Hey, I’m Sam Rolph, a mid level grinder from Cardiff and one the three team members that live in the same house together. As you can probably tell from the title, I am writing about my recent Magic Online Pro Tro Qualifier Top 8 finish . So let’s get down to it!

The deck is solid, the game plan is to cast aggressively costed creatures and cast combat tricks to kill your opponent within the first few turns of the game. However sometimes you can “combo” your opponent, by casting pump spells on your Electrostatic Pummeler and deal a ton of damage as early as turn 4. After game one, this combo involving Pummeler is usually sideboarded out because most decks have lots of removal and you no longer want the combat tricks in your deck as you just get  attritioned out of the game. It becomes harder to find time to cast your tricks without the risk of getting 2 for 1ed by a timely removal spell.

Here is the list that i played

Creature (20)
4 Bristling Hydra
4 Electrostatic Pummeler
1 Glorybringer
4 Longtusk Cub
3 Servant of the Conduit
4 Voltaic Brawler
Sorcery (6)
4 Attune with Aether
2 Larger Than Life
Instant (12)
4 Blossoming Defense
2 Fling
2 Harnessed Lightning
4 Invigorated Rampage
Land (22)
4 Aether Hub
7 Forest
4 Game Trail
4 Mountain
3 Sheltered Thicket
Sideboard (15)
2 Glorybringer
2 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
3 Prowling Serpopard
2 Harnessed Lighning
3 Manglehorn
3 Tireless Tracker

Why did I play this deck?

After careful consideration I believed that everyone’s decks would be inconsistent and borderline unplayable for the first week of the format and I wanted to punish loose deck building. This was the plan which worked rather well, alongside some tight play and lucky draws I managed to top 8 this event. However, what I didn’t foresee was the mono red deck that did well and that match up is very poor for pummeler. They have more efficient spells and removal early on, if the game somehow manages to last until turn 5-6 you’re generally ahead because your cards have a higher quality, but it rarely does that. More often than not you find yourself dead before we can begin to assemble a strong board presence and our lack of removal means we have a hard time keeping up.

I played against a lot of unplayable decks in the swiss and got a lot of wins as I was punishing people for playing with expensive cards like Nicol Bolas, God Pharaoh which are poor against this style of deck.

Would I play it again right now? I would not play this deck again yet! The most recent Star City Games tournament was won by a control deck match up is poor they kill all your guys. The match up may be winnable, however I think your win rate would be improved by playing the meta game and playing something that beats the best deck. I think the deck is solid however mono red is a deck that is much better at going under the control deck the the pummeler deck is.

A 7 mana sorcery is very powerful, but not when you are dead on turn 4!

Sideboarding:

I wrote this section in because sideboarding with this deck changes a lot and I did mention that I was sideboarding out of the tricks and pummelers. Most of the decisions here are quite straightforward and often you find yourself siding a large amount of cards or none at all. In nearly every grindy match: control decks, midrange decks or just decks that have lots or removal spells, I board out all of the combat tricks and pummelers and board into the grindy cards like tireless tracker Glorybringer and Chandra. This makes your deck more threat dense and lets you fight the more powerful cards from other decks. I also just don’t sideboard any cards against quite a few decks like zombies and Temur. The cards in your sideboard just aren’t better than your plan that you already have.

Anyways to wrap up, I felt the deck was powerful this weekend but next weekend the format is likely going to change. I would test this deck though it is very fun and has a lot of complex lines, let me know in the comments how big you’ve been able to make your pummeler, my record is 40! Tune in next week for a draft video and recap of GP Toronto!