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bjholmes3
12-02-2013, 09:34 PM
http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5484/11199316566_872de4a4a2_o.jpg

Ad Nauseam Tendrils
Last updated 02/11/2018


NOTE: The old ANT thread can be found here (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?11184-Deck-ANT-(Ad-Nauseam-Tendrils)).


Table of Contents

I. What is the deck?
II. What does the deck look like?
III. How do I play the deck?
IV. What do the cards do?
V. What do my matchups look like?
VI. FAQs
VII. Useful Links

I. What is the deck?

Ad Nauseam Tendrils is a combo deck that focuses on leveraging the storm (https://mtg.gamepedia.com/Storm) mechanic to cast a game-winning Tendrils of Agony. This is made possible by the combination of powerful ritual effects, excellent tutors, powerful Storm-generating engines, and a discard suite for protection, all of which will be discussed in upcoming sections. This deck is strong and consistent, and has been placing in big tournaments for years. If you want a strong combo deck that has a long history of success, this is the deck for you.


II. What does the deck look like?

Here is a sample build of the deck and a great starting point for new players. To keep up with the latest played builds and newest tech, check this link (https://www.mtggoldfish.com/archetype/legacy-storm-24413#paper).

4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
4 Brainstorm
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Dark Ritual
1 Rain of Filth
1 Ad Nauseam
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Polluted Delta
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
1 Swamp
2 Island
3 Duress
3 Cabal Therapy
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Ponder
2 Preordain
4 Infernal Tutor
1 Dark Petition
1 Past in Flames
1 Empty the Warrens
1 Tendrils of Agony

3 Chrome Mox
2 Chain of Vapor
2 Echoing Truth
2 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Wipe Away
2 Fatal Push
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Cabal Therapy
1 Thoughtseize


III. How do I play the deck?

ANT typically wins on turn 3-4, with occasional turn 2 wins and rare turn 1 wins. This means that for the first few turns of the game, you want to be digging for your combo pieces with your cantrips and disrupting your opponent with discard. When you have your pieces and the coast is clear, you will start to cast ritual effects, draw spells, and storm engines until you have amassed adequate storm count to finish them off with Tendrils of Agony. The biggest obstacle to learning storm combo is learning how and when to combo off. Failing to learn this will cause you to keep bad hands, to get hated out by the opponent, to fizzle, or to wait longer than you should. Therefore, outlined below are some simple combo routes to get you started. Be sure to read the Cards section below for more in-depth info on when and how each card should be used. Let it be said, however, that the best way to learn is to watch skilled pilots play the deck, and to goldfish it yourself. Practice, practice, practice!

Legend


#StormCount CardName(ManaFloating)(Notes)
All examples assume player has out 1 Swamp, 1 Island, and 1 Underground Sea
All examples assume player has 5 cards in grave, with 2 fetches and 3 draw/discard



Past in Flames Engine


1 Gitaxian Probe(Opponent has no disruption)
2 Lion's Eye Diamond
3 Dark Ritual(BBB)
4 Cabal Ritual(BBBBBB)(Threshold)
5 Infernal Tutor -> Crack Lion's Eye Diamond(BBBBRRR)(LED for Red, Tutor for Past in Flames)
6 Past in Flames(BBB)
7 Cabal Ritual(BBBBBB)(Flashback)
8 Dark Ritual(BBBBBBBB)(Flashback)
9 Infernal Tutor(BBBBBB)(Flashback, Tutor for Tendrils of Agony)
10 Tendrils of Agony(BB)(20 damage)



Tutor Chain Engine


1 Gitaxian Probe(Opponent has castable Force of Will)
2 Cabal Therapy(Naming Force of Will)
3 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
5 Dark Ritual(BBB)
6 Cabal Ritual(BBBBBB)
7 Infernal Tutor -> Crack both Lion's Eye Diamond(BBBBBBBBBB)(LEDs for Black, Tutor for another Tutor)
8 Infernal Tutor(BBBBBBBB)(Tutor for another Tutor)
9 Infernal Tutor(BBBBBB)(Tutor for Tendrils of Agony)
10 Tendrils of Agony(BB)(20 damage)



IV. What do the cards do?


Cantrips


Brainstorm, run 4 - Instant speed cantrip with many uses. Cast in response to discard to hide away valuable cards. Cast in coordination with shuffle/scry effects from Fetches, Tutors, and (worst-case scenario) other cantrips to sculpt a new hand. This card has many uses, and one defining element of a good Legacy player is proper use of the card. Casting Brainstorm without any of its enablers is not getting full value of it, and should only be done in a pinch or if the extra power is not necessary.
Gitaxian Probe, run 4 - 0 mana cantrip which gives us information on the opponent's hand. Useful for determining when it is safe to combo and also allows us to get more value out of Cabal Therapy.
Ponder, run 4 - A strong cantrip which, much like Brainstorm, becomes much stronger in coordination with shuffle effects which allow you to take however many of the 3 you wish and shuffle away the rest. Don't be afraid to shuffle if the cards are not exactly what you need.
Preordain, run 0-2 - Our weakest cantrip. Can be used to be rid of leftover cards from Brainstorm/Ponder in a pinch. Generally the first card to cut when sideboarding or trying new tech.


Discard


Cabal Therapy, run 3-4 - Very strong discard which demands knowledge of opponent's deck to use properly. If you are not confident naming something blindly, don't be afraid to save it until you can Duress or Probe your opponent to make an informed decision. With appropriate preparation, this card gets rid of everything that threatens us. See FAQ section below for more information on what to name.
Duress, run 2-4 - Great against combo and control, useless against creature decks. Very effective way to get rid of key enemy cards easily without threatening our life total like Thoughtseize does, and easily sided out in creature-based matchups like D&T. You generally want 6 discard, so balance the numbers on this out with your Cabal Therapy.
Thoughtseize, run 0-1 - Useful in that it gets rid of everything that is threatening to us, but the life cost is relevant. If you main Ad Nauseam, you should not main this card. Otherwise, 1 is worth considering.


Mana Acceleration


Lotus Petal, run 4 - Free storm, free mana, good card.
Lion's Eye Diamond, run 4 - Free Storm and mana if you use it right. Obviously you can't go casting cards in your hand with LED, but there are some tricks of the trade. Note, however, that as of 2010 I believe you can't carry mana over from the upkeep to the draw step. So, if you're reading info from before then, don't be tempted by those shenanigans. So, to make the most out of this, keep the following tricks in mind. For one, this card works extremely well with Infernal Tutor. Most of the time you crack a LED, it will be for that interaction. This is sometimes a source of confusion, so pay attention. You cast LED and pass priority (assume it resolves). Then, you cast Infernal Tutor and crack LED in response without asking your opponent "k?". If you ask for a response to IT before cracking LED, they can just say "k" and suddenly you can't crack LED anymore until IT does its thing. Other benefits of doing the above listed procedure is that it makes your LED safe from Instant-speed permanent removal. Your opponent never has priority while LED is a permanent, so cards like Abrupt Decay are useless. If you have Past in Flames in hand or in the bin, this card can help you cast it easily. When you cast Ad Nauseam with these out, think about your goals. If you have enough mana floating to reasonably win the game with the cards you draw, keep your LEDs in case you get lots of lands with your Tutors. Otherwise, crack them so you have enough mana to at least set yourself up with an awesome hand and a clear field for next turn. Also, these empower your Cabal Rituals. Cast Tutor, respond with CRit, then crack LED to reach Threshold for tons of mana.
Dark Ritual, run 4 - 1 mana for 3 mana. Instant speed is relevant, can be used in response to taxing counters like Spell Pierce to pay for them.
Cabal Ritual, run 4 - Again, don't forget this card is an Instant. You can cast it in response to taxing counters to surprise your opponent. Before threshold this card is meh, but given the nature of this deck, we are likely to reach Threshold by the time we cast this card. After Threshold, this card provides massive mana acceleration.
Rain of Filth, run 0-1 - Essentially another ritual with the drawback of losing your lands. On the victory turn this is free mana and Threshold count, but if you do not win losing land is a major setback. Use with caution.

Business


Ad Nauseam, run 0-1 - Ah, the namesake of the deck. Do keep in mind, however, that this card is not your primary or even your secondary route to victory (those are Tutor Chaining and PiF "loops", respectively). You use this if you need to pull a win out of nowhere, which it can and will do for you, or if you only need a couple cards and know this will get them for you. Never get too greedy with this card. Don't go down to 3 if the opponent has a Mountain untapped. Don't take any more cards once you hit 4 life unless you must. Just be wary of what your opponent can do to you when you cast this. Also, don't forget it's an Instant, meaning that you can cast it EoT on your opponent's turn to set up your combo turn, or in response to something that your opponent casts that would otherwise screw you over.
Infernal Tutor, run 4 - Interacts nicely with Lion's Eye Diamond to reach Hellbent. See the combo routes in the above section to see what to fetch and what to crack LED for. Remember, this card can fail to find things if you use its first ability, which is helpful if you have a hand with 2 Tutors and not enough mana for a full chain. You can use this early to fetch up more acceleration to combo off, if needed. Also, if your opponent hits you with discard, this is what they usually will (and should) get first. For the love of all that is holy, don't let this get Surgical Extraction'd. Use Brainstorm to protect this card, as it is extremely valuable.
Past in Flames, run 1-2 - Fabulous card. This makes comboing out much easier. See the above combo routes section for more info on how to use this card. Beware, of course, that this card means that opposing grave hate actually becomes relevant, so be ready to play through or around that. Also, when you're Flashbacking everything, keep in mind to cast Cabal Ritual again while you still have Threshold, and to use your tutors before you Flashback cantrips.
Dark Petition, run 0-2 - Expensive 5 mana cost up-front, but upon resolution is only a net loss of 2 mana for any card in your deck. Devastating if this card is countered or if your grave is nuked, but if you can afford the mana cost and fulfill the Spell Mastery condition, this is more effective than your other tutors.
Tendrils of Agony, run 1-3 - Our wincon, and the ugliest card in our deck (unless you have the FNM promo version, of course). When casting this card, keep in mind how the opponent can interact with it. Countermagic will only counter one of the many copies of this card, but that also means that you need more Storm to kill them. Also, the opponent can do tricky things like Swords to Plowshares-ing their own dudes. Be vigilant and prepared. Also, while this card is pretty resilient to countermagic, it is still vulnerable to the likes of Flusterstorm and Mindbreak Trap, so be sure to get rid of that stuff. Also, do not forget, the Storm trigger can be Stifle'd. Grinding Station lists run more than one, otherwise run a singleton.


Common Sideboard Options


Ad Nauseam - Decks which do not run this card main should include it in the side to give the deck more speed against matchups where that is needed.
Extirpate, Surgical Extraction - In coordination with discard, this card is absolutely devastating, particularly against combo decks. Extirpate is more effective against control and counters, but is more restrictive. Surgical Extraction is much more flexible, but is easier to deal with. Consider running 1-2 in combo (particularly Show & Tell) or control heavy metas.
Xantid Swarm - A resolved Swarm is backbreaking against counter-heavy decks without removal. It also serves as a body to Flashback Cabal Therapy. Against any blue meta, you should always have 2 of these.
Carpet of Flowers - Another anti-blue card which shines in Delver matchups. Provides lots of mana in both main phases to power through their taxing counters while avoiding their removal. If you're meta is Delver heavy, consider 2-3 of these.
Abrupt Decay - Kills most hatebears and artifacts, and simply gets rid of problem permanents. Incredibly useful, and completely changes several matchups for the better.
Chain of Vapor - Compared to Abrupt Decay, this is cheaper, on color, and hits more things, like Leyline of Sanctity, at the cost of being counterable. Bouncing instead of destruction usually isn't a problem, as you'll tend to cast this when your opponent will not be receiving another turn to recast their beloved permanent. Also, you can be tricky with this. Bounce your own free Artifacts, sac your tapped lands, and then get your opponent's stuff. This provides you with more free storm and potential artifact protection. Don't forget this is an instant, you can cast this EoT before combo turn or in response to lethal. You should always have 2-3 of these.
Empty the Warrens - This is your alternate win-con. This is where the sideboarding metagame really comes into play. On the one hand, much of the hate for Tendrils is blanked by this card (e.g. Leyline of Sanctity), and you can go off both earlier and with lower Storm counts (12-14 goblins is usually adequate), but on the other hand, these tokens will die if you breathe on them too hard, and Batterskull will ruin your day. Typically, though, your average opponent won't go creature hate on you, so this is a useful thing to throw into your deck post-board to deal with the hate you anticipate for your opponent to bring in. Furthermore, this allows you full value from your Therapies, so that will help keep you safe. If you don't have one in your main, you should have one in your side.
Tendrils of Agony - An extra Tendrils is included in some sideboards to add even more resilience to the deck and to improve the control matchup and matchups with discard and grave hate (minus Extirpate and Surgical Extraction). Consider running 1 against slow, grindy metas.



V. What do my matchups look like?


Caleb Scherer has kept up an amazing blog in which he has detailed his list modifications, matchup notes, and sideboard strategies, which can be found here (https://adventuringgear.wordpress.com/). I would highly encourage you visit it and take a look!


VI. FAQs


Why do we play Ad Nauseam with so many high CMC cards?

Dark Petition is a common 2-of in many lists these days, which certainly appears to be a non-bo with Ad Nauseam. Before I go any further, I need to make it clear that yes, there will be games where you flip 2 Petitions and just die. I also need to point out, however, that the risk has proven to be worth it. Dark Petition is a very powerful tutor. If you can put together the mana to cast it after Ad Nauseam, you are very likely to find a route to victory, whereas its counterpart Infernal Tutor almost requires LED to perform the same function. Therefore, while Petition will zap you for more, it will also on average allow you to get away with smaller, aka less risky, Ad Nauseam piles.


What do I name with Cabal Therapy against an unknown opponent?

A lot of the decision making with Cabal Therapy comes from knowing what your opponent is playing. However, sometimes you just don't know, and in those situations using your Therapies properly can be tricky. In many cases, it is advisable to hold on to discard until you are ready to go off against an unknown deck. That said, there are also cases where you might be encouraged to use them early, for instance hands with multiple Therapies or which will not have the ability to cast discard on the combo turn. In these situations it can be advisable to just play the numbers game and name some of the most common cards in Legacy: Force of Will and Brainstorm. If I have multiple discard in hand, I like to name Brainstorm, as it leaves the opponent with less of an ability to sculpt their hand and play around future discards. If I'm casting it early because of mana restraints in a turn 1 Therapy turn 2 combo situation, I'll name Force of Will. Again though, try to remember that if you can wait to cast the card against an unknown opponent, you probably should so you can get a better idea of what to name.


VII. Useful Links

Old ANT thread (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?11184-Deck-ANT-(Ad-Nauseam-Tendrils)), lots of useful discussion to read through here
Examining Variance (http://articles.mtgcardmarket.com/examining-variance-in-tcgs/), article by Jeff Hoogland
Storm Training Regimen (http://www.starcitygames.com/article/26673_Storm-Training-Regimen.html), article by Carsten Kotter
Storm Boarding (http://www.starcitygames.com/article/29060_Stormboarding.html), article by Carsten Kotter
The Legacy Laser (http://www.eternalcentral.com/the-legacy-laser-ubr-ad-nauseam-tendrils/), article by Timo Schunemann
How to Convince Your Opponent to Hand You the Game (http://www.channelfireball.com/articles/how-to-convince-your-opponent-to-hand-you-the-game/), article by Paulo Vitor Damo da Rosa
Bluffing (http://www.channelfireball.com/articles/bluffing/), article by Jacob Wilson
The Art of Sideboarding (http://www.starcitygames.com/article/29970_The-Art-Of-Sideboarding.html), article by Sam Black
Legacy Storm Primer (http://www.starcitygames.com/article/25829_Legacy-Storm-Primer.html), article by Adam Prosak
The Epic Storm (http://www.theepicstorm.com/), website by Bryant Cook
The Storm Box (https://theweeklywars.wordpress.com/2015/04/29/the-storm-box/), article by Jonathan Alexander

How to Beat Storm (https://youtu.be/dQw4w9WgXcQ), video for people looking to, well, beat our deck
The Weather Channel (http://www.weather.com/), so you can have more Storm knowledge than anyone else

vercadium
12-03-2013, 06:15 AM
Great job on the new thread - much more befitting such an established and popular deck.

Machahiko
12-03-2013, 06:30 AM
Thank you, I think that having a "what to sideboard out" guide would be appreciated as well. I would love to hear what people like to side out in specific matchups since it hasn't been a problem to bring stuff in, but take stuff out.

Zombie
12-03-2013, 08:09 AM
I think you overrate the Elves matchup. Elves is about as fast as ANT, IMO - the difference G1 is that in ANT that fundamental turn includes discard, in Elves it doesn't. G1 is obviously horrible as a result. G2/G3 depends a lot on who wins the die roll, obviously, and on what Elves can bring in. Mindbreak Trap is a bad card against a smart ANT player IMO, which is why many people run Thorns/Thalia. The fundamental turn can increase a lot with Ruric Thar - T2 NO isn't usually done G1 because the Hoof isn't lethal, but Ruric is vs. Storm. Furthermore, Gaddock Teeg is a possibility, turning GSZ=2 into something nasty. The typical MO is boarding out Symbiotes and Visionaries, basically turning into a prison-combo deck. You pull enough fast kills and highly disruptive hands with that that the postboard matchup is pretty even, IMHO. Still overall in your favour.

Fatal
12-03-2013, 08:51 AM
Missing informations:
- Dark Confidant and Cabal Therapy interaction
- Grim Tutor over Burning Wish in Past in Flames perspective

MU / SB in Mirror

I agree that Elves are very favorable only G1, G2/G3 is much harder.

bjholmes3
12-03-2013, 10:56 AM
Updated card sections on Burning Wish, Grim Tutor, Empty the Warrens, and Bob. Also, reworded the Elves! matchup to make it seem less exaggerated. :)

Zombie
12-03-2013, 01:21 PM
Also Wirewood Symbiote is poor against Storm and usually 2-3 get sided out as a result. Creature-wise, what you're afraid of are mana dorks and Quirion Ranger, and to some extent Heritage Druid, because those are what enable T2 NO =>win.

Sloshthedark
12-03-2013, 01:35 PM
btw. Where is the old thread? Should be a link in the OP...

Koby
12-03-2013, 01:38 PM
Link to the archived thread can be found here (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?11184-Deck-ANT-(Ad-Nauseam-Tendrils)).

bjholmes3
12-03-2013, 03:02 PM
I made a video to expand on the How to Play section. Is it helpful?

http://youtu.be/F9o7oj03xIo

Side note: I uploaded the wrong video, lol, where I cut the last few minutes. Only up to 9:55 is good. Really, though, I just want to know if the idea of the video is good or not, so I can make a better one.

Patrunkenphat7
12-03-2013, 03:22 PM
I made a video to expand on the How to Play section. Is it helpful?

http://youtu.be/F9o7oj03xIo

Side note: I uploaded the wrong video, lol, where I cut the last few minutes. Only up to 9:55 is good. Really, though, I just want to know if the idea of the video is good or not, so I can make a better one.

Haven't watched more than the one game, but why didn't you just win at 1:30 after you Pondered into the Probe/Tutor? You had the win and passing the turn is much worse there.

Edit: Watched game 2. I also don't understand why you didn't take Probe off Ponder (keeping PiF as next card) and cast it and just win on turn 2 instead of passing turn for no reason.

lawlz @ the ragequit punt game 4…

So I'm being tough on you… But yes, videos would be cool if done well. Don't rush through them like LSV and make a bunch of mistakes. It is OK to take your time and talk through each little play.

practical joke
12-03-2013, 03:58 PM
Good job at cleaning the thread a bit.

Will keep a bit of activity to assist with information as well when I've got some free time

bjholmes3
12-03-2013, 04:02 PM
Haven't watched more than the one game, but why didn't you just win at 1:30 after you Pondered into the Probe/Tutor? You had the win and passing the turn is much worse there.

Edit: Watched game 2. I also don't understand why you didn't take Probe off Ponder (keeping PiF as next card) and cast it and just win on turn 2 instead of passing turn for no reason.

lawlz @ the ragequit punt game 4…

So I'm being tough on you… But yes, videos would be cool if done well. Don't rush through them like LSV and make a bunch of mistakes. It is OK to take your time and talk through each little play.

I was a little tilted, lol. I got spammed when I downloaded HyperCam (evidently CNet isn't as good as I thought), and my computer was freaking out before I fixed it. Then, I had to rerecord, like, 10 times, mostly because of mana flood. It was horrible, one I drew land every turn, and every cantrip revealed all lands the whole game. So this is the kind of thing that would be helpful? If so, I can spend more time on it and make it legit.

Also, uploads to YouTube take FOREVER. I had no idea.

phazonmutant
12-03-2013, 07:39 PM
That Tendrils art is so gross. Wow. It looks better on the card.

Good job on the primer!

bjholmes3
12-03-2013, 09:15 PM
Made a new video, this one was much better. Make sure to leave feedback. It'll be up in a few hours at this address:

http://youtu.be/3gc7MgK3vd8

EDIT: Video is up! Enjoy, I made a small mistake, but I annotated it to fix it up. Also, I made a small change to the op, see if you can find it.

phazonmutant
12-04-2013, 02:15 AM
Made a new video, this one was much better. Make sure to leave feedback. It'll be up in a few hours at this address:

http://youtu.be/3gc7MgK3vd8

EDIT: Video is up! Enjoy, I made a small mistake, but I annotated it to fix it up. Also, I made a small change to the op, see if you can find it.

Lol. Love it. I hope you didn't take down the Tendrils art for little old me.

Dia_Bot
12-04-2013, 02:29 AM
Nice video bjholmes! I like it and I think it will be very usefull for people picking up the deck!

Some small pointers though:

1st game second turn
you had the "kill" in hand before you drew LED with the probe. Maybe you could point out that if he didn't have any countermagic you could AN with a landdrop left to make at this point.
2nd game second turn
I think you should have waited with playing the swamp before playing brainstorm. You never know if your going to draw a fetch with the BS
You also could have comboed out after the BS: putting back infernal + AN. Play petal, ritual, LED. Play ponder resp saccing LED and play AN with one mana floating and a tutor on top.
(I know AN sucks in this deck :tongue: and it might be better to wait but it might be usefull to point the possible wins sequences out to newer players)
2nd game third turn
when you go off you might want to point out that against a real life opponent you always want to play your LED last (you don't want to lose it to an abrupt decay or sth in response to the dark rit)
5th game second turn
It's better to play the preordain before you start the ritual sequence. If by any chance the top 3 cards would be lands or uncastable cards you wouldn't have been able to empty your hand for the inf tutor and would have lost your tutors. This didn't happen ofcourse but still :wink:

Hope some of these comments are usefull.
And again, great job on all the work!
EDIT: you pointed out the 2nd game 2nd turn win after the game. My bad!:rolleyes:

Machahiko
12-04-2013, 06:58 AM
Nice videos, would be nice if you did some while playing against an opponent that has some kind of hate or disruption against you. ;) I would like to start a discussion about what to take out when sideboarding, here's example list with an sideboard:

Instants [13]

1 Ad Nauseam
4 Brainstorm
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Dark Ritual

Sorceries [23]

1 Past in Flames
1 Tendrils of Agony
2 Preordain
3 Duress
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Infernal Tutor
4 Ponder


Artifacts [9]

1 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal

Lands [15]

1 Bayou
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Tropical Island
1 Volcanic Island
2 Underground Sea
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Polluted Delta



Sideboard:
3 Xantid Swarm
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Chain of Vapor
3 Dread of Night
3 Carpet of Flowers
1 Dark Confidant


I'll go through my sideboarding and thoughts, I'll use the matches used in the opening post:

RUG Delver:
+3 Carpet of Flowers
-1 SDT
-1 Preordain
-1 Gitaxian Probe

I feel like I might want to side out Ad Nauseam, since I haven't been so impressed with nauseam from low life with this deck. I'm not 100% on the SDT either, but I feel like it just makes the game longer, which is good for the RUG pilot. I'm taking one probe out because I feel like I wouldn't want a multiple of these. I wouldn't want to take Swarms in, even though I would like to. If I would take swarms in, what would you take out?

Patriot:
+3 Carpet of Flowers
(+2 Chain of Vapor)
+3 Abrupt Decay
-1 Sensei's Divining Top
-2 Preordain
-2 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Cabal Ritual
(-2 Gitaxian Probe)

This gets really tricky, there's so much that I would like to take in, but so little to take out. Feels like I'm diluting my maindeck way too much, but I kind of want to take Carpets in to pay for soft counters. I kind of also want 3-5 responses to answer Meddling Mage or AEthersworn Canonist.

Blade Control

+1 Dark Confidant
-1 Preordain

I feel like mainboard is pretty well positioned against this deck. If there's no fear of hatebears I'd go with this. If there would be hatebears, I'd bring in decays and/or chains of vapor, taking out probes and preordains.

Team America

+1 Dark Confidant
+3 Carpet of Flowers
-3 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Cabal Ritual

Carpets to pay for the soft counters, confidant to possibly take some card advantage. Probes out instead of preordain because preordain feels like a good card against discard. Cabal Ritual out because taking 3 carpet in.

Elves

+2 Chain of Vapor
+3 Abrupt Decay
-1 Sensei's Divining Top
-1 Preordain
-3 Duress

Taking in the removal to answer Teeg or ruric thar. Taking out SDT because it's slow, preordain instead of probe because of speed and Duress because it can only take away GSZ or Glimpse.

Death & Taxes

+3 Dread of Night
+3 Abrupt Decay
+2 Chain of Vapor
(+1 Dark Confidant)
-3 Duress
-4 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Cabal Ritual
(-1 Preordain)

Instead of trying to win fast, I'd aim to play the control role. Trying to either kill their board with single Dread of Night or stick two to the board so all you have to be afraid are Revokers. If I would play a massacre or hurkyl's recall, this is the matchup where I would take them in. Taking Duress and Probes out, because duress is a blank and probes are the weakest card in this matchup in my opinion.

BUG Control:

I think that the sideboard doesn't really provide anything that would radically make this matchup better. Xantid Swarms could be added so the opponent would have to waste his FoW or Abrupt Decay on it instead of a LED that has been played to the table to save it. If Swarms come in, Probes go out.

UWx Miracles:

+3 Abrupt Decay
+3 Xantid Swarm
+1 Dark Confidant
-1 Swamp
-1 Island
-1 Lion's Eye Diamond
-4 Gitaxian Probe

Gather up an unbeatable hand and then go off. Taking basics out because this deck doesn't play wasteland and LED because the games tend to go long and you should be able to find enough mana.

Sneak Attack

+3 Xantid Swarm
(+2 Chain of Vapor if expecting LLoS)
-1 Sensei's Divining Top
-2 Preordain
(-2 I have no idea, feels like Probe or basics)

This is horrible, I have no idea what to do and it's a horrible matchup anyways. :(

Maverick

+3 Dread of Night
+3 Abrupt Decay
+2 Chain of Vapor
(+1 Dark Confidant)
-3 Duress
-4 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Cabal Ritual
(-1 Preordain)

Same line of thought with playing against Death and Taxes, this time you have to be more afraid of hatebears, but they should play less Revokers!

Jund

+1 Dark Confidant
-1 Gitaxian Probe

Not much to take in, just taking in Dark Confidant to possibly draw some cards lost to their discard.

Reanimator

+3 Xantid Swarm
(+2 Chain of Vapor)
-1 Sensei's Divining Top
-2 Preordain
(-2 Gitaxian Probe)

Taking in the swarms (because you can get them countered and then brought back thanks to your lovely opponent!) and possibly Chain of Vapors as a back-up if they stick a fatty into the table. Not so sure about that.

OmniTell

+3 Xantid Swarm
+2 Chain of Vapor
+1 Dark Confidant
-1 Sensei's Divining Top
-2 Preordain
-3 Gitaxian Probe

Discard, discard and discard. Vapors in to bounce LLoS or Omniscience/Dream Halls. Xantid Swarm can null all their counterspells, Dark Confidant should draw you more discard. LLoS is scary and should be expected in all three games.




I would like to hear your thoughts regarding these sideboarding plans, what would you do differently and why? I would like to discuss about siding out wincons (AdN/PiF) and possibly siding out Lion's Eye Diamonds. Siding out LED's feels so hard!

Thanks in advance, hopefully this will bring up a nice discussion.

Lemnear
12-04-2013, 07:07 AM
Why the heck would you ever cut or board out even a single Probe? You know that the card does for your Cabal Rituals, Cabal Therapies and other cantrips in case you see discard in your opponents hand?

Machahiko
12-04-2013, 07:33 AM
Why the heck would you ever cut or board out even a single Probe? You know that the card does for your Cabal Rituals, Cabal Therapies and other cantrips in case you see discard in your opponents hand?

Good question, in this deck I just feel like it's a card that can be cut out easily. Other easy cuts are Preordains and the singleton SDT or Cabal Ritual, besides that taking out any of the other cards feels like diluting or taking out too good pieces of your deck. I find Discard hard to cut and the fast mana is very good as well. What would you suggest to take out instead of Gitaxian Probes - Preordains & Lotus Petals or something completely different?

Lemnear
12-04-2013, 08:07 AM
Good question, in this deck I just feel like it's a card that can be cut out easily. Other easy cuts are Preordains and the singleton SDT or Cabal Ritual, besides that taking out any of the other cards feels like diluting or taking out too good pieces of your deck. I find Discard hard to cut and the fast mana is very good as well. What would you suggest to take out instead of Gitaxian Probes - Preordains & Lotus Petals or something completely different?

Lotus petal is another card, that quickly creates thresh and is a red initial mana, so i doubt it. Easy cut is duress in matchups against maverick, D&T or Show&Tell (leyline) and the beforementioned preordain and a single ponder/sdt(/CabalRitual/LED). Depending on your opponent you might wanna board out Ad Nauseam (Burn or even tempo) or EtW (Elves, Batterskull, miracles). That should make easily 4 or even more spots to board in hate

Machahiko
12-04-2013, 08:15 AM
Well, this is exactly why I wanted to bring this up, because the deck seems so dense that it's really hard to take anything out and Carsten Kotter in his article says that taking discard out first if possible, then the weakest cards that you have. Timo Schünemann in his Eternal-Central article is siding out gitaxian probes in almost every matchup. I'll try sideboarding like this later on when playtesting!

:rolleyes:

Lemnear
12-04-2013, 08:27 AM
Well, this is exactly why I wanted to bring this up, because the deck seems so dense that it's really hard to take anything out and Carsten Kotter in his article says that taking discard out first if possible, then the weakest cards that you have. Timo Schünemann in his Eternal-Central article is siding out gitaxian probes in almost every matchup. I'll try sideboarding like this later on when playtesting!

:rolleyes:

Dunno about Timo's approach, but Carsten is a local, therefore you may render me biased ;)

In essence, I would not take any actions that make the deck slower than it already is.

m_xer
12-04-2013, 08:52 AM
I swap cabal rituals for carpets, preordains for decay or chain of vapor, duress for swarm or dread of night.

I don't like boarding out skeleton of the deck.

Lemnear
12-04-2013, 08:53 AM
I swap cabal rituals for carpets, preordains for decay or chain of vapor, duress for swarm or dread of night.

I don't like boarding out skeleton of the deck.

I can get behind that

Jay_Gatz
12-04-2013, 09:30 AM
vs. Blade Control

This deck has risen from the dead courtesy of it's new friend in TNN. It makes use of Stoneforge Mystic to empower its beaters and to win games. MB Vendilion Cliques, discard, counters, and Snapcaster to do it all again are things we need to keep our eyes on. When using discard, consider what you plan to do for the next couple turns and then make your decision. If you plan on going off next turn, their clock is largely irrelevant (unless it's about to stroke midnight, of course), so you should aim for their disruption. However, if you need more time for your combo, their clock becomes much more important, because you can always dig for more business. Stoneforge is always a problem and should be dealt with if you can't win by turn 4. TNN without Stoneforge is not a very big threat, and even with her/equipment, it still takes until turn 6 or so for things to add up. Postboard, they have more counters and discard, along with potential grave hate and Tidehollow Sculler. They'll be much more disruptive game 2/3, so be on point with your Therapies. Again, bring in your removal, it hits almost everything, bring in your extra discard, and consider bringing your Swarms in (this makes their removal relevant, so be warned).


Unless I put my opponent on either Canonist or Meddling mage post board I would never bring in removal against blade decks. Decay doesn't kill the only thing we care about (Batterskull) and their clock isn't anywhere near fast enough to dilute the deck. Swarms I would consider for game 3 only if I saw an excess of flusterstorms and such and still only if I expect the player to keep a hand with only counters.

Dark Confidant is less common these days but definitely deserves a spot in the primer.
Also how is URW delver an old deck and BUG control a new kid on the block?...

Luklinda
12-04-2013, 09:36 AM
Unless I put my opponent on either Canonist or Meddling mage post board I would never bring in removal against blade decks. Decay doesn't kill the only thing we care about (Batterskull) and their clock isn't anywhere near fast enough to dilute the deck. Swarms I would consider for game 3 only if I saw an excess of flusterstorms and such and still only if I expect the player to keep a hand with only counters.

Dark Confidant is less common these days but definitely deserves a spot in the primer.
Also how is URW delver an old deck and BUG control a new kid on the block?...

Decay hits germ token just fine. If you're letting them live till 5 mana, sure they can re-equip but you can just blast whatever they put it on every time.

Lemnear
12-04-2013, 09:42 AM
Unless I put my opponent on either Canonist or Meddling mage post board I would never bring in removal against blade decks. Decay doesn't kill the only thing we care about (Batterskull) and their clock isn't anywhere near fast enough to dilute the deck.

Once your opponent runs white I bet they bring in Cannonist, Thalia or Maddling Mage. Not boarding in removal equals a loss ... BoM lesson ;)

Jay_Gatz
12-04-2013, 09:43 AM
There is only one turn between when they can attack with a germ and when they will have 5 mana so I'm still seeing no point in trying to fight batterskull that way.

Once your opponent runs white I bet they bring in Cannonist, Thalia or Maddling Mage. Not boarding in removal equals a loss ... BoM lesson ;)

There should probably be a mention of this in the primer then.

JamieW89
12-04-2013, 10:17 AM
Some quick ideas regarding boarding cards out:

Discard: Discard can be boarded out often, replacing them with answers for permanent hate against decks without counters.

Cabal Ritual: 1 is often shaved, 1-2 can be replaced by Carpet.

Gitaxian Probe: 1-2 are often cut, not if goblins, therapy or speed are key in the matchups strategic plan.

Preordain: Get boarded out often, but never against discard decks.

Land #15: A basic versus decks without LD sometimes

PiF: I board it out vs miracles (RiP and can usually tutor chain)

AdN/EtW: Often one main and one sb.

A tutor: Grim Tutor when life matters or 1 IT when it doesn't can be boarded out but you need a good reason and I don't often do so. Same deal with the 4th LED.

Don't board out:
Brainstorm, Ponder, Ritual, LP, 2 CRit, 3 LED, 3 IT, Tendrils, 14 Lands

Mindlash
12-04-2013, 10:46 AM
Well, this is exactly why I wanted to bring this up, because the deck seems so dense that it's really hard to take anything out and Carsten Kotter in his article says that taking discard out first if possible, then the weakest cards that you have. Timo Schünemann in his Eternal-Central article is siding out gitaxian probes in almost every matchup. I'll try sideboarding like this later on when playtesting!

:rolleyes:

I can search my Pc for some of Timos boardingplans. I am sure I do not have his BoM Sideboarding, but some of his later decklists where similar to the version he is playing now and I updated the boardingplans everytime he sent me his newest changes to the deck. The decklist in his Eternal-Central article was about Burning Wish ANT which boards differently due to more business cards in Burning Wish which never got boardet out and less cantrips. I can PM you what I got on my Pc after work or at the weekend...I am a bit busy right now :/

I can ask him for his BoM plans but he is not often online on Facebook lately and I won't probably see him personally till GP Paris.

As for a boarding section in the primer I guess something like Bryan's approach in the TES primer might be the best. We do not have that one list which most people agree on. Some people use 16 cantrips, some use Burning Wish or even Grim Tutor in the main. Some explanation on the matchups for what cards are the least useful and what cards might be needed is probably the best solution. The Jund primer did something similar if I remember right.

If we want a decklist with "set in stone" boardingplans (-a -b -c +x +y +z) for the primer I guess the 16 cantrip version will fit the most as it is the most basic version of the deck (ANT blueprint like Jona said) and most decklists nowadays are just slightly different (at least maindeck). It is also a good starting point for new ANT players to get a feeling for the deck before changes to the deck are done by themselves.

Greetings Chris

Edit: @Jamie's Boarding: This is kind of what I meant with Bryan's approach and I think this will be the best form for boarding guidelines.

Jay_Gatz
12-04-2013, 10:59 AM
Some quick ideas regarding boarding cards out: Discard: Discard can be boarded out often, replacing them with answers for permanent hate against decks without counters. Cabal Ritual: 1 is often shaved, 1-2 can be replaced by Carpet. Gitaxian Probe: 1-2 are often cut, not if goblins, therapy or speed are key in the matchups strategic plan. Preordain: Get boarded out often, but never against discard decks. Land #15: A basic versus decks without LD sometimes PiF: I board it out vs miracles (RiP and can usually tutor chain) AdN/EtW: Often one main and one sb. A tutor: Grim Tutor when life matters or 1 IT when it doesn't can be boarded out but you need a good reason and I don't often do so. Same deal with the 4th LED. Don't board out: Brainstorm, Ponder, Ritual, LP, 2 CRit, 3 LED, 3 IT, Tendrils, 14 Lands
I have never and probably will never board out gitaxian probes, it has far too much synergy with the rest of the deck and I probably wouldn't ever board out a tutor in a standard list unless I was playing wishes in which case I do it all the time.

Griselpuff
12-04-2013, 11:05 AM
With the uptick in cards like Meddling Mage and Golgari Charm/Zealous Persecution, doesn't it mean Burning ANT is the way to go? Burning Wish gets Massacre for hatebears (Teeg is not very popular and you still have Chain of Vapor/Grapeshot/Pyroclasm), and Golgari Charm effects make Goblins less than appealing (so don't play TES). Plus, Past in Flames is just incredibly broken.

Jonathan Alexander
12-04-2013, 11:12 AM
As for a boarding section in the primer I guess something like Bryan's approach in the TES primer might be the best. We do not have that one list which most people agree on. Some people use 16 cantrips, some use Burning Wish or even Grim Tutor in the main. Some explanation on the matchups for what cards are the least useful and what cards might be needed is probably the best solution. The Jund primer did something similar if I remember right.

If we want a decklist with "set in stone" boardingplans (-a -b -c +x +y +z) for the primer I guess the 16 cantrip version will fit the most as it is the most basic version of the deck (ANT blueprint like Jona said) and most decklists nowadays are just slightly different (at least maindeck). It is also a good starting point for new ANT players to get a feeling for the deck before changes to the deck are done by themselves.

Greetings Chris

Edit: @Jamie's Boarding: This is kind of what I meant with Bryan's approach and I think this will be the best form for boarding guidelines.

I like giving explanations on which cards are good and which don't matter much, out of the usual choices. That way, you can cover multiple versions and sideboard without focusing on a specific list. Maybe you want to include sample plans for one list (I think the Prosak-list is best for that).

Also, I think that it's best to lead with one list in the beginning and then discuss other versions in the end. Again, I think Prosak's list is most important (variations like cutting two Preordains don't really need to be discussed specifically), and then definitely the Burning Wish version and maybe one of the old lists with Chant - keeping the idea around seems pretty good to me.

BeardTron
12-04-2013, 11:23 AM
Greetings all. I'm a new Legacy player (reading and playing proxies for 3 weeks now) and new to ANT.

I tested w/ a friend last night and I tried 1 Empty the Warrens main (also had AN and Tenrils main) and EtW won me the match in Game 3 as I was able to make 12 Goblins on T2.

So here's my dilemma: It seems to me that EtW and Tendrils can't really exist in the main together w/ AN still main as it makes it even more risky using AN as chances have increased of killing myself and/or not finding what I need in time.

Am I correct? Can EtW/Tendrils/AN exist together in the main?

Should I stick w/ the AN/Tendrils/PiF package main and keep EtW side? Or put AN in the side? If AN is in the board...what match-ups would you bring it in?

I've been going through Carsten's articles and his recent list moved AN to the side, but, as mentioned here, with the rise of Golgari Charm, is EtW really the right plan for the main?

I know this can be meta-dependent, but still worth it to ask.

Excellent work on the new primer bjholmes :)

Jay_Gatz
12-04-2013, 11:27 AM
Greetings all. I'm a new Legacy player (reading and playing proxies for 3 weeks now) and new to ANT. I tested w/ a friend last night and I tried 1 Empty the Warrens main (also had AN and Tenrils main) and EtW won me the match in Game 3 as I was able to make 12 Goblins on T2. So here's my dilemma: It seems to me that EtW and Tendrils can't really exist in the main together w/ AN still main as it makes it even more risky using AN as chances have increased of killing myself and/or not finding what I need in time. Am I correct? Can EtW/Tendrils/AN exist together in the main? Should I stick w/ the AN/Tendrils/PiF package main and keep EtW side? Or put AN in the side? If AN is in the board...what match-ups would you bring it in? I've been going through Carsten's articles and his recent list moved AN to the side, but, as mentioned here, with the rise of Golgari Charm, is EtW really the right plan for the main? I know this can be meta-dependent, but still worth it to ask. Excellent work on the new primer bjholmes :)
Having an extra 4 drop in the main puts too much strain on an already weakened but necessary engine in the deck

Jonathan Alexander
12-04-2013, 11:48 AM
I've been going through Carsten's articles and his recent list moved AN to the side, but, as mentioned here, with the rise of Golgari Charm, is EtW really the right plan for the main?


There's not really a conflict here as Golgari Charm is almost exclusively a sideboard card. I like having Empty maindeck right now as a lot of decks can't interact with it if it comes early. It's very similar to Ad Nauseam actually, only that it becomes weaker faster; in exchange, it's more resilient (can't be outright countered) and usually requires less resources.

bjholmes3
12-04-2013, 01:54 PM
Whoah, lots of posts happened since last night. Lots of new things to do, lol. Here's my list:

1.) Is the most recent video I've made quality enough for inclusion in the primer? If not, what needs fixing? If so, would other videos be helpful, such as those against real players?
2.) I have accepted that SB plans must happen. Therefore, are we all agreed that the example sideboard deck will be the vanilla 16 Cantrip version? The principles which apply to this deck should help players of any build, really. I really need help with this, I have trouble boarding in some less familiar matchups.
3.) I want to add a helpful links section at the end of the primer. Please gather any quality articles, streams, or whatever for this deck for me to include in this section.

EDIT: Added new SB section to the end of the Primer. Check it out and give some feedback.

m_xer
12-04-2013, 03:22 PM
I am not really sure 16 cantrip version is best for sideboarding tutorial, as more often than not it just cuts Preordains. I'd use some 14 cantrip + 1 discard + 1 something version.

It 16 cantrip is fine for showcase build but as said sideboarding with it is easier than with most.

bjholmes3
12-04-2013, 04:56 PM
I disagree. The primer is directed to new players of the deck, to whom I strongly recommend the 16 cantrip version. It is the most straightforward and "vanilla" form of the deck, so far as I'm aware. Once they are advanced enough to start tweaking their own build to preference, they will be advanced enough to make SB decisions for their own brew.

End3r000
12-04-2013, 07:22 PM
16 cantrip list is indeed the most vanilla of the various lists and a decent starting point. I would never run PiF, Tendrils, AdN, and EtW all in the main. At most I would play 3/4 of them. Usually PiF, Tendrils, and AdN. Empty rarely wins me games anymore against experienced Legacy players. As for boarding I usually board my 2 Preordains and 3 Duress and the 15th land. Anymore than that and I feel you're overboarding.

Patrunkenphat7
12-04-2013, 10:15 PM
I swap cabal rituals for carpets, preordains for decay or chain of vapor, duress for swarm or dread of night.

I don't like boarding out skeleton of the deck.

I don't like the Carpet for Cabal swap for several reasons… 1 - it makes Past in Flames a TON worse. 2 - AN is not that good against the tempo decks like RUG Delver in the first place, and most of the time you want your PiF to be good. In my opinion Carpet of Flowers is a very overrated SB card. I don't want to be playing a Trop against Tempo decks.

m_xer
12-05-2013, 04:31 AM
I don't like the Carpet for Cabal swap for several reasons… 1 - it makes Past in Flames a TON worse. 2 - AN is not that good against the tempo decks like RUG Delver in the first place, and most of the time you want your PiF to be good. In my opinion Carpet of Flowers is a very overrated SB card. I don't want to be playing a Trop against Tempo decks.
That's all true but there is no magic sideboard cards that give you major advantage against RUG, resolving Cabal Rituals against them can be really tricky and once you resolve Carpet i don't really care if they waste my Trop. Granted you could get wasted and Carpet countered but that's their modus operandi. And all tempo deck tend to board in some kind of GY hate that makes Cabal Ritual miserable.

If i suspect opponent is boarding out all removal i might try the Xantid Swarm route but hardly any players i know do.

What do you put in and take out against RUG delver?

fetzonk
12-05-2013, 07:02 AM
I disagree. The primer is directed to new players of the deck, to whom I strongly recommend the 16 cantrip version. It is the most straightforward and "vanilla" form of the deck, so far as I'm aware. Once they are advanced enough to start tweaking their own build to preference, they will be advanced enough to make SB decisions for their own brew.

Coming from Esper Stoneblade/Deathblade, I am just starting to learn this deck (still most of the time in goldfishing mode) and i have to say, that as a beginner the with the 16 cantrip version is indeed easier start with. Overall I was faster with a Version with +1 lim-dûl's vault, +1 sensei's divining top but less consistant.

Just wanted to say, that I appreciate the new Primer a lot. I really need help from all angles. Still struggling a lot when facing disruption. Haven't got the time to watch the clips, but i am sure that they and a Sideboarding-Guide will be a big help.

This deck has got a steep learning curve and I hope that in some months i am confident enough, to switch from my stoneblade deck to this one for smaller tournaments. Anyway, thanks!

Domel
12-05-2013, 08:42 AM
Against Elves! I would rather keep Duresses and side out Therapies - main discard targets are not creatures (NO, GSZ, Thorn, M Trap...) so you need probe to discard their fast hate efficiently.

Patrunkenphat7
12-05-2013, 10:23 AM
That's all true but there is no magic sideboard cards that give you major advantage against RUG, resolving Cabal Rituals against them can be really tricky and once you resolve Carpet i don't really care if they waste my Trop. Granted you could get wasted and Carpet countered but that's their modus operandi. And all tempo deck tend to board in some kind of GY hate that makes Cabal Ritual miserable.

If i suspect opponent is boarding out all removal i might try the Xantid Swarm route but hardly any players i know do.

What do you put in and take out against RUG delver?

My list is pretty different from the "stock," but generally I find the best strategy is to board in Empty for AN (if you have it, very good against tempo decks). AN is just so poor against Delver. Carpet plays well with AN but plays poorly with Empty the Warrens. I also play 1 maindeck Thoughtseize, and I swap it out for an Inquisition since the lifeloss is very relevant, and Inquisition hits 30+ relevant cards. I wouldn't do this if I only played 6 discard spells though, because you need to hit Force (I have 8 discard, 6 tutors, no Preordains).

In general I just don't like boarding in green cards since fetching basics is one of the most important parts of this matchup. Even without the major downside of not having flashback on combo turn, there are quite a few situations where they can negate your carpet of flowers by having like a 1 dual + Waste hand or simply not crack a fetch past their first. I think it's worth mentioning that the GY hate of choice right now in RUG seems to be Cage, so the Cabal Rits are unaffected even if you can't PiF with Cage in play.

bjholmes3
12-05-2013, 11:38 AM
Coming from Esper Stoneblade/Deathblade, I am just starting to learn this deck (still most of the time in goldfishing mode) and i have to say, that as a beginner the with the 16 cantrip version is indeed easier start with. Overall I was faster with a Version with +1 lim-dûl's vault, +1 sensei's divining top but less consistant.

Just wanted to say, that I appreciate the new Primer a lot. I really need help from all angles. Still struggling a lot when facing disruption. Haven't got the time to watch the clips, but i am sure that they and a Sideboarding-Guide will be a big help.

This deck has got a steep learning curve and I hope that in some months i am confident enough, to switch from my stoneblade deck to this one for smaller tournaments. Anyway, thanks!

Something to try if you want to practice against hate without the stress of playing against hate is the following:

1.) Goldfish after opponent's turn 2 paying 1 extra mana for Thalia.
2.) Discard your most important card on opponent's turn 1 to simulate getting Thoughtseized.
3.) Pretend your opponent has a Wasteland + Dual, and play around it.
4.) Goldfish several rounds in which your opponent has various counters for you to play around.

Also, remember to always record your goldfishes. Write them down, take a video, even have a friend watch it. Whatever it takes. This way you don't go into goldfishing "God mode". You will plainly see where your weaknesses are and you will know what to work on and how to do it, especially if you can get feedback from elsewhere.

EDIT: Added a Useful Links section to the primer, to which I would like to add articles, videos, and good decklists. Also, touched up the formatting a bit. I want the section headers to be visible enough to be easily seen at a glance while scrolling through the document. Are they? They are for me, but that's because I wrote it, lol.

MTG Junkie
12-05-2013, 01:12 PM
My list is pretty different from the "stock," but generally I find the best strategy is to board in Empty for AN (if you have it, very good against tempo decks). AN is just so poor against Delver. Carpet plays well with AN but plays poorly with Empty the Warrens. I also play 1 maindeck Thoughtseize, and I swap it out for an Inquisition since the lifeloss is very relevant, and Inquisition hits 30+ relevant cards. I wouldn't do this if I only played 6 discard spells though, because you need to hit Force (I have 8 discard, 6 tutors, no Preordains).

In general I just don't like boarding in green cards sincefetching basics is one of the most important parts ofhis matchup. Even without the major downside of not having flashback on combo turn, there are quite a few situations where they can negate your carpet of flowers by having like a 1 dual + Waste hand or simply not crack a fetch past their first. I think it's worth mentioning that the GY hate of choice right now in RUG seems to be Cage, so the Cabal Rits are unaffected even if you can't PiF with Cage in play.

Just curious are the 5th and 6th Wishes? Are you not playing green period? Iv felt the same about basics but also feel 2 is the comfort spot. Against non RUG decks anyway. What's your mana base look like?

Patrunkenphat7
12-05-2013, 01:38 PM
Just curious are the 5th and 6th Wishes? Are you not playing green period? Iv felt the same about basics but also feel 2 is the comfort spot. Against non RUG decks anyway. What's your mana base look like?

I'll just go ahead and post my list so it exists in this new thread:

4 Dark Rit
4 Cabal Rit
4 Lotus Petal
4 LED

4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Gitaxian Probe

4 Duress
1 Thoughtseize
3 Cabal Therapy

4 Infernal Tutor
2 Grim Tutor
1 Past in Flames
1 Empty the Warrens
1 Tendrils

4 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Bloodstained Mire
2 Island
1 Swamp
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island

SB
1 Tropical Island
4 Xantid Swarm
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Thoughtseize
1 Pithing Needle
2 Massacre
1 Karakas
2 Chain of Vapor

bjholmes3
12-05-2013, 03:16 PM
More stuff in the primer. Things are coming right along, methinks. Remember, feedback is always welcome! Again, I want this thread to be the place to learn about ANT.

Final Fortune
12-06-2013, 02:44 AM
16 cantrip list is indeed the most vanilla of the various lists and a decent starting point. I would never run PiF, Tendrils, AdN, and EtW all in the main. At most I would play 3/4 of them. Usually PiF, Tendrils, and AdN. Empty rarely wins me games anymore against experienced Legacy players. As for boarding I usually board my 2 Preordains and 3 Duress and the 15th land. Anymore than that and I feel you're overboarding.

I don't agree with MDing AN, mainly because Thoughtseize is so much better than Duress in this metagame. You really only want AN whenever you want Xantid Swarm/Autumn's Veil, which is strictly against Show&Tell (Storm mirror is pretty rare, in which case I might just take Telemin Performance for shits and giggles).

Solune
12-06-2013, 06:59 AM
More stuff in the primer. Things are coming right along, methinks. Remember, feedback is always welcome! Again, I want this thread to be the place to learn about ANT.

Hi !

I'm a new legacy player, and i decided to start with ANT which is a pretty hard deck to pilot. Well, the truth is i wanted to play a strong Past in Flames deck and had to jump the bridge to legacy. I really like the deck but it's really hard to win through discard and / or counterspells, i really need to practice.

As for the primer, it's great to gather in one spot all great articles about storm in the end. I would be interested in a section "history of the deck", if this is doable.
I think you might fuse part V and VI so that the sideboarding plan comes right after the analysis of the matchup.

I've started with a stock list with 15 cantrips and 7 discard main. Now i'm interested in taking in burning wish to play 6 tutors. The real question is the sideboard, i would need a few wish targets which reduce sideboard space. Considering that i get to play legacy online only, what would be a good sideboard for the modo meta?

Thanks for the great job!

Fatal
12-06-2013, 07:16 AM
I don't agree with MDing AN, mainly because Thoughtseize is so much better than Duress in this metagame. You really only want AN whenever you want Xantid Swarm/Autumn's Veil, which is strictly against Show&Tell (Storm mirror is pretty rare, in which case I might just take Telemin Performance for shits and giggles).

AdN is great vs Miracles - specially when they resolve RiP, building 10 storm count without Past in Flames is really hard.

Jay_Gatz
12-06-2013, 12:20 PM
In the section on cabal therapy you should probably mention synergies with xantid swarm, dark confidant and empty the warrens. And even main deck I totally flash back therapy with PIF!

bjholmes3
12-06-2013, 12:26 PM
When I said Therapy's flashback wouldn't be used, I meant, well, its flashback. I worried that wasn't clear though. I'll touch it up.

Jay_Gatz
12-06-2013, 02:03 PM
The second half was a joke, but I do think the other synergies are worth noting

Patrunkenphat7
12-06-2013, 03:51 PM
The opening post is great, but one thing I would tweak would be to remove some of the strong opinions about some of the card options and leave everyone else to decide for themselves what they think is best. An example of this is when you list Inquisition of Kozilek and come to the conclusion that people should not play it. I think that card is a perfectly reasonable SB option against Jund and hatebear decks, so I wouldn't wanted anyone immediately discounting it. I think the bias towards a more stock "Prosak Storm" list sort of comes out in the writing.

I also think it would be cool to have like a stock list with flex options like I see in some opening posts. This would help new players sort of build their list using some starting numbers for mandatory cards and card options. Example maindeck breakdown:

4 Lotus Petal
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual

4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Gitaxian Probe
0-4 Preordain

2-4 Duress
2-4 Cabal Therapy
0-2 Thoughtseize

4 Infernal Tutor
0-2 Grim Tutor
0-3 Burning Wish
0-2 Lim-dul's Vault
0-2 Sensei's Divining Top

1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Past in Flames
0-1 Ad Nauseam
0-1 Empty the Warrens

4 Polluted Delta
3-5 Blue fetchland
0-2 Bloodstained Mire
1-2 Island
1-2 Swamp
2-3 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
0-1 Badlands
0-1 Tropical Island
0-1 Bayou
0-2 Gemstone Mine

There are also some different SB options that you might want to explore - like if you are going to mention Wipe Away, you probably want to list Echoing Truth. Mentioning different types of discard like Tseize or Inquisiton in the SB might be helpful in explaining how these cards could be more useful than Duress and Therapy in certain matchups. Instead of saying "etc" next to Massacre and friends, you probably want to list out Disfigure, Deathmark, Virtue's Ruin, Toxic Deluge, Infest, and Pyroclasm. If you are going to list Trop, you might as well also list Bayou. Random stuff like Pithing Needle to deal with Spellbombs, Deathrites, and Lily in Jund might be worth mentioning. We just want there to have a ton of different options listed in the opening post. Thanks for doing all this work; it is looking great!

BeardTron
12-08-2013, 11:01 AM
So what's the plan against Pox? I know it's not super popular, but still may be worth putting in the Primer.

I tested a match with it yesterday and besides a Turn 1 kill on the play one game, it wrecked me. Granted, I'm very new but it felt tough trying to fight through discard and land destruction.

Prosak sided Ignorant Bliss...would that be a decent option here? Are we mostly reliant on our own disruption to deal with them? If we can't win by Turn 3 it gets pretty grim.

bjholmes3
12-08-2013, 11:36 AM
Sure, I can add a Pox section. :)

Dia_Bot
12-08-2013, 11:40 AM
So what's the plan against Pox? I know it's not super popular, but still may be worth putting in the Primer.

I tested a match with it yesterday and besides a Turn 1 kill on the play one game, it wrecked me. Granted, I'm very new but it felt tough trying to fight through discard and land destruction.

Prosak sided Ignorant Bliss...would that be a decent option here? Are we mostly reliant on our own disruption to deal with them? If we can't win by Turn 3 it gets pretty grim.

Ignorant Bliss is just a horrible card for storm!
The plan is: (if you can't go off T1), play your LED's and petals. Let them kill your hand, topdeck tutor -> win.
They have one of the slowest clocks ever so you will get tons of time. The matchup isn't actually that hard but you have to play tight. You'll get there :wink:

Machahiko
12-08-2013, 12:53 PM
Played at the Finnish champs, went 3-3 and dropped because friends had already dropped and wanted to go get some drinks and go to sauna so they pressured me to give up and leave with them. Wins were R1 Patriot, R4 Elves, R5 Spanish Inquisition and losses were to R2 Jund, R3 Shardless BUG and R6 Jund. I learned how annoying discard and deathrite shamans can be, the metagame here could really call for more than just one Dark Confidant. Playing against elves was fun, t2 ad nauseam from 20 life to 4, played 4 ponders, two-four preordains/brainstorms and used SDT at every chance when it was relevant, got to 16 mana, 17 storm and my deck had only 13 cards left, including 3 infernals, PiF and Tendrils, but couldn't find any of them. I think I should have just stopped at safe(r) lifetotal played out my artifact mana and then storm him out the next turn. Games 2 and 3 I was faster, g3 including storming with Chain of vapor, two petals, led and infernal for lethal 18. :smile:

My R2 loss could possibly have been prevented if I didn't receive a game loss for forgetting to write my Dread of Nights to the sideboard... I could also have played better against Shardless BUG, first game I decided to just go for it, I knew he was packing discard and possibly Hymn, he had two cards in hand and I had enough mana for Ad Nauseam while I have plenty of mana floating, good life total and no land played. He did have the force of will. Game two he pressured me with Deathrite Shamans keeping my graveyard small, while doing 2-4 damage a turn. I had plenty of cards in hand and found Tendrils of Agony. He had a good amount of cards in hand while I had cabal therapy, I counted that I could have made exactly 20 life if he plays nothing from his hand. 22 if he plays Force of Will. He's at 17 life and he has two active shamans with two Shardless Agents in the graveyard. I go for it, he doesn't play force of will even though he has it and I can't go for it, cause I'll do 20 damage and he will then just exile the tendrils. I'm at 7 life and he activates DRS twice in my end, then again after he has untapped. GG! At first I kind of regretted not going for it, I had few cabal rituals in hand and I could have possibly make him waste DRS activation on something in my graveyard. On the other hand, I know he plays ANT also and would have played very carefully until the end.

I haven't tested against Jund a lot, but I think I did all the right things, not keeping hands with business that could be discarded and then surgicaled, saving brainstorms, laying down artifact mana (LED did get R2 t2 decayed then surgicaled...) and playing very carefully. All the games ended 2-1 in their favor and I did just fine in my opinion. Playing the deck was extremely fun and all my opponents were really nice, especially the Elves! player in round four. Max Sjöblom also played ANT and piloted it all the way to the top 4, losing to Jund and making me feel a little bit better about my two losses against Jund.

Tops:
+Meeting a lot of great people, there should be more big events where to play in!
+Starting the tournament with 2-0 victory over Patriot
+Doing better than (most) my friends ;)
+Every time when I or my opponents used something to watch opponents hand, people were willing to play with their hands open until a brainstorm
+After the tournament shitEDH, Death and Taxes vs. Maverick games for fun and all the people that I traveled with
+My friends loaning me better fetches, the missing bayou and tropical.
+Deck was a blast to play

Flops:
-I don't know how to write deck lists and my friends public shaming about it
-Hymn to Tourach hitting so well.
-Discard
-Didn't use Swarms or Dread of Nights from the sideboard even once during the tournament
-After inspecting what kind of decks were played in the tournament, I discover that there was only 6 Jund decks in the tournament of 100 players, and I got to play against two of them. Just my luck!

Thanks to every judge, organizer, participant and opponent I got to face in the tournament, hopefully I'll get to meet you soon once again! :smile:

End3r000
12-09-2013, 11:13 AM
Jund is not usually an issue to beat. Even their best draw, t1 discard, t2 hymn, t3 lili, is beatable with the right draw. Keeping cantrip heavy hands usually helps. Admittedly I have lost to it a couple times, but 1 time was due to greed on my part during an Ad Nauseam, and the second time bad keeps vs. good draws.

Anselm
12-09-2013, 05:26 PM
There are a huge number of things in this thread I disagree with. I'll touch some random topics:

- I've ran AdN, PiF, ToA, EtW in the maindeck before and am doing so currently. It's only 1 more casting cost than using a Grim Tutor, and nobody complained about that increasing the mana cost too much. It's basically fine. I hate LDV, I dislike Grim Tutor, and I don't think preordains give enough gas. Also, having access to maindeck EtW increases your clock quite a bit sometimes.

- I'd almost never side out all preordains. I can see myself cutting one probe.

- Against URW Delver, bring in at least two of the Abrupt Decays and Massacres. You need to be prepared for Meddling Mage, and they buy time against Delver and Mystic.

- I have never liked Carpet of Flowers. Having to get green mana to fight the mana disruption is counterproductive. You end up being weak to Stifle and Wasteland (and Daze, to a lesser extent). I've been using one or two City of Traitors against Delver to some success. Also, bring in EtW against Delver. I've frequently cut AdN here.

- I like an extra AdN in the sideboard as the plan against jund. It's excellent to naturally draw vs discard, and it beats Mindbreak Trap. Also, I'm trying out a couple Chrome Mox along with the extra AdN against fast combo to improve your clock quite a bit.

- Cabal Therapy is definitely the best discard spell. The discard suite should be 4 Cabal Therapy, 2-3 Duress.

- What do you need Chain of Vapor for, anyway? The only thing that isn't hit by Abrupt Decay is likely Leyline of Sanctity, and you're not really resolving Chain there anyway when you can't use your discard to take their counters. I'd rather just ignore it and play more things like Dread of Night and Massacre to kill Death and Taxes. :) You still have EtW as an out anyway.

bjholmes3
12-09-2013, 09:28 PM
1.) I have never liked Carpet of Flowers. Having to get green mana to fight the mana disruption is counterproductive. You end up being weak to Stifle and Wasteland (and Daze, to a lesser extent). I've been using one or two City of Traitors against Delver to some success. Also, bring in EtW against Delver. I've frequently cut AdN here.

2.) What do you need Chain of Vapor for, anyway? The only thing that isn't hit by Abrupt Decay is likely Leyline of Sanctity, and you're not really resolving Chain there anyway when you can't use your discard to take their counters. I'd rather just ignore it and play more things like Dread of Night and Massacre to kill Death and Taxes. :) You still have EtW as an out anyway.

1.) I fail to see how Carpet of Flowers makes one more vulnerable to Wasteland than your proposed replacement City of Traitors. :I EtW is nice against RUG, but against Patriot it is risky, as it is castrated by Batterskull.

2.) Ruric Thar, the Unbowed is a card. As is Omniscience and Dream Halls. As is Sneak Attack. As is Griselbrand. As is Iona, Shield of Emeria. As is Flame-Kin Zealot and Flayer of the Hatebound. As is Jace, the Mind Sculptor. Don't forget Blood Moon, which ain't going anywhere anytime soon against Decay. Also, I recall someone arguing that getting green mana to fight the mana disruption is counterproductive. 1U to get rid of Thalia is a nice deal, as opposed to 1BG. Furthermore, it also advances our game against D&T by bouncing our artifact mana before Thalia for free storm later.

bondfan
12-09-2013, 10:48 PM
I don't think Chain of Vapor really works when your opponent has already resolved Show and Tell or Dread Return. I do however think it is necessary in the deck and is much better than Abrupt Decay. I've gone down to 2 Abrupt Decay recently for the reason Abrupt Decay is only better than Chain of Vapor against three cards in whole format.

I'm not terribly in love with Carpet of Flowers. It is only good against RUG Delver and don't think it is worth the 3 sideboard slots for the one match-up.

In the past, Massacre has been the nuts against UWR. But recently more and more people know about the card and have been playing around it. I really like Disfigure against the deck as it is on color and kills everything relevant as they tend to board out TNN.

The City of Traitors/Crystal Vein tech I remember from 2010 and don't remember it being too good. However I have not personally tested it.

Anselm
12-10-2013, 04:30 AM
1.) I fail to see how Carpet of Flowers makes one more vulnerable to Wasteland than your proposed replacement City of Traitors. :I EtW is nice against RUG, but against Patriot it is risky, as it is castrated by Batterskull.

2.) Ruric Thar, the Unbowed is a card. As is Omniscience and Dream Halls. As is Sneak Attack. As is Griselbrand. As is Iona, Shield of Emeria. As is Flame-Kin Zealot and Flayer of the Hatebound. As is Jace, the Mind Sculptor. Don't forget Blood Moon, which ain't going anywhere anytime soon against Decay. Also, I recall someone arguing that getting green mana to fight the mana disruption is counterproductive. 1U to get rid of Thalia is a nice deal, as opposed to 1BG. Furthermore, it also advances our game against D&T by bouncing our artifact mana before Thalia for free storm later.

City of Traitors gives you mana the turn you go off. I guess Carpet of Flowers does the same if you hold off casting it until you go off, essentially making it just another ritual. I was more thinking about fetching Tropical turn 1 and getting the Carpet Dazed, but I admit that that argument for City of Traitors isn't really valid. I might actually have to try out a Carpet of Flowers there instead. Still, being vulnurable to Stifle is a thing.

Of all your proposed Chainable problems, I wouldn't want to bounce a single one. Every single one of them kills you after they have resolved anyway, except for Jace, and if they tap out for Jace you should just kill them, not bounce Jace. Blood Moon is horrible against ANT, you can fetch basics and they're dead if they tap out for it most of the time. Thalia is a non-factor once you sideboard in 3-4 Dread of Night and 0-2 Massacre, not to mention the Decays.

Star|Scream
12-10-2013, 08:25 AM
City of Traitors gives you mana the turn you go off. I guess Carpet of Flowers does the same if you hold off casting it until you go off, essentially making it just another ritual. I was more thinking about fetching Tropical turn 1 and getting the Carpet Dazed, but I admit that that argument for City of Traitors isn't really valid. I might actually have to try out a Carpet of Flowers there instead. Still, being vulnurable to Stifle is a thing.


Are you suggesting they would stifle the carpet trigger? Couldn't you just go to 2nd main and retrigger it? I suppose if it were the first turn you were using it, that would suck, but isn't the point of carpet to stick it early and use it multiple times throughout the game?

Anselm
12-10-2013, 08:32 AM
Are you suggesting they would stifle the carpet trigger? Couldn't you just go to 2nd main and retrigger it? I suppose if it were the first turn you were using it, that would suck, but isn't the point of carpet to stick it early and use it multiple times throughout the game?

No, sorry, I'm saying that you need to fetch your tropical island to get green mana, most of the time, thus opening yourself up to Stifle. And, sticking it early means exposing yourself to Wasteland, as was my original point. Really, you have no bad cards against RUG, I'm happy to just swap the AdN for EtW and call it a go. For RWU, adding some massacre and decays instead of maybe a petal and some preordain/probe.

Jonathan Alexander
12-10-2013, 08:39 AM
If you fetch another land, you're still open to Stifle. Also, Cabal Ritual is pretty bad against blue decks. Good players counter your mana and cantrips, so casting multiple rituals will end up pretty hard. Carpet might only be an upgrade to Cabal Ritual, but it's a huge one.

Jay_Gatz
12-10-2013, 08:42 AM
If they stifle your carpet just go to second main phase and try it again..

Luklinda
12-10-2013, 08:43 AM
City of Traitors gives you mana the turn you go off. I guess Carpet of Flowers does the same if you hold off casting it until you go off, essentially making it just another ritual. I was more thinking about fetching Tropical turn 1 and getting the Carpet Dazed, but I admit that that argument for City of Traitors isn't really valid. I might actually have to try out a Carpet of Flowers there instead. Still, being vulnurable to Stifle is a thing.

Of all your proposed Chainable problems, I wouldn't want to bounce a single one. Every single one of them kills you after they have resolved anyway, except for Jace, and if they tap out for Jace you should just kill them, not bounce Jace. Blood Moon is horrible against ANT, you can fetch basics and they're dead if they tap out for it most of the time. Thalia is a non-factor once you sideboard in 3-4 Dread of Night and 0-2 Massacre, not to mention the Decays.

Chain is a great catch-all and allows natural tendrils kills through sac-bouncing artifact mana. Although not necessarily plan A; it's an anti-hate that opens up further lines of play. Also answers Teeg (massacre and single DoN don't).

Higgs
12-10-2013, 08:48 AM
Just checked the oracle text on Carpet again and it says: "At the beginning of each of your main phases,..."

Edit: Someone edited or deleted their post but there was a post saying that carpet triggered only on your main phase before combat.

Star|Scream
12-10-2013, 09:10 AM
No, sorry, I'm saying that you need to fetch your tropical island to get green mana, most of the time, thus opening yourself up to Stifle. And, sticking it early means exposing yourself to Wasteland, as was my original point. Really, you have no bad cards against RUG, I'm happy to just swap the AdN for EtW and call it a go. For RWU, adding some massacre and decays instead of maybe a petal and some preordain/probe.


Now I understand what you're saying, but fetching for island on your first turn also opens you up to stifle. And if carpet resolves, you are no longer vulnerable to wasteland. Now if they daze your carpet AND wasteland you, you're gonna have a bad time, but I think the benefit outweighs the risk. However, I'm not sure if I would bring in carpets against Team America as they can function on just a sea and a bayou. Is it worth it for only 1 mana?

Jay_Gatz
12-10-2013, 10:19 AM
1.) I fail to see how Carpet of Flowers makes one more vulnerable to Wasteland than your proposed replacement City of Traitors. :I EtW is nice against RUG, but against Patriot it is risky, as it is castrated by Batterskull.

2.) Ruric Thar, the Unbowed is a card. As is Omniscience and Dream Halls. As is Sneak Attack. As is Griselbrand. As is Iona, Shield of Emeria. As is Flame-Kin Zealot and Flayer of the Hatebound. As is Jace, the Mind Sculptor. Don't forget Blood Moon, which ain't going anywhere anytime soon against Decay. Also, I recall someone arguing that getting green mana to fight the mana disruption is counterproductive. 1U to get rid of Thalia is a nice deal, as opposed to 1BG. Furthermore, it also advances our game against D&T by bouncing our artifact mana before Thalia for free storm later.

What is the point in chaining a flame-kin? You will almost certainly be dead regardless

bjholmes3
12-10-2013, 11:14 AM
That's true. Honestly, I got the Dredge wincons mixed up, and didn't want to have to look them up. Very pro, I know, lol.

So, any further requests for the guide? I'm fairly busy, but I can find time here and there to add to it. So far, I still need to finish some matchups and SB strats (need help on this, guys. Never played against Team America once, lol).

Patrunkenphat7
12-10-2013, 04:59 PM
Carpet might only be an upgrade to Cabal Ritual, but it's a huge one.

But you can't flash it back... And PiF win is 80%+ of how this deck wins.

practical joke
12-10-2013, 08:41 PM
First things first: You do not have to stick the carpet of flowers the first thing in the game.

You can easily wait to turn 3+ and drop it there and use it as a ritual instead.
Tempo decks often play very passively against a combo deck which could cost them as well.
If they drop a creature/outtap for anything, that's the part you can try to punish them and sneak in that carpet.


Also, PiF is a good card, but it's not your main wincondition. It's a tool to let you win attrition wars very well,
this is one of the main reasons I still run the oldschool ill-gotten gains/2nd ad nauseam in the board or main instead of a PiF.


About cabal ritual being crap against decks with a lot of counters and disruption...
That's actually where they get quite good.
You will hit the threshhold, you will be topdecking for cards.
This card, on it's own, produces the mana required for an ad nauseam or PiF ( assuming you are on 3 lands or whatever)
LED doesn't do this, ritual doesn't do this etc etc.

NiiLoC
12-14-2013, 04:12 AM
Also, PiF is a good card, but it's not your main wincondition. It's a tool to let you win attrition wars very well,
this is one of the main reasons I still run the oldschool ill-gotten gains/2nd ad nauseam in the board or main instead of a PiF.



care to post your list?

I recently switched from a BW build (similar to Jezierski's list from BOM) back to a more traditional list with 1x grim tutor and 7 discard...I miss IGG...

practical joke
12-14-2013, 04:14 PM
care to post your list?

I recently switched from a BW build (similar to Jezierski's list from BOM) back to a more traditional list with 1x grim tutor and 7 discard...I miss IGG...

Besides sideboard, I don't think I've changed it for 3 years or something. This is the list I ran a few years back and as ANT still do.

If you switch this build into prob/therapy and/or 7 discards into a combination of chants/discard. it's fine either way, just a way of preferences.


At each event, I just run through my box of combo cards and decide what I'll run with at that event if I decide to play combo.
This is mostly for sideboard cards, they change wherever I go

if I'd run BW, I'll immediatly switch to the TNT style of builds ( which have been forged into ANT currently it seems)


Maindeck:


Land (15)
2 Island
1 Swamp

4 Misty Rainforest
4 Polluted Delta
2 Underground Sea
2 Verdant Catacombs

Non-Land Mana (18)

2 Chrome Mox
4 Lion’s Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Dark Ritual

Draw (19)

2 Ad Nauseam
4 Infernal Tutor

1 Ill-Gotten Gains

4 Ponder

4 Preordain

4 Brainstorm

Disruption (7)

4 Duress

3 Thoughtseize

Kill (1)
1 Tendrils of Agony

Deviruchi
12-14-2013, 05:35 PM
I was looking at modo results when I saw larkblue decklist (4-0 and 3-1) which has 2 Cavern of Souls with 2 Notion Thief + 4 Dark Confidant in the SB. He has to have nice blowout stories with these Thieves already. Those techs...

gregtron
12-14-2013, 06:03 PM
City of Traitors gives you mana the turn you go off. I guess Carpet of Flowers does the same if you hold off casting it until you go off, essentially making it just another ritual. I was more thinking about fetching Tropical turn 1 and getting the Carpet Dazed, but I admit that that argument for City of Traitors isn't really valid. I might actually have to try out a Carpet of Flowers there instead. Still, being vulnurable to Stifle is a thing.

Of all your proposed Chainable problems, I wouldn't want to bounce a single one. Every single one of them kills you after they have resolved anyway, except for Jace, and if they tap out for Jace you should just kill them, not bounce Jace. Blood Moon is horrible against ANT, you can fetch basics and they're dead if they tap out for it most of the time. Thalia is a non-factor once you sideboard in 3-4 Dread of Night and 0-2 Massacre, not to mention the Decays.

Who holds carpet for the turn they go off? You fire off a Probe or a Therapy and fucking windmill that shit. Calling it "just another ritual" is sort of ridiculous, because 1) it's multiple rituals in any color that only requires you to invest one card upfront, and 2) "Lotus Petal is just another ritual." I just can't imagine using City of Traitors against the Wasteland/Stifle deck instead of a repeatable, unremovable mana source. And if they stifle my Carpet trigger? Awesome, that's one less card I have to Duress out of their hands before I machine-gun them.

Chalice is good because it's a flexible card, making it less likely to be dead in game 2 when you aren't sure what they're boarding in, or to cover holes in your sideboard for things you were just hoping to not play against or didn't expect. It's fine to acknowledge that there's a better solution to a specific problem, but we only get 15 sideboard slots and I'd rather punch myself to death than play a board with 4 Dread of Night and 2 Massacre.

Sloshthedark
12-15-2013, 10:28 AM
I was looking at modo results when I saw larkblue decklist (4-0 and 3-1) which has 2 Cavern of Souls with 2 Notion Thief + 4 Dark Confidant in the SB. He has to have nice blowout stories with these Thieves already. Those techs...

I can't say why would be Cavern or Silence splash good, but I have had 2 Thieves ever since it's release in SB and do not plan to drop them soon... it's much better in combo matchups than Confidant and has decent surprise factor vs control, realistically you're the only deck that can catch T2 BS efficiently

Dia_Bot
12-15-2013, 10:43 AM
I can't say why would be Cavern or Silence splash good, but I have had 2 Thieves ever since it's release in SB and do not plan to drop them soon... it's much better in combo matchups than Confidant and has decent surprise factor vs control, realistically you're the only deck that can catch T2 BS efficiently

Notion thief is actually quite cool. If I wouldn't play a BW version I would try them out in the SB.

Anselm
12-15-2013, 12:33 PM
Okay, you guys have persuaded me to try out Carpet of Flowers in place of City of Traitors a bit.

Still don't like Chain of Vapor, though. And 3 Dread of Night/2 Massacre is what you want (or 4 Dread/0 Massacre, just for this matchup) against DnT, the massacres you need against RUW Delver too.

Notion Thief sounds intriguing, but a bit cute.

Sloshthedark
12-16-2013, 04:36 AM
Okay, you guys have persuaded me to try out Carpet of Flowers in place of City of Traitors a bit.

Still don't like Chain of Vapor, though. And 3 Dread of Night/2 Massacre is what you want (or 4 Dread/0 Massacre, just for this matchup) against DnT, the massacres you need against RUW Delver too.

Notion Thief sounds intriguing, but a bit cute.

I won't play any of it, I have no time/psychical power to struggle against the main "schools of thought" there... the Carpet is low impact piercable exposure to mana problems that can be played around by tempo players, how could THAT replace Cabal Ritual is a mystery to me... City of traitors, yeah when you see that in your opener/BS looking for fetchland, you know...

CoV is a weaker card that it used to be, sure... Why do you all shit your pants from D&T?, I haven't lost a match to D&T ever in last 2 years with no dedicated hate, 5 so straightforward cards is a bit of paranoid... I dislike DoN, multiples or lacking multiples is awful and you know which comes when...

Bed Decks Palyer
12-16-2013, 05:06 AM
I won't play any of it, I have no time/psychical power to struggle against the main "schools of thought" there... the Carpet is low impact piercable exposure to mana problems that can be played around by tempo players, how could THAT replace Cabal Ritual is a mystery to me... City of traitors, yeah when you see that in your opener/BS looking for fetchland, you know...

CoV is a weaker card that it used to be, sure... Why do you all shit your pants from D&T?, I haven't lost a match to D&T ever in last 2 years with no dedicated hate, 5 so straightforward cards is a bit of paranoid... I dislike DoN, multiples or lacking multiples is awful and you know which comes when...

People in our lgs that play D+t quite suck. Except for Vojta, who built the deck few weeks ago, I can't remember anyone who's more-than-average player. Also, with the price of Karakas, it wasn't very popular deck until recently, so I guess you've met most of those D+T decks in last few months.
I won't give you bad advices and I think DoN is narrow, but look the average Thursday's meta: Thalia all across the place, and then loads of RUG, BUG, GRU, BURG, UGB and BGU. That and Junk. Part of the reason why I thrown away the deck was that every second pairings I stared at some HateBearEverywhere.dec, pondering into oblivion looking for some removal.

anakyn
12-16-2013, 10:24 AM
People in our lgs that play D+t quite suck. Except for Vojta, who built the deck few weeks ago, I can't remember anyone who's more-than-average player.

Well, playing D&T vs Storm should be pretty straightforward even for inexperienced players: land Mom/Vial on turn 1, land hatebears on turn 2-3 (Canonist --> Thalia --> Revoker), land Mystic, fetch Batterskull, win.

It shouldn't be a complex matchup for the D&T player, even the sideboard options are pretty easy.

I'm not saying it's favorable (well, it is), just that's not complicated at all.

Anselm
12-16-2013, 10:54 AM
I would never replace a ritual with Carpet of Flowers or City of Traitors; I would replace a business spell, probably.

The thing about City of Traitors is that against RUG, I usually find myself going off the turn I run out of lands to play, and if you then have a City in hand, you've effectively went +2 uncounterable mana. That is my theory, nothing else.

Dia_Bot
12-16-2013, 06:24 PM
Well, playing D&T vs Storm should be pretty straightforward even for inexperienced players: land Mom/Vial on turn 1, land hatebears on turn 2-3 (Canonist --> Thalia --> Revoker), land Mystic, fetch Batterskull, win.

It shouldn't be a complex matchup for the D&T player, even the sideboard options are pretty easy.

I'm not saying it's favorable (well, it is), just that's not complicated at all.

It's certainly not difficult from a D&T perspective. From our point..it's a totally different story (unless you play DoN ofc :tongue:)

Sloshthedark
12-17-2013, 02:51 PM
People in our lgs that play D+t quite suck. Except for Vojta, who built the deck few weeks ago, I can't remember anyone who's more-than-average player. Also, with the price of Karakas, it wasn't very popular deck until recently, so I guess you've met most of those D+T decks in last few months.
I won't give you bad advices and I think DoN is narrow, but look the average Thursday's meta: Thalia all across the place, and then loads of RUG, BUG, GRU, BURG, UGB and BGU. That and Junk. Part of the reason why I thrown away the deck was that every second pairings I stared at some HateBearEverywhere.dec, pondering into oblivion looking for some removal.

maybe, everyone and his retarded redneck cousin knows what I'm on and that's most important - so mulligan into hatebear and deploy them accordingly... I admit D&T might be demanding in creature based matchups - mana management, combat math, tricks and such, ANT - no rocket science here... I think it's because I have more removal and no ph33R :)

tested them, they are subpar or overkill, Cannonist is worse problem than Thalia DoN doesn't solve and DoN is miserable strategy vs. U decks+hatebears

Bed Decks Palyer
12-17-2013, 03:33 PM
maybe, everyone and his retarded redneck cousin knows what I'm on and that's most important - so mulligan into hatebear and deploy them accordingly... I admit D&T might be demanding in creature based matchups - mana management, combat math, tricks and such, ANT - no rocket science here... I think it's because I have more removal and no ph33R :)

tested them, they are subpar or overkill, Cannonist is worse problem than Thalia DoN doesn't solve and DoN is miserable strategy vs. U decks+hatebears

Yep, you're rgiht, against ANT the only decission they may mismanage is to keep/mull uncertain hands and then of course some misplays or bad sb.

bjholmes3
12-19-2013, 02:10 AM
Just proxied and sleeved up ANT, D&T, and Deathblade to introduce my LGS to Legacy. It's nice to finally play this deck IRL for once. Also, geez, tutors and fetches are a pain. I guess Cockatrice was good for something after all.

In other news, I have some time tomorrow to work on the primer. Number one priority right now is to complete the SB section and to tweak the MU section to reflect the changes other decks have been making lately, particularly to their SB plans.

fetzonk
12-19-2013, 09:02 AM
I have got a noob-question:
Why are a lot ANT-Decks packing scalding tarn and misty rainforest even if they don't run a single bayou or badlands (e.g. Avery Williams-List)? Are they trying to bluff, they COULD go for these cards or for basics?
I ask this, because i am coming from Esper Stoneblade having included flooded strand as a substitution, because i haven't got enough scalding tarn/ misty rainforest. I think I might even benefit from this, because I am known to play esper in my LGS und a flooded strand->island->ponder wouldn't raise any suspicions that I switched to the dark side :eek:.

Jin Gitaxias
12-19-2013, 09:15 AM
assuming you dont run bayou/badlands every blue fetch is acceptable. As long as your fetch can grab everything beside the basic swamp it is fine.
For example: my current manabase
Lands (14)
4 polluted delta
4 scalding tarn
2 underground sea
1 volcanic island
2 island
1 swmap

this could easily become
Lands (14)
4 polluted delta
1 scalding tarn
1 misty rainforest
2 flooded strand
2 island
1 swamp

Notice how every land can still fetch everything, except the basic swamp wich is why we run 4 polluted delta's.
The reason all of these fetches are blue is because we need islands to cast cantrips. You only need one black mana source to cast your rituals, wich will give you enough black mana.

aaronm678
12-27-2013, 10:41 AM
If you have 3 DON in the sideboard, the Death and Taxes matchup should be very favorable. G1 is kinda a crapshoot (depends a lot on whether both players know what the other is playing and who is on the play -- if we know what they're playing, we can mull to therapy and/or fast hands, if they know what we're playing, they mull to Thalia) - if they land a T2 Thalia on the play, we're not winning - but if we have time to therapy Thalia, we'll usually win (Revoker is a little annoying, but they don't generally have a fast enough clock to make it a major problem, and usually they don't run Mindcensor main). G2 and 3 should be extremely favorable with 3 DON, 5 creature kill, and Karakas, though - you should have plenty of time to dig for DON, and their win % is extremely low if we resolve one.

davelin
12-27-2013, 06:35 PM
I have got a noob-question:
Why are a lot ANT-Decks packing scalding tarn and misty rainforest even if they don't run a single bayou or badlands (e.g. Avery Williams-List)? Are they trying to bluff, they COULD go for these cards or for basics?
I ask this, because i am coming from Esper Stoneblade having included flooded strand as a substitution, because i haven't got enough scalding tarn/ misty rainforest. I think I might even benefit from this, because I am known to play esper in my LGS und a flooded strand->island->ponder wouldn't raise any suspicions that I switched to the dark side :eek:.

To grab islands or blue duals.

Dzra
12-27-2013, 11:30 PM
Polluted Delta fetches everything. Scalding Tarn is the only other fetch that grabs blue duals plus Badlands. Bayou and/or Misty Rainforest are inferior, but if you don't run Badlands then it doesn't matter which blue fetch you run.

Said-In-Contest
12-28-2013, 05:58 AM
Hi everyone!
First of all, I would like to say thank you for the new ANT primer!
It really looked like a refresh was needed!
Having that said, let's talk about the sideboarding with this deck!
I think that managing the main build, and piloting it decently is not an impossible goal to achieve, even for a beginner of the deck!
On the other hand, the correct sideboarding plan is essential to be successful with this amazing archetype!
Here is my list:



ANT 3.0 2013

LANDS 15
4 Polluted Delta
4 Flooded Strand
2 Underground Sea
2 Island
1 Swamp
1 Volcanic Island
1 Tropical Island

SPELLS 45
4 Lotus Petal
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Infernal Tutor
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Duress
3 Cabal Therapy
2 Preordain
1 Lim-Dul's Vault
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Past in Flames
1 Tendrils of Agony

SIDEBOARD
3 Dread of Night
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Chain of Vapor
3 Carpet of Flowers
3 Xantid Swarm

Just a couple of words about the sideboard:

3 Dread of Night: I would never run less, D&T is invincible without these! Still considering the option of playing 4!!

3 Chain of Vapor: also needed vs death and taxes! The other use is against show and tell based decks, basically to bounce Leyline or random stuff

3 Abrupt Decay: let's say miracle...then something else, and you will see looking at the ins and outs below

3 Carpet of Flowers: vs all the tempo decks

3 Xantid Swarm: basically vs S&T and/or decks with counters but no red



Here we go with the boarding planes!


• VS ANT 0

No sideboard


•VS BANT NEMESIS 5
-2 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Duress
-1 Cabal Ritual
-1 Preordain

+3 Abrupt Decay
+2 Xantid Swarm


•VS BELCHER 2
-2 Preordain

+2 Chain of Vapor


•VS BUG DELVER 3
-2 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Lim-Dul's Vault

+3 Carpet of Flowers


• VS BURN 2
-2 Gitaxian Probe

+2 Chain of Vapor


• CANADIAN 3
-2 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Lim-Dul's Vault

+3 Carpet of Flowers


• VS DEATH AND TAXES 6
-4 Duress
-2 Cabal Therapy

+3 Dread of Night
+3 Chain of Vapor


• VS DEATHBLADE 5
-2 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Duress
-1 Cabal Ritual
-1 Preordain

+3 Abrupt Decay
+2 Xantid Swarm


• VS DREDGE 0

No Sideboard


• VS ELVES 0

No Sideboard


•VS ESPER STONEBLADE 5
-2 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Duress
-1 Cabal Ritual
-1 Preordain

+3 Abrupt Decay
+2 Xantid Swarm


• VS GOBLINS 0

No Sideboard


• VS JUND 0

No sideboard
😱 Catene di Mefistofele (Chain of V)
😱 Mindbreak Trap


• VS MAVERIK 5
-4 Duress
-1 Cabal Therapy

+3 Dread of Night
+2 Chain of Vapor


• VS MERFOLKS 0

No Sideboard


• VS MIRACLE 5
-2 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Duress
-1 Cabal Ritual
-1 Preordain

+3 Abrupt Decay
+2 Xantid Swarm


• VS OMITELL 5
-3 Cabal Therapy
-3 Duress

+3 Chain of Vapor
+3 Xantid Swarm


•VS PAINTER 0

No Sideboard


•PATRIOT 6
-2 Gitaxian Proble
-2 Preordain
-1 Cabal Ritual
-1 Lim-Dul's Vault


+3 Carpet of Flowers
+3 Abrupt Decay

• VS REANIMATOR 2
-1 Lim-Dul's Vault
-1 Preordain

+2 Chain of Vapor


• VS ROBIN <---------------------------
?????


• VS SHARDLESS BUG 0

No Sideboard


• VS SNEAK & SHOW 5
-3 Cabal Therapy
-2 Duress

+3 Chain of Vapor
+3 Xantid Swarm


• VS TES 0

No Sideboard


• VS UR PYROMANCER-NEMESIS
-1 Preordain
-1 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Lim-Dul's Vault

+3 Carpet of Flowers

•UW STONEBLADE 5
-2 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Duress
-1 Cabal Ritual
-1 Preordain

+3 Abrupt Decay
+2 Xantid Swarm


If there is something you don't understand or of you have other ideas, please feel free to point that out!
I do not pretend to be right, and I'm looking forward to hear some good players' opinion!
Holaaaaaaaaa

Machahiko
12-28-2013, 07:42 AM
Few pages back there was discussion about this after I told my plans and after that I think that the discussion after that was really helpful. Now I would almost never ever side gitaxian probe out due to what Lemnear instructed.

Panda-san
12-28-2013, 07:53 AM
Hi,

This might sound a little stupid, but why do you board in Chain of Vapor instead of Abrupt decay against Death & Taxes?

Lemnear
12-28-2013, 08:06 AM
Hi,

This might sound a little stupid, but why do you board in Chain of Vapor instead of Abrupt decay against Death & Taxes?

Thalia + Wasteland + Rishadan Port = you'll never get to pay for Decay


Few pages back there was discussion about this after I told my plans and after that I think that the discussion after that was really helpful. Now I would almost never ever side gitaxian probe out due to what Lemnear instructed.

I'm sure BJ does his best to fill the gaps in the primer and SB guides need to be there. It's amusing that peeps are too lazy to browse through 5 pages (discussion started on page 1 about sb'ing) to find their questions already answered, but instead write a wall of text with wrong SB instructions


Own topic:

Carpet don't pull it's weight imo. Too many times Tempo archtypes can work off a single land (sometimes with DRS) to turn Carpet into a manastone in a deck that is already 40% mana (hyperbole!). I guess it's maybe time to return to Pyroblast in this storm-subtype as well to battle Delver, Clique, Counterbalance, Meddling Mage, TNN, S&T, stupid Painter pilots, etc. with an increased Splash of red mana and cut green/Decays completely unless you fear MUD

aaronm678
12-28-2013, 08:25 AM
•VS BANT NEMESIS 5
-2 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Duress
-1 Cabal Ritual
-1 Preordain

+3 Abrupt Decay
+2 Xantid Swarm


You should probably prioritize cutting duress here and leave in Gitaxian Probe. Xantid Swarm doesn't really seem needed - these decks typically run 1 hard counter (Force), and typically they SB permanent disruption. I'd do:
-3 Duress
+3 Abrupt Decay



•VS BELCHER 2
-2 Preordain
+2 Chain of Vapor


You want all 3 Chains on the draw here, cutting a therapy. On the play, Therapy is probably better.



•VS BUG DELVER 3
-2 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Lim-Dul's Vault
+3 Carpet of Flowers


I think you board out GP too much - it's one of your more powerful cards against the tempo decks. I'd cut Preordains here over GP.



• CANADIAN 3
-2 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Lim-Dul's Vault
+3 Carpet of Flowers


Ditto -- I'd cut preordain here over GP.



• VS DEATHBLADE 5
-2 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Duress
-1 Cabal Ritual
-1 Preordain

+3 Abrupt Decay
+2 Xantid Swarm


I'd cut LDV over GP here. Also note - if you don't see Meddling Mage after G2, cut AD for duress, ritual, and GP. MM is getting more and more popular, but AD is going to be completely dead if you bring it in and they don't have it.



• VS DREDGE 0


-3 Therapy
+3 Chain

You can often set them back a couple turns by bouncing Narcomeobas and Ichorids on draw step, which is really important, since this matchup is a straight race.



• VS ELVES 0
No Sideboard


Elves almost always brings in some sort of permanent based disruption (Thorn of Amethyst of Gaddock Teeg). Cut Duresses for Chain at the very least, and possibly consider cutting additional discard for AD.



•VS ESPER STONEBLADE 5
-2 Gitaxian Probe
-1 Duress
-1 Cabal Ritual
-1 Preordain

+3 Abrupt Decay
+2 Xantid Swarm


This deck is identical to Deathblade as far as we're concerned. Cut AD if they don't have MM.



• VS GOBLINS 0

No Sideboard


Goblins very often brings in Thalia or Thorn of Amethyst. Cut Duress for Chains.



• VS JUND 0

No sideboard
😱 Catene di Mefistofele (Chain of V)
😱 Mindbreak Trap


Duress isn't great here - I'd bring in CoV and put duress back in only if they have MBT (it's a very, very uncommon SB card)



• VS OMITELL 5
-3 Cabal Therapy
-3 Duress

+3 Chain of Vapor
+3 Xantid Swarm


These decks are very, very weak to Discard, and Chain doesn't do anything to them, and the matchup isn't really much of a race - we have inevitibility, I like playing this matchup to just force them to discard their kill conditions and kill them eventually. I'd do -2 Preordain, -1 GP, +3 Xantid.

If you see Leyline G2, then you can board this way - but I wouldn't just automatically cut all of your discard just because you might see Leyline - it's definitely not a given that they're SBing it, and if they aren't, this SB is awful.



•PATRIOT 6
-2 Gitaxian Proble
-2 Preordain
-1 Cabal Ritual
-1 Lim-Dul's Vault
+3 Carpet of Flowers
+3 Abrupt Decay


Don't cut GP here, just like the other tempo decks.



• VS REANIMATOR 2
-1 Lim-Dul's Vault
-1 Preordain

+2 Chain of Vapor


Chain doesn't really do anything here, and Xantid is excellent (There isn't really any point in bouncing a Griselbrand or Iona - if they've reanimated one of these guys, we aren't winning)




• VS SNEAK & SHOW 5
-3 Cabal Therapy
-2 Duress

+3 Chain of Vapor
+3 Xantid Swarm


Same as Omnitell - you definitely don't want to cut all of your discard here - they're very weak to it. Chain of Vapor is almost a straight blank, since this deck almost never SBs Leyline (even less often than Omnitell)

davelin
12-28-2013, 09:18 AM
Thalia + Wasteland + Rishadan Port = you'll never get to pay for Decay



I'm sure BJ does his best to fill the gaps in the primer and SB guides need to be there. It's amusing that peeps are too lazy to browse through 5 pages (discussion started on page 1 about sb'ing) to find their questions already answered, but instead write a wall of text with wrong SB instructions


Own topic:

Carpet don't pull it's weight imo. Too many times Tempo archtypes can work off a single land (sometimes with DRS) to turn Carpet into a manastone in a deck that is already 40% mana (hyperbole!). I guess it's maybe time to return to Pyroblast in this storm-subtype as well to battle Delver, Clique, Counterbalance, Meddling Mage, TNN, S&T, stupid Painter pilots, etc. with an increased Splash of red mana and cut green/Decays completely unless you fear MUD

I've seen some lists running counters (such as Swan Song or Flusterstorm) in the SB which always seems to be contradictory (nombo with LED/IT). Curious if these measures have been helpful, I haven't seen much discussion on when they are brought in and their usefulness.

Lemnear
12-28-2013, 09:54 AM
I've seen some lists running counters (such as Swan Song or Flusterstorm) in the SB which always seems to be contradictory (nombo with LED/IT). Curious if these measures have been helpful, I haven't seen much discussion on when they are brought in and their usefulness.

Flusterstorm and Swan Song are pretty passive, but to the nature of ANT being a bit slower than Counterbalance/S&T/etc. bridging the gap between their combo/hate and your critical turn is valid.

Pyroblast adresses most of the cards you fear (sans Thalia/Cannonist) on the Stack but also on the table unlike the blue counters.

kiwi
12-28-2013, 02:16 PM
Nowadays is very strange to see in ant's sideboard cards against the graveyard, but I'm thinking about packing 3 o 4 surgical extractions, tinfins and reanimator are bad pairings on other hand now is very strange to see leylines of sanctity in the sideboards, maybe is time to change chain of vapor for better removal against hatebears or taking some slot for graveyard hate. (I know that reanimator and tin fins arent tier 1 decks but if you are going to play a big tournament is easy to be paired against them im some round)

bjholmes3
12-28-2013, 02:34 PM
OP looks nicer now. Adding further SB guides for November meta later tonight. Been real busy studying, reading like 6+ hours per day. Needless to say, one doesn't want to write a primer after that.

bondfan
12-28-2013, 07:01 PM
Nowadays is very strange to see in ant's sideboard cards against the graveyard, but I'm thinking about packing 3 o 4 surgical extractions, tinfins and reanimator are bad pairings on other hand now is very strange to see leylines of sanctity in the sideboards, maybe is time to change chain of vapor for better removal against hatebears or taking some slot for graveyard hate. (I know that reanimator and tin fins arent tier 1 decks but if you are going to play a big tournament is easy to be paired against them im some round)

It depends how specific you want to get with your hate. Karakas is the best hate against Reanimator but Surgical has use against other GY decks and Storm mirrors.

DarkJester
12-28-2013, 07:51 PM
I play 2 Surgical, 1 Karakas atm for the Reanimator-MU, Karakas is good against D'n'T and Surgical is good againt Dredge and the Mirros as well.

Said-In-Contest
12-28-2013, 10:11 PM
Hi,

This might sound a little stupid, but why do you board in Chain of Vapor instead of Abrupt decay against Death & Taxes?

Because decay has some problems:

1) it costs G and B...especially G is not easy to keep against a denial deck like D&T!

2) it costs cc2...this means that with a Thalia on board you have to pay 3! Again, considering the land denial that D&T can do, it is not something amazing

Chain of vapor, on the other hand, is cheap, versatile, and it might be used to increase the storm count in those scenarios in which you draw it and it have no hate to bounce (decay, in the same spot, is just a dead card)

Moreover, I use to combo off against D&T with always a U open/in pool...this because if they have a vial at 2/3 or 3 mana open, they would be able to put a hatebear onto play at instant speed...at this point, you might just lose the game...but a chain of vapor can save you!
The same thing cannot be done (most of the time I mean) with decay: leaving open a B and a G mana is quite rare to be done...

I hope I've been able to explain my point!
Ps even Adam Prosak says the same things about decay vs hatebear decks :)

Griselpuff
01-02-2014, 10:42 PM
What are others thoughts of Burning ANT? I think Burning Wish is good vs. Meddling Mage, not to mention giving you ways to kill Teeg, Chalice, Leyline and CB.

I'm currently playing the following targets:

Empty the Warrens
Grapeshot
Grim Tutor
Massacre
Meltdown
Past in Flames
Reverent Silence
Tendrils of Agony
Thoughtseize

Final Fortune
01-02-2014, 11:05 PM
Thalia + Wasteland + Rishadan Port = you'll never get to pay for Decay



I'm sure BJ does his best to fill the gaps in the primer and SB guides need to be there. It's amusing that peeps are too lazy to browse through 5 pages (discussion started on page 1 about sb'ing) to find their questions already answered, but instead write a wall of text with wrong SB instructions


Own topic:

Carpet don't pull it's weight imo. Too many times Tempo archtypes can work off a single land (sometimes with DRS) to turn Carpet into a manastone in a deck that is already 40% mana (hyperbole!). I guess it's maybe time to return to Pyroblast in this storm-subtype as well to battle Delver, Clique, Counterbalance, Meddling Mage, TNN, S&T, stupid Painter pilots, etc. with an increased Splash of red mana and cut green/Decays completely unless you fear MUD

I more or less came to the same conclusion regarding Pyroblast replacing Abrupt Decay in TES at least, Counterbalance is played in one deck compared to Meddling Mage, Vendillion Clique and counter spells and the mana efficiency of the card is just absolutely critical. I also think people under estimate just how useful being able to counter their Ponder/Brainstorm in order to keep them off land and counters is or counter Delver of Secrets to keep you off a clock.

anakyn
01-03-2014, 06:03 AM
I more or less came to the same conclusion regarding Pyroblast replacing Abrupt Decay in TES at least, Counterbalance is played in one deck compared to Meddling Mage, Vendillion Clique and counter spells and the mana efficiency of the card is just absolutely critical. I also think people under estimate just how useful being able to counter their Ponder/Brainstorm in order to keep them off land and counters is or counter Delver of Secrets to keep you off a clock.

How do you handle Chalice @1 without Decay?

Lemnear
01-03-2014, 06:12 AM
How do you handle Chalice @1 without Decay?

You can't. You'll gamble for not facing MUD

Final Fortune
01-03-2014, 08:43 AM
There's no reason the deck can't use more specific removal or bounce like Wipe Away, Echoing Truth or Shattering Spree, if you're not playing Green then you have a lot of new found SB space. Also I don't think playing Pyroblast necessarily means that you can't play green as well, I just don't SB in Abrupt Decay over Pyroblast in any blue matchups at this point because it's too linear in comparison.

CabalTherapy
01-03-2014, 08:43 AM
You can't. You'll gamble for not facing MUD

Cast cantrips till threshold and use Cabal Rituals.

davelin
01-03-2014, 09:12 AM
You can't. You'll gamble for not facing MUD

It's not favorable but with Cabal Rits, LEDs and Petals, it's still entirely possible to beat Chalice @ 1. I have, and I'm sure many others have done this.

Lemnear
01-03-2014, 09:33 AM
Because finding 2+ Cabal Rituals, 1+ LED plus an Infernal without any cantrips is a realistic scenario? We all know such stupidness CAN happen, but arguing with such stuff is laughable at best. I take this discussion serious

davelin
01-03-2014, 09:53 AM
Because finding 2+ Cabal Rituals, 1+ LED plus an Infernal without any cantrips is a realistic scenario? We all know such stupidness CAN happen, but arguing with such stuff is laughable at best. I take this discussion serious

Again I'm not saying it's likely but it's a more likely scenario than just saying Chalice @ 1 is unbeatable. On the play without a sol-land from their side you have the opportunity to cast two cantrips (maybe more) to find your outs. Or you Duress/Therapy away their first and they need a couple of turns to land their second. Just saying Chalice @ 1 doesn't equal GG for them.

And why isn't 2x LED + plus Infernal or 1x LED and 1X CR plus Infernal good enough for the win?

Lemnear
01-03-2014, 11:29 AM
Again I'm not saying it's likely but it's a more likely scenario than just saying Chalice @ 1 is unbeatable. On the play without a sol-land from their side you have the opportunity to cast two cantrips (maybe more) to find your outs. Or you Duress/Therapy away their first and they need a couple of turns to land their second. Just saying Chalice @ 1 doesn't equal GG for them.

And why isn't 2x LED + plus Infernal or 1x LED and 1X CR plus Infernal good enough for the win?

First I feel were talking AN lists vs. Lists without AN here which sure makes a difference. All I was trying to Highlight was that your chances to win against a turn 1 Chalice @ 1 is below 20% with ANT vs MUD as the Chalice won't be your only problem for long. I resist to discuss cases in which your MUD opponent starts the game without any mentionable plays during the first 2-3 turns aka no Sol lands, no other acceleration as that was not the question asked.

In essence, the Chance to dig you out from the Turn 1 Chalice is imo too slim to consider "drawing the nuts naturally" as a valid gameplan here.

davelin
01-03-2014, 11:42 AM
First I feel were talking AN lists vs. Lists without AN here which sure makes a difference. All I was trying to Highlight was that your chances to win against a turn 1 Chalice @ 1 is below 20% with ANT vs MUD as the Chalice won't be your only problem for long. I resist to discuss cases in which your MUD opponent starts the game without any mentionable plays during the first 2-3 turns aka no Sol lands, no other acceleration as that was not the question asked.

In essence, the Chance to dig you out from the Turn 1 Chalice is imo too slim to consider "drawing the nuts naturally" as a valid gameplan here.

The original question didn't stipulate when the Chalice @ 1 landed. I agree if we assume it lands turn one we are in a very bad shape, but I would stipulate that is probably still the case with Decays since ANT typically plays with 2-3 and Chalice is shutting off our ability to dig for them.

Lemnear
01-03-2014, 11:49 AM
The original question didn't stipulate when the Chalice @ 1 landed. I agree if we assume it lands turn one we are in a very bad shape, but I would stipulate that is probably still the case with Decays since ANT typically plays with 2-3 and Chalice is shutting off our ability to dig for them.

Those are still additional OUTS and single-card-solutions in addition which doesn't require a combination of 3-4 cards in your hand to beat Chalice. ;)

davelin
01-03-2014, 12:08 PM
Those are still additional OUTS and single-card-solutions in addition which doesn't require a combination of 3-4 cards in your hand to beat Chalice. ;)

Fair enough :-)

ThomasDowd
01-03-2014, 06:31 PM
What are others thoughts of Burning ANT? I think Burning Wish is good vs. Meddling Mage, not to mention giving you ways to kill Teeg, Chalice, Leyline and CB.

I'm currently playing the following targets:

Empty the Warrens
Grapeshot
Grim Tutor
Massacre
Meltdown
Past in Flames
Reverent Silence
Tendrils of Agony
Thoughtseize


I played something similar
- R. silence
- Grapeshot
Thoughtseize-> the 8th discard of the suite
PiF-> IGG

I liked it. My plan versus CB was to win fast( it did not work out in my games) but that requires drawing the nuts, but with 7 tutors instead of the normal 4( or 5) plus cantrips its somewhat feasible. even just early empty for 10 puts them on a pretty large back foot. the logic was flawed though because they also have countermagic for days. i have since moved back to 4 color with a grim, a chrome mox, and a preordain in place of the 3 burning wish. not sure on whcih is better. always a meta call.

The last 3-4 spots in this deck make all the difference

Lemnear
01-03-2014, 07:05 PM
I doubt the deck it really suited to support Burning Wish aka a full UBRg manabase without giving up it's feature of being able to operate off Basic lands. Bob, I could easily see you getting in troubles against Wasteland and Stifle at times with Burning Wish. However, a Burning Wish ANT made 3rd at the last BoM even if the deck played out pretty random from what I have witnessed

Arguing for T1 EtW with Burning Wish is strange, as it rises the question of why not playing TES instead.

ThomasDowd
01-03-2014, 08:09 PM
I doubt the deck it really suited to support Burning Wish aka a full UBRg manabase without giving up it's feature of being able to operate off Basic lands. Bob, I could easily see you getting in troubles against Wasteland and Stifle at times with Burning Wish. However, a Burning Wish ANT made 3rd at the last BoM even if the deck played out pretty random from what I have witnessed

Arguing for T1 EtW with Burning Wish is strange, as it rises the question of why not playing TES instead.

The 4 color build was without burning wish and more inline with what this thread is proposing(one volcanic, one trop, 2 sea), the burning wish build was strictly 3 color and without green.

I like the long game of ANT better. and feel it better suits my style of play. The T1 empty is just an option if it is absolutely needed. as the case for the CB matchup, there are very short, small windows you have to jump through to go off and having the option of empty is pretty strong when you can't kill them outright. That being said I still find it very difficult to beat a highly skilled CB player. but then again i only play once every 4 or 5 months and don't touch cards in between at all.

anakyn
01-04-2014, 07:58 PM
How do you handle Chalice @1 without Decay?
You can't. You'll gamble for not facing MUD


Fair enough (and that's why I would never play without 2-3 Decay in a storm deck), but I don't think it's just a MUD-related problem.
A full set of maindeck Chalices is also played by Tezzerator and Aggro Loam, while most Affinity and some Goblin lists play them in the sideboard (some Affinity list even maindeck).

I know we're talking about fringe decks, but both Tezzerator and Aggro Loam have won a Starcitygames tournament last year, while Affinity and Goblin keep being shuffled by many players, so it's not that unlikely to face them in competitive events.
I would include also Stax, if only he hadn't disappeared from the meta (thanks god).

But sure: among these, MUD is the deck against which storm decks have more problems.

cheerios
01-06-2014, 01:07 AM
How effective is the extra Ad Naus in the sideboard?

Lemnear
01-06-2014, 01:33 AM
How effective is the extra Ad Naus in the sideboard?

Who does this?

cheerios
01-06-2014, 01:48 AM
Few players such as Timo Schunemann (http://www.tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=12122&iddeck=88836) and Max Sjoblom (http://www.tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=12373&iddeck=90675) had success with this card in the sideboard. I've been testing it vs fair decks and control decks. Sometimes it's great to just double dark rit into Ad Naus vs fair decks but I've also died several times to flipping Past In Flames then the 2nd Ad Naus (9 life in two cards). I wonder if there are also other players practicing the same strategy.

Lemnear
01-06-2014, 02:05 AM
Few players such as Timo Schunemann (http://www.tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=12122&iddeck=88836) and Max Sjoblom (http://www.tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=12373&iddeck=90675) had success with this card in the sideboard. I've been testing it vs fair decks and control decks. Sometimes it's great to just double dark rit into Ad Naus vs fair decks but I've also died several times to flipping Past In Flames then the 2nd Ad Naus (9 life in two cards). I wonder if there are also other players practicing the same strategy.

I'm sure that this is a typo in Timo's list, as several BoM lists were listed plain wrong on their website

cheerios
01-06-2014, 02:11 AM
I'm sure that this is a typo in Timo's list, as several BoM lists were listed plain wrong on their website

Thanks for the info. I was wondering what was the reason behind it since based on my testing, it wasn't that great or significant.

Mindlash
01-06-2014, 03:16 AM
Thanks for the info. I was wondering what was the reason behind it since based on my testing, it wasn't that great or significant.

Timo's sideboard Ad Nauseam was a typo. It is a second Chain of Vapor. Max just copied his decklist and changed some cards. Therefore his second Ad Nauseam is only a copied typo ;)

BeardTron
01-06-2014, 10:50 AM
4th Place finish by Ethan Jain-Washburn at SCG yesterday.

Has 4 Thoughtseize in the 75 (1 main) and a Telemin Performance (Honestly, I'm a little confused as to why this is here) in the side.
Along w/ a Grim Tutor.

Quite a bit of life loss w/ Seize/Grim/Probe main.

Obviously did very well with it...lost to that Jund Depths brew in the Semi's.

NoizeMe
01-06-2014, 11:05 AM
... and a Telemin Performance (Honestly, I'm a little confused as to why this is here) in the side.

It is quit good against other Storm decks and Lands as they do not run any creatures, at least in the Main, so it is a 5 mana "I win"-spell, which has also applications against Show and Tell.

Lemnear
01-06-2014, 11:06 AM
4th Place finish by Ethan Jain-Washburn at SCG yesterday.

Has 4 Thoughtseize in the 75 (1 main) and a Telemin Performance (Honestly, I'm a little confused as to why this is here) in the side.
Along w/ a Grim Tutor.

Quite a bit of life loss w/ Seize/Grim/Probe main.

Obviously did very well with it...lost to that Jund Depths brew in the Semi's.

To board Telemin for Ad Nauseam in combo-mirrors

Asgar
01-10-2014, 08:06 AM
And Omnitell and High Tide and Sneak Attack :)

DarkJester
01-10-2014, 09:03 AM
And Omnitell and High Tide and Sneak Attack :)

Well, I think the term "combo-mirrors" includes these archetypes, too.^^

Lemnear
01-10-2014, 09:23 AM
Well, I think the term "combo-mirrors" includes these archetypes, too.^^

At least I intended it ;)

Zombie
01-12-2014, 07:35 AM
To board Telemin for Ad Nauseam in combo-mirrors

Board it in vs. me, please please please? :D

cheerios
01-13-2014, 01:18 AM
what's the best strategy to fight discard with graveyatd hate? Aside from going off early, I've been relying on the goblins plan lately versus this kind of deck. I find it hard to reach 10 storm. Any advise experienced storm troopers?

Lemnear
01-13-2014, 03:04 AM
what's the best strategy to fight discard with graveyatd hate? Aside from going off early, I've been relying on the goblins plan lately versus this kind of deck. I find it hard to reach 10 storm. Any advise experienced storm troopers?

If that strategy is wide-spread in your metagame, I would switch to ANT's graveyard Independent sibling for the time being. This is na natural weakness of ANT. Alternatively you may try Dark Confidant in your board

cheerios
01-13-2014, 03:48 AM
If that strategy is wide-spread in your metagame, I would switch to ANT's graveyard Independent sibling for the time being. This is na natural weakness of ANT. Alternatively you may try Dark Confidant in your board

Luckily, it's not that prevalent here. But I've suffered several defeats to the same strategy. I don't have the cards to switch to TES since I've just recently completed ANT.

bjholmes3
01-13-2014, 09:30 AM
Yeah, those matchups are what the SB Bob is all about. If discard is really that prevalent, then he would be an excellent addition.

Lans89
01-13-2014, 11:08 AM
Confidant is awesome vs Esperblade, Deathblade, Shardless BUG, BUG Tempo/Team America and even Miracles! But most of the time you want Ad Nauseam aswell, so that could be problematic. But when I play them I can most often go for a natural tendrils after a few hits or simply because you draw more cards. But as off now, I can't seem to find the sideboard space to include them again =(..

Sideboard
1# Pithing Needle
2# Xantid Swarm
2# Carpet of Flowers
3# Dread of Night
3# Chain of Vapor
2# Abrupt Decay
1# Hurkyl’s Recall
1# Empty the Warrens

This was my sb for a 6-1 (trial) and 6-3 (main event) at the last BoM. Needle was awesome vs diffrent Elves, but mostly Deathrite & Liliana, and secured 2 wins vs Jund. Against Reanimate, it made me win trough Griselbrand. I also faced Painter 3 times, but don't think I drew it those games. And obviously he is a blast vs Miracles most important weapon 'Sensei's Divining Top'. It also stops Vial from flashing back Chained creatures. I didn't face Sneaky Show, but my friend and top 8'r Jamie Westlake did stop a Sneak Attack once if I'm correct ^_^. So that's that, I don't want to cut Needle! I do want to cut the 3 Dread of Night, because I just never faced D&T or Maverick. But when I do I need to play 2 Massacre, so still no space for 3/4 Confidants... In the past I didn't play Carpets, but I need it to fight RUG and UWR Delver.

Dzra
01-13-2014, 11:11 AM
what's the best strategy to fight discard with graveyatd hate? Aside from going off early, I've been relying on the goblins plan lately versus this kind of deck. I find it hard to reach 10 storm. Any advise experienced storm troopers?

If you don't already, running a single Burning Wish is helpful if your Tendrils gets exiled. Other than that, you'll just have to slug through it. Ad Nauseam, while bad most places, is pretty good against discard and/or gy hate. I'm usually not a big fan of Bob.

afb0032
01-13-2014, 12:12 PM
Confidant is awesome vs Esperblade, Deathblade, Shardless BUG, BUG Tempo/Team America and even Miracles! But most of the time you want Ad Nauseam aswell, so that could be problematic. But when I play them I can most often go for a natural tendrils after a few hits or simply because you draw more cards. But as off now, I can't seem to find the sideboard space to include them again =(..

Sideboard
1# Pithing Needle
2# Xantid Swarm
2# Carpet of Flowers
3# Dread of Night
3# Chain of Vapor
2# Abrupt Decay
1# Hurkyl’s Recall
1# Empty the Warrens

This was my sb for a 6-1 (trial) and 6-3 (main event) at the last BoM. Needle was awesome vs diffrent Elves, but mostly Deathrite & Liliana, and secured 2 wins vs Jund. Against Reanimate, it made me win trough Griselbrand. I also faced Painter 3 times, but don't think I drew it those games. And obviously he is a blast vs Miracles most important weapon 'Sensei's Divining Top'. It also stops Vial from flashing back Chained creatures. I didn't face Sneaky Show, but my friend and top 8'r Jamie Westlake did stop a Sneak Attack once if I'm correct ^_^. So that's that, I don't want to cut Needle! I do want to cut the 3 Dread of Night, because I just never faced D&T or Maverick. But when I do I need to play 2 Massacre, so still no space for 3/4 Confidants... In the past I didn't play Carpets, but I need it to fight RUG and UWR Delver.

You may want to consider -3 DoN and -1 for Hurkyl's and go for +1 Massacre, +1 Pyroclasm or Toxic Deluge, and +2 Bob if you want to leave needle.



If you don't already, running a single Burning Wish is helpful if your Tendrils gets exiled. Other than that, you'll just have to slug through it. Ad Nauseam, while bad most places, is pretty good against discard and/or gy hate. I'm usually not a big fan of Bob.

If you currently have a grim tutor in the main you could try this 1 for 1 swap and see if it works for you.

DarkJester
01-13-2014, 02:45 PM
Confidant is awesome vs Esperblade, Deathblade, Shardless BUG, BUG Tempo/Team America and even Miracles! But most of the time you want Ad Nauseam aswell, so that could be problematic. But when I play them I can most often go for a natural tendrils after a few hits or simply because you draw more cards. But as off now, I can't seem to find the sideboard space to include them again =(..

Sideboard
1# Pithing Needle
2# Xantid Swarm
2# Carpet of Flowers
3# Dread of Night
3# Chain of Vapor
2# Abrupt Decay
1# Hurkyl’s Recall
1# Empty the Warrens

This was my sb for a 6-1 (trial) and 6-3 (main event) at the last BoM. Needle was awesome vs diffrent Elves, but mostly Deathrite & Liliana, and secured 2 wins vs Jund. Against Reanimate, it made me win trough Griselbrand. I also faced Painter 3 times, but don't think I drew it those games. And obviously he is a blast vs Miracles most important weapon 'Sensei's Divining Top'. It also stops Vial from flashing back Chained creatures. I didn't face Sneaky Show, but my friend and top 8'r Jamie Westlake did stop a Sneak Attack once if I'm correct ^_^. So that's that, I don't want to cut Needle! I do want to cut the 3 Dread of Night, because I just never faced D&T or Maverick. But when I do I need to play 2 Massacre, so still no space for 3/4 Confidants... In the past I didn't play Carpets, but I need it to fight RUG and UWR Delver.

If you want to beat Patriot or Canadian I think you should be fine with an additional Duress from the board (going up to 8 Discard Effects postboard) as protection-spell. During my last tournaments I faced those decks often and tried different things, including the old-school Defense Grid (which has rarely been better than an additional discard-spell in situations that require protection). Right now I board -1 Preordain or Grim Tutor -1 Ad Nauseam +1 Duress +1 EtW against Canadian and am pretty fine with it. Against Patriot I leave the Goblins in the board most of the time (Batterskull) and bring in outs to MM. (Slaughter Pact and 2 Chains). That should be enough imo.
Carpet didn't serve me well until now, maybe it's better against Patriot than Canadian, but both decks operate on a very low curve. Just be able to fetch basics and you should do well.

nevilshute
01-13-2014, 03:01 PM
Confidant is awesome vs Esperblade, Deathblade, Shardless BUG, BUG Tempo/Team America and even Miracles! But most of the time you want Ad Nauseam aswell, so that could be problematic. But when I play them I can most often go for a natural tendrils after a few hits or simply because you draw more cards. But as off now, I can't seem to find the sideboard space to include them again =(..

Sideboard
1# Pithing Needle
2# Xantid Swarm
2# Carpet of Flowers
3# Dread of Night
3# Chain of Vapor
2# Abrupt Decay
1# Hurkyl’s Recall
1# Empty the Warrens

This was my sb for a 6-1 (trial) and 6-3 (main event) at the last BoM. Needle was awesome vs diffrent Elves, but mostly Deathrite & Liliana, and secured 2 wins vs Jund. Against Reanimate, it made me win trough Griselbrand. I also faced Painter 3 times, but don't think I drew it those games. And obviously he is a blast vs Miracles most important weapon 'Sensei's Divining Top'. It also stops Vial from flashing back Chained creatures. I didn't face Sneaky Show, but my friend and top 8'r Jamie Westlake did stop a Sneak Attack once if I'm correct ^_^. So that's that, I don't want to cut Needle! I do want to cut the 3 Dread of Night, because I just never faced D&T or Maverick. But when I do I need to play 2 Massacre, so still no space for 3/4 Confidants... In the past I didn't play Carpets, but I need it to fight RUG and UWR Delver.

Vis a vis Dark Confidants: would you recommend boarding in Confidants versus Jund? Their bolts and Lilianas won't come out so there'll be many ways for them to get rid of Bob. Otoh they rely heavily on discard and gy disruption so a Bob left alone for 2+ turns can really make a huge difference.

Lemnear
01-13-2014, 03:05 PM
Vis a vis Dark Confidants: would you recommend boarding in Confidants versus Jund? Their bolts and Lilianas won't come out so there'll be many ways for them to get rid of Bob. Otoh they rely heavily on discard and gy disruption so a Bob left alone for 2+ turns can really make a huge difference.

No, jund has just too many removal for bob to do more than cantripping for 1B.

DarkJester
01-13-2014, 03:11 PM
Vis a vis Dark Confidants: would you recommend boarding in Confidants versus Jund? Their bolts and Lilianas won't come out so there'll be many ways for them to get rid of Bob. Otoh they rely heavily on discard and gy disruption so a Bob left alone for 2+ turns can really make a huge difference.

I would never ever board Bob against Jund. As you said, their Bolts stay in their deck for postboard-games and they will kill him on sight! But apparently, I don't think that this MU is that difficult. Play out LED's and wait for business like in other heavy discard matchups, and hope that their clock is slower than your cantrips.

DarkJester
01-13-2014, 03:11 PM
Sorry, double post

Lans89
01-13-2014, 05:37 PM
Bob was indeed not good enough vs Jund. Liliana or bolt removes it too fast (but punishing jund boards out punishing fire and doesn't play bolt, so that makes it little worse), and you will not be able to kick a few times (which is a big + vs some other decks). You can better have your discard to hit theirs, or toy around with Chain of Vapors (they can up the stormcount by a significant amount when you've played out your artifact mana :D).

I have the Hurkyl's Recall instead of the 3th Decay, because it is a nice one-off vs Affinity and MUD, but still works against Miracles (Top and Canonist). It might be the best option to cut for Confidants, but I don't think it's safe. You can most likely only play Confidants if you choose to cut either Swarm or Carpet entirely. A lot of people here say that Carpet sucks. While I agree that a 8th discard would be enough most of the time, Carpet just let's you win trough softcounters so easely! And sometimes even fixes mana issues or let you cast stuff trough Stifle ^^! But you guys agree that Massacre is the best option as a sweeper after cutting Dread of Night? I first need to handle that and will still think about Confidant in the meantime (I think there is less discard than before?).

anakyn
01-13-2014, 07:30 PM
(but punishing jund boards out punishing fire and doesn't play bolt, so that makes it little worse)


I don't think that will happen too often, frankly.
Yes, there are some lists playing only Punishing fire and no Bolts, but the majority of Punishing Jund lists play at least a couple of Bolts too.
My Punishing Jund list does never play less than 3 Bolts, they are just too good to leave them out, even if you play Fires; and I think most Jund players feel the same way about it.

Lans89
01-13-2014, 09:12 PM
I don't think that will happen too often, frankly.
Yes, there are some lists playing only Punishing fire and no Bolts, but the majority of Punishing Jund lists play at least a couple of Bolts too.
My Punishing Jund list does never play less than 3 Bolts, they are just too good to leave them out, even if you play Fires; and I think most Jund players feel the same way about it.

I checked and you are right! Cory Teran (#2 SCG Vegas) played a list that supports my statement, but most others seem to play 2/3 bolt. Anyway, Jund was not in the list of decks (where Bob is good to side in) I mentioned for good reasons =). Even Abrupt Decay is good to be left in (if they have the space), because LED's should all be played out, and could kill your Bob. While decks like Shardless BUG (one of the decks I mentioned) is forced to side them out. Sadly those Golgari Charm sweepers these days could also punish you for going t1 land -> petal -> Bob =(

anakyn
01-14-2014, 07:08 AM
Even Abrupt Decay is good to be left in (if they have the space), because LED's should all be played out, and could kill your Bob.


This is right, because a smart ANT player should play its LED/Petals immediately, but Jund's sideboard has enough combo hate to reclaim many slots: usually it is 2-3 Duress, 3 Pyroblast, 2 Extirpate/Surgical, 1-2 Chains of Mephistopheles, a couple of Golgari charms if needed (Empty the warrens hate). That's about 10 slots to sideboard against TES, and about 8 against ANT (if it doesn't play Warrens): I guess Decay has to be cut most times, but 1 or 2 Ancient grudge could be sided in sometimes.

Pdingo
01-14-2014, 07:54 AM
A smart ant playet nevet cut his decays
He cut the elfes and 1-2 goyfs and punish fires..

Sometimes you should have attention to put your leds in the play;)

Lans89
01-14-2014, 07:57 AM
Yeah Broadbraid Elf is so slow (and you don't want to hit blasts or sweepers with no targets), I also see it being cut when playtesting. But Jund is certainly a deck where people can do a lot of different things ^^! So you have to be prepaired.

Anselm
01-14-2014, 08:14 AM
I'm currently running an extra AdN in the board. It's useful against discard and in combo mirrors where you want to race (the mirror, Tin Fins). Also have a couple of Chrome Moxes for those last matchups. Improves the clock quite a bit. Against Jund for example, I almost always want to draw the natural AdN.

anakyn
01-14-2014, 09:46 AM
A smart ant playet nevet cut his decays
He cut the elfes and 1-2 goyfs and punish fires..

Sometimes you should have attention to put your leds in the play;)


I guess you meant a smart Jund player ;)

Well, it's a matter of preference: I'm not sure Decay is better than Bloodbraid against ANT.
Considering the amount of disruption (let's say the ANT player will be hit by a couple of discard spells before being able to go off) and the fact ANT is not particularly fast, I'd say that the Jund player should live until the 3rd/4th turn, when he should have already used all the discard he has drawn, so a 3/2 hasty body cascading into additional discard or Liliana can be devastating... you know, a lucky Bloodbraid can be read as: "deal 3 recurring damage a turn and make the opponent discard 2 cards at random". Even cascading into a Bolt means 6 damage, and that's not bad at all since you are reducing by far an Ad Nauseam potential.
Decay could be dead if the ANT player has just Rituals to close the combo, Bloodbraid on the other hand is never dead: for sure there's luck involved, but in any case it's a clock at least.

If the Jund deck has Ancient Grudge in the board and wants to interact against LED/Petal, probably boarding in Grudge in the place of Decays could be the right move.

southfloridamagic
01-14-2014, 10:05 AM
Hey guys, Dave from www.southfloridamagic.com here. I top 4'd SCG Orlando w/ ANT and will be doing a write up that goes live tomorrow, will cross post here. I've been reading the ANT thread for a while (mostly the old one) and would love to give some contribution since your guys' words have helped me.

Additionally, Thomas Hake (who got 2nd the same tournament) will be joining me for a live legacy tournament where we will both be commentating this Wednesday around 7:30pm EST. You can watch at twitch.tv/southfloridamagic if you are into that sort of thing.

Dzra
01-14-2014, 03:48 PM
Abrupt Decay only hits resolved LEDs and Petals. If ANT is playing out LEDs and Petals then either Jund is about to die or Jund has another turn to fire off their discard where they will still likely find plenty of relevant things to hit. Even holding Abrupt Decay for your LED on the table, I feel like spending their turn 2 casting Hymn or some combination of Deathrite, discard, and Wasteland is much more productive.

Looking at the most recent Jund list that I can find, http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=62548, I feel like their ideal sideboard would be the following:

+3 Pyroblast, +2 Duress, +2 Nihil Spellbomb, +2 Surgical Extraction
-4 Abrupt Decay, -3 Bloodbraid Elf, -1 Forest, -1 Maelstrom Pulse

Now, many Jund players aren't going to get exactly this, however, I would expect something close. Maybe they'll leave in an Abrupt Decay or two, but considering the amount of discard they have, I would probably still play into it every time.

Also, if they expect Empty the Warrens (for example you show them a Burning Wish), then perhaps they leave in the Pulse and bring in the Golgari Charm. Possibly they side out a couple Punishing Fire or a PFire and a Pyroblast in order to do this.

In any event, as Lemnear said, it seems unlikely that Dark Confidant will do much more than cantrip.

BeardTron
01-14-2014, 05:03 PM
Hey guys, Dave from www.southfloridamagic.com here. I top 4'd SCG Orlando w/ ANT and will be doing a write up that goes live tomorrow, will cross post here. I've been reading the ANT thread for a while (mostly the old one) and would love to give some contribution since your guys' words have helped me.

Additionally, Thomas Hake (who got 2nd the same tournament) will be joining me for a live legacy tournament where we will both be commentating this Wednesday around 7:30pm EST. You can watch at twitch.tv/southfloridamagic if you are into that sort of thing.

Congrats on the finish, Dave. Look forward to reading the report.

southfloridamagic
01-15-2014, 01:53 AM
Congrats on the finish, Dave. Look forward to reading the report.

Thanks BeardTron.

As promised, here is the Top 4 recap (http://southfloridamagic.com/archives/4th-at-scg-orlando-with-ant-tournament-report).

nevilshute
01-15-2014, 04:34 AM
Thanks BeardTron.

As promised, here is the Top 4 recap (http://southfloridamagic.com/archives/4th-at-scg-orlando-with-ant-tournament-report).

Hey there David, many congrats on the fine performance, and thanks for the write up.

I have a comment/question:

You write at one point that against delver decks is where Xantid Swarm really shines. I'm quite intrigued by this. I like to bring in some number of swarms against most delver decks, even against RUG in spite of their bolts. I know, however, that some contingent of the ANT population feel that it's down right wrong to be bringing them in against a delver deck with bolts as those are unlikely to come out for games 2 and 3 and so they'll have removal for your swarms. The one delver deck that I'm the most hesitant to bring in the swarms against is actually BUG because of their discard. It feels slightly underwhelming to resolve a swarm and pass the turn only to be hit by a hymn. That's not to say that it is incorrect to board the swarms in against BUG but I just don't feel that delver decks is where the swarms really shine. I think they really shine against decks like show and tell and miracles. Basically counter heavy decks with no discard and no-to-little removal (miracles MIGHT keep in a plow or two just for the swarms). What is your take on it?

Again, congrats on the awesome result, I was rootin' for ya in the semis. Was rough to see him hide force on top and waste you.

southfloridamagic
01-15-2014, 08:14 AM
Hey there David, many congrats on the fine performance, and thanks for the write up.

I have a comment/question:

You write at one point that against delver decks is where Xantid Swarm really shines. I'm quite intrigued by this. I like to bring in some number of swarms against most delver decks, even against RUG in spite of their bolts. I know, however, that some contingent of the ANT population feel that it's down right wrong to be bringing them in against a delver deck with bolts as those are unlikely to come out for games 2 and 3 and so they'll have removal for your swarms. The one delver deck that I'm the most hesitant to bring in the swarms against is actually BUG because of their discard. It feels slightly underwhelming to resolve a swarm and pass the turn only to be hit by a hymn. That's not to say that it is incorrect to board the swarms in against BUG but I just don't feel that delver decks is where the swarms really shine. I think they really shine against decks like show and tell and miracles. Basically counter heavy decks with no discard and no-to-little removal (miracles MIGHT keep in a plow or two just for the swarms). What is your take on it?

Again, congrats on the awesome result, I was rootin' for ya in the semis. Was rough to see him hide force on top and waste you.

I think Swarm is stronger against Show and Tell then Delver, but I still also Swarm is stronger against Delver than Carpet of Flowers. Any good opponent can play around carpet of flowers with ease, but playing around Swarm is a lot harder. Resolved Swarms just had so much more impact in my games over the past few months than Carpet ever did. I also altered my line of play when I had the Swarm in hand and would strip their burn if they had any before resolving the Swarm and it worked out nicely for me. Could be a corner case scenario, and very well could be wrong.

nevilshute
01-15-2014, 08:25 AM
I think Swarm is stronger against Show and Tell then Delver, but I still also Swarm is stronger against Delver than Carpet of Flowers. Any good opponent can play around carpet of flowers with ease, but playing around Swarm is a lot harder. Resolved Swarms just had so much more impact in my games over the past few months than Carpet ever did. I also altered my line of play when I had the Swarm in hand and would strip their burn if they had any before resolving the Swarm and it worked out nicely for me. Could be a corner case scenario, and very well could be wrong.

I agree for the most part with your swarm vs carpet argument. I've gone away from using carpets as well instead of swarms, but from an underlying (and probably over simplified) reasoning of "I can only allocate 3-4 slots to combat islands.deck in my board and swarm is just much more of a crux than carpet. I still think carpet is stronger against delver decks over all thatn swarm is. It's not that easy to play around carpet imo, especially with RUG delver being replaced by the more mana hungry UWR delver. 2 Islands in play on the other side of the fence and carpet is pretty fantastic against a deck that still relies quite heavily on soft counters and wastelands. However, against show and tell decks carpet is nigh useless... it's hardly ever going to be a lack of mana that loses us those matchups but rather our inability to discard them through their leylines.

anakyn
01-15-2014, 08:28 AM
I think they really shine against decks like show and tell and miracles. Basically counter heavy decks with no discard and no-to-little removal


Don't forget about Merfolk, which is another matchup where the Swarm can win the game alone.

For my part, I never board in Swarm if opponent has removal for it. Against tempo I use Carpet.


EDIT

A question about the Jund matchup, that I tested yesterday (only post-board games) and I found it to be harder than I expected (when I tested Jund with TES it was easier): do you board something against them, or you simply keep the maindeck inaltered?
I both tried boarding nothing and boarding in 3 Decays (for their Shaman - Liliana - Confidant) in place of 2 preordain / 1 Lim-dul's, and I felt better with the no sideboard plan: I guess having more cantrips helps recovering from their discard.

Only once I managed to combo without being hit by any discard (I was on the draw but he played just Shaman T1 and I had a T1-kill hand); on average their discard hit me at least three times per game, and recovering from that isn't easy at all, espacially if they landed Liliana and/or Shaman.
I'm starting to think that ANT suffers discard more than counters.

nevilshute
01-15-2014, 08:47 AM
Don't forget about Merfolk, which is another matchup where the Swarm can win the game alone.

For my part, I never board in Swarm if opponent has removal for it. Against tempo I use Carpet.


EDIT

A question about the Jund matchup, that I tested yesterday (only post-board games) and I found it to be harder than I expected (when I tested Jund with TES it was easier): do you board something against them, or you simply keep the maindeck inaltered?
I both tried boarding nothing and boarding in 3 Decays (for their Shaman - Liliana - Confidant) in place of 2 preordain / 1 Lim-dul's, and I felt better with the no sideboard plan: I guess having more cantrips helps recovering from their discard.

Only once I managed to combo without being hit by any discard (I was on the draw but he played just Shaman T1 and I had a T1-kill hand); on average their discard hit me at least three times per game, and recovering from that isn't easy at all, espacially if they landed Liliana and/or Shaman.
I'm starting to think that ANT suffers discard more than counters.

Cards that I find to be good against Jund (but perhaps not necessarily good enough against a broader meta):

Pithing Needle
Sensei's Divining Top
Empty the Warrens

JamieW89
01-15-2014, 08:53 AM
Nice job Dave! I'm not sold on the Swarms versus Delver decks (I don't like the card versus Bolt or discard) either though.




A question about the Jund matchup, that I tested yesterday (only post-board games) and I found it to be harder than I expected (when I tested Jund with TES it was easier): do you board something against them, or you simply keep the maindeck inaltered?
I both tried boarding nothing and boarding in 3 Decays (for their Shaman - Liliana - Confidant) in place of 2 preordain / 1 Lim-dul's, and I felt better with the no sideboard plan: I guess having more cantrips helps recovering from their discard.

Only once I managed to combo without being hit by any discard (I was on the draw but he played just Shaman T1 and I had a T1-kill hand); on average their discard hit me at least three times per game, and recovering from that isn't easy at all, espacially if they landed Liliana and/or Shaman.
I'm starting to think that ANT suffers discard more than counters.

I board two Decays or bounce spells in the dark in addition to any other stuff I have (just one Needle atm), since they sometimes play permanent hate such as Thorn, and getting rid of Shaman, Lilly or their clock isn't all that bad. Never cut cantrips versus discard decks though, I'd probably shave Therapies first versus them. Other cards you can board are Divert, Flusterstorm, Sensei's Divining Top, Pithing Needle, Leyline of Sanctity, 2nd Ad Nauseam (EtW isn't bad either, but I think AdN is better in the MU).

kiwi
01-15-2014, 10:02 AM
I also did my homework and I won my byes for GP Paris with Ant :cool:

What do you think what is now the best strategy against Patriot may be to sideboard in Carpet of flowers, Massacres, some abrupt decays and empty the warrens ?

I have seen some players sideboarding out Past in flames vs decks with shamans like Jund, Team America or Bug, but I dont like that I think that I never sideboarded out past in flames since I started to play that card.


I have been testing these months a version with two ad nauseams and some moxes, and the deck had more turns 2 kill and I think that is better vs non blue decks, but I think that is more solid to play with only 1 Ad nuseam and the deck is more consistently vs blue decks.

anakyn
01-15-2014, 10:10 AM
Cards that I find to be good against Jund (but perhaps not necessarily good enough against a broader meta):

Pithing Needle
Sensei's Divining Top
Empty the Warrens


I board two Decays or bounce spells in the dark in addition to any other stuff I have (just one Needle atm), since they sometimes play permanent hate such as Thorn, and getting rid of Shaman, Lilly or their clock isn't all that bad. Never cut cantrips versus discard decks though, I'd probably shave Therapies first versus them. Other cards you can board are Divert, Flusterstorm, Sensei's Divining Top, Pithing Needle, Leyline of Sanctity, 2nd Ad Nauseam (EtW isn't bad either, but I think AdN is better in the MU).


Thanks for the answers.


I'm not convinced on the Warrens plan because probably the Jund player is boarding a couple of Golgari charms and Engineered explosives / Pernicious deed / Engineered plague just for that: I would really prefer winning on the spot with Tendrils than hoping they don't have or they don't draw into any sweeper.

Maybe I should just cut a couple of Therapies for a couple of Decays.

kiwi
01-15-2014, 12:19 PM
Another option vs decks with discards is Ignorant Bliss but well I think that the best option vs discard is sensei divining top.

Lemnear
01-15-2014, 12:33 PM
Another option vs decks with discards is Ignorant Bliss but well I think that the best option vs discard is sensei divining top.

Neither option is viable as a strategy. Bliss is 2 mana against Thoughtseize, Hymn and Lilli.. laughable. SDT is slow and a real mana-sink

DarkJester
01-15-2014, 01:01 PM
Neither option is viable as a strategy. Bliss is 2 mana against Thoughtseize, Hymn and Lilli.. laughable. SDT is slow and a real mana-sink

+1
SDT may be good versus discard decks without a fast clock like B/W-Blade aka Deadguy or Esperblade, but Jund is able to put serious pressure on your life-total really fast. They tend to slow you down with discard and land an early Goyf or (if it stays in their deck after boarding) BBE into SOMETHING and the damage is done. Play out your artifacts (LED's) and wait for your Storm-Engine (even Chain of Vapor is sometimes good enough here). Ignorant Bliss forces you to fetch for an early Volc against a Wasteland-Deck or to burn a Petal... that seems horrible. Like Jamie pointed out, don't cut your cantrips against Jund, fetch for basics if possible like against Tempo, play out LED's and sit there waiting... I tend to board my 2 Chains to buy a bit of time or to be prepared if they land a hate-permanent.

anakyn
01-15-2014, 01:12 PM
I tend to board my 2 Chains to buy a bit of time or to be prepared if they land a hate-permanent.


Do you prefer Chains over Decays vs Jund? Can you explain why?



Speaking in general, the only real issue I got when I have to sideboard with ANT against any deck packing some permanent-hate (Liliana / Shaman, Leyline, Meddling mage / Canonist and so on) is to decide which is the best answer between Chain and Decay. Right now I play 3+3, but I rarely board in all 6 of them cause cutting 6 cards from the main is a lot.
There are obvious choices like Decay vs Chalice / Counterbalance or Chain vs Leyline, but in the other matchups I'm a bit on the fence.

For example, against DnT I usually prefer Chain cause Decay is somewhat hard to cast against their mana denial.

But what about the matchups where both Chain and Decay are good? How do you choose between them?

guillemnicolau
01-15-2014, 02:00 PM
But what about the matchups where both Chain and Vapor are good? How do you choose between them?
They usually have the same strengths and weaknesses.

Jin Gitaxias
01-15-2014, 03:36 PM
if i'm in doubt i board in my chains isntead of decays because i can use them as a (mini-)storm generator.

bkemke
01-16-2014, 11:51 AM
I'm curious on people's thoughts on this deck in the TNN infested meta? Typically when the meta shifts to control aggro becomes better however TNN can keep aggro in check as well.

Lemnear
01-16-2014, 12:03 PM
I'm curious on people's thoughts on this deck in the TNN infested meta? Typically when the meta shifts to control aggro becomes better however TNN can keep aggro in check as well.

The fact that you don't really need to protect TNN, leaves you with much more MB and SB space to tackle unfavorable matchups like combo. It's a sign that UWR can run 4 Meddling mage + 2 Flusterstorm + 2 REB's in the side without loosing ground against other decks.

It's not necessarily a good time to play combo unless you really can Profit from the ongoing fight around SFM, which is not a problem unless people realize that Spell Snare is much better in the current metagame than spell pierce.

southfloridamagic
01-16-2014, 12:18 PM
The fact that you don't really need to protect TNN, leaves you with much more MB and SB space to tackle unfavorable matchups like combo. It's a sign that UWR can run 4 Meddling mage + 2 Flusterstorm + 2 REB's in the side without loosing ground against other decks.

It's not necessarily a good time to play combo unless you really can Profit from the ongoing fight around SFM, which is not a problem unless people realize that Spell Snare is much better in the current metagame than spell pierce.

Beat UWR Delver 3 times at SCG last week, once in Top 8 even. Multiple Massacres in the board and sticking a Xantid Swarm make the match up easier. I'd rather play UWR Delver than RUG.

Bryant Cook
01-16-2014, 12:22 PM
Beat UWR Delver 3 times at SCG last week, once in Top 8 even. Multiple Massacres in the board and sticking a Xantid Swarm make the match up easier. I'd rather play UWR Delver than RUG.

Boards in Massacre, also boards in Xantid Swarm.

On top of that, what is with people siding in Xantid Swarm against decks with removal/Lightning Bolt?

anakyn
01-16-2014, 12:45 PM
Beat UWR Delver 3 times at SCG last week, once in Top 8 even. Multiple Massacres in the board and sticking a Xantid Swarm make the match up easier. I'd rather play UWR Delver than RUG.


Do you board Swarm in even against a deck playing 4 Bolts?

Sloshthedark
01-16-2014, 02:16 PM
out of DTB again?:really:



On top of that, what is with people siding in Xantid Swarm against decks with removal/Lightning Bolt?

I think that's obvious how good/bad that can be... The question is why do people board in xantid swarms when permanents is the problem to answer


Do you board Swarm in even against a deck playing 4 Bolts?

depends on the rest of the deck, 4 removal is not an argument not to do so for me

gregtron
01-16-2014, 02:28 PM
Only once I managed to combo without being hit by any discard (I was on the draw but he played just Shaman T1 and I had a T1-kill hand); on average their discard hit me at least three times per game, and recovering from that isn't easy at all, espacially if they landed Liliana and/or Shaman.
I'm starting to think that ANT suffers discard more than counters.

Definitely agree on that last point. If I'm playing against control, then we're both casting cantrips to find win+disruption, a fight which I feel tends to favor the deck that gets to cast Probe, Therapy, Duress, and can also win on the spot if enough of those resolve. How to fight against Force, Daze, Flusterstorm, etc, is a set of skills that can be learned over time. The only thing you learn from Thoughtseize into Hymn is that the world is a terrible place full of terrible people, and maybe that you should've boarded in the Ad Nauseam.

anakyn
01-16-2014, 03:03 PM
depends on the rest of the deck, 4 removal is not an argument not to do so for me


Well, I think it's a pretty solid argument to be honest: 4 Bolts vs 3 Swarm means the Swarm will stick very rarely on the ground. And if it's killed we just traded 1 for 1, and the card they lost isn't even a counter.

Lans89
01-16-2014, 03:47 PM
Beat UWR Delver 3 times at SCG last week, once in Top 8 even. Multiple Massacres in the board and sticking a Xantid Swarm make the match up easier. I'd rather play UWR Delver than RUG.

You side in Xantid Swarm vs UWR Delver? And also RUG? That is not very common right =)

I also want to ask you about Massacre. Do you also side him in versus Blade Control, or do you rely on Chain of Vapor because Massacre ruins your Ad Nauseam?

bondfan
01-16-2014, 10:09 PM
I have been running Pyroclasm recently and it has been fairly impressive. Massacre is insane, but most W(x) decks will bring in RIP which requires AdN. I also cut the Bayou and replaced it with Badlands to compensate for the red.

Looooooooo
01-17-2014, 03:45 AM
I have been running Pyroclasm recently and it has been fairly impressive. Massacre is insane, but most W(x) decks will bring in RIP which requires AdN. I also cut the Bayou and replaced it with Badlands to compensate for the red.

Massacre is a house against deck that tends to overextend like D&T, once you control the board with massacre taking care of RIP with an AD is enough to not rely completely on AdN

- L

Zombie
01-17-2014, 08:17 AM
Does a Sjöblom maindeck (http://tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=12373&iddeck=90675) with a sideboard like this look horrible to you guys? Maybe Massacre in there somewhere?

3 Decay
3 Dread of Night
3 Xantid Swarm
1 Telemin Performance

2 Chain of Vapor
2 Flusterstorm
1 Pithing Needle

Sloshthedark
01-17-2014, 08:49 AM
Well, I think it's a pretty solid argument to be honest: 4 Bolts vs 3 Swarm means the Swarm will stick very rarely on the ground. And if it's killed we just traded 1 for 1, and the card they lost isn't even a counter.

you're underestimating CT interaction or playing it wrong, I'm playing it vs Thresh with great success // I usually do not bring in Swarm vs. UWR

southfloridamagic
01-17-2014, 08:57 AM
You side in Xantid Swarm vs UWR Delver? And also RUG? That is not very common right =)

I also want to ask you about Massacre. Do you also side him in versus Blade Control, or do you rely on Chain of Vapor because Massacre ruins your Ad Nauseam?

I'm simply stating what's been working for me for three months. Carpet has been absolute garbage because all the tempo players just play around it, or don't flood the board with extra islands. Additionally, Swarm is for the Show and Tell / Reanimator / Miracle type matchups, but it also has game in the UWR Delver / RUG matchup. I cut carpets in favor of Swarm because carpet wasn't doing work and Swarm had better applications elsewhere. I added an extra Massacre to hedge the Meddling Mage / Thalia match ups that were expected to be prevalent in Orlando. I'm not here to discuss what is right and what is wrong because I really don't care if other's agree - I'm simply stating what has been working for me because it might work for someone else. I've gotten some great ideas from the TES / ANT thread here (I liked Slosh's Lightning Bolt idea, but couldn't make it work, for example) so I figured I'd try and give back a little.

In regards to Swarm / Massacre being in at the same time - obviously it's a nonbo. I don't Massacre until I need the Mage to be dead, which at that point my Swarm's trigger has already likely resolved. It's not that complicated.

Looooooooo
01-17-2014, 08:59 AM
Does a Sjöblom maindeck (http://tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=12373&iddeck=90675) with a sideboard like this look horrible to you guys? Maybe Massacre in there somewhere?

3 Decay
3 Dread of Night
3 Xantid Swarm
1 Telemin Performance

2 Chain of Vapor
2 Flusterstorm
1 Pithing Needle

If you want to make room for Massacre, which i advice you to do, maybe you can start dropping a single DoN. Storm is really relevant in your meta? if not, maybe 2 flusterstorm are too much with 7 MD discard.

- L

afb0032
01-17-2014, 10:45 AM
Southfloridamagic: If xantid works for you and not carpet in your meta then by all means keep at it. Thanks for your input and write up.

Dark Ritual
01-17-2014, 03:45 PM
I never board in swarm against decks with bolt. It just eats a bolt or a force if you're lucky. Swarm is for griselbrand and miracles/decks that can float countermagic on top that we can't discard with therapy, duress, or seize. Otherwise your swarm eats a removal spell and ask yourself this. Would you ever duress a lightning bolt? No? Because that's essentially what xantid swarm is against RUG and UWR. Not to mention both those decks play wasteland/you have to fetch green for swarm and open yourself up to wasteland. Unless I know my RUG/UWR opponent is boarding out every single removal spell in their deck I'm not going to bring in swarm.

Carpet is pretty weak. Competent players play around it out of RUG and UWR. Netting one extra mana a turn out of carpet isn't worth the card.

Lans89
01-17-2014, 08:17 PM
Carpet is pretty weak. Competent players play around it out of RUG and UWR. Netting one extra mana a turn out of carpet isn't worth the card.

Most of the time you get more mana vs UWR, and against RUG Carpet helps a lot to play around Stifle. And I've seen people throw Force and Pierce against Carpet, so it does its job most of the time.
Carpet rly did a great job for me, but I always played 2. Now I upped the count to 3 because I don't know what to do with 2 of my sb slots since I cut the Dread of Nights and made some changes.

So with Tropical and Bayou in the main, my sideboard looks like this now:

Sideboard
3# Abrupt Decay
3# Carpet of Flowers
2# Xantid Swarm
2# Massacre
2# Chain of Vapor
1# Pithing Needle
1# Empty the Warrens
1# Karakas

This was my old sideboard:

2# Xantid Swarm
2# Carpet of Flowers
2# Abrupt Decay
1# Hurkyl's Recall
3# Chain of Vapor
3# Dread of Night
1# Empty the Warrens
1# Pithing Needle

How does your sideboard look like? I would also like to hear some opions about sideboarding vs Uwb Blade and Deathblade. Massacre is good but you want to use Ad Nauseam, so I side in Chains and Decays to fight their Meddling Mages/Canonists.

Lemnear
01-18-2014, 02:47 AM
Most of the time you get more mana vs UWR, and against RUG Carpet helps a lot to play around Stifle. And I've seen people throw Force and Pierce against Carpet, so it does its job most of the time.

This just doesn't make sense to me. How does Carpet help you if they stifle targets your Fetchland that was supposed to dig for your Tropical?? If you are forced to cast Xantid off a Petal therefore, casting FoW is perfectly acceptable. Pierce is a 1-for-1 trade against a deck that still has Dazes, Forces, Flusterstorms and Meddling Mages. I don't know how you think that making a laughable 1-for-1 trade is really helpful :/

GoblinZ
01-18-2014, 06:01 AM
I personally play carpet but I don't like it very much. I think it is strong on the play when you see one copy in your open hand, but it is really mediocre on the draw.

As for xantid swarm, I never understand why there is still someone bring it in against tempo...I always see some random SCG players killed by delver with multiple swarms in hand....

Lemnear
01-18-2014, 06:16 AM
I personally play carpet but I don't like it very much. I think it is strong on the play when you see one copy in your open hand, but it is really mediocre on the draw.

As for xantid swarm, I never understand why there is still someone bring it in against tempo...I always see some random SCG players killed by delver with multiple swarms in hand....

The point is: on the play, you need to fetch for a Tropical and your opponent can play around it by just Dumping fetches without using it; or on the draw you cast it directly into a Daze/Pierce with the green mana Source still being a lackluster

Final Fortune
01-18-2014, 06:20 AM
Boarding in Xantid Swarm vs UWR seems terrible, it's just one more disruption spell that doesn't even address Meddling Mage or Vendillion Clique and a veritable lightning rod. I'm still running strong with 7 MD discard spells and 4 Chrome Mox vs a UW/x meta, in a day and age where everybody's SB has 4 Meddling Mage + X Vendillion Clique it's just really important to have versatile disruption.

Lans89
01-18-2014, 06:44 AM
This just doesn't make sense to me. How does Carpet help you if they stifle targets your Fetchland that was supposed to dig for your Tropical?? If you are forced to cast Xantid off a Petal therefore, casting FoW is perfectly acceptable. Pierce is a 1-for-1 trade against a deck that still has Dazes, Forces, Flusterstorms and Meddling Mages. I don't know how you think that making a laughable 1-for-1 trade is really helpful :/

Well maybe I think too much about a game vs a stifle heavy hand ^_^, where I started and cast Carpet. A little later I was cantripping with 2 fetchland open, untill I found the Therapy to get rid of the 2 Stifles. Something like that. But overall Carpet is just awesome to ignore 8 of your opponents counters (daze and pierce). Now I can side +3 Carpet +1 Empty the Warrens and side out -2 Preordain -1 Cabal Ritual -1 Ad Nauseam, versus RUG/BUG tempo decks. And vs UWR I add 2 Massacre and maybe cut 2 Probe? Ofc Pierce should always be used on Carpet ;). But when they FoW to protect all the softcounters in their deck. Carpet does a great job.

But any suggestions for changes in my sb are welcome, so go ahead =)

Lemnear
01-18-2014, 07:01 AM
Well maybe I think too much about a game vs a stifle heavy hand ^_^, where I started and cast Carpet. A little later I was cantripping with 2 fetchland open, untill I found the Therapy to get rid of the 2 Stifles. Something like that. But overall Carpet is just awesome to ignore 8 of your opponents counters (daze and pierce), versus all tempo decks. Now I can side +3 Carpet +1 Empty the Warrens and side out -2 Preordain -1 Cabal Ritual -1 Ad Nauseam. Ofc Pierce should always be used on Carpet ;). But when they FoW to protect all the softcounters in their deck. Carpet does a great job.

But any suggestions for changes in my sb are welcome, so go ahead =)

There is a bigger conceptional misunderstanding I fear. How would you like to beat double Stifle with a Therapy while the Stilfe block your mana to cast the Therapy through Daze/Pierce?

How is boarding out a +3 mana Source that fuels your kill condition (PIF) inferior to a +1-mana-enchantment in terms of beating soft-counters? I'm sure Slosh would agree that it is nonsense to replace Cabal Ritual with Carpets

Pure Tempo decks (NO SFM or TNN shenanigans) have and will switch their Pierces for Snares to beat SFM, Goofy and Infernal/Wish on a more reliable base. Carpet does a shit against that development. Stay ahead of countermeasures instead of trying to catch up

Jessenator
01-18-2014, 12:11 PM
Finding out that Massacre is much much better than Dread of Night in the meta at the moment due to the numerous numbers of UWR Delver. Since Dread of Night still doesn't kill Canoist and Vial-ing in Thalia / Mindsensor. Thoughts on the number of cards in the SB to fight D&T?

Also have been testing Swan Song. Seems very good in the combo mirrors, especially vs our bad matchups such as Miracles, Show and Tell and Reanimator. Has anyone else tested Swan Song?

Lemnear
01-18-2014, 12:27 PM
Finding out that Massacre is much much better than Dread of Night in the meta at the moment due to the numerous numbers of UWR Delver. Since Dread of Night still doesn't kill Canoist and Vial-ing in Thalia / Mindsensor. Thoughts on the number of cards in the SB to fight D&T?

Also have been testing Swan Song. Seems very good in the combo mirrors, especially vs our bad matchups such as Miracles, Show and Tell and Reanimator. Has anyone else tested Swan Song?

I feel that Flusterstorm is a much better SB counter in this deck as it's uncounterable and dös not give your opponent a free beater.

Massacre is kinda tricky. Your opponent can possibly waste your Underground (lesser Problem), don't play Plains (you underestimate how often that is the case against D&T not having a Plains but Karakas, Eiganjo or AEther Vial) or counter your Massacre under a Cannonist. I don't say it's bad, but it's not quite an I-win-button.

Lans89
01-18-2014, 02:27 PM
There is a bigger conceptional misunderstanding I fear. How would you like to beat double Stifle with a Therapy while the Stilfe block your mana to cast the Therapy through Daze/Pierce?

How is boarding out a +3 mana Source that fuels your kill condition (PIF) inferior to a +1-mana-enchantment in terms of beating soft-counters? I'm sure Slosh would agree that it is nonsense to replace Cabal Ritual with Carpets

Pure Tempo decks (NO SFM or TNN shenanigans) have and will switch their Pierces for Snares to beat SFM, Goofy and Infernal/Wish on a more reliable base. Carpet does a shit against that development. Stay ahead of countermeasures instead of trying to catch up

I described a game that actually happened.. I was only mentioning that besides playing through soft-counters, Carpet also enables you to cantrip/sculpt a nice hand/do SOMETHING when you don't want to crack your fetchland. It contributes to a better game in different ways.

Maybe you could try and answer some of my questions instead of trying to dismiss any tiny argument I come up with. I see you on this forum all day and know that you can do better :smile:! Everyone knows Carpets main purpose, generate mana to play through soft counters, but I get it that not everyone likes it as much as I do now. When I still played Confidants side I always ignored Carpet as a sideboard card, and now I liked it as a 2-off but I'm not really sure if I want that 3th copy.. Since I don't feel the need for 3 DoN in the board to fight D&T, I struggle to find the right sideboard configuration.

Edit: In the past I knew some RUG players played Snare for a while, but I never seen it in months. If they go that road again it would be a pain for us for sure!

Lemnear
01-18-2014, 07:49 PM
I described a game that actually happened.. I was only mentioning that besides playing through soft-counters, Carpet also enables you to cantrip/sculpt a nice hand/do SOMETHING when you don't want to crack your fetchland. It contributes to a better game in different ways.

Maybe you could try and answer some of my questions instead of trying to dismiss any tiny argument I come up with. I see you on this forum all day and know that you can do better :smile:! Everyone knows Carpets main purpose, generate mana to play through soft counters, but I get it that not everyone likes it as much as I do now. When I still played Confidants side I always ignored Carpet as a sideboard card, and now I liked it as a 2-off but I'm not really sure if I want that 3th copy.. Since I don't feel the need for 3 DoN in the board to fight D&T, I struggle to find the right sideboard configuration.

Edit: In the past I knew some RUG players played Snare for a while, but I never seen it in months. If they go that road again it would be a pain for us for sure!

If you take a peek into the bUrg thread you'll notice that the number of Pierces goes down while Snares became the counter of choice and therefore I hinted that Carpet gets worse as the only taxing counter I faced for quite a while were Dazes and SB Flusterstorms.

You answered most of your questions already yourself, so I don't think you need me to confirm your impression that Massacre + Ad Nauseam is a no-go ;). Therefore, if you have to SB AN out, PIF is your engine of choice and weakening it by removing Rituals is counter-intuitive.

Easiest against D&T should be boarding out Duresses for Massacre/CoV

DarkJester
01-19-2014, 08:15 AM
Went 4-2 in a 60-Player-Event yesterday. Deck was consistent and very strong as ever. Lost very close to Esper-Deathblade (1-2, one mana short to Tutor-Chain for lethal in the last possible turn) and MUD (Game 2, I'm not joking here, he had Chalice 0 and 1, Sphere of Resistance, Trini, Golem and two Revokers :cry: ). Won against a strange G/W-Maverick-like-Deck with RiP and Helm, 2x Miracles (2-1 and 1-0 :eyebrow: ) and Affinity with plenty Hatebears postboard.

NoizeMe
01-19-2014, 10:53 AM
Yesterday, I played ANT at our LGS for a GPT. The deck felt very strong, consistent and resilient.
I went 3-2-1 overall... Not very good, but enough to convince me to play it at GP Paris, since I felt that may loses were not related to the deck itself or my skill (to some extend maybe).
What I noticed that AdN felt not as strong as it should be and I'm thinking of replacing it with a second PiF and moving the AdN to the sideboard.
I had to pass the turn after AdN three times, which is not a very good feeling at all. On the other hand it is just such a strong engine if it all comes together and often enables fast kills which were not possible with PiF.
What a second PiF does at to the deck is more resilience to discard and a better late-game.
It would push the deck even more to a grindy, slower combo deck but add even more consistence.

Did anyone of you tested to PiFs over the AdN?

DarkJester
01-19-2014, 01:24 PM
I wouldn't cut AdN entirely from your 75. It's another angle of attack which adds diversity to your deck. AdN may be not as strong as it tends to be in TES-Builds, but if you are used to cast it to draw a bunch of cards (I won a match against active counter-top by casting AdN during my opp's upkeep and then outplaying the Balance) or with enough mana floating or open landdrops it rarely dissapoints. Just don't expect it to be a direct gamewinner often. But it's still strong enough in what it does.

cheerios
01-19-2014, 08:38 PM
Ended 3-2 in a small tourney. Overall, I was happy with the deck's performance but felt like I could have played better. Short tourney report:

Pox: 2-0
Mud: 0-2 (Turn 1 chalice, turn 2 Trinisiphere twice)
UR Delver: 1-2 (Won game 1 via PIF. Got my infernal tutors surgically extracted on game 2. Kept a slow hand full of discard (mull to 6 or 5) on game 3 and had to slowly die to a deck in top deck mode. In hindsight, I felt like I should have shipped back my starting hand and looked for a faster hand.)
12post: 2-0 (Opponent taps out, I win. Turn 2 kill on game 2 via Ad Naus.)
Affinity: 2-0 (Turn 3 kill on game 1, Turn 2 kill on game 2).

Played about 6 pre-board games vs my teammate piloting TES after the tourney and won only once. TES was about a turn faster in both games.

Lemnear
01-20-2014, 02:15 AM
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=151341&d=1390194288

Mother of God! Kills all cantrips..

cheerios
01-20-2014, 03:46 AM
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=151341&d=1390194288

Mother of God! Kills all cantrips..

Not too many hatebears eh? On a side note, it still dies to the same answers we have.

Lemnear
01-20-2014, 03:47 AM
Not too many hatebears eh? On a side note, it still dies to the same answers we have.

Thank God there's Dread of Night

Jin Gitaxias
01-20-2014, 03:52 AM
While i'm definately not excited about another white hatebear i'm not sure this is better then canonist because theoretically you can win through this card and it dies to a single dread of night. Except d&t there probably isnt a deck that has space to run this along with their current hatebears.

Lemnear
01-20-2014, 03:56 AM
While i'm definately not excited about another white hatebear i'm not sure this is better then canonist because theoretically you can win through this card and it dies to a single dread of night. Except d&t there probably isnt a deck that has space to run this along with their current hatebears.

I disagree. The fact that it is good against ANY blue deck in Legacy makes it a superior MD choice than Cannonist alongside the increased power and therefore I expect it to side with Thalia in many D&T/Maverick/Junk mainboards while Cannonist remains a pure anti-storm card. SoL possibly replaces Revoker in D&T

Sloshthedark
01-20-2014, 04:34 AM
God I feel so much anger right now, this is the point where this deck starts to turn into dredge in the metagame.. makes me sick on another entire level not only it ridiculously overpowered, how this could ever be a 3/1... But substarcts what fun in the game means to me for all decks and turns it into topdeck lunapark, clap clap for that idiot crying for BS banhammer... Is this GP paris legal? Since my tickets arent booked yet...

Jin Gitaxias
01-20-2014, 04:39 AM
Also, because the creature is vulnerable to both creature destruction and enchantment destruction, the development team felt able to push it a little.

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/mm/283

Lemnear
01-20-2014, 05:38 AM
http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/mm/283

According to that nonsense Dryad Arbor should be a 3/1 or 2/2 as well? I don't know how that creature corners storm as a combo-deck, if High Tide and SneakShow get such a low blow. :/

PS: I'm rage-selling my whole hard-control cards



@Slosh: It's legal at 7th Feb, so yeah.

Arsenal
01-20-2014, 07:50 AM
Not too many hatebears eh? On a side note, it still dies to the same answers we have.

True, but SoL requires you to have said answer already in hand when she resolves. You can no longer fire off youe cantrips in order to dig for your 3 Abrupt Decays you boarded in.

Looooooooo
01-20-2014, 01:06 PM
With up to 12 Hatebears is ANT almost dead?

- L

anakyn
01-20-2014, 01:17 PM
SoL possibly replaces Revoker in D&T


I don't think DnT players will cut Revoker for SotL, I guess they'll prefer to cut some number of Mindcensors and Flickerwisps.
IMHO Revoker is just to good and versatile for their strategy.

kiwi
01-20-2014, 02:07 PM
I'm not too worry about the new hatebear, we have the tools for defeating it, pyroclasm, DREADS OF NIGHTS :laugh:, massacres, chain of vapors, cabal therapies, etc (g1 well be harder of course, but in g2 our weapons will be ready for killing spirits and witches like thalia)... on the other hand I'm more worried about the rusing success of reanimator and team america, in my point of view these are two of our worst pairings (togheter with chalices and trinisphere decks)

NoizeMe
01-20-2014, 02:38 PM
I do not see the problem with this card to be honest.
Sure, it disables all cantrips in a very efficient way, but the decks who can play this card do already pack efficient hatebears against ANT (and combo-decks in general). Against DnT the mana was already very tight so that digging was sometimes impossible.
After all having no cantrips is not nearly as backbreaking as Thalia, because you can still go of with your cards already in hand and none of the storm engines are effected.
By the way, Ponder is still a bad Index, which may or may not be enough to win the game/find a sweeper.

cheerios
01-20-2014, 08:28 PM
True, but SoL requires you to have said answer already in hand when she resolves. You can no longer fire off youe cantrips in order to dig for your 3 Abrupt Decays you boarded in.

It slows the deck by a turn I guess, but we can still dig for answers. It's not as bad as Chains. The card can be quite problematic tho if combined with discard.

Final Fortune
01-21-2014, 03:30 AM
It doesn't seem that bad, we have Dread of Night and we can either MD or SB Thoughtseize while still being able to cast one to two cantrips before it resolves. At best, I might be less thrilled to play the 16 cantrip version.

jtos84
01-21-2014, 04:17 AM
Spirit of the Labrynth is probably going to cause much more trouble for delver decks. It is probably going to make dark depths a better deck because its more difficult matches can be defeated by death and taxes. This card would pose a problem for ANT if duress is played instead of thoughtseize. As long as you are practiced and efficient with the deck thoughtseize should be more of an asset than a drawback. As stated before dread of night and pyroclasm are also good options. Pyroclasm and massacre are probably really good to have in the s/b especially because of all the meddling mages.

emidln
01-21-2014, 01:03 PM
Spirit of the Labrynth is probably going to cause much more trouble for delver decks. It is probably going to make dark depths a better deck because its more difficult matches can be defeated by death and taxes. This card would pose a problem for ANT if duress is played instead of thoughtseize. As long as you are practiced and efficient with the deck thoughtseize should be more of an asset than a drawback. As stated before dread of night and pyroclasm are also good options. Pyroclasm and massacre are probably really good to have in the s/b especially because of all the meddling mages.

I'm just going to switch up to a Burning Wish build, put a Massacre in my sideboard, and call it day. No reason to freak out about yet another hate bear. Particularly considering that you can reasonably just kill them when they play this (with the right hand). I'm still more afraid of facing Thalia.

nevilshute
01-21-2014, 03:05 PM
I'm just going to switch up to a Burning Wish build, put a Massacre in my sideboard, and call it day. No reason to freak out about yet another hate bear. Particularly considering that you can reasonably just kill them when they play this (with the right hand). I'm still more afraid of facing Thalia.

Agree with this. This is another hatebear that death and taxes can throw at us... At 2 comic this means we'll get our first (and second if on the play) turn to cantrip, discard them or just straight up win. If their turn-2 move is SotL then chances are we are done cantripping and can just win on the untap. Thalia, and canonist are still worse creatures for us by a distance.

Like someone else mentioned I'm more worried for the fair brainstorm decks that aim to have game past turn 3-4

gregtron
01-21-2014, 04:25 PM
I ended up moving Ad Naus to the board, replacing it and Grim Tutor with two Burning Wishes. Pryoclasm, Massacre, Thoughtseize, and Warrens are my only targets, and it's been fine so far.

So yeah, it's not like we're not already equipped to fight Hate Cat.

Koby
01-21-2014, 05:14 PM
I ended up moving Ad Naus to the board, replacing it and Grim Tutor with two Burning Wishes. Pryoclasm, Massacre, Thoughtseize, and Warrens are my only targets, and it's been fine so far.

So yeah, it's not like we're not already equipped to fight Hate Cat.

Curious if you would even consider IGG, as it provides the only Storm-building Sorcery that you can find in a pinch.

jtos84
01-21-2014, 09:44 PM
I'm just going to switch up to a Burning Wish build, put a Massacre in my sideboard, and call it day. No reason to freak out about yet another hate bear. Particularly considering that you can reasonably just kill them when they play this (with the right hand). I'm still more afraid of facing Thalia.

Burning Wish is about the only card I would consider adding to Ant's main 60. The reason I started using Grim Tutor in its place is because Grim Tutor ends up winning more games than Burning Wish can save. Wish can also cost us a game if we do not have Led in hand when we have an infernal tutor. Because quite a few of our wins come through rituals and deck searching as opposed to drawing, the spirit card is not that much of an issue. Most of the time I beat D&T on turns one or two before a Thalia is dropped. Game one is normally not that much of a fight.

jtos84
01-21-2014, 09:46 PM
I ended up moving Ad Naus to the board, replacing it and Grim Tutor with two Burning Wishes. Pryoclasm, Massacre, Thoughtseize, and Warrens are my only targets, and it's been fine so far.

So yeah, it's not like we're not already equipped to fight Hate Cat.

Ad Nauseum probably accounts for 60% of my wins at least. I would think it would be really difficult to win matches without it in the main deck.

gregtron
01-22-2014, 11:26 AM
Curious if you would even consider IGG, as it provides the only Storm-building Sorcery that you can find in a pinch.

I run IGG in the board. It's not uncommon to BW for it to IGG loop off of LEDs if I don't have enough Rituals in the yard for PiF, and I board it in for PiF in matches where I have to fight Deathrite and other pin-point-type graveyard hate.


Ad Nauseum probably accounts for 60% of my wins at least. I would think it would be really difficult to win matches without it in the main deck.

Even when I was main-decking it, Ad Naus was a much, much smaller percentage of my wins than you. I don't know if it's a fundamental difference in the way we play or build our decks or a metgame thing, but I kept casting Ad Naus and losing. Now I just bring it in when I absolutely have to have it, for example against non-blue Hymn decks, Thalias, and non-blue combo. I'm much happier this way, but I don't think there's, you know, a "right" call on where you keep it in your 75.

gregtron
01-22-2014, 11:31 AM
Burning Wish is about the only card I would consider adding to Ant's main 60. The reason I started using Grim Tutor in its place is because Grim Tutor ends up winning more games than Burning Wish can save. Wish can also cost us a game if we do not have Led in hand when we have an infernal tutor. Because quite a few of our wins come through rituals and deck searching as opposed to drawing, the spirit card is not that much of an issue. Most of the time I beat D&T on turns one or two before a Thalia is dropped. Game one is normally not that much of a fight.

I love Burning Wish. The flexibility that even one or two copies gives you is phenomenal: ways to address Teeg and other Hate Bears in game 1, the 7th or 8th duress-effect if you're in a pinch, and an army of 1/1 goblins at your beck and call.

jtos84
01-23-2014, 01:41 AM
I love Burning Wish. The flexibility that even one or two copies gives you is phenomenal: ways to address Teeg and other Hate Bears in game 1, the 7th or 8th duress-effect if you're in a pinch, and an army of 1/1 goblins at your beck and call.

Ad Nauseum definitely belongs in the main deck. The key to ANT is playing it over and over, and then just keep playing it because you will discover lines of play you did not know about. Play style may have something to do with what cards different ANT players use. I personally stick with one main deck tendrils of agony for the win condition because of the consistency it provides. That said, I do not think many ANT players learn to play the deck without all types of alternative spells that allow for more frequent, less than lethal tendrils or an empty the warrens. When I decided to give ANT a shot, I had experimented with four burning wishes in the past. I new I wasn't doing everything right, so I played only this deck for two weeks straight. I was nearly proficient with it, and decided it was much better than I gave it credit for. After that I continued playing it, and I still pick up new interactions.

CabalTherapy
01-23-2014, 07:44 AM
I new I wasn't doing everything right, so I played only this deck for two weeks straight. I was nearly proficient with it, and decided it was much better than I gave it credit for. After that I continued playing it, and I still pick up new interactions.

You have been playing this deck for two weeks? Wow, you have to have to greatest expertise in playing this deck of all players here. :tongue:

gregtron
01-23-2014, 11:36 AM
You have been playing this deck for two weeks? Wow, you have to have to greatest expertise in playing this deck of all players here. :tongue:

-_-

Some of the people here make me feel like a nub, and I played DDFT for a year before switching to ANT in 2011.

jtos84
01-23-2014, 04:21 PM
You have been playing this deck for two weeks? Wow, you have to have to greatest expertise in playing this deck of all players here. :tongue:

I think you drew that conclusion on your own. I was telling the other person that to begin to understand the interactions and lines of play I put my other decks down, and I only played ANT for two weeks straight. I think that was in 2012. If you have some expertise to share I am all ears. I love to pick up new plays.

gregtron
01-24-2014, 11:30 AM
I think you drew that conclusion on your own. I was telling the other person that to begin to understand the interactions and lines of play I put my other decks down, and I only played ANT for two weeks straight. I think that was in 2012. If you have some expertise to share I am all ears. I love to pick up new plays.

We are sharing our expertise, it just so happens to conflict with what you know and prefer about ANT. We were all involved in a pretty huge discussion regarding the merits of cutting Ad Naus from the maindeck in the old ANT thread - if you're looking for the underlying logic, I suggest you go back there and read up to prevent us from re-inventing the wheel. There's also a lot of great discussion and testing results from around the same time that weighed the number of burning wishes, grim tutor, and even lim dul's vault to compensate for cutting the card.

jtos84
01-25-2014, 12:21 AM
We are sharing our expertise, it just so happens to conflict with what you know and prefer about ANT. We were all involved in a pretty huge discussion regarding the merits of cutting Ad Naus from the maindeck in the old ANT thread - if you're looking for the underlying logic, I suggest you go back there and read up to prevent us from re-inventing the wheel. There's also a lot of great discussion and testing results from around the same time that weighed the number of burning wishes, grim tutor, and even lim dul's vault to compensate for cutting the card.

I don't know why everything turns into an immediate argument in forums. I normally do not go back and read very far unless I know something has changed. It has been years since I have heard of anyone playing without Ad Nauseum in the main deck. I just read that someone was wanting to cut it from the main. Are there any tournament results to back up this theory?

It seems fairly risky to cut the Ad Nauseum because of the amount of deathrite shamans. It can also be difficult to consistently fix your mana base to consistently rely on Past in Flames. I'm not saying the strategy cannot work, and I have not looked at the lists yet, but I would assume it would accommodate more red for the Burning Wishes into Empty the Warrens which is not a bad idea.

nevilshute
01-25-2014, 03:38 AM
I don't know why everything turns into an immediate argument in forums. I normally do not go back and read very far unless I know something has changed. It has been years since I have heard of anyone playing without Ad Nauseum in the main deck. I just read that someone was wanting to cut it from the main. Are there any tournament results to back up this theory?

It seems fairly risky to cut the Ad Nauseum because of the amount of deathrite shamans. It can also be difficult to consistently fix your mana base to consistently rely on Past in Flames. I'm not saying the strategy cannot work, and I have not looked at the lists yet, but I would assume it would accommodate more red for the Burning Wishes into Empty the Warrens which is not a bad idea.

The 5th place deck at the BoM ran a list with no AN in the main (http://mtgpulse.com/event/14791#210124). I've run with AN in the side for a while to some success, but has since then gone back to putting it in the main. Replacing AN with EtW gives you more turn 1 and 2 wins than AN does. It felt like it made the deck quite a bit more explosive. In the end for me personally, I missed AN too much for those times where it's your only real out. I've opted to run both AN and EtW main deck now and am currently quite happy with how the deck performs even if AN is more spikey now :)

Lemnear
01-25-2014, 04:25 AM
The 5th place deck at the BoM ran a list with no AN in the main (http://mtgpulse.com/event/14791#210124). I've run with AN in the side for a while to some success, but has since then gone back to putting it in the main. Replacing AN with EtW gives you more turn 1 and 2 wins than AN does. It felt like it made the deck quite a bit more explosive. In the end for me personally, I missed AN too much for those times where it's your only real out. I've opted to run both AN and EtW main deck now and am currently quite happy with how the deck performs even if AN is more spikey now :)

You can ask him directly about that design decision as Jamie is member of TheSource

jtos84
01-25-2014, 08:56 AM
You can ask him directly about that design decision as Jamie is member of TheSource

That list is definitely alright to play. I was thinking that the other player was relying on past in flames alone. Personally I prefer one tendrils main and no etw, but I do not deny that lists using etw or burning wishe are effective.

Patrunkenphat7
01-25-2014, 03:42 PM
I've gone 11-4 at GP DC, 10-3-1 at GP Denver, 8-2 at the Somerset SCG Open, won 2 IQ's, won 1 local Legacy event (~15 people), lost in the finals of 1 local Legacy event (~15 people), and won 1 GPT with ANT running no Ad Nauseams. That is my total sanctioned experience with Ad Nauseam-less ANT. I haven't had any impressive huge finishes, but I've consistently won a pretty high percentage of my matches with the deck. I'm not making any judgments for you as to whether this version is better or worse than normal ANT, but hopefully it shows you that the deck can certainly operate respectively well.

Dragonslayer_90
01-25-2014, 09:47 PM
On the topic of Jamie's opinion on Ad Nauseam vs. EtW, he already talked about it in his BoM report here on The Source:


Most lists play Ad Nauseam over the Empty, but I just didn’t like the card in this deck. In hindsight I feel these slots should be switched again, Ad Nauseam is enough better against some common matchups to want it while PiF & Tutor chains are almost always the way to go preboard anyways. Empty was good in most matchups though, and it’s definately not bad to cut the Ad Nauseam.

jtos84
01-26-2014, 12:59 AM
On the topic of Jamie's opinion on Ad Nauseam vs. EtW, he already talked about it in his BoM report here on The Source:

My original comment was towards what I thought was someone who wasn't able to find success with Ad Nauseum. I do not think one version is better than another, but I play with Ad Nauseum and one tendrils because I think the deck performs in a predictable way. Any thoughts I have on other versions are normally coming from my perspective of playing ANT against other versions as opposed to other decks vrs other versions of storm. Seeing these results and the reasoning behind it makes me want to look into it more. It is an interesting perspective on the meta game.

GoldenCid
01-26-2014, 10:05 PM
Hello everybody!

This night i was alone at home and make some play test on cocka and wanted to share my impresions:

This was the list:

1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Past in Flames
1 Ad Nauseam
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Ponder
4 Gitaxian Probe
3 Cabal Therapy
4 Duress
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Brainstorm
4 Infernal Tutor
4 Lotus Petal
4 Polluted Delta
4 Flooded Strand
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
1 Badlands
1 Island
1 Swamp
3 Burning Wish
1 Tropical Island
SB: 3 Abrupt Decay
SB: 1 Empty the Warrens
SB: 1 Massacre
SB: 1 Cabal Therapy
SB: 1 Tendrils of Agony
SB: 1 Past in Flames
SB: 1 Virtue's Ruin
SB: 1 Reverent Silence
SB: 3 Xantid Swarm
SB: 2 Surgical Extraction

Dragon stompy: 0-2

The guy smashed me easly with very good hands both games. I thought probably wrongly that EtW would hurt him i took this side plan:

Op. 7 g1: u sea, swamp, it, wish, ToA, ponder, dark ritual. kp
Op. 7 g2: u sea, duress, etw, wish, ponder, bstorm, dark ritual. bad kp.

-1 ToA -1 Probe + 1 Therapy +1 Warrens. Decay seemed very hard to cast with at least 7 moon effects in the other side.

BUG: 2-0

Op. 7 g1: no land
Mull 6: probe, ponder, d ritual, c ritual, fetch, island. kp

Op 7 g2: therapy x 2, duress, probe, badland, fetch. Destroyed his hand.

side plan: -1 probe - 1 duress -1 dont remember (what do you suggest, maybe wish) + 3 xantid

Tin Fins: 2-1

g1 Mull 5: probe, c ritual, u sea, swamp, fetch

Op 7 g2: LED x 2, nausea, petal, probe, c ritual, u sea. kp.

Sode plan: -1 duress -1 therapy + 2 surgical.

POX?
2-0

Op 7 g1: Wish, Bstorm, duress, fetch, probe x 2, volcanic. kp
Op 7 g2: d ritual, duress, bstorm, petal, fetch x 2, island. kp

Side plan (wasnt pretty convinced. Didnt want to side at all): -1 probe - 1 duress +2 surgical.

Anycoment is welcomed!!


GC.

Lans89
01-27-2014, 05:26 AM
The 5th place deck at the BoM ran a list with no AN in the main (http://mtgpulse.com/event/14791#210124). I've run with AN in the side for a while to some success, but has since then gone back to putting it in the main. Replacing AN with EtW gives you more turn 1 and 2 wins than AN does. It felt like it made the deck quite a bit more explosive. In the end for me personally, I missed AN too much for those times where it's your only real out. I've opted to run both AN and EtW main deck now and am currently quite happy with how the deck performs even if AN is more spikey now :)

When I spoke to Jamie this weekend he was even considering cutting Empty entirely from the 75, because every deck has TNN hate that wipes our goblins.. It is risky to go for 12 goblins like we used to, when you know that ANT can have a reasonable lategame. I think he almost always plays Ad Nauseam main, also in the 6-1 the day before BoM, but at that time it worked to play Empty main.

gregtron
01-27-2014, 03:21 PM
My original comment was towards what I thought was someone who wasn't able to find success with Ad Nauseum. I do not think one version is better than another, but I play with Ad Nauseum and one tendrils because I think the deck performs in a predictable way. Any thoughts I have on other versions are normally coming from my perspective of playing ANT against other versions as opposed to other decks vrs other versions of storm. Seeing these results and the reasoning behind it makes me want to look into it more. It is an interesting perspective on the meta game.

Yeah, man, try it out if you're curious. I'm not saying I'll never run AN in the main again, just that I've never felt like it was an "I win" card in ANT. Watching BBD play storm on camera this weekend didn't do anything to change my mind, either, and he even tweeted about whiffing on Ad Naus in an off-camera match.

Ad Nauseam is still good, it's just that we have all these other tools that provide consistency AND stability that it's worth being open-minded.

jtos84
01-30-2014, 10:24 AM
I played ANT against Team America and the new versions of Death and Taxes, and I just felt like it was meaningless to play. I felt ANT needed restructured, and what I ended up with was what you guys have been talking about on here with a few other cards. I cut preordain and went down to two gitaxian probes for three Lim-Dul's vaults and four Force of wills. I also put AD Nauseum in the s/b and put in Empty the Warrens. I also cut three duress for three thoughtseize. The discard package is three cabal therapy and three thoughtseize.

The testing results are undefeated against new Maverick, Cloudpost with Bonfires, and Zoo. I haven't had the opportunity to test it against blue yet, but that is what I will be working on today.

jtos84
01-30-2014, 10:39 AM
I should probably include the s/b too.

/ Sideboard
SB: 2 Chain of Vapor
SB: 1 Karakas
SB: 3 Abrupt Decay
SB: 3 Xantid Swarm
SB: 3 Dread of Night
SB: 2 Dark Confidant
SB: 1 Ad Nauseam