Being both a writer and an editor on Mana Deprived, I’m privy to a lot of behind the scenes machinations that go on. Before you let your mind wander, don’t, it’s all civil, unless we begin having a conversation!

For the limited time that I’ve spent at Mana Deprived, a constant subject of discussion is how it is possible to recruit casual players to write for the site or how we can write articles that appeal to casual players. The task is quite difficult as we are generally competitive players so appealing to the casual crowd is not something we are very in tune with.

Speaking for myself, I quite enjoy building crazy decks and borrowing crazy decks to play formats like EDH or kitchen table Magic. But I would not know the first thing about what a casual player is looking for in an article or video. Even trying to remember what my ten year old self was looking for online seems to be a lost cause.

All that said, playing on MTGO can feel like it has its drawbacks as you are essentially investing in two separate collections, one paper and one online. Recently I decided to try a new format and now I’m hooked though I refuse to play in any of the MTGO Dailies and instead choose to play for the fun of playing casually.

That format is Pauper.

Initially I was looking to build a storm combo deck in Legacy but something that was not based around Tendrils of Agony, I was looking to avoid spending too much money on [Card]Lion’s Eye Diamond[/Card]. So I came across four storm cards of interest; [Card]Brain Freeze[/Card], [Card]Empty The Warrens[/Card], [Card]Grapeshot[/Card] & [Card]Storm Entity[/Card].

Now the brain freeze deck felt too similar to [Card]High Tide[/Card], though not as good, but the other cards reminded me of something: [Card]Dragonstorm[/Card]. Having played this back when it was legal, I felt that although it was a decent deck it would not survive in the Legacy metagame.

I still wanted to try the other three storm cards but was unsure how, so I tried grapeshot with [Card]Enduring Renewal[/Card] and although it worked, it was extremely clunky so I went through my red cards on MTGO and built a deck with those three storm cards and random mana spells like [Card]Rite of Flame[/Card], [Card]Manamorphose[/Card], [Card]Seething Song[/Card] & [Card]Desperate Ritual[/Card] and I tested it out however it created situations where I would get storm counts of five or six if I was able to pile up my hand though usually I would die before going off.

So I checked the boards for some solutions and ran across the following deck:

[Deck Title=Blaine1Johnson – Pauper Storm]
[Lands]
4 Ancient Spring
4 Irrigation Ditch
4 Sulfur Vent
[/Lands][Spells]
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Careful Study
4 Chromatic Sphere
4 Chromatic Star
4 Compulsive Research
4 Dark Ritual
4 Grapeshot
4 Ideas Unbound
4 Lotus Petal
4 Manamorphose
4 Rite of Flame
4 Sign In Blood
[/Spells][Sideboard]
5 Island
5 Mountain
5 Swamp
[/Sideboard][/Deck]

Now this was looking something like the deck I had built, just much less clunky. I hadn’t realized that of all the cards I had thrown into my deck were common with the exception of the storm entity, I also never considered blue for the card drawing power from [Card]Ideas Unbound[/Card]. So I went back to the market and picked up a few miscellaneous cards, all for under one ticket and built the deck.

With the deck built I went off to test it and in my first match I started to go off on Turn 3, still unsure as to whether I could go off or not, and then an interesting thing happened… my opponent conceded.

Good start to the deck so I played again and again and each time my opponent would concede. This is when it became frustrating; I was never actually able to play out my combo.

I played one last opponent who the minute I played Ideas, he wrote gg but I was able to quickly ask him to wait and asked why everyone kept conceding. His response was and I’m paraphrasing because it was a while back, “Unless you’re grinding in the Dailies or mini tournaments no one plays Storm combo and no one wants to play against Storm combo.”

My response to this was to hell with him, I’ll go in Classic matches to see if it was competitive and turns out the deck could win but it lost to most of the better decks so I decided this was going to be what I try to play in Legacy, but the good version. I went shopping for the good cards and found out something ridiculous, the lands were 5 bucks a piece.

Pauper my ass.

So it was back to the drawing board until I received a message from the same person, who explained why no one wanted to play against the deck, asking if I wanted to play some Pauper against him and some of his buddies for fun as they were missing a sixth guy.

So I threw a bunch of red burn cards with some red creatures into a deck and said sure. Turns out I had a blast playing against the various decks and it was a nice break. Generally I spend time building decks at home based on the latest strategy or trying to tune and tweak them to get where I want or I play MTGO competitively to grind for tickets and prizes. Pauper changes all that, instead I can sit back in my desk chair and relax while I play according to however I wish with a wide variety of decks, which is something else that is quite enjoyable.

There are exceptions but for the most part commons on MTGO are pennies a piece so you can easily build decks with only a couple of tickets. Even better is when you start to collect commons across a range of sets you can mix and match to try out weird combinations which, for me, brings back good memories of being a kid and having a limited card pool where you would jam in any card to your deck to make it fun and playable.

Some might suggest why not play EDH on MTGO because that is a casual format and my answer is, it does not provide the same experience. When playing at a store with friends many times the game will be of little consequence and instead the conversation and the jokes and back and forth are what is the main draw of EDH for me. Unfortunately MTGO does not provide the same Commander experience for me so I prefer to stay with Pauper for casual online and EDH for casual paper Magic.

It seems kind of odd but I have yet to explain what Pauper is so I’ll take this moment to do that before I get into some decks. Pauper in general is played with common and uncommon cards that can be from whatever set, as long as they were once uncommon or common. MTGO’s version of Pauper restricts cards so that you may only use a card that was printed at common in an MTGO set. An example is Atog was a common in Masters Edition so the uncommon Mirrodin version may be played however [Card]Hymn To Tourach[/Card] was printed at uncommon in Masters Edition and cannot be played even though it was printed at common in Fallen Empires because Fallen Empires has not been released on MTGO. Hopefully you get that explanation, now on to decks that may not be Tier 1 decks but instead are fun decks to play.

First on the list is the Sligh deck that I originally built.

[Deck Title=William Blondon – Pauper Sligh]
[Lands]
4 Forgotten Cave
10 Mountains
2 Teetering Peeks
4 Terramorphic Expanse
[/Lands][Creatures]
4 Keldon Marauders
4 Plated Geopede
4 Spark Elemental
[/Creatures][Spells]
4 Burst Lightning
4 Lave Spike
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Rift Bolt
4 Staggershock
[/Spells][/Deck]

The original deck I built featured as mana random cards as possible as I was missing certain play sets of commons so this list is the updated, better constructed one. I loosely based it off of the list Patrick Sullivan plays in Legacy. I removed all the uncommons and rares instead switching them for some commons and changed the mana base so that it was common but also not completely stagnant. There is no sideboard as I don’t play competitively and don’t need one.

So brief overview, the goal of the deck is to kill your opponent as quickly as possible. This is accomplished by running out creatures with decent upsides to smash at your opponent while employing burn spell aimed at your opponent’s creatures to let yours smash through. Alternately if you opponent is low enough on life you can aim the burn spells at their dome to finish the job.

An area of interest is that while the deck wants to end the game as quickly as possible, half of the lands come into play tapped. The reason for this is the 4 [Card]Terramorphic Expanse[/Card] help to filter out lands in the deck, the 2 [Card] Teetering Peeks[/Card] can be considered as being similar to [Card]Shock[/Card] as the plus two power costs one mana, if you will. Last the 4 [Card]Forgotten Cave[/Card] can be used as lands in a pinch but should generally be used for their cycling ability for an extra spell you may need instead of playing another land.

As I mentioned the storm decks aren’t generally found in the casual lobbies and many of the decks you will face are instead creature based decks, which puts you on pretty good footing and provides for a solid matchup. Just be on the look out for [Card]Wellwisher[/Card] or Soul Sister type decks as those creatures allow for putting the game out of reach for your burn spells.

Speaking of which, let’s next examine Soul Sisters:

[Deck Title=Soul Sisters By William Blondon]
[Lands]
20 Plains
4 Secluded Steepe
[/Lands][Creatures]
4 Leonin Skyhunter
4 Lone Missionary
4 Mourning Thrull
4 Porcelain Legionnaire
4 Soul Warden
4 Soul’s Attendant
4 Suture Priest
4 Vault Skirge
[/Creatures][Spells]
4 Carom
[/Spells][/Deck]

Although the deck is named after the life gain combo, at heart the deck is a white weenie beat down deck. The advantage it has is by playing through their creatures, the deck gains a life advantage which can impede your opponent’s game plan of quickly winning, instead creature a drag out game where this deck is favored.

Along with the storm menace in Pauper, there is another menace which most players would like to avoids, Affinity. Here is a sample Affinity list I’ve built:

[Deck Title=Pauper Affinity By William Blondon]
[Lands]
4 Darksteel Citadel
4 Great Furnace
4 Seat of the Synod
4 Vault of Whispers
[/Lands][Creatures]
4 Arcbound Worker
4 Atog
4 Disciple of the Vault
4 Frogmite
4 Myr Enforcer
4 Phyrexian Walker
4 Somber Hoverguard
[/Creatures][Spells]
4 Cranial Plating
4 Galvanic Blast
4 Springleaf Drum
4 Thoughtcast
[/Spells][/Deck]

Bear in mind there are surely better lists that exist or at least more tuned list but this version seems to have the least amount of people hating on it, so that’s a good thing! The deck is more in tune with the Standard Affinity list as it only features 2 non-Mirrodin block cards. And similar every other Affinity list ever, this decks goal is to turn sideways and bash face as quickly as possible.

As for the choices the lands and spells are all pretty much consistent through lists where [Card]Galvanic Blast[/Card] is used to clear creatures out of your way. As for creatures it may seem odd to have 4 non-artifact creatures but each serves a different role. Most know of the [Card]Arcbound Ravager[/Card] and [Card]Disciple of the Vault[/Card] combo where you can sac your board and bash with Ravager for the win. This deck instead employs [Card]Atog[/Card] to fill this role as although it doesn’t get counters the added one power and toughness make it a blowout quickly is not dealt with.

As already explained, one of the rules for MTGO Pauper is no uncommons unless there is a set featuring the card at common. [Card]Ornithopter[/Card] unfortunately loses out with this rule. Though it was printed at common in Antiquities, that set was not released on MTGO and every set on MTGO with Ornithopter has it at uncommon making Affinity lose out on its flier. This is the reason for Somber Hoverguard, it provides you with a flying and added power up front. True it cannot be cast for free but one blue mana for a 3/2 is good value any day.

The bad matchups for this deck seem to be the Storm decks, as they have no way to interact on the battlefield with Affinity so instead they ignore it all together while they set up their storm combo which will allow them to win. The first sign of storm is either their mana base or playing cards like [Card]Ponder[/Card] and [Card]Preordain[/Card] to set up their combo in the early game so make sure to get there as quickly as possible.

Against other aggro decks the matchup is generally favored though without a [Card]Galvanic Blast[/Card], [Card]Wellwisher[/Card] will win the game for Elf decks and Soul Sisters can power out creatures to pump their life total which will allow the deck to ignore you unless it needs to block with creatures.

Insert clever and witty segue text to introduce Elves. I think that went well! Next up on the deck tech radar is elves which is always a fan favorite and completely customizable. Here is my take on the deck:

[Deck Title=Pauper Elves By William Blondon]
[Lands]
12 Forest
4 Tranquil Thicket
[/Lands][Creatures]
4 Birchlore Rangers
4 Elvish Branchbender
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Essence Warden
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Llanowar Empath
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Quirion Ranger
4 Timberwatch Elf
4 Wellwisher
[/Creatures][Spells]
4 Commune With Nature
[/Spells][/Deck]

This is my best approximation to the elves decks that are quite popular. As already mentioned, unless you are facing down a storm combo deck or mono red, which has burn spells, elves can be extremely explosive on its own and landing an early wellwisher or two can put the game out of reach very quickly as your opponent will be unable to beat you down enough.

Now with the printing of [Card]Phyrexian Obliterator[/Card], people have been getting excited for Mono Black Control to make a come back in Standard. If that is your case, may I suggest MRC or Mono Rat Control. That’s right, an entire deck dedicated to rat control, here’s a sample list for you:

[Deck Title=Mono Rat Control By William Blondon]
[Lands]
4 Evolving Wilds
18 Swamp
[/Lands][Creatures]
4 Chittering Rats
4 Crypt Rats
1 Okiba-Gang Shinobi
4 Phyrexian Rager
4 Ravenous Rats
[/Creatures][Spells]
3 Corrupt
4 Disfigure
2 Grasp of Darkness
4 Mind Rot
4 Sign In Blood
4 Unearth
[/Spells][Sideboard]
3 Choking Sands
2 Diabolic Edict
2 Distress
3 Duress
3 Echoing Truth
2 Tendrils of Corruption
[/Sideboard][/Deck]

So why play a tribal rat deck? Because if you don’t get land flooded it is quite effective at slowing your opponent down to a crawl. The decks goal is to play out rat after rat which generates a card disadvantage for your opponent by making them lose a card in their hand and then allowing you to attack a little bit at a time till you get there.

It is particularly effect against the higher tier storm combo decks as their goal is to have as many cards as possible in hand, where as you are constantly stripping their hand of cards, making their task of going off that much more difficult.

This version of the deck features a complement of discard spells to keep the pressure on your opponent and make sure they have an empty hand. It also features [Card]Corrupt[/Card] to give it some late game reach and [Card]Unearth[/Card] which will allow for Rat recursion and greater discard.

Finally there is a small suite of creature removal, as your rats are not very powerful, to clear some of the stuff off your opponents board and copies of [Card]Sign In Blood[/Card] to generate some card advantage on your end to make sure the rats and discard keep on coming.

I do want to take a moment to wish a goodbye to Frantic storm. The deck was a storm combo deck built with [Card]Frantic Search[/Card] and was one of the most powerful and annoying in Pauper but among the fuss that was kicked up about swinging the Ban Hammer squarely in the face of [Card]Jace, the
Mind Sculptor[/Card] and [Card]Stoneforge Mystic[/Card] a small piece of information was also added in to that release, [Card]Frantic Search[/Card] was banned. Now if you’re unfamiliar with the card, it is banned in Legacy and restricted in Vintage which means there is an inherent power in it.

Here is a list for Frantic Storm, for your interest. Wizards delivered a kick square to the nuts of this deck.

[Deck Title=Frantic Storm Pauper]
[Lands]
3 Azorius Chancery
3 Dimir Aqueduct
2 Evolving Wilds
6 Island
3 Plains
2 Swamp
3 Terramorphic Expanse
[/Lands][Creatures]
4 Cloud of Faeries
1 Mnemonic Wall
3 Mulldrifter
4 Nightscape Familiar
2 Sea Gate Oracle
4 Sunscape Familiar
[/Creatures][Spells]
1 Capsize
4 Compulsive Research
3 Deep Analysis
1 Foresee
4 Frantic Search
4 Snap
3 Temporal Fissure
[/Spells][Sideboard]
2 Boomerang
1 Capsize
2 Galina’s Knight
4 Lone Missionary
2 Prismatic Strands
2 Rest for the Weary
2 Vedalken Outlander
[/Sideboard][/Deck]

Now, I’m sure this deck will continue in some form as players have invested a decent amount of money in this deck however the lost of [Card]Frantic Search[/Card] will definitely be felt as it provided two key interactions: the first it added to the storm count while allowing you to untap Ravnica lands, netting you extra mana, the second reason, and what separates it from [Card]Cloud of Faeries[/Card] and [Card]Snap[/Card] is that it also provides you with extra cards allowing you to ditch some extra lands or unnecessary spells for some action spells.

That wraps up my introduction and overview to Pauper. I’m not sure how many of you were already playing the format and how many had no inclination towards or didn’t even know it existed but hopefully one of the decks I presented sparked an interest in you. The analysis was rather straight forward but the goal was no to get into the nitty gritty of in depth analysis and strategy and instead to provide an overview to a format that I casually play for the fun of playing magic. Do I make misplays? Tons but when the goal is to have fun, the correct way of playing is not of great importance. There’s no PTQ season or World Championship for Pauper, sure you can grind the Dailies on MTGO. Instead there is a group of players who enjoy playing a relatively inexpensive format with a decent variety of decks.

Let me know what you think about the decks and the article in the comments, I’ll read every one and until next time: Have Fun Playing Magic!