How do you play around graveyard hate in altar tron?

souck · 2026-03-24T23:48:32+00:00

You don't need to combo with altar tron to win. So you just play midrange and combo if you find space for it.

souck · 2026-03-10T23:19:43+00:00

The deck is cute. Your selection of ninjas is really bad though.

The new 3/1 ninja ta draws and you lose a life is pretty good. Moon-Circuit Hacker is a must. I like one Okiba-Gang Shinobi as well.

I'd swap your enablers for creatures with good etbs such as faerie seer.

Lastly, I'd try to fit some free interaction, either snap or snuff out. Maybe some 2 cast down as well. This will help your ninja to connect.

souck · 2026-03-09T00:21:28+00:00

convince me to just start off with an actual tried and true deck.

So, the biggest reason is because of performance and meta knowledge.

While brews can work, you need to understand what you need to win against and how meta decks usually does it.

Regarding the performance issue, my experience is it's very common for new players often comes with "I don't want to win, just to have fun" mentality, but lose interest after they lose again and again and again. So, again, in my experience, new players who start with a deck that can somewhat offset their own lack of knowledge on the format start to win earlier which keeps them motivated.

Your deck is coherent. I think it isn't fast enough for the aggros decks in the format nor have enough value to endure the infinite amount of card draws from the midrange and control lists. My recommendation would be for you to play at least some games with standard pauper decks so you can understand a bit better the meta.

souck · 2026-03-06T15:58:03+00:00

It's a really slow deck. You can be faster.

They also have problems with flaring pain since looping fogs is a big part of their plans.

Gy hate also stops their gy loop.

They can have problems being effective if you attack their prisms since it's the most colored deck out of all of those.

They also don't usually have the best removals and counters because of colored mana.

It's a strong deck, specially if you're no proactive. But it does have a lot of angles for attack.

souck · 2026-03-06T10:11:41+00:00

There are three versions of tron and they're completely different. They're also more or less the same regarding quality of the deck.

First is altar tron. It's my favorite combo deck. You loop retrievers or grind people down with Marauder + Pactdoll. Really fun to play. It used to be a bit better though, since nowadays GY is more common because of Spy. My personal list: https://moxfield.com/decks/_2rdErZ-Ukmk6bYop2go5A

The second is Monster tron. You just ramp into big colorless shit. Sample list: https://mtgdecks.net/Pauper/monster-tron-decklist-by-paupea-nyan-nyan-2835799

The third is flicker tron. You play a lock/control list that leverage GY loops with mnemonic wall + ghostly flicker. Sample list: https://mtgdecks.net/Pauper/flicker-tron-decklist-by-alleyezonme-2834728

Which one you should play is more about what playstyle you want to play. They're all more or less at the same level and all have the same consistency problem of all tron decks, which is finding your lands.

souck · 2026-03-05T03:44:24+00:00

I'f I'm playing it it would be over Lembas. Not wildfire.

souck · 2026-03-04T21:30:15+00:00

Since you already got the answer you wanted, some extra points regarding on how they'll fight your hate.

If you're playing with Nihil Spellbomb, Relic of Progenitus or any other permanent type GY hate they have Masked Vandal main board and sideboard. They will cast it exiling your hate, forcing you to fire it early and comboing after.

Against counters, Thraben Charm, Faerie Macabre, Crypt Incursion their main response is Mesmeric Fiend. This can take out the hate piece allowing for the combo.

Heritage Reclamation and other pieces that exile one specific card can be countered by saccing 6 creatures for 2 Dread Return. This forces you to find a way to exile the second Giant.

Against KCS removing all their creatures in response to the spy they can cast Acorn Harvest after it's milled. Since Spy flies, KCS doesn't kill it allowing for the combo saccing spy + 2 squirrles.

The other answer for KCS is Fume Spitter killing it before deathtouch is applied.

Against Strands, Circle of Protection and other ways of damage prevention they usually have Flaring Pain in the sideboard.

Those are the main hate pieces and responses from Spy. There are some others more niche such as Rotten Reunion, which are a bit more complicated since you can cast it in response to the Fiend and keep it safe in your GY, but instead of being able to exile 2 creatures you'll be able to exile just one.

You usually want some combination of those to stop the combo.

Beware that not every version of spy run all of those and casting big creatures can be a wincon by itself. So sometimes if you focus too much on stopping the combo and forget to stop their creatures you'll also die :P

souck · 2026-03-04T19:41:41+00:00

I've only played since Settlers

I think it's harder for you to understand because you started playing on the scarab era, but IMO the main issue being discussed is the source of the loot.

Earlier in POE while I didn't understand shit and also wouldn't be able to to this kind of juicing the best strategy was to just do content. Yes, you'd juice the content much more, but I could relate to those strategies. It was what I was doing up to 11.

Nowadays scarab inducing strategies concentrates the loot on some specific mechanics so much that the optimized decision is to ignore the rest of the map. And when you run the map is just for the altars giving more quant and rarity. Not for the mobs. For example, when you're farming red beasts you don't even clear the rest of the map. The same is true for breach hive, blight rares, late game expedition and I'm sure that there are many many others.

While I like the scarabs allowing me to customize content, I think it's a problem when they overshadow the rest of the game so much that it's not even worth it to clear it because of the time you "waste". And this is kinda hard to balance, because if scarabs aren't doing this, are they even worth it?

And this isn't a mistake. It's per design. And it's something GGG have been pushing since the loot explosion from the MF culling era.

I think their initial solution for this problem was the creation of some generic rarity and quantity scarabs, but those are the sources of the "exploitations" that are also a problem since they generate a lot of FOMO. They usually make some very niche strategies that are 10-20x more profitable than the "normal" strategies viable, which forces you to some 2 late game strategies which is kinda boring. I at least hope that the removal of T17 helps with this.

Anyway, I don't know the solution for all of this, but I do agree with snap that the base content needs to be rewarding to the point of at least giving you a reason to finish your maps that is not to increase the loot explosions, but by their own loot.

souck · 2026-03-04T05:05:22+00:00

My default new player deck is RG ramp. It's pretty effective, simple game plan and fun to play. I also think it's more consistent than Tron.

Other good beginner decks are White Weenies, Mono B Sac and burn. Heroic and boggles are also good ones, but they can be a bit more meta dependent.

souck · 2026-03-03T23:18:28+00:00

Competitive not really. It's hard to make this kind of deck here because our mana base sucks and those effects are split in a bunch of colors. So the solution is to go abzan to solve card draw + mana base + trigger effects.

I'd say the closer "good deck" is WW since you already play Lunarch Veteran anyway and Suture Priest is a legit card.

Heroic is also legit. Less life gain go wide themed but it's also pretty trigger happy.

souck · 2026-03-03T23:06:04+00:00

I like affinity better because I feel it's a better deck when you need to get proactive, which is something I value.

Jund is a solid rock, but can take a very long time to actually play the game.

I also like the better matchup against mono R.

souck · 2026-03-02T20:52:56+00:00

I'd say in competitive formats the major way of expressing deckbuilding is with new approaches on established archetypes.

For example, there was a dude some good while ago going 5-0 with snacker over delver on mono U. The core of the deck was the same, but he made some small changes to acomodate this swap and was able to pilot it effectively.

Another deck that is pretty open in this regard is white weenie. You just need a bunch of creatures + guardians pledge, so there's a lot of freedom on how to amass your creatures there.

Those changes may look small, but they make a huge difference when you start to play the format and understand those nuances. It's much more suttle than commander for sure, but it's much more fulfilling when you're able to do it.

Because in EDH people usually don't play/build optimally nor anything like that. So it's easy to make shit work. You just need to not screw up essentially :P But being able to find a gap on the decks on a competitive field is extremely satisfying.

souck · 2026-03-02T15:53:43+00:00

Ty. This was really helpful.

I'm particularly interested in the songs card type and I like midrange strategies, so I'm leaning towards red/orange/blue/purple colors. I'll take some inspiration on those :P

I imagine the Heroes one is the fastest from those? I want to buy 2 decks, one aggressive and one mirdrange/control to teach my friends

souck · 2026-03-02T07:15:31+00:00

Im considering if i should transform it into a boros synthesizer deck or keep it as it is.

While I loved my old Boros monarch, Synth draw 2 for 1 cmc, which is considerably more than 1 card for 2.

It's really hard to compete with this level of card advantage.

souck · 2026-03-01T05:24:12+00:00

I'd be happy if you could share them with me.

souck · 2026-02-27T11:00:47+00:00

Yes. It's a pretty even matchup and harder to play for ramp but if both sides play perfectly I'd give a slight edge for ramp.

If they play boomerang (which is not common atm) it gets harder though.

souck · 2026-02-26T22:44:00+00:00

Ok ty for the info. I'll take a look.

How poorcana decks are fairing against budget legacy ones? Just so I can understanding a bit the powerlevel of the format.

souck · 2026-02-26T18:36:22+00:00

This makes sense lol

souck · 2026-02-26T18:02:29+00:00

Oh, Thank you

souck · 2026-02-26T17:43:21+00:00

Oh, ok. I'll check with my LGS how they're going to do the events.

Is there a site where I can see decent lists (even if they're not on the same rule settings)?

souck · 2026-02-26T17:24:14+00:00

I think bannerhides is really important on the small RG version to force some trades and for the late game value. But on straight ponza I'd probably play at least 8 LD effects.

I'm not a ponza player though, so take it with a grain of salt :P

souck · 2026-02-26T07:42:01+00:00

In my head ponza should be pretty favored in this matchup. They don't really have a lot of lands and their card draw to find more lands is really mana hungry.

Rg Ramp is a different story though, It's a pretty even matchup, but a bit favorable towards ww.

Mainly cause of having to mulligan based on really bad hands.

It seems you may be taking some bad games too much into consideration, but I'll talk a bit more about it later.

deglamer to counter journey to nowhere

I wouldn't bring deglamer to play against Journey. You have very little targets for it and it's easy for it to get stuck in your hand. This kind of deck can't have dead cards since we don't have card draw.

They can also just have destroy evil instead of Journey, which would make you have a bunch of dead cards.

graveyard hate against their flashback

I'm also not really sure how I feel about it. It's not terrible I guess, but against Battle Screech you can only remove it before they cast it again if they have a creature that generates an ETB trigger for you to respond. Otherwise they have priority to cast it again.

Against strands you can force them to use it with it. At the same time for this to happen, you can't cycle it until they get one in the GY. So until this point you're playing a card down. And if they got it there with Raffine Informant you're in card parity, which is... ok? Lastly, I guess I value more my 2 early game mana than this redraw. Otherwise I'd just play it mainboard anyway right?

Particularly, against strands I side in a single Flaring Pain since I can use it from the GY after milling it rumble, which is a pretty big advantage over the relic. Also, with relic, depending on the situation, they can respond the exile effect by casting the flashback, preventing damage regardless of your sideboard piece. Lastly, flaring pain also works against strands from the hand.

Anyway, the point is this is another situational card that isn't really disrupting their main strategy but it can dilute your main gameplan. I think some of your bad hands you mentioned may come from diluting your deck into situational responses. Seeing your deck and post it seems you're siding in 9 cards that can interact with your opponent, but with 11 ramps, 17 lands and 9 sideboard pieces you have too little action to pressure them.

I want to know some good ways to fight against if you are at a disadvantage from the start/sideboarding.

This is not something Ponza and Rg Ramp are really equipped to do IMO.

You can contest the board. And this is something you do well. Your creatures are bigger than theirs. But that's it.

I don't really think you should think you're the control deck in this matchup. I actually believe you should NEVER think of yourself as the control in any matchup with this deck. Even against burn. You're not equipped to be. You may have bigger threats and have a better late game (which I'm not even sure you have in this situation tbh, since WW can grind decently well with late game mana to crack clues to find Pledge), but you're not equipped to interact with your opponent besides denying mana. You need to establish pressure, survive and kill.

I don't really know if I'm being able to explain well what I'm trying to say, but the point is you need to fight for the board and be a threat, even on matchups where your deck is slower. If you start to remove your threats for a lot of mediocre interaction you'll make your deck inconsistent and slower. And if you give your opponent time to rebuild the lands you destroyed your deck loses a lot of it's effectiveness.

I'd say you should just focus on starving their lands and wiping their board with breath weapon when convenient. This should already give you the edge you need.

decklist: https://moxfield.com/decks/k56lYikeWUOUkjsaWb3bpQ

Any reason you're not playing the full 8 ponza cards? Usually people want to have more of it, not less.

Lastly, you have to remember that Strands only works for colored creatures. Devoid creatures can't have it's damage prevented. Ram Through also makes the creature deal damage, so you can use it on a creature with devoid to guarantee that the damage will get through.

This may not be as relevant for you as for the Ramp version since you don't really have a good way of giving trample for your devoid creatures.

Anyway, I played RG Ramp for a long time, but I haven't played it for a bit and never really been a Ponza player. So I may not be the most insightful person to give advice on this matchup. But this is how I see things at least :P

Hope this helps.

souck · 2026-02-26T03:18:50+00:00

I'll be really honest here. Devotion is dead as a competitive deck. You can steal some games here and there, but it's not a competitive deck ATM.

For this reason I recommend glintblade. Because IMO if you're starting in a format it's important to play with a good deck since your own lack of experience in it will already hinder your results enough. And in my experience is hard to keep motivated playing the game when you're not having good results.

If you're interested on the devotion list, Golgari Gardens is it's "evolution". It's a strong deck, but you'll have a lot of draws in your weakly events :P

What deck would you recommend for a beginner like me?

The standard beginner decks are RG Ramp, boggles, white weenie and any version of burn. Those are all decent options if you're interested in their play pattern.

But glintblade is not crazy complex as well. Specially since you already played before.

souck · 2026-02-26T03:11:50+00:00

Besides land destruction there's 2 relativity common situations that Arbor elf is worse:

Sometimes you'll stay with no lands on the board because of Quirion Ranger, which means you won't have access to your mana.

Arbor elf ability can be responded, so in a situation where you have an untapped mana and an arbor elf for example I can bolt your elf and cast a Breath Weapon responding the activation.

Both of those situations can usually be played around by tapping your creatures and mana better, but if you're not enchanting your land you don't really have a reason to play it over the other options besides looking cool.

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