Hey everyone!
I’m back this week to discuss the best performing deck in Paupergeddon, Dimir Terror. I’ve been playing Mono Blue Terror recently to some success, but can’t argue with the results of an event with 983 players.
It’s great to see Dimir Terror have a good weekend because it was the deck I used to get into Pauper a few years ago.
Let’s get to it!
WHAT IS PAUPERGEDDON?
To put it simply, Paupergeddon is the closest thing we have to a Pauper Grand Prix. It happens three times per year in Italy and recent events have about one thousand players. There are also plenty of other large events in the convention.
WHY DIMIR TERROR?
Last week I was favoring Mono Blue Terror for manabase consistency, but the large amounts of Elves and Affinity caused me to try Dimir. Below is the day 1 Paupergeddon Spring 2026 metagame matrix of 983 participants:
Photo credit: Paupergeddon.com
This is the metagame of a healthy format. There were about twenty-five archetypes with at least a 1% representation. While that might not seem interesting on the surface, remember there were close to one thousand participants. It requires ten people to achieve a 1% metagame share.
Mono Red Madness (11.7%)was the most popular deck which is no surprise given the win at the prior Paupergeddon and was also the most played strategy. It’s a well-rounded deck that gets the opponent dead quickly.
Grixis Affinity (10.1%), followed by Elves (7.94%), are the next two most played decks which doesn’t bode well for Mono Blue Terror.
Blue Terror is still highly represented with 6.11% metagame share, but is waning in popularity compared to Paupergeddon Winter 2025 in Lucca with 9.9%.
There were just twenty-four Dimir Terror players for a 2.44% metagame share.
I was surprised to see just 3.46% of the field playing White Weenie despite the buff with Leonardo, Big Brother.
Let’s see how the metagame changed with the second day requiring at least a 6-2 record to advance:
Photo credit: Paupergeddon.com
Mono Blue Terror declined from 6.11% to 4.55% while Dimir Terror advanced to 4.55% from 2.44%. Dimir nearly doubled its presence in the day 2 metagame which is quite the breakout. We started with Blue Terror being three times as popular as Dimir and we’re now at an even split.
There are plenty of other decks that fared better or worse than expectation, but we can see it better with the winrate matrix:
Photo credit: Cross_Entropy on Twitter
This is a very surprising win rate matrix. The archetypes are listed in order of popularity and many of the top decks hovered around a 50% win rate. It’s not until Golgari Spy Combo that we see anything close to 55%; the seventh most played deck.
Mono Blue Terror underperformed as evidenced by the shrinking day 2 metagame share and a win rate of 45%. It won against Grixis Affinity 35% of the time and Elves 41%; this is expected as the matchups aren’t favorable. The main draw of Blue Terror at Paupergeddon is it boasts a positive matchup against Mono Red Madness.
Dimir Terror is the best performing deck at a 56% win rate. It didn’t have a negative matchup result until the eighth most played deck, Caw Gates. It also performed poorly against Red Rally and Faeries.
If you know, you know
One disclaimer on the win rate data is that Dimir Terror is the fifteenth most played deck. The confidence of the matchups aren’t as strong as Mono Blue Terror because each one was played less frequently.
DIMIR TERROR DECKS FROM PAUPERGEDDON
Now that we’ve established this is a surprise deck with a great metagame position, let’s look at some of the best performing Dimir Terror decklists.
Here’s the highest performing list piloted by Lorenzo Pucci to a top 4 finish:
Photo credit: Paupergeddon.com
This list is very streamlined. It uses the full eight Mental Note effects to ramp out four Tolarian Terror and two Gurmag Angler. There are fewer Anglers as they don’t synergize with Tolarian Terror, but can be cast earlier because Mental Note guarantees three cards to delve. Angler gets better in post board games when the opponent’s deck is full of Pyroblasts.
The Avatar set gave Dimir Terror an upgrade in Abandon Attachments. Discarding Sneaky Snacker on your turn to Abandon Attachments will immediately trigger and return to the battlefield assuming you haven’t already drawn three cards.
Sneaky Snacker is in a better metagame position than Delver of Secrets given the popularity of Affinity and Jund Wildfire with Refurbished Familiar. It provides a great card to discard to the Familiar as well. The matchup against Faeries is still negative, but a 2/1 recursive flyer is helpful.
The single Murmuring Mystic in the maindeck is a way to diversify away from the graveyard.
Unexpected Fangs helps gain life against Red Madness and Rally Red when paired with Tolarian Terror and Gurmag Angler. It’s also passable on a Sneaky Snacker because a 3/2 with flying and lifelink is a serious threat and the opponent doesn’t want to spend removal.
Snuff Out and Cast Down help against Elves and Blue Terror. Another reason I plan to pivot from Blue Terror is that an uptick in Dimir is unfavorable. Dimir boasted a 91% win rate against Blue Terror; it won ten out of eleven matches.
Two Spell Pierce works well in this version of Dimir. I can’t afford to play a more general counter alongside the four Counterspell, like Deprive, because Abandon Attachments, Cast Down, and Sneaky Snacker give Dimir a higher curve than Mono Blue Terror. It’s good to have a catch-all counter that can help against Relic of Progenitus after sideboard.
Pucci played my preferred manabase- ten Island and six duals. Contaminated Aquifer is technically better than Ice Tunnel because of Thermokarst, but will rarely matter.
The sideboard featured five Hydroblast effects. I prefer four and then move onto Dispel as they can counter Pyroblast.
Steel Sabotage takes the place of some Annul which are much better against Affinity and Jund Wildfire at the expense of Bogles and White Heroic. This is more palatable with the two Spell Pierce in the maindeck to counter enchantments.
Nihil Spellbomb is a great reward for playing the black splash. Blue Terror essentially plays Envelop in this slot to fight graveyard decks, like Spy and Dredge. Spellbomb is the more powerful option as it also helps against Terror mirrors and Altar Tron.
Agony Warp is able to take down Guardian of the Guildpact and indestructible artifact lands from Kenku Artificer. I also like Agony Warp against Red Rally as it essentially gains life, but Cast Down is too slow given their threat velocity.
A second Murmuring Mystic in the sideboard helps against the mirror and to further move away from needing the graveyard to close the game. It’s not a perfect solution because it’s susceptible to Pyroblast.
I prefer not to play Extract a Confession because it’s sorcery-speed and sometimes I need to exile cards from the graveyard. It can kill a hexproof threat, but will often play out worse than a Cast Down. This slot in the sideboard supports the maindeck Cast Downs.
Arms of Hadar is a bomb against small creature decks, but I prefer a single copy alongside Suffocating Fumes for curve considerations. I want Murmuring Mystic against some of the creature decks and can only play so many four-drops.
Here’s the next highest finishing deck (14th) by Marco Battagliola:
I like playing seven Mental Note effects because as the game goes long every remaining threat matters. Swapping an Abandon Attachments for Deep Analysis can help against slower decks at the expense of adding more life loss on top of Snuff Out.
Deep Analysis plays out differently in Dimir Terror compared to Mono Blue. I’m more likely to cycle Lorien Revealed in Dimir because there are more options for lands which gives room to cast another expensive spell.
Spell Pierce is swapped for Dispel as the fifth and sixth maindeck counter. A split is also reasonable as Dispel has matchups with zero hits, but scales better.
Maindeck Suffocating Fumes has a high floor given the cycling. It can even help a Tolarian Terror take down opposing 5/5s. I prefer sideboarding Suffocating Fumes as creature decks, like Caw Gates, don’t require Arms of Hadar, but still want to remove multiple threats.
The second Cast Down in the maindeck is another reasonable choice. Every black card does have the drawback of not being castable without a tap land, but is a great draw in the late game. It also helps against decks where Snuff Out doesn’t line up well.
Thorn of the Black Rose is an alternative to Murmuring Mystic that lines up better against Jund and the mirror at the risk of introducing the monarchy and then losing it. Another upside of Sneaky Snacker is that you have more ways to steal the monarchy and initiative.
Sebastiano Fornasari also made top 16 with Dimir Terror:
Photo credit: Paupergeddon.com
We’re now seeing with the third datapoint what is stock. The notable difference with Sebastiano’s list is just fifteen lands: ten Islands and five duals. I strongly prefer the extra land given that Lorien Revealed can be hard cast and the first black mana is crucial.
A new sideboard option is EDH all-star, Mystic Remora, against spell-based decks. I watched Remora play out against Devoted Pizza Combo on the Paupergeddon stream and it wasn’t amazing without a clock on the battlefield, but would have easily won with it otherwise.
MY DIMIR TERROR DECKLIST
We covered a lot of ground on the metagame and the different Dimir Terror lists to consider. Here’s what I would play:
Photo credit: mtggoldfish.com
