Pauper Aristocracy [PDH]

[Oversoul]

I've been invited to play Pauper EDH. When I was asked about playing this variant in the past, I generally said no. But eventually I hit on an idea of being ostentatious about it. The format only allows commons in the maindeck and the commander can be any uncommon creature. So I decided I'd run the uncommon creature with the highest secondary market price point. Since many of the most expensive actual uncommons are Alpha printings of otherwise cheap cards, I further specified that it'd be all-inclusive when it came to printings. And the answer back when I did this, and I think even now, is Khabál Ghoul from Arabian Nights. It's the third most dollar-expensive Commander-legal uncommon creature according to Scryfall, and it's sitting behind Sorceress Queen and Imperial Recruiter, both of which have been reprinted. But Khabál Ghoul is on the Reserved List, so it beats out the competition. Looking at its ability, even though I've never used this card before, it actually looks pretty fun.

Putting this together, I believe that if called upon to play this as a legal deck in traditional EDH, I can do so by swapping out the non-legendary commander for Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed. Should actually be a much stronger commander. And yes, I am aware that Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed was "reprinted" on MTGO at uncommon and is therefore also legal as a commander in Pauper EDH. I'm aware of it, but I would never stoop to that level. In actual PDH gameplay, this deck is to be helmed by Khabál Ghoul.

Commander:
1 Khabál Ghoul

1 Abyssal Gatekeeper
1 Agency Coroner
1 Ahriman
1 Ashes to Ashes
1 Ashnod's Altar
1 Biblioplex Assistant
1 Blood Pet
1 Blood Vassal
1 Bog Initiate
1 Cabal Ritual
1 Cadaver Imp
1 Carrier Thrall
1 Carrion Feeder
1 Cathodion
1 Clay Revenant
1 Conjurer's Bauble
1 Corrupted Conviction
1 Crypt Rats
1 Culling the Weak
1 Dark Ritual
1 Darkness
1 Deathgreeter
1 Dimir House Guard
1 Disturbed Burial
1 Dread Return
1 Driver of the Dead
1 Durable Coilbug
1 Feed the Swarm
1 Fleshbag Marauder
1 Foundry Inspector
1 Grave Scrabbler
1 Gray Merchant of Asphodel
1 Grim Harvest
1 Guildsworn Prowler
1 Horror of the Broken Lands
1 Infestation Sage
1 Innocent Blood
1 Lotus Petal
1 Lurching Rotbeast
1 Merchant of Many Hats
1 Mortician Beetle
1 Myr Retriever
1 Oubliette
1 Perigee Beckoner
1 Persistent Specimen
1 Phyrexian Ghoul
1 Reaping the Graves
1 Rite of Consumption
1 Rowan's Grim Search
1 Sanitarium Skeleton
1 Shred Memory
1 Sign in Blood
1 Soldevi Adnate
1 Songs of the Damned
1 Stinkweed Imp
1 Street Wraith
34 Swamp
1 Syphon Mind
1 Tortured Existence
1 Troll of Khazad-dûm
1 Unearth
1 Vault of Whispers
1 Village Rites
1 Wayfarer's Bauble
1 Whispersilk Cloak
1 Workshop Assistant

Alternative Commander:
1 Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed

 

[Oversoul]

-1 Cheerful Osteomancer
+1 Reaping the Graves

I'd originally intended to run Reaping the Graves in this deck. Couldn't find a copy. Picked on up right before my first actual game with it. So now we're running it.

I played three games with this deck last Wednesday, and it was amazing. Unqualified success. I love this deck. I am now hooked on this format. Regarding the individual games, I won the first game by being able to bring back Stinkweed Imp as a flying blocker to hold off my last opponent's commander while Khabal Ghoul kept growing and eating blockers on his side until he ran out. The second game was a five-man pod. My deck stalled out overall, but the Ghoul proved to be a menace. Despite eventually recovering and building toward a lethal boardstate, I wasn't able to get enough flying blockers, with Stinkweed Imp getting hit with removal to set up the attacks, and was picked off. Third game I came out swinging, with Fleshbag Marader fueling an early Ghoul, then Tortured Existence bringing it back after repeated removal killed it. Opponents started scaling past me, but we hit a stalemate and I spent most of my life using the Tortured Existence + Stinkweed Imp + Street Wraith engine. I teamed up with one player to hold back the other, then used Darkness to save us from combat before finally (with eight cards left in my library) drawing Songs of the Damned and looping it with Biblioplex Assistant. I even played one more game afterward, but for that one I piloted someone else's Nezumi Graverobber deck.

 

[Oversoul]

Brought out the Ghoul deck again for the last game of Wednesday night. Despite facing a scary number of tokens generated by that pesky Evangel of Heliod again, and despite having to burn through Prismatic Strands (the card of the evening, apparenlty) I was able to grind out a close win with beatdown.

 

[Oversoul]

Played this deck again after it sat in a box last week. I was excited, because it's still my favorite of my Pauper EDH decks. Well, despite some strong early plays, such as a first turn Unearth for Street Wraith and an early Mortician Beetle, my opponents kept killing enough of my creatures that my board state stalled. I had Grim Harvest, and used it to recur my commander multiple times. But my topdecks didn't really give me card advantage or anything explosive. I just kept falling behind, and was overwhelmed when facing my final opponent in the end.

The deck still has an excellent overall win percentage. I'm not going to read too much into this one game. I might look into doing less stuff that is focused on minor incremental graveyard recursion and more on developing a strong board presence more reliably. But I think it plays well, so I'm hesitant on that.

 

[Oversoul]

Brought this deck out for my final game of last night. It was the only normal four-player pod. I got hit by disruption from every side: countermagic, removal "in response" when I tried stuff, and eventually my options narrowed. A timely Gray Merchant of Asphodel brought my life total back up, but my opponents wore away at it again. The Jasmine Boreal of the Seven player should have won, but he split his focus between me and his other remaining opponent. With four life left, I was able to make an attack that brought the Zidane, Tantalus Thief player down to three life, then I activated Crypt Rats for 3 damage, closing out a long game.

 

[Oversoul]

For the final game of Wednesday night, I tried this deck. I became a bit of an archenemy at the table and multiple players worked to keep Khabál Ghoul shut down. My friend seated across from me tried to finish me off, but I was just barely able to finish him off first. Weakened from my war against him, the other players took me down. I think there were a couple of points where if just one player hadn't committed resources against me, I'd have come out ahead. But the combined effects of all the kill spells and attacks on me was just too much.

 

[Oversoul]

Some revision, replacing low-synergy cards with ones that I think will make more impact.

-1 Ashes to Ashes
-1 Oubliette
-1 Syphon Mind
+1 Death's-Head Buzzard
+1 Drown in Sorrow
+1 Pestilence

 

[Oversoul]

Khabál Ghoul hits extremly hard and keeps coming back. So far, only one of my wins used an infinite combo. However, I did build the deck so that it had multiple possible infinite combo lines available to it. And I'd better explain those, because most of them are not very compact, and therefore not very obvious.

There are two components that form the basis for most of my infinite combo lines. One of those is a classic spell we probably all remember from Ice Age: Songs of the Damned. The other is a relatively new creature I didn't have on my radar at all until I started searching online to see if there was any way to recur Songs of the Damned at common in a mono-black deck. There is, and the card's name is Biblioplex Assistant.


Combined with some way to draw a card and some way to recur a creature, this little gargoyle lets me recur any instant or sorcery in my deck. And if you couldn't already tell, drawing cards and recurring creatures is very much what this deck is built to do in the first place. So Biblioplex Assistant is useful in normal gameplay. But where it really goes bonkers is with Songs of the Damned.

Infinite combo lines using Biblioplex Assistant and Songs of the Damned (those two cards won't be noted, but the other components will be)...

• Ashnod's Altar + Disturbed Burial OR Grim Harvest + Guildsworn Prowler (requires 11+ other creatures in my graveyard)
• Tortured Existence + Ahriman OR Agency Courier + Sanitarium Skeleton OR Clay Revenant OR Merchant of Many Hats OR Durable Coilbug (requires 10+ other creatures in my graveyard or 12+ for Durable Coilbug)
• Ahriman OR Agency Courier + Disturbed Burial OR Grim Harvest (requires 12+ other creatures in my graveyard)
• Disturbed Burial OR Grim Harvest + Carrion Feeder OR Phyrexian Ghoul + Guildsworn Prowler (requires 15+ other creatures in my graveyard)
• Ashnod's Altar + Tortured Existence + Guildsworn Prowler + Sanitarium Skeleton OR Clay Revenant OR Merchant of Many Hats OR Durable Coilbug (requires 9+ other creatures in my graveyard, runs out of black mana with only 8, needs a single B added into the loop to stabilize with 9, but goes mana-positive once that happens)
• Tortured Existence + Ashnod's Altar + Horror of the Broken Lands OR Lurching Rotbeast + Sanitarium Skeleton OR Clay Revenant OR Merchant of Many Hats OR Durable Coilbug (requires 9+ other creatures in my graveyard or 13+ for Durable Coilbug)
• Tortured Existence + Carrion Feeder OR Phyrexian Ghoul + Horror of the Broken Lands OR Lurching Rotbeast + Sanitarium Skeleton OR Clay Revenant OR Merchant of Many Hats OR Durable Coilbug (requires 11+ other creatures in my graveyard or 15+ for Durable Coilbug)

If Perigee Beckoner is also available, most of these loops (all but the ones that use Myr Retriever or Workshop Assistant) can incorporate it by warping it in targeting Biblioplex Assistant, sacrificing the Assistant to put Songs of the Damned back on top of the library, and then sacrificing the Beckoner instead of the Assistant. Intead of having to recast the 4-drop Biblioplex Assistant as part of the loop, Perigee Beckoner can take its place and warp in for a mere 1B. This can cut down the required number of creature cards in the graveyard in order for Songs to loop infinitely.

Also, without using Songs of the Damned, there are these infinite combo lines...

• Ashnod's Altar + Foundry Inspector + Myr Retriever + Workshop Assistant + Bog Initiate (infinite black mana, or infinite colorless mana without Bog Initiate in the mix)
• Ashnod's Altar + Tortured Existence + Foundry Inspector + Myr Retriever + Cathodion + Sanitarium Skeleton OR Clay Revenant OR Merchant of Many Hats + Bog Initiate (nets no mana, but loops creatures infinitely for Deathgreeter, Mortician Beetle, and/or Khabál Ghoul)
• Ashnod's Altar + Bog Initiate + Cathodion + Perigee Beckoner (nets no mana, but loops creatures infinitely for Deathgreeter, Mortician Beetle, and/or Khabál Ghoul)

I have not yet attempted to calculate the requirements, but it is also possible to go infinite with Biblioplex Assistant and Reaping the Graves, using various configurations of the aforementioned cards to generate mana and to draw a card (which Biblioplex Assistant will guarantee is Reaping the Graves). This does not require a high storm count to get started, but is highly dependent on some source of mana production, with Ashnod's Altar + Bog Initiate being probably the easiest method to get this working.