format! I think a good match for White Weenie would be either the BR sacrifical aggro-control deck or the Tortured Existence deck, as none of these are particularly fast or oppressive and should lead to more exciting back and forth games.
Stompy also has a whopping 12 keywords to learn in the deck, so it's not much easier. In terms of playstyle, however, it's very straightforward.
Stompy VS. Mono-Black Control is a classic matchup and is in your price range. If not, something like Boros Kitty or Tortured Existence would be okay. Even if they're not as fast, they have the potential to stabilize in the mid/late game and take over.
What would be a good sideboard option for MBC when facing Affinity? I have MBC, Elves, and MUD and my bro plays Affinity. Got a few Annul for MUD, got a few copies of Naturalize/Natural State for Elves (I know Gleeful Sabotage is strictly better, but it's also 20x cost for playset, I'll upgrade eventually) and for MBC.. crickets. I don't know what to sideboard for MBC against Affinity.
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What would be a good sideboard option for MBC when facing Affinity? I have MBC, Elves, and MUD and my bro plays Affinity. Got a few Annul for MUD, got a few copies of Naturalize/Natural State for Elves (I know Gleeful Sabotage is strictly better, but it's also 20x cost for playset, I'll upgrade eventually) and for MBC.. crickets. I don't know what to sideboard for MBC against Affinity.
The first thing that comes to mind for me is Dead Weight. It kills an Atog dead and also cripples their bigger dudes in a pinch. Any straight-up kill spell like Doom Blade and Victim of Night are also very good against them, as they take care of every creature in their deck, no questions asked. Gray Merchants and other forms of life gain will also keep you out of Burn range. All in all, it should be a very interesting matchup and the amount of removal you get in your opening hand determines how well the game will go for you.
Would Disciple of the Vault be good against them? It would really make them think twice about when to start pumping Atog and if they do then you'd probably have a Doom Blade ready, so they lose life and most of their board!
Yeah, I just really wish there was a pseudo-board wipe to use in Pauper. I've played against Affinity with MBC in other formats and you just need to hold out until turn 3 or 4 and play a Toxic Deluge, Languish or Mutilate then you pretty much have the win. Evincar's Justice is the closest we have, but looking at your OP list, it would only clear Frogmites and the opponent would probably just sac them to keep an Atog in play. I guess boarding in more spot removal is the best we can do right now.
EDIT: Or Crypt Rats and Pestilence are other board wipe options.
Many MBC sideboards contain either Crypt Rats or Pestilence in their sideboards, which will really help. I think Crypt rats might be a bit stronger because of the potential recursion some decks run, like Unearth or Death Denied.
I just did a pretty major update on the pricing of the Battle Bag. It's not looking good. Due to many reasons, the current cost to buy this collection would be of approximately $714.26. I can't believe the price of these cards has risen around $300 since I last checked. Pauper may not be as cheap a format as it used to be. We're talking about $44.64 as an average per deck.
That being said, I opened up a few more Chain Lightnings in my Eternal Masters box, which allowed me to add them to the bag and still have my originals in other decks. This raised the price of the Burn deck considerably. The Eldrazi menace contributed to the significantly higher prices of Tron staples, which made the deck much pricier than it already was. I noticed Journey to Nowhere is well above $1.00 now, making it one of the most expensive white cards in the collection. I have a large amount of them in almost every White deck. The last thing I noticed was that Muddle the Mixture shot up in value because of the unbanning of Sword of the Meek, making it a staple card in the Modern combo deck.
Yeah it's crazy. I started playing Magic again in January and just since then the prices have gone bonkers from my point of view. If you look at price history for cards on MTGGoldfish, or a similar site, you can see how paper Pauper cards have really exploded since December. Oubliette for example was around $10 in January and I SCOFFED at paying $10 for a common card.. derp. Should of just bought the darn thing then.
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Heh. I remember Oubliette being $3 and thinking that was too much. Back when I bought the bulk of my pauper cards 2-3 years ago, few (if any) cards were above $1. Maybe Brainstorm? That one's actually gone down though. Most were what you expect (I guess you can't anymore) commons to be - a few dimes or less. I distinctly remember getting Slippery Bogles at 35 cents a pop. Suffice to say that my own battle bag wouldn't have nearly as many decks if I were to start making it today. I always hope Wizards will be more liberal in their reprints, but given their track record, I don't imagine they believe that's in their best interest. Unfortunate, really.
As for MBC vs Affinity, perhaps Ostracize would be another option? Works well against other decks too if you need a bit of extra hate.
It does seem like each card has risen in value in general. Although I see non-Pauper reasons why cards have gone up in value, I can't help but wonder if part of it is also because Pauper itself is becoming more popular in paper. I can't really see a way to prove that theory. Perhaps those huge paper tournaments in Italy have something to do with it. Eternal Masters has been excessively good about reprinting good Pauper cards, which may have also contributed to popularity.
It seems like buying into the format early always seems to be the answer. I would never have begun to build this collection if the price was that high, but at the time I was building, it cost me under $300, easily.
I noticed the primer intro hasn't been updated since last September. Will there be anything from the new sets included in this. I think this is a fantastic idea BTW and really appreciate the work thats been put into it.
Thanks for your comment! I am indeed making some adjustments to several decks, most notably the Pestilence deck is going over yet another face-lift, although this one is going to be really competitive.
Boros Kitty should probably be updated to include Thraben Inspector.
Also, Elusive Spellfist is being used in a fair amount of Eye Candy decks that I've been coming across on MTGO. It may not be as explosive as the other creatures, but it adds consistent damage to the deck.
Agreed. I think it's best to look at strategy and mood/tone of a deck before caring about its color. Stompy and Elves both might be MonoGreen (or close) but they are totally different. Elves and Goblins and Soul Sisters are all creature spam decks but the feel of each is unique.
WUBRGPauper Battle BoxWUBRG ... and why I am not a fan of Wayne Reynolds' Illustrations.
It's my deck collection, and this is how I decided to arrange it. I specifically wanted to avoid having too much of one colour (I've mentioned this a few times). Feel free to make your own collection of decks as you please, but don't say my idea is "silly". That's pretty insulting.
Elves has a total of 4 Blue cards. For all intents and purposes, it's just another Mono-Green deck that splashes for Distant Melody. Splashing Blue for card draw is a very common thing to see in Pauper. You see it in Tron and Boros Kitty as well. I wanted a "real" Simic deck.
I don't understand why the colour-oriented concept matters so much. It's a concept that I chose, and I happen to like it!
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
I can't speak for others, but it seems like you are potentially limiting what your collection can cover by restricting what you can do with regards to color - especially when color is a somewhat arbitrary parameter. Basically, I think you would have more fun with a more liberal approach to color and I'll tell you what I think you should do because this is an online forum and you live 3000 miles from me
My goal is to represent the online metagame, but also be able to say to anyone who uses the box "So, what kind of decks do you like to play? Okay, here's the Pauper version of that."
WUBRGPauper Battle BoxWUBRG ... and why I am not a fan of Wayne Reynolds' Illustrations.
I think your design philosophy is great! It is different from mine, and that's perfectly fine.
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
I thought the thread was discussing battle bags in general. So as someone who has one I was just telling ppl about options.
just a thought.
cheers,
H.G.
http://hgcube.blogspot.com/ (help me Make my Custom CUBE!)
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=382498
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Redit Proxy Article "current gallery"
MY LEGACY ALTERS
Active Player: 1994-1999, 2016-
Sign & Share Petition To Fix MTG: Arena's Economy: https://goo.gl/z8fop8
Other than that, I had started giving brief strategy descriptions for each, in hopes of including them in the deck box, but I was struggling with keeping it short, so dropped the idea at the time. I might just try again if there is a desire for it, however. Thanks for the good suggestion!
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
I've added a small descriptor for each deck. Please let me know how I could improve them, while still keeping them short.
I've overhauled the Pestilence deck into something that I feel is a lot more playable, especially 1-v-1.
I've made several other adjustments throughout. The most notable changes are in the Delver deck, replacing banned cards and tweaking here and there.
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
Active Player: 1994-1999, 2016-
Sign & Share Petition To Fix MTG: Arena's Economy: https://goo.gl/z8fop8
MBC
MUD
Elfball
Affinity
But I like your question, I would be interested to hear what the OP has to say about a balanced mix as well.
Active Player: 1994-1999, 2016-
Sign & Share Petition To Fix MTG: Arena's Economy: https://goo.gl/z8fop8
Hi Man1acc! Welcome to MTGS! I hope you enjoy the great community here!
Pauper is a great place to start if you're on a budget! Pauper is still has a rather large pool of mechanics to learn, so starting with Pauper may prove challenging to people who haven't played collectible card games before.
In terms of good decks to get started and their price, there are a few options for you.
The five cheapest decks in my collection currently are:
White Weenies
Pestilence
Tortured Existence
Teachings
Trinkets
Here, the decks are relatively well balanced and non-oppressive. The strategies are also fairly diverse with a blend of aggro, control and everything in between.
If you want my opinion, I think it's worth spending a little more and including a few decks that are a bit more "well-known" in the Pauper metagame. My suggestion would be:
Black Control
Teachings
Stompy
White Weenie
Boros Kitty
With these five, you also get a decent blend of strategies but hit a lot more of the classics from Pauper. It has interesting rock-paper-scissors scenarios where a deck like White weenie will do poorly against Boros Kitty but very well against MBC, while MBC beats Boros Kitty. Stompy is a pure aggro strategy that is definitely worth the money you put into it.
Teachings might be a bit too difficult to play for beginners, even if it's affordable. Feel free to switch it out with something less intense like Trinkets or Pestilence if you need to, though they may not be as strong. If you feel like spending a little more, Delver is worth every penny.
I hope this helps and I look forward to seeing more of you around the forums!
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
If you want to teach people with these decks, by all means do so! If you take the time to explain each card and give her the time to take it all in with a few games, I'm sure she'll enjoy it just about as much as any format! I think a good match for White Weenie would be either the BR sacrifical aggro-control deck or the Tortured Existence deck, as none of these are particularly fast or oppressive and should lead to more exciting back and forth games.
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
Stompy VS. Mono-Black Control is a classic matchup and is in your price range. If not, something like Boros Kitty or Tortured Existence would be okay. Even if they're not as fast, they have the potential to stabilize in the mid/late game and take over.
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
Active Player: 1994-1999, 2016-
Sign & Share Petition To Fix MTG: Arena's Economy: https://goo.gl/z8fop8
The first thing that comes to mind for me is Dead Weight. It kills an Atog dead and also cripples their bigger dudes in a pinch. Any straight-up kill spell like Doom Blade and Victim of Night are also very good against them, as they take care of every creature in their deck, no questions asked. Gray Merchants and other forms of life gain will also keep you out of Burn range. All in all, it should be a very interesting matchup and the amount of removal you get in your opening hand determines how well the game will go for you.
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
EDIT: Or Crypt Rats and Pestilence are other board wipe options.
I just did a pretty major update on the pricing of the Battle Bag. It's not looking good. Due to many reasons, the current cost to buy this collection would be of approximately $714.26. I can't believe the price of these cards has risen around $300 since I last checked. Pauper may not be as cheap a format as it used to be. We're talking about $44.64 as an average per deck.
That being said, I opened up a few more Chain Lightnings in my Eternal Masters box, which allowed me to add them to the bag and still have my originals in other decks. This raised the price of the Burn deck considerably. The Eldrazi menace contributed to the significantly higher prices of Tron staples, which made the deck much pricier than it already was. I noticed Journey to Nowhere is well above $1.00 now, making it one of the most expensive white cards in the collection. I have a large amount of them in almost every White deck. The last thing I noticed was that Muddle the Mixture shot up in value because of the unbanning of Sword of the Meek, making it a staple card in the Modern combo deck.
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
Active Player: 1994-1999, 2016-
Sign & Share Petition To Fix MTG: Arena's Economy: https://goo.gl/z8fop8
As for MBC vs Affinity, perhaps Ostracize would be another option? Works well against other decks too if you need a bit of extra hate.
It seems like buying into the format early always seems to be the answer. I would never have begun to build this collection if the price was that high, but at the time I was building, it cost me under $300, easily.
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
Thanks for your comment! I am indeed making some adjustments to several decks, most notably the Pestilence deck is going over yet another face-lift, although this one is going to be really competitive.
Burning-Tree Emissary is going to be making an appearance in Stompy, obviously.
There are also a few tweaks I'll be bringing into Turbo Fog to reflect my current technology.
Pulse of Murasa is going to be added to the Tron deck to make it a bit more modern.
My Mono-Black deck is really out of date. I'll have to bring it up to today's standards in terms of removal choices.
Are there any new cards you feel should be making an appearance?
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
Also, Elusive Spellfist is being used in a fair amount of Eye Candy decks that I've been coming across on MTGO. It may not be as explosive as the other creatures, but it adds consistent damage to the deck.