[Deck] Unpowered Belcher

[forneus]

grim monolith, yeah that seems to be a good choice the wishes however i have to think through i just seem to be so hooked on the idea of being able to reach for my sideboard at anytime during the match!

[GrandpaBelcher]

Living Wish is a good card, one that definitely carries its weight in certain situations, but it has some drawbacks as well:

1.  It functions as additional win-conditions.  Being able to storm up and Wish for Storm Entity is strong.  Being able to get Tarmogoyf or Tombstalker when in draw-go mode is strong as well.  The problem is that these win conditions are often too weak or slow to finish the game in a powered or proxy environment.  More powerful win conditions often aren't worth it with an extra 1G tacked on to their cost.

2.  It can get answers like Ingot Chewer, Xantid Swarm, or Eternal Witness.  The problem is that they're often slower than just getting a win condition.  Plus, since you won't likely run more than two Living Wish and maybe some tutors to find them, relying on that plan is unreliable or not cost-effective.

3.  It can get more mana.  Well, yes and no.  Often you'll just break even on the land you get.  I explained this a little more in an earlier post.  Workshop always nets mana but can't activate Belcher.  Tolarian is unreliable.  Ancient Tomb breaks even.  The benefit Living Wish has is that you can keep lands outside your deck to not disrupt your Belches, and the lands it gets are permanent mana sources.

4.  It can help you dig to combo by getting Dark Confidant or Bazaar of Baghdad.  This is really slow right now and you'd probably only either of these in the most dire of situations. 

So there are definite benefits to Living Wish, but each of those comes with its own set of problems.  Belcher, thanks to the unrestriction of Chrome Mox, has gotten noticeably faster, and speed has always been the deck's primary strength.  Now that the deck is easily the fastest one in a low-power, non-proxy metagame, that is especially true.  My feeling is that anything slowing you down can be cut safely.  Living Wish, except when you're using it to get a win condition, is usually just a distraction or a hinderance, and worse, you have to build a sideboard around it.  You don't need it to get answers because your opponent should be answering you!  You shouldn't need to get mana because 2/3 of your deck makes mana!  You shouldn't need help to dig for your combo because you should already have won the game!

Most of the cards in Belcher should either be restricted or good enough to run as a four-of, and I don't think Living Wish makes that cut.

[forneus]

now that you point it out i think you nailed it. anyway i always had trouble figuring out what to come out of the deck when it comes to sideboarding, so having living wish really helped me on that end anyway what are your suggestions for the SB and what cards do you think should come off for them? I mean in facing post SB cards such as null rods, needles and chalice?

[GrandpaBelcher]

Sideboarding with Belcher is tricky.  So often it's figuring out what's not good in a matchup and figuring out what you can put in your deck to replace those cards.

Workshops - anything that can play Sphere of Resistance on turn one reliably
-4 Guttural Response (obv.)
-4 Manamorphose (these are worse than terrible under a sphere; you can decide to keep them on the play, though)

Ichorid
-4 Guttural Response

Combo
-2 Goblin Welder (they're often too slow)
-4 Guttural Response if they don't have FoW (Gutturals can't counter Timetwister or Tinker)

Fish, Slaver, most Drain decks
No changes.  Honestly.  You should race Null Rod and Drain (and Meddling Mage, etc.) or play around them with Empty the Warrens.  Guttural Response is there for Stifle and Force.  You can drop Manamorphose if you're worried about Null Rods or sideboard Spheres.

So now you know what you want to take out.  What do you want to put in?

Workshops
+4 Ingot Chewers get around Chalice-1 and Thorn and are about the best you can do.
+2 Goblin Welder
+2 Desperate Rituals.  Trying to beat them at the artifact game is like trying to stop the tide.  You're often better off racing them.  You could also bring in something like Tarmogoyf, Storm Entity or Tombstalker as a cheap thing that beats face.

Ichorid
+4 Tormod's Crypt slows them down and increases storm for Empty the Warrens

Combo
+4 Desperate Rituals
+2 Tormod's Crypt

So
4x Ingot Chewer
2x Goblin Welder
4x Desperate Ritual
4x Tormod's Crypt
1x ?

That leaves you with one extra slot.  You could bring in an extra Pyroblast for the combo and Drain matchup or an extra Empty the Warrens to make win conditions easer to find.  If you have Painter's Servant and Grindstone to worry about, you can bring in Gaea's Blessing, which isn't totally dead on its own.

[forneus]

hmm.. yeah that could work, thanks I will try playtesting this and give some feedback some time later

[mort-]

By the way, what are your thoughts on defense grid?
I thought of swapping them with the 4 Guttural Responses.

[forneus]

i dont think defense grid is good personally i love the gluttoral responses, they pitch well to the chromes and they are a surprise protection for the belcher player

[mort-]

So I was at a tournament yesterday, standing 2:3 after 5 rounds.
Round 1 against Food Chain Goblins - I did draw really bad all three rounds and lost 1:2.
Round 2 against Powered BU Confidant Control - Couldn't do much. 0:2
Round 3 against Unpowered Reanimator without FoW - 2:1, lost the first game due to topdecking him Echoing Truth.
Round 4 against Unpowered Dragonstorm: 2:0 - Finally my deck shows some good draws.
Round 5 against Powered Oath - Lost the first game cause of Echoing Truth and a playing mistake (R1 10 Goblins, attack R2, R2 14 Tokens with Will, R3 he plays ET). 0:2

All in all I have to say that my draw did suck most of the time, don't ask me why ^^ Murphy's Law imho. I'll try it again at other tournaments, maybe I'm having better luck then.
If there is anything you want to know, just ask.

Oh and btw, 2 Tombstalkers main do rule quite a bit. I played them more often then Belcher / EtW in this Tournament (didn't see those two very often -.-')

[forneus]

could you post your decklist and sb?

[mort-]

could you post your decklist and sb?

Ofcourse

Unpowered 2-Land-Belcher aka Stormbelcher aka Shoop da Whoop

1 Bayou
1 Taiga

2 Goblin Welder
4 Simian Spirit Guide
4 Tinder Wall
2 Tombstalker
4 Elvish Spirit Guide

1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
4 Goblin Charbelcher
4 Chrome Mox
1 Memory Jar
1 Lion's Eye Diamond
1 Lotus Petal
1 Sol Ring

4 Manamorphose
4 Dark Ritual
4 Guttural Response

1 Wheel of Fortune
4 Rite of Flame
1 Channel
4 Empty the Warrens
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Demonic Tutor
4 Land Grant

Sideboard:

3x Tormod's Crypt
4x Desperate Ritual
2x Storm Entity
2x Goblin Welder
4x Ingot Chewer

[forneus]

we pretty much have the same stuff, what did u have difficulty with? was it more on bad opening hands or was it more on opponent's deck tech against your deck? how did storm entity go? were u able to side it in?

[mort-]

we pretty much have the same stuff, what did u have difficulty with? was it more on bad opening hands or was it more on opponent's deck tech against your deck? how did storm entity go? were u able to side it in?

Well, most problems I did have against Echoing Truth ^^ Got me killed in 4 or 5 games due to bouncing Tombstalker or EtW (I did not draw any belcher in those games..).
I boarded the Storm Entities in matchups where i thought that BB would be hard to get due to counterspells. They did win me one match (One 1/1 and one 3/3) because my opponent didn't draw any mana.
The most difficulty I had was with the UB control player. My oppening hands were all pretty so~so. Against UB control having 6 manasources + wheel, drawing into NOTHING while my opponent (who had no force in his hands) drew Lotus, Ancestral, FoW, FoW, Drain ~~
I wanted to play 1 Storm Entity / 1 Stalker main, but I thought "then you draw a Entity when you need a Stalker and vice versa", so I played 2 Stalker

[GrandpaBelcher]

How aggressively did you mulligan?

With four Belchers, four Empties, and two other (in your case Tombstalkers), you should be able to mulligan fairly aggressively, even down to five or four cards, to find a playable win condition.  It's a little bit worse for you since you don't have Black Lotus to fall into, but Crypt, Vault, Channel and Dark Ritual are all pretty good too.  Belcher does live and die in its opening hand, so if you don't think your first seven will get you anywhere useful on turn one or two, you have little to lose by throwing it back.  Same for six and five card hands.

Is Echoing Truth very prominent in your metagame?  I mean, do people play more than one copy maindeck?  If you need to play around ET, you can add more Red Blasts or play Skirk Prospector.  When they target a goblin with ET, sac it to the Prospector and the spell will fizzle.

As for pooping out with Wheel of Fortune - nothing you can do about that but shrug it off and go to the next game.

[forneus]

yeah i guess its all about whats prominent in your area's metagame, here most people play chain of vapor over ETs and although they do have ETs they're mostly just one offs. I also agree about aggressively taking a mulligan as you cannot ever have a weak opening hand and play it.

I'm just curious, if you do gold fish i mean play solitaire with the deck, how many times out of 5 do you get killer opening hands? ^^

[GrandpaBelcher]

@ mort-

I have a couple more questions and comments about your mini report.

The first is still how aggressively you mulliganed in round one against Food Chain.  Barring an insanely good draw by them, you should be faster than they are so I'm surprised you couldn't pull out another win for the match.

Round two, depending on what his build looked like, you really could have had a hard time winning.  Again, though, I'm surprised you didn't get at least one game.  Playing Belcher, I rarely go 2-0 or 0-2 in matches since the deck is fast enough to steal a win at least one game out of three.

Likewise in round three I'm surprised you lost in two games.  You mention a play mistake - what was it?  Your line of play suggests you Emptied the Warrens on turn one for 10 goblins, attacked on turn two, then played Yawgmoth's Will to make more goblins.  Is that correct?  Why did you make more goblins?  With 10 goblins already on board, it's not likely that your clock would get faster by making more; plus you would have saved Yawgmoth's Will to protect yourself from Echoing Truth.  Maybe I'm reading incorrectly, or maybe you were already pointing this out as your mistake.

Also, you say that you played Tombstalker more than playing Belcher or Empty.  My instinct here is to tell you to mulligan away from Tombstalker unless you're already down a card or two.  Empty and Belcher are going to be stronger win conditions in almost every situation.  I lost a couple games at my last tournament simply because I kept seven card hands that relied on Storm Entity rather than finding something more reliable.  Empty the Warrens is strong against Force of Will on its own, and Belcher is easier to protect since you have Welders in the deck, so you want to look to them first.

[mort-]

The first is still how aggressively you mulliganed in round one against Food Chain.  Barring an insanely good draw by them, you should be faster than they are so I'm surprised you couldn't pull out another win for the match.

First round I went to 5 cards (only manasources) and did hope to draw a finisher or a draw 7.. which did ofc not happen
I did not mulligan that aggressiv, staying at 6 cards if the hand was halfway ok all over the tournament.

Round two, depending on what his build looked like, you really could have had a hard time winning.  Again, though, I'm surprised you didn't get at least one game.  Playing Belcher, I rarely go 2-0 or 0-2 in matches since the deck is fast enough to steal a win at least one game out of three.

First game I did play wheel and drew nothing. Second game I played a tombstalker which he bounced. It never got out again.

Likewise in round three I'm surprised you lost in two games.  You mention a play mistake - what was it?  Your line of play suggests you Emptied the Warrens on turn one for 10 goblins, attacked on turn two, then played Yawgmoth's Will to make more goblins.  Is that correct?  Why did you make more goblins?  With 10 goblins already on board, it's not likely that your clock would get faster by making more; plus you would have saved Yawgmoth's Will to protect yourself from Echoing Truth.  Maybe I'm reading incorrectly, or maybe you were already pointing this out as your mistake.

Yes, that was my mistake.. I know, a pretty big one :/

Also, you say that you played Tombstalker more than playing Belcher or Empty.  My instinct here is to tell you to mulligan away from Tombstalker unless you're already down a card or two.  Empty and Belcher are going to be stronger win conditions in almost every situation.  I lost a couple games at my last tournament simply because I kept seven card hands that relied on Storm Entity rather than finding something more reliable.  Empty the Warrens is strong against Force of Will on its own, and Belcher is easier to protect since you have Welders in the deck, so you want to look to them first.

That's what I'm trying in my next tournament. I do think I lost a few matches because of my playing experience (which I do not have ), so I hope it gets better with time. Also I'm trying to mulligan more agressive. Thing is, my hand is ok - not super, not bad - ok. Then I'm thinking "There are hands that are MUCH better" but fear to mulligan because there are also the ones that are much worse :/

mort-

[policehq]

Has anyone considered playing Salvage Titan in the sideboard? It would possibly be decent against Stax, but definitely good against Null Rod Fish. He can block and kill a Tarmogoyf and race or block their other creatures also.

Given my testing with Tolarian Academy and Lochinvar's earlier statement, having three artifacts in play  can be difficult. However, if you're locked out of the game otherwise from a Null Rod, you are playing slowly anyway. One other thing to keep in mind is that you can sacrifice a Chrome Mox without an imprint.

Salvage Titan

Casting cost: 4BB

Card text: You may sacrifice three artifacts rather than pay Salvage Titan's mana cost.

[Hillboy]

Did living wish help at all? I'm building a RG version that's a glass cannon and was wondering how much you liked living wish.

If your wondering here's my current decklist.

Kill
4 Empty the Warrens
4 Goblin Charbelcher

Creatures
2 Goblin Welder

Mana
4 SSG
4 ESG
4 Rite of Flame
4 Desperate Ritual
4 Seething Song
4 Land Grant
2 Taiga
4 Tinder Wall
1 Mana Crypt
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Vault
1 Grim Monolith
4 Chrome Mox
1 Lion's Eye Diamond
1 Lotus Petal

Draw
1 Memory Jar
1 Wheel of Fortune
4 ManaMorphose
4 Street Wraith

Sideboard
4 Pact of Negation
4 Ingot Chewer
2 Goblin Welder
4 Pyrokinesis
1 Recoup

The sideboard is going to change once I get Guttural Responses. and When I get channel I'll fit that in the main too.

In goldfishing and against goblins this deck seems pretty good and I rarely mull into oblivion. Granted my list is basically dumbed down and has no disruption or backup plan past belcher and empty but it sure is fun.

[forneus]

hmm i think playing seething song in this deck is bad, its not cast-able when you don't have the other rituals and it doesn't help your match up against stax based decks, it looks like a win more card to me. Salvage Titan might be good but I think personally that Tombstalker still deserves the slot, the chances that you would have 3 idle artifacts are slim while the chances you fail to go off in a round is high and so tombstalker would be of great help there.

[policehq]

I'm testing Salvage Titan with a list that has been slightly changed from Lochinvar's proposed list. Tombstalker's only advantage, in my opinion, is that is has evasion. Salvage Titan is much easier to cast and does not require black or rituals.

Beyond that, I want to talk about the advantage of Street Wraith over Chromatic Star in Lochinvar's list. Street Wraith does not cost mana nor fix mana, both are random, but 4 Chromatic Star in place of 4 Street Wraith, in my testing, are more optimal for proper Welder abuse. Without additional off-color Moxen in play, it is difficult to make stellar plays with Welder. On the other hand, Street Wraith can be imprinted onto a Chrome Mox in a pinch.

[GrandpaBelcher]

Chromatic Star uses a mana, and if you're ever reduced to playing Welder tricks to draw cards with it, you've probably already lost.  Welder has never needed any help and is a constant lifesaver against Stax, Colossus, Duress, and counterspells.  Plus, he combos ridiculously well with Memory Jar and Lion's Eye Diamond.  Plus, Welder is even better now that there are more cheap artifacts in the deck, thanks to Chrome Mox's unrestriction.

For my view, after having played Belcher for more than a year, there are three cards that let me look at a list and say, "These could be something better": Chromatic Star/Sphere, Serum Powder, and Seething Song.  They never live up to expectations and are worse than other cards when they appear at the wrong time.

Random draws are always random - you can't rely on them to give you the right thing at the right time, so it's rarely worth putting any extra effort into them.  Street Wraith is the closest thing to a free draw available.  Using it puts you very close to playing a 56 card deck.

[Hillboy]

I'm starting to see why seething song is bad. It occasionally is incredible for getting a belcher in play in activating it. However every time I see seething song and ETW in my opening grip I almost want to cry. I'm thinking of putting it in the sideboard and maindecking gutteral response, but having seething song in the board I feel might help me when I need to race.

[policehq]

Chromatic Star uses a mana, and if you're ever reduced to playing Welder tricks to draw cards with it, you've probably already lost. 

I was just bringing up some worst case scenarios. There were two occasions out of many games using your prescribed unpowered list where I had Lion's Eye Diamond, Welder, Taiga/Tinder Wall/whatever in play and a Charbelcher in the graveyard, with no artifact in play to weld. In one of those scenarios, Street Wraith failed to cycle into a playable artifact or draw-7. You're only playing about 10 artifacts worth welding, and 4 of those are Chrome Mox, which may or may not matter with card advantage playing this deck.

Finally, Pyrostatic Pillar is a sideboard card to keep note of, at least, if Tendrils decks delve more into Ad Nauseam.

[GrandpaBelcher]

I think you probably mistyped your gamestate.  LED, Welder, Taiga, and Tinder Wall in play with Belcher in the graveyard is a win; you weld out LED for Belcher and activate it with Taiga and Tinder Wall.  If Belcher is in your hand, all you need is another mana source so you can cast Belcher and activate with LED.  Hoping for Street Wraith to become a Draw-7 is pretty slim odds, but if you're just looking for another artifact or a mana source, your chances are pretty good (13 remaining artifacts, and 2/3 of the deck is mana).

Also, I haven't had a chance to try Pyrostatic Pillar in a tournament yet, but it is in my sideboard as a four of against combo.  Jerry Yang, who did some tournament testing for me, recommended it as being good if you can put some pressure down with it.  So we've been playing it in conjunction with Empty, Storm Entity, Welder, or hardcast Spirit Guides.

[policehq]

Taiga was tapped, which delayed my activation for a full turn.