[Deck] New Belcher

[Scott_Limoges]

Congratulation to Team Meandeck and Stephen for creating Meandeck Tendrils - the innovation, research and time commitment involved in creating Tendrils has advanced T1.
   
After reviewing Meandeck Tendrils, I was inspired to revisit the previously obsolete belcher.  

As an early innovator of Belcher, during the unrestriction of LED (user name "Lime" http://www.themanadrain.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=14810 ) my involvement and interest in combo peaked with the excitement surrounding Long.dec leading to Belcher.  Now the same holds true for Meandeck Tendrils to Belcher.

Belcher Modifications:

Pursuant to a thorough analysis, the mana bases for both Tendrils and Belcher are similar in off-color acceleration to fuel the combo/components while requiring intensive on-color mana.  The first modification was to stabilize belchers mana through the addition of more color fixers i.e. Darkwater Egg.

After careful deliberation, the strengths of Tinder Wall did not justify its inclusion because of the detremental off-colored casting requirements of green and off-color net product of one red.  Furthermore, Goblin Welder did not provide sufficient evidence to validate the use in a pure combo deck, utilizing Tinder Wall.  The second modification is the replacement of Tinder Wall for the on-color producing Cabal Ritual.

Other minor modifications such as a compliment of Spoils of the Vault, restricted tutors, draw 7's (barring Diminishing Returns) and a lone Tendrils of Agony found inclusions through the synergies of Chromatic Sphere and Darkwater Egg.

The end result was more consistent, faster and reliable Belcher.

My goldfish testing has provided results of first turn kills slightly under %50 and up to second turn kills approximately 80% of the time.  Please test before commenting.

Certain advantages make this deck a better combo choice during tournaments depending on the metagame.  First, the deck is less skill intensive than other combo decks thus reducing mental fatigued and play error that can accompany long tournaments.  Second, the matches end quickly allowing for relaxation/tournament scouting between rounds and further relaxation.  Finally, the confidence of winning turn one can instill the attitude necessary to win a large tournament.

However, certain disadvantages make this deck a poor choice depending on the metagame.  The northeastern popular Force of Will (my former meta    ) will significantly slow the decks speed, as will trinisphere played first turn.

Please review the deck and feel free to post comments, questions or concerns.

// Mana Base
    1  Bayou
    4  Land Grant
    4  Elvish Spirit Guide
    1  Channel
    1  Mox Emerald
    1  Mana Vault
    1  Mox Jet
    1  Mox Pearl
    1  Mox Ruby
    1  Mox Sapphire
    1  Lotus Petal
    1  Sol Ring
    1  Mana Crypt
    1  Lion's Eye Diamond
    1  Chrome Mox
    1  Grim Monolith
    1  Black Lotus
    4  Dark Ritual
    4  Cabal Ritual
    4  Chromatic Sphere
    4  Darkwater Egg

// Spells
    1  Yawgmoth's Will
    1  Wheel of Fortune
    1  Windfall
    1  Tinker
    1  Memory Jar
    1  Timetwister
    1  Ancestral Recall
    1  Necropotence
   
    4  Spoils of the Vault
    1  Demonic Tutor
    1  Vampiric Tutor
    1  Mystical Tutor
    1  Demonic Consultation

    4  Goblin Charbelcher
    1  Tendrils of Agony

[Nantuko Rice]

the earlier versions (the ones currently being played) have some cards to deal with disruption and permission... in the form of goblin welder, xantid swarm, and duress. in this build, you've cut all those cards.  maybe that's fine for wherever you are now, but if you still played in the northeast (with blue control decks everywhere), wouldn't you like to run some of those cards?

also, you've cut living wish. no more wishing for tolarian academy or mishra's working, or even the goblin welder/xantid swarm. do you miss the massive amounts of mana that can be generated or those 2 creatures that you can gain by wishing?

[Scott_Limoges]

Nantuko Rice wrote:
the earlier versions (the ones currently being played) have some cards to deal with disruption and permission... in the form of goblin welder, xantid swarm, and duress. in this build, you've cut all those cards. maybe that's fine for wherever you are now, but if you still played in the northeast (with blue control decks everywhere), wouldn't you like to run some of those cards?

The deck focuses on winning or playing its win condition turn one. The typical sequence of plays usually involves either a Land Grant or Dark Ritual to begin; however, these cards will most likely be countered preventing combo or mana necessary to play Duress, Xantid Swarm, or Goblin Welder (Note, the sequence of play is certainly not limited to an Dark Ritual).

The remaining caveat is where a draw 7 resolves and the opponent has another opportunity to draw Force of Will. Duress may be helpful in this situation given there is sufficient black mana available from the opening hand (a scenario that is conditional - based the deck containing FOW and the use of a draw 7).

The ability to play Goblin Charbelcher on turn one limits the amount of disruption the opponent can play. My analysis shows the following scenarios where Belcher can be disrupted, given variables such as who plays first and the card pool of disruption (please feel free to include scenarios that were overlooked):

Belcher plays first - Force of Will is the only disruption that can probit the combo.

Opponent plays first - Duress, Trinisphere, Force of Will and Null Rod will disrupt the combo.

Nantuko Rice wrote:
also, you've cut living wish. no more wishing for tolarian academy or mishra's working, or even the goblin welder/xantid swarm. do you miss the massive amounts of mana that can be generated or those 2 creatures that you can gain by wishing?

Living Wish generally slowed the tempo by prohibiting aturn one kill. The now awkward G casting cost was also a problem with bayou denying the black mana for green. Elvish Spirit Guide was also not sufficient to justify it.

[Whatever Works]

Have you tried a version with more red that would include any of the following??? I was having similar (if not faster) kills with a version that did this....
4 Tinder Wall
3 Seething Song (seething song often happens off tinder wall)
2 Gamble
2 Guilded Lotus (seething song into this is actually quite nice... sinse its reusable mana, but having this mana drained in games that last longer then 1 turn really suck)

Gamble is rather nice if you can maintain a large enough hand size (I noticed that its rather easy to manage... I also think that running Eggs is probably not neccessary because you did cut the red from the deck so you wouldnt need as much mana fixers... 4 spoils would give me a nervous breakdown personally, and I wouldnt want to play an 8 round tourney with 4 of them no matter how good the statistically % of me drawing said card would be...

If you did run disruption what would you run??? Looking at the deck I would geuss that at least a few duress would be a natural inclusion, because you can cast it and still consistently combo out turn 1 in many cases... I have always found with belcher your rarely 1 mana short... your either going to combo out no matter what or your going to have to wait an extra turn.

[Scott_Limoges]

Have you tried a version with more red that would include any of the following??? I was having similar (if not faster) kills with a version that did this....
4 Tinder Wall
3 Seething Song (seething song often happens off tinder wall)
2 Gamble
2 Guilded Lotus (seething song into this is actually quite nice... sinse its reusable mana, but having this mana drained in games that last longer then 1 turn really suck)

Gamble is rather nice if you can maintain a large enough hand size (I noticed that its rather easy to manage... I also think that running Eggs is probably not necessary because you did cut the red from the deck so you wouldn’t need as much mana fixers... 4 spoils would give me a nervous breakdown personally, and I wouldn’t want to play an 8 round tourney with 4 of them no matter how good the statistically % of me drawing said card would be...

If you did run disruption what would you run??? Looking at the deck I would guess that at least a few duress would be a natural inclusion, because you can cast it and still consistently combo out turn 1 in many cases... I have always found with belcher your rarely 1 mana short... your either going to combo out no matter what or your going to have to wait an extra turn.

In previous builds, green was necessary for casting tinder wall for mana acceleration which could also be used to cast Goblin Welder.  However, using one-shot color fixers to produce green mana usually meant other colors could not be fixed for business spells - in essence mana producing more mana and nothing else (mox mox Chromatic Sphere-> Tinder Wall -> Seething Song).  However, Darkwater Egg added two sources of on-colored mana through one fix and cycled to boot.  Unfortunately, green does not provide any business spells and its acceleration can be replaced by other on-color spells such as Cabal Ritual.  The only castible green spell with enough power is Channel.

Spoils of the Vault is a risky card; however, the card is the best of its type (Tainted Pact, Plunge into Darkness ect…) and usually fetches either ritual or Goblin Charbelcher.  Spoils is a card that is usually used only once per game, but is wins games where other tutors would not.

IF the deck played disruption it would certainly be Duress or Unmask (most likely the former) because of the on-color common sense.

I highly recommend re-assembling the old belcher and modifying to the above list on apprentice or MWS.  I'm confident you will be impressed.

[stephen3200]

what is the problem with the tinder walls though? They net you one mana and can be cast off a lone spirit guide or a single land grant, providing you with access to effectivley having traded two cards and no mana in hand for 2 mana, which seems a fair enough swap. And if you want to be able to draw enough mana to be able to run the disruption you would need an average mana production of each card (after casting) to produce at least one mana, or an extra card. Both or which need to be an average of about 1.33 cards per card in hand, or mana produced.

This means the eggs are good because while they net you no card, and no mana you do however get two (correctly) coloured mana, which can be used for further castings. Whereas chromatic sphere is slightly worse because while it repalces itself it still drops you down a card.

Have living wishes been considered? They could be used to grab a lone welder from sb, to ressurect a broken belcher, because if you can get the wish through it is likley you'll also get the following card through. Alternatively the wishes could be used to grab either a workshop, or in certain circumstances tolarian academy- with lots of artifacts being able to offset the initial cost of wishing- or phyrexian negator- if you're in need of a alternate threat and can simply wish it into play, with a dark ritual.

I also feel brainstorms go very well in the deck, they enable you to filter the top three cards of your library, in a similar way to if you were playing fetch lands- with these being replaced by the land grants.

If you can reach a high enough level of mana production you could also add either unmask or duress- it would however be highly dpeendent on the build, with the more card productive ones using the unmasks as they will be able to replace the card, while those with a higher facility for producing mana being able to use the durresses to a better effect, wlthough a combination of the two would give best effect.

[Scott_Limoges]

what is the problem with the tinder walls though? They net you one mana and can be cast off a lone spirit guide or a single land grant, providing you with access to effectivley having traded two cards and no mana in hand for 2 mana, which seems a fair enough swap. And if you want to be able to draw enough mana to be able to run the disruption you would need an average mana production of each card (after casting) to produce at least one mana, or an extra card. Both or which need to be an average of about 1.33 cards per card in hand, or mana produced.

This means the eggs are good because while they net you no card, and no mana you do however get two (correctly) coloured mana, which can be used for further castings. Whereas chromatic sphere is slightly worse because while it repalces itself it still drops you down a card.

Have living wishes been considered? They could be used to grab a lone welder from sb, to ressurect a broken belcher, because if you can get the wish through it is likley you'll also get the following card through. Alternatively the wishes could be used to grab either a workshop, or in certain circumstances tolarian academy- with lots of artifacts being able to offset the initial cost of wishing- or phyrexian negator- if you're in need of a alternate threat and can simply wish it into play, with a dark ritual.

I also feel brainstorms go very well in the deck, they enable you to filter the top three cards of your library, in a similar way to if you were playing fetch lands- with these being replaced by the land grants.

If you can reach a high enough level of mana production you could also add either unmask or duress- it would however be highly dpeendent on the build, with the more card productive ones using the unmasks as they will be able to replace the card, while those with a higher facility for producing mana being able to use the durresses to a better effect, wlthough a combination of the two would give best effect.

The problem with Tinder Wall is the green off-color casting cost and red off-color acceleration. This new Belcher is now two colors, blue and black. Any spell that requires mana other than blue or black needs to be game breaking such as Channel or Wheel of Fortune.

For example, consider all mana sources to be black or blue through Chromatic Sphere or Darkwater Egg expect for green sources (these are on color for the example). Land Grants and the Bayou will be considered a swamp and the Black Lotus and Lotus Petal will produce only blue or black (to use rituals, spoils, tutors, ect). The green mana sources to cast Tinder Wall are: 4 Elvish Spirit Guide and a Mox Emerald; only 5 cards. Now consider that a color fixer is needed to convert the red mana from Tinder Wall to on-colored mana, which will use the acceleration of Tinder Wall. The end result is a net gain of 0 on-color mana that is conditional. The replacement of Tinder Wall, Cabal Ritual produces a net gain of 1 on-color mana without the use of a color-fixer. I strongly feel that the use of Tinder Wall in old Belcher was the primary reason for its inconsistency.

Unfortunately, the inconsistency in Living Wish (yes, the flexibility of a wish can be inconsistent within its casting cost) poses the same mana issues as Tinder Wall. The difference is the tempo loss of Living Wish is equally detrimental as the mana issues of Tinder Wall (0 net on-color mana), or card loss.

The cards tested that were runners-up include: Brainstorms, Time Walk, Yawgmoth's Bargin, Tropical Island and Duress (the MD protection of Duress may be needed in certain metagames, for Force of Will).

I appreciate your input.

[smallstepsagainstinertia]

Belcher is, hands down and absolutely, my favorite deck. I've taken it to T8 numerous times and always have a blast playing it. I've worked on several different versions (one similar to the build starting this topic also influenced by Meandeck SX) and none have caught my attention as much as the original 2-land Belcher.

As previously mentioned, the Wishes are amazing and it also has many ways of working around FoW's and other quick counters. The meta around here is pretty aggro (5/3, stax, etc) and a lot of control. I've had no problems with any of these decks (except for that annoying 1st turn Trinisphere). I've never seen anything wrong with Tinder Wall, especially with the Chromatic Sphere's in the deck. They've never been a problem with me.

I've been working on a 1-land build to better handle Trinisphere/MWS based decks as they're very very popular around here. It looks like your deck would have a pretty big problem with disruption (I don't like the spoils, either).

[Scott_Limoges]

Belcher is, hands down and absolutely, my favorite deck. I've taken it to T8 numerous times and always have a blast playing it. I've worked on several different versions (one similar to the build starting this topic also influenced by Meandeck SX) and none have caught my attention as much as the original 2-land Belcher.

As previously mentioned, the Wishes are amazing and it also has many ways of working around FoW's and other quick counters. The meta around here is pretty aggro (5/3, stax, etc) and a lot of control. I've had no problems with any of these decks (except for that annoying 1st turn Trinisphere). I've never seen anything wrong with Tinder Wall, especially with the Chromatic Sphere's in the deck. They've never been a problem with me.

I've been working on a 1-land build to better handle Trinisphere/MWS based decks as they're very very popular around here. It looks like your deck would have a pretty big problem with disruption (I don't like the spoils, either).

The deck does have issues with opposing disruption; however, the tool used to beat disruption, which was the intent of the design, is speed.

I wrote:

The ability to play Goblin Charbelcher on turn one limits the amount of disruption the opponent can play. My analysis shows the following scenarios where Belcher can be disrupted, given variables such as who plays first and the card pool of disruption (please feel free to include scenarios that were overlooked):

Belcher plays first - Force of Will is the only disruption that can prohibit the combo.

Opponent plays first - Duress, Trinisphere, Force of Will and Null Rod will disrupt the combo.

There appears to be concern that main deck disruption should be included for particular metagames.  To answer this concern, comprimising the speed of the deck to add disruption will only increase the amount of opposing disruption - cancelling each out.  Knowing this and looking at past combo, some still feel compeled to add disruption to combo.

To accomidate this, the following analysis will identify the utility of main deck disruption to the above situations using the proposed disruption of: Goblin Welder, Duress, Xantid Swarm and Living Wish:

Disruption Report Card:  

Scale by utility: Useful 90% - Conditional 75%- Useless 60%

The purpose of the scale is to compare the utility of different main deck disruption spells to each other.

Applying tangible grades to intangible concepts is a difficult task and is open for interpretation, such as measuring the effectiveness of an interaction.

- Belcher plays first - Force of Will is the only disruption that can prohibit the combo.
    Duress - Useful, provided the opponent does not counter the black source used...Land Grant or Ritual.
    Goblin Welder - Conditional, slows tempo through summoning sickness.
    Xantid Swarm - Conditional, slows tempo through summoning sickness.
    Living Wish - Conditional, also slows tempo by adding the tutor casting cost to the creature retrieved.  The creature itself will further slow the tempo through summoning sickness.  In rare instances, Living Wish can retrieve a land that may increase tempo, Tolarian Academy.

- Opponent plays first The analysis will be less in depth due to the number combinations and redundancy -
   
Opponent plays Duress:
    Duress - Nearly Useless
    Goblin Welder - Useful
    Xantid Swarm - Useless
    Living Wish - Conditional

Opponent plays Null Rod:
    Duress - Nearly useless
    Goblin Welder - Conditional
    Xantid Swarm - Useless
    Living Wish - Conditional

Opponent plays Trinisphere - All disruption is nearly useless as a first turn Trinisphere is a near defeat.

Opponent plays Force of Will - The above situation, playing first, is the same.

Scores:
Duress - 72%
Goblin Welder - 75%
Xantid Swarm - 66%
Living Wish - 72%

What the scale doesn't account for is the color casting requirements of the spells.  This will certainly effect the playability and score of each spell.

In short conclusion, Duress seems to be the most effective disruption spell barring metagame differences.

[Mon, Goblin Chief]

Well, I guess with Meandeck Tendrils out and you deck here looking quite similar to what we have, I'll open CABs archives for this threat.

This deck is from the summer, actually I posted the original list at June 1st in CABs forum. We withheld the decklist, because quite simply, we didn't want a turn1-combo-deck in the environment because of it's randomizing effect. That problem should be already here with Meandecks Tendrils, so maybe this at least helps the development of this thread.
 
We didn't play the deck in a bigger tournament because we realized the same thing Meandeck realized with their Tendrils-deck, we were just lucky enough to do so during testing instead of at bigger tournaments. The problem I mean is that at some point the number of turn 1 kills vs turn 2 kills is not important any more. Once you make the opponent mulligan into FoW/Trinisphere/whatever hate they use, resilency becomes more important than additional speed.
(ASIDE Imo DeathLong is the far superior combo-deck compared to both MeandeckTendrils and this, because it's still fast enough to force the FoW-mulligan and more resilent to the hate than either END ASIDE)

Well, with the long explanation done, finally our decklist:

CAB Speedbelcher

1 Bayou
4 Land Grant

5 Moxe
1 Chrome Mox
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt

4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
2 Tinder Wall
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 LED
1 Lotus
1 Petal
1 Mana Vault

3 C-Sphere
3 Pentad Prism (these are soooooo good)

1 Ancestral Recall
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Demonic Consultation
1 Spoils of the Vault

1 Channel
1 Bargain
1 Necropotence
1 Yawgmoth's Will

1 Timetwister
1 Wheel
1 Windfall
1 Tinker
1 Memory Jar

2 Xantid Swarm/Duress

3 Tendrils of Agony
4 Goblin Charbelcher

The deck isn't completely fine-tuned (especially no ready SB) because we stopped developing it once we realized pure speed wasn't that useful.

differences to your build
Pentad Prism over Darkwater Egg:
This is not a cantrip-deck like Meandeck Tendrils and Pentad Prism fixes mana for free quite often. Mana is, imo, far more limiting than cards in hand for this deck, so Prism is imo the far better choice compared to Eggs. Would be the main thing to change in your deck imo.  


Three Tendrils in the deck:
When playing the regular Belcher I realized I often could play a Draw7 on turn one and hardcast the Belcher, but not activate it. The 3 Tendrils make it far more likely you draw into one of your now 7 kill-conditions if you do play a Draw7 AND it also made it far more likely to just win on turn 1 instead of saying go with a possible kill on the table.


As for stats, this is what this goldfished at (noticeably slower than Meandeck Tendrils, doesn't kill itself with spoils, though):

Half the games where considered on the draw and the other half on the play:

turn 1: ~42%
turn 2: ~91%
turn 3: ~94%
turn 4+: ~100%

Well, I hope this was of some interest and helpful. As said before, I'd rather play DeathLong instead of either of the super-speed decks. The sacrifices in the manabase just cost more consistency than the extra turn 1 kill percentage is worth.

[Scott_Limoges]

differences to your build
Pentad Prism over Darkwater Egg:
This is not a cantrip-deck like Meandeck Tendrils and Pentad Prism fixes mana for free quite often. Mana is, imo, far more limiting than cards in hand for this deck, so Prism is imo the far better choice compared to Eggs. Would be the main thing to change in your deck imo.

I've had the opportunity to test Pentad Prism in my build and these are my conclusions (for the most part there obvious):

Pentad Prism was most useful when I had an Elvish Spirit Guide or off-color mox in my opening hand.  The Prism was also useful for casting Channel and Wheel of Fortune, the off-colored spells.  In rare instances Pentad Prism was useful for building mana acceleration for next turn from two moxen.

I.E.
Channel
Pentad Prism vs. Darkwater Egg
Land Grant
Mox pearl
Channel
Goblin Charbelcher
Dark Ritual

Pentad Prism was less useful with colorless or on-color acceleration such as Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, Mana Vault, Dark Ritual and Cabal Ritual.  It should be noted that often Spoils of the Vault is used to find either Cabal or Dark Ritual for single color acceleration (generating mana is not an issue for this deck).

I.E.
Dark Ritual
Spoils of the Vault
Land Grant
Pentad Prism vs. Darkwater Egg
Windfall
Goblin Charbelcher

In summary, Pentad Prism seems less useful than DarkWater Egg in a two color build.  Pentad Prism does have the benefit of converting mana to off-colors for casting wheel and channel; however, the benefits Spoils of the Vault to find single color acceleration and the additional card from Darkwater Egg make the Egg a better candidate.

Team CAB's build seems to take greater advantage of the Prism through the use of three colors and in using Tinder Wall to create off color mana.

[Mixing Mike]

Hey Scott, after some goldfishing and some random MWS play, I think this deck curls over to Forces and Duresses a bit too easily.  Maybe it's just me sucking or something, but the deck doesn't seem to fit very well for the NE meta.  It doesn't have much of a way to keep going after a Force.  Duress is only an issues when you're on the draw, as is Trinisphere (obv).

[Whatever Works]

Hey Scott, after some goldfishing and some random MWS play, I think this deck curls over to Forces and Duresses a bit too easily.  Maybe it's just me sucking or something, but the deck doesn't seem to fit very well for the NE meta.  It doesn't have much of a way to keep going after a Force.  Duress is only an issues when you're on the draw, as is Trinisphere (obv).

Thats why he is so happy to be living in Colorodo now.  :lol:

[Exalted Teacher]

After reading the "New Belcher" post and about team CAB´s speedbelcher I became curious about how the deck would be working in real tournament play and not only in games against my goldfish (where it did an amazing job regarding the 1st turn kill average).
So I decided to take it to a local tournament with the following list:

Team Tinker - The Perfect Belcher

1 Ancetral
1 Mystical
1 DT
1 Vampiric
1 Consultation
1 Spoils
1 Tinker

1 Twister
1 Wheel
1 Windfall
1 Jar

1 Will
1 Bargain
1 Necro
 
3 Tendrils
4 Belcher

4 Land Grant
4 ESG
3 Tinder Wall
1 Channel
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual

1 Lotus
4 Moxen  (I don´t have the Pearl)
1 Crypt
1 Vault
1 Petal
1 LED
1 Grim
1 Chrome mox
1 Sol Ring

3 Chromatic Sphere
3 Pentad Prism (Mon is right, they are amazing!!)

1 Bayou


We played 5 rounds of swiss (24 players attending) and I faced the following decks:

Round 1: random.dec
Round 2: 4cc
Round 3: Rector Tendrils
Round 4: Rector Tendrils
Round 5: Tog

I went 4-1 => 2nd place with only one loss in the finals against tog. (I will turn to that again later on)

After four rounds my winning-average looked like this:

4(!) 1st turn kills (2 against 4cc, 1 against RectorTendrils, 1 against random.dec)
2    2nd turn kills
1    3rd turn kill
1    4th turn kill

That makes a first turn kill average of 50%  :lol: (quite nice).

The 5th round against Tog:

I kept a hand with Mox G, Land Grant, Cabal Ritual, C-Sphere, Belcher, ESG and Pentad Prism.
He starts with Tropical Island-go and plays Ancestral in my upkeep. I draw (not sure what) and play Land Grant -no counter. Bayou, Ritual, ESG for Belcher-no counter....go
He strips my Bayou and plays a Pearl- go.
I draw demonic consultation and pass. He plays land Pernicious Deed and sacs for zero - ouch! Response I tap the Mox, sac sphere for black and play the consultation for lotus which will win me the game next turn. Unfortunately, the first card I have to remove is.....sure, Black Lotus   and he goes for the win.

2nd game I can´t finish him early enough so that he is able to play deed again, gain control of the game and win...

Though the last consultation was really, really annoying, playing the deck was a real blast and much fun. Therefore, thanks to CAB for posting the list!

The only problem I had with it was sideboarding sth out. Because every single card seems to be needed as it is either a bomb, a mana source or a kill card....so I often randomly sided out the spoils, one tendrils/ belcher to put in duress, xantid swarm or deconstruct/ naturalize- which were at the same time the only cards that proved to be necessary.....

Thus, I would appreciate any recommendations towards other sideboard-techs that I did not think of. Of course any comments on the maindeck are also welcome.

[Smmenen]

Scott, have you put anymore work into this?  

I find it amazing that there are so many potential possible design variants with, in the case of belcher, no clear superior design.  I know that Michael Simister has put alot of effort into Belcher and I was hoping he'd pop his head in to give his thoughts.

[Imsomniac101]

That Perfect Belcher list is far from perfect. It lacks Duress and isn't as consistent as 2-land Belcher. Hell, the only thing it does better than the 2-land Belcher is making more mana and even so, not by much.

[Scott_Limoges]

I have continued making develops and hopeful improvements to the deck within short, periodic spurts.  The creativity and availability of new ideas always seems heightened after innovation hits (meandeck tendrils).

The fact that numerous variants do exist is interesting, which I feel is partly attributed to the T1 deck building philosophy.  IMO, the fundamentals of T1 deck construction is composed of three components; the kill strategy, the broken T1 cards, and the supportive cards.  The first two components are obviously the easiest to identify in concept and card choice; however, the third is more discrete and sensitive in recognition.  Often, the reason why card choices become gray is attributed to the vass card pool that literally makes the format.  From experience, after browsing pages of cards that have similar but subtle differences, the best choice is not always obvious.  These small differences play intricate roles or contain faint synergies with other cards.  The research time necessary to explore each interaction can be significant and tedious.  Belcher suffers from this riddle.

(The above topic may make a good article, T1 deck construction.  Anyone may feel free to use it!)


Belcher - Cantrips!

New additions:

The deck builds its mana base and durability through the cantrips.
   
The cantrips enable the deck to cycle through its library to find permanent mana sources and build threshhold.  A concern with previous belcher builds was the one-time mana investment spells that were non-recyclable casting a threat.  The mana needed on subsequent turns would be unavailable to cast additional threats.

The threats are more abundant through cantrips (currently 15 threats against control).

Again, the cycling ability of cantrips allows more threats and the right threats to be drawn to apply constant pressure on the opponent.  The diverse threat casting costs provides a flexible utility accommodating for the current mana resources available.  The threat costing costs of 1, 3, and 4 also allows for either a cascade of threat opportunities from one turn to the next or multiple threats in a single turn.  The threats are abundant as ¼ of the deck’s spells pressure control or combo.

The late game resiliency is improved through cantrips.

After establishing the mana base and casting the threats (assuming unsuccessfully), the late game resiliency is improved through the addition of cantrips.  The probability of drawing a threat is significantly increased by the probability of drawing a cantrip and cycling.  The shortcoming of previous belcher was the inflexibilities beyond the opening hand leading to stagnation.

// Lands
    1  Bayou
    1  Tropical Island

// Creatures
    4  Elvish Spirit Guide

// Spells
    4  Brainstorm
    4  Chromatic Sphere
    3  Darkwater Egg
    4  Dark Ritual
    4  Cabal Ritual
    4  Land Grant
    1  Ancestral Recall
    1  Yawgmoth's Will
    1  Demonic Tutor
    1  Demonic Consultation
    1  Lion's Eye Diamond
    1  Black Lotus
    1  Mox Emerald
    1  Mox Sapphire
    1  Mox Ruby
    1  Mox Jet
    1  Mox Pearl
    1  Mana Crypt
    1  Mana Vault
    1  Lotus Petal
    1  Sol Ring
    1  Tendrils of Agony
    1  Chrome Mox
    1  Vampiric Tutor
    4  Goblin Charbelcher
    4  Duress
    1  Windfall
    1  Memory Jar
    1  Tinker
    1 Timetwister
    1  Necropotence

Any suggestions?  Comments?

What do you feel are the weakest card choices?

What additional cards would make the deck better?  What would you replace?

[Machinus]

A concern with previous belcher builds was the one-time mana investment spells that were non-recyclable casting a threat.  

Again, the cycling ability of cantrips allows more threats and the right threats to be drawn to apply constant pressure on the opponent.  

The late game resiliency is improved through cantrips.

After establishing the mana base and casting the threats (assuming unsuccessfully), the late game resiliency is improved through the addition of cantrips.  The probability of drawing a threat is significantly increased by the probability of drawing a cantrip and cycling.  The shortcoming of previous belcher was the inflexibilities beyond the opening hand leading to stagnation.


1  Lion's Eye Diamond
1  Mox Emerald
1  Mox Sapphire
1  Mox Ruby
1  Mox Jet
1  Mox Pearl
1  Mana Crypt
1  Mana Vault
1  Sol Ring
1  Chrome Mox

4  Goblin Charbelcher

1  Windfall
1  Memory Jar

I have to recommdend at LEAST sideboarding welders, if not maindecking them. At the moment, they are a strong metagame choice pretty much anywhere you go (they are good against so many decks, and are very strong counter bait), and your deck already has very strong synergy with them.

Adding welders would require you to modify your manabase, and of course add wheel to the decklist. You talk about adding late game resiliency, and beefing up the matchup against denial strategies. The above listed cards, along with black lotus, lotus petal, and wheel, have very strong synergy with the welder strategy. Welders take a turn to become active, but if they resolve they can pose a substantial threat to the opponent, no matter what the gamestate is.

The welders would probably have to take the place of duress, and I would suggest cutting either chrome mox, a second egg, or the fourth cabal ritual for the wheel.

[Scott_Limoges]

I tested variants containing welder maindeck with an altered mana base, especially surrounding the recent hype including restriction discussions.  What I found was (is) welder is a conditional threat dependant on the ability to resolve or cast certain spells (specifically belcher and draw 7s).  If these criteria were not met, then welder became a non-threat.  Unfortunately, the substitution of welder for duress increased the probability of the control player stopping the draw spells, making welder more conditional.  The significance of the conditional behavior of welder became increasingly important when facing combo where the risk outweighed the returns, in terms of consistency.

To accommodate welder, other inconsistencies were inherited in different facets of the deck such as the mana base.  The increase to three colors meant that darkwater egg no longer generated the color mana to support all spells.  An excellent replacement was found in pentad prism, lending synergies for casting and using welder, however, the cantrip effect was no longer present.

I do agree with you that Goblin welder is an effective strategy when the supporting cards accommodated his presence.  These types of strategies would include making welder less conditional and more of a threat (such as forcing through spells against control).  I constructed a SB that includes welder and an additional color, for these strategies against certain decks.

3 Goblin Welder
3 Pentad Prism
4 REB
2 Taiga
1 Wheel of Fortune

2 Rack and Ruin

[Fall-Titan]

Ok although i commend your exploration of the deck i feel that you do not fully understand what it is. By this i mean the deck has an identity crisis. If you are looking for pure speed then this deck falls short of Spoils-Tendrils by a 15-20% turn one gold fish. With the failure to include disruption the decks only outlet is speed and it is inferior to spoils-tendrils so why not play it instead. If you are looking for a turn 1-2 win without the threat of killing yourself then traditional belcher (slightly modified rather than the makeover you gave it here) is a far better choice seeing as how it has more outlets for the early, mid, and late game as well as adding some disruption stoppers and/or disruption (Goblin Welder). And you refuse to venture into a combo deck with some elements of disruption in it but if you do choose to go that route... TPS is far superior to this deck. I have tested about 3 versions of the deck and the only upside i could find to it is that it has a lower degree of skill level involved in making decisions than that of spoils-tendrils but i do not feel that this is reason to sacrifice a signifigant turn one win percentage. Maybe you are hoping for a comparable turn one win to that of spoils-tendrils but i feel you have not achieved that as of yet. Personally unless ones metagame is filled with madness and non-MWS aggro decks i think that there are better choices for combo. Normally rogue combo can sneak in a few wins because of the lack of sideboard techs against it but this deck is hurt by all of the cliche disruption that most combo decks are as well as more (Artifact hate). Maybe im missing something to the deck but i cant see what it would be. If i am please inform me so i can playtest differently.

[Scott_Limoges]

Thanks for your constructive criticisms.

My intention in modifying this deck is to create a superior variant that is tournament playable, as Smmenen stated.  Given the vass card pool and deck building philosophy, many unexplored options are waiting to be discovered and implemented.  I have tested and played this deck before lions eye diamond was restricted, played several tournaments after LEDs restriction, tested numerous versions – colors, card choices, ideas and can confidently say the above version has provided the greatest resiliency, flexibility, and disruptive speed against control (the benchmark).

Benchmarking facets.  My interpretation from your example of (identity crisis?) is a benchmark that weighs each facet against an established deck.  The combo facets frequently discussed are speed and disruption.  For comparative reasons, this theory is sound for making general claims to support a notion; however, in actual practice it is flawed.  The misconception of the theory is - it doesn’t consider the objective of winning when forced to interact. Mike Flores discusses this in his article The Limit of Interactivity.  A team experienced this at the most recent Waterbury.  To a certain extent, disruption or strategic interaction limits the degree of interaction between an opponent; however, it will never nullify opposing interaction, as tournament history has shown.  To complete the theory a third component must be integrated that accounts for real interaction, which could be resiliency.  Belcher is a unique example that takes advantage of this inevitability through its supportive cards and non-conditional win condition (meaning it doesn’t need 9 spells or more than one combo part).

Thanks for your response.  It is obvious you have tested different variants.

What facets need to be improved?  What card choices would improve these?

Edit - Duress is played for discruption pre-SB.