[Deck] GushMan

[Anusien]

Bomberman is the only deck I've won power with, back in June of 2007 at a SCG event in Roanoke, VA.  Unfortunately when I tested it in the post-Gush world, it did too little.  Aside from a poor matchup against TyrantOath, you simply could not compete with GAT.  You would trade until both of you had almost nothing left and you might have a Trinket Mage.  Then the opponent would cast Gush, and explode all over your face.  I had briefly toyed with the idea of Gush in Bomberman, but I never did anything with it.

Then on a whim, MadAsAHatter, BrassMan and I started actually testing Gush in Bomberman and started having success with it.  You had the same or more disruption as GAT and Oath, but your creatures actually did something relevant (mostly get Black Lotus, which was fine).  We ended up settling on this list:

Decklist
4 Flooded Strand
4 Island
1 Polluted Delta
2 Tropical Island
1 Tundra
2 Underground Sea
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring
1 Lotus Petal
1 Black Lotus

2 Auriok Salvagers
1 Darksteel Colossus
4 Trinket Mage

1 AEther Spellbomb
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Engineered Explosives

1 Ancestral Recall
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
4 Brainstorm
4 Gush
3 Merchant Scroll

4 Force of Will
3 Duress
3 Mana Drain
1 Echoing Truth

1 Fastbond
1 Time Walk
1 Tinker
1 Yawgmoth's Will

Sideboard:
1 Claws of Gix
2 Extirpate
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Yixlid Jailer
1 Pithing Needle
1 Tropical Island
4 Tarmogoyf
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Balance
1 Seal of Cleansing

We all settled on the same maindeck with one exception; MadAsAHatter ended up -1 Island +1 Polluted Delta.  MadAsAHatter put a Tundra in the Tropical Island slot and BrassMan ran 1 Tormod's Crypt 1 Extirpate in the Yixlid Jailor slot and ran a Kami of Ancient Law instead of the Seal of Cleansing.

The sideboard plan we did not go with is the Oath of Druids sideboard plan against Aggro and Workshops.  You do not have the room post-board to go for the full Tyrant plan, and none of us felt comfortable with the Angel plan enough to sideboard it, plus we felt we were giving up some advantages that keeping Trinket Mages in give you.  You probably have 4 Oath, 3 Angels in place of 4 Tarmogoyf, 1Tropical Island, 1 Hurkyl's Recall, 1 Seal of Cleansing.  The other risk with this sideboard plan is that in order to go onto the Oath plan, you have to cut 4 Trinket Mage, 2 Auriok Salvagers (and possibly the Darksteel Colossus; you need it to not lose to Earwig Squad).  Consequently you have a lot of cards you would ordinarily bring out that you have to keep in the deck.

You have 21 mana sources, which is one more than Oath and two more than GAT.  You need to consistently hit three which makes it acceptable; plus the last piece is the incredibly awesome Sol Ring.

Matchups
GAT: Somewhat favorable.  You have the same amount of disruption (4 Force 3 Drain 3 Duress), 2 more mana sources and 1 less Merchant Scroll.  This is tempered by one big advantage: your creatures.  Multiple times in testing Tarmogoyf was a virtual blank, while the opponent was getting ahead with Trinket Mage for Black Lotus, bouncing Psychatog with Aether Spellbomb and getting in for damage.  The GushMan player also has two virtual trumps in the matchup: Tinker/Colossus and Salvagers comboing.  Yes, GAT has Wish->Extirpate which was relevant but never backbreaking.  Just Salvaging back Spellbombs each turn is a fine player, and Tormod's Crypt can be a hindrance.  This is the main matchup we put Tinker/Colossus in for, because I was not confident in the ability to beat a Tarmogoyf on defense without it.
Sideboarding:
-1 Vampiric Tutor, -1 Echoing Truth
+2 Extirpate
You only have 1 or 2 slots to sideboard out; even BrassMan with the 3rd Extirpate in the sideboard chose not to board it in versus GAT.

Oath: Slightly favorable.  I felt the worst about Oath coming into our testing, but we found it was slightly ahead.  You win almost every game they don't have a turn 1-2 Oath; the deck is just built to deliver a turn 1-2 Oath.  Occasionally you can even win those games with Engineered Explosives or comboing out.  They'll rarely Will you out because of Tormod's Crypt; generally they can just Oath and win that way.  You'll probably have to get Crypt with the second Trinket (assuming they've already Oathed), and they can just bounce it; you sacrifice; and they respond with Reclamationing.  On the upside, you do have 3 more pieces of disruption than them (they only have 4 Force and 3 other pieces, generally).
Sideboarding:
-1 Echoing Truth, -1 Tormod's Crypt, -1 Tinker, -1 Darksteel Colossus
+2 Extirpate, +1 Seal of Cleansing, +1 Claws of Gix
Ideally we'd like to find another card to bring out to bring in the 2nd Engineered Explosives.  You could bring out Vampiric Tutor for that; it wouldn't be the worst choice in the world.  I do not feel comfortable with this sideboarding plan; it accounted for one of the deck's losses in the Top 8.  They get Extirpate and Pithing Needle so they're not completely cold to the Claws plan.  There's still a risk that they can land an early Oath before you get the mana to fetch Claws and activate it once or twice.

Stax: Varies.  I beat MonoR Shop Aggro (9 Sphere build) twice (2-0 in Swiss, 2-0 in T8) and MadAsAHatter picked up a win or two against the deck as well, but in testing we ended up way behind to a similar build game 1.  The sideboarding plan is pretty good here anyway.  The sideboarding is listed against MonoR 9Sphere Aggro; you'll have to adjust against different builds; Balance probably won't come in against a deck without Juggernauts.
Sideboarding:
-1 Tormod's Crypt, -2 Auriok Salvagers, -1 Aether Spellbomb, -3 Duress
+4 Tarmogoyf, +1 Balance, +1 Pithing Needle, +1 Engineered Explosives
The sideboard plan isn't set in stone here; I experimented with bringing in the extra land as well in place of a Tarmogoyf.  The extra land comes in generally as a 15th source, and I ran a Tropical Island to try and make sure I could cast Tarmogoyf through Wasteland (MadAsAHatter liked Balance more).  You probably want all 4 Tarmogoyfs as a way to make sure an early Juggernaut doesn't beat you.  Generally you want to stabilize with creatures and draw the game out to the point where you can Hurkyl's at end step and just win on untap.  Pithing Needle and EE are key to make sure your main win plan, Tinker->Darksteel Colossus, doesn't lose to Welder.  Keep a counter ready for Duplicant though.

Aggro (which is mostly Goblins and Fish): Varies.  We found we were behind versus Goblins game 1, and did not test against Fish.  We expected low numbers of Fish, and a small contingent of Goblins.  Basically your only hope is to either hope they went all-in on a Lackey and you had the answer, or you won early.
Sideboarding (varies, here is the Goblins SB):
-1 Tormod's Crypt, -3 Duress, -1 Engineered Explosives/Mana Drain
+1 Balance, +4 Tarmogoyf
MadAsAHatter and BrassMan both like Engineered Explosives a lot more than I do in the Goblins matchup, and it is one of the few answers to a turn 1 Goblin Lackey.  On the other hand, it does so little later; it'll usually only get one creature.  The main issue here is to have some sort of plan that does not lose to Earwig Squad.

Ichorid: Way ahead.  You're one of the few decks in the format that actually has a chance against Ichorid game 1 with maindeck EE and Tormod's Crypt.  Sideboarding you bring in enough cards to completely smash.  The worst builds for you are the ones with Chalice of the Void.
Sideboarding:
-3 Duress, -3 Mana Drain
+2 Extirpate, +1 Engineered Explosives, +2 Yixlid Jailer, +1 Pithing Needle (or other 3 anti-Ichorid cards)

Why?
The deck is slightly ahead against GAT and Oath, and way ahead against Ichorid.  We felt like our plan against Goblins and Stax is very good; we were something like 3-0 on the day against Stax.  We may not be as far ahead against Oath as other decks in the format (I want to test and re-evaluate the deck's plan in the matchup), but in a lot of metagames, having those matchups is a good idea.  The deck is basically GAT with better creatures.

If you have any questions, please ask.  There is not really a comprehensive thread on Bomberman, so a lot of things I take for granted about how to play the deck or build the sideboard that others may not get right away.

[DoubleDrain]

Quick question,


Is it considered unnecessary to run a cunning wish main and a brainfreeze in the board to deck your opponents? I suppose you plan on just casting all the critters and time walking for the win, correct? Thanks for the clarification.

Travis

[Anusien]

The only reason to run a Cunning Wish + Brain Freeze is because you can't play all your guys and Time Walk for the win on turn 5 of extra turns.  The problem is that running a Cunning Wish provides limited utility in the maindeck.  Plus, if you want to use Wish to win the game, you can't use it any other way; it's not a card that can be replayed off Will.  I've heard of running a Brain Freeze main, but I've never been interested in a Wish main.

[PhilipJFry]

This deck seems to have really slid under the radar.   I sleeved it up for some tests against my wife (so the level of play was low, since she doesn't care), but I was still pleased with the build.  One particularly memorable game was agaisnt Ichorid, where a first turn Fastbond into Gush into Scroll into Gush into Scroll (and so on) led to a first turn (O.K., a Time Walk aided second turn) win.  That was one particularly busted open. 

After playing some games, I had a few questions:

1. In this build, I can see two primary purposes for Yawgmoth's Will:  First, to get way ahead by replaying your graveyard, and second, to replay a Time Walk to go for the win.  Is this about on track, or am I missing something?

2.  How has Tinker/Colossus worked out for you?  It seems like an alternative win to Trinket/Salvager Beats or comboing out, but it does seem to be pushing the aggressive aspects of the deck.  I may be playing this wrongly, however.

3.   Have you revamped the anti-Oath plan at all?  I know you expressed some mis-givings about the plan, and with the accelerated rise of Tidespout Oath, it certainly is a meta-threat.

4. What is your best response to the new Flash deck?  I imagine similar to the Ichorid plan in terms of what comes in, but what changes in terms of deletions?

5. Sol Ring over Mana Crypt/Duress over Thoughtseize - are these decisions mainly a desire to protect the life total?

I appreciate the responses.

-PJF

[T00L]

Duress over thoughtseize was probably just a matter of preference. However I do know that brassman always said not to run mana crypt in bomberman simply because on average you can't race your mana crypt.

[Anusien]

1. In this build, I can see two primary purposes for Yawgmoth's Will:  First, to get way ahead by replaying your graveyard, and second, to replay a Time Walk to go for the win.  Is this about on track, or am I missing something?

The nice thing about Will in Bomberman is that you don't have to hold your Time Walk until you're ready to combo off (okay you rarely did, but it's nice to win right away).  The most common uses of Yawgmoth's Will is basically
Replaying some mana sources and Gushes to set up...
a) Tinker->Colossus #1
b) Auriok Salvagers #2
c) Putting a bunch of men on the table and beating down
Occasionally you cast a mini-Will by just going Gush, Ancestral, Merchant Scroll, land, but I don't like to run out will until I know it's safe because getting it countered is so devastating.

2.  How has Tinker/Colossus worked out for you?  It seems like an alternative win to Trinket/Salvager Beats or comboing out, but it does seem to be pushing the aggressive aspects of the deck.  I may be playing this wrongly, however.

Tinker->Colossus was originally run to beat GAT, but it's not 100% needed.  I liked that it was not graveyard, and more importantly, it can be huge in the Stax matchup.  I think I won all 4 games against Stax with DSC.

3.   Have you revamped the anti-Oath plan at all?  I know you expressed some mis-givings about the plan, and with the accelerated rise of Tidespout Oath, it certainly is a meta-threat.

I don't know if Oath is that huge; I think it's dying down.  That said, at the moment we've gone -1 land, -1 Seal of Cleansing for 2 Ray of Revelation.  Now that the new SCG has been announced, I'll test this matchup/plan more.

4. What is your best response to the new Flash deck?  I imagine similar to the Ichorid plan in terms of what comes in, but what changes in terms of deletions?

I don't know if I'd change the deck to accomodate for Flash.  If I faced Flash right now, I'd board like this:
+1 Pithing Needle, +2 Extirpate
-1 Tormod's Crypt, -1 Vampiric Tutor, -1 X (not sure)

I might change the board to deal with the Flash menace, but I'd have to test and see what hate is most relevant.

5. Sol Ring over Mana Crypt/Duress over Thoughtseize - are these decisions mainly a desire to protect the life total?

There's really no creature you would want to Thoughtseize except Magus of the Moon, and Duress is really bad in that matchup because of how redundant they are.  Plus against Ichorid you might Duress them and then be forced to discard them a Dredger.  Plus, Fastbond wears down the life total already.
I never liked Mana Crypt in the deck even before I added Fastbond.

Glad you liked the deck