Mtg-Peasant

A few lists from Sweden Mar 21, 2020, 4:45 PM
urdjur	Hello everybody! I'm a big fan of the peasant format even though I don't live in France or play much on-line. I use it as a basis for both casual and competitive play, and would like to see it spread. Anyway, here are my three peasant decks - the lists are quite different from what I see on this site. If you have any comments (French is fine, though I'll be replying in English), I'd be happy to receive them. Decklist 1: THOPTER SWORD 4 Ash Barrens 4 Mystic Sanctuary 10 Snow-Covered Island 3 Snow-Covered Swamp 4 Arcum's Astrolabe 3 Thopter Foundry (u) 2 Sword of the Meek (u) 3 Muddle the Mixture 4 Brainstorm 4 Impulse 2 Tragic Lesson 4 Counterspell 4 Miscalculation 1 Deprive 4 Innocent Blood 3 Agony Warp 1 Echoing Truth Sideboard 4 Duress 3 Gurmag Angler 2 Cremate 2 Negate 2 Recoil 2 Evincar's Justice 1 Diabolic Edict 1 Doom Blade I call this variant "frozen sanctuary". It mostly differs from regular thopter-sword lists in the mana base. Most lists will use Dismal Backwater and sometimes Dimir Guildgate for mana flexibility. This deck likes to keep 2 mana open at all times for instant speed interactions, so being able to choose between UU or UB on the fly means that you can use Agony Warp or Counterspell or whatever you wish depending on the situation - very neat indeed. Traditional lists also include some number of black or blue artifact lands, to feed to Thopter Foundry when you don't have Sword of the Meek yet. However, this weakens the mana base in games 2 and 3 when many have artifact hate to bring in. I instead use Arcum's Astrolabe for both mana flexibility and extra thopter fodder. This has the added benefit of creating a mana base that supports Mystic Sanctuary. Not only does it let me reuse the most valuable instants and sorceries in the game, but it forms another combo with Tragic Lesson/Deprive. This second combo lets the deck play the "UB Teachings" style attrition game as a secondary strategy. The final card I wanted to discuss here was Miscalculation. I don't think I've seen it in any Thopter/Sword lists, and to me it's just the best main deck counter for the deck after Counterspell. Early on, it's just as powerful but less color restrictive, and later it lets you dig into your combo pieces. With 2 mana open, you will often want a draw effect EOT when opponent didn't make a counter-worthy play, and this works very well alongside Impulse and Brainstorm + Ash Barrens in this role. In games 2-3, you can side it out for more dedicated hate such as Duress, when you know what you're up against. Decklist 2: BURN 16 Mountain 2 Simian Spirit Guide 3 Ghitu Lavarunner 4 Monastery Swiftspear (u) 3 Thermo-Alchemist 4 Lightning Bolt 4 Lava Spike 4 Chain Lightning 4 Rift Bolt 4 Skewer the Critics 3 Fireblast 3 Lava Dart 3 Magma Jet 2 Flame Rift 1 Light up the Stage (u) Sideboard 3 Martyr of Sands 3 Pyroblast 3 Smash to Smithereens 2 Flaring Pain 2 Relic of Progenitus 2 Searing Blaze Again, the manabase is atypical. I like to do something called Hypergeometric Distributions, which is basically a mathematical tool to figure out how many of a certain card you should be running to acheive a certain result. Now for some theory! Consider a simple burn deck of just Lightning Bolt and Mountain. Such a deck would need 7 bolts (3x7=21 damage) to win, and this would take 7 mana to cast: 1+2+3+1 mana if you make your 3rd land drop or 1+2+2+2 if you don't. Either way, you're looking at winning on turn 4. Now with some spells such as Fireblast, or if you get much value out of a t1 Swiftspear, it's conceivable that you even win on turn 3, but most of the time you're not super-lucky and your opponent is not a goldfish, and t4 is what you should expect. Furthermore, we can note that if you mulligan on average once 50% of the time and you're on the play vs. on the draw 50% of the time, you will see 10 cards total by turn 4. That means 3 of those need to be mana and 7 need to be spells. Now in the real world, your deck is not all Lightning Bolt, but that's OK. Because if we assume 3 land drops and 4 turns, you actually have 9 mana to spend, so you can afford to run a few more expensive spells. Also, you could go for a more interactive game against aggro and accept a slower turn 4-5 kill plan with greater consistency. Here we have the two basic subtypes of Burn - the fast variant and the slow variant (with 3 CMC cards such as Volcanic Fallout). For either variant, the problem is that you can only keep 2-3 land hands. Keeping 1 land is almost always too risky and keeping 4 lands means your first 10 cards will certainly not contain 7 threats. I will not bore you with the hypergeometric distributions, but here are a few take home messages: 21 lands: The best number to maximize probability of 2-3 land hands. Unfortunately, with this many lands, there is still a 50% chance that you'll see more than 3 lands in your first 10 cards. This is the maximum number that "heavy" lists with 3 CMC cards should play. 18 lands: The best number to maximize having exactly 3 lands in 10 cards. Having more than 3 lands is now 34% chance (16% reduction from 21 lands) but you will mulligan 3% more often because of the increase in 1-land hands. 15 lands: Included as a reference, not a recommendation. 9% more mulligans than with 21 lands but only a 20% chance of more than 3 lands in 10 cards. As you can see, seemingly dramatic changes in land total still don't affect your net result that much. What you lose in mulligans, you gain back in threat density. The important thing is to pick a mana base that suits your curve. Now Simian Spirit Guide enters to make things a bit more interesting! Remember the 1+2+3+3=9 mana we had available to complete Burn's game plan? So if you need to finance 7 spells with that mana, basically 2/7 or 12/42 of your spells can be CMC 2 rather than CMC 1. Well in that scenario, the last land is only tapped twice (t3 and t4), producing 2 mana. You'll have emptied your hand by then, so avaialble mana beyond that point doesn't really matter - any top deck will be castable. But if one of those lands is Simian Spirit Guide instead, he will only ever produce 1 mana, but he can provide it at any point in the game which compensates you greatly for the net mana loss. So by running 2 SSG, you speed up your game at the price of being able to run even fewer 2 CMC spells in your deck, because you'll sometimes just have 8 mana and not 9 available by turn 4. The important thing is never to get 2 of them, because replacing 2 lands with 2 SSGs is a terrible net loss of available mana, and he can't (realistically) do damage on his own, so 2 is the correct number to run in your deck, and that means no more than 10 CMC 2 spells with 18 mana sources (note that Light up the Stage is effectively a CMC 2 spell, because it adds a 1 mana tax to the spell it hopefully draws). If you're with me so far, you may have guessed that my firm belief is that Peasant Burn should play anywhere from 16+2 mana sources for the fastest lists, up to 19+2 mana sources for the slower ones (that is Mountains + SSG). The much under-used SSG permits plays like t1 Thermo-Alchemist or t1 Swiftspear -> t2 two spells + Ghitu Lavarunner and attack for 5, not to mention randomly hosing Daze. I very much recommend running it for all Burn lists as a 2-of! Another much under-used card is Magma Jet, for many of the reasons described above. The correct number to run is 3 and you should pretty much always play it in your t3 upkeep, before your draw step. This filters your last two draws, avoiding mana flood. If Magma Jet saves you from only 1 Mountain, it will have contributed 5 damage total - only Thermo-Alchemist (and occasionally Keldon Marauders) can compete with that. It also lets me keep more 1 land hands with SSG. Mountain + SSG + Magma Jet is a solid keep on the draw - if you didn't draw land t1, Magma Jet in t2 upkeep financed by SSG, scry for land, draw and proceed as normal. It's also great for clearing a path for your creatures to connect for damage. The rest of the list should be pretty self-evident, but ask away if you're wondering about copy numbers etc. 4 Fireblast is too risky for the fast lists IMO, since you're not planning to drop 4 lands. For heavier lists that interact more, 4 copies is fine. In return, the fast lists can run a few Flame Rift instead, as well as Lava Dart to abuse Swiftspear/Alchemist and enable top decked spectacle cards. Decklist 3: HEXPROOF 13 Forest 4 Plains 4 Utopia Sprawl 4 Abundant Growth 4 Gladecover Scout 4 Slippery Bogle 4 Silhana Ledgewalker 3 Season of Growth (u) 4 Ethereal Armor 4 Armadillo Cloak 4 Rancor 3 Ancestral Mask 3 Cartouche of Solidarity 2 Spirit Mantle (u) Sideboard 3 Young Wolf 3 Return to Nature 3 Journey to Nowhere 2 Standard Bearer 2 Circle of Protection: Red 2 Karametra's Blessing Not much to say about this list except for Season of Growth - now even seen in Modern hexproof lists that are also starting to look more and more like Peasant lists in other aspects. I haven't seen it before in Peasant. It's awesome, basically. Against control where you don't need to race, you can drop t1 bogle and t2 season before they can start countering everything. Now what will they do? Countering your auras is losing, because you draw when casting. Not countering them is losing too. They have edict effects immediately, or they lose basically. Against quicker decks, playing it t4 is fine and just drawing a couple of cards from your last auras as you solidify your position even more. Another observation though: I don't think Hexproof should run any tap-lands at all. Why would it? You need 12-ish Forests for Utopia Sprawl anyway. You certainly want Abundant Growth as well. Why would you want to add even more green sources at that point? Plains produce white, and ETB untapped - they work very well here. You can easily have 12 white sources to support your white cards without resorting to tap-lands. Yet I see many fetches or Blossoming Sands in these lists. They seem bad. Enjoy the mana consistency and power of green auras, and just play basic plains instead IMO. I also think Khalni Garden is a big mistake now that Cartouche of Solidarity is available. Khalni Garden breaks your game plan, which is t1 land aura or t1 bogle. With 16 1-drops, no tap lands need apply. If you're worried about edict effects, I recommend 3 Young Wolf in the SB instead. An oldie but goodie, that card is really hard to get around with edicts and board wipes once the opponent boards out all targeted removal. Hope you like my list variants and that they can spark a fruitful discussion on the forum!

A few lists from Sweden Mar 21, 2020, 4:45 PM

Hello everybody! I'm a big fan of the peasant format even though I don't live in France or play much on-line. I use it as a basis for both casual and competitive play, and would like to see it spread. Anyway, here are my three peasant decks - the lists are quite different from what I see on this site. If you have any comments (French is fine, though I'll be replying in English), I'd be happy to receive them.

Decklist 1: THOPTER SWORD
4 Ash Barrens
4 Mystic Sanctuary
10 Snow-Covered Island
3 Snow-Covered Swamp

4 Arcum's Astrolabe

3 Thopter Foundry (u)
2 Sword of the Meek (u)
3 Muddle the Mixture

4 Brainstorm
4 Impulse
2 Tragic Lesson

4 Counterspell
4 Miscalculation
1 Deprive

4 Innocent Blood
3 Agony Warp
1 Echoing Truth

Sideboard
4 Duress
3 Gurmag Angler
2 Cremate
2 Negate
2 Recoil
2 Evincar's Justice
1 Diabolic Edict
1 Doom Blade

I call this variant "frozen sanctuary". It mostly differs from regular thopter-sword lists in the mana base. Most lists will use Dismal Backwater and sometimes Dimir Guildgate for mana flexibility. This deck likes to keep 2 mana open at all times for instant speed interactions, so being able to choose between UU or UB on the fly means that you can use Agony Warp or Counterspell or whatever you wish depending on the situation - very neat indeed. Traditional lists also include some number of black or blue artifact lands, to feed to Thopter Foundry when you don't have Sword of the Meek yet. However, this weakens the mana base in games 2 and 3 when many have artifact hate to bring in.

I instead use Arcum's Astrolabe for both mana flexibility and extra thopter fodder. This has the added benefit of creating a mana base that supports Mystic Sanctuary. Not only does it let me reuse the most valuable instants and sorceries in the game, but it forms another combo with Tragic Lesson/Deprive. This second combo lets the deck play the "UB Teachings" style attrition game as a secondary strategy.

The final card I wanted to discuss here was Miscalculation. I don't think I've seen it in any Thopter/Sword lists, and to me it's just the best main deck counter for the deck after Counterspell. Early on, it's just as powerful but less color restrictive, and later it lets you dig into your combo pieces. With 2 mana open, you will often want a draw effect EOT when opponent didn't make a counter-worthy play, and this works very well alongside Impulse and Brainstorm + Ash Barrens in this role. In games 2-3, you can side it out for more dedicated hate such as Duress, when you know what you're up against.

Decklist 2: BURN
16 Mountain
2 Simian Spirit Guide

3 Ghitu Lavarunner
4 Monastery Swiftspear (u)
3 Thermo-Alchemist

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Lava Spike
4 Chain Lightning
4 Rift Bolt
4 Skewer the Critics

3 Fireblast
3 Lava Dart
3 Magma Jet
2 Flame Rift
1 Light up the Stage (u)

Sideboard
3 Martyr of Sands
3 Pyroblast
3 Smash to Smithereens
2 Flaring Pain
2 Relic of Progenitus
2 Searing Blaze

Again, the manabase is atypical. I like to do something called Hypergeometric Distributions, which is basically a mathematical tool to figure out how many of a certain card you should be running to acheive a certain result. Now for some theory!

Consider a simple burn deck of just Lightning Bolt and Mountain. Such a deck would need 7 bolts (3x7=21 damage) to win, and this would take 7 mana to cast: 1+2+3+1 mana if you make your 3rd land drop or 1+2+2+2 if you don't. Either way, you're looking at winning on turn 4. Now with some spells such as Fireblast, or if you get much value out of a t1 Swiftspear, it's conceivable that you even win on turn 3, but most of the time you're not super-lucky and your opponent is not a goldfish, and t4 is what you should expect. Furthermore, we can note that if you mulligan on average once 50% of the time and you're on the play vs. on the draw 50% of the time, you will see 10 cards total by turn 4. That means 3 of those need to be mana and 7 need to be spells.

Now in the real world, your deck is not all Lightning Bolt, but that's OK. Because if we assume 3 land drops and 4 turns, you actually have 9 mana to spend, so you can afford to run a few more expensive spells. Also, you could go for a more interactive game against aggro and accept a slower turn 4-5 kill plan with greater consistency. Here we have the two basic subtypes of Burn - the fast variant and the slow variant (with 3 CMC cards such as Volcanic Fallout).

For either variant, the problem is that you can only keep 2-3 land hands. Keeping 1 land is almost always too risky and keeping 4 lands means your first 10 cards will certainly not contain 7 threats. I will not bore you with the hypergeometric distributions, but here are a few take home messages:
21 lands: The best number to maximize probability of 2-3 land hands. Unfortunately, with this many lands, there is still a 50% chance that you'll see more than 3 lands in your first 10 cards. This is the maximum number that "heavy" lists with 3 CMC cards should play.
18 lands: The best number to maximize having exactly 3 lands in 10 cards. Having more than 3 lands is now 34% chance (16% reduction from 21 lands) but you will mulligan 3% more often because of the increase in 1-land hands.
15 lands: Included as a reference, not a recommendation. 9% more mulligans than with 21 lands but only a 20% chance of more than 3 lands in 10 cards.

As you can see, seemingly dramatic changes in land total still don't affect your net result that much. What you lose in mulligans, you gain back in threat density. The important thing is to pick a mana base that suits your curve. Now Simian Spirit Guide enters to make things a bit more interesting!

Remember the 1+2+3+3=9 mana we had available to complete Burn's game plan? So if you need to finance 7 spells with that mana, basically 2/7 or 12/42 of your spells can be CMC 2 rather than CMC 1. Well in that scenario, the last land is only tapped twice (t3 and t4), producing 2 mana. You'll have emptied your hand by then, so avaialble mana beyond that point doesn't really matter - any top deck will be castable. But if one of those lands is Simian Spirit Guide instead, he will only ever produce 1 mana, but he can provide it at any point in the game which compensates you greatly for the net mana loss. So by running 2 SSG, you speed up your game at the price of being able to run even fewer 2 CMC spells in your deck, because you'll sometimes just have 8 mana and not 9 available by turn 4. The important thing is never to get 2 of them, because replacing 2 lands with 2 SSGs is a terrible net loss of available mana, and he can't (realistically) do damage on his own, so 2 is the correct number to run in your deck, and that means no more than 10 CMC 2 spells with 18 mana sources (note that Light up the Stage is effectively a CMC 2 spell, because it adds a 1 mana tax to the spell it hopefully draws).

If you're with me so far, you may have guessed that my firm belief is that Peasant Burn should play anywhere from 16+2 mana sources for the fastest lists, up to 19+2 mana sources for the slower ones (that is Mountains + SSG). The much under-used SSG permits plays like t1 Thermo-Alchemist or t1 Swiftspear -> t2 two spells + Ghitu Lavarunner and attack for 5, not to mention randomly hosing Daze. I very much recommend running it for all Burn lists as a 2-of!

Another much under-used card is Magma Jet, for many of the reasons described above. The correct number to run is 3 and you should pretty much always play it in your t3 upkeep, before your draw step. This filters your last two draws, avoiding mana flood. If Magma Jet saves you from only 1 Mountain, it will have contributed 5 damage total - only Thermo-Alchemist (and occasionally Keldon Marauders) can compete with that. It also lets me keep more 1 land hands with SSG. Mountain + SSG + Magma Jet is a solid keep on the draw - if you didn't draw land t1, Magma Jet in t2 upkeep financed by SSG, scry for land, draw and proceed as normal. It's also great for clearing a path for your creatures to connect for damage.

The rest of the list should be pretty self-evident, but ask away if you're wondering about copy numbers etc. 4 Fireblast is too risky for the fast lists IMO, since you're not planning to drop 4 lands. For heavier lists that interact more, 4 copies is fine. In return, the fast lists can run a few Flame Rift instead, as well as Lava Dart to abuse Swiftspear/Alchemist and enable top decked spectacle cards.

Decklist 3: HEXPROOF
13 Forest
4 Plains

4 Utopia Sprawl
4 Abundant Growth

4 Gladecover Scout
4 Slippery Bogle
4 Silhana Ledgewalker

3 Season of Growth (u)

4 Ethereal Armor
4 Armadillo Cloak
4 Rancor
3 Ancestral Mask
3 Cartouche of Solidarity
2 Spirit Mantle (u)

Sideboard
3 Young Wolf
3 Return to Nature
3 Journey to Nowhere
2 Standard Bearer
2 Circle of Protection: Red
2 Karametra's Blessing

Not much to say about this list except for Season of Growth - now even seen in Modern hexproof lists that are also starting to look more and more like Peasant lists in other aspects. I haven't seen it before in Peasant. It's awesome, basically. Against control where you don't need to race, you can drop t1 bogle and t2 season before they can start countering everything. Now what will they do? Countering your auras is losing, because you draw when casting. Not countering them is losing too. They have edict effects immediately, or they lose basically. Against quicker decks, playing it t4 is fine and just drawing a couple of cards from your last auras as you solidify your position even more.

Another observation though: I don't think Hexproof should run any tap-lands at all. Why would it? You need 12-ish Forests for Utopia Sprawl anyway. You certainly want Abundant Growth as well. Why would you want to add even more green sources at that point? Plains produce white, and ETB untapped - they work very well here. You can easily have 12 white sources to support your white cards without resorting to tap-lands. Yet I see many fetches or Blossoming Sands in these lists. They seem bad. Enjoy the mana consistency and power of green auras, and just play basic plains instead IMO.

I also think Khalni Garden is a big mistake now that Cartouche of Solidarity is available. Khalni Garden breaks your game plan, which is t1 land aura or t1 bogle. With 16 1-drops, no tap lands need apply. If you're worried about edict effects, I recommend 3 Young Wolf in the SB instead. An oldie but goodie, that card is really hard to get around with edicts and board wipes once the opponent boards out all targeted removal.

Hope you like my list variants and that they can spark a fruitful discussion on the forum!

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Kaeru	Mar 21, 2020, 8:13 PM Hey there friend ! Happy to see the format spread, bring the love home ! There is tons of tournament running right as most of us are confined, so if you want to try cockatrice (that is free) we as a community would welcome you gladly. Come give us what we deserve ! We have a discord too So, concerning your list: I really like the thopter one, but would suggest a few things ! - 2 Deprive is must in long game as you can loop them with sanctuary's making a "deprive" lock that can prevent your opponent doing anything in the late stage of a game. - a 4th muddle the mixture is great as countering artifact hate, and is a tutor as you already know, so I would run a full playset. Have you thought of adding some trinket mage with witching well and some sideboard hate like relic of progenitus and Executioner's Capsule? It would ba able to fetch for astro and witching well is amazing in a "draw go" style of game. I like your burn list too but, for real, play a playset of thermo... it wins most game if they are not taken care off And lastly, I like your boggles list, I also like the choice in Season of growth, I've been discussing it with another player trying to put on a boggles list too ! As it is underplayed and nobody packs enough enchant removal right now. I would cut 2 Silhana for 2 Siona, Captain of the Pyleas (amaziiiing, season of growth on foot) And a Season for Enlightened Tutor as it can fetch anything you want from ramp/fixing aura's too game ending spell (Mask/Cloak). 2 Plains seems sufficient too, maybe try some Cave of temptation? As they fix your mana, and can be spent later to give 2 counters on your Boggles. Also more than 3 Rancor and 1 Cartouche of solidarity is overkill (if you don't play against edict deck though) So I would probably add instead of other aura's: - Cartouche of Strenght (help remove annoying creature, such as standard bearer) - Spider Umbra (Makes Delver/Faeries MU more "fair" as well as giving totem armor) - Sentinel's eyes (if you drop it early enough, most aggro MU are auto wins, as you attack with a big strong boggles and they can't swing back.. And can be recast on a new creature if first one get's killed) And lastly, 1 Fling/Soul's Fire/Essence harvest is mandatory right now as there is a tons of fog and if you don't wanna be fog lock/Stonehorn lock. (that's the traditional list played by the biggest hexproof grinder in pauper: https://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=24196&d=368881&f=PAU ) Manabase is fine without astrolabe ! Mutagenic growth is also better than Karametra's in side if you use it in answer to eletrickery/nausea etc as it is free. Hope I could help, and of course, that's my take on thoses decks, there is different ways to go !
urdjur	Mar 22, 2020, 12:14 AM Excellent, Kaeru - exactly the kind of high quality feedback I was hoping for There is tons of tournament running right as most of us are confined, so if you want to try cockatrice (that is free) we as a community would welcome you gladly. Come give us what we deserve ! I might take you up on that! I'm mostly available in the weekends, but have more time for MtG right now due to everything else being cancelled. So far I'm spending most of it on getting my cube ready (finally!), but I couldn't resist revising my peasant decks too - so much has happened in the format lately. Playtesting on-line would be really cool and give me some needed variety! - 2 Deprive is must in long game as you can loop them with sanctuary's making a "deprive" lock that can prevent your opponent doing anything in the late stage of a game. Is such a hard lock really necessary do you find? I'm thinking Deprive every other turn is more than enough, because they will still draw 1/3 land, and even if you needed to counter EVERY spell, you still have all your other disruption. Wouldn't you rather pay 3 to draw 2 every other turn, to get access to all the other disruption in your deck too? I found that the "counter turns" in this soft lock version were actually a bit lack-luster, because I was countering harmless things just so I could bounce Sanctuary. Getting to chose whether to draw or counter or produce thopter tokens or whatever seems better. A second Deprive could be fitted in the list for sure, but it's not unproblematic since it's such a late game play - I really want to keep lands on board until I get to 4 Island. Considering this, do you still find it necessary? - a 4th muddle the mixture is great as countering artifact hate, and is a tutor as you already know, so I would run a full playset. Many do. I'm concerned about keeping mana open and sorcery speed tutoring at 3 mana. It's not something you'd want to do twice in a game IMO. With all the library manipulation, I almost always have a tutor at turn 5 with 3 copies, and half of the combo in hand. But your point about artifact hate is very acute. Thinking about it, having a 4th Muddle post board seems more important than having a Negate, so I think running the 4th in the SB might be the best call! Have you thought of adding some trinket mage with witching well and some sideboard hate like relic of progenitus and Executioner's Capsule? It would ba able to fetch for astro and witching well is amazing in a "draw go" style of game. That is really cute! But there are several problems. Trinket Mage is 3 mana at sorcery speed, and I was apprehensive already for the 4th Muddle... Trinket Mage tutors in yet another category without hitting your main combo. You can already tutor for Doom Blade post board, why add a Mage + Capsule package in this particular deck? Also, fetching for Astro is too late - you want it t1 or at the latest you want some black source by t3 so you can kill some creatures. At that point, Astro is just cantrip + thopter fuel. Artifacts also don't fit into the deck's recursion engine either. But speaking of which, what do you think about 1x Shred Memory in the SB? Much like the 4th Muddle the Mixture discussed above? Your artifact-hate-hate tutors and now your graveyard-hate tutors too. Everything tutors!! I like your burn list too but, for real, play a playset of thermo... it wins most game if they are not taken care off You might be right - I've debated that slot a lot with myself. But gah, they are so BAD in multiples! In fact, all the creatures are except Swiftspear because it's cheap and always has haste. How do you handle redundant copies, do you just t2 Thermo, t3 Thermo - EOT ping for 1..? Maybe there's a t1 Swiftspear there too to make it really interesting! I just don't see it working. ONE creature is perfect, two is OK if one of them is Swiftspear. Double Thermo is a lost card pretty much. Come on, sell this to me - I secretely want to run 4 but come up with too many reasons not to Siona, Captain of the Pyleas I don't think she is very good for the deck TBH. You go from 0 targetable creatures to 2. How much spot removal does the opponent have? All will be directed towards Siona - it's the only place it can go. Heliod's Pilgrim is better IMO because you don't really care if he dies after ETB, and he gets exactlyt the aura you want rather than something from the top of your library. And a Season for Enlightened Tutor as it can fetch anything you want from ramp/fixing aura's too game ending spell (Mask/Cloak). I originally included 2x Heliod's Pilgrim in my build. I think it's better because it doesn't take up an uncommon slot, the 2 extra mana is on par with not being card disadvantage, and the body is relevant as edict fodder. Still though, when finding Season of Growth, I cut it because I didn't really need the toolbox - it got smaller and smaller until it disappeared entirely and I relied on raw card advantage alone. Also, ETutor -> Season puts you back 2 cards. You need to cast 2 auras after that play just to break even, like if you never had ETutored or played Season at all. 2 Plains seems sufficient too, maybe try some Cave of temptation? As they fix your mana, and can be spent later to give 2 counters on your Boggles. What an interesting idea! I hadn't considered non-tapped colorless utility lands for the deck at all before, but you're right - color wise, there is room to squeeze a couple in. There's also the possibility of enchanting such a land with Abundant Growth, negating the colorless drawback... Maybe Cave of Temptation isn't the most powerful alternative here though. Off the top of my head, what about Haunted Fengraf? Seems like strong life insurance to me. Also more than 3 Rancor and 1 Cartouche of solidarity is overkill (if you don't play against edict deck though) So I would probably add instead of other aura's: - Cartouche of Strenght (help remove annoying creature, such as standard bearer) - Spider Umbra (Makes Delver/Faeries MU more "fair" as well as giving totem armor) - Sentinel's eyes (if you drop it early enough, most aggro MU are auto wins, as you attack with a big strong boggles and they can't swing back.. And can be recast on a new creature if first one get's killed) All good suggestions. I'll look into how to fit this between main and side. I don't like singletons if I can't tutor for them though, but maybe 2x Cartouche of Strength is a good call for the main? And lastly, 1 Fling/Soul's Fire/Essence harvest is mandatory right now as there is a tons of fog and if you don't wanna be fog lock/Stonehorn lock. Oh. I think running 2 in the SB must be the better choice then, rather than relying on a singleton instant against a specific strategy game 1. I'm thinking there must be a better solution to this though. Is it Moment's Peace, Stonehorn Dignitary or what is the mechanism of the fog lock you refer to? If they also have counters, isn't a fling plan really vulnerable? (that's the traditional list played by the biggest hexproof grinder in pauper: https://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=24196&d=368881&f=PAU ) Interesting list. 1x Heliod's Pilgrim kinda makes sense. Perhaps I should run that too after all. 2x Favor of the Overbeing was unorthodox, I think I like the Spider Umbra/Sentinel's Eyes plan more. Mutagenic growth is also better than Karametra's in side if you use it in answer to eletrickery/nausea etc as it is free. Oh! Right you are - sometimes the simplest is the best, I hadn't considered it for the Bogles deck Hope I could help, and of course, that's my take on thoses decks, there is different ways to go ! You've given me lots to think about! I'll sleep on it and tweak tomorrow. The hexproof list seems to need the most work, which makes sense since it's the one I'm least experienced with.
pismy	Mar 22, 2020, 10:59 AM Hey Urdjur ! Wow, I must confess I'm very impressed by the depth and quality of your reflexions dude. Where does your knowledge of Peasant come from ? Is there a Peasant community in Sweden that we didn't hear of ? (too bad I spent 3 weeks there a few years ago). R U playing online ? With mates ? Or is it "only" a theoretical knowledge of this format (which would be even more impressive) ? I've been playing UB Thopter very recently but I'm no good builder (and just average player ) so I basically played the "Mr everybody" list. I'm quite interested about your snow manabase + astrolabe approach, I'll definitely give it a try. But I'm 100% convinced about the Sanctuary+Lesson+Deprive in this deck. Actually I'm ashame I didn't have the idea by myself. This is already something I have in most of my U/Ux control decks, and that work very well. And the fact is the late game can be sometimes tough with Thopter versus a control deck. Maybe 4 Sanctuaries is too much. I will play 2 or 3. Moreover I just realized how good Tragic Lesson can be in that deck: with Foundry in play, you could choose to discard a Sword from your hand, sacrifice a random artifact to your Foundry to bring back the Sword. Clearly a must ! I'm also very interested about your reflexions about burn (manabase + use of Magma Jet you detailled very precisely). Actually there is maybe one thing I'm not too bad at: coding (well, that's my job ). I've developped a goldfish simulator, and if I have time I'll run some simulations with your list and your way of playing Magma Jet (but I have to implement scry: it's no piece of cake). The tool should compute the mulligans rate, average kill turn per number of mulligans taken and the "mean absolute difference" (a measure of statistical dispersion: how regular your deck is). If you're interested: - code on GitHub: https://github.com/pismy/perfect-deck - my last "Peasant French Cup" report where I introduce the tool and my approach (for a BR Reanimator deck but anyway the tool is not deck specific): https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NY2g_PZNKaWHhuu5rZUAbI8M3-YB8zLllvRWBG7eaVU Thanks for your sharing ! C U soon on Cockatrice ?
Kaeru	Mar 22, 2020, 12:34 PM Hey back there ! Then definitely subscribe to one of the tournament, there is different style and one would likely suits you ! Considering this, do you still find it necessary? I don't think anything is necessary, but everything is metagame dependent? As sometimes Thopter games can be really long against some other archetype a Deprive lock makes sense to me for thoses grindy MU when you gonna fight true multiple artifact hate/big effect spell like resolving your thopter after first one being Pyroblasted or countering their big effect spell. For exemple: right now one of the most common artifact hate used are Ancient grudge (that can be played 2 times per copy) and Shenanigans (that can be played a lot) how do you do against thoses before you can exile them from grave? If you expect fast archetype from your opponent 2 Deprive makes no sense, but tragic lesson neither as you wanna be able to close game fast with your game plan. Mystic Sanctuary + Deprive + Tragic Lesson is a way to gain advantage in grindy games that is hard to match, but don't do much before you assemble 3 island+sanctuary and have free mana or are under not a ton of pressure IMO Also against midrangy deck that can't bounce their rocks no more, or that doesn't draw much, having 1 counter a turn for sure is a win as they litteraly can't play the only thing they draw each turn. 4th Muddle post board seems more important than having a Negate Watch out for oblivion ring 1x Shred Memory in the SB It seems legit for sure ! If you can't tutor for Relic/Faerie Macabre, I would go for that, watch out for counter spell though, as it can be interacted with. Double Thermo is a lost card pretty much. Come on, sell this to me Unfortunately I'm not a burn player, but you can still say that it is a threat that your opponent must remove, so they don't develop their game plan while you have it on board, so you gain turn to burn them. Also it's a decent blocker, but mostly 1 thermo makes your burn 4 damage, 2 makes them 5. 4 Spell clock. How much spot removal does the opponent have? My point with it are: It doesn't die to most hate your opponent will bring as nausea/electrickery/holy light It makes edict foder when you target it. It looks for 7 deep, putting lands and creatures bottom in a deck with no shuffle. And G2/3 your opponent will side out most/all their 1 for 1 removal that are not edict so they are not likely to be taken out except by Bolt/Galvanic blast after G1, come on, it's silly to keep removal against Bogles no? Still testing with it though. For E.tutor, it's just personal, I like the 1 mana toolbox héhé, that is instant speed. You better not tap out. And I also like cave of temptation for the extra toughness it brings sometimes, even more when your opponent start chipping at your aura's. It can be game winning against leave no trace on a Silhana to finish the race, but there might be better option, or more suitable to your playstyle for sure. 2x Cartouche of Strength is a good call for the main? I would go 1 main and 1 side, and couple it with a cartouche of ambition side, Bearer will never be a nightmare again, Wellwisher and a board full of elves neither, as well as helping race burn. Is it Moment's Peace, Stonehorn Dignitary or what is the mechanism of the fog lock you refer to? It mostly depend on the archetype you face. Tron will have both but will foglock you with Stornehorn more likely. All green deck can have access to Moment's peace and in my Affinity combo list, I had 1 sb and I know that if Tron run's it, they can lock you with it too. Also Prismatic Strands in the Wx Monarch build can be a pain, as some list runs 2 main & 2 side so it can add up to 8 fog effect, sufficient to kill you before you "reach" Also with fling, you force your opponent to not tap out, and they might not expect it as your out. And lastly, if you have a token or a second creature on board, you can fling toward the Bearer, always the Bearer... haha If they also have counters, isn't a fling plan really vulnerable? I really like fling because I played Affinity before. But most people in pauper now run 1 Essence Harvest (amazing against Prismatic Strands) or 1 Soul's fire main, and 1 Fling side. Favor of the Overbeing is neat as it gives vigilance to your creature, if it silhana it doesn't care about flying, if it's Bogles though, it gains +2/+2 and Flying+Vigilance, that's why it's run. My little theory about Hexproof crafting in peasant: You can have access to a lot of things thanks to astrolabe and uncommons here, but you can't run everything as your pack needs to be tight to be efficient. So there is 3 informations here: Do you want to be aggressive to win on goldfish alone and don't let enough time to slow deck/midrange durdle the time to settle? Do you want to be stable and not have trouble casting your creature/fixing your mana? Do you want to make enough CA to be able to tie with grindier deck as they can't interact with you much and making a big fat bogles with trample will win you the game most likely on the spot? Even better with a Fling type of spell main? Now, you can choose 2 out of thoses 3. You can be Aggressive and Stable. Aggressive and CA (even if it can look contradictory) or Stable and CA. And everything will depend on some little stuff like: How many creature you run? What's your plan against fog? (being faster than the other deck can lock you? Or grind your way in until a big turn) Will you run astrolabe and kor skyfisher package? What's your uncommons package? For exemple, a 12/13 creature list, with seasons of growth can be all in, and make lot's of aggressive play, and have CA back up depending on the MU, if aggression went south. But without access to astrolabe, you are dependent on your forest and 8 mana fixing spell and are less likely to have 4c+ in your sideboard. (Awkward 1 plain oppening hand right? ) As a list with 4 astrolabe/4 skyfisher and 8 mana fixing aura's is so stable and makes a ton of CA, even more with season of growth, but you will rarely goldfish for a win without interaction. You can also go with the 8 aura's, 4 astrolabe and no season of growth/E.tutor/Siona and only opt for good aura's card and always be able to cast all your colors while being fast AF. But you can only choose 2 out of the 3 you see? Depends on metagame, sideboard consideration, and how you like to play the deck too. IMO, there is not enough good uncommons aura's to make an aggressive and stable version, only gryff boon/spirit mantle would make it here previously. Though with Staggering Insight, that might have changed, it needs some testing. Anyway good luck with it !
urdjur	Mar 22, 2020, 11:04 PM Where does your knowledge of Peasant come from ? Is there a Peasant community in Sweden that we didn't hear of ? (too bad I spent 3 weeks there a few years ago). R U playing online ? With mates ? Or is it "only" a theoretical knowledge of this format (which would be even more impressive) ? Hi Pismy! There is not so much a peasant community in Sweden, but I've been blessed by two different MtG communities in smaller cities in Sweden that were/are both very Pauper/Peasant positive (one where I live right now). I've always prefered eternal formats myself and started out in Legacy about when it was still known as type 1.5 - so like 20 years ago. Like many, I got into Burn because I couldn't really afford anything else. But I got so into the deck theory that I ended up writing one iteration of the legacy Burn primer on MTG Salvation if you know that site (many years ago now). Then I went into Death and Taxes, then into EDH when that format came along - then it mostly degenerated into casual play and drafting with mates haha The interest for well-balanced, eternal formats that don't cost a fortune to build decks in has stuck all along. I think Peasant is the perfect paper format for me, both for casual and competitive play, and I've been following the format and this site for many years (though Hexproof is a new deck for me that I look forward to playing more in the future). Paper Pauper is not well-defined, and hence doesn't have a coherent community, or the variety/brewing potential of Peasant. Having left Legacy behind, I see no reason at all to enter Modern where the power level of decks and format speed is comparable to Peasant, but mana bases cost several orders of magnitude more. Pioneer even less so - let WotC do their little cyclic 8-year dance. Meanwhile, I shall be casting Chain Lightning. I'm quite interested about your snow manabase + astrolabe approach, I'll definitely give it a try. But I'm 100% convinced about the Sanctuary+Lesson+Deprive in this deck. I think you will find they go hand in hand. You need a large number of islands to support Sanctuary. How then will you get black sources? Running 8 fetches is clunky. Dismal Backwater isn't an island. The best bet IMO is Ash Barrens + Astrolabe. The Barrens can power the astrolabe, so you'll end up playing it untapped more, or using it as a shuffle effect for Brainstorm. Normal Thopter/Sword mana bases don't run fetches, so they must use Preordain instead which can sometimes be hard to fit in the curve. Besides, as you've already figured out, the astrolabe is very useful in the deck and now you don't need vulnerable artifact lands either. Maybe 4 Sanctuaries is too much. I will play 2 or 3. I had 3 to start with, then put in the 4th. This "too much" thinking got to me too, but here's the deal: All that matters is how many one-drops you run. If the only other thing you want to drop t1 is Astrolabe, then 4 Sanctuaries is fine (you don't want to Brainstorn t1, and you can't really Innocent Blood t1 either). If you have nothing to do with your mana, it doesn't matter if your first island ETB tapped. If you get 2 in your opener, shuffle the second one away with Brainstorm if you have better lands to play in early turns. You want your 4th island to be a sanctuary, so having 3 left in your deck helps with that (that first Sanctuary counts just as much as an island for your second one, of course). Having 3 bounce spells for the first land helps even more - they can also bounce a played Ash Barrens, then you cycle it for Snow-Covered Island, and use top-decked Swamp to pay for Astrolabe instead (this way, no more than 1 non-island in play at any time). One way or the other, you will be playing untapped Sanctuary on turn 5 almost every game with this set-up. And if you're still waiting for your land bouncers at that point, isn't even MOAR sanctuaries = bettar? Play 4! Moreover I just realized how good Tragic Lesson can be in that deck: with Foundry in play, you could choose to discard a Sword from your hand, sacrifice a random artifact to your Foundry to bring back the Sword. Clearly a must ! I know! I actually began in that end, looking for discard outs to cheat a bit on mana for sword so as to make the combo less clunky. It was only later that I happened upon Tragic Lesson as part of the sanctuary combo and found the looting spell I had been looking for all along. See, isn't Arcum's Astrolabe growing on you already for this deck? I've developped a goldfish simulator, and if I have time I'll run some simulations with your list and your way of playing Magma Jet (but I have to implement scry: it's no piece of cake). That would be so awesome! I took a look at the simulator/code and realized it was a bit over my head to punch in the details (I use Apple devices...) I'm contemplating a few tweaks to the burn list as detailed below though. @Kaeru Mystic Sanctuary + Deprive + Tragic Lesson is a way to gain advantage in grindy games that is hard to match, but don't do much before you assemble 3 island+sanctuary and have free mana or are under not a ton of pressure IMO Hmm... well, Sanctuary can be used as just Island almost at any point in the game for almost no opportunity cost as explained above. Tragic Lesson can be played whenever you happen to hold 3 mana open instead of just 2, and you can profitably discard Sword of the Meek to it as also explained above (or just another card that is situationally irrelevant). Premature Deprive though, is a problem. That is why I'd rather not use more than 1. It's also tutorable, which Tragic Lesson isn't. I think a 2/1 split is the best choice all things considered. Unfortunately I'm not a burn player, but you can still say that it is a threat that your opponent must remove, so they don't develop their game plan while you have it on board, so you gain turn to burn them. Also it's a decent blocker, but mostly 1 thermo makes your burn 4 damage, 2 makes them 5. 4 Spell clock. Yes, I've given this some thought during today's dog walks, and I think you're right. It's a bit like if they counter the t2 Thermo and you play a second on t3, it's like t2 never happened. The key here is that they must interact (using up cards and mana) on your first thermo. If they can just ignore it in a race, you've just delayed your fundamental turn and lost the race. BUT a t2 0/3 wall IS interactive against most non-control decks too. And for the ones where it isn't, boarding the 4th copy out for games 2-3 seems very reasonable. So this got me thinking further! With 4x Thermo, perhaps Ghitu Lavarunner isn't the best 1 CMC creature for the deck after Swiftspear? If you're always dropping Thermo, you're not filling the yard for early Lavarunner. So I went looking on Scryfall and found: Goblin Champion. He's as good as Swiftspear on t1. He doesn't really care about Thermo, because it's not attacking so it doesn't interact. He's still good with Swiftspear though, because he still adds damage to the monk even he's too weak to connect himself - and if the monk is removed, he powers back up again to sneak some damage in. He's even decent in multiples because exalted stacks. In fact the only time when he's bad, is when you have 2 Swiftspear, because he'll only boost one of them if it attacks alone. This got me thinking further still: -1 Monastery Swiftspear +1 Light up the Stage. You see, not only is this more synergistic with the creature base, but with this creature base, I can actually use 2x Light up the Stage as Mountain #17-18 when making mulligan decisions on keepable hands. That is huge! I can keep 1-land hands with LotS if I have a reasonable source of damage on t2 that drops on t1. Rift Bolt is most reliable here, but Champion/Swiftspear works well too and with 11 sources of such damage, you can pretty much treat it as land when making mull decisions. So I'm thinking right now: +1 Thermo-Alchemist -1 Monastery Swiftspear +1 Light up the Stage -3 Ghitu Lavarunner +4 Goblin Champion -2 Flame Rift Though with Staggering Insight, that might have changed, it needs some testing. Wow! Staggering Insight was a... a staggering insight! I had missed that card completely. I always felt Spirit Mantle as an uncommon choice lacked a certain... je ne sais quoi. But this card delivers! I've also thought about your Hexproof "2-out-of-3" theory, which makes all kinds of sense. But still, I feel like if you need to go to 4+ colors to make a deck work in the meta, something is wrong. That, and I think the bogles lists with Astrolabe + Kor Skyfisher are just aesthetically disgusting - like why would you do that?? (I know why, and in the words of Armadillo Cloak - "don't laugh, it works" - but it looks god awful). Before I read your theory, I thought all bogles were just "play bogles + auras, attack for profit", but I realize there's more to it than that. As for my own preference, what I really value is consistency and stability. I hate losing to myself more than to my opponent. But on that note, let's return to Staggering Insight. We've already seen that purist W/G is actually overly stable in the mana base, so you can even afford extravagances such as Cave of Temptation. But I think we could make it three colors, still very stable, and vastly expand the repertoire of SB options while still completely ignoring any black and red cards. The five uncommons would of course be Staggering Insight and Season of Growth, which is perhaps the most CA I've seen in a peasant deck, let alone an aggro one. And there's no reason why such a list would not be aggro AF too! I hope that's what you mean with Staggering Insight perhaps changing things and being the holy grail to achieve the full trinity. At least, I think I shall revise my list for a Bant build - will post a draft considering all your suggestions once I have something finished!
Kaeru	Mar 23, 2020, 12:22 AM Hey ! Goblin Champion Why would you run more than 8 creatures? When you already have 4 thermo and 4 Swiftspear ! You have the pauper 8's but 4 of them are just strictly better ! staggering insight! I had missed that card completely Yeah me too ! It was introduced to me by Antho63, and it felt real good. CA + Lifelink? Never lose to burn again? Race every aggro deck? damn FINE. I always felt Spirit Mantle as an uncommon choice lacked a certain... je ne sais quoi. Yeah me too, for me playing it T2 feels like a timewalk, a lot of other uncommons aura are way better, and I always prefered Gryff boon over it because it helped in MU with lots of flyers when you are behind, fly your way through most aggro deck, and can come back if it's or your creature's blew up. I don't say you need too go 4c+ though, I say that's one of the strength of Bogles, is that it can if it needs too. My list is 2c main and to 4c side because it can, and with sufficient mana fixing, like affinity it's a powerful tool. And Astrolabe + Skyfisher can be legit, not if your plan is to goldfish your way to the finish line. I tried astrolabe without skyfisher and astrolabe and skyfisher though, the first is good at fixing and cantriping right, but it looks like you never draw your payoff and play a more consistent but way less strong version of itself, so you kinda loose to competitive deck. The second didn't suit my vision of the deck either, as you loose most of your main gameplan for more CA and better Ux MU. For me you play Hexproof for 2 Reasons. 1) The meta is target removal heavy. 2) The hate is not in side. So why opening up to other gameplan and probably weakness when you have so much of a strong gameplan in the first place? Otherwise just play Heroic, it's more consistent. I hate losing to myself more than to my opponent. I understand that, it nearly made me quit playing affinity out of frustration haha. But I think we could make it three colors Honestly, just go for GW and add 2 staggering insight, the mana base will support it anyway (abundant growth/utopia and cave can cast card that have only U in their CMC) With a manabase like that you can definitely play some of other color if you don't go too crazy about it, but I would still keep up to the regular colors main (+UU for the 2 insight) to not destibilize your game plan, as G1 is your most "free" game as most of the tough decision and play come during the sideboarding and in the following games. So yeah I definitely think that Staggering insight can be a powerful tool, and that the list should either go with Season of Growth and Insight, or without the Season of Growth to be 100% Goldfish, but I wouldn't advise to go for greedier package with more colors. Keep it for the side, and enjoy your mostly free G1
urdjur	Mar 23, 2020, 4:07 PM You know, Cave of Temptation really starts to make more and more sense. I really like the idea of GWu(rb) with tiny splashes for silver bullets in other colors like you suggest, but without Astrolabe. I'll go to work on such a list! Why would you run more than 8 creatures? When you already have 4 thermo and 4 Swiftspear ! You have the pauper 8's but 4 of them are just strictly better ! I'm already running 10, my new version considers 11 creatures instead - not that big of a difference. Legacy and Modern routinely runs 12 creatures. The card type doesn't really matter in burn, just the damage potential. Creatures often have the benefit of helping burn not to run out of steam against control, while still helping in the race against aggro and combo - if they are the right ones. And of course Swiftspear is strictly better than the common options - it'd better be, to qualify for your precious uncommon slots. There are many options for those slots though, I just think Swiftspear and Light up the Stage are some of the best alternatives, but to make good use of Light up the Stage in a fast list, you need a density of free t2 damage sources as explained above - which gets more important as you increase the copy number. Anyway, don't simply consider the number of creatures, that's a bit irrelevant. Consider the build as a whole - what goes with what. I'm looking forward to if @Pismy's simulations could provide some insight here I have a gut feeling that 16 Mountain + 2 SSG + 2 LotS (if supported with adequate 1-drops) might be very strong, but we'll see.
pismy	Mar 24, 2020, 10:34 AM Hey A few additional thoughts about your thopter list. - 4 artifacts (astro) seems not enough. I would add 2 land artifacts - 4 shuffle effects for 4 brainstorm is not enough - 1 echoing truth MD is very handy to manage unpleasant things on board such as Engineered Plague or Scarecrow (and furthermore tutorable with muddle)
urdjur	Mar 24, 2020, 11:30 AM @Pismy - thanks for the comments. 1) Not enough for what? The only time I'd really like an artifact apart from Sword of the Meek is for the discard to Tragic Lesson play. Such a fringe benefit does not seem worth losing snow support for Astrolabe, Islands for Mystic Sanctuary and the inherent vulnerability games 2-3 of artifact lands themselves. In traditional builds, the artifact lands help avoid mana flood and make something useful post your 5-6th land drop, but here I use Sanctuary to stop dropping land instead. 2) Indeed, there are 7 though with Muddle, and I've added another transmute spell too now (see below). T2 Brainstorm is possible with Ash Barrens, but not optimal. Brainstorm gets more powerful the later you play it. I also envision playing it EOT t4 to proceed with t5 transmute, keeping 2 mana open and using brainstorm to secure the land drop. I can also do the little trick of picking up early Ash Barrens with land bounce spells to make sure all of them can shuffle for Brainstorm. In short, waiting to use Brainstorm is typically the correct play and shuffle effects will present themselves. 3) Agreed, and I do - there's an Echoing Truth in the list right under Agony Warp Now to the LIST CHANGES: Burn: I experimented a bit and decided the plan to use LotS to keep 1-land hands thanks to 1-drop creatures is very shady. You get bad lines of play even in ideal circumstances, like forcing to attack with vanilla Monk to then draw land and have mana to spend on a spell that will now not give prowess... it's a waste. So 4 Monks + 1 LotS is better - and you just use that LotS whenever it's convenient to restock a bit your hand. I also read up on the use of Seal of Fire in recent burn lists and I'm a believer. Not only is it a good spectacle enabler and counter-proof finisher that you can drop early to trigger Swiftspear, but it's also a silver bullet in some MUs like Tribe. So the list changes here came out to: -3 Ghitu Lavarunner +1 Thermo-Alchemist +2 Seal of Fire Very pleased with the Burn list now! Thopter Sword: The SB needed the most work, but in the end I decided to go with a 3/1 Muddle the Mixture + Shred Memory split in the main. That's 4 tutors and by turn 5 you can transmute for 1BB without problems. The chance is greater that instant/sorcery countering OR GY hate will be relevant game 1, than just the first, and you transmute what you don't need. Nihil Spellbomb looks really strong in the board too as it good GY hate on its own but can also cantrip with Thopter Foundry if needed. With 4 tutor effects main, sadly no extra MtM in the SB but in return I managed to keep Negate. I also cut some sorcery speed cards in the SB that didn't fit the game plan because it turned out I had mistakenly a 17 card SB! -1 Miscalculation +1 Shred Memory SB: -2 Cremate +2 Nihil Spellbomb (-2 Evincar's Justice, previously SB cards 16-17!) Hexproof: This got the most changes. I really liked the singleton Heliod's Pilgrim in that pauper list, because it permits a small main deck toolbox to help in game 1, and diversifies your SB plan a bit. In the end, I decided I liked 2x Soul's Fire in the SB best because it gives additional answers to Flagbearer too. Here's what I ended up with: -2 Plains +2 Cave of Temptation -2 Spirit Mantle (u) +2 Staggering Insight (u) +1 Heliod's Pilgrim -1 Rancor -2 Cartouche of Solidarity +1 Cartouche of Strength +1 Cartouch of Knowledge +1 Sentinel's Eyes (moved 1 Ancestral Mask to SB for the more racing MUs) SB: -1 Young Wolf -3 Return to Nowhere (the space saving of this card is good, but the deck doesn't want mana open) +2 Seal of Primordium +2 Faerie Macabre -2 Karametra's Blessing -3 Journey to Nowhere +2 Soul's Fire +1 Cartouche of Ambition +1 Quiet Disrepair (and the 3rd Ancestral Mask copy) All in all, very pleased with how it turned out and I couldn't have done it wihtout you! Now to order some cards and hope to see you both on-line in the near future
Kaeru	Mar 24, 2020, 12:44 PM Hey urdjur ! Quite a lot of change in your deck, happy we got you brainstorming that much ! I will pass on Thopter and Burn because that's not my field of work, but seems legit. For hexproof though ! I don't think cartouche of knowledge is relevent? As you already have tons of trample aura's and 4x Ledgewalker? It free's you a slot, and lately, I've been running Nylea's Presence in that slot, doesn't seems much, but count for your pay off and help with the mana base, it's a worse abundant growth but sometimes it is the only one you have ! Anyway there is a ton of flexibility in that archetype so do what's feel best ! The only thing I can't seems to agree with is less ancestral mask main. The deck was only built because of 4x ethereal armor + 4 ancestral mask on hexproof creature, that's litteraly why the deck was made, because thoses cards are your "pay off", the one that will win you games/get you out of harms way. And I really felt a shift in powerlevel when I started playing a full playset of thoses two. Maybe a 2nd cartouche of solidarity in SB in case you face tons of edict? Better than young wolf with Heliod's pilgrim (Seems to become popular because of Jund Midrange and UB Delver). Ray of revelation and Seal of primordium split is good too I found out. And lastly, don't forget some dispel and mutagenic growth, electrickery is still here creeping ! btw, would be nice you make a post with the full list again, would help us not have to go all the way up and figuring out the change héhé. Don't forget to join our discord !

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