Is playing without Treasure Cruise even worthwhile in Pauper? Jason makes an attempt with White Weenie in the 2-mans, but the common dorks might end up getting roasted.
I should’ve known.
Ever since getting my hands on Treasure Cruise I’ve been of the opinion that blue is clearly the best way to go in Classic Pauper. Delver of Secrets certainly hammers that point home, since both he and Cruise like the idea of cheap instants and sorceries. But it’s not about any one piece of the puzzle, it’s the totality. The sheer brokenness that blue has been known for year after magical year. Cards that are so powerful they’ve yet to be outclassed, and are in some cases banned. Counterspell. Hydroblast. Gush. And it’s the color that draws the most cards? And it’s proactive, if not outright aggressive? Yes. A hundred times yes. Sign me up for that.
I should’ve known that straying from blue would have repercussions…
…But every once in a while you like to test the waters. And since I’ve had a long-running interest in Mono White, it didn’t seem like all that much could go wrong. Granted, my last attempt at playing white was an unmitigated disaster, but this time I’ve got a tuned list on my side! Compliments of AndreyS, the Pauper captain of the White Weenie archetype.
White Weenie by AndreyS
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While not thrilled about the components of this list (as you might notice during the deck tech video), I was willing to give it a try before making adjustments. I will say that playing a fair deck in the current environment is pretty much the last thing I’d want to be doing, especially when there is so little card advantage to go along with it.
Where is Doomed Traveler? Loyal Cathar? Safehold Elite? Anything to keep the fires lit would be nice, but in the end it all pales in comparison to the almighty Cruise.
If anything I should be familiar with the deck’s style by now, so let’s see how it goes!
End Step
I ended up cutting things short because essentially I’d seen enough. If four Order of Leitbur main and two Obsidian Acolyte after board is not enough to beat MBC than I don’t know why we should bother. There once was a time when white was the best life gain color, but that’s ancient history. These days the best life gain spell around is Gray Merchant of Asphodel and it doesn’t seem like our hate bears do a good enough job of combating him.
Long story short, looks like I’ll be playing blue next time! I’m a fan of both the Delver and Fiend decks from my previous articles, so unless someone makes a compelling request expect to see one of those back soon!
I hope you enjoyed watching these matches, and please let me know if you have any questions or suggestions.
Until next time, my fellow commoners!
R1: How is bringing in Crimson Acolyte bad? It completely blanks the Skreds, and foils Tribal Flames some of the time. The protection extends to other creatures too. And, it’s a weenie like the rest.
xiaosha – Thanks for the comment! In my opinion the cons outweigh the pros.
Acolyte doesn’t completely blank Skred, it occasionally blanks Skred when we can afford to keep up mana and make the assumption that they’re holding it. That line also assumes we have a creature better than Acolyte on the table that we want to protect, so why not just play creatures better than Acolyte altogether?
The creature matchups need to be fought on the board, and a 1/1 for two mana is a terrible rate that doesn’t fight a single creature in their deck.