Belcherless Gifts Belcher: Analysis and a SCGP9 Rochester report (2nd)

[dicemanx]

After doing well in a couple of events with Gifts, I decided to start up this thread to discuss my version of the deck and present an accompanying report at the end detailing some of my SCGP9 Rochester adventures on my way to 2nd place. First, the list that I decided on for the event:

Belcherless Gifts Belcher (aka Gifts.fr)

Disruption(13)

4x Force of Will
4x Mana Drain
3x Duress
2x Phyrexian Furnace

Card drawing/search (13)

4x Brainstorm
3x Thirst for Knowledge
1x Fact or Fiction
1x Ancestral Recall
3x Gifts Ungiven
1x Skeletal Scrying

Tutoring (5)

1x Mystical Tutor
1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Cunning Wish
1x Burning Wish

Broken (4)

1x Time Walk
1x Tinker
1x Yawgmoth’s Will
1x Recoup

The kill (1)

1x Darksteel Colossus

Mana (25)

1x Black Lotus
1x Mox Jet
1x Mox Sapphire
1x Mox Pearl
1x Mox Ruby
1x Mox Emerald
1x Sol Ring
1x Mana Crypt

4x Island
1x Swamp
4x Polluted Delta
3x Underground Sea
3x Volcanic Island
1x Tolarian Academy
1x Library of Alexandria


Sideboard (15)

3x Old Man of the Sea
1x Lava Dart
1x Pyroclasm
2x Red Elemental Blast
2x Engineered Explosives
2x Rack and Ruin
1x Rebuild
1x Tendrils of Agony
1x Mind Twist
1x Boseiju Who Shelters All


Deck analysis:

A. Kill condition:

I decided to make some modifications to Gifts.fr in preparation of this event. The biggest change was removing the Goblin Charbelcher + Mana Severance combo to make room for more disruption/card drawing. I was finding that having two kills was redundant, and while Belcher and Severance are useful on their own, there are far stronger cards that this deck can run to ensure that it gets itself into a winning position in the first place. It seems that a sole Colossus is extremely risky, but the win is actually quite trivial even if the opponents hold lots of removal. I played a tournament game a few weeks prior to this event that really increased my confidence in the sole Colossus – my opponent, playing U/W Landstill, at one point held 4 Swords to Plowshares with 4 Tundras in play but easily succumbed to my Yawgmoth’s Will. Nevertheless, that event also featured games where I had to face very scary cards like Planar Void and Maze of Ith. As a result I decided to put a Tendrils of Agony in the SB “just in case�, but in retrospect I think that this was a mistake – I didn’t even come close to getting a lethal Tendrils for one thing, but more importantly it was never necessary to rely on anything other than Colossus. I suppose that having a back-up plan does allow for more early “blind Tinkering� (walking into a potential Swords to Plowshares via Tinker without having disruption to protect it) but such situations haven’t really come up. I was really hurting for certain SB cards in the event, and making more room by axing the Tendrils would have helped.

B. Mana Sources

The mana base has some flexibility when it comes to the last few slots. Specifically, the options include:

Boseiju Who Shelters All
Library of Alexandria
Lotus Petal
Mana Vault
Strip Mine
Swamp

I opted to run the Library and a basic Swamp in the deck. Here is a quick analysis of some of the choices:

Lotus Petal – The idea here is more artifact acceleration, getting Mana Drain online faster, and having an additional artifact to pitch to Thirst for Knowledge. The downsides, which I assessed as being much too serious, are the fact that it isn’t a permanent mana source, and probably more importantly it’s yet another mana source stopped by Chalice of the Void for 0 or Null Rod. Given the fact that we anticipated tons of Fish at the event, and the fact that the environment should have a very appreciable amount of non-basic hate, I decided to run a more solid mana base. I believed that the deck was powerful enough to beat anything, and the last thing I wanted to do was giving up freebies to decks like Fish if they got a good mana disruption draw. Perhaps in the future I would consider the card if I ran a more aggressive build of Gifts that sacrificed some of the disruption for more card drawing, but until then I will continue to hedge against Fish and CotV/Null Rod.

Mana Vault – Again, the idea here is more acceleration to power out the more expensive draw spells early, while also increasing the artifact count for Thirst. There are also two other subtle advantages: the first is the ability to get around CotV for 0, and the second is to allow for the casting of Engineered Explosives for 0 to kill CotV for 0. However, two things concerned me: as with Petal, the Vault cannot be considered a permanent mana source when it counts most (early in the game), and it can also get shut off by Null Rod or the next popular option for CotV: a CotV for 1. Burning a Vault early in order to cast Gifts usually isn’t a very good idea, and even wasting it on something like a Thirst for Knowledge didn’t really excite me. Once again, I wanted to ensure my mana base was more stable and more resistant to non basic hate. I traded explosiveness for more consistency, believing that I could outplay or have the deck outmuscle my opponents without introducing a bigger element of luck into the matches.

Boseiju – This card is obviously powerful against quite a few archetypes, however it is not the type of card you want to draw early against the more aggressive decks. Again, this was a judgement call based on the anticipation of many aggro-control decks at the event. Curiously, even against decks where Boseiju is the most powerful (Control Slaver and other Gifts decks), sometimes the card can cause a slight tempo loss early in the match that can mean the difference between winning and losing. Therefore, I opted to put it in the SB instead to go along with its sidekick, Mind Twist, and just hoped for the best.

Strip Mine – This gets a mention from me because I will lose the odd game to a Library of Alexandria. However, that probably doesn’t justify the inclusion of the card, especially since it might not be drawn in time to stop LoA from doing the damage.

Library of Alexandria – Pain free and coming into play untapped makes this a considerable improvement over Boseiju, particularly against the more aggressive decks. Also, LoA has a subtle use mentioned above – it can help you cast Explosives for 0 against CotV for 0. While it seems there are many on the fence about this card, it continues to steal games for me, and I would never remove this card when running any sort of control deck, Gifts.fr included. I like free wins. Yes, there are some obvious downsides (the most notable is not getting a Mana Drain online until turn 3 if LoA is played first), but this isn’t convincing enough to make me cut the card from the deck.

Basic Swamp (and 4 basic Islands) – I upped the basic land count to make the mana base more solid against the anticipated Fish decks and their scary mana disruption. The Swamp was added to support the higher black card count – with only 3 Underground Seas and the frequent need to fetch up a black source very early to cast one of three Duresses or to cast Vampiric Tutor, I decided to make the slight concession of not getting  Mana Drain mana up by turn 2. This seemed to pay off for me in this event – having more basics ensured that I wasn’t getting cut off from either B or UU, and also ensured that I would build to higher mana counts in the face of the inevitable CotV for 0 or Null Rod. I even had to face random Blood Moons and Back to Basics in this event, not to mention lots of Crucibles/Wastelands, so the 5 basics helped out a lot. As I said, my goal was to ensure that I wouldn’t be dying to mana screw, and give myself every chance to outplay my opponents.

Because of the Swamp, I had to run 4 Polluted Deltas instead of the typical 2 Delta/2 Flooded Strand configuration typical of most Gifts decks. Perhaps more surprisingly, I ran no Snow Covered Islands either. I simply haven’t encountered any situations where I needed to Gifts for mana where it was critical to Gifts for a basic land specifically. Plus, there IS a disadvantage to running Snow covered lands, but again the reason was quite subtle – quite often during the day my opponents were unsure what I was playing, and as a consequence made certain misplays, failed to call the correct card with Meddling Mage, or didn’t sideboard properly. If they saw a Snow covered land on my side of the table, that might unnecessarily give them a big clue as to what I was playing. As Shock Wave and I both agree, a significant portion of a deck’s strength comes from the surprise factor and limiting your opponent’s knowledge about your deck as much as possible. As such it is sometimes important to make certain sacrifices (run a less optimal build) to keep your opponents guessing and maximize the likelihood that they will commit critical play errors or make poor decisions against you. It is no surprise to us, for example, that so many people believe that Shock Wave’s pet deck, “Die Drone Dieâ€?, is a miserable pile of cards. They are missing the point of why it continues to do so well in his hands.     


C. Disruption

While 4 FoW and 4 Drain are pretty much a given in the deck, the remainder of the disruption base is quite flexible. I decided to increase the Duress count to 3, and now wished that I was running up to 4. It was a card that I almost always wanted to see in my opening hand, but running a full complement makes much more sense if the deck is running that solitary Swamp. Having to fetch out an Underground to Duress only to have it wasted and get cut off from black for x number of turns is a risky proposition; I have been on the losing end of such scenarios in the previous two events.

The big issue for me prior to the event, however, was what other disruption cards to run between the main deck and SB. Here are my comments on the cards I elected to use:

Phyrexian Furnace – This card is potentially devastating against certain decks (Dragon and the two control-combo decks that rely on the graveyard – Salvagers and Control Slaver). Unfortunately, drawing a Furnace is less than stellar when your opponent has padded his graveyard with lots of spells. Sacrificing the Furnace to nab a solitary card in a graveyard and draw a card is a little underwhelming at times – in fact, the cantrip effect is a little deceiving, because the Furnace rarely replaces itself immediately, so you potentially sacrifice a draw step to draw it and have it sit there waiting for a relevant target. So far, I cannot pinpoint any game where I rode the Furnaces to victory or relied on them to stop my opponent. Much to the disbelief of some, I actually sided them out against Control Slaver on a couple of occasions, for a few reasons. For one thing, I’ve noticed that some CS players like to swap Welders for CotVs and set CotV to 1; also, CS, like Gifts, can be more of a Yawgwill/Drain deck and can overwhelm you with card drawing and ultimately hard-casting its threats – Furnaces don’t have such an easy time in stopping huge Wills unless you drop 2-3 Furnaces early, which is a low percentage play. To top it off, a single Furnace can be negated by a single Welder as long as their grave is padded, not to mention that the Welder can kill your Furnace if you’re attempting to reap the most benefit from Thirst for Knowledge.

On top of all of this, Furnace simply blows against aggro control, especially if they cut off the cantrip effect with Null Rod. So why did I run them, if I anticipated a field full of Fish? I’m not entirely sure, but I think it has to do with the fact that you just WANT to believe that Furnace is powerful and worthy of inclusion. It also assists in maximizing the power of one of the best draw spells available to Gifts by virtue of being an artifact – Thirst for Knowledge. I think it’s this latter point that makes me very hesitant in cutting the Furnaces entirely; if I did, I’d either start swapping the Thirsts for Skeletal Scryings (although increasing the black card count has its own drawbacks), or find some other suitable artifact replacements, including the extra mana sources in Petal and/or Mana Vault. Main deck Engineered Explosives might perhaps be a very important consideration given that so many Fish decks are switching from Null Rod to CotV along with running so many 2-casting-cost creatures (Meddling Mage being the most problematic). However, I just don’t see myself running main deck Explosives, as the card can also be a little underwhelming at times. I will continue to experiment in any case.

Burning Wish – I ended up trimming the SB of Sorcery cards, weakening the card a little. The only SB targets are now Pyroclasm and Mind Twist (and Tendrils as the win condition #2), although this really doesn’t bother me so much. Burning Wish’s primary purpose is to recur Time Walk and Yawgmoth’s Will, so having Sorceries in the SB is of smaller importance. 

Cunning Wish – I experimented a little with the inclusion of this card after cutting the Belcher + Severance, and it felt just right for this event. The obvious inclusions in the SB were the two REBs (even though one *should* have been a Pyroblast – I couldn’t find mine and I wasn’t about to proxy it) the two Rack and Ruins (amazing choices versus Fish and Workshop) and Rebuild, which incidentally served as my one removal spell against an opposing Tinkered Colossus (which was better in my opinion than having to run a Chainer’s Edict). There was also a solitary Lava Dart specifically against Welders, although it turned out not to be too amazing during the event. What I did sorely miss, however, was a draw spell! I completely forgot to include a Skeletal Scrying in the SB, which in retrospect I would easily swap for that Tendrils of Agony.

The sideboard disruption cards not mentioned above:

Old Man of the Sea – This was an easy choice given the many Fish decks expected for the event. I chose old Men over Flametongue Kavus because the Men are one mana cheaper which can be an absolutely huge consideration given that I would be facing mana denial and Dazes. In addition, while FtK can 2 for 1 they do nothing against Factories and you can still get overwhelmed by their creatures; on top of this if they drop a Standstill before dropping creatures as targets for your FtKs then it might be a serious a problem. Old Men by comparison come down faster and can control the entire board. If I had more room I would up the Old Man count to 4.

Engineered Explosives - Another huge card against both Fish and any decks using CotV, not to mention significant uses against Control Slaver’s Welders and Oath’s Oath of Druids. Another card at times I wish I had more room for in the SB. I also decided that this would be my only card against Oath – I didn’t bother with the usual choice, Spawning Pit, as the card is so inflexible in the SB (it is useless against everything else), and it doesn’t always stop them from winning – it just stops them from winning quickly, and only if you get one down before they drop the combo on you or if they fail to find their bounce spell(s) early. The Oath match up most of the time revolves around disruption and card drawing anyways as most control on control matches do, except that they can get these stupid early knock-out punches with Mox-Orchard-Oath. I’d concede such games to them and not bother with hedging against such possibilities by wasting precious SB space. Plus, it seems that Fish, on the strength of Meddling Mage, is somehow beating Oath these days, which limits the chances of encountering one in the tourney.


D. Card Drawing/tutoring

There are only two points worthy of discussion here, as many of the card choices have been discussed before.

The first is the inclusion of Vampiric Tutor. The deck seemed to benefit from the increased tutoring power, especially when needing to find either Tinker, Yawgmoth’s Will, Black Lotus, Tolarian Academy, or Library of Alexandria (Ancestral Recall too of course). After the event it seemed like a very natural inclusion in the deck, adding to the consistency at the cost of a card.

The second issue was the ratio of Thirsts for Knowledge to Skeletal Scryings. I opted for 3 TfK, mainly to not overload on too many black spells and to not lower the blue card count for FoW. Otherwise it is hard to decide on the optimal ratio; TfK doesn’t always draw a net of two cards, although it’s a great card to dispose a DSC from your hand without relying of Brainstorm and it digs 1 card deeper at 3 mana. Also, the life payment of Scrying could be a big issue against a more aggressive field, not to mention the fact that you might be forced to remove some juicy YawgWill targets early in the game. I was happy with my configuration at the event, although as I mentioned above I would add a Scrying to the SB to fetch via the Cunning Wish.



Here are the actual details from the Rochester P9 event. I forgot many of the details so this will be more of a QnD report. I also don’t feel like detailing the adventures of our trip, so perhaps one of my fellow teammates will fill you in on our adventures . Here we go:


Round 1: Eli Kassis (4C Witness/DSC Oath)

I begin the event with a feature match against Eli, a solid player who is playing his unique take on Oath. We end up fighting three very close games; our decks are very similar in that we are both running FoWs, Drains, Duress, and a wealth of draw spells/broken stuff. Eli has a short clock in Oath-Orchard, but I have the edge draw/spell wise in that I’m packing Gifts Ungiven. Game 1 goes to Eli who managed to resolve a mid game Oath after we had exhausted our hands with disruption. An Orchard soon followed and I couldn’t find any gas before Colossus killed me. Sideboarding I decided to take out the two Furnaces, Swamp (he didn’t have Wastes) and a Thirst for Knowledge for the two REBs and the Boseiju/Mind Twist. Game 2 he didn’t find Oath early enough, so I had enough time to outdraw him and combo him out. Game 3 was similar, except towards the end of the 50 minutes he finally managed to plop down an Oath, but didn’t have enough extra turns to kill me. An exciting match that set the tone for the rest of the day – most of my matches would end up 2-1 going to time in almost every case. Even though I would end up playing almost 14 straight hours of Magic, I was up to the challenge! 

Match: 1-1-1

Record: 0-0-1


Round 2: Stefan Verveniotis (Oath/Witness + Pandeburst/Replenish combo)

A fellow Canadian, and my second Oath deck. The one deck (or two card combo rather, given both Stefan’s and Eli’s unique approaches) I decided not to SB for. Predictably, I get smashed in two games as my luck against Eli was exhausted. Stefan began game 1 with 3 Oaths in hand and nothing else of consequence, but the key point was that he was able to resolve the Oath past my Duress and FoW and he drew into Orchard before I got myself rolling. He Oathed up a Witness, managed to hard cast a Pandemonium and with the aid of a Duress in hand and Saproling Burst in the graveyard he forced through a Replenish. Game 2 was ridiculously short – he manages a turn 1 Boseiju followed by a turn 2 Tinker into Colossus which he had sided in. That was good might, as I only had counters in hand and couldn’t get my own Tinker in time.  I wished Stefan continued success at that point, as I was now dependent on him bettering my tiebreakers while needing to win out from this point on.

Match: 0-2

Record: 0-1-1


Round 3: ??? (U/R Fish with Jitte)

My round three opponent was a very pleasant individual who was sporting a dangerous U/R Fish deck. He was running the game ending (for me) Rootwater Thiefs, although fortunately for me he opted to play MD Jittes over Null Rod. I didn’t see any CotVs, so I’m not sure if they were in there. Game 1 I get run over by angry little blue men, and game 2 is shaping up the same way until I manage to Pyroclasm away his board. I SBed in the Old Men, Pyroclasm, Engineered Explosives and the two Rack and Ruins (removing Furnaces – surprise surprise – along with Cunning Wish, TfK, Gifts, Drain, Scrying and Vampiric Tutor). I managed to win game 2 handily but not before I got him to reveal some of his tech – a Copy Artifact, which he attempted to cast after I Tinkered up my Colossus! I debated removing the Tinker and DSC for game three and riding my Old Men to victory, but elected not to. Game 3 was a bit of a shocker. He plays a Null Rod mid game after a flurry of early action (he probably boarded in Null Rods, but I still had my two Rack and Ruins). Fortunately, I build up my mana base without issues thanks in part to my heavy basics count. He then proceeds to play a morphed creature (!), which I know is a Willbender from the previous game. I Duressed him earlier and know he’s holding another techy card – Dominating Licid! I have a Tinker in hand along with an Old Man with some key cards in my graveyard, and I make my move. I cast the Old Man and pass the turn. He resolves his Licid. On my turn I attempt to steal the Licid, and he unmorphs his Willbender to change the Old Man’s target to itself. I anticipated this, as he missed the fact that I had both Time Walk and Recoup in my graveyard. I take my extra turn, steal the Licid, and Tinker up Colossus with enough counters in hand to stop his subsequent Copy Artifact. An exciting finish, and kudos to my opponent for trying some very interesting cards in his Fish build.

Match: 2-1

Record: 1-1-1


Round 4: Bob Kochis (U/W/B control)

Bob is the finalist from SCG: Syracuse, so I’m wondering if he’s with his U/W Landstill today. I find out soon enough as he gets LoA going early and ends up discarding a Future Sight early, along with playing some Underground Seas. I suspect he’s with some version of 3 color control instead of Landstill, but that is small comfort and the LoA is killing me. He’s still a bit mana shy despite drawing all those cards, and I in turn have quality cards in hand with lots of disruption and some card drawing. Mid game he lets himself engage in a counter war over some spell which I manage to win. I’m happy as I finally don’t have to worry about LoA for the time being, although I’m still not out of the woods as we are more or less in top deck mode. I drew better than him at this point and manage to resolve the first of two(!) YawgWills thanks to Burning Wish. He understandably doesn’t concede as he still has no idea what I’m playing, since I haven’t seen a Gifts all this time and I don’t play Snow Covered Islands. I proceed to simply Tinker in the Colossus and have counter back-up, and he is without business cards in hand. On to game 2. I SB in the REBs, Mind Twist, and decide to give Boseiju a try, removing the Furnaces, Cunning Wish, and a TfK.Game 2 is also a tense battle early, but he manages to cycle a mid game Decree of Justice for 3 and a Meddling Mage. He is too far ahead and when 10 minutes left in the round is called I concede to save time. Game 3 is more kind to me, and I manage to resolve a Boseiju fueled Mind Twist followed by ripping a Tutor for YawgWill. He manages to Waste the Boseiju but doesn’t have any business in hand to my 2 Drains. I will and build up my hand, resolve Tinker and that’s game. I win just in time in extra turns, thanks to Time Walk.

Match: 2-1

Record: 2-1-1


Round 5: ??? (U/W Fish with Null Rod)

Another Fish player with more unique cards – this time I am facing Mystic Remora. Game 1 he manages to resolve a couple of Null Rods early, but doesn’t have much in terms of creatures. I Duress a couple of Times stripping away an StP and Stifle, and he is without much action. I build my mana base (thanks to my basics) and Cunning Wish for a REB, nailing a Meddling Mage with it. He Resolves a Cloud of Faeries and Ninjutsu’s in a Ninja next turn. On my turn, I’m forced to burn my YawgWill to replay the REB and kill the Ninja. That’s all the action I see from him and I resolve a Tinker soon after. On to game 2. I SB similarly to my round 3 match, and the game starts off with him beating me down with a Spiketail while a Remora prevents me from casting anything. My hand is all gas though, so I patiently wait until his mana runs out, and I have the Drain when he tries to resolve Remora #2. At that point I explode on him, and without Null Rod I have enough mana to combo out.

Match: 2-0

Record: 3-1-1


Round 6: ??? (Bomberman – Salvagers combo)

My French Canadian opponent is quite tricky. He would unveil some interesting card choices and tactics (“can I count your SB please?�). I managed to somehow win game 1, and game 2 featured some interesting action. My opponent got very confused how his CotVs worked in relation the my SBed in Explosives. He set a CotV for 0 at the start of game 2, but I managed to get a Boseiju out and used it to play an EE for 0. At first my opponent got excited and claimed that I couldn’t cast the EE with Boseiju as it was for Instants and Sorceries only. Um, no. Then we called a judge as he believed that my EE would be countered by the CotV for 0. The EE nailed his CotV, but the problem was that he managed to resolve an early Samurai of the Pale Curtain and went all the way with it. Not sure why he boarded it in – to go the beatdown route perhaps? In any case, the game was his. Game three featured more CotV shenanigans. He plays a CotV for 1 early on after I manage to resolve a Duress and Brainstorm, so I wasn’t too concerned. Eventually I did draw into an EE, and cast it for 0 by paying a colorless mana off a Drain after he plopped down another CotV for 0. I blew up the CotVs, but he thought that his CotV for 1 wouldn’t die to the Explosives. Hmm, what’s going on. He accepts the judge’s patient explanation of how CMCs work and we play on. I build up a solid hand with card drawing while he begins accumulating some chaff that he SBed in. I see two Energy Flux (!?) in his hand after a Duress, and a short while later he attempts to resolve a Back to Basics which I FoW. I let him have a Flux, saving my Drains for any removal as I Tinker up Colossus. Like a good player I remember the upkeep on my Colossus and win game 3. Exciting.

Match 2-1

Record: 4-1-1   


Round 7: Matt Locke (Salvagers combo-control)

Another fellow Canadian. I recently faced Matt in the finals (which I lost 0-2) of an event not too long ago back home in this exact match-up, although the key difference is that I’m sporting more draw/disruption and less Belcher/Severance. We play two games, both of which were similar: we would trade draw spells and disruption exhausting our hands, but I was packing a little more card drawing than him and top-decked better. I resolved some monstrous YawgWills both games as a result.

Match: 2-0

Record: 5-1-1


Round 8: Ben ??? (Control Slaver)

Final round. If I win I have a good shot at top 8, as my tie breaks are not too horrible as one might expect after starting 0-1-1. My first two opponents, Eli and Stefan, managed to accumulate good records so I have some hope. Skill decides to take a back seat in game 1 of this match as the deck completely unloads on my opponent – I’m almost as much of a spectator here as Ben. I chain my draw spells into tons of disruption and a mid-sized YawgWill which is enough to put me far ahead of him card wise. I quickly see my Tinker and it’s on to game 2. In the second game he SBs in Blood Moon which completely took me by surprise. After a flurry of disruption spells in the first 2-3 turns he resolves a Blood Moon and a CotV for 0, but I have an Island and Tinker in hand. He made a slight mistake when casting Blood Moon, as he had a REB but missed the fact that his LoA would turn into a Mountain. As a result he was without red mana to stop the Tinker, although I had more gas in hand and would have led with the TfK, baiting any REBs and hoping to draw into FoW to safeguard the Tinker. In any case Tinker resolves, giving him two turns to find a Welder. He doesn’t and just like that it is over. Fortunately, as it turns out I didn’t have to depend on tiebreaks as all of the 6-1-1 players made it in, with me as the 8th seed.

Match: 2-0

Record: 6-1-1


Top 8

Predictably, my first opponent in the top 8 is none other than my friend and playtest partner, Rich (Shock Wave). It seems that we are always destined to knock each other out in the quarterfinals when we both make it in. We had three extremely tense and exciting games, the details of which are covered in the SCG premium coverage. The semis against Nick Rosu were a a bit of an anti-climax, as Nick had disruption light starts and without Null Rod or CotV I was given free reign, managing to draw tons of cards and eventually resolving the Tinker for the win both games. Congratulations to Nick for his amazing performance with a solid deck (along with fellow Canadian Brian Finch, co creator of that amazing OFM2K5 Fish variant!) and to Rich as well for finally making top 8 after being so close on so many occasions! The finals were an absolute marathon, with me having to fight through amazing starts by my French Canadian opponent, Ugo, in all three games. I maximized my chances and it did come down to a top deck war in game 3, but it was not to be. I think my opponent was a bit unfairly criticized by many for making play mistakes in that match – it obviously took quite a bit of skill to reach the finals of a major event such as this one, and even though perhaps he lost a bit of focus towards the end of the night resulting in some play errors (we were going strong all the way past 1am after starting just before 11 am the previous day) he was still making many correct decisions. It was certainly an exciting match to be a part of, and although I was always struggling from behind in each game because of the initial luck of the draw I had my chances so I cannot complain. Congratulations to Ugo for his win, and to many of the Canadians who managed to showcase their impressive deckbuilding and play skills!

[Machinus]

Thanks a lot for the report, and especially the analysis of the deck. We have pretty similar builds. I am planning on taking gifts-colossus to some local events and I find myself also wanting to take the furnaces out. I want to maindeck explosives for them but I don't know if thats a good move or not. Anyway, congratulations on the finish, and great work on the deck.

[Toad]

Very interesting read Peter. Good call on cutting Goblin Charbelcher and Mana Severance, these are awful in the deck.
The lone Cunning Wish could probably become a second Skeletal Scrying. Phyrexian Furnace are probably not maindeck material now the metagame has adapted, but It's quite hard to find useful artifacts to put in these slots. I also don't really like 4 Duress maindeck, because sometimes you end up with no real business spell in hand and too much disruption / countermagic, facing a threat on the board. I still run that Duress in the sideboard for Combo matchups and an occasionnal Burning Wish target if needed.

Considering Fish variants tend to run Kira now, why did you elected to run 3 Old Man of the Sea over, say, more Pyroclasms for example?

[dicemanx]

Very interesting read Peter. Good call on cutting Goblin Charbelcher and Mana Severance, these are awful in the deck.
The lone Cunning Wish could probably become a second Skeletal Scrying.

This might be a good call, although I did like the flexibility that Cunning Wish offered especially having access to REB and Rebuild/Rack and Ruin. With both Burning Wish and Cunning Wish I have access to slightly more removal against Fish (either REB or RnR/Rebuild to deal with Null Rod/CotV if necessary) and against Tinkered up threats (Rebuild for Platinum Angel/Colossus).

Phyrexian Furnace are probably not maindeck material now the metagame has adapted, but It's quite hard to find useful artifacts to put in these slots. I also don't really like 4 Duress maindeck, because sometimes you end up with no real business spell in hand and too much disruption / countermagic, facing a threat on the board. I still run that Duress in the sideboard for Combo matchups and an occasionnal Burning Wish target if needed.

This indeed was a problem in some games - too much disruption in hand and not enough draw spells. This is why I'll probably end up sticking to just the 3 Duress.

Considering Fish variants tend to run Kira now, why did you elected to run 3 Old Man of the Sea over, say, more Pyroclasms for example?

I must admit I didn't see Kira coming at all. I'm not entirely sure how many Fish decks ran her at the Rochester event, and I'm also not sure if the players would know to side her in against me game 2 - she might be more of a game 3 SB card. After I found out about Kira I was still unsure about the best SB card, or even if Old Man was inferior to more Pyroclasms. The issue I have with Pyroclasm is that I don't want to overload on red spells - I already have the Recoup and Burning Wish (which could get swapped for the Pyroclasm post SB), and against Fish I want to bring in the two REB and Rack and Ruin. Bringing in more Pyroclasms could lead to a situation where I'm forced to fetch up a Volcanic early and have it Wasted, getting cut off from red. The other potential problem of not running Old Men is Rootwater Thief, which made some occasional appearances. Old Men could turn into victory conditions, and even if Kira does make it on the table I still have removal for her via Blasts/Pyroclasm. The fact that she's legendary probably means that they won't run a full set of 4, so focusing on stopping/removing all of their Kira's to make sure Old Man can do his stuff is quite doable. Plus, Old Man is still an amazing blocker, stopping everything except Cloud of Faeries and a lone Kira, so, worst case scenario I just buy myself a few turns while Old Man stares down Meddling mages and Ninjas.

There is one other deck that I like to have the option of bringing in Old Men against: Salvagers control/combo. Local builds along with Bomberman run other two power creatures (Trinket Mage and/or Meddling Mage), so Old Man has plenty of targets.


Perhaps in a future build I will try an Abyss or two in the SB as an anti Fish card?

Thanks a lot for the report, and especially the analysis of the deck. We have pretty similar builds. I am planning on taking gifts-colossus to some local events and I find myself also wanting to take the furnaces out. I want to maindeck explosives for them but I don't know if thats a good move or not. Anyway, congratulations on the finish, and great work on the deck.

Thanks! Let me know how the EEs work out if you do try them. As I mentioned above perhaps running a Petal and Mana Vault to up the mana count and make the deck more explosive with all the card drawing is something worth trying, but the presence of Null Rod/CotV complicates things a little.

[And11]

First of all: Good job man! I've also chosen to throw Belcher and friends to the trashcan for the EXACT same reasons you mentioned. That they've been replaced with cards that allow you to play Tinker with no fear at all (hand full of disruption or a well placed Duress...).

I see that we disagree on the TfK vs. Scrying subject. Skeletal Scrying can completely turn the game around a way that Thirst never could. In a Drain mirror where REB's + twin are sideboarded in, you really see the difference. On the other side, TfK are easier to cast, better against all aggro and gets rid of the big boy. Tough call really

I'm going to a 50 man tournament next weekend with this decklist. I've tried to explain the card-choises the best I could. My metagame is non-proxy so only half of the field will be playing expensive decks, the other half will play budget decks like affinity, r/g, FCG, WTF, u/w fish and the like. This explains why you won't find Furnaces in there, but Engineered Explosives to deal with opposing Mages, Rods or CotV's.

Main Deck: 61                                                                         

1x Tinker
1x Darksteel Colossus

3x Duress (We totally agree)
4x Mana Drain
4x Force of Will
1x Engineered Explosives (Because of metagame)

4x Brainstorm
3x Gifts Ungiven (Fetches TfK, Recall/Wish, SS and FoF a lot)
1x Thirst for Knowledge (Flexibility with GU)
2x Skeletal Scrying (Best engine available)
1x Fact or Fiction (Flexibility with GU)
1x Ancestral Recall
1x Cunning Wish (For the flexibility)
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Mystical Tutor (Easier access to Tinker vs. aggro)
1x Vampiric Tutor (Same)

1x Time Walk
1x Yawgmoth's Will
1x Burning Wish
1x Recoup

1x Black Lotus
1x Sol Ring
1x Mana Crypt
1x Mana Vault
1x Mox Sapphire
1x Mox Emerald
1x Mox Ruby
1x Mox Pearl
1x Mox Jet
2x Polluted Delta
3x Flooded Strand (Because of Pithing Needle, I'd amagine ppl would rather name Delta)
2x Island
1x Snow-Covered Island (A hand of Vault/Lotus, land and Gifts will need to find basix against fish)
1x Library of Alexandria (<3 random wins vs. Drain, can force EE through against CotV for 0)
1x Boseiju, Who Shelters All (Look above)
1x Tolarian Academy
4x Underground Sea
3x Volcanic Island

Sideboard: 15
2x Rack and Ruin (Against Stax and MWS aggro)
1x Pyroblast (Drain)
1x Red Elemental Blast (Drain)
1x Engineered Explosives (Aggro and Oath)
3x Pyroclasm (Aggro)
1x Primitive Justice (Wish target for Platz and gets sided in vs. MWS)
1x Tendrils of Agony (I've used this as a win a couple of times)
1x Mindtwist (B. Wish target against Drain)
1x Rushing River (Wished for against opposing DSC or Oath)
1x Skeletal Scrying (Standard with target vs. control)
1x Blue Elemental Blast (Goblins and and Slaver with Blood Moon)
1x Hydroblast (Same...)

Once again, grats on your succes,
/9k/AndreaZ of Denmark

[MaxxMatt]

Hi dicemanx

I play you exact list ( as you can read briefly in the tourney section ) but with those differencies.

-2 Furnaces
-1 TFK
+1 Balance
+1 F/I
+1 Mindtwist

Good addition the maindeck Cunning Wish, in order to optimize some key plays against resolved spells.
I play with that touch of white with a single Tundra in the mana base, but with the same total ( 25 total mana fonts ).
I found F/I one of the best additions to the maindeck and if I had more spece I would add another one ( maibe cutting Balance ).
Balance could be used aggressively or reactively without difficulties and it is more than a rest button, it is a game breaking spell! I suggest you to shuffle a bit with it and play against MW.dec and Welder.dec or more aggro-control.dec. It is definitively one of my MVP cards.

I like a lot the sideboard configuration and excluding Old Man of the Sea ( i have Furnaces in those spots ) we are playing almost the same things ( i have a junky Decree of Justice and a Cranial in the spot where you have a Rebuild and an E.E. . OTOH, I noticed how sweet and elegant is the lone Rebuild when you are going to go off with the Tendrils of Agony, maybe without needing the everused Y WIll.

My meta had too many Rods all around to be able to play with E.E.

I found 2 TFK to be more than enough to achieve a good board/card/control positions against combo and control. How is needed the third one for you?

Good job.


MaxxMatt

[mrieff]

Very interesting analysis and congrats on your T8.
My suggestions for possible improvement are virtually identical to the points Toad raised.

One very small detail: in your report you refer to Chainer's Edict. Bet you mean Diabolic Edict here

[reBU5]

Hi
I have one simple idea too share- besides all card choices etc. don't U guys think that this deck need a new name? Belcherless Gifts Belcher is nice but /more popular/ Tinker.dec is so obvious and sometimes confusing (deck with 4x Transmute Artifact). How about TPC? =The Perfect Combat or (Yoda style ) TPC/IP * = The Perfect Combat I Play.



* close to TCP/IP which is name for Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol   

[Webster]

One very small detail: in your report you refer to Chainer's Edict. Bet you mean Diabolic Edict here

Chainer's Edict is the card being refered to. Most gift lists posted do not run a Cunning Wish. Burning Wish does not get Diabolic Edict because it is an instant.


Webster

[Eddie]

Nice report. I love what you've done with this deck. Right now, I'd cut the Phyrexian Furnace and run 2 Engineered Explosives main. They are very good in the current meta. I'd also try fire/ice instead of lava dart in the side. Aside from destroying welders, it can also tap things like a colossus on the other side, or a Maze of Ith. It just adds flexibility to your sideboard. Also, I'm still running 3 Chalice of the Void in the side. I love them against combo, and they are quite usefull against other decks.

Edit: Webster beatz me in fast typing.

[Godot]

Balance could be used aggressively or reactively without difficulties and it is more than a rest button, it is a game breaking spell! I suggest you to shuffle a bit with it and play against MW.dec and Welder.dec or more aggro-control.dec. It is definitively one of my MVP cards.

I spent time testing all three major builds and one thing that really stood out in the CAB build was Balance.  Balance was consistently huge, most especially in the aggro-control matchups.  When I moved on to testing the other builds I reallly missed having Balance to fall back on.  Pyroclasm is nice, but its not gonna handle a Wild Mongrel or anything wielding a Jitte.  That being said though seeing that Tundra in your opening hand or drawing into it before you need it def. a pain in the ass.

[Machinus]

Thanks a lot for the report, and especially the analysis of the deck. We have pretty similar builds. I am planning on taking gifts-colossus to some local events and I find myself also wanting to take the furnaces out. I want to maindeck explosives for them but I don't know if thats a good move or not. Anyway, congratulations on the finish, and great work on the deck.

Thanks! Let me know how the EEs work out if you do try them. As I mentioned above perhaps running a Petal and Mana Vault to up the mana count and make the deck more explosive with all the card drawing is something worth trying, but the presence of Null Rod/CotV complicates things a little.

The EE were spectacular. I would even consider running 3 next time. Check out my report.

[mrieff]

Chainer's Edict is the card being refered to. Most gift lists posted do not run a Cunning Wish. Burning Wish does not get Diabolic Edict because it is an instant.

Webster

I assumed Diabolic because he discussed the card in the Cunning Wish section, not the Buring Wish section. 

[Dozer]

don't U guys think that this deck need a new name? Belcherless Gifts Belcher is nice but /more popular/ Tinker.dec is so obvious and sometimes confusing (deck with 4x Transmute Artifact). How about TPC? =The Perfect Combat or (Yoda style ) TPC/IP * = The Perfect Combat I Play.

No. It's called Gifted, or Gifted.fr. Toad has been advertising the deck for a while now, I don't think that new confusion concerning the name is necessary.

A very thorough report, diceman, it was a good read. Congratulations on your finish, too! Two questions in particular stick out for me:
- What about Balance, that MaxxMatt and Godot already pointed out? Seeing as you anticipated Fish, was the mana inconsistency the worse part of the deal?

- Why did you not run 4 Gifts? Were you always comfortable with 3 or did you have situations where you had wanted an early Gifts but didn't find it? Your result carries a big "no, I didn't"-sign, but what is your reasoning behind playing only 3 of the key card in your deck?

Dozer

[dicemanx]

Thanks for the replies so far, and the kind words. It looks like there were some interesting cards suggested, and I wanted to add to that discussion.

I see that we disagree on the TfK vs. Scrying subject. Skeletal Scrying can completely turn the game around a way that Thirst never could. In a Drain mirror where REB's + twin are sideboarded in, you really see the difference. On the other side, TfK are easier to cast, better against all aggro and gets rid of the big boy. Tough call really

It seems that we can list many situations that will favor one card over the other, but you're right (as is Toad) that Scrying can be completely devestating in control mirrors as its effect is far more significant. I think if I end up dropping the Furnaces without replacing them with artifacts, then I will swap one TfK and add a Scrying, going with a 2/2 configuration.

3x Flooded Strand (Because of Pithing Needle, I'd amagine ppl would rather name Delta)

This is an issue that I haven't addressed yet. Running so many black cards in the deck pushes me towards that solitary Swamp and the four Polluted Deltas to ensure that I don't get cut off from black; however, if Pithing Needles become popular in T1 then that plan might not be ideal. I'm going to first wait and see what impact the Needle has.

I play you exact list ( as you can read briefly in the tourney section ) but with those differencies.

-2 Furnaces
-1 TFK
+1 Balance
+1 F/I
+1 Mindtwist

Good addition the maindeck Cunning Wish, in order to optimize some key plays against resolved spells.
I play with that touch of white with a single Tundra in the mana base, but with the same total ( 25 total mana fonts ).
I found F/I one of the best additions to the maindeck and if I had more spece I would add another one ( maibe cutting Balance ).
Balance could be used aggressively or reactively without difficulties and it is more than a rest button, it is a game breaking spell! I suggest you to shuffle a bit with it and play against MW.dec and Welder.dec or more aggro-control.dec. It is definitively one of my MVP cards.

I like the idea of Balance in this deck, although my concern is the mana to cast it and relying on that solitary Tundra. Something that I'd consider trying for sure. I'm surprised to hear however that Fire/Ice has been so strong for you. It seems a bit underwhelming against anything other than Welder, although I imagine it can be useful to just burn as a cantrip and perhaps even cut off Mana Drain mana early, or even tapping an opposing DSC to get through for damage with the help of Time Walk. I'm just wondering if its not better to just have the Cunning Wish main and the F/I in the SB? In my deck I ran the Lava Dart in the SB but realize that F/I would have been stronger.

You also have Mind Twist main. Is it working well for you? Do you have Boseiju main as well? Mind Twist looks like one of those cards that increases the risk (uncastable early) to increase the reward (devestating if resolved lmid game). I found myself siding this card in and out randomly against various decks without much of a clear plan in the last three events. Even in the finals against Ugo's CS I sided in Twist game 2 only to SB it out again game 3. It was more based on "feeling" than anything concrete.

One very small detail: in your report you refer to Chainer's Edict. Bet you mean Diabolic Edict here

Yeah, I did mean Chainer's Edict, even though it was in the discussion about Cunning Wish. The deck needs a way to deal with an opponent's resolved Tinker, so either the Cunning Wish can fetch Rebuild (or F/I against DSC) or Burning Wish can fetch Chainer's Edict. With the suggestion of Balance this might not be such a crucial consideration anymore.

Nice report. I love what you've done with this deck. Right now, I'd cut the Phyrexian Furnace and run 2 Engineered Explosives main. They are very good in the current meta. I'd also try fire/ice instead of lava dart in the side. Aside from destroying welders, it can also tap things like a colossus on the other side, or a Maze of Ith. It just adds flexibility to your sideboard. Also, I'm still running 3 Chalice of the Void in the side. I love them against combo, and they are quite usefull against other decks.

I might try the EEs in the next event, assuming that I play this deck again . And yes, I would replace the Dart with F/I. The Maze of Ith issue actually came up in a previous tournament, where my opponent put one into play and I was forced to scramble for DSC and 2 Time Walks all in the same turn past their disruption. I pulled it off, but if he found his second Maze I would have lost. While cards like Maze rarely make an appearance, I like to be prepared for everything as long as the cards designed to deal with certain issues remain flexible and have multiple uses.

The EE were spectacular. I would even consider running 3 next time. Check out my report.

Nice job, although it seemed from the report that the EEs didn't factor in so heavily. They still sound good against aggro heavy metas, which is where we seem to be moving right now.

A very thorough report, diceman, it was a good read. Congratulations on your finish, too! Two questions in particular stick out for me:
- What about Balance, that MaxxMatt and Godot already pointed out? Seeing as you anticipated Fish, was the mana inconsistency the worse part of the deal?

- Why did you not run 4 Gifts? Were you always comfortable with 3 or did you have situations where you had wanted an early Gifts but didn't find it? Your result carries a big "no, I didn't"-sign, but what is your reasoning behind playing only 3 of the key card in your deck?

The Balance didn't occur to me at the time, as adding another color seemed to be a risky proposition. It makes a lot of sense now, especially with the Recoup allowing for multiple Balances to be resolved, and with Gifts adding to the ability to locate the right mana.

Why not 4 Gifts? The card isn't something I wanted to see all the time, especially early in the game. I think there were more situations where the Gifts sat in my hand while other spells were being cast, as opposed to situations where I wished I had the Gifts in hand. For example, if I was facing control and they had parity (ie they had enough disruption to deal with my threats), then resolving Gifts might not have increased the business spell count significantly enough in my favor - in fact I might be stripping too many key cards from the deck, losing two of them to the graveyard. Also, building to 4 mana and/or having enough mana to resolve the broken stuff might be a problem when facing a Null Rod/CotV mana denial. So, while Gifts is a "draw spell" that signals the end of the game in many cases, this usually doesn't happen until mid game when I have enough mana and not unless I can be sure of punching through the disruption. I need faster draw spells (Scrying, TfK) or even more disruption to build my resources and ensure that I reach that favorable mid game state first.



I had another idea on how to try to handle the rising numbers of aggro-control, while also hedging against cards like Rootwater Thief or StP - what about 1-2 Psychatogs? This would give the deck nice walls to stem the aggro tide, while offering alternate routes to victory - a Fling in the SB might be one consideration. The Psychatog can even serve to protect the DSC from Welder removal if need be, and allow for more blind Tinkering withut losing because the opponent has StP for the DSC. One big downside of Psychatog is that it gets killed by Jitte, so that might be enough to shelve the idea right now.

[Ferrismonk]

Great job!  You've explained your card choices very well.  I just have a couple points though:

1. Don't you want to run at least one flooded strand?  I've had to gifts for delta, strand, volcanic, mox before to get red mana.  Sometimes (especially post SB) that red mana can be really hard to have on the table when you need it.

2. Go with the explosives. I've actually been using 2 Engineered explosives (EE) in the Phyrexian furnace (PF) slot ever since I saw the gifted.fr decklist.  Think about it for a minute.  What is PF useful against?  Dragon, Control Slaver, Birdsh*t, and other welder based decks.  EE gets rid of welders, chalices, phyrexian dreadnaughts, xantid swarms, moxes, gobins and man-lands oops ..  Combine that with the fact that you can pitch it to Thirst for Knowledge, and I wouldn't want it to be anything else.

I don't necessarily think that I would want to up the count to 3 though because having two in hand seems too much. It's more of a flexible answer than a necessary part of the backbone of the deck.

[Jacob Orlove]

EE gets rid of ... man-lands.

Engineered Explosives
X   
Artifact   
Sunburst (This comes into play with a charge counter on it for each color of mana used to pay its cost.)
2, Sacrifice Engineered Explosives: Destroy each nonland permanent with converted mana cost equal to the number of charge counters on Engineered Explosives. 

Also, running 4 of the fetchland that gets your non-island basic is pretty much mandatory (it's much more important than Gifts synergy, for example), but wow is needle going to hit your manabase hard. I guess "wait and see" is a fair approach to take here, though.

[Machinus]

The EE were spectacular. I would even consider running 3 next time. Check out my report.

Nice job, although it seemed from the report that the EEs didn't factor in so heavily. They still sound good against aggro heavy metas, which is where we seem to be moving right now.

You are right, I only drew them a few times, but every time I did they performed excellently and I could have used them much more often than I did. Explosives is one of those cards that can eliminate many threats to the deck's strategy (chalice, null rod, meddling mage, welder, whatever), and in a deck with quick access to 3 colors, they can do it efficiently. Often they will take 2 or more threats at a time. This deck has real problems with getting mana disrupted early, and this seems to me like a great card to rely on to execute the main strategy. Killing chalice for 0 is just so awesome. Mana Vault is a card I would find hard to cut and this is one reason why.

On another note, I ran 3 strand and 2 deltas exactly because of pithing needle. Black is on color and white is not, therefore anyone who knows what you are playing will name delta because it's possible to run swamps and some builds do, like yours. So needle will hit delta instead of strand, which is what you want.

[Godot]

Explosives is one of those cards that can eliminate many threats to the deck's strategy (chalice, null rod, meddling mage, welder, whatever)

Hate to nitpick, but EE def doesnt do anything about Null Rod.

[Machinus]

Explosives is one of those cards that can eliminate many threats to the deck's strategy (chalice, null rod, meddling mage, welder, whatever)

Hate to nitpick, but EE def doesnt do anything about Null Rod.

Woops, my mistake. Obviously this is true.

[Shin Akuma]

I just got back from playing the Italian Mana Drain tournament at Area 51 in Cortland NY.  I went 5-2-1 with a intentional draw and a second place finish.  I ran Diceman's list -2 Furnace, +2 Explosives and tweaked the sideboard some.  The deck performed very well verses Chalice Oath, WTF, Transmute Stax / 5/3 Hybrid and WW with Maze of Ith.  However FCG just seemed to be to fast.  It was my only lose in the Swiss and in the finals.  The combination of a faster fundamental turn as disruption from Wasteland / Strip Mine / REB / Blood Moon was very problematic.  I initially was running 2 Pyroclasms however 4 Pyroclasms should greatly help verses them as it inhibits them long enough to establish control.  4 Pyroclasms should also help out verses the U/W and U/R Fish decks.  Their also somewhat solid verses WTF as they hit everything but Mongrel, as Rootwallah is often 1/1 on your turn.  It also deals with Kira which shuts off Old Man.  I also used Rushing River over Rebuild and was very pleased with its versatility.  It's solid verses stuff like Oath in addition to random stuff like Chalice for 0 verses decks that lack a second Rack and Ruin target and of course Darksteel.  Fire / Ice also served to shut off a Maze of Ith and provides additional relief verses FCG and Welders.  You could always run -1 Rushing River, -1 Boseiju / Mind Twist +2 Furnace sideboard if necessary to deal with Dragon and Welder if there prominent in your meta.  I didn't find Mind Twist to be overly relevant all day and didn't bother sideboarding it in once as it seems to slow for the current speed of control decks.  Neither Dragon or Welders are prevalent in my meta and my new sideboard reflects this.  After the tournament I have switched over to the following sideboard and was wondering your opinions.

1 Boseiju, Who Shelters All
1 Red Elemental Blast
1 Pyroblast
4 Pyroclasm
1 Fire / Ice
2 Old Man of the Sea
2 Rack and Ruin
1 Rushing River
1 Skeletal Scrying
1 Mind Twist

[MaxxMatt]

@dicemanx

this is my board at now.
it differs a lot fro yours especially because of my own metagame.
I have to face and survive from a lot of Extracts, Jesters, Rods, Welders, Atogs and Storm-based decks.
If the Vials would become more popular, signing the end of the Rods-Era, I would add more Pyroclasm as well.

Not-Wishable Things
3 CotVs
2 Furnaces
Istant Speed Things
1 Dart
1 R&R
1 Rebuild
1 ReB
1 BeB
Sorcery Speed Things
1 Tendrils
1 Edict
1 Primitive Justice
1 Pyroclasm
1 Duress


-Tendrils is a MUST. I can Wish or Maindeck it when needed and escape easier from nasty situations where my DSC would become useless
-Duress is better than Mindtwist..or in explained in a better way, MIndtwist is better if maindecked, especially because of his impact during the midgame and his good sinergy with Gifts.
-I prefer to have the row power of the Twist maindecked and the little but selective help of an eventual Duressto wish for.
-Primitive Justice and Edict are here only for a  better versatility of the Burning Wish, but there are a few situations during which they are really needed
-Rebuild is one of your tech and it help me A LOT in different situations. It is game breaking when trying to go off with the single Tendrils WITHOUT even needing to use the powerfull Y Will and it is oe of the best ways to get rid of Rods, CotVs and Locking Artifacts all at once. Really good.
-While the istant-speed spells are autoexplaining, I HAVE to use CotVs to survive to TPS. The game cannot be won without them, even if they are so much anti-synergic with a lot of your strong spells.
-I'm not sure arebout the Chainer. I would prefer an istant speed spell in this spot or another way to win, maybe different from Tendrils and DSC. I was using a single Decree of Justice in the past days, but it feels so wimp if compared with the other two, that his only strong use consist on not auto-scoopig to a first actived Jester's Cap.

I swapped island #3 for the single Tundra and I not had too many consistency problems, ifyou esclude some asty losses to first-second turn CoW+Waste+Rod, that are not so frequents.

i don't feel the need to kill greater creatures or strange artifacts with sorcery speed at now. The ones that are usually affectedby those two sorceries are the less threatening among the ones commonly used.

I'm going to try these changes at now.
-1 Primitive Justice
-1 Chainer's Edict
+1 Diabolic Edict / E.E.
+1 R&R / Orim's Thunder

Both those choices are connected with the introduction of a lone Cunning Wish ( maybe I would play with 61 cards, that should not be an issue with so many tutors, drawers and fixers ).


What do you think about these ones instead?

+2 Cunning Wishes
-1 F/I ( even if I'm loving it all the day long )
-1 Vamp ( even if I'm loving it all the day long )

You would have more consistency and not relying on a single blue tutor could improve some matchups against Aggro-Control and Control matchups.


MaxxMatt

[Hi-Val]

I've cut the Justice and Edict and all those effects from my board because Turbulent Dreams does a similar job and it's on-color. At one point, I turbo'ed up 5 cards vs. WTF. It's a decent card to use if you're trying to go off with Chalices out, because you'll have dead cards in hand that you want to pitch anyway. The ability to bounce multiple permanents is gold.

[dicemanx]

I initially was running 2 Pyroclasms however 4 Pyroclasms should greatly help verses them as it inhibits them long enough to establish control.  4 Pyroclasms should also help out verses the U/W and U/R Fish decks.  Their also somewhat solid verses WTF as they hit everything but Mongrel, as Rootwallah is often 1/1 on your turn.  It also deals with Kira which shuts off Old Man

I like the idea of trying 4 Pyroclasms. My only concern is that it eats up so much SB space, and you might still lose to a Rootwater Thief or god forbid an Extract (which I can see Fish/Fish variants SBing in, even though the card isn't that good). I wouldn't dismiss Old Men so quickly. Fish decks will likely only SB in 2, maybe 3 Kira at most, and she can be dealt with separately via Mana Drain, REB, lone Pyroclasm, etc. Alternately, they might not draw Kira at all. Also, a Kira is trumped by two Old Men - in fact, as a bonus to you the Old Man can no longer be killed by a solitary StP with her in play. Neither can your Tinkered DSC. Old Man also does a way better job against WTF compared to Pyroclasm, because it can strip cards from hand if Mongrel is in play. You might not be able to steal the Mongrel but at least no other creature will be in play (Rootwallas need 4 mana open to survive a theft attempt on their turn and your turn).

While the istant-speed spells are autoexplaining, I HAVE to use CotVs to survive to TPS. The game cannot be won without them, even if they are so much anti-synergic with a lot of your strong spells

Thanks Maxxmatt for the interesting thoughts. One comment on this one though: perhaps a consideration against TPS, if the deck is giving you so much trouble, is Arcane Lab. A CotV for 1 hurts you as much as it hurts them, so the CotV plan will most likely be for 0 on turn 1. I'm not sure I'd want to depend on getting CotV in my opening draw (and needing to go first on top of it), because drawing it mid game isn't stellar.

+2 Cunning Wishes
-1 F/I ( even if I'm loving it all the day long )
-1 Vamp ( even if I'm loving it all the day long )

I think at this point I would not cut Vampiric. It is just too powerful to let go, and having another way to get a Tinker (or Balance) is very important given the rise of aggro/aggro-control. The ability to retrieve Lotus, Academy, or Boseiju/LoA is also very important.

I've cut the Justice and Edict and all those effects from my board because Turbulent Dreams does a similar job and it's on-color. At one point, I turbo'ed up 5 cards vs. WTF. It's a decent card to use if you're trying to go off with Chalices out, because you'll have dead cards in hand that you want to pitch anyway. The ability to bounce multiple permanents is gold.

I'm a bit wary of cards like Turbulent Dreams and Rushing River. They are great when you're setting up to go off, but there seem to be frequent situations where you are still building your resources and drawing cards, but you need to remove stuff *now*.

Incidentally, another card I have been contemplating in the SB is Meltdown as a Burning Wish target.This card will guarantee that you nail every CotV and Null Rod on the board. You can also use Meltdown to devastate something like Stax/Shop aggro if you can afford the 4-5 mana. 

[Webster]

There was a sapphire tournament yesterday that my friend and I went to. We played dicemanx's list with some minor changes that I had made the night before. We ended up placing 1st and 3rd/4th.

Here are some of my thoughts on what we had discussed during the tournament;

1. Engineered explosives worked very well. They hit problematic cards in the majority of matchups that were presented (oath, U/W fish, WTF, belcher, stax, shop aggro). The only time that I ever sided them out was against the mirror and CS where lava dart would perform better.

2. Drawing burning wish without having much utility to fetch out of the SB was annoying. Agreeably, burning wish is most abusive when fetching yawgmoth's will, time walk, or a tinker pitched to force of will, I found its narrowness disappointing and will expand on its SB targets at the next event that I play with the deck.

3. Pyroclasm was underwhelming against WTF, U/W. I would see an occasional 2-for-1, but oftentimes, the fish player would not commit to the board and I would have to kill a single ninja. Letting the ninja stay on the board hoping that more x/2 creatures would hit play isn't a good strategy. I didn't play against the one FCG player, so maybe my view is a bit biased when I say that I would only want 1 pyroclasm in the SB.

4. Tendrils was very good and I cannot ever see cutting this from the SB. IMO, tendrils serves as a pseudo "belcher kill" in the sense that when I need you dead _NOW_, I can do that. Several games were won with tendrils that DSC would have not won.


Webster

[Smmenen]

I was helping my team develop some Gifts lists in preparation for Richmond.  I almost played a Gifts list myself but stuck with Stax because I had been testing with it the most and hadn't found a tuned Gifts list I was happy with.

I don't have the time to work on the deck anymore, but I do have some general observations (and more which will be published in a forthcoming article):

1) I completely agree about the lack of Belcher.  I cut the card on my first day of testing with the deck. People haven't questioned that decision in your deck, so I won't discuss it further.

2) The draw engine is not right.  As you say, you not infrequently discarded two cards to Thirst.  That is unacceptable.  I was really dissapointed in how Thirst functioned in the deck becuase I don't feel there were enough artifacts to support it.  Furnace is pretty weak right now and probably doesn't deserve the space.  I tooled around with alternative draw engines that I would be happy to talk about at a future date.  Suffice to say I think the approach my teammates took in Richmond and Rochester with the deck is closer to what I think may be optimal. 

3) Duress is much weaker than it should be.  I think that more disruption as a rule is better since so much of what these decks have is symmetrical: 4 FOW, 4 Drain, etc.  I think there are alternatives that aren't being discussed here that should be explored...

4) I wanted Vampiric Tutor to be good.  Becuase it is a good card.  It finds Tinker, Academy, etc.  But this card was not good.  The black often got in the way of another card.  This may be becuase I was running Duress - I can't be sure.  But I found that this card would probably be better as something else despite how good it seemed in theory. 

5) I agree with running alot of basics.  I think that approach is sound.

6) In theory I think that the back up Tendrils in the board is needed - but I can see how in practice - in a tournament of 8 rounds with a top 8 you may only want it there once.  That may not be enough to justify its presence.  On the other hand, if you have a Rebuild maindeck, then it could become a far more potent threat.

7) I think that Gifts lists still have along way to go.  There is alot of work to be done and it will be some time before an optimal build emerges - and even then what is considered optimal will be subject to change and further evolution. 

[zero]

If you think you discard to thirst too often (as seems to be the problem in non-slaver decks using it as a draw spell), I've always simply fit in 2 deep analysis, and put a scrying in the sideboard as a wish target. Also, how do you plan on getting rid of chalice for 0 or 1? I believe you can't use the explosives for that, unless I'm misreading the card (It will be 0 or 1 on the stack, respectively, and will get countered by the chalice, right?). Are we supposed to wish for the answer, or should some bounce be maindecked also?

[Smmenen]

I agree with those that a bounce spell in the maindeck is a necessary evil. 

[mr_rogers]

You can get around CotV set at 0 or 1 with EE if you use colorless mana to get it out. The colorless will not add sunburst counters so it will be set at 0 and blow up the Chalice.

[Webster]

If you think you discard to thirst too often (as seems to be the problem in non-slaver decks using it as a draw spell), I've always simply fit in 2 deep analysis, and put a scrying in the sideboard as a wish target. Also, how do you plan on getting rid of chalice for 0 or 1? I believe you can't use the explosives for that, unless I'm misreading the card (It will be 0 or 1 on the stack, respectively, and will get countered by the chalice, right?). Are we supposed to wish for the answer, or should some bounce be maindecked also?

Deep analysis is quite slow and doesn't seem like it would fit well in this deck which is incredibly tight on "metagame spots" as it is. Honestly, if I am going to pay 4 mana for sorcery, it should win the game; deep analysis does not do that for me.

Engineered Explosives can be played using colorless mana for its casting cost X. Mana crypt, sol ring, boseiju, library of alexandria, and mana drain mana are the sources of colorless mana. A common misconception about the casting cost of engineered explosives X and sunburst X is that they are directly linked which is false. Sunburst merely tracks how many colors of mana were used to play a spell whereas casting cost X is defined as the total amount of mana used to play a spell.


Webster