[Deck] ANT (Ad Nauseam Tendrils) Storm Combo

[Chaam]

As for the 2nd Island vs. Bayou vs. Badlands discussion, why not a 2nd Trop? Am I missing something here? It seems like it is the best option.

[Lemnear]

As for the 2nd Island vs. Bayou vs. Badlands discussion, why not a 2nd Trop?

Because T1 Volcanic + Ponder/Preordain into T2 Ponder/Brainstorm/Preordain into Fetchland into Bayou casts not only all Protection (Discard and Xantid) but also provides all 4 colors

[CabalTherapy]

As for the 2nd Island vs. Bayou vs. Badlands discussion, why not a 2nd Trop? Am I missing something here? It seems like it is the best option.

There isn't any discussion about this topic and please don't start one because reasons are obvious. Yes, you are missing something here. And no, a second Tropical is horrible.

[lordofthepit]

As for the 2nd Island vs. Bayou vs. Badlands discussion, why not a 2nd Trop? Am I missing something here? It seems like it is the best option.

phazonmutant is the only ANT player I know that plays 2 Tropicals. I know when I faced him in a weekly and saw him with two Tropicals on the board, I immediately assumed (incorrectly) that he was on BUG when I initially put him on ANT. Hopefully, he'll chime in with his thoughts on his land base.

[Chaam]

I mean if you are planning on playing the 2nd island anyways wouldn't a 2nd trop just be better 95% of the time? You probably only need to fetch one basic island.

[phazonmutant]

There isn't any discussion about this topic and please don't start one because reasons are obvious. Yes, you are missing something here. And no, a second Tropical is horrible.

So dismissive. Obviously the reasons aren't obvious, he wouldn't ask if they were.

Ant really wants to cast cantrips for the first turn or two. Most often, a draw just fails to come together when you're sitting around hoping to naturally draw something good. With this in mind, drawing an opener with no blue source is MUCH more likely to result in a mulligan than a hand with no black source. After all, you mostly need black the turn you go off, and then you have plentiful black from rituals. Against non counterbalance Brainstorm decks, it's often better to cantrip instead of casting discard for a couple reasons. They feel safer so might not cantrip for protection as hard. They might get mana constrained if they try to protect their hand. They have fewer cards in bin for Cruise. It also gives you better information - I've lost to Duressing their last counterspell, passing, and having them rip another plenty of times.

So I think it's unacceptable to have two nonU sources. It increases inconsistency. 2 Seas are sufficient. I do play a Verdant to have another fetch that can find a basic Swamp to virtually have more black sources.

[phazonmutant]

I mean if you are planning on playing the 2nd island anyways wouldn't a 2nd trop just be better 95% of the time? You probably only need to fetch one basic island.

That's true, but it's not quite accurate. The second basic Island almost always comes at the cost of a fetch. Fetches are super important for threshold, shuffling cantrips, and colors. The other thing it could be at the expense of is a dual, but there aren't an I feel comfortable cutting. 2 Sea, 1 Volc is the bare minimum for the combo cards, and I think 2 green sources are important for casting Decay against Wasteland + Hate permanent decks like MUD.

[Togores]

So dismissive. Obviously the reasons aren't obvious, he wouldn't ask if they were.

Ant really wants to cast cantrips for the first turn or two. Most often, a draw just fails to come together when you're sitting around hoping to naturally draw something good. With this in mind, drawing an opener with no blue source is MUCH more likely to result in a mulligan than a hand with no black source. After all, you mostly need black the turn you go off, and then you have plentiful black from rituals. Against non counterbalance Brainstorm decks, it's often better to cantrip instead of casting discard for a couple reasons. They feel safer so might not cantrip for protection as hard. They might get mana constrained if they try to protect their hand. They have fewer cards in bin for Cruise. It also gives you better information - I've lost to Duressing their last counterspell, passing, and having them rip another plenty of times.

So I think it's unacceptable to have two nonU sources. It increases inconsistency. 2 Seas are sufficient. I do play a Verdant to have another fetch that can find a basic Swamp to virtually have more black sources.

against any tempo deck the best aproach is getting to a hand that makes this the combo turn.
Cast a bunch of rituals to negate theyr soft counters. Then therapy and duress theyr hard counters (you can also 1st discard then ritual or ritual in resp to soft counters. Then you go off and win. best aproach is load them with discard the turn you combo. Also therapying them of counters holding a duress back for the combo turn, the next turn is really good plan.

[phazonmutant]

against any tempo deck the best aproach is getting to a hand that makes this the combo turn.
Cast a bunch of rituals to negate theyr soft counters. Then therapy and duress theyr hard counters (you can also 1st discard then ritual or ritual in resp to soft counters. Then you go off and win. best aproach is load them with discard the turn you combo. Also therapying them of counters holding a duress back for the combo turn, the next turn is really good plan.

So are you agreeing or disagreeing with my assessment? It seems like you're agreeing that blue sources are important to set up for "getting to a hand that makes this the combo turn".

[sawatarix]

To be homest,i've never missed the additional blue land until now in my storm carreer.
All lands except Swamp and Bayou/Badlands produce blue and that's enough if you run 10 blue spells (I'm not counting Gitaxian Probe here because it's a zero mana spell most of the time)
What we really need are as many initial black sources as possible.You all know that duress into dark rituals+kill is a common play.If one of these spells get countered we still should be able to fire off other rituals during the same turn.
Smart players try to counter our rituals,keep that in mind.
Plus we don't want to waste our cantrips to search for black duals.
I already dislike games where i have island+tropical island with a hand full of black stuff.

[CabalTherapy]

To be homest,i've never missed the additional blue land until now in my storm carreer.
All lands except Swamp and Bayou/Badlands produce blue and that's enough if you run 10 blue spells (I'm not counting Gitaxian Probe here because it's a zero mana spell most of the time)
What we really need are as many initial black sources as possible.You all know that duress into dark rituals+kill is a common play.If one of these spells get countered we still should be able to fire off other rituals during the same turn.
Smart players try to counter our rituals,keep that in mind.
Plus we don't want to waste our cantrips to search for black duals.
I already dislike games where i have island+tropical island with a hand full of black stuff.

This Kai speaks straight from my heart.

Also, I don't want to be "dismissive" but I don't see an importance to run that discussion and I still belive that reasons are obvious. They just want to be set free by a thinking mind. (I expect someone searching for a flame here, but that is not my intent. )

ANT is UB where the majority of spells are black (+reasons members gave above). We don't even need U for the kill, therefore a second Tropical Island is strictly inferior to Bayou in the usual build and Badlands in the R-heavy build.

[sawatarix]

Straight from your Heart <3

#NoHomo

[GoblinZ]

Today first time playing legacy event with 15 or 16 players in HongKong and top 2nd winning a revised Savannah

Swiss：
2-0 win vs random deck. he is new to legacy so free win.
2-0 win vs reanimator. he made some mistakes imo so I beat him without difficulty
2-0 win vs infect. I think this mu is much favorable than delver variants.

Draw into top 4

Top 4:
2:0 win vs RUG or BURG delver. game one is pretty easy he mulliganed to five and only had spell snare. game two, he has surgical extraction, but thanks to it, I natrually tendrils him...

final:
1:2 lose vs DNT. game one I therapy his thalia and won. game two I had my PIF stuck in hand and if I drew a petal or a fetch for red mana I could go for it but I drew 2 tutor and 2 ritual in a row, pretty unlucky...game three I mulligan to six and had one ritual, led and tutor in hand, but never never...drew another ritual to go for it...


There were 3 MUD today and lukily I didnot face any one...I will play Hurkyl‘s recall next time, which I found may be also good against DNT, since you can bounce Cannonist and vial at the same time.

[Lemnear]

There were 3 MUD today and lukily I didnot face any one...I will play Hurkyl‘s recall next time, which I found may be also good against DNT, since you can bounce Cannonist and vial at the same time.

If you are fine to pay 3 mana against Thalia or Thorn, you can run Trygon which wins those matchups on it's own

[GoblinZ]

If you are fine to pay 3 mana against Thalia or Thorn, you can run Trygon which wins those matchups on it's own

I actually prepare for possible mud game with one echoing truth in sb, which I thought initially is more “versatile”, but it only turns out to be bad...I didn't board it in against DNT today, I know three is indeed too much...

I saw the interesting discussion on Trygon in TES thread, but I assume it is not a practical idea with port and wasteland online.

currently my sideboard plan against DNT is -3 duress -1 therapy -1 preordain +2 CoV +2 Dread of Night +1 Massacre, maybe you can help me improving my sideboarding, Lemnear.

[Lemnear]

I'm not a fan of DoN. Not because if fails to remove SFM, Revoker or Canonist, but because it also has zero application against UWR Delver or decks with Meddling Mage in general. I strickly prefer Massacre because you can sweep the whole UWR board (including Delver) for zero if they control a Tundra and gain plenty of time. Against D&T, you can opt to board Decays in addition if you don't want to spend more slots for dedicated creature removal in your sideboard, I guess

On Trygon: I dunno if Wasteland and Port are a real problem if you run Basics (fetch green dual the turn you plan to play Trygon) and Petals to power the bugger out. I sure dunno if 3 mana is acceptable for a 15-lands manabase

[GoblinZ]

I'm not a fan of DoN. Not because if fails to remove SFM, Revoker or Canonist, but because it also has zero application against UWR Delver or decks with Meddling Mage in general. I strickly prefer Massacre because you can sweep the whole UWR board (including Delver) for zero if they control a Tundra and gain plenty of time. Against D&T, you can opt to board Decays in addition if you don't want to spend more slots for dedicated creature removal in your sideboard, I guess

On Trygon: I dunno if Wasteland and Port are a real problem if you run Basics (fetch green dual the turn you plan to play Trygon) and Petals to power the bugger out. I sure dunno if 3 mana is acceptable for a 15-lands manabase

thank you very much! I agree massacre is much better than DoN. Unless you dedicate a lot of room of sb for DoN, it is not that great.

The only problem with Massacre I have is I fear it may make Ad Nauseam worse since there are several cards in library coverted 4cc...

Since I play grim tutor, maybe I can tutor for my single one massacre if necessary, but this never happened during my recent testing and gamings.

[Lemnear]

thank you very much! I agree massacre is much better than DoN. Unless you dedicate a lot of room of sb for DoN, it is not that great.

The only problem with Massacre I have is I fear it may make Ad Nauseam worse since there are several cards in library coverted 4cc...

Since I play grim tutor, maybe I can tutor for my single one massacre if necessary, but this never happened during my recent testing and gamings.

Tbh there are already plenty of miserable flips for AN in your deck (foremost the Grim) so unless you plan that AN works as an Autopilot win-con delivering 15+ cards and you are fine with it only drawing you a fresh, full grip which you convert into a PIF loop or a natural chain instead, everything is fine.

Edit: Congratulations! Barely forgot that one lol

[GoblinZ]

Thanks, very reasonable. Since I have both decks, I can begin some new tests on my own

[GodsAreShining]

Hi all storm players!! Ive played this deck along time ago and after ive switched to show and tell xD now im looking to come back to ant but ive see all list are running grim tutor and my answer is that card can be changed with something else?? Thx all ^^