A Pauper Review of Avacyn Restored

When the Helvault breaks open, unleashing a horde of ruthless demons and their angelic archenemy Avacyn onto the world of Magic, Pauper will have a total of three demons and six angels available (unless you count the wannabe angel and demon changelings from Lorwyn), all of which are pretty much completely unplayable. But even if Avacyn Restored doesn’t bring Pauper the hopes of unburying a Griselbrand or mastering time, it does bring some new tricks to the table for Pauper.

Also, I do want blatantly to acknowledge the fact that Pauper is an eternal format, and new cards have quite a precedent to meet in order to be considered playable. More often than not, a new card will be either outclassed by or functionally equivalent to a card that already exists and sees no play. For example, Amass the Components is exciting, but Sift already exists and sees no play. What will really allow a new common to break onto the competitive Pauper landscape is most often its uniqueness, that is, a positive answer to the question — does this card offer something which the current enormous card pool does not? That being said, I do want to lean toward being charitable in exploring the possibilities of certain cards, though I will refrain from being hopelessly optimistic. Above all, this article will largely be about looking at the roles of Avacyn Restored‘s commons as they relate to current archetypes and some, but certainly not all, of the interesting interactions which come from it and the rest of the card pool.

It is a commonly acknowledged fact that Pauper is quite scarce of generic, board-sweeping removal with Holy Light, Seismic Shudder, and Crypt Rats being the most notable exceptions; and yet, even these cards are generally limited to picking off smaller creatures. What this means is that Pauper really relies on targeted removal from Lightning Bolt to Capsize to deal with threats. Obviously in such a format, hexproof becomes a rather valuable keyword, and anyone who has watched helplessly as they lost to a Silhana Ledgewalkers or a Calcite Snapper can vouch for this, and I think this presents a pretty exploitable option for decks that want to use Shieldmate. As of right now, there is no card that does quite what this does. There are a variety of things which grant Shroud in overly complex ways (such as Hisokas Guard, various enchantments or equipments which also give shroud or hexproof (such as Whispersilk Cloak, and combat tricks (such as Rangers Guile). The creatures all suffer from being not reliable and prone to removal. Enchantments are less effective because of the fact that they are only useful once a creature is in play and can lead to really unfavorable situations in which the opponent responds to enchanting by removing the would-be-enchanted creature. Furthermore, both of these are unreliable because the thing giving the shroud hexproof can be targeted and removed, so, for example, an opponent can simply Capsize the Whispersilk Cloak first and then remove the creature. And obviously the instants which grant hexproof and shroud are not really comparable to Shieldmate since the tricks are merely temporary and trying to serve a completely different goal through being only one-time things.

This goes to demonstrate how many good things the Shieldmate has going for her. Assuming you’re at least going to have one more creature in play when you play her, Shieldmate is a 2/3 hexproof creature for 3U that makes one other creature you play virtually unkillable, and I think this can lead to some very powerful blowouts against decks which will have no way to deal with hexproof.

At first glance, this card will be compared to Exclude and be dismissed as being inferior; however, I think that there are several decks which would gladly make use of a Summoners Bane. I think this card could be a rather natural fit as a 1-of in any creature-based Mono-U variant. In these decks, the goal is to use countermagic to disrupt the opponent while beating down with smaller creatures, and I think such a deck would gladly make use of the opportunity to make another creature to apply pressure and race while also countering something the opponent plays.

While on the topic of Mono-U Aggro, there is no better time to bring up Wingcrafter. While all decks with Delvers and Spellstutter Sprites seemed to be classified under “Mono-U Aggro” decks, there are a few nuances among different lists. One of these differences is that some builds opt for a more controlling game by playing many pieces of countermagic and fewer creatures, while other builds seek to be more aggressive through playing cards such as Phantasmal Bear and Zephyr Sprite. In the first version of the deck, Wingcrafter is terribly unexciting, since everything you are playing typically already has flying or will have flying on your next upkeep. However, this opens up quite a few deckbuilding possibilities for the more aggressive creature builds by offering an aggressive 1-drop which is still very relevant during later turns of the game, which is certainly the case with the Zephyr Sprite.

Also, it is worth mentioning that Wingcrafter can give Ninja of the Deep Hours flying, which in itself can be game ending due to the sheer amount of card advantage produced. The interaction here is incredibly strong and possibly enough to merit running Wingcrafter solely to give the Ninja flying. Once again, this is also in addition to being a 1-drop which makes a Turn 2 Ninja (which is generally just as devastating) possible.

For some time now I’ve been wondering why there hasn’t been a slower version of Infect which went into black for Plague Stingers and also for the black hand disruption (i.e., Duress) to combat any of the hate cards an opponent sides in. I think if such a deck were to emerge, Predator’s Gambit could actually fill a pretty important role in that deck. For the most part, Infect decks run a fairly low number of creatures, which means that the enchanted creature will have an intimidate effect on the game more often than not, and that the aura’s “restriction” will rarely actually be restrictive. The two reasons why Infect has to have the Blitzkrieg approach right now (aside from the fact that it can, which is enough of a reason for many people) is that the creatures are prone to removal and because infect creatures, which are half the size of normal creatures, have difficultly attacking through a developed board. Adding black to the mix gives the Infect deck a way of handling removal spells through targeted hand disruption, and, with the addition of Gambit, allows the infect creatures to be more or less unblockable. And even if you do end up playing a deck that shares a color with all of your creatures (such as Mono-G Stompy or Mono-B Control), the option still remains to put a Predator’s Gambit on an Ichorclaw Myr, which will end the game against everything but Affinity.

This is certainly one of the more interesting cards to come out of Avacyn Restored, and I’m not entirely sure what to make of it, as it does not really fit into any existing archetypes outside of Mono-B Control slapping it on a random creature before removing it. The most notable pre-existing deck which comes to mind as wanting this card is the MBC variant which ran an absurd amount of creature removal. For such a deck with a ton of removal readily available, Pact really allows for a bunch of tricks, since any removal spell is essentially letting you Mind Control at instant speed. For starters, this will make combat more difficult for any aggressive strategies (think Act of Aggression). Even against control decks, this with a piece of removal on a Mulldrifter is a pretty significant tempo swing, even if you’re only breaking even on card advantage. And for those of us living in a dream world, there will be those wonderful games in which your opponent taps out for Ulamogs Crusher and you steal it with this.

This card is essentially one-third of a Goblin Bushwhacker for half the price of Bushwhacker, since you are not giving your creatures haste and it itself is not a creature; however, because of the absurd tricks that decks which want Bushwhacker can do with it (mainly Goblins), I would not be terribly surprised if this shows up occasionally to fill the role of an “extra Bushwhacker”. In Goblins, which will consistently have 5+ creatures on board, the 5 extra damage this can press for is nothing to scoff at.

Storm decks on the other hand, the other home of Goblin Bushwhacker, will have virtually no use for this, since the haste given by Bushwhacker makes it invaluable, and any cards beyond the four copies of Bushwhacker are going to be completely cumbersome in a deck which strives to be as streamlined and consistent as possible.

Although it may sound weird to describe this card as “replenishing your hand” since you’re discarding your hand and at best only getting one extra card out of it, but that is precisely what this does in Burn decks, which, although a very limited application, is a deck that really wants a card. The Burn archetype is notorious for being very aggressive, but frequently running out of gas. This point is illustrated by how quickly the deck can burn through resources (pun intended). This couples very nicely with Dangerous Wager, since it essentially eliminates the drawback of discarding your hand (because you will ideally have no hand when the card is played). More often than not, this will act as a Divination for Burn decks, which is actually quite unheard of and is insanely powerful.

This is one of the cards out of Avacyn Restored which I believe is capable of spawning new archetype. Lords are very hard to come by in Pauper, and coincidentally, the two most popular ones outside of slivers, Veteran Armorer and Veteran Armorsmith, interact very favorably with Riot Ringerleader. In addition to this, there are a great deal of creatures in Pauper which are both humans and veterans, and it is very possible to build a deck which benefits from having access to three Lords. Riot Ringleader also fills a very nice place in this archetype because it boosts power instead of toughness, which is precisely what is needed for an aggressive deck.

There was a time where I really wanted to build a deck that capitalized on all of the “ping” creatures in Pauper, such as Prodigal Pyromancer and the ton of other cards exactly like it. With this I wanted to use Ophidian Eye and Freed from the Real to draw ludicrous amounts of cards. However, the problem with this strategy was that it had no way of reliably killing any creatures with a toughness greater than 1. And the only solution to this was Venomous Fangs, which seemed really clunky. This brings me to why I am excited for Nightshade Peddler. Running this with a bunch of pingers is a rather reliable source of creature removal, and is one of the cards I am really looking forward to brewing with from Avacyn Restored.

The only reason this card deserves mention is because there is a relatively unknown combo with Nomads en-Kor, Task Force, and Heal the Scars which results in infinite life (or would, if MTGO recognized infinite combos). In this deck, Sheltering Word acts not only as a combo piece, but also does all relevant things at half the cost. The combo is a bit weird on MTGO, since you can not just declare that you wish to gain infinite life and have the opponent scoop, but will more often than not repeat the same action an endless amount of time and just keep F6-ing until the opponent loses (or gets frustrated and quits). But nonetheless, it is a useful card for the archetype.

This block was like Christmas for Mono-G Stompy, which has already gotten Young Wolf and Hunger of the Howlpack, and now gets this. It is hard to understate how effective the “Creatures with power less than this card cannot block it” clause is in an aggro deck loaded with pump spells, as it easily allows you to have mammoth unblockable creatures. Anyone who has experience with Skarrgan Pit-Skulk can attest to the fact that it is quite the beating, and I predict that Stompy will gladly welcome a playset of these. With Delver varients being arguably the most popular deck right now, I can see this quickly taking the place of Silhana Ledgewalker because, as it turns out, walking on ledges isn’t particularly useful against a field of things which fly.

This is a card which I am confident will have a considerable influence on the Pauper world. Aside from the lack of board sweepers, the other distinguishing factor about Pauper is how horrendous its mana bases are. Sure, there are the bouncelands and the come-into-play-tapped fetchlands, but all of these effects are slow and cumbersome, and you are still deprived of your second color until you untap on the following turn. Abundant Growth fills this gap by being a much-needed mana fixer which will allow multicolor decks to reliably access its colors, and I would not be surprised if this led to the development of a three color aggro deck, which, up to this point, has been largely unheard of.

Certainly, the mana fixing aspect of the card is nothing new, as Fertile Ground and Utopia Sprawl both exist, as well as things such as Wanderers Twig, but the fact that the card cantrips is invaluable. This allows for decks to fix mana while not losing a card in the process, removing the inherent card disadvantage for trying to fix your mana.

The other aspect of this card which is incredibly valuable is that is can be played on Turn 1. The most similar card to Abundant Growth currently in Pauper is Prophetic Prism. The popularity of Prism in control variants demonstrates how useful and scarce color fixing is in Pauper.

However, Prism is not necessarily a viable option for aggressive strategies because the higher mana cost means that the player cannot really play anything until Turn 3, which is quite a sacrifice for an aggro strategy, but lends itself perfectly to slower, control decks which do not immediately need to have threats on board.

But even more of an issue is that aggro decks need color fixing more readily than control decks, so having access to only four cards to fix mana without losing card advantage in the process is unreliable for an aggro strategy. Doubling the number of fixing options available essentially solves this problem, since it makes it early mana twice as reliable and consistent as it would otherwise be.

I don’t think the impact of this card will be seen readily because what it potentially allows for is very open-ended and there is no obvious “best use” as there would be for all of the other tricks from the set. The release of this card is like the print of a dual land in a format full of basic lands. I think this card will lead to an abundant growth of multicolor strategies in Pauper.

I really like these cards and wish they were playable, especially since they both combine so nicely with Trinket Mage. Unfortunately, there is a critical lack of angels and demons in the format, and without the corresponding creature type, each card is essentially a filter card and a discard card, respectively. However, they are worth keeping in mind for some future set in which more angels and demons are printed at common, or if something wants to be ambitious and build the deck based off of changelings.

Conclusion

All in all, I am really forward to several of the new things Avacyn Restored brings to the format. While there is no obvious powerhouse in this set along the lines of Glistener Elf or Delver of Secrets, there still exist a variety of new and interesting things to brew with that can break onto the competitive landscape. Thank you all for reading my article! And please let me know your thoughts on it, as well as which commons you are looking forward to from Avacyn Restored, in the comments section below!