The People’s Hammer

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EDIT – I changed the decklist to match the one I used in the Holiday Vintage Festival final, where I took 2nd out of 130-ish players (losing to LSV in the finals). The tweaks from before were to take out 2 Time Spirals, Brainstorm, and a Time Walk for a Mystical Tutor, the 4th Grim Monolith, and 2 Tezzerets. The Tezzerets were definitely better than Spirals. (I also put 2 Workshops in the board, which helped me win the one match I played vs ‘Shops, but I had to activate Belcher twice since I had a land in my deck.)

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Here is the decklist for the Mono-Blue Goblin Charbelcher deck I used against Kai, and used to qualify for the Vintage Holiday Festival championship:

1 Ancestral Recall
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Timetwister
3 Chrome Mox
4 Mox Opal
1 Tolarian Academy
4 Force of Will
4 Gitaxian Probe
1 Mind’s Desire
4 Preordain
1 Tinker
4 Expedition Map
4 Goblin Charbelcher
4 Grim Monolith
1 Lion’s Eye Diamond
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Memory Jar
2 Voltaic Key
1 Ponder
1 Time Vault
1 Lotus Petal
1 Sol Ring
1 Windfall
3 Pact of Negation
2 Tezzeret the Seeker
1 Time Spiral
1 Mystical Tutor

1 Void Snare
3 Mental Misstep
2 Mindbreak Trap
2 Defense Grid
2 Mishra’s Workshop
4 Leyline of Anticipation
1 Hurkyl’s Recall

It’s possible that I should have more mana (the 4th Chrome Mox, the 4th Grim Monolith, and/or the 3rd Voltaic Key) as it’s felt a little tight lately, but I really like having 3 Pacts. Maybe I have too much expensive card drawing? Also – sideboard out Windfall on the draw.

Leyline of Anticipation is the plan when on the draw against Shops as you literally cannot cast a spell if they go first and play any sort of Sphere effect. Don’t play this deck if you think you’re likely to run into ‘Shops, but I think it’s pretty good against blue decks, especially permission-light ones (like Delver).

Enjoy!

3 thoughts on “The People’s Hammer”

  1. Great writeup, Randy. Any chance you can talk a bit about sideboarding with this deck? I’m going to play a small local Vintage event next week and will be playing this blind, so any tips would be appreciated.

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    1. The short version is: don’t sideboard much at all, except versus Shops. I cut Windfall on the draw and I try to sneak in a couple of Mental Missteps against Delver (they’re better than Pact against Pyroblasts and their own Missteps). Other than that you have a couple bounce spells if they show you a bullshit permanent that hoses you, but I don’t bring those in until/unless I see one. And then versus Shops you need to do major surgery to have a chance (Leylines, Workshop, etc.)

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      1. Awesome, thanks.

        Yeah, my question was mostly geared towards Shops, since that’s where you want to bring in 8 cards: 4 Leyline, 2 Workshop, 1 Hurkyl’s Recall, and 1 Void Snare (though maybe this is just terrible vs. a deck that wants to Chalice for 1?).

        Seems like reasonable cuts would be the Pacts, since you can’t normally use them to stop their lock pieces, and then maybe some of the secondary business spells (Tezz, Mind’s Desire, etc., which you can only cast if you’re already winning) and potentially a Preordain or two?

        Is it too risky to cut business spells?

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