Dime a Dozen #21: Let’s Brew Pauper with Dragon’s Maze

Hello everyone! Dragon’s Maze has been fully spoiled, and it’s time to put our brewing caps on. Before we get started though, let’s assess the quality of the set’s commons and see what cards we can get excited about.

So what cards can we get excited about?

…

…Where did all these crickets come from?

In all honesty, things aren’t that bleak, but Dragon’s Maze on the whole is a very underwhelming set for Classic Pauper. First of all, it’s a notably small set (the first I’ve reviewed in article form) and therefore intrinsically shallow. We’re talking eight commons per color total, and ten multicolored. That’s not a lot to work with. Additionally, it’s following up a pair of expansions in Return to Ravnica and Gatecrash that have been rather kind to us Pauper heads. Just how kind? Let’s take a look.

We have Return to Ravnica and Gatecrash to thank for the guildgates. These duals have appeared in decks such as Izzet Cloudpost, Hexproof, Izzet Fiend and variations of Dimir. They’ve also given Standard Pauper decks superior manabases in conjunction with Evolving Wilds. Additionally, Delver, Goblins, Hexproof and Izzet Cloudpost have all received boosts from the cards Frostburn Weird, Foundry Street Denizen, Ethereal Armor and Electrickery respectively. Cloudfin Raptor and Daring Skyjek have made their way into winning decklsts to a lesser degree as well. That’s three lands and six spells that have contributed to the format thus far (at least on the more competitive side of things). In other words, Dragon’s Maze has a tough couple of acts to follow. Unfortunately for us, there isn’t a whole lot that will actually shake up the format (at least from what I can see).

For the purpose of brewing with Dragon‘s Maze, we may have to get a little more creative (and potentially casual) than usual. Nothing wrong with that of course! I think it’s about time we dive into Dragon’s Maze.

The One-Eyed Man is King

It’s quite clear that Nivix Cyclops is the most anticipated card of the set for Classic Pauper. I say this because others have already discussed and written about Cyclops’ inclusion in the pre-existing Kiln Fiend-plus-Wee Dragonauts deck, and rightfully so. The benefit Cylcops has over Fiend is that it can survive in the red zone more frequently due to its additional 2 toughness. Moreover, it receives an additional +1/+0 beyond Dragonauts from instants or sorceries, making it reasonably formidable despite not having built-in evasion. All in all, Cylcops is likely the best Pauper card of the set (though some of my honorable mentions have the potential to usurp that title).

Since Cyclops already has a pretty obvious home, it will be our job to try and design the best version of that home. Here’s what I came up with:

Izzet Fiend by Jason Moore

creatures (16) 4 Delver of Secrets 4 Kiln Fiend 4 Nivix Cyclops 4 Wee Dragonauts Other spells (25) 4 Apostle’s Blessing 2 Artful Dodge 3 Assault Strobe 2 Dispel 2 Electrickery 3 Gitaxian Probe 4 Lightning Bolt 4 Ponder 1 Preordain Lands (19) 1 Evolving Wilds 8 Island 4 Izzet Guildgate 6 Mountain Sideboard (15) 3 Boomerang 1 Dispel 1 Electrickery 2 Flame Slash 2 Flaring Pain 3 Hydroblast 3 Pyroblast

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Izzet Fiend wins by pumping a guy with instants and sorceries, granting said guy double strike, unblockability, etc., and dealing lethal damage. This can occur over multiple turns, or sometimes in one fell swoop. In that sense it is comparable to Infect, and with the addition of Cyclops, it now has a creature count that is on par with the poison strategy. The downside is that unlike Infect, Izzet Fiend must deal 20 damage instead of 10, and plays eight creatures with a multicolored 3 CMC price tag. Hopefully the creature base is self-explanatory, but if you have any questions, let me know in the comments section. For the purpose of this article I’m going to move right into the instants and sorceries.

Buffs and Protection

Apostle’s Blessing is going to be our most versatile protection spell, as it thwarts enchantments, artifacts and other forms of targeted removal. It also prevents defending creatures from blocking, which can be a critical asset to this kind of strategy. Because of the low creature count, keeping guys alive can be crucial. This is the primary reason we’re playing four copies of Blessing.

Artful Dodge is next, and generally would be an effect that we’d like to play three copies of (since we’d like to see one in most games, but having multiples early can be overkill). However, because this spell has flashback, and because we also play dig spells to fish for it, I noticed that even three copies of this effect are perhaps too many. It also has some overlap with Apostle’s Blessing, which can sometimes provide the same effect.

One of the real haymakers of the deck is Assault Strobe, which can one-shot an opponent with Cyclops or Fiend, and two other instants or sorceries. Three copies seems just about right, though an argument for the full set could be made.

Doubling as an interactive counter and a protection spell are the two Dispels, which ensure that a creature or pump will resolve, a Snap or Galvanic Blast (for instance) won’t, or that a lethal pump from Stompy won’t ruin our racing plans. Playing two copies is reasonable for a card that will improve some of our Game 1s in specific matchups.

Cantrips

The cantrip that takes priority in this deck (in my opinion) is Ponder. Ponder is BFFs with Delver of Secrets, because it sets up a flip so effectively. Preordain acts as a virtual fifth copy, though I considered playing Serum Visions instead. Visions can get Delver to flip even if you choose to bottom one of the cards with scry, but ultimately Preordain will be better in other scenarios when you want to draw a threat or protection spell immediately. These spells are followed up by three copies of Gitaxian Probe, which is an important free spell to pump creatures, draw into additional pumps, and identify what cards to play around.

Removal and Burn

Sometimes you just need to remove a blocker or resort to direct damage, which is why we’re playing a full set of Lightning Bolts. Having Electrickery around in the main may not be completely necessary, but I think there are enough Faeries, Goblins, Elves and Hexproof-heavy boards in the format to warrant its inclusion as a Game 1 hedge. Typically in this deck it’s important to have the option of hitting a player’s face with our burn spells, so something like Chain Lightning over Electrickery might actually be correct.

Sideboarding

The sideboard is far from a masterpiece, but here is a brief overview. Boomerang is meant to set Cloudpost and Karoo-based Temporal Fissure decks back on mana while we beat them down. Dispel is mostly for the Mono-Red Burn decks (so if you can think of a better option against them, feel free to sub that one out). Burn seems like a particularly tough matchup, since almost every spell in their deck can double as a way to remove our creatures. Electrickery combats the smaller dudes in swarm strategies, since their clock may outperform ours at times. The same goes for Hexproof. To fend off Affinity and Stompy, we have two copies of Flame Slash. Anyone attempting to Fog our combo by casting Moment’s Peace will also have to be concerned about Flaring Pain. For Affinity, Burn, Goblins and Izzet Cloudpost we’re packing Hydroblasts, and for almost anyone blue we’ve got Pyroblast.

Izzet Fiend is a deck you should be looking out for not only when Dragon’s Maze is released on MTGO, but also in these weeks leading up to it (as players will be taking this time to familiarize themselves with the deck). No matter which side of the table you plan to be on in a match that involves Izzet Fiend, make sure you’re prepared!

Best-Laid Plans

There hasn’t been much talk about Pilfered Plans, and perhaps there’s a reason for that. Plans lacks the versatility of Consult the Necrosages (which has seen some Pauper play, and can be either a Divination or a Mind Rot). It’s also generally unexciting…if you’re thinking of using the mill effect on your opponent. If you’re playing a deck where you want to mill yourself, however, this card becomes quite appealing. It gets us ahead on cards, and generates additional card advantage by enabling various graveyard interactions. What kind of graveyard interactions? Perhaps something along these lines:

Dimir Tortured Existence by Jason Moore

Creatures (28) 4 Carrion Feeder 2 Golgari Brownscale 3 Grave Scrabbler 3 Makeshift Mauler 4 Merfolk Looter 2 Mesmeric Fiend 4 Perilous Myr 4 Stinkweed Imp 2 Viscera Seer Other spells (10) 3 Pilfered Plans 4 Tortured Existence 3 Victim of Night Land (22) 4 Dimir Guildgate 2 Evolving Wilds 2 Island 12 Swamp 2 Terramorphic Expanse

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I haven’t figured out a sideboard yet, but I’m curious to see how this deck works out. Tortured Existence has been explored in a few color combinations already, and Dimir certainly has some things to offer. For those of you unfamiliar with Existence decks, they essentially are focused on graveyard and recursion synergies, namely between Tortured Existence, Grave Scrabbler and creatures with the dredge mechanic.

In this list, sacrifice outlets in the form of Carrion Feeder and Viscera Seer populate the yard, as do discard effects (Merfolk Looter, Pilfered Plans, and Tortured Existence). The dredge creatures Stinkweed Imp and Golgari Brownscale (which we can’t actually cast, but is a potent source of life gain with Existence) also ensure that the bin is plenty full.

Makeshift Mauler might end up being too slow and expensive, but otherwise helps close out games alongside an enlarged Carrion Feeder. It’s very nice to have a creature that survives combat with Affinity, Galvanic Blast, Stompy creatures with Rancor, etc. Mesmeric Fiend and Perilous Myr both work well with sacrifice abilities, and Victim of Night is one of the least-often “blanked” spot removal spells around.

I think this may be one of the best homes for Pilfered Plans, but others may arise in due time.

First Impressions

It’s easy to forget amidst all the spoiler excitement that at the end of the day…sometimes you just gotta bring the beats! Viashino Firstblade excels in that department, giving us 4 power on a hasted body for 3 mana. Combine that with one of the more relevant Pauper creature types (soldier, not viashino) and a cool-as-Hell flavor text, and you’ve got something that definitely grabs my attention.

Since Firstblade naturally puts us in Boros colors, I’ve drawn up an aggressive list that plays red and white, but utilizes red as more of a splash than as an equal shareholder. Here is what I’ve got so far:

White Lightning by Jason Moore

Creatures (29) 1 Aven Riftwatcher 2 Doomed Traveler 4 Icatian Javelineers 2 Kor Skyfisher 4 Leonin Skyhunter 4 Loyal Cathar 4 Squadron Hawk 4 Viashino Firstblade 4 War Falcon Other spells (10) 4 Chain Lightning 4 Lightning Bolt 2 Prismatic Strands Lands (21) 4 Boros Guildgate 2 Evolving Wilds 2 Mountain 11 Plains 2 Terramorphic Expanse Sideboard (15) 2 Aven Riftwatcher 2 Electrickery 1 Gorilla Shaman 1 Prismatic Strands 3 Pyroblast 3 Smash to Smithereens 3 Standard Bearer

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Currently the biggest problem is the occasionally clunky mana. I’ve tried to mitigate this by relegating red to a splash color, but if you wanted to try the opposite and make the deck primarily red, I’m sure you could do that, too. I’d also like to get some kind of land destruction into the sideboard, but I don’t know what the best options are (probably Raze, since Molten Rain is hard to splash, and like Stone Rain is a little slow at 3 mana).

Otherwise this is a pretty straightforward War Falcon shell, with a lower Kor Skyfisher count than usual. Since our mana is slightly slower as it is, we don’t want multiple Skyfishers in hand with nothing but lands to bounce. There’s still plenty of good bounce targets, from Aven Riftwatcher to Icatian Javelineers to flipped Loyal Cathars to Viashino Firstblade himself.

This list as a whole is one that probably needs some more tweaking, but I think it could prove to be quite fun.

Honorable Mentions

The first of my honorable mentions is a card called Hidden Strings. The most logical home (or use, even) for this card is an utter mystery to me, but I’ve heard talk of some potentially explosive interactions between Arbor Elf and a forest enchanted with some sort of Overgrowth effect. Is that something that could impact Pauper? Beats me. I wouldn’t be surprised to see something degenerate going on with this card, though. I’ll definitely leave figuring it out to those who are more “Johnny” than I.

The next honorable mention is Uncovered Clues. I’m not too excited about this card, but others seem to be. Perhaps they are better at evaluating its worth than I am, but to me this looks disappointing at sorcery speed, especially when sometimes you’ll whiff and get worse than a Divination. What deck right now is going to want this, and why is it better than the other blue dig spells currently available? In spite of my doubts I’ll give this a mention since I could just be way off base here.

As far as other mentions, I don’t think I have any. Sadly, I’m just not too excited by this set for Clasic Pauper. Standard Pauper will have a bit more to appreciate, but I expect the Classic Pauper format to be relatively unmoved.

End Step

Please let me know in the comments section what you think of the article. What cards did I miss? Which ones am I right or wrong about? Do you think Dragon’s Maze will be making a big splash in the coming months? Your input is very much appreciated. Until next time (and as always), thanks for reading… and please comment!

You can find Jason
hosting the Pauper’s Cage podcast
on MTGO as BambooRush
on Twitter @dimecollectorsc
and on Youtube at youtube.com/dimecollectorsc