Standard Pauper Card of the Day: Razortip Whip

Once again I have to apologize for a missed deadline as there was no Weekend Update.  The excuse this time comes in the form of eight inches of powder falling over the weekend as well as some increased musical activity.  I'll share more about that last bit someday, but for now, I'm pressed for time again and still need to make some changes to my Boros Aggro deck before MPDC starts today.

But I've got time for a pretty interesting Standard Pauper Card of the Day that I'll be going into battle with:

Razortip Whip - Gatecrash

Razortip Whip - MTGO Traders - 0.02 Tix

One of the things I make sure to do on the blog is link to a place to purchase an online copy of the card (always to MTGO Traders, because they support Standard Pauper more than anyone else) in case you don't yet own a copy.  I had to stock up on these after they made their debut in the metagame long after their Gatecrash release.  They didn't look like much then, but these days they count for a lot more than met the eye.

Whip was first employed to break Dimir Mill mirrors from the sidebaord.  These acted as an extra "ping" threat akin to the Archaeomancers that served as the back-up plan to milling the opponent to death in the original version of the deck.  The nice thing about them was the neither list had anything beyond counterspells that could interact with an artifact.  They were guaranteed to stick and put the opponent on a more strict clock than any creature could.


Soon, Whip became used even more.  According to a Gatherling search, it's been featured in over 20 decks entered in Standard Pauper contests, from Dimir Mill itself to aggressive Red-based builds and controlling Black ones and even completely unrelated Azorius builds!

Presently, sideboards are starting to feature artifact-hate and one would be hard pressed to cite a source other than Razortip Whip to justify such inclusions.  I like when older cards that get overlooked upon their release finally reveal themselves to be relevant.  It helps prove that Standard Pauper is always evolving and the small card pool has more opportunities to explore than meets the eye.

Off to go find some sideboard or maindeck space for a couple more!  Thanks for reading, and sorry for the delay again.  Peace,

- C