Three colors in Pauper has always been hard to justify to me. Essentially, you're pretty much taking an already mono mana based format and trying to make it bend over backwards to give you a splash of options. I've always thought it made your deck weaker. Until VengefulVeggies showed me some weird Control deck that took him on a 5-3 record on the day he play tested it. He called it "Grixis Delveless" but I'm weird and like ridiculous and catchy names. So...after a very long discussion, we got togethr and built this. A Grixis Control deck with no Delver or Angler, but still some nice value. Enjoy!
This deck was born when my old pal VengefulVeggies was staring at Wormfang Drake and asked herself, "How can I make this work?" After some time, Veggies gathered some Dimir cards in Pauper that just had flat out value and said, "This'll do." After tinkering with numbers and looking for optimized options to control the game, Grixis Delveless was born. Originally, her list also included some red ETB damage cards, like Keldon Marauders, but after some discussion, we decided to toss those cards for more control. That is your plan: Control the board. Sitting back and gaining life off of lands like Dismal Backwater, bouncing them with Dimir Aqueduct, and replaying them for more life is how you'll be thinking. Don't plan for now, plan for 3 turns from now. "Can I keep a light beatdown going with 2 Ravenous Rats, then Wormfang Drake one for more power?" These kinds of questions should be going on in your head as you play. Most decks nowadays in Pauper run control, and quite frankly, your deck has a helluva lot of value. With discard outlets in Ravenous Rats, draw Outlets in Sea Gate Oracle, removal in Faceless Butcher, and control in cards like Terminate and Exclude, you will have a very easy time shutting your opponent out of the game. It's simple: if all you have are cards worth playing any turn of the game, how can you not eventually just win?
SIDEBOARD:
Evincar's Justice and Pristine Talisman come in for creature heavy matchups to offer you some recurring board wipe potential. Combined with Essence Scatter and your already heavy removal based mainboard, punishing your opponent on a constant basis come naturally. Eventually, you can just sustain as your cast Justice, leaving your opponent with hardly any life as your threats clean up.
In a more control based match, Syphon Life, Duress, and Dispel come in. Your goal is to outplay the counter magic long enough to get a clock on your opponent with your threats and Syphon Life, which can be used after gathering a nice few lands to whittle away that life total while not caring about counter magic. Pristine Talisman can also come in, giving you the sustain needed to stall the game until you can get something going.
Lastly, Shattering Pulse can get a nice recurring artifact removal going. Late game, you can demolish all hopes of metalcraft or destroy artifact lands to ruin your opponent's deck.