Pauper BG Tortex

Pauper* BG (Golgari) Dredge Pauper

Tennon

Creature (28)

• 1x Battlefield Scrounger
• 1x Crypt Rats
• 4x Fume Spitter
• 3x Golgari Brownscale
• 3x Grave Scrabbler
• 2x Gurmag Angler
• 1x Krosan Tusker
• 2x Predatory Nightstalker
• 4x Satyr Wayfinder
• 3x Stinkweed Imp
• 1x Thrull Surgeon
• 2x Tilling Treefolk
• 1x Undergrowth Scavenger

Land (22)

• 1x Bojuka Bog
• 3x Evolving Wilds
• 6x Forest
• 3x Golgari Rot Farm
• 8x Swamp
• 1x Tranquil Thicket

Enchantment (4)

• 4x Tortured Existence

Instant (1)

• 1x Gnaw to the Bone

Sorcery (5)

• 4x Commune with the Gods
• 1x Last Rites

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Sideboard

Creature (13)

• 1x Battlefield Scrounger
• 3x Caustic Caterpillar
• 2x Crypt Rats
• 4x Deadly Recluse
• 2x Faerie Macabre
• 1x Shinen of Life's Roar

Instant (2)

• 2x Gnaw to the Bone

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Last Update 2-28-16

Insanely grindy TortEx dredge deck for MTGO, has answers to almost anything in the format.

The key to succeeding with this deck is finding your Tortured Existence early. Commune with the Gods is primarily there for this purpose. Avoid dredging and Satyr Wayfinders as much as possible if you don't yet have a tortured existence in hand or on the battlefield; you don't have any ways to get back copies that are milled.

Card-by-card breakdown:

Creatures

• Battlefield Scrounger: a massive beatsatick that beats gurmag angler in combat. Also essential for preventing decking out, or hedging against graveyard hate.

• Crypt Rats: the deck's sweeper option, and one of the reasons to heavily prioritize black mana when possible. great against aggro decks, and for clearing the way in board stall situations.

• Fume Spitter: your answer to things like faeries, delver of secrets, pingers and other annoying 1-toughness creatures. 4 is likely too many since the banning of cloud of faeries.

• Golgari Brownscale: the dredger you will be using most often. The two life every turn is often relevant, and dredging 2 is small enough that you have a lot of turns to grind your opponent out and develop your mana. cast it if you need to, but try to avoid doing so.

• Grave Scrabbler: one of the primary sources of card advantage in the deck. Dredging effectively ensures you draw spells every turn, but sometimes 1 spell a turn is not enough. This guy lets you effectively double gravedig for 3 mana with tortex out. pretty useless without tortex.

• Gurmag Angler: the standard beastick for black decks in pauper. holds the ground against affinity admirably, and resists most of the removal in the format. powering out an early angler is not the goal of the deck, but if you have the opportunity you can sometimes steal wins by doing so. Delve away your non-creature, non-lands first, then evolving wilds, then other lands, then creatures only if you feel you need to.

• Krosan Tusker: a very powerful card advantage engine if you need to hit your land drops (which you almost certainly do). cycling can't be countered, making it very strong against control decks. feel free to dredge off of the cycling draw.

• Predatory Nightstalker: the only removal for large creatures in the deck. 5 mana is a lot to pay for this effect, but the 3/2 body is likely to also trade for a creature, making it a solid 2-for-1. pair with a small crypt rats activation to ensure clearing away a large creature. Note: Printed at common only on MTGO, so may not be legal in paper pauper, depending on your event's rules.

• Satyr Wayfinder: serves multiple purposes in this deck. It is your cheapest option for hitting your land drops once you start dredging, getting you past 3 or 4 lands in play. It also fills your graveyard if you are looking for a dredger or to delve out an angler.

• Stinkweed Imp: your faster dredge option. dredge 5 is huge, and you will rip through your deck. prioritize stinkweed imp if you are looking for a specific creature, or if your graveyard is small. A 1/2 deathtouch flyer actually does a really good job blocking, and in some matchups you will just want to cast these.

• Thrull Surgeon: this made the deck over raven's crime due to its selection ability letting it snatch troublesome cards like reality acid out of your opponent's hand. its pretty slow but can do work or at least bait out counters from control decks. It can also hit lands, in case your opponent is sandbagging a bojuka bog, or just preventing an outright whiff.

• Tilling Treefolk: your best bet for finding lands once you have started to dredge. getting 2 lands means you can free up half of your turns with getting back better action cards and still hit every land drop. the 1/3 body isn't miserable but often just chump blocks so you can get it back, eats an edict, or brick walls a 2/2 or something.

• Undergrowth Scavenger: a recent addition, scavenger is insanely huge, bigger than anything else in the format. You won't be casting him early, so expect him to be a 10/10 or larger. Primarily useful to trump gurmag angler and present a must-answer threat.

Non-Creatures

Tortured Existence: The heart and soul, the bread and butter of the deck. You really really really want to find and resolve one of these in the early turns of the game. you can technically function without it, but you lose a huge amount of power, utility and inevitability.

Commune with the Gods: the closest thing you have to tortEx 5-8. cast it early and often to find your first tortex, then cast them as you have the opportunity to fill your graveyard. You likely won't see more than 1 or 2 in a game since you will probably just start dredging once you hit your first tortex.

Last Rites: a solid value play in the early turns of the game. While technically card disadvantage, you will easily make that back later in the game, and this is a great way to strip your opponent's hand of things like counters, mulldrifers, enchantment removal, graveyard hate, etc. Discard aggressively, usually your opponent's hand size minus 1 or 2 to try to rip apart your opponent's hand. Also excellent counter bait if you are trying to resolve your first tortex.

Gnaw to the Bone: an excellent tool for stabilizing against the aggro and tempo decks of the format. Gaining 8+ life can often give you the time you need to sweep your opponen't board or else turn the corner in some other way. Frequently gains obscene amounts of life.

Sideboard Breakdown

• 1x Battlefield Scrounger: Mostly a hedge against graveyard hate, as it ccan help keep your graveyard small, or if your first gets exiled.

• 3x Caustic Caterpillar: your go-to for all artifact and enchantment destruction. you will want these against affinity, jeskai kitty, control decks with pristine talisman/curse of the bloody tome, other tortured existence decks, trinket mage decks, acid trip. Arguably 1 copy should be in the maindeck. Cheaper and more easily recurrable than other options in my opinion.

• 2x Crypt Rats: more sweepers when you need them. Stompy, tokens, delver. Most other matchups you won't want extra copies but will want to keep the first in the maindeck.

• 4x Deadly Recluse: the best option i've found for dealing with early aggression from delver. Stops the 1/1 faeries cold, trades with their bigger fliers. Also useful for stompy, although it can't block their pit-skulks. 4 copies is likely too many, but your maindeck versus aggro is pretty weak, so having lots of things to bring in to stem the bleeding isn't bad.

• 2x Faerie Macabre: the graveyard hate of choice for the deck. these could potentially be extra bojuka bogs, but instant speed is way more important in my opinion than mass GY removal. Useful against teachings, monoblack, other tortex decks, reanimator etc. You'll know when to bring these in.

• 2x Gnaw to the Bone: extra copies to gain time against aggro decks to bring your sweepers and creatures to bear. Obviously great against burn. Don't be afraid to cast these for just 4 or 6 life if necessary.

• 1x Shinen of Life's Roar: a recent addition to break board stalls in grindy matchups against creature decks. Great against monoblack, acid trip, and other tortex/madness decks. Build up a lethal board with undergrowth scavenger, anglers, tusker, etc, then toss this on a tilling treefolk and go for the kill. Considered maindeck over the fourth fume spitter.

I haven't done enough proper testing to lay out precise sideboard plans versus the common decks in pauper, but I am reasonably happy with the sideboard and deck.

Date added	8 years
Last updated	8 years
Legality	This deck is not Pauper legal.
Cards	60
Avg. CMC	2.92
Folders	Cool Pauper