Why Isn't Pauper More Popular?
Pauper forum
Posted on Feb. 9, 2016, 1:55 p.m. by HairyManBack
I think I know the reason - Wizards and Starcity don't push it. What throws me off is your average Magic player budget. From what I gather it's not budgeted for most of our non-Pauper Tier 1 or 2 decks.
I do know it's nice coming in FNM with $400 of rares in your hand. ;) Still I'd like for many more players to have the same access to great decks. Not sure why a lot more people don't start playing Pauper.
I wish Pauper had a bigger following. I enjoy it quite a bit.
If you are anywhere near Philadelphia, there is a Pauper FNM this Friday. 7pm.
Dark Depths Games, 732 S 4th St. Philadelphia.
February 9, 2016 2:23 p.m.
Certainly the drop in power, but it's also a daunting task building a deck from scratch. It's an eternal format with a completely different meta: it just requires too much research to play.
February 9, 2016 2:56 p.m.
Have you tried to drum up pauper interest in your area? I did that in my area and organized a Pauper tournament with the help of my LGS and now my LGS wants to run one a month.
The first tournament was this past Saturday and we had 17 people show up. It may not be a huge number, but it's respectable given that there was no vocal interest in Pauper previously. Many of the people that came weren't even regulars of my LGS and were kitchen table players that heard about it from their friends.
The idea of having a tournament-viable deck for ~$100 appeals to a lot of people. Many of the cards are good in other formats so the investment isn't a huge risk if they decide they don't like it.
February 9, 2016 3:09 p.m.
Format popularity is due to three things really: financial ease of access, tournament ease of access, and actually enjoying the decks in the format.
Pauper is easy to build financially which is great, but almost no one hosts tournaments for it. So unless you and your friends really just love the format, there's really no point.
That being said, I started playing pauper two months ago and really love the format. So do a lot of my friends... and we're all legacy/modern nuts. And let's be realistic, while a lot of the cards are underpowered, the actual backbone cards of the good decks aren't. You get to sling Brainstorm, Ponder, Preordain, Lightning Bolt, Diabolic Edict, etc.
To be honest, it's not that hard to convince 3-6 people you know to toss $50-60 into a deck. The format doesn't rotate, and it's a great way to spend a few hours. It helps that the pauper decks are built on synergy instead of just powerful cards, as that tends to make the decks much more fun to play in general.
February 9, 2016 3:25 p.m. Edited.
Yeah people who are saying pauper is underpowered - you havent played much pauper.
Some of the decks are incredibly powerful.
February 9, 2016 3:28 p.m.
UB Teachings is hands down the best, and most fun, control deck i've played in years.
February 9, 2016 3:43 p.m.
Fantastic_Mr_King says... #10
I have to correct EmblemMan's assessment. Pauper is not an under-powered format. In every format power level is relative. I beat a guy with my pauper deck with his modern deck. He assumed since it was pauper it was a casual. That is a very common misconception. However, you are correct about it being hard to brew in classic pauper. Since it's a common only format pauper rely heavily on synergy. You can't just put a bunch of powerful cards in and expect to win. You need a deep understanding of the meta and deck building fundamentals to be successful. To HairyManBack this ties into why pauper isn't as popular as it was. Since brewing is hard and decks are cheap it's easier for most people to net deck. If your deck often loses to mono blue delver, mono black midrange, and mono red burn playing pauper will be a miserable experience.
February 9, 2016 4:35 p.m.
I beat Dark Jeskai with my Reality Acid deck, so I wouldn't call it underpowered.
February 9, 2016 5:57 p.m.
HairyManBack says... #12
I'm glad everyone who gave their input did. Appreciate it. I can see where you guys/gals are coming from. Particularly happy about those who suggested starting your own Pauper tourneys.
The format reminds me of I first started. Me and the boys got introduced to Magic. We scrounged up our dollars. Went to the commons box at the comic book shop (yes, when comics were cool, lol). We learned what was better and how to build decks. There was no concept of a netdeck to us. It was based on who could make the best deck against everyone else. I hope more people start playing it. Thanks again for everyone's input.
February 9, 2016 8 p.m. Edited.
ComradeJim270 says... #13
I'd love to play Pauper. Seems awesomely fun. Nobody plays it here. Vintage, Legacy, EDH, Draft, Modern, Standard... no Pauper. Being poorly supported is huge.
Maybe I'll try and drum up some support for it.
February 14, 2016 2:13 a.m.
PistonGolem says... #14
Well, I like the concept of pauper because you get cheap decks that are usually less than 20 dollars, which is huge for me because I am a budget fanatic. And when I play budget like this, others will be doing the same. I think Pauper should be more popular!
February 22, 2016 8:58 p.m.
Dalektable says... #15
Yeah I don't agree with the argument of pauper being underpowered. I play Mono U Delver and it can easily beat many modern decks and most standard decks wouldn't stand a chance. Many pauper decks are insanely powerful. But I agree, I wish pauper was more commonly played I love it.
March 1, 2016 3:48 p.m.
We had our second Pauper tournament this past weekend and 18 people showed up, half of them being people that didn't come the first time.
All it takes is a little marketing to help drum up interest.
March 1, 2016 4:12 p.m.
HairyManBack says... #17
I'd love to play more Pauper. I started on MTGO. Then I found out 9/10 people play copy/paste decks. Unfortunately, I went back to Standard online.
It would be fun to get to a card shop that gets Pauper going. Getting there friday nights takes up time and money I don't want to invest in.
March 1, 2016 5:01 p.m.
HarbingerJK says... #18
I'm just getting into Pauper myself. Just me building a Pauper deck and being excited about it has my playgroup looking at different decklists. You just need to get people to realize that you can still build great decks without access to mythic rares and crazy land bases.
March 1, 2016 8:27 p.m.
HairyManBack says... #19
HarbingerJK - for sure. wish you guys were on my block. come on over and have a magic pauper marathon!
March 1, 2016 8:36 p.m.
HarbingerJK says... #20
That'd be awesome. Been a long time since we had a tournament style get together. They're long but hella fun.
March 1, 2016 9:10 p.m.
I think that the main problem of Pauper is that it's not an official format encouraged by Wizards.Since it is so cheap, you can take the risk of building a deck that you thought by yourself, and in case it isn't competitive, at least you had the fun (and pride) of building it yourself without investing a lot of money in.The only drawback is that the meta is really static and, although you can win with a non top tier deck, you may lack consistency.Fortunately, there's a store nearby that organizes 3 Pauper tournaments per week, and I play with friends at home, too.
March 8, 2016 9:23 a.m.
PistonGolem says... #23
I think that Wizards doesn't promote pauper because it is based on cheap, common cards, not the bomby chase rares. But I think that it should be supported, budget player's dream!
March 8, 2016 11:29 a.m.
Here is a solution:
Step 1: Skip on buying into standard this rotation. This will save you several hundred bucks.
Step 2: Buy 8 pauper decks. At 40 bucks average per deck, that is around 320, which is around what a competitive standard deck or wetting your feet in Modern's ocean would cost.
Step 3: Organize a tournament yourself.
Step 3.5: Give out decks to people.
Decks to use:
- UB Creatureless Teachings
- Jeskai Kuldotha
- Affinity
- Mono U/UB Delver
- Mono green aggro
- GB Dredge
- RUG Tron
- White Weenie or UG Freed from Real Combo
March 9, 2016 4:36 a.m.
Boza Step 4: Now that you are popular, run for president.
March 9, 2016 5:04 a.m.
Step 5: get your face on cash.
But seriously, the main reason pauper is not popular is that people do not know jack about it. If you give them all the tools in their hands, it will be a lot easier to get them going.
March 9, 2016 5:13 a.m.
My god. There's a BG Dredge list?!
I must research this. That was my favorite archetype in RTR/THS standard.
March 9, 2016 9:40 a.m.
Pauper may not be as powerful as other formats, but it's not a weak format either. It's cheap to get into, cheap to build decks and there are some great commons out there. Makes you appreciate those cards that most people overlook.
Having a pauper tournament and interest in each area is probably why it hasn't taken off like it should. My LGC hosts pauper 3 times a week and does pretty good.
EmblemMan says... #2
I would disagree with that and say the reason people dont like it is it is not easy to brew and its so dreadfully under powered. People want to play good cards and cast big creatures or broken spells sure they are good within pauper as a format but its not that much compared to other cards
February 9, 2016 1:59 p.m.