Not to be rude, but placing fourth in an 8-man just means that the player won the first match. It doesn't actually mean anything. Don't get me wrong - I like what this deck is trying to do, and I've enjoyed playing it myself for fun, but let's not get too excited about a single published match win.
A brand new deck appearing for the first time in forth place after testing and much discussion by a community of dedicated players is certainly worth celebrating. While it still may have placed forth, it placed forth in a format whose metagame is clearly defined (Tron, Twin, Storm/Combo, Affinity, Jund...)
I went 3-3 at Blippy's Slugapalooza (results found here, scroll down to find "KITTEH" or "Belching Forests" to find my list), winning vs merfolk, budget (and strange) gr, and uwr control while losing to mono u tron, Loam-Assault delver, and wub zur.
Of note was that the deck found belcher with consistency, but couldn't always activate it for lethal. There were only a couple games where I could/had the time to thin my deck of all lands (and only one where I could stack my library as I chose, against uwr. He didn't win.).
Also of note is that I faced 5 blue decks, and although I went 2-3 against them, all the games (except for one against loam and one against zur) were close and very much within reach. Vs tron, I held back belcher for one turn , but had I jammed it, he had no counters and I'd have hit him before he mindslavered me (oops). Vs loam, my opp almost mana leak'd but apparently decided negate at the last second (2 mana open on my side, spirit guide in hand). Against zur, 3 nature's claims were shipped to the bottom with recross the turn before stony silence came down. Basically, the games were significantly closer than I expected them to be.
The deck is fun to play. I mostly sold out of mtgo when events went down and this was a hilarious budget alternative to my normal merfolk.
Oh, and in a practice game before the event, I found out that Emrakul has nothing on belcher.
Good job Ree, you certainly won more games than most people that played. How did people react to the deck that were unfamiliar with it? Why do you think Assault Loam was a tough match up?
I would highly highly suggest cutting SSG/wall of roots. The main problem with them is that they dont actually thin your deck of lands, and meerly give you a slightly better chance of winning turn4
The problem with this is that you are much more likely to win turn 4 by jumping ahead atleast one mana one turn one, to get the same effect on a later turn you need to get more than one extra mana out of it (see wall of roots).
Also, please stop playing arbor elf, as its basically worse than utopia sprawl at everything (besides chump blocking). EDIT: swap arbor elf for into the north, you really really need that card as two mana jumps on mana (ala rampant growth) are much more powerful than their three mana counterparts (ala recross/kodamas/harrow ect.)
here is my list, which trades just a slight bit of explosiveness for extreme consistency, and much more resiliance:
the 3x fog/grid/and torpor orb are all flex spots that are meta dependent, you could keep the SSG/wall of roots in this spot, but i firmly belive that this deck should is much better served by playing a little defensively (enough for one turn) coupled with a little more consistently, than the unstable lists that others are using
G1 vs assault loam I just didn't find belcher/fabricate while g2 he negated. I don't think it's a horrendous matchup, but it isn't good (pressure w/delver + counters).
The lack of blue was a problem 1 game. I started with a singleton breeding pool to find w/recross but I didn't like it or think it was necessary.
Spirit guide was underwhelming and I would cut it from the deck going forwards.
Wall of roots over performed and I would not cut it. The immediate mana allowed for some explosive turns. The same with arbor elf in conjunction with utopia sprawl.
I did not like rampant growth all that much and tended to shave one with side boarding. I'm not sure I want into the north when I dislike the 2 mana ramp effect. However, in the future I may shave a recross instead.
Recross was quite good as the untapped land mattered in at least 3 games. It bouncing back to hand came up in 2 games. The reordering effect came up in 2 games. I would not go to fewer than 3.
you said it yourself, you lost because you couldnt thin out enouh land from the deck. my version doesnt activate on turn four as often, but when it does it is always for lethal. also, realize that a turn 4 activation for nonlethal is the same as a turn 5 activation for lethal, the difference is that my list is more prepared to actually survive till then
when you play so many non-land-grabbing cards, you risk getting all mana and not enough forest. exactly like what happened to you
lastly: belcher is the way this deck wins, extra fabricates can be used to bait counters/ find hate permanents, play 4x fabricates
The problem was less the consistency of thinning the deck as much as actually having enough time to. Your changes give me less of a chance to go off/hit a critical creature before I'm actually dead.
All the deck wants is mana. I'll be tweaking the deck as I play and we'll see where it goes from there.
4 fabricates is something I will be trying when I next have time to play. Not finding business was an issue.
I think it might be valuable to have 1 stomping grounds as one of your lands. this would allow you to try to go off a turn earlier if you desperately need to race against someone who would have lethal the next turn. Looks like a cool deck and I'm definitely keen on trying it out!
The mana that wall of roots offers is very deceptive.
jumping on mana turn 1 is basically the only time that playing a non-forest-searching mana accell spell matters for getting the turn 4 kill over the turn 5.
wall of roots is still mana negative the turn you cast it, and is only really mana positive 3 turns down the road. This means that its only really good for a turn 4 kill if you drop it turn two. Sure it does let you go off in their upkeep with 5 lands in play (tap three+roots to play belcher, then tap 2 lands and roots again in their upkeep) but then you still have two lands in your deck which means that with 45 cards in your deck you will still do lethal less than 50% of the time.
Recross is also worse than into the north for getting lands out of your deck. into the north only costs two, while recross costs a virtual two after getting the land, the difference is that you basically wont ever recross turn 1, while having a chancellor+ land means that you can realistically cast into the north turn one, which is just enough of a jump in mana that you will basically always be able to play/activate belcher turn 4 (as long as you draw it naturally, and as long as you play above the critical mass of search-spells)
The thing is, you basically wont ever be able to belch turn 4 if you have to tutor for it. because you will either have too many forest in the deck still to kill them, or not enough mana to play/and activate. Yall have chosen to make sure that you always have mana, I have made sure that I always clear my deck of forests.
This deck really is a turn 5 deck barring the printing of another lay of the land varient, with the occasional turn 4 thrown in that is almost completely reliant on your opening hand. This is a metagame predator that eats midrangy durdly decks.
You do have a point on the mana negative portion of wall. However, it still useful for the deck as blocking is one of the few forms of interaction we have. It saved me a couple of the games for that alone.
I know getting more lands out of the deck does help. However, when not on turn 1, I didn't like having rampant growth. It felt slow once it hit turn 2 or 3.
That being said, I'll try out your variant when I get home to see how it performs for me.
Also, what about a single Panglacial Wurm MD? I've found myself beating with chancellors in some games and this is strictly better. Would it hurt our combo too much?
I found a problem with that. You have to spend mana to search, usually, and since we only run so few mana resources it can be quite difficult to actually cast the wurm. Also our chancellors are big dudes themselves, so not exactly necessary.
The mana that wall of roots offers is very deceptive.
jumping on mana turn 1 is basically the only time that playing a non-forest-searching mana accell spell matters for getting the turn 4 kill over the turn 5.
wall of roots is still mana negative the turn you cast it, and is only really mana positive 3 turns down the road. This means that its only really good for a turn 4 kill if you drop it turn two. Sure it does let you go off in their upkeep with 5 lands in play (tap three+roots to play belcher, then tap 2 lands and roots again in their upkeep) but then you still have two lands in your deck which means that with 45 cards in your deck you will still do lethal less than 50% of the time.
That's all true if you are just goldfishing with the deck, where the only thing that matters is a lethal Belcher activation in as few turns as possible. But in real games, Wall has a lot of other benefits in addition to the early Belcher activation.
First of all, it's not really negative mana because if you can use 2 mana to cast Wall you can then use wall mana to cast a Vigil effect. If you used North, you wouldn't be able to use that Vigil/Lay/Quest on the turn you played North. This also works with Sprawl and BoP. In any turn 1 hand with Land + Chancellor, Wall is the best thing you can drop. That's also true on turn 2 because you can go turn 2 Wall into turn 2 Elder/North as long as you had one extra mana.
Second, Wall blocks. North doesn't. That can buy you a lot of life against BGx and Melira Pod, especially in games 2/3 when you can't go off immediately because you are searching for an answer like Orb or Claim.
Finally, the Wall into Belcher trick works throughout the game, not just on turn 2. It's particularly strong in the later game when you need extra mana to Fabricate into Belcher into an activation, which you just can't do on 7 lands alone. Wall enables that line of play. That's on top of enabling the turn 3 Belcher activation and the turn 4 Belcher activation. Sure, it might not be lethal all the time, but against some decks (Twin and Affinity come to mind), just activating Belcher on a creature will buy you a turn. No Wall means no activation, which can often mean instant death against Mite or Inkmoth.
Recross is also worse than into the north for getting lands out of your deck. into the north only costs two, while recross costs a virtual two after getting the land, the difference is that you basically wont ever recross turn 1, while having a chancellor+ land means that you can realistically cast into the north turn one, which is just enough of a jump in mana that you will basically always be able to play/activate belcher turn 4 (as long as you draw it naturally, and as long as you play above the critical mass of search-spells)
Yeah, but Recross is a tutor. It's a tutor that hides the cards from Thoughtseize and gives you a critical mass of threats against control. If Recross was purely an accelerator then I would agree with you. But the tutoring side of Recross is invaluable in the grindy matchups, especially against UWR and BGx.
As for the effective win turn, I don't know what build you are using, but mine is pretty consistent for turn 4, with the occasional turn 3 and the slightly below average turn 5. That's partially a function of SSG and Wall, so I admit that if you ditch either/both of those you are going to see a speed reduction and consistency boost. But I would rather not lose that speed against decks like Tron and Affinity and Burn where you absolutely just need to race.
Its still mana negative the turn you play it. as you could just do a lay of the land effect without the wall and you would be one mana ahead. Also, wall is only mana positive over 3 turns if you tap out each turn.
Blocking is a completely valid argument FOR wall of roots, however. And I think that just reflects us testing against different metas. Ive found that fog works better against the decks which I test (aka, not losing to twin, and passible against big affinity turns and other agro decks). And if you do decide to test my list, I suggest that you mess with the fog slots first.
Recross IS a tutor, but if you are using it in that aspect, you arent winning on turn 4 anyways.
I really do think that this deck is not *quite* fast enough on its own to just combo kill folks, and doing well with it is going to come down to selecting the right hate for the right decks both MD and SB
Its still mana negative the turn you play it. as you could just do a lay of the land effect without the wall and you would be one mana ahead. Also, wall is only mana positive over 3 turns if you tap out each turn.
Yeah, but by that logic nor is Sprawl or BoP "mana positive" until 2 turns later, and no one is making that argument. I think if you use the strictest definition of mana positive and negative, then you can argue out of using any of those cards. But in practice, the ability to cast Wall for 2 and then use the ability to add an additional 1 i very strong. To the Lay example, if I have Chancellor and Land, I can't just play Lay the same way I can just play Wall into Lay. Playing Lay alone leaves me with one mana doing nothing. But I can play Wall into Lay (or Birds) and get a jump start on my next turn. And that line of play happens throughout the game. All of that also ignores the Belcher/Wall activation trick, which comes up in probably 1/3 of my games and either wins the game outright or lets me hold for an additional turn before the win.
Recross IS a tutor, but if you are using it in that aspect, you arent winning on turn 4 anyways.
But the average "turn 4 win" is only against some decks. You don't win on turn 4 against UWR Control or BGx in games 2/3. You need to grind out those games and that's where Recross is huge. In a total goldfish vacuum I agree it's not great. Nor is it good if you have nothing but fast decks in your metagame. But my metagame, like the MTGO metagame, is about 20% BGx and 10% or so UWR Control, so in those 30% of my total games I am going to need Recross to grind out a match.
So i slotted wall of roots into the fog slot and I really like it. I still maintain that we want as many low CMC low land search spells as possible.
birds is mana positive after two turns, but it gets a slot becuase you jumping to 3 mana by turn 2 is essential for lining up the turn four win.
sprawl is mana neutral the turn you play it (play it on an untaped forest) and positive after just 1 turn. which is why I recommend it over any other dork.
I realize that BGx and URW are long grindyish matchups, which is why i am conformable playing less than 4x recross. those decks will give you many more drawsteps than the fast ones.
Has anyone tried stomping grounds from the side in g2 or something? So that your G2 and G3 can be more of a "coin flip" while you just play a less explosive version g1?
It's a strategy used for legacy dredge where they use dredge g1 and then reanimator g2 to beat hate.
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My love of lands knows no bounds.
Currently playing: GCasual 8-post R Casual Land Destruction UBRWG Legacy Dredge WGB Modern Melira Pod RUG EDH
It's an interesting idea Jeffw, I'll have to try it sometime.
Last night I played some more games with this deck. God, I just love this deck. I love Sylvan Ranger so much, maybe more than Steve. She trades with Bob, and so many other efficient early game beaters.
Game 1 is so easy, being able to play Goblin Charbelcher on turn 3 is basically unfair, even if you are on the draw. I hope people don't give up on this deck, I really think we have struck gold here.
I'm a long time mtgsalvation forum lurker, but this is my first post. I registered on the site finally just to discuss this deck!
After reading through the entire thread a couple of times, I finally picked up all the pieces for the deck in paper, and I'm having a blast just goldfishing with it as I dream of turn 4 kills.
I'm using Ktkenshinx's decklist from the twin tests, except I moved Pithing Needle to the sideboard in the Autumn Veil slot, and added a single Into the North back in the main for a total of 5 Rampant Growth effects not counting the Steves.
The problem I'm having is that I cannot seem to get the deck to "go off" reliably before turn 6. In all my testing, I've only managed to trigger a turn 4 kill (Charbelcher activation for 32 points of damage with 1 snow-covered forest left in the deck) once.
I played the deck against my friends RW Heroic deck last night for a few games, just to get a feel for it in a live game environment. He beat me every time because his deck was just to fast. Granted, neither of us were playing with sideboards, just our main decks because it was just for fun. I'm sure Fog out of the sideboard would have done a lot to delay his deck long enough for me to secure a couple kills. The deck just seemed to be 1 or 2 turns too slow in the matchup.
Speaking of that, can anyone here go though what they consider to be optimal opening hands, and when we should be mulliganing with this deck? I've read about others using the deck getting reliable turn 4 and turn 5 kills, and I think my inexperience with the deck must be holding me back. So can one of you more experienced pilots walk us all through your decision tree when keeping opening hands and maybe playing out the first couple of turns?
I would appreciate any guidance. Keep up the good work. I've noticed a slow down in the number of posts here over the last few days, and I hope the enthusiasm for this deck is not waning. I think it's a lot of fun, and want to see it succeed.
This deck usually kills around turn 5 or 6. Turn 4 is not common, and not guaranteed - you have to get pretty lucky with blind Belcher flips.
For opening hands, just make sure you can get to 2 mana. If you're going to be stuck on 1 mana for a long time, ship it.
Some keepable hands:
a) 2 lands
b) 1 land, 1 Chancellor/SSG, 1 Rampant Growth
c) 1 land, 1 Chancellor/SSG, 1 Wall
d) 1 land, 1 Sprawl
e) 1 land, 1 Lay
If you know your opponent has no way to kill Arbor Elf (at least, before you hit your second land), a 1 land/1 Elf hand is keepable too.
Yeah, the only time I've scored a turn 4 kill, I had an opening hand including both Breeding Pool and Snow-Covered Forest, three land-search spells and a belcher.
Do you always play a land search spell before a mana dork? For instance, with an opening hand of no land, but a chancellor and SSG and an Arbor Elf and BOP and a Rampant Growth or Lay, do you always use the opening-hand mana to find lands, or do you play mana dorks and then use them to find lands next turn and hope for a land draw?
My default has to always look for land over any other consideration, at least when goldfishing, because getting land out of our deck is how we win. I'm just wondering if that's typically the best move.
Play mana dorks first. You get more mana to cast your spells with dorks than Rampant Growths. Dorks cost 1 mana and give you 1 mana per turn; Growths cost 2 mana and gives you 1 mana per turn.
Thank you again, Izzet! This has been extremely helpful. Maybe Illusionist can add your post about ideal opening hands to the primer?
Has anyone tried stomping grounds from the side in g2 or something? So that your G2 and G3 can be more of a "coin flip" while you just play a less explosive version g1?
It's a strategy used for legacy dredge where they use dredge g1 and then reanimator g2 to beat hate.
Where would you side the Stomping Grounds in, though? In the Breeding Pool slot? I only ask because it seems that after game 1, our opponent will know our win con and be gunning to take out Charbelcher. That would make Fabricate even more important in games 2 and 3, right? Or are we comfortable in the 8 chances we already have to create blue mana (Birds and Utopia Sprawl)?
I'm using Ktkenshinx's decklist from the twin tests, except I moved Pithing Needle to the sideboard in the Autumn Veil slot, and added a single Into the North back in the main for a total of 5 Rampant Growth effects not counting the Steves.
I also upped my Fabricate count to 3 and ditched one Arbor Elf for +1 BoP. Adding the third Fabricate gives you a much better chance of going turn 2 Fabricate into turn 3 Belcher or turn 3 Fabricate into turn 4 Belcher and activate. It also helps you recover from removal better, and has a lot of synergy with our artifact heavy sideboard. The 4th BoP is necessary to accommodate the additional Fabricate, and it is also the best chump blocker against Affinity,
The problem I'm having is that I cannot seem to get the deck to "go off" reliably before turn 6. In all my testing, I've only managed to trigger a turn 4 kill (Charbelcher activation for 32 points of damage with 1 snow-covered forest left in the deck) once.
I played the deck against my friends RW Heroic deck last night for a few games, just to get a feel for it in a live game environment. He beat me every time because his deck was just to fast. Granted, neither of us were playing with sideboards, just our main decks because it was just for fun. I'm sure Fog out of the sideboard would have done a lot to delay his deck long enough for me to secure a couple kills. The deck just seemed to be 1 or 2 turns too slow in the matchup.
The deck isn't quite a turn 4 deck yet. It's still about 4.5 or 4.75 in my testing. Let's look at my Affinity matchups because those high-speed games would be most analogous to your RW Heroic experience. In the Affinity matchup, which was decided almost entirely by speed, I won 27 of my 60 games (11/30 game 1, 15/30 games 2-3) with an average win turn of about 4.73. Here was the win-turn breakdown for those 60 games expressed as wins (% of total wins):
In tandem with Fog, or if I was on the play, the turn 4 and turn 5 win was almost always enough to race Affinity. Ideally, the deck should be a consistent turn 4 deck and not a turn 4.75 deck, but I also am not sure why your own tests aren't getting as many turn 4 and turn 5 wins.
Speaking of that, can anyone here go though what they consider to be optimal opening hands, and when we should be mulliganing with this deck? I've read about others using the deck getting reliable turn 4 and turn 5 kills, and I think my inexperience with the deck must be holding me back. So can one of you more experienced pilots walk us all through your decision tree when keeping opening hands and maybe playing out the first couple of turns?
Izzetmage's breakdown is spot on in terms of mana sources. If your hand doesn't fit one of those criteria, then you mull it. There are only a few things I would add to that. For one, if I know I am playing against an aggressive deck, I will always mulligan an opening hand that doesn't have either Belcher, Fabricate, or Recross. If you don't have one of those cards in your opening 7, you have a better chance of drawing it in your next 6 than if you just go into topdeck mode for the next 4 turns. Also, when choosing between a deck thinning spell or a straight ramp spell, you should preference the thinning spell, especially if you don't have a Belcher or Fabricate in your hand. Ramp becomes good when you do have one of those cards. Thinning is good when you do not.
Re: Stomping Ground
I'm still trying to resolve the question of Stomping Ground. It hinges entirely on how many lands you can get out of your deck. It also hinges on how many lands you need to get out of your deck to have enough mana to cast and fire Belcher. It would stink to have 5 forests in play, and a Ground/Pool in your deck, with a bunch of dead cards in your hand that can no longer thin for lack of basics. But if we reliably get Pool and 5 Forests in play, then we can probably run a singleton Ground safely.
The lethality math for Ground is itself pretty easy. Let's assume you have 1 land left in your deck when you activate Belcher and that you have played 5 deck thinning spells thus far. Let's also assume it's turn 4 and you were on the play, at which point you have draw 3 cards and thinned out 5-6 cards. This leaves 44 cards in your deck when you activate Belcher on turn 4. If that last land is a Ground, you have a 75% chance of firing a lethal Belcher and revealing at least 11 cards (including the Ground). Bu if that last land is a Forest, you only have a 53% chance of making that a lethal activation, and you would need to reveal a full 21 cards.
Assuming an opponent at 17 life, which is about average in Modern, the chance of a lethal turn 4 activation with just Ground in your deck goes up to 77%. For the singe Forest case, it's at 61%. So from a pure lethality perspective, a singleton Ground definitely makes sense. It means that turn 4 Belcher activations will kill their opponent in 3 of 4 games. With no Ground, turn 4 Belcher activations only kill their opponent in between 53% and 61% of all games. That's a pretty persuasive case for adding 1 Ground in place of 1 Forest.
But the issue is casting the Belcher with only 5 lands in your deck that can reliably be thinned. You would only get Ground if it was your last land in your deck, so it's effectively dead mana when we are trying to ramp. This is a question that can really only be answered with some testing.
I'm sorry, Ktkenshinx, I should have clarified that I already made the changes to your deck list you announced in the thread after the twin test. Plus the Pithing Needle swap. I'm not 100 percent sure how to format decklists in the forums yet, but I'll try:
My issue with Stomping Ground is that it seems to be an all or nothing strategy. Either cut Breeding Pool for it and hope you'll have blue for Fabricate if you need it, or not. This also ignores the fact that you have 4 cards (Safewright Quest) that can fetch Breeding Pool if you need to cast fabricate and don't have Utopia Sprawl or Birds in hand/play.
I don't think going to 5 forests, and 1 each of Breeding Pool and Stomping Ground is worth it for the reasons you mentioned. (The largest being dead fetch cards once you have five forests out). But maybe it's a matter of more playtesting. I've certainly had "games" where a turn 5 activation with one forest left in the deck resulted in a Charbelcher activation for 11 or 13, or so. If that last land is Stomping Ground, that's GG.
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A brand new deck appearing for the first time in forth place after testing and much discussion by a community of dedicated players is certainly worth celebrating. While it still may have placed forth, it placed forth in a format whose metagame is clearly defined (Tron, Twin, Storm/Combo, Affinity, Jund...)
Nice job guys. I applaud you.
"There are no two words in the English language more harmful than 'good job'." -Terrance Fletcher, Whiplash (2014)
I just want to say that this is very, very clever and awesome.
Of note was that the deck found belcher with consistency, but couldn't always activate it for lethal. There were only a couple games where I could/had the time to thin my deck of all lands (and only one where I could stack my library as I chose, against uwr. He didn't win.).
Also of note is that I faced 5 blue decks, and although I went 2-3 against them, all the games (except for one against loam and one against zur) were close and very much within reach. Vs tron, I held back belcher for one turn , but had I jammed it, he had no counters and I'd have hit him before he mindslavered me (oops). Vs loam, my opp almost mana leak'd but apparently decided negate at the last second (2 mana open on my side, spirit guide in hand). Against zur, 3 nature's claims were shipped to the bottom with recross the turn before stony silence came down. Basically, the games were significantly closer than I expected them to be.
The deck is fun to play. I mostly sold out of mtgo when events went down and this was a hilarious budget alternative to my normal merfolk.
Oh, and in a practice game before the event, I found out that Emrakul has nothing on belcher.
Your list is interesting, are you able to cast Fabricate consistently just relying on Birds of Paradise and Utopia Sprawl? How's Simian Spirit Guide working out?
UBRKess, Dissident MageUBR - Controlling Dissidents
GRhonas the IndomitableG - Indomitable Four Drops
WUBOloro, Ageless AsceticWUB - Loot & Renanimate
The problem with this is that you are much more likely to win turn 4 by jumping ahead atleast one mana one turn one, to get the same effect on a later turn you need to get more than one extra mana out of it (see wall of roots).
Also, please stop playing arbor elf, as its basically worse than utopia sprawl at everything (besides chump blocking).EDIT: swap arbor elf for into the north, you really really need that card as two mana jumps on mana (ala rampant growth) are much more powerful than their three mana counterparts (ala recross/kodamas/harrow ect.)here is my list, which trades just a slight bit of explosiveness for extreme consistency, and much more resiliance:
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
4 Chancellor of the Tangle
4 Goblin Charbelcher
4 Rampant Growth
4 Safewright Quest
4 Lay of the Land
3 Into the North
6 Snow-Covered Forest
4 Utopia Sprawl
4 Fabricate
4 Sylvan Ranger
1 Breeding Pool
3 Birds of Paradise
2 Recross the Paths
3 Fog
1 Defense Grid
1 Torpor Orb
the 3x fog/grid/and torpor orb are all flex spots that are meta dependent, you could keep the SSG/wall of roots in this spot, but i firmly belive that this deck should is much better served by playing a little defensively (enough for one turn) coupled with a little more consistently, than the unstable lists that others are using
The lack of blue was a problem 1 game. I started with a singleton breeding pool to find w/recross but I didn't like it or think it was necessary.
Spirit guide was underwhelming and I would cut it from the deck going forwards.
Wall of roots over performed and I would not cut it. The immediate mana allowed for some explosive turns. The same with arbor elf in conjunction with utopia sprawl.
I did not like rampant growth all that much and tended to shave one with side boarding. I'm not sure I want into the north when I dislike the 2 mana ramp effect. However, in the future I may shave a recross instead.
Recross was quite good as the untapped land mattered in at least 3 games. It bouncing back to hand came up in 2 games. The reordering effect came up in 2 games. I would not go to fewer than 3.
when you play so many non-land-grabbing cards, you risk getting all mana and not enough forest. exactly like what happened to you
lastly: belcher is the way this deck wins, extra fabricates can be used to bait counters/ find hate permanents, play 4x fabricates
All the deck wants is mana. I'll be tweaking the deck as I play and we'll see where it goes from there.
4 fabricates is something I will be trying when I next have time to play. Not finding business was an issue.
jumping on mana turn 1 is basically the only time that playing a non-forest-searching mana accell spell matters for getting the turn 4 kill over the turn 5.
wall of roots is still mana negative the turn you cast it, and is only really mana positive 3 turns down the road. This means that its only really good for a turn 4 kill if you drop it turn two. Sure it does let you go off in their upkeep with 5 lands in play (tap three+roots to play belcher, then tap 2 lands and roots again in their upkeep) but then you still have two lands in your deck which means that with 45 cards in your deck you will still do lethal less than 50% of the time.
Recross is also worse than into the north for getting lands out of your deck. into the north only costs two, while recross costs a virtual two after getting the land, the difference is that you basically wont ever recross turn 1, while having a chancellor+ land means that you can realistically cast into the north turn one, which is just enough of a jump in mana that you will basically always be able to play/activate belcher turn 4 (as long as you draw it naturally, and as long as you play above the critical mass of search-spells)
The thing is, you basically wont ever be able to belch turn 4 if you have to tutor for it. because you will either have too many forest in the deck still to kill them, or not enough mana to play/and activate. Yall have chosen to make sure that you always have mana, I have made sure that I always clear my deck of forests.
This deck really is a turn 5 deck barring the printing of another lay of the land varient, with the occasional turn 4 thrown in that is almost completely reliant on your opening hand. This is a metagame predator that eats midrangy durdly decks.
I know getting more lands out of the deck does help. However, when not on turn 1, I didn't like having rampant growth. It felt slow once it hit turn 2 or 3.
That being said, I'll try out your variant when I get home to see how it performs for me.
I found a problem with that. You have to spend mana to search, usually, and since we only run so few mana resources it can be quite difficult to actually cast the wurm. Also our chancellors are big dudes themselves, so not exactly necessary.
That's all true if you are just goldfishing with the deck, where the only thing that matters is a lethal Belcher activation in as few turns as possible. But in real games, Wall has a lot of other benefits in addition to the early Belcher activation.
First of all, it's not really negative mana because if you can use 2 mana to cast Wall you can then use wall mana to cast a Vigil effect. If you used North, you wouldn't be able to use that Vigil/Lay/Quest on the turn you played North. This also works with Sprawl and BoP. In any turn 1 hand with Land + Chancellor, Wall is the best thing you can drop. That's also true on turn 2 because you can go turn 2 Wall into turn 2 Elder/North as long as you had one extra mana.
Second, Wall blocks. North doesn't. That can buy you a lot of life against BGx and Melira Pod, especially in games 2/3 when you can't go off immediately because you are searching for an answer like Orb or Claim.
Finally, the Wall into Belcher trick works throughout the game, not just on turn 2. It's particularly strong in the later game when you need extra mana to Fabricate into Belcher into an activation, which you just can't do on 7 lands alone. Wall enables that line of play. That's on top of enabling the turn 3 Belcher activation and the turn 4 Belcher activation. Sure, it might not be lethal all the time, but against some decks (Twin and Affinity come to mind), just activating Belcher on a creature will buy you a turn. No Wall means no activation, which can often mean instant death against Mite or Inkmoth.
Yeah, but Recross is a tutor. It's a tutor that hides the cards from Thoughtseize and gives you a critical mass of threats against control. If Recross was purely an accelerator then I would agree with you. But the tutoring side of Recross is invaluable in the grindy matchups, especially against UWR and BGx.
As for the effective win turn, I don't know what build you are using, but mine is pretty consistent for turn 4, with the occasional turn 3 and the slightly below average turn 5. That's partially a function of SSG and Wall, so I admit that if you ditch either/both of those you are going to see a speed reduction and consistency boost. But I would rather not lose that speed against decks like Tron and Affinity and Burn where you absolutely just need to race.
Blocking is a completely valid argument FOR wall of roots, however. And I think that just reflects us testing against different metas. Ive found that fog works better against the decks which I test (aka, not losing to twin, and passible against big affinity turns and other agro decks). And if you do decide to test my list, I suggest that you mess with the fog slots first.
Recross IS a tutor, but if you are using it in that aspect, you arent winning on turn 4 anyways.
I really do think that this deck is not *quite* fast enough on its own to just combo kill folks, and doing well with it is going to come down to selecting the right hate for the right decks both MD and SB
Yeah, but by that logic nor is Sprawl or BoP "mana positive" until 2 turns later, and no one is making that argument. I think if you use the strictest definition of mana positive and negative, then you can argue out of using any of those cards. But in practice, the ability to cast Wall for 2 and then use the ability to add an additional 1 i very strong. To the Lay example, if I have Chancellor and Land, I can't just play Lay the same way I can just play Wall into Lay. Playing Lay alone leaves me with one mana doing nothing. But I can play Wall into Lay (or Birds) and get a jump start on my next turn. And that line of play happens throughout the game. All of that also ignores the Belcher/Wall activation trick, which comes up in probably 1/3 of my games and either wins the game outright or lets me hold for an additional turn before the win.
But the average "turn 4 win" is only against some decks. You don't win on turn 4 against UWR Control or BGx in games 2/3. You need to grind out those games and that's where Recross is huge. In a total goldfish vacuum I agree it's not great. Nor is it good if you have nothing but fast decks in your metagame. But my metagame, like the MTGO metagame, is about 20% BGx and 10% or so UWR Control, so in those 30% of my total games I am going to need Recross to grind out a match.
birds is mana positive after two turns, but it gets a slot becuase you jumping to 3 mana by turn 2 is essential for lining up the turn four win.
sprawl is mana neutral the turn you play it (play it on an untaped forest) and positive after just 1 turn. which is why I recommend it over any other dork.
I realize that BGx and URW are long grindyish matchups, which is why i am conformable playing less than 4x recross. those decks will give you many more drawsteps than the fast ones.
It's a strategy used for legacy dredge where they use dredge g1 and then reanimator g2 to beat hate.
Currently playing:
GCasual 8-post
R Casual Land Destruction
UBRWG Legacy Dredge
WGB Modern Melira Pod
RUG EDH
Last night I played some more games with this deck. God, I just love this deck. I love Sylvan Ranger so much, maybe more than Steve. She trades with Bob, and so many other efficient early game beaters.
Game 1 is so easy, being able to play Goblin Charbelcher on turn 3 is basically unfair, even if you are on the draw. I hope people don't give up on this deck, I really think we have struck gold here.
UBRKess, Dissident MageUBR - Controlling Dissidents
GRhonas the IndomitableG - Indomitable Four Drops
WUBOloro, Ageless AsceticWUB - Loot & Renanimate
I'm a long time mtgsalvation forum lurker, but this is my first post. I registered on the site finally just to discuss this deck!
After reading through the entire thread a couple of times, I finally picked up all the pieces for the deck in paper, and I'm having a blast just goldfishing with it as I dream of turn 4 kills.
I'm using Ktkenshinx's decklist from the twin tests, except I moved Pithing Needle to the sideboard in the Autumn Veil slot, and added a single Into the North back in the main for a total of 5 Rampant Growth effects not counting the Steves.
The problem I'm having is that I cannot seem to get the deck to "go off" reliably before turn 6. In all my testing, I've only managed to trigger a turn 4 kill (Charbelcher activation for 32 points of damage with 1 snow-covered forest left in the deck) once.
I played the deck against my friends RW Heroic deck last night for a few games, just to get a feel for it in a live game environment. He beat me every time because his deck was just to fast. Granted, neither of us were playing with sideboards, just our main decks because it was just for fun. I'm sure Fog out of the sideboard would have done a lot to delay his deck long enough for me to secure a couple kills. The deck just seemed to be 1 or 2 turns too slow in the matchup.
Speaking of that, can anyone here go though what they consider to be optimal opening hands, and when we should be mulliganing with this deck? I've read about others using the deck getting reliable turn 4 and turn 5 kills, and I think my inexperience with the deck must be holding me back. So can one of you more experienced pilots walk us all through your decision tree when keeping opening hands and maybe playing out the first couple of turns?
I would appreciate any guidance. Keep up the good work. I've noticed a slow down in the number of posts here over the last few days, and I hope the enthusiasm for this deck is not waning. I think it's a lot of fun, and want to see it succeed.
Thanks for all your help.
For opening hands, just make sure you can get to 2 mana. If you're going to be stuck on 1 mana for a long time, ship it.
Some keepable hands:
a) 2 lands
b) 1 land, 1 Chancellor/SSG, 1 Rampant Growth
c) 1 land, 1 Chancellor/SSG, 1 Wall
d) 1 land, 1 Sprawl
e) 1 land, 1 Lay
If you know your opponent has no way to kill Arbor Elf (at least, before you hit your second land), a 1 land/1 Elf hand is keepable too.
| Ad Nauseam
| Infect
Big Johnny.
Yeah, the only time I've scored a turn 4 kill, I had an opening hand including both Breeding Pool and Snow-Covered Forest, three land-search spells and a belcher.
Do you always play a land search spell before a mana dork? For instance, with an opening hand of no land, but a chancellor and SSG and an Arbor Elf and BOP and a Rampant Growth or Lay, do you always use the opening-hand mana to find lands, or do you play mana dorks and then use them to find lands next turn and hope for a land draw?
My default has to always look for land over any other consideration, at least when goldfishing, because getting land out of our deck is how we win. I'm just wondering if that's typically the best move.
| Ad Nauseam
| Infect
Big Johnny.
Where would you side the Stomping Grounds in, though? In the Breeding Pool slot? I only ask because it seems that after game 1, our opponent will know our win con and be gunning to take out Charbelcher. That would make Fabricate even more important in games 2 and 3, right? Or are we comfortable in the 8 chances we already have to create blue mana (Birds and Utopia Sprawl)?
Great to have you here, and great to have you participating in this awesome deck discussion.
I also upped my Fabricate count to 3 and ditched one Arbor Elf for +1 BoP. Adding the third Fabricate gives you a much better chance of going turn 2 Fabricate into turn 3 Belcher or turn 3 Fabricate into turn 4 Belcher and activate. It also helps you recover from removal better, and has a lot of synergy with our artifact heavy sideboard. The 4th BoP is necessary to accommodate the additional Fabricate, and it is also the best chump blocker against Affinity,
The deck isn't quite a turn 4 deck yet. It's still about 4.5 or 4.75 in my testing. Let's look at my Affinity matchups because those high-speed games would be most analogous to your RW Heroic experience. In the Affinity matchup, which was decided almost entirely by speed, I won 27 of my 60 games (11/30 game 1, 15/30 games 2-3) with an average win turn of about 4.73. Here was the win-turn breakdown for those 60 games expressed as wins (% of total wins):
Turn 3: 1 (4%)
Turn 4: 10 (38%)
Turn 5: 10 (38%)
Turn 6: 5 (19%)
In tandem with Fog, or if I was on the play, the turn 4 and turn 5 win was almost always enough to race Affinity. Ideally, the deck should be a consistent turn 4 deck and not a turn 4.75 deck, but I also am not sure why your own tests aren't getting as many turn 4 and turn 5 wins.
Izzetmage's breakdown is spot on in terms of mana sources. If your hand doesn't fit one of those criteria, then you mull it. There are only a few things I would add to that. For one, if I know I am playing against an aggressive deck, I will always mulligan an opening hand that doesn't have either Belcher, Fabricate, or Recross. If you don't have one of those cards in your opening 7, you have a better chance of drawing it in your next 6 than if you just go into topdeck mode for the next 4 turns. Also, when choosing between a deck thinning spell or a straight ramp spell, you should preference the thinning spell, especially if you don't have a Belcher or Fabricate in your hand. Ramp becomes good when you do have one of those cards. Thinning is good when you do not.
Re: Stomping Ground
I'm still trying to resolve the question of Stomping Ground. It hinges entirely on how many lands you can get out of your deck. It also hinges on how many lands you need to get out of your deck to have enough mana to cast and fire Belcher. It would stink to have 5 forests in play, and a Ground/Pool in your deck, with a bunch of dead cards in your hand that can no longer thin for lack of basics. But if we reliably get Pool and 5 Forests in play, then we can probably run a singleton Ground safely.
The lethality math for Ground is itself pretty easy. Let's assume you have 1 land left in your deck when you activate Belcher and that you have played 5 deck thinning spells thus far. Let's also assume it's turn 4 and you were on the play, at which point you have draw 3 cards and thinned out 5-6 cards. This leaves 44 cards in your deck when you activate Belcher on turn 4. If that last land is a Ground, you have a 75% chance of firing a lethal Belcher and revealing at least 11 cards (including the Ground). Bu if that last land is a Forest, you only have a 53% chance of making that a lethal activation, and you would need to reveal a full 21 cards.
Assuming an opponent at 17 life, which is about average in Modern, the chance of a lethal turn 4 activation with just Ground in your deck goes up to 77%. For the singe Forest case, it's at 61%. So from a pure lethality perspective, a singleton Ground definitely makes sense. It means that turn 4 Belcher activations will kill their opponent in 3 of 4 games. With no Ground, turn 4 Belcher activations only kill their opponent in between 53% and 61% of all games. That's a pretty persuasive case for adding 1 Ground in place of 1 Forest.
But the issue is casting the Belcher with only 5 lands in your deck that can reliably be thinned. You would only get Ground if it was your last land in your deck, so it's effectively dead mana when we are trying to ramp. This is a question that can really only be answered with some testing.
6 Snow-Covered Forest
1 Breeding Pool
Creatures: 21
2 Arbor Elf
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Chancellor of the Tangle
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
3 Simian Spirit Guide
4 Wall of Roots
4 Caravan Vigil
3 Fabricate
4 Goblin Charbelcher
4 Into the North
4 Lay of the Land
1 Rampant Growth
4 Recross the Paths
4 Safewright Quest
4 Utopia Sprawl
3 Defense Grid
3 Fog
3 Nature's Claim
1 Pithing Needle
2 Spellskite
3 Torpor Orb
My issue with Stomping Ground is that it seems to be an all or nothing strategy. Either cut Breeding Pool for it and hope you'll have blue for Fabricate if you need it, or not. This also ignores the fact that you have 4 cards (Safewright Quest) that can fetch Breeding Pool if you need to cast fabricate and don't have Utopia Sprawl or Birds in hand/play.
I don't think going to 5 forests, and 1 each of Breeding Pool and Stomping Ground is worth it for the reasons you mentioned. (The largest being dead fetch cards once you have five forests out). But maybe it's a matter of more playtesting. I've certainly had "games" where a turn 5 activation with one forest left in the deck resulted in a Charbelcher activation for 11 or 13, or so. If that last land is Stomping Ground, that's GG.