[Deck] Belcher

[feline]

Yea, that turn 1 Empty The Warrens usually spells "good game". But when you go turn 1 "Remove Simian Spirit Guide for a red, cast Rite of Flame" only to be met with Force of Will while you're holding what would have been a turn 1 Empty The Warrens with 6 or 7 storm, you pretty much just cry inside.

My meta is so blue heavy that Belcher just doesn't get there. It seems like every opponent in my meta is packing Force, Stifle & Daze. You either play blue here, or die to blue. It kinda sucks. I like the TES lists that run Orim's chant or Silence or both just because of all the blue here. But Belcher doesn't have that luxury. IF I could figure out how to beat blue with this deck on a consistant basis, I'd ram it down thier throat! I love playing it.

I have both Xantid Swarm & Autumn's Veil in my belcher sideboard, when I first start playing magic again, the first deck I updated was my belcher deck, played it a few times at Exalted games of Tacoma but haven't played it yet at Comics Cube, at first it was because at the Comics Cube meta it would have just been unfair, but now the metagame is a true indicator of type 1.5, so now I don't play it because of the same reason I rarely push it at Exalted, all the blue makes it tough, I have actually gotten a 1st with it once at Exalted, but in the finals, I went against Maverick, which knocked out RUG the previous round, I basically got lucky and didn't run into any bad match up's.

One "trick" if they know how to fight belcher, is when you get an Empty the Warrens In your opening hand, you start going off and when they wait to counter your Seething Song or whatever else, basically, waiting to counter after you've put 3 mana in the pool, wasting as many of your cards as possible to really put you out, instead of burning some of that mana to produce more mana and then get setback, just use one of the 8 spirit guides Elvish Spirit Guide Simian Spirit Guide for that 4th mana, and then cast Empty the Warrens off that for enough tokens to get there. The harder part however is the "counter your Burning Wish / Goblin Charbelcher.

[Vacrix]

Has anyone thought about playing a man plan in the Belcher sideboard provided you have either a Wishless build or a micro sideboard? Creatures dodge Spell Pierce, Flusterstorm, often Spell Snare, and typically you can use a spare ESG/SSG, or even LED to pay for Daze. That leaves Force of Will. Theres quite a lot of RUG and Merfolk that have absolutely no answers to creatures with X > 3 toughness. Only decks with STP, Terminus, Counterspell, etc. will have an easier time with this strategy but they often play longer games which means you have more opportunities to fuck with their mana base with Moon effects, or even bust out Thrun and watch their jaw drop.

Here's some Brainstorming for discussion:

Creatures:
Deus of Calamity - Tramples, quite large, and destroys lands
Goblin Chieftain - combos with Empty the Warrens
Magus of the Moon - punishes an opponent for getting greedy with their mana base
Thrun, the Last Troll - difficult to remove

These are a stretch but their might be something in here thats worth running:

Sulfur Elemental - stops, thalia, mom, and friends
Dosan the Falling Leaf - anti-countermagic measure
Hellrider - combos with empty the warrens quite well
Leatherback Baloth - efficient for the cost
Goblin Lookout - doesn't give goblins haste but thats always going to be relevant. in this case, he makes an empty the warrens for 8 + this guy is now 21 damage at your face.
Grim Lavamancer - Reach, removal, etc.
Molten Steel Dragon - 4 for a 4/4 flying is decent (and pay 4 life), the firebreathing seems useful for closing quickly on the life total
Mungha Wurm - 6/5 for 4. untapping 1 land per turn is irrelevant as a drawback
Omnath, Locus of Mana - 3 mana, combos with Carpet of Flowers REALLY well, and LEDs and lands
Desolation Giant - Blow the board? Not so good when you are sitting on tokens, but if you have a lot of them then you probably won anyway. If you don't, they might have put up a wall or overcommited with their creatures. This would be a nice way to reset things with a 3/3 on your side. Getting WW might be tough unless you have Carpet/Petal/MM.
Rakdos Pit Dragon - Another guy in the 4cc slot. Potentially is evasive, potential double strike (its not hard to get hellbent), as well as firebreathing
River Boa - Island walk is pretty good, and regeneration laughs at Burn removal.
Shizuko, Caller of Autumn - Extra mana each turn to cast fat guys. It seems like it would only be good in a build that can abuse the mana better htan the opponent can. Omnath seems legit with this, and Leatherback Baloth, Mungha Worm, etc. So the green creatures rather than the red ones.
Silvos, Rogue Elemental - For 6, which is pretty steep, he gets 8 power, trample and regeneration. Pretty beast.
Storm Entity - Small dude but he can get pretty big if he's cast from the opening hand.
Tarmogoyf - Had to include your friendly neighborhood spidergoyf.
Terra Stomper - Another in the 6cc slot. Probably better than Silvos since he's not counterable.
Thunderscape Master - Seemed like an interesting guy at 4cc. He has some reach on him, easier to kill, but he also pumps up Goblins.
Vexing Shusher - Protect your spells.


Non-creature:
Bloodmoon - Would accompany Magus nicely if +4 moon effects are optimal.



The non-creature list is currently small cause I actually looked through nearly 100 pages for the creatures so I'm done for today. I think this concept is worth exploring though. Granted, people leave in removal for Xantid Swarms, but if you can drop something like Thrun, what are they gonna do? Or Terrastomper while they are holding that Force? Carpet of Flowers is seriously nuts when you play the long game and creatures like these help you get there.

[ahg113]

I've been thinking of going a creature route base as well. The cards that most appeal to me are:
Vexing Shusher
Demigod of Revenge
Deus of Calamity
Hellspark Elemental
Ball Lightning
Blistering Firecat
Lightning Serpent
Lava Runner(just because I already own the card...)

Either a solid bang for your buck (red haste creatures), real utility (Shusher), fat (Deus) or resistance, recursion (Demigod).

I've gone wishless, and have no real desire to go back to a wish sb. That said, I really enjoy having 4 Carpet of Flowers and 2 Mirri's Guile. After those 6, I feel as though my selections are good, but nothing too over the top. I also have 4 Xanthid Swarm, 3 Pyroblast and 2 Defense Grid. In any iteration, I'd keep the Flowers and Guile.

And for the actual deck when SB, what comes out? With adding creatures (not swarm), we're effectively chanigng the wincons of the deck, so Charbelcher, EtW or RtS should come out. Probably leaning toward Charbelcher coming out first, but that's food for thought. I wouldn't want to keep the 11 wincons (counting RtS) in and then add creatures on top of it.

Cheers,
food for thought

[Vacrix]

I like the idea of Demigod since if they say trade playing RUG with a Delver and a Bolt, it comes back 2 'fold when you draw the second one. Also, correct me if I'm wrong but when you cast Demi God, it doesn't need to resolve for the other ones to come into play so countermagic doesn't really matter with this guy. If thats how it works by the way (really hope so), I'm so fucking testing this guy. He flies as well and is just out of single spell Burn range.

I think Deus is probably the next strongest choice.

Magus of the Moon might also be good but not right now considering there are so many decks playing heavy basics. It used to be way better.

I'm leaning towards Belchers and BW coming out, unless BW was already cut, and then you board in land and carpets. Man plans don't work without perpetuals. Empty the Warrens still seems pretty strong post-board so I'd definitely leave that in.


I'll do a bit of testing soon and see how this plan works and get back to you.

[ahg113]

So, spit balling a creature/land sb here...

4 Carpet of Flowers
2 Mirri's Guile
4 Demigod of Revenge
2 Forest based duals
3 Magus of the Moon

Two forest lands to improve Land Grant, Magus of the Moon to get utility disruption out of our creature addition, and Demigod as a new wincon. Aside from Carpet and Mirri's Guile, there are no necessary green spells for us to cast. Chrome Mox, Lotus Petal, and ESG are all unaffected by Magus.

I think siding out Belcher is a given, that's 4. Another 8 cards would typically be cantrips, but I'd rather keep them in this set-up. I guess a proper deck list is needed before talking about what to take out. I'm a fan of keeping RtS, in order to restock the hand.

You're right too, when you cast Demigod, the others recur. Stifle would probably stop it, but it's pretty immune to conventional counterspells. It's a pain to cast, but a good payoff.
The dream (totally convoluted) is to have Mirri's Guile and LED in play. put a cantrip on top, with Demigod next. Draw the cantrip, play, pop LED in response, pitching some number of Demigods already in hand, draw and play Demigod, profit. A bastard version of Miracle so to say.

[Vacrix]

Sylvan Library has some advantages over Guile. Library not only lets you rearrange the top 3 but for the extra mana (though this opens you up to Snare), lets you draw extra cards, which means you could be drawing as many as 3 cards a turn. Belcher has an easy time rebuilding with that kind of draw engine. It usually just needs about 6 cards in hand to go off. If you pay 8 life twice, you could have a 6 cards in hand + whatever is left.

Then again, Guile does have the LED/cantrip trick. I think Manamorphose often comes out though post-board, so given that, I don't think this play will come up often enough to warrant Guile. Actually I was thinking about a business substitution. Instead of trying to board out the heavy rituals for protection and such, why not instead sideout Belchers and BW (if you play it) for the creature plan which dodges Pierce, Thalia, and Flusterstorm, which are all typical U answers to storm combo. Daze is pretty easy to play around since the deck has so much mana and instant speed spirit guide tricks. That leaves Counterspell, which needs UU to use which is great with Carpet of Flowers, and then you have Spell Snare, which is largely irrelevant if you lack Wish (which they will probably save it for), and Library if it winds up being good. And of course, Force of Will, but Demigod even dodges THAT if you have already tried to play one, or perhaps traded with the opponent's Coralhelm Commander, or RUG's Delver + Bolt.

I think if Belchers are definitely coming out, Taiga's should come in for sure. Fewer dead land grants and more perpetual mana sources is good for a deck thats trying to hard cast creatures that cost 5, even with multiple acceleration.

[SBGpinas]

The biggest problem in my experience with the Wishless build is that I find that you mulligan more often, because of the fact that you have 3 less Kill-conditions in the deck vs. a Burning Wish build.

That said, I am working on the assumption that No Kill-Cons in the opening hand is a mull, regardless of how many cantrips you have in hand. I have tried gambling at times, but it seldom works out.

I would have to disagree with people saying that the Burning Wish build leaves you more open to counters. Experienced players I've encountered don't need to counter Belcher, EtW or BW - they counter whatever brings you to 4 mana in the pool, so regardless of having BW or EtW in hand, you're still screwed.

[Vacrix]

Thats only in the pre-board. Post-board in wishless builds you can run stuff like Carpet of Flowers. If they don't counter it, or you hold on to it and let them crack their fetchlands first, then you should have no problem getting to 4 or 5 mana.

[SBGpinas]

Thats only in the pre-board. Post-board in wishless builds you can run stuff like Carpet of Flowers. If they don't counter it, or you hold on to it and let them crack their fetchlands first, then you should have no problem getting to 4 or 5 mana.

Yes, Carpet of Flowers alleviates that problem Game 2 and 3. Which makes that SB card much better suited with a Wish-less build, though there has been a successful Burning Wish build a month ago that had a single CoF in their board (as far as how it did in actual play, I would have no idea)

There's still the biggest problem IMO, which is mulligans. Of course, I may just be unlucky with my openings, but I am curious as to how the math works out.

Anyone can shed some light to this? Of course we have to take into consideration that out of 12 cantrips in the wish-less build, 4 of them are "situational" cantrips (Manamorphose - since it's not free). I'm not a mathematician so I dunno what to make of it haha

[Vacrix]

Perhaps you aren't running Reforge the Soul. Its a decent replacement for Burning Wish. Both are counterable, but you can even leave in Reforge post-board, and have lots of 'oops I win' situations that you can even sit up with Mirri's Guile/Sylvan Library.

[SBGpinas]

Perhaps you aren't running Reforge the Soul. Its a decent replacement for Burning Wish. Both are counterable, but you can even leave in Reforge post-board, and have lots of 'oops I win' situations that you can even sit up with Mirri's Guile/Sylvan Library.

To be honest, I'm not a big fan of Reforge the Soul. It's pretty much a gamble as well, as not only are you hoping that the next 7 cards will enable you to win outright, but also that your opponent doesn't draw into any answers.

However, I do see the merit of it in the Wish-less build. It pretty much serves the same role as Diminishing Returns in the wishboard.

[karaxu]

I must say I am interested in going with the "man plan" or lets just say a transformational sideboard for Belcher.

Deus of Calamity or Demigod of Revenge are good creatures but is really fragile IMO. A well timed removal spell and our advantage is lost. So for the creature plan Thrun would seem be the best choice. And also I think whatever you board into must either stick or provide enough advantage to you and I thought of planeswalkers!

So assuming a wishless build with the 12 cantrips as the main deck. Here is how I would build it.

OUT:
4 Street Wraith
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Goblin Charbelcher
3 Lion's Eye Diamond

IN:
4 Carpet of Flowers - already discussed.
3 Taiga / 2 Taiga 1 Fetchland - I feel we need to add more permanent mana.
3 Garruk, Primal Hunter - Makes Beasts, Draws Cards.
2 Thrun, the Last Troll - He Sticks and He beats.
1 Chandra Ablaze - Not too sure about this but I wouldn't want to play 4 Garruks, Plus her 2nd ability lets us disrupt and draw at the same time.
2 Xantid Swarm - Just a fail safe, as we still have the Empty the Warrens route to win.

Still Considering:
Garruk Relentless - I still like Primal Hunter Better but if 3 Green Mana would be an issue (I am assuming it is not thanks to Manamorphose) then he might be worth trying.
Demigod of Revenge - When the meta runs less swords to plowshares, he may be the guy for the job.

The problem would still be resolving the planeswalkers, so maybe up Thrun's count to 3?
Completely untested. Just theorizing here. Thoughts?

[Vacrix]

Well the point of the creature plan is that it dodges Spell Pierce, Burn, and what I didn't mention, Counterbalance. To play through Counterbalance/Top with BW or Empty is basically impossible. However, the 5cc dudes dodge it quite nicely. Provided you can get a lot of perpetual resources, you blank Spell Pierce, Burn spells, Spell Snare, Flusterstorm. Against RUG/UR that leaves just Force to hold you back. Seems good. Against the UW variations popping up, you have a better long game than Belcher normally does, I'd even leave in the Belchers for that match since if it resolves, they usually don't have the clock to kill you and you can activate multiple times if you can resolve Carpet. Even if you can't, post-board lands + Chrome Mox can produce quite a bit of mana. Also, UW has access to STP, Counterspell, and often Snapcaster so they have a lot more options to hold you back. Thrun will be strong in this matchup.

The problem with Planeswalkers is that they are still vulnerable to Burn and Spell Pierce. Also, Demigod can return other Demigods that your opponent already killed or countered, meaning that in a sense, its just as good as Thrun. I'd actually say a combination of Thruns and Demigods is the best choice. Also, I'm thinking that its worth going up to 2 Taiga's in the maindeck. After all, the deck used to be called two-land Belcher. I know it increases your chances of misfire, but it saves you an entire slot in the board for something else, especially when the Belchers are coming out for something else.

For example,
Maindeck:
(standard wishless list)
2 Taigas

SB:
4 Carpet of Flowers
4 Demigod of Revenge
2 Deus of Calamity
2 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Worldly Tutor
2 Taiga


Postboard that gives you the following perpetual resources:
4 Taiga
4 Land Grant
4 Chrome Mox
4 Carpet of Flowers

16 is huge. You don't even need rituals at that point. Even so, 12 of these cards contribute to a storm count and stick around to ensure you'll have multiple combo attempts.

Business after post-board:
4 Demigod
2 Deus of Calamity
2 Thrun, the Last Troll
4 Empty the Warrens
1 Worldly Tutor

17 business is pretty solid in supporting 16 perpetual resources, Carpet being the strongest and single handily casting some of these dudes. Now, Demigod is psuedo-uncounterable in upon being cast he brings back guys. Then you have 6 other non-counterable spells, ie. Empty the Warrens and Thrun. So thats 10 spells that are resistant to countermagic.. to different degrees. Demigod is still counterable so you need to run into multiples for him to be the most effective. I don't like Thrun in more than 2 because you don't want to run into him instead of another dude. Also, Empty the Warrens is still counterable via Flusterstorm. Worldly Tutor is a Demigod virtual copy for when you've already played one and want something that flies instead of Thrun. Also, it finds Thrun for when thats a better choice, ie. the opponent has removal spells but not countermagic. Deus is pretty beast as shutting down the opponents mana base, per hit, allows you to solidify your position as your opponent scrambles to cantrip, play creatures, etc. and have mana open to counter whatever else you have to play.



I think that the Worldly Tutor option is something we might want to explore in more depth. For example, this alternative has peaked my interest:

SB:
4 Carpet of Flowers
2 Taiga

4 Demigod of Revenge
2 Worldly Tutor
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Magus of the Moon
1 Goblin Chieftain/Goblin Lookout/Sulfur ElementalOpen slot

Magus is nice for shutting down an opponent who gets greedy with duals, while they stick to a gameplan of keeping Carpet of Flowers off the table. Thrun, is an obvious choice, but limiting the number of Thruns to one, and then running +2 virtual copies instead seems better. Also, Goblin Chieftain seems good if you manage to sneak in an Empty the Warrens. Also, this version would get to run 4 + 2 (virtual) Demigods, which means it gains a bit more value when you start hitting those perpetual resources. Goblin Lookout is just as good if not better since each goblin nets you more damage. Sulfur Elemental also fucks with Thalia, Lingering Souls, Squadron Hawks, etc.




Also, this plan is effective in different ways against different decks. UW control variants have access to swords to plowshares and usually pretty awesome board locking situations like Counterbalance, or Terminus to wipe tokens, etc. However, they need lots of mana to function, so Carpet of Flowers gains a lot of value. Also, these decks can deal with Thrun only with Terminus, nothing else, but it can still be a very effective way to get in there. Against decks like RUG/UR control, they function on very few lands, sometimes just one or two. UR usually plays basics as well though, so they can function pretty well with just one Island. RUG usually plays a purely non-basic mana base, meaning that Carpet of Flowers is pretty awesome, but it produces less mana than it typically would against UW control; also RUG/UR often play Daze so they can sandbag you on Carpet if they know what they are doing. UW control variants do not have this advantage. Also, UW control plays a LONG game, so you have a lot of time to do stuff like Demigod tricks, where they Forced one Demigod and then ran into another one only to find 10 power swinging at their face. So Demigod is good in the long game,

[Togores]

I think the best idea is to run 4 thrun due its the best creature that you can play against control deck, they have realy hard time removing it. and usualy its gg agaianst.
planeswalkers can be counterer with for or spell pierce, wich he obius is gonna have, but thrun is only killed by terminus and is near impoisble to outrace if its turn 1 o or 2.


And insted of playing so many taigas i would play at least one forest, due it gets mana for our cards like carpet, sylvan and thrunn.

I think the perfect plan is playing 2 forest and 1 taiga in board.

4 thrun
4 carpets
4 wordly tutot
2 forest
1 taiga


The main plan is thrun and it should enoughtly good vs control. to winn with ease.

[Vacrix]

You could, but what happens when you play against BUG control and they turn 1 Innocent Blood? You need back up plans. 4 Thrun is also redundant. I'd rather play 4 Worldly Tutors, 1 Thrun that way you can have 5 of them without running into hands like 3 Thruns in hand, and 2 of them are just dead cards. Also, Terminus is still a thing. I think that Demigod was the best thing we've thought of so far. You see it might be swords-material, but if they counter it because they don't have swords at the time, then when you get the second one, its more effective. Against UR(g) thats not the case though because they only have Burn, but Burn + Delver still trades with just about anything we could try to play. Still, each creature has its advantages against different decks. For example, against RUG that plays Goyf, Thrun is basically useless. Against, Stoneforge mystic with a Batterskull equipped, Thrun is doesn't do anything but block Batterskull. Demigod flies though. Thats huge, on top of him bringing his friends back to life. This means, Demigod is usually going to be better in a long game overall, even against UW, because of the countermagic vs. STP case I mentioned earlier, while Thrun is not something you want to go for as the primary game plan against RUG because they can just bust out Goyf and then block it all day while Delver and reach spells kick your ass.


I made some edits on card choices above, but COMPLETELY forgot to mention that Worldly Tutor is awesome because it can also be a mana source, ie. Worldly Tutor --> Tinder wall.




EDIT:
Also, Wickerbough Elder seems pretty legit as well for when we want to get rid of a Batterskull, Counterbalance (so we can cast an EtW), etc.

[karaxu]

I completely forgot about spell pierce for a moment there, point taken. Planeswalkers may not be the way to go.

So I guess Thrun is the #1 candidate the question is how many and who to back him up Demigod seems good or another Hexproof/Shroud or uncounterable dude.

[Vacrix]

I think I've settled on testing this board (with the 2 Taiga, BW-less maindeck):

SB:
4 Carpet of Flowers
4 Demigod of Revenge
3 Worldly Tutor
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Wickerbough Elder
2 Taiga



7 Demigods post-board is NUTS. Its gives you a really good chance of running into a second one. The deck will still have 17 business postboard, and 16 perpetual resources. Thats basically what I play in PSI post-board so I think it should work here; I play 18 business and 16 perpetual resources. The advantage of the SI game plan, however, is that the business costs consistently less than it does in this Belcher game plan; ie. 8 3cc spells, 3 2cc spells, and 7 4cc spells.




Also, as far as boarding IN/OUT is concerned.. I initially said that Belchers should come out. I still believe that but only against non-UW control decks. Against UW, Terminus is a thing, and so is Flusterstorm and Snapcaster. I think that Belcher might actually be stronger in that specific matchup, even with 4 lands in the deck, we can't forget that they are mountains and that there are 4 LG to search them up. Also, against UW you will usually have extra time for multiple activations while RUG doesn't usually allow you that much time.

[karaxu]

Did a quick search for hexproof/shroud guys like Thrun.

Is Quagnoth worth a shot?

@Vacrix, list looks solid, please update us of your testing

[Vacrix]

Indeed I will.


Quagnoth is meh. Its significantly more expensive than Thrun (by 2), and is much easier to kill given that he doesn't have Regeneration. For that kind of mana, I'd rather look at Terrastomper. 3GGG for an 8/8 Trampler, uncounterable? Sounds legit. Still, I think that Wickerbough Elder is probably the best choice for his slot considering an active Batterskull shuts down this play pretty hard, ie. winning the race against a single Demigod, EtW tokens, or just blocking Thrun all day, bouncing and replaying Batterskull with SFM. Also, Elder actually has a good amount of P/T to contribute to a beat down plan, unlike an alternative such as Ingot Chewer, which is more suitable for destroying shit like Chalice of the Void.



EDIT:
Just wanted to point out that Worldly Tutor adds more Shuffle effects to the deck, making Mirri's Guile more attractive for people who enjoy playing that in their board.

[Damoxx]

6-3 @ SCG: MN (42nd place)

Wins: DnT, Omni-Tell, Rug x2, UBR ANT, High Tide
Losses: EsperBlade, Stax, Rug w/ Stifle

Against Omnitell, I got to live the dream of my opponent casting SnT against my board of tinder wall while I am holding an ESG and Belcher.

I feel that the surprise element really helped me in game ones. G.Probe-ing people turn one and finding no counters while they are playing blue was always a great feeling.

I felt myself really wanting Autumn's veil against RUG. While Pyroblast is more flexible, I'd rather "chant" them for a turn rather than have a counter up. Also, by keeping swarm out of the deck against RUG, it negates all their removal that they didn't side out.