#mono u

Ten of the best pauper modern players on earth gathered at my home on a sunny Saturday, and I somehow prevailed! I took the crown for the first time after being runner-up at many a Pauper Modern tournament.

I piloted mono blue faeries after running mono blue terror last tourney, and Kiln Fiend in tournaments past.

I used insider information to get the edge in the meta. I utilized a phishing scam to learn Rob wouldn’t be bringing his synth deck and removed two Annuls from my sideboard. I saw Todd walk in my door and tossed in two copies of Tormod’s Crypt. I gave Chris COVID by sending infected customers to their new job, so I knew their storm deck wasn’t as likely and therefore Echoing Truth was less valuable. 

Here’s what I settled on: 

Faeries:

4 spellstutter

4 seer

4 miscreant

Ninjas:

4 deep hours

4 moon circuit hacker 

Others: 

2 brinebarrow intruder

4 spire golem

Spells:

2 preordain

4 lorain revealed

4 counterspell

2 vapor snag

2 mutagenic growth

4 of one mind

16 islands

Sideboard: 

2 echoing truth 

2 annul

2 mana leak

2 vapor snag

2 snaremaster sprite

2 tormond’s crypt

2 spell pierce

1 bonesplitter 

Match 1: Todd - Mono U Serpent

First match I was paired up against Todd and I was thankful I added the Crypts. Last tourney we were both slapping our serpents around, so I was excited to see how the faeries would do against this T1 powerhouse. The first game was absolutely insane. Todd played Delver turn 1, though he didn’t flip it until turn 3. He got two serpents down at one point, but I Vapor Snagged one of them back to hand and had enough faerie babies to sacrifice - like Andromeda - to the remaining serpent. I was at 1 life and the serpent was eating up my faeries while the Delver defended the sky. I then drew into my final Vapor Snag and bounced the insect. With only a few faeries, it seemed I didn’t have the juice to get him down to zero, but I had Perseus’s will on my side! My faerie swarm flew over his snek and ninjitsued into Moon Circuit Hackers, dealing exactly lethal.  I was at 1 life.

Game two I was expecting the same butthole-clenching action, and boarded in 10 cards, taking out Miscreant, Brinebarrow, Mutagenic Growth, and two Spire Golems. Unfortunately Todd got two no-landers in a row and had to mull to 5. I Crypted turn 3 and when the faeries finally won he had three serpents stuck in hand. 

Match 2: Ben - Jeskai Ephemerate 

I welcomed Ben to his first tournament at my house. He borrowed one of Brian’s beautiful decks with gorgeous lands and shiny creatures, all contained in a deck box neatly-labeled “Jeskai Ephemetate.” First game Ben played Cleansing Wildfire and pretty soon was way ahead on lands. Still he didn’t play an Ephemerate and only late in the game got an Archaeomancer out before the faeries ate his entire life total one tiny-mouthed bite at a time.

Game two he Cleansing Wildfired what felt like all of the basic lands and still couldn’t get enough to slow down the faeries. He tried to teach me the “Kill Spellstutter when it ETB to reduce the number of faeries and therefore make Spellstutter fizzle” trick, but I refused to learn! Still with only 12 creatures, there weren’t enough bodies to stop the fated faerie fish (Mulldrifter) feast. After our match we played for fun and Ben prevailed.

Match 3: Brian - Goblin Combo

The first time I met Goblin Combo (https://www.moxfield.com/decks/6blWcj57AECqd6RZ7HQAnA ) I was confused and terrified, like my cat. “Infinite mana!?” I asked. Brian explained the insanity of First Day of Class and its interaction with Putrid Goblin. I was going to learn today - first day of class indeed. Game one I tempoed him out even though he Bolted my first Faerie Seer.  Still I feared the combo. I realized the only thing to fear is Putrid Goblin resolving, so I boarded in Annul, Spell Pierce, Mana Leak, and the remaining Vapor Snags.  Brian played Unearth so I boarded in Tormond’s Crypt.

Game two I was on the hunt for Putrid Goblin and countered one and subsequently Crypted it into oblivion. Another Putrid Goblin resolved after Brian foiled my Spellstutter’s counter attempt by blasting it after ETB (a lesson I refused to learn from match 2). I made a play error by discarding to hand size Annul rather than Spell Pierce, which allowed Brian to resolve Makeshift Munitions and zap my faeries at instant speed. Brian’s combo resolved and I took infinite damage.

Game three was ultimate buttclenching. Thinking I had forced him to board out the Unearths with Tormond’s, I switched the Crypts for Mutagenic Growth to save a ninja from Bolt or finish the game slightly faster. Brian was stuck on 3 lands and couldn’t make it happen, and I was on to the final match. 

Match 4: Taylor - Boros Synth

Another newcomer was Daniel’s cousin Taylor who was 2-1 when we met in match 4. We discussed what would happen if he won and were both 3-1. Would the computer decide that he defeated me in the “final” and therefore is the champion? To frail humans like myself this is the appropriate outcome. However in prior tournaments, the algorithm determined the match loser was the tourney winner. We deferred to the machine. For faerie pride and to ensure the algorithm didn’t steal my glory, I knew I had to prevail. It was man versus machine, appropriate for the matchup against Synth.

My opponent was a hilarious shit-talker who borrowed my version of Synth (read: Rob’s deck). That same deck that took gold last tourney piloted by Cyrus. Taylor switched the Lembas for Ichor Wellspring and added Kuldotha Rebirth for the Batterfists.

Game one Taylor landed a turn one Swiftspear and started the assault. He showed the Wellspring and the Rebirth. I showed Mutagenic Growth to take out a Kor Skyfisher with a faerie early to instill fear of the free combat trick for the rest of the match. Brinebarrow Intruder did real work taking out a Glinthawk with a Ninja of the Deep Hours. Narrow victory, much buttclenching. Boarded in Annul, Mana Leak, Echoing Truth, Spell Pierce, and Bonesplitter for the Vapor Snags, a Growth, an Island, and the Miscreants.

Game two again a turn one Swiftspear. I persevered but eventually was Synthed out in a grind.

Game 3 I got ahead on land after denying some Synth shenanigans, and the Golems took over the game. Taylor proclaimed, “Spire Golem for free - the best words in Magic.” I agreed, and clouded the air with Golems despite two going on Journeys to Nowhere. I became undisputed champ in both human intuition and machine logic. 

Epilogue

I, like Oberon, have ascended to the faerie throne. However it was a hollow victory, as I brought a T1 deck against the mind-boggling brews of my comrades. Still haunted by Rob taunting, “Your net deck is showing,” when modern-banned cards popped up in my Pauper Modern decks, I am hopeful to prevail with an original brew. Until then,

Mono-Blue Card Draw Package

It’s Saturday evening on this first week of the 8x8 Theory, so to start wrapping up, I bring you my mono-blue card draw package. Blue can always draw a lot of cards, so it may not be the most exciting topic, but someone had to do it. One thing to note is I have three unique categories this week---repeatable, false, and surge draw---and I’ll tackle each of them separately. Without further ado, let’s get down to business and talk cards.

Repeatable Draw

The first card in this category is Mystic Remora. Now, I’m sure you’re asking why Mystic Remora and not Rhystic Study. Well, firstly, I wanted to stay super budget this first week and I wanted to show off cards you maybe haven’t heard of.  More importantly, I feel that in most games it can put in about as much work as Rhystic Study, especially in the early game. A turn one Remora into a table of Sol Rings will level out the playing field at least a little and unlike Study, it costs 4 to prevent so you’re more likely to profit off of your trigger. It will also receive a little less hate than Study because it eventually will kill itself.

Second, we have Arcanis the Omnipotent. He may cost a lot, but in my opinion, three extra cards levels that out pretty quickly, not to mention the fact that he has built in protection on a solid 3/4 body.

Lastly, in repeatable draw we have Mind Unbound. While it’s big and clunky, it gets the job done and if you can take an extra turn or two, then it can get out of hand very quickly.

False Draw

Fake draw may not be considered the best for kind of draw, mostly because these two cards and other similar effects won’t trigger anything like Sphinx’s Tutelage, even though they create a nearly identical effect, so look out.

First of all, Dig Through Time. If you were playing Standard during Khans of Tarkir, then I’m sure you remember this scourge of a staple. Look seven cards into your library and pick two, often for a mere two mana. It was ridiculous which is why it was banned from just about every format outside of Standard, but that ended up being great for budget EDH players because now it is very cheap and very legal. It’s pretty self-explanatory in my opinion: grab the two cards you need from the top seven and get rid of anything you didn’t want over the next seven turns.

Future Sight is a very similarly strong card, expanding your hand by a card and turning almost everything you cast into a cantrip. It’s also an enchantment, so it’s one of the generally more protected permanents in EDH.

Surge Draw

Sometimes drawing a lot of cards is important in a game and that’s what these cards are for, at varying levels of power and consistency

First, we have Flow of Ideas. If we were a multicolored deck, I would never recommend this card, but since we’re looking at this from a strictly mono-blue perspective, this has potential to be very strong. Since it gets stronger with each land drop we hit, the later we play this the better, but there is a danger in waiting a few turns to draw extra value out of it. Ideally this draws 6+ cards but more realistically is maybe 4-5+ cards.

Second up is Blue Sun’s Zenith. The cycle of Mirrodin Suns is a little strange in that it’s rarely a bad time to cast one because you can always get it again later for more (assuming it resolves). In my opinion, it’s still worth running in commander, especially in mono-blue, but the shuffle clause is definitely less valuable in 100-card singleton.

Finally, we have the most expensive card this week, coming in at a whopping $2.55---Minds Aglow.  One of the most important things in a multiplayer game is politics and the Join Forces cycle really plays into that. From my experience, Minds Aglow will draw you about 1-2 cards per player but depending on how quickly the board is established, its usefulness can drop off sharply. On the other hand, it can sometimes tell you a little bit about what’s in everyone’s hands by how quickly and how much they pay into the spell.

Honorable Mentions

I’m going to try and include a few honorable mentions at the end of my posts each week just as a few options. I won’t go in depth on them, but you can always ask me why you should play them or why they didn’t make the 1x8.

This week’s honorable mentions are: Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur, Rhystic Study, Distant Memories, and Mulldrifter.