I like the way the deck is progressing. I strongly agree with your speculations about Counterbalance. 1 counterbalance is a very good call since it's uncastable enough to not want it all the time, but good enuogh to tutor for.
I see your problems with choosing a disruption package. In my build, I want force over therapy because you don't need to guess or be worried about naming the wrong card. This is less true about Duress, but I'd like the ability to take things as they come, not invest mana, take out threats while tapping down mana...in other words, I dig counters.
I'm baack! I'm back with no testing, no good news, and no major insights. Sorry.
I'm taking a year off to volunteer in israel. If you thought testing with me was hard then, it's gonna be really hard now.
Card to suggest at the moment: Leyline of the Void. Both ichorid and breakfast are affected by it and it's uncounterable if played turn 0. This is relevant vs breakfast which packs counters. Both Ich and CB can deal with it in the sb with chain of vapor/whatever but this leads me to another point.
This deck rarely has answers to non-creature threats. I've always felt helpless playing this deck, and that the only interaction I had with the opponent was assembling horror the best I could. If it wasn't a creature or something I could obviously therapy out of their hand, I was doomed.
And I just compared the recent VH list to a list of UGR Thresh. They've got gigantic counterspell and anti-creature bases, and in both respects outdoes VH. It's arguable whether they do have a better archiving system, (cantrips vs draw engines and tutors).
But I'm not here to bemoan our losses, I'm here to improve it. Here's the list that I think is a better alternative.
I forgot the mana base, but it's cool. No major changes there.
Daze and Force of Will fill the gap I'm talking about. The list isn't so drastic, really. I just dropped Sage and Cabal therapy for Force of Will and daze. Cabal therapy is too much of a bother for me, it doesn't guarantee anything.
3 echoing truth is a bit too much. I figured I'd want to neutralize cards like Pong Horror and Drake as quickly as possible. Either that, or I haven't been paying attention to the metagame enough to know which decks to gear towards...:p. Possible considerations include Counterspell. sage, jitte, parallax dementia, you think about it.
As far as preliminary testing goes, I really really like powder keg. Belcher can't counter it with their red blasts, it wipes all tokens, which means if you've got a pong token and a centaur token all will go away, it's fetchable via infiltrator, you can play it pre-emtively so if you play a horror you don't have to wait for another untap step to kill the tokens, it kills artifacts too and you can raise it to whatever you want. Engineered might be better, so I'm testing that out now.
What should I put in my sideboard? I want more stuff against aggro and aggro control, but what?
EtW scares the crap out of me. I am definetly trading a good aggro game for a good combo game.
There are a lot of changes here from the standard list. I abandoned Sage for simply stocking my deck with bombs vs combo. I put Pong in the board because it wouldn't be relevant in the combo matchup, but I still wanted it in the board so I could deal with fish/aggro decks. Powder Keg replaced echoing truth since it not only destroys EtW tokens, but also manages Pong and Horror tokens as well. Stifle got moved in because Stifle has a thousand uses. Duress is there for combo as well.
I'm good weekdays at around 430-530. Those are sucky hours, but I just got a job as a camp counselor. I'm new to the job, so I'm not sure when I can take hours off and what not. Things will get better with time.
I'm in pennsylvania, so figure eastern standard time. Is wisconsin/ish on the same time zone?
here's the deck i've been working on. that is to say, when i have the time to play. that it is also to say that 70% of the time i've been playing against crap opponents.
i've been rather unsatisfatied with this deck. the most important distinction is the inclusion of meddling mage in the pongnify spot. i have not tested this element exclusively. i also felt the dire need to include some stifles.
now, i pretty much hate the deck i've got now. counterbalance is not a hard counter. sensei's divining top wastes my time, i'd much rather have pro-active threat, maybe more stifles or echoing truths md. what's more, counterbalance is hard as hell to cast. i have reason to believe that mana maze would be so much better.
if i can get a game vs someone on these threads, my life would be a thousand times easier.
MD- How does losing to every deck with those cards work out for me...Um? What's with the hostility? I'm just saying that I speculate that Counterbalance is not an effective counter strategy for CRET belcher.
Ah...i've been gone from my computer for the last week...let's see where this thread went...
Okay then. Maybe Counterbalance should be fit in the board, and SDT stays maindeck?
I've been testing a little bit of CRET belcher, and let me tell you it is insane. I've fought past chalice for 1 without even having to pull out artifact hate from the board. I doubt that counterbalance will be every effective, if chalice wasn't.
Well, how do we expect the field to look like in the near future? Combo is gonna beat the crap out of aggro, but that doesn't mean that people won't play goblins. So do we think goblins is still going to be played even though it won't win?
All of those cards are too expensive unless you have Gaea's Cradle out, which is why I say you could really use some Crop Rotations.
Seeing as Overrun is a very powerful card of your deck, come game two your opponent will be doing all sorts of stuff to make sure it doesn't resolve. Meddling Mage, counterspells, duress, you name it. You need a back up plan of some type. I suggest Echoing Courage. It'll only work on tokens that have the same name, like Spirit or Saproling, but it's not a bad back up strategy.
For a little bit of extra power, methinks you might find it in your interest to test animate land. It might slow you.
Oooh! Did you try Concordant Crossroads? It's a little risky, but it'll benefit you alot, provided empty the warrens doesn't hijack it.
Stephen: I have YET to play a game vs combo. I have no idea how counterbalance + top would impact it. Have you have some experience with it? How did it go?
I see your problems with choosing a disruption package. In my build, I want force over therapy because you don't need to guess or be worried about naming the wrong card. This is less true about Duress, but I'd like the ability to take things as they come, not invest mana, take out threats while tapping down mana...in other words, I dig counters.
How often do you get force with confidant?
I'm taking a year off to volunteer in israel. If you thought testing with me was hard then, it's gonna be really hard now.
Card to suggest at the moment: Leyline of the Void. Both ichorid and breakfast are affected by it and it's uncounterable if played turn 0. This is relevant vs breakfast which packs counters. Both Ich and CB can deal with it in the sb with chain of vapor/whatever but this leads me to another point.
This deck rarely has answers to non-creature threats. I've always felt helpless playing this deck, and that the only interaction I had with the opponent was assembling horror the best I could. If it wasn't a creature or something I could obviously therapy out of their hand, I was doomed.
And I just compared the recent VH list to a list of UGR Thresh. They've got gigantic counterspell and anti-creature bases, and in both respects outdoes VH. It's arguable whether they do have a better archiving system, (cantrips vs draw engines and tutors).
But I'm not here to bemoan our losses, I'm here to improve it. Here's the list that I think is a better alternative.
3 Hunted Horror
Archiving
4 Dark Confidant
1 Phyrexian Arena
3 Dimir Infiltrator
3 Pongify
4 Gilded Drake
Counter-Base
4 Force of Will
3 Daze
4 Stifle
4 Aether Vial
3 Despotic Scepter
2 Tel-Jilad Stylus
3 Echoing Truth
I forgot the mana base, but it's cool. No major changes there.
Daze and Force of Will fill the gap I'm talking about. The list isn't so drastic, really. I just dropped Sage and Cabal therapy for Force of Will and daze. Cabal therapy is too much of a bother for me, it doesn't guarantee anything.
3 echoing truth is a bit too much. I figured I'd want to neutralize cards like Pong Horror and Drake as quickly as possible. Either that, or I haven't been paying attention to the metagame enough to know which decks to gear towards...:p. Possible considerations include Counterspell. sage, jitte, parallax dementia, you think about it.
4 [ON] Polluted Delta
4 [ON] Bloodstained Mire
4 [R] Underground Sea
1 [U] Scrubland
2 [ON] Swamp (4)
2 [US] Island (1)
1 [SH] Volrath's Stronghold
1 [ON] Riptide Laboratory
// Creatures
4 [RAV] Dark Confidant
3 [RAV] Dimir Infiltrator
4 [US] Gilded Drake
3 [RAV] Hunted Horror
2 [FUT] Epochrasite
4 [JU] Cabal Therapy
4 [DS] AEther Vial
2 [IA] Despotic Scepter
2 [MR] Tel-Jilad Stylus
1 [BOK] Umezawa's Jitte
4 [SC] Stifle
1 [PLC] Pongify
4 [7E] Duress
1 [UD] Powder Keg
2 [FD] Engineered Explosives
As far as preliminary testing goes, I really really like powder keg. Belcher can't counter it with their red blasts, it wipes all tokens, which means if you've got a pong token and a centaur token all will go away, it's fetchable via infiltrator, you can play it pre-emtively so if you play a horror you don't have to wait for another untap step to kill the tokens, it kills artifacts too and you can raise it to whatever you want. Engineered might be better, so I'm testing that out now.
What should I put in my sideboard? I want more stuff against aggro and aggro control, but what?
I've been doing some testing of my own, not as in depth as yours. But here's my deck.
4 [ON] Polluted Delta
4 [ON] Bloodstained Mire
4 [R] Underground Sea
1 [U] Scrubland
2 [ON] Swamp (4)
2 [US] Island (1)
1 [SH] Volrath's Stronghold
1 [ON] Riptide Laboratory
// Creatures
4 [RAV] Dark Confidant
3 [RAV] Dimir Infiltrator
4 [US] Gilded Drake
3 [RAV] Hunted Horror
4 [JU] Cabal Therapy
4 [DS] AEther Vial
3 [IA] Despotic Scepter
2 [MR] Tel-Jilad Stylus
1 [BOK] Umezawa's Jitte
4 [SC] Stifle
1 [PLC] Pongify
4 [7E] Duress
4 [UD] Powder Keg
EtW scares the crap out of me. I am definetly trading a good aggro game for a good combo game.
There are a lot of changes here from the standard list. I abandoned Sage for simply stocking my deck with bombs vs combo. I put Pong in the board because it wouldn't be relevant in the combo matchup, but I still wanted it in the board so I could deal with fish/aggro decks. Powder Keg replaced echoing truth since it not only destroys EtW tokens, but also manages Pong and Horror tokens as well. Stifle got moved in because Stifle has a thousand uses. Duress is there for combo as well.
Is my fear of combo entirely irrational?
I'm in pennsylvania, so figure eastern standard time. Is wisconsin/ish on the same time zone?
// Lands
4 [ON] Polluted Delta
4 [ON] Bloodstained Mire
4 [R] Underground Sea
1 [U] Scrubland
2 [ON] Swamp (4)
2 [US] Island (1)
1 [SH] Volrath's Stronghold
1 [ON] Riptide Laboratory
// Creatures
4 [RAV] Dark Confidant
3 [RAV] Dimir Infiltrator
4 [US] Gilded Drake
3 [RAV] Hunted Horror
3 [PS] Meddling Mage
// Spells
4 [JU] Cabal Therapy
4 [DS] AEther Vial
3 [IA] Despotic Scepter
2 [MR] Tel-Jilad Stylus
1 [BOK] Umezawa's Jitte
1 [DS] Echoing Truth
2 [SC] Stifle
3 [CS] Counterbalance
4 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top
// Sideboard
SB: 4 [SOK] Pithing Needle
SB: 4 [FD] Engineered Explosives
SB: 4 [IN] Mana Maze
SB: 3 [PLC] Pongify
i've been rather unsatisfatied with this deck. the most important distinction is the inclusion of meddling mage in the pongnify spot. i have not tested this element exclusively. i also felt the dire need to include some stifles.
now, i pretty much hate the deck i've got now. counterbalance is not a hard counter. sensei's divining top wastes my time, i'd much rather have pro-active threat, maybe more stifles or echoing truths md. what's more, counterbalance is hard as hell to cast. i have reason to believe that mana maze would be so much better.
if i can get a game vs someone on these threads, my life would be a thousand times easier.
MD- How does losing to every deck with those cards work out for me...Um? What's with the hostility? I'm just saying that I speculate that Counterbalance is not an effective counter strategy for CRET belcher.
When's gencon?
Okay then. Maybe Counterbalance should be fit in the board, and SDT stays maindeck?
I've been testing a little bit of CRET belcher, and let me tell you it is insane. I've fought past chalice for 1 without even having to pull out artifact hate from the board. I doubt that counterbalance will be every effective, if chalice wasn't.
Seeing as Overrun is a very powerful card of your deck, come game two your opponent will be doing all sorts of stuff to make sure it doesn't resolve. Meddling Mage, counterspells, duress, you name it. You need a back up plan of some type. I suggest Echoing Courage. It'll only work on tokens that have the same name, like Spirit or Saproling, but it's not a bad back up strategy.
For a little bit of extra power, methinks you might find it in your interest to test animate land. It might slow you.
Oooh! Did you try Concordant Crossroads? It's a little risky, but it'll benefit you alot, provided empty the warrens doesn't hijack it.
Edit: Durr. Pendelhaven Elder.