Tortured Existence is one of the few truly engine archetypes in the whole Pauper meta. The deck relies in using the Dredge mechanic and use the graveyard as a tollbox for looping effects that completely shuts out certain archetypes, and it preys heavily on aggressive strategies.
Classicaly designed as a BG toolbox or even a Lantern Control style deck, I decided to take a different approach to the deck and build my own Abzan version.
Why Abzan?
Since the deck greateast weakness is, obviously, graveyard hate, I didn't want to rely solely on this as a resource for grinding the opponent out of the game. By adding white, we can use Kor Skyfisher to have a source of recursion other than Tortured Existence itself. Also, we can widen the range of the deck resources by adding Custodi Squire (previously Auramancer) to reccur destroyed Tortured Existence or even force play errors by opponents confused by the Will of the Council mechanic.
EDIT 07/10/2019:
With the changes Modern Horizons and the Blue Monday Bans brought to the meta - specially the inclusion of Arcum's Astrolabe, I twicked the deck a bit to fight the new wave of decks that changed to support the one mana artifact. Because of this, I had to let the Arboreal Grazer go to leave room for main deck artifact hate in the form of Qasali Pridemage and Wickerbough Elder. I know it doesn't entirely stop the astrolabe, but it directly affects their mana base, since some decks became three colors due to the mana filter, such as Jeskai Skred. This slows them down and let them play the astrolabe as just a common cantrip.
Also, while Qasali Pridemage boosts your creatures and is recursive through Tortured Existence, Wickerbough Elder has a nasty interaction with Fume Spitter, rendering decks that heavily rely on artifacts (I'm looking at you, Affinity) to very difficult situations to escape when the combo is assembled.
What does this deck specifically aims for?
By reading Alex Ullman's article on 8 May, 2019 about the Pauper metagame (Link here), it's pretty clear that top Pauper decks (not named Elves or Tron, at least) follows two trends: Monarch-driven and Gush-driven strategies. I decided to try a take on a Monarch Tortured Existence, using Thorn of the Black Rose as my enabler. The card is already used in several sideboard lists and I thought it would be an obvious inclusion.
Monarch helps us have a game against one of the worst matchups for the deck: Tron. We may have a great matchup against aggro decks and play even against UB Control and UB Delver, but Tron is a real pain. To improve our chances, I decided to direct the strategy towards gaining Monarch and not losing it.
How do we do this?
Against Control, this is very straightforward: You just build your board presence while gaining card advantage through Monarch. The Dredge mechanic is used carefully here, since you can just deck yourself out of the game pretty easily.
They main issue is to keep the Monarch against aggressive decks. Since they're our good matchups, we don't want to give them hope by handling them the Monarch, so we maindeck card:Kami of te False Hope (a strictly financial choice over Spore Frog) and rely on looping it to bore our opponents to death while advantaging our board with the help of Monarch. This way, we can dredge Golgari Brownscale and still draw a card each turn.
Also, I included some cards that block well. Fume Spitter is an archetype staple since it can block a creature and take out another from combat with the -1/-1 counter. Also, its low cost makes it pretty easy to loop.
Stinkweed Imp, other than a great dredger, blocks pretty well and preys on players that don't expect to see them being cast. Thorn of the Black Rose itself is a great blocker, as well as Kor Skyfisher.
War of the Spark introduced us to Arboreal Grazer, which is a 0/3 Reach creature that completely discourage players to pressure us early in the game.
Also, it puts a land into play tapped from our hand, which can be a game changer.
Tortured Existence is known for being a slow engine, and the use of a third color just makes things worse. Arboreal Grazer heavily diminishes this disadvantage on the early stages of the game. With 11 taplands, It's pretty difficult to stablish a proper curve, but the Grazer mitigates this by letting us virtually play our cards on curve. With that many taplands, the disadvantage of putting lands into play tapped is a minor issue compared to the advantage the Grazer offer us.
As you may imagine, Carrion Feeder is a terrible blocker - Since, well, it can't block. This plays against our main plan - to retain Monarch. Also, our second goal is to leverage on 1-to-1 effects to overwhelm our opponent in the long game. Even though the Feeder enables Tortured Existence loops, it doesn't do anything more than just be a sacrifice outlet.
A case can be made for the inclusion of Viscera Seer, Thoughtpicker Witch or even the new Spark Reaper (which actually cycles the creature and delivers card advantage - I'm planning on testing it), but since we're blocking A LOT with this deck, the creatures just go to the graveyard naturally or by sacrificing themselves.
The grind Carrion Feeder offers can be mitigated by the inclusion of Kor Skyfisher, which is one of the cores of this deck.
The Kor helps us loop important cards while advancing our board with evasive creatures that block pretty well, but can get the job done against slow control decks such as Orzhov Control.
We rely on silver bullets that have ETB effects like Chittering Rats, Slum Reaper, Bojuka Bog and the previously mentioned Custodi Squire, and the Skyfisher interacts pretty well with them. On my playtests, to loop these cards two to three times in a single game is enough to put us way ahead our opponents, so the dependency on Tortured Existence lows.
Moreover, our second draw engine revolves around Kor Skyfisher and Abundant Growth - That's also excellent to fix our mana. This can put us ahead of our opponents already on the early game if combined with Arboreal Grazer, which the BG version struggles to do.
Skyfisher also goes well with Grave Scrabbler, since you can recur it for another round with Tortured Existence.
Sideboard Choices
First, a disclaimer: I suck at sideboarding. Since I rarely play competitively, this is definitely not my strong side.
Our sideboard strategy relies on silver bullets against specific decks, with more choices offered to fight our weakest matchups: Orzhov Control variants (Monarch, Pestilence... you name it), Boros Monarch, MonoU Faeries and, of course, Tron. Also, it's important to respect Burn, so we dedicate two slots for it.
It's important to know that we enter every post-board match in disadvantage. Every deck features at least some kind of graveyard hate, so we have to play around it while leveraging on our engine. This is one of the reasons Tortured Existence decks are known for being so difficult to pilot.
Regarding our choices:
1x Festercreep - Helps us against Elves and MonoU Faeries. This slot can also be Penumbra Spider or Death's-Head Buzzard.
1x Standard Bearer - The worst nightmare for Boggles and Stompy variants.
1x Thrull Surgeon - Tron, Orzhov Control, Rakdos Control, MonoU faeries, UB Control. I chose Surgeon over Mesmeric Fiend because the Fiend becomes much weaker without Card:Carrion Feeder's loop.
1x Aven Riftwatcher - I played it maindeck for a long time against aggro decks in general, but it really shines against Burn. Besties with Kor Skyfisher.
1x Okiba-Gang Shinobi - Against Control archetypes in general and Tron. It's a way to put their Mulldrifter in check and diminish their card advantage - and can't be countered with Ninjutsu online.
2x Faerie Macabre - Against Graveyard strategies, such as the mirror, UB Teachings, and even Murasa Tron. Can be instant-speed recurred with card:Trotured Existence.
2x Wickerbough Elder - It really shines against Affinity, which can be completely locked out of the game by combining it with Fume Spitter. I bring it in almost every game because one of the most commonly used cards against us post-board is Relic of Progenitus.
2x Contaminated Ground - Delays Tron by a few turns, which can be just what we need to start pressuring them with our hand disruption. Also, it's an enchantment that can be recurred with Custodi Squire.
2x Curse of Chains - Another extra removal for big boys, but also important in the Orzhov matchup to hold Guardian of the Guildpact in check for a few turns, while opponents don't skyfish them.
1x Journey to Nowhere - Just a premium removal spell too good to not remain in the final 75.
1x Circle of Protection: Red - Against Burn, but also forces Boros Monarch, Boros Aggro and MonoR aggro to play a match with almost no removal and no reach, which is important for us to gain time to estabilize.
I guess that wraps it up. The deck definitely punishes misplays and is very demanding even for skilled players, but it's very fun to play with because of the myriad of choices it offers. Just be careful about the number of cards in your library and the clock ;)
