[Report] 10th Place at SCG with Belcher

[Klep]

As usual, I headed up to Roanoke for the Power 9 event with Belcher sleeved up, and ended up placing 10th.  The release of Future Sight and the discussion about the deck a couple months ago led me to make a few changes.  I was doing some goldfishing at the time, and I came to a realization.  Despite my strong argumentation in favor of running black over blue because tutors are better than draw 7's, I was still running two draw 7's in Memory Jar and Wheel of Fortune.  Given that I remembered losing games because of playing those cards, I decided to take a look to see what tutor options were available for me to consider replacing them with.  Long story short, further goldfishing showed that replacing Jar and Wheel with Grim Tutors did nothing to harm the deck and didn't give my opponent the luxury of a new hand.  My full list was the following:

2-Land Belcher
Artifacts
1 Black Lotus
4 Chromatic Star
4 Goblin Charbelcher
1 Grim Monolith
1 Lion's Eye Diamond
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault  
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring

Creatures
3 Elvish Spirit Guide
3 Goblin Welder
3 Simian Spirit Guide
4 Street Wraith

Enchantments
1 Necropotence
1 Yawgmoth's Bargain

Instants
2 Cabal Ritual
4 Dark Ritual
1 Demonic Consultation
1 Vampiric Tutor

Sorceries
3 Cabal Therapy
1 Channel
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Empty the Warrens
2 Grim Tutor
4 Land Grant
2 Living Wish
1 Yawgmoth's Will

Lands
1 Bayou
1 Taiga

Sideboard:
1 Dark Confidant
1 Goblin Welder
1 Viridian Shaman
1 Yixlid Jailer
4 Leyline of the Void
2 Seething Song
3 Shattering Spree
1 City Of Brass
1 Tolarian Academy


Empty the Warrens is in there because it's better than Imperial Seal, which sucks.  The Leylines were fantastic for me, but I think the Jailer smacks a bit of The Fear.  If I were to play the tournament over again I might replace that with something else, possibly Spree number 4.  The Seething Songs come in whenever I board in Sprees, because they make it easier for me to maximize the Sprees.  I can also bring them in when I feel I need a bit of a push in speed.

I'm not sure the maindeck was right, because I lost game 1 in every round but one.  Cabal Therapy used to be the right call because you typically only cared about a very specific set of cards, but now that the format has sped up, it may be time to go back to Duress so I can disrupt my opponent's strategy as well as protect my own.  There were a number of times where I had turn 1 Therapy, whiffed, but saw something else I really wanted to take.  I never missed having Xantid Swarm.  Swarm is just too slow now.

Round 1 – Chad with some W/R Combo Hate Deck
I had just been talking with Brass Man about his fear of Aven Mindcensor.  I told him the odds of a turn 1 Mindcensor were low enough that it just wasn't something I was going to worry about.  My opponent wins the roll and starts off Mox Pearl, Ancient Tomb, pass.  I kept my 6-card hand on the strength of two Land Grants, so obviously he drops Mindcensor in response to the first one.  He followed up with an Exalted Angel and a Null Rod, so I quickly lost that game.  Game 2 I had a turn 2 Empty for 8 goblins, which he was unable to draw an answer to.  Game 3 I fanned open SSG, Belcher, Dark Rit, Welder, Bayou, Land Grant, Mox Pearl. A turn 1 Belcher, turn 2 activate.  Chad is on the play and opens with Ancient Tomb, Black Lotus.  I grow concerned, and my concerns are realized when he drops Chalice at 1 and a Glowrider.  I sigh, but am not too concerned yet because a single Glowrider isn't much of a clock.  On my turn I play the Bayou, tap it for the Pearl, tap that to play Land Grant for Taiga, and pass.  He plays Sphere of Resistance. I deflate, because now all my spells cost 2 more, which hurts pretty badly.  I doubt I could draw out of it before my opponent kills me, but I soldier on.  I untap and draw... Channel.  GG.

1-0

Round 2 – Josh Krause (krauserkrauser) with Ichorid
I think Josh felt worse about his chances than I did, because I haven't run into post-FS Ichorid yet with Belcher.  He wins the roll and proceeds to win game 1 on turn 2.  Game 2 I'm on the play and I have a turn 1 Empty for 10 goblins.  Josh's dredges are not what they could be and the Goblins go the distance.  Game 3 I keep a hand with Leyline and enough artifacts to give me a strong first turn Empty.  The Leyline shuts Josh down pretty well, but he still manages a first turn Chalice at 0, which shuts down a lot of my hand.  It isn't enough, however, as the Leyline gives me sufficient time to find non-0cc accelerants to win anyway.

2-0

Round 3 – George with the Izzet Guildmage deck
I can't remember the details of this deck.  I know it's a blue control shell with some Izzet Guildmage combo, but I don't see enough of it this round to know the rest.  He wins the roll, but I still manage a turn 1 Belcher and activate it.... hitting Taiga as the 6th card.  Fortunately he doesn't draw anything and we move to game 2.  Game 2 he starts off with a Time Walk off a Sapphire, and plays another land.  I Land Grant, which he Forces, and then I Land Grant again, which he hesitates before allowing to resolve.  I decide to Therapy him for Drain (because he has 2 blue up), which whiffs, but I see he has another Force.  On his turn he plays a Guildmage.  On mine, I play out a Simian Spirit Guide. He plays a Pithing Needle on Belcher.  On my turn again, I sac the Guide to flashback Therapy on Force, and hit two!  Unfortunately, his last card was Trickbind.  This is very annoying because I was working up to drop Bargain and go for the Empty kill so I wouldn't have to worry about the Needle.  Fortunately, on my next turn I draw DT, and so I'm able to ramp up with Will and get both a Belcher and a Shattering Spree to nail his needle. I end up forcing him to use his Trickbind, and still have enough mana on the table to acivate again after I next untap.  He doesn't draw anything to deal with the Belcher, and scoops.

3-0

Round 4 – Brass Man with Gifts
I win a roll with a 2! Brassy rolled a 1!  Brassman combos me out!  I turn 1 Therapied for Force, and see a bunch of artifact mana (including Lotus) and a Drain.  The next 2 turns he seems to draw Academy and Gifts. GG.  Game 2 I keep a hand with double Leyline.  Because I don't have time to test properly, I don't know how good it is against him.  I definitely messed up sideboarding, because I didn't bring in any Shattering Sprees.  He drops a Needle on Belcher, but it doesn't really matter because I needed a few more turns than I had anyway after he Tinkered out Colossus.

3-1

Round 5 – Jeremy with Grim Long
I win the roll.  Jeremy has a stupid win game 1.  I have a stupid win game 2.  Game 3 I have a stupid win.  One of the games I won I had a Leyline, but I don't think it mattered given the rest of my hand.

4-1

Round 6 – Peter with Grim Long
So I'm all stoked, thinking I can draw into the top 8.  Unfortunately, I get paired up with the lowest 4-1, and he can't draw, so we have to play.  This round, my deck finally decides to really crap out on me.  Game 1 I kept a questionable hand I possibly shouldn't have, but I didn't know what he was playing, and I was on the play with 2 Therapies in hand.  He kills me turn 1.  Game 2 I mull to 6 and keep a hand with mana, but not really anything else.  I wasn't happy, but I figured it was better than going to 5.  Unfortunately, I don't draw anything but more mana and all I can do is play out 3 Spirit Guides.  Peter wins this one handily as well.

4-2

I was pretty dejected after that.  I felt like my deck had really lived up to my expectations all day until that last round, where I was forced to play instead of drawing in.  I bear Peter no ill will for that, he was doing what he had to.  I was just bummed out after having gotten my hopes up that I would finally Top 8 one of these.  When the final standings are posted, I'm in 10th place and I walk away with a beat-up Juzam Djinn.

I had a blast overall.  Playing Belcher makes Type 1 so much fun.  I don't by any means think it's the best deck in the format, but I think it's significantly stronger than most people give it credit for.  I suspect a large part of that is my expertise with the deck, which gives me a much better idea of what it's capable of than most people have.  Hopefully the next time Star City holds a Power 9 down here, I'll finally be able to get to the top.

[GrandpaBelcher]

I untap and draw... Channel.  GG.

Channel is AMAYZING!  To anyone thinking about playing Belcher without Channel, don't.  Just don't.

Anyway, what were your mulligans like?  The only time you really mention them is in the last round when they didn't work out.  When you open a hand, what is your priority - win condition, mana, something else?

Thanks for writing a report.  I was hoping you would when I heard Belcher took 10th.  No reason to be dejected there.

[Klep]

Anyway, what were your mulligans like?  The only time you really mention them is in the last round when they didn't work out.  When you open a hand, what is your priority - win condition, mana, something else?

My mulligans were no more than I would expect with any deck.  I mulled to 6 probably on average a little less than once per match, but never went lower.  Given that most of my matches were 3 games, I consider that acceptable.  When I look at a hand, I'm looking for mana and something to take me to the win, be it a win condition or some kind of tutoring.  Occasionally I will keep a hand that doesn't provide a clear path to victory if I've already mulliganned or if it has something else going for it (like possibly Leylines against Ichorid).  If a hand doesn't have ANY action whatsoever, I always throw it back.

[T00L]

Bummer about the inability to draw but congrats on the strong showing with an underrated deck

Also the W/R hate deck is the newest version of The Mountains Win Again

[twault]

Congrats! I never would have guessed a Belcher deck would make it into the top 10. Very sneaky meta choice.

Klep, did you ever find yourself running short on black mana? That's the problem that I had with my build. I ended up streamlining the black cards and keeping just the Rits, Consultation, V. Tutor, and D. Tutor. If only there was a "black" spirit guide.

I found that Necro/Bargain were great, but I rarely got them into play. So, they got cut. Duress seemed to slow me down an entire turn, because it was using the black mana I needed to cast Rit. I moved to Pyroblast/REB, because I like the possibility of SSG---> REB on my turn 0. Yet, it's useless against any non-blue spells.

Grim Tutor was an interesting choice, so after playing it, would you use it again or go back to Wheel & Jar?

I guess overall, what would you have done differently?

Thanks for the report. I thought for sure Belcher would be thrown by the wayside after Flash entered the format.

[Anusien]

I've always disliked Cabal Therapy in the deck, possibly because there was such a wide range of hate available.  I think I like a change to Duress.

Why the 3/3 Spirit Guide split?  You only have a few red spells, and a greater number of green spells.  Is this to better support Seething Song in the sideboard?

Nice deck, sir.

[nicofromtokyo]

Intersting choices for your list. Did'nt you find yourself wanting Serum Powder in stead of street wraith? As you only have 6 Kills in the deck, mulligans occur more often than expected. No Rite of Flame surprises me, as the Grim Tutors do. Draw7 give a new hand to the opponent but give you a lot of mana to be able to cast a big etW, but Grim Tutor lets you without mana (unless you play Cabal Ritual, but threshold on the first turn with Belcher...). How was your 1-2 turns kill percentage?
Ow, and congratulations! 

[The Atog Lord]

Congratulations, Klep. It's great to see you doing well with an archetype most people have written off. It seems that your loses came to decks which managed to become the combo deck against you; Brassman went off against your and so did Peter. Without Force of Will, it seems much harder to stop losing to other Fast Combo. Duress might have been useful in those cases. Do you think that Belcher will be strong going forward, when the metagame makes way for GAT, a very disruption-centric deck?

[Klep]

Klep, did you ever find yourself running short on black mana? That's the problem that I had with my build. I ended up streamlining the black cards and keeping just the Rits, Consultation, V. Tutor, and D. Tutor. If only there was a "black" spirit guide.

Very rarely.

I found that Necro/Bargain were great, but I rarely got them into play. So, they got cut. Duress seemed to slow me down an entire turn, because it was using the black mana I needed to cast Rit. I moved to Pyroblast/REB, because I like the possibility of SSG---> REB on my turn 0. Yet, it's useless against any non-blue spells.

Cutting Bargain and Necro are almost certainly mistakes.  They're just too powerful.  As far as Duress slowing you down, you don't have to play it just because it's in your hand.  If you think all it's going to do is slow you down, then don't play it.

Grim Tutor was an interesting choice, so after playing it, would you use it again or go back to Wheel & Jar?

Nope.  I've lost too many games to playing draw 7's.

Why the 3/3 Spirit Guide split?  You only have a few red spells, and a greater number of green spells.  Is this to better support Seething Song in the sideboard?

It was 4/4 before Street Wraith.  I haven't really thought about changing the relative balance of the two, but I was happy with what I had.

Intersting choices for your list. Did'nt you find yourself wanting Serum Powder in stead of street wraith?

Never.

As you only have 6 Kills in the deck, mulligans occur more often than expected.

Untrue.  First, it's 5 kills.  Second, I mulligan with Belcher no more often than I do anything else, in any format.  I mulligan more often than most people, but most people don't mulligan as often as they should.

No Rite of Flame surprises me, as the Grim Tutors do. Draw7 give a new hand to the opponent but give you a lot of mana to be able to cast a big etW, but Grim Tutor lets you without mana (unless you play Cabal Ritual, but threshold on the first turn with Belcher...). How was your 1-2 turns kill percentage?

Why would no Rite of Flame surprise you?  The red commitment of this deck isn't high.  I only ever need more than one red in a turn when I bring in Sprees, and I have Seething Song to help there.  Grim costs no more total mana than either of those draw 7's, and gets you the specific card you need rather than a chance at what you need and a chance of giving your opponent what he needs.  Remember, the primary plan of Belcher is Belcher, not Empty.  I can't remember what percentage of games I won on turn 1 or 2, but it was reasonable.

Congratulations, Klep. It's great to see you doing well with an archetype most people have written off. It seems that your loses came to decks which managed to become the combo deck against you; Brassman went off against your and so did Peter. Without Force of Will, it seems much harder to stop losing to other Fast Combo. Duress might have been useful in those cases. Do you think that Belcher will be strong going forward, when the metagame makes way for GAT, a very disruption-centric deck?

That's a pretty good observation.  I lost when my opponent managed to be faster than me, which happened in large part because I didn't have the proper tool for the job (Duress instead of Therapy).  Twice when I Therapied for Force, I saw Lotus in my opponent's hand instead.  I think it's difficult to say how GAT will affect Belcher.  It would depend highly on the disruption suite it used, and that we won't know until it shakes out a bit.  Needless to say, Misdirection is never going to be terribly effective against Belcher.  With Duress in, the only card Misdirection could do anything with is Shattering Spree, and intelligent play can easily minimize the risk there.  It's possible GAT will have less direct effect on Belcher than its indirect effect of how it changes the metagame.

[twault]

Klep, did you ever find yourself running short on black mana? That's the problem that I had with my build. I ended up streamlining the black cards and keeping just the Rits, Consultation, V. Tutor, and D. Tutor. If only there was a "black" spirit guide.

Very rarely.

I found that Necro/Bargain were great, but I rarely got them into play. So, they got cut. Duress seemed to slow me down an entire turn, because it was using the black mana I needed to cast Rit. I moved to Pyroblast/REB, because I like the possibility of SSG---> REB on my turn 0. Yet, it's useless against any non-blue spells.

Cutting Bargain and Necro are almost certainly mistakes.  They're just too powerful.  As far as Duress slowing you down, you don't have to play it just because it's in your hand.  If you think all it's going to do is slow you down, then don't play it.

Grim Tutor was an interesting choice, so after playing it, would you use it again or go back to Wheel & Jar?

Nope.  I've lost too many games to playing draw 7's.

Thanks for your thoughts and analysis of card choices.

I just seem to have a hard time keeping black mana. Either my opponent FOWs my Land Grant or my Bayou gets hit by a Wasteland. Regardless, I have a heck of a time trying to play my Rits and Tutors.

Do you rely on the Stars a lot to generate black mana and would you say "4" is the correct number?

[Klep]

Do you rely on the Stars a lot to generate black mana and would you say "4" is the correct number?

4 is absolutely the right number, but I don't rely on them to make black mana specifically so much as whatever mana I happen to be missing.  I rely on the Bayou to get me black mana, and that generally works out. 

[Vegeta2711]

Nice report and finish. On a serious note, have you considered Pact of Negation at all as a sideboard option against Drains or is that too limited for you? I only thought about it, because it seems like it'd compliment Duress and Therapy nicely as your go-to if trying to win while the other two could be played in a defensive role as well.

As Rich pointed out, it seemed you lost more because the opponents were simply faster at time, but I can't really figure out how to combat that past cheating and playing more Duress. Maybe board in more fast mana and quad Mind Twist?

[Klep]

Nice report and finish. On a serious note, have you considered Pact of Negation at all as a sideboard option against Drains or is that too limited for you? I only thought about it, because it seems like it'd compliment Duress and Therapy nicely as your go-to if trying to win while the other two could be played in a defensive role as well.

As Rich pointed out, it seemed you lost more because the opponents were simply faster at time, but I can't really figure out how to combat that past cheating and playing more Duress. Maybe board in more fast mana and quad Mind Twist?

I have thought about it, and it makes me very nervous.  Belcher has to untap enough that the upkeep on the Pact bothers me.  I could be wrong and it might not be an issue, but I don't think I really need the card anyway.  Frankly, Drains don't seem to be that big of a concern in the current meta.  If the format were to slow back down to that point, I'd just go back to Xantids.  They accomplish the same goal and are less risky.  Also I can Wish for them.  I really think that if I'd had Duress instead of Therapy I might have been able to actually do something in a couple of the games I lost.

[seer]

Why would you bring in Leyline of the Void against Gifts? Seems terrible.

[Klep]

Why would you bring in Leyline of the Void against Gifts? Seems terrible.

It was.

[Illissius]

Belcher has to untap enough that the upkeep on the Pact bothers me.

If you don't also have to draw a card, you can still activate Belcher in response to the Pact trigger.

[Klep]

Belcher has to untap enough that the upkeep on the Pact bothers me.

If you don't also have to draw a card, you can still activate Belcher in response to the Pact trigger.

Sometimes you do.  Sometimes you get the Belcher into play, but still need to find more mana.  Frankly, I don't think the card is needed, so I'm not willing to take the risk.