PDA

View Full Version : [Pauper] Naya Zoo



(nameless one)
08-19-2009, 08:32 AM
has anyone tried running naya zoo in pauper?

if you want to share a decklist or ideas, please feel free

and yes, pauper is my new addiction!

Capitalization is required on these boards. Please use it in the future. Thanks. - Zilla

Koby
08-19-2009, 02:12 PM
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Kird Ape (common in one of the older sets)
4 Basking Rootwalla
4 Wild Mongrel
4 Silhana Ledgewalker
4 Qasali Pridemage

4 Armadillo Cloak
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Firebolt
2 Incinerate // mix of two depending on what you face

4 terramorphic expanse
18 basics

I also like to run Gaurdian of the Guildpact as he is the dog's bollocks against mono-decks (not so much vs. Mimic decks).

Cloak is literally MVP and beats a lot of decks, especially on either of your "shroud' guys.

Roman Candle
08-19-2009, 02:17 PM
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Kird Ape (common in one of the older sets)
4 Basking Rootwalla
4 Wild Mongrel
4 Silhana Ledgewalker
4 Qasali Pridemage

4 Armadillo Cloak
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Firebolt
2 Incinerate // mix of two depending on what you face

4 terramorphic expanse
18 basics

I also like to run Gaurdian of the Guildpact as he is the dog's bollocks against mono-decks (not so much vs. Mimic decks).

Cloak is literally MVP and beats a lot of decks, especially on either of your "shroud' guys.

Isn't Fireblast legal in Pauper? I would assume so, since its a common in the Chandra duel deck... I remember checking on MTGO to see if it was legal, and seeing that it was, but maybe I'm wrong.

(nameless one)
08-19-2009, 02:30 PM
this is sweet!

although i was thinking of werebear, i guess hes not good enough?

and on silhanna ledgewalker: i dont think shes good enough on zoo. if i were running X-land stompy with lots of pump spells.

but for the most part, thanks for the help. i will try to develop my own version and see how far it goes

Waikiki
08-19-2009, 02:34 PM
id suggest running the naya panorama.

Capitalization and punctuation are required on these boards. Please use them in the future. Thanks. - Zilla

(nameless one)
08-19-2009, 02:44 PM
id suggest running the naya panorama.

although terramorphic expanse doesnt tap for mana, i still think its superior to naya panorama

Capitalization and punctuation are required on these boards. Please use them in the future. Thanks. - Zilla

troopatroop
08-19-2009, 02:58 PM
although terramorphic expanse doesnt tap for mana, i still think its superior to naya panorama

He didn't say he wanted to cut the expanses. Panorama can be run alongside it, and it's a really good idea. Losing to your 3 color manabase is going to be all too common without them.

(nameless one)
08-19-2009, 03:03 PM
oh i see, so i should run upto 25 lands or get rid some of the basic lands?

Capitalization is required on these boards. Please use it in the future. Thanks. - Zilla

yugular
09-27-2009, 01:47 AM
@ (nameless one)

Did you put it together? Decklist? I was also thinking about Naya pauper and maybe I will put it together some day..

Have you considered these guys:
Naya Hushblade / Jund Hackblade / Bant Sureblade ?

All three seem like decent two drops. Especially Jund Hackblade since he can get Haste.

If I run creature-heavy decklist would Sigil Blessing fit into the deck? Or are there some better options to give +/+ to your guys?

How is the manabase? Do we need manafixers like Druid of the Anima?

thanks
-yugular

grahf
09-27-2009, 05:16 AM
Rancor is common, you know. But maybe armadillo cloak is enough creature pump... 3/3 split perhaps? Dunno what to take out, though.

Koby
09-27-2009, 03:06 PM
I would cut Incinerate and a few Firebolts for Rancor.

Man I wish that was available on MTGO - it would rock in this deck!

(nameless one)
09-27-2009, 11:59 PM
I haven't really playtested this deck due to time restrictions. It's mostly based on zoo decks.

Lands:

6 Forest
5 Plains
4 Mountain
4 Terramorphic Expanse
1 Naya Panorama

Creatures:

4 Kird Ape - Zoo staple
4 Wild Nacatl - Zoo staple
4 Werebear - pauper's version of Tarmogoyf
3 Steppe Lynx - if you play your lands, it's usually a 2/3 for W
3 Qasali Pridemage - boost + utility doesn't hurt at all
2 Goblin Legionnaire - Zoo's back up utility

Spells:

4 Lightning Bolt - one of Zoo's choice creature removal
4 Rancor - because recursive fat jacket for your creatures doesn't hurt
3 Journey to Nowhere - pauper's version of PtE
3 Oblivion Ring - same reason as JtN and it adds more utility
3 Harrow - you need plains + mountains + forest online right away. This helps
3 Armadillo Cloak - pauper's answer to Umezawa's Jitte

I might switch Werebear with Plated Geopede and switch it as a 3-off and add an additional Goblin Legionnaire. If you guys see any flaws, let me know. Thank you all.

kicks_422
09-28-2009, 07:53 AM
One of the things which holds this deck back (or any budget/pauper 3-color deck in general) is the manabase. What do you guys think would be the most optimal configuration for that? 4 Terramorphic Expanse, 4 XYZ Panorama, and 12-14 basics?

(nameless one)
09-28-2009, 10:44 AM
Maybe I should run the following instead for my manabase:

5 Forest
4 Plains
3 Mountains
4 Naya Panorama
4 Terramorphic Expanse

Both TE and NP are both Landfall enablers. I will try to encorporate landfall with this zoo built.

With TE and NP, is it still worth running Harrow or should I replace it with Burn instead?

Willoe
09-28-2009, 11:59 AM
That looks interesting, but I have a couple of comments/questions:

-Doesn't the manabase suck? I mean, 5 craptastic (but necessary) fetches and 19 1cc cards aren't going to work. Of course, you don't want to lan a Rancor at turn 1, so let's make that 15 1cc cards. That's still a lot considering they are color-distributed like this:

3 white
8 red
4 green

That isn't going to work methinks. If you want to zap a dude at turn 1 with your bolt or land your Ape at turn to strike for 4 (rancored) turn 2, you have to play more mountains.

And it is rather pointless to play a deck with such a low curve if you can't exploit the speed of the it. I'd rather go two color then splash the white solely for the Wild Nacatl pump (and possibly Armadillo Cloak) and Oblivion Ring/artifact-enchantment removal in the sideboard. That way you'll have a much better manabase, I think.

-Regarding Kird Ape and

The two formats function in complete different ways. Pauper is dominated by card advantage generating creatures, where legacy is stuffed up by undercosted threats. Because the threats available in Pauper aren't fast enough to kill an opponent before he gets a Mulldrifter or two online, the strategy with undercosted dudes does not work.

Building a deck with Kird Ape and Wild Nacatl is fine, but expect them to be slaughtered later on. While it's sad to get beat down by Steamcore Wierds and Mulldrifters, decks containing those cards tend to win most games. Because Pauper is a format defined even more by creatures than legacy is (Aside from High Tide, which is broken, no competitive combo deck exists), stuffing your deck with creature removal is essential. The way to answer this is simply by drawing a lot of cards, play Burn, or play recursion. Zoo doesn't do any of those things, sadly. And the creatures are too small to survive a Bolt.

To sum up, I think it's worth trying, but if your creatures are -rather- small and you don't play efficent removal like Skred or Terminate, and your creatures do not have evasion like flying or shadow, I don't think it will beat most decks.

-Regarding the Werebear/Tarmogoyf clause. I think it's important to understand that one has to build a deck around Werebear to make it work. While it's an extremely efficent creature, it can't be stuffed into any pauper deck playing green like Tarmogoyf (almost) can in Legacy decks. Werebear needs seven cards in your graveyard to work, Tarmogoyf needs three/four different in different graveyards, a goal which is a lot easier to accomplish. Threshold is, unless you play UG madness or Tortured Existence decks, really hard to accomplish and hardly worth the effort. Hell, I even think a Grizzly Bear would get to deal more damage than Werebear would deal in your deck. Let's see how many cards that reaches the graveyards by themselves:

1 Panorama
4 Expanse
2 Legionnaire
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Harrow

A total of 14 cards. Of course, more cards like creatures will hit the yard in the game. For you to get those seven cards of yours to the graveyard, you will need to draw half of your deck, something that requires 23 turns. The game should have been finished at that point. When a deck like Threshold can get Threshold pretty often is it because of the 10-12 cantrips, the 6-8 fetches, the 8-12 counterspells and the 4-8 removal spells. The only cards that don't hit the yard by themselves in those decks are the dudes.

If you want to give Werebear a chance, I'd suggest removing O-Ring and JtN from the deck and add a mix of either 4/2, 3/3 or 2/4 of Chain Lightning and Incinerate/Rift Bolt. That gives you twenty yard-hitters as well as some sweet burn.

-Harrow and Landfall:
How often do you need manabase fixing beyond turn 2? Not very often, I think. That's most important at turn 1 perhaps 2, and Harrow can't do that. So basically, it's just a card which fills 2 cards in the yard as well as giving +4/+4 to your Landfallers. Currently, you play 3. That's not very good, is it? I'd rather play Vigorous Charge if I was to play any sort of pump spell (Charge is, in fact, pretty awesome) rather than some burn, which I wouldn't anyway if I had access to red. You have acces to red and thereby some of the most efficent burn spells out there. Use them!

The Landfall dudes... Well, they're pretty cool, but then again, no evasion almost equals sucking greatly, sadly. I can the blue Landfaller becoming good because of all the Panoramas you can crack in the late game to fly in for a lot of damage and perhaps win the game. I can see the Geopede being a nice creature, but then again, he can be chumped which sucks if you've built your hand for a couple of turns to blast the opponent with a couple of land-dropping cards. And Steppe Lynx is simply too risky. If it can't even deal damage in some turns, it's worthless. A 2/2 that can only attack every second turn is like a 1/1. Also, the Lynx can be pinged by i.e. Fireslinger in response to the growth effect, so that sucks.

I wouldn't play Landfall effects unless my deck was built around it siply because the effects aren't too gamebreaking. On the other hand, it's worth a try, and that Zektar Shrine Expedition simply looks so cool that it has to be tested.

-The deck in general:
It can certainly be improved, but even though it may sound like I found nothing good, I see some potential. I have recently fell in love with Wild Nacatl, that's why. Completely theoretical as my criticism was, here is a rough sketch to Zoo the way I'd like to build it:

4 Terramorphic Expanse
8 Forest
8 Mountain
1 Plains

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Kird Ape
4 Skarrgan Pit-Skulk
4 Scab-Clan Mauler
3 Scryb Sprites

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Rift Bolt
4 Rancor
4 Bonesplitter (maybe 3 Rancor, 3 Bonesplitter and 2 Armadillo Cloaks)

You may see that some of my comments are oxymorons in relation to each other. Anyway, this is the summary of the novel:

-Don't play WRG, do an RG decklist with a W splash instead for small purposes
-Good Legacy creatures are not necessarily good in Pauper
-Don't play Werebear unless your deck is built around it
-Play more burn rather than O-Ring and stuff
-Landfall can be bested by burn an pump spells (speculation)

Well, in the meantime while I've been typing this flow of consciousness in Word, other users have made some comments that might look like mine. I'll post this mofo anyway.

(nameless one)
09-29-2009, 02:57 PM
If I play more burn than O-rings, would Werebear be actually worth running?

Also with Scryb Sprites; it is a damn efficient creature. 1/1 flying for G is damn good but would Silhana Ledgewalker be better? I know this sounds repetitive but would Qasali Pridemage or Goblin Legionnaire be good on this spot (reduced to 2).

Since we're playing more burn (more cards in the graveyard), could Werebear actually make the cut?

And since we've already established no O-rings, would Qasali Pridemage be a good alternative to get rid of problematic artifacts/enchantments?

I know you said less white but maybe:

-1 Forest, -1 Mountain, +2 Plains?

On Scab-Clan Mauler: Can I run Ruinous Minotaur (off of Zendikar) on this spot? its a 3 for 5/2

Also, I like the idea of 3 Rancor, 3 Bonesplitter, 2 Armadillo Cloak

Lcpdenijs
09-09-2010, 08:29 AM
Its been a while since someone added to this post, hope to revive it.
Here is my suggestion (decklist)
The snowcovered lands can be exploited to powerful cards like Skred and Boreal Centaur.

Creatures
4 Basking Rootwalla
4 Boreal Centaur
4 Kird Ape
4 Qasali Pridemage
4 Scab-Clan Mauler
4 Wild Nacatl

Spells
4 Chain Lightning
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Skred

Enchantments
4 Rancor Buy

Artifacts
2 Bonesplitter

Lands
2 Evolving Wilds
2 Naya Panorama
6 Snow-Covered Forest
4 Snow-Covered Mountain
2 Snow-Covered Plains
2 Terramorphic Expanse

Mr. Safety
04-25-2011, 10:52 AM
Here is a list I've been thinking about using:

4x Wild Nacatl
4x Nettle Sentinel
4x Kird Ape
4x Skarrgan Pit-Skulk
4x Qasali Pridemage
4x Keldon Marauders
4x Giantbaiting
4x Lightning Bolt
3x Oblivion RIng
4x Rancor
4x Terramorphic Expanse
2x Evolving Wilds
6x Forest
6x Mountain
3x Plains


There are so many solid commons available...these are other common cards I'm considering using:

Flame Slash
Incinerate
Burst Lightning
Rip-Clan Crasher
Colossal Might
Giant Growth
Brute Force
Inner-Flame Acolyte
Onslaught
Werebear
Goblin Bushwhacker
Reckless Charge
Reckless Abandon

daugarten
04-25-2011, 05:56 PM
Just wanted to put my two cents in about Armadillo Cloak. My first deck ever (only been playing for a year) was a budget tribal cat deck that uses the cloak as a 3-of. Works wonders against other budget decks (read: "probably works wonders against pauper decks as well").