[Article] The Legacy Laser – UBR Ad Nauseam Tendrils

[RaNDoMxGeSTuReS]

http://www.eternal-central.com/?p=3216

Pretty much talks about how ANT is better than TES and not playing Probe/Therapy right now is a mistake. Apparently 1 Grim Tutor is necessary for ANT. The article doesn't touch on the new builds with Abrupt Decay or Snapcaster Mage.

My take is TES is the better "Ad Nauseam" deck, where more often ANT wants to tutor chain for the win. I find you usually kill yourself when casting an early Ad Nauseam with ANT, where with TES it's not a problem. Article also states the dead horse topic about basics versus gold lands to beat Wasteland.

Discuss.

[alderon666]

I really don't think Orim's Chant/Silence are real cards against Show and Tell/Reanimator/GW. They are not completely dead cards, but discard is SO much better...

What I really don't like about his take on the sideboard is that it's really short of BW targets. While he addresses the most difficult matchup using those slots, playing the list I really missed some old stars like Deathmark/Diminishing Returns(not good in this deck anyway)/Pulverize.

I really like this deck over TES. What made me drop TES was casting Brainstorm, bricking and not having a way to shuffle the top. That's is just a dealbraker for me. Also, TESs' manabase is way too fragile IMO.

[cogitoergosum]

I think the deck should be name "RUB my Tendrils". That is all.

[KevinTrudeau]

While I'm of the mind that Cabal Therapy is not what you want to be playing right now, I know for a fact that Grafdigger's Cage is absolutely terrible and should not be run by anyone in this archetype. Cutting a Duress also seems really awful. TES > ANT, rainbow lands > basics, Rite of Flame > Cabal Ritual, etc. ANT's not a bad deck or anything, but I think emphasizing Empty the Warrens is better than having a marginally better late game.

[alderon666]

While I'm of the mind that Cabal Therapy is not what you want to be playing right now, I know for a fact that Grafdigger's Cage is absolutely terrible and should not be run by anyone in this archetype. Cutting a Duress also seems really awful. TES > ANT, rainbow lands > basics, Rite of Flame > Cabal Ritual, etc. ANT's not a bad deck or anything, but I think emphasizing Empty the Warrens is better than having a marginally better late game.

Cutting the Duress for Inquisiton is a nod to Thalia. If you think Force of Will will be a bigger problem, just switch it.
Rainbow lands are good for going off fast. Turn 1 add U, turn 2 add R and turn 3 add B. Basics are good for Turn 1 fetch Island, Turn 2 fetch Swamp, Turn 3 fetch Volcanic Island/Badlands and go off. "Oh you had a Wasteland, didn't even notice."
Rite of Flame is great for playing around Spell Snare and taxing counters, costing 2 really hurts Cabal. But on the other hand, Cabal adds 5 black most of the time in this deck and if you have Past in Flames as a plan B, that's what you need.
I feel that Empty is kinda weak nowadays. Terminus, Batterskull, Stifle, fast combo decks, Griselbees... I could go on. Past in Flames while slow and vulnerable to graveyard hate, allows you to go off on low life totals, against opponent's with high life totals and actually gets better as the game progresses, unlike Empty.

But hey, that's just one man's opinion.

[Rico Suave]

While I'm of the mind that Cabal Therapy is not what you want to be playing right now, I know for a fact that Grafdigger's Cage is absolutely terrible and should not be run by anyone in this archetype. Cutting a Duress also seems really awful. TES > ANT, rainbow lands > basics, Rite of Flame > Cabal Ritual, etc. ANT's not a bad deck or anything, but I think emphasizing Empty the Warrens is better than having a marginally better late game.

These are all quite bold claims. And you think these things...why? Oh, you know these things for facts? I could easily argue (correctly) that all of your statements are false and directly the opposite of reality, but I'll save myself the hassle and ask you to prove yourself before making controversial claims. If you can.

[alderon666]

These are all quite bold claims. And you think these things...why? Oh, you know these things for facts? I could easily argue (correctly) that all of your statements are false and directly the opposite of reality, but I'll save myself the hassle and ask you to prove yourself before making controversial claims. If you can.

Ouch...? Really? Cmon...

[Sloshthedark]

nice deck preview, but I don't like the setup and the SB plans... you just kill them just try not being stupid attitude doesn't appeal to me although somehow truthful , btw. report/discussing plays is the most interesting thing as it's the thinking process that separates dumb and successful...
anyway well written still I hope not many will pick up the deck, the last thing you want is rising Storm presence and incompetent players ;)


Cutting the Duress for Inquisiton is a nod to Thalia. If you think Force of Will will be a bigger problem, just switch it.
Rainbow lands are good for going off fast. Turn 1 add U, turn 2 add R and turn 3 add B. Basics are good for Turn 1 fetch Island, Turn 2 fetch Swamp, Turn 3 fetch Volcanic Island/Badlands and go off. "Oh you had a Wasteland, didn't even notice."
Rite of Flame is great for playing around Spell Snare and taxing counters, costing 2 really hurts Cabal. But on the other hand, Cabal adds 5 black most of the time in this deck and if you have Past in Flames as a plan B, that's what you need.
I feel that Empty is kinda weak nowadays. Terminus, Batterskull, Stifle, fast combo decks, Griselbees... I could go on. Past in Flames while slow and vulnerable to graveyard hate, allows you to go off on low life totals, against opponent's with high life totals and actually gets better as the game progresses, unlike Empty.

But hey, that's just one man's opinion.

fetching basics is overrated and overplayed... ANT all the way of course

[Final Fortune]

These are all quite bold claims. And you think these things...why? Oh, you know these things for facts? I could easily argue (correctly) that all of your statements are false and directly the opposite of reality, but I'll save myself the hassle and ask you to prove yourself before making controversial claims. If you can.

Because Bryant and TES have put up tournament numbers for years and this player and this deck haven't accomplished anything significant that I'm aware of?

People really shouldn't post an untested Storm list and just claim it's superior to TES when said Storm list and TES are just fundamentally two different Storm decks with their own varrying strengths and weaknesses, nothing clearly makes discard or Cabal Ritual any stronger than Silence, Xantid Swarm or Rite of Flame, where one set of cards is trying to win before the opponent reaches the mid-game and the second set of cards is trying to win before the opponent plays his second land drop.

I've played UBR ANT before, and I find Burning Wish incredibly awkward, because you don't have a Diminishing Returns or an Infernal Tutor as a Storm engine in your deck and you're overly graveyard reliant because the only reliable win condition in the deck is Past in Flames. I really don't see what this deck has to offer over DDFT, for example, if you go the Burning Wish route, and you could just play an Infernal Tutor centric Storm deck with 4 Pre-Ordain instead and have a more consistent deck IMO.

About the only thing I agree with is that Chrome Mox is a "bad" card in the sense that it's Storm's equivalent of dead combo pieces you really don't want to draw, but they're ultimately necessary for Ad Nauseam if you're trying to win with Ad Nauseam before Threshold is reached.

Edit: And yeah I don't care if the author and the deck won Ghent, flash in the pan success doessn't really give you the position to bash a format staple without objective arguments.

[NecroYawgmoth]

So finishing first in a GP, and 2nd in ovino 7 isn't significant enough?

[door]

Because Bryant and TES have put up tournament numbers for years and this player and this deck haven't accomplished anything significant that I'm aware of?


Maybe you should pay more attention to bigger tournaments? Or is top1 at GP Ghent and splitting in finals of Ovino7 this year with the same 75 not enough "significant"?

[Final Fortune]

Bah, in before edit, no I don't care if the author and the deck won GP Ghent, compare that to Bryant and TES's tournament placements over numerous years in this format and it's nothing more than a flash in the pan success and not a reason to unnecessarily bash on TES without being objective.

[Sloshthedark]

Bah, in before edit, no I don't care if the author and the deck won GP Ghent, compare that to Bryant and TES's tournament placements over numerous years in this format and it's nothing more than a flash in the pan success and not a reason to unnecessarily bash on TES without being objective.

compared, failed

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

@Timo: excellent article, good writing and good content made this a joy to read.

As to the rest of this thread, alright let's have the whole "needs to be moar TES!!11!" discussion again we had when I wrote about the deck? For comparison, check the thread for that article: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?23413-Article-Eternal-Europe-The-Cabal-Rises .

One particularly amusing thing to note from that thread is seeing Bryant bashing Probe as utterly terrible in Storm before adding a full set to TES by now.

This deck has been largely outperforming TES lately and should arguably have won the last two European Legacy GPs (given that in Amsterdam only not desideboarding kept the deck out of the finals where it would have had to face a very favorable matchup).

As for Timo's decklist, I still dislike Burning Wish in the deck for its non-synergy with the PiF win and making you actually need multiple non-LED red mana a relevant amount of the time, which works against what I feel the deck wants to do: Fetch basics and cantrip into the perfect hand while ignoring the opponents fumbling efforts to interact.

@KevinTrudeau: As Rico didn't go through the trouble of doing so, I'll examine your claims in a bit of detail:

gold lands > basics: Yeah, clearly gold lands are super good, that's why every deck that can runs of off duals/fetches/basics. Opening every landdrop you have up to Wasteland is clearly a big benefit that makes it worth it to have your lands die after being used a few times or to get pinged whenever you tap them. Gold lands are the cost you pay to make your 4.5 color manabase consistent in TES. If the deck worked of duals/fetches, it would clearly prefer to run those.

RoF > CRit: Rite of Flame is awkward in that it forces you to have multiple starter mana sources (so that you can generate both R and B before tutoring - see also why I don't like BWish in this deck) and the extra-mana benefits come up significantly less often than Cabals while also being less impressive (+1 mana for the second RoF instead of +2 for threshed CRit). All CRit has working against it is that it costs 2.

TES > ANT: One of the reasons people misjudge this deck is that this deck retains it's ANT moniker. It is not a AdN deck (or rather it's pretty bad at being an AdN deck), it's a PiF/Tutor-chain deck.
TES is not a bad deck but much more like Belcher than PiF-ANT. You lose to variance (reaching from opposing Wasteland-draws to multi-Chrome Moxes to awkward mana requirements and the heavy AdN reliance) significantly more often and all you gain is a more comfortable protection-spell (if Chant/Silence resolves you are safe even against a Top on the table) and a slight increase in speed. If you're comfortable with those trade-offs, TES is a fine deck for you. It is far from simpy superior, though, and I personally would pretty much never pick up TES over this due to the mentioned variance-issues.

/edit: What I'm trying to say here is simply this: TES is more susceptible to variance and more early game all-in focused than PiF-ANT. It's basically speed vs resilience all over again. That leads to me preferring the the PiF side of things, because I'd rather win slower but safer. In the end, which deck is "better" has more to do with personal preference than anything else.

@Final Fortune: Your posts seem much less objective than anything said here or in the article, especially dismissing successive high placings in large events throughout the last year. The last two European GPs had one of these in the Top 8, it split first at Ovino 7 and has placed in Top16/Top 8 in SCG Opens multiple times. You're either being ignorant or biased enough to not actually see results for what they are.

[Julian23]

If you don't acknowledge Timo Schünemann's success with both Dredge and recently Storm in Legacy, there's no point in "in hominem" in the first place.
I never thought I'd get to use "in" four out of three consecutive words in a sentence.

[Bryant Cook]

Kid gets lucky once and now he's an expert.

Timo picked up ANT two months before the Grand Prix and attempted to learn to properly play Belcher, T.E.S., and ANT in that time? I doubt it. The truth more realistically is that he lost a couple games against his friends with Belcher & T.E.S. after an initial hand or two then shelved the decks. Did he lose because the decks were bad or did he lose because of lack of experience and knowledge? That's up to you.

What Timo did was pick up ANT because it's incredibly easy to play and has fewer lines of thought.

I enjoyed the section where he gave reasons not to play T.E.S., two additional Chrome Mox and Rite of Flame. Was Timo aware when he wrote this article that T.E.S. also plays Gitaxian Probe and Cabal Therapy? When I compare decks, I usually do some homework.

T.E.S. is always more likely to win off of an Ad Nauseam compared to ANT.

Chrome Mox makes you much faster against Dredge, Goblins, Show & Tell, and Maverick. T.E.S can just win before a turn two Thalia or not have to worry about Dredge's second turn. ANT doesn't have that luxury.

As for Rite of Flame vs. Cabal Ritual, Rite of Flame is much better in a deck that runs Burning Wish. You probably would've figured that one out if you had done proper testing. It's also much faster than Cabal Ritual, Rite of Flame is always effective in the first two turns of the game. You know, the turns that matter for a combo deck? Turn three threshold for Cabal Ritual is nice, but it's turn three, any ritual would've worked there. Someone hand me a Channel of the Suns! These are combo decks and the goal is to win before the opponents do anything, when your ritual effects are most effective on turn three... something is wrong.

Rite of Flame is better against counters like Daze, Spell Pierce, and Spell Snare making the RUG match-up better.

Rite of Flame is less damage on Ad Nauseam. This matters. Especially considering that his list plays three expensive spells and more two drops.

Lastly, just throw a green source into your deck and play Abrupt Decay? How is that manabase any better than T.E.S.'s? At that point you're a four color deck based on duals and fetchlands, you're only slowing down the deck even more.

I didn't have time to write all of my thought down seeing as I am at work. I'll stop back later and argue off other people's nonsense.

[Namida]

Kid gets lucky once and now he's an expert.

I don't mean to belittle the guy's success, but something about his style of writing makes me feel very much like he just threw 75 cards together, they turned out to be good enough to place very well, and now that he's being tasked with retroactively explaining what exactly happened all he can come up with is "My deck is fucking sick, and it should be obvious why!" I don't know if whether or not this is because I have some experience with Storm, but I don't get the feeling he knows entirely what he's talking about because I feel like he spends too much of the article saying that the reader should already know his deck (and by extension he himself) is awesome.

[Spigore]

This might become an interesting discussion.
As both TES and UB(r) ANT both have their pro's and con's. I think it's mostly playstyle dependant.

Basically I see TES going a full turn earlier for the combo. However, going T1 usually makes a bunch of goblin tokens, ending the game on your turn 3.
TES provides combo protection through Silence/Xantid Swarm and some discard.
ANT builds safety in its first turns with discard and a more resilient manabase. Going off later when there is threshhold (in reach).

Meh, why am I posting this? I don't have to be telling this to anyone.
Personally, I run UB ANT, as posted in Carsten's (Mon's) article.

[Sloshthedark]

When I compare decks, I usually do some homework.

then do your homework and compare when have you started playing therapy/probe and GP date ;)

[Bryant Cook]

then do your homework and compare when have you started playing therapy/probe and GP date ;)

I understood when the GP Date was and when I added Probe. I also admitted that I was wrong about Probe when I made it's inclusion, but when you write an article MONTHS later. Make sure to write about the current deck. It's like writing about Maverick before Dryad Militant now.

[SaberTooth]

if he won a gp and later split finals in ovino... idk.. good player? good deck? both? is not a coincidence to me at least

[Rico Suave]

Kid gets lucky once and now he's an expert.

This "kid" has luck like you do.

[Einherjer]

Well, maybe he got lucky once in a while - we all do.

BUT: He and his friends have been winning like every eternal-tournament they enter. He provides some of them with lists and boardingplans, and these guys win tournaments like BoM. He himself wins GP, Ovino-Modern-Top8 (ends late in night) and right at the next day Ovino-Legacy Top2-split... so... lucky..maybe...skilful? definitely!

Great article, though I enjoy his (german) blogs more :P I may be picking up ANT too :P

And yes, he is an expert, atleast for certain parts of Legacy. If he'd tell me what counter-suite to play in Miracle I'd say.."Thanks for the ideas, Ill give it a try." If he tells me how to play Dredge/Storm I say "Yes, Sir."

Greetings

[RaNDoMxGeSTuReS]

I'll never be on board with playing any form of graveyard hate in my sideboard. It's just terrible.

[Tammit67]

I'll never be on board with playing any form of graveyard hate in my sideboard. It's just terrible.

Why exactly? You are running a slower version of storm (as compared to TES/Belcher), slow enough for GY dependant decks to start gaining an edge against you. Without silence to chant lock dredge, devote 2 slots and win? What's wrong with that?

Lastly, just throw a green source into your deck and play Abrupt Decay? How is that manabase any better than T.E.S.'s? At that point you're a four color deck based on duals and fetchlands, you're only slowing down the deck even more.

Most of the lists I've seen run it in the board, almost exclusively for Miracles. Miracles really wants to hit UU by turn 2 and rarely tries also to jam wasteland with that sort of color requirement. I see the reasoning behind the rest of your post here, but the matchup where abrupt decay is aiming for along with the 4th color, they do not have wastelands. Even if Miracles starts running wastes, hold up that fetch or land in hand until you can decay and kill in one turn: it isn't like you are under pressure.


Because Bryant and TES have put up tournament numbers for years and this player and this deck haven't accomplished anything significant that I'm aware of?

People really shouldn't post an untested Storm list and just claim it's superior to TES when said Storm list and TES are just fundamentally two different Storm decks with their own varrying strengths and weaknesses, nothing clearly makes discard or Cabal Ritual any stronger than Silence, Xantid Swarm or Rite of Flame, where one set of cards is trying to win before the opponent reaches the mid-game and the second set of cards is trying to win before the opponent plays his second land drop.

UBx AnT has had continued success in Europe across several players, while TES's numbers stem largely from Bryant alone. To say it is UNTESTED is wrong: the first instance of the deck i recall was here back in March
http://www.thecouncil.es/tcdecks/deck.php?id=8049&iddeck=58671 . Since then both Matt Elias and Carsten Kotter have written about it on SCG, with links:
http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/legacy/23945_Legacys_Best_Combo_Deck.html (scroll to the end for the list)
http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/legacy/23816_Eternal_Europe_The_Cabal_Rises.html (A list from February)

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

Why exactly? You are running a slower version of storm (as compared to TES/Belcher), slow enough for GY dependant decks to start gaining an edge against you. Without silence to chant lock dredge, devote 2 slots and win? What's wrong with that?


Most of the lists I've seen run it in the board, almost exclusively for Miracles. Miracles really wants to hit UU by turn 2 and rarely tries also to jam wasteland with that sort of color requirement. I see the reasoning behind the rest of your post here, but the matchup where abrupt decay is aiming for along with the 4th color, they do not have wastelands. Even if Miracles starts running wastes, hold up that fetch or land in hand until you can decay and kill in one turn: it isn't like you are under pressure.



UBx AnT has had continued success in Europe across several players, while TES's numbers stem largely from Bryant alone. To say it is UNTESTED is wrong: the first instance of the deck i recall was here back in March
http://www.thecouncil.es/tcdecks/deck.php?id=8049&iddeck=58671 . Since then both Matt Elias and Carsten Kotter have written about it on SCG, with links:
http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/legacy/23945_Legacys_Best_Combo_Deck.html (scroll to the end for the list)
http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/legacy/23816_Eternal_Europe_The_Cabal_Rises.html (A list from February)

Which is basically still the list I'm using, for what it's worth (with a different SB), though I'm considering emidlns Snapcasters instead of the Preordains. To give credit where credit is due, the very first time this list has popped up to my knowledge is actually at GP Amsterdam back nearly a year ago in the hands of Elie Pichon:

http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/eventcoverage/gpams11/welcome#0

If someone is interested why the deck didn't win that GP already and was largely overlooked, check the semifinals coverage.

[Julian23]

If someone is interested why the deck didn't win that GP already and was largely overlooked, check the semifinals coverage.


tl;dr: he got a game loss for improper sideboarding that stopped him cold, IIRC.

[JDK]

Kid gets lucky once and now he's an expert.
And yet he wins/top8s three consecutive tournaments with several hundred players. Yeah, "lucky".

Flames removed. - zilla

[Final Fortune]

Why exactly? You are running a slower version of storm (as compared to TES/Belcher), slow enough for GY dependant decks to start gaining an edge against you. Without silence to chant lock dredge, devote 2 slots and win? What's wrong with that?


Most of the lists I've seen run it in the board, almost exclusively for Miracles. Miracles really wants to hit UU by turn 2 and rarely tries also to jam wasteland with that sort of color requirement. I see the reasoning behind the rest of your post here, but the matchup where abrupt decay is aiming for along with the 4th color, they do not have wastelands. Even if Miracles starts running wastes, hold up that fetch or land in hand until you can decay and kill in one turn: it isn't like you are under pressure.



UBx AnT has had continued success in Europe across several players, while TES's numbers stem largely from Bryant alone. To say it is UNTESTED is wrong: the first instance of the deck i recall was here back in March
http://www.thecouncil.es/tcdecks/deck.php?id=8049&iddeck=58671 . Since then both Matt Elias and Carsten Kotter have written about it on SCG, with links:
http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/legacy/23945_Legacys_Best_Combo_Deck.html (scroll to the end for the list)
http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/legacy/23816_Eternal_Europe_The_Cabal_Rises.html (A list from February)

I never said anything about ANT as an archetype in Legacy, I was commenting about the guy's specific version of the deck. If his performances hold I'll reconsider my position, I just don't think attacking a long standing archetype with years of tournament showings as a basis for your article lends itself any credibility.

[lordofthepit]

I never said anything about ANT as an archetype in Legacy, I was commenting about the guy's specific version of the deck. If his performances hold I'll reconsider my position, I just don't think attacking a long standing archetype with years of tournament showings as a basis for your article lends itself any credibility.

So basically, you'll be convinced if he keeps winning or splitting in the Finals of large tournaments (445 to 1345 players)?

[Final Fortune]

So basically, you'll be convinced if he keeps winning or splitting in the Finals of large tournaments (445 to 1345 players)?

I'm not certain tournament size is the most relevant factor, but yes, two major wins is a coincidence, three is a pattern and if he continues to put up results I'll take him more seriously than I will by reading his unnecessarily abrasive teenage writing style.

[Valdez]

This is not a matter of tes vs. ant, this is about how Mr.Bryant-please-like-my-Facebook-Page-Cook got butthurt...

Just fyi Timo never claimed topic be an expert...

[menace13]

Best storm deck right now.

Any one want to say other wise should have got a top 8 at a GP with their list this year.

Pretty hard to get lucky playing 20 rounds, twice.

[dunk]

T.E.S. is just the worse storm deck - why should anyone still play it? Actually it's the worse storm deck since, I dunno, 2 years at least? I always had the impression that if a storm player wanted to play more colors and stuff like Orims Chant he would just opt for Doomsday, which at least gets out of situations the T.E.S deck couldn't.

Oh and no, I don't play storm myself, but from just looking at the decklists and playing against both T.E.S and Ant ( all those names are bullshit, theres only 1 STORM.dec and thats the one with the better win percentage ) I know that one deck is inferior to the other.

[JACO]

Bah, in before edit, no I don't care if the author and the deck won GP Ghent, compare that to Bryant and TES's tournament placements over numerous years in this format and it's nothing more than a flash in the pan success and not a reason to unnecessarily bash on TES without being objective.
Wow, some of you really are delusional. So winning a Grand Prix and two of the five biggest Legacy events this year (and other smaller ones) with the same 75 is not comparable to Bryant playing TES and doing well in tournaments less than 100 people on average? You truly must not understand how stupid your statement is.

Having a fetchland base is superior when you play against competent opponents in tournaments with many rounds. How many other people have been winning Grand Prixs and the like with TES? Go look at some results and then come back to this thread.

[Final Fortune]

Wow, some of you really are delusional. So winning a Grand Prix and two of the five biggest Legacy events this year (and other smaller ones) with the same 75 is not comparable to Bryant playing TES and doing well in tournaments less than 100 people on average? You truly must not understand how stupid your statement is.

Having a fetchland base is superior when you play against competent opponents in tournaments with many rounds. How many other people have been winning Grand Prixs and the like with TES? Go look at some results and then come back to this thread.

Whatever, I have nothing against the author or his deck other than the unnecessary tone and lack of objectivism in his article, but I'm certainly not going to just immediately jump on the "band wagon" after some one wins a single GP with a Storm variant. That said having placed multiple times in major Top 8s recently is respectable, and I'll wait to see whether or not the deck continues to perform before I arbitrarily compare one deck to another as inarguably superior like everybody else seems to be doing.

Sorry, but for the people who actually play Storm as an archetype, it's just not that black and white.

[Einherjer]

Before ranting you may be well advised with reading the first paragraph again?

"This is not your average strategy article. You have been warned."

Greetings

[JDK]

Whatever, I have nothing against the author or his deck other than the unnecessary tone and lack of objectivism in his article, but I'm certainly not going to just immediately jump on the "band wagon" after some one wins a single GP with a Storm variant. That said having placed multiple times in major Top 8s recently is respectable, and I'll wait to see whether or not the deck continues to perform before I arbitrarily compare one deck to another as inarguably superior like everybody else seems to be doing.

Sorry, but for the people who actually play Storm as an archetype, it's just not that black and white.
Sorry, but for the people who actually aren't delusional making such generalisations is...well, delusional. Talking about black and white and making such statements shows your double standards and not your "expertise".

[tsabo_tavoc]

Timo, I really like your writing, keep on with juicy articles :smile:

You sold me the statement of (1-mana) targeted Discard being insanely good, more so in a proactive deck. I would need practice to process information faster and cope with the two most powerful effects in Legacy, Brainstorm + Fetchland and Cabal Therapy/Thoughtseize.

TES fanatics: The author was not in a position to argue, why would we? We take nourishment from their articles, gear towards a better Storm list in our meta, and enjoy Magic as our hobby.

[RaNDoMxGeSTuReS]

Coming this Christmas...
"Bryant Cook vs. Europe"
...to a theater near you.

[ReinVos]

Overall, ANT is probably the better deck. In some metagames, TES is the better choice.

Legacy is a format with lots of interaction. As a combo deck, you want to avoid interaction. You can do this in two ways; speed and resilience. I think it's better to play around legacy's threats (basics for Wasteland) than beating them by winning before my opponent can deploy them (kill them before Thalia hits play). Only when there's relatively few blue decks in your metagame, TES is better. But in a format where Brainstorm and Force of Will are available, blue will always be the best color. So I have to agree that ANT is the better deck, generally speaking.

But Legacy is constantly evolving. If you have a metagame where Miracles and RUG dominate, and people start playing Goblins to beat up on those decks. And then people are trying to play something that beats Goblins instead of playing Miracles or RUG, then the metagame suddenly is starting to look very TES friendly. Unfair decks beat Goblins and TES does well against other unfair decks because of speed and chant effects.

So it's unclear which deck is better until a metagame is given, but in most metagames ANT is the better choice.

[joemauer]

Wow! I thought this was a thread about Storm decks. I had no idea it was actually the Hatfields vs. The McCoys.

Truth is both decks(ANT & TES) are constantly changing. Both are adjusting to the changing meta games.
The most fascinating thing about the evolution of these decks is that as they change the closer they resemble each other. Both decks have been borrowing the strengths of the other for a while now. I don't think either deck has gotten to it's final form, especially with the printing of Abrupt Decay.

Finally, saying one deck is better than the other is silly. Both have been successful. Both have their share of pros and cons. To say for certainty which deck is the best deck then one must have an elaborate breakdown of the current meta game. As well as a complete breakdown of each deck's strong and weak matchups.

[Tammit67]

I never said anything about ANT as an archetype in Legacy, I was commenting about the guy's specific version of the deck.

And I'm arguing that version of the deck was out for months before he put up those results. That's a while. Did you click the links?

[alderon666]

I was testing UBR ANT and this really interesting situation came up.

I was against Merfolk, I was below 10 and the next attack was lethal. I played Duress, he Dazed, I pay, he Cursecatches it. I let it go and play Dark Ritual with my last mana source. He has second Daze. Now I'm left with zero mana and a hand of Past in Flames, 2x LED, 2x Cabal Ritual... those Cabal Rituals look pretty bad right now don't they?

So I just go for the last ditch effort. LED, LED, crack both for UUURRR, flashback Past in Flames and cast Brainstorm with the last mana. I get LED, play it crack it for BBB, play all my rituals and win.

This scenario both shows how Cabal Ritual is crap against taxing counters, but also shows how powerful Past in Flames is.

[emidln]

I was testing UBR ANT and this really interesting situation came up.

I was against Merfolk, I was below 10 and the next attack was lethal. I played Duress, he Dazed, I pay, he Cursecatches it. I let it go and play Dark Ritual with my last mana source. He has second Daze. Now I'm left with zero mana and a hand of Past in Flames, 2x LED, 2x Cabal Ritual... those Cabal Rituals look pretty bad right now don't they?

So I just go for the last ditch effort. LED, LED, crack both for UUURRR, flashback Past in Flames and cast Brainstorm with the last mana. I get LED, play it crack it for BBB, play all my rituals and win.

This scenario both shows how Cabal Ritual is crap against taxing counters, but also shows how powerful Past in Flames is.

Your example makes no sense. Break for BBBRRR. Cast PiF via Flashback floating B. flashback rit, crit, crit. If any of those have thresh (sounds like the first one only needed one unknown graveyard card like a fetch/petal(known cards: duress, led, led, 2nd crit, brainstorm, it) or you have any other ritual effects), you can IT->Tendrils.

[Arianrhod]

Coming this Christmas...
"Bryant Cook vs. Europe"
...to a theater near you.

Pretty sure Bryant would win, if only because I don't think it's entered his mind yet that he COULD lose.

[Tammit67]

Your example makes no sense. Break for BBBRRR. Cast PiF via Flashback floating B. flashback rit, crit, crit. If any of those have thresh (sounds like the first one only needed one unknown graveyard card like a fetch/petal(known cards: duress, led, led, 2nd crit, brainstorm, it) or you have any other ritual effects), you can IT->Tendrils.

What's the fun in a deterministic win? :(

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

I was testing UBR ANT and this really interesting situation came up.

I was against Merfolk, I was below 10 and the next attack was lethal. I played Duress, he Dazed, I pay, he Cursecatches it. I let it go and play Dark Ritual with my last mana source. He has second Daze. Now I'm left with zero mana and a hand of Past in Flames, 2x LED, 2x Cabal Ritual... those Cabal Rituals look pretty bad right now don't they?

So I just go for the last ditch effort. LED, LED, crack both for UUURRR, flashback Past in Flames and cast Brainstorm with the last mana. I get LED, play it crack it for BBB, play all my rituals and win.

This scenario both shows how Cabal Ritual is crap against taxing counters, but also shows how powerful Past in Flames is.

How many Wastelands did your opponent have access to at that point? Also, with Rites instead of Cabals you'd likely have run into just as big color issues instead of running out of mana.
All of that ignores the fact that RoF would have made absolutely no positive difference at any point here anyway. He has a softcounter for every manasource you have. Any Ritual, Duress or whatever you try will be Dazed anyway. The big difference? with RoF you can't even win here as you won't have access to the mixed color sources necessary to flashback all your Rituals.


Your example makes no sense. Break for BBBRRR. Cast PiF via Flashback floating B. flashback rit, crit, crit. If any of those have thresh (sounds like the first one only needed one unknown graveyard card like a fetch/petal(known cards: duress, led, led, 2nd crit, brainstorm, it) or you have any other ritual effects), you can IT->Tendrils.

I disagree with your corrected line (though I agree that he should have won safely), as this was misplayed earlier already. The correct line is Duress, pay, don't pay. LED, LED, Ritual, sac LEDs to pay for Daze, flashback PiF, win from there. You don't even need Threshold.

[emidln]

I disagree with your corrected line (though I agree that he should have won safely), as this was misplayed earlier already. The correct line is Duress, pay, don't pay. LED, LED, Ritual, sac LEDs to pay for Daze, flashback PiF, win from there. You don't even need Threshold.

I was merely pointing out that the decision to go for Brainstorm at that point was bad. LEDs to pay for taxing counters with spells on the stack / cards on top of the deck + SDT, or PiF in hand is something that probably isn't discussed enough.

[alderon666]

Your example makes no sense. Break for BBBRRR. Cast PiF via Flashback floating B. flashback rit, crit, crit. If any of those have thresh (sounds like the first one only needed one unknown graveyard card like a fetch/petal(known cards: duress, led, led, 2nd crit, brainstorm, it) or you have any other ritual effects), you can IT->Tendrils.

I have to stop posting from work. I didn't have the Dark Ritual, must have been something else. The point is, after everything I was left with Cabal Ritual 2x, LED 2x and Past in Flames in hand. And cantrips + Infernal Tutor in the graveyard.


I was merely pointing out that the decision to go for Brainstorm at that point was bad. LEDs to pay for taxing counters with spells on the stack / cards on top of the deck + SDT, or PiF in hand is something that probably isn't discussed enough.

Yeah, now that you pointed that out... I could have casted the Cabal Ritual and used LED to pay for the taxing. Huh. And even the Duress if I really needed it to resolve.

Something like: Duress, Daze, Cabal in response, sac LEDs and pay for everything.

But that kind of opens you up for Force on the Cabal Ritual.

[emidln]

But that kind of opens you up for Force on the Cabal Ritual.

You lose to Force without that line of play. Without using LED mana to pay for taxing counters, you can't beat Force on flashbacked Past in Flames. If you were worried about Force, you have to use LEDs to pay for the taxes on Duress.

[johnathanbfez]

I truly know the meaning of the term bittersweet. Every premiere-TDK, now this one, seems like there is a vast dark hole missing. It is a marked absence. He would have loved this premiere-low key, in Soho with funky wardrobe options. As for Lily, my word, how tall is she anyway? She makes Terry look like an elf.

[alekill]

I truly know the meaning of the term bittersweet. Every premiere-TDK, now this one, seems like there is a vast dark hole missing. It is a marked absence. He would have loved this premiere-low key, in Soho with funky wardrobe options. As for Lily, my word, how tall is she anyway? She makes Terry look like an elf.

What's with these spam bots lately? For those interested here is the origin of the quote http://www.heathheathens.net/forum/lofiversion/index.php/t4901.html.