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By: Motu, Aaron Kahler
Aug 17 2009 2:12am
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I've had a week filled with memorable moments.  I hardcast Progenitus and got to cascade off of it thanks to Maelstrom Nexus in Commander.  I not only killed an opponent for the first time with Progenitus but proceeded to finish off the remaining two players at the table with the legendary hydra as well.  Then at FNM, I watched as my opponent confidently tapped eight and windmill slammed Empyrial Archangel only to have his confidence turn into horror when my sideboarded Pestilent Kathari gained first strike and banished the angelic being to the nether world.   However in the midst of a great week I decided it was time to get back to Pauper and video commentary with something a bit less flamboyant than .

Over the past several weeks control has come to supplant Mono-black control as the black control deck of choice.  Traditionally the rise of mono-black is met with  haterator decks packed with protection from black beaters.  But with the new breed of black-blue control decks packing a full eight "sacrifice a creature" spells (Diabolic Edict and Innocent Blood) is the matchup still favorable for the green-white hate bear lists or is the green-white mage better off casting a horde of slivers against the new black brew?

In attempts to answer this question I decided to run a set of test matches with the highest placing list of each respective archetype from the latest Pauper event:

 

The Bu Control list has dropped the Corrupts of MBC and even shaved the Tendrils of Corruption and Crypt Rats count in order to run the full eight sacrifice effects to combat the normal channels of opposition - removal resistant creatures: Llanowar Knight, Valeron Outlander, Guardian of the Guildpact, Obsidian Acolyte, etc.  The deck also packs Probe, Deep Analysis, and Mulldrifter for much needed card draw.  It has the ability to resist discard: Deep Analysis, and combat opposing control decks: Distress, Deep Analysis, Probe, Grim Harvest, and even Duress after board.  It isn't shocking that the deck has become a dominant force in the Pauper metagame.

 

Hate Bears is filled with six pro-black beaters split three and three as protection from the likes of Echoing Truth.  They are complemented with eight pairs of pants, Armadillo Cloak and Shield of the Oversoul, with which to make them monstrous.  Benevolent Bodyguard protects your dudes from any unfriendly fire while they are suiting up.  The game plan is simple: make efficient beaters even more efficient and bash until the opponent is at 0.  But can protection from black, pants, and indestructibility still get it done in a world of Diabolic Edicts and Innocent Bloods?

Video

 

 

Conclusions

The Hate Bears list is far better equipped to fight the Black-blue Control decks than the typical Armadillo Cloak lists. However it appears even with all of the hate the matchup isn't much better than 50/50.  Akrasan Squire and Benevolent Bodyguard coupled with the six pro-black critters make the early game clearly in favor of the GW deck as one might normally expect, but the eight one-drops made a significant difference in the games GW was able to secure.  Yet in testing we found the control deck was typically able to stall until the card advantage generated by Mulldrifter, Crypt Rats, and Probe was such that all the one-for-one trades became backbreaking for the aggro deck.  Worse still, at a low life total the Black-blue Control list could fire off a Tendrils of Corruption and suddenly be looking at two more turns with which to stabilize.

After sideboard things get worse for the hate bears player.  There is nothing to bring in unless you want to cut Oblivion Ring for Hallow as additional Tendrils of Corruption protection.  Meanwhile the Black-blue player gets to bring in the additional Tendrils of Corruption along with a full set of Dross Golem in place of Grim Harvest, Deep Analysis, and a (Chittering Rat).  Dross Golem gets some serious facetime alongside Mulldrifter as team block pro-black.  Whereas Chittering Rats is often close to a blank since it can't block the pro-black guys and can't trade with a 2/2 pumped by exalted from Akrasan Squire or Qasali Pridemage, Dross Golem with three power can not only block the hate bears but can also trade with a creature enhanced by one exalted trigger.

While GW Hate Bears looks to have a stranglehold on the RDW matchup and Shield of the Oversoul and Armadillo Cloak wreak havoc on opposing creature decks, especially when attached to the ever vigilant Steward of Valeron, Slivers seems to be the better GW choice against the Black-blue lists.  In a sea of non-targeted removal indestructibility and pro-black just aren't the same and the eight auras tend to only offer control more chances at two-for-ones.  I'd be tempted to replace Hallow in the SB with Aven Riftwatcher as another option against RDW and simply to have another creature in place of enchantments against Black-blue.  Between Armadillo Cloak and Aven Riftwatcher I can't imagine wanting CoP:Red as well.  I'd want to have the fourth copy of the pro-black guys in the board and wouldn't mind the third Scattershot Archer for skies and the like.  The other interesting SB decision is whether you bring in Gleeful Sabotage for Dross Golem or not.  I believe the standard procedure for the control deck is to bring in the golems and as such I would cut out auras for the narrow removal as it seems superior to Armadillo Cloak in the matchup.  As such I would recommend the following sideboard for GW Hate Bears: 4x Holy Light, 3x Gleeful Sabotage, 3x Aven Riftwatcher, 3x Scattershot Archer, 1x Llanowar Knight, 1x Valeron Outlander.  That would then make the sideboard plan against the following: -4 Armadillo Cloak, -4 Shield of the Oversoul -- +3 Gleeful Sabotage, +3 Aven Riftwatcher, +1 Llanowar Knight, +1 Valeron Outlander.  In anticipation of Black-blue control bringing in 4 Dross Golem, 1 Tendrils of Corruption and cutting 1 Grim Harvest and some number of Deep Analysis and Chittering Rats.

Black-blue Control has proven itself.  Time will tell if GW becomes a sea of slivers or if pants continue to be fashionable this fall.

19 Comments

If sacrifice effects are so popular by Theobill (not verified) at Mon, 08/17/2009 - 03:19
Theobill's picture

Why not run tukatounge thallid, it comes down on turn 1 and neuters any sacrifice effects until they kill it, twice. Also, if we're trying to max out the mono Black matchup. how about naya blades rather than bant blades. Admittedly bant blades are far better against aggro decks.

The thallid is a great option by Motu at Mon, 08/17/2009 - 09:39
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The thallid is a great option if you are only concerned with the Black-blue matchup (great idea btw, hadn't considered this). However there are still other decks in the format that the pants deck is counting on having a favorable matchup -- notably RDW and other aggro decks. In these matchups the Benevolent Bodyguard's ability to protect a creature from removal while sticking Shield of the Oversoul or Armadillo Cloak is crucial.

hmm by Paul Leicht at Mon, 08/17/2009 - 03:20
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Where is your slivers listing? and You only gave us 2games. Seems a bit short. Also what about other dominant pauper decks, storm, affinity etc. Do they factor at all? Or are you just mostly worried about MBCu vs GW?

I recently started to play by Klemzo at Mon, 08/17/2009 - 04:45
Klemzo's picture

I recently started to play Pauper and your questions seam to be right.

When you go on big tournaments with Pauper you will mostly see this 2 decks.
Artifact Affinity, Storm and Goblin rush are pretty good but not good enough to beat this 2 decks... at least the BU Control.

I know cause I tried all of them and the best one that works is BU Control. The only thing that got bored in Pauper now is that too many people use BU and its getting boring. Imagine BU vs BU. I really don't see that much fun in it :P

But thx for this great article Motu. I added few cards to my BU ;)

The idea here isn't to by Motu at Mon, 08/17/2009 - 09:38
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The idea here isn't to comment on two decks against the entire field but rather to to examine whether GW lists which on paper look like they are geared to crush the black decks actually do in fact have an edge in the matchup.

I find many players play pauper on the side and so when they grab a deck off the net and see six pro-black dudes and are still losing to the Black-blue deck they wonder if they are really that terrible or what is going on.

This article was an attempt to demonstrate that one shouldn't pick up the GW Hate Bears lists and expect to have insane numbers vs the new breed of Bu running the 8 sacrifice effects and for those who are running the old black lists and having trouble with GW it might be time to switch to the updated model.

Ok but... by Paul Leicht at Mon, 08/17/2009 - 10:07
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You did mention a slivers variation and didn't provide a list. :) I get the idea of the article I just felt it was rather short and not very fleshy.

I also think it is a real shame if the pauper format is completely dominated by one deck archetype. If this isn't the case then where are the good answers? (Most of the ones I associate with normally are not pauper.)

The possibility exists that there are decks no one has tried but I think it unlikely. Perhaps the problem is that anything control tends to have a slight edge over anything not control unless the notcontrol is hard to stop or race. That being said it seems that the combination of blue and black gets around the innate problems of facing a hatorer deck. Maybe something needs banning? or perhaps the format needs to be redefined ever so slightly. Is there a good B&R list for Pauper?

Coral Net by RagMan17 at Mon, 08/17/2009 - 12:27
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Another sideboard card I like for BU vs GW is Coral Net. However I do not see where to fit it into the sideboard of your current BU build.

As for Red instead of Blue, with how fast most pauper decks are if you dont have the card drawing of blue you lose too much (if you look at the deck, blue is almost pretty much only in the deck for the card drawing, well and a 2/2 beater to go against pro black critters) and I think you don't gain enough through red to make up for the loss of card advantage. And I think that BR would loose to the BU semi-mirror match. BR would also just seem to run out of gas too quickly and then you and your oppoenent are both sitting there wishing to get the better top deck draw.

RagMan

Game one didn't the opponent by Anonymous (not verified) at Mon, 08/17/2009 - 13:50
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Game one didn't the opponent mess up when he dropped the shield on Akrasan Squire he should've saved it by sacrificing one bodyguard imo.

Misplay by cRUMMYdUMMY at Mon, 08/17/2009 - 16:15
cRUMMYdUMMY's picture

Yes, his opponent did misplay by not sacrificing the Bodyguard to Shield the Squire. This would have let him do 3 damage instead of 2. Which would have won the GW player the game as Motu finished with 1 life. Unfortunate mistake on the GW player's part.

How embarrassing by A_Webb at Tue, 08/18/2009 - 19:30
A_Webb's picture

How embarrassing. Toss one more in the GW column when Bu mulled to 5. However I agree with the article that this is a not better than a 50/50 match for GW. I have been playing pauper for only about 2 weeks. I saw a comment about this format being dominated by one archtype, but that has not been my experience at all. There seem to be a large number of decks that can compete in the format. M

As best I can tell I ended by Motu at Tue, 08/18/2009 - 22:48
Motu's picture

As best I can tell I ended the game at 5 life as such it didn't impact the final outcome of the game.

I played with Pox deck by Anonymous (not verified) at Mon, 08/17/2009 - 13:57
Anonymous's picture

I played with Pox deck against my friend's persist deck and learned that Diabolic Edict and Innocent blood are very annoying against those sort of creatures as you have to spend 2 spells getting one creature. Safehold Elite seems to be an obvious choice.

I'm not saying it's the best by Anonymous (not verified) at Mon, 08/17/2009 - 13:58
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I'm not saying it's the best answer in general play, but playing Cerulean Wisp on your Crypt Rats lays waste to the block protection.

I'm extremely confused by by Lenney (not verified) at Mon, 08/17/2009 - 18:17
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I'm extremely confused by this comment

I think by JXClaytor at Mon, 08/17/2009 - 18:33
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That it is a little muddy. I also think that the word block is the supposed to be the word black.

So if you cast the wisps, targeting the Rats, it's a blue creature, than activate the rats, instead of black rats dealing damage to pro black guys (which can not be done.) it's blue rats dealing damage to pro black guys, which would kill the pro black guys.

I think that is what he was trying to say.

Tried it by Kriterian (not verified) at Tue, 08/18/2009 - 11:14
Kriterian's picture

I usually play mono black in Pauper but decided to try these two out last night. I only came across one person playing something similar to the Blue Black while playing the GW, and it destroyed me. All the protection in the world won't save you from 8 sacrifice spells. Also a few games could have gone my way if I'd had Corrupt instead of Tendrils. Progenitus was nice because I see alot of recursion, reanimators and graveyard play. I might even up it to three.

. by Numdiar (not verified) at Wed, 08/19/2009 - 23:42
Numdiar's picture

M/U is a good deck for a skilled player but it's not the best deck or probably even 2nd or 3rd best. It's a viable option if you're good and want to play control, but it's really just another deck in the meta. Saying m/u is overrunning the format is absurd, and if you told someone playing pauper regularly that you thought something from m/u should be banned they'd probably laugh. I'd say slivers, affinity, and mono black are all better than it. Even then, there are a ton of decks that can win vs it. I play goblins all the time and m/u is a very favorable matchup for me. I just want to make sure people reading this understand that m/u is NOT a dominant deck close to anything like faeries was in std or even 5c or anything else.

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