Belching Fire

My habit of playing substandard, Tier Five or Six decks has got me tinkering with Belcher again. I've decided that Justin Droba (JDizzle on TMD) is right that blue, even though it makes up a full third of the Power Nine, is not meant to be included in Belcher. It's shocking, I know. Ancestral Recall, Time Walk, and Timetwister just don't belong in this particular Vintage Deck.

My feeling now is that green doesn't belong in there either.

This is the list I've been working on lately, give or take a few cards that I'm not remembering:

4x Land Grant
1x Bayou
1x Taiga
5x Moxes
1x Black Lotus
1x Lion's Eye Diamond
1x Chrome Mox
1x Lotus Petal
1x Sol Ring
1x Mana Vault
1x Grim Monolith
1x Mana Crypt

4x Dark Ritual
3x Cabal Ritual
4x Rite of Flame
4x Elvish Spirit Guide
3x Tinder Wall
4x Chromatic Sphere

1x Wheel of Fortune
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Demonic Consultation
1x Imperial Seal
1x Yawgmoth's Will
1x Necropotence
1x Memory Jar

3x Duress
3x Goblin Welder
1x Living Wish

4x Goblin Charbelcher

The biggest innovation right now is Rite of Flame. Sure, right now it's just a crappy Dark Ritual, but it costs one and makes more mana than I put into it. Sometimes, in conjunction with Chromatic Sphere or Wheel of Fortune or Grim Monolith, it's just what the doctor ordered, and three of them produce seven mana, just like three Dark Rituals do.

The chances of a successful first turn belch are definitely better than those with the other, bluer deck because Ancestral Recall and Brainstorm aren't there tempting me to use them. And every subsequent turn just gets better for the same reason; I'm not wasting effort trying to be tricksy.

Not including blue also means that I have room for a bit more control. With seven blue spells in the deck (Ancestral, Walk, Tinker, Twister, Windfall, and two Brainstorms), I had room for no protection. Then I dropped the brainstorms for a Hurkyll's Recall and a Chain of Vapor.

Now I've got three whole Duresses! It's one of my favorite control spells ever because there's so much it can do. Plus, in a two player game, it can't be Misdirected, not that I was having a huge problem with that and Hurkyll's Recall.

As soon as I get home, though, I'm tearing that Living Wish out with a passion and replacing it with Burning Wish. Living Wish is probably the best toolbox card I've never liked. There's just nothing good to get that's a land or a creature. In fact, when I'd sideboard and take it out in favor of a Taiga, I'd like 3-Land Belcher better than 2-Land Belcher with Wish.

If something comes up that you'll have to deal with through your sideboard, like an onboard Null Rod or Pithing Needle, Living Wish is about the most inconvenient way ever of dealing with it. Paying 3GG to kill an artifact with Uktabi Orangutan is hard no matter how much mana your deck can make! So is giving your opponent a Time Walk and paying 1RG to go get Goblin Welder. Mox Monkey? 6RG for Null Rod and 4RG for Pithing Needle. Scavenger Folk are 1GGG and a turn; that's an Elvish Spirit Guide, both lands, and a mox that might not work because of Null Rod.

Pppshh, whatever. If I'm paying that much mana, I want to go ahead and win now.

I'ma go get Tendrils of Agony, Shattering Spree, or Deconstruct.

Sure, I can't get more land, but who cares? Getting more land just means I'm less likely to have a successful belch. Most of the time I'd just imprint my one Living Wish on my one Chrome Mox and use it to cast a Tinder Wall, and I was thrilled if I could do that since I was at least getting something out of it.

Having Tendrils available in the board makes it so I don't even have to care about Null Rod. I can play lots of Rituals and Rites off of my lands, go get Tendrils, maybe Yawgmoth's Will if I have to, and then just win.

That's so much better than the Living Wish scenarios, which play out thusly:

Me: Land, Land, Dark Ritual, Living Wish, Uktabi Poontang targeting Null Rod.
Opponent: Okay.
Me: Go.
Opponent: Play second Null Rod.
Me: Okay.
Opponent: Play Pithing Needle, naming Charbelcher.
Me: I scooped when you played Null Rod. That card is like God against me, like David P. Baum is against the rest of the world.

Plus, having Rite of Flame means that Burning Wish is so much more playable, as is Shattering Spree out of the board, which could probably look something like this:

1x Bayou
1x Forest
1x Duress
1x Tendrils of Agony
1x Trash for Treasure
2x Shattering Spree
2x Deconstruct
3x Xantid Swarm
3x Phyrexian Negator

The Negators make up what Anthony likes to call the "Man Plan." It's a solid plan wherein people side out their creature hate against you, and then you point huge creatures at their face. Negator's probably the best choice in this role because it can get played off a turn one Ritual. I'd probably use something far more retarded like Balduvian Horde, just because I don't have Negators and don't want to have to pay for them.

I haven't played any sideboarded games yet, but when I do, that's what I'll start with.

Right now, I'm about as sure about Trash for Treasure as I am about Goblin Welder. Both are powerful cards, clearly, as they discourage counterspells. The problem is that for Welder to work, something has to be in my graveyard, which actually necessitates counterspells because Belcher has so few discard effects. Counterspells are not something I like to encourage in my opponents.

Anyway, that's my big innovation: Burning Wish with Rite of Flame to back it up. I'll be testing it over the next few days and unless it's really good (i.e. too technologically advanced for the general public) or really bad (i.e. I don't want to embarrass myself further) I might let you know how it goes, if I remember.

To quote Master Tetsu: "Go, Play."