If you need/want another kill condition, Hunting Pack and Manamorphose were alright, I ran that config. vs Duress for awhile. You can even fit Natural Order in the deck, either by adding a Dryad Arbor or like 4 of the r/g mana filter guy.
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If you need/want another kill condition, Hunting Pack and Manamorphose were alright, I ran that config. vs Duress for awhile. You can even fit Natural Order in the deck, either by adding a Dryad Arbor or like 4 of the r/g mana filter guy.
Still no love for Recross the Paths people? With 3 Mana available and Taiga on the table it's a strictly better Doomsday. Without the Taiga it's effectively a 3cc sorcery that finds that Taiga and then has an above-average chance of clashing itself right back into your hand, and with an extra 2 mana investment you get to tap that Taiga and replay it on the spot.
Anyway since my last input didn't really spark any discussion I'm going to go ahead and post a mini-primer instead. It's at least worth the consideration Imo.
// Lands
1 [B] Taiga
// Creatures
4 [CST] Tinder Wall
4 [FUT] Street Wraith
4 [PLC] Simian Spirit Guide
4 [AL] Elvish Spirit Guide
// Spells
4 [MI] Lion's Eye Diamond
4 [CS] Rite of Flame
4 [SHM] Manamorphose
4 [MM] Land Grant
4 [MR] Chrome Mox
4 [TE] Lotus Petal
1 [OV] Meditate
4 [MR] Goblin Charbelcher
3 [MOR] Recross the Paths
4 [JU] Burning Wish
4 [CHK] Desperate Ritual
3 [9E] Seething Song
// Sideboard
SB: 1 [MOR] Recross the Paths
SB: 1 [TSP] Empty the Warrens
SB: 1 [MM] Cave-In
SB: 1 [NE] Reverent Silence
SB: 1 [LG] Chain Lightning
SB: 1 [6E] Infernal Contract
SB: 3 [GP] Shattering Spree
SB: 1 [MM] Crash
SB: 1 [MM] Thunderclap
SB: 4 [SC] Xantid Swarm
Mini-Q&A
Q: What does Recross the Paths do?
A: It reveals cards off the top of your library until it hits a land card and then puts the revealed cards back in any order at the bottom of it, meaning that if you don't have any lands left in it you get to stack it from the bottom up.
Q: Doesn't that make it useless unless you also draw the Taiga/Land Grant?
A: It makes it worse, but not entirely useless. You can still play it to find the aforementioned Taiga, and with any luck you'll also win the clash meaning that you get your investment back. Remember that with the Taiga you only need another 2 mana to replay it the same turn..
Q: How fast do you win after stacking your deck?
A: Depends on how many cantrips and/or Mana floating you've got left after Recrossing. With 3 mana and a cantrip OR 2 cantrips (and 2 mana for Manamorphose should you not have 2 Wraiths) on hand you can win the same turn you Recross. With one Cantrip OR the means of producing 3 mana you'll win the next turn. If you have an empty hand you'll need to spend 2 turns drawing into Mana as well as the Meditate to initiate the piles; preferrably by topdecking a LED and a Street Wraith - which is still as fast as EtW in the vast majority of all situations.
Q: Isn't EtW better versus blue-based decks?
A: Nah. They can still counter your mana sources to prevent you from reaching 4 Mana (especially if you had to use Land Grant and they see it coming), and 12+ Goblins isn't a guaranteed win by a long shot since there isn't a deck out there that won't be able to deal with them at least postside.
Generic Piles:
Kill Pile (as ordered from top through bottom):
*Street Wraith (for Clashing if you wanna get the Recross back for Imprinting Chrome Mox)
*Setup (Whatever is still needed to cast Meditate ASAP - see the Mini-FAQ)
Meditate
LED
LED
Lotus Petal (If you have a surplus mana you can substitute this for Thunderclap/Crash/Reverent Silence to remove inconvenient permanents game 2)
Street Wraith
Goblin Charbelcher
Do your preparations. Cast Meditate to draw into the LED's and Wraith. Cycle the Wraith whilst cracking the LED's in response and end up with Charbelcher in hand and 7-9 mana in pool. Win.
Slightly more convoluted kill that can also deal with whatever hate they managed Pile:
*Street Wraith
*Setup
Meditate
LED
LED
LED
Street Wraith
Burning Wish
LED
Seething Song
Burning Wish
Street Wraith
Charbelcher
Cast Meditate. Draw cards, cycle wraith whilst cracking the LEDs' for RRRRRRBBB, draw Wish and cast it for Infernal Contract. Cast infernal Contract with RRRR in pool for the next set of cards. Cast Seething Song and Burning Wish for your hatecard of choice. Remove what keeps you from winning, then cycle Street Wraith whilst cracking LED for Charbelcher. This one might take a lot of tweaking in order to fit the gamestate and is more of a general guideline than a step-for-step walkthrough (it assumes you still have all 4 LEDs remaining, for an instance).
Preside removing artifacts or creatures requires you to either have an extra mana in the pool whilst casting Meditate in order to compensate for the mana used by Spree/Lightning - this is why Thunder Clap/Crash is in the sideboard. If you don't have the extra mana don't forget that you can also substitute the last LED for a Lotus Petal and instead draw into it the next turn to fire off the Charbelcher.
I like it a lot, it's a cool effect :cool:
The question that every Belcher player are thinking: Are this list better vs Blue decks that standard Belcher?
I went 3-1 splitting the top 4 at my local tournament here in Rochester. This was my list
4 Charbelcher
4 Burning Wish
3 Empty the Warrens
4 Lotus Petal
4 Chrome Mox
4 Simian Spirit Guide
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Land Grant
1 Taiga
1 Bayou
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Dark Ritual
4 Rites of Flame
4 Desperate Ritual
4 Seething Song
4 Tinder Wall
3 Manamorphose
SB
1 REB
1 Shattering Spree
1 Duress
1 Cave-in
1 Infernal Tutor
1 Empty the Warrens
1 Diminishing Returns
1 Reverent Silence
2 Xantid Swarm
2 Deathmark
Something else i don't remember
My matchups were:
Match 1 - Patrick Playing Sneak Attack
He won the die roll. Huge disadvantage for me. He goes first and drops a 20/20 serra avatar with haste.
Game two I go first. I start things off with 12 goblins. He can't beat the two turn clock and we go to game three.
He goes first and luckily doesn't kill me. Me with a smile on my face drop belcher and activate it. And OF COURSE I hit a Taiga at card number 9. Next turn he sneak attacks protean hulk into play. Loss
0-1
Match 2 - Suicide Black
I open a hand with belcher but one mana short of going off. He thoughtseize's me stealing away belcher. I draw my mana outlet. He goes and plays dark rit phyrexian negator. I draw empty the warrens and lay down 12 happy goblins. He can't handle it and loses.
Game two I open a hand of belcher, empty the warrens, land grant, lotus petal, rit of flame, seething song, seething song. He first turn thought seizes me, and takes away empty the warrens. I go, dropping belcher and activating it, and of course hitting taiga on the third card. I eventually activate belcher again and killing him.
1-1
Match 3 - Painter's Stone (Running FOW)
I knew I'd have to face blue at some point.. Game one I burning wish blowing up 3 LED's in the process. He doesn't FOW so I think I'm safe. I grab infernal tutor, he still doesn't FOW, so I grab belcher, and he forces it... And then grindstones in my face.
Game two I empty the warrens all over his FOW. I win.
Game three I get turn one Xantid swarm. 2 turn I belch on him.
2-1
Match 4 - Josh playing ANT (Pimped out completely)
Game one I lose the die roll and I try and drop Belch for the win but he chants me. He then procedes to double dark rit and ad nauseum me.
Game two I drop belcher and activate, but in response he drops angels grace. Sitting at one life, he has almost nothing he can do, so I'm able to build up enough to rebelch him for the win.
Game three he mulls to 5 (I figure hes looking for a chant) and he drops land and passes. I go, play lotus petal, no response from him, rite of flame, no response from him, desperate ritual, no response from him, LED, no response from him, and then exile simian spirit guide to drop belcher. He curses as he forgets that he can't respond to simian spirit guide. I belch for the win.
3-1
Top four split. Overall, I was pretty happy with how the deck ran. I did not like the fact that I fizzled twice, and because of that I'm thinking about removing the Bayou and dark rits for Street Wraiths.
Since this deck is bad against blue, and good against everything else-ish have people considered supplementing or replacing xantid swarm with goblin welder. Both are good against blue with welder having the bonus ability to more easily allow for multiple belches in the event of fizzling.
Usually, the Blue strategy vs Belcher is to play counterspells targeting Big Ritual spells.
If I resolve Seething Song vs Blue, I'm going to play Empty the Warrens, not Belcher, so Welder can't recover it.
I went 3-1 (7-2) with Belcher yesterday at my local tournament. I moved down to one land belcher, removing the dark rits for street wraiths and the bayou for the 4th manamorphose. The deck performed excellently, never fizzling even once. I lost to Survival which sided in 10 hate cards against me. I actually made a play mistake game two where I should have won, but it happens to the best of us.
Hey Everybody,
Long time lurker, I think first time poster... Been watching the thread and reading everyone's ideas. Very cool stuff!
I picked up the deck recently after playing pox and fish, because I think the deck concept is awesome.
Currently I am playing the RG version after hitting bayou too many times on belcher activations. I used Wild Cantor instead of dark rit for a while, but honestly she sucks pretty bad in the RG version. You don't almost ever need the mana fixing in RG, and she then basically only adds to storm count. So I know it seems the consensus on Street Wraith is that he sucks, but I would rather have a chance at mana than no mana at all. He does make mulligan decisions harder, especially with 8 total draw effects (including manamorphose), but overall I think he is still a better choice than cantor.
Anyways, now that you know what version I am playing, here is my question:
How do I play against dredge -_- ?
I lost to dredge both games in a tournament over this weekend. First game I made 16 goblins turn 1. She made 9 zombies and an Iona naming red. Next game I made 10 goblins... same deal I got rocked early.
I have thought about trying to mulligan for belcher kills, but that seems dangerous because by the time I hit a hand with belcher it will be too slow to drop the belcher on the first turn, leaving me in a scary place to get cabal therapied to death.
Any thoughts?
In my experience the match up vs Ichorid is generally 50/50. You'll win the games where you go the belcher route and lose the games you go the ETW route.
Also, if you're going to test Wild Cantor in any spot it's going to be in the Timber Wall slot, but you're correct you don't need mana fixing until you run a list with spoils and even then the difference between Cantor and Timber are pretty negligable.
I have picked this deck up again recently, and have an idea for a sideboard - as we have to pack GY hate, what do you guys think of putting 4 Leyline of the Void and 3 Helm of Obedience in as an alternate win against GY based decks, as well as against decks that bring in Pithing Needle on Belcher?
Seems bad. Your devoting half the sb to one matchup that isn't even that bad for you. After Xantid Swarm you have 4 tool box cards left. I don't see how Helm of Obedience is even a win condition.. Explain it to me if I'm wrong. And pithing needle isn't THAT bad. Empty the warrens or burning wish for shattering spree.Quote:
Originally Posted by yankeedave
In short, if you have Leyline of the Void in play and activate Helm of Obedience (X>0) the opponent's whole library is removed from the game.
Interesting... I still don't really know if its worth it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hopo
I'd say that the Helmline combo would be a nice alternative to Belcher. bThery Needle Belch, you go, 'ok, HElm x=1, gg?'
X can't be zero on helm. Read the rules text. I don't see it helping at all; belcher is a one card combo, whereas leyline + helm is 2 cards that you need in hand. Seems a lot harder to set up unless you go the spoils route which is terribly weak against ichorid if you lose half your life using spoils.
Nice tournament report. Stupid sneak attack.
Ok guys, I have played this deck in the past and had a bit of success but I was thinking about it for the upcoming big events in legacy's future. For me mainly:
SCG Open: Indy
GP: Columbus
Legacy Champs
Here is my list and I need some help with the board. Plus what is everyones play/draw stratagy? I always thought you opt to draw but I am not sure if that is right against all decks due to daze. Also against what decks do you go off ASAP and what decks do you wait until they have lethal on board? Lastly what is your default plan if they are on the play and you see a blue dual land?
// Lands
1 Taiga
1 Bayou
// Creatures
4 Tinder Wall
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Simian Spirit Guide
// Spells
3 Empty the Warrens
4 Chrome Mox
4 Goblin Charbelcher
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
4 Rite of Flame
4 Desperate Ritual
3 Manamorphose
4 Seething Song
4 Burning Wish
4 Land Grant
4 Dark Ritual
// Sideboard
SB: 1 Empty the Warrens
SB: 4 Xantid Swarm
SB: 1 Duress
SB: 1 Tendrils of Agony
SB: 1 Shattering Spree
SB: 1 Reverent Silence
SB: 1 Deathmark
SB: 3 Ingot Chewer
SB: 1 Infernal Tutor
SB: 1 Goblin War Strike
Oh, and what the hell do I take out? I have been leaning towards manamorphose but...I honestly have no clue.
Why do you want to take anything out? Its a pretty canned list that doesn't need anything else.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kilz88
Honestly, I don't think this is the right deck for the meta you'll find at a "big" legacy event. Because big legacy events will be heavy in blue, and with the printing of mindbreak trap you really wont stand much of a chance. Look at tournament results, theres a reason this deck rarely top 8's with anything above 40 people.
Your sure?Quote:
Originally Posted by JonBarber
SCG: Philly 6th
SCG: LA 8th & T16
Side Event @ PT: SD: 6th
Side Event @ GP: Minneapolis: Top 2 Split between 2 belcher decks
GPT Madrid: 3rd
SCG: Richmond 9th
http://www.deckcheck.net/list.php?ty...acy&sort=edate
Counting side events is iffy. And most of those events on deckcheck are under 40 people, so my words hold true. Sure it pops up in the 4-8 occasionally, but its significantly better in meta's with lower numbers of people. Compare it to the number of top 8's by ANT, and its clear to see it doesn't put up the same results. It has 4 sb protection spells (5 if you count the duress), which really isn't enough in most developed metas. Your welcome to compete with it, but belcher decks are rarely seen as a serious threat. I play the deck and I love it, but I don't think I'd play it at any major events.Quote:
Originally Posted by Damoxx
You miss, GP Madrid, 18thQuote:
Originally Posted by Damoxx
I consider Belcher to be a serious threat, but nobody plays it.
The other 4-0 deck at the Pro Tour side event was a Belcher player. I squeaked by with a bit of luck and he got eliminated by Enchantress of all things to finish in 5th or 6th place (extra round + cut to top 4, so he was out). I consistently see a Belcher or two hanging around the top tables. You can't confuse the lack of a tournament win (or the lack of extremely high-density high placement finishes) with the deck being bad. There just aren't very many people playing Belcher. I think just that guy in the PT and in the other two SCGs events (the ones we have data for), there were only like 6 people playing it and 4 of them finished 17th place or better.
I've never seen a Belcher player win less than half of its matches, and many that put up very impressive finishes.
You invited the ANT comparison, so I'll point this out: ANT has a few tournament wins, but also tons and tons of people play the deck. Saito and Do Anne are just the tip of the iceberg, you don't see the 50 or 100 ANT players who finished out of the money, out of day 2, and even with a sub-50% win ratio.
I piloted Belcher to 3-3 drop at Madrid and really enjoyed my day. I felt I had a chance against almost everyone and always won at least one game in every match. I would have won my last match before I dropped, but I kept a questionable hand and paid for it against discard. I feel that this deck is against a lot of the field, as long as you are willing to bring Xantid Swarm against every single deck in the format due to Mindbreak Trap!
When I said "take something out" I meant side out. Sorry for the confusion. I meant what do you guys take out for the 4 swarms and stuff. Also, I agree with the guys posting all the good placements. The deck in the past 6 months has actually been somewhere in the top 16 of a LOT of the big tournaments. Richmond was a big deal to me. It was 200+ players and it got 9th. Probably on tie breakers.
The good news about the meta is this, yes there are some blue decks, but there also is a TON of zoo. A match which this deck actually CANT lose. The only time it can is in the case of mindbreak trap which if you havenet noticed, no one actually uses. Don't get me wrong they totally should. Especially 43 Land. (Another auto-win for belcher). I'd say the worst match up for this deck is gonna be blue decks that also play removal like swords or lightning bolt. Because if they for some reason leave it in post board then you will probably lose you swarm. Decks like merfolk are a much better match up post board. They have too many "must counters" and all their counters are daze/cursecatcher.
Anyway, keep it coming guys, lemme know what you think.
How is counting side events iffy? Serious players make it out to those too, and the top tables will always be filled with decent to good players. If you're top 8ing those, the deck is doing something right, dodging blue decks or not. You're also discounting the three recent SCG events it has placed in, as well as 18th place at the late 2200+ player GP Madrid.Quote:
Originally Posted by JonBarber
I'm not saying the deck is the amazing answer to the format either, but I'm saying you're giving it a lot less credit than it deserves. The speed and resilience is actually pretty scary when you're on the other side of the table. And yes, Forbiddian has a point as well: very few people take the deck to major events because everyone always rags on how inconsistent the deck is. In all honesty, this is far from the truth, and these placements are testament. Considering most SCG events have only and will only ever have <5 Belcher players, those are some pretty solid results.
The deck is inconsistent, that is why it is known to be a glass cannon. You tend to take the first match, as people aren't expecting the deck, then lose the second one, and then win the 3rd when you are on the play again. Sadly, my meta has caught onto this and will mulligan aggressively into Mindbreak Trap, making the Swarm more necessary than ever, which turns their removal back on. I don't think I would take this to a major event again, but I did have a blast playing it at Madrid. I just got ver tired of having 35+ mins to kill every round!
Dave
I posted this on the storm boards, figured I should post it here as well. I took this deck to my local tournament and made it to the finals, but lost out in the final match. Here is the list I played followed by a very brief summary:
4x Belcher
3x EtW
4x Burning Wish
4x Blood Moon
4x ESG
4x SSG
4x Tinder Wall
4x Street Wraith
4x Rite of Flame
4x Seething Song
4x Desperate Ritual
4x LED
4x Petal
4x Mox
4x Land Grant
1x Taiga
SB
4x Xantid Swarm
3x Shattering Spree
3x Serum Powder
Wish Targets
1x EtW
1x Telemin Performance
1x Shattering Spree
1x Reverent Silence
1x Pyroclasm
Round 1 - UG Survival Madness w/ Force and Daze with Chill in the board.
G1 - I ask if he has a Force, turn 1 Empty for 14 on the play beats most decks in the format!
G2 - I board in Swarms for Blood Moons and resolve a Swarm on turn 1. He drops Chill on turn 2 which is just sickening, as my has has Rite, Desperate and Seething Song. No matter though, a turn before I die I draw my last initial mana source and Belch him out with Xantid protection!
Round 2 - Zoo
G1 - Turn 1 Belcher, turn 2 activate.
G2 - Turn 1 Empty for 12 ... he loses is very short order.
Round 3 - Glimpse Elves
G1 - Turn 1 Belcher Activate with Land Grant in hand!
G2 - Turn 1 Empty for 12 easily gets there.
Round 4 - ID
Round 5 - ID
Round 6 - Reanimator
G1 - Turn 1 Moon but he has 2/3 Petals in his deck ... Iona on red on turn 2.
G2 - Both mull to 6, I Empty for 8 turn 1, run into Force, but my 6 goblins get there!
G3 - I mull to 5 and he mulls to 3! This was sick. I win on turn 3 after I rip Belcher off the top on turn 2 and activate it turn 3!
Round 7 - Uwb CB Weird Stuff
G1 - Turn 1 Moon and I proceed to draw pure fucking shit then get locked out of the game after he draws both his basic islands and casts CB then Jace.
G2 - Turn 1 Swarm, turn 4 Belcher + LED.
G3 - Turn 1 Moon locks him out this time. I Ritual out a SSG and he gets there in 8 turns! Moon was pure devastation in this matchup.
Round 8 - Piece of shit who played out the top 4 at 1:20 A.M. and the finals at 2:15 A.M. on a wednesday night (some of us have work during the weekdays, inconsiderate dick): UWg Probasco CB garbage
G1 - He gets a nuts draw and I mull down to 5 since I am unable to find an IMS or a wincon.
G2 - My opening hand is: 2x ESG, Tinder Wall, Desperate Ritual, Rite of Flame, Empty the Warrens, Petal. He keeps his opening 7 so I know he has Force, I play out Petal, Wall, sac wall and decide to cast Desperate Ritual first since if that gets countered I save Rite for another day, it resolves, I play Rite, he Forces, double ESG into Empty for 12, GG.
G3 - I mull to 5 or 6, he keeps his opening 7 yet again, and it seems he just has an answer for everything I do. The CB shit normally doesn't run this good, but his deck was just loving him. I EtW on turn 2 for 8. They get in a swing before he plays Trinket Mage fetching EE. He then plays: CB on turn 4, Top + Goyf on turn 5, another Goyf on turn 6. Sad times :( I leave the store at 2:45 A.M. ..... we now have a new store policy to avoid this in the future, but come on, this is fucking ridiculous. I don't give a shit that I lost, its the principal, this is probably the most selfish act I have ever seen in Magic, even one of the store owners (the one who was there at the time) was advising a split because he ... has to work in the morning, but he couldn't force a split so we can leave. Even after the owner said "lets wrap this up", he asked the owner if we could pick up the finals next wednesday and the owner just scoffed and walked away, as we began to play out the finals.
I have to say, Blood Moon was .... AWESOME! The matchups where it was worthless it is still better than Manamorphose in every way. Moon adds the same amount of mana that Manamorphose does and gives you 15 bombs instead of 11. Extra storm that Manamorphose adds does not make up for how amazing this card is when you have to mulligan and open up that sick had with 2x rituals and the Burning Wish you can't possibly cast but see a Moon. This list is just stupid fast and is certainly the most consistent Belcher list I have ever tested. The board was great. Serum Powder is there for the matchups you have to mull really hard for a Belcher kill, or is just better than Moon, Wraith, or Seething Song (always sided out 3 in the blue matchups and brought in Powder).
I tried siding in the 4th EtW in the CB matchups so I can keep a hand without Swarm and Powder gives me the ability to mulliigan aggressively into it. I am not sure if this is the correct play but, it seemed to work out pretty well. I have has such bad experience with BW in the past against CB because it forces you to go all-in. I really want to replace Telemin Performance with some kind of sorcery that makes a flying token of some kind so that card isn't totally worthless. I just really like EtW for playing into Force and defying that card and not making me keep marginal hands with Swarm in them.
Telemin Performance was not played but I didn't play against a single combo deck or Garden. I still really like Telemin Performance, especially against Reanimator, that would be cool as hell and most likely better than Goblin tokens that attack once and meet Blazing Archon a turn later; your chances of hitting an Iona are quite good! Thoughts, comments?
The Bloodmoon strategy is really cool, I tried using Bloodmoon/Magus of the Moon in the past in the G/r builds and they just randomly boned the opponent when I had an otherwise unkeepable hand. I also managed to Living Wish into a Magus of the Moon quite often and make opponent's just drop their jaw to that awesome bit of tech.
Also, I think Balance of Power (yeah, look it up) is a seriously underrated SB card for Belcher considering it's clearly superior to Diminishing Returns on T1 and you easily have the mana for it compared to TES considering Manamorphose and all. It's a significant improvement to the deck's non Empty the Warrens win rates for sure. Go go random crap from Portal :)
Not certain what you'd use for flying token generator Sorceries other than Decree of Justice, but I've tried it before and the CC was too much.
Quote:
Originally Posted by yankeedave
I don't think so, the deck can actually go off fairly consistently.
The main reson why noone plays this: There is no skill involved. You mulligan until you have something keepable and then hope the opponent doesn't have anything to stop you.
Of course sometimes this will pay off, but especially players who are better than most of their opponents would rather decide the match with playskill than with praying.
Blood Moon is a lot better than Magus IMOP. Firespout can't answer it! Living Wish is interesting, it seems a worthy replacement to Street Wraith since he serves no other purpose than adding randomness and making the deck 56 cards. But there are numerous hands where you open up all acceleration + Street Wraith, were that a Living Wish you could wish for Magus or Deus t1, or in the blue matchups you could get Swarm.Quote:
Originally Posted by BreathWeapon
What do you think would be worthy Living Wish targets in a Rg build? Off the top of my head I think:
Magus of the Moon is an auto-include.
Deus of Calamity would be absolutely fucking devastating turn 1 against almost anything, and it seems superior to Demigod of Revenge in that it doesn't give them a chance to recover, it just Stone Rains them until they are dead.
Ingot Chewer seems excellent as it makes Living Wish another out to CotV or Trinisphere or Needle.
I think 1 more would be excellent so I could cut Telemin Performance and have 4x BW targets, 4x LW targets, and 4x Swarm and 3x Serum Powder in the board. I loved this thing, it helped out a TON in some problem matchups.
What other creature could you wish for that would be devastating? Eternal Witness seems meh, Blurred Mongoose and Scragnoth are funny as hell but probably not very effective. How many good targets can you think of BreathWeapon?
Don't you have too many "Non-add-mana" cards?. 4 LW, 4 BW, 3 Empty the Warrens and 4 Goblin charbelcher.
This could let you many hands with 2 of them and not enough mana to explode at T1.
You forgot 4x Blood Moon as well. And no, I have not cut a single bit of acceleration for any of these cards. Manamorphose is shit so thats a dead spot, and Street Wraith is filler, so not missing out on anything there.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gocho
And I know the response to this "well just think of SW as acceleration", which is quite wrong, about 67% of the time SW will be what you think it is and the other you will draw additional wincons which adds, IMOP, excessive variance. I like Street Wraith in the deck but ... he is quite worthless, if they ever printed another green/red ritual he would be out of the deck so fast.
But I am not advocating that anyone play my lists, just testing things out and trying a new approach to Belcher. Now that Stax and Dragon Stompy have died out in my meta, it seems a great time to bring the turn-1-wonder back! I don't think Living Wish is pushing things too far at all, jesus, it adds threat density and 2/3 of the entire deck is acceleration! But I will see how it works out. LW may be pure shit, you just never know.
I would not play Manamorphose AND Street Wraith (or Blood Moon AND Living Wish in the slots), but I agree that LW would worth the test.
What about Vexing Susher in the Wish target free slot?
What your doing is messing up the ratio of accel to non accel cards in the deck though. Street wraiths and manamorphoses essentially remove 8 cards from the deck. That gives you a 11:41 ratio of accel vs. win cons. Thats roughly a 1-4 average meaning you should have roughly one win con in a hand of 7. If you remove streeth wraiths and manamorphoses for other shit, your now looking at a 19:41 ratio, which then almost becomes a 1-3 instead of 1-4. This will make the average hand have 2 win cons it, meaning less acceleration. On the surface the draw cards seem useless, but they play a very important role in the deck.Quote:
Originally Posted by Pulp_Fiction
I am not advocating playing what I do, just trying a new approach. And I promise you, I have played a lot of storm combo, I understand the numbers. It would be nice to not lose to a single Duress though. Manamorphose is garbage, I would not run this card ever, Street Wraith .. ehh, it gets boarded out most of the time that Moons are worthwhile, threat density is important, but I understand your arguments.Quote:
Originally Posted by JonBarber
Slithermuse is strictly better, although it's not fetchable with Burning Wish. It's another possible Living Wish-target though, for those who are considering that route.Quote:
Originally Posted by BreathWeapon
Forgot about him, Slithermuse is interesting, its a lot like another Serum Powder, especially against a deck like Enchantress or Lands where you mull into a hand of all acceleration and LW, you open 7 cards and have great chances of hitting a win con with the decks threat density. I am not sure how necessary it is but its certainly interesting.Quote:
Originally Posted by NiRVeS
I have been giving a lot of thought to Tomb or Urami and Gargoyle Castle. I like Castle better since it does not require an LED to cast.
Karakas is also an awesome answer to Reanimator, but between all the Moon effects and pure speed, playing defense with probably the most explosive deck in the format seems bad.
I see people using Ingot Chewer over Shattering Spree. What are the pros and cons for both cards? I am trying to figure out which one I want to use.
You see people playing him in belcher? Well its pretty obvious what the difference is: shattering spree is a sorcery, ingot is a creature. Therefore burning wish can get shattering spree. Also, shattering spree can take out multiple targets. There shouldn't really be any question there as to whats better..Quote:
Originally Posted by j-flo
Yes, they are using ingot chewer in the sideboard. Multiple belcher decks on deck check and the deck that top sixteened at the most recent star city games open were all using 4 chewer in their board. There has to be a reason behind this right?
Takes out Chalice@1 for R less, can somewhat fight through countertop by aiming for the Top and using artifact mana to combo out that turn. That, and targeting multiple artifacts is rarely relevant (although bein able to take out Needle against an opponent holding counters is nice). Overall I'd say SS is better since it is more versatile versus blue decks, which are Belchers only truly bad MU.