By Betão [Monarchs], 08/30/20
This article belongs to the series Starting to play the Pauper format:
1. Got excited about Pauper and want to get into it! Where should I start?
2. Pauper: What to expect when you are waiting!
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Cranial Plating
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Frantic Search
had its end since it would draw cards and untap lands, something that the notorious Storm decks would abuse to achieve combo easier.Temporal Fissure
andCloudpost
were banned. In the previous ban wizards also thought to take outTemporal Fissure
because, some decks were also presenting risky numbers, however, this card wasn't as oppressive as the others, so they tried to leave it alone. It didn't last much. After the release ofGhostly Flicker
, decks that relied on ETB effects became even stronger since, besides being more efficient in its strategy and having a way to defend its creatures and artifacts they could also target a land they own to produce more mana. Decks such asTemporal Wall
andUR Tron Post
unhealthily stood out in victories. Temporal Wall abused flicking some of its permanents, mainlyMnemonic Wall
, returning cards with storm and reusing them to almost clear the opponent's field in a single turn.Ad
UG Locus
:Treasure Cruise
may be considered one of the cards that should never have been printed as common. This card was responsible for reducing the diversity of the metagame as it was the most present card in all decks, excluding islands. So on March 23 of 2015 the ban hammer came. In the following year, the familiar was again a problem. Having a card that untaps lands, alongside the black and white familiars (that reduces the manacost) a player can easily produce infinite mana having the combination ofMnemonic Wall
,Cloud of Faeries
andGhostly Flicker
, then he easily searches for or has a win con. Blue cards were dominant, 9 out of 10 of the most used cards were blue. Diversity once more became a problem, and in the end the ban was needed, the card above was the victim on January 22 of 2016.Peregrine Drake
alongside the previous ban, although its winrate wasn't out of the curve yet, so Wizards decided to leave it be for the time hoping for Pauper to adapt to it. Clearly, that wasn't the case, the winrate rose quickly side by side to the number of the decks in online tournaments, getting to the point where they represented one forth of the field. Inevitably there had to be another announcement in November of 2016, leaving behind another bully deck, Izzet Drake:Foil
added to the deck was way too strong. Now the player could be tapped out, cast gush, draw two cards, discard 2 cards and counter a spell withFoil
while filling its graveyard, enablingGurmang Angler
delve ability earlier in the game. It is important to say that opponents also had cold feet to make actions without extra mana sinceDaze
could also counter them. The deck had high synergy, "fetches" would fill the grave along side lots low cost instant and sorcerys. The can trips made easy finding another threats such asDelver of Secrets
and flipping it. The whole format had to have lots of answers to try to win against it, sometimes the easier path was just playing with it. Seeing that, Wizards decided to weaken the Blue color banning the cards bellow:Ad
Modern Horizons
was released and showed pauper some new cards likeEphemerate
andArcum's Astrolabe
. This artifact brought the ice age to the format. Lots of decks tried to take advantage of the bonus that astrolabe came with while fixing their mana. The card was the perfect one drop because any snow basic land could pay its cost. The card made Pauper into a too fast format with lots of decks using it. Snow Bogles Tron also bet on a snow version, but the deck that really took off wasJeskai Ephemerate
. It could generate infinite resources and, due to this, its winrate rose to the point were it would be in 5 spots of top 8 in tournaments.UR Skred
,Mono Blue
due to the interaction between (Tragic Lesson),Deprive
and the recent banned card: This card managed to make these decks to survive to late game and win with its advantage. Shoulder-to-shoulder to sanctuaryExpedition Map
also said goodbye to Pauper. Lots of players had been asking for a hit on Tron decks as they were always strong. That's all the banned cards we have until now, I hope all of you liked the article. I'd like to take this paragraph to also thank Cards Realm for the support, space, and trust. I extent my gratitude to Vipermats for offering a 10% discount in any playmat, its pretty easy redeeming it, you just need to create an account on Cards Realm, using either your Facebook or Google, and comment in one of my articles #querodesconto that I will forward you the code. That's it for to day, thank you for your time and until the next article!