Welcome to the inaugural issue of RIW PAUPER CHAMPIONSHIP WEEKLY! Since this is the 1st one, I’ll start with a little bit about what this series is…
Basically, as the title suggests, the plan is to put out a weekly article chronicling what’s going on in Pauper at the shop at our Wednesday 6PM events for the Pauper Championship Series.
A few things I’d like to highlight every week are to track and report on trends in the metagame as well as feature the undefeated 4-0 decklists and players. Beyond that… I’d love to include anything that players think is interesting or noteworthy.
I’m currently in the role of running the Weds evening Pauper Twitch Stream and giving commentary on the games, so while I don’t get to regularly participate in the Tournaments as a player – I do have a unique perspective of watching every single Table #1 match up played out on camera. All-around Pauper “Good Guy” Michael Russo offered up his services to occasionally commentate so that I can get some games in. While I’m on the subject of the Weds Night Stream, I’d like to invite anybody who is interested to sit in on commentary with me at any time.
If you pull the Bye… Or, finish a match early… I’d love company on the microphone talking about and discussing the Pauper feature matches. It’s always great when Gary, Jon, Cam, Russo, Nikolas, etc. drop in and share their expertise and I wanted to open that invitation up to anybody who is interested.
Also, if you’re interested in playing in a feature match (and haven’t been featured yet) hit me up in between rounds and I’ll do what I can to get you in the Stream Room. 🙂
Here’s what the metagame looked like last week:
Other = a deck that had only a single copy represented in the field. Decks included:UW Familiars, U Terror, Goblins, Devoted Pizza Combo, Hot Dogs, Boros, Spy, Dimir Terror & Red Madness.
The first thing that stands out to me looking at this graph is that there are a ton of viable archetypes being played in Pauper! > 1/3 of the field in a 29 player event were unique decks. The format looks super cool and pretty much whatever playstyle of deck a player prefers, it would appear there is a viable option available.
As a point of contrast to the distribution of the Pauper graph, I did commentary with Kyle Boggemes at the RIW Modern RCQ this past weekend, where Boros Enroughergy was roughly 1/3 of a similar sized ~30-player event and had a greater than 50% conversion rate to Top 8.
To me, the Modern meta looks to be more defined by a particularly powerful deck, whereas in our Pauper meta the most played deck, BW Blade, was only about 16% (so, 1/2 that of Boros Energy in Modern). Also, it was interesting to see that Orzhov Blade was the most played deck in the field (when there was only a lone copy the week before).
I was chatting with Jason in between rounds and shared that his signature deck was on the uptick and was the most played deck in the field. I joked that he was either “ahead of the curve or influencing the meta with his article.” Can confirm after talking with two of the Blade pilots that his article about the deck was their jumping into the archetype point.
One other trend I’ve noticed over the course of the Pauper series is that Red Aggro decks have really cooled off in regard to their metagame share. I’ve only recently started casting the weekly Weds Pauper events, but I’ve been on the mic for most of the Major Events over the past year and half and RIW’s meta has traditionally been pretty “red heavy.” Obviously, Red has taken some hits on the B&R but I was surprised to see only three different flavors of Red aggro in a 30 player field and 0 copies of Rally Red (a deck that has been extremely Paupular in previous weeks and months.
Another notable observation of the graph: 0 Faerie decks, which I also found surprising as I typically see at least one on Camera over the course of a 4-Rounder.
Big Congrats to these two on going undefeated and earning 2 Pauper Points toward this year’s invi.
| Ethan Kolby – Grixis Affinity |
Andrew Hanna – Mono U Terror |
| 3 Krark-Clan Shaman |
4 Delver of Secrets |
| 4 Refurbished Familiar |
4 Tolarian Terror |
| 3 Utrom Monitor |
4 Cryptic Serpent |
| 4 Myr Enforcer |
3 Ponder |
| 4 Galvanic Blast |
1 Deep Analysis |
| 4 Thoughtcast |
1 Deem Inferior |
| 2 Toxin Analysis |
2 Sleep of the Dead |
| 2 Sewer-velience Cam |
4 Lorien Revealed |
| 3 Nihil Spellbomb |
4 Brainstorm |
| 2 Blood Fountain |
4 Mental Note |
| 4 Reckoner’s Bargain |
4 Thought Scour |
| 4 Ichor Wellspring |
4 Force Spike |
| 1 Makeshift Munitions |
1 Spell Pierce |
| 4 Drossforge Bridge |
4 Counterspell |
| 4 Mistvault Bridge |
16 Island |
| 3 Silverbluff Bridge |
|
| 3 Vault of Whispers |
|
| 3 Great Furnace |
|
| 2 Seat of the Synod |
|
| 1 Swamp |
|
| SIDEBOARD |
SIDEBOARD |
| 1 Krark-Clan Shaman |
3 Hydroblast |
| 5 Red / Pyro Blast |
3 Blue Elemental Blast |
| 5 Blue / Red Blast |
4 Gut Shot |
| 1 Breath Weapon |
3 Annul |
| 1 Duress |
1 Dispel |
| 1 Extract a Confession |
1 Envelop |
| 1 Unexpected Fangs |
|
Ethan and Andrew both had feature matches and so I had a chance to see their decks in action and chat with them when I got their decklists for the article.
Andrew was a little reluctant to have the Mono U Terror list included at first, because he said that he literally had a stock list he got from Goldfish, made zero changes, and tried it out on Weds. On hearing that, I was like, “Now I want to include the list twice as much! Because I think it’s a great story that might motivate a new player to give Pauper a try.” Finding a stock list that has done well in a tournament before, and playing it “as is,” is a fantastic way to learn Pauper.
Ethan had a great idea to include a couple of “tips and tricks” about his deck of choice, Grixis Affinity.
Affinity Tip #1:
You can cast Myr Enforcer and then sacrifice Artifacts to Krark-Clan Shaman while the Enforcer is on the stack to get the Affinity cost reduction and have the Enforcer dodge the KCS damage.
Affinity Tip # 2:
In a situation where you play Toxin Analysis on a Krark-Clan Shaman and an opponent has a Nyxborn Hydra Bestowed upon one of their creatures – if you put two KCS (w Deathtouch) activations on the stack the first activation will kill all the creatures in play, THEN the Hydra will enter the Battlefield as a creatures, and then the second KCS DT damage will resolve – killing the Hydra.
I’m already looking forward to the Weds Night Pauper at RIW Hobbies. If you have any ideas about things you’d like to see in the Weekly series feel free to hit me up on Weds or on socials.
