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By: gwyned, gwyned
May 08 2012 9:11am
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I. Introduction

It's that time again. With the release of Avacyn Restored, various authors are weighing in on the new set, evaluating the individual cards themselves as well as how they as a whole will shape Constructed and Limited over the next few months of play. In the past, I have avoided adding my own voice to the cacophony of players weighing in on the new set. But, in my continuing quest to bring greater exposure to the world of Standard Pauper and promote it as an important online format, it seemed appropriate to offer my thoughts on how this set will impact the current metagame. Thus, in this article I will bring you what I believe are five of the most relevant cards from Avacyn Restored for Standard Pauper, one for each of the five colors. Note that my evaluation will be limited only to Standard Pauper. How particular cards will impact the Pauper format as a whole, or any of the various Magic formats, I will leave to much better players than I.

But before we get to that, let me remind you once again that the goal of Standard & Pauper is to highlight relevant information about the Standard Pauper format from the results of Monday Pauper Deck Challenge, commonly referred to as MPDC. MPDC is a weekly PRE featuring a Swiss tournament in the Standard Pauper format, with prizes awarded for the Top 8 finishers thanks to the sponsorship of MTGOTraders. As always, if you've never checked out MPDC, I encourage you to browse over to PDCMagic.com for all the information and then come join us at 2:00pm EST / 6:00pm GMT in the /join MPDC room. You can also check out any of my previous articles by clicking here.

II. Five Relevant Cards for Standard Pauper

So without further ado, here are my picks for the best Common from each color for Standard Pauper. For convenience sake, I will only be using "standard" sized preview images of the cards in question. But you can also click on the individual cards to load a larger version of the card for ease of reading.

1. For its converted mana cost, this is arguably one of the strongest White Commons to see print. While 2/4s for 4 in White are fairly common, some of the best White commons in a set have been 2/4s with a relevant ability for 4 mana (Safehold Duo and Rhox Meditant both come to mind as recent examples). The closest equivalent to this card is Makindi Griffin from Rise of the Eldrazi, which saw play but wasn't ever great. Combining both Flying and Lifelink make this angel quite a potent combatant. She can block almost all relevant flyers while gaining you back some life, including the ever-popular Stitched Drake. 4 Toughness also means she can ignore most Red burn spells (Artillerize, Morbid Brimstone Volley, and Metalcraft Galvanic Blast being the obvious exceptions). This clearly has a home in the upper-end of White Weenie, seems a solid 1 or 2 of in Kuldotha Hawk, and quite possible could serve as a keystone for an emerging  Control or Midrange deck. While not as dominant as Kor Skyfisher or Squadron Hawk, this seraph is solid reason to be playing White in the future.

2. While the verdict is still out, I predict that Soulbond will not make a major impact on Standard Pauper. But this Shieldmate is the strongest of the Commons with this mechanic, and does something that has never been seen before at Common. After the brief opportunity to remove this creature as the Soulbond trigger goes on the stack, both the Shieldmate and its paired creature gain Hexproof as long as both creatures remain in play. In my estimation, this is an extremely strong effect at Common, and one that will prove a major source of frustration to some players. The ability to protect a flyer like Delver of Secrets, Stitched Drake, or even Seraph of Dawn from nearly everything except creature combat (and edict effects such as Geth's Verdict) is very solid, and once again may lead to the creation of a potent Control or Midrange deck. With the possible exception of Mono Delver this does not seem to easily slot into an established deck in the current metagame.  Nonetheless, I predict it will see a significant amount of play after Avacyn Restored is released on Magic Online.

3. The first words of several players when seeing this card was something to the effect of, "A Reveillark at Common!?" While clearly not that strong, one must go way back to Magic's early days to find cards that move creatures directly from the Graveyard back to the Battlefield at Common. While the list of 2 mana costed creatures at Common isn't amazing, even in Black cards like Fume Spitter, Duskhunter Bat, or Vault Skirge are not irrelevant to return to play for free. Compared to Gravedigger for the same cost, you gain both an extra point of Power and the tempo bonus of immediately returning the creature. While not as strong in a Control deck, this vampire is potentially better in a more aggressive oriented deck. Specifically, it may prove to be very strong in either the Sacrifice deck or the Morbid deck, allowing one to squeeze more value out of cards like Altar's Reap, Undying Evil, or Hunger of the Howlpack. While perhaps not as strong as it first appears, this card may end up being a solid boost to archetypes that are not as dominant in the current metagame.

4. Goblin Bushwhacker proved to be an important card for aggressive strategies in Pauper, thanks to its relevant ability to pump all creatures by 1 power upon entering play. Similar abilities are always limited in scope, typically through only pumping a certain type of creature (such as Veteran Swordsmith). This card serves in a similar role, boosting itself and all other Humans when it attacks. Given that there are over 60 Humans in the current card set of Standard Pauper, this seems a very relevant ability. By itself, the Ringleader is a 3/2 for 2 when attacking, which is solid if not impressive. But in combination with a aggressive deck, one could amass a sizable army of creatures with the potential to swing in for a massive amount of damage fairly quickly. This would be a significant change for the current Kuldotha Hawk deck that currently occupies this space in the metagame, and so it remains to be seen whether this strategy is powerful enough to replace it. But this effect is certainly powerful enough to be worth consideration as the new metagame emerges.

5. Of the five, this card alone is not something new but merely a reprint. However, one could argue that the Ranger represents one of the strongest Green Commons of recent memory. The ability to get a relevant 2/2 for 2 that both ramps and fixes your mana is quite strong, especially given the poor options that are available in Standard Pauper for mana fixing. Solid fixing like the Ranger goes a long way toward enabling a greater number of Control decks, and I would not be at all surprised to see this archetype increase going forward. Additionally, enters-the-battlefield effects like these are traditionally very strong in Standard Pauper, and have great synergy with "flicker" like spells such as Cloudshift or with graveyard recursion such as Undying Evil. Additionally, I suspect that lists that include Viridian Emissary may want to consider the Borderlander, since one need not wait for the creature to die to retrieve the needed Land. Whether its return will be enough to make Green a more solid contender in the metagame remains to be seen, but I suspect that such will be the case.

III. Honorable Mention

While arguably not as strong as the cards above (at least not in their respective colors), these four cards are also worthy of consideration. Not surprisingly, of the nine cards mentioned in this article, three of them are Blue. I suspect Blue will be the dominant color in Standard Pauper moving forward. And so I present four additional cards from the set in alphabetical order.

1. Green Enchantments that provide color-fixing are nothing new at Common, with some examples from the more recent past including Fertile Ground, Lush Growth, and Trace of Abundance. This card is very much in line with these other effects, transforming a single Land to produce any color of mana for the very reasonable cost of  . The real cost of these type effects, however, has always been the card slot they occupy in the deck. While mana fixing is certainly vital, spending spell slots instead of Land slots has an inherent disadvantage in that it weakens one's deck overall and is very nearly a wasted card, since it has no effect on the board when it enters the battlefield. The real strength of Abundant Growth is that it goes a long way towards overcoming this disadvantage by immediately replacing itself. While not strong in a card set that includes Borderland Ranger, this is still one of the better ways to provide fixing for Standard Pauper.
 


2. Sift does not see play much play in Pauper, probably because of the presence of Compulsive Research for a single mana cheaper. In general though, effects that allow you to see three cards are quite solid, especially if it also allows you to discard an undesirable card. With this card, one also retains the chosen card in the deck, although much of the time this effect will probably not be relevant. For Standard Pauper, however, this may be the strongest draw spell since Foresee, although it is admittedly not quite at the same power level. While this card is neither unusual nor potentially format-defining, it is another component in shifting the metagame back towards Control. If a strong or Control deck becomes popular with the release of Avacyn Restored, it isn't hard to predict that Amass the Components will play a role.


3. The so-called Vampire ability from Innistrad, while having the potential to be quite strong, never saw much play in Standard Pauper. Even in Limited, cards like Bloodcrazed Neonate were not reliable enough to be good, for the simple reason that one lacked a dependable means for them to connect. Heirs of Stromkirk, while still not amazing, at least provides evasion, making it more likely that one will be able to connect a couple times and grow this vampire to a more formidable size. However, as long as Scars of Mirrodin remains in Standard, there will probably continue to be too many Artifact creatures for this creature to reliably pose a threat. After all, Perilous Myr sees play in just about every deck in Standard Pauper currently. The fact that these Heirs of Stromkirk also die to almost all of the relevant removal in the set further weakens their usefulness. Still, the creature is interesting, and has the potential to be quite powerful if one can come up with a plan to shore up these weaknesses.
 

4.Our final card is a significant upgrade to what was already a strong card. Aether Adept, while not widely played in Standard Pauper, has found a home in a few different types of deck in the past few months. While certainly good, even in Standard Pauper a 2/2 body without any relevant abilities is still a little underwhelming. Mist Raven is nearly identical, but has the very relevant upgrade of Flying for only a single additional mana. Along with the aforementioned Adept, the strength of these cards in combination with spells such as Silent Departure and Vapor Snag makes me wonder if a more tempo-based Blue deck might come into its own in the new metagame. Mono Delver may also have a home for a few copies of this card, although there it is in competition against the formidable Stitched Drake and Stormbound Geist which serve in a similar role. Finally, this card may also serve as yet another incentive to bring a Blue Control deck back into prominence in Standard Pauper.


IV. Conclusion

Thanks for reading this review of some of the most relevant Commons from Avacyn Restored. In closing, let me remind you that if you would like a sneak peak at my video content before it goes live here at PureMTGO.com, you can always browse over to YouTube.com, search for "gwyned42," select one of my video-casts, and click the Subscribe button. You can also follow me on Twitter at the username gwyned42; check out my profile here and click on Follow. Next week I hope to be back with my top picks for Standard Pauper from Avacyn Restored, so definitely check that out when it gets published. Until then, let me extend my gratitude for the great community of Standard Pauper players on Magic Online. More than anything else, it is this great community that keeps me in the game. See you next time!

2 Comments

in my opinion there are a lot by JustSin at Tue, 05/08/2012 - 14:49
JustSin's picture
5

in my opinion there are a lot of 2 drops for Driver in Pauper, but assuming you meant it totally in relation to std then I'd agree... I'm curious to see if it gets any application in the MBC list outside of std pauper

IMO Wandering Wolf should by avery61 at Wed, 05/09/2012 - 18:56
avery61's picture

IMO Wandering Wolf should have made this list. It's a solid two-drop that can't be blocked by a lot of other two drops and belongs in any green aggro deck. With the plethora of pump spells in std right now you could run him all way in for the win.