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Magic the Gathering Online (MTGO) 1 Event Ticket Collection Challenge! - Part 8

11/9/2017

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by ElspethFTW, Gaming Successfully Staff
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After a two-day break from the 1 Event Ticket Collection Challenge on Magic Online, we find ourselves in a good position. We dodge a bullet with one of our big specs, our main spec looks solid, and overall, our other picks are looking good, too. First, let’s take a look at the dodged bullet.

I was really a believer in Captain Lannery Storm. While she actually would’ve been a great stock to buy into at 0.07 or 0.08 tix each, we bought in at 0.14 tix each. The highest her retail price hit was 0.2, but at no time could we sell for more than 0.15 tix each. I wanted to get at least 0.25 tix a copy for a fair profit. But during the past week, we watched her dip by half and slowly tick back up. Not seeing enough play right now, I decided I would have to exit, even if there was a slight loss involved.

Fortunately for us, I was able to out our four copies of Captain Lannery Storm for 0.1445 tix each. This gives us a tiny 0.018 tix profit. While that seems insignificant, that brings us 0.578 tix back to spend. My risky bid didn’t pay off. When you’re dealing with penny stocks like this, buying in too early is a real risk. The bummer is that I could have doubled my money here. But I can’t hold and risk a loss for profit that may never come.

Without good arbitrage opportunities the past couple of days we only had 0.2 tix to spend. While that’s enough for a couple of 0.01-0.02 tix possibilities,, I had to wait and see. Deadeye Tracker, our new main spec, is doing better. It dropped to 0.17 tix briefly after we bought in at 0.19 tix. But it’s hovering around 0.20-0.21 tix mostly.


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Deadeye Tracker has a much stronger demand profile. What I mean is that people aren’t offloading many copies. While Lannery Storm is definitely a potential Standard breakout, being a four-drop limits where she can go.  One-drops with the upside of Deadeye Tracker are a lot more versatile, especially those who can bring you card advantage through the explore mechanic.

This card is more powerful than his price suggests and a lot of players already know that. This guy could breach 1 ticket each. What’s our target for him? I’m willing to see just how high he goes. But creatures like him tend to hang out in the 0.75 to 1.25 tix range. More than tripling up is fine with me, but the point of a spec like this is to go for a massive gain to fuel our efforts.

With three arbtritage fails in Ancient Stirrings (0.032 total), Minister of Inquiries (0.008 tix), and Attune with Aether (0.004 tix), I missed out on a potential 0.3+ tix boost to our coffers. Still, we have almost 0.8 tix to spend. With only 1.13 tix invested, this means we have plenty of room to grow our portfolio. I’m also going to be more careful in ensuring specs are relatively bottomed out before I buy in again.

Our penny stocks are all up a bit. But of all of them, Entrancing Melody has already been a good stock for us. I already had a chance to cash in at 0.017 tix each after buing in at 0.01 tix each. But that’s not nearly enough to dump it now. With a new buy-in of 0.03 tix, I will hope for at least 0.1tix, but our realistic target is 0.05 tix. Getting 0.2 for a 0.04 investment is awesome. Any more is just amazing. The rest of our penny stocks, including our accidental ones for arbitrage purposes, are mostly up in retail but I’d be barely breaking even to sell a few of them. So holding them doesn’t hurt us.

Any new investments today? There’s a great penny stock that I finally decided to buy into.


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Oviya Pashiri, Sage Lifecrafter has always reminded me of a poor man’s Rhys the Redeemed. No, she’s not as good as the token-doubling Elf, but she does make tokens, both big and small. She’s a solid early play as a one-drop with 2 toughness and is popping up in some Green/White Aggro lists.

She’s really only peaked as high as 0.03 tix, but keeps dancing between 0.01 and 0.02 tix all the time. I didn’t want to buy in at 0.02 tix, which is why I kept holding off. But at a penny, I really can’t go wrong. I don’t have a price target for Oviya, but I know people are playing her. This is a Standard spec I’m willing to hold for a bit since she’s really not done much since her Kaladesh release and the investment is tiny.

There are a couple of other interesting penny stocks I’d like to take a stab at, but are at 0.02 - 0.03 tix currently. While these could be acceptable losses if they pan out, I know from experience that I could be selling off these at 0.003 to 0.006 tix each. At a penny investment, that’s palatable. But any higher is just throwing away bot credit.

A lot of perfectly good cards bottom out at a penny. Even the Standard staple Rogue Refiner was a penny for a bit, and now he’s up over 0.3 tix. It’s identifying the valleys of cards that should be 0.25 tix or more at their peak is where the money is made in this game. I could just buy every possibly playable card that’s 0.01 tix and hope for the best, but timing is everything. You have to buy in early, but not too late, but not so soon that you’re tying up funds.

In our next part of the Challenge, we’ll be getting a bit more aggressive with penny stocks. Captain Lannery Storm hampered us a bit too much and arbitrage has been pretty useless. So while it will take longer, finding truly good penny stocks is the way to go looking forward.



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Magic the Gathering Online (MTGO) 1 Event Ticket Collection Challenge! - Part 6

11/5/2017

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by ElspethFTW, Gaming Successfully Staff
So our MTGO 1 Event Ticket Collection Challenge is sort of stalled out at the moment. It doesn’t really have much to do with Captain Lannery Storm going down to 0.07 tix per. The main issue is that our arbitrage flips aren’t panning out. I’ve gathered a lot of hotlist picks and none of them have panned out at all. Fortunately, I was able to sell some of them for a tiny profit (fractions of pennies). So not all is lost, and all of these pickups were good cards. Here’s what I have left from our “accidental investments.”

  • 2x Disfigure at 0.001 per
  • 4x Essence Extraction at 0.002 per
  • 4x Search for Tomorrow at 0.002 per
  • 4x Nature’s Claim at 0.005 per
  • 4x Ponder (LRW) at 0.006 per
  • 4x Everflowing Chalice at 0.006 per
  • 4x Servant of the Conduit at 0.01 per

That’s about 0.126 tix tied up in potential arbitrage flips. Fortunately, I think that these will come around on hotlists again. If not, I’m happy with breaking even or taking the tiny 0.02 tix or so of profit I eked out of the others.

Good news, though. We made some more penny stock investments from Ixalan. All three are ones that have shown up on hotlists.

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Arcane Adaptation is a card that’s already seen some play on Saffron Olive’s Against the Odds. It has a tidy little combo with Turntimber Ranger in Modern, making infinite 2/2 Wolf tokens and giving the Ranger infinite +1/+1 counters. It’s an awesome little enchantment, and there are other ways to take advantage of it, so I’m happy sinking 0.04 tix into a playset for the long-haul.


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Old-Growth Dryads just feels like a good card to me. Heck, it’s a one-drop for a 3/3! Yes, giving your opponents a free Rampant Growth (basic land into play tapped) is a bit of a drawback. But this has Green Stompy written all over it, and that’s already a deck in Modern (Mono-Green Devotion). It’s been on hotlists and while it hasn’t really seen any play yet, I can see this doing work in Standard at some point too. I may even invest in a second playset of these.

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Shadowed Caravel is a neat little vehicle overshadowed (pun intended) by those from Kaladesh. It requires that you really build around the explore mechanic, but it can become a handy little beater. While it may never do much and could be sitting in our binder forever, I’m happy to cash it in if it just goes up to something like 0.05 tix. Really, though, this is a long-term hold, just like the other two.

Because two of these cards have Modern upside, I’m happy to hold them for a long time. We’ll be seeking out some more penny stocks this week, especially ones that have long-term appeal beyond just Standard. Hopefully our hotlist flips - or some new ones - give us a shot in the arm for spending power.

As for Lannery Storm, I feel confident that we’ll be at least able to essentially break even on her. Sometimes you take a risk and you whiff. But she’s just good enough that I’m not cutting my losses just yet.

See any cards we should be looking at for penny stock investments? Let us know in the comments?


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Magic the Gathering Online (MTGO) 1 Event Ticket Collection Challenge! - Part 5

11/3/2017

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by ElspethFTW, Gaming Successfully Staff
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The MTGO 1 Event Ticket Collection Challenge is going fairly well. Or is it? We may have bad news about my risky Captain Lannery Storm play… But first, good news!

For arbitrage plays, last night, I bought 4x Needle Drop for 0.016 total, and sold for 0.15 tix. That’s a 0.134 tix profit! While that doesn’t sound like much, it’s potentially 3 or 4 new potential specs that we can now buy into!

This morning, I made three more hotlist plays. One didn’t work out, Radiant Fountain, so I’m now “invested” in 4 copies of the Magic 2015 land for 0.016 tix. But this card is on hotlists enough and actually sees play in a couple different formats, so I’m OK with wasting that little bit. The other two buys worked out, 7th Edition Shock at 0.01 per and Diabolic Tutor (again!) at 0.003 per. For only a 0.052 tix investment, I came out with 0.24 tix. Even with our little failures here and there, these plays bring us to a new total of 0.879 to spend! So we can go a little deeper now.

But as for Lannery Storm, she fell to 0.08 tix this morning! We can cash out for 0.07 tix each, but that means we lost half of our initial 0.56 investment! It’s OK, though, we’re not going to panic.I’m holding at the moment. Here’s why:

Ebbs and flows happen with cards like this all the time. Cards in Standard that hold some promise tend to see some back and forth movement. Since Storm isn’t currently seeing any play in top decks, people decided to cash her in at 0.13 tix each, so now the stock is back up. However, because there are still buyers at 0.07 tix when she’s retailing at 0.08 tells me that this is not a card to dump just yet. She has enough upside that I’m willing to risk her dipping to penny status first before she hits it big.

Remember, my price target on Storm isn’t that aggressive. I’m happy getting 0.25 tix per, so I’m not going to get greedy. But we definitely need targets that quickly appreciate so we can move on and build our portfolio fairly quickly. Our top spec cutting in half so quickly hurts, but I’m going to see if the new low price gets people to buy in again. It just takes one deck to 4-0 a daily event...

Since our arbitrage plays are making us some quick gains, and others are still in reserve just waiting for the hotlist bots to want them again, we can actually still invest in a couple more things today. However, I’m happy to sit today out. There’s no reason to go deep in anything at the moment with our small bankroll. Perhaps I’m feeling a bit of regret in the Lannery Storm purchase not turning us a little profit quickly, but this is part of the game. I’m willing to wait a bit longer and see what the weekend brings!


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Magic the Gathering Online (MTGO) 1 Event Ticket Collection Challenge! Part 2

10/30/2017

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by ElspethFTW, Gaming Successfully Staff
In the first part of this series, we began our 1 Event Ticket Collection Challenge on Magic Online! Through this series, we are using only a single MTGO event ticket as our seed money to build our online collection! In the first part, we made one arbitrage trade (bought from one bot and sold to another at a higher price within moments) and one investment. In this part, we’ll start making more moves.
Let’s review where we are:

  • Bought 3x Spark Elemental for 0.09 tix, sold for 0.225 tix
  • Bought 4x Spark Trawler for 0.2, 0.05 each as investment

This left us slightly in the red in our 1 event ticket challenge so far. But I would make that right back! How did I do that? With some arbitrage, of course!

The first move I made in arbitrage today was Shock from 7th Edition.
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Shock is actually in Standard at the time of this writing, as it’s been reprinted in Aether Revolt. People really seem to like this particular artwork of Shock (I do, too), so it seems that it’s always in demand. Why the heck people keep buying and selling it on a regular basis, I’m not sure, but it causes some hotlists to want 0.03 tix for it when it sells for 0.01 (a penny) tix or less elsewhere. I took advantage of this opportunity to make a quick flip. I spent 0.04, but immediately made back 0.12. This is a total profit of 0.08 tix and it took me barely a minute.

(If you happen to find copies of 7E Shock on bulk bots, they are worth collecting since they are very often needed by bots!)

There’s also one other thing I need to point out. Just because a card is on a bot chain’s hotlist does not mean that you will necessarily be able to sell it once you actually hit up the bot. There have been a number of times where I bought a card to immediately flip to a hotlist and the bot was no longer accepting copies. You may think… uh-oh, I wasted credit! Fortunately, there are cards that come up on hotlists almost all of the time, and I’ll be sure to point out which ones those are!.There are some that if you can’t immediately flip them, you may as well hold them and see how they pan out! (This can actually work out quite well with Standard-legal commons and uncommons.)


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This actually happened to me today. I bought 4 copies of Nyx-Fleece Ram and 4 copies of Nature’s Claim for a grand total of 0.032 tix. My return looked to be 0.24 tix, but unfortunately, the hotlist bot no longer wanted them. So for now, I’m out 0.032 tix. However, these are cards that I’ve flipped on hotlists before and they should come up again. If not, it’s the risk you take that someone will fill their quota before you can.

Because I was just setting the tone of the overall series, I didn’t really dive too deep into how I decide on choosing my “penny stocks” on MTGO. While I haven’t been successful with all of them (who is), I’ve been wildly successful on a few. Some I actually sold out of too early! But as we’ll learn in the course of this series, it’s better to sell for guaranteed profit nine times out of ten, especially when you’re doubling or tripling up on your investment!

Then sometimes, you have to take a big risk!
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I bought four copies of Captain Lannery Storm from Ixalan for 0.14 each or 0.56 tix total.

This is a huge chunk of our portfolio now and it’s a huge gamble. Or is it? I couldn’t find another card in Standard that had such a low spread between sell price and buy price that was also this affordable. Storm reminds me of Kari Zev, Skyship Raider, once herself worth only a penny before spiking to over 1 ticket a piece. I sold her far too early, but even then, I made a healthy profit.

The difference with Captain Lannery Storm is that she creates a Treasure token whenever she attacks. While Kari Zev brings a 2/1 Monkey into play, the potential mana the Treasures create can be similarly valuable. Unlike Kari Zev, Storm has haste, and also even though she’s just a 2/2, whenever you sacrifice a Treasure, Storm gains +1/+0. They’re similar cards, but since Kari Zev is 2 mana and Storm is 3, they can be in the same deck. Kari Zev is still over 0.6 tix each, so it seems fair to think that Storm could carry a similar price point.

The thing is, Storm hasn’t found a real deck yet. She’s too good to not have a home, though. All it takes on MTGO is for a deck to 4-0 a competitive event with 2 or more copies in the mainboard for her price to jump. That’s what we’re looking for.

Between her and Scrap Trawler, plus the hotlist duds, we have 0.792 tix tied up. But thanks to some quick profits, we still have 0.423 tix to spend. For now,  though, we’ll hold off and see how the big gamble pays off.

Stay tuned for our next installment of the the MTGO 1 Event Ticket Collection Challenge!


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Magic the Gathering Online (MTGO) 1 Event Ticket Collection Challenge! - Part 1

10/30/2017

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by ElspethFTW, Gaming Successfully Staff
At one time, I planned on writing a series about how you can build a fairly substantial Magic: the Gathering Online collection with just a single event ticket! How? Through thoughtful speculation on certain cards and finding arbitrage deals on others, I have in the past made 20+ tickets over the course of a couple of weeks using only one event ticket and the tickets and bot credit associated with the sales of the cards! I decided to start fresh and document this effort one day at a time!

So one of the best strategies I have to start building up some buying power quickly is to find cards that are buying and selling for substantially different prices. This is often the case with commons and uncommons which are in high demand. By buying them from one bot and selling them to another bot at a higher price, you generate some easy profit that you can then reinvest on a different target.
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There was only one really good arbitrage opportunity that I found today. There were 3 copies of Spark Elemental available for only 0.03 tickets on one bot, but a hotlist was offering a little over 0.07 tix each! This was the perfect opportunity to swap 0.09 tix on one bot for 0.225 tix on another! Spark Elemental is a fairly played card in Pauper and the occasional Legacy or Modern burn deck. It’s a good card, but the price of this particular creature varies wildly on Magic Online, making it not very safe to invest in long-term.

Because people buy in and out of decks so often on Magic Online, many key commons and uncommons can fluctuate wildly in price, meaning that not all vendors can catch up. This happens in regular “paper” Magic, too. But on MTGO, you can take advantage of these opportunities immediately! This may not be the last time we make a little money with this guy! Also, as we go along with this challenge, you’ll see a lot of the same cards being bought and sold for very different prices.

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While I could be very happy with increasing my spending power by over 20 percent right off the bat, I decided to reinvest this profit, plus a little more on four copies of Scrap Trawler from Aether Revolt. This artifact creature has already seen some play in Modern and the potential for it to skyrocket in price due to competitive play is certainly there. While it hasn’t done much at all in Standard, because it has Modern and other eternal format applications, this is a nice speculative target to hold onto for a bit.

My thought process for this card is that it has reached between 0.1 and 0.2 tix per copy before on several occasions. It also sees a fair amount of Commander play, and while that is not a major format on Magic Online, there is competitive Commander as a real format now. So, it doesn’t hurt to gamble just 0.2 tix when the return could very likely be at least 0.4 or 0.6. Of course, I’m shooting for much higher. I’m hoping that I can eventually out these at 0.5 tix each, but given the opportunity to sell out for a good profit, I’m sure I’ll take it. On the flip side, it could drop to a penny and stay there forever, but that’s unlikely.

The most important thing about the 1 tix challenge is to keep the tickets and bot credit flowing, as the ultimate goal is to stockpile enough credits worth of profit to actually purchase event tickets. You can then out these tickets through venues like MTGOTraders or MTGOTickets for cash! For this exercise, however, we’ll be reinvesting our profit entirely for the time being. Once we’ve reached a certain threshold of tickets, however, I may decide to cash out some if the tickets are buying for a good rate ($0.90 per ticket or more).

We are going to take more risks as time goes on, after all, since our initial investment is so low! However, I tend to like targets that are 0.10 tix or below per copy. This is because there’s a real chance of completely losing our bets and having to sell off failures for fractions of a penny. Therefore, we will take profits whenever we can unless there are clear signs that we can hold out for more,

Is this a challenge you’d like to take with me? Are there cards you’d like to purchase now that you feel are really strong bets to make a profit? Let me know in the comments! I’ll be back soon with the next part of my MTGO 1 Event Ticket Collection Challenge!


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Boros Metalcraft (W/R Affinity) - Magic the Gathering (MTG) Pauper Deck Profile

10/18/2017

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by ElspethFTW, Old School Duelist
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Boros Affinity in Pauper?

Pauper is a highly competitive tournament format in Magic the Gathering. It is a format of only common cards, with a relatively small ban list. For years, the format really shined on Magic Online, but now, it has become supported in Paper Magic, as well. What's great about Pauper is the sheer amount of competitive decks you can play. This particular deck, a Boros Affinity deck, once went 4-0 in a Daily Event. While this list we’re looking at today is from 2013, the archetype is still very viable.

The best part about this list, is that in MTGO terms, the deck only costs about 10 tix. As you'll discover though when we peruse the list, about 8 tix of that is for the 2 copies of Pyroblast in the sideboard! In paper, it's a mere $40 or so. This is a ridiculously cheap deck!

Affinity was always a strong archetype in Pauper, but wasn't getting 4-0 in Daily events until this list popped up. So, what makes this Pauper Affinity deck different? Let's take a look!

The Deck List!

Creatures
4 Ardent Recruit
4 Vault Skirge
4 Court Homunculus
4 Porcelain Legionnaire
4 Glint Hawk
3 Auriok Sunchaser

Non-Creatures
4 Bonesaw
4 Bonesplitter
4 Galvanic Blast
2 Prophetic Prism
2 Lightning Bolt
1 Flayer Husk

Land
7 Plains
4 Great Furnace
4 Ancient Den
3 Boros Guildgate
1 Mountain
1 Vault of Whispers

Sideboard
3 Stone Rain
2 Lone Missionary
2 Journey to Nowhere
2 Flame Slash
2 Pyroblast
2 Smash to Smithereens
2 Electrickery


The Creatures!

While this is not a typical Affinity deck, having Artifacts does indeed matter quite a bit here. Starting off with our Ardent Recruit, we have a 1/1 guy that has a Metalcraft ability that gives him +2/+2. Metalcraft is attained by having at least three artifacts on the battlefield. Since the artifact lands (Great Furnace, Ancient Den, and the lone Vault of Whispers) count towards activating this ability, you're most often going to be getting a 3/3 creature for 1 mana!

Vault Skirge is a Pauper stalwart. For 1 and a Phyrexian mana (black or 2 life) you have a 1/1 flyer with lifelink. With the one copy of Vault of Whispers in the deck, it's possible to cast it without paying the 2 life. But being an artifact itself, as well as having lifelink, it's worth paying the life just for the creature (especially if casting Skirge gives you Metalcraft!) Having four of these in the deck guarantees a pesky 1/1 flyer with lifelink that gets better with the equipment in the deck!

Next we have four Court Homunculus. The Court Homunculus is similar to Ardent Recruit, in that it costs a single white mana, except that it gains +1/+1 as long as you control any other artifact. What's especially interesting about him, though, is that he himself is an artifact. If you simply control another Court Homunculus, it becomes a 2/2.

If that wasn't enough, we have a full playset of another Pauper favorite, and one-time Tempered Steel stalwart, Porcelain Legionnaire! For two and a Phyrexian mana (White or two life), you get a 3/1 with first strike. Being able to play him on Turn Two is ridiculous, and he himself is also an artifact!

Glint Hawk is a fun little card which used to abuse Mox Opal when it was legal in Standard. But the Hawk became relatively forgotten outside of some Pauper Affinity builds. But in this deck, Glint Hawk works well with the several 0 drop artifacts in this deck. Also, if you would miss a land drop anyway, you can bounce an artifact land back to your hand in order to replay it. The Hawk is a 2/2 flyer, so this down-side really isn't too bad. You have a full playset of these, as well.

The last creature is a trio of Auriok Sunchaser. It's a 1/1 for 1W, but its Metalcraft ability gives it +2/+2 and flying! A 3/3 flyer for 2 mana is pretty silly.


Non-Creature Lineup!

As if the deck couldn't win with just its creature lineup alone, the non-creature spells are pretty interesting, too!

The first one is a zero drop, Bone Saw, an equipment that has an equip cost of 1, and gives the equipped creature +0/+1. Seriously, though, you're rarely going to care about equipping this. Mostly, it exists to more easily activate Metalcraft, and to give you something to bounce for Glint Hawk.

Next is a full playset of Bonesplitter. It's probably the best equipment in Pauper outside of perhaps Armadillo Cloak. It's a staple in White Weenie, which has been a very competitive strategy in Pauper over the years. Bonesplitter costs only 1 to play and only 1 to equip. It gives a creature +2/+0, and with the flyers in this deck, you can get in some cheap evasive damage very early on!

Galvanic Blast is an okay burn spell until you see that it deals 4 damage to target creature or player if you have Metalcraft! Without Metalcraft, it's just a Shoc. But with how often you’ll have Metalcraft, the 4 Galvanic Blasts can almost win you the game on their own! Paired with the 2 Lightning Bolt in the main board, you have plenty of both removal and direct damage.

Lastly, we have Prophetic Prism and Flayer Husk. Prophetic Prism is a two-drop artifact that draws you a card when it enters. It also allows you to filter your mana, which is very important in this deck!

The Flayer Husk is a Living Weapon equipment that comes into play with a 0/0 creature token attached to it. The Husk gives its equipped creature +1/+1, so it's a nice cheap creature. When the creature dies, or you find a better target for the Husk, it gives that creature +1/+1 for an equip cost of 2. It's not quite Bonesplitter, but it works well.

The mana base is 7 Plains and 1 Mountain, with 4 Great Furnace (the red artifact land), 4 Ancient Den (the white Artifact land), 3 Boros Guildgate (red/white), and a single Vault of Whispers (for help with casting the Vault Skirges).


The Sideboard!

As is the case with many Pauper decks, the majority of the cost of the deck comes from a single card in the sideboard. In this case it's Pyroblast. Basically, what Pyroblast does for a single red mana is counter any target blue spell or destroy any blue permanent. If you don't want to spend the $8 or so to acquire them, though, you could probably just switch them out for 2 more copies of Lightning Bolt.

The rest of the sideboard is typically Pauper staples. 3 Stone Rain lets you keep decks off of their most important lands or colors. 2 Lone Missionary can be boarded in against more aggressive decks or burn decks. Gaining that 4 life can certainly be a big deal in certain matchups, especially where this deck will need to race often.

For creature removal, we have 2 Journey to Nowhere, 2 Flame Slash (which deals 4 damage to target creature, but is at sorcery speed), and the aforementioned Pyroblasts. We also have Electrickery, which with its very cheap overload cost murders all 1 toughness creatures on your opponent's side of the board. Lastly we have Smash to Smithereens, which is played in many sideboards in other formats. It's excellent artifact removal that also deals 3 damage to that artifact's controller, all for 1R!


Impressions of the Deck

It's easy to see how this deck wins. It requires very little mana to get going and can survive land destruction and artifact destruction, since it plays plenty of copies of 1 and 2 drop cards. The most expensive card casting cost wise in the deck is technically Porcelain Legionnaire. That will be boarded out in certain match-ups anyway!

The best part about this deck's creatures is that they are bigger than their mana costs would lead you to believe. There are plenty of flyers in this deck, and the Bonesplitters alone can lead to some very quick damage. The creature line-up can hold down both the air and ground quite well!

Also, the deck has a nice burn package in it. The only thing I'm not crazy about in the deck is probably the lone Flayer Husk. I'd personally run a third Lightning Bolt, and I'm not sure the deck needs the Vault of Whispers or a fourth Legionnaire, either. If I removed these, I'd max out the Bolts. The main reason I feel this way is that 4 Blasts and 4 Bolts in some combination can kill a player outright. But the list, as is, should work fantastic, as it proved in that Daily Event.

Side-boarding doesn't look too hard with this deck, either. Honestly, the sideboard probably will only be relevant in mirror matches or against Delver decks. The deck is quick enough that it can win in a hurry. I can see card advantage perhaps becoming an issue, but each card you play delivers a ton of value. Also, the power of each card you can swing with makes up for that. You don't have to overextend yourself with this deck in order to win, which I really like.

This deck picks up where White Weenie really started failing. As long as you have that single red source and Metalcraft, this deck can beat you in the air, on the ground, and with pure burn spells. I still want to see 4 Bolts mainboard, and this is something I'll be playing around with myself.

If you're looking to get into competitive Pauper, this is the deck to try, I'd say! Minus the Pyroblasts, you're looking at a maximum $6 investment. Not much to lose here, especially since the artifact lands are the majority of that expense, and they're always good to have in Pauper! Plus, you may have the majority of the cards already if you've been playing online for awhile, if not all!

Congrats to twoduckcubed for authoring and piloting this 4-0 to victory! Here is the deck list!

If you’re looking for a newer, albeit more expensive (30+ tickets / $70), version of this Boros Metalcraft deck, check out this tournament winner piloted by Klybby in October 2017.


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