Pauper Set Review: The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth

The full spoiler for Lord of the Rings: Tales of the Middle-Earth has officially been released this Friday, June 9th. Like other sets that don't go through Standard, this one brings some unique and interesting additions to Pauper!

In this article, we'll cover the main cards of the new set, and what their possible impacts on the Metagame will be!

Game state mechanics are old acquaintances on Pauper. After all, two of them have become dominant strengths of the format since they were released - Monarch and Initiative - so it's expected that The Ring mechanic will also make a difference in the Metagame.

There are plenty of common cards in LotR that care about making the Ring tempt you. This means, in effect, that you'll be given a game state called The Ring, and you can choose one of your creatures to be the ring bearer. That creature becomes legendary, and for each time the Ring tempts you, it gains a new ability.

1. Your Ring-bearer is legendary and can’t be blocked by creatures with greater power.

2. Whenever your Ring-bearer attacks, draw a card, then discard a card.

3. Whenever your Ring-bearer becomes blocked by a creature, that creature’s controller sacrifices it at the end of combat.

4. Whenever your Ring-bearer deals combat damage to a player, each opponent loses 3 life.

Overall, the main abilities for constructed formats refer to numbers one, two, and four - with the first two being the most relevant. But, at least in Pauper, there are several creatures with very low-power seeing play to take advantage of the evasion the Ring offers.

Unless a player is willing to use cards with zero power, many archetypes of a creature-based format like Pauper have relatively low power, making them good blockers against the ring bearer, which negates their potential to guarantee an extra damage or even a combat damage trigger.

In these cases, the ability that really matters is the second one, which offers a small looting whenever the creature attacks. However, we need to ask ourselves whether the cards we're going to use to be tempted by the Ring are good enough or make up for it in the overall consistency of our deck.

On the other hand, there are also several strategies where huge creatures are present, and in these cases, cards like Ninja of the Deep Hours or Monastery Swiftspear can take advantage of the ring's first ability to break through the opponent's blockers, granting you a free pass to cast your spells after the blockers are declared with Monastery Swiftspear, or an extra draw with Ninja of the Deep Hours.

Finally, we cannot forget the threat that this effect brings to creatures that have already established themselves as major threats. An Avenging Hunter with a full Ring cycle is even more threatening, a Tolarian Terror that gives you one looting per turn helps to cast Gurmag Angler.

I believe the card that will benefit the most from this mechanic is Sacred Cat - it already offers a two-for-one trade on its own, is difficult to block in larger decks, grows with Basilisk Gate to survive in turns where there are 1/1 creatures to block it, and Lifelink is still one of the best solutions for a faster Metagame like the current one.

Other cards that also benefit from the Ring are those that can grow after the blocking phase, such as Kiln Fiend and Monastery Swiftspear, as well as Silhana Ledgewalker alongside some Pump effects at Instant-Speed. The fact that we can avoid the opponent's creatures with the first ability means that we don't need much to abuse this mechanic in a "Blitz" strategy, and this may bring some problematic trends in the future.

Eagles of the North have a very high cost to see game in the main decks of the format today, and I doubt that archetypes like Tron can benefit as much from it. However, its Plainscycling allows you to correct the mana curve for archetypes like Naya Ephemerate, and although it doesn't offer an advantage the moment it comes into play, guaranteeing a power boost and First Strike means making the combat much more favorable for your creatures.

There is a very strong Food sub-theme in Tales of the Middle-Earth. I'm not yet sure of the competitive potential this strategy offers Pauper, but Eastfarthing Farmer has a decent body, a good ETB effect, and can even help grow one of your creatures for the next combat.

Also, it's worth remembering that Cauldron Familiar became a common card in JumpStart.

Esquire of the King looks pretty bad compared to the other +1/+1 mass effects on Pauper. However, it is attached to a creature, and if the Ring mechanic becomes commonplace in the format, its ability only costs three mana to increase your clock every turn.

It doesn't seem like a competitive option even for Boros Bully today, but it deserves an honorable mention.

Hobbit's Sting is a valid removal for lists that care about having many creatures in play, or if the Food mechanic appears in the format. The fact that it's an Instant also gives extra value to decks like White Weenie, should it need more removals.

The playability of Now for Wrath, Now for Ruin! on Pauper depends a lot on how relevant the +1/+1 counters are, rather than the extra power boost that cards like Rally the Peasants and Inspired Charge give to white decks in the format.

Slip on the Ring is a Cloudshift with the bonus of making the Ring tempt you. Next to Mnemonic Wall or Ardent Elementalist, this means that we can repeat this effect often enough to be able to get all four stages of the Ring with very few cards.

Therefore, if there is an Instant that allows you to abuse this effect, it is likely to be this one, and the question is whether any creature of these archetypes is interested in having a creature that attacks as their Ring bearer, or if it is just a win-more card.

Five mana for a 4/3 that adds in yet another of the Ring's stages doesn't sound very impressive, but Stalwarts of Osgiliath also interacts with cantrips, Mulldrifter and other draw effects to grow each turn and become a threat on its own.

Also, the fact that your interaction with the Ring is tied to an ETB effect makes it possible to take advantage of its ability alongside Ephemerate and the like.

Westfold Rider competes with Cathar Commando for the aggressive creature slot that also functions as hate against artifacts and enchantments. In the current Metagame, I believe that the less mana to activate its ability compensates for the lack of Flash and the restriction that we can only sacrifice it on our turn.

Birthday Escape is a bad cantrip that makes a creature the ring bearer. It's the easiest and cheapest way to get this game state in Pauper, and as such, it's likely to become a staple if the ability turns out to be stronger than most people realize.

Any deck that wants cantrips might be interested in Birthday Escape if their list has enough creatures to use it. However, in a format where not every creature has an immediate effect when attacking, and the Metagame is defined by the dispute between speed and value, this spell gets worse, and using it instead of some established staples, such as Preordain , brings a serious drop in consistency.

Therefore, the viability of Birthday Escape will depend on how relevant having a Ringbearer is in Pauper when compared to having access to some of the best cantrips in the game's history, such as Preordain, Ponder and Brainstorm.

Dreadful as the Storm is an excellent combat trick for a would-be wielder, allowing them to survive a blocker, or causing them to deal more combat damage while triggering yet another Ring ability. It has a high cost for its effect and, therefore, I don't see it with much potential for Pauper.

As pointed out by Ricardo Mattana, Lorien Revealed allows Dimir Terror to repair his mana while adding one more Sorcery to his graveyard to feed Tolarian Terror, as well as allowing Augur of Bolas to "find" a land through Cycling.

Soothing of Sméagol is an excellent means of removing blockers your opponent would have against its wielder, while giving it one more relevant ability. I find it too restrictive for its mana value, but like Birthday Escape, it also interacts with a strategy whose potential has yet to be evaluated, for a low cost, and through a medium effect.

Two copies of Treason of Isengard can create a loop with each other, where you cast one of them, put two +1/+1 counters on your army of Orcs, and put the other from your graveyard back into the deck.

It doesn't seem like the most efficient card for Pauper, but its inclusion does at some point allow for a more sadistic style of Control in the format.

The Black Breath is one of the most efficient methods of ensuring the ring bearer connects on the battlefield, given that it will normally be a 1/1 creature.

In this case, The Black Breath removes opposing blockers and still grants an additional portion of the Ring's temptation to its controller. It's less efficient than Suffocating Fumes and Arms of Hadar in other strategies, but it's one of the cards with the most potential for tests with this mechanic.

Three mana at Sorcery Speed to destroy a creature seems inefficient, even for black midranges like Black Gardens, but Claim the Precious is another effect that interacts with our opponent's board position, and while it looks pretty bad against Kuldotha Burn or other "go wide" archetypes, it offers a fair trade in Midrange mirrors.

Mirkwood Bats have potential with various effects aimed at creating tokens, such as Deadly Dispute, Thraben Inspector, Kuldotha Rebirth, and Voldaren Epicure, but their 2/3 body is barely relevant for its cost, and its life drain ping is too low to do anything relevant in the medium term.

Its greatest potential, therefore, is at the mercy of interactions with Food tokens as well, or some looping that creates infinite tokens, such as those with Prosperous Pirates and Ghostly Flicker on some Familiars variants.

Another good interaction of Mirkwood Bats is alongside Bartered Cow and Tortured Existence, where the creature will create a Food token every time it is discarded, and you can use that interaction (and some means to filter mana) to create multiple tokens by discarding a copy of Bartered Cow to return another to your hand.

Honorable mention. While it doesn't seem viable in a competitive Metagame to me, the fact that Mordor Muster is a sorcery might give some useful interactions to this Dusk Legion Zealot variant.

Nasty End has a much lower ceiling than Reckoner's Bargain and/or Deadly Dispute, as it only sacrifices creatures and doesn't interact with any other permanents. However, if being tempted by the Ring becomes common in Pauper, this spell draws three cards when sacrificing your ring bearer, since it will be a legendary creature. Therefore, it deserves an honorable mention.

Orcish Medicine is a nice variant of an effect we already see in the format, with Unexpected Fangs and the like. Its advantage over the others is the creation of a token to block a possible opponent's attack on the next turn, while Lifelink helps its controller to hold the match for one more turn.

Unexpected Fangs still seems the best option against Aggro in the format, as the Lifelink given by it is permanent. However, there are situations where Orcish Medicine can be a useful Sideboard piece.

Among the creatures with the ability to tempt the Ring, Uruk-Hai Berserker is one of the most cost and body efficient cards. 3/2 for three mana isn't very impressive, but it does a good job of establishing a ring bearer on the battlefield, while attacking and blocking relatively well on Midranges.

It certainly deserves a slot in the Orzhov Ephemerate for a few weeks to see how much its ability makes a difference alongside 1/1 and 1/2 creatures like Thraben Inspector and Spirited Companion, or along with evasive threats such as Vampire Sovereign and Inspiring Overseer.

Cast into the Fire is the card with the most potential to become a Sideboard staple, due to the flexibility it offers in those slots.

While it's not as efficient as End the Festivities or Electrickery at dealing with X/1 creatures, the bonus of exiling artifacts (and on a red card gaining this ability) is extremely useful in a Metagame where these are the core of several archetypes in the competitive scene, with Bridges in Affinity, in addition to Experimental Synthesizer and Ichor Wellspring in other strategies.

In the X/1 creature category, Pauper also has a high number of them that become legal targets for this spell, such as Sacred Cat, Spellstutter Sprite, the Kuldotha Rebirth tokens, and Inspiring Overseer, and this increases the scope of matchups where Cast into the Fire deserves slots on your sideboard.

I don't think it will get to the point where it's a main deck necessity unless the Metagame becomes more polarized between Kuldotha Burn and Affinity, but its inclusion in various strategies is pretty useful.

Honorable mention. I believe that Kessig Flamebreather is still the best card in its category in Pauper, but having even more consistency in thistype of effect increases the chances of seeing a "Ping Storm" in the format.

Improvised Club is the closest thing we have to Shrapnel Blast in Pauper. Heartfire didn't see any play in the format when it was released, and it's not present in the Metagame to this day, but the ability to sacrifice artifacts makes Improvised Club an excellent effect to generate card advantage while killing a threat, or dealing four damage to the opponent.

Given the discrepancy that Deadly Dispute and Reckoner's Bargain had with Village Rites, I believe that the inclusion of Improvised Club will be beneficial for archetypes that care about artifacts, like Rakdos Burn, Kuldotha Burn and Affinity, in case it prefers a more proactive stance instead of the current Midrange version.

Like Uruk-Hai Berserker, Relentless Rohirrim is another creature whose ETB interacts with the Ring. In its case, its cost and body seem less efficient than with the black creature, but the fact that it is red allows it to enter the Jeskai variants of Ephemerate decks, and therefore, it deserves an honorable mention.

Rohirrim Lancer is perhaps the best Ring enabler for Pauper. He is an efficient one-drop that difficult blocking, and with a power/toughness that makes it very hard to stop in fair decks- and if the opponent kills it with some removal, your next Ring bearer will be even more efficient!

Outside this mechanic, this creature leaves a lot to be desired compared to others present in Pauper. So, unless you can sacrifice it for value (and it's a great target for Nasty End), I don't see it as ubiquitous in the Metagame unless its mechanic becomes prevalent.

Smite the Deathless can earn Sideboard slots against Kenku Artificer archetypes, as it removes the indestructible from lands that this creature turns into a flying threat. Other decks where it can be present are against strategies with some recursion, such as Orzhov Ephemerate.

There are better cards in the main deck slots, and an extra point of damage would make it excellent against Affinity, but in its current form, this card might deserve a few Sideboards slots.

Bombadil's Song offers protection to its ring bearer, while giving it one more ability the moment it deals damage. Two mana is a very high cost for a protection effect on green, as we have Vines of Vastwood and Ranger's Guile, so I don't think this spell will become a staple of the format.

On the other hand, given the interaction of the Ring mechanics with pumps, it's possible that some Stompy lists or similar archetypes will look to experiment with this card in the coming weeks.

Elvish Farsight is a strange card. On the one hand, it is one of the most efficient cantrips in Pauper's history - the most efficient on green in the game's history since Once Upon a Time - and Scry 3 is a huge filter that will almost always guarantee that it replaces itself.

On the other hand, why would a deck that wants plenty of creatures to play this card use instead of including Winding Way and Lead the Stampede, which offer card advantage instead of a one-for-one trade?

Decks like Slivers and Elves don't need to find specific pieces, but replace the hand in case the opponent manages to exhaust their resources on the board, while Walls Combo doesn't mind paying three mana to look at five cards instead of one mana to look at four searching for its combo pieces - not counting the ability to Transmute with Drift of Phantasms.

Moggwarts, another archetype that could be interested in closing a combo, is in the Rakdos colors and already has Goblin Matron as a tutor, and Deadly Dispute as a source of card advantage. That is, although its effect seems very strong, the inclusion of Elvish Farsight in Pauper seems to do more harm than good for decks that are interested in it.

Enraged Huorn brings up another proposal for the ability to be tempted by the Ring. Instead of focusing on small creatures, this permanent allows you to turn a creature with Trample as the Ring bearer, and since the opponent will always need to block with creatures with lesser power than yours, unless they trade with two or more blockers, you will always connect at least one damage with it.

If archetypes like Black Gardens are interested in this mechanic, as they were interested in Monarch and Initiative, it is likely that Enraged Huorn or Uruk-Hai Berserker will be their cards of choice.

Honorable mention. Although this is just a manafixing, Many Partings creates a Food token, which matters if this theme becomes the centerpiece of some new strategy in Pauper.

Returning permanents from the graveyard to the hand is a new effect on Pauper, and for two mana, there are a couple of different possible legal targets for it in the format.

However, this card competes with Pulse of Murasa in the recursion of the main permanent type present in the Metagame today, and the strategies that run it - Midranges and Big Mana - don't care so much about artifacts and enchantments to the point of wanting to relinquish six life and the Instant-Speed.

Inherited Envelope is another in the cycle of "Darksteel Ingot with a boost", released in the format as common since Bonder's Ornament. Having access to this effect for any color for three mana makes it an interesting option for midrange archetypes with efficient late-game plays, but it also requires that these decks have enough threats that the opponent cares if you have a ring bearer in play.

Like other cards with this ability, this artifact will rely on the potential of the mechanic itself for archetypes that can pay three mana for a ramp card.

Lembas is one of the hardest cards to rate in this set: it doesn't seem to be any more efficient than Ichor Wellspring in Deadly Dispute or Kuldotha Rebirth decks, as Scry 1 it's not worth more than an extra card in your hand, but it, on its own, works best in less aggressive strategies.

Archetypes with Kor Skyfisher and Glint Hawk already resort to Golden Egg or Spare Supplies to increase its consistency to bounce good permanents, and Lembas works great on these archetypes because, as they are slower or want to take the match into the late-game, the Scry 1 and the three extra life make a difference both on Midrange mirrors and against Aggro.

Decks like Black Gardens may also be interested in this artifact for the same reason, as well as other less explosive archetypes - even the current Attrition variants of Affinity - as these have enough elements to hold Aggro, while also helping to filter out the draws in attrition games to have better cards than the opponent.

Another essential point about Lembas is the fact that it goes back to the library when it goes to the graveyard. This allows for some interactions on Midrange mirrors, where you'll have more opportunities to filter cards from the top and gain life.

In addition, three copies of this artifact allow to never lose due to having no cards to draw without being via a Mill effect, as since they always return from the graveyard if they went there from the battlefield, its controller will always have at least one copy of it in the deck, one in play, and one in hand to repeat this looping between them.

Lembas looks strong enough to affect the competitive Metagame, and is perhaps the best card in the set for Pauper!

Wizard's Rockets is a variant of Terrarion that we can sacrifice for no mana, just to draw a card. It doesn't seem impactful enough on Pauper against cards like Experimental Synthesizer, but its manafixing can give it some slots in certain archetypes.

Shire Terrace is an improved version of the Panorama cycle from Shards of Alara. Since Panoramas see almost no play in Pauper, and cards like Ash Barrens are more efficient in terms of manafixing, I don't think it will have much space in the Metagame.

Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-Earth brought several new features to Pauper. The biggest one, the Ring mechanic, needs extensive testing to assess whether it will have the same impact on the Metagame as Initiative and Monarch did.

Cards that interact with this ability are under-optimized compared to what the format offers, but the same is also true when it comes to cards like Avenging Hunter and Palace Sentinels, which are current staples.

Outside that mechanic, Food has gained quite a bit of attention, and could be getting some more proper treatment in the coming weeks, while Cast into the Fire and Lembas stand out as potential staples.

Thanks for reading!