For those who like their Magic: The Gathering more pixel than personal, today is a big day. April 8th marks the digital release date for the game’s latest expansion, Tarkir: Dragonstorm. Both MTG Arena and MTG Online will be getting the set today, which means testing for the new cards can officially begin. As a format primarily played on MTGO, today is particularly exciting for Pauper.
While it isn’t quite as exciting for Magic’s most accessible format as other recent expansions, there are still plenty of gems here at the common rarity. A few excellent creatures should make showings in popular archetypes, while the Omen mechanic may help define new ones. If you only have a few dollars to spend on Tarkir: Dragonstorm, you could do far worse than grabbing these cards.
5 | Humbling Elder
- Mana Value: U
- Rarity: Common
- Type: Creature – Human Monk
- Stats: 1/2
- Card Text: Flash
When this creature enters, target creature an opponent controls gets -2/-0 until end of turn.
Humbling Elder is exactly the kind of card Pauper was meant for. To most Magic: The Gathering players, it looks deeply underwhelming; a 1/2 with Flash and a tiny combat trick is hardly worth considering in Limited, after all, let alone in Standard or Commander. In Pauper, however, it has a deck ready and waiting for it.
That deck is Mono-Blue Faeries, and it’s actually one of the best decks in the format right now. It runs a ton of super-cheap blue creatures and plays for tempo with the likes of Spellstutter Sprite and Ninja of the Deep Hours. The deck also typically runs a full playset of Brinebarrow Intruder, which is nearly identical to Humbling Elder.
Intruder does two things for the deck. First, it provides a nice combat trick for the kind of low-stakes combat scenarios Pauper is known for. Second, it adds a Human to the board to enable Of One Mind, the deck’s best draw spell. Until now, players have run copies of Cogwork Wrestler as extra Intruder redundancy, but Elder is a much better alternative. Enabling Of One Mind where Wrestler doesn’t is a big deal. Players may even run a 3/3 split of this and Intruder to play around the pesky Echoing Decay.
4 | Seize Opportunity
- Mana Value: 2R
- Rarity: Common
- Type: Instant
- Card Text: Choose one —
• Exile the top two cards of your library. Until the end of your next turn, you may play those cards.
• Up to two target creatures each get +2/+1 until end of turn.
Seize Opportunity is just a fantastic multi-tool of an instant that Impulse draws you two cards for three mana, which is a solid rate in Pauper. Now that Deadly Dispute has finally been banned, alternatives like this will need to be trialed. On top of that, it’s also a surprisingly useful combat trick. +2/+1 to two creatures can swing a tight combat in your favor or serve as a finisher in aggressive decks.
There are a number of potential homes for a card like this. Gruul Ponza, or Gruul Ramp, immediately sticks out as a good option here. The deck consistently generates a lot of mana, which means it’s likely to be able to play the two extra cards before they vanish into the void. It’s also a fairly aggressive deck that runs a number of Trample creatures, like Avenging Hunter. In that way, it makes use of both halves of the card.
Alternatively, this card could find its way into good ol’ fashioned Mono Red Synthesizer. The deck took a big hit with the banning of Kuldotha Rebirth, but it’s still part of the meta. As with Gruul Ponza, this is a deck that can really make use of both the cad draw and pump spell aspects of Seize Opportunity. It may simply be too slow at three mana, but I think it’s well worth testing. It’s not traditionally flashy, but I believe it’s one of the best commons in Tarkir: Dragonstorm nonetheless.
3 | Common Omen Dragons
Why pick just one card for an entry when you can pick a whole mechanic? Omen is a brand-new mechanic in Tarkir: Dragosntorm, and while it doesn’t look amazing for Standard, it could be a different story in Pauper. The format can be extremely grindy, after all, to the point where cards like this could actually win games.
All five of the common Omen Dragons are decent bodies on one side and cheap spells on the other. Naturally, they’ll be at their best in lists that can leverage both sides at some point in the game. From this perspective, Stormshriek Feral and Dirgur Island Dragon look like the best of the bunch. The former can sculpt your hand early in Gruul Ramp, then come down as a scalable finisher later on. The latter is a nice tempo tool for Mono-Blue and maybe even Dimir Control, thanks to Skimming Strike’s instant speed and card draw.
The other three are tougher sells. Sagu Wilding could potentially offer fixing for the likes of Tron, but they just got Prophetic Prism back, so it’s probably unnecessary. Dawnbreaker could be decent in White Weenie, but it could easily prove too clunky in either form. Deathgorger does offer a nice bit of graveyard hate, but at six mana you’re unlikely to have it online when you need it.
With all of that said, I think the common Omen Dragons are well worth watching. Flexibility like this is typically reserved for higher rarities, so there’s real potential for these to break out somewhere in Pauper.
2 | Salt Road Packbeast
- Mana Value: 5W
- Rarity: Common
- Type: Creature – Beast
- Stats: 4/3
- Card Text: This spell costs 1 less to cast for each creature you control.
When this creature enters, draw a card.
Salt Road Packbeast is a fantastic addition to White Weenie decks in Pauper. It’s easy to go wide using cheap creatures and Battle Screech, at which point this is a 4/3 for two (or less) that draws you a card. That’s a fine rate and one that could well push White Weenie into contention in the meta. As of right now, it’s more of a fringe option than a 5-0 League winner.
Packbeast isn’t perfect, of course. It dies to Lightning Bolt, and often Galvanic Blast as well. It’s also worth noting that Search Party Captain, a very similar card, has been legal in the format for a while now and has yet to make an impact. All of that said, Packbeast’s higher stats, which crucially let it trade with a Myr Enforcer in Affinity matchups, could carry it to success.
Outside of White Weenie, Packbeast could potentially find homes in other go-wide decks like Boros Synthesizer or Affinity. This is less likely since those decks are more set-in-stone than White Weenie is at present. That said, card draw on a body is always good, so I wouldn’t totally count this out in any white deck running creatures.
1 | Champion Of Dusan
- Mana Value: 2G
- Rarity: Common
- Type: Creature – Human Warrior
- Stats: 4/2
- Card Text: Trample.
Renew — 1G, Exile this card from your graveyard: Put a +1/+1 counter and a Trample counter on target creature. Activate only as a sorcery.
When it came time to pick the best of the new commons in Tarkir: Dragonstorm, Champion of Dusan really stood out as an exceptional choice. This is a well-statted creature with an aggressively-costed Renew effect attached. It’s a great green creature for the format and one that could find its way into multiple strategies.
Perhaps most obviously, the card is an ideal fit for Mono-Green Stompy lists. While three mana is more than what such decks are typically willing to pay for a creature, it hits hard enough to warrant the cost. The fact that it can grant Trample counters via Renew is huge in board stalls, too. Slap this ability on a Bayou Groff, however, and your opponent is in for a very bad time. The obvious synergy with Ram Through, on both halves of the card, is worth noting as well.
There may also be a home for Champion in Gruul Ponza, too. While many of the creatures in that deck have Trample by default, adding it to a Boarding Party or Writhing Chrysalis can make a huge difference. Overall, Champion looks like a superb aggressive card that attacks well and has plenty of use beyond the grave. I’d be very surprised if it didn’t end up a staple in one Pauper list or another.