First with BUG Delver

BUG Delver
First place (4-1 in the swiss)

A few weeks ago (only just got around to typing up my notes) I got to play in my first legacy event since Cruise got banned, and I was keen to bust out BUG Delver again. We all know Cruise is what was keeping is down, and that we should have been well positioned again without it (I’m really pleased to see us back on the DTB forum!). I also wanted to try out a slightly different build and mess with some new cards, so I put together a bit of a brew and took it for a spin. The event went really well for me and I took home some sweet prizes. Here’s my list, a few comments on card selection, and a run down of how my matches went.

Creatures (14)
4 Delver
4 Deathrite
4 Goyf
2 Tasigur, Bananaman

Spells (27)
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Disfigure
4 Brainstorm
3 Ponder
4 Stifle
2 Divert (!!)
1 Spell Pierce
4 Daze
4 Force of Will

Lands (19)
9 Fetches
4 Wasteland
3 Underground Sea
2 Tropical Island
1 Bayou


Sideboard:
1 Garruk Relentless
1 Flusterstorm
1 Spell Pierce
1 Golgari Charm
1 Abrupt Decay
1 Krosan Grip
1 Ravenous Trap
3 Surgical Extraction
1 Grafdigger’s Cage
1 Pithing Needle
1 Null Rod
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Ghost Quarter



Quick notes on card choices-

Tasigur
Can anybody say “one mana Tarmogoyf?” Cruise got banned because delve is a busted mechanic, and apparently this guy has it too. I spotted this guy before release day and ordered ten of them when they were still $2 each because he’s clearly going to be a thing, even if only in Modern and even if it never hits the lofty heights of Goyf’s $200 price tag. The main removal spells in those formats are Abrupt Decay, Bolt and Swords/Path (delete as appropriate) - Bananaman dodges two of these three, making him a bit difficult for most decks to remove. I wasn’t expecting to get to activate his ability many times, but I figure he looks solid even if you pretend that ability isn’t there, so I really wanted to test him out. I was not disappointed. He’s obviously a bit wonky against Karakas, but we have Wasteland so hopefully we can get away with that.

27 spells, but only 7 cantrips
I’ve grown to really hate “setting up” Delver flips, to the point that I sometimes feel like he’s the weak link in the deck. You Ponder, you put the cards back in the order that you don’t really want them, then they kill him et voilà! you’ve just bled a ton of tempo. That’s not to say that it’s never the correct play - it often is - but as often as possible I want him to do the work himself. I also hate the runner-runner-cantrip games, where you cast 5 or 6 of them before losing because you just didn’t see any actual gas (at which point your idiot opponent claims they’re surprised to have won considering you saw so many, not realising that cantrip flood is just another kind of mana flood…). So I shaved a Ponder, and maximised on cards that will flip Delver blind.

No Hymns or Lilianas
I’m off the BB plan. It means I can fill my graveyard a little bit faster with cheaper spells, leave mana up more often (especially on post-board games when I’ve got extra countermagic), cast my spells more reliably, and most importantly that I’m not obliged to play a second Bayou (I don’t like the blue-source-less draws we sometimes get) or to search for my Bayou when I’d really rather find Trop. I could probably have run 0 and got away with it, but it’s nice to have one I think.

Stifle??
Yeahhh I know there are a lot of reasons not to play this card, but I just love it. It can often be what decides the mirror (which I was expecting to play against) and puts you on a more level footing against RUG. It has other niche applications like miracle triggers, and you get a lot of value out of people just playing around it. Also, if you’re not on Hymn, it’s one of the more obvious choices for those slots.


Divert??!!?
Yes, Divert. I’d got it into my head other people would be back on BUG and I fancied redirecting some Hymns and Abrupt Decays or maybe even a Force. I figured it was probably supposed to be a 1-of, or maybe just be left in the sideboard, but I’d decided the word of the day was “testing” so I jammed 2 in the main with the expectation of actually casting them. In the end, I didn’t get to redirect a single spell - it just didn’t show up very often, and was usually the first card, over a Brainstorm or something, to get pitched to Force. I did get some real value out of people knowing I had it though - I revealed it to Delver in one or two games and it really did make people’s faces drop as they realised they were in a bit of a pickle.


The entire sideboard…
...is a mess. I was expecting a fair amount of graveyard strategies, including 2-3 players on TinFins, so overboarded a bit there. I also wanted an extra land for the BUG/RUG matches, and decided to go for Ghost Quarter + Crucible just to be cute. Yes, I did get it off once during the tournament, and yes, it was glorious.



Round 1 - Esperblade

This match is all about keeping Batterskull off the table. In games 1 and even on a mulligan to 5 in game 3 (kept Deathrite, Delver, Daze, fetch, Wasteland on the play), I managed to do that; in game 2 he had the double Thoughtseize draw and just got around too much of my disruption. Disfiguring/Stifling SFMs buys you an obscene amount of time against this deck, whose eggs seem to be very much in one basket, and the mana base war is laughably easy. You have DRS where they don’t; there are Wastelands going both directions, and you’re Stifling them as well. Dazes were live for most of the match, and Krosan Grip and Pithing Needle out of the board made things a little easier.

1-0 (2-1)


Round 2 - BUG Delver

My opponent is on the BB plan with Hymns, Lilianas, and Tombstalkers at the top of the curve. The difference in card choices here was extremely relevant, so much so that it almost feels wrong to call it the mirror. Delver mirrors are often about who can cast the most spells in the shortest space of time, and your Stifle to their Hymn makes a big difference in that regard, especially when you start to factor Daze into the equation - yours being live much more of the time than theirs. The information game with Divert did me some favours (making Hymn look even worse and forcing him to be very careful with his Decays) but I didn’t actually cast one at any point. The only thing I was worried about was Tombstalker, as it’s big and flies and doges basically all of my removal, but I was able to force him to block Tasigur with it and then use Disfigure as a trump. These games were closer than I’d have liked them to have been, but it was nevertheless a solid 2-0 win for me here, largely down to feeling like I had tons more mana than my opponent at every stage of the match and my opponent not getting Delver flips / having to burn cantrips on them.

2-0 (4-1)


Round 3 - Dark Maverick

I hadn’t played against anybody on Maverick in a really long time, which already put me in a bit of a weak spot, and he managed to keep the Deathrite/Abrupt Decay/Maelstrom Pulse splash a secret from me for long enough to get a pretty significant blowout against me in game 1 - I went from slightly ahead to very, very behind in the space of a turn, and racing a Batterskull is just too hard. Game 2 was a depressing experience. He drew all gas, and even though I had a reasonable amount of disruption, killing off all the best threats first and leaving them with just a Noble Hierarch means you’re still pretty dead when they rip their Sword of FaF. I’m not sure if this is a deck I should expect to see more of in the future, but if it is then I need a much better plan for fighting it.

2-1 (4-3)


Round 4 - Shardless BUG

I absolutely crushed in game 1, despite being on the draw, with a hand of Deathrite and disruption. He was on 1 or 0 mana for most of the game and didn’t manage to resolve anything relevant. Game two was much closer, revolving largely around Deathrites on both sides of the board, with him getting some good cascades (eventually WotC will figure out that “draw three cards” is an effect that’s supposed to gost mana!) and being able to match me on most of my removal. The decisive play was blocking a 4/5 Goyf with a 4/5 Tasigur (which had already been blanking Goyf or several turns, and which his deck is completely incapable of removing), then using Deathrite to shrink the Goyf before damage.

3-1 (6-3)

Round 5 - Miracles

I get paired down against somebody who can’t ID, so we play. I win the die roll, and open with Deathrite into Daze on his turn 1 Top. Wasteland into Abrupt Decay on his turn 2 Counterbalance leaevs me nicely in front, and that’s basically where I stay until Deathrite has done enough nibbling away at his life for him to scoop. He’s on the play in game 2, I mulligan and keep a very average 6. He’s got a double Swords hand, which makes short work of my early game, and he gets Top online. The game was very grindy, with him finding lots of removal and me just not being able to efficiently attack his life total. I thought I was back in the game when I finally landed a Tasigur against his empty board, but he quickly found a Karakas. I was able to pick up an Abrupt Decay with his ability and take down a Counterbalance, but at this point I’m clearly behind on board (despite life totals of 22-10 to me). He finally finds his Entreat, which I’m unable to stop, and takes the game. Unfortunately for him it took until there were only 2 minutes left on the clock, meaning that there was no way he could get the 3 points he needed. He acknowledged that I’d clearly been trying to play quickly rather than waste time, and gave me the concession. This puts me at the top of the swiss, putting me on the play for the entire top 8.

4-1 (7-4)


Quarterfinals - BUG Delver

My opponent this round is a friend of mine who I’ve been talking to a lot about BUG lists. We roughly know each other’s builds for the day - he’s on the Hymn/Liliana plan and he knows I have Stifle/Divert. Our openers are very similar, with Deathrites on both sides of the table from the first turn, and the game plays out in a very symmetrical fashion for the next few turns - matching Disfigures to Deathrites and Abrupt Decays to Goyfs. The potential breakout card - Tasigur - shows up for both of us on the same turn. Eventually an asymmetry emerges in the form of a flipped Delver on his side of the board and a Deathrite on mine, so the race is on. Most of the way down he’s winning, of course, but eventually I find an extra Goyf and am able to attack through or lethal with only 1 life left. Game 2 was over pretty swiftly - he keeps a mana intensive hand (with at least a Goyf and a Liliana) largely on the back of a Deathrite to play on turn 1, which I immediately Disfigure. I have a Deathrite of my own on turn 2, leaving up Stifle (which gets a fetch) before leading into turn 3 Wasteland plus Crucible off the Deathrite. At this point he’s essentially locked out of the game.

5-1 (9-4)


Semifinals - Tinfins

I played this deck myself for a little while, when Cruise was still in the format and I wasn’t having much luck with BUG, so I knew more or less what to expect. In game 1 I had the turn 1 Deathrite. He played it out, as there was no reason not to, but we both knew that the game was essentially over right there. I was forced to sacrifice a lot of tempo in order to keep Deathrite + mana up, but I was still the only one presenting a clock. By the time he’d engineered a situation where he could cast two reanimate effects at once to get around Deathrite, I had multiple counters in hand. In game 2, he was on the play and had what looked like a turn 1 kill, but I had the Surgical in hand and was able to remove all his Griselbrands. I knew his only remaining out was to Emrakul me, which would wipe my board but not deal lethal damage, and then follow it up with Tendrils or possibly even Children to deal the last couple of points. I was light on disruption, so I sandbagged a couple of lands and a Goyf to play out after the annihilator trigger and just let him Emrakul me. He was never able to finish me off, and the match was mine.

6-1 (11-4)


Final - URb Delver

This deck was a fairly straightforward adaptation of the UR Delver decks with Cruise, except it had Dig Through Time and was splashing for Cabal Therapy (which is amusingly good with Young Pyromancer) off a single Sea. In game 1 I led with Delver, which blind flipped on turn 2 revealing a Divert. This caused my opponent a headache as it meant he just couldn’t remove it - all his burn spells would get pointed back at his own face. I kept up disruption and Delver dealt lethal damage all by itself. I’m not the biggest fan of BUG Delver’s namesake card but this game was the absolute epitome of how it should work. Divert also played an interesting role in causing a lot of inaction from my opponent; I had to leave 1 mana up all the time but he basically just didn’t play spells. Game 2 was extremely uneventful. My opponent, on the play, had to mulligan to 4 and led with Volc into Ponder. I opened with Wasteland, which coupled with the Surgical in my hand meant I could remove all the Volcs from his deck. His entire mana base consisted of 4x Volc, 1x Sea, 1x Island and 10 or so fetches (and, notably, no basic Mountain), so I had completely shut him off red mana and left him basically unable to play magic.

7-1 (13-4)



Notes:

I only mulliganed in two games all day - once to 6 and once to 5 - and I didn’t drop a single game in the top 8. Divert didn’t show up as often as I’d have liked in order for me to really get to test it, but my gut feeling is that I’ll probably not play it next time. I got a lot of value out of it in certain situations just from my opponent playing around it, and the fact that it pitches to Force is of course a nice bonus, but I think I’ll just play a couple of Thoughtseize in that slot instead (it really helps in the Stoneforge matches). Tasigur was just a beast every time I cast it, I’ll definitely be giving him another go. The games with turn 1 Deathrite went much more smoothly than others. If you could play 5, I probably would. I’m considering a lone Noble Hierarch just to see how it pans out. My sideboard was a mess, even if I did get to silver-bullet a few people.

First, congratz for the result.

As a side note, wouldn't you split Tasigur with Gurmag Angler the fish? One more card to delve but +1 power and most important, Karakas won't bounce it.

Karakas is a thing, we've got Wasteland but once is bounced, is bounced. On top of that, 4 mana to activate Tasigur's ability are a lot of mana, and you play only 6 duals, instead of the usual 7 / 8 duals / fetches.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk.

Hi, Congratulations!
I play a very similar main deck, -2 divert +1decay +1ponder, I would try a monocopy of life from the loam to increase manadenial and delve, what you think about loam?

Maybe edit your title to say something more meaningful than "First with BUG Delver". You should list the name of the tournament you won, or this forum gets pretty hard to navigate.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by meffeo

First, congratz for the result.

As a side note, wouldn't you split Tasigur with Gurmag Angler the fish? One more card to delve but +1 power and most important, Karakas won't bounce it.

Karakas is a thing, we've got Wasteland but once is bounced, is bounced. On top of that, 4 mana to activate Tasigur's ability are a lot of mana, and you play only 6 duals, instead of the usual 7 / 8 duals / fetches.

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I hadn't really considered Angler. Mainly because I just really wanted to draw Tasigur enough times in the tournament to get to test him properly. I think one more card to delve could be too much, but equally being a 5/5 instead of 4/5 is huge in certain gamest - especially the mirror or against other Tarmogoyf decks. I might try 1 Tasigur + 1 Angler next time.

As for the activated ability - I think it's a mistake to evaluate the card as if you're ever going to activate it. In the majority of games you'll never get the opportunity, regardless of what lands you play. The 9 Fetch / 6 Dual mix was intended to help both the delves and the Deathrite plays. Dropping back to 8/7 (I don't think many lists play 7/8) makes delving harder, and I still don't think you'd be activating Tasigur very often. If you really want, you can always tap a Wasteland to help pay for it... but I generally think it's best to pretend that ability just isn't even on the card. He's just a Tarmogoyf that doesn't die to Abrupt Decay.

http://40.media.tumblr.com/5ee975746...65k7o1_400.jpg

Quote:

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Originally Posted by maverick_87it

Hi, Congratulations!
I play a very similar main deck, -2 divert +1decay +1ponder, I would try a monocopy of life from the loam to increase manadenial and delve, what you think about loam?

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I considered Loam - the dredge works very nicely with delve - but I didn't want my opponent to be able to exile it with Delver. Maybe this was poor reasoning on my part - I'll test with Loam at some point.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Bahra

Maybe edit your title to say something more meaningful than "First with BUG Delver". You should list the name of the tournament you won, or this forum gets pretty hard to navigate.

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Good point. Although there wasn't much special about the tournament so I don't know what else to call it :D
Now it won't let me change it :(