SCG Philly 12th Place bUrg Delver

[personalbackfire]

This past weekend I took bUrg Delver to Philadelphia to battle in the SCG Legacy Open. I finished 12th, and this is my report. My list can be found here: http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...p?DeckID=58928

3 Deathrite Shaman
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Nimble Mongoose
1 Scavening Ooze
2 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Spell Pierce
4 Stifle
2 Gitaxian Probe
4 Ponder
3 Misty Rainforest
4 Scalding Tarn
1 Taiga
2 Underground Sea
2 Tropical Island
2 Volcanic Island
4 Wasteland

Sb
1 Grafdigger’s Cage
1 Sulfuric Vortex
1 Abrupt Decay
1 Ancient Grudge
2 Fire Covenant
2 Flusterstorm
2 Pyroblast
1 Spell Pierce
3 Submerge

My interest in the deck started a few months ago. I was wondering why RUG wasn’t including Deathrite Shaman and set up to brew a few lists. A week or so later Florian Koch wrote an article about this deck here: http://www.channelfireball.com/articles/burg-delver/. That was enough to get me more interested in the deck and I set out to playtest the list. Truth be told I only played a few games against TES, but I liked the feel of the deck a lot.

Two weekends ago I took the list from his article (3 Spell Snare, 1 Pierce, 0 Probe, 1 Ooze) with a slightly different sideboard to a local Legacy Tournament where I went 4-2 with the deck. The deck felt strong, with my biggest concern being the mana. The deck is a bit greedy with its mana, but overall I really liked the deck.

I decided to think of ways to try and improve the mana and ultimately decided to run Gitaxian Probe instead as another free cantrip to hopefully help. This led to the question of what to cut; I really liked Spell Snare when I had played it. However, I was already running the 3rd Decay in my sideboard and thought most 2 casting cost spells can be answered with Decay and Bolt, so I decided to axe the snares in favor of 2 Pierce. This was reinforced by looking at RUG lists in the US that have been doing well lately on the SCG Circuit.

Rd 1 ANT
Game 1 The first few turns were spent by me playing a Nimble Mongoose and telegraphing the Stifle that was in my hand. Unfortunately for me my opponent played around the Stifle in my hand. I then drew a second one and had both copies Cabal Therapied away. The following turn I played out my Ooze and continued with the beats. My hand consisted of Force and a blue card. A turn or two later I Ponder into Force, Daze, Land, and we have the first misplay of the tournament. I take the Daze making my hand Force, Daze, Blue card and leave the Force on top. I was thinking I would be playing around Cabal Therapy by taking Daze, but that doesn’t really make sense since he is bound to have more Duress in his deck than Therapy. His next turn he leads with Duress taking my Force of Will. He then plays a bunch of mana and casts a hellbent Infernal Tutor. He considers his options since my Ooze will eat all tutors in his gy if he goes for Past in Flames, his life isn’t particularly high to go for ANT, and apparently he was one mana off to go for the tutor chain because of my Daze. He settles on PIF, I Daze and eat both tutors in his gy. He has a bunch of cantrips and on the very last card of the last Ponder he has mana available to cast he hits LED and wins the game.

Game 2 revolves around some of my creatures lowering his life to a point where his Ad Nauseum is ineffective, due largely to the fact that he flipped a 4 casting cost spell, then an Infernal Tutor to kill him.

Game 3 is a little less exciting as he either Probed or Duressed me early on seeing a Force, which he apparently could not beat. He spends his turns looking for disruption as I attack him and drain him with Shaman. The game ends by my attacks and drains from Shaman.

1-0

Rd2 Miracles
These games run together in my mind. Game 1 starts with me Probing him and seeing a Clique, Jace, Force, STP (I think), and some others. I play my Mongoose and start attacking. One of the turns before Jace can come down my opponent cast Clique in my combat step. I have 3 lands up and cast Decay with the trigger on the stack, my hand has Bolt, Force, and some others including a blue card. That resolves and he ships my Bolt to the bottom. A turn or two later he casts Terminus, which I let resolve since I want to use my Force on Jace. I eventually draw into another Mongoose and attack for the win seeing 3 Force, 3 Daze, and 1 Spell Pierce throughout the game.

Would you have Forced Terminus? If I Force Terminus more than likely Jace will resolve, and I should be able to attack it with my Mongoose, but it would take 3 attack steps to kill it (assuming he fateseals twice) since I no longer have Bolt. I also didn’t have any creatures in my hand.

Game 2 I believe he cast a RIP, which didn’t accomplish much since I was attacking with Delvers and Ooze. I also think my opponent misplays this game. I have a flipped delver, and he has CB/Top and an EE on 0 but waited a few turns to sac it. The life loss doesn’t seem worth it to keep an EE around on 0.

2-0

Rd 3 Belcher
Game 1 he plays out most of his hand and cast Belcher. On my turn I Waste his Taiga leaving his board as Chrome Mox (which produced green mana), and Belcher. He then gets excited as he thinks he has the win by removing Elvish Spirit Guide and trying to cast a Rite of Flame, which he doesn’t have the red to produce. The rest of the game is spent by me attacking him and holding up stifle.

Game 2 He mulls to 6 and casts Land Grant (revealing his hand), which allows me to hold up Flusterstorm for his Empty the Warrens in hand, and attack with my creatures to win the game. He was never really able to get started.

3-0

Then the wheels began to fall off…

Rd 4 Manaless Dredge
I win the die roll and keep a hand that does not have Deathrite Shaman and that is pretty much the game… I had never played against this version of Dredge before so had to read most of the cards to see how they worked. He very easily kills me and we move on. Game 2 I brought in my one Cage and choose to battle on the play, mistake number 2. I then kept a decent hand that did not have Cage or Shaman and lost again a few turns later.

3-1

Rd 5 Slivers
Both games can be summed up as Turn 1 Cavern on Slivers, turn 2 Crystalline Sliver. I can’t beat that. However, in game 1 I did make a misplay which cost me at the least time. I had played a turn one shaman off a Taiga after Probing him. Turn 2 I cast Ponder off a freshly drawn Trop and see Wasteland. I see the error of my way, but it doesn’t matter as nothing at this point is going to stop the turn two Crystalline Sliver of death for my deck.

Would you have Pondered off of Deathrite activation knowing your opponent has Crystalline in hand?

This match seems close to unwinnable if they resolve a turn 2 Crystalline. I spent some time thinking about ways to improve this, but I haven’t reached any sort of conclusion.

3-2

Rd 6 Nic Fit
I wish I can remember more of these games as they were fairly interactive but I can’t. Game 1 I won probably because of Forcing Veteran Explorer and the power of Stifle in the match up. At some point he Green Sunned for a 5 drop, which wasn’t Thragtusk and I was able to swing through.

Game 2 I countered Carpet of Flowers, Stifled the first Veteran Explorer trigger, attacked through 1 Kitchen Finks (bolting it and removing it with my Ooze with the persist trigger on the stack) and 2 Spike Feeders, and then played a Grafdiggers Cage to avoid any Green Sun or Birthing Pod nonsense. My opponent unfortunately missed seeing the cage and tried to play and activate a Birthing Pod. He lost on the swing back.

4-2

Rd 7 Esper Stoneblade
Game 1 he keeps a Tundra Brainstorm hand and misses on seeing a land. My Wasteland on his Tundra causes him to concede.

I felt like I boarded incorrectly, not bringing in Grudge for Game 2, and in general just not having confidence on my boarding decisions. Game 2 I lost to Lingering Souls as I held Pyroblast x2 and a Bolt.

Game 3 I was able to pull out in typical bUrg Delver fashion. The end of the game saw him trying to race me with an Elspeth jumping his Snapcaster Mage. He had a brain fart and tried to cast Massacre that same turn for free, but I didn’t have any plains. On his next turn I hardcast Force on his hardcasted Massacre and I am able to win the race.

5-2

Rd 8 Miracles
Did I mention the miracles games all seem to run together? Game 1 was won on the power of Delver of Secrets I believe. He had cast a RIP which did not do much, and never saw CB or a way to deal with my Delver through my permission.

Game 2 I made another serious misplay, which almost cost me the game. I had a Delver in play and was on the attack plan. He had a RIP in play and was on the control plan. End of turn he cast Enlightened Tutor with a Top in play and I believe one other card in hand. His options were Energy Field (which I didn’t yet know about), Blood Moon, or Counterbalance. I was really fine with anything since I was already holding Abrupt Decay and had the mana to cast it. He casts Counterbalance on his turn which I let resolve and we move on to me attacking with my Delver. A turn or so later he plays Energy Field. I read the card and let it resolve since I just figure I will end of turn cast Decay on his Counterbalance, the Energy Field will have to be sacrificed and it should be an easy win at that point. Unfortunately, I forgot all about the Rest in Peace and I put myself in a horrible spot. Luckily for me I draw a Pyroblast a few turns and cantrips later and cast it on the Energy Field. He attempts to misdirect it my Delver Insect but I had the Force to stop that. I win easily from there.

6-2

Rd 8 Goblins
Game 1 He doesn’t have Vial or Cavern, I bolt his turn one Lackey and we play a fair game. I make another error facing down Krenko and another Goblin. On his turn I did the math (incorrectly), that if I Shaman away my instant in my gy, taking me off of thresh for Mongoose, and then on my turn attack with my flipped Delver, Mongoose, and Ooze, he will take one damage from Mongoose and 3 from Delver and I will be able to Deathrite him to 0 life. Well, I didn’t think about the Krenko ability and set myself up for disaster, losing my Mongoose in the process for no gain. Luckily, Delver still has flying and I am at a high life total, with more instants in my GY to finish him off with Deathrite and Delver.

Game 2 He has no turn one play, but turn 2 has the double strike goblin lackey. I Bolt it and basically trade 1 for 1 on removal spells in the early game since I am holding Fire Covenant and figure at some point I can blow him out with that and win from there. He was constrained on 2 mana for a few turns which made this plan easier. Either way I have a Delver and he has a Goblin in play later in the game. He then plays a Lackey and cycles Incinerator to kill my Delver, which I respond with Fire Covenant. I keep my Delver and am able to attack him to 0.

7-2: 12th Place.

I was quite happy with the list and felt confident in most matches. My plan for the future with the deck involves adding more graveyard hate to the sideboard. Losing to Dredge/Reanimator feels like it could be avoidable, but I skimped on numbers and paid the price (Two weekends ago one of my losses with to Shawn Tappen on Reanimator). The other concern was how to beat turn 2 Crystalline Sliver. If anyone has some good board advice I’d be happy to hear.

Ooze has been an all-star in every game I’ve seen him in both tournaments I’ve played. I have no intentions on playing a different card in that slot. The question of if I should include another Ooze has come up on these forums and I honestly don’t know the answer yet. The deck is tight on slots, so adding another creature would require cutting a Probe. Probe is a great card that lets you plan your game with perfect information for at least a turn.
I am open to any suggestions.

Thanks for reading,
Steve

[entreri_fans]

awesome report!

but in your green tempo deck, no use of Tarmogoyf?

[lordofthepit]

Like the poster above, I'm curious about the decision to include no Goyfs (rather than a copy or two).

Don't get me wrong, I generally consider the card overrated and would rather have Ooze in many decks, but not sure about a tempo deck like RUG Delver. I would argue that since this manabase is even greedier than RUG Delver's, and because of the inclusion of Deathrite Shaman, this list benefits even less from Ooze. Can you elaborate on your experience and decision process?

[HammafistRoob]

Nice work and report, congrats.

I think the idea behind Scooze is that he can swing board states into your favor more heavily than Goyf give 2-3 turns. Often the board stalls, and/or the opponent has spent all their removal on your Delvers/Shamans, which really allows Scooze to swing the game completely. He's also strong against Dredge, Reanimator, Snapcaster, Shaman, Goyf, Goose, PFire combo, and Lavamancer.

[David Kaplan]

Congrats Steve. Did you ever want a 4th Shaman or prefer Probe to Ponder?

[Sasan]

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...l=1#post747940


Here is an analysis of Steve's decklist. You can join the discussion in the bUrg thread. Great finish and report :-)

Concerning your problems on Slivers: Spell Snare comes handy as it can counter Crystalline. Cavern of Souls must be wasted so boarding Loam seems logical. If they have the nut draw of turn 2 Cavern and Crystalline, then you have no
chance.

I still believe that my 2 Goyf/3 Snare list is better versus creature decks, especially tribal, than your version of bUrg :-)

If Slivers become a major meta factor we need Virtue's Ruin. That will be enough.

[personalbackfire]

@ Tarmagoyf
As I said, I literally just took the list from the article originally. This is what Florian Kock says in his article about the subject linked above:

“The most important change to RUG Delver is cutting Tarmogoyfs for Deathrite Shamans. I know not everyone will agree on this, but frankly Tarmogoyf was never that good in RUG Delver. It was certainly decent, which shouldn’t come as a surprise, considering Tarmogoyf‘s power level, but compared to the one-drops it is a rather clunky. Also, fair decks can easily dispatch of it, and to unfair decks it is not as good a clock as it should be. Of course, it is not harder to kill a Deathrite Shaman, but Deathrite Shaman has some invaluable advantages.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that costing one mana instead of two is a major advantage in a deck that has 14 + 4 lands. You will often end up opening on hands with only a single land. For those hands, Tarmogoyf can be a liability, whereas Deathrite Shaman makes them better. In this way, Deathrite Shaman protects your deck from mana screw.”

I honestly didn’t even think about running Tarmogoyf before beginning to post on the source about this deck.

@Ooze
I agree with what MammafistRoob said. That and sometimes you just need a creature to finish the game or get through bigger threats on the ground. As I said I have been very happy with him. In my match against NicFit I grew him to a 6 or 7 and was able to attack through everything he played to win the game. When I played against Miracles and my opponent played RIP, I removed some creatures in response to grow him and still had a decent sized attacker. Against ANT I was able to remove both tutors in his gy to prevent an easy win from his side. He is just good at being a beat stick with a relevant ability.

@ David Kaplan
I really like Deathrite and would consider the 4th. The problem is there just isn’t a lot of room in the deck. That said, I didn’t necessarily want the 4th or feel like I wasn’t seeing him enough when I was playing.

I would cut Probe over Ponder always in this deck. It is just too important to make sure you are hitting your first few land drops ensuring that you can play your spells on time.

@Sasan
Thanks for the sliver tech. I don’t think I knew that card existed.