[Deck] ANT (Ad Nauseam Tendrils) Storm Combo

[.Ix]

As awesome as that sounds, it might be a little too hard on the colors to run Ancient Tomb.


Phazonmutant:

Do you whiff a lot with Pieces? I'm running it in a different combo deck with 35 Instants and Sorceries and I get only 1 card off it quite a few times.

[CabalTherapy]

I've been kicking around bringing back the third Duress instead of the Chain and going back to seven discards. I'm curious: do you feel like seven pieces of disruption in the maindeck has been a setup that's led to flooding? I used to think that because there were times when it would happen, but I feel like we're in an environment in which there are decks that'll just shut us out of the game immediately if we can't land a discard right away. Chain obviously doesn't solve this problem, but I felt like testing maindeck anti-permanent stuff.

CabalTherapy, thanks a lot for your input. I'm interested to hear what you think about adding discards at the moment/why we shouldn't, and I'll probably put Chain back in the 'board after its underperformance yesterday. Felt too narrow for the matchups I faced, though it would've been great in the matchups I had last week (barring Eldrazi).

I don't think that there is a higher philosophy to discard spells but I feel like 6 with 2 Pif main are a decent set up. As Jonathan Alexander pointed out some pages ago, format switched to a rather permanent based fight with less counterspells over the course of the last months. There are more non-U MUs and there we generally don't need discard spells but more juice.

[Ronald Deuce]

I don't think that there is a higher philosophy to discard spells but I feel like 6 with 2 Pif main are a decent set up. As Jonathan Alexander pointed out some pages ago, format switched to a rather permanent based fight with less counterspells over the course of the last months. There are more non-U MUs and there we generally don't need discard spells but more juice.

Thank you for the response!

Do you feel similarly about a six-count in builds running Dark Petition instead of double-PiF? For the time being, I've gone back to six discards, and I'll try a 3-3 split next time I bring the deck out. Seven discards felt like it flooded. Back to two Preordains for the time being

Some time ago, someone mentioned using Personal Tutor. Is anyone still working with that card? What spot in the deck did it fill?

[phazonmutant]

As awesome as that sounds, it might be a little too hard on the colors to run Ancient Tomb.


Phazonmutant:

Do you whiff a lot with Pieces? I'm running it in a different combo deck with 35 Instants and Sorceries and I get only 1 card off it quite a few times.

I hit one spell once, but never straight whiffed. I have 39 hits, a few more than you. Running the math: I'm assuming that it takes 3 non-spells to cast Pieces and Pieces itself, so we can exclude those 4 from the deck population to approximate proportions of success to population size in an actual game.
Population (N): 56 (60 - 3 lands - 1 Pieces)
Successes (K): 38 (39 spells - 1 Pieces)
Sample Size (n): 5
Successes in Sample (k): 1
P(X <= k = 1) = 0.03268

For K=34
P(X <= k) = 0.07200

So 39 spells is about a 96.7% chance to hit 2 or more spells, whereas 35 spells is 92.8%.

[bjholmes3]

It's that time again, I'll be researching, playtesting, and updating the guide in the weeks to come. Best of luck in your matches everyone, and may the storm count be ever in your favor.

[Sloshthedark]

Played 3 Pieces tonight against Shardless, 4c control brew with Thing in the Ice, Burn and Esper Mentor ... none of these deck play Daze, so theoreticaly all 3 U are perfect MUs for the tech, all my opponents respected the card - I had it discarded or countered EVERY time I (could) cast it (roughly 10 times), if countered I haven't advanced my gameplan at all, felt pretty bad, lost 1 game because I couldn't cast or get rid of it, it forced weird cantripping (3 lands instead of more effective plays), I haven't had the guts to DR into Pieces in the dark if that should be a standard play I'm not interested anyway... overall I felt more manascrewed than usual, I could imagine it as omnipotent topdeck on 5 lands, unfortunately wasn't the case... generally it went as I thought it would, just no Daze got involved, too expensive, too sorcery and U on the top of it

[Patrunkenphat7]

Eff we got moved to the slums. That's probably good though because people are more likely to be unprepared. This deck is actually one of the best right now IMO.

[CabalTherapy]

Thank you for the response!

Do you feel similarly about a six-count in builds running Dark Petition instead of double-PiF? For the time being, I've gone back to six discards, and I'll try a 3-3 split next time I bring the deck out. Seven discards felt like it flooded. Back to two Preordains for the time being

Some time ago, someone mentioned using Personal Tutor. Is anyone still working with that card? What spot in the deck did it fill?

I am afraid, I cannot help here: I never played Dark Petition, thus it's for other people to evaluate.

[Jonathan Alexander]

Thank you for the response!

Do you feel similarly about a six-count in builds running Dark Petition instead of double-PiF? For the time being, I've gone back to six discards, and I'll try a 3-3 split next time I bring the deck out. Seven discards felt like it flooded. Back to two Preordains for the time being

Some time ago, someone mentioned using Personal Tutor. Is anyone still working with that card? What spot in the deck did it fill?

If you run Petitions, that's because you don't expect to face much countermagic in the first place. Wouldn't make much sense to run heavy disruption maindeck then. Although I liked my Dark Petition list with four extra sideboard discard spells to go up to ten against Miracles and in combo mirrors.

[Ronald Deuce]

If you run Petitions, that's because you don't expect to face much countermagic in the first place. Wouldn't make much sense to run heavy disruption maindeck then. Although I liked my Dark Petition list with four extra sideboard discard spells to go up to ten against Miracles and in combo mirrors.

How much of a difference do you think there really is between running Petition and running 2x PiF? I ask because I find that oftentimes it doesn't feel like it matters which card I have in hand; they either don't have enough to stop me, or their hand is totally stacked. I lost to BUG Delver Sunday because in game 3 he was sitting on three untapped lands with a hand of Clique, Force of Will, Flusterstorm, 2x Stifle, and some other irrelevant stuff. Wouldn't have mattered which config I was running; beating four counterspells and a clock feels pretty much impossible for our deck.

Feels like I've started to have a lot of unwinnable matchups in my meta, but that could just be that it's a small enough meta that people will board against my deck rather readily. There's still a whole lot of blue control floating around, as well. Getting a bit discouraged, so I might mix it up and play something else next time.

[Jonathan Alexander]

With Petition, you tend to run Ad Nauseam. Petition is a much better flip than Past in Flames, because it can be LED or Tutor (or both), depending on what you need/have. I think the biggest difference outside of Ad Nauseam (or at least most noticeable for me) is the lack of extra Storm spells. Not having the second Tendrils can be really annoying.
When I tested 2 Past / 2 Tendrils / 1 Petition, I never noticed a difference between that and clean 2/3.

[Ronald Deuce]

With Petition, you tend to run Ad Nauseam. Petition is a much better flip than Past in Flames, because it can be LED or Tutor (or both), depending on what you need/have. I think the biggest difference outside of Ad Nauseam (or at least most noticeable for me) is the lack of extra Storm spells. Not having the second Tendrils can be really annoying.
When I tested 2 Past / 2 Tendrils / 1 Petition, I never noticed a difference between that and clean 2/3.

Are you a proponent of running additional business over Ad Nauseam at this point? I like having the AdN in my maindeck, but I'm starting to sour on playing this deck without more answers to countermagic than I'm finding right now, and AdN doesn't help there. Currently I'm running singletons of AdN, Petition, Empty, PiF, and Tendrils.

Have you tested with singletons AdN, Petition, Tendrils, and 2 PiF? I've been feeling more and more like I've been banking too heavily on hands that look like they could develop into a quick Empty but that never do. I used to run two Petitions maindeck (the other one's in my 'board), but I think the players in my meta have stepped up their blue game. I'm not taking last week's experience to be evidential (that god-hand from BUG Delver; also, there were only three rounds and I had a bye), but I am starting to feel like the increase in resilience of a second PiF would be better than the speed of maindeck Empty or the flexibility of a second Petition.

Here's hoping this weekend doesn't herald any opponents' drawing 2x Stifle, 2x Flusterstorm, Delver, Island, Force...

[ScottW]

I played in a GPT today and had the pleasure to play 2 PIF, 2 Tendrils, 1 Grim, and 1 Empty because the store let me borrow their Grim Tutor (pretty nice). AN was in my side board.

One of my opponents was on RUG and had a hand of 3 FOW, 2 Stifle, Daze. He Forced my 2 CTs and so his hand was FOW / Stifle, which I baited out with an Empty and then blew him out with a gazillion Tendrils via PIF on the same turn. So much mana! I felt like I was constantly discarding tutors, PIF, and Tendrils with my LEDs. Maybe luck but it was fun.

[thefringthing]

Some time ago, someone mentioned using Personal Tutor. Is anyone still working with that card? What spot in the deck did it fill?

That was me. It's good. I ran it with 0 Dark Petition, 1 Tendrils, 1 PIF, 1 Empty. That said, I think the metagame is pretty horrible right now for storm, and for 1-mana cards.

[Ronald Deuce]

That was me. It's good. I ran it with 0 Dark Petition, 1 Tendrils, 1 PIF, 1 Empty. That said, I think the metagame is pretty horrible right now for storm, and for 1-mana cards.

Thanks for the feedback!

Agreed on the 1-mana thing (and the meta in general), but I've been looking for an alternative to Dark Petition or Preordain lately. Petition's worked out pretty well for me, but it's a bit difficult to parlay a Petition into a fast Empty, so I've moved Empty back to the 'board for now because I've been liking the fifth tutor. Still really dislike Preordain, but I'm learning to live with a singleton in the absence of something better.

Have you noticed any distinct advantages or disadvantages to running Personal Tutor? Obviously it requires cantrips to fire immediately and it can't find AdN, but I'm wondering how often those problems arise and whether Personal Tutor's advantages (mana cost, primarily) have outweighed the difficulties.

No tournament last Sunday, but I got to practice against Eldrazi, and it went better than expected. Came out close to a tie after 5+ games.

I've been running an unorthodox setup lately: 2 PiF and singletons Tendrils, AdN, Petition, Preordain, Chrome Mox, Rain of Filth. 14 lands (Tropical in the 'board), 3-3 Duress to Therapy. Singletons of Petition and Empty in the sideboard.

I'm not missing the second Petition too much, but I need to play the deck more to see how flexible the list is with only 4-5 tutors. I don't like having more than one piece of business in the 'board, so I may just run without the second Petition. Seems like an upgrade over the second PiF against non-blue decks, though. Of course, so is Empty, but Empty's pretty bad in a lot of matchups where another tutor would help (Elves, Gobbos, anything with Ensnaring Bridge).

I've also been toying with the idea of running a second Tendrils in the board, but I'm still having trouble wrapping my head around how exactly that would help us. Feels like it just reduces flexibility compared with a tutor and reduces resilience compared with PiF. Not trolling; I'd appreciate any observations or pointers people could give me. Could be that I'm just bad at Magic, but I feel like a minimum of five tutors is pretty important for the deck's consistency and flexibility.

I'm not getting a strong feeling for how useful the Mox is. It bailed me out once, but I still get cantrip-flooded and have trouble finding a discard when I need it. The discard problem might be solved by PiF, but I'm not sure yet because I wasn't battling blue. I like Rain a lot, but it seems like a lot of people have been replacing it with the Mox lately for AdN and other fast starts. I also feel like Rain has been extremely helpful for stopping soft-counters and reaching Threshold. Anyone else running both cards?

Thanks in advance for any feedback, everybody!

[OlegtheSuper]

@Ronald Deuce, how do you SB vs Eldrazi? What wasEldrazi's list? What were the scenarios of games you won and lost?

[taconaut]

Also interested in the details about the Eldrazi.

I've been running a chrome mox as well, and I share your distaste for preordains, so I know the feeling. I'm currently running one PiF, one ToA in the main, but an extra of each in the board. The second tendrils helps you have more business against decks where you have a little time to set up, and it's nice that sometime you can fire off a tendrils that isn't lethal, but gives you time to work up to a second one. Also, it's nice when you can get a decent amount of mana but not much storm, or grave hate stops you from going the PiF route.

[Ronald Deuce]

@Ronald Deuce, how do you SB vs Eldrazi? What wasEldrazi's list? What were the scenarios of games you won and lost?

Also interested in the details about the Eldrazi.

For quick reference, here's what I played: standard skeleton with 14 lands; 6 discards; 2 PiF; 1 Preordain, Mox, Rain, AdN, Petition, Tendrils. 4x Decay, 2x Hurkyll's, 1x Rebuild, Trop, Empty, and Petition (among other things) in the sideboard.

Opponent was running a blue-white list, with Drowner of Hope, Skyspawner, 8 lock pieces in the 75 (Chalices and Thorns), and at least 2 Mindbreak Traps in the 'board. It looked like it was less strong against us than colorless lists with 10-12 lock pieces, but like it might be better against more creaturey decks like D&T. Eldrazi Spawn have been wreaking havoc on me when I play Dredge, too, though it's possible to get around that. Didn't see any Wastelands that I can remember.

For G2, I boarded in 2x Hurkyl's, 1x Rebuild, Abrupt Decay, Tropical. Took out 3 Cabal Therapy, 1 Preordain, 1 PiF (I think). Subsequently I also added Empty in exchange for (I think) Rain of Filth. In the future, I might try to side a tad lighter and keep a Therapy or replace Rebuild with another Hurkyl's or a Decay.

I didn't take notes and a couple of the games weren't particularly memorable (either fast lock shut me out or he didn't find the pieces before a combo), but I'll try to remember as much as I can.

I won two games off of Ad Nauseam. If the Eldrazi player doesn't drop a T1 lock-piece or swing out quickly, we can get where we need to be with little trouble using it, and it's a great tutor target if we only have one Ritual to go with our mana rocks. It also can't be countered by Warping Wail, though I've never had trouble with that card because Eldrazi taps out pretty much every turn. AdN loses a great deal of effectiveness with every turn we don't use it, but it's saved me several times against the Eldrazi after taking me down to 1 life, including once yesterday.

I lost my opening game after keeping a strong hand. Had two or three Cabal Rituals, an LED, and a tutor. Trouble was that the opponent dropped two Thorns and no Chalices, so I didn't really have plays after that.

Another game I lost because my opponent had a Mindbreak Trap and I couldn't find a discard. Had an easy combo in hand and went through about four cantrips in the final turn looking for Duress, but he'd built up his board, so he just swung for the fences.

Surprisingly, I didn't see a double-Chalice opening at all that day.

So here's what I've been thinking about the matchup lately:
—AdN is great in this matchup if you can fire it quickly. They don't have instant-speed damage—at least, not without Endbringer, which I didn't see—so we can afford to drop to 1 if absolutely necessary to find a kill.
—Rebuild is a bit of a lemon. It's great against Chalices, but it's really bad against Thorns. I'm probably switching it out.
—Hurkyl's Recall is excellent, but it didn't come up much the other day. I think I drew one in a game in which there was a Thorn on the board, and I just didn't have/draw the lands to cast it. I don't think we should take these out, though; we're gonna have to live with those lock-pieces, and Recall can wipe their hate while getting around Chalice on 1 but without having a base cost of 3. Not sure whether three Recalls would be better than two, but I'd like to try a third one for the time being.
—Running 15 lands is important against Eldrazi, though I don't tend to like it against decks without Wasteland. Opens up Abrupt Decay (not the greatest, but it's something) and makes it easier to work around Thorn, but does these things at the cost of making our topdecks worse.
—I've been hurting for another discard spell in this matchup. T1 Duress on the play is often all we need to stop them from doing anything meaningful against us. I still like the fact that Therapy can take multiples, though. Not sure whether I'd run a fourth Duress or Therapy, especially because at least some of the discards are probably getting sided out for other forms of disruption.
—Empty never came up. Not sure why; I think in one game I had a choice between Empty and AdN and I picked AdN because I didn't have the storm for a big Empty or the opponent already had a solid board. Empty has worked in the past, though, and it's faster than Petition, so I think one is pretty important for this matchup. Not sure how much the Scion-heavy builds will reduce its effectiveness, so pending further discussion I'm not totally on board with running multiples.
—Thorn of Amethyst is really, really bad. I've had significantly fewer problems with Chalice than I've had with Thorn. Getting locked out of 1- or 2-costed cards is abysmal, but it requires more than one Chalice to seal us in. A single Thorn makes everything we do worse, and we're light enough on lands that it's really tough to get around it without breaking our rocks. (It's for this reason that I'm very reluctant to board out any copies of Petal.) There's also the fact that—good as it is against Thalia in D&T/Mav—Chain of Vapor is pretty much dead against Thorn in this matchup because of Chalice. I'm interested to hear what (if anything) you guys think is best against Thorn because it's really, really savage.

Nevilshute, enjoying your latest set of League videos. Keep 'em coming! Sorry about how disappointing the Eldrazi match was, but I found it really helpful to watch. I found your using additional Empties against Eldrazi to be an interesting choice. Have you found running additional Empties to give you better odds than running Recalls, etc.? Couldn't tell whether you were saying in the vid that Hurkyll's was worse or that you just wanted to try multiple Empties. I feel like comparing the odds of having Hurkyll's but not being able to use it/getting it Thought-Knazi'd to the odds of flooding on business is the best measure, but I'm curious as to what you think. Also, I think Ad Nauseam is more useful in this matchup than additional Empties would be, but I don't think I have enough experience to make that call. You could try running Empty in place of Grim Tutor. I feel like we can't really mix Grim and AdN, and AdN has saved me an inordinate number of times against Eldrazi.

I've been running a chrome mox as well, and I share your distaste for preordains, so I know the feeling. I'm currently running one PiF, one ToA in the main, but an extra of each in the board. The second tendrils helps you have more business against decks where you have a little time to set up, and it's nice that sometime you can fire off a tendrils that isn't lethal, but gives you time to work up to a second one. Also, it's nice when you can get a decent amount of mana but not much storm, or grave hate stops you from going the PiF route.

Thanks for the feedback! Sounds similar to what I'd had in mind; maybe it's not making as much sense as it should because I haven't played it out myself. Are you running Rain of Filth?

[Pelikanudo]

...?

I believe that ingot chewer is the best card vs both chalice and thorn - the problem - is anti ad nauseam, but hey! thats a TES problem... you explode much more the PiF engine...

[the_ob3lisk]

Any links to videos of ANT defeating Eldrazi?

Went 2-2 at my local last night with both losses to the menace.