[Deck] Belcher

[Brehn]

You don't want to cut Land Grant as it's an initial mana source which can start your engine and improves your Belcher. I've seen Elvish Spirit Guides and Seething Songs being cut for a 2nd land or more Blasts and it feels better for me, but as long as nobody comes up with actual numbers it's just a matter of taste.

[BreathWeapon]

You shouldn't run more than 4 Blasts main, with more than that it becomes too hard to combo. And Xantid main doesn't look good either, it will be bad too many times and it's not even a good color on a Mox. With the SB you can do pretty much anything you want, Belcher's SB isn't very strong anyway because if you board more than 4 cards it becomes inconsistent and if you don't have a land probably won't have mana to cast the Welders/Swarms/whatever and still combo.

@Sacearuse:How can you combo half of the time with Goblin charbelcher when only 4/11 (appr.36%) of your wincons are Belcher?

The number of Blasts in the MD has nothing to do with whether or not the deck can/can't combo unless the Blasts are replacing Serum Powder, and Serum Powder is too much of a tell in the MD. You don't keep a hand with Street Wraith hoping to draw into more mana, and Wild Cantor's mana fixing is moot in a 2c deck. If you aren't running 8 Blasts, you can't count on a Blast being in your opening hand, and that changes the Threshold % by a lot.

You seriously don't need 2 lands, or even want 2 lands. I've lost more games to a failed Belcher activation than I have from not being able to find another Taiga. If you have 2 Land Grant, just imprint one on a Chrome Mox or cast it for storm. Top decking dead Land Grants and having to wait another turn to combo isn't nearly as bad as failing to kill with the Belcher and waiting turns to try it again.

You already choke about 1 in 10 times with Belcher, choking 1/5 times is totally unacceptable.

Unless you're playing with Serum Powder or casting Burning Wish for Diminishing Returns, there's no way you're winning an equal amount of games with Warrens and Belcher. It's a 7 to 4 ratio if you count Burning Wish as additional copies of Warrens, and you should.

[raudo]

I browsed through all my cards trying to find a card to replace the weak Wild Cantor / Pyroblast slot. I don't know how stupid idea this is but I'm going to test 2-4 Winds of Change. Probably the casting cost of R can still be too much to spend but I'd like to find it out.

If opening hand is something like this (like it usually is) Winds of Change can give you a chance:

Lion's Eye Diamond
(Wild Cantor) Winds of Change
Chrome Mox
Simian Spirit Guide
Desperate Ritual
Rite of Flame
Seething Song

Play LED, Discard Simian, play Winds of Change. Get Burning Wish, Lotus Petal, Elvish Spirit Guide and Land Grant. There is just enough mana to go for Empty the Warrens.

[Nihil Credo]

Street Wraith or even Serum Powder seem both miles better than Winds of Change. They fulfill the same role - helping bad draws - for zero mana.

[Slay]

Street Wraith should be in this deck. It makes one mana on average, which is usually exactly what you need.
-Slay

[BreathWeapon]

Street Wraith should be in this deck. It makes one mana on average, which is usually exactly what you need.
-Slay

That's troublesome tho', because Street Wraith shouldn't be counted on drawing into what you need, he's just there to make already good hands better. Even on the draw, it's speculative at best.

[Slay]

That's troublesome tho', because Street Wraith shouldn't be counted on drawing into what you need, he's just there to make already good hands better. Even on the draw, it's speculative at best.

There is an ~80% chance that Street Wraith will be a ESG or better. In a deck which is purely statistical, those are odds I like.
-Slay

[Iranon]

For those questioning the number of lands...

The chance of a Belcher activation dealing more than 19 points of damage if you have 52 cards left in your library are roughly

81% (1 Taiga left), 65% (2 Taigas left) or 57% (1 Taiga, 1 Bayou left).

This surprised me a little; especially the difference between both 2-land variants (it felt larger in actual play).


***

Personally, I never liked the blasts much, favouring Storm Entity as a cheap win condition that shines if they try to counter your mana sources. They're also quite good at bringing home a game that started off with a lacklustre goblin swarm and can turn useless hands into merely sucky hands.

[Wallace]

Why would you even consider Winds of Change? You wan't gain any cards off of it, shuffle in like one maybe two cards, draw 1-2?

Street wraith is really good in belcher, I have been running it for a month now and like the results I have gotten with it. I aslo have droped to 1 Taiga insted of two, you really don't need two and one works just fine.

[BreathWeapon]

There is an ~80% chance that Street Wraith will be a ESG or better. In a deck which is purely statistical, those are odds I like.
-Slay

And the other 20% is as good as GG. Belcher is built on statistics, but it isn't built to withstand variance. Relying on your Street Wraith or your 8th card to fix your hand is often worse than just taking a mulligan unless your mulligan is diminimus. Those implied Time Walks add up really, really fast at a tournament if you're not careful about it.

[Slay]

And the other 20% is as good as GG. Belcher is built on statistics, but it isn't built to withstand variance. Relying on your Street Wraith or your 8th card to fix your hand is often worse than just taking a mulligan unless your mulligan is diminimus. Those implied Time Walks add up really, really fast at a tournament if you're not careful about it.

I'd much rather hope my 8th card or Street Wraith brings me up to the 7 or 4 mana required to win than mulligan and risk mulling into oblivion. Street Wraith may not be the best card in the world, but it's better than any other choices for the deck(like shitty Wild Cantor or Living Wish). Besides, if my hand required Street Wraith to be something good to bail me out of it, I'd be mulliganing anyways.

And if you honestly think mulliganing is better than taking a 4/5 chance that you win the game, you should NEVER be allowed to touch Belcher.
-Slay

[BreathWeapon]

No, I'm saying if you don't have a hand that can commit a threat to the board on your first turn, you should ship it. If you're relying on Street Wraith in order to do that for you, you have to ask yourself whether or not you want to play with Serum Powder instead. If you just want to gamble on .8 of a mana source, as opposed to Serum Powder mulligans, mulligans, mulligans into Serum Powder mulligans etc. that's you're business, but the deck was built around mulliganing, and I've seen no math that backs .8 mana source .2 Time Walk being better than whatever Street Wraith is replacing + mulligans.

The decision has to be numbers based, but presuming that Street Wraith is superior to just mulligans, when the status quo was mulliganing before Street Wraith was printed, isn't an argument.

[Nihil Credo]

Serum Powder, as a statistical enhancer, has one huge drawback over Street Wraith: it forces you to reveal your hand. It's uniquely terrible on the play, as any opponent will instantly mulligan into FoW or any answer they may have in the maindeck (EE, Needle, etc.); but it's annoying on the draw too, since it lets your opponent know that, for example, he should go for Turn 1 Brainstorm instead of Turn 1 Mongoose, or Turn 1 Duress instead of Turn 1 Ritual -> Negator.

It may be slightly better than SW at fixing bad hands, but that issue alone solidly pushes it into second place.

[Slay]

Serum Powder is worse than Street Wraith for the reasons Nihil said, but it's also terrible in the midgame too. Street Wraith is never a dead card, so even in a very few scenarios where it's slightly worse than Serum Powder, it's still the superior card.
-Slay

[aTn]

Has anyone tried Last Chance or Warrior's Oath as possible Burning Wish targets in the sideboard ? I don't see it as a great idea, but here's what I thought:

It lets you get an extra turn to be able to attack with ETW tokens for the win: for example, you resolve ETW on turn one (on the play), you attack with tokens on your second turn and resolve Last Chance, you then attack with ETW token on your extra turn (your opponent will not have the opportunity to resolve Engineered Explosives or Pyroclasm - assuming he plays no acceleration like Chrome Mox, etc.). It also gives you the opportunity to resolve Belcher and get an extra turn to activate it. I think it's circumstantial at best... just an idea.

[Wallace]

Has anyone tried Last Chance or Warrior's Oath as possible Burning Wish targets in the sideboard ? I don't see it as a great idea, but here's what I thought:

It lets you get an extra turn to be able to attack with ETW tokens for the win: for example, you resolve ETW on turn one (on the play), you attack with tokens on your second turn and resolve Last Chance, you then attack with ETW token on your extra turn (your opponent will not have the opportunity to resolve Engineered Explosives or Pyroclasm - assuming he plays no acceleration like Chrome Mox, etc.). It also gives you the opportunity to resolve Belcher and get an extra turn to activate it. I think it's circumstantial at best... just an idea.

Its sounds ok but I think Goblin War Strike is just a better all around idea. Serves almost the same purpose and doesn't cause you to lose if something goes wrong.

[Shriekmaw]

Its sounds ok but I think Goblin War Strike is just a better all around idea. Serves almost the same purpose and doesn't cause you to lose if something goes wrong.

I've seen Goblin War Strike in a lot of boards for both TES and Belcher. I never ran the card because I found that almost all the time you combo out via warrens, you don't have another wish to war strike the opponent out. I would rather use my slots in the board for more useful wish targets or cards against the tough matchups.

The rough matchups are basically any decks that play "blue" cards. :)

[aTn]

I never ran the card because I found that almost all the time you combo out via warrens, you don't have another wish to war strike the opponent out.

I totally agree (this applies also to my suggestions). That's why I found them circumstantial at best.

Even playing four-ofs in the SB and siding them in wouldn't guarantee the play situations I mentioned would happen (and it would be a waste of SB slots).

EDIT: I agree with you Sacearuse, Warstrike is better than Last Chance.

[Wallace]

I've seen Goblin War Strike in a lot of boards for both TES and Belcher. I never ran the card because I found that almost all the time you combo out via warrens, you don't have another wish to war strike the opponent out. I would rather use my slots in the board for more useful wish targets or cards against the tough matchups.

The rough matchups are basically any decks that play "blue" cards. :)

I was just saying that compaired to Final Fortune/Last Chance, warstrike is better.

[asdljas]

Sometimes, I wish for Goblin Warstrike before I Empty the Warrens. It comes up where I have both the wish and EtW, and I can do both with my mana. Goblin Warstrike doesn't add to the storm count, but I can always get it, combo, and hold it to cast the next turn when my Taiga or Chrome Mox untaps. It can't be bad as a one-of in the board. It makes your EtW kill one turn faster, which is sometimes relevant.

For those of us considering cutting 1 Taiga, and running one-land Belcher: should we cut a land grant, and go down to three? If so, are there viable options for additional free mana?

Also, I run four Rite of Flame in the main deck. Sometimes, I'd like to wish for a ritual effect though. Does anyone have any input on this? Should I be running one Rite in the board, or maybe a Seething Song or something?