This Week in Pauper Feb 18-Feb 22

Intermission

    This week in standard pauper saw only one tournament, Thursday's SPDC 19.15. That leaves quite a hole to fill so with a nod toward tonight's Oscar awards I would like to examine what I believe were the top five common cards from Return to Ravnica.  Keep in mind these cards pertain only to the standard pauper format.  In many cases they would see little to no play in classic pauper or limited formats, but are what I consider all-star cards since their release.  For the sake of argument, no lands will be included in this list.  It could easily be argued that Selesnya Guildgate is the best overall card of the set, but I believe it's a more productive area of discussion to focus on the non-lands.  

    These cards made an immediate and lasting impact on the format and will continue to do so for the remainder of their legality in standard pauper.  These cards are not listed in any particular order and there is no definable winner.  With such a wide variety of decks being played throughout the set's release, and with such a wide set of utilities for each card it would be nearly impossible to rank them.  With that in mind, here are the nominees.  

    Centaur Healer

    From a flavor aspect I love Return to Ravnica not only because of the interplay between the guilds, but also for the return of powerful creature types, predominately centaurs.  Such a majestic, intelligent and intimidating beast has been left out of the main stable of creatures far too long and it's satisfying to see its return.  

    I give credit to the WoTC designers for not just throwing these creatures in without thought about how they should be judged in play terms. Centaur Healer was a card that became an immediate hit in W/G decks.  With it's 3/3 body it is ability to stay out of striking range of many of the format's most popular removal such as Pillar of Flame and Dead Weight, it passes the vanilla test easily in W/G decks.  

    One of the other gameplay mechanics that Return to Ravnica focused on was life gain. I think the designers have long been searching for a way to make life gain a serious consideration when deckbuilding, but until now have not been able to pull it off.  Centaur Healer's life gain is nothing to look past.  It is good enough that no opponent wants to bounce him back to your hand and unlike many life gain creatures of the past this isn't dependent upon any other condition.  It just happens when you cast it, plain and simple, no exceptions.  A 3/3 and 3 life for 3.  I'll take it.

Electrickery

   Although it appeared mainly as a sideboard card Electrickery gets into the top five because of two reasons:                 1. Red is such a staple color in the format because of Izzet decks and this card is as cheap as it gets with a huge overload bonus.  In fact, you would almost never see this played without it's overload cost.  

2. Electrickery single-handedly makes Populate a dead mechanic in standard pauper.  

    It's been a while since we've seen a common wrath-style spell(Rise of the Eldrazi if I'm not mistaken) and this card fits four of into any deck with red, even if it's just splashed.  There are always a plethora of 1 toughness creatures in standard pauper and even if it's only used without Overload I think this card will hang around in sideboards for a long time. 

Ethereal Armor

    It still remains to be seen if the Return to Ravnica block will make enchantments worthwhile, but at least for one shining moment Ethereal Armor has had it's moment in the sun. What makes this enchantment special is that even if it's the only enchantment you control it's doing at least some good.  When it's in a White Weenie deck though, you are sure to hit a Pacifism or two during the match to take this to another level.  First Strike is a potent ability and the boost in toughness is what brings this card from unplayable to possibly crushing in the right deck.  

    It was tough for me to put this in the top five because despite all its good it's still an enchantment that can be two-for-oned by the most popular and simple spells and it needs to be in just the right enchantment heavy deck to get the maximum good.  However, it has seen so much play in such successful decks that I thought it deserved a spot.  

Frostburn Weird

   For as long as Frostburn Weird has been the centerpiece of Izzet decks it would be foolish not to include in the top five.  I have to admit I didn't see it coming.  I took note of the card and it's capabilities when it was spoiled, but didn't think it would be the staple card in the staple deck.  

    In a vacuum it's not that impressive, but when put into a control deck like we've seen Izzet playing since RtR was legal, it is a behemoth.  It's major strength is its versatility.  It can sit there from round two as a 1/4, not bad.  Later, when the major threats have been removed it sizes up to make for some uncomfortable blocks and in the late game when all threats have been neutralized it is a stone-cold killer.  I've always felt that U/R is the most potent color combination and there will certainly be no shortage of cards in those colors to impress in the rest of the block.  

Goblin Electromancer

    Having played against this card many times, I no longer make the mistake of saving removal for more potent creatures.  Goblin Electromancer acts mainly as an enchantment in the early rounds, but is such a powerful enabler that when the board has been cleared by what becomes ultra cheap removal it becomes an attacking force.  

    The main ability of electromancer is to bring otherwise mana intensive cards back into the realm of castability in decks with a limited land source.  Spells like Cancel, Divination and Think Twice are now being cast a turn or two earlier than normal.  I've also seen some rarely used land destruction decks taking advantage of this guy to bring a new order of frustration to any game.  There is a reason WoTC stopped making cheap counterspells and draw cards.  Now they aren't that cheap.  If you're able to get two onto the battlefield it may as well be GG.  The only flaw I've found with this card is the fact that anything with the word Goblin cannot possibly have serious flavor text.  This is the least funny Goblin I've ever seen, I won't be smiling any time I see him across the table.  

SPDC 19.15

    For a format supposedly strong in multi-colored cards we saw three out of the top four decks this week featuring only one color.  WW is back in first place this week with petermere's WW for Fly deck.  

    This deck features all the usual suspects with the possible exception of Cloudshift to offer some protection and bring back an Attended Knight or flipped Loyal Cathar for another two uses, or possibly just get a creature out of the clutches of an opponent's Pacifism.  White has had the best assortment of pauper creatures for a long time now and unless Dragon's Maze and the next block turn that precedent on its head we will be seeing this style deck in the top 4 for a long time.  

  Obernoob took his mono-black MBA all the way to the finals on Thursday with harmonious mix of creatures and spells. One of this decks many strengths is only requiring the use of 18 lands, allowing for a few more critical removal spells that would normally be used for lands.  

    Duress and Sign in Blood are two crippling spells in this lineup, but as far as creatures are concerned Basilica Screecher does great work.  When the set was first spoiled Extort looked to a be a deck on it's own, but the truth is that it's probably best to put only one good extort creature in a deck.  The greatest advantage of Extort is that players are able to use any extra mana they may have to Extort.  With more than one Extort creature in play you will often find yourself tempted into Extorting when you should really be leaving mana up for removal or casting another creature.  It's a great mana sink, but not a great use for mana in general.  

    That being said, when you can add the benefits of Extort to a flyer with 2 toughness for 1B, that's what I call value.  

  Flucus took an unorthodox approach this week with a mono green aggro deck he calls Titanic Wolves.  The deck takes the same basic approach as the old mono green Infect decks, with plenty of evasive, value creatures stacked with instants like Giant Growth to plow through for an unexpectedly quick finish.  

    Young Wolf is value incarnate and Trusted Forcemage is a powerhouse when paired with Orchard Spirit, but I'd like to see Spire Tracer replace the Avacyn's Pilgrim for a more powerful aggro approach.  Overall, this is a potent deck that might benefit from NOT using Centaur Healer.  

    Panamimed piloted the only control deck in the top 4, an unusual change from recent events.  The Dimir Control deck featured only nine creatures, four of them being Archaeomancer.  This deck is just the right mix of draw/counter/removal to make aggro decks fizzle out by the middle rounds where Archaeomancer takes over and Bloodhunter Bat is able to get in for some damage.  

   I've been waiting to see how Psychic Strike pans out because these types of spells are a double-edged sword.  The counter aspect is always great of course, but you are either milling two cards you really needed to mill for great effect, or you are letting them dig past dead cards to the stuff they really need.  When it works it's glorious, when it doesn't you wish you had a Cancel.  The bottom line is that mill is not a competitive strategy right now and until it is this kind of card has it's drawbacks.  

    I can appreciate a great control deck like this, but I have reservations about it's potency in the current meta and how it would fare against WW or even mono green aggro.  This is a potentially powerful build however, and should see a lot of meta-dependent tuning in the coming weeks.  

    Next week should have a full slate of standard pauper action that I look forward to following and hope you do as well.  Until then, may the shuffler be with you.  

This Week in Pauper: Feb 11- Feb 15

Welcome to the Big Leagues

    During this season of MPDC we've seen a steady stable of players taking top four honors.  The names have become familiar and their achievements well documented.  These crafty deckbuilders and precision players were brought together this Monday for the MPDC season 19 championship, better known as MPDC Worlds.
    This season consisted of 18 weeks and players are awarded points based on how they perform; three points for a game win, 2 points for a bye and 1 point for a loss.  Only the top players are invited to the MPDC worlds and this how the top eight contestants fared this season:

Name-Season Points

Chipp-103
pk23-89
joekewwl-87
Malum-87
ellmaris-87
Froggery-79
PROboszcz-74
Adner-74

   Congratulations to all of this season's players, I'm sure we'll be seeing these names at the top of the leader board in season 20.



MPDC Worlds

    Pulling double duty as both player and host, Malum took the season 19 championship on Monday with his Izzet deck RDW.  Red/Blue has been a major contender in the past weeks and as I mentioned in last week's recap, this particular version is controlling, timely and most importantly flexible.  It can go from a burn deck to counter deck during sideboarding and loses nothing in terms of effectiveness and never seems to stumble for mana.  The most intriguing aspect of this deck to me is its cavernously low CMC of 1.69.
    In pauper we are generally used to seeing and average card cost between 2 and 2.30.  Sometimes a particularly fast red deck or highly efficient WW will come in somewhere around 1.90 but it's rare.  To see Malum's deck with nothing but 1 and 2 mana casting costs, its hard to imagine ever coming up short on mana.  Even with only three on the table this deck is able to cast two spells per turn, if not three!

    Joekewwl piloted a deck full of +1/+1 counters called Selesnya Beats to a second place finish.  This deck uses the ever popular Travel Preparations as well as Common Bond (sounds like a great name for a pauper clan)  and Trusted Forcemage to pile on the counters.  This deck uses lifegain in order to play a little catch-up when needed against more aggressive decks and uses Ranger's Guile and Primal Huntbeast for some creature protection to keep the creature count in its favor against decks with heavy removal.

    Garlan came in third in the worlds with a tried and true season 19 White Weenie deck, the only WW in the top eight.  This is one of the most creature heavy decks I've ever seen, featuring 35 efficient creatures.  The reason this deck is so popular and has won or placed highly in so many standard pauper tournaments is the tenacious efficiency that it holds.  Creatures like Attended Knight, Loyal Cathar and Doomed Traveler are all two for one's and Loyal Cathar and Doomed Traveler must be killed twice. Along with being cheap to cast,  this deck infuriates removal heavy decks the most because they simply cannot gain card advantage.

   Pk23 finished fourth against pauper's best competition with USA control, a fusion R/U deck that spashes white for Pacifism and Keening Apparition.  Pk has used this deck for the last couple weeks with good success due to the decks combination of card draw, graveyard shenanigans featuring Archaeomancer and Stitched Drake and gains card and creature advantage with Mist Raven and Ghostly Flicker.  This deck has a little bit of everything, making it tough to find answers with such good card draw to search for the best card for each situation.  It's only drawback may be that it's a little too slow against Selesnya and WW but it's still one of the most effective decks out there when run in capable hands such as pk's.



PK Standard 2.05

    


    Selesnya stood tall in last week's Pauper Krew tournament hosted by FabioS.  White mana was represented in 78% of decks and W/G was the color combo of choice.  However, it was Rakura's W/U deck, Picture Perfect Pancakes that took the trophy.
   The deck doesn't seem to be able to get on the board and running very quickly but when it does it's able to control the skies with the ever present threat of Seraphs as well as a highly efficient Gryff Vanguard which is able to replace its self when it is inevitably taken out by the removal heavy decks it is certain to face.  Getting a card back in return is nothing to laugh about, unless you're piloting the deck and draw another Gryff  or that critical Pacifism.
     It's the deck's non-creatures that have me intrigued however.  Forbidden Alchemy may be the all-star of the deck with it's ability to dig deep in search of the exact spell you need for a crucial situation.  Feeling of Dread is a highly underrated card that more W/U decks should consider running.  Being able to tap down two creatures before your opponent attacks then untapping and tapping down two more to swarm in for the kill can be a huge blowout.  Not only that, just keeping the flashback stowed away for late game use is often a great tactic.  So many other flashback cards with a much higher flashback cost see regular play in standard pauper that I'm surprised that so few decks have been running this potent card, though use has picked up lately.
    The deck's sideboard is immensely hateful of enchantments and deservedly so.  With so many Ethereal Armors and Pacifisms running around enchantment hate is a slam dunk strategy in the current meta.
    Heavy Mattock is an interesting selection.  It's a card that is easy to dismiss when looking for good ways of pumping creatures due to it's relatively intensive mana cost.  It can really slow a deck down when you need to cast creatures on turns three and four, but opt instead to cast an artifact which you cannot yet equip. The reason this card works well in this deck, though, is that it's a Human heavy deck and there is virtually no artifact removal in the current meta.  Being able to board this card in and throw it onto any of your evasive flyers can be a huge swing.  Furthermore, it's time to admit that the days of great artifacts like Sylvok Lifestaff are over.  Three is probably on the upper end of doable for casting cost these days and two is about as good as you're going to get for an equip cost, at least for any card worth playing.

    Andres1995 posted a second place finish with his deck, Junk Midrange.  This is the popular W/G/B Centaur Healer deck with great black removal.  I think the card that tips the scales in this deck's favor is Sign in Blood.  With such prolific lifegain this deck doesn't think twice about taking a couple points off for two cards when it's trying to grind it out in the late game.
   Ogre Jailbreaker seems like a card that just doesn't have what it takes to go in this deck, but a 4/4 for four without a double mana cost is just on this side of playable, however I wonder if there are not better options for the four slot in this deck.
    As great as I think Feeling of Dread is I would cringe at casting it without being able to recuperate it later for its flashback cost.  But, when you need to tap down two Seraph's or that one last pesky Centaur Healer this card will do the job even without getting full value.

    In addition to having a provocative and creative deck name, Ellmaris took his Blue Selesbians to a top four finish with what I consider to be the most interesting deck in the tournament.  I have long been wondering when Elgaud Shieldmate was going to make her appearance in standard pauper, as this card can be an unstoppable weapon against heavy removal.  It's not always a main board option but when it's in a deck with evasive creatures like Deathcult Rogue and Spire Tracer it can wreak havoc.
    Normally I abhor the kind of creature enchantments that this deck runs because the creatures they enchant are far too easily removed, leaving their controller open for multiple two-for-ones.  However, with Shieldmate holding down the fort and other hexproof creatures like Rubbleback Rhino and Primal Huntbeast in the mix the enchantments become nearly impossible to remove, forcing the opponent to side in a pile of white enchantment hate when they would rather be playing more proactive killers.  Believe me, it's one of the most frustrating feelings to have a hand full of removal and watch a bunch of pumped up unblockables sneaking in for damage that piles up in a hurry.



Overview

   With no SPDC last thursday my main observation about the meta game in standard pauper is that decks are moving away from highly aggressive, mana friendly archetypes into more controlling, mana intensive ones.  We are seeing a lot more decks with non-creatures outnumbering creatures and more decks with curves topping out at five CMC.  Decks don't seem to be as quick off the draw and much more geared toward holding a board state by clogging the lanes of traffic or more notably lifegain.
    Lifegain is a strategy that hasn't seen much in standard pauper in quite a while and it's thrown a new stick into the spokes.  Aggro essentially becomes a useless strategy in the face of cards that use life gain not as their sole function, but as an added on bonus to already playable cards.  It would take quite a fast deck indeed to overcome such incidental lifegain, as evidenced by the fact that no decks in the top four of PK Standard contained red and even though four of the top eight decks in MPDC contained red, none of those decks can be considered aggro decks. In addition, PK Standard had no WW finalists and MPDC had only one.  
    Maybe aggro is not aggro enough right now or maybe it will take a highly creative, ultra-aggressive deck to turn the tables on the current meta.  Until next time, may the shuffler be with you.

This Week in Pauper: Feb 4- Feb 8

The Rundown

    Welcome to the first ever issue of Standard Pauper Weekly.  If you haven't already guessed, this is a weekly blog focusing solely on the weekly standard pauper tournaments hosted by the generous and dedicated members of Magic Online's thriving standard pauper community. These hosts, to be given proper credit with each tournament synopsis, have been the backbone of a burgeoning community of magic players dedicated to the standard pauper format. This blog will recap the tournament week and hopefully provide solid footing in the format's meta-game for both weekly tournament participants as well as casual players of the format not able to compete in the tournaments on a regular basis.
    It is my intention to present a weekly, editorial style review of the week in standard pauper as well as my interpretation of the constant ebb and flow of standard pauper's ever changing meta-game.
    This blog will not contain any deck building tips.  Minds infinitely more creative than mine spend vast amounts of time with this aspect of the game and to tread upon their territory would be foolish of me.  This is merely one man's opinion and observations on a wonderfully fun format and I hope you enjoy my weekly presentations and maybe even learn something along the way.
    Currently, there are three major player run tournaments in the standard pauper format.  MPDC held on Mondays, SPDC held on Thursdays and a weekly tournament hosted by and for the Pauper Krew clan on Wednesdays.  The PK tournament is open only to Pauper Krew clan members, but has a robust following rivaling the other two major tournaments, which is why the results will be reviewed on this blog.  If anyone knows of any other standard pauper tournaments please let me know, I am always interested to hear other fans opinions and reviews of the format.  As always, I look forward to your opinions and comments about the current state of standard pauper and hope to find many new friends through this blog.  So without any further delay, lets get to the tournaments.



MPDC 19.13

    Since the introduction of Frostburn Weird into the common card pool with the release of Return to Ravnica, the Izzet colors have seen a resurgence in popularity, as evidenced by host Malum's victory piloting his version of Izzet Delver in Monday's tournament.  This particular brew, however contained some interesting creature choices such as Hinterland Hermit and Wingcrafter.  Along with Pursuit of Flight, this deck takes to the skies to defend itself against the rampant WW decks in the format.
   As with most red-based decks, it features a suitable compliment of burn spells to take care of the lower toughness creatures in the current meta, but it's sideboard is what mostly interests me.  In situations where a ton of burn is either not needed or not effective, this deck can load up on Essence Scatterand Negate to turn the deck into a counter heavy threat to fend off the mirror matchup as well as Black Flag and those pesky Seraph's.  This deck packs a lot of punch and it's easy to see why.  With a curve topping out at two it can get by with only eighteen lands, leaving plenty of room for both burn and counter.  Quite a deadly combo indeed as Malum's 6-0 performance would indicate.
    Runner up Chipp's GWR Naya deck showed how well a truly balanced deck can perform.  Equal parts creature threat, burn and pump, with a little mana fixing thrown in, this deck has no problems finding exactly the mana it needs at exactly the right time.  Splatter Thug is a surprisingly balanced card for red that I thought would see a lot more play than it has, but fits perfectly into this deck.  Placed alongside Attended Knight, two creature slots with first strike can be a daunting obstacle, especially when considering the help they get from Trusted Forcemage and Travel Preps.
    It's well known that pauper contains a lot of good, cost-effective removal and most decks running white, black or red usually have access to multiple ways to kill or maim those pumped up first strikers.  However, this deck runs a full compliment of Seraph's, making it difficult to waste burn or lockdown spells early in the game when you know you have such a big threat taking to the skies soon.  With Spiders and  Scarecrows keeping the skies clear and the ability to hate on enchantments, this deck seems to have an answer for everything.  Almost everything, that is.  This deck's only two match losses came to control decks.  A straight control deck in swiss and Malum's blue heavy Izzet Delver in the finals.
    Black Flag made an appearance as well in Monday's tournament, this time played by Adner. Despite their shortcomings, I've always held a special place in my heart for aggro decks and Black Flag is no exception.  They may not always be tournament viable, but they sure are fun to play.  Every non-creature in this deck list is a kill card with the exception of a single well-timed(hopefully) Undying Evil.  Highborn Ghoul makes his re-entrance into the deck after being hated on for too long by the early meta.  With almost no black creatures running around these days he is a ghastly early play that must be dealt with.
    Not to be outdone, or outnumbered, White Weenie made two appearances in the top eight.  Both Gordani's and Aladar ran nearly identical builds, but I do like Gordani's sideboard better.  The Farbog Explorer becomes an all star against the growing number of decks beginning to use a few swamps and Ajani's Sunstriker gives a great chump that will trade with nearly any ground pounder in the current meta and puts its controller one turn further away from death when it's eventually sacrificed to it's cat god. Either way, WW is still a force to be reckoned with due to it's leader, Attended Knight.  The proof of how great this card is remains the fact that it gets struck down so quickly and consistently.  If the opponent has something to destroy a creature with, a 2/2 first strike is usually the first to go.  
   The defining characteristic of this tournament, and those to follow as we shall see, is the multitude of Izzet decks.  WW has finally met its match and it will be fun to see how the meta develops to counteract both of these highly efficient strategies.



PK Standard 2.04

    Pauper Krew, the largest pauper clan on MTGO, holds their pauper standard tournament on Wednesdays at 5 p.m Eastern/10 p.m GMT and is hosted currently by Fabio S.  As of 2.04 this is a single elimination tournament, making for an exciting sports playoff style feel.
  There was a small change of pace for the meta in the PK tournament, with only one true Izzet deck making top eight.  Top honors goes to Andres 1995 with his WGB Midrange Junk deck.  Riding on the backs of Centaurs and Seraphs this deck is able to recover well from an early beating with a strong arsenal of removal  and ample lifegain, both as traditional creature abilities and Centaur Healer's  ETB lifegain.
    The all-star of this deck, despite the removal bombs it sports, is the oft overlooked Abundant Growth.  Much more efficient than Transguild Promenade, Abundant Growth replaces itself, doesn't require extra mana to cast and can be used it's first turn in play.  More specifically to this deck, it allows for a much broader array of lands and permits the use of only two plains despite the double white cost in the Seraph.  Most decks in current standard don't use as many lands as Midrange Junk, opting for a more aggressive curve early, but Andres' deck has proven worthy of waiting for a couple turns in order to knock out some bigger creature threats.
    The land distribution in this deck is crucial and Abundant Growth helps smooth out the prolific amount of double mana costs.  There are five unique cards in the deck among three different colors with double mana symbols in their cost.  It is not only critical to hit a land drop every turn with this deck, but also to get the right kind of mana, which Andres was capable of in his 4-0 tournament win on Wednesday.
    The only mono colored deck we're used to seeing in standard pauper is usually WW.  It was surprising then to see Mygalaxy's mono green, creature heavy deck take runner up.  It features thirty creatures with the possibility of even more due to the use of Haunted Fengraf.  Featuring Aerial Predation and Prey Upon in it's limited suite of removal, the Greeniyeah! deck is able to keep the skies absolutely clear with the help of the deadly spiders Kessig Recluse and Deadly Recluse.  Sprinkle in some evasion with Orchard Spirit and Somberwald Dryad and Mygalaxy was able to overrun most of his opponents.



SPDC 19.14

    Thursday's SPDC seems to herald a change in the meta.  Only one Izzet deck made top eight, Germansmurf's Watercourser.  This deck features Watercourser as opposed to Frostburn Weird and sports many more non-creatures than creatures.  Only one WW made top eight, though it was a wonderful second place finish by Garlan.
    PK23 took the trophy with a tri-color control deck, something not seen regularly since the days of Zendikar/Scars; ironically a very aggressive format. We will have to wait to see if control is something back en vogue, but PK23 showed what a truly balanced, synergistic deck with a refined mana base can do in a creature heavy format like the current meta.
    All of the deck's creatures are true threats including Frostburn Weird, Seraph of Dawn and Stitched Drake, but unlike most standard pauper decks these creatures can't be reached until late game.  The multitude of control spells in the deck, most notably Amass the Components, Pillar of Flame and Essence Scatter, allow this deck to at least tread water until the big boys can come online.  Then it's only a short time before the Archaeomancer can retrieve some of the instants and sorceries like Brimstone Volley and Ghostly Flicker needed to finish off the opponent who is most likely top decking or stuck behind a wall of flying menaces.
     In my opinion, the most noteworthy introduction(or re-introduction) into the format is Orzhov Exalted.  Two decks of this style made top eight this week and it's easy to see why. Using an arsenal of exalted creatures and the evasion of a couple Tormented Souls and Sewer Shamblers, Millhouse02 was able to pilot his deck to a second place finish.  Featuring a full compliment of removal the deck is a classic swipe and slaughter style deck; swipe out the opponents creatures in the early rounds and slaughter him with exalted in the "middle" rounds, which more often than not end up being the late rounds for the opponent.  I believe this will be the deck archetype to watch in the coming weeks as some critical Gatecrash cards make their debut next week.  The addition of Orzhov Guildgate along withBasilica Screecher, Deathcult Rogue, Kingpen's Pet and Syndicate Enforcer could all make the rounds in this deck.



Final Thoughts

   There is always variation throughout each week of standard, but I feel this week marked a particularly strong and fast change.  This change may be indicative of a dedicated reaction to Izzet and WW or it may be in preparation for the upcoming changes we will see when Gatecrash floods the card pool.  My favorite time in the standard season is on the horizon.  It is a time when nearly all decks are rogue decks(perhaps even Rogue decks, as in the creature type) and the meta gets thrown out the window while dedicated playtesters hone their game and build ever more daring and experimental decks.  It's going to be difficult to examine the meta-game in a proper way for the next few weeks, but that's part of the fun.
    I encourage everyone to give comment and criticism and please check www.pdcmagic.com for decklists from the above tournaments as well as upcoming player run events. Please visit www.pauperkrew.com to join the largest and most dedicated pauper community online.  I look forward to comments and always welcome a friendly hello on MTGO.  See you next week!