The Power of Pauper: The Scales Have Tipped
Howdy folks! It's time yet again for another edition of The Power of Pauper! I'm your host, Joe Dyer, and this week we're going to be diving a little deeper into the effect that Broodscale Combo is having on Pauper and whether it's similar to another very recent situation with All That Glitters. In addition, we've got some Challenges to look at. We didn't have an article last week because of some other circumstances ongoing.
Without further ado, let's dive right in!
Broodscale? BROODSCALE!
While we had a look at this deck a few weeks back, things have only continued to get more interesting for Pauper in that time as the "Gleezard" / Basking Broodscale Combo deck has continued to become more and more heavily played in Pauper overall.
Over this time, the decklists have become more tightened down and the two major variants (Golgari and Jund) are slowly whittling down to the one major variant, Golgari. What makes the Golgari variant a more preferred method? Well, one of the big reasons is the overall deckbuilding costs afforded the Golgari variant. Having one less color makes the manabase a lot healthier and the deck is still playing all the cards that this shell wants to, things like Deadly Dispute and Ichor Wellspring, etc etc. The deckbuilding costs for this are very low and make the deck much leaner.
The other major aspect of this variant is the protection that it is able to run. Proactively this deck can cast things like Duress and take the removal pieces you were hoping to spend on the combo, while Snakeskin Veil lets them deploy the combo at their leisure and hold up Veil to give Hexproof (oh and a +1/+1 counter to boot).
And yes, there's the combo itself. One thing I don't think people realize about the combo is that it is often generally lights out when the combo begins to go off. Cards like Chromatic Star, Energy Refractor, and Wizard's Rockets let you filter the colorless mana generated by the combo into other colors, which is relevant for finding the way to win the game, which is more than often not attacking for lethal. The primary mode of the combo now is to find Nadier's Nightblade and just win the game that way by draining the opponent with every token made. So much of the deck is drawing cards that its huge to have 12 artifacts that all draw a card in some fashion, not to mention that many of them draw multiple cards with Dispute and Eviscerator's Insight. Insight pulls double duty here too since it can be flashed back to keep the train rumbling.
At this point, this combo is no longer a "well you just Doom Blade the creature in response" and that is that. What makes this deck so good is knowing how and when to deploy the combo, and also the fact that the entire game you need to respect the combo, making it hard to tap out for things. Tapping out could just legitimately result in losing the game if the opponent is smartly playing around your removal. In the absence of not tapping out, the deck can just deploy a Broodscale or Nightblade and attack, while drawing cards to eventually rip apart the opponent's hand and deploy the combo anyways.
Another card that had this same issue? The most recently banned All That Glitters. Glitters had a very similar play pattern in that it could be deployed when it was time to close out a game and an opponent could not interact with it favorably. Gleezard has a very similar play pattern in that regard.
Now, I'm not actually calling for a ban just yet, I'd rather see what the format does and how it reacts to this deck, but the very Splinter Twin-esque play patterns of Gleezard make it hard to ignore the fact that the deck is a lot more than an A+B combo that is disrupted by removal. It now has a bunch of ways to actually interact and pave the way for the combo, and that in of itself is interesting.
Pauper Challenge 32 8/2
The first Challenge event of the week was the Friday event. There was no data for this event.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here. The Top 8 is below.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Gruul Ramp | 1st | Purgatory_01 |
| Dredge | 2nd | Captain_Tsubasa |
| Dimir Terror | 3rd | Jujubinha39 |
| Mono Blue Terror | 4th | OmnipotentOlive |
| Mono Blue Terror | 5th | discoverN |
| Elves | 6th | Shiib |
| Bogles | 7th | _goblinlackey |
| Grixis Affinity | 8th | PedraStone |
Pretty interesting Top 8 here. At the end of the event it was Gruul Ramp that won.
Cutting the Ponza elements seems to have massively improved the quality of this deck overall. Seems like a really strong deck right now for sure.
In Second Place we had Dredge.
This deck got one new interesting piece out of MH3 and that's Malevolent Rumble. That card has continuously looked great every time I've cast it. It's always incredibly good. In this deck it's even better because it puts cards into the graveyard.
Also in this Top 8 we had Elves.
Nyxborn Hydra is a sweet inclusion here. Being able just to make a huge threat with reach and trample is gas, but then being able to bestow it onto something is even better especially since you can also pump it with Timberwatch Elf and if your opponent kills the Elf you still get the Hydra off the bestow.
Pauper Challenge 32 8/3
The second Challenge of the weekend was the Saturday event. There was no data for this event.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here. The Top 8 is below.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Broodscale Combo | 1st | TrueHero |
| Grixis Affinity | 2nd | LuffyDoChapeuDePalha |
| Gruul Ramp | 3rd | LasVegasChaos |
| Izzet Terror | 4th | SpockVidaLoka |
| Gruul Ramp | 5th | AliEnWaRe_ |
| Jund Gardens | 6th | Villela |
| Azorius Gates | 7th | PauloCabral_Br |
| Gruul Ramp | 8th | IvernOP |
Lot of Gruul here, but at the end it was Broodscale Combo that won.
This deck continually keeps tightening up and tightening up as we discussed already. It's slowly figuring out what it wants to be, and that might not be good for the rest of the format.
In Second Place we had Grixis Affinity.
Candy Trail is a slick way to enable getting down Refurbished Familiar on Turn 2 much easier. Two artifact lands and a Candy Trail let you get a Familiar down for B, but then you also get to Scry 2. Seems great.
Further down the Top 8 we had Jund Gardens.
Yes, Writhing Chrysalis seems like an absolutely insane card still in Pauper. Very powerful. Having access to Gorilla Shaman and Breath Weapon is also great.
Pauper Challenge 32 8/4
The final Challenge of the weekend was the Sunday event. There was no data for this event.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here. The Top 8 is below.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Mono Blue Terror | 1st | Yugi_Muto |
| Grixis Affinity | 2nd | LuffyDoChapeuDePalha |
| Broodscale Combo | 3rd | PauloCabral_Br |
| Kiln Fiend | 4th | carrot_eater |
| Broodscale Combo | 5th | NMT_Sco94 |
| Elves | 6th | newbarola |
| Mono White Aggro | 7th | billsive |
| Gruul Ramp | 8th | rasvd |
Fairly solid Top 8 here. At the end of the event it was Mono Blue Terror that won.
Deem Inferior seems like a really sweet card here. You're definitely going to be drawing a reasonable amount of cards enough that making this cost 1U or U is reasonable enough. Being able to get rid of a threat to set up counterspells for said threat is nice.
In Second Place we had Grixis Affinity.
Another card to point out here is Toxin Analysis. That card makes an artifact with the Clue but also gives something deathtouch and lifelink seems quite strong.
Further down the Top 8 we had Kiln Fiend Aggro.
Izzet Kiln Fiend is an interesting thing to see. Having access to both Ponder and Preordain to just keep churning the deck is a neat thing. Festival Crasher is also super sweet as a secondary Kiln Fiend.
My Video of the Week
Oh hey, I got a video out this week for Pauper! We played a little Gruul Ramp on stream this week, which was super fun. Check out the embedded video below!
Around the Web
- Bryant Cook has a video on Gleezard. Check it out here.
- TeasdaleMTG has a video on Mono Green Tokens. Check it out here.
- HeartyShow has a video on Izzet Skred. Check it out here.
The Spice Corner
As League results are now spread out across the week, let's dig in and find something spicy!
Molten Gatekeeper in Altar Tron seems pretty sweet and definitely seems like it might shore up some of the deck's clicking issues on MTGO.
Wrapping Up
That's all the time we have this week folks! Thanks for continuing to support the column and join us next week as we continue our journey into Pauper!
As always you can reach me at all my associated links via my Link Tree! In addition, I'm always around the MTGGoldfish Discord Server and the MTGPauper Discord Server.
Until next time!
