Orzhov extort auras; COMPLETE REVAMP (August 2015) of my former deck "Fast Aggro Pauper Black/White" to a Peasant legal deck.
History
I heard once in my LGS there was a great Pauper deck built around
Edge of the Divinity
and
Nip Gwyllion
and tried to do my version, with Tithe Drinker, Undying Evil, Dark Ritual, some removal...
A friend (rasgrizht) later showed me his mature build, which was a nightmare to play against, with
Pillory of the Sleepless
and
Edge of the Divinity
powering Ethereal Armor, and
Castigate
and Beckon Apparition powering
Nightsky Mimic
and triggering extort...
After learning about the Peasant variant of Pauper (see here), I decided to try my own version of said deck, but in the Peasant variant: different banned list, and most especially, with five uncommon cards at most out of the 75 deck cards (MB+SB).
This is it.
Revamp
Based upon what I remember of rasgrizht's deck, with a couple of tweaks (
Crypt Rats
and Dark Ritual) and the 5 uncommon cards:
Blood-Cursed Knight
, Vampire Nighthawk, and Dismember/Mortify. I considered
Gift of Orzhova
, but the flying and lifelink themes seem already present in the rest of the cards...
This deck is fairly aggressive, but quite resilient also. Let it survive the first turns and it will be hard for an opponent to overcome so many overpowered threats. It is especially difficult to fight it without enchantment hate (looking at you, Delver Fiend). In case the opponent effectively packs enchantment hate, there is sheer redundancy, and even Dash Hopes to consider for the SB...
There are a zillion secondary synergies in the deck:
-
Blood-Cursed Knight
has 11 enchantments that can power it. If one of them is
Edge of the Divinity
, it becomes a 7/6 lifelinker for W/B... give it also an Ethereal Armor and it becomes a 9/8 first striker lifelinker...
- there are 27 gold spells that can trigger
Nightsky Mimic
to become most of the time a 4/4 flyer
- Vampire Nighthawk is awesome per se, and something which can't be ignored
-
Castigate
, Diabolic Edict, and Dismember fuel Beckon Apparition, which is almost a flying
Nip Gwyllion
, waiting for an
Edge of the Divinity
to become a 4/4 flyer for 2 mana...
-
Crypt Rats
is almost only a finisher or insurance, as there are a lot of lifelink creatures and effects. You should always be ahead in life so as to not be afraid to sacrifice
Crypt Rats
for as much damage as you can pump black mana into it... if you also happen to have a 9/8 or 7/6 or similar, you might leave it alone on the board...
- Do not underestimate the cumulative effect of
Pillory of the Sleepless
and extort triggers to cripple opponent's life... in a similar fashion, I have dismissed Geth's Verdict over Diabolic Edict due to mana flexibility, but they are basically interchangeable
- still trying to find the correct mix of Evolving Wilds and Terramorphic Expanse over Scoured Barrens... I want to thin the deck, but I also want flexibility and life gaining...
Coda
SB to be built ad hoc, as Peasant is a local-flavored format (eg it is very popular in France, but I have to find someone yet who has heard about it in Spain)... for the time being I would consider Circles or Runes of Protection or similar, Disenchant or similar for the mirror and Hexproof Auras... something against Infect (which even packs Invigorate in Peasant!!!!), eg exiling enchantments like Journey to Nowhere or similar.
Remaining things: playtest a lot, and maybe incorporate sustainable card drawing effects...
Other uncommons under consideration: Dash Hopes, as a counter (but not viable against Infect)... Hypnotic Specter... but it is far more fragile today than in the early 90s...
Please playtest, share thoughts, comment, etc! and don't forget upvoting if you like it!
