[Variant] Pauper EDH

[TheMightyQuinn]

I've been thinking about Pauper EDH lately and would like to get a group going in my area. Has anyone played this variant before? These are the rules I will be proposing.

Rules:


Any uncommon creature can be used as a commander.


Only common cards can be used as the other 99.


Players start with 30 life.


All other existing Commander rules apply.


Pretty simple. Peasant would follow the same rules except 10 (?) other uncommon cards would be allowed. Personally, I like the idea of straight Pauper better, but I wouldn't mind trying both.

I'm guessing that multiplayer would be pretty slow and boring since there aren't any really swingy cards, so the decks I build are going to be for 1v1. One of the first decks I'm going to build is going to be Joraga Treespeaker stompy. Some other generals that seem like they would be good:


Deepfire Elemental
Dimir Guildmage
Viral Drake
Bloodbraid Elf
Rhox War Monk
Nucklavee
Dragonsoul Knight


Anyone have any gems for this format?

[kombatkiwi]

Maybe you should just be able to use rare commanders but all the cards in the deck have to be commons. that way at least you can still play games against other people with normal decks and you dont have to bother trying to work out if there is some uncommon creature that needs to be banned and so on.

I can understand if you wouldnt want to do that though because it would basically just be underpowered normal commander instead of a completely new Format

[Purgatory]

Yeah, I think I'd stick to the legendary general rule as well. I think part of what makes EDH appealing is the cool legendary creatures you get to play with.

Also, I assume that this pauper idea is for budget reasons, most generals are fairly cheap, bar a few more obscure ones like Xiahou Dun. Aside from him, there are a few Legendary creatures that are tough on the wallet (Vendilion Clique, Thrun, and Geist of Saint Traft come to mind), but I don't think buying one rare/mythic card will be a problem for any players.

There might, however, be some balance issues since many of the spells will be underwhelming, and I guess any decent general could do a number on some players. Vorosh, for example, dodges a lot of the common removal (Terror, Doom Blade etc.) and could potentially win fairly quickly with general damage.

[TheMightyQuinn]

This isn't for budget reasons. I play regular EDH too. Plus, choice of your general is a fraction of the cost of most decks.

I want to do this for variety/something new. Definitely going to keep to uncommon creatures for generals. It will be more balanced and open up new options.

[Aggro_zombies]

My experience with Constructed Pauper makes me think this format will get stale quickly.

Constructed Pauper is far more about tempo than card advantage, and most of the decks are aggro decks or storm combo decks that won't translate to this format because there's not enough stuff to fill out a 99 card list. Control decks (Post and I guess Familiar Storm) would also be dead because they beat aggro decks through having multiples of their important cards.

My suspicion is the lack of sweepers, combined with a lack of ways to generate card advantage, will make for a format that is both very grindy and revolves around successfully navigating cluttered board states. Allowing legendary generals into this mix would probably break the format in half; the best generals would be so far in power level above your average deck that the game would devolve into "who can stick their general the longest" with the rest of the cards not really mattering. This is especially true for something like Vorosh, who is virtually unanswerable in the format, or generals with lots of support at common, like Wort, Boggart Auntie or Nath of the Gilt-Leaf.

If you want a cheap format, allow uncommons but limit how much of your deck can be composed of them - say, no more than 33%. That gives decks access to both sweepers and more powerful build-around-me cards that will diversify the field. Otherwise, you'll probably just end up with a bunch of riffs on "random beaters and a bunch of one-for-ones".