Midnight Presence: Things That Untap in the Night

the midnight sisters deck is cool. I would revert the manabase back to the same as the souls sisters deck though. And probably only have 2 presence of gond. Seems like a real fun deck,

Hello Michael,

very nice article – looking forward to read more. Curious if this will find a place in the Pauper meta or if other more reliable strategies will keep an edge.

the soulsisters build is cleeearly bettter. the combo fits so nicely into the shell. my favorite thing about the deck though is that there is actually another infinite combo in it lol: 4 midnight guards+ Sprout swarm = infitnite tokens

Hi Micheal,
nice first article, very detaild. However, I have to disagree with you in certain aspects:
1) Flagbearers do not hinder the Grapeshot plan at all. Their ability says “While choosing targets as part of casting a spell or activating an ability, your opponents must choose at least one Flagbearer on the battlefield if able.” which only applies for the actual Grapeshot spell but not for its copies.
2) I don’t think that one copy of Armadillo Cloak is sufficient for match ups where life gain is relevant. In my opinion, you need to have it in your opening hand or draw it within the first three or four turns since the opposing decks are usually that fast (e.g. you normally won’t have sufficient time to tutor Armadillo Cloak with Totem-Guide Hartebeest against burn).
3) Due to the fact that those tokens don’t have hast, as you stated yourself, it’s pretty much just a slower Empty the Warrens combo. The sideboard cards against “infinite” Goblin tokens also wreck Elves, plus their creature removal pre-board is already interfering your game plan (which is usually dead when playing against Empty the Warrens).
Still, I do like the deck idea and I think it’s quite fun to play (well, I guess I’d prefer to play it in real life as the whole clicking thingy which is needed to make sufficient tokens would really piss me off). Anyway, keep writing about Pauper

Cheers,
High_Gene

P.S.: I would have liked a brief introduction of yourself and what your column is gonna be about. Maybe it’s stated somewhere else and I just missed it.

Thanks for all of the comments!

I was not aware that Standard Bearer actually did not stop Grapeshot, so thank you for pointing that out. As someone else had said, replacing them with Apostate’s Blessing or Stave Off seem like pretty good options.

I do like the interaction between Midnight Guard and Convoke. I didn’t include it in the article because I did not know where to put it, but four of either Midnight Guard or Nettle Sentinel also let you go infinite with Sprout Swarm.

I also think that the combo is a slow Empty the Warrens, but it has the advantage of only requiring 8 spaces instead of an entire deck to support it. Plus, Warrens is pretty much blown out by an Echoing Decay/Truth, but this combo is a little more resilient against it. Plus, if you incorporate it into a deck that simultaneously does something else, it makes it hard to sideboard in and use certain cards compare the the Storm matchup.

Once again, thanks for checking out my article and all of the comments on it!

i actually tried incorporating midnight-presence with the GW aura deck but havent really tried it in a tourney. did test it though withsome friends and got some good results in terms of consistency. here’s my deck list

LANDS
18 Forests

Creatures:
4x midnight guard
4x glade cover scout
4x slippery bogle
4x silhana ledgewalker

Enchantments:
4x abundant growth
4x utopia sprawl
4x nylea’s presence
4x ethereal armor
4x presence of gond
4x armadillo cloak

Spells:
2x Commune with the gods

havent thought much of the sideboards yet as im still testing the concept. basically tried it in this deck since presence of gond still is an enchantment and helps feed ethereal armor still. also utopia sprawl gets me midnight guard on turn 2 then probably get me a presence of gond up on turn 3 then go infinite before turn 3 of my enemy ends then attack on turn 4. abundant growth & nyleas presence gives me access to any mana color and card advantage as well and chances to draw midnight guard or presence due to their draw ability. the hexproof creatures are there as an alternate win condition as well. and communewith the gods could help me tutor both midnight guard and presence of gond. hoping to get feedback for this list. what do you guys think?