Wednesday, September 25, 2019

September 22 Pauper Challenge Winner's Metagame Breakdown

11 Challenges, one Mythic Championship Qualifier, and one Format Playoff. The Core 2020 season closed with the September 22 Pauper Challenge. Throne of Eldraine is coming and the format is likely to experience some shifts before the October 7th Banned and Restricted List Update even if nothing ends up leaving the format.
The narrative coming out of Sunday was the "fall" of Jeskai. Despite making up half of the Top 8 only one build of Jeskai made the Top 4 and it was crowded out of the Finals. The other three decks in the Top 4 were all Stompy decks with slightly different creature suites. So which archetype had a better day? 

I don't have a solid answer. Jeskai decks were more popular - 9 total appearances - and they took home 40% of the Win+ points available in the Challenge. At the same time, Stompy won the dang thing and had three decks in the Top 4. It had 28% of all Win+ with 15.6% of the field. Compare this to Jeskai's 40% in 31.25% of the Top 32. If you were asking me to pick a winner on Sunday I would give the edge to Stompy, but not by a mile.
And isn't that the story of Core 2020 season? Jeskai is the most popular deck and racks up Top 8 appearances - 34 out of 96 total Top 8s - but doesn't win nearly as often. All Jeskai variants have 3 Challenge wins - Stompy has 4 in 10 Top 8 appearances.
(These numbers are inclusive of the MCQ but not the Format Playoff, as that tournament only reported the Top 16).

Jeskai, for better or worse, defined the last 13 weeks of high level Pauper play. It may be more accurate to say that the interaction of Mulldrifter and Ephemerate were the focal point, with Arcum's Astrolabe finding these cards and fixing mana, but that generates another question: is it okay for a format to have a clear best interaction around which everything revolves?
This question gets to the heart of differing opinions about what Pauper should be. Should there be a static point at the center that everyone is coming for, or should that center loci shift over time - and if so how long is appropriate?

Over the 12 events (in 13 weeks), Jeskai made up a quarter of all Top 32 appearances but it accounted for over a third of all Win+. Put another way: for every record 5-2 or better, Jeskai accounted for 1/3 of those wins. When looking at every other macro-archetype, the next best performer was Burning-Tree Emissary at nearly 13%. Beyond that you have Ethereal Armor decks and Tron decks that try to play the same game as Jeskai, only with a mana abundance. Should the core of Arcum's Astrolabe-Ephemerate-Mulldrifter-Archaeomancer/Mnemonic Wall account for over a third of the Top 32 and over 40% of the weighted metagame? That's a question for the folks in Renton.

My hope? Regardless of whether or not anything gets banned I'd like to see some evening out of these numbers. Moving into Throne of Eldraine season I'd like to see a smaller delta in the Jeskai numbers and I would like to see other decks claw back some of the metagame share. Whether this means people adopting maindeck hate measures or an overload of sideboard silver bullets, I'd like to see the meta pull itself free of Jeskai's gravtitational pull.

2019 is going to be a banner year for Pauper. I want to continue to be at the forefront of the metagame. If you like the work I do, please consider becoming a Patron. Thank you!

Monday, September 16, 2019

Examining the September 15th Pauper Playoff

There was not a Pauper Challenge this past weekend. Instead there was an invite only Format Playoff. The result of the tournament is noteworthy - Elves over Eldrazi Green - but before we do I want to take a look at the Top 16. 

Unlike Challenges, Playoffs only provide the Top 16 decks. Out of these 16 decks, 8 were Jeskai featuring an Ephemerate engine and two were Tron featuring the same engine - 62.5% of the Top 16. When looking at Win+ the Jeskai decks accounted for 41.67% of all Win+ and when you add the Tron decks, Ephemerate engine decks accounted for more than 58% of the total volume of Win+ in the Top 16. Compare this to Stompy - the next most popular deck (or archetype) with 2 appearances, which accounted for 16.67% of all Win+. It is not that the Ephemerate engine decks are better than the rest of the format, it is that they are significantly better and are forcing nearly every other archetype to the fringes. 

Now, as to this event. Elves won the day. In the Top 8 it had to take down two different Jeskai decks, packing a grand total of three Electrickery and one Swirling Sandstorm. Even with that, Federusher came prepared for sweepers with Wrap in Vigor and Magnify, as well was running the maximum allowable copies of Lead the Stampede and Winding Way. They even packed a copy of Vivien's Grizzly in their sideboard. Needless to say they did not want to get blown out. Federusher also came ready for the mirror with two copies of Viridian Longbow main in addition to a Trinket Mage to fetch the equipment.

Federusher had to be Ponderouscz in the finals, with the latter player also making their way through two Jeskai decks. They were running Eldrazi Green - a mono green ramp deck that wants to resolve huge threats early while blowing up the opponent's lands. Normally a threat to Tron, Ponderouscz made some changes to help bulwark the deck against Jeskai. 
Traditionally Eldrazi Green has leaned on the interaction of Arbor Elf and Wild Growth/Utopia Sprawl to generate its mana abundance. Historically this has been a fragile plan thanks to haha dead Elf. Ponderouscz build in redundancy with Nest Invader and Kozilek's Predator. While not as explosive as Arbor Elf, the Eldrazi Spawn provide an insurance policy that can help cast key spells. Ponderouscz also ran the full four copies of Entourage of Trest to keep the cards flowing. While they did not include any sweepers, it could be trivially easy for the deck to include copies of Electrickery or Swirling Sandstorm and set Utopia Sprawl to red in games two and three.

The success of Eldrazi Green points to Jeskai's greed. The deck centers on four and five mana haymaker plays but tries to get away on 19 or 20 land. This is an exploit for land destruction strategies. While Jeskai can easily handle any threat Eldrazi Green can present it has a harder time doing so when its mana is constrained. 

Can this strategy persist? Unclear. Eldrazi Green thrives when it is on the play. It also has a hard time against Burn and other decks that can pressure a life total while not needing a ton of mana. Additionally, if Elves remains a popular archetype Eldrazi Green could be in for a world of hurt thanks to Quirion Ranger. 

Still, it's nice to live in a world where this deck was a good call for an event.

2019 is going to be a banner year for Pauper. I want to continue to be at the forefront of the metagame. If you like the work I do, please consider becoming a Patron. Thank you!

Wednesday, September 11, 2019

Why There Should Be Bans on October 7th

Yesterday I ended my entry on this blog by saying that Arcum's Astrolabe, Ephemerate, and the Tron mana engine should be banned. Today I am going to do my best to explain my position on the matter. This is going to be replacing my usual Patron's Only post for the week, but considering the subject matter I did not want to restrict access.
Similarly I am want to keep this on my blog because a lot of this is my opinion. While it is informed by data, this post is going to trend a little more negative than I'd like. I have heard a ton of feedback for I am endeavoring to be more positive on my more widely published pieces.

Before I go any further I am going to ask those of you reading to be civil in your comments. People who disagree with you are not crybabies or whiners. If you are reading this chances are you are like me and you want to see Pauper grow, succeed, and thrive. While we may see different routes to those ends we can at least agree on the end goal: a vibrant Pauper. 


This chart represents the online Pauper metagame, starting with the July 7th Challenge and running through the Challenge on September 8th. It is inclusive of the Mythic Championship Qualifier. It takes into account 352 decks from the Top 32s. While this is not a statistically significant sample size, it is fairly indicative of the metagame going back to the release of Core 2020. In that time, Jeskai decks have accounted for nearly 25% of all Top 32 lists - 87 decks to be exact - and 30 Top 8 slots (that's over 34%). If you are a regular reader you know I like the Win+ metric - something that measures wins above an X-3 record. Jeskai decks have accounted for nearly 33% of the Win+ share (indicated by the red trend line in the graph). All of these metrics seem to indicate the format is out of balance. Jeskai is defining the format it is dominating. 

What does a healthy format look like? A lot of this is going to be subjective but to me a healthy format is one that is dynamic. While there may be a Best Deck it should not be so potent that it is immune to shifts in the metagame. At the height of its power even post-Cloud of Faeries Delver had bad matchups that approached the game from different angles. By comparison the best way to beat an Ephemerate deck is to race. 
If we want to talk numbers, I think averaging between 12% and 15% of the top of the metagame is acceptable. Achieving a delta of between 3% and 5% of actual volume and weighted volume is likely ideal. The current delta for the top macro-archetype in Pauper currently sits at 8.24%.

So how do we restore parity? Right now the best way is to take cards out of the format. The current crop of Throne of Eldraine spoilers continue the trend of role players as opposed to metagame shapers. To be clear this is fine - Pauper is defined by cards released at commons, not a wish list of high power cards. 

One thing I am not going to do this time around is advocate for a ban on the Monarch mechanic. While I do feel that it has no place in two-player Magic it has also never existed in a format where beatdown decks did not have to compete with Daze. Daze was such a huge beating against decks that wanted to present two-drop threats that it helped stifle aggro. The fact it was often paired with Augur of Bolas did not help things either. While it may be true that the Monarch is too good for Pauper, I would like to see what a deck like Stompy could do if it did not have to contend with Daze on top of cards like Kor Skyfisher and Augur of Bolas. In this world is the Monarch a dominant force or one that is constrained by the inherent risk of the mechanic? While I am inclined to believe the former if the Monarch could survive and be a viable option without wapring the meta, I am all for keeping it around.


The case for banning Arcum's Astrolabe, as I see it, is as follows: it subverts the mana system. Prior to Astrolabe the format did not have great mana. While it was the best it had ever been between Khans of Tarkir Gain Lands and the Ravnica Block Bounce Lands, running more than two colors and reliably casting your spells was a bit of a stretch. Astrolabe did not just make the mana for decks better, it gave every one of those decks access to a card draw package. One reason to dip into multiple colors is to gain access to powerful effects outside your main chroma. In the world of Astrolabe this is trivial and has allowed four-color blue decks to rule the day. Make no mistake- all those Kor Skyfisher decks are blue decks and like all mana fixing in Pauper blue is able to make best use of Astrolabe. 
Many Pauper players love Astrolabe, likening it to Fetch Lands. They make decks more consistent and make it easier to cast your spells. This is valid. At the same time when the mana in a format gets too good decks start to resemble one another. While there may be multiple varieties of Jeskai out there, they all run the same core cards. Aside from a few flex slots - Trinket Mage vs Spellstutter Sprite for example - what is the actual difference in these decks?

Is this metagame diversity? 

Ephemerate looks innocuous. Blink strategies have been around the format since before it was sanctioned. While Ghostly Flicker has helped to power out some game ending loops it required multiple cards - Mnemonic Wall and another card - to enable the victory formation. Even then many players felt that Ghostly Flicker was too powerful to keep around. 

I was not one of them. When I saw Ephemerate I thought it would be a neat card but not one that broke things in half. 

I was wrong.

Whereas Ghostly Flicker requires two friends to do work, Ephemerate only needs one. Targeting Mnemonic Wall or Archaeomancer with Ephemerate means you get the best spell out of your graveyard and then you can get back the Ephemerate and start the process over again. Pair Ephemerate with Mulldrifter to draw six cards for four total mana. It is not the effect of Ephemerate as much as the cost. At a single mana it is trivial to set up a turn where you can enact the loop with your shields up. Ephemerate also can store itself in exile, meaning that traditional graveyard hate is less useful against the card. Ephemerate has had nearly four months approaching the summit of Pauper, let's have the card retire in peace.

The last card I want to see sunset is three cards - Urza's Mine, Urza's Power Plant, and Urza's Tower. When a deck has access to the best spells in the format thanks the best possible mana - Astrolabe and Prophetic Prism - and has a surplus of resources, it can run roughshod over the metagame. If Tron was simply being used to power out Fangren Marauder and Rolling Thunder it would be safe to keep around. However Tron's main use these days is as part of a prison deck that can lock people out of interacting as early as turn four. Unlike prison strategies in other formats there are very few natural foils available in Pauper. The pieces can be stored in the graveyard or exile and thanks to a Mystical Teachings toolbox they can be retrieved and protected with ease. 
While there are fair applications of Tron, there is no path forward for including powerful cards that does not end with Tron running them and doing so, casting twice as many per turn thanks to 1+1+1 = 7. 

Tron also does work in stifling other end game decks. Slower midrange and control decks cannot keep up with a deck that simply out-manas them. As such, as long as Tron remains in the format these decks will tend towards Tron. One high profile Tron pilot has said the only reason the decks isn't dominating online is because of how physically taxing it is to pilot correctly.

So what happens if these bans take place? I hesitate to speculate too much. Boros Monarch and Stompy likely remain as solid options but I also imagine a new control deck will emerge and Familiar combo will see a resurgence. Regardless of all this I hope that October 7th ends with a healthier, more balance Pauper metagame.

2019 is going to be a banner year for Pauper. I want to continue to be at the forefront of the metagame. If you like the work I do, please consider becoming a Patron. Thank you!

Tuesday, September 10, 2019

September 8 Challenge Winner's Metagame Breakdown

On September 8th Hellsau won the Challenge with Flicker Tron. Five Jeskai decks made the Top 8. Despite the fact the interaction of Mulldriter and Ephemerate have dominated the Pauper metagame for the past several months, there have not been many innovations when it comes to countering the menace. 

But don't worry - there were plenty of copies of Leave no Trace for Heroic and Hexproof - the scourge of September 1st.

To be fair it is hard to metagame against the Jeskai deck - and against Ephemerate-Mulldrifter- in the abstract. The decks that are able to run these cards dedicate multiple slots to cheap interaction to protect their engine. Some decks can come prepared - Spellstutter Sprite is quite good at eating Ephemerate - but the best Sprite decks these days just so happen to also be Jeskai decks. 

There are ways to fight the engine. Magma Spray and Last Breath can exile creatures in response to Ephemerate. Castigate can nab the card directly from the hand. There are a bounty of cards that can hit a spell in the graveyard, provided the shields are down. Heck, Faerie Trickery can get it off the stack for good, as can Syncopate and Liquify.

Have all of these been attempted? Possibly. It is also possible that running these cards might leave you at a disadvantage against the rest of the field. 

Still, Jeskai was five of the Top 8 decks on Sunday with another three in the Top 16. If you add up all Ephemerate-Mulldrifter decks in the Top 16, you come out to 10: 8 Jeskai, 2 Tron. That's out of 15 such decks in the Top 32. A 66% conversion rate to a 5-2 or better record is pretty darn good. 

And this is a sustained level of success, at least with regards to Jeskai. On August 11, Jeskai decks comprised 25% of the challenge Top 32 decks and accumulated 30% of all Win+ points. By the end of Sunday the volume shrunk to 24.72% but the Win+ volume rose to 32.96%. Even as the deck gets less popular, it gets better.

These numbers should give Pauper players pause. They indicate that nothing can keep Jeskai down. Even if you want to take solace in the results from Sunday that means Tron is the hero (and we all know the Tron memes at this point). With Throne of Eldraine looking to play in space that will not benefit the format of commons it means that other action may need to be taken to ensure the health of the format moving forward.

Yes I'm talking about bans. Arcum's Astrolabe, Ephemerate, and Tron.

2019 is going to be a banner year for Pauper. I want to continue to be at the forefront of the metagame. If you like the work I do, please consider becoming a Patron. Thank you!

Monday, September 2, 2019

September 1 Pauper Challenge Winner's Metagame

And now for something completely different. The September 1st Pauper Challenge was won by a Jeskai deck featuring both Arcum's Astrolabe and Ephemerate. But Ethereal Armor had a breakout performance.

Last week (in a Patrons only post) I said that Ethereal Armor was the way to go moving forward. In an article that went live today I expanded on this notion. Namely, the proliferation of Arcum's Astrolabe decks makes the various Jeskai and Tron decks impossible to predict. While a macro strategy may be discernible, these decks could run any card they darn well please. So rather than trying to interact on a meaningful axis, the best way to attack them is to go as fast as possible and ignore their ability to interact with you. Both Heroic and Hexproof are able to do this, while piling on the damage thanks to Ethereal Armor and other force multipliers. 
These decks did more than perform well, they pushed out most other linear decks. Burn put up one Top 32 finish while Affinity was nowhere to be found. The aggressive bend on September 1st also kneecapped Tron decks, as none appeared in the Top 16.
The winning Jeskai list seemed to be prepared for this eventuality. While it did not overload on removal main it did have a copy of Journey to Nowhere, which could have proved instrumental it taking out Lagonna-Band Trailblazers during the Swiss rounds. The winner also packed two Spellstutter Sprite main, and that faerie has been feasting on one drops for more than a decade. Finally, Cracudo packed two copies of Standard Bearer in the sideboard as a way to obfuscate the plan of Hexproof, Heroic, and Stompy. 

So where does that leave the metagame moving into September 8th? Jeskai remains the dominant archetype and will surely adapt to the rise of these "go-tall" decks. The strategy must also adjust to meet the resurgent threat of Tribe Combo. If I were preparing for next week, I wouldn't leave home without access to Chainer's Edict and Pestilence. 

But that's just me.

2019 is going to be a banner year for Pauper. I want to continue to be at the forefront of the metagame. If you like the work I do, please consider becoming a Patron. Thank you!