Hi, I’m Marianne (it/she), a Pauper player from Dresden. After managing to get a Top 8 with my deck in the second gameday of this year’s Lega Pauper Lipsia, I decided to do a little write up about my tournament.

Deck Choice

Walls Combo was the deck with which I originally started to play Pauper over a year ago. At the time, I wasn’t really convinced that it was good and quickly started to play different decks. But after a pretty disastrous showing with my current Rakdos Madness deck at Common Cause, a feeling that the other deck I played regularly (Slivers) wasn’t good enough to challenge the current meta, and some rebuilding of the deck by a friend, I decided to go back to it. And after a good showing at the first gameday of the league with a 3-2 record and recognizing that I probably could have won both losses with fixing a few mistakes, I chose to bring Walls Combo again for this round.

Our deck is a creature focused combo deck whose main goal it is to demonstrate an infinite mana loop with either an Axebane Guardian/Overgrown Battlement, an untaper in Freed From The Real/Galvanic Alchemist and having at least 2/4 creatures with Defender on the table. Then we can use that mana to burn our opponent for lethal with Valakut Invoker or by venturing into the Lost Mines of Phandelver’s Dark Pool with Secret Door, until their life total hits zero. Should we not manage to get our loop immediately, we can still generate a lot of mana to put into cards like Vivien’s Grizzly to dig for our combo pieces or just play big creatures like Generous Ent to grind out a game win.

The deck itself is capable of pretty consistent turn 4 combo wins if your opponent doesn’t run a lot of interaction, but struggles against decks which have enough removal or counters to prevent you from having a fast game.

My current decklist is here: https://archidekt.com/decks/14490733/pauper_walls_combo

Before the event

Thanks to the Deutsche Bahn deciding that the ICE from Dresden should arrive fifteen minutes early, I was already in the venue at 9:30. So I spend most of the time shuffling my deck, testing my starting hands and mulligan decisions and talking to the organizers. The rest of my playgroup from Dresden decided to take the RE, but I wanted to have a bit of sanity left before playing combo all day. My test hands already give me a bit of a bad feeling due to mostly drawing one- or non-landers without much cohesion and I hope that it wasn’t to be foreshadowing for how the rest of the day was going to be (thankfully it wasn’t).

Round 1: Nomads en-Kor Combo (1-2)

Well, Match 1 is against another combo deck which I haven’t seen before. Game 1 I manage to quickly build my board up and combo off on turn 4 for the win. I don’t see anything on their side except two Nomads and a Task Force so I figure it’s some targeting combo and board in two Standard Bearers, but sadly still lack complete understanding of their game plan. In Game 2 I get off to another quick start and can threaten combo turn 4 again, but sadly decide to cast an unnecessary Winding Way, leaving no blockers up. They play a Treefolk Umbra on their Task Force and demonstrate the loop to me. Game 3 we play both of our Standard Bearers and I have to play around theirs too much to be fast. They manage to remove mine, then play an Escape Tunnel, making their Daru Spiritualist unblockable and swing in for the win, 1-2. While it was very cool to see a combo which I didn’t know about, I was very frustrated by my misplay in Game 2.

Round 2: Bye

Luckily I got some time to deal with my frustration thanks to not having to play in Round 2. Obviously playing more games would have been cooler, but a free win and some time to relax are also good. I grabbed something to eat so I didn’t have to hurry during the lunch break and then watched some of the other games my friends from Dresden played.

Round 3: Gruul Cascade (2-0)

A match-up against a deck not running a lot of interaction, that’s pretty much what I am here for. In Game 1 they have some good ramp on turns 1 and 2 and manage to drop an early Avenging Hunter, but I manage to combo on the next turn before they can gain enough value from the Initiative. I sideboard nothing (even though Standard Bearers against Nyxborn Hydras would have been good, but I forgot) and we moved to Game 2. I manage to play a turn 1 Tinder Wall and convert it to a turn 3 Tuktuk Rubblefort, which enables Haste across my entire board. I manage to snowball on the same turn into multiple Wall Lords and get to do the rare turn 3 kill. Fifteen minutes have passed and I get to watch a frankly wonderful High Tide Mirror at the table beside me (highly recommend).

Round 4: Elves (2-0)

Another amazing match-up for me, but the game was a bit of a blur. Game 1 I get a turn 4 combo win and we move to sideboard. I board in Standard Bearers against their Timberwatch Elf and my sole copy of Mirrorshell Crab for some combo protection in a pinch should they board in interaction. Game 2 goes similarly, they start off too slowly to pressure me effectively, I draw perfectly and we have another turn 4 kill. We look at each other, laugh, look at the round timer and only ten minutes have passed. I benefited from getting Freed from the Real into my opening hand twice, which let me play extremely fast. We discuss the match-up a bit and they suggest Vines of Vastwood as a sideboard choice for themselves which I agree with. I accidentally (due some game interference on the table) missed a Connive trigger, but thankfully nobody is too mad. I benefited from getting Freed from the Real into my opening hand twice, which let me be able to play extremely fast. Having matched last times win total it’s now on to Round five.

Round 5: Mono U Faeries (2-0)

I sit down at the table, see my opponent has blue sleeves and immediately get scared. After a bit of asking they reveal they play Fairies and I resign myself to a 3-2 record. But the next games showed I shouldn’t always be so negative. In Game 1 I won due to them not drawing any interaction which threatens me, so it becomes a pure damage race between their flyers and my ability to combo off. Ultimately I manage to outrun their clock and finish the game. After nearly dying to their flyers I board in all three of my Scattershot Archers and again my single Mirrorshell Crab. Game 2 I start off with an early Rubblefort, but even though they again draw nearly no Counterspells, they have enough of their tap enchantments to slow me down significantly, so it becomes another Combo vs. Flyers race. I desperately dig for my Archers but can’t find any and barely dodge lethal damage thanks to an Ent’s Food Token. They tap out completely and I manage to win next turn thanks to a Galvanic Alchemist and a Secret Door. I chat a bit with the other people from Dresden until the results come in. My final record for the Day is now 4-1.

Final Thoughts

First of all, I want to extend a huge thank you to the organizing team for once again putting on an amazing tournament. It is nice to have a league to play in that is so close to where I live. I also was happy that a few more people from my local group managed to show up again, who also all had a great time. As for me personally, I feel like I’m starting to feel more and more comfortable with the deck. Of course there is always a big point of luck with your draws and match-ups, but at least I can say for myself that I didn’t make any large mistakes except in Round 1. So far I also had the luck of there just not being too many problematic decks in the local meta and in nine rounds I only ran into one game which I considered bad for me (which I still won). Depending on how the meta shifts with more control decks coming back, it could be that Walls Combo will become worse again but right now I think it is in a good place as a fast combo deck, which in my opinion is loads of fun to play. And if there isn’t great Sliver support in Edge of Eternities, I definitely will spend a few more tournaments on it.