[Deck] U/R Delver

[JDK]

Were you satisfied with the Probes? It's one of my favorite cards, but I just cannot justfiy cutting other spells to include more than two, as I feel like UR Delver is already an extremely tight deck and I am a proponent of Daze and a well rounded counter-suite in the maindeck in general.

[meffeo]

Went 3-0 at my lgs with a more tempo-oriented shell. Defeated Thopter Combo 2-0, MUD 2-1 and Stoneblade 2-1.

Here's the list:

Creatures:10
4 Delver of Secrets
2 Grim Lavamancer
4 Young Pyromancer

Spells:33
4 Brainstorm
2 Forked Bolt
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Ponder
2 Spell Pierce
2 Spell Snare
3 Stifle
4 Daze
1 Fire // Ice
4 Force of Will

Lands:18
1 Bloodstained Mire
3 Island
3 Misty Rainforest
2 Mountain
2 Scalding Tarn
3 Volcanic Island
4 Wasteland

Sideboard:15
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Electrickery
1 Flusterstorm
1 Pithing Needle
2 Pyroblast
1 Red Elemental Blast
1 Relic of Progenitus
1 Smash to Smithereens
1 Sulfur Elemental
2 Sulfuric Vortex
2 Submerge

Probably going with -1 mountain +1 island.

[Richard Cheese]

Thanks guys, but I'm just a pilot. I didn't really do much tweaking with the deck outside of fitting in Gitaxian Probes.

I'm actually interested in why you went with Probes over Daze or even more burn. Do you still find the information useful in a deck without discard, or is the free cantrip really the more important component?

[Zilla]

The extra info from Probe is nice, but I like it mostly for free Pyromancer tokens + card draw. I've been running 3 of them in my UR Delver list for months and really liking them.

[Koby]

I'm actually interested in why you went with Probes over Daze or even more burn. Do you still find the information useful in a deck without discard, or is the free cantrip really the more important component?

The extra info from Probe is nice, but I like it mostly for free Pyromancer tokens + card draw. I've been running 3 of them in my UR Delver list for months and really liking them.

I found Probe to be a cantrip, and I certainly needed to maintain a large blue count, and large spell count for FoW and Delver, respectively. I had been trying to find a way to fit in Pyromancer, but ultimately felt that at 2 mana, it's too slow when combined with Snapcaster Mage. I really wanted to play a Price of Progress deck, and Burn is basically unplayable if you want to win regularly. I found Andrew Schneider's list very agreeable, but never really felt that Daze was worthwhile when the goal is to hit 3 mana to turn on Snapcaster Mage.

Probe basically just cycling while providing context for sequencing was good enough. I never wanted to flash it back with SCM because of how much mana and life that commits to the main phase. The information is very worthwhile against combo, and very lacking in other matches. I boarded them out along with FoWs against discard for more burn. B/x decks with discard have a hard enough time dealing with 8 bolts, and 12 is just gravy.

My matches from Sunday:

R1: Mono Blue Omni-Tell (2-0)
R2: Reanimator (2-0)
R3: Jund (2-0)
R4: Punishing Maverick (2-1?)
R5: Merfolk (2-1?)
R6: Sneak & Show (2-1)
R7: Death & Taxes (2-1)
R8 / R9 - ID

T8 - Sneak & Show (2-1... 3-0 if I didn't brain fart and draw 3 off Ponder)
T4 - Food Chain (2-1)
Finals - BUG Midrange (0-2)

[Megadeus]

I liked your plays vs Sneak and show. Seeing that he had a matching fetch land in hand off of Probe and using surgical to screw him out of a land was awesome.

[Koby]

I liked your plays vs Sneak and show. Seeing that he had a matching fetch land in hand off of Probe and using surgical to screw him out of a land was awesome.

I usually don't recommend these types of plays, as it's very low impact. However, lacking a hard counter for Sneak Attack, I needed to buy time to get a threat on board. Probe helped to figure this puzzle out. Surgical also provides the same "peek at hand" effect which is why I cast it again after Kelvin Brainstormed. Using my knowledge of playing Sneak Show, I knew it relied heavily on its cantrips to piece A+B, so removing his filtering (in this case Ponder as he already used 3 Brainstorms and locked himself without a land) reduced his chances to just blindly topdecking.

[Andrew.Schneider]

I found Probe to be a cantrip, and I certainly needed to maintain a large blue count, and large spell count for FoW and Delver, respectively. I had been trying to find a way to fit in Pyromancer, but ultimately felt that at 2 mana, it's too slow when combined with Snapcaster Mage. I really wanted to play a Price of Progress deck, and Burn is basically unplayable if you want to win regularly. I found Andrew Schneider's list very agreeable, but never really felt that Daze was worthwhile when the goal is to hit 3 mana to turn on Snapcaster Mage.

I really like the change. Probe is a card I've always wanted to fit in but couldn't figure out how. And I can tell from your reasoning that you understand how we should be playing games. I'll have to give it a try.

[JDK]

btw here's a video of the second round (against Junk) of my most recent tournament:

[beez]

I usually don't recommend these types of plays, as it's very low impact. However, lacking a hard counter for Sneak Attack, I needed to buy time to get a threat on board. Probe helped to figure this puzzle out. Surgical also provides the same "peek at hand" effect which is why I cast it again after Kelvin Brainstormed. Using my knowledge of playing Sneak Show, I knew it relied heavily on its cantrips to piece A+B, so removing his filtering (in this case Ponder as he already used 3 Brainstorms and locked himself without a land) reduced his chances to just blindly topdecking.

It certainly seems to make a blazing fast deck even faster. The question I have is it seems to significantly weaken the matchups against those decks that like first or second turn Chalice @1 , not so uncommon for me to run against, Tezzerator, AggroLoam ,etc. Not such a big deal in the wider meta, but I guess I don't like punting matchups completely. Combo plays around Daze, but it is still a turn, still a counter, though I see a Probe can help you find a Force or a sided in Flusterstorm faster. I do like the idea of not sometimes losing tempo to Daze however.

[beez]

btw here's a video of the second round (against Junk) of my most recent tournament:

Like taking candy from a baby

[Koby]

It certainly seems to make a blazing fast deck even faster. The question I have is it seems to significantly weaken the matchups against those decks that like first or second turn Chalice @1 , not so uncommon for me to run against, Tezzerator, AggroLoam ,etc. Not such a big deal in the wider meta, but I guess I don't like punting matchups completely. Combo plays around Daze, but it is still a turn, still a counter, though I see a Probe can help you find a Force or a sided in Flusterstorm faster. I do like the idea of not sometimes losing tempo to Daze however.

There's a lot of points here, so let's break them out:

Chalice decks -- these are not a large part of the metagame. It's probably a very bad matchup considering the concentration of 1-drops. Probably 20/80 in my opinion, or slightly higher due to Force of Will.
Combo - weak G1 due to non-important cards. SB should and does fix this with Flusterstorm, REBs, and Surgical (altho weak).

All of which Gitaxian Probe reveals and helps you shift gears to align your cantrips with your opponent's strategy. Sometimes, this doesn't work out well like my finals match showed. (nevermind I was playing to my out of Price of Progress both games. I wanted to put on a show :D)

Finally, Daze is better in a Wasteland/Stifle type of deck. UR Delver lists for the most part play into their best card: Price of Progress. While there is a small synergy between showing Daze to force the opponent to overcommit lands into PoP, the deck does not generally care to play a mana denial strategy. Daze loses a lot of ground as a Force Spike thus. I preferred to just play more cantrips (Probe, 4th Ponder) and square up the burn package to streamline/linearize the game plan. Seemed to have worked out for me. My opponent may have attempted to play around Daze, but I never bothered to notice. I was more concerned with finding a clock and sequencing mana/cantrips correctly to maximize topdecks.

I had a ton of really close games, and this seems to have helped much more than access to Daze.

[JDK]

Like taking candy from a baby

That's how it felt. Good (candy!) and wrong at the same time. :D

[Nordvoll]

Koby: Would you cut a Lava Spike or a Sulfuric Vortex If you where to up Surgical Extraction to 3 ?

[Demonic_Attorney]

Koby: Would you cut a Lava Spike or a Sulfuric Vortex If you where to up Surgical Extraction to 3 ?

Given that there are only 2x Sulfuric Vortex in the SB it would not be prudent, in my view, to cut one (1) and go down to a single copy. If you're contemplating playing 3x Surgical Extraction in your SB I think that cutting a Lava Spike makes the most sense; however, Koby can provide his insight which I suspect he will do in due course.

[JDK]

Vortex is the single most important card against Miracles and it's generally a beast in UWx matchups. It may be fine to play two or less in the North American metagame, but in Europe I wouldn't settle with less than two. Local metas may vary, though.

[meffeo]

Vortex is the single most important card against Miracles and it's generally a beast in UWx matchups. It may be fine to play two or less in the North American metagame, but in Europe I wouldn't settle with less than two. Local metas may vary, though.

Usually I side in the 2 Vortex also against MUD (see Wurmcoil Engine).
Against MUD also Daze is a great card (see Ancient Tomb) that normally remains in mainboard.

[JDK]

Vortex's job is to prey on UWx, pretty much everything else is just bonus, as decks like MUD are fringe ones and you could do way better than Vortex against it.

[mextremartini]

Hello everyone, i was thinking about a more tempo oriented approach.

This is a much more RUG delver style, but with more stable mana base. All creatures have evasion, and the set of Spell Pierce is there, not just to counter enemy's brainstorm, but also to protect your own value creatures. Those 8 creatures are very good and mana efficiente, while Clique can come as an instant. I never really liked to get my shields down.

Please, feel confortable to make sugestions.

4 Delver of Secrets
4 Grim Lavamancer
2 Vendillion Clique

4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Lighning Bolt
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Stifle
4 Spell Pierce

4 Wasteland
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Volcanic Island
2 Island
1 Mountain

[Koby]

Koby: Would you cut a Lava Spike or a Sulfuric Vortex If you where to up Surgical Extraction to 3 ?

Given that there are only 2x Sulfuric Vortex in the SB it would not be prudent, in my view, to cut one (1) and go down to a single copy. If you're contemplating playing 3x Surgical Extraction in your SB I think that cutting a Lava Spike makes the most sense; however, Koby can provide his insight which I suspect he will do in due course.

The sideboard should really be build to address and shore up any weaker matchups you expect to face in your meta. I anticipated plenty of Jund, and other matches where I would not want Force of Will; so I needed a way to max out on Lava Spikes. If you have more combo or graveyard decks, definitely pump up the number of Extractions. Lava Spike down to 3 seems OK. I do recommend no less than 2 Sulfuric Vortex for the reasons D_A gave.