Finishing Second at Paupergeddon with Flicker Tron

On March 26 I went to Lecco, a city near Milan in northern Italy, and got second place out of 614 players. My deck of choice was Flicker Tron, one of the few control decks available in the meta. Deciding the deck was hard; my other three options were:

• Grixis Affinity
  The theoretically best deck in the format struggles a lot with mulligans and hate like if you don't draw enough counterspells. The mirror match is awful, it requires and still is mostly random.

• Altar Tron
  I expected tons of white midrange piles. Both Affinity and this combo deck are great against those. Sadly I hadn't tested it, mostly because on Magic Online the combo/loop is impraticable. The deck is clearly tier one in paper and always well represented at big tabletop events.

• Walls Combo
  Even though I love combo strategies, this deck struggles too much versus Affinity and Monored Synthesizer. It's good in specific metagames and bad against and .

In the end, I expected Affinity, Monored, and white midrange piles to make up the largest part of the field. So I chose the deck I have played the most as a meta pick.

The Tournament

Trying to remember every small game detail is too hard and hardly worthwhile. Instead I want to focus more on the game plans.

Round 1: Tribe Combo

Funnily enough, out of all the hundreds and hundreds of players, I'm paired against a friend from the same team who came here from the same city. He's playing Azorius Tribe, a blue-based combo deck that tries to set up a one-turn combo with and . Each card you discard is worth only 4 damage, but it can easily overcome life gain effects thanks to . You discard it, then you sacrifice a land to have an extra card in hand. The matchup is fearsome: While I can try to stop him from killing me via combat with cards like , he has better counterspells, for example .

In the first game he has a slow start and I establish an early lock with and some counterspells. Postboard I want to have more counterspells, adding and cutting the clunky stuff like . Unfortunately double Pyroblast isn't enough against turn four Inside Out plus plus Circular Logic. The third game goes longer, but I don't find the last Urzatron land. I have and the Wall in hand, but it's too risky to tap down for the creature. We fight over an Inside Out, stacking three or four counterspells each, and I easily lose.

Round 2: Monored Synthesizer

All right, we were expecting this one. The matchup isn't a walk in the park but certainly winnable with a little bit of luck. The game plan is all about landing the Urzatron early, then finding and .

Game one is an easy win for my opponent, as I mulligan to five and don't have blue mana. I win games two and three thanks to , mana ramp, life gain, and the opponent's bad start.

Round 3: Monoblue Faeries

The current blue Fae deck is still annoying for Control Tron, but whitout and they lack consistency. For that reason, they tap out more often and you have higher chances to resolve valuable spells.

I slow down my opponent in the first game with on and on to "counter" another Ninja. Their flood, along with my , settle the game. My sideboard plan is straight and simple: and . Thanks to blasts and counters I keep everything under control long enough to land a couple of s and s, ending the match.

Round 4: Monored Synthesizer

All right, here we go again. s (but no s) aren't enough to stop looping . In the second game, Breath Weapon, , and Weather the Storm annihilate the battlefield and render the burn spells immaterial. Their turn one did nothing. loops are the endgame, and if we reach that stage, I'm already winning.

Round 5: Monored Blitz

In my opinion the matchup is fine. Compared to Synthesizer, Blitz doesn't have enough card advantage to keep going later in the game, and it is weak to both Blue Elemental Blast and .

However, I don't know yet what I'm up against. After one mulligan, I decide to keep a natural Tron hand, with some s but no colored mana. At this point of the tournament I see high chances to face some clunky anti-burn deck, and I am on the draw. So, believing to have enough time to draw one tapped land at least, I lose game one by turn four thanks to a , four s, and some other spells.

For the second game I mull down to four. My starting hand is , two , and . I kill the first creature, and then I hit a land pocket. I also draw another BEB and Mnemonic Wall, to return the blast from my graveyard. My opponent is not as lucky. After hitting the fourth land only on his sixth turn, he cannot find enough creatures. The game is over when in I topdeck the last Urza land and . In the final game I finally keep a good hand, rich in mana and answers. Vice-versa, my opponent doesn't have enough of these resources, and I win.

Round 6: Grixis Affinity

I'm never in control of the first game but attack with Mulldrifter while managing the counterattacks with Moment's Peace and Weather the Storm. I eventually end the game with an 8-damage , backed by and for the eventuality of a .

Postboard games are tricky and it's difficult to play around everything Affinity may have. In my opinion the most valuable cards to bring in are and . and Ancient Grudge kill three . My opponent can't find other creatures or . A couple , plus on a last-minute –animated land, end the match.

Round 7: Jeskai Ephemerate

Whoever locks the opponent with first wins. Both my opponent and I aren't able to find enough counterspells to provide sufficient cover for the Wall/ loop, and we mostly trade one-for-one via removal. He exiles some nonrelevant stuff with , and in return I exile his graveyard with , preventing . After an endless struggle I am finally able to play Mnemonic Wall, do stuff with , and get the win.

Postboard I want , , and . I also want two to three copies of Blue Elemental Blast as counter to and . Fortunately, at least for me, I draw very well while my opponent finds neither enough counters nor card advantage.

Round 8: Dimir Terror

Unexpectedly, they play a turn one . Regardless, the first game proceeds, more or less, quite smoothly. They miss some land drops and I them in time to prevent . I resolve some Mulldrifters and they scoop. In the second game Pyroblast and Dinrova Horror are enough to give me an even easier win.

Round 9: Monored Synthesizer

I have a stable but slow hand, which isn't able to find me any life gain in time. I lose by turn six, without putting up much of a fight.

My starting hand in the second game has , , , , , and lands. My opponent doesn't have enough pressure in the early game to beat this. The decider turns into a weird game where I'm able to fight over every piece of card advantage they have, forcing them into topdeck mode. In the late game, with their burn long depleted, plus seal the deal.

Round 10:

Intentional draw. After losing the first round (and the first game in the second) I have somehow secured a spot in the Top 8.

Quartefinals: White Weenie

White Weenie is a strong anti-meta deck. Alongside the swarm game plan, the life gain and artifact hate can decently disrupt both Affinity and Monored. Of course it isn't fast enough to interact well with Fog Tron.

The first game is easy, and there's nothing to worry about. plus plus quickly locks everything up. After handles all critters in the second, we end up flooding for some time. To cut a long story short, he draws creatures, I them, I play , I Thunder the player.

Semifinals: Grixis Affinity

After the quarters we decide to split the Top 4 prize pool, but I still want to play because I'd love to place first. It is the biggest Pauper tournament ever, after all. My opponent is concerned due to the late hour—already midnight—concedes and goes home.

Finals: Altar Tron

An infinite amount of ? No worries. Without he can't pass through the lock. In the second game my starting hand with Moment's Peace and isn't enough against my opponent's and . My mana flood doesn't help.

I mull down to five, and the third game is tense. For a while things look like I have a high chance to win, but then my opponent topdecks , leading to Duress into Nihil Spellbomb, exiling all my life gain and fogs. Good game.

Anyway, I'm really satisfied with the result. I had a great run and a great time meeting so many friends from Italy and other parts of Europe again. Sorry for bringing you the report so late, but I didn't plan to write it at first.

Final score: 10-2-1

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