Written by The Origin of Uberobot’s Pauper Boros Deck.
Prepare to be crushed!
It all started with Magic Online. I had very little money to spend and I wanted a deck that could compete in the current standard. This was around the Zendikar block. I spent 10 dollars on some bot tickets and started looking up card prices and deck options. Boros was a deck that was doing very well and I couldn’t help but notice that a good portion of the deck was just commons. I dropped around 5 tickets and built my first budget boros deck that was something like the list below.
I tested the deck out in both casual and standard single games and…It never lost. Now obviously I had some amazing draws like a topdeck Journey to Nowhere to answer a Sun Titan but the deck still beat every deck I played against. The beasty budget boros deck was arisen!
After most of the deck rotated out of standard I pretty much put the deck on the backburner and stopped playing Magic Online. I let it simmer with the beastly win record that it had. It quit while it was on top.
But something came along that would bring the beast from its slumber. A local gaming shop was having pauper tournaments. Wuh? I can win that! So I took the time and rebuilt the deck irl with cards that I had available. With some slight tweaks from the original list and some solitaire playtesting I came to this list.
That’s what’s up son.
I never played in the tournament…but AdamRA4 did and he stomped it hard! No, he wasn’t playing this deck but I did play against his winning deck with this list. It was yet another glorious day for the Budget Boros Beast! I think the record went 5-1 in the casual games that we were playing. So…If he stomped the tournament with his deck, and I stomped his deck, then I could have had a really good chance at winning that tournament.
The main point here is that the deck is super strong, super cheap and super fun. The landfall and creature interactions are a blast to calculate. Let me go over a few of the awesome interactions this seemingly straightforward deck can have.
One of the all-stars of the deck is Kor Skyfisher. A card that would normally be thought to have been printed with a drawback is actually better since it has the “drawback” ability! It can get back Teetering Peaks to give a Squadron Hawk that extra boost of damage, it pulls Keldon Marauders back to your hand to get the extra damage triggers and keep it from vanishing (especially good after an attack), it can return a Goblin Bushwhacker to your hand after it already did its kickin’ and it can also reset your Journey to Nowheres when a bigger threat hits the table. Talk about some versatility. And all of that is packed in a 2/3 flyer for 1W! Buh BOOM!
The land base allows you to set up for some explosive attacks and also keep the defenses up against damage threats. For instance, by mid to late game you’ll have enough mana to cast any of the spells that you would need to in a turn. This allows you to let fetches sit and remain uncracked until they’re necessary to blow somebody up. An example of this was in a game I played recently where I had a fetch sitting in play and a fetch in hand. The opponent had a lone Fume Spitter and sacrificed it to try to kill my Steppe Lynx that was equipped with Adventuring Gear before combat on my turn…I don’t know why he didn’t kill it last turn or block first then sac but….that’s good for me! I cracked the fetch, played the other fetch and cracked it and swung to the dome for a BILLION! Sure, the Steppe Lynx died at the end of the turn but…My opponent died a couple turns later from a kicked Goblin Bushwhacker and some Squadron Hawks! 😉
Come at me bro!
You can also let a fetch sit early game to keep enemies scared to attack into your landfall creatures. This gives you a good read on any combat tricks the opponent might have. If they attack into your guy there are pretty much three different possibilities of what they’re trying to do. They could have a way to kill your creature next turn when you have no fetches in play, they have the extra damage to kill your creature after blocks this turn or they have a way to straight up kill your creature at instant speed. This lets you play around shenanigans a little bit.
Get journeyed on.
The removal suite in the deck does a lot of work as well. Journey to Nowhere is one of the best cards to deal with threats beyond burn’s reach. This card makes people with expensive decks rage. 😛 The deck also packs the best lightning, Lightning Bolt and Burst Lightning. Shock being reprinted strictly better is insane imo. Burst Lightning is either a Shock or basically an instant speed X spell that says eat a dick.
It all boils down to this deck having some of the best bang for the buck available in Magic. If you like aggro this deck is definitely worth a shot. Now go play some unsleeved Magic against people with expensive cards! Be sure to tell them to eat it when you attack too.
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