And on the subject of netdecking, I have an uncanny ability to turn top 8 decks into bottom 8 decks simply by changing things around and trying out cards I like in that deck. I don’t think anyone minds this keep of netdecking…

Going to a few “100 commons for 1 tix” bots would be a good start for any pauper deck, and I am convinced spending 3 tix there could build you 3-4 decks that are just as ‘competitive’ as this one (by which I mean not very competitive imo ).

First of all, since the deck is all commons, I definitely think you should develop it as a pauper (standard pauper PREs are available) deck. Of course you can add more expensive cards in the deck (the first of which would be bloodbraid elf most likely for these colors), but I think that would change the whole deck entirely. Assuming you play the deck as a normal standard deck, here are some weaknesses: in today’s standard, creatures are everywhere. Control decks run 1/3s or 0/4s in sea gate oracle and wall of omens. your turn 1 scythe tiger (which kills a land of yours and in a relatively land light deck with no 1CC spells other than more scythe tigers and 2 llanowar elves (also 4 bolts, but those require a different color and are not usually played on turn 1), you set yourself quite far behind. because you have no cards that provide card advantage except borderland ranger (in fact many of them are card disadvantage), you will probably run out of gas as soon as your opponent can stabilize. against different decks this happens at different times, but for example against jund a sprouting thrinax as early as turn 3 and its subsequent tokens pretty much stop your deck for a long time + the amount of removal the deck has means that the deck will stabilize fast. mythic can put down baneslayer on turn 3 which stops every creature in your deck or trades with it, aside from that knight of the reliquary often comes out at 4/4 or bigger which quickly becomes unstoppable for the deck. UW control has wall of omens, gideon, day of judgement, path etc. mono red has enough burn to kill all your creatures other than scythe tiger which trades with goblin guide at best or just gets stopped by opposing geopedes + fetchland in play. of course the deck might be fun as just a casual standard deck, but then i think you will still get outclassed by decks with bigger/more of the same sized guys. the highest costing spell in the deck is 3, but you have lots of ramp which serve only the purpose of pumping geopede or activating shrines. it seems only half effective to me.

so if you look at the deck from a pauper point of view, the power level of the cards around it is much lower. however, pauper is much more of a creature based format (especially standard pauper) so your creatures that max out at 2 toughness are easily removed or traded with. i think scythe tiger might be a feasible sideboard option against creature light decks, but is quite poor against sweepers and only really good when it comes down early. since it has shroud but no evasion, you can’t even use pump spells on it to shorten your clock.

i don’t exactly know where the deck should go to be really good, but as long as it’s fun…that’s pretty important too
imo more burn spells and a little less ramp would make it perform better too

Thank you all for the feedback! I’m glad the article got people talking.

@Aznsilly and Shardfenix: Yes, that’s more or less the approach I was trying to encourage; it’s both inevitable and, I think, right, that people use the resources on the web, but that shouldn’t be the end of the story. There is a very big difference between taking inspiration from the decks PTQ winners are using, and just copying them outright.

@Masterofbrine: I couldn’t agree more. Interesting decks make for interesting games!