[Deck] Nausea - Tendrils for the win.

[Evil Roopey]

Well, since my deck was mentioned a couple of times already I guess I wouldn’t mind giving this contest a whirl.

This deck is called Nausea. The reason for that is because of Solidarity actually. I figured that I would use a worthy name for a worthy deck. The idea actually came from Alix (Ob. Freely) in that, if any of you have ever heard the Solidarity story, Nausea was the reason why Solidarity was boarded in. I’m not saying that Solidarity beats this deck, because it doesn’t, I’m saying that I really like that story. XD

So here is the list(Edited Dec 29, 2005):

Nausea 2.1
// Mana
4 City of Traitors
1 Bayou
1 Tropical Island
1 Taiga
1 Wooded Foothills
4 Land Grant
4 Lotus Petal
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Dark Ritual

// Cantrip
3 Darkwater Egg
4 Chromatic Sphere
3 Shadowblood Egg
4 Sleight of Hand
3 Night's Whisper

// Other Shit
4 Burning Wish
3 Tendrils of Agony
4 Helm of Awakening
4 Spoils of the Vault


// Sideboard
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Night's Whisper
1 Ill-Gotten Gains
1 Diminishing Returns
1 Promise of Power
1 Regrowth
1 Infernal Contract
1 Cabal Therapy
1 Simplify
1 Echoing Ruin
1 Firebolt
4 Xantid Swarm


Now for the fun part: the rambling. Now I have been fiddling with this deck for the good part of 2 months now, and I still don’t consider it optimal. This is what actually led me to post this in the Open Discussion forum before I had actual tournament records and thorough testing to back-up my conclusions. As it stands though, the deck has been performing well and it is great fun to play (that is if you like killing your opponent before they blink.)

The average goldfish of this deck has actually turned out to be 2.5. That is fast. Really fast. For a format that likes to sit around and wait until turn 4-5 to kill someone, that is too fast. Of course you will fizzle and of course your opponent might stop you, but you can hold your own with this deck trust me.

This deck has fought through hell and back and still won. IBA was playing some stupid Mono-white deck the other day with 4 Abeyance and 3 Orim’s Chant plus a few Aura of Silence and it still ended at an even record, when any of that should have smashed me. I’m not saying this deck is unbelievably resilient to everything, because its not, every deck has weaknesses. I’m just saying you can fight through a lot of it.

Card Choices:
I’m only going over debatable cards, not things like Dark Ritual.

City of Traitors: I really don’t know what brought me to put this card into the deck, but once I did, I never looked back. The card makes a first turn Helm very plausible. It pops Eggs with ease and without you having to use precious colored mana on them. It is simply acceleration. Acceleration is always good for combo decks, right?

Spoils of the Vault: This card is Legacy’s Vampiric Tutor, a very weak one mind you. Seriously though this card is the best Black tutor effect in the format. At least I can’t think of a better one.

Darkwater Eggs and Chromatic Sphere: These cards under Helm are the most amazing cantrips you can find. They are free, they fix mana, and they draw a card. You don’t get much better than that.

Helm of Awakening: I think this might be the most popular card for Legacy combo decks. The card is everywhere in the N&D forum. All of the Tendrils decks use it, why part from the crowd when they are going where you want to go?

Brainstorm: There was a point in time where I tested Impulse in this slot, but Brainstorm is just to powerful to deny when combined with Land Grant. Draw three cards, put back 2 lands, and then Land Grant. Now that’s a deal I will do more than once.

Meditate: This card seems to have been questioned in my thread about this deck, so I will go over why this card is nuts. Drawing four cards will almost always win you the game, unless of course you are unlucky. For 3 mana you draw 4 cards. Under Helm it’s for 2 mana. Another reason, there are very few things that a lot of the decks in this format can do to you with an extra turn. If you do end up passing the turn after playing a Meditate, have no fear because you will most likely be going off when the clock comes back to you.

Now I am going to go through a goldfish game.

Game - My opening hand is actually not spectacular. Dark Ritual, Cabal Ritual, Brainstorm, Chrome Mox, Bayou, and 2 Land Grants. Assuming I’m on the play, my first turn is Bayou, pass.

For my next turn I draw a Darkwater Egg. Could have been better, but we’re just dealing with what’s given. So I Land Grant to find a Tropical Island then Brainstorm with it. Well off of the Brainstorm I draw Tendrils, Meditate, and Spoils. Looks like I stacked the deck when I wasn’t looking. So I put back the Mox and the Tendrils because I will hopefully find a Tendrils by the time I’m done going off, and Mox is not helpful right now. I kept the Egg because right now I have to way of casting Meditate if I decide to go off this turn. Now here is the tricky part: deciding whether to go off now or next turn with Tendrils in hand. In most cases I will want to wait the turn because my opponent will not likely cripple me on turn 2.

So I take my next turn, drawing the Tendrils on the top of the library. Now my hand looks like Tendrils, Dark Ritual, Cabal Ritual, Meditate, Darkwater Egg, Land Grant, and Spoils of the Vault. My first move is to Land Grant, grabbing the final Trop. I did this because I don’t want to risk removing the Trop. with Spoils. After finding the Trop. I Dark Ritual and Spoils for Helm of Awakening. I find the Helm 13 cards down, so now I’m at 8. I play Helm with the 2 black mana in my pool. I lay the second Trop. down and play and pop egg. Leaving me with 1 blue and 1 black in my pool. I draw a brainstorm. Well that seems pretty good. I cast Brainstorm. Now I have to find another draw spell or a mana fixer in order to keep going with Meditate. I draw Dark Ritual, Spoils, and Chromatic Sphere. I put back Tendrils and Spoils of the Vault. Cast Dark Ritual with the single black floating in my pool. Then I play and pop Chromatic Sphere drawing a Tendrils that I put back and then casting Meditate with one black still left in pool. Note that now I have achieved threshold and have the single black I need to cast the Cabal Ritual in my hand. Also note that I have a storm count of 9, so drawing 4 City of Traitors is OK because I can just cast Cabal Ritual then Tendrils. Which is exactly what I do despite the fact that I drew Night’s Whisper, Lotus Petal, Spoils, and City of Traitors off of the Meditate. This leaves room for you to potentially go off again next turn by Spoilsing for a Meditate if you’re feeling lucky.

So that was a turn 3 win. Remarkably, that was a mediocre hand. Also to note, I drew almost everything that I needed to make that hand as amazing as it turned out to be. This is one factor in the deck: luck.

Now I have one last thing to do, match-ups.

Well the match-ups for this deck are actually extraordinary. Against almost any aggro deck in this format, this deck just wins to fast.

Vial Goblins: 7-3 My favor. This was shocking. I actually thought that Goblins might be able to race me a fair amount of the time, but I just ran over them. I will admit wasteland plus mass beats is tough to get around. I pulled some games out while at a very dangerous life total.

Solidarity: 6-4 My favor. This match-up was very fun and interesting to play. There was a game where I went off, being careful not to play more than 10 spells, and he just went off in response. In is going off though he Wished for Stifle and Forced my original copy just for more storm, just to Brain Freeze me for around 180. All in all I had a favorable match-up because I would go off on turn 2 when he had 1 land in play or on turn 3 when he had 2. It was very hard for him to keep up. But there were my mediocre hands that just got ran over by his.

Welder Survival: 9-1 My favor. I think this match up was slightly distorted because I didn’t fizzle once the entire 10 games. In actuality I believe that it should be around 8-2 or 7-3. The game he did win though was when he got a turn 2 Sundering Titan…that was redonkulous.

Enchantress: I didn’t write the match-up down, but it was something ridiculous like 8-2 in my favor. He won very few games while we sat there. There were games where Echoing Truth actually won me the game. Of course, there were games where I lost because I couldn’t find the Echoing Truth. I will note that Enchantress can abuse a Helm like crazy, so you might want to not play the Helm until you are going off, or know that you are going off next turn.

ATS: 5-5 This match-up wasn't all to amazing. You can race the counters most of the time. Also I got very unlucky during this round of testing.

Landstill: 6-4 Your favor. They have a lot of dead cards. When I say a lot, I mean a lot. They have 8 counters, and 4 Standstills. Thats about it. You can give them a run for there money. Second turn Standstill could mean trouble. Post sideboard, you side in either Duress or Xantid Swarm. I think it should be Duress just because they might leave in Swords to deal wtih Swarms.

Well thats my rap yo.

Roop

[Peter_Rotten]

First, here's the link to the old thread. (http://mtgthesource.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=27;t=203)

Second, I'm suprised at the consistency of the goldfishes. I've been hitting turn three nearly every time - except the time I tried for a double Spoils :( .

Third, I have a question about your play style for the deck. Do you, in general, burn a draw spell or two on your first and/or second turn, or do you save them for the turn you will be going off? I'll give you an example of a hand that raised this question for me:

City of Traitors
City of Traitors
Bayou
Dark Ritual
Night's Whisper
Brainstorm
Tendrils of Angony

I decided that the hand is keep-able. Weak, but keep-able. Would you turn one, play Bayou, Ritual, Whipers? Or would you wait for turn two?

edit I'm also wondering about the single Echoing Truth main. In my goldfishing, I've found that I'm drawing the card and wishing that it was a draw spell. Has it proven necessary in actual tornament play, or is it more often a dead spell?

[Evil Roopey]

In reference to that hand, my first turn would be Bayou, go. I don't mind using draw spells before the turn I attempt to go off, but I do mind using Rituals. This rule is only broken when I'm playing a Helm with the Ritual. I would definatly play the Whisper second turn even though I will most likely burn. It gives you more cards in hand when you are trying to go off.

The Echoing Truth has actually won me 2 games yesterday in the tournament I played in. But on the flip side it was definatly drawn many times and me wishing on everything that is was the Whisper I cut. I'm not really sure. Only time and more testing will tell.

Also, yesterday was the first tournament I played with this deck due to work scheduling being very stupid. I went 2-1-1 into the top 8. The only reason we drew last round was because neither of us wanted to play the mirror match in fear of to much thinking. :p I did however play against Solidarity in the finals. Xantid Swarm>Solidarity. So I ended up winning which was really cool.

After the tournament, I obviously began to do more testing. I was determined to find the decks weakness, well because it hadn't shown many yet. Guess what I figured out: GRO and Pox>Nausea. Yeah that was bad...

Roop

[cheeseman]

I REALLY like your drawing base. The inclusion of Night's Whisper is something that I think that more combo decks could use. I too am a bit surprised that Goblins couldn't outrace you, especially game one with life loss still going strong on your own spells.

Good job designing a solid deck!

P.S. How did the deck fair against Belcher? Did their combo protection spells slow you down at all?

[Evil Roopey]

I have not had time to get around to testing the Belcher matchup, but I think this could be due to the fact that noone plays Belcher around here. I would guess that it would be around 50/50 match-up. This would probably be the one deck that can abuse Helm just as much as my deck.

On the point of the Goblin match-up, everytime that I felt threatened against them I would just go off. Every time. The turn before they would win the game, I won the game. There is no reason to push for a the first turn against this deck, becasue they have no real threats until turn 3.

Thats all for now, and everyone keep up the testing, I believe with time hopefully people will start to backup my claims on this deck.

Roop

[Peter_Rotten]

After the tournament, I obviously began to do more testing. I was determined to find the decks weakness, well because it hadn't shown many yet. Guess what I figured out: GRO and Pox>Nausea. Yeah that was bad...
Hmmm... What about UW Fish with Meddling Mage main? I have a real bad feeling about that one. So many cheap or free counters will be a problem. Plus Mage naming Tendrils means that they only have to counter a single Truth.

[Elvenwish]

I have been testing this deck for about two weeks and by no means have I become good at playing the deck but I am concerned iwth its consitancy. I would say about 40% of the time I am fizzling, way more than I would like to admit. I knwo I shuffle well and I would like to think I am making the correct decisions. Any advice or keys to playing the deck well?

Also, in October when teh starter level and portal set sbecome leagal, is their merit in exploring personal and grim tutor?

[Evil Roopey]

I'm really not sure what you are doing wrong. I mean there is a given number of fizzles you will have out of 10 games, which averages around 2-3, but not 4. There are some pretty rough descisions while going through you go off turn, but the way i figured it out was when I was faced with a descision I did one choice see if that worked then went back and did the other to see if that worked better or not. Sooner or later I just picked up what was the correct play in most situations.

There are sometimes where you just gotta follow your gut. Actually my team, the people I test with, thinks I am the luckiest little man in the world because I just follow my gut half the time without actually doing any math, and I'm right more than half the time. So practice and practice will only let you need to practice more. No one is a perfect player and there will always be room for improvement, just keep it up. I'm glad you like the deck.

Roop

[Evil Roopey]

I was actually wondering if anyone has been testing Nausea lately. I have given the deck a break after actually losing to SDZ in tournament with the deck...::sigh::

Blue aggro control is a real problem for this deck. They have a fast clock and many small counters that effect the game in a very favorable way for them, I was wondering if any one had suggestions on that matchup. Also, if anyone had ideas on improving the all around resiliency of the deck that would be greatly appreciated.

Roop

[Hoojo]

I've been playing around with Nausea a bit, and I was thinking of increasing the maindeck protection. I've been testing:

-1 Chrome Mox
-1 Spoils of the Vault
-1 Helm of Awakening

+3 Xantid Swarm 1st
+3 Duress 2nd
+3 Defense Grid 3rd

Overall, the maindeck Xantid Swarm's seem to be working well, since all your lands produce G, but they do nothing for a Chalice of the Void for 1. Duress fits well, and is almost as castable as Xantid Swarm. It grabs everything you want to toss, and if you have a decent draw, you can lead off with it easily. The Defense Grid's I tested on a whim, and do well when laid first turn off a City of Traitors, but are incredibly awkward drawn when comboing out.

Overall, I am going to try to run with 3 maindecked Duress, possibly trying to squeeze in the 4th.

[Evil Roopey]

I agree that Duress needs to find itself into the main, but I do not agree with cutting Helm or Spoils. Maybe cutting a Helm, but never a Spoils. The card makes things go more than you might think. I don't like Night's Whisper, but you can't cut it for something like Duress, because the slot needs to be there doing something that makes the deck go, not stopping your opponent from going.

It's an enigma to me what should be cut, but I don't agree with cutting a Spoils or a Helm.

Roop

[Evil Roopey]

I know this is "illegal", but IBA does it all the time and I want to be just like him when I grow up!!!

I wanted to know everyones opinions on Savior's card drawing spells. There is Ideas Unbound and Pain's Reward. Both cards would take the place of Whisper and Spoils respectively.

Unbound draws 1 more card than Whisper, but it cost double blue, which has been a problem and hasn't been a problem, it depends on your hand.

When casting Spoils, you will find yourself Spoilsing for a Meditate anyways. So why not just run Reward? I mean you can even trick you opponent into bidding enough life for you to kill him with a lethal Tendrils that wasn't lethal before. MWAHAHAHA! Now we play games with your head. Maybe the deck will live up to its shitty name.

Roop

P.S. IBA you are an idiot if you thought I was being serious about me wanting to be like you. Actually, even if you didn't think so, your still an idiot.

[Peter_Rotten]

Hmmm... I have found myself Spoils-ing for Tendrils often, so I am unsure about replacing Spoils with Pain's Reward.

But I do think that Ideas Unbound should find its way into this deck. Does that mean we have to overhaul the manabase? Probably, but I have a gut feeling that it might be worth it.

[bigredmeanie]

I dislike Land Grant. I often just want to replace them with a few lands. On turn 1 they are usually a liability for deck packing counters or Cabal Therapy. Also they force you to play Green duals for no reason. I would rather strentghen the manabase by including on color duals as well as more basics. Especially if Ideas Unbound gets worked in. I like Pains reward in this deck. It does exactly what you want it to most of the time.

[AnwarA101]

I really feel the deck should abuse LED. Generating that much mana for 0 should be abusable by a deck like this. I think the deck also needs more draw, Ideas Unbound and Pain's Reward seem like they should both go in. In addition maybe the Land Grant engine isn't the best since it doesn't let you run Underground sea which this deck seems like its begging for.

[TorpidNinja]

With reference to Pain's Reward, I'm curious how players would use it. I don't mean "when" as much as "how would you bid?"

As the player you're trying to keep the bidding between Skeletal Scrying and Infernal Contract (otherwise you'd just be using one of those or sticking with Meditate).

I mean, any way you look at it your opponent is simply paying life, with no tempo loss, for 4 cards. I suppose you can look at it from that perspective a few different ways: If they realize the value of the cards then they'll pay huge and if not then you'll get off with a bargain.

So here's a few questions:

-What will be the average life loss the player or opponent?
-How much should be the average life loss in order to be good?
-How much will a good player bid compared to a scrub?
-What is the most one would pay?
-Would Reward be a strict replacement for Spoils (considering that you can follow a lost bidding with a spoils for the win)

(Under Helm of Awakening the situation will be pretty different so I'm just reffering to regular hard-cast Reward)

[midnightAce]

These questions are very situational.

Let's take a look at a few things first.

The lethal count is is 9 spells + Tendrils. Most of the decks runs fetch of some kind, assume they use 2 fetchs, that lowers it down to 8 pells + Tendrils. I believe you would start the bid at 3 life, (3 mana + 3 life = 4 cards, strickly better than Night's Whisper, especially under Helm, let's not look at Helm for now.) and then you bid accordingly to your hand, just keep topping odd number of life points, so that the opponent is forced to lose even number of life points, (every 2 life = one whole spell not needed for the storm.) I believe the combo player should normally bid below 6 and tries to get the other guy to bid 6, shaving off a whole 3 spells off the storm stack, simply because this deck has close to 90% combo rate if only 6 spells are needed before Tendrils.

[Hoojo]

Thats a good analysis. I was thinking 4 life for 4 cards, but I like the idea of shaving 3 spells of the the storm count. Of course, if you got them to bid 6, would you still try to beat that to get the cards, seeing how giving them 4 cards could screw you?

[midnightAce]

Well, I think once you reach that 6 life mark, (by their bid), if you really wanted the draw, then of course it's okay to bid more, but as you bid more and more, it becomes an Infernal Contract, whether or not that's really worth the investments, that's purely depends on your hand.

Upon further examination, even my own analysis is wrong. The Reward will often be casted in the turn that you try to combo, so it in itself is a copy, by playing Reward and have your opponent bid 6 or more life, (by even number intervals), you shave off the 4 copies of storm with 2B and a card. Now you only need 5 spells + Tendrils, during comboing, multiple Rewards will probably guarentee a win. Then again, these are all very theoratically assumptions and projections at this point, what to take out for these cards and how many each will have to be throughly tested.

[System]

I would say keep bidding untill at least 10 life because if u draw 4 and play 4 spells for storm thats 8 damage anyway and then it prevents the from drawing an answer off the 4 cards. And then great if a noobie wants to pat ten life the u auto win.

ps. start the bidding at 1 kepping them on the even side and maybe getting the 4 cards really chep. :)

[Evil Roopey]

Well the reason I don't run Contract right now is because triple black is hard to give up sometimes. It isn't effected by Helm and you can't cast it with City. Pain's Reward is definatly something that I want to put in.

@ Pete: The reason I am cutting Spoils for it is because you really can't run them in the same deck. The life loss is to great for anyone to have both of the cards in a deck. Ideas and Pain make the deck actually gain card advantage, which is something very needed.

I need to keep testing. Once I have a lot of testing done then I will post results. Until then....

Roop

[Jander78]

In theory I can't see Pain's Reward working at all against an aggro deck or any deck with early damage. If they know your deck requires cards it would be way more benefitial to just take the damage draw 4 and continue to beat your face while your still stuck trying to obtain a decent storm count or enough mana to cast a Tendrils. It just seems a little hard for a combo deck to use a card like this when they will most likely be at the lower end of the life totals in a matchup.



Edited By Jander78 on 1116553309

[System]

The deck is far too fast too lose to any agro deck( with decent hands). goblins are in exception, this card may not be as good aginst gobs because goblins deals damage alot faster then any other agro deck. and the deck still need a answer to wast land.
this card might work better then meditate in some situations.
???

[Hoojo]

I see Jander's point. This deck goes off ~turn 3. by then, most aggro or aggro control decks will be at 20 life and you will be down to at least 12. Against decks with much slower clocks, it could work, but aggro anything might be a problem.

[TorpidNinja]

@midnightAce: my thoughts exacty

I can see how that might be a problem against decks that are packing burn, but otherwise that doesn't seem to be reason not to run Rewards.

Even with 12 life you can still gain some massive card advantage or put a huge hit to their life total. I mean, an 8 point life loss on their part after Rewards (and depending on your hand) means you only need 5 more spells (minimum) to win, which this deck can accomplish easily. In fact, I'd think that the best bet for any deck running this is to bid aggressively. A large starting bid (like 7 life) could scare your opponent into just giving you cards or make them assume that you desperately need the cards to win causing them to bid. Either situation is in your favour so long as you've done well with your hand.

More or less, this card always puts you at the advantage. You start the bidding. You know the math to beat your opponent. You know whether or not you actually need the cards. You can depend on your opponent's greed to get you a few points closer to winning (depending on the player).

[Hoojo]

I definately see many advantages, but it seems like it could play against you. If he out bids you, he loses life and you shave spells of the storm count, but he also gets 4 cards. If you out bid him, you get 4 cards, but you also lose the life, which could bite you in the ass if he is holding a (insert aggro damage spell here), or has (insert aggro permanent damage source here.) He could play a numbers game and get you to bid what he needs you to lose so he can finish the game.

[Jander78]

I definately see many advantages, but it seems like it could play against you. If he out bids you, he loses life and you shave spells of the storm count, but he also gets 4 cards. If you out bid him, you get 4 cards, but you also lose the life, which could bite you in the ass if he is holding a (insert aggro damage spell here), or has (insert aggro permanent damage source here.) He could play a numbers game and get you to bid what he needs you to lose so he can finish the game.
Exactly...!

Plus it also falls under the category of situational draw, that I personally tend to avoid when trying to create a consistent combo deck. I would much rather stick with Night's Whisper for consistent/cheap card drawing, that doesn't let your opponent have a play in the outcome.

[midnightAce]

That's true, but the deck needs not to pack 4 Pain's Reward, and other than burn and control, if you casted the Reward during the turn that you are comboing, those card draws are irrelevent for opponent if he won the bid.

Again, I admit that I have not yet proxied and tested yet, so I have no backup support of my theories, so I look forward to Evil Roopey testing both Idea Unbound and Pain's Reward, if the latter turns out to be not worth the inclusion, then let's look at other options.

[Jander78]

That's true, but the deck needs not to pack 4 Pain's Reward, and other than burn and control, if you casted the Reward during the turn that you are comboing, those card draws are irrelevent for opponent if he won the bid.
True, they aren't relevent for the opponent, but that draw is extremely relevent for the Tendril's player to not fizzle by loosing one of their major draw spells due to the fact that their opponent can simply out-resource them at that time instead of allowing them access to draw 4 cards. This card just seems more tailored for an aggro deck.



Edited By Jander78 on 1116621098

[Bastian]

Pain's Reward is a bad choice because you don't want to lose too much life to it. You're probably not gonna play it more than once, twice max and if you do you won't be able to use Spoils of the Vault to search for whatever key spell you need to go off.

I think that Ideas Unbound doesn't really add much to the deck. I tweaked to mana base and pack a full set of the card and it really doesn't give much more consistency than it had before and I prefer to be playing Night's whisper because I don't have to worry so much about having blue mana to dig deeper into my library because between Ideas Unbound and Night's Whisper the Whisper can cost less through Helm of Awakening and it can make use of the copious ammounts of black mana you should be producing by turn 3.

Ideas Unbound decks will quite possibly be less consistent in the long run rather than those with Night's Whisper.

[Evil Roopey]

After extensive testing of many different cards, here is me new list:

Nausea, Version 1.1
Lands//
4x City of Traitors
2x Tropical Island
1x Bayou
1x Polluted Delta
4x Land Grant

Mana//
4x Lotus Petal
3x Chrome Mox
4x Dark Ritual
4x Cabal Ritual

Helms//
4x Helm Of Awakening

Search and Kill//
3x Spoils of the Vault
4x Tendrils of Agony

Draw and Mana Fixers//
4x Chromatic Sphere
4x Darkwater Egg
2x Night's Whisper
4x Brainstorm
4x Meditate

Random Hate//
4x Duress

SB:
4x Xantid Swarm
2x Oxidize
3x Naturalize
1x Smother
1x Vendetta
4x Something Or Anothers…?

Duress has proved insane in the main. Actually in goldfishing, it improved the consistancy. Without Helm it is a 1cc black spell, making it easier to get to 10 spells. Duress also adds something the deck didn't pack before: resiliency.

Ideas Unbound nor Pains Rewsard made it in. Pain's Reward didn't for all of the obvious reasons that have already been stated. Ideas Unbound didn't because it cost double blue. I do not deny the power of Ideas, but in order to be able to play it I have to revamp the entire mana base. I love the mana base that I have already, so it didn't make the cut.

Breaking the format,
Roop

[AnwarA101]

Have you considered sleight of hand instead of brainstorm? While not looking as many cards, it digs further in that you don't end up drawing the same cards again. Plus this would probably make spoils much more efficient. Having to play a draw spell after a brainstorm is always less than stellar. I really like the main deck Duress, but Pox is still a nightmare (Don't feel bad, Pox is suppose to beat combo!)

[Evil Roopey]

Sleight is definatly a consideration. Brainstorm is just so powerful that I never thought of replacing it. It shall be tested, like every other suggestion or idea I get.

Roop

P.S. Pox sucks cocks and I hate you.

[calosso]

Roopey the only reason you hate Pox is because you get owned by it every week.

[Evil Roopey]

Ok first of all that statement was completely pointless and is considered spam.

Second, since when did you become the #1 Vial Goblin player? Last I remember you make like 5 mistakes a match and are just a generally bad player. Your also forgetting that I introduced you to the fucking deck. Just by making the claim that you are #1 in itself means you are not. ::le sigh::

Anywhos, does anyone have any thoughts on the maindeck Duresses? I have found them to be nothing but amazing. General feedback would be appreciated.

Calosso sucks,
Roop

[calosso]

About the duress what did you cut for it. Because if you cut draw for it might not seem as good.

[AnwarA101]

Anywhos, does anyone have any thoughts on the maindeck Duresses? I have found them to be nothing but amazing. General feedback would be appreciated.

Calosso sucks,
Roop

Duress seems very good in the deck, besides the fact that it is a 1cc spell that builds your storm count, it also protects you while you are chaining together your combo. I don't see any problem with it, but it would be interesting to know what spot it did take. Have you had a chance to check sleight of hand? I really think that would help you to dig.

[Evil Roopey]

It took the spot of 2x Night's Whispers, 1x Chrome Mox, and 1x Spoils. I have had very minimal problems with the missing draw.

Also, I have actually not had a chance to, but I hope to get to it tonight at playtesting.

Roop

[Hoojo]

Anywhos, does anyone have any thoughts on the maindeck Duresses? I have found them to be nothing but amazing. General feedback would be appreciated.


It took the spot of 2x Night's Whispers, 1x Chrome Mox, and 1x Spoils. I have had very minimal problems with the missing draw.

The maindeck Duress are, to quote an old cliche, just what the doctor ordered. Against control, leading off with a Duress has won more games. I dropped 1x Helm of Awakening (I know you didn't want to, but its working fine for me), 1x Spoils of the Vault, 1x Chrome Mox, and the one Echoing Truth from the first build. Now its time to start putting up numbers and get this bumped up.

[Pyrokinesis]

After some consideration I finally picked the deck up and tried playtesting it, and I have to say that I really like it. It's fast, it's consistent, and it certainly works...
If you play it right. I'll be damned if that isn't hard to do.
Part of the problem (for me, at least) has been the four Darkwater Eggs. They're great with the Helm (of course), but if you don't have it they just eat a mana and get you a card, which isn't that great since, unlike in Type I Tendrils, you don't have Stupid Broken Power to get you out of some pit should you find yourself in one. I prefer keeping Night's Whisper a four-of, and I've tried playing with Lion's Eye Diamond using the trick of announcing a spell (ideally Meditate or Spoils of the Vault for Meditate) and popping the Diamond to pay for it. However, I've ended up drawing something like Land Grant, Dark Ritual, Chrome Mox and Land Grant way too often... but that could just be an anomaly of bad luck.

Nice deck.

[Ewokslayer]

I've tried playing with Lion's Eye Diamond using the trick of announcing a spell (ideally Meditate or Spoils of the Vault for Meditate) and popping the Diamond to pay for it.
That doesn't work. LED can only be used as a instant so you can't use it to pay for a spell in your hand. You CAN use it after you have played a spell (announced, paid all costs and put on the stack) but before it resolves. So in the case of Meditate you would pay 3 cast meditate, crack the LED for 3 mana of one color and then draw four cards.

[Pyrokinesis]

Hmm... If I remember correctly a common trick in Type II Affinity decks was to announce casting an Affinity critter and as part of the cost pop Chromatic Sphere. According to 409.g from the February 1, 2004 Comprehensive Rules - which specifically refers to mana abilities - spells are paid for after announcement. LED is a mana ability, so yes, I can pop the LED to pay for Meditate.
I'm not sure if it's worth it, though.

[troopatroop]

no... you can't

it's been eratta'd so that it can't

[Sims]

Aye, Troopa is correct on this.

Oracle text of LED:



Sacrifice Lion’s Eye Diamond, Discard your hand: Add three mana of any one color to your mana pool. Play this ability only any time you could play an instant.

The "Play this ability only any time you could play an instant" is what prevents that trick from working, as you cannot cast an Instant between the Announcment of a spell and the paying of costs. Mana Abilities however, like Chromatic Sphere, can be used anytime. This allows them to announce Thoughtcast at U with 4 artifacts in play (including sphere), then crack the sphere for U to pay it's costs.

[Magi]

Aye, Troopa is correct on this.

Oracle text of LED:



Sacrifice Lion’s Eye Diamond, Discard your hand: Add three mana of any one color to your mana pool. Play this ability only any time you could play an instant.

The "Play this ability only any time you could play an instant" is what prevents that trick from working, as you cannot cast an Instant between the Announcment of a spell and the paying of costs. Mana Abilities however, like Chromatic Sphere, can be used anytime. This allows them to announce Thoughtcast at U with 4 artifacts in play (including sphere), then crack the sphere for U to pay it's costs.
The way I like to explain it is

you don't get the mana until your hand is empty.

[AnwarA101]

After extensive testing of many different cards, here is me new list:

Nausea, Version 1.1
Lands//
4x City of Traitors
2x Tropical Island
1x Bayou
1x Polluted Delta
4x Land Grant

Mana//
4x Lotus Petal
3x Chrome Mox
4x Dark Ritual
4x Cabal Ritual

Helms//
4x Helm Of Awakening

Search and Kill//
3x Spoils of the Vault
4x Tendrils of Agony

Draw and Mana Fixers//
4x Chromatic Sphere
4x Darkwater Egg
2x Night's Whisper
4x Brainstorm
4x Meditate

Random Hate//
4x Duress

SB:
4x Xantid Swarm
2x Oxidize
3x Naturalize
1x Smother
1x Vendetta
4x Something Or Anothers…?

Duress has proved insane in the main. Actually in goldfishing, it improved the consistancy. Without Helm it is a 1cc black spell, making it easier to get to 10 spells. Duress also adds something the deck didn't pack before: resiliency.

Ideas Unbound nor Pains Rewsard made it in. Pain's Reward didn't for all of the obvious reasons that have already been stated. Ideas Unbound didn't because it cost double blue. I do not deny the power of Ideas, but in order to be able to play it I have to revamp the entire mana base. I love the mana base that I have already, so it didn't make the cut.

Breaking the format,
Roop
Have you tried goin mono-black? Here were my thoughts for whatever its worth.

You would have to cut the 4 Land Grants for Fetchs/Swamps and then cut the 4 City for 4 Swamps. Cut 1 Helm for 1 Swamp.

Then cut 1 Helm and add 1 land since none of your lands prodcue 2 mana (like the Cities).

Then cut the Blue draw - Brainstorm and Meditate. Add Infernal Contract and Diving Top.

Here's an initial list -

//Lands
4 Swamps
3 Snow-covered Swamps
3 Polluted Delta
3 Bloodstained Mire

//Mana
4x Lotus Petal
3x Chrome Mox
4x Dark Ritual
4x Cabal Ritual
3x Lion's Eye Diamond

//Helms
3 Helm of Awakening

//Search and Kill
3x Tainted Pact
4x Tendrils of Agony

//Draw
4x Chromatic Sphere
4x Night's Whisper
3x Sensei Diving Top
4x Infernal Contract

//Protection
4x Duress


I like the consistent mana base, plus the use of Top for manipulation with using Infernal Contract as your Draw 4 instead of Meditate. With all the life loss, Spoils did not fit so I added Tainted Pact (thus the snow-covered swamps). Let me know what you think, this was just an idea. I don't really play combo, but this version seems like it might have a shot.

[Pyrokinesis]

No. Just... no.
City of Traitors allows for a turn one Helm, Spoils of the Vault is pretty close to Demonic Consultation, Land Grant adds to the Storm count for no mana (and thins the deck), and Blue just has the draw power necessary to facilitate such a crazy deck as this - not to mention that you don't lose life for drawing cards, so you're less likely to get killed by some random burn in response to Tendrils.

[Evil Roopey]

After much more in-depth testing, I'm now playing my innitial build of the deck. The Duresses didn't help nearly as much as I would have hoped. So now I'm back to consistancy and speed over resiliency. I don't really think many cards can change in this deck without messing up its consistancy.

Roop

[Hoojo]

After much more in-depth testing, I'm now playing my innitial build of the deck. The Duresses didn't help nearly as much as I would have hoped. So now I'm back to consistancy and speed over resiliency. I don't really think many cards can change in this deck without messing up its consistancy.


Wow. I have found just the opposite, though I went back to just 3 maindeck Duress. The 4th always showed up too late or too early (i.e. two with in first two turns or right in the middle of going off, I'd get two.) I like the speed of the original list, but I felt too vulnerable to a well aimed Counterspell or Force of Will.

[LinkXwing]

I like the speed of the original list, but I felt too vulnerable to a well aimed Counterspell or Force of Will.
This and randomly killing yourself with Spoils are the only flaws I can really find with the deck.

Now that the deck has been out of the bag for a while, how have your results vs. Control been? How has the Landstill (UW, UR, and UWr) match progressed? BBS? Tog? UW[r] Control?

What about Aggro-control packing counters and/or discard such as The Rock, UG madness? With TJS I can fight through pure control rather easily, but aggro-control is the deck's downfall. Have you found the same or the opposite for Nausea?

[Evil Roopey]

Well the Landstill matchup is still around even, and almost any other control matchup is slightyly under even other than Hulk which happens to be absolutely horrible.

The aggro-control matchups are also pretty bad. They have counters and a clock. Thats bad. Its winnable but not very likely. It's definitely a rough matchup.

Also, I am currently working on the primer for the deck to submit into StarCity so Bastian shuts up about no body supporting Legacy. Also because I want more people to pick up the deck and realize its power and speed.

Roop

[SkippyTheLemming]

I think that maindeck Duress, as a 3 of, is essential for this deck to do well. There are to many things that stop this deck in its tracks, like counterspells. You should look into cutting 1 Mox, and 2 Whispers. I have been getting great results with that.

[nicofromtokyo]

Hi Roop,

I practiced your deck for several days, and think I'm gonna bring it to the next Legacy Tournament in Tokyo. Would like to ask you a question regarding the side-board: which card am I supposed to cut for the 2nd game, without loosing speed and regularity? Every card I would like to cut just seems to me as a key card, either to draw or do mana. Any advice would be helpfull :) .

[Evil Roopey]

I know this sounds horrible, but normally I cut Nights Whisper. It really could be my hate for the card, but it always comes out. I have had very little problems post-sideboard considering those games go slower because of your opponents hate.

There hasn't been much discussion about Nausea lately, I would love to get more peoples opinions on the deck and more ideas on how to mke the deck better. Better lists, anything. My primer is sitting on my computer at home ready to go, but my internet went down while I was writing it and hasn't come back up yet.

Roop

[Hoojo]

Thought I'd pipe in to let you know some changes I am testing. Take your original list:

-1 Chrome Mox
-1 Helm of Awakening
-1 Echoing Truth
-3 Night's Whisper
+3 Sleight of Hand
+3 Duress

I've found the Sleight of Hand's work well as a replacement of Night's Whisper and I like the three maindeck Duress better than the lone Echoing Truth. The extra Chrome Mox was producing too many scenarios in which to use it for mana, I would have to pitch a key spell. Helm of Awakening was dead after one was in play. On rare occasion, having two helped, but it was showing up too often as a 4-of, and since I couldn't pitch it to Chrome Mox, I went ahead and cut one for disruption.

With those changes, the deck is still very, very consistent. Matches with opposing discard hurt the worst; the maindeck Duress and its incredible speed help versus countermagic. It's gotten to where the local kids are playing more deckwithMBCelements.dec when they play me :cool: . I look forward to reading your primer; I'd like to harden the deck more for those matchups.

[nicofromtokyo]

I took the deck with me this w-e to a small tournament (10 people). I won't write a detailed report as it's not the right place, but just let you know the results. Btw, I took with me the 1rst version without Duress.

Against BU Discard: first game, I go on combo on turn 2, game. 2nd game, I ate Duress, but start to go off. I have the mana for a ToA, play a Meditate, but draw only mana (DR x2 + Petal + Mox), lost. Last game, what can I do against Nethervoid? [:o]
Against a bad build of Psychatog: 1st, die to a Spoil for a lethal TOA. 2nd game, only succed to cast a ToA for 14 points, killed by Tog.
Against Sensei Sensei: 1st, thanks to his Helm, combo turn 2. 2nd, I have mana to cast the lethal ToA, 14 life, spoiled for it. It was the 16th card... Last, he won thanks to my Helm.

Well, 0-3-0. 7 matchs, 2 won, 2 spoiled death, 2 fizzles, 1 game too late.

After this tournament, I played against a Heavy Control deck (like 12 counters on the deck), and died 2 times to Spoil before I get the lethal ToA (with 15 or more life!). Then I changed the deck, took the control one, and lost this time, although I countered 2 Dark Ritual and Misdi one copy of the stormed ToA in one turn... Well, I know I may not be a good player, or I should have missed something in the use of the deck, but the instability seems to be the biggest problem (at least to me ^^;;). Did you ever think about using Diabolic Vision? One draw for UB, but it let you the choice between 5 cards while fixing the 4 following. Anyway, it was a lot of fun to use it (loosing to Spoil when you know that if ToA was the next card you would have won, is so... :D ), but winning consistently on tournament may be difficult.

[Evil Roopey]

Well, I have been working on getting my internet back up, but that hasn't really been going as planned.

Also, I have been fiddling around with the main of the deck a little bit. Hoojo raised an interesting point in cutting a Helm, Mox, and a Whisper for 3 Duress. Well, since I'm still not sold on the Duresses, I put in 3 Sleight of Hand instead. The deck ran fabulously. I did realize though that the deck needs the 4th Helm. So instead I cut a 2nd Whisper and added in the Helm. So no the deck look slike this:

Nausea
Lands//
4x City of Traitors
2x Tropical Island
1x Bayou
1x Polluted Delta
4x Land Grant

Mana//
4x Lotus Petal
3x Chrome Mox
4x Dark Ritual
4x Cabal Ritual

Helms//
4x Helm Of Awakening

Search and Kill//
4x Spoils of the Vault
4x Tendrils of Agony

Draw and Mana Fixers//
4x Chromatic Sphere
4x Darkwater Egg
2x Night's Whisper
4x Brainstorm
4x Meditate
3x Sleight of Hand

SB:
4x Xantid Swarm
4x Duress
2x Oxidize
3x Naturalize
1x Smother
1x Vendetta


I'm going to edit this into the first post because I have absolutely fallen in love with this list.

Numbers on this list out of 20 goldfishings:
Turn 1: 0%
Turn 2: 25%
Turn 3: 50%
Turn 4: 10%
Fizzle: 10%

When the deck starts to go off, it has a lot less fizzles than the original list. I haven't got around to testing Hoojo's list with the Duresses, but I will try to get on that ASAP. See all y'all at BAII.

Roop

[MattH]

Your numbers only add up to 95%...? What's missing?

[Skullclamping]

I think the deck is great, so I started playing it some days ago
my friends are all thinking same things as me, but I use a similar list, but not the same; there are the changes(taking last list posted by roopey):

-3 Chrome Mox
-2 Night's Whisper

+2 Mox Diamond (i think this helps more than the chrome)
+3 Duress (this disruption helps playing the combo securely, and also does storm)


this is what I play, but I have a question:

if a fork is played to tendrils, does the storm triggers or he only plays only a copy and not the storm?

thanks, and please give your opinion about the changes

[AngryTroll]

Well, I have a couple of things to say.

First, Skullclamping....How often are you able to pitch a land to the Mox Diamond? It seems that with only 8 lands in the deck, and the deck comboing off on turn three, that there wouldn't be enough lands in the deck to imprint regularly.

Roopey, the numbers you posted....how often did you kill yourself with Spoils? Is that the missing 5%? It seems to me like Spoils kills you more often then that, even. It appears that the deck is now fundamentally turn 3....with 75% of the kills happening at turn 3 or later. Not to start another flame war, but if this deck is working at turn 3, what is the real advantage over TJS? Yes, the 25% turn 2 is nice, but turn three still beats the aggro clock (and it can go off on turn 2 when needed....we just don't push it if we don't need to. Still, when I needed to, I went off on turn 2 three times last weekend) and seems to have a more solid game against control.

Last week, I was able to win after being Duressed and Cabal Therapied multiple times, because cards like Deep Analysis, Fact or Fiction, and Night's Whisper add cards to your hand, so you can cast them to help set up. Cantrip effects are cheaper, but much less useful trying to set up, recover from disruption, or build a hand against control. The more I look at the decklists, the closer the decks appear to be. The biggest difference is the City of Traitors, Spoils, and cantrips vs. Card advantage.

Nausea does seem to be a bit faster, winning on turn two more often then TJS. However, TJS seems to win more often overall by turn three then Nausea.

Not to be rude or snide, but what is the overall reason to play Nausea over TJS currently? (This post was carefully thought through and reread several times to try to avoid flaming. I believe I am being fair to both decks. Without starting a flame war, can we try to compare the two?)

[Drkdstryer]

I've built this deck and absolutely LOVE it. That said, I can only goldfish with it, because there is no Legacy where I live : (

Anyway, from my goldfishing (With the original list, -1 Echoing Trush +1 Whisper) the fundamental turn seems like turn 2. Again, this is goldfish so I'm not playing against any disruption, but if I go off on turn two, I rarely fizzle. Or, at least I fizzle way less than I succeed.

In reply to Skullclamping:

No way does Mox Diamond work in this deck. You don't have nearl the land count for it to work. Chrome Mox is way better than Diamond (in this deck, as well as most decks that want to run a Mox)

Fork (or Spoon) on a Storm card will NOT replay the Storm trigger, that only triggers when you play the card from your hand, not when you make a copy of it. So you would only get one more effect of lose 2/gain 2, not another flurry of spells.

[Skullclamping]

well the think to play diamond is because i get all my lands in hand when the combo is running, but i can play with chromes too and the difference is not as big as you tell, anyway, this is a personal opinion

can anybody post a link to a TJS deck explanation, or put the full name?

thanks, and also for the fork :)

[LinkXwing]

TJS discussion (http://mtgthesource.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=2670)

(^.^) The search function is your friend. It's a long article/debate/flamewar, but there is some usefull things said.

Anyway, regionals is over now and I'm back to testing Tendrils lists in Legacy. Initial games for TJS vs. Landstill look promising in TJS's favor. I'll start testing Nausea, Roop, as soon as that is in. I look forward to having difinitive evidence as to which deck is superior overall.

[Skullclamping]

I have tried to read all the article, but is long and I have only concentrated in the most important ideas

TJS is also a good deck, that is better vs control; but Nausea is not so bad against control because it can easely win in turn 2, where your opponent can only cast a FoW, or 2 if he has them in hand. Obviously I'm talking about blue control decks

I have a question:

Where I play, there aren't any of this type of decks, but how do this decks against discard?

finally I have to say I preffer the chromes, so any diamonds and that I have also tried Plunge into Darkness instead of 2 Night's Whisper and 1 Spoils of the last list posted by roop

what do u think about Plunge? Have you tested it?
Sometimes it works better than Spoils, but they can't be combined

[Evil Roopey]

I took Nausea up to Big Arse, and it did rediculously terrible. I don't really know why, but it was being just as inconsistant as Belcher..... :(

I'm gooing to be revamping the deck soon. And at the TJS players, after this weekend you can say whatever the hell you want to about Nausea.

Roop

[LinkXwing]

I took Nausea up to Big Arse, and it did rediculously terrible. I don't really know why, but it was being just as inconsistant as Belcher..... :(

I'm gooing to be revamping the deck soon. And at the TJS players, after this weekend you can say whatever the hell you want to about Nausea.

Roop
I'm not dissin' you Roop, storm fizzles sometimes, shit happens.

The goal is not to point an laugh at you at the moment, the question is: Is there anyway to change the deck to make it not do whatever happened at the BA2.

Did you just hit that % chance of fizzling? Did you make play errors? Did you just draw shit over and over again? (I've done that with old Bazaar-Dragon on many occasions.) Were there dead cards over and over that can be fixed?

What happened at the BA2?

[ISOCHRONIC_SCEPTER]

I am currently testing your deck roopey... i really like the build and i refer it over 1 land belcher. my only concern is what peter rotten addressed earlier... the blue aggro situation.. or any deck running 4x meddling mages. Seems hard/ very difficult to pull an early win out of that situation... any suggestions?

[Evil Roopey]

Basically what happened at BAII was drew shit all day long. While playing against Menendian Belcher, I fizzled turn two then proceeded to not draw a single draw spell for the rest of the game, which incidentally lasted like 8 turns because Belcher sucks. It was just a stroke of really bad luck. I will be working on the deck to see if I can't make it even more consistant. Resiliancy wasn't much of the issue as consistancy.

Roop

[ISOCHRONIC_SCEPTER]

Roopey... ive averaged turn 3-4 kill consistent with this deck minus disruption.. and every once in a while i can go off turn 2 with an insane meditate... but i was thinking.. can this deck deal with early wastelands on the only 3 duals inn the deck? I mean sure u have petals and moxes... but if they r playing landstill w/ wasteland.. it could slow you down too much where they can pick up more counters/standstills.

Read and obey (http://mtgthesource.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=2590) please. Thanks. -Zilla

[ISOCHRONIC_SCEPTER]

Sorry Zilla. I didn't read that note before i made my post. Anyways, Roopey.. I was also wondering what cards you choose to sideboard out first. The reason I ask this is because when I am sideboarding against control ( 4x xantid swarm), it is a tough decision for me as to what to take out. Most of the cards that are options at all are all liable combo pieces. I was wondering your strategy during sideboard.

thanks

[legacyplayer]

This deck looks like it can completely smash any aggro deck game 1, but I'm going to have to agree with Scepter that it loses horribly to Meddling Mage. It also losed to a LOT of other cards. How does it beat a Duress followed by a clock? How does it beat Rule of Law? How about Pyrosatic Pillar? You're going to need a lot of disruption to beat that.

[Obfuscate Freely]

Pyrostatic Pillar is bad against any Tendrils-based deck because they can just cast Tendrils mid-combo to refuel their life. Consider that an early Pillar against Nausea may very well be answered by a Tendrils for 16-18. They'll regain the life they lost to Pillar, and you'll be locked out by your own hate card.

I guess Nausea does lose to the other cards. I think the answer currently is to board in Echoing Truth and/or outrace the hate. If you assume a pre-sideboard win, you get 2 chances to beat the hate and win the match, but...
this is why combo sucks. :p



Edited By Obfuscate Freely on 1122036219

[ISOCHRONIC_SCEPTER]

Well put Phil... I didn't think about Rule of Law. That would also screw the deck over very much so. Seems as though decks will always find ways to hate out combo. *sigh*

[Skullclamping]

roopey have you tried to make a new version?

well, I have

in my opinion, it is necessary to run 3 duress in main and I also run 3 Plunge into darkness, so I definitly think they are better than the spoils, but I also run those ones


in the sideboard I have 4 echoing truth against meddlings but they are only an option

make your decisions and say some solution to thye problems tthe deck actually has:;):

[Bane of the Living]

A friend and I playtested the deck all night long against Survival, Landstill, Gobs, and Affinity. It produced amazing results with only welder survival being a turn away from a win each time by welding in a platinum angel. The deck scratched its way through wastelands and force of wills, it broke standstills and came out clean. We weren't playing with duress's. Actually we put in 2 Peer Through Depths because we didn't remember what the hell sleight of hand did with only your list printed off. Peer proved amazing since it dug deeper than even meditate if all your looking for is a tendrils or ritual.

Have you considered Cunning wishes?

Cunning wish will give you access to removal or bounce to deal with mages and such, you can even fetch up an abeyance or fog to assure you combo off, giving you a little more room to set up for difficult matchups.

[dsg123456789]

This is an innovation that a friend of mine showed me. He suggested 4 Phyrexian Negators in the sideboard, because many control decks will side out creature removal for better hate, and when you go ritual-->Negator on the first turn and they have no creature removal, it is a good day for you.

[Koby]

Has anyone considered Impulse in place of Brainstorm? In almost all situations in which I was going off and had Brainstorm in hand, I wished it was a dig card rather than a what it really is: a last chance shot at drawing a Ritual or Tendrils to finish the game. In that respect, I don't like it, even if it is just U to cast as opposed to 1U.

I am testing a version right now with these changes:

-1 Polluted Delta
-1 Spoils of the Vault (total 3)
-4 Brainstorm
+3 Impulse
+2 Night's Whisper (total 4)
+1 Sleight of Hand (total 4)

In goldfishing, it appears to be more consistant and doesn't stall as often (as Storm deck are to do from time to time), but I havn't had a chance to test against live opponents which I can't seem to find around here.

About the only card that I dread to see more than outrate hate (Null Rod, Chalice of the Void, Rule of Law/Arcane Lab) is Wasteland, which more often than not shuts downs your catalyst into going off (a single B mana).

@ dsg1-9:
Negator at first seems like a good SB option, but remember that this is Legacy and this format is dominated by creatures and creature kill. Not to mention that bringing Negator in agaisnt Landstill doesn't fulfill the surprise fast kill, because they run at least 6 manlands that can block and set you back your entire board.

[Pyrokinesis]

Just saying:
In case you haven't heard the news, they aren't banning Grim Tutor. With the Helm it's just as good as a Demonic Tutor... and as I can tell from many goldfishes, even without the Helm it makes this deck absolutely disgusting.
Get your four while (and if) you can.

[Skullclamping]

now, I'm running a different version than you
mine has 3 Plunge into Darkness, so it deeps into library better than a Night's Whisper and it helps to draw, to search the meditate we need to continue and, if you don't get the card you want, you can esily pick a similar (Brainstorm/Meditate, Sphere/Egg...), and 3 Duress, cause most of decks in my meta are sligh or have Red Blast in side or main :angry:
Duress is also an option for Chrome Mox :;):

now the deck:

// Lands
1 [B] Bayou
2 [B] Tropical Island
4 [EX] City of Traitors
1 [ON] Polluted Delta

// Spells
4 [MM] Land Grant
4 [SC] Tendrils of Agony
3 [MR] Spoils of the Vault
4 [MI] Dark Ritual
4 [TO] Cabal Ritual
4 [TE] Lotus Petal
4 [OD] Darkwater Egg
4 [5E] Brainstorm
4 [TE] Meditate
4 [VI] Helm of Awakening
4 [IN] Chromatic Sphere
3 [MR] Chrome Mox
3 [FD] Plunge into Darkness
3 [US] Duress

// Sideboard
SB: 1 [US] Duress
SB: 3 [ON] Naturalize
SB: 4 [DS] Echoing Truth
SB: 3 [DS] Oxidize
SB: 4 [9E] Defense Grid


I think the Negator is a good side option, but as I've said, it isnt against sligh cause you haven't got enough permanents, and landstill is fucki*** you with lands

A friend is actually testing the deck with me.
He plays TPS in t1 and he wants to playa tendrils deck in 1.5
Landstill is the worst matchup cause of counters, so we have Defense Grid in side, probably better than Xantid Swarm cause you can get it first turn with a City of Traitors
We've also tried Impulse and Sleight, but we deffinitly preffer Brainstorm cause is easy to deep with it:

Brainstorm+Land Grant
Brain...+Polluted Delta
Brain...+Spoils of the Vault (here you can choose any card to remove from your hand just paying 1 life)

Meditate is a good card to play. It gives your opponent another turn, but it deeps 4 cards in your library. We don't have to matter cause of the turn, so you win the turn you play it.

Please, give your oppinions from my version ^_^

[Bane of the Living]

We already had Meditate in there buddy, read up on the other posts a bit. Plunge is good but it's not amazing. I prefer pains rewards. There are tons of arguements made against this card but I used it in the deck and got 4 wins because people just paid to much life and I ritual'd and played tendrils. It's usually the card I side out since it wont work as good after the first game but just take my word.. Reward needs to be played with to see how it actually works for you.

[Evil Roopey]

Well, I have finally decided to not give up on this deck just yet. I came up with a totally new look for it, hopefully you guys like it.


// Nausea v2.0
// Mana
4 City of Traitors
1 Bayou
1 Tropical Island
1 Taiga
1 Wooded Foothills
4 Land Grant
4 Lotus Petal
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Dark Ritual

// Cantrip
3 Darkwater Egg
4 Chromatic Sphere
3 Shadowblood Egg
4 Sleight of Hand
3 Night's Whisper

// Other Shit
4 Burning Wish
3 Tendrils of Agony
4 Helm of Awakening
4 Spoils of the Vault


// Sideboard
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Night's Whisper
1 Diminishing Returns
1 Regrowth
4 Xantid Swarm
1 Overmaster
1 Cabal Therapy
1 Drain Power
1 Baleful Stare
1 Simplify
1 Echoing Ruin
1 Chain Lightning

It's pretty resilient and has lost abosutley no speed. In fact it has probably gained some consistancy. Burning Wish is something that I have been trying to get to work in this deck, and I finally have.

@Spoils: I know that this is one of the reasons the deck loses, but it is a necessary evil.

@No Meditate: I think it costs to much.

Thoughts?

EDIT: I cut the Duress for a Drain Power. Drain Power>Solidarity.

[Hoojo]

I've been a faithful Nausea player ever since its creation, and I am glad you haven't given up on it. I am a little worried about the loss of the best card draw the deck had, Meditate. This spell was usually the gamebreaker in many of my matches. Do the extra 'eggs make up for this?

Still no maindeck disruption; it's risky, but I'm willing to give it a go for a while.

I'm personally glad to see Brainstorm go; I've been running Sleight of Hand in that spot for a while.

Finally, Lion's Eye Diamond! I had built a deck (http://mtgthesource.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=729) to utilize LED and Burning Wish on your structure a long time ago, but I could never make it work really consistently with 3 colors.

I will definately try this out; I love Tendrils combo!

EDIT: Without another fast tutor, Spoils will have to do. Too bad Grim didn't cost 1B :D

[Evil Roopey]

I'm going to go into more detail about Meditate. I wanted the deck to run purely on cantrips. With enough of them the deck runs very smoothly. The only exception to this is Wish for a big draw spell like Diminishing Returns. Meditate breaks this rule by costing 3 and having a hefty drawback. I think that this is the way to go.

Also, you do have MD disruption in Burning Wish. It has been doing fine for me so far. If it becomes necessary I will add in some Duresses or something. I don't think it will though.

Diminishing Returns>All,
Roop

[Evil Roopey]

I did some goldfishing with the new list.

Turn 1 III
Turn 2 IIIIIIIIIII
Turn 3 IIIIII
Turn 4
Turn 5 III
Turn Dead IIII
Spoils III


So out of 30 games I went off by turn3 66.6% of the time. That's a 6-4/7/3 average against Goblins. That'd decent.

I also found out that there was a great need for a mediocre draw spell in the SB. The is Whisper for a cantrip and Returns to win the game. There was nothing in the middle for cheap. So I took out Baleful Stare for Ideas Unbound. I think this might greatly effect golfishing in a very posistive way. I'll get back to you guys when I have more results.

Roop

[Ebinsugewa]

Pardon me if I'm mixing the TJS and Nausea threads, but I think that Top was discussed briefly in one or the other, and should be reconsidered in light of Brainstorm. Whenever I tested, Sleight of Hand seemed to be a very useful card, but it still felt a little underwhelming. The (re)inclusion of Brainstorm and Tops creates a decent possibility of an infinite Storm and also gives you a free spell that actually can be helpful anyways under Helm. Just working from previous experience with Tendrils-Helm decks. Also, this is not to say that Sleight and Brainstorm are mutually exclusive either, though good luck finding room in this excellent list for both. A job well done, I love the deck.

EDIT: Instead of double-posting, I'd also like to say that I like the utility of Burning Wish, but I've only ever used it to fetch a game-winning Tendrils off a Shadowblood Egg for the win. I know that there are obviously myriad uses for it, but they all seem mediocre to me. So if you wanted room for Brainstorms and Tops, the Sleights and Wishes would be my first choice. Preferably not all of the Wishes, but maybe one. Cause at 2, they're sort of pointless. And that would require a complete overhaul of sideboard and maindeck focus. Which I don't have time to give right now. So I figured I'd open it up for feedback while I go to bed :D Will get on this soon, though.

[Evil Roopey]

I did already think of and test Top in the new list because of there being 4 LEDs in the deck. I didn't like how it ran in the least bit. Without Helm, I never ever wanted to draw Top. It was never worth the mana investment.

Also, if you take out a single Burning Wish, let alone all of them, I would greatly greatly fear consistency of the deck. I have no clue how many times I have Wished for the Returns or IGG to win the game. It would have to be countless.

That reminds me, Night's Whisper came out of the board for an IGG. It's been working wonderfully.

Roop

[Phantom Ogre]

[color=#000000:post_uid9]Isn’t your current list just a blatant rehash of this (http://s10.invisionfree.com/Team_ABS/index.php?showtopic=202&view=findpost&p=393530) deck with a few minor changes?[/color:post_uid9]

[troopatroop]

Actually We've had lists just like that 5-6 monthes ago. Evil Roopey developed nausea by himself, noone else. Your Team ABS boards are actually behind. Minor changes are absolutely critical in decks like this, so "a blatant rehash with minor changes" is an oxymoron.

[Phantom Ogre]

Your Team ABS boards are actually behind.
I hope you realize that the post I linked was from back in May.

Also, the exact same decklist was posted by its creator on this site around the same time it was posted there, so there's a good possibility that Evil Roopey may have gotten some of his ideas from it. It was a legitimate question.

[Evil Roopey]

I am not trying to not give anyone credit that they deserve, but I came up with this list on my own. I actually built it from a BR version of Nausea that I was working on, then I fused them together. I wrote a brief article that I sent into Star City that explains all of this. I doubt they will publish it though, because I was very brief in my description of the whole thing.

Here it is.

Legacy is defiantly shaping into a very fun and diverse format. There are still a couple things that are missing from it though. One of these things is a good combo deck. I know, I know. What about Solidarity (High Tide)? Well, I think we can do better than a turn four win in a format as big as ours. So I have been working for some time to fix that. It is a lot harder than it looks. You have to have a deck that can fight through a couple counters and kill before turn four.

Well since April I have been working on this. I had initially built a deck that could kill on turn 2.5 very consistently. The only problem was that it lost to a single counter. This was about the time that Gro was getting big in my area, so development on the deck further than that was slowed down by my unbelief that I could get it to work. Here is the initial build of the deck.


//Nausea
//Lands
4x City of Traitors
2x Tropical Island
1x Bayou
1x Polluted Delta
4x Land Grant

//Mana
4x Lotus Petal
3x Chrome Mox
4x Dark Ritual
4x Cabal Ritual

//Helms
4x Helm Of Awakening

//Search and Kill
4x Spoils of the Vault
4x Tendrils of Agony

//Draw and Mana Fixers
4x Chromatic Sphere
4x Darkwater Egg
2x Night's Whisper
4x Brainstorm
4x Meditate
3x Sleight of Hand

//Sideboard
4x Xantid Swarm
4x Duress
2x Oxidize
3x Naturalize
1x Smother
1x Vendetta

That list was fast, but there was no way to stop someone from stopping you. The list was based on Meandeck Tendrils. Cutting almost anything from the deck took away from its consistency. After a while it just became strictly worse to play this over Solidarity. I was stumped. I had been working on the deck for a couple months and I had found no way to make it work like I wanted to, so I gave up.

So a couple months ago I decided that it was time to pull out the old notes and see what I could do. I tested a lot of new lists. I tested a black and red list that ran Desperate Ritual and Burning Wish. It was ok, but it cried for a cheaper set-up spell than Night’s Whisper. Overmaster made that list pretty resilient, and it was slightly faster than Solidarity. Here is that list.


// Nausea v2.0
// Mana
4 City of Traitors
1 Bayou
2 Taiga
1 Wooded Foothills
4 Land Grant
4 Lotus Petal
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Dark Ritual
2 Desperate Ritual

// Cantrip
4 Shadowblood Egg
4 Chromatic Sphere
4 Overmaster
3 Night's Whisper

// Other Shit
4 Burning Wish
3 Tendrils of Agony
4 Helm of Awakening
4 Spoils of the Vault


// Sideboard
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Promise of Power
1 Diminishing Returns
1 Regrowth
4 Xantid Swarm
1 Baleful Stare
1 Cabal Therapy
1 Drain Power
1 Ideas Unbound
1 Simplify
1 Echoing Ruin
1 Chain Lightning

Like I said above, the deck was in desperate need of a small cantrip. It had Overmaster, but that was about it. The deck did utilize all of its resources to the maximum, which is what I want the deck to do. It also had quite a bit of resiliency.

Yet still I was unsatisfied. The deck had improved a great deal, but I wanted more. So I tried putting blue back into the main for a light splash.


// Nausea v2.1
// Mana
4 City of Traitors
1 Bayou
1 Tropical Island
1 Taiga
1 Wooded Foothills
4 Land Grant
4 Lotus Petal
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Dark Ritual

// Cantrip
3 Darkwater Egg
4 Chromatic Sphere
3 Shadowblood Egg
4 Sleight of Hand
3 Night's Whisper

// Other Shit
4 Burning Wish
3 Tendrils of Agony
4 Helm of Awakening
4 Spoils of the Vault


// Sideboard
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Pain’s Reward
1 Diminishing Returns
1 Regrowth
4 Xantid Swarm
1 Overmaster
1 Cabal Therapy
1 Drain Power
1 Ideas Unbound
1 Simplify
1 Echoing Ruin
1 Chain Lightning

Now I’m not positive on which of the last two lists is better against the metagame, but they are both very solid lists. I just like the slight more consistency over the added resiliency in Overmaster. Sleight of Hand definitely made the deck run as smooth as I wanted it too with having some resiliency in Burning Wish.

Here are some numbers:
Turn 1 III
Turn 2 IIIIIIIIIII
Turn 3 IIIIII
Turn 4
Turn 5 III
Turn Dead IIII
Spoils III

Now that is a pretty consistent turn three kill. It gives you close to a 7/3 record against Goblins. That’s nothing to scoff at. Now the only problem is the fact that Gro and Deadguy Ale both are on the rise. I have found that I can fight threw Gro’s counterwall unless they are playing the white version with Meddling Mage in the main. I normally beat Deadguy Ale unless they do some crazy Ritual, Duress, Hymn first turn. I can normally outrace most of the hate or use Burning Wish to fight threw it.


This deck happens to be slightly difficult to play. People on The Source PM me all the time with something along the lines of: “I am not getting the same results as you. What am I doing wrong?” I have played this deck for a long time now, so most things that I just do on instinct people might not se right away. There is a lot to playing this deck correctly that I will get to in another article. For now the only thing I can say is play it. See what works and what does not.

I think that there is a lot of potential for this deck to do very well in the coming months. Maybe someone will take it to Lille and do as well as my testing says they will. As long as there isn’t a mass number of UGW Threshold decks.


Not anything special, I was lazy that day, probably high.

In any case, that link was probably based on Nausea, not the other way around.

Roop

[Ebinsugewa]

I'm just still trying to get my head around this. Can you maybe describe methods you have for managing your mana, or some of your requirements for keeping an opening hand. I'm sure that I don't need a Helm to combo, but all my testing results seem to prove otherwise. I manage to get to maybe 6-7-8 Storm, but that's all I can muster. I like this deck a ton, but some of the things that are instinctual to you I think are lost on me. It's probably because I played Easter Tendrils for so long, which is quite a different deck, regardless of what they have in common. So I hope that I see that article soon.

[Evil Roopey]

Ok so I changed my mind.

The most common play mistake with this deck is not takings mulligans correctly. Now you want a hand that will be able to go off before turn four. Now think about what you need to do that. You are going to need four mana, nine spells played, and a Tendrils of Agony in hand. Now if you don’t believe that your hand can do that by turn 3, pitch it back and try again. Most of the time a keepable hand is a mixture of mana and draw.

Now there is, how do you know you can go off? Do some math. Well do a lot of math. Do you have Burning Wish? Do you have the means to find Burning Wish? If I Spoils for it, how many Tendrils am I likely to RFG in the process? If it is a lot, can I cast Returns reliably and find the next wish to get the Tendrils? What is there life total, how many spells do I need to cast? Can I cast that many spells? How many cantrips do I have, and is it enough to get nine storm and a Tendrils? How much mana do I have to get all of this done with? Am I likely to draw more mana? Do I need a Helm? If so, can I find one? These are all the questions you should ask yourself before going off. After a while, it should just be instinct and you will just know what works and what doesn’t.

The way that I figured out how to play the deck best was I forced myself to go off turn three every game. I did this until I figured out for myself what I thought worked and what didn’t.

Playing things in the correct order is key in this deck. It is a lot less relevant now that Brainstorm has been cut, but it still stays true to some extent. You always want to play all of the cantrips in your hand and use them before casting a Spoils. This is of course unless you need a Helm to go off, then cast Spoils first. If you have multiple Land Grants in hand and you are going off, cast one and fail to find anything. Only find the land with the last one in hand. Always cast Land Grant before Spoils if you need to play a certain land that turn. If you have a lot of Eggs make sure you filter your mana correctly. Most of the time you are going to need a single Black, Red, and Blue mana. That way no matter what you draw you will be able to cast it. This is of course you have a Tendrils in hand then you are going to want double black.

Always, always, always remember that you need four mana, nine storm, and a Tendrils throughout the entire game. Never stop thinking it. When there life total changes, change your thoughts accordingly. Look at the deck as a whole. Look at it as a puzzle that needs solving. Memorize what piece goes where, and just do the puzzle over and over again. Sooner or later you will find a better way to solve the puzzle. Never look at only your hand, look at the whole deck in your mind. Find out what needs to be done for you to win the game. Now when you find out what needs to be done, find out what will happen if your opponent does something to stop you. What then? Are you going to be able to recover fast enough? Should this change the play? Probably.

Hope that helps. Please ask any questions you have.


Roop

[Bane of the Living]

Roopey I'm glad to see you using a list with the wishes. I've been keeping mad tabs on this deck and every time my buddies and I play it or think about it I cream my pants alittle.

I did want to ask you about a few issues concerning the 3 colours. Your saying to filter through eggs accourdingly, leaving U, B, R so you can cast anything. If I need to use one of those as colorless mana, which mana do I use? Obviously not black..?

And have you tried serum visions over slieght of hand? They seem equally good to us.
Thanks!

[Ebinsugewa]

I tend to draw blue mostly from my Lotus Petals when I need to Sleight; rarely do I ever use the blue from Darkwater Egg as colored mana. This is probably not correct though :)

My main problem is with the Lion's Eye Diamonds. I know you can crack them for your Wished/Spoiled whatever, but are there any other uses for them? I feel as if I'm not using them correctly, other than for free Storm.

[Evil Roopey]

I did want to ask you about a few issues concerning the 3 colours. Your saying to filter through eggs accourdingly, leaving U, B, R so you can cast anything. If I need to use one of those as colorless mana, which mana do I use? Obviously not black..?

Most it really depends on your hand. If you are using the colorless for say a Wish, it depends on what you are Whishing for. If you are using it for an Egg, it doesn't matter if you have only three mana. If for a Sphere then use the mana that you aren't going to need, if you need to draw a Wish, use the blue mana. If you need to draw a Sleight use the Red mana. I think you get the jist.


And have you tried serum visions over slieght of hand? They seem equally good to us.
Serum Visions is a better setup spell and Sleight is better while going off. I think Serum Visions is better due to the fact that you don't want a suboptimal draw spell while going off. Sleight is a decent draw spell and is amazing while going off.


I tend to draw blue mostly from my Lotus Petals when I need to Sleight; rarely do I ever use the blue from Darkwater Egg as colored mana. This is probably not correct though
This is going to happen sometimes. It evens out with more numbers though. I use Sphere more than anything to get Blue mana for Sleight. Although most of the time if I have Sleight and Petal in my opening hand, I do that before I do anything else.


My main problem is with the Lion's Eye Diamonds. I know you can crack them for your Wished/Spoiled whatever, but are there any other uses for them? I feel as if I'm not using them correctly, other than for free Storm.

I forgot to go over LED in my little rant. I normally do use LED when I cast Wish or Spoils, but there have been a couple exceptions. When I have a Helm in play and a few Eggs/Spheres I tend to drop all of them then pop LED. This gives you plenty of mana and cards in your hand to use it on. Also, LED has come in a great deal handy when I'm wishing for IGG, that card was made for LED.

Hope this helps you guys out. If you have more questions, I would be happy to answer them.

Roop

[Happy Gilmore]

I would just like to testify that the current list is quite different from previous lists. It can fight through approximately 1-2 more counters on the turn it goes off which is really impressive. The addition of Burning Wish adds both redundancy and flexability, things the older builds did not have. Nice innovations Roop.

[Koby]

I can't help but notice that adding LED makes Nausea look much more like TJS. And since you're already playing blue for Sleight of Hand, why not add Deep Analysis? With Helm of Awakening, it allows you to get all the card draw you need, and it's only slightly more painful than Night's Whispers, but with better synergy.

It seems like Burning Wish definitly helps out the consistency. I played the old version (circa August) for a while and found getting consistant mana (that 3 duals + city) usually didn't help against Wasteland x2 draw.

[Evil Roopey]

I can't help but notice that adding LED makes Nausea look much more like TJS. And since you're already playing blue for Sleight of Hand, why not add Deep Analysis? With Helm of Awakening, it allows you to get all the card draw you need, and it's only slightly more painful than Night's Whispers, but with better synergy.

The problem that I see right off the bat with DA is that it is not something I want to see in a hand without LED. Narrow cards are not good. You want to be able to use your cards in a lot of situations, not just two, the other being slow playing. I don't like the idea of there being something to slow me down in the deck. It will get tested though.


I played the old version (circa August) for a while and found getting consistant mana (that 3 duals + city) usually didn't help against Wasteland x2 draw

So I should be worried about 10% of the Goblin matchup going bad? I think I can stick with my 9/1 record against the stupid little green men. :)


Other things:

Some people have asked if Helm is a necessity to going off. The short answer is no. The long answer is maybe. It really depends on your hand. Just like every other card in the deck, your hand might be dependant on something else. If you are really short on mana or have a lot of Eggs then sure Helm will help a lot. If not then who cares? Helm is in the deck for the same reason any other card, it is not a necessity to go off, but it is a necessity of the deck.

Also, I was testing against UGBThresh with maindeck Stifles and went 4/6 against it. Not horrible but not a record that I can brag about. I think that if people start running Pithing Needle that the record should improve slightly. I think I might have to start doing more innovation with the upstart of Gro everywhere. Stupid Gro. Someone should start a thread about banning Mongoose and Werebear. :p

That's all for now,
Roop

[hacksign]

I know I know, call me newb but I am playing nausea since version 1 without any problem but now that version number 2 is out I can't get the deck to run. I just fizzle all the time... Maybe only once or twice I got lucky and managed to get the deck going. What I just dont know is when to go off or if the hand is good. I tried to follow Roop's advices but I am still having trouble. Someone please help?

[Evil Roopey]

I really don't know what to say. All of my testing has been amazing with this deck. I won the local tourny in NoVa with this last Satuday. I will try to type up a more in-depth summary on how to play the new version some time soon, but I have to get some rest for tommorow.


Roop

[Bane of the Living]

Just wanted to let you know I'm getting great results with this deck as well. Opening hands of City, Helm, LED, cog, cog, cog are beautiful things. I like the fact LED doubles as a free means to blow em all up, it's my most often use for it when i dont see spoils or wish.

Do you need so many wish targets in the board? Could any of these slots be devoted to anti hand disruption maybe?

[hacksign]

Uhm, maybe I found my problem, I try to go off without helm of awakening even when I shouldn't.

[Daze]

I've also build the deck and it's incredible, imho, the best Combodeck in Legacy (somewhat reminds me of Death Long... :D).
Still, I've got some questions...
As far as I've experienced, you can't go off if your opponent has a counter and is able to target the right spell (which is, of course, quite hard to decide). Is this just me bad-playing or is the statment, that you can fight 1-2 counters kind of an exageration?

What do you board OUT for Xantid Swarms?

Why Cabal Therapy and not Duress?

I'm also desperatly searching for a mana-producing sorcery for my SB, but the best we got is Inner Fire :/. And LAnd Grant is horrible, if your opponent has Cabal Therapies :P.

[Bane of the Living]

The new decklist fights through counters much better than the old one. You dont fizzle against counter because your not relying on meditate anymore, the only spells to counter are now wish and helm. The fact that you can go off with either of them, i lucky, is rediculous.

heil nausea

[blacklotus3636]

I think if this deck can go at least even with U/G/W threshold that has meddling mages,stifles and a thick counterwall it will rise to tier one status. I was wondering about the wishboard though. It seems as though there are too many targets and not enough to sideboard. I would probably put in 4 duress/therapy alongside the swarms.

[Evil Roopey]

I would probably put in 4 duress/therapy alongside the swarms.

Hasn't been necessary yet. The deck handily beats Gro without it.

[AnwarA101]

Why is this deck good against Gro? It seems like counter magic would hurt it alot since it can't really generate card advantage outside of night's whisper. It seems like counter magic plus fast beats would make it difficult to win.

[Evil Roopey]

Why is this deck good against Gro? It seems like counter magic would hurt it alot since it can't really generate card advantage outside of night's whisper. It seems like counter magic plus fast beats would make it difficult to win.
That is actually why. A lot of hands I don't do anything they want to counter then win. Nobody counters Eggs and Sleights because its the wrong play, then they die.

[troopatroop]

Well obviously any smart player would know that it is the smart play, and win. You can't justify that argument.

[Evil Roopey]

Well obviously any smart player would know that it is the smart play, and win. You can't justify that argument.
So what you are trying to tell me is that countering an Egg is the correct play when I will probably have more? Rituals are the same way. The actual thing that beats Gro is redundancy. They normally can't counter everything they want to. They normally have 1-2 counters by the turn I go off, and I can go off through that. Overlord and Gilmore can both attest to this because they have played Gro against me.

I went over a very long conversation with BlackLotus last night that I should have saved and didn't. It was about the Gro matchup. I don't feel like saying it again.

Roop

[Lego]

I haven't tested this deck much, but I can attest to the new version being worlds better than the old. The redundancy is really the key here. The old deck would lose to a counter on Meditate, or Spoils, whereas here, the deck is simply playing cog after cog, and you never want to counter those. Knowing the order to play your spells is also key. Sometimes I would want to counter a Lion's Eye Diamond (in the Helm, Diamond, cog, cog, cog draw), but other times the Diamond is useless for the hand, and I'll just be wasting a counter and upping the storm count.

It is a pretty hard deck for control to play against, especially when piloted by a good player. I'd say if it starts being played, and puts up some numbers, it could easily reach DTB status.

Props Roop!

[Daze]

I begin to see where the real problem for control lies... they just can't know which spell is the critical key making it possible to go off. Still, I often feel somewhat shortened, especially the LED doesn't reallly work (apart from turns like cog, cog, cog, cog, sac LED to use the cogs) because if i sac it in response to a Wish or Spoils, i have no hand and they know if they counter now, my Combo has to fizzle.

[Evil Roopey]

You want to avoid doing the whole Wish, LED thing against blue. Well that is unless you believe them to use all there counters already. Then go nuts. If that is what you are trying to do, I would psych them into countering something you don't actually need.

Roop

[Lego]

Actually, I find it better to just not play the deck against blue. I get much better win percentages that way :;):

[Hoojo]

The reason Nausea can win against gro is exactly what Roop said, redundancy. The control deck needs permanent solutions to be able to shut the deck down. If gro is maindecking Pithing Needle, he can still only name one Egg, Diamond, Sphere, or whatever against Nausea. I've found Helms to be the must counters, but the deck can win without it. The key is not to rush it unless you have a godly hand. With enough mana, you can blast through multiple counterspells pretty easily.

[Evil Roopey]

If gro is maindecking Pithing Needle, he can still only name one Egg, Diamond, Sphere, or whatever against Nausea.

I would just like to point out that the only thing that you can Needle in this deck is Foothills. Needle can't hit mana abilities.

Roop

[Ebinsugewa]

Just wondering how testing against Threshold was going for everyone; I find that the White splash is quite difficult when a Meddling Mage sticks, leaving the Wish -> Chain Lightning plan = :frown:

Anyone have any ideas on improving the matchup, or tips on how to play it more efficiently?

[Skullclamping]

I think Chain Lightning is the best option
all other options are black INSTANTS, so no way to use them
and blue options are overcosted

[Obfuscate Freely]

Firebolt seems like it would be a lot stronger than Chain Lightning.

This is Roop, BTW.



Edited By Obfuscate Freely on 1136024311

[Lego]

There don't seem to be anything that Chain can hit that Firebolt can't, but would you ever have the mana/need to flash it back?

EDIT: Random question with a hopefully obvious answer: Have you ever hit the opponent with a Chain?

[Evil Roopey]

Once, but he was at two because of Tendrils, so Bolt would have done the same thing. I didn't have the mana to get Tendrils, so Chain FTW.

I don't know if anyone noticed, but on the first page is where I keep my updated lists. I have recently added Promise of Power to the SB, and it is absolutely amazing. It serves as a great draw spell when you only have Rituals and no LEDs, and it is a very, very good alternate kill. I have killed 3-4 people with a Demon token in testing. It's good times, and makes for funny stories.

Roop

[Ebinsugewa]

I've always used Promise in my Belcher lists, I find it to be a very good alternative to Spoils when you've got a less than stellar life total. But what exactly are you accomplishing with it in the sideboard? What would you bring it in against and what would you take it out for it?

[Slay]

He's finding them with Burning Wish.
-Slay

[Ebinsugewa]

Oh, well that's obvious to me now. The way he put it sounded to me like it was in multiples. Even if you are finding them with the Wish, however, isn't that a hell of a lot of mana that you're not winning the game with? Sure, it's powerful draw, but at 2BBB it's really tipping the scales of one-shot mana sources here, as it requires a City/Egg and a Dark Ritual or a Thresholded Cabal Ritual. And that doesn't even take into account the Wish that found it. It seems to me like it would be much more versatile in the main deck, where it sort of replaces Meditate and also opens up an alternate win. If I'm screwed enough that I need to Wish for a Demon token with seven mana, I really worry about if it matters.

[Slay]

It actually costs 5ish mana, if you factor in Helm of Awakening. And 5 mana isn't that difficult to get on a consistent basis, especially with Threshold and/or LED.
-Slay

[noobslayer]

Has anyone tested Ill-gotten gains as a wish target? I'd be interested to see results.

[Evil Roopey]

IGGy has been in the board for a while. Look at the first page, where I keep updated list, before asking questions.

IGGy has been absolutely amazing. Just remember your opponent does it too, and you will be fine.

Roop

[Ebinsugewa]

It actually costs 5ish mana, if you factor in Helm of Awakening.
I think that if something is an inclusion solely based on having a Helm in play, then it's not really that useful of a spot. I thought the whole point was that having a Helm was not entirely necessary for the combo to occur.

[Evil Roopey]

It actually costs 5ish mana, if you factor in Helm of Awakening.
I think that if something is an inclusion solely based on having a Helm in play, then it's not really that useful of a spot. I thought the whole point was that having a Helm was not entirely necessary for the combo to occur.
Wishing for a PoP is not either. I would suggest only doing it when Helm is in play because of it's overcostedness. With Helm it is 5 mana for 5 cards, without its 7 mana. That is too much to spend. You want the whole 1 mana = 1 card thing going. Helm breaks this rule completely in half with Eggs and such, which is why Helm is in the deck, but that doesn't mean that you have to Wish for a card that is not good in the current situation. I believe that Wishing for PoP in such a situation is the incorrect play, unless of course it turns out to be the best option, which could happen. Hence, versatility is what the Wish board is for, so why not abuse it?

Roop

[Lego]

A couple of questions about the wish board Roop.

-How often does Overmaster work? I guess it's good if they're saving that counter for Tendrils, but it requires the Tendrils in hand and a storm already high enough.

-What does Simplify usually hit? Going off as early as the deck is supposed to, I can't think of anything that would be a huge problem. Echoing Ruin makes sense because I've hit Pithing Needle and even Null Rod, but I can't think of any low CC Enchantments that would be a problem.

Thanks!

[Daze]

Tendrils can't really be countered (ok, Stifle... but that's targeting the ability, as far as I know) because you would have to counter each copy. Overmaster works great with things like Burning Wish, but of course it depends on the situation, sometimes you use it just as cantrip, sometimes you make a Dark Ritual uncounterable, etc.

Simplify gets rid of nasty things like Solitary Confinement and Ivory Mask.

Still I'd really like to know what you board out for the Xantid Swarms, to me everything seems needed :-(. (I guess you usually board the same cards out?)

[Revert_To_Saved]

-What does Simplify usually hit? Going off as early as the deck is supposed to, I can't think of anything that would be a huge problem.
Pyrostatic Pillar seems to be a big one, and possibly Rule of Law/Arcane Lab and a few others.

@Sideboarding Xantids: Roop's said in another thread that he takes out Sleight of Hands.

[Evil Roopey]

-How often does Overmaster work? I guess it's good if they're saving that counter for Tendrils, but it requires the Tendrils in hand and a storm already high enough.

Overmaster should have been taken out a while ago. For what? I haven't figured out, probably another more flexible draw spell. Maybe more protection, I'm not sure, but I have never ever wished for it.


-What does Simplify usually hit? Going off as early as the deck is supposed to, I can't think of anything that would be a huge problem. Echoing Ruin makes sense because I've hit Pithing Needle and even Null Rod, but I can't think of any low CC Enchantments that would be a problem.

Everyone explained this very nicely. Just remember if you think your opponent is playing Arcane Lab, Wish for Simplifiy early, that way you can play it the turn it comes down and go off. That is if you can't go off before that.

Roop

[Ebinsugewa]

City of Traitors: I really don’t know what brought me to put this card into the deck, but once I did, I never looked back. The card makes a first turn Helm very plausible. It pops Eggs with ease and without you having to use precious colored mana on them. It is simply acceleration.
Ever since I started playing with this deck, I've always wanted to use Ancient Tomb instead. Sure, it will hit you a couple times over the length of the game, but with the added bonus of staying around after you Land Grant. I find that my City gets hit turn two when I need that Bayou to Ritual. However, Ancient Tomb will stay around when you need it; it still has the same vulnerability to Wasteland, but at the added benefit of not screwing your mana development. Burn shouldn't be a problem, even if you activate it every turn including Turn 3. Also, if we still maintain that as our fundamental turn, we still go off right before Goblins goes busted and runs over us.

EDIT: You should probably update that original post while I'm thinking of it. You've still got card discussion of Meditate, which isn't even in the deck anymore. Just a heads up.

[Evil Roopey]

City of Traitors: I really don’t know what brought me to put this card into the deck, but once I did, I never looked back. The card makes a first turn Helm very plausible. It pops Eggs with ease and without you having to use precious colored mana on them. It is simply acceleration.
Ever since I started playing with this deck, I've always wanted to use Ancient Tomb instead. Sure, it will hit you a couple times over the length of the game, but with the added bonus of staying around after you Land Grant. I find that my City gets hit turn two when I need that Bayou to Ritual. However, Ancient Tomb will stay around when you need it; it still has the same vulnerability to Wasteland, but at the added benefit of not screwing your mana development. Burn shouldn't be a problem, even if you activate it every turn including Turn 3. Also, if we still maintain that as our fundamental turn, we still go off right before Goblins goes busted and runs over us.

EDIT: You should probably update that original post while I'm thinking of it. You've still got card discussion of Meditate, which isn't even in the deck anymore. Just a heads up.
The problem with Tomb is that you run Spoils, Whisper, and now PoP in the board. This is a lot of life loss. The original monoblack list of the deck ran Tomb, but I soon realized that it was to much life loss. You often killed yourself, or your opponent could kill you because you were at 2. Hence the reason I run City.

Roop

[Lego]

Sorry about the idiotic countering of Tendrils remark. I'll try to stop doing that.

[Bane of the Living]

I've only been screwed by choice of cities ONE time out of countless games. i went to turn three and saw 3 of them :(

theres been discussion about unbanning one or more remotely insane card in legacy. perhaps to even out with banning lackey? or to help compete?
on the list are..
dream halls
land tax
mind over matter
and the monster.. Grim Monolith.

I see monolith immediately added to this deck.

[Evil Roopey]

I see monolith immediately added to this deck.

I don't see why Monolith is any better than Desperate Ritual. Especially since you can splice mutliple Rituals together. Anyways, I doubt either of them will see play in this deck.

Desperate Research has been added to the board over Overmaster. The added "Tutor" effect has been working out pretty good so far. It's good because now you basically have a Ritual in the SB to wish for.

Additional plays some people might not see: Regrowth is in the board to bring back Rituals for more mana. Just remember that you are going to need a green for it and plan it well.

Roop

[Phantom Ogre]

Desperate Ritual has been added to the board over Overmaster.
Desperate Ritual is an instant; how do you plan to access it?

[Evil Roopey]

Desperate Ritual has been added to the board over Overmaster.
Desperate Ritual is an instant; how do you plan to access it?
Fixed. Sorry, I'm retarded sometimes. I was thinking about to many things when I posted that.

[Slay]

I see monolith immediately added to this deck.

I don't see why Monolith is any better than Desperate Ritual. Especially since you can splice mutliple Rituals together. Anyways, I doubt either of them will see play in this deck.

Desperate Research has been added to the board over Overmaster. The added "Tutor" effect has been working out pretty good so far. It's good because now you basically have a Ritual in the SB to wish for.

Additional plays some people might not see: Regrowth is in the board to bring back Rituals for more mana. Just remember that you are going to need a green for it and plan it well.

Roop
City, Monolith, go.

5 mana on your next turn. Please tell me you can win with that.
-Slay

[Evil Roopey]

I see monolith immediately added to this deck.

I don't see why Monolith is any better than Desperate Ritual. Especially since you can splice mutliple Rituals together. Anyways, I doubt either of them will see play in this deck.

Desperate Research has been added to the board over Overmaster. The added "Tutor" effect has been working out pretty good so far. It's good because now you basically have a Ritual in the SB to wish for.

Additional plays some people might not see: Regrowth is in the board to bring back Rituals for more mana. Just remember that you are going to need a green for it and plan it well.

Roop
City, Monolith, go.

5 mana on your next turn. Please tell me you can win with that.
-Slay
You people need to stop proving me wrong. That does seem strong, yet I seriously doubt it will get unbanned.

[Drkdstryer]

Were there not plans to add Ideas Unbound to the SB? UU can be tricky but I've been messing around with it and it works out all right. I took out the Promise for it, because I really don't like that card at all.... 5 mana seems way too much. The effect is strong, but I don't often have 4 or 5 mana just sitting around.

EDIT: Well, further goldfishing has proved that Promise actually IS good and definitely worth it, but I've Wished for Ideas Unbound enough times to really want to fit it into the side. The biggest attraction to me is that if you Wish, LED without a Helm out, you can't cast IGGy or Diminishing Returns, but you CAN cast Ideas and still have that U open. That's come up enough times that I really want to find a Sorcery draw spell for 2 or 3, and Ideas really fits that well. Any ideas?

[Evil Roopey]

Were there not plans to add Ideas Unbound to the SB? UU can be tricky but I've been messing around with it and it works out all right. I took out the Promise for it, because I really don't like that card at all.... 5 mana seems way too much. The effect is strong, but I don't often have 4 or 5 mana just sitting around.

EDIT: Well, further goldfishing has proved that Promise actually IS good and definitely worth it, but I've Wished for Ideas Unbound enough times to really want to fit it into the side. The biggest attraction to me is that if you Wish, LED without a Helm out, you can't cast IGGy or Diminishing Returns, but you CAN cast Ideas and still have that U open. That's come up enough times that I really want to find a Sorcery draw spell for 2 or 3, and Ideas really fits that well. Any ideas?
I find Night's Whisper being better in these situations. I did test Ideas, and I could never Wish for it. Night's Whisper on the other hand leaves a black floating in that situation, which in turn means you can actually cast the Ritual you draw. I know it draws 1 less card, but it can't be too busted.

Roop

[Ray D 3]

Ideas is awful. I would much rather be paying RB to draw 2 than RUU to draw 3 in a deck that has more than a little difficulty producing more than 1 of any off colored mana, and in which doing so will jeapordize its odds of going off.

Anyway, just to reduce playtesting idiocy, I would say a hand that can go off with any amount of speed must look like one of the following:

wish+helm+decent mana (needing red obviously)
spoils+helm+decent mana (red, multiple black, and lots of life)
wish+lots of mana producers (red pre-diamond)
spoils+lots of mana producers (red pre-diamond, multiple black, and lots of life)
Tendrilsx2+lots of fucking mana
Tendrils+lots of cantrips+lots of fucking mana

I would say that unless you are clearly dead next turn, never try to go off with anything less than the above. If anyone thinks I missed a hand that has a reasonable chance of going off, please post it.



Edited By Ray D 3 on 1136686118

[Ebinsugewa]

So do you use Desperate Research basically when you need a draw spell? I'm just trying to find the proper way to use it. I notice that it interacts with Burning Wish well, but you have to use the Wish to find it in the first place. I can't see any other interactions, and I don't see myself Wishing for it unless I'm really screwed and can't take life from Spoils. Or is that the use? Just curious as to your rationale, because I'm not sure how to use it as I've never Wished for it in a match yet. Honestly, I've never even used the card. So I think that adds to my uncomfortability with it. Just looking for some insight.

PS - In my testing, going off on Turn 3 is remarkably consistent and is actually easier than I first thought. Even with mediocre hands with just draw and mana, I can find outs. Great job, Roop and others.

[Ebinsugewa]

Now it's time for: How would you play it?

Here's the deal. 3 cards in hand: 2x Night's Whisper and a Shadowblood Egg. A Bayou and a Tropical Island are tapped, and a Lotus Petal and Chromatic Sphere are untapped. You're at 7 Storm, and 2x Land Grant, a Sleight of Hand, a Chromatic Sphere, and a Dark Ritual are in the yard. BB is currently floating. You have just played a Sleight of Hand, and it reveals a Lotus Petal and a Spoils. Which do you take? Do you go with bonus mana, and rely on the 4 cards from the Night's Whispers to find a Wish or Tendrils? Or do you Spoils for something to continue the chain? If so, what do you Spoils for?

This situation just came up in playtesting, and I'm intrigued as to how you guys would play it, cause it reveals a bit about your style as well as shares knowledge :) Good morning, by the way :O

[Drkdstryer]

Good morning my ass, I have yet to sleep :P

My first reaction is to Spoils for Cabal Ritual - after using the Sphere you have Threshhold, giving you BBBBB and a Lotus Petal. Hopefully you have enough life to keep going with your Whispers. I'll reconstruct the hand and see what happens...


Well I managed to go off but I was down to popping two LEDs in response to Night's Whisper, for B and R, and got lucky and drew a Burning Wish FTW. I dunno, I think my play is OK.

At this point what you need is a little more mana and then Tendrils - you're only two storm and 2 mana short. I think the first thing you have to do is pop the Sphere no matter what you do. You need to find a Tendrils soon, so that means fueling the Whispers in your hand, and that means mana. Spoils for Cabal gives you +3 mana, and lets you use the Night's Whispers in your hand. Of the 4-of's remaining in your library, it seems the safest to go for.


Now here's a new question: how often do you guys use a Lotus Petal to get a turn 1 Helm? I find that's one of the best plays for my Petals. I really hate wasting the card, but the -1 on every spell makes up for the 1 mana you get for the Petal, right?

[Evil Roopey]

Ideas is awful. I would much rather be paying RB to draw 2 than RUU to draw 3 in a deck that has more than a little difficulty producing more than 1 of any off colored mana, and in which doing so will jeapordize its odds of going off.

Anyway, just to reduce playtesting idiocy, I would say a hand that can go off with any amount of speed must look like one of the following:

wish+helm+decent mana (needing red obviously)
spoils+helm+decent mana (red, multiple black, and lots of life)
wish+lots of mana producers (red pre-diamond)
spoils+lots of mana producers (red pre-diamond, multiple black, and lots of life)
Tendrilsx2+lots of fucking mana
Tendrils+lots of cantrips+lots of fucking mana

I would say that unless you are clearly dead next turn, never try to go off with anything less than the above. If anyone thinks I missed a hand that has a reasonable chance of going off, please post it.

I don't completely agree with this. I believe that you should be able to turn almost any hand you get into a decent hand by turn 3, as long as you have lands. Those might be a good start on hands that you need to go off, but then again that's not even true. If you have to go off, most hands will turn into any of the listed.


Now it's time for: How would you play it?

Here's the deal. 3 cards in hand: 2x Night's Whisper and a Shadowblood Egg. A Bayou and a Tropical Island are tapped, and a Lotus Petal and Chromatic Sphere are untapped. You're at 7 Storm, and 2x Land Grant, a Sleight of Hand, a Chromatic Sphere, and a Dark Ritual are in the yard. BB is currently floating. You have just played a Sleight of Hand, and it reveals a Lotus Petal and a Spoils. Which do you take? Do you go with bonus mana, and rely on the 4 cards from the Night's Whispers to find a Wish or Tendrils? Or do you Spoils for something to continue the chain? If so, what do you Spoils for?

This situation just came up in playtesting, and I'm intrigued as to how you guys would play it, cause it reveals a bit about your style as well as shares knowledge Good morning, by the way

Well, the first thing is you already made a mistake. You should have popped that Sphere to dig deeper before using Sleight. This way you have more of an idea of what you need to take with it because you have more cards in hand. Second, you should obviously take the Spoils and go for the Cabal Ritual like stated above. But still Pop the Sphere before you Spoils, this will let you either, take 1 less life or give you the card you wanted anyways and you can Spoils for something else. Either way it's the better play. Play the hand as it comes together from there.


Now here's a new question: how often do you guys use a Lotus Petal to get a turn 1 Helm? I find that's one of the best plays for my Petals. I really hate wasting the card, but the -1 on every spell makes up for the 1 mana you get for the Petal, right?

It really depends on the hand. If the hand is going to need the Petal for colored mana then I might keep it back, otherwise I really like playing Helm first turn. So, again, it comes back to just playing it over and over again until you get a feel of what works and what doesn't.

Keep the questions coming,
Roop

[Skullclamping]

I havesome questions:

Why do you use Swarm instead of Grid in side? Are both good options?
Why do you also use Echoing Ruin there? It also doesn't seem good
And the same for Desperate Research

And for the question asked before, I also use Petal for Helm many times, specially if you have a hand full of 'Eggs'

[Ray D 3]

Ideas is awful. I would much rather be paying RB to draw 2 than RUU to draw 3 in a deck that has more than a little difficulty producing more than 1 of any off colored mana, and in which doing so will jeapordize its odds of going off.

Anyway, just to reduce playtesting idiocy, I would say a hand that can go off with any amount of speed must look like one of the following:

wish+helm+decent mana (needing red obviously)
spoils+helm+decent mana (red, multiple black, and lots of life)
wish+lots of mana producers (red pre-diamond)
spoils+lots of mana producers (red pre-diamond, multiple black, and lots of life)
Tendrilsx2+lots of fucking mana
Tendrils+lots of cantrips+lots of fucking mana

I would say that unless you are clearly dead next turn, never try to go off with anything less than the above. If anyone thinks I missed a hand that has a reasonable chance of going off, please post it.

I don't completely agree with this. I believe that you should be able to turn almost any hand you get into a decent hand by turn 3, as long as you have lands. Those might be a good start on hands that you need to go off, but then again that's not even true. If you have to go off, most hands will turn into any of the listed.
I would say that it may be possible to sculpt your hand into what you need, but since your cantrips suck and a wasteland would stop this process almost dead, I would not risk it.

As far as being able to go off with a hand worse than the ones I listed, I did not say it was impossible, but I did say it was not worth the risk unless you were certain to die next turn.

[Ray D 3]

Ideas is awful. I would much rather be paying RB to draw 2 than RUU to draw 3 in a deck that has more than a little difficulty producing more than 1 of any off colored mana, and in which doing so will jeapordize its odds of going off.

Anyway, just to reduce playtesting idiocy, I would say a hand that can go off with any amount of speed must look like one of the following:

wish+helm+decent mana (needing red obviously)
spoils+helm+decent mana (red, multiple black, and lots of life)
wish+lots of mana producers (red pre-diamond)
spoils+lots of mana producers (red pre-diamond, multiple black, and lots of life)
Tendrilsx2+lots of fucking mana
Tendrils+lots of cantrips+lots of fucking mana

I would say that unless you are clearly dead next turn, never try to go off with anything less than the above. If anyone thinks I missed a hand that has a reasonable chance of going off, please post it.

I don't completely agree with this. I believe that you should be able to turn almost any hand you get into a decent hand by turn 3, as long as you have lands. Those might be a good start on hands that you need to go off, but then again that's not even true. If you have to go off, most hands will turn into any of the listed.
I would say that it may be possible to sculpt your hand into what you need, but since your cantrips suck and a wasteland would stop this process almost dead, I would not risk it.

As far as being able to go off with a hand worse than the ones I listed, I did not say it was impossible, but I did say it was not worth the risk unless you were certain to die next turn.

[Drkdstryer]

I havesome questions:

Why do you use Swarm instead of Grid in side? Are both good options?
Why do you also use Echoing Ruin there? It also doesn't seem good
And the same for Desperate Research

And for the question asked before, I also use Petal for Helm many times, specially if you have a hand full of 'Eggs'
I dunno about Grid vs Swarm, I have noone to test against while on break :\

Echoing Ruin is a sorcery - you can wish for it. Desperate Research is a decent tutor for what it does. Digging 7 cards deep for 1B sounds pretty good to me (althought I rarely Wish for it, it's come up before).

[Evil Roopey]

I havesome questions:

Why do you use Swarm instead of Grid in side? Are both good options?
Why do you also use Echoing Ruin there? It also doesn't seem good
And the same for Desperate Research

And for the question asked before, I also use Petal for Helm many times, specially if you have a hand full of 'Eggs'
I have never actually thought about Grid, it should probably be tested.

Echoing Ruin is amazing. It destroys 2 Chalices if they are set for 0 and 1, which has happened. It is easily the best option when it comes to sorcery-speed artifact removal.

As for Desperate Research, I haven't been to happy with at all either. The fact that you Wish for it means it must be good, but it is only good half of the time. Which I don't like at all. Again, I'll be testing new replacements.

Roop

[Skullclamping]

I think Grid is better, basically for its colorless mana
but there's one thing that gives points to both, because if you played a Helm on first game, a W deck will take Disenchants from side, and get StP on SB, so Swarms will have a choice to protect us
but in other matchups, withut artifact removal or when we haven't played Helm, they will have creature kill, so Grid will be better

what do you, the others, think about it?

and also another question:

has anybody tested the deck against any deck with discard?
it seems to be a bad matchup, because you show your hand to a 100% Therapy, and Duress also affects you, and nothing to say for Hymn/Gerrard's Veredict...

[Ebinsugewa]

has anybody tested the deck against any deck with discard?
it seems to be a bad matchup, because you show your hand to a 100% Therapy
Wishing for your own disruption sounds like a plan, though there are no Pikula/other disruption decks in my meta to test against. I certainly think the sideboard needs an overhaul, but I'm really not sure what to put in yet. And no one else seems confident in that either.

[Evil Roopey]

I think Grid is better, basically for its colorless mana
but there's one thing that gives points to both, because if you played a Helm on first game, a W deck will take Disenchants from side, and get StP on SB, so Swarms will have a choice to protect us
but in other matchups, withut artifact removal or when we haven't played Helm, they will have creature kill, so Grid will be better

what do you, the others, think about it?

and also another question:

has anybody tested the deck against any deck with discard?
it seems to be a bad matchup, because you show your hand to a 100% Therapy, and Duress also affects you, and nothing to say for Hymn/Gerrard's Veredict...

After some consideration, I still believe that Swarm is better than Grid. Most people will side in artifact removal for Helm while siding out there creature removal. Banking on this, you should be able to side in Swarm without problems.

I have tested against Deadguy quite thoroughly actually. The matchup is around 6-4 in Nausea's favor. Most hands you will be able to outrace the discard, and other hands you can go off with just a Spoils or Wish. There are still the hands where you can't get in there fast enough, so you will lose those, but you should win the majority of the matches.



I certainly think the sideboard needs an overhaul, but I'm really not sure what to put in yet. And no one else seems confident in that either.

Was this in referance to the Nausea SB or the Deadugy SB?

On that note, what does everyone think about Infernal Contract taking the Desperate Research spot in the board? I haven't tested it, but it seems kinda decent.

[Ebinsugewa]

Was this in referance to the Nausea SB or the Deadugy SB? ... Infernal Contract taking the Desperate Research spot

The Nausea board; we all seem to agree that PoP, Desperate Research, and Firebolt are still experimental. And I have found the Therapy underwhelming. Our problem is that these are useful answers for certain gamestates, however, and we have nothing to take their place. At least that's the way I see it.

EDIT: Forgot to address Infernal Contract. I think that the original rationale for dropping it was correct, it is unaffected by Helm, and the life loss in conjunction with Spoils and Night's Whisper might be rough. Just my .02c. However, it is exactly Cabal/Dark Ritual or cracked LED mana, which happens in response to Wish very often.

[Lego]

I've been running the Infernal Contract in my wishboard for a while in testing now, since I got the idea from the janky storm (what's that thing called) and I've found that it gets wished for enough that it is worth the inclusion. The life loss never usually becomes too big a deal, because you're never going to topdeck it. You only get it when *you* want it, so sometimes, yes, it won't be an option because then you won't be able to Night's Whisper or Spoils at all, but when you've just missing the Tendrils, or one or two more cards for the storm count, a Wish for Contract, popping an LED in response, or using Ritual mana, will usually get you one of the cards you're looking for, or enough gas to find one. The fact is, it can't kill you unless you're at one, and if you're going to win this turn, that's not often a big deal.

I'm for it, but make your own decisions from testing :)

[Skullclamping]

Promise of Power is better than Contract I think, and as Roopey (and also me) said, Swarm is a bit better than Grid for the sideboard choice of our opponent, but I think this is more about the metagame, and see what decks have or not too creature kill

[Lego]

@ Skullclamping: Right, agreed. I forgot to ever take those Promises out of my binder. One will go in the sideboard this afternoon for testing, thanks :)

[Bane of the Living]

I've been playing Rhystic Tutor in the board with much success. I wish for it like 1 in 4 times. I think its better than contract. For the same mana, or less via helms, you DO get the card you needed with contract. With no life loss. Dont pretend life loss isnt an issue because you know your playing with spoils and you know spoils is unforgiving. My opponents barely ever has the mana to stop it EVER. Infact there were only 2 in 10 games where they had 2 up when I was going off.

And I do think that grid is better than swarm. Swarm has way to many ways to die to fish and landstill and red Thresh and then the counters go online. Most people I play with in woosta would never be foolish enough to take out too much removal, figuring you would try some sneaky Negator tricks. As a landstill player w the red splash, I will have a swords or a fire/ice ready for the 0/1 insect. I expect him. Grid shuts down ALL nonsense without doing anything but playing it, usually turn 1. If they nuke it GOOD. It wasnt helm. And they probably tapped out which means I win. And I can Rhystic Tutor! :o

[Evil Roopey]

@ Skullclamping: Right, agreed. I forgot to ever take those Promises out of my binder. One will go in the sideboard this afternoon for testing, thanks :)

Promise has been in the SB for a while now.

After some thurough testing I firmly believe that Infernal Contract should be in the SB.

// Sideboard
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Night's Whisper
1 Ill-Gotten Gains
1 Diminishing Returns
1 Promise of Power
1 Regrowth
1 Infernal Contract
1 Cabal Therapy
1 Simplify
1 Echoing Ruin
1 Firebolt
4 Xantid Swarm

That is the SB for people who are too lazy to go to the first page.


The Nausea board; we all seem to agree that PoP, Desperate Research, and Firebolt are still experimental. And I have found the Therapy underwhelming. Our problem is that these are useful answers for certain gamestates, however, and we have nothing to take their place. At least that's the way I see it.

How is this SB not optimal? What do you propose to replace these "suboptimal" cards? They are easily the best answer/draw that you
have access to in Legacy.

[Bane of the Living]

Roopey what made you come to the decision of the swarms?

Why do you feel you need the sb cards against counter anyways?
I've been playing 4 Duress in that spot and have been very happy with it. It cherry picks orims chant and abeyance from hands as well as counterspells. It's not as narrow.

I could see where swarm/grid would be better against a blue tuned meta, but the only deck were I would give a shit is thresh, and duress is doing fine there. Not to mention it's accessable via wish.

[Skullclamping]

I've been playing Rhystic Tutor in the board with much success.

you don't need it, everything you can want is still in side


After some thurough testing I firmly believe that Infernal Contract should be in the SB.

why? can you give any arguments?
I still think PoP can do the same work


Roopey what made you come to the decision of the swarms?
...
I've been playing 4 Duress in that spot and have been very happy with it.

I also thought something like you
with this, you can get Teraphy out of side, giving us another slot
and Duress is also good against decks with mass discard or possibly mirror...

and I also have a question:

Do you use the Diminishing Returns in side?
I think I have not wished for it many times, most times you can win with IGG or Tendrils instead of Returns, so it isn't so good I think (it's great, but you have other things to use)
And also, when I was thinking in any other Sorcery for side, I remembered an Odissey card, Recoup
what do you think about it?

[Evil Roopey]

Roopey what made you come to the decision of the swarms?

Why do you feel you need the sb cards against counter anyways?
I've been playing 4 Duress in that spot and have been very happy with it. It cherry picks orims chant and abeyance from hands as well as counterspells. It's not as narrow.

I could see where swarm/grid would be better against a blue tuned meta, but the only deck were I would give a shit is thresh, and duress is doing fine there. Not to mention it's accessable via wish.

Swarm "gets" all of the counters out of there hand, where Duress only gets one. I think that would be the main arguement against it. Other than that, I guess it's really up to you, but I still believe Swarm is much better than Duress.


Evil Roopey wrote:
After some thurough testing I firmly believe that Infernal Contract should be in the SB.


why? can you give any arguments?
I still think PoP can do the same work

It's in the SB in addition to PoP. It is in there because of the fact that you can wish for it when you are low on mana and can't afford a PoP. It's a wishable Meditate, how bad can that be? I'm thinking not at all.


Do you use the Diminishing Returns in side?
I think I have not wished for it many times, most times you can win with IGG or Tendrils instead of Returns, so it isn't so good I think (it's great, but you have other things to use)
And also, when I was thinking in any other Sorcery for side, I remembered an Odissey card, Recoup
what do you think about it?

Diminishing Returns was the whole reason to have a Wish board. I absolutely love the card. I think that it is easily more powerful than anything else in the SB.

Also, Recoup seems interesting, but I don't think it is stronger than Regrowth for a couple reasons. Regrowth has been able to get back Helms, lands, and much needed other stuff. I will test it based on the fact that it can actually be played off of an Egg, and it might turn out to be better. Who knows until you test?

Roop

[Drkdstryer]

Roopey what made you come to the decision of the swarms?

Why do you feel you need the sb cards against counter anyways?
I've been playing 4 Duress in that spot and have been very happy with it. It cherry picks orims chant and abeyance from hands as well as counterspells. It's not as narrow.

I could see where swarm/grid would be better against a blue tuned meta, but the only deck were I would give a shit is thresh, and duress is doing fine there. Not to mention it's accessable via wish.

Swarm "gets" all of the counters out of there hand, where Duress only gets one. I think that would be the main arguement against it. Other than that, I guess it's really up to you, but I still believe Swarm is much better than Duress.


Evil Roopey wrote:
After some thurough testing I firmly believe that Infernal Contract should be in the SB.


why? can you give any arguments?
I still think PoP can do the same work

It's in the SB in addition to PoP. It is in there because of the fact that you can wish for it when you are low on mana and can't afford a PoP. It's a wishable Meditate, how bad can that be? I'm thinking not at all.


Do you use the Diminishing Returns in side?
I think I have not wished for it many times, most times you can win with IGG or Tendrils instead of Returns, so it isn't so good I think (it's great, but you have other things to use)
And also, when I was thinking in any other Sorcery for side, I remembered an Odissey card, Recoup
what do you think about it?

Diminishing Returns was the whole reason to have a Wish board. I absolutely love the card. I think that it is easily more powerful than anything else in the SB.

Also, Recoup seems interesting, but I don't think it is stronger than Regrowth for a couple reasons. Regrowth has been able to get back Helms, lands, and much needed other stuff. I will test it based on the fact that it can actually be played off of an Egg, and it might turn out to be better. Who knows until you test?

Roop

Dimisnishing Returns is the nuts, but now that I've figured out IGGy, I've actually been going for that more than I have for Diminishing Returns. If you cast Burning wish as your 5th spell and have a Tendrils and a Ritual in your hand OR yard... you pretty much win. It's actually that insane for me.

What hasn't been insane for me is Regrowth. I have yet ti wish for it... you said that it's best for getting Rituals back, but then it's (best case scenario, involving Helm) RGB for BBB. Fairly subpar IMO.

[Lego]

Promise has been in the SB for a while now.


I *know* that, I just forgot to *put* it there :)

I also have never wished for Regrowth, although I suppose it can get back a Tendrils and play it again :wink:

[jrp]

What hasn't been insane for me is Regrowth. I have yet ti wish for it... you said that it's best for getting Rituals back, but then it's (best case scenario, involving Helm) RGB for BBB. Fairly subpar IMO.

Ritual can also be Cabal Ritual (so RGB for BBBBB under Helm). Personally, I have wished for Regrowth. If you are light on mana, but need 2 or 3 more storm and have a ritual in the graveyard, then that is where Regrowth is great.

[Drkdstryer]

What hasn't been insane for me is Regrowth. I have yet ti wish for it... you said that it's best for getting Rituals back, but then it's (best case scenario, involving Helm) RGB for BBB. Fairly subpar IMO.

Ritual can also be Cabal Ritual (so RGB for BBBBB under Helm). Personally, I have wished for Regrowth. If you are light on mana, but need 2 or 3 more storm and have a ritual in the graveyard, then that is where Regrowth is great.

But that also assumes Threshold. So basically, the only time that you would Wish for Regrowth is with a Helm out, with an untapped land (or Chromatic Sphere and an extra mana), 7 cards in your yard - including Cabal Ritual. Seems kinda weak - if I had a Ritual in my yard, an untapped land, and a Helm out, I could almost always win by going for IGGy.

[Skullclamping]

Do you use the Diminishing Returns in side?
I think I have not wished for it many times, most times you can win with IGG or Tendrils instead of Returns, so it isn't so good I think (it's great, but you have other things to use)

Diminishing Returns was the whole reason to have a Wish board. I absolutely love the card. I think that it is easily more powerful than anything else in the SB.

Dimisnishing Returns is the nuts, but now that I've figured out IGGy, I've actually been going for that more than I have for Diminishing Returns. If you cast Burning wish as your 5th spell and have a Tendrils and a Ritual in your hand OR yard... you pretty much win. It's actually that insane for me.

yes, that's what I was saying, to use a Diminishing Returns, you can use an IGG in an easier way, so I think that after including this, Returns is not so powerful

[Lego]

Simply stated, Diminishing Returns gives you 7 cards, Ill-Gotten Gains gives you 3. That's a huge difference. There have been many times where all I will have in my yard is some mana acceleration, and maybe one card drawer. If I've already got plenty of mana floating after the Wish, and I just want to keep comboing off, I'll take the 7 cards over a ritual, LED, and a Night's Whisper. What I'm saying is that in a lot of situations, IGG doesn't give you enough options, so the seven cards are nice just to keep going off.

[Ebinsugewa]

Diminishing Returns was the whole reason to have a Wish board. I absolutely love the card. I think that it is easily more powerful than anything else in the SB.
And you would be absolutely correct. For a great price, we can get back a full hand and continue going off. I think it's easily the most broken card we have in Legacy for Storm combo of this nature. And it's my favorite card to wish for, even in front of Tendrils.

As for the rest of the sideboard, and what I said earlier, I never said it was "not optimal," because that statement would be a fallacy. One can never really know what sideboard is optimal, because play conditions always change. And that leads me to my original point: some cards seem really busted, and we Wish for them all the time, yet some don't see much use. And I know they serve a distinct purpose, but I wish they could be on power level with the rest (Tendrils, IGG, Diminishing Returns). I'm not used to playing a resilient Storm deck; from my experience, my Wishboards (see: Extended Desire, Legacy Easter Tendrils) have always just been gas for going off mid combo, or transformational boards into the "Man plan". So, I'm still getting used to the gamestates in which these answers are useful, not saying that they're awful. There can always be more efficient answers, however, and we should certainly not stop looking for new and better ideas.

[Bane of the Living]

I haven't been very fond of Promise of Power/Infernal Contract.
When do you decide if you want IGG or Diminishing Returns over them? Is it based off if you have LED or not?

Most times I'd rather take IGG because of whats in my yard. Going in blind for more cards via contract/power is when I seem to fizzle out.

I've also been missing chrome mox. :?

[Slay]

Gains can be good if you have a Tendrils in the yard. If you're at 5 storm before you cast the Wish, you can win if there's a tendrils and 2 cheap accels in the yard. Otherwise, the deck's draw power is woefully bad, so I'd just use the Returns for much love and happiness.
-Slay

[Drkdstryer]

Simply stated, Diminishing Returns gives you 7 cards, Ill-Gotten Gains gives you 3. That's a huge difference. There have been many times where all I will have in my yard is some mana acceleration, and maybe one card drawer. If I've already got plenty of mana floating after the Wish, and I just want to keep comboing off, I'll take the 7 cards over a ritual, LED, and a Night's Whisper. What I'm saying is that in a lot of situations, IGG doesn't give you enough options, so the seven cards are nice just to keep going off.

Well that's why both are in the SB, you go for them in different situations. But the 7 : 3 isn't entirely accurate, as IGGy gives you 3 KNOWN cards and Returns gets you 7 UNKNOWN cards.

I didn't try out Infernal Contract yet, but PoP was fine for me when I had an LED and a Ritual effect, 5 cards seems pretty good : P

[Lego]

I didn't say IGG shouldn't be in the board, I just said Returns should. They both have their uses.

[Skullclamping]

I'm agree right now that Returns must be there, it gives you 7 cards, right, and most times it's enough to win
what I'm not agree is Infernal Contract, and because I have many problems with enchantments in my meta (full of t1 or old extended decks) becausae of Enchantress decks, I have a Tranquility, but it's not standard :P

[Drkdstryer]

I didn't say IGG shouldn't be in the board, I just said Returns should. They both have their uses.

Heh, I know. As I was typing up my post I kinda realized that we're not really arguing anything... just extolling the virtues of IGGy and Returns, repsectively ;P

@Skullclamping: If you have a problem with Enchantments, just replace the Simplify in the board with Tranquility... I still think that Infernal Contract is a very good midrange draw spell that the deck needs.

[Skullclamping]

@Skullclamping: If you have a problem with Enchantments, just replace the Simplify in the board with Tranquility... I still think that Infernal Contract is a very good midrange draw spell that the deck needs.

I also thought on that, and I will just try like this, because Tranquility lets me win :P

but I would like to know when are you using Infernal Contract, so I never find the moment to use it
any advice?

[SillyMetalGAT]

hey ummm.... what happened to this deck? did it die or sumthing? ive been interested in this deck ever since we tested it first in our worcester meta....and it is nuts. So did anyone figure a new combo base? go Nausea!

[Lego]

I don't think it died, I think people just haven't been innovating on it for a while. Same reason the Spring Tide list hasn't changed for a couple of months. It plays a Wishboard, so boarding choices don't change too much, and it's been streamlined pretty well, so there's not a whole lot of need to update.

Incidentally, have you ever tested this thing vs. Spring Tide? My two favorite Legacy combo decks, we should try it out :)

[Bane of the Living]

I played the deck alittle today against gro..

I tried to actually work around daze, going for a turn 3 kill. I had a much better game against them. Has anyone else done this and found it worth it? Or is letting them get to Counterspell mana bad?

[potatofloss]

What do you guys do when Threshold Dazes your Land Grants? That usually owns me pretty hard.

[Bane of the Living]

thats one of the reasons I try to play around daze. it seems to help anyways.

[Evil Roopey]

What do you guys do when Threshold Dazes your Land Grants? That usually owns me pretty hard.

I don't lose the die roll is how. There really isn't anything you can do about it really. Just sit there and take it like a man. Hopefully your entire hand wasn't kept because of the Grant though because then you are screwed.

[Bane of the Living]

in my testing against gro I've noticed most players will not counter your land grant. They figure it's tempo for tempo and usually figure your playing belcher when you play. They run few counterspells so often if they have a daze they'll save it for a bigger spell. Versions running Meddling Mage and Pithing Needle will crap at the chance to see your hand. Land Grant is usually safe. But to be sure, when playing this matchup dont keep hands that rely too heavy on it.

[Ebinsugewa]

According to the philosophy of Gro (as I have played it), it's usually a bad idea to Daze/FoW stuff that isn't a bomb. You can't play like a mono-U deck with inevitability and counter mundane things like Land Grant. And like Roop and Bane said, don't keep bad hands solely based on Land Grant, even if you're not playing against Gro.

On that note, I'm close to getting all the stuff together to play this on paper on Sundays now. That is, if Bane isn't playing it, or else I'll just swipe it from him. I think our meta is really lax on hating Storm combo, and if we bring it in force, it should T4 with ease. Especially with all the jank that people are playing. Anyways, expect a report from one of us soon.

[Zilla]

According to the philosophy of Gro (as I have played it), it's usually a bad idea to Daze/FoW stuff that isn't a bomb.
I agree about FoW, but Daze? I'll Daze almost anything, just to make sure I get a good use out of it. I'd Daze a Land Grant against Nausea.

[Lego]

When I'm playing Gro, I pretty much Daze anything I can, and I'd Daze a Land Grant against any deck. Unless I had a Meddling Mage in hand, and they weren't going to do anything cool with the land.

[Bane of the Living]

Ok I dont want to argue about what a gro player would daze.. that can be discussed in another place. I want to talk about how alot of time it isnt. Ive played this deck against alot of decks since page one. Most people wont know what your playing. For that reason they chose to let it resolve. This is why..

1 You know they have a very tight mana base. Daze is still good.
2 You can see whats in their hand. Now Pithing Needle and Meddling mage are prepared. Why do you think some versions play Peek.

Weigh that against, now or never. Especially if you'd rather use it for force fodder.

Only very good gro players that have experience against Nausea will be able to make the right play by knowledge.

On to other things..
I almost always side in defense grids now. Xantid Swarm always lived to die. Turn one Defense Grid will take out even naturalize. They'd need to smash that first. I side them in so much, Im thinking I want them maindeck. But I dont know what else to take out.

This actually goes the same for duress.

_EDIT_
He's to 20 pages of Nausea!

[Obfuscate Freely]

You guys know that Land Grant requires you to reveal your hand instead of paying the mana cost, right? That means when you play Grant, you announce it, and then pay costs by tipping your hand. At that point, if Dazing (or even Forcing) the Grant will cripple you, your opponent will know it and they will do it.

And Meddling Mage and Pithing Needle have nothing to do with that decision.

[Skullclamping]

I almost always side in defense grids now. Xantid Swarm always lived to die. Turn one Defense Grid will take out even naturalize. They'd need to smash that first. I side them in so much, Im thinking I want them maindeck. But I dont know what else to take out.

This actually goes the same for duress.

so what are you playing in SIDE?
Grid + Swarm + Duress seems too much...
can you explain it better?

[Bane of the Living]

I switch off from the 3. They all have ups and downs.
I think grid and duress are both better than swarm but im not sure which of those 2 is better. Right now I'm going with 4 Defense Grids tho.

[Lego]

I've found Defense Grid to be stellar in Spring Tide, and here you can play it much earlier, before a counter wall comes online. I'd test it :)

[Ebinsugewa]

I would have to agree that Defense Grid rocks when you can City it out first turn or play it under a Helm. However, it certainly doesn't warrant maindeck slots. It's something you really want to hit first/second turn and never want to see again. So therefore, 4 is the number to run; that in and of itself causes you a dilemma. You want to bring these in for special matchups where diluting your maindeck is not as much of an issue, instead of handicapping yourself game one all the time. Seeing these game one when you need Rituals or Wishes for answers is less than stellar. I know you'll side them in A LOT, but would you rather keep ripping cantrips or topdeck a Defense Grid?

[Skullclamping]

I have a question to ask

what do you think of Plunge into Darkness? Is it better than Spoils?

I think it gives us more life control, what's good, but it doesn't give us a certain card, just something we can want
what do you think?

[Evil Roopey]

I have a question to ask

what do you think of Plunge into Darkness? Is it better than Spoils?

I think it gives us more life control, what's good, but it doesn't give us a certain card, just something we can want
what do you think?


I've thought about it, and if it cost 1 I'd probably be playing it. It's just the fact that 2 is a little too much mana to add to the spell, especially when you already have a tutor at 2. It just seems bad. I'll test it though.

[Ebinsugewa]

Plunge is acceptable in Belcher or other decks that are going balls-out for the W, but Nausea is more concerned with getting card parity and grinding down the opposition and then Tendrils to the face. We don't need 17 million tutor effects because the cantrips will find things in due time. It's very rare that you will kill yourself with Spoils if you pick a four-of in this deck, because it moves cards with Sleight or Eggs so quickly, and Nausea has many redundant cards that you should be able to use in your situation.

[Skullclamping]

right, it has many top-library moving effects (¿?) but we are using Night's Whisper, draw 2 for 2 life, why not try Plunge?
I tried it yesterday because I only own 3 Wishes, I cut a Spoils and played with 2 Plunges
I had more life control, seems that all my opponents were using Lightning Bolts, Gro, Burn, UR Fish...

[Ebinsugewa]

I don't see your point about Night's Whisper. It's not a tutor, it's a draw card that you can conveniently cast exactly off the mana from one Shadowblood Egg. Spoils and Plunge are tutor effects to get you a certain card. The selection that they provide is worth the life loss, where the card advantage is also worth it in Night's Whisper. But the difference is that Spoils will ALWAYS get you the card you need. If you pick an arbitrary number like 12 or something with Plunge, the card you're looking for could be in the top 5, and you just wasted 7 life for that card. Spoils has an inherent risk in that you may kill yourself, but it is more efficient in that it will never waste life after you find the card. Both remove cards from the game, so you can Wish for them, so they're roughly equivalent, but Spoils is much better. If you're using Spoils to make your hand good, you have to accept the probability that you may kill yourself because you had a subpar hand. If you're Spoils-ing turn three or four after using a lot of cantrips, you know how many of a certain card are left and there are fewer cards inbetween the card you're tutoring for, and the life loss is much less significant. You can play Plunge and Spoils as a personal preference, tell us how it works. But I have a feeling you'll realize that you'll often lose MORE life with Plunge than with Spoils in the long run.

[Daze]

To keep the thread alive...

I've played it today at aour local weekly tournament and went 4-2, 7th place.


I haven't been exspecting much because I don't really have got much knowlegde about Legacy nor about tournaments in general. My list was the same expect I had SB Duress instead of Cabal Therapy and Desperate Research as a filler because i couldn't get an Infernal Contract.

I didn't take any notes, but I'll try to summarize from memory the games as I hope it helps some1.


1st Game: Life

Bah, Life in T1.5? Ugly... 1st game I was fast enough (next round he would've had his combo going),
2nd game I saw a 2nd round Rule of Law (thanks to my Helm). I wished for Simplify and would've killed him next round, but he was abel to go off during is turn.
3rd game- I kill him fast enough.

2nd Game: W/R Rift

1st game I am fast enough.
2nd game he mulligans to 5 and I keep at 7 with only mana and a boarded DEfense Grid (I was afraid of Abeyance). We both don't do much, he Rifts me to 13, then I go off.

3rd Game: B Suicide/Zombies

1st game he gets 2 Wastelands which shuts me down for the rest of the game...
2nd game he Duresses twice but I am able to go off.
3rd game- i make a horrible playing mistake, I've been playing lots of spells and just need the Tendrils, i try Spoils with LED for Burining Wish, but as Í find it, my opponent counts the mana and we recognize that I would need one more mana to cast the Tendrils. I don't think I could have redone it; if I had known that I would've named Tendrils, of course. Guess what the 1st card I revealed was.... XD

4th Game: Sligh (Burn)

I kill him easily both times.

5th Game: Goblins

I start with playing Helm, he play Lacky, i start going off (and it looked really good for me) but suddenly the judge screams "repairings" -.-. I have to play against the same player, but of course my nice 2nd round kill is gone. I'm quite angry and play as bad as never before- i try a 1st round kill with Grant, Ritual, Helm, LED, 3 Cogs, sac LED to fire the cogs. The three cards I draw are land, LED, Helm. I had no reason not to wait one or two turns, so this was probably my worst playing mistake so far. He then finishes me off with some freaky red men.
2nd round he is lucky. REALLY lucky. I get Tendrils for 18 and then have another Tendrils, ******** and a Bayou left, next turn i draw Cabal Ritual, so I just need one freaking mana while I'm at 27 and he at 1 life. I get to draw 3 more cards until the 2 Piledrivers kick my ass.

6th Game: Angel Stompy

I killed both games on turn 3 without any disturbances (Rule of Law/Abeyance/Chant/Glowrider) by him, although the 2nd time I was at 6 life.


All in all, the deck has performed really nice altough i made some stupid mistakes. I never spoiled myself nor did I get tough matchups (not one single deck with FoW :D).

I am not sure if Promise of Power is that great, because even with 2 Helms it is almost the same as Infernal Contract. I don't see the point in playing Cabal Therapy over Duress SB. If you are afraid of multiple enchantments, try Revered Silence instead of Tranquility, it's much better.

Your worst enemy is the deck itself (you need skill like hell to get 1st place with it, and of course luck for things like Spoils). Then there are Wastelands, which can disruppt you badly and there are many decks playing them.
There is Rule of Law which takes some time to play around. There is Pyrostatic Pillar, also nasty and often deadly if you haven't already got the Wish in your hand. There is Glowrider, which can steal you enough time.
Ther is Trinisphere, which kills you (unless you get 3 mana, wish, again 3 mana for Echoing Ruin).

So far my experiences.

[Ebinsugewa]

One of us in Worcester will be playing it tomorrow, be it me, bane, or niknight. I hope we'll get a report together and up tomorrow night.

[Skullclamping]

If you afraid of multiple enchantments, try Revered Silence instead of Tranquility, it's much better.

Yes, I use it over Tranquility and Simplify

You must also try Doomsday, possibly over Regrowth
I have won many games with it, just with a Spoils in hand and a Helm in play or with a huge amount of mana, you can play 5 more spells
your library should be like this, depending on the board:
Whisper
Ritual
Whisper
Ritual
Tendrils

or a combination of that. If the first Whisper is in hand, use a Spoils between the last Ritual and Tendrils ;)

[clavio]

I just tested out the doomsday in the board. It works very well. You don't need spoils in your hand, you just need some eggs on the field. The only problem is, after losing half your life are you able to whisper twice? I still like it.

[niknight]

Since Ebinsugewa was nice enough to loan me Nausea, while I gave him Spring Tide, I guess the tourney report is mine.

Rnd 1 - Ebinsugewa playing Spring Tide

This is how much DCI reporter hate us, we've played round 1 of the last 4 tourneys we've been in.

Game 1 - He tries to combo on turn 3, fails and instead of discarding his hand, he scoops.

Game 2 & 3 - In midst of my combo, I Spoils myself to death twice. Once from 20, and the other from 18.

0-1, 1-2

Rnd 2 - William playing R/G madness

Game 1 - He drops first turn Rootwalla, 2nd turn Mongrel and 3rd turn Violent Eruption. I combo out on my turn 3.

Game 2 - He drops turn 2 Mongrel, pitches his hand which includes Anger. I combo out during my next turn (turn 2).

1-1, 3-2

Round 3 - Bane of the Living playing CAL

Great. I play someone who knows my deck better than I do, and can win the game simply by resolving 1 card.

Game 1 - I get the absolute nuts and combo out on turn 2.

Game 2 - He mulls to 5, and Gambles for Confinement. Being the bad player that I am, I can't capitolize on the 1 in 4 chance of pulling the Confinement out of his hand. I then proceed to topdeck Helm, and attempt to combo on turn 2. A couple of nice topdecks later, I tendrils for the win.... Better lucky than good.

2-1, 5-2

Round 4 - Jie playing 3 Color Control

Game 1 - He says the phrase that is music to my ears "I have 13 dead cards against you". He plays as though he has counter all the way, so I slow play him until I resolve the Wish for Therapy on turn 4. The game ends from there.

Game 2 - I have the absolute nuts in my opening hand. If he didn't Duress out my Burning Wish, I would have had the turn 1. He then proceeds to play a Mage for LED. On turn 3, he drops a morph. I then Spoils for Helm, which he Forces, ending that game.

Game 3 - He mages LED again... and I proceed to draw 3 of them. I mini combo for about 12 on turn 3, which buys me enough time to draw Xantid Swarm, followed by Cabal Rit and Burning Wish. I Wish for IGG, bringing back Cabal, Petal and Tendrils for the win.

3-1, 7-3

Round 5 - Stephen playing R/G/u Thresh (w/ no counters)

A threshold deck with no counters, this will be easy.

Game 1 - I waste no time, killing on turn 2.

Game 2 - I tendrils him for 14 on turn 3, and follow that with a Spoils naming Burning Wish. I have the mana available to get the other Tendrils and win, but I wind up Spoiling myself for 24 out of my 26 life. The last 2 are taken by a bolt. God I suck at this game.

Game 3 - I win on turn 4, fairly straightforward combo.

4-1, 9-4

Showing just how much I suck, my 4-1 record was good enough for 5th place in a tournament that cuts to top 4.

Kills -

Turn 1 - 0
Turn 2 - 4
Turn 3 - 1
Turn 4 - 2
Turn 5+ - 1
Spoiled to death - 3

It was a blast to play, and was more difficult than playing Solidarity (by a fairly wide margin)

edit: Just couldn't leave this out... after seeing the deck in action, one of the casual players scoping out the tournament scene suggested that I get a shirt with "I am a Bastard" in bold lettering.

[Daze]

Nice report, ty.
Some questions- die you Spoil for 4-offs?
How did the Xantid Swarms work for you?
Why is Cabal Therapy better than Duress?

;-)

[Skullclamping]

I use Grids instead of Swarms

and for teh Duress/Terapy, is just kind of luck
if you use Therapy, you can ake 2 cards or nothing, if you use Duress, you cant take a card leaving another one, but you will always take one...
i don't know what's better...

[niknight]

Swarm is really a meta call. Our field has regular Aluren,Enchantress, Survival; so everyones SB has artifact/enchantment hate. Plus, it plays into people's potential SB plans... why leave creature kill vs a deck that has no guys?

And to clarify on Therapy v Duress: both are in the board (with duress as a 4x, therapy as a single). In that situation, I was able to reduce my opponent's outs to 1 card, so I wanted to take all copies of it. If I were worried about multiple cards, I would have taken Duress.

One thing that I have found when playing these combo decks (Nausea, Sp. Tide, Solidarity) is that you must be able to read your opponent. It is as important (if not more so) to know what your opp has, than it is to know how to combo. I saw this in spades at Philly, as almost none of the combo players seemed to even care that they had an opponent, nevermind that their opponent telegraphed their disruption.

[Ebinsugewa]

Yeah, the fifth place was my fault. Niknight killed himself round one, (we basically traded decks, he was playing my/Bane's Nausea and I was playing his Spring Tide with splash) and I then proceeded to play the only two decks in the room with Wasteland in a row. I almost scooped to him anyways, just cause I would have 1) maybe gotten credit, and 2) put Nausea undefeated in the top 4 to probably win out. Shame I didn't but that's how it goes.

PS - There is never any non-basic hate in our meta, so we splashed, knowing that there was other combo in the room besides ours. So I basically ruined his tiebreakers.

PPS - We even showed the deck to one of the better ranked Eternal players in the room, and he was amazed at how stupidly good the deck was when we were showing him how to pilot it. He even said himself that the deck was scary as hell when you play Storm combo correctly.

[Rambo]

This is my first post so moderators feel free to delete it if it brakes the rules :wink:
I have been playing this deck quite a lot, and frankly I love it. I've been doing well for the most part but keep running into u/w/g threshold and always end up getting owned by it(mostly due to meddling mage). I was thinking that massacre might help for mages, and to help race angel stompy( Also a threat in my meta). As an added bonus, it is also wishable, so you can clear mages as you go off. More cabal therapies might help fend off the crazy amount of hate I usually face(just a thought). I also think with a tiny bit more tuning this can become a strong force in legacy. Long live nausea!:smile:
And what do you guys think about therpay and massacre?

[A Banana]

I would say Therapy deserves testing and Massacare sux. This is a combo deck, not a control one. Anyway, why are we scared of white? Meddline Mage is annoying, but hey, your a combo, we don't slow for stuff like that! No, Burning Wish should grab cards that speed the victory, or much more powerful removal than Massacare. But Therapy should be tested.

[Bane of the Living]

Massacre actually isnt that bad. Ive been testing alot of 'free' spells in the wish board. Massacre helps against meddling mage but thats about as far as it goes. Are you having a problem wishing for chain lightning or other removal?

[A Banana]

Another question: Why is this better than IGGy Pop? IGGy Pop placed higher in Lille. The way I see it, this deck is faster while IGGy Pop is more consistent and doesn't kill itself 15% of the time.

Please explain!

[Rambo]

I think that 1 massacre can be included (in the sideboard) in a u/w/g threshold heavy enviorment. Cabal therapy however, is good against all decks and needs more slots in the maindeck and/or sideboard. As for why this is better than iggy pop
1. it can go of a lot more consistantly on turn 1 and 2, which means it can speed out hate like pyrostatic pillar.
2. it can fight through counters better than iggy pop can
3. It can fight through hate more easily with a wishboard.
4. Its awsome to play:smile:

[Bane of the Living]

If you play Ill Gotten Gains and your opponent has a Force in their yard it really f*cks up your day. Not too mention Iggy relies on its graveyard to win. Tormods Crypt is already seeing very heavy play thanks to Thresh, that means you catch an additional 4 hate cards out of some random guys sideboard.

Iggy Pop is something caught off the grape vine, it's the Tendrils combo deck that people not on the source came up with. Most people still dont know Nausea even exists.

Oh and of course Nausea beats Iggy Pop.

[Rambo]

@bane: my thoughts exactly

What do you guys think about -1 sleight, -1 spoils ( once lost me 3 matches in one tourney:frown: ) -1 wooded foothills, +3 cabal therapy? something like that

[A Banana]

I would not run Cabal Therapy over Duress because you run no creatures. Making the flashback, and thus, card advantage, worthless. Maybe I was wrong on Massacare though. I guess I should test it.

[Ebinsugewa]

-1 wooded foothills

I hear being able to fetch any of the three lands you need is really bad. Don't cut fetches, please.

[Rambo]

I dont want to spam this thread, but why does everybody think this deck is dead?? Its not in the top two tiers as most people see it ( I personally think its better than salvage game which supposidly is) so it could maybe use some more improvement.

[Bane of the Living]

I really dont think this deck is better than Salvager Game. As far as Im concerned thats the best combo deck in the format. Salvager has 8 1cc spells to be used as disruption and anti disruption measures. It also has much more consistancy. Salvager Games has been putting up wins in alot of major events. Where is Nausea? Can the deck really play through 8 rounds of an unknown meta?

There are many more hate cards Nausea can't play through unless using wish, which slows the deck considerably.

Infact the past two times Nausea was played at my store it scrubbed out really bad. It was played by less experienced Nausea players but it seemed the problem came from consistancy issues. Nights Whisper would draw into 2 Helms, or Rituals would be no where in sight. I really do miss Chrome Mox in this deck, and sometimes Meditate as well. Meditate still works well with LED if you hand is nearly empty when playing it. I think I might add it back to the deck. I feel like I need something that draws more than 2 cards.

[Evil Roopey]

I really dont think this deck is better than Salvager Game. As far as Im concerned thats the best combo deck in the format. Salvager has 8 1cc spells to be used as disruption and anti disruption measures. It also has much more consistancy. Salvager Games has been putting up wins in alot of major events. Where is Nausea? Can the deck really play through 8 rounds of an unknown meta?

There are many more hate cards Nausea can't play through unless using wish, which slows the deck considerably.

Infact the past two times Nausea was played at my store it scrubbed out really bad. It was played by less experienced Nausea players but it seemed the problem came from consistancy issues. Nights Whisper would draw into 2 Helms, or Rituals would be no where in sight. I really do miss Chrome Mox in this deck, and sometimes Meditate as well. Meditate still works well with LED if you hand is nearly empty when playing it. I think I might add it back to the deck. I feel like I need something that draws more than 2 cards.

Salvagers loses to StP, Pithing Needle, Force of Will, and many many other cards. Sure it has ways of getting around those cards, but more often then not it will lose to one. You see Nausea has a way of getting around hate as well and that is outracing it.

The real reason Nausea is dead is because (sorry for tuting my own horn here) I have yet to see a compotant player with the deck other than myself. I know it sounds harsh, but this deck is extremely hard to play and if you don't spends months and months and months working on improving your skills with the deck, you will lose. It's that simple.

If Solidarity is the hardest deck in the format to play, this deck is impossible to play. It all really comes down to the fact that most Legacy players suck, and you will notice that most of the good ones play other formats as well.

Now the reason I don't play the deck anymore is because after a good 8 months or so of only playing the deck, it got boring. I'm one of those players that tries to improve the format, and I know for a fact that Nausea will never do that because it is to hard to play, so I moved on.

Roop

[AnwarA101]

The real reason Nausea is dead is because (sorry for tuting my own horn here) I have yet to see a compotant player with the deck other than myself. I know it sounds harsh, but this deck is extremely hard to play and if you don't spends months and months and months working on improving your skills with the deck, you will lose. It's that simple.


I think that most decks that are "really hard to play" are just bad decks for the most part. You can claim a deck is really hard to play, but that is not an excuse for the deck never making a Top8 if it was a really good deck.



If Solidarity is the hardest deck in the format to play, this deck is impossible to play. It all really comes down to the fact that most Legacy players suck, and you will notice that most of the good ones play other formats as well.


Its overrated how hard Solidarity is to play. Sure playing around hate is difficult but many times it just comes down to manipulating the stack or just having more threats than your opponent has counterspells.

I think insulting Legacy players is just a way to shield the fact that this deck isn't probably as good as you claim it to be.



Now the reason I don't play the deck anymore is because after a good 8 months or so of only playing the deck, it got boring. I'm one of those players that tries to improve the format, and I know for a fact that Nausea will never do that because it is to hard to play, so I moved on.

Roop

Good to know you moved on to better decks.

[Evil Roopey]

I think that most decks that are "really hard to play" are just bad decks for the most part. You can claim a deck is really hard to play, but that is not an excuse for the deck never making a Top8 if it was a really good deck.

I don't remember a time that I played Nausea at the Frog and didn't make Top2.



Good to know you moved on to better decks.

Cool, now when are you going to?

[calosso]

I don't remember a time that I played Nausea at the Frog and didn't make Top2.




Cool, now when are you going to?


Even if you only played nausea 4 or 5 times. Also you never had to play against solidarity evertime you play at the frog.

[Evil Roopey]

Even if you only played nausea 4 or 5 times. Also you never had to play against solidarity evertime you play at the frog.

Yeah I have. In one finals I faced against Dave and beat him then I faced Anwar in yet another one and lost to him. So that ended up around 50/50, but according to testing that Dave and I did a long time ago the match is in Nausea's favor because it can go off much faster than Solidarity. Both decks have improved since than, but I doubt the match has changed all that much.

Roop

[Skullclamping]

Nights Whisper would draw into 2 Helms...

I played in a 51 people tournament last weekend, and I won 4 out of 6 games (1 point to top8), and the main problem I had was the bad topdecking, drawing 4 lands + Land Grant + Petal/LED or similar 2 times or more

I think the deck is good, but I think it needs a '*spark*'

[Bane of the Living]

Well Roop I'd like to think Im one of the better Nausea players besides you. Ive been playing the deck since you posted it. I also played Vintage before I started Legacy, the only deck I played was Long Death. And let me tell you, Nausea has nothing on that deck in terms of 'hard to play'. LongDeath has so many more choices, and its so much more unforgiving.

As far as Salvagers Game being a better combo deck, I truely think it is. Nausea gets faster more reliant kills, but it doesnt put the consistancy it needs through 10 rounds of play. Salvagers is showing me numbers.

[Rambo]

Problem salvagers get f*cked up by sideboards that go like this
4 meddlin mage
4 pimping needle
4 Tormods screwer

[Bane of the Living]

Well Needle and Crypt can be answered by Living Wish and Pernicious Deed. Meddling Mage can be handled by Deed, Innocent Blood, and Living Wish.

Nausea's problem is it needs to play Burning Wish to find answers to hate. Wish is what my smarter opponents name with their mage, then counter a key spell to stop me from comboing.

[Rambo]

Nausea is still more resilient. While you are wishing and deeding and such, they can be beating you down. Nausea can even outrace meddling mage, but some tweaks still need to be ma.(i think)

[Bane of the Living]

Who's going to be beating me down when Deed does its job??

For Nausea to outrace a Mage it needs to go for a turn 2 kill if it was on the play. To do that you cant play around Daze at all. At least from my exp. You also lead blindly into FoW. Thresh that packs Mage maindeck is a nightmare for any combo deck, so I really think its pointless to cry about it.

Let me also add that Tendrils combo is a bit more known than Salvager Game especially thanks to Iggy. Opponents playing Cabal Therapy and Meddling Mage will know turn one if your trying to pull off any 10 spell nonsense to win. Land Grant also puts you at a large opening for the aformentioned. Many players wont know what Salvager Game is from turns 1-3 until it combos off. Maindecked Mages often name jank like H Spector or Vindicate against me. That gives me a big advantage game one. When my opponents see me combo off they bring in Needles to stop Salvager. I bring in an 11/11 indestructable killing machine.

Nausea doesnt have that cool little trick going for it.

[Rambo]

Well, it depends on how many deeds you are running. I personally would run 2-3 seeing(and one in the board) seeing how much hate I face.:frown:

[Zir]

New card from Dissention:
Infernal Tutor - 1B
Reveal a card in your hand. Search your library for a card with the same name as the revealed card and put it into your hand. Shuffle your library.
Hellbent - If you have no cards in your hand, search your library for a card and put it into your hand. Shuffle your library.

Could this have a place in Nausea?

[Bane of the Living]

Wow, I would say so. I wonder if said spoilers are correct with all the issues they had with elf.

Looks like some more LED synergy to me.

[Hoojo]

Just wanted to say that I have played Nausea in its current incarnation as well as its past since this thread started. I don't play it at every tournament around here, but I have played it in several, and it does well.

As Roop said, the deck, while good, isn't great, and will be difficult to make great. I play it because it is the only solid Tendrils combo deck I've seen.

Salvagers is good, but I think Nausea is faster. I have played Salvagers twice and won both times in our tiny meta. I've never played Solidarity; nobody does around here, so I cannot comment on this matchup.

I still keep the deck together, but I have also moved on to other decks. I just wanted to give props to the best Tendrils deck in Legacy.

[Ebinsugewa]

I'm actually in the process of taking it apart, I just can't handle the inconsistencies anymore. Now, if that tutor were a) to see play in un-neutered form, and b) if Nausea were to play blue again, that would be savage. Tutor -> crack LED -> Meditate for four new cards is a deal I'd do more than once. Or find Tendrils FTW with Helm and LED.

I think this card might be the kick in the junk Nausea really needed, if it stays intact.

[Evil Roopey]

Makes me sad to see all the loyal followers of Nausea go, but it's probably for the best.

Good-bye silly Tendrils deck, we barely knew thee.

[Bane of the Living]

Well Roopey no use cryin over spilt milk. You did give us a combo deck faster than Solidarity and more consistant than Belcher. This deck isn't dead at all, Im sure the new tutor will prove usefull, not to mention that whenever any good draw spell/tutor/free mana comes out Nausea will improve till the day Tendrils gets the axe.

[Ebinsugewa]

The deck will only be dead when there's a better combo deck. However, playing the deck for a solid three months and still losing is a savage barrier to entry. I think that overhauling the deck should not be out of the question, i.e. removing Burning Wish, or going back to Chrome Mox or what have you.

[Rambo]

Dang, its hard to see everybody abandon my favorite deck. But infernal tutor may change all of that. Burning wish + LED + Infernal tutor (Props to wizards for printing an awesome combo card) will be dead awsome/broken. Also what do you guys think about running a sole belcher incase someone mages tendli

[Koby]

LED + Burning Wish can get Tendrils, why would you get Infernal Tutor? You would need at least 1-2 more mana to grab the maindeck Tendril of Agony.

Infernal Tutor could easily be put in the maindeck. Tutoring a 2nd or 3rd LED (using the non-hellbent ability) or extra Rituals is definitly a good play while setting up or mid-combo.

About the Belcher/Meddling Mage: There is a Firebolt in the SB for this reason. Burning Wish -> Firebolt -> Tendrils.

------
I've played the old list (pre-Burning Wish), and the new list, and I have to say it really is tough to pull out of situations where you need to activate LED for mana, but your only out is Burning Wish which you can't cast. It seems that the older list was much easier to not stall in this situation. With the addition of LED, it also make the deck seem so similiar to IGGY-pop, since IGG is almost always my Burning Wish target.

Burning Wish just adds a bit more flexibility at this moment, yet I feel that Infernal Tutor and perhaps even maindeck Ill-Gotten Gains will make the deck more consistent. Also, reducing the amount of colors in the deck helps. I always wish the Tropical Island was a Bayou or an Underground Sea.

4 LED
4 Infernal Tutor
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Helm of Awakening
4 Night's Whisper
4 Lotus Petal
3 Spoils of the Vault
4 Tendrils of Agony
4 Land Grant
3 Ambition's Cost// Infernal Contract
3 Ill-Gotten Gains
4 Chromatic Sphere
4 Darkwater Egg
3 Bayou
4 City of Traitors

With this setup, Ill-Gotten Gains enables you to abuse Infernal Tutor:

Make some mana with Rituals, cast Ill-Gotten Gains, discarding Infernal Tutor. Target Infernal Tutor, Rituals. Cast Rituals grab Tendrils of Agony. Or it you're lacking storm, Infernal Tutor for Infernal Tutor for Inferal Tutor for Tendrils.

[noobslayer]

I just did a little testing with my own list that I threw together (definetly not optimal). Ill-gotten gains is amazing. The deck definetly gets much more of an IGGy pop feel, but you can still use many of the old elements from Nausea. My list used blue and black, mostly because Lim-Dul's vault is amazing, but I think red is still a strong option.

Hello Infernal Tutor. Btw, grab them quick.

[Evil Roopey]

How has testing with Infernal Tutor gone with Nausea? I haven't got around to it yet, but will be very soon. Looks powerful, maybe I said goodbye to soon.

[Bane of the Living]

Ive been playing IT in belcher with pretty good results. Im sure it would do just as good here, if not then better. Pick it up and try roop.

[GreenOne]

I searched for a decklist from page 7 to 13 and didn't find it..
Can anyone post me the current list for Nausea?

Really thanks.

[Lukas Preuss]

I searched for a decklist from page 7 to 13 and didn't find it..
Can anyone post me the current list for Nausea?

Really thanks.

As far as I know, the list in the opening post is always the current one. Roopey keeps it up to date.

[MasterBlaster]

I was looking through Antiquities cards and I think I found something that might find a home in Nausea.

Drafna's Restoration U
Sorcery
Return any number of target artifact cards from target player’s graveyard to the top of his or her library in any order.

Stacking the top of your library with eggs and chromatic spheres might be good. It might at least be a good Burning Wish target if nothing else.

[PunkRocker1134]

With Helm of Awakening I can see that being useful, but without it seems totatlly worthless. I think this deck needs a way to be less reliant on Helm not more.

[SillyMetalGAT]

Just to let everyone in, I tested with Infenal Tutor. You know how you love to draw Burning Wish? Well, consider Infernal Tutor your Burning Wish 5-8, BUT FOR ANY CARD IN THE DECK! It serves the SAME purpose, except you can get any card in the deck. This leaves the opportunity for possible 1-ofs?