Back to Standard Pauper with Izzet Tokens

It's been a while since I last posted here after rage-quitting Magic Online because Standard Pauper wasn't listed on the Formats page.  And out of frustration with how poorly that program was performing...

But after a few months of cooling down, I found that Wizards of the Coast remedied the problem faster than I expected.  And when I took the plunge to invest a few bucks into cards for some Standard Pauper decks just to see if Magic Online was working, I was pleasantly surprised with how well both the client and the deck I constructed were performing.

To make a long story short, the client has never once crashed, disconnected, or otherwise crapped out on me in three weeks of playing, during which I've had some of the most fun and successful Standard Pauper experiences of my "career" in the format.  In other words, it's a fanastic time to stop hating on WotC and play some Standard Pauper!

So I guess I take back all those means things I said about R&D and Maro.  Sorry guys!  I suppose I just love the game too much and it makes me a jerk sometimes  But enough of that, on to the deck!

Token Izzet Control

Not Your Mom's Blue-Red Deck by Cabel

Creatures 0 cards Other Spells 4 Dragon Fodder 4 Lightning Strike 4 Magma Spray 4 Nullify 4 Treasure Cruise 3 Anticipate 3 Divination 3 Flurry of Horns 3 Ojutai's Summons 2 Cancel 2 Voyage's End 36 cards

Lands 11 Island 5 Mountain 4 Evolving Wilds 4 Swiftwater Cliffs 24 cards Sideboard 3 Scouring Sands 3 Disdainful Stroke 3 Negate 2 Whirlwind Adept 2 Pin to the Earth 2 Voyage's End 15 cards

As of this writing, on the eve of the MPDC Season 29 Worlds Championship, I've had greater Top 8 success with my Token Izzet Control build than any other stack of 75 digital cards I ever entered in a PDC tournament.  I've twice made it the finals for a second-place finish and twice made it to the semi-finals out of five total entries.  I consider this successful because, hey, winning isn't everything!

Just tonight I nearly won the SPDC Season 29 championship against a Mono Black Control build that I had bested in the Swiss.  Unfortunately, my luck ran out against Izzet Control's toughest matchup.

But I still wouldn't change a thing about this list.  All I'm going to do is update the Khans-block Dragon Fodders with the cool new Magic Origins printing that features the original Shards of Alara artwork.  This brings me to a question I really have to ask:

Why have Izzet Control players not been using Dragon Fodder all season???  

Dragon Fodder has always been a nuts card and fits perfectly into the strategy of using only token-producing spells to summon two dudes at once while leaving the rest of the list open for control, card draw, more control, and even more card draw.

Most importantly, by running Dragon Fodder in Izzet Control instead of relying only the five-mana big token spells, the deck suddenly has the opportunity to apply pressure in the early game.  I've won games off the back of a single Dragon Fodder dropped on the second turn while taking care of every potential blocker and threat my opponent could muster.  It almost feels like I'm playing a Red Deck Wins....with Treasure Cruise and Nullify!

That and those Goblin tokens are fantastic when you need a couple of chumps to fend off a Boros Aggro or Formidable Green assault.  I cannot recommend using Dragon Fodder in Izzet Control lists any higher.  This inclusion was the only main difference between my build and the established Izzet decks, some of which forgo tokens entirely and focus on on Whirlwind Adept (which makes for a nice sideboard option here) hence the name "Token Izzet Control" to distinguish it from the rest.  I believe it's well positioned in the format and primed for a win...

I've got one last chance this season to take the top spot as MPDC Season 29 Worlds happens tomorrow!  But after results like this, I'm happy just to play.  Indeed, I'm happier now that I'm actually able to play without Magic Online blowing up and it's a bit easier to find opponents.  That, and this Standard Pauper metagame is incredibly deep and diverse.

So it's good to be back and it's even better to have people reading the blog.  For the few who do, don't expect me to go overboard again and post all the time.  I've already decided that blogging about Magic doesn't make one a better Magic player, so my updates here will be infrequent and completely random.

But thanks for reading anyway and good luck & have fun for everybody who participates in the last event of the season.  It's good to be back :-)  Peace,

- C

Monthly Metablog & Metagame Report: March 2015, Part II - Standard Pauper Metagame

The month of March saw nine Player Run Events on Magic Online via PDCMagic.com.  The  Standard Pauper Deck Challenge (SPDC) and Monday Pauper Deck Challenge (MPDC) are nearing the end of their 28th seasons for the ninth and eighth years running, respectively.  The metagame data for these events are compiled on the Gatherling tool on PDCMagic.

TOP DECKS OF MARCH 2015

The Top Deck of the format this month was an Aggro build, Azorius Heroic Cruise.  This build adds the power of Treasure Cruise to a combination of efficient White and Blue Heroic and Prowess creatures with effective combat tricks to trigger these mechanics, protect threats, and frequently cantrip into more of the same.  With four wins, Heroic Cruise has won twice as many events as any other competing archetype.  It's performance in the Top Four is also better than any other list, making the cut nine times out of nine, an amazing 100% events-to-playoffs ratio.

Azorius Heroic Cruise

1st Place at MPDC 28.03, March 9th, 2015, by Forli

Creatures 4 Akroan Skyguard 4 Hopeful Eidolon 4 Wingsteed Rider 2 Jeskai Student 2 Lagonna-Band Trailblazer 16 cards Other Spells 3 Jeskai Sage 4 Defiant Strike 4 Feat of Resistance 4 Gods Willing 4 Treasure Cruise 3 Refocus 2 Chosen By Heliod 18 cards

Lands 10 Plains 4 Evolving Wilds 4 Tranquil Cove 2 Island 20 cards Sideboard 3 Negate 3 Retraction Helix 2 Ajani's Presence 2 Disdainful Stroke 2 Last Breath 2 Pillar of Light 1 Erase 15 cards

That means it's not just the breakout builds of the season.  It will go down in history as one of the greatest Standard Pauper decks of all time!

The Metagame is almost evenly split between Aggro and Control strategies, with 19 of the former and 16 of the latter being piloted to Top Four status.  The most top-performing Control deck is Izzet Tokens Control, a "creatureless" strategy with the win conditions Flurry of Horns and/or Rise of Eagles, generating two large tokens at once, and backed up with counters, bounce, and burn.  Behind Azorius Heroic Cruise is the other best Aggro deck, Boros Heroic Aggro, which forgoes the card-drawing prowess in blue for more aggressive red creatures and direct damage.

Other decks of note are the Black-splash-Blue Devotion builds running Gray Merchant of Asphodel, at once a win condition and an engine for staying in the game.  These also play Treasure Cruise along with blue and black removal and card advantage spells for controlling board until Gary drops down on the battlefield.  Some players have splashed an additional color, the most popular being White for even more drain-life effects useful in the long-game.  On the Aggro end of the spectrum, an Orzhov Tokens strategy has become popular this month, featuring  powerful white token-makers for card advantage and enough black removal to clear a path before a well-time white mass pump spell.

Only one Top 8 deck, Mono Blue Control, has completely dropped off the radar after appearing earlier in the month.  Most recently, entirely new builds have surprised contestants and won events in their first entry! The last two events were won by an Izzet Blitz list, looking very much like "Red Deck Splashes Blue for the Win," piloted by the event host himself.  The next day, a Grixis Control build by rrmedio1 with no Gary or Izzet token makers (but plenty of Treasure Cruise and a scary Hexproof finisher) took the top spot at the last MPDC tournament of the month.

TOP STORIES OF THE MONTH

Treasure Cruise Banned in Pauper, Remains Legal in Standard Pauper

The most powerful card in the format is hands down Treasure Cruise.  No hard numbers are needed to back this up: the card was banned in Classic Pauper last month.  Having already been banned in other Eternal formats, this makes Standard Pauper one of the last places to play Magic where the card is legal and not overpowered.

Still, the conversation about possible ban-hammer-worthy cards is contentious - even when they are commons - and we Standard Pauper players must remain vigilant to make sure no single card destroys our format.  Until then, it's safe to say that Cruise has replaced Gary as the boogie man of Standard Pauper, for better or for worse.  It is this Pauper's opinion that the ship should remain on the waters and not be banned, and the rest of the community seems to have come to the same consensus.  It's a sure bet that Treasure Cruise will remain legal in the 29th seasons of MPDC and SPDC starting soon.

Campaign to Get Standard Pauper Listed on the Magic Formats Web Page

The banning of Treasure Cruise in Pauper raised questions of whether or not the card would still work with the Magic Online Standard Pauper filter.  In researching this, I came to discover that finding information on Standard Pauper on the official Magic: the Gathering Formats page on Wizards of the Coast web site is impossible: Standard Pauper is not listed as a format.

This month, other top players and I began discussing (perhaps a little too strongly at first...my bad!) on how to change this lack of information this long-running format, which has existed and thrived on Magic Online for going on ten years and is now being explored In Real Life at Local Game Shops as a result of the MTGO v4 debacle.  Stay tuned to the PDCMagic.com and other forums (and, of course, this blog!) for updates on the ongoing campaign to get Standard Pauper listed on the Magic: the Gathering Formats information page.

IN CONCLUSION

The month of March 2015 in the World of Standard Pauper is now in the history books.  Looking ahead, the month of April 2015 starts off with a bang: The SPDC Worlds Season Championship takes place this Sunday and the MPDC finale will take place about a week later.  It is very rare that new winning decks take players by surprise the week before these season finales.  Based on the metagame this month, one can expect the above-discussed archetypes to have a good change at the top trophies of the season(s).

Best of luck to and congratulations the Paupers who earned invitations and byes to the championships. And to all participants, may your topdecks be relevant, your maths be accurate. Good luck & have fun...and hey...Good Friday, too :-)  Peace,

- C

Standard Pauper Card o' the Day: Akroan Crusader

It appears I've accidentally established a Red theme for my first week, even before my first weekly theme is figured out.  So let's make the Standard Pauper Card o' the Day another interesting Red selection.  This guy might end up being my new hero:

Akroan Crusader - Theros

MTGO Traders - Akroan Crusader - 0.02 Tix

Now that is one unique and very flavorful card.  It's an A+ in design and a perfect five-out-of-five fit for all player psychographics.  Everybody's inner-Melvin and Vorthos can see the Spartan flavor everywhere.  Spikes should see a token-generator with card-advantage potential, Timmies are thinking about building around the Heroic mechanic for token swarms, Johnny's are trying to figure out how to trigger this 300 times in a single turn while screaming "This! Is! Pauper!"

He's also a big step in filling out Red's philosophical position in the color pie.  Would you believe Akroan Crusader is the first 1/1 Human Soldier for one Red mana at common in history?  I had trouble too, but what a debut!  See, he's also only the third common Red creature to see print that can produce one or more tokens.  His company is as illustrious as I believe he will soldier on to be.

This list of Red Token-making creatures is illustrative of a split between Standard and Classic and even the gap between Vintage in the paper world versus the MTGO realm. But they can wait on that for now, because they are now letting me do this!

All that said about our Card o' the Day and I've never even really tested him!  My red one-drop of choice so far has been Foundry Street Denizen, but I've been impressed with guy from the other side of the table, so it's time to log on and test out Akrosan Crusader.  Give him a shot, thanks for reading and until next time, GL & HF!  Peace,

- C