Anything But: A Look at Hexproof

Hexproof as a deck isn’t a new thing for Pauper. The deck, if you were not aware, has been around as a homebrew option that didn’t actually have any real power behind it. Recent printings have finally given the deck enough real power behind it that it can finally be a threat on the field. On paper the mechanic seems incredibly strong, but that means little in this game. We’re going to be taking a look this week into, not only the hexproof mechanic, but also the deck. I’ve got plenty of information for you guys including deck lists, matchups, and even a short interview with a regular from Pauper’s competitive scene. As always, before we get to that, we’ve got to look at what the competitive scene looks like…

We’re not quite at that point yet where I have been working on tracking the competitive scene in Pauper for a year. I almost feel like when that point comes there will have to be something special that I’ll have to do, but we did come to a point this week that brought back memories of Competitive Corners long ago. As many of my regular readers might remember, when I first started tracking the Pauper meta I had combined all versions of MonoBlue Control into a single deck-type. That means that MonoBlue Control and DelverBlue were occupying a single space on the deck list. What this resulted in was an obvious domination of the metagame…

Daily Event Results 1/3 – 1/16

We have seen some significantly dominating performances here in the Competitive Corner. In some cases we’ve even seen a single deck-type account for a quarter of all of the week’s showings. This performance by DelverBlue was not that overpowering; however, DelverBlue players did manage to show up in force, as they easily won more than any other deck with a significant 30-win cushion. Just as surprising was the fact that the number-two deck overall was Infect, knocking down the usual Storm contender. This almost makes me want to examine again the split between TPPS and UR Storm, as the combined total would have been only two wins away from beating out Infect. This is not meant to put down how well Infect performed this week, but instead to examine the difference between the two… oh well… that is probably an entire article within itself… *makes note* Other names remained strong as we see a continued resurgence of Goblins and a significant role of Mono-Blue control variants as they managed a total of 141 showings between the three types, approximately 24% of the total. This means if you’re looking to “sleeve up” for an upcoming Daily Event, you best have your game plan ready for some, if not all, forms of Mono-Blue Control.

I do think that it is perhaps time to revisit my old rule where I limited the decks that made it onto this table. Before it was ruled that only one Daily Event per format, per day, would be posted, I had a limit in place for decks. I had it laid out so that any decks that did not show up more than five times within a week would be left off and simply deemed as the week’s rogues. This was altered based on the fact that there were so fewer decks listed out thanks to the new, censored data. The thinking was that there would not be so many different variations on deck types showing up on a weekly basis and this table would not get out of hand. Well, maybe this is simply a result of the madness caused by Force of Will. I think for now, I’ll give it a bit more time just to see if things settle out a little bit, but I will keep in mind that this chart is getting a bit ridiculous in length.

At the bottom of our list, we had a lot of cool things showing up. As usual, we get the few decks here and there that show up from time to time such as Burn and UB Control. More importantly we saw a few decks making a comeback after a long time away. The first is an old favorite of mine, Teachings Control. The deck looks to build up a large mana base and then use Mystical Teachings alongside a toolbox of instant spells in order to control board state and game tempo. This was a very popular deck back in August when we had seen an increase in the number of players who ran Stompy. As the number of aggro decks in the meta increased, so did the number of control decks, with Teachings Control becoming a popular option for both countermagic as well as kill. Reaching even further back, we saw the reappearance of Boros Landfall, which we’ll take a look at in our spotlight for the week. Finally we saw the White Weenie, Soldiers version in one daily event as well. This deck follows your typical Mono-White Aggro strategy with a twist that focuses on the soldier creature type and pumps off of Veteran Armorer, Veteran Armorsmith, and Veteran Swordsmith. The deck never managed to make as big a splash as your typical Mono-White Aggro list because it lacked the card advantage provided by Squadron Hawks as well as the variety of creatures/abilities.

This is where you would normally see the Daily Event spotlight where I break down a specific Daily Event that was not provided. Unfortunately this week, you’re not going to be seeing that. Thanks to some technical issues and a blue screen of death, this is going to have to be forgone for the week. Rest assured, we will be back on schedule with our look at Daily Events next week where I’m going to be doing a month-long summary of what we’ve found in the Pauper meta. While we won’t see our usual Daily Event spotlight, we will take a look at our spotlight deck for the week!

Boros Landfall

The landfall mechanic was first introduced to us back during Zendikar Block. The idea was that whenever a land went into play the extra instance of landfall would be triggered. During the days of Zendikar, the landfall deck was a force to be reckoned with thanks to Steppe Lynx, Plated Geopede, and the Arid Mesa fetch land. Now, while Arid Mesa isn’t a common, both Steppe Lynx and Plated Geopede are. This meant that Pauper had access to this fast deck and could use other fetches such as Terramorphic Expanse or Naya Panorama in order to trigger that landfall ability. More recent printings have even given us a second version of Terramorphic Expanse in the form of Evolving Wilds.

Alongside these two creatures, the deck often runs Adventuring Gear, which basically duplicates the pump effect that both creatures have off of landfall. This ability, coupled with the fetch lands, gives the landfall player the ability to create a big threat on the board at their discretion. Not only do these creatures swing big on command, but the landfall player can also choose to pump creatures to a certain level for effective blocking. The remaining non-creature spells entirely include burn spells in order to really amplify the speed of the deck. Early landfall creatures have the ability to swing for a significant amount of damage, and then the player can follow up that attack with a Lightning Bolt or two to the face to finish the game. The player who decided to bring back this classic list was 2112 and here’s how he was running the list…

This list is pretty typical of what the Landfall decks of Pauper’s past used to look like. Recent sets have not really given the deck anything new to work with, which is part of the reason why the deck has not seen resurgence. There are a few interesting choices such as Blisterstick Shaman, but I can see how landing one past a Counterspell could give the deck a chance to kill Delver of Secrets before it flips. While the Blisterstick Shaman and Kor Hookmaster are the only odd choices for the maindeck, the sideboard has perhaps more interesting cards. A traditional sideboard for the Boros Landfall deck looked to things such as Standard Bearer, which I think still has a good place thanks to popular decks like Stompy, Infect, and Hexproof. I also feel this particular sideboard seems to have a bit of a hole when it comes to facing 8-post variants, but I guess in an ideal world, the Landfall deck wants to race down 8-post before it gets a chance to find itself in the mid-to-late game.

This deck went out of style mostly due to an unfavorable playing environment that was very removal-heavy. In a similar way with WeeFiend, you can simply beat this deck by removing the creature threats. Unlike WeeFiend, this deck does get a bit of an edge by being able to use Adventuring Gear to turn a creature other than Steppe Lynx and Plated Geopede into a landfall-triggered threat. Can it come back? We find ourselves on the verge of a release of another Ravnica-based set where we will once again be reintroduced to the Boros guild. Seeing this deck show up again made me wonder whether or not there would finally be new cards for this deck to use and whether its speed could once again be realized. I won’t go into a lot of detail here in case people are trying to avoid spoilers, but feel free to look up the names. Cards I wonder about with regard to this deck would be things like Madcap Skills, Scorchwalker, or Martial Glory. Will any of these cards be the deck’s savior? Probably not, but it sure is fun to imagine, isn’t it?

The term “hexproof” wasn’t something that we were introduced to until the printing of M12, but that wasn’t the first time we’d seen the idea. For those who aren’t familiar with this mechanic, here’s how it breaks down…

• A permanent with hexproof cannot be the target of spells or abilities that an opponent controls.
• A player with hexproof cannot be the target of spells or abilities that an opponent controls.

The concept is pretty straightforward. With hexproof, nothing can target you or your creatures except for spells that you cast. This gives you the chance to cast beneficial spells on your creatures, but keeps them from being killed through targeted kill such as Doom Blade. So imagine that for a minute. You now have a creature on the battlefield that cannot be removed with targeted kill. The only way that your opponent will be able to remove that creature is through combat damage or edict effects. There is one thing you might notice about our options for edict effects in Magic…

Yep, if you look closely, you’ll see that most of these don’t fall within the boundaries of Pauper’s commons only rule. Out of these ten cards, we have only two playable options with Diabolic Edict and Geth’s Verdict (unplayable would include Grave Exchange). Even then, this list is somewhat jaded towards running heavy black in your deck because of the fact that Geth’s Verdict requires double black mana to play.

Before I go further, I already hear the gnashing of teeth of some people who realize this really isn’t it for options. You’ve got me. There are also global effects that can help you clear out creatures with hexproof, but even these choices are limited by the only-commons restriction. One of my favorites from this global list would include Innocent Blood, which is a global edict effect, but even this requires you to be playing enough black to be able to hit this within the first couple of turns in order for it to be effective. The other global options? Well, since this is Pauper, that means that your other color choice is going to be to be playing red mana for things like Electrickery. The great plus-side is that these spells will kill off Pauper’s hexproof creatures, but the bad side is that it has to be played prior to them being enchanted. This rules out things such as Yamabushi’s Storm, which cannot be cast in response to your opponent’s enchantment. In blue your option is Curfew, which is a great option for clearing already enchanted creatures as long as you realize it will be returning. In an ideal world, your play would be Curfew returning Spellstutter Sprite with mana open to use that countermagic on the replay. This single sideboard option gives DelverBlue a nice advantage for the match, and its heavy play in the current metagame may be partly to blame for Hexproof not being as popular as it could be.

Since there are so many restrictions to what your opponent can do in order to combat your hexproof creatures, the deck becomes tempting to many. So how do people look to take advantage of this ability? While some benefit can be gained off of combat tricks similar to those used by Stompy in the form of Hunger of the Howlpack or Vines of Vastwood. Where these spells go wrong is the fact that these are (in most instances) temporary adjustments. When your entire creature base is made up of 1/1 creatures, you may find benefit from pumping them up, but with “until end of turn” spells they will just go right back to being those non-threatening 1/1s. Enter the enchantments.

When looking for a more permanent solution to making those small creatures into formidable foes, the ideal place to turn is enchantments. Creature enchantments often get no love, but seem to finally find a home in Hexproof decks. For the early versions of the deck, there were always easy choices to bring in. Rancor is a beast of an enchantment that not only allows your creatures to swing for more damage, but also it gains additional benefit from the addition of trample and its recursion effects. Once Rancor hits the table, it becomes very hard to remove as killing the creature or destroying the enchantment only works to return it to your hand for future use. The other bomb enchantment for the early version of the Hexproof deck was Ancestral Mask, which made the creature larger for each other enchantment on the field.

The core of the deck was starting to come together. The idea for abusing the hexproof mechanic was in place and the deck just required a few more spells in order to make it a real contender. Enter Ethereal Armor. With the printing of Return to Ravnica, we were introduced into perhaps an odd enchantment for the set. This new enchantment would work to be the definition of power creep when compared to its predecessor. Just take a look at how one-sided things are between these two spells…

Allow me to quickly clarify that last box there. If we take a look at the wording on Ancestral Mask, it says that it will make the enchanted creature bigger for each other enchantment on the battlefield. Looking at the wording on Ethereal Armor, we see that it makes creatures bigger for each enchantment. What this means is that when you put down an Ethereal Armor on a 1/1 creature where that is your only enchantment, the creature becomes a 2/2. If you have an Ancestral Mask with no other enchantments, then that creature remains a 1/1. These two enchantments really don’t compare. In the late game, when you have more enchantments on the field, Ancestral Mask becomes a powerhouse, but in the early game you can’t compete with the ability of Ethereal Armor.

The only drawback that would come with the inclusion of Ethereal Armor would be that the deck would be required to run a second color since the majority of hexproof creatures have been printed in green. Key word there is “would”. In fact, the early versions of Hexproof, those made and ran prior to the printing of Ethereal Armor, were already running white mana in order to grab Armadillo Cloak. This meant that the inclusion of this new enchantment really didn’t require any significant alteration of the manabase beyond the fact that Hexproof players could now reduce the number of lands that they were running in favor of some of green’s single-cost land enchantments. So let’s take a look at a few versions of what the modern day Hexproof deck looks like…

As you can see, the card choices between both versions are relatively similar. There is a significant core that we can clearly see at each of the card slots.

The defined creature base focuses on a set of hexproof creatures that come in at a cheap cost. Slippery Boggle and Gladecover Scout are basically the same creature, as both will be played for a single green mana and start off as a 1/1. The remaining hexproof creature is Silhana Ledgewalker, which costs more for the same 1/1 body, but gains the added benefit of requiring flying to block. The creature base for this deck is surprisingly small for an aggro-based strategy, but the deck gets an additional bruiser in the form of Aura Gnarlid. The Aura Gnarlid gains additional evasion for the deck with its blocking requirements, but in most lists, it only showed up as a set, as you see in the first list. This always seemed a little odd, but my thought base was that because it was lacking that hexproof ability, it would be squishy. Newer lists, such as that run by deluxeicoff, are starting to realize that a threat is a threat, squishy or otherwise, and so are running a full set.

There really is little else to mention when it comes to the non-creature spells of the deck. The majority is creature-based auras and then the remainder is going to be land enchantments to help raise that aura count. From here, I think it’s best to take a quick look at my thoughts on the deck and then after hearing from me, we’ll get to hear from someone with great competitive background with this particular deck…

Author’s Note: The following interview has been edited for the salvation of my OCD so that it is in sentence-structure only. All provided content remains intact.

JustSin: So you’re now playing Hexproof exclusively?

deluxeicoff: Yup

J: Why the change from Stompy?

D: Stompy is a great deck first off, but in the current metagame I find it lacking. Mostly versus Storm it is at best 50/50 and that is with the nut hand. Having 90% of your stuff untouchable is a great boon. One of the main benefits to this deck is that you appear to be a noob… for years many players have tried to make this kind of strategy work, but it hasn’t (until the inclusion of the powerhouse combo of Ethereal Armor and Ancestral Mask)been more than a tier 2 strategy at best. Stompy is actually the deck’s best matchup outside of 8-post, which is usually a total joke. Make no mistake the appearance of being an ‘idiot noob’ is a powerful one.

Author’s Note: Can I just say how awesome that last line is??:

“The appearance of being an ‘idiot noob’ is a powerful one.” ™

J: What are the deck’s biggest strengths?

D: You simply have to draw bad for your opponent to win… that’s a nice place to be.

J: So could we correctly assume that the deck’s biggest strength is the Hexproof mechanic and the biggest weakness is the fact that your creatures have 1 toughness?

D: I agree… Electrickery at the right time can obviously be devastating, which is why the Bond Beetle tech versus edicts or Curfew effects is so important, but that is rare in my experience. While Electrickery is a great card there are so many ways to negate it that it still becomes a cointoss.

J: Does the deck have an ideal hand? Is it a must to drop your hand down until you get at least one creature?

D: Forest, Utopia Sprawl, Ethereal Armor, Slippery Boggle, Rancor, etc. – the ‘etc.’ can really be anything, but yes a creature is a must.

J: Does the use of guildgates slow the deck down any?

D: Not at all. Hundreds of test draws in solitary games proved this in early stages. Access to white is paramount and my build has 16 ways to do it… SIXTEEN! It’s a big number and one that wasn’t arrived at lightly because consistency wins tourneys. Yet another reason that Lush Growth is a sleeper MVP. Have access? Cool, let’s screw with our opponent’s mana. If not? You can take a turn where it comes into play tapped and still have the same basic board position.

J: Well that’s why I was curious because you DO have so many other ways to get white mana beyond the gates.

D: First turn gate rarely has beaten my stats.

J: When playing Hexproof is it best to try and spread out enchantments to combat edict effects?

D: No, quite the opposite actually. I pile them on one guy.

J: What about Aura Gnarlid? Do you think it’s necessary to run a full set of them?

D: They’re not as vulnerable as you’d think. Versus 8-post, once the Aura Gnarlids are 5/5, you’re good to go. Really ask the reverse… in a Hexproof deck why the heel? Because they win games outright. Answer it NOW or lose.

J: So you’re saying it basically creates a split threat?

D: Exactly. Like I said before if I had a mantra it would be “BE THE PROBLEM”. Sure some decks have the answer, but over time/odds they won’t.

J: Is it reasonable to say that you’d rarely enchant Aura Gnarlids because of their vulnerability?

D: Right. Now obviously if I’m facing an Innocent Blood/edict version build of 8-post and I have a 1/1 Slippery Boggle out then I’ll enchant the hell out of Aura Gnarlid, but otherwise no.

J: What are your thoughts on the consistency of the deck?

D: That’s an insult buddy! I’ve been running it for 3 months straight haven’t I?!

J: Well yea, but do you mean to tell me that you’re winning every event that you join??

D: Consider Stompy which runs 17 lands and one color. Well this runs two, but the second color has 16 access points! Nuts! I win about 83% at 3-1 or better.

J: Ok then what are the match-ups like?

D: Versus Storm you have a solid lock with Benevolent Unicorn and Standard Bearer. Versus Stompy or the mirror nothing is nastier than a 4/4 first striking Standard Bearer… those flags just got dyed in blood baby! The best matches by far are 8-post and Stompy. MonoBlue Control is nasty if they go first with the nuts, but then again what deck isn’t? Again the key (and I know this sounds silly, but in game play it’s very important) is Lush Growth. Many a time I cast it on their Island prolonging a Spire Golem or stopping a Counterspell from being relevant and so on. Funny stat I lose a LOT of my first games. Something many players neglect is the sideboard. Sideboarding is 2/3rds of Magic and I pride myself on being a great chemist in this regard.

J: In your opinion what’s the most effective way to counter Hexproof decks?

D: Go first and be “the problem”. Enchantments are powerful for a reason. They’re traditionally easily countered, but not so much here. Selesnya is here to stay, Wizards has done a fantastic job of balancing power in my opinion.

J: You make it sound so great… so why doesn’t it see more play?…

D: I remember how “silly” Psychatog was in PT San Diego literally the week before it exploded? Similar in scope.

So there we have it, right from the mouth of a player who has played the deck to extensive lengths in numerous competitive events. However we still didn’t really get our answer. Why doesn’t this deck see more play? In an attempt to dig deeper into this situation, I got a chance to play some matches against deluxeicoff to see what information I could glean from the different aspects of the deck. If you’ve watched my deck video above, then you’ll know what’s coming, but for those who haven’t had a chance just yet, well, here’s what I did. We played out three different matches where deluxe ran his version of Hexproof (a list that despite his best efforts has become quite meta these days). These matches represented the three different angles from which one would see Hexproof: a favorable match, an unfavorable match, and a mirror match.

Again, for those who may not be able to watch these videos right away, here are some of the highlights…

In the favorable match, I sat down with IzzetPost, easily the most popular version of 8-post in the meta today. During our discussion, deluxe had mentioned how this, along with Stompy, was one of the deck’s best matches. This proved to be easily true. IzzetPost’s only creature answers come in the form of targeted kill, which can only hit Aura Gnarlid and only if it is within range (an often unlikely scenario). After sideboarding, IzzetPost does gain access to things such as Electrickery (if it was not already running a copy or two in the main), but this falls under the disadvantage that deluxe had mentioned earlier. I could cast off Electrickery in order to wipe the board, but at most it would kill two to three creatures if I were lucky, and then he’d have an opportunity to bring out new ones. If you watch the video, I really stress how much worse this gets for the IzzetPost player after sideboarding because of the Benevolent Unicorn‘s effect to continue reducing damage.

In the mirror match, I used the exact same list as deluxe with the only exception being that I ran a set of the Bond Beetles in my sideboard, whereas deluxe ran Spore Frogs. This match really did often come down to who got the first move or who had the better draw because you both can do gross things. The MVP in most mirror games will be Silhana Ledgewalker, which cannot be defended up until the point of sideboarding, where it becomes a race to see who gets Standard Bearer on the field first. If your opponent gets one down before you, then it is pretty well game over since you won’t be able to put any creature enchantments on the field until you find your own.

In the unfavorable match, I brought a homebrew version of Teachings Control. For those who may not be as familiar, Teachings Control is a blue-black control deck that uses countermagic alongside creature kill in order to dictate tempo. My particular version is very unfriendly for Hexproof as it runs Innocent Blood and Diabolic Edicts in addition to a control package that is only limited by 24 lands and 4 creatures. As expected, the Hexproof deck could easily get off to a fast start, but if Teachings found legs, then it was game over.

So now I had a better understanding of the deck and what it looked like from all sides. In the favorable match, it just sits back and wins. Unfavorable required a bit more maneuvering, but there was still a chance. On paper there is little reason not to run this deck… and yet?

Maybe it is the stigma attached to the deck. Do we really sit back, look at this deck, and call it a fluke? Can a deck be considered a top threat if it isn’t run by the masses? Well, now you’ve been presented with the evidence. You make the decision…

Check me out on Twitter @MTGOJustSin.