“You know, they tell ya to never hit a man with a closed fist but it is, on occasion, hilarious.” – Captain Malcolm Reynolds, Firefly, “Train Job”
For the five of you that recognize my name, I’m back. You may be a bit surprised that this article isn’t about Legacy, but instead that I’m writing about Standard. I’m an unemployed college student, and writing about Legacy doesn’t exactly pay the bills. In fact, I actually have to pay Knut to publish my stuff (the check’s in the mail, I swear), so time to give that a break. In fact, I have a serious feeling that the only reason that this got published is because Knut likes Firefly, and I included a Firefly quote at the beginning of the article. At any rate I’ve tripped on what I think is the best deck in Standard, but because I’m such an awful player, I can’t pilot it to a top finish. Instead, I’ll let the readers of StarCityGames do that. But first, a long and unnecessary introduction.
Back during the heyday of Affinity I had what I maintained was a great B/G Tooth and Nail list. I had Echoing Decay, Tel-Jilad Justice, Terror, and Barter in Blood main with Eternal Witness backup, and Oxidize and Viridian Shaman in the board versus aggro and Affinity. I had Mindslavers, Sensei’s Divining Top and Night’s Whisper for draw (along with Tel-Jilad Justice’s scry) and I had a great sideboarding plan: Bringer of the Black Dawn (to fetch Mindslaver) + Bringer of the White Dawn (to recur Mindslaver). The problem was, it didn’t beat Affinity. Nothing did. So I basically ignored Standard until the problem went away. And it did; the ban-hammer got dropped on Affinity. I eventually came back to the format, and while I love the deck, it still isn’t any good, so I went looking for other decks. I resurrected Salvagers Control now that Affinity and its Disciple of the Vault is gone. Salvagers still isn’t good, and it won’t ever be. Pristine Angel is good… Auriok Salvagers is not.
Next a friend recommended R/G Land Destruction to me because the format was slow enough for it, or so he said. Your best games with that deck go “Forest, Birds, go. Mountain, Stone Rain, go. Land, Molten Rain, go. Land, Plow Under. Win.” What he did not mention was that any opening short of that one is practically an auto-loss. Your opponent drops a dude on turn 2, and you lose. If you stop to kill the creature, then all your land destruction becomes irrelevant, and if you keep on killing lands, you get beat to death. Any game where you don’t have turn 2 land destruction on the play seems to lose to aggro. Every time I play the deck on the draw, I feel like I should side out all the land destruction for good cards. The deck also has weird mana issues – it wants lots of land in the early game but less and less in the late game, and the deck is very picky about its mana; if you mix up its RR and GG spells, you are in for a world of hurt. I could even resolve Kiki-Jiki, Star of the Deck and still lose.
Important aside:
Kiki-Jiki, Incredible Goblin is fun as hell. It ends up not being so practical a card except for ridiculousness with Eternal Witness in the deck, but it is fun. I mean honestly, what do you need two Arc-Sloggers for?
Enough about bad decks that I played because I hate myself; let’s talk about good decks. Anyone remember Mike Flores talking about running a 12-land Belcher list in the old Standard? At this point I can’t even find the article where he mentions it, and I know no decklist was given. In fact I never actually found a list for 12-land Belcher (going back into the archives, I’ve found several articles, but they’re all outdated) I did however trip over this gem in the Starcitygames deck library:
Creatures (18)
Lands (10)
Spells (32)
- 3 Sensei's Divining Top
- 3 Serum Visions
- 2 Rampant Growth
- 4 Kodama's Reach
- 4 Goblin Charbelcher
- 2 Fabricate
- 4 Condescend
- 4 Echoing Truth
- 2 Journey of Discovery
- 4 Chrome Mox
Sideboard
This is the deck Hiroyuki Morii piloted to a 3rd place finish at 2004 Hyogo-ken Champs. The deck uses all the Green mana acceleration from Champions of Kamigawa to power out rapid Charbelchers. This deck is more explosive than Tooth and Nail, and can drop more mana faster. It also only runs 10 lands, which is just enough for Eternal Witness/Fabricate, cast Belcher and activate it.
Playing the deck
Mana Making
2 Rampant Growth
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
4 Kodama’s Reach
3 Solemn Simulacrum
The meat of the deck. Cast a bunch of spells to thin your deck of land so you can Belch for lethal. A few notes though: If you don’t need to, you may not want to sacrifice Sakura-Tribe Elder right away. If you have a good play the next turn without him, feel free to attack or block with him. Solemn Simulacrum is an all-star, soaking up damage and getting you an extra card.
Journey of Discovery rarely needs to be entwined; most of the time it will make your land drop for the turn and then just enable your next drop. However, Seek the Horizon seems to be a much better replacement; for one more mana it pulls 3 lands out of your deck, meaning it can come up with the elusive tenth land that I hate with such a fiery passion.
Enablers
4 Chrome Mox
4 Birds of Paradise
These are the second wave of mana acceleration. Birds of Paradise might help you with that critical Blue mana, or powering out turn 2 Kodama’s Reaches, but they are inherently more vulnerable than lands. As a budget alternative, I’m testing out Elvish Pioneers as a worse Birds of Paradise. Chrome Mox can power out a turn 1 Sakura-Tribe Elder at the cost of a valuable card from your hand.
4 Eternal Witness
This card is incredibly hot in this deck. If you start to run out of gas you can recycle Kodama’s Reaches, bring back a killed/countered Goblin Charbelcher, recycle Echoing Truth to keep the pressure off, and you can chain Witnesses to keep blockers away. The real trick is knowing when to use it and when to hold it.
Disruption
4 Condescend
For the most part I try to be the aggressor in most matchups which means Condescend won’t come online until you’ve spent most of your hand. I use Condescend to keep the opponent’s most dangerous threats off the table, especially in union with Echoing Truth. When you’re ready to win, it can help protect the Belcher. Against many decks the Condescend can serve as a clutch surprise.
4 Echoing Truth
The primary use is to bounce some attackers and keep the pressure off for a little, but you can also bounce Eternal Witnesses to abuse the graveyard. You can get two Witnesses with one card, letting one of them return the Echoing Truth and the other returning another card.
Draw
3 Serum Visions
This card gets the booby prize for a turn 1 play, because it isn’t a good one. If this is all you can do turn 1, you should probably throw the hand back. Serum Visions will be powerful later when it thins the deck by one and helps set up your draws.
3 Sensei’s Divining Top
The Top on the other hand is very good with all the land shuffling effects, but be prepared not to use it until turn 3 or 4. Your first few turns will set up lots of land, and then the top will come online to help you dig for threats.
2 Fabricate
Goblin Charbelchers #5-6.
Winning
3 Keiga, the Tide Star
Even though I call this a Belcher deck, don’t be afraid to win with Keiga. There is nothing shameful about beating down with a 5/5 Persuasion. If it comes down to it though, don’t be afraid to just block. Keiga is a win condition, but it’s also a don’t lose condition. Keiga’s best role is to block and kill something, or to trade with an opposing creature and steal an attacker. Keiga buys time to let you set up a lethal Charbelcher or just swing four times for the win.
4 Goblin Charbelcher
Your seven-mana kill spell. Sometimes you need to hold your Charbelcher back to keep it from being killed prematurely, but you also have Eternal Witnesses to get it back, and with all your lands on the table, you can Witness, cast the Charbelcher and Belch for the win. Also, don’t be afraid to Belch prematurely. With one or two lands left in your remaining 40 cards, you can do some damage, and at the very least you will set yourself up for a lethal Belcher activation the next turn. If you only have one land left in a deck of at least 21 cards, your next activation is guaranteed to do 20, because you put the one land on the bottom of the deck. (Just don’t shuffle). You can also turn the Belcher on creatures to push away lands and remove threats.
Sideboard
1 Keiga, The Tide Star
1 Rude Awakening
1 Beacon Of Creation
4 Mana Leak
4 Naturalize
4 Oxidize
I’ll be honest; I don’t like this sideboard. The deck placed third in a field of Affinity: the Top 8 contained 3 Affinity decks, one KCI, one Tooth, one Ponza, and one Mono-Black. Hiroyuki Morii, the guy who placed with the deck, seems to be very afraid of Cranial Extraction, a fear which seems unfounded. Instead we have to worry about Pithing Needle, but Echoing Truth does that duty in the deck. As I see it, the deck’s main worries:
Fast Aggro
I’d sideboard Nourish or Joyous Respite to combat decks like White Weenie. Yes, life gain is generally bad and all but if you can gain at least as much life as they take away, you get to Time Walk, and maybe even recur the Time Walk with Eternal Witness.
Cute Artifact/Enchantment Tricks
I’m split on how much I want of Naturalize or Oxidize. The biggest threat is Pithing Needle and the second biggest threat is Ivory Mask. My gut reaction is to just stick with Naturalize just in case, especially if something like Honden of Cleansing Fire causes you trouble. I also feel like keeping the Rude Awakening and Beacon of Creation in the board to combat Cranial Extraction and similar tricks.
I’m also keeping the Mana Leaks in the board, just in case.
New List
// Lands
8 Forest
2 Island
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Eternal Witness
3 Keiga, the Tide Star
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
3 Solemn Simulacrum
4 Chrome Mox
4 Condescend
4 Echoing Truth
2 Fabricate
4 Goblin Charbelcher
2 Seek the Horizon
4 Kodama’s Reach
2 Rampant Growth
3 Sensei’s Divining Top
3 Serum Visions
Sideboard:
1
“>Keiga, the Tide Star
1
“>Beacon of Creation
1
“>Rude Awakening
4
“>Mana Leak
4
“>Joyous Respite
4 Naturalize
I don’t run Pithing Needles in the board, mainly because I don’t own any, but I can see where they would be viable choices. If you have anyway, I’d swap them out for the Mana Leaks.
Mulligans
You only run 10 lands in the entire deck, which means in the first 12 cards you see, on average two of them will be lands. Compare this to a 24/60 ratio where you can expect to see 2 lands in the first 5 cards. This means that you can’t depend on topdecking a land in the first few turns to make a hand work. As a baseline rule, I’ve found that if you don’t reliably have a turn 1 or turn 2 play besides Sensei’s Divining Top (and sometimes Serum Visions), you can’t keep the hand. Basically, if you can’t drop down a mana producer like Birds of Paradise, Rampant Growth or Sakura-Tribe Elder by the second turn, ship the hand. Even then, whatever you cast on the first couple of turns needs to keep you going with juice. That turn 1 Birds needs to power out Sakura-Tribe Elder on turn 2, or the turn 1 Rampant Growth needs to power out Kodama’s Reach on turn 2. If the hand isn’t going anywhere in a hurry, ship it back – you can’t afford to wait around searching for gas. Keep shipping until you get a playable hand, even if it means going to 4. You’re the most explosive deck in the format, especially early. You can afford to sacrifice some cards to get a better hand. What you can’t afford is topdecking non-lands for 20 turns until you die.
Matchups
White Weenie:
This deck has some obnoxious disruption elements. Samurai of the Pale Curtain is a nuisance for Solemn Simulacrum and Eternal Witness (two of your best cards), as well as being a 2/2 for two that none of your creatures can trade with (damn Bushido!) and Hokori, Dust Drinker hits you where it hurts: the manabase (although 4 Chrome Mox + Birds of Paradise alleviates this somewhat). The hot card of Betrayers of Kamigawa, Shining Shoal, has been notably absent from the playing field whenever I played WW (although I saw it get pitched to Chrome Mox once), but it could give you a hard day if you’re not prepared for it. Still, when this deck wins by Belcher it does so with at least 30 damage, so I’m not too worried about the Shoal. The other worry in the deck is how many fliers they have, and whether they splash a color. If they don’t splash a color they will be hardpressed to deal with Goblin Charbelcher when it comes out, and you can probably play it early to start dealing with creatures. There is also a growing number of White Weenie decks that are more in the style of White Skies. Keiga is your only blocker in the skies (except for maybe Birds), so the White Skies variants are much tougher on you.
Pithing Needle names: Umezawa’s Jitte
Sideboarding: -4 Condescend, +4 Joyous Respite
Ponza:
Heavy land destruction early can wreck you hardcore because you don’t have enough gas early to recover from losing one or more lands. The Green splashes are more benign because Plow Under does little against you; you have plenty of shuffle effects and Kodama’s Reach can pull two lands right out. Post-board try and play the control route and counter their land destruction.
Pithing Needle names: Arc-Slogger
Sideboarding: -4 Echoing Truth, +4 Mana Leak
Tooth and Nail:
This is a race, and I’m confident that you should be able to take the match easily. You can easily race them; the only risk is them getting a fast Sundering Titan out and taking two of your lands. Titan + Kiki-Jiki is a huge problem, because it will take 6 lands.
Pithing Needle names: Sensei’s Divining Top, Kiki-Jiki Mirror-Breaker
Sideboarding: -4 Echoing Truth, +4 Mana Leak to out control them and shut down their engine or -4 Echoing Truth, +1 Keiga, the Tide Star, +1 Beacon of Creation, +1 Rude Awakening, +1 Mana Leak to draw into more threats faster to win the race.
Beacon Green:
Sadly I haven’t tested enough against this specific matchup to give you a good read on how it plays. The speedy Wakefield Green versions will be a real problem, but the midrange Green decks should be more tolerable.
Mono-Blue Control:
This matchup depends on how early they learn to start countering your stuff. You have more must-counters than they have counterspells, but you need a certain amount of gas to get going. An explosive hand is a must in this matchup so you can overwhelm them before they get mana up. Vedalken Shackles may hurt you here with Keiga, but you don’t have to cast them. You have 8 Charbelchers, counting Witness, and they can’t do much to remove it once it’s cast. Use Condescend for surprise and you’ll do fine. Echoing Truth on Magpie to keep them tapped out.
Pithing Needle names: Vedalken Shackles
Sideboarding: -3 Keiga, the Tide Star, +1 Beacon of Creation, +1 Rude Awakening, +1 Mana Leak
B/G Cloud:
You have Chrome Mox to help you avoid a fatal Death Cloud, but this matchup won’t be a fun one by any stretch of the imagination if they get a cloud off. Race it if you can.
Sideboarding: -4 Echoing Truth, +4 Mana Leak
Losing with the deck:
If you decide to play this deck, I hope you’re lucky. This deck is more at the whim of luck than most other decks in the format. You can have one land left in your deck of 40, and only Belch for 6 damage. That happens; most of what you do is using the Top and test Belcher activations to maximize the chances of doing all the damage you need. There are only 8 Forests and 2 Islands in your entire deck; know how many are left at all times and maximize the land search spells you cast.
Against aggro you are racing, although they don’t know it. They may expect you to be playing some bad U/G control deck, so Belcher can come out of nowhere to wreck them. The risk is that you will generally win from behind, and sometimes the cards you need won’t come up. I’ve been in the situation multiple times where I had 8 answers in 40 cards left (3 Witnesses, 3 Charbelchers and 2 Fabricate) and failed to come up with the win. Let me just restate: you need to be lucky to play this deck.