Aetherdrift cards have been available for tournament use for a couple weeks, and lots of different designs are making a big impact. It’s natural for players to hype up flashy mythic rares like Ketramose, the New Dawn, but even the commons of Aetherdrift are making their presences felt.
In fact, one particular common has helped spawn a cool combo deck in Pauper. The combo revolves around Pactdoll Terror and some Affinity mainstays, allowing you to drain the opponent of all their life! Let’s dive in and see what this deck is all about.
The Combo
- Mana Value: 3B
- Rarity: Common
- Stats: 3/4
- Card Type: Artifact Creature- Toy
- MTG Sets: Aetherdrift
- Card Type: Whenever this creature or another artifact you control enters, each opponent loses 1 life and you gain 1 life.
At its core, this deck is very similar to traditional Affinity shells in Pauper. However, this deck eschews common red staples like Galvanic Blast in order to make room for some key combo cards. In order to execute the combo, you need access to Pactdoll Terror, Steelfin Whale, Frogmite, and Retraction Helix.
You also need at least three other artifacts in play to go along with Pactdoll Terror and Frogmite, but the presence of artifact lands makes this an easy task. From there, you can win the game by following these steps:
- Cast Retraction Helix targeting Steelfin Whale
- Tap Steelfin Whale to bounce Frogmite back to your hand
- Cast Frogmite for free. When it enters, Steelfin Whale will untap and Pactdoll Terror will drain the opponent for 1 life
- Repeat steps two and three over and over
Notably, Tooth of Chiss-Goria can replace Frogmite in the combo described above. Tooth doesn’t do much on its own, but the fact that it has flash means you can actually go for the combo kill at instant speed if the opponent ever taps out.
Obviously, a four-card combo isn’t the easiest to put together. The good news, though, is that Pactdoll Terror and Steelfin Whale are perfectly serviceable threats outside of the combo. Simply attacking with your burly creatures and continuously playing artifacts to trigger Pactdoll Terror gives you a solid backup plan.
Churning Through Your Library
- Mana Value: 4U
- Rarity: Common
- Card Type: Sorcery
- MTG Sets: Mirrodin, Modern Masters 2015, Neon Dynasty Commander, The Brother’s War Commander, March of the Machine Commander, Foundations Jumpstart, Special Guests
- Card Text: Affinity for artifacts (This spell costs 1 less to cast for each artifact you control.) Draw two cards.
The other reason the inclusion of a four-card combo is not as bad as it sounds is that you have tons of ways to draw extra cards. If you’ve ever played against Grixis Affinity in Pauper, you know how well the deck is built for grindy games. Well, this version of Affinity still utilizes a lot of the same pieces.
The strongest of these cards are without a doubt Thoughtcast and Deadly Dispute. Thoughtcast will routinely cost one mana in this shell. Deadly Dispute does require you to sacrifice an artifact to get the bonus, but you get a Treasure token for your efforts. Plus, thanks to Ichor Wellspring and Blood tokens from Blood Fountain, you shouldn’t have to sacrifice anything super valuable.
Speaking of Blood Fountain, this one-mana artifact is so much better than it looks here. It gives you two artifacts at once, reducing the cost of Thoughtcast and Steelfin Whale in no time, while making it trivial to cast Metallic Rebuke for one mana. The Blood is perfect fodder for Deadly Dispute or Fanatical Offering. Then, in attrition wars, Blood Fountain can rebuy copies of Steelfin Whale or Pactdoll Terror that have bit the dust.
Bringing back copies of Refurbished Familiar is also a nice option to have. Refurbished Familiar doesn’t directly help your combo, but it’s a value-generating flier that pairs nicely with Pactdoll Terror. You’d be surprised how quickly the life drain from Pactdoll Terror and flying damage from Refurbished Familiar add up.
Tradeoffs
- Mana Value: R
- Rarity: Common
- Stats: 1/1
- Card Type: Creature- Goblin Shaman
- MTG Sets: Mirrodin
- Card Text: Sacrifice an artifact: Krark-Clan Shaman deals 1 damage to each creature without flying.
At the end of the day, it’s still unclear if going down this route versus the more traditional Affinity builds is worthwhile. There are a number of matchups where having access to red mana comes in handy.
The Kuldotha red matchup becomes a lot trickier, for instance, since you don’t have cards like Krark-Clan Shaman that can clean up a wide board of Goblin tokens. Pactdoll Terror is clearly very strong, and the life drain makes it rather difficult to get burnt out as the game goes long. Unfortunately, if you don’t draw Hydroblast, you risk getting run over before you can get your engine online.
Without Galvanic Blast, you also don’t have a good way of removing Basking Broodscale once it hits the board. Racing with your own combo is an option, but yours requires more cards, more setup, and is more mana intensive.
On the flip side, in matchups where your opponent doesn’t have a ton of interaction or breaking through an army of ground blockers is difficult, your combo can be the difference between winning and losing. Winning through combat against Bogles, for example, can be a nightmare, and traditional removal is ineffective in the matchup. Luckily, Pactdoll Terror can undo any lifegain from the Bogles side.
Pactdoll Terror is just a strong enough card that it warrants exploring different ways to maximize it. The card has made some noise in Altar Tron decklists as an elite combo piece all the same. It dodges Snuff Out, Lightning Bolt, and common Blast effects out of the sideboard. The Toy may just be a common, but it can take over any game if left unchecked.