Pauper: BG Project X Deck Tech & SIdeboard Guide

Welcome everyone and I hope you all like the article and can clear your doubts with the tips. My name is Burt Lancaster, aka Burt of Paradise, because of the Birds of Paradise card.

So let's talk about Project X, a deck that has been my personal project for years!

Project X is an Aggro-Combo deck that uses a combination of creatures, being able to perform an infinite power cycle, and/or gain infinite life and/or infinite life loss, with card advantage and some effective removals.

Carrion Feeder is the key piece of the combo that makes it work infinite times. With him alone at the board, your opponent will do anything to kill it. With its sac effect, you can perform the combo until it has infinite power.

Safehold Elite is the second piece of the combo, with the ability Persist, where the loop will focus on it dying and coming back with a -1/-1 counter which will be nullified by the third piece.

Ivy Lane Denizen is the third piece in the combo, making the -1/-1 counter be nullified when another green creature enters the battlefield under your control. With this, every time Safehold Elite dies, it can return to the battlefield, cancel the -1/-1 counter and be able to sacrifice infinite times with Carrion Feeder.

How to Combo? How to Tutor?

These are the 3 initial creatures necessary for the combo to start, but we have others in the deck that make the game can be finished faster or even prevent you from losing easily, having infinite life.

The Wirewood Herald is an important tutor in the deck, as he can go after the combo pieces, being able to get an elf-type card when he dies, such as Essence Warden, Ivy Lane Denizen, Safehold Elite Masked Vandal or Jaspera Sentinel.

In other lists it is also possible to test Nameless Inversion, Eyeblight's Ending and Entourage of Trest according to the Metagame.

Our draw spells are Deadly Dispute, Reckoner's Bargain alongside Ichor Wellspring, a powerful combo in the current format.

As removals, we have Cast Down and Snuff Out, being effective and even dealing with a threat out of nowhere by paying the alternate cost.

And as we all know, faeries have always been present in the format for years, and we have Jaspera Sentinel to help against this matchup while improving our mana.

A good starting hand should have at least 2 lands, preferably Green and Black, and creatures for one or two mana to develop your game.

For a starting hand to combo at 3, you need to start from Forest + Jaspera Sentinel on turn 1, on Turn 2, Swamp, Carrion Feeder and Safehold Elite, and on your 3rd turn another land to add 4 mana using Elite with Jaspera, cast Ivy Lane Denizen, and start the loop to attack with Carrion Feeder with infinite power.

A recommended hand is to play Jaspera on 1 or a tapped land, and on turn 2, play Jaspera or Elite or Wellspring.

But it's always better to play creatures in the first turns, with that, we can pressure them even without our combo, since our opponent always has a chance to respond and break it if we focus too much in going infinite too soon. Later on, we focus on our draw spells because when you already have the answer in hand, you don't have to look for the pieces.

Let's discuss the idea of ​​the sideboard and which match to use the cards, increasing the odds of winning the games.

Crypt Rats is chosen instead of Suffocating Fumes or Arms of Hadar because you can return it with Unearth, allowing us to reuse it. It can be slow against some games, but the deck manages to hold it for long enough for Rats to clean up the board. We will generally run it against Elves, Faeries, Caw Gate, Boros Bully, and Bogles.

In this list, after testing Relic of Progenitus and/or Nihil Spellbomb, I decided to play with Faerie Macabre because its ability can be used at any time, catching the opponent off guard. In the latter case, it is also possible to return it with Unearth.

We will add it against Reanimate, UW Familiar, Jeskai Ephemerate, Boros Bully (mainly taking Prismatic Strands at end of turn), Turbo Fog, and Tron if it appears.

One removal that has grown a lot on the sideboard has been Edicts, each having the space it needs on each deck.

I chose Chainer's Edict since it adds some extra value on grindy matchups, and we're not that afraid of graveyard hate anyway.

We will run it against Heroic, Hot Dog, Bogles and decks with Guardian of the Guildpact (Boros Gate, Caw Gate and BW Pestilence, etc) and can even use it against Faeries to deal with a turn 2 ninja.

Everyone knows that cards with Storm have always been a bit broken, and that's also true for lifegain. In green, Weather the Storm is the best lifegain spell available.

We will use it against Burn (Traditional and Midrange), Rakdos Burn, Dot Dog, Red Deck Wins and Stompy, which are fast decks.

When it comes to choosing an Artifact and enchantment removal, we have several options, such as Gleeful Sabotage or Return to Nature that we can use more often or with more variety of effects. But since Affinity is an ever-present deck in the format and has Indestructible lands, I chose Deglamer, as it will help both against it and against decks that run Bridges wih Cleansing Wildfire.

We will run Deglamer against Affinity, Heroic, Bogles, Indestructible Artifact Lands (especially if they're animated with Kenku Artificer), Caw Gate (against Journey), BW Pestilence, among others that run graveyard hate to slow you down.

Finishing the side we have 1 copy of each, to complete the Main deck, against Control or decks that run many artifacts or enchantments.

Masked Vandal will assist you in removing artifacts and enchantments, playing against decks that Degramer enters as well.

Duress will be used against Faeries, UW Familiar, Tron, BW Pestilence, Burn and Rakdos Burn.

Vs Affinity

This match is quite complicated as they run permanents that can clear our board against small threats and draw a lot with spells and their own artifacts. But they are slow on the first turns, starting to be as of turn three and four.

IN:

OUT:

Your initial strategy will be to focus on the Bridges, as they won't be able to develop the game well. With Deglamer and Vandal, we can manage to delay their game for long enough.

If these cards don't come at your starting hand, you can play on top of the combo - remembering that there are cards that are still effective removals that take the artifact creatures out of it. If you think there is no need for Snuff Out, you can exchange it for 2 Chainer's Edict.

Vs Rakdos Burn

This matchup is a fast game, where your opponent is slowly burning you and recovering their life, in addition to keeping the gas running with draw spells. Our strategy in this game will be to survive and try to combo as soon as possible to finish.

IN:

OUT:

In this matchup, it's essential to gain life to slow them down, and it's recommended to play Duress when they're tapped out to avoid giving them the opportunity to cast a Madness spell.

As they run black creatures, we replaced Snuff Out with Chainer's Edict, and since Jaspera is not effective and doesn't take cards out of the combo, we enter with storm to gain life.

Always try to cast Essence Warden to gain life with creatures, and value every life you gain.

Vs UW Cyborgs

This matchup is almost identical to traditional Affinity, the difference is that it manages to pressure you very fast due to their cheap threats. It also runs Galvanic Blast as a splash.

IN:

OUT:

As most of their creatures aren't artifacts, we don't need to focus so much on artifact hate. Instead, focus on dealing with their creatures for long enough to Crypt Rats to hit the board and wipe them out. Deglamer should be used on Journey to Nowhere or graveyard hate.

Vs Bw Custodi

This deck is the traditional BW with many White creatures, which generates value with ETB effects. It's a boring match, focused on the gravetard, with too few removal, which we manage to play around.

IN:

OUT:

In this match, we took some copies of Jaspera Sentinel because it is not that effective, as their flying creatures have 2 power.

Crypt Rats is for clearing the board on the late-game.

Deglamer will focus on Journey to Nowhere, Pestilence or Omen of the Dead, whichever is inconvenient throughout the game. And Chainer's Edict is to kill Guardian of the Guildpact in case it hits too fast and there are no other creatures in play.

Vs Izzet Faeries

Playing decks that have effective counterspells and removals is always tricky.

So, we have to play with caution and always try to bait them with the least useful stuff so what really needs to be on the board has a chance of actually getting in and surviving.

IN:

OUT:

In this matchup, to avoid giving them too much value with their Spellstutter Sprite, I decided to take some of the Carrion Feeder and Essence Warden.

Always play imagining what they might have in hand, try not to let or delay the entry of Ninja of the Deep Hours, so they don't have more resources than you. If a fast ninja enters, we must focus on killing it with Chainer's Edict as soon as possible, and if they don't have removal, try to delay their game with Elite or Wirewood.

Project X is an Aggro Combo deck, which can be quick to combo or attack your opponent, having several responses to the current Metagame. Don't always try to win only in the combo, every life point you can take from your opponent will help you finish without the combo.

Magic: the Gathering is a game of strategy, so it's always important to play with what your opponent might have in hand and try to get around their plays. When you start the starting hand with 7 cards, you have to set up the game plan and plan your next 3 turns.

This is a deck you don't see much of in Leagues or tournaments, but whenever possible, I'm playing the tournaments with it and getting results.

I hope you all enjoyed it and have fun playing with the tips I left! Remembering that we have FREE Tournaments here at Cards Realm, in addition to other Deck Tech articles!

Until next time!