Band Together marks probably the strongest playable we've seen so far imo. 2 for 1 at instant speed in green. I'd be up to pay one extra over normal fight spells.
Have made a breakthrough of sorts with Death Spark. Allows loads of cool tricks with cards I've used at various stages of builds.
You can use its ability to pseudo-draw cards for effects like Lightning Axe, the Insolent Neonate Engine, there are so many options. Its similar in a way to Sanitarium Skeleton, but unfortunately isn't a creature. However, it provides a lot of consistency and hooks up with a few cards to form mini engines on its own, and overall has a lot of value. It's incredibly good with Undertaker, and allows you to really quickly just gain heaps and floods of relevant card advantage. Its great alongside dredgers, and the deck has have a lot of outlets to cause its trigger to work. Cast/Discard it, and then discard any creature, or dredge something over it for easy recursions. I've been tinkering with the build a little bit and im unsure of the numbers, but im upping discard outlets like Undertaker and Lightning Axe, and bringing in some number of looters (Mad Prophet, Rummaging Goblin) as well as playing with the removal suite. I think the card will change the build, and im already seeing strong showings from Death Spark in the minimal testing ive done with newer lists. Another piece of tech im experimenting with is using a 1-3 split of Grim Harvest and Grave Scrabbler. I think the recover ability is often super relevant with dredge, and it can act as a way to recur things in tough situations where you don't have an outlet. You'll almost always have mana when its triggered on your upkeep, and its saved me in a pinch or two.
will update with build soon
edit:
- Land (22) - Instant (7) - Creature (27) - Enchantment (4) -
Ob Nixilis's Cruelty probably isnt going to do anything too crazy. Black has a seriously deep removal pool already, which people dont even fully utilize, with amazing cards at 0-2 mana (yes 0, why doesnt Snuff Out see more play?) that mostly outclass the 2B instant in every way. Even if I wanted to pay 2B, i'd be running Rend Flesh for better coverage. Overall none of these cards seem more powerful than anything we have, at least so far. Frankly I'm disappointed WOTC chose not to print any common PWs, would have been really really interesting to see weak walkers at common come into pauper, though I doubt even some of the rare PWs from this set would have any impact, they seem to be taking a very cautious approach powerlevel-wise. Karn, the Great Creator looks to be the only PW worthy of eternal format play so far, and we've had a lot spoiled. Teferi's Time Twist looks fun, but I dont think it'll be taking any spots over Ghostly Flicker or Momentary Blink
Suggestions aside, this list is too slow for Modern, at least as an aggro deck. If you want to push this to be competetive I think you need to rework the creature base. Maindeck Beseech and Duress over Inqui or Seize seems silly, and your land count is high for an aggro deck. You have a lot of emphasis on 4 drops that arent good enough to pay 4 mana for, which will not hold up in the modern environment. Cavern of Souls seems overlooked, and Aether Vial is always an option for creature heavy lists. As hard as it is to say, this is not a winning list.
Fast forward to today. Flux Channeler provides the perfect catalyst for go wide artifact mana, since everything you're already casting constantly is giving you more and more proliferation triggers. We can abuse it with counter-matters artifacts like Magistrate's Scepter(Time Walk every turn if you can cast 3 spells), Orochi Hatchery, Lux Cannon, etc.
The newly spoiled Karn, the Great Creator gives us strictly better things to do with the mana, and some of the other proliferate cards in WAR are playable. Having powerful narrow hosers game one like Ensnaring Bridge, Torpor Orb, Relic of Progenitus, etc, is a very strong plan, and 10 mana in one turn isnt much to ask from this deck, the famed Mycosynth Lattice payoff well within it's reach. Constant proliferation with Flux Channeler and Tezzeret's Gambit also allows us to use his -2 more than twice in a row without offing him. I think a retooling of the pieces could create something cool, discuss?
Immediate ideas:
We now have 8 copies of the Bitterblossom effect for sacrifice outlet decks, including the previously spoiled Cabal Therapist for MH1, with the new Dreadhorde Invasion, Trap card or not, Cabal Therapy every turn is very powerful Flux Channeler has a sneaky home in an old brew of mine that abuses artifact mana with Everflowing Chalice, Tezzeret's Gambit and friends to generate absurdist amounts very quickly. Could be fun
Have been playing Sea Legs in my monoblue Delver lists a lot after reading this post last week. I can say confidently that this card is a lot of fun, you have my thanks. It enables tons of profitable blocks/attacks with Augur and Ninja and is a neat 1 or 2 of. Im not sure if its the best for the job, but its cute and fresh nonetheless, and got me looking into similar effects. It seems in part to be outclassed by Stream of Unconsciousness in some situations due to a natural density of Wizards (Spellstutter Sprite, Delver of Secrets, and friends) to cantrip and a stronger -X, but being an enchantment is a neat upside to blank certain threats.
Unfortunately, I think even in mono blue, Vapor Snag/Snap/Boomerang is going to outperform combat tricks most of the time.
Your U/R Phoenix Matchup looks pretty awful, and thats a huge part of the Meta right now. Its the new hotness and everyone's playing it. You need some amount of mainboard Path to Exile to deal with problem creatures you'd otherwise struggle to beat like big Goyfs/Gurmag, or cards that threaten to win the game (My mind goes to Thing in the Ice.
I've found it. The piece I needed to fix the card disadvantage was Sanitarium Skeleton. He's an enabler that can also come down as an efficient early blocker and gives us another relevant turn 1 play, but he can be used with all our effects for maximum value, and he lets you essentially spend 2B to draw a card (in the resource sense) any time he's in the graveyard. He lets you artificially come back from card disadvantage when you have extra mana on a turn and still be traded for any creature card in the graveyard using Tortured Existence. He's also a great card to bin if you need to throw out an early Lightning Axe or Kris Mage activation that you cant follow with a madness creature.
Another note; looping Mournwhelk every turn with a dredger against some decks is pretty nasty.
My one issue with the deck is how fast it churns through resources to get the engine operating. I feel like I need some way to pull the number of cards in my hand back up in the midgame, and Read the Bones just isnt enough. Really it could be any kind of card, I just need something that 3 for 1s or provides significant long term card advantage so I can use recurring outlets like Insolent Neonate to generate value from extra cards. Pauper's apparent lack of Phyrexian Arena effects is proving difficult, so I've been looking at things that fill my hand up with anything at all en masse. The best i've found in my browsing are some 3 for 1 Graveyard to Hand creature recursion, but im unsure if the high mana costs are worth it, and what im really craving is something I could use from the bin in case I mill it.
Also I'm awful at this manabase thing. I miss my fetch lands. Who knew it'd be such a struggle to design a two color deck that could use all of its cards when it wanted to, lol. This is what I get for never branching seriously beyond monoblue in pauper. Any suggestions would be appreciated.
This deck is ******* awful against Relic in game two unfortunately, but I dont think theres anything I can do about that.
It'd be a crime to leave Flickerwisp on the sidelines. This card does it all, it provides so much value for you, allowing you to re-use any etb, bounce permanents like Ensnaring Bridge, remove blockers, do its civil duty as an Ambush Viper, the list goes on. Flickerwisp is kind of an insane magic card, and your list looks like the perfect place. This seems to be a more budget list, so I'll refrain from recommending Aether Vial, though the card probably belongs here. Obviously, the mana base is more than lacking, but again, budgets are budgets. Id reccomend picking up at least a few of checklands like Sunpetal Grove, Woodland Cemetery, etc. Theyre very cheap in comparison to a normal manabase and provide good enough fixing to let you more reliably cast spells.
Also I see no reason to run Oblivion Ring over Fiend Hunter and similar effects in a Panharmonicon deck. Leonin Relic-Warder is also nice if you need to disrupt noncreature permanents, and creates an infinite ETB combo that you could potentially abuse with something.
Undertaker is an absolutely sweet little piece of tech. Often, we are only using the ability from Tortured Existence once per turn, and running Undertaker in place of, or in addition to, the 4th Tortured Existence allows us to bin cards like Fiery Temper/Psychotic Episode and additional redundant copies of Existence/Bolt/Axe/Land while still maintaining card parity and generating value. He's also a creature, so if we get him in the yard via the dredge plan, he can be recurred with Grave Scrabbler.
Kris Mage feels absolutely great every time im finding it. It's winning so many matchups by itself, and totally controls the midgame. Its a super relevant ability and it allows constant Reckless Wurms to dominate opposing Gurmag Anglers and let you get tons of other profitable blocks with your disposable creatures. And when you get one, you can kind of just keep it, its super hard to remove and we have so much recursion. Im almost tempted to try a sort of small graveyard toolbox where the deck just bins synergy utility creatures that are good enough on their own to come down, but can also be dredged with Stinkweed Imp and power a sort of tutorable list of answers and value accessible with Grave Scrabbler and Tortured Existence.
Lightning Axe is an all star, really enjoying just mopping the floor with gurmag decks and making crazy tempo swing plays with it. Turns out unconditional Roast for one mana is pretty good if you can mitigate the downside.
Honestly, im thinking of dipping into 1 main 1 side uncastable Golgari Brownscale. The card feels so value in some matchups, it just gains you so much life. I've snuck one in the side just to test and its really been quite strong.
Edit: I've been playing some games tonight and trying really random cards in the sideboard. Psychotic Episode is actually feeling very powerful against a lot of decks. Not only does it give you perfect information, it allows you to tuck any card, even lands from tron
Would love to hear your opinions and suggestions on this. Don't do pauper too often but brewing this a side project to my modern stuff has turned me onto the format and i've been playing a lot recently and grinding out games with it. Here's my sort of WIP mini-primer on the deck, updated for the current list.
This is a grind-heavy B/R midrange deck that typically falls into more controlling roles. It preys on creature based decks, but has the resilience to beat more traditional black and blue based control archetypes. It plays mostly at instant speed despite running upwards of 25 creatures. The black base uses old favorites like Tortured Existence, Grave Scrabbler, and Stinkweed Imp, but dips into red for UMA newcomer threat Reckless Wurm, and its removal package. It leans on Lightning Axe and other discard outlets to create swing plays in combat with madness blockers and dispose of powerful opposing creatures like Gurmag Angler and Ulamog's Crusher with ease. Death Spark completes the removal suite, helping to grind out smaller bodies and utility creatures (see Delver of Secrets, Llanowar Elves, etc.) while also spearheading the deck's card advantage plan. Utility creatures like Insolent Neonate, Mad Prophet and Kris Mage/Plague Witch can be utilized by minimizing downsize with cards the deck wants to discard, fueling repeatable value plays. The graveyard is a resource for this build, dredging often and accessing the cards it wants to see with Tortured Existence. It also uses binned lands to loop Gurmag Angler, and allows you to access most sideboard cards multiple times in a single game, even if you only see one copy. When the deck gets going it has access to double or triple the amount of cards that the opponent does, and doesnt have issues finding its 1-2 ofs and sideboard cards. It hopes to create an "unnwinnable gamestate" quickly before closing games with large creatures or looping Death Spark ad nauseam. It's adept at turning the corner, and heavily rewards good sequencing.
The Stinkweed Imp/Golgari Brownscale + Tortured Existence Engine allows us to fuel the graveyard, creating a tutorable library of creatures, and helping to loop cards like Gurmag Angler, Death Spark, and Monstrous Carabid. Stinkweed digs 5 deep every draw, and Golgari Brownscale just wins a lot of games by itself due to the pauper metagames general inability to overcome life gain. With this combo we can turn any madness creature into a selective cantrip that can be played every turn while churning through your deck. We play at instant speed using our madness effects, and gain huge amounts of psuedo card advantage to win via attrition with the help of our enablers. Defensively, the deck can drop Stinkweed Imp and friends early to gum up the board, strike down threats with burn, control the game, and hopefully pull the boardstate into a grindy topdeck situation, where we have an incredible advantage in most matchups. Some of the deck struggles against hate in games 2/3, though we can fall onto a backup beatdown plan with our efficient 4 power creatures.
This deck spends a lot of time grinding its way to victory. Opponents will often scoop it up in the face of our engine across a finally empty board, and the grind is the portion of the deck you have to get good at maneuvering around if you want to see success. The MTGO clock is a real factor in some matchups if you're playing online. An understanding of sequencing is absolutely key to winning with this list. I'd like to add that the list feels super fun and skill intensive, leading to a replayable rewarding grind. A lot of the time it plays out like a control deck against aggro plans, slowly stabilizing as it brings the gamestate to a standstill and allows your engine to do its thing until you overwhelm them. Against control, you can sort of play the aggressor, and Mournwhelk puts in work from the board, fighting card advantage from enemy Mulldrifters and demanding an answer. I find the deck is better positioned against creature based strategies, which is often fine, as that's not unpopular in pauper.
These colors and the shell allow ufor some awesome sideboard plans that create post board configurations that feel like intuitive functioning decks with better matchups, rather than a pile of silver bullets you have to make space for that don't fit into the plan. There's potential for a lot of synergy, and interesting cards like Ingot Chewer, Mournwhelk, and Faerie Macabre combine with Tortured Existence to give the deck repeatable "spells" that provide premium value when slotted into the engine against many common meta decks. Cards like Golgari Brownscale and Crypt Rats come in against aggressive decks to sustain you, but again, don't dilute your plan when drawn.
Card Choices & Synergy Overview:
Red Madness Creatures -Bloodmad Vampire and Reckless Wurm are secret all stars. They can be played at instant speed with all of your enablers, and are an Ambush Viper worthy of pauper's powerlevel. Wurm is a solid blocker, and he spearheads the beatdown plan that the deck executes to win if your opponent doesnt scoop it up, plowing through smaller creatures with trample. Using the resilience provided by the deck's engine, a few copies can clear away any defense given time, or boardstall opponents for multiple turns with a wall of 4/4's. Bloodmad can come down as early as turn 2 against more controlling decks with weaker board presence, and punch in for a lot of damage. The vampire spends much more time dying than Wurm on ambush duty, but can also be reasonably played without it's madness cost in the earlygame, and is less mana intensive to loop, making it an effective removal spell after your engine gets going. Notably, both Reckless Wurm and Bloodmad Vampire trade up to Gurmag Angler easily with the help of Death Spark, Kris Mage, or Plague Witch.
Death Spark - This card is a whole mess of fun, but requires proper sequencing to get the most out of. Essentially a repeatable Gut Shot, Death Spark is an effective answer to popular creatures from many meta decks across pauper, easily clearing away 1 and 2 toughness creatures for the entirety of the game. It dominates Delver of Secrets, Spellstutter Sprite, and anything out Elves or Goblins. Its a hose against most cheap utility creatures and being able to have all your copies every turn really wins some games by itself. It takes some practice to use properly, but Death Spark is almost always going to stick around once you nab a copy, and even when its not removing things you can be using it to chip at their life total every time a creature is about to hit your bin. There are a lot of turns in the earlygame where you'll have spare mana to use it, and it really shines. It's felt so good I've even cut the omnipotent Lightning Bolt from the maindeck, as it was feeling mediocre compared to Lightning Axe at mopping up larger threats, and inefficient next to Death Spark for smaller ones. When you're dredging through your deck, you actually have the option to order the cards that hit the bin, so you can often snag extra copies of the useful utility spell when you're using Stinkweed Imp to see more cards. Death Spark is also facilitated by most of our discard enablers, most notably Monstrous Carabid and Tortured Existence. It's not too hard to keep a constant flow of them going, and 2-3 copies can be looped every turn with some consistency in the later turns. The best part about Death Spark is that it does so much more than just removal and damage for this build. It's recursion offers a great synergy with the list, allowing you to discard the spark for value, and recur it later into the game, really helping to combat the inherent card disadvantage that some of the cards the deck uses inflict. Paying a mere 1 on upkeep to pseudo-draw a card is an incredible effect to have in a list full of discard outlets.
Heres a few relevant synergies and ways to enable Death Spark's recursion for anyone who hasnt played with the card:
- Undertaker - Discard Death Spark and a creature using another source to effectively pay 1B to tutor a creature from your graveyard every turn.
- Mad Prophet - Discard Death Spark to Mad Prophet and a creature using another source to effectively pay 1 to draw a card every turn.
- Insolent Neonate - Discard Death Spark to pay for an Insolent Neonate activation. Because of the sequencing of the Neonate's ability, Death Spark is put into the graveyard below Insolent Neonate, resulting in an easy recurrence that allows you to pay 1 any future turn to recoup some of your card advantage loss on the Neonate's ability.
Undertaker - My current version is happily running a pair of Undertakers. This card is functionally very similar to Tortured Existence and is in many ways copies 5-8, chipping in for consistency. The two drop however has the advantage of being a creature. This allows you to recur him from the graveyard with our Grave Scrabblers if you need to get the engine running, and can be grabbed in response to your Tortured Existence being removed, allowing you to continue your gameplan in dire situations. He can even be set up beside a Tortured Existence to allow us to exchange extra lands or spells (like the self recurring Death Spark) for creatures. Well worth some number in the main.
Monstrous Carabid - I'll admit, it took me a while to really understand how good cycling creatures like Monstrous Carabid and Horror of the Broken Lands are in this deck. Part of it is that I didnt quite get at first that it needs creatures in the bin, and often, our opponent just isn't going to oblige. Both Tortured Existence and Undertaker require a target, and sometimes you find yourself sitting on a handful of Grave Scrabblers with nothing to recur. Monstrous Carabid allows us to have something to do during our often durdly early turns, cycling itself for no immediate drawback and thinning our deck. When we do need a target for our engines, you maintain card parity in the graveyard by simply grabbing the Carabid, and cycling it right back. Not only does this allow us to cast our Madness creatures, it ends up creating tons of card advantage, and is something you're always happy to do when you have spare mana. It helps enable Death Spark recursions with ease, and is a great target for Grave Scrabbler/Tortex if you dont particularly need anything and you want to dig for answers instead. Carabid also allows us to get as many dredges as we can afford, at instant speed to boot. In an absolute worst case scenario, his 4/4 body isnt even irrelevant in pauper, trumping 90% of the creature base. Probably one of the secret best cards of the deck.
Mad Prophet - So, my defense of UMA draft chaff. Frankly, I wish this card was Merfolk Looter, but red doesn't have great repeatable rummage effects at common. Mad Prophet's mana cost is excessive, and I wont debate that. However, I think an on-board rummage brings something to this deck that it truly needs. Being able to rummage enables a ton of relevant interactions with cards like Death Spark, Stinkweed Imp, and anymadnesscreature. The card advantage provided by turning the negative half of rummaging into an upside is invaluable, and I think its well worth running the clunky 4 drop to get. I considered and tested Rummaging Goblin in his place, but found it much worse. Both of these creatures are bolt bait. They die a lot, and have a lot of removal pointed at them. Now, this isnt too much of an issue for a deck that has as much recursion as this one does, but it means Haste is relevant text, allowing us to get at least some immediate use every time it's cast. Being a 2/2 is also relevant, allowing Mad Prophet to block much better than the goblin, live the occasional Crypt Rats activation from our side of the board, and dissuade Gut Shot effects, so Mad Prophet made the cut instead.
Rakdos Carnarium - I have not built a lot of pauper manabases. I'll be the first to admit it. However, I do think Rakdos Carnarium is an awesome include here. This is a deck that is very greedy with its mana, and it likes having 5-8 mana every turn in the later stages of the game to really get the most out of the engine. Its also a deck that really wants a lot of effects, cramming outlets/dredgers/value/removal/etc , and happens to pass up on turn 2 plays for the most part, or put another 1 drop into play. Carnarium seems like a no brainer, allowing us to lower the total land count and still see enough sources. You can also cheekily use it to get Madness creatures into play by discarding due to hand size without missing land drops, but that's a rare application.
----
Lemme know what you think, Is this any good? Am I just a crazy Modern player who has no idea what hes talking about? Any neat cards i've missed? Been playing this a ton on MTGO recently with more success than I expected. How could I improve it?
You can use its ability to pseudo-draw cards for effects like Lightning Axe, the Insolent Neonate Engine, there are so many options. Its similar in a way to Sanitarium Skeleton, but unfortunately isn't a creature. However, it provides a lot of consistency and hooks up with a few cards to form mini engines on its own, and overall has a lot of value. It's incredibly good with Undertaker, and allows you to really quickly just gain heaps and floods of relevant card advantage. Its great alongside dredgers, and the deck has have a lot of outlets to cause its trigger to work. Cast/Discard it, and then discard any creature, or dredge something over it for easy recursions. I've been tinkering with the build a little bit and im unsure of the numbers, but im upping discard outlets like Undertaker and Lightning Axe, and bringing in some number of looters (Mad Prophet, Rummaging Goblin) as well as playing with the removal suite. I think the card will change the build, and im already seeing strong showings from Death Spark in the minimal testing ive done with newer lists. Another piece of tech im experimenting with is using a 1-3 split of Grim Harvest and Grave Scrabbler. I think the recover ability is often super relevant with dredge, and it can act as a way to recur things in tough situations where you don't have an outlet. You'll almost always have mana when its triggered on your upkeep, and its saved me in a pinch or two.
will update with build soon
edit:
- Land (22) - Instant (7) - Creature (27) - Enchantment (4) -
3 Reckless Wurm
1 Bloodmad Vampire
1 Gurmag Angler
- Card Advantage -
2 Mad Prophet
4 Monstrous Carabid
4 Death Spark
- Value Engine -
4 Tortured Existence
3 Stinkweed Imp
4 Grave Scrabbler
2 Golgari Brownscale
2 Undertaker
4 Insolent Neonate
3 Lightning Axe
1 Kris Mage
- Manabase -
4 Rakdos Carnarium
4 Bloodfell Caves
1 Bojuka Bog
7 Mountain
6 Swamp
3 Ingot Chewer
1 Golgari Brownscale
4 Crypt Rats
3 Faerie Macabre
2 Thorn of the Black Rose
1 Plague Witch
1 Mournwhelk
Edit: Build and mini primer updated
http://mythicspoiler.com/war/cards/davrielrogueshadowmage.html
Davriel, Rogue Shadowmage
Suggestions aside, this list is too slow for Modern, at least as an aggro deck. If you want to push this to be competetive I think you need to rework the creature base. Maindeck Beseech and Duress over Inqui or Seize seems silly, and your land count is high for an aggro deck. You have a lot of emphasis on 4 drops that arent good enough to pay 4 mana for, which will not hold up in the modern environment. Cavern of Souls seems overlooked, and Aether Vial is always an option for creature heavy lists. As hard as it is to say, this is not a winning list.
3 mana 2/3s just dont cut it in 2019.
The idea is to use cards like Everflowing Chalice, Astral Cornucopia, Mox Opal, and Voltaic Key (possibly even Surge Node) to generate a ton of mana quickly and draw a lot of cards using using proliferate (Thoughtcast, Tezzeret's Gambit, Ancient Stirrings, Coretapper). Then, dump the mana into cards like Ugin, The Spirit Dragon and All Is Dust to disrupt while continuing to build up your board, and eventually sink that huge pool of mana into things like Emrakul or Walking Ballista. I've included cards like Lux Cannon in some versions, and even Steady Progress. You can use Indigo Faerie with your abundance of mana in conjunction with Ugin or Dust to clear away their lands or other colorless permanents.Its kind of a silly idea, but t4 Ugin into t5 1 way Armageddon wallops a lot of decks.
Fast forward to today. Flux Channeler provides the perfect catalyst for go wide artifact mana, since everything you're already casting constantly is giving you more and more proliferation triggers. We can abuse it with counter-matters artifacts like Magistrate's Scepter(Time Walk every turn if you can cast 3 spells), Orochi Hatchery, Lux Cannon, etc.
The newly spoiled Karn, the Great Creator gives us strictly better things to do with the mana, and some of the other proliferate cards in WAR are playable. Having powerful narrow hosers game one like Ensnaring Bridge, Torpor Orb, Relic of Progenitus, etc, is a very strong plan, and 10 mana in one turn isnt much to ask from this deck, the famed Mycosynth Lattice payoff well within it's reach. Constant proliferation with Flux Channeler and Tezzeret's Gambit also allows us to use his -2 more than twice in a row without offing him. I think a retooling of the pieces could create something cool, discuss?
(sample list)
Land (18) - Creature (8) - Artifact (25) - Planeswalker (4) - Sorcery (12)
4 Karn, the Great Creator
2 Magistrate's Scepter
- Rocks -
4 Astral Cornucopia
4 Everflowing Chalice
3 Mox Opal
4 Voltaic Key
- Counter Manipulation -
4 Coretapper
3 Flux Channeler
2 Surge Node
4 Tezzeret's Gambit
4 Thoughtcast
4 Ancient Stirrings
- Land -
4 Botanical Sanctum
3 Darksteel Citadel
4 Glimmervoid
4 Spire of Industry
1 Calciform Pools
1 Inkmoth Nexus
1 Karn's Bastion
4 Relic of Progenitus
1 Torpor Orb
2 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Orbs of Warding
1 Mycosynth Lattice
3 Walking Ballista
1 Batterskull
2 Unmoored Ego
We now have 8 copies of the Bitterblossom effect for sacrifice outlet decks, including the previously spoiled Cabal Therapist for MH1, with the new Dreadhorde Invasion, Trap card or not, Cabal Therapy every turn is very powerful
Flux Channeler has a sneaky home in an old brew of mine that abuses artifact mana with Everflowing Chalice, Tezzeret's Gambit and friends to generate absurdist amounts very quickly. Could be fun
Unfortunately, I think even in mono blue, Vapor Snag/Snap/Boomerang is going to outperform combat tricks most of the time.
Another note; looping Mournwhelk every turn with a dredger against some decks is pretty nasty.
Also I'm awful at this manabase thing. I miss my fetch lands. Who knew it'd be such a struggle to design a two color deck that could use all of its cards when it wanted to, lol. This is what I get for never branching seriously beyond monoblue in pauper. Any suggestions would be appreciated.
This deck is ******* awful against Relic in game two unfortunately, but I dont think theres anything I can do about that.
Also I see no reason to run Oblivion Ring over Fiend Hunter and similar effects in a Panharmonicon deck. Leonin Relic-Warder is also nice if you need to disrupt noncreature permanents, and creates an infinite ETB combo that you could potentially abuse with something.
Undertaker is an absolutely sweet little piece of tech. Often, we are only using the ability from Tortured Existence once per turn, and running Undertaker in place of, or in addition to, the 4th Tortured Existence allows us to bin cards like Fiery Temper/Psychotic Episode and additional redundant copies of Existence/Bolt/Axe/Land while still maintaining card parity and generating value. He's also a creature, so if we get him in the yard via the dredge plan, he can be recurred with Grave Scrabbler.
4 Bloodmad Vampire
4 Reckless Wurm
2 Gurmag Angler
- Value Engine -
3 Tortured Existence
4 Grave Scrabbler
3 Stinkweed Imp
1 Golgari Brownscale
1 Undertaker
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Lightning Axe
- Enablers -
4 Insolent Neonate
3 Read the Bones
2 Kris Mage
- Manabase (22) -
3 Rakdos Carnarium
4 Bloodfell Caves
6 Mountain
9 Swamp
4 Psychotic Haze
1 Kris Mage
2 Golgari Brownscale
2 Duress
2 Psychotic Episode
3 Ghastly Demise
1 Lightning Axe
Lightning Axe is an all star, really enjoying just mopping the floor with gurmag decks and making crazy tempo swing plays with it. Turns out unconditional Roast for one mana is pretty good if you can mitigate the downside.
Honestly, im thinking of dipping into 1 main 1 side uncastable Golgari Brownscale. The card feels so value in some matchups, it just gains you so much life. I've snuck one in the side just to test and its really been quite strong.
Edit: I've been playing some games tonight and trying really random cards in the sideboard. Psychotic Episode is actually feeling very powerful against a lot of decks. Not only does it give you perfect information, it allows you to tuck any card, even lands from tron
This is a grind-heavy B/R midrange deck that typically falls into more controlling roles. It preys on creature based decks, but has the resilience to beat more traditional black and blue based control archetypes. It plays mostly at instant speed despite running upwards of 25 creatures. The black base uses old favorites like Tortured Existence, Grave Scrabbler, and Stinkweed Imp, but dips into red for UMA newcomer threat Reckless Wurm, and its removal package. It leans on Lightning Axe and other discard outlets to create swing plays in combat with madness blockers and dispose of powerful opposing creatures like Gurmag Angler and Ulamog's Crusher with ease. Death Spark completes the removal suite, helping to grind out smaller bodies and utility creatures (see Delver of Secrets, Llanowar Elves, etc.) while also spearheading the deck's card advantage plan. Utility creatures like Insolent Neonate, Mad Prophet and Kris Mage/Plague Witch can be utilized by minimizing downsize with cards the deck wants to discard, fueling repeatable value plays. The graveyard is a resource for this build, dredging often and accessing the cards it wants to see with Tortured Existence. It also uses binned lands to loop Gurmag Angler, and allows you to access most sideboard cards multiple times in a single game, even if you only see one copy. When the deck gets going it has access to double or triple the amount of cards that the opponent does, and doesnt have issues finding its 1-2 ofs and sideboard cards. It hopes to create an "unnwinnable gamestate" quickly before closing games with large creatures or looping Death Spark ad nauseam. It's adept at turning the corner, and heavily rewards good sequencing.
(Sample Build)
- Land (22) - Instant (7) - Creature (27) - Enchantment (4) -
3 Reckless Wurm
1 Bloodmad Vampire
1 Gurmag Angler
- Card Advantage -
4 Grave Scrabbler
4 Monstrous Carabid
4 Death Spark
- Dredgers -
3 Stinkweed Imp
2 Golgari Brownscale
- Outlets -
4 Tortured Existence
4 Insolent Neonate
3 Lightning Axe
2 Mad Prophet
2 Undertaker
1 Bog Witch
7 Mountain
6 Swamp
4 Rakdos Carnarium
4 Bloodfell Caves
1 Bojuka Bog
4 Crypt Rats
3 Ingot Chewer
3 Faerie Macabre
2 Thorn of the Black Rose
1 Golgari Brownscale
1 Plague Witch
1 Mournwhelk
The Stinkweed Imp/Golgari Brownscale + Tortured Existence Engine allows us to fuel the graveyard, creating a tutorable library of creatures, and helping to loop cards like Gurmag Angler, Death Spark, and Monstrous Carabid. Stinkweed digs 5 deep every draw, and Golgari Brownscale just wins a lot of games by itself due to the pauper metagames general inability to overcome life gain. With this combo we can turn any madness creature into a selective cantrip that can be played every turn while churning through your deck. We play at instant speed using our madness effects, and gain huge amounts of psuedo card advantage to win via attrition with the help of our enablers. Defensively, the deck can drop Stinkweed Imp and friends early to gum up the board, strike down threats with burn, control the game, and hopefully pull the boardstate into a grindy topdeck situation, where we have an incredible advantage in most matchups. Some of the deck struggles against hate in games 2/3, though we can fall onto a backup beatdown plan with our efficient 4 power creatures.
This deck spends a lot of time grinding its way to victory. Opponents will often scoop it up in the face of our engine across a finally empty board, and the grind is the portion of the deck you have to get good at maneuvering around if you want to see success. The MTGO clock is a real factor in some matchups if you're playing online. An understanding of sequencing is absolutely key to winning with this list. I'd like to add that the list feels super fun and skill intensive, leading to a replayable rewarding grind. A lot of the time it plays out like a control deck against aggro plans, slowly stabilizing as it brings the gamestate to a standstill and allows your engine to do its thing until you overwhelm them. Against control, you can sort of play the aggressor, and Mournwhelk puts in work from the board, fighting card advantage from enemy Mulldrifters and demanding an answer. I find the deck is better positioned against creature based strategies, which is often fine, as that's not unpopular in pauper.
These colors and the shell allow ufor some awesome sideboard plans that create post board configurations that feel like intuitive functioning decks with better matchups, rather than a pile of silver bullets you have to make space for that don't fit into the plan. There's potential for a lot of synergy, and interesting cards like Ingot Chewer, Mournwhelk, and Faerie Macabre combine with Tortured Existence to give the deck repeatable "spells" that provide premium value when slotted into the engine against many common meta decks. Cards like Golgari Brownscale and Crypt Rats come in against aggressive decks to sustain you, but again, don't dilute your plan when drawn.
Death Spark - This card is a whole mess of fun, but requires proper sequencing to get the most out of. Essentially a repeatable Gut Shot, Death Spark is an effective answer to popular creatures from many meta decks across pauper, easily clearing away 1 and 2 toughness creatures for the entirety of the game. It dominates Delver of Secrets, Spellstutter Sprite, and anything out Elves or Goblins. Its a hose against most cheap utility creatures and being able to have all your copies every turn really wins some games by itself. It takes some practice to use properly, but Death Spark is almost always going to stick around once you nab a copy, and even when its not removing things you can be using it to chip at their life total every time a creature is about to hit your bin. There are a lot of turns in the earlygame where you'll have spare mana to use it, and it really shines. It's felt so good I've even cut the omnipotent Lightning Bolt from the maindeck, as it was feeling mediocre compared to Lightning Axe at mopping up larger threats, and inefficient next to Death Spark for smaller ones. When you're dredging through your deck, you actually have the option to order the cards that hit the bin, so you can often snag extra copies of the useful utility spell when you're using Stinkweed Imp to see more cards. Death Spark is also facilitated by most of our discard enablers, most notably Monstrous Carabid and Tortured Existence. It's not too hard to keep a constant flow of them going, and 2-3 copies can be looped every turn with some consistency in the later turns. The best part about Death Spark is that it does so much more than just removal and damage for this build. It's recursion offers a great synergy with the list, allowing you to discard the spark for value, and recur it later into the game, really helping to combat the inherent card disadvantage that some of the cards the deck uses inflict. Paying a mere 1 on upkeep to pseudo-draw a card is an incredible effect to have in a list full of discard outlets.
Heres a few relevant synergies and ways to enable Death Spark's recursion for anyone who hasnt played with the card:
- Undertaker - Discard Death Spark and a creature using another source to effectively pay 1B to tutor a creature from your graveyard every turn.
- Mad Prophet - Discard Death Spark to Mad Prophet and a creature using another source to effectively pay 1 to draw a card every turn.
- Insolent Neonate - Discard Death Spark to pay for an Insolent Neonate activation. Because of the sequencing of the Neonate's ability, Death Spark is put into the graveyard below Insolent Neonate, resulting in an easy recurrence that allows you to pay 1 any future turn to recoup some of your card advantage loss on the Neonate's ability.
- Recur Death Spark after its put into your yard by any means by timing activations of any discard outlet like Tortured Existence, Undertaker, Mad Prophet, etc. to place creature cards above it. (Be careful not to dredge away creatures you're using to recur it if you're dredging at instant speed with Insolent Neonate or Monstrous Carabid.)
- Recur Death Spark after its put into your yard by any means by cycling a Monstrous Carabid.
Undertaker - My current version is happily running a pair of Undertakers. This card is functionally very similar to Tortured Existence and is in many ways copies 5-8, chipping in for consistency. The two drop however has the advantage of being a creature. This allows you to recur him from the graveyard with our Grave Scrabblers if you need to get the engine running, and can be grabbed in response to your Tortured Existence being removed, allowing you to continue your gameplan in dire situations. He can even be set up beside a Tortured Existence to allow us to exchange extra lands or spells (like the self recurring Death Spark) for creatures. Well worth some number in the main.
Monstrous Carabid - I'll admit, it took me a while to really understand how good cycling creatures like Monstrous Carabid and Horror of the Broken Lands are in this deck. Part of it is that I didnt quite get at first that it needs creatures in the bin, and often, our opponent just isn't going to oblige. Both Tortured Existence and Undertaker require a target, and sometimes you find yourself sitting on a handful of Grave Scrabblers with nothing to recur. Monstrous Carabid allows us to have something to do during our often durdly early turns, cycling itself for no immediate drawback and thinning our deck. When we do need a target for our engines, you maintain card parity in the graveyard by simply grabbing the Carabid, and cycling it right back. Not only does this allow us to cast our Madness creatures, it ends up creating tons of card advantage, and is something you're always happy to do when you have spare mana. It helps enable Death Spark recursions with ease, and is a great target for Grave Scrabbler/Tortex if you dont particularly need anything and you want to dig for answers instead. Carabid also allows us to get as many dredges as we can afford, at instant speed to boot. In an absolute worst case scenario, his 4/4 body isnt even irrelevant in pauper, trumping 90% of the creature base. Probably one of the secret best cards of the deck.
Mad Prophet - So, my defense of UMA draft chaff. Frankly, I wish this card was Merfolk Looter, but red doesn't have great repeatable rummage effects at common. Mad Prophet's mana cost is excessive, and I wont debate that. However, I think an on-board rummage brings something to this deck that it truly needs. Being able to rummage enables a ton of relevant interactions with cards like Death Spark, Stinkweed Imp, and any madness creature. The card advantage provided by turning the negative half of rummaging into an upside is invaluable, and I think its well worth running the clunky 4 drop to get. I considered and tested Rummaging Goblin in his place, but found it much worse. Both of these creatures are bolt bait. They die a lot, and have a lot of removal pointed at them. Now, this isnt too much of an issue for a deck that has as much recursion as this one does, but it means Haste is relevant text, allowing us to get at least some immediate use every time it's cast. Being a 2/2 is also relevant, allowing Mad Prophet to block much better than the goblin, live the occasional Crypt Rats activation from our side of the board, and dissuade Gut Shot effects, so Mad Prophet made the cut instead.
Rakdos Carnarium - I have not built a lot of pauper manabases. I'll be the first to admit it. However, I do think Rakdos Carnarium is an awesome include here. This is a deck that is very greedy with its mana, and it likes having 5-8 mana every turn in the later stages of the game to really get the most out of the engine. Its also a deck that really wants a lot of effects, cramming outlets/dredgers/value/removal/etc , and happens to pass up on turn 2 plays for the most part, or put another 1 drop into play. Carnarium seems like a no brainer, allowing us to lower the total land count and still see enough sources. You can also cheekily use it to get Madness creatures into play by discarding due to hand size without missing land drops, but that's a rare application.
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Lemme know what you think, Is this any good? Am I just a crazy Modern player who has no idea what hes talking about? Any neat cards i've missed? Been playing this a ton on MTGO recently with more success than I expected. How could I improve it?