April 4th- Pauper Storm

What do Dark Ritual and Lotus Petal have in common?



Well, in addition to both being extremely broken mana producers, both are commons and are therefore legal in Pauper.

For those of you unfamiliar with the format, Pauper is a fairly popular format online with only commons being legal (and Cranial Plating being the only banned card).  The allure of the format is that decks are relatively cheap to build without any expensive rares or mythics. While there are a few commons worth a couple dollars, competitive decks can be built for essentially nothing.

But don't let the fact that only commons are allowed cause you to think decks aren't powerful.  The beatdown decks can regularly kill by turn 4 or 5, Cloudpost+Glimmerpost team up to produce insane amounts of mana, artifact lands+affinity is a perfectly acceptable strategy, and there's always storm.

While such hits as Mind's Desire, Tendrils of Agony, and Brain Freeze may not be options, Grapeshot, Empty the Warrens, and Temporal Fissure all exist as ways to effectively end the game given a high enough storm count.  Temporal Fissure decks utilize cost reducing cards in conjunction with Cloud of Faeries, Snap, and Frantic Search to build up storm, then bounce all of your permanents each turn (thanks the Mnemonic Wall) while slowly killing you with 1/1's.

I find this approach to be more fun

Pauper Storm | The Rusty Machete

0 Creatures:  

47 Spells:  
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Rite of Flame
4 Lotus Petal
4 Manamorphose
4 Chromatic Star
3 Chromatic Sphere
4 Sign in Blood
4 Ideas Unbound
4 Preordain
4 Grapeshot
4 Empty the Warrens

13 Lands:  
4 Ancient Spring
4 Sulfur Vent
3 Geothermal Crevice
2 Irrigation Ditch

15 Sideboard:  
1 Geothermal Crevice
1 Irrigation Ditch
4 Duress
3 Goblin Bushwacker
3 Ponder
1 Echoing Decay
2 Flaring Pain

Here, Empty the Warrens making over 20 guys is the way most games are won.  Few decks can survive the attack on the following turn, especially in game 1.  It is possible to get up to 20 to kill with a Grapeshot, but more often 2 Grapeshots for 10 and 11 do the trick or even Grapeshot for 6, 7, and 8.  If needed, Grapeshot can also clear out blockers for a smaller Empty the Warrens or dome your opponent for enough that Empty for 14-18 guys is enough.

The mana engine is fairly straightforward.  You have 13 lands all of which make 2 mana (since you rarely play a non-chromatic, non-preordain) spell unless you're going off that turn.  In addition you have 16 ritual effects including the Lotus Petals, meaning 1 or 2 lands is usually enough to do whatever you want.

Sign in Blood, Ideas Unbound, and Preordain exists as the draw spells in the deck.  Preordain is the 1 cost cantrip of choice since you don't have a way to shuffle for Brainstorm or Ponder, and getting rid of excess lands is important.  Careful Study is something I've considered, but I've simply found Preordain to be better.  Lastly, the Chromatic Stars/Spheres and Manamorphose all draw you a card, which helps a lot.

The sideboard may seem strange, but its important to realize that you can't over sideboard with this deck.  The most cards I can justify boarding in for any matchup is 7 which is for the mirror, and most matchups involve boarding in 4 to 5 cards.  Bushwacker combos with Empty to allow a storm of 4+bushwacker to be lethal, and also beats any sorcery speed answer to the goblin tokens.  Duress is there to nab a hate card or a counterspell.  Ponder allows you to recover vs heavy discard and sometimes 1 can be brought in as the 5th preordain in matchups where mana and time are tight.  Echoing Decay kills opposing goblin tokens in the mirror, and can also kill x/2 hate creatures such as Benevolent Unicorn or Martyr of Ashes.
Flaring Pain is the most narrow card in the board, but the majority of white hate cards involve damage prevention and beat a single duress, so Flaring Pain is better there.


Most game 1's play out with you going off on around turn 3.  Given a good hand, it is also completely reasonable to just cast an smaller Empty the Warrens on turn 1 or 2 and kill in 2-3 attacks since few decks will play out enough creatures to stabilize in time.  Admittedly, you will fizzle around 10% of the time, but the other 80-90% expect to win fairly easily.
Post-board, expect every deck to have a decent amount of hate.  There are several routes to which people will try to disrupt you, but they always have to have the right kind of hate to beat your draw.  They can attack your mana with Stone Rain effects (or Spreading Seas out of blue decks), attack your hand with discard, try to counter your spells, or lastly play a specific hate card to beat either Empty the Warrens or Grapeshot.


Lastly, a few tips if you want to play the deck
1. Don't get greedy.  If you're tight on mana, trying to dig for rituals just to build up storm isn't worth it unless you need to kill with grapeshot that turn.  Sometimes you just have to accept you fell short and storm for a non-lethal amount hoping its enough.
2. Sign in Blood can target them.  It may not come up very often, but dealing 18 or 19, followed by Sign in Blood is perfectly reasonable.
3. Don't try to go off unless you need to or your hand is very good.  Your odds of killing them on the spot typically only go up with time, so you may as well wait to see an extra card if you aren't under significant pressure.


Even the mirror match is a blast, since crazy things can happen out of nowhere.

In this match, my opponent cast an empty for more than lethal.  I had 2 empties and a bushwacker in my hand, so I cast an empty for enough to survive his attack, and with all of his dudes tapped killed him on my next turn thanks to bushwacker.


If you're bored with other formats or may not be able to afford to play the decks you want, I'd highly encourage you to give Pauper a shot.  Storm is definitely a blast to play and is highly competitive right now, so feel free to try it out online.