[Deck] ANT (Ad Nauseam Tendrils) Storm Combo [Archive] - Page 5

CabalTherapy

08-05-2014, 05:22 AM

I have a minor question about handling Esperblade and Patriot Delver postboard, hoping to find some insight. Both decks have troublesome permanents like Rest in Peace, Meddling Mage, and the occasional Ethersworn Canonist. With that in mind, some sort of removal is needed, but I've seen people opt for either Chain of Vapor or Abrupt Decay in both matchups. The former being easier to cast versus the latter's uncounterability is the obvious tradeoff, but I'm unsure which is the optimal removal agent in either matchup, or if it's different between the two decks, despite the problem cards being the same. Since Wasteland/Stifle occur more often in Delver decks, I'm initially inclined to think Chain of Vapor is a solid choice for Patriot. whereas the relatively less taxing Esperblade matchup could be good for Abrupt Decay, as it can strike down permanents like Liliana/SFM, though those aren't exactly exciting choices, they could be relevant.

In my opinion boarding Abrupt Decay against UWR Delver is just strictly wrong. As you already mentioned, they have Wastelands and sometimes a fast clock, where you don't want to sacrifice a land. I am pretty sure that the correct plan is to board 3 Chain of Vapor and 1 Massacre (if one plays Grim Tutor, if not +2 Chain of Vapor, +2 Massacre), although Massacre blocks Ad Nauseam which is nonetheless not a good option against a Delver deck (against UWR, being maybe the slowest of them, it is still reasonable to cast it). Chain of Vapor is almost never a dead card, bouncing LEDs or a flipped Delver, even without hate permanents of the opponent's side. The problem with Esperblade is that this deck plays differently against us in game 2 and 3. They have a lot of dead cards preboard and transform their deck to a hatemachine with more counter, hate permanents, discard, Extractions... and what have you. I wouldn't board a lot against them because, as you can read in Carsten's newest article, we don't want to make our deck worse in order to fight against hate, albeit there are times we have to. The main reason I wouldn't board Decay or more than two cards against Esper is on the one hand their discard (let the Preordains in there), and on the other hand their huge boarding plan which makes their deck's main strategy weaker thus our deck is still superior even in game 2/3 where we have 2 cards from the SB and Esper having 10 or whatever.

wonderPreaux

08-05-2014, 01:14 PM

Alright, I''ll try the CoV + Massacre plan for Patriot Delver, and try some CoVs for Esper. Thanks.

A followup question about Sensei's Divining Top: Am I right in thinking that I'd only want it against control and non-combo decks with discard? It seems vaguely alluring in some midrange matches, but I get the feeling I'm just better off trying to crush such decks with a fast combo, perhaps even supplemented by a sb Empty the Warrens. Also on my mind, has anyone had success with the sided Flusterstorm for combo and Delver matches? I'm wondering how good a tech it is.

JamieW89

08-05-2014, 06:36 PM

7-0'd a local with ANT last weekend, my first legacy tournament since the dissapointing BoM. Not sure how relevant that was though since I beat RUG 5x and didn't see a single BUG Delver or Miracles opponent. I was also well set up for RUG with Empty main and 2 Carpets in the board.

Some quick thoughts:
*I finally played a singleton SDT in the main over the second preordain and liked it.
*Tried LDV over Grim Tutor and still think Grim is much better.
*Obviously happy with MD empty, because of the skewed meta.
*I like one Flusterstorm versus RUG, but I'm not sure if I want more (I would board 2 vs BUG, but I have a split with 1 Divert. With a meta full of combo I could definately see playing 2-3 Flusterstorm)

@Carsten
In your Prague article you sb out SDT in the mirror, that seems strange to me. Isn't top insane in the grindy half of the games (even more so with the Flusterstorms)? Nice articles though, I especially like the boarding one.

Acclimation

08-05-2014, 06:57 PM

Is the sb Flusterstorm that great of a slot?

I've been looking into ANT builds recently and question it, since LED+Countermagic don't play well together. For the match-ups that it is brought in, does it increase our percentages against those decks?

sawatarix

08-06-2014, 03:46 AM

i'm back from vacation,made a road trip through germany and attended 2 legacy tournaments.
in Nürnberg i 5:0:0-ed and finished first and in Mainz i 5:1:0-ed and finished 3rd due to brakers.

gonna write a report soon for sou guys with some tips&tricks how to crush tournaments.
sounds good?

Barbed Blightning

08-06-2014, 03:49 AM

meffeo

08-06-2014, 03:52 AM

Togores

08-06-2014, 07:13 AM

@Kai

Why telemin pefomance? And if, why over bribery?

redhamjack

08-07-2014, 02:29 AM

I don't want to speak for Kai, but I'd assume the Telemin Preformance fills the same role as Bribery but with the upside of being a 5cc insta win against creatureless decks.

Togores

08-07-2014, 04:40 AM

I tested and telemin is not so great vs sneak and show. U get an emrakul on your next turn you opp gets emrakul on its own with sneak atack and ur dead >.<

Barbed Blightning

08-07-2014, 04:45 AM

I tested and telemin is not so great vs sneak and show. U get an emrakul on your next turn you opp gets emrakul on its own with sneak atack and ur dead >.<
You could get a Grizzlebees and win on the spot, too

Togores

08-07-2014, 07:36 AM

But with bribery u get it 100% also getting a sb card like vendion or so is not so nice i think.

Togores

08-08-2014, 06:35 PM

Lately (2 months) I have been playing 1 empty in the side mostly for Canadian ***** and taxes usualy taking out the nauseam against them.

Against taxes it was ok cause playing 2 massacre let me clear theyr field for free and then smash the goblins but in most situations i could have pifed or nauseam anyway.

but specialy vs Canadian it was not so great, also nauseam is also not great if they just got 1 beater so Idk what to do. Because I would like a second bussines spell. and think nauseam is weak, pif is cool but with cage/surgical is not the best. Im thinking of sidding like the second tendrills in so that when we go into a counter war to resolve the spell I can just end up with tendrills.

nowadays my side vs ***** is
-1 sensei (I main 2)
-1 preordian
-1 ant

+1 emty / tendrills
+2 fluster

I also thought on putting in the 8th discard spell. And sidding like so:
+1 tendrills
+1 therapy
-1 nauseam
-1 preordian

what you guys think about the empty plan vs Canadian? convinced? agaianst? whats ur plan? just pif? or another?

thanks

sawatarix

08-08-2014, 10:28 PM

Empty is fine against RUG Delver, they board in 2 rough/tumble against us but we have cabal therapy+flashback to get rid of it (or cantrips like ponder)

so boarding out ad nauseam for empty is fine.but i wouldn't side out to many cantrips as they are crucial to find missing pieces to combo off.
remember that we only run 4 infernal tutors and 1 past in flames so each cantrip is really helpful.
most of the time we don't have that much time to sculpt a hand so every mana has to be spent for cantrips during the early turns.

i would just board like this:

-1 ad nauseam
+1 empty the warrens

end of story.

ps: -1 lotus petal +1 discard is also fine to combat a wall of countermagic , especially if your opponent runs spell snare which is a hardcounter.

pps: my report will be up today so stay tuned ;)

Sloshthedark

08-09-2014, 02:47 AM

what you guys think about the empty plan vs Canadian? convinced? agaianst? whats ur plan? just pif? or another?

thanks

My deck is different, with 2 pif, 2 Toa, EtW and Bolts it's hard to lose... Generaly I won't respect gy hate, Thresh plays 1-2 slot maxa and Cage is prefered... I usualy board in Xantid swarm and another land if I have them

So i strongly support EtW vs Thresh other than that small amount of additional disruption for LP and cantrip, 4 therapy is a no brainer

sawatarix

08-09-2014, 05:40 AM

Tadaaaa:

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?28437-10-1-better-than-Germany-vs-Brasil

cheerios

08-09-2014, 10:34 PM

Kai,

Do you aggresively mulligan slow hands vs elves post board knowing they are packing a ton of hate after? Do you look for a specific set of cards in your openers vs elves? Thanks for the awesome report!!

Cheers

sawatarix

08-09-2014, 10:51 PM

The games against Elves looks like this short example:

It is a pure race, we try to combo off as soon as possible and they try to resolve natural order (ruric thar which is a common card in most elves maindeck).
While game 1 is really in our favour, they board in around 6-8 hatecards against us.Most of the time it is a combination of discard and a few counterspells like flusterstorm/swan song.
They still can't really stop us completely from going off but they can delay our comboturn to buy time for their natural order or stain the mind(m15).
They want to have a long (fair) game , not us.

so keeping a fast hand with a lot of gas is welcome.
cantrip heavy hands are good in general but not in this matchup.
for example i would ship back this opener on the draw.

scalding tarn
underground sea
ponder
ponder
lotus petal
duress
preordain

while i would snapkeep this one:

lotus petal
lotus petal
dark ritual
lion's eye diamond
duress
duress
brainstorm

cheerios

08-09-2014, 11:33 PM

Thanks a lot! I'm not yet confident in my postboard game against elves. I will keep the tips in mind.

CabalTherapy

08-10-2014, 12:41 PM

Thanks a lot! I'm not yet confident in my postboard game against elves. I will keep the tips in mind.

Kai is right. We have 2 games to win against their hate because the first one should be one-sided; of course in our favour.
Due to their discard and possible counter, Elves weakens themselves which means that their game becomes more of a creature > discard > creature > attack play moving away from the combo kill.
I would recommend to board light, moving the Top to the board (if you play one) and the Swamp in favour of two Chain of Vapor which can deal with Null Rod, Deathrite Shamans (if planning to kill via PiF and adds to storm and and and...). Aggressive (fast) hands are the precondition for a win here.

08-10-2014, 09:46 PM

while i would snapkeep this one:

lotus petal
lotus petal
dark ritual
lion's eye diamond
duress
duress
brainstorm

I'll apologize for the newb question, I am currently finishing up my playset of Infernal Tutors so I am looking at trying my hand with a Storm deck. I've decided this one would probably be the most straight forward to start with.

My question is, how would you play out the hand above? Do you Petal into Duress, then Petal in to Brainstorm if the cost is clear? Or do you break it up over two turns and gain the extra draw phase? Thanks for any help.

sawatarix

08-10-2014, 09:58 PM

08-10-2014, 10:51 PM

against elves i would crack 1 petal for brainstorm immediately, if you get a manasource+tutor you win.
but land+ponder/preordain is also fine to grab deeper through the deck.
duress is a card i would fire off around turn 2/3 to get rid of flusterstorm or natural order.

Thanks for the quick response. I think this might be the hardest part of playing Storm initially, is properly judging these kinds of opening hands, at least for me. Thanks again for the help.

I think I will start with your recent list, probably with a slight change in the board to align better with my local meta.

phazonmutant

08-11-2014, 03:40 AM

Togores

08-11-2014, 05:32 AM

Congrats!

Thats why I side in vs drs+discard decks the random burning wish from the side. So you have a second tendrills if one gets removed o fired fast. Also i dont like empty vs bug delver drs helps too much to race the goblins. We are not Tes that we can make so easyly a t1 8-12 goblins. But as stated lately I think the empty plan is not so good anymore. And I prefer pif, or second tendrills plan vs them.

sawatarix

08-14-2014, 12:02 AM

lordofthepit

08-14-2014, 03:20 AM

Togores

08-14-2014, 04:03 AM

speaking of burning wish, i have also an idea for the deck:
playing a singleton burning wish in the maindeck instead of the 7th discrad spell.
it is one of the best cards post ad nauseam and can grab a lot of answers against any kind of deck.
at least it can also fetch an discard spell from the sideboard so cutting a discard spell for it seems the best.

playing burning wish while still having access to many cantrips like preordain and senseis devining top should be worth testing.
what do you think?

ps: if you have tested it so far, please let me know about your results.i'm not a fan of a big wishboard so i'm thinkin about just 3-4 slots: 1 tendrils of agony,empty the warrens,thoughtseize,void snare.

Before putng the bruning in the side i tested it main with a side like you said. but a pyroclams instead of the non existing snare. The proble was that usualy the card in the main was nothing but and extra thoughseize for 3 mana in g1. So I shaved to to the side. Wish void snare may be better testing required but as I said was not really great to have to fetch the volcanic to get a thoughseize.
May be playing the badlands it gets better giving it another try is never worng.

Sloshthedark

08-14-2014, 04:53 PM

speaking of burning wish, i have also an idea for the deck:
playing a singleton burning wish in the maindeck instead of the 7th discrad spell.
it is one of the best cards post ad nauseam and can grab a lot of answers against any kind of deck.
at least it can also fetch an discard spell from the sideboard so cutting a discard spell for it seems the best.

playing burning wish while still having access to many cantrips like preordain and senseis devining top should be worth testing.
what do you think?

ps: if you have tested it so far, please let me know about your results.i'm not a fan of a big wishboard so i'm thinkin about just 3-4 slots: 1 tendrils of agony,empty the warrens,thoughtseize,void snare.

I used to run that like 2 years ago (along and w/o Grim Tutor) and prefer just the GT (which goes well with EtW main)... you feel like 7 discard spell is too much or the 7th is the weakest card (I'd cut apreordain prior to that)? a sweeper is still better than a void snare imo

btw. I'm starting to test 2GT 2PIF 2TOA EtW build for Ovino... 3:1 today, mostly irrelevant matchups

sawatarix

08-14-2014, 06:32 PM

@Slosh: Having access to 6 tutor cards seems decent, have you ever thought about rain of filth instead of lotus petals?could be helpful for big tutor chains.

P-E

08-15-2014, 09:32 AM

@Slosh , with your ovino build you tend to Grinding Station ^^

Maybe a build with 3 grim 4 infernal or even 4/4 ahaha

Sloshthedark

08-15-2014, 12:44 PM

Sloshthedark has been advocating Lightning Bolts for a while and I've tried them in the board a couple of times. They're alright, probably better than the third Chain of Vapor, but it's difficult to justify bringing them in unless you know there will be a ton of hate bears, and it's not very maindeckable. I was thinking that maybe Grapeshot has a place in the main of a Grim Tutor build. TES has played it as a 2-mana Arc Lightning that also happens to kill them for a long time, so why not play it in ANT? It's a good way to take care of hate bears, buy time, and it's not totally preposterous to get 20 storm with Past in Flames.

Also I went 4-1 in the GP Portland Sunday legacy event with Carsten Kotter's build of ANT (minus a Chain and Decay for 2 Bolts). I liked the Tops much more than I thought I would, although I'm still not sold on Ad Nauseam. I wonder if another Past in Flames might be better (a friend swears by 2 PiF). I had forgotten how much fun storm is. I'm definitely shelving BUG Delver for a bit. Having that Grapeshot would have been clutch against a BUG Delver opponent - he discarded my Empty early and ate it with Deathrite, then I was only able to Tendrils him down to 1 with lethal on board. Another way to win would have got there.

Well I found it very maindeckable, nearly every deck has a relevant target (and BS, you know), I also thought about Grapeshot, but 2 mana and sorcery is not something I'd like to be doing or GT for it..

once again 2 Pif and never look back...

@Slosh: Having access to 6 tutor cards seems decent, have you ever thought about rain of filth instead of lotus petals?could be helpful for big tutor chains.

I did play it few times (long ago with MD Ad Nauseam I believe), do not remember any significant situations, In actual build I have 3 LP already and still want to be fast... I have to admit it's sort of unexplored card as a one of it's hard to tell how relevent /cumbersome it is when the upsides should show in actual gameplay

@Slosh , with your ovino build you tend to Grinding Station ^^

Maybe a build with 3 grim 4 infernal or even 4/4 ahaha

I hope to be better then Grinding Station =) for me it's a natural evolution... it plays out the same as Ant (8vs7 is a cornercase), but with better lategame and obv. no flipping... btw. I do not understand why Grinding Station doesn't MD EtW ... basically I'm plaing with 2nd GT, 2nd Toa, Bolts and STD ratio... wondering if the 2 GT aren't too much lifeloss /and play Thoughtseize vs. versatility....and if that can make SB better... actually which SB configuartion will that be will be hardest

Togores

08-16-2014, 04:53 PM

Tom T

08-16-2014, 05:46 PM

Tomorrow im gonna play ant in a paralel evet with th wcqc. 4 usea for the champ. :O

Im having problems with my side.
I expect rug and bug delever allong with uw control decks like blade or miracles.
Most of a fair envourment but dont wanna loose vs combo there will be also dredge and so.

With my 2 sensei build.

3 decay
3 xantid
2 masaacre
2 chain of vapor
1 tendrills
1 burning
2 fluster

That was my aide beffore.
I have 1 spot left and wanna include
2 carpets
1 more chain of vapor

Opinions?

btw KAI here is a rug t shirt that i saw in a shop last week. May be interested.

http://fr.spf.com/es/tienda/productos/camiseta-rugged-0243442

I think Flusterstorm isn't that great in that meta you described except for maybe BUG Delver. I think Pyroblast may be better against the RUG/UWR Delver decks and also countering Counterbalance/Clique. Also, why would you play multiple Chain of Vapor in that meta, you already have Massacre against hate bears. Tormod's Crypt is pretty narrow, but really cool against Dredge. If you expect a lot of reanimator or storm, you can also add some Surgical Extraction to your sideboard.

So I think:
3 Decay
3 Xantid
2 Massacre
1 Tendrils
1 Burning
1 Pyroblast
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Tormod's Crypt

and

2 Carpet of Flowers (these get wrecked by BUG delvers Golgari Charm btw, and against RUG you have few things to board out and Pyroblast is better imo)

or

2 Pithing Needle (I think this card is really good against Bug Delver, because the best plan against discard-decks is Ad Nauseam or late-game Past in Flames, and this way you can stop their Deathrite Shamans.)

or

2 Surgical Extraction and drop the Crypt for a Pithing Needle

sawatarix

08-16-2014, 08:09 PM

btw KAI here is a rug t shirt that i saw in a shop last week. May be interested.

http://fr.spf.com/es/tienda/producto...rugged-0243442

thx dude but i have seen cooler shirts :D

@your sideboard:
sounds like carpet of flowers and young pyromancers could do a great job !would include them both in your sideboard.
i don't know how essential your burning wish and your second tendrils is but i would cut them for pyrodudes.
carpet of flowers are not a must, only if you have trouble with delver decks.
notice that ant has already perfect tools to beat delver decks all day long without them.

Sloshthedark

08-17-2014, 02:28 AM

I agree with the Pithing needle and Pyro, Carpet is just miserable do nothing... I don't think you need anything against dredgw but winning the dieroll

Togores

08-17-2014, 09:30 AM

We are like 56 ppl
Im now undefeated after round 4. Just draw draw and top and the just win the underground sea playset :D
Defeated
2-1 burn
2-1 rug carpet was mvp
2-1 jund
2-0 taxes

At the end i played this side
1 massacre
1 burning
1 tendrills
3 xanrid
3 decay
2 chain
2 carpet
2 fluster

Thanks for help guys^^

CabalTherapy

08-17-2014, 11:51 AM

If you expect a lot of reanimator or storm, you can also add some Surgical Extraction to your sideboard.

I played 2 Extractions against Storm and Reanimator some time ago. Now I am running one Extirpate in the side to accompany my 2 Flusterstorms against these decks.
Extirpate can also be nice against Miracles where you can mess around with their on-top-of-library-cards or simply remove their Balance, FoW, whatever.

Tom T

08-17-2014, 12:44 PM

I played 2 Extractions against Storm and Reanimator some time ago. Now I am running one Extirpate in the side to accompany my 2 Flusterstorms against these decks.
Extirpate can also be nice against Miracles where you can mess around with their on-top-of-library-cards or simply remove their Balance, FoW, whatever.

I chose Surgical because against Miracles you already board in a lot of cards. And the rest of the decks you either want turn0 interaction against dredge/reanimator/storm or play it during your combo-turn for free extra storm or hellbent-ness.

CabalTherapy

08-17-2014, 02:18 PM

I chose Surgical because against Miracles you already board in a lot of cards. And the rest of the decks you either want turn0 interaction against dredge/reanimator/storm or play it during your combo-turn for free extra storm or hellbent-ness.

In contrast to TES our deck does not have strict board plans/ SB in general (see Carsten's latest article where he boards in 4 Decays).
Against all of these decks one would play Petal/LED thus having access to :b: mana. It is subject to testing but I guess that Split Second is the big difference here.

Togores

08-17-2014, 02:44 PM

Ended up loosing top 8 to bug delver.
His mull to 6 on the play g1 was:
Fetch
Chaman
Hymn
Hymn
Fow
Daze

Un beateable

G2
His hand
Shaman
Fetch
Fetch
fow
Delever
Hymn
Seize

I can go of t2 if he disnt force my ritual but he does and on his t2 he makes seize hymn. Gg

Im really sad cause rest of top 8 was full of decks i can beat easy:
Gwb tespian
2 merfolks
Uwr blade
Miracles
Taxes

Sad sad sad and angry 😡

sawatarix

08-17-2014, 08:14 PM

To be honest Bug Delver is our worst delver matchup among all the others.
I love to play against rug delver,uwr delver or 4 colour delver all day long, but not bug delver: the deck has it all from countermagic to discard to graveyardhate and a fast clock - all in one deck.

some words on the bud delver matchup:

- Cantrips: Use your brainstorms to defend your hand against opposing discard spells like thoughtseize or hymn to tourach.
senseis devining top is a great tool to hide a tutor on top of your library while making land drops every turn to set up a perfect turn.

- because they have a deathrite shaman on the battlefield doesn't mean that past in flames doesn't work.I see a lot of people who give up the pif line just because of the elf, do not ! What you need is an additional ritual to start a line like this: duress ->ritual -> ritual -> ritual -> nfernal tutor -> infernal tutor -> past in flames.A lonely deathrite shaman cannot disrupt this line.

- Empty the warrens is not as good as you think. I remember a game when i created 8 goblins on turn 1 against bug delver and they got stalled by multiple deathrite shamans and delvers on 4 life, it felt very miserable. After turn 3 Empty the warrens becomes a dead card.
Same goes for Young Pyromancer, this boy has trouble when he faces tarmogoyfs + deathrite shamans.you have to make around 6+ elementals to break the wall.

after all, i'm still looking for a sideboard card to turn the matchup into our favour.if you have any ideas (crazy ideas are also welcome) let me know.
ps: a friend of mine suggested compost :D

Togores

08-17-2014, 08:41 PM

As said bug delver is a too bad pairing.

cards I think could help:
Spirirtual Focus (its white but the cards is just to awesome not to mention)
Ancestral vision
divert

Noxwalrus

08-17-2014, 10:51 PM

Hey felt I'd share my current list as it has been performing well locally. BUG/RUG Delver matchups are about the same as a stock 15/16 cantrip list but I feel this list has much better matchups vs DnT, Elves, and UWR due to the wishboard.

Main:
4 Polluted Delta
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Underground Sea
1 Badlands
1 Tropical Island
1 Volcanic Island
1 Island
1 Swamp
3 Cabal Therapy
3 Duress
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
1 Preordain
1 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Lotus Petal
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
3 Infernal Tutor
1 Past in Flames
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Ad Nauseam
3 Burning Wish

Side:
3 Abrupt Decay
1 Cabal Therapy
2 Massacre
1 Tendrils of Agony
2 Chain of Vapor
1 Empty the Warrens
1 Void Snare
1 Pyroclasm
1 Infernal Tutor
2 Xantid Swarm

I originally had the idea of running a single BW over Grim as an additional tutor, but figured if I'm going to dedicate at least 2 sideboard slots to wish targets I might as well run 2 and expand my wish board a bit. After some testing I was really enjoying seeing a turn 1 plains-->vial and responding with a turn 1 BW for Massacre so I didn't want to cut BW. However, a 4-2 split of Infernal-BW is probably the most ideal if it wasn't for the fact that BW can't get PiF. I remedied this by bumping to a 3-3 split, allowing a BW-->Infernal-->PiF line for when goblins doesn't cut it or you can only make 6-7 storm pre BW.

The wishboard really helps vs elves, goblins, and dredge due to the Pyroclasm. And DnT is obv helped with Massacres and Pyroclasm. I think the big benefits are vs UWR, running both BW and Infernal means Meddling Mage gets worse and you don't need to dilute the deck with removal as much due to the ability to wish up Void Snare or Massacre or whatever else sparks your fancy. I've noticed slight improvements vs BUG decks as well. The higher density of action leaves you less vulnerable to discard and some hands with IT and BW are pretty much impervious to discard.

Having played both this and wishless lists, I think BW is the way to go. Any thoughts or criticisms welcome. Ideas for SB material is appreciated.

pondering

08-17-2014, 11:26 PM

Hello All,
First time contributing but a long time reader I have been trying out different ideas as of late to make the deck faster and more consistent, I started thinking what card was last in and first out the answer was of course was always preordain so I decided to test a mix of cards in the spot and the results are below.

Please be aware wins and losses are based on match and not games also pretty stock list.

2-BURNING WISH 1-TOP
Bug-
3W 5L
Rug
5W 3L
Miracles-
3W 5L
D&T-
6W 2L

2-TOP 1-GRIM
Bug-
4W 4L
Rug
5W 3L
Miracles-
5W 3L
D&T-
3W 5L

2-PERSONAL TUTOR 1-PREORDAIN
Bug-
5W 3L
Rug
6W 2L
Miracles-
6W 2L
D&T-
5W 3L

2-PERSONAL , 1 GAMBLE
Bug-
3W 5L
Rug
4W 4L
Miracles-
5W 3L
D&T-
5W 3L

conclusion the list i found the most consistent was the preordain / personal tutor list almost never losing a game one really helped out and made the side boarded games a coin flip but it never felt that close. Ad nauseam is a lot better out of all the games with the deck i fizzled once. the only thing i didn't try but wanted too was running a top with the personals has anyone else tried this and if so please give feedback because i might have just ran good.

nevilshute

08-18-2014, 04:22 AM

@Kai:

I really think this should be our most important area of focus: beating bug delver. It is the quintessential tough-but-beatable matchup imo. And I'll agree with you that it is our worst matchup (among the tier 1 strategies). So what cards should we be testing out?

I think it would be good to just brainstorm a bit and not exclude any card without at least discussing it.

A couple of cards that merit discussion:

Ignorant Bliss - This card was (as far as I remember) last discussed when Adam Prosak advocated it but was not picked up by the storm community at large. I'll admit to having never tried it out myself. At one mana CMC it would have been another story altogether. But at two CMC it means making our 2nd land drop (or burning a petal on this). That means that it won't stop their turn one Thoughtseize. Heck, on the draw it won't even stop their turn two Hymn. I can see it having some niche uses a bit later in the game like randomly mizing a Liliana activation. But I think that's quite narrow. We need to either stop their discard spells early on or have some way of slowing the game down enough to actually make us get to a mid-or-late game (perhaps this, along side Young Pyro?). I also don't like how this has a big, fat Daze/Pierce bulls eye on it.

Young Pyromancer - Popularized by you Kai, I only bring him up because I still think he merits some discussion. He can be very good against bug delver. A friend of mine plays bug delver a lot and he says that the deck hates this guy. An early pyromancer represents a real problem for a tempo deck with only 12-14 creatures. That said I think he's somewhat poorer here than against RUG delver due, mainly, to Deathrite Shaman. First of all, deathrite is a one-drop with 2 toughness unlike Nimble Mongoose which will start the game as a 1/1. This means a bit in practice. Not only because he profitably blocks an elemental token during each of our combat steps, but also - and more damaging for us - because he remains an active asset for them. Against RUG we only need to worry about flipped delvers. With an active pyromancer we can pretty much have infinite blockers for their goyfs and mongooses in most situations meaning the game slows down. Eventually we amass all the combo pieces and disruption we need to just win, or we make a 2nd pyromancer and will eventually win that way.

That's not the case with an active deathrite as he will be pinging us for 2 every turn while taking meaningful spells out of our yard, all the while remaining active as a blocker. I've found it extremely troublesome to win the battle even after resolving Pyromancer if my opponent has a goyf and a deathrite, or even worse 2 deathrites. This also speaks to your experience with Empty the Warrens, Kai. Making 8 goblins on turn 1/2 against RUG delver is usually game unless they can deploy running goyfs on subsequent turns. Against bug delver it is rarely enough. I still think Empty is an inherently strong card against tempo strategies but it needs to be at its best against bug delver. Making 8 on turn 1 on the play will probably be enough in a majority of cases but is by no means a sure thing. On any later turn I'd say it's a losing position. 10 goblins on turn 1 on the play should be a win nearly every time. Incidentally I think (and this mostly goes for sideboarded games) that Empty can be a strong finisher in the mid-to-late game. This only really works if you've managed to slow them down which in turn means stopping their threats either by discarding creatures, using Abrupt Decays on them or getting down a pyromancer to gum up the ground.

Another issue for the pyromancer is Golgari Charm and co. As this tech has become more well known (and even if it wasn't then just because people fear Empty the Warrens) the bug decks will usually have 2-3 golgari charm effects after sideboard. Such a small number means that it is not unreasonable to expect to dodge it in many games but they will blow out your pyromancer AND all his tokens every now and again which is usually game over.

All of this has actually got me thinking about Talrand, Sky Summoner. Now he is probably one mana too expensive (on the other hand this means that he dodges Abrupt Decay :smile:)

Pros:
- they have nearly no way to remove him once he is in play. Liliana, really, is the only way and that implies us not having a way to cast one spell with him in play to make a drake token.
- his power level is through the roof. His effect is... well more than twice as good as that of the pyromancer. His tokens fly. That means that all of the problems posed by deathrite shaman are more or less avoided. I would imagine that a resolved Talrand will end the game in very few turns.
- neither him nor his drakes die to -1/-1 effects.
- is also good (probably better) against miracles. The games are already slow so we will be getting to 4 mana much more frequently.

Cons:
- his mana cost... That's pretty much it, but I imagine that this will be his downfall. I like to play 16 lands which is 1 more than the norm but even then, getting to 4CMC is a tall order. Especially against a wasteland/daze deck.

I think I will test him as a 2-of in my sideboard in mtgo and see how it goes, but I'm not going in with high expectations.

Compost is not a bad idea, actually. It's a bit situational though which would be my biggest concern. Sometimes bug delver beats us without casting any black spells other than deathrite. Also, thoughtseize is still very potent, and this will "merely" turn it into a Clique effect. If they take our tutor the turn before we go off then it's quite unlikely that the top of our library contains another tutor. I mean it's still an awesome effect and infinitely better than nothing when being discarded.

Sloshthedark

08-18-2014, 04:56 AM

I chose Surgical because against Miracles you already board in a lot of cards. And the rest of the decks you either want turn0 interaction against dredge/reanimator/storm or play it during your combo-turn for free extra storm or hellbent-ness.

Other than turn 0 interaction (Daze?Fow?) Extirpate is "strictly" better with reanimator and Storm and applicable with control and tempo... Eot Fow check no BS, therapy something ggtnxbye... Extra storm is less or irrelevant for cardchoices after PIF release... I agree Extraction is better extracting yourself thou

@Togores - it happens, UBG is not very good, congratulations

Ancestral Visions - used to be tech in Spain years back I believe, tried that like half year ago, went disapointed
Spiritual Focus - interesting but slow, offcolor and shuts off discard just in terms of card quantity
Divert - is decent

@ sawatarix - I think Confidant UBG Build is the worse... Compost is just..not good
-Blood Moon =) - you wanted to be crazy... I tried that just in TES for 2 tournamens, actually never cast it... sounds awful at first, but it's one card...
-heavy Manplan
-16 cantrip build might be good once... no easy answer

@pondering
interesting, I think it's much more up to you to interpret the games/matches ... 5/3 doesn't prove much
I'd check LDV before PT (should be better unless you have a sorcery "bomb" like miracle wheel/mass bounce/sweeper), SDT is a natural fit for both

@ Nevilshute - Talrand is interesting but the CC4 resp UU doen't make it a consistent plan

Dragonslayer_90

08-18-2014, 08:34 AM

Togores

08-18-2014, 09:07 AM

@Togores: Congrats on your good finish. I was wondering what is your main deck configuration with two sensei's top?

@ beating BUG Delver: If not Blood Moon as Sloshthedark suggested maybe Back to Basics? Worse than actual blood moon but easier to cast early since by turn 2 we can have both basics out and cast it off a dark ritual.

Thats the deck I signed in:

Spells:45
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
4 Brainstorm
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Dark Ritual
3 Duress
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Ponder
1 Preordain
2 Sensei Divining Top
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Infernal Tutor
1 Past in Flames
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Ad Nauseam

Lands:15
1 Island
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Polluted Delta
1 Swamp
1 Bayou
1 Tropical Island
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island

Sideboard:15
2 Chain of Vapor
1 Massacre
2 Flusterstorm
3 Xantid Swarm
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Carpet of Flowers
1 Tendrills of agony
1 Bruning Wish

sawatarix

08-18-2014, 10:53 PM

among all the ideas we had so far i like divert/flusterstorm the most , simply because they can counter a discard spell or even a counterspell (if they try to counter one of our own discard spells or rituals.

cards like compost and bloodmoon are pretty cute, during BoM7 in november last year my friends and i were trolling around with some bloodmoon ideas in our ant/tes-sideboards to completely shut down decks with greedy manabases.
The problem with blood moon is that the card becomes dead when deathrite shaman hits the field.
i dont see any alternate winconditions next to the stormroute against bug delver.
senseis divining top combined with flusterstorm/divert could be the way to go.
another thing: in g2/g3 you can slam all LED's you have on the battlefield immediately because our opponent won't have any abrupt decays left in his deck.

talrand is the best merfolk ever printed (even better than superstar true-name nemesis) if it hits the table.
but as martin says UU2 demands at least one lotus petal or dark ritual and we don't want to turn on their problasts !

P-E

08-19-2014, 12:32 AM

How can t you see another win route against bug? 4 baloth 4 dodecapod 4 guerilla tactics 3 psychic purge and prey they have a lot of hymn and lilies :{

Turn 2 dark ritual the abyss ahah

Jin Gitaxias

08-19-2014, 02:12 AM

I may try out 1 talrand if i have the time to test. Just to make sure no stone stays unturned when trying to solve the bugdelver matchup. I do not think pyroblast is something to worry about in that matchup though :wink:

Togores

08-19-2014, 08:30 AM

another thing: in g2/g3 you can slam all LED's you have on the battlefield immediately because our opponent won't have any abrupt decays left in his deck.

!

Thats not true, usualy most of my bug delver opponents have decay game 2. I usualy drop the leds but they keep it in in fear of the xantid usualy. And to catch led, sensei or so.

Obv not 4x but 2x wuld not be strange to see.

Dragonslayer_90

08-19-2014, 09:26 AM

Thats not true, usualy most of my bug delver opponents have decay game 2. I usualy drop the leds but they keep it in in fear of the xantid usualy. And to catch led, sensei or so.

Obv not 4x but 2x wuld not be strange to see.

This is true, though it is not totally unreasonable to cut all of them if you have at least two Liliana postboard I think. I don't know how other people board but I've always cut all my removal except Liliana postboard when playing Team America against ANT. Can be slow at times but if you have some early game disruption you will have enough time to cast it. I think from the ANT side we should probably just play our petals and LEDs out to play around discard game 2. If you see Abrupt Decay then maybe consider not playing artifact mana out game 3. Then again maybe still play them out because as a two of they aren't going to see them that often and they will probably shuffle them away a lot with ponder and brainstorm+fetchland since abrupt decay is pretty bad a lot of the time against ANT.

iamajellydonut

08-20-2014, 01:42 PM

Question: In the event that you do run a Top in the sideboard, when do you board it in? Also, when do you board the one in the main out?

Tom T

08-20-2014, 02:32 PM

Question: In the event that you do run a Top in the sideboard, when do you board it in? Also, when do you board the one in the main out?

Top is better in grindy games vs things like blue control. And against discard you can build your mana by dropping lands and artifacts. You board them out if speed becomes an issue, like, for instance the combo mirror.

Also, you can do all kinds of cool things with the Top. For instance you can go of with an Infernal Tutor-crack-LED and have another tutor on top floating in case your tutor is countered. You can float a Flusterstorm in the mirror. Also, with Top in play you can generate a lot of extra storm for minimal mana compared to chaining Infernal Tutors. Draw a card with Top in your upkeep and before you cast cantrips you can use the Top so you draw the Top again (get it? :P). So you can chain Top-Cantrip-Top-Cantrip etc for (1) or (U). Pretty nifty. Next to that you can use LED-mana to cast business-spells, like the Brainstorm+GitaxianProbe+AdNauseam interaction. ALSOOO, in case you shit your pants with Ad Nauseam and have to stop due to life-issues (like, you have the black mana and tutor, but lack a LED), you can use Top as a black-mana cantrip. Furthermore, postboard you can use redundant Chain of Vapor as a cantrip by bouncing the Top in response on it's activation.

It feels a bit like playing DDFT (for dummies) sometimes :smile:

sawatarix

08-20-2014, 07:27 PM

Togores

08-20-2014, 07:44 PM

^ u start getting to the right direction :D

Tom T

08-20-2014, 08:18 PM

The more we talk about how awesome Senseis Divining Top is the more i love it !
Damn have to get more of them. 2 In the maindeck could be solid.
Chain of Vapour on top in resp to the top-draw is decent, reminds me at good old miracle days i had during grand prix strassbourg when i repealed my own top.It was so much value.

@TomT: i would keep top in the storm mirror game simply because the games go very disruptive until no one has cards.

I play a configuration with 2 SDT, 1 Preordain and the 7th discard spell. The second SDT used to be a Grim Tutor and it hurt to take him out.
Just had a game where I could make a natural Tendrils line by chaining Tops. Pretty awesome!

I was mostly referring to the Sneak&Show, Reanimator, Elves, Dredge and High Tide match-up. Here the Top is just too slow most of the time. However, one could argue that Dredge and Reanimator play discard so you could keep them in.
And Storm mirrors are usually pretty grindy if both players can't win turn 1/2. But I wouldn't board in the full 3 SDT in the match-up. Just one, maybe two.

.Ix

08-21-2014, 02:41 AM

Decided to try ANT because I really couldn't believe I lost to JUND with TES last time. Wastelands really cramped my style, and I absolutely love Sensei in combo, so I thought I'd give it a chance. I went 3-0-1 to place first. The report is from memory so it's probably not completely accurate.

List:

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

3 Duress
3 Cabal Therapy

4 Brainstorm
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Ponder
1 Preordain
1 Sensei's Divining Top

4 Cabal Ritual
4 Infernal Tutor
2 Burning Wish
1 Past in Flames
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Ad Nauseam

1 Badlands
1 Island
3 Polluted Delta
3 Scalding Tarn
1 Swamp
1 Tropical Island
2 Underground Sea
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Volcanic Island
1 Bloodstained Mire

SB: 3 Xantid Swarm
SB: 1 Thoughtseize
SB: 1 Tendrils of Agony
SB: 1 Empty the Warrens
SB: 3 Abrupt Decay
SB: 1 Chain of Vapor
SB: 2 Flusterstorm
SB: 1 Massacre
SB: 1 Sensei's Divining Top

It was a small 8-man with 4 rounds.

RD1: Sneak Show

G1: T1 Duress takes his Show and Tell. He ponders. T2 Duress takes his Sneak Attack. He ponders. T3 Therapy takes his Grisel. T4 he plays Sneak Attack. I cast Ad Nauseam.

-1 SDT -1 Swamp -1 preordain -2 Burning Wish -1 Cabal Therapy +3 Xantid +2 Flusterstorm +1 Thoughtseize

G2: T1 he plays a land and passes. I Duress, he brainstorms, I take a FOW. He plays fetch and passes. I Therapy for 2 Griselbrands, he has a Swan Song. Haha! I tap cantrip for 2 turns. (I thought the chance of Showing a Grisel was very low at this point). He Shows Emrakul after two turns, but I PIF him to death.

2-0 in games
1-0 in matches

RD2: Affinity

G1: He drops stuff, I storm out

-3 Duress -1 Sensei +1 Void Snare +1 Chalice +1 Thoughtseize +1 Decay

G2: He mulls to 5, I keep a cantrippy 7. He plays Canonist T2, I cantrip for several turns, I find a decay but he has another Canonist. I die.

G3: He draws nothing, I win

4-1 in games
2-0 in matches

RD3: My own Maverick deck piloted by a friend

G1: He wins the roll and Zeniths for Arbor on T1. My hand is a loose keep, island, cantrips, Duress, Therapy, and Petal. I decide to crack petal to blind Therapy naming Thalia. Of course he has Teeg in hand. I dig for the Burning wish but I never find it.

-3 Duress -1 Sensei +1 Chain of Vapor +1 Void Snare +1 Thoughtseize +1 Decay

G2: I start with a fetch and pass. He plays Chalice of the Void (WTF, I did not put this in the deck!) on zero , plays a land and a Deathrite. I slap myself because I didn't drop the artifacts in hand. I cantrip some more. He drops Chalice for 1. He has no Wastelands and a very slow clock, but I'm at the mercy of my topdecks. I toss a Chain of Vapor EOT just to help get Threshold. He drops Thalia. I cry inside. I topdeck Burning Wish!! I cast it for Massacre and pass the turn. He plays a Knight. I Massacre on my turn and pass. He plays Scavenging Ooze and Dark Depths, and EOT I decay the Chalice for 1. I Void Snare the Chalice for 0, casting Cabal Ritual into Ad Nauseam with 8 cards in the graveyard against an Ooze with G untapped. AND I was facing a Marit Lage activation EOT. Whew!

We ID because we're the top 2 players anyway. We would have faced the same two opponents, and I thought there was too much hate from his side to win game 3. We play it out anyway.

G3: He drops a Chalice for 0 and a Hierarch. I cantrip. He has nothing. I keep cantripping. He plays a Knight. EOT I play Dark Ritual, Cabal Ritual, Ad Nauseam tapping an Island and a black source. I find the Void Snare and kill him on my turn.

Still an ID, but I won the games so they count.
6-2 in games
2-0-1 in matches

RD 4: Deadguy Ale

G1: He goes first and Inquisitions me. He takes the Brainstorm over SDT!! I don't know why he did that but I was VERY happy about it. I play SDT and my Petal. I sculpt my hand while he has little pressure. He hits me with 2 Hymns, taking 2 cabal Rituals, a Tendrils, and a Dark Ritual. After a little top spinning, I'm at 7 life with 4 lands and a petal. I draw the Ad Nauseam and hit exactly what i need: LED, PIF, Petal, and Dark Ritual.

SB:-3 Duress +1 SDT +1 Chain +1 Void Snare

G2: He starts with discard again. Somehow I land a Top T1 again. I think I topdecked it. I also drop the LED and Petal. He Inquisitions me. I duress. He topdecks Hymn and casts it. I spin EOT and pass. He Vindicates the LED, and I crack it to spin the Top for no reason, and I end up discarding my Ponder. Absolutely pathetic misplay, but I'm still good because my I have Cabal Ritual and IT on top. I realize that without misplaying that LED Crack, I wouldn't have gone Hellbent. He has SFM active with Batterskull in hand, and his Pain Seers have taken me to something like 15. My Turn, I Cabal Ritual, tap the Top to draw the IT, PIF and kill him.

8-2 in games
3-0-1 in matches

I took first, and I had a lot of fun with ANT this time. I'm very happy with the maindeck Burning Wishes at the moment. I was goldfishing with 4 IT and 1 LDV (I don't have Grim Tutor) and I had too many games where I couldn't find the Tutor to kill, so I tried the Burning Wish and it was actually decent, particularly for beating Teeg and other annoying things Game 1. Basics and Sensei are the reasons I really wanted to try ANT, and they absolutely proved themselves. I only have 3 Delta, but I think it's fine. People have started to play Pithing Needle on Delta as well, so that's a kind of a bonus. I'm new to ANT guys, so go easy on me.

CabalTherapy

08-21-2014, 06:51 PM

Decided to try ANT because I really couldn't believe I lost to JUND with TES last time.

Gratulations, you have chosen the right deck.

I have just taken down a 4 rounds tournament here in Berlin. Played my usual 60 with one Grim main.

Round 1: NicFit
I can cantrip into the win on turn 3 or 4 while he does nothing relevant. In the second game, I manage to assamble the perfect hand and win via PiF.
1-0

Round 2: UR StandstillDelver
A highly disruptive deck with Stifle and a lot of counter. In game 1, he had 10 cards in hand due to Standstill but no mana left, and just FoW and Misdirection ready to cast. I went for it without having the kill in hand, but after a resolved DRit and a Ponder, I eventually find a LED and won from there with Duress and some more Rituals into Tendrils.
2-0

Round 3: Miracles
What an annoying deck. He scoops as I therapy his 2 CB, and leave him with only a Terminus in hand on turn 2. Then, we struggled through the second match as I went for Extirpate>Counterbalance. We both stalled the board until the turns where I resolved a Tendrils for 10 lifedrain and he was unable to kill me with Snapcaster and Clique. Lucky.
3-0

Round 4: Burg Delver
I was the only one with 3-0 and had to face another hard MU, which I lost 1:2. In the first match, I was able to discard all his relevant cards and just showed him my perfectly sculpted hand.
The other 2 games my opponent did what Burg Delver does against combo. He disrupted me with Wastelands, Stifles and had a plethora of counter in hand. My Swarms, of which I thought could turn around the games, unfortunately got bolted. Null Rod is also a pretty decent card in this MU.
3-1

Lucky me, my opp-score is high enough for the first place.
Today's best play: I played Venser (1off in SB) and bounced an attacking Snappcaster Mage with RiP in play in order to prevent damage against Miracles.

Tom T

08-22-2014, 11:16 AM

Hi dudes!

Usually I play TES, but ever since BUG-delver is the most played deck in my region I started playing Miracles again. Despite the fact I enjoy Miracles a lot, I miss the extra time in between rounds and blowing peoples heads up with some turn 1/2 kills. It's way more satisfying and it makes me more proud of myself :tongue:

So, I also love playing Sensei's Divining Top and it's shenanigans in storm.

The list I'll be playing:

Maindeck

4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Lotus Petal
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Infernal Tutor
3 Duress
2 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Preordain
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Past in Flames
1 Tendrils of Agony
4 Polluted Delta
3 Scalding Tarn
1 Verdant Catacombs
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
1 Tropical Island
1 Badlands
1 Island
1 Swamp

Sideboard
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Xantid Swarm
3 Chain of Vapor
2 Flusterstorm
4 Young Pyromancer

Now, my question is; Is Young Pyromancer still good against Miracles or has it already spread like wildfire and is everyone prepared? I'm playing in the Benelux. And if not, I think bringing Swarms in against them is also pretty bad (if they're playing Swords instead of Terminus as answer). If that's the case I'll switch the Pyromancers for 3 Pithing Needle and a Notion Thief or 4 Pithing Needle. This is to combat SDT, as it's the most resilient card Miracles has against us.

So, what do you guys think?

~Tom

CabalTherapy

08-23-2014, 01:04 PM

Now, my question is; Is Young Pyromancer still good against Miracles or has it already spread like wildfire and is everyone prepared? I'm playing in the Benelux. And if not, I think bringing Swarms in against them is also pretty bad (if they're playing Swords instead of Terminus as answer). If that's the case I'll switch the Pyromancers for 3 Pithing Needle and a Notion Thief or 4 Pithing Needle. This is to combat SDT, as it's the most resilient card Miracles has against us.

So, what do you guys think?

I can only speak about my local gaming area where the young Pyrodude was introduced to the ANT board, and where every Miracles player is aware of him. Consequently, not playing him in my meta is nice, although as the Miracles players will notice his absence, Pyrodude is a valid option again. Next-leveling into another level of next-leveling I would guess.

Additionally, I don't see Needle as a good card against Miracles naming Sensei's Divining Top because on the one hand your list contains 2 Tops main, and on the other hand as Top is a good card against Miracles, you are simply going to weaken your list. Presumably moving 2 Tops to the side in favor of 4 Needles in order to fight the enemy's Tops sounds really weak.

Ricca84

08-25-2014, 09:41 AM

Hi guys,

about BUG/Team America MU I agree with you that is probably the worst matchup in the meta with Miracles ( Reanimator does not exist anymore). This is because ANT has some trouble with deck that are able to attack it from different side. In this case we have to fight vs:

- hand distruption
- counterspells ( except FoW and maybe some flusterstorms they are all tax counters ).
- soft grave hate
- a consistent, but not so fast race

in this scenario we have to figure out a good side out/in.

my personal idea starting from this sideboard (that seems to be too solid):

3 xantid
3 chain of vapor
2 Sensei's divining top
1 ETW
2 Flusterstorm
4 Abrupt Decay

is the following:

+2 xantid
+2 Sensei's divining top
+1 Flusterstorm

-2 discard
-2 preordain
-1 cabal ritual

but i'm not really convinced about. Is worth to upgrade discards into xantid in this MU ( all abrupt decay will be sided out or not?)

any comment is welcome

:)

CabalTherapy

08-25-2014, 11:03 AM

+2 xantid
+2 Sensei's divining top
+1 Flusterstorm

-2 discard
-2 preordain
-1 cabal ritual

Xantid Swarm is pure card-disadvantage.
Top is very good, while Flusterstorm is not needed in this MU. It ideally trades with a Hymn.

Preordain hast to stay in because it is a decent cantrip, and that is what you need against discard.

But: All these things are already written down, thus a backscroll or whatever is not that difficult.

Togores

08-25-2014, 05:39 PM

Lemnear

08-25-2014, 05:44 PM

Lately in all the scg opens there has been no ant nauseam on top16 apart from bryant cook playing tes (he is also one of the best stormers) Im just wondering why the deck seems to me soo good in europe and here is shown it just rapes all day and there it makes nothing.

Does no one plays it?
Does no good players play it?

I would love some hinsighy from usual us players.

Thanks

The average SCG grinders are not known to work themselves into the depths of storm as most are Multi-format gamers. You can't blame them for picking "easier" decks like Delver and SneakShow which doesn't fall apart if their pilot makes a mistake.

iamajellydonut

08-25-2014, 05:49 PM

Does no one plays it?
Does no good players play it?

Both. I can only remember playing against ANT once at a major event. I lost anyway, but he killed himself in one game with an Ad Nauseum when he had lethal and then almost lost another when he thought repeating Chain of Vapor increased storm count.

Even at a local level, it's rarely played and the people who do sometimes throw it together have no vested interest in the deck.

DaGarver

08-25-2014, 06:41 PM

my personal idea starting from this sideboard (that seems to be too solid):

3 xantid
3 chain of vapor
2 Sensei's divining top
1 ETW
2 Flusterstorm
4 Abrupt Decay

is the following:

+2 xantid
+2 Sensei's divining top
+1 Flusterstorm

-2 discard
-2 preordain
-1 cabal ritual

The issue is that BUG Delver presents a consistent and fast clock (you are effectively dead on turn 5) while attacking you from every possible angle. Your cards in hand, your graveyard, and your mana sources are all under attack. This is why it is so good at posting results: it beats the tar out of combo decks.

Honestly, your best bet is probably something like a Leyline of Sanctity or a Defense Grid. The easy way to win is to Storm out on early turns when they can't race an EtW for 10 gobbos or just kill them on the spot. The former scenario is basically game over if you get it on the play. Their only answer is Golgari Charm, and they have to draw it.

I'm not sure if the matchup is even close to winnable outside of that scenario or getting lucky with their draws. I've been boarding for it like this:

Out: Ad Nauseam, Grim Tutor
In: 2 Chain of Vapor

You just have to go fast. That's the only way you're going to simultaneously beat their discard and countermagic.

Lately in all the scg opens there has been no ant nauseam on top16 apart from bryant cook playing tes (he is also one of the best stormers) Im just wondering why the deck seems to me soo good in europe and here is shown it just rapes all day and there it makes nothing.

Does no one plays it?
Does no good players play it?

I would love some hinsighy from usual us players.

Thanks

Everyone in the USA plays Delver. Delver eats combo decks alive, especially slow, grindy combo decks like this one.

The pilots also tend to be bad, but that's a different story.

Togores

08-25-2014, 07:02 PM

Everyone in the USA plays Delver. Delver eats combo decks alive, especially slow, grindy combo decks like this one.

The pilots also tend to be bad, but that's a different story.

Thats not true. I havent lost to delever in a long long time playing storm apart to bug delever. I eat rug and patriot for breakfast. If you know your gameplan its really east to just headshot them all day.

Namida

08-25-2014, 07:39 PM

Everyone in the USA plays Delver. Delver eats combo decks alive, especially slow, grindy combo decks like this one.

The pilots also tend to be bad, but that's a different story.

Being a Delver deck doesn't automatically make you butcher combo decks. In fact, I would say that the only Delver decks I have problems with are the ones that play discard. I contend that "The pilots tend to be bad" is probably the real culprit and not unrelated as you claim, because I feel that the Storm/nonblack Delver matchups tend to favor the more experienced player instead of the match being inherently lopsided in any direction.

CabalTherapy

08-25-2014, 08:13 PM

Something like this for Delver MUs where UWR and Canadian are definitely positive MUs.

Difficult MU

Team America
Burg Delver
UWR Delver
Canadian

Easy MU

Again, I would like to point out that cutting business spells against Team America is not a good plan. A topdecked Ad Nauseam can win the game, and I don't want to miss it in this MU. It does not have to be a lethal draw, but some cards are usually enough to go from there, and blank their discard. A fast Ad Nauseam is also the win here, before they can land Null Rod, Shaman or play Hymn. The important point here is card advantage. To elaborate on that, Xantid Swarm for example is pure card-disadvantage against BUG because it does nothing during the turn it comes into play. Additionally, it has to survive one turn in order to create some kind of protection against the enemy's counterspells. However, BUG's disruption is divided into two: counter and discard, they may play Hymn to Tourach and destroy ANT's hand. On the other hand, I have to admit that Swarm may work sometimes. Try to seek for the highest card value against BUG without looking at a specific context, where Swarm or whatever may be better than a simple Preordain.

Surfinbird

08-26-2014, 01:39 PM

Stormers, i've got a new idea for this deck and i'd like to know your opinion about it:

First of all i must say that i was tired of losing against deathrite shaman decks. This creature stopped our combo via Ad Nauseam (taking down our lifepoints) and via Past in flames (Ye, we can win with an extra ritual, but the most of the times getting them is really difficult because they're playing discard too...). Also, i don't like playing only 4 infernal tutors as bussines spells: Sometimes we lose simply to not finding one.

Considering this points, i've thought about the next idea (which is working the last days): RUNNING 3 PERSONAL TUTOR AND 1 ENTREAT THE ANGELS.

3 PERSONAL TUTOR:
- They will look for infernals, past in flames, discard spells or, in special cases, a ponder.

- In a PiF loop it works as an infernal tutor if we've got a cantrip in the grave. We can play personal tutor to PiF and go for the combo in the next turn or doing it in the same turn if we have enough mana and a cantrip. I have to point that this plan is awesome with Gitaxian Probe.

- With at least a Led or 2 petals, we can play the artifacts, search for an Entreat the Angels and play it in the next turn creating lots of angels.

- We can play some 1-ofs in the Sideboard like pyroclasm, massacre, void snare...

- It works pretty well with miracles... Reforge the soul could be tested against discard decks. Terminus and devastation tide against permanents. Temporal mastery doesn't sound to good to me, but who knows?

- Meddling Mages are worse against us.

1 ENTREAT THE ANGELS:

- A way to win that isn't stop by graveyard hate or having less than 10 lifepoints. Nothing more to say. It works fantastically with personal tutor allowing plays like: t1 duress, t2 personal tutor, LEds/Petals, t3 4+ angels.

- While running this card, drawing a personal tutor at the topdeck can win lots of games for us.

- Probably the way to go against Team America.

the list i've been testing is this one:

4 Polluted delta
3 Flooded strand
1 Marsh flats
2 underground sea
1 scrubland
1 tundra
1 island
1 swamp
1 volcanic island

4 Lion's eye diamond
4 Lotus petal
4 Dark ritual
4 Cabal ritual

4 Infernal tutor
3 Personal Tutor
1 Past in Flames
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Entreat the Angels
1 Tendrils of Agony

4 Ponder
4 Brainstorm
4 Gitaxian Probe

4 Duress
2 Cabal therapy

SIDEBOARD:

3 Abrupt decay
2 Chain of vapor
2 Dread of night
2 Cabal therapy
1 tropical island
1 sensei's divining top
1 void snare
1 reforge the soul
1 Massacre
1 Pyroclasm

After some games, i've reached some conclusions:

- Probably we don't need the white lands. I've NEVER needed them and i've used Entreat the Angels an important number of times. I think this point is VERY IMPORTANT. I'll keep testing it to get a definitive conclusion in that point.

- More than one time i've wished to be playing Devastation tide when playing a Personal Tutor post SB. Maybe because i've played 2 times against MUD, not sure:)

- This works guys. Winning via entreat against Team America when they have shamans and delvers destroying our AN, PIF and Tutor chain (due to discard) ways is incredibly easy.

I still have to work a lot in this list. If we take the maximum power of personal tutor and its shenanigans we could ANT into a more devastating and difficult to stop deck.

iamajellydonut

08-26-2014, 01:48 PM

That seems like an incredible and unnecessary amount of liability. I'm not really sure what more I can say about it beyond stating my reluctance to give it a whirl.

CabalTherapy

08-26-2014, 02:44 PM

Stormers, i've got a new idea for this deck and i'd like to know your opinion about it:

I would like to recommend this card:
http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=19657&type=card
A neat addition to your board.

phazonmutant

08-26-2014, 03:07 PM

Both. I can only remember playing against ANT once at a major event. I lost anyway, but he killed himself in one game with an Ad Nauseum when he had lethal and then almost lost another when he thought repeating Chain of Vapor increased storm count.

Even at a local level, it's rarely played and the people who do sometimes throw it together have no vested interest in the deck.

Agreed, although there are a few. Hunter Wilson and Eric Rill come to mind as grinders who play it well and somewhat often. Storm also the reputation of having a bunch of unwinnable common matchups like against Miracles and Delver decks.

Sunday I played in a 52-person tournament in Bellingham, WA for a judge foil Force of Will and duals. Made top 8, and should have made top 4 if not for a huge punt (more later). I built my list based on Carsten Kotter's build with some ideas from Sloshthedark,

// Maindeck
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Gitaxian Probe
2 Preordain

3 Duress
3 Cabal Therapy

4 Infernal Tutor
1 Grim Tutor
1 Past in Flames
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Grapeshot

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

4 Polluted Delta
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
1 Badlands
1 Tropical Island
1 Island
1 Swamp

// Sideboard
2 Chain of Vapor
2 Flusterstorm
1 Lightning Bolt
1 Empty the Warrens
3 Xantid Swarm
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Sensei's Divining Top

So the notable things are Tops in the board - not new to the Europeans, but all my friends were surprised and skeptical - and the red creature death spells - Grapeshot and Bolt.
- I was pretty uncertain of the Tops before playing with this list, but I'm definitely sold on at least 2 in the board. They're quite good against the black decks and they also just have a surprising amount of utility like hellbent tricks or banking a mana to get another spell of the top of your library for free on the combo turn. I'm not certain about having 3 Tops, but I didn't play against Miracles (despite there being like 6+ decent/good pilots in the field). I wouldn't mind having 1 main, but not sure what to cut.
- Grapeshot was a solid role-player. I played a bunch of test games against UR burn, and a couple times he Probed me seeing Grapeshot and had to slow down his creature onslaught pretty drastically to play around it. Also it's tough to counter. Another time I used it and a naturally-drawn Tendrils to natural storm him with the 6 spells in my hand. The field had a bunch of Death and Taxes (6+), so was happy to have it there too.

R1 Elves 2-0
He borrowed the deck and didn't realize he had to keep a fast kill or disruption. Also I got 2 turn-2 kills on the draw. Declined on Grapeshoting his team for rub-ins, a clear punt. However it did give me time to take a dump and order a burrito the size of a baby's torso.

R2 Death & Taxes 2-1
We knew what each other were on. G1 he mulliganed to 5 looking for 2 lands and disruption. I kept a 7 with Probe-Therapy to take his Thalia, and killed him on like turn 3 or 4. He asked me how to sideboard between games and I told him Mother isn't bad. Why did I do that? G2 he mulliganed and I again sniped a Thalia, but he had Ports to lock down my basics while I bricked on lands. He drew a Canonist with active Mother in play the turn I was going to kill him by flashing back PiF with LEDs. My Lightning Bolt didn't have any Chain of Vapor friends. G3 he kept a hand with no disruption, I killed him on turn 3.

R3 Junk Depths 2-1
G1 he kept 6 lands, Vampire Hexmage. My Duress was sad. He drew Deathrite Shaman and made a 20/20 on turn 2. I was forced to turn a hand of LP, LP, IT, IT, GT, land, Duress (with land on board) into a kill given a turn. So I decided to GT for LED, next turn IT for LED, IT for Ad Nauseam from 12. Revealed a bunch of cantrips and a PiF, didn't get there. Is there a better line?
G2 He Thoughtseized me, taking IT. I dropped a Top and killed him via PiF the turn he made a 20/20. G3 he played a DRS. I Probed him and saw land, Hymn, Lili, Lili. Decided to go for land, DR, LED, IT, Empty for 10 Tokens, and flashbacked a discarded Therapy to take his Lilis. He bricked on his 5-outer of Tabernacle or Crop Rotation and was very salty.

R4 Elves 2-0
He kept a hand without a mana dork or a second land, so when I probed and saw 2 Natural Orders I guessed (correctly) that I needed to play around Ruric Thar. Killed him on turn 3. Game 2 he Thoughtseized me and took the LED (correct), but I ripped another and killed him anyway.

R5, R6 0-0-3 naptime

Quarters Junk Depths 1-2
Same Junk Depths guy. I again lost G1 to a quick kill, but made a mistake. I was on the play, Preordained. He played Bayou, pass. I Pondered, Duressed, saw:
Urborg, Vampire Hexmage, Hymn to Tourach, Knight of the Reliquary, fetchland, Crop Rotation, land(?)
I didn't realize he could Rotate EOT, Hexmage, and kill me on the next turn, so I took the Hymn thinking I'd have 2 turns. He killed me.
G2 he seemed to have a slow start, holding up a Bayou in favor of playing a spell t1. I cantripped while he played a land, Deathrite, and again held up Bayou. On my turn, I sniffed a rat and put him on Crop Rotation for Bojuka Bog, so I just tutored up Ad Nauseam from 19 with 2 mana floating, got there very easily.
G3 he led on Thoughtseize and stripped a LED from a solid hand with cantrips and mana, but no tutor and only one land. I played a Top. He played a Deathrite and a Dark Depths. I Topped in upkeep and found a fetch, Infernal Tutor, and Chain of Vapor, taking the land. He played a Hexmage and passed. I Brainstormed, keeping the Chain and the Tutor, Duressed a Hymn, and played a Petal. In end step, he made a Marit Lage and I bounced it. He simply played another land and Hexmage and passed with Deathrite and Bayou up. Here's where I made a big punt. I Pondered and saw Probe, Dark Rit, Cabal Rit (with LED, Top, 1 untapped land in play; IT, LP in hand). He was at 15. So obviously I took the GP, played it, and flipped Top, and had 10 mana; and I needed to storm him for 18 because he had Deathrite + g up. I forgot to count the initial Tutor and thought I could tutor chain him, but instead fumbled 3 tutors in and just dealt him 16. I saw the Past in Flames line (Tutor -> Tutor -> PiF with DR, CR, CR in graveyard) and decided on the "cooler" Tutor chain line.

So he exiled the Hexmage in bin going to 1, then exiled the Tendrils and I lost.

This and another experience which prompted me to include Grapeshot in the first place make me think that I should always have at least Tendrils and Grapeshot in against a deck with Deathrite and discard. So yes, obv I top 8 an event where I never play against blue decks :tongue: But it was a good test of the Grapeshot and board plan, which I'm liking quite a bit. I'd like to test more against Miracles to see if the third Top is necessary.

I continue to think Ad Nauseam sucks. I think I cast it 3 times - once from 12 life with B floating and a land drop and I died. Twice with B or so floating from like 18 and I won. One of those times I couldn't win via PiF because of grave hate, the other because I had double LED. The time where I killed myself, I had double LED. That makes me wonder if IGG and/or Empty the Warrens might be better than Ad Nauseam.

Sloshthedark

08-26-2014, 05:01 PM

R3 Junk Depths 2-1
G1 didn't get there. Is there a better line?

This seems fine, depends on what you draw

This and another experience which prompted me to include Grapeshot in the first place make me think that I should always have at least Tendrils and Grapeshot in against a deck with Deathrite and discard. So yes, obv I top 8 an event where I never play against blue decks :tongue: But it was a good test of the Grapeshot and board plan, which I'm liking quite a bit. I'd like to test more against Miracles to see if the third Top is necessary.

Why not -1-2 Preordain +1-2 SDT? those slots seem interchangeable (or what do you board out for SDTs?), 3 SDT is a lot :really:

I continue to think Ad Nauseam sucks. I think I cast it 3 times - once from 12 life with B floating and a land drop and I died. Twice with B or so floating from like 18 and I won. One of those times I couldn't win via PiF because of grave hate, the other because I had double LED. The time where I killed myself, I had double LED. That makes me wonder if IGG and/or Empty the Warrens might be better than Ad Nauseam.

IGG is dead card and similar route to PIF, AN switch with sb EtW opens up Thoughtseize and 4th Therapy reducing creature problems

btw. how did the Bolt perform?

phazonmutant

08-26-2014, 05:31 PM

Why not -1-2 Preordain +1-2 SDT? those slots seem interchangeable (or what do you board out for SDTs?), 3 SDT is a lot

You're right, 3 does seem like a lot. I did generally board out a Preordain when I brought in Tops so I could just make that switch main. Carsten's argument is that you want to be able to drop a Top before Counterbalance hits so you can sculpt your hand and find a Decay under Counterbalance. I haven't gotten enough games against Miracles to say if it's good.

IGG is dead card and similar route to PIF, AN switch with sb EtW opens up Thoughtseize and 4th Therapy reducing creature problems

btw. how did the Bolt perform?

You're right that it's similar to PiF, but it's not strictly dead in hand. Maybe I just fondly remember the days of using IGG as a mind twist... I'm absolutely a fan of Empty. I won several games with it today, and the Cabal Therapy interaction is very good.

The Bolt was decent. Against Death and Taxes I would have preferred having a Massacre, but being a 1-mana instant would have been very relevant if I had also drawn a Chain of Vapor. I didn't play against a Meddling Mage deck, but I would have been happy to have it there. It seems fine as a 1-of, but Massacre might be better. In most situations Bolt was relevant, Grapeshot was as good or better, though.

Sloshthedark

08-26-2014, 05:49 PM

@Entreat the Angels - doesn't work well without chant fx and SDT ...Personal tutor is such disadvantage... RtS is kind of tempting... but still no...

You're right, 3 does seem like a lot. I did generally board out a Preordain when I brought in Tops so I could just make that switch main. Carsten's argument is that you want to be able to drop a Top before Counterbalance hits so you can sculpt your hand and find a Decay under Counterbalance. I haven't gotten enough games against Miracles to say if it's good.

This saves SB space, I'm reluctant to commit more SB slots for filtering, I'm not sure how good is it with Miracles (and I like it more vs UBG in theory), I have adopted the opposite approach with Pithing Needle, which works well for me

You're right that it's similar to PiF, but it's not strictly dead in hand. Maybe I just fondly remember the days of using IGG as a mind twist... I'm absolutely a fan of Empty. I won several games with it today, and the Cabal Therapy interaction is very good.

I meant dead as a now subpar card, PIF is a stronger choice overall, IGG suffers from the same hate and doesn't offer "angle" different enough like AN or EtW do... running PIF, IGG and EtW is something I haven't tried I think, I thought about IGG upsides as too marginal

The Bolt was decent. Against Death and Taxes I would have preferred having a Massacre, but being a 1-mana instant would have been very relevant if I had also drawn a Chain of Vapor. I didn't play against a Meddling Mage deck, but I would have been happy to have it there. It seems fine as a 1-of, but Massacre might be better. In most situations Bolt was relevant, Grapeshot was as good or better, though.

interesting... as I posted I dislike GS in theory

Megadeus

08-26-2014, 05:50 PM

Is massacre just not worth it since you don't have access to it via a burning wish? I always like massacre despite its dis-synergy with AN.

Togores

08-26-2014, 08:23 PM

I play usualy 1-2 masacre on the board depending on the meta i expect. And vs for example death and taxes i somt side out the nauseam and side in both masacre. Even if i flip them with nausea
I can stop at am healthy Amount of life. Keep and good grip and on the bext turn with all my lands untaped i can masacre them again and just win.

Togores

08-27-2014, 05:44 PM

This is Todd anderson Death blade deck from this weks scg.
Scg is really pushing the archtype and its a cool deck making good results.

http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=72096

They play counters, deathrite, discard, vendilion, and medling mage on board.

What side would we do vs them?
Chains? Decay? Carpets?

A likely sideboard plan would be great^^

CabalTherapy

08-27-2014, 06:12 PM

This is Todd anderson Death blade deck from this weks scg.
Scg is really pushing the archtype and its a cool deck making good results.

They play counters, deathrite, discard, vendilion, and medling mage on board.

What side would we do vs them?
Chains? Decay? Carpets?

A likely sideboard plan would be great^^

It's true they play diverse hate, but in a limited amount, especially preboard. Also, they do not have a fast clock and a lot of blanks against us.
Since, they have at least 3 Wastelands, I wouldn't board Decay in and preferably stay on-color. Chains sound plausible and Sensei's D Top if you have some in the board. But I know that your run them main, so I can spare time on that. And, don't forget that Massacre kills everything they can play, as far as I can image Esper Deathblade correctly.

Togores

08-27-2014, 07:08 PM

Sorry forgor to post the list. Already edited.

Yeah masacre seems a fine card allong with the chain. i like this aproach.
Thanks!

JamieW89

08-27-2014, 09:12 PM

Yeah Massacre wrecks them too, and they never really suspect it (although them having discard effects can allow them to sometimes play around it). I've been on at least 2 Massacre for half a year and am happy with them. It's a bit awkward to want to keep in Empty against Stoneforge decks (Massacre is strong vs UWR, Deathblade, Maverick and Death & Taxes which all play Batterskull), although AdNing to low life and then playing Massacre to setup for next turn can be fine too, so have AdN over EtW in this MU because of the discard. Chain is a fine card too, for storm count, buying time (bouncing germs f.e.) or solving a problem like a hatebear.
Dark Confidant is another decent card versus Deathblade if anyone still plays that.
A single Needle isn't too bad in the matchup, to stop Shaman, Lilly, Waste or even a Jace that's threatening to win (or stoneforge after/during a quick EtW?).
Flusterstorm/Divert are okay if they play 7-8 discard spells, but I don't like them in this matchup.

Carpet of Flowers seems weak unless they play a large amount of taxing counters (Like 10 combined of Daze, Pierce, Flusterstorm, Stifle counts as 1/2 or so) which they usually do not.
Xantid Swarm, while insane versus the counter heavy UW Blade lists, is quite weak here imo.

Myself I board something like this:
+2 Massacre
+1 Chain
+1 Needle
+1 AdN (although I sometimes like to keep EtW, especially if I feel they board out SFM's, which they cut/shave after ~5 removal + Jitte )
+up to 2 SDT (I play 1 MD 0 SB now, but would board 2 in if I played 0/2 versus discard heavy lists)
-1 EtW (When I board in AdN)
-Stuff (The usual shaving. Probably 1-2 discard spells unless I suspect more counters than usual, 1 cabal rit can go. Would rather keep Preordain vs more discard but if only 3-4 then those can go. 1 Probe is shaveable etc)

Dr Brian Pepper

08-28-2014, 05:20 AM

Young Pyromancer was not been that awesome agasint miracles as I wanted, what are some good replacements?

Higgs

08-28-2014, 06:35 AM

I am thinking about trying Divining Top against Miracles. What I've found is the postboard games always go long and you struggle to find that last Abrupt Decay after you've reached critical mass or fall prey to that turn 10 Clique when you wished you could float the Infernal on top of your library.

Hivenet

08-28-2014, 07:25 PM

Hi this is my first post so sorry if I get anything wrong. I have been reading this section for about a year but I am finally heading to my first proper tournament.

I am taking roughly this list to a small legacy tournament (around 18 people most of whom I know) but am not sure what tweaks I should make as with such a small group of decks I feel certain changes can be made, I have tested online a lot but haven't really been able to practise to the extent I know what to board against the more obscure decks. Would someone be able to advise me on any tuning, likely mostly for the sideboard. The tournament will be only a few rounds but will have 2-4 separate events. Please see my list below:

Main Deck:

4 Polluted delta
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
1 Badlands
2 Island
1 Swamp

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

4 Infernal Tutor
1 Lim-Dul's Vault

1 Past in Flames
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Tendrils of Agony

4 Ponder
4 Brainstorm
4 Gitaxian Probe
1 Preordain
1 Sensei's Divining Top

3 Duress
4 Cabal therapy

Sideboard:

1 Tropical Island (Should this be main now removing either an Island or the Badlands, I often find Badlands pretty useless)
1 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Flusterstorm
2 Dread of night
2 Massacre (Maybe 1?)
2 Chain of Vapor (Maybe 3?)
2 Xantid Swarm (Maybe 3?)
3 Abrupt Decay

The decks i know of that will be there out of around total 15-18 are:

1x BUG Delver
1x Death and Taxes
1x MUD
1x Pox
1x Nic Fit (BUG)
1x Painter Grindstone
1x Esper Blade
1x Enchantress
1-2x Reanimator
2x Elves
2x Miracles

Should I maybe put empty in the main in case of Leyline from Enchantress or would a main decked chain be good vs MUD, Enchantress, Reanimator and Painter?

Also since I have a high chance of facing MUD would boarding a Hurkyl's Recall be appropriate or is there a better one of? I have played against most of these decks a lot and have a winning record against pretty much all of them (beat Pox 8 games in a row before we stopped) but I don't know if I have ever beaten MUD. Should I just hope he dies to Delver/Esper blade/Pox and fade it or is it worth it for a one of?

Since it's a friendly tournament I will try and post a report afterwards but its still a few weeks or so off.

Thanks in advance :)

JamieW89

08-28-2014, 07:51 PM

I would play 2 green duals main, you want to board 3 Decays versus wasteland decks. For this I'd cut Island#2 and Badlands.
I don't like Lim-Dul's Vault (each time I try it dissapoints), but I assume you have no Grim Tutor to replace it with, maybe a second Preordain is better.
I think I'd play Ad Nauseam main and Empty side (or not at all).
I'd consider boarding 2 Hurkyl's Recall, it's solid versus Painter, DnT (Canonist+Revoker+Vial), MUD. MUD will still be negative probably, but you might just win.
I also like Needle in that metagame, for Painter and Miracles mainly.

SB:
3 Abrupt Decay (DnT,MUD,Painter,Miracles,Enchantress maybe?)
2 Chain of Vapor (Elves,DnT,MUD,Enchantress,Reanimate etc, 1-2 vs Blade if hatebears)
2 Hurkyl's Recall (DnT,MUD,Painter)
2 Xantid Swarm (Miracles,Reanimate)
2 Flusterstorm (BUG,Pox,Esper Blade/reanimate maybe, possibly Elves on the play)
2 Pithing Needle (on SDT vs Miracles, on combo vs Painter, perhaps on Griseldaddy vs Reanimate)
1 Karakas (for DnT, Reanimator & maybe Elves)
1 Open Slot (could be SDT#2 but makes the needles a bit worse, could be Empty, could be more of the previous etc.)

Jin Gitaxias

08-29-2014, 12:42 AM

I agree with Jamie, but i would turn the remaining open slot into the 3rd swarm and board it in vs miracles, because you really want it before they reanimate a griselbrand (if they get iona you are dead game 1 no matter what). I would not board in flusterstorms, because it makes you too slow.

Sloshthedark

08-29-2014, 04:20 AM

Unlike Jamie I kind of like LDV along SDT (but the deck gets way harder to play optimaly )

so
A, I'd cut Preordain for another SDT, weakens Pithing Needle sideboard which is great for the meta imo, -Island, -Badlands, +Trop +Bayou
B, my personal choice +EtW -AN , -SDT +PIF, -Island +fetch
C, just the 2 G land switch

SB - I like what Jamie proposed - I'd not be afraid to cut 2 XS in that (this way you could even -Badlands +Trop, -Island +fetch) for Needle plan +EtW (I like that vs. MUD, D+T) ... and if you're bold slot X could be Pernicious Deed (or 2 without EtW)... also Extirpate or Massacre can be that slot

[QUOTE=JamieW89;830955]
[I]
SB:
3 Abrupt Decay (DnT,MUD,Painter,Miracles,Enchantress maybe? (do not like much))
2 Chain of Vapor (Elves,DnT,MUD,Enchantress,Reanimate etc, 1-2 vs Blade if hatebears)
2 Hurkyl's Recall (DnT,MUD,Painter)
2 Flusterstorm (BUG,Pox,Esper Blade/reanimate maybe, possibly Elves on the play (sounds weird but maybe))
3 Pithing Needle (3x on SDT vs Miracles, 3x on combo vs Painter, 3x Griseldaddy, 2-3x Enchantress (Sterling Grove), 2x Elves no sb Flusterstorm )
1 Karakas (for DnT, Reanimator & Elves)

1 Pernicious Deed (MUD, Enchantress, Painter, Miracles)
1 Empty the Warrens (possibly everything :D ) or open

[I]2 Xantid Swarm (Miracles,Reanimate)

Togores

08-29-2014, 09:42 AM

Every time that i have played lim duls vault in a deck, cefalid breakfast and nauseam. I found the card really bad. Before ldv i would play grim tutor or burning wish. And also think both are not good enought. So i would just go without.
Its the worst to draw a ldv turn before loosing and not being able to get the card directly. Also paying 2 mana for pure card disadvantage is shitt. I rather pay 3 and doomsday me the perfect win.

Hivenet

08-29-2014, 12:15 PM

nevilshute

08-29-2014, 03:03 PM

I have used EtW in modern but havent really touched it with this deck, in what match ups should i look to play it g1 and when should I board it (Sorry EtW noob). The idea of 2 past in flames in a meta with very few deathrites sounds interesting especially since elves is already a good matchup.

I do really like LDV especially with SDT and the fact opponents tend not to value it correctly. I was thinking maybe replace the badlands with a trop main but im not sure about the bayou, the second island has been great vs wasteland and blood moon so I may keep that in.

Karakas seems fantastic, can replace the boarded trop with that. Pithing needle great, is nice against DnT and means I dont need DoN.

So really im just undecided on the empty. Any further information?

Thanks :)

Empty the Warrens is primarily strong against RUG Delver and similar tempo strategies. It is also good against BUG Delver for instance. If you resolve 10-12 goblins on turn 1-2 against RUG Delver they're dead in like 9/10 cases. Often, 8 Goblins is enough on turn 1, at least on the play.

Empty is conditionally also very strong against many other strategies while only being decidedly weak against other combo decks. Some people won't play Empty against decks with Stoneforge Mystic which is fair, but I still like it in some of those matchups. You can often power out a 10-12 empty before stoneforge becomes relevant or you can clear the way with a Cabal Therapy that can now be flashbacked.

Ricca84

08-30-2014, 04:04 AM

wonderPreaux

08-30-2014, 04:18 AM

ok time to crazy ideas..

https://www.magiccardmarket.eu/Products/Singles/New+Phyrexia/img/d6625b41a6e8155f74b99102d0dbee5d/cards/New_Phyrexia/phyrexian_obliterator.jpg

Maybe vs deck that attack us from too many angles, we can try a little trasformational side with this card.
For example vs BUG Control / team America this is a good stuff ( only liliana can kill him)

For sure it's only an idea, do you think could be insane... or insane is only my brain :D ?

against BUG, one of the big issues is discard, and being at 4 mana means that this often wouldn't be appearing until the opponent has at least had the chance to thoughtseize. shardless has strix/maelstrom pulse (arguably toxic deluge) to deal with this, and delver has daze to make it awkward to cast, so both variants can give you trouble. i think, if you want a man-plan, the pyromancer would likely be better, as your discard can pivot to go after -1/-1 effects and you can just pressure them to the point where their discard and taxing counters arent as good.

Togores

08-30-2014, 06:38 AM

The good thing is that obliterator can be casted from a ritual and a land but if they force is still 2x2 cause is strange to cast it from 4 lands. I think if i would like to test a 4cc guy if would be talrand.
Making like with 3 landa dark ritual. Dures. Tallrand. Or talrand and beeing able to pay for daze seems huge. But stil a 4cc card...
The this that sharless plays strix and deluge should not be a problem. I would see more a problem for obliterator a jace or liliana.

Sloshthedark

08-30-2014, 07:42 AM

if you aim for manplan just 4 Obliterators is not enough, outside of planeswalkers you can simply get raced so Obliterator often translates into "your Goyfs cannot attack until I'm dead"...you need plan like this http://www.tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=14458&iddeck=106776 maybe feat. Tombstalker... and obv. you face the same "tech" problem once it is known the plan gets significantly worse.... but time to time this could work well... I've some foil Talrands ordered just to test them, but I don't even bother to get them asian, same with the other manplans, it's just to fragile and I don't play Storm for creature beatdown...

Surfinbird

08-30-2014, 12:20 PM

talking about manplans... what about pack rats?

Sloshthedark

08-30-2014, 01:12 PM

talking about manplans... what about pack rats?

maybe without the "discard a card" and lower activation, seems too all-in, low impact and requires too many resources to get reasonable size to not be too fragile

Togores

08-30-2014, 01:57 PM

I tested pack rat. And was not good.
You started needing 3 basics in your deck to not loose vs a wasteland so easy (i think more that 2 basics are waste of space. Cause you need the doubles so u cut a fetch).
And when your commit to the rat plan your other plans get bad. You just stop investing in storm to invest in rats. And you can usualy just make a rat per turn. So facing a tarmo or a delver. U would need to many turns to race it.

Ghiwo

09-03-2014, 05:49 AM

Has someone before me tested Divert as an alternative to Flusterstorm? I see Flusterstorm maybe better, is a pretty defensive card especially when addressing discard and stifles. Divert interests me for its "aggressive" way of interaction, redirecting an Hymn to Tourach, or a Thoughtseize seems huge to me. The problem is that it doesn't take Stifles. Which one would you prefer in a metagame full of Team America and Miracles, which is the one I expect to be at the Ovino? I'm testing both right now, so I'll let you know also my opinions.

Togores

09-03-2014, 06:25 AM

JamieW89

09-03-2014, 03:00 PM

I've been playing 1 Fluster 1-2 Divert most of the time, since I don't feel the need for the 2nd/3rd Flusterstorm usually and Divert is better versus BUG and Jund and the like. Hymn is the key card in the BUG Delver matchup, and Divert hits it quite well. The main disadvantages to Flusterstorm are being worse vs combo and Stifle/Flusterstorm out of RUG where Flusterstorm can defend a storm spell from hand or a fetchland easier (or even counter Rough//Tumble).

sawatarix

09-03-2014, 07:15 PM

in my opinion divert is a situational card.it hits a hymn quite well but sometimes it also doesn't do anything.
i wouldn't even board any of those cards which could be dead sometimes.
remember, every card we board out from the maindeck weakens the deck.

by the way,i booked for Ovino and Prage Eternal this fall, who will be there?

Togores

09-03-2014, 10:11 PM

Sloshthedark

09-04-2014, 05:22 AM

Divert is too narrow imo (and I'm not playing Flusterstorm anyway)

in my opinion divert is a situational card.it hits a hymn quite well but sometimes it also doesn't do anything.
i wouldn't even board any of those cards which could be dead sometimes.
remember, every card we board out from the maindeck weakens the deck.

by the way,i booked for Ovino and Prage Eternal this fall, who will be there?

Me and 3 (the 2 top8 guys from PE + the one grixis you played R2) (Th-Su) + 4 vintage specialists feat Zuzy (Fr-Mo) are staying in the B&B Sesto Martelli (https://www.google.com/maps/place/B%26B+Hotel+Milano+-+Sesto/@45.5242271,9.2285903,1062m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m18!1m15!4m14!1m6!1m2!1s0x4786c760c35c235d:0x6d779e1a4fe1874c!2sB%26B+Hotel+Milano+-+Sesto,+Viale+Ercole+Marelli+303,+20099+Sesto+San+Giovanni+Milano,+Italy!2m2!1d9.229346!2d45.526918!1m6!1m2!1s0x4786c742bb9d117d:0x8ec325728443c325!2sVia+Sant'Uguzzone,+20126+Milano,+Italy!2m2!1d9.2248197!2d45.5206396!3m1!1s0x4786c760c35c235d:0x6d779e1a4fe1874c)

PE is my backyard so unless I get crazy to fly to GP NJ... btw. the new site is awesome

edit: what about the Dannish champs Nevilshute wrote about? - I've missed my cheap flight opportunity, but might get there if someone of the Ovino guys joins me

CabalTherapy

09-04-2014, 02:19 PM

edit: what about the Dannish champs Nevilshute wrote about? - I've missed my cheap flight opportunity, but might get there if someone of the Ovino guys joins me

Actually, Kai and I are opting to attend this tournament and to dominate with ANT.

Surfinbird

09-05-2014, 03:59 AM

nevilshute

09-05-2014, 05:29 AM

Divert is too narrow imo (and I'm not playing Flusterstorm anyway)

Me and 3 (the 2 top8 guys from PE + the one grixis you played R2) (Th-Su) + 4 vintage specialists feat Zuzy (Fr-Mo) are staying in the B&B Sesto Martelli (https://www.google.com/maps/place/B%26B+Hotel+Milano+-+Sesto/@45.5242271,9.2285903,1062m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m18!1m15!4m14!1m6!1m2!1s0x4786c760c35c235d:0x6d779e1a4fe1874c!2sB%26B+Hotel+Milano+-+Sesto,+Viale+Ercole+Marelli+303,+20099+Sesto+San+Giovanni+Milano,+Italy!2m2!1d9.229346!2d45.526918!1m6!1m2!1s0x4786c742bb9d117d:0x8ec325728443c325!2sVia+Sant'Uguzzone,+20126+Milano,+Italy!2m2!1d9.2248197!2d45.5206396!3m1!1s0x4786c760c35c235d:0x6d779e1a4fe1874c)

PE is my backyard so unless I get crazy to fly to GP NJ... btw. the new site is awesome

edit: what about the Dannish champs Nevilshute wrote about? - I've missed my cheap flight opportunity, but might get there if someone of the Ovino guys joins me

I'm happy you are considering going Slosh!

For any information you can check out the DLM (Danish Legacy Masters) on facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DanishLegacyMasters

I have just posted the prize structure today :smile:

Ghiwo

09-05-2014, 05:56 AM

Divert does affect stifles. I have been playing 3x in sneak and show since a lot of time. You need a blue source. And a fetch. When opp activates his fetch just fetch in response. If they stifle you divert. This can also happens so: opp activates drs fetch stifle the drs. Or you fetch. Stifle and tap sensei to draw and redirect the stifle there. Like fluster u just have to make your plays come to that sceanrio.

That's right, and I didn't figure it out. That's why tips from better players are so helpful :tongue:

Talking about better players, Kai and Jamie, wouldn't you run Flusterstorms/Divert in 2 copies in the board in order to fight Team America? I know that our maindeck configuration is already prepared to fight it, but, following Carsten's upgrade-our-tools theory, I was thinking about a 2-of to improve this match-up, which I expect to be so popular at the Ovino (I'm Italian, so I have an idea of the metagame here). Because they cut their dead cards to bring in even more hate, so I'd like to "react". I think that this is our worse match-up, maybe only for me, so I'm testing it extensively trying to improve my ability to beat it.

Thanks a lot everybody for your help!

Dragonslayer_90

09-05-2014, 09:46 AM

Hi guys! Which is the best way to side against UWR delver and Deathblade? As Robert, i don't like siding in to many cards, so sometimes i feel unsure about boarding in 3 xantids +2 massacre +1 chain of vapor...

In my meta Deathblade is the most played deck, usually with 7 counterspells maindeck and 5 more in G2 and G3. I've thought that maybe the best way to side against this matchup could be just adding 2 Massacre and 2 Cabal therapy (4 Duress +2 therapy in MD). And against patriot, more or less the same... what do you think? In my maindeck i'm running 3 preordains and 1 personal tutor (works like the 5th infernal and can look for discard or others in some cases).

So my sideboard could be like this:

3 Abrupt decay
3 Xantid swarm (just against combo, miracles and merfolks)
2 Dread of night
2 Massacre
2 Chain of vapor
2 Cabal therapy
1 Empty the Warrens (It's worked porperly against team america, but i'm still not sure about this one).

My questions are:

1. Should I side in xantids against Canadian, UWR Delver and Deathblade? Or is it better to just side in extra discard spells?

2. Which is the best maindeck configuration? I'm not a fan of sensei's divining top and i like playing the personal tutor to have less probabilities of losing to not finding the tutor. Should i play the 7th discard spell MD?

3. Which is the best way to beat BUG Delver? Empty the Warrens works... sometimes.

Thanks for helping!

1. I am hesistant to side in Xantid against decks with wasteland. I think Extra discard is probably better. Depends on the deck's board plan. If they are upping their counterspell count to a point that is more you can handle then maybe bring in Xantid then.

2. There is no consensus best list yet. It all depends on meta and playstyle. If you don't want to play top you could play a grim tutor and 7th discard spell like CabalTherapy does. I haven't tested with Personal Tutor so I have nothing to say there. If you want to play it I suggest testing with it a lot before taking it to a big tournament.

3. Go faster than they can handle. They are rather counter light compared to other Delver decks so if you can go off turn one or two before they cast hymn you will probably win. When you can't fast combo them you will have to grind, which is a very feasible plan when you have Sensei's Divining Top in your list.

I was wondering are any of you European Storm players coming to the States for GP NJ? Come teach these dumb Americans Storm's not dead! :laugh:

Surfinbird

09-05-2014, 03:28 PM

I won't go no this GP, i'm only 18 (since 16 playing ANT!) so I haven't got money hahahaha. But i'll try to go to the GP Lille in July!

I'm competing in the catalan league of legacy (1 tournament every month till november, between 70 and 150 players depending on the city where it's celebrated) and after the first 8 months i'm the 3rd :D I'll try to crush the next 3 tournaments to end up winning the league! Here is the ranking: http://www.eternalcatala.com/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=2560

Surfinbird

09-05-2014, 05:08 PM

I'm a bit desperated to find an alternative wincon to beat team america and i've found this:

https://scontent-a-vie.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xfa1/v/t1.0-9/10404246_374667702680653_5387133663611269002_n.jpg?oh=b778532e8a79b84151d5170349127b93&oe=5485AF64

I don't think it works, but I post it anyways:rolleyes:

Sloshthedark

09-05-2014, 05:54 PM

Nevishute - I'd really like to attend, but money, right after Ovino, blablabla... will see..

Dragonslayer - dunno might be a few, the group I was aware of there was none

Surfinbird -

1. I prefer just Canadian Threshold, UWR has more important permanent hate than counters, Deathblade - just Fow+randoms soft, has Liliana, potentinaly Clique = why?

2. the one you feel best with

3. there is no clear answer, I like EtW and Needle to some extent, I started testing Talrand - awfuly hard to cast, ends game in 2 turns if you untap with it, probably not worth it

The new Empty potentionaly nets you ~5 zombies T2 if things go very good (which means win through PiF in vast majority of times anyway), those do not die to Golgari Charm, but are too few and easily blocked, storm independence is nice but the spell is very hungry and likely improves the deck just in few cornercases

Surfinbird

09-05-2014, 06:46 PM

Togores

09-05-2014, 07:09 PM

I was wondering are any of you European Storm players coming to the States for GP NJ? Come teach these dumb Americans Storm's not dead! :laugh:

I will travel with a few friends to Usa in october to play scg Worcester and eternal weekend in philadefia, just to take both events by storm by ease :D

iamajellydonut

09-05-2014, 07:20 PM

I will travel with a few friends to Usa in october to play scg Worcester and eternal weekend in philadefia, just to take both events by storm by ease :D

And I will play against you round one and dream crush.

Seriously though, it will be nice to have some ANT around this area. I wasn't exaggerating with the examples in my earlier post.

CabalTherapy

09-07-2014, 03:54 AM

Deathblade players in my metagame are running 4 Fows + 3 spell pierce MD plus 3 flusterstorm and 2 swan song in the sideboard, but i think i can beath them with 4 Duress and 4 cabal therapy:)

Now i'm running this sideboard:

3 Xantid Swarm
3 Dread of night
3 Abrupt decay
2 Chain of vapor
2 Massacre (maybe the 2n one should be another chain of vapor? I love them against UWR delver, Deathblade and thalia decks, but the combination with AN is a problem)
1 Cabal therapy
1 empty the warrens

I am a fan of the 3 Chain/1 Massacre configuration, however, my Grim Tutor allows for copying Massacre. Not sure if you need Dread of Nights because 3 Chains function in a similar way.

In the MD i'm running 2 preordains, 1 personal tutor and the 3rd therapy (so 7 discard spells)

The list is working pretty good and i'll keep it like this for the next tournaments. I'll side like this:

UGR threshold:

+3 xantid +1 cabal therapy + 1 empty the warrens
- 4 gitaxian probe -1 cabal ritual

They don't have a chance to interact with our hand, but I see Xantid Swarm as a easy target for Lightning Bolt. EtW and Therapies are very good here.
On the other hand, I won't board out the full set of Probes because they a very valuable if the opponent is short on counter. You can spot free zones with Probe.
But I guess Xantid Swarm may do some good work, too.

Team America:

+1 Empty the warrens
-1 gitaxian probe

Looks solid. I like Chain of Vapor here (and of course SDT) because it can bounce stuff like Deathrite, Null Rod. End of turn a nice Chain of Deathrite and in turn the usual Pif-Loop is a nice way to win.

UWR Delver:

+2 Massacre +1 Cabal therapy + 1 chain of vapor
-2 gitaxian probe -1 preordain -1 cabal ritual

Maybe you can switch one Duress for one Therapy in order to maintain the 7 discard spells. With your SB something like this:
+2 Massacre, +1 Therapy, +2 Chain of Vapor
-1 Duress, -1 Cabal Ritual, -1 Gitaxian Probe, -1 Lotus Petal (we don't have to win fast here), -1 Preordain

Deathblade:

+ 2 Massacre +1 chain of vapor +1 cabal therapy
- 2 gitaxian probe -1 cabal ritual -1 lotus petal

Looks good. Maybe again: -1 Duress and keep 3 Probes in the main.

Do you think it's correct?

Sloshthedark

09-07-2014, 06:19 AM

Deathblade players in my metagame are running 4 Fows + 3 spell pierce MD plus 3 flusterstorm and 2 swan song in the sideboard, but i think i can beath them with 4 Duress and 4 cabal therapy:)

that makes more sense then

Now i'm running this sideboard:

3 Xantid Swarm
3 Dread of night
3 Abrupt decay
2 Chain of vapor
2 Massacre (maybe the 2n one should be another chain of vapor? I love them against UWR delver, Deathblade and thalia decks, but the combination with AN is a problem)
1 Cabal therapy
1 empty the warrens

In the MD i'm running 2 preordains, 1 personal tutor and the 3rd therapy (so 7 discard spells)

The list is working pretty good and i'll keep it like this for the next tournaments. I'll side like this:

UGR threshold:

+3 xantid +1 cabal therapy + 1 empty the warrens
- 4 gitaxian probe -1 cabal ritual

Probes below 3 is something you don't usualy want, 2 or less really bad you never go bellow 2 in ~standard list , -4 GP that was back in the days GP as release and people were sceptical even playing it
yours -1 GP, -Personal Tutor (U and disadvantagev), -2 Duress (XS is interchangable), -CR or Preordain for me

Team America:

+1 Empty the warrens
-1 gitaxian probe

or -CR, but with EtW definitely +CT -Duress

UWR Delver:

+2 Massacre +1 Cabal therapy + 1 chain of vapor
-2 gitaxian probe -1 preordain -1 cabal ritual

yours +CoV, +GP, +EtW, -Preordain, -Personal Tutor, -Duress

Deathblade:

+ 2 Massacre +1 chain of vapor +1 cabal therapy
- 2 gitaxian probe -1 cabal ritual -1 lotus petal

the same as UWR maybe +PT, depends on if permanents/counters are in their SB, I find it really hard to tell, XS may be reasonable

Do you think it's correct?

Hivenet

09-07-2014, 11:16 AM

I'm having some real problems with Miracles at the moment (aren't we all). My current sideboard for an unknown meta (outside the fact miracles is very popular in the uk) is as follows:

1 Tropical Island
3 Chain of Vapor
3 Abrupt Decay
1 Slaughter Pact
2 Flusterstorm
1 Tormod's Crypt (There is a lot of dredge too)
3 Xantid Swarm
1 Massacre

What should I be siding in/out of a stock storm list for what against them. Should I side out the Duresses for Xantids or keep it all in for more disruption and take out pre ordains?

Cheers

sawatarix

09-07-2014, 11:31 AM

what you actually do is to side in your Xantid Swarms and Abrupt Decays.
take out some number of cabal ritual(s) and lotus peral(s) and also a few copies of theraphies.

we do have access to a lot more powerful cards against miracle control,namely senseis devining top and young pyromancer (i still have him in my sideboard because of the blowout potential)

CabalTherapy

09-07-2014, 04:19 PM

This Jund against ANT is so sad. :( @SCGSTL
WTF was that?

Sloshthedark

09-07-2014, 04:27 PM

This Jund against ANT is so sad. :( @SCGSTL
WTF was that?

clowns, G3 with appropriete ending...

CabalTherapy

09-07-2014, 04:35 PM

clowns

I mean seriously, c'mon. This round was just a joke. This Ad Nauseam flip in the third match and the Grim Tutor/Chain of Vapor play were comical.

Sloshthedark

09-07-2014, 04:36 PM

I mean seriously, c'mon. This round was just a joke. This Ad Nauseam flip in the third match and the Grim Tutor/Chain of Vapor play were comical.

he also lost G1 to himself weren't opp galant enough to pay 0 attention and scoop

Surfinbird

09-07-2014, 05:46 PM

Hi guys!

Today I've been in a 4-round tournament in a local shop and i've won it after a 3-0-1. There is a little report:

My list was the normal one but with 2 preordains and a personal tutor. 4 Duress and 3 cabal therapies as discard spells. My sideboard was:

3 Xantdi Swarm
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Chain of vapor
2 Massacre
2 Tormod's crypt
1 Cabal therapy
1 Empty the Warrens

I expected reanimator and i supposed it wouldn't be any Death and taxes, so i changed 3 Dread of night for 2 Tormod's and teh third chain.

1. UR Delver 2-0

G1: After assembling my mana base despite a stifle and a wasteland i discarded a FoW and an Spell Snare to win through Daze and Spell Pierce before his Young pyromancer played on turn 4-5 killed me in the next turn.

In: 3 Xantid swarm (He's got a building similar tu UGr so i can imagine he's only got 4 bolts)
Out: 1 Gitaxian probe, 1 cabal ritual, 1 preordain

G2: My turn 1 xantid was countered by a Force of will and he played a Pyromancer the next turn. I won 3 or 4 turns later after discarding some counterspells.

2. Miracle control 1-1

G1: I sculpt my hand without seeing any discard spells but with a Pif, infernal and lots of mana which should be enough to win through 2-3 counterspells. The turn before i go off he topdecked a counterbalance and stopped me with brainstorms and jace. At the end, i lost against an snapcaster and a vendilion.

In: 3 Xantid Swarm, 3 Abrupt decay, 2 Chain of vapor (He's playing 4 leylines in sideboard, fucking fascist:cry:)
Out: 2 Cabal ritual, 1 Lotus petal, 1 Swamp, 2 Gitaxian probe, 1 Preordain, 1 Cabal therapy

G2: He starts with Leyline and a FoW to my turn 1 Xantid Swarm. Nice. He played top but not a counterbalance. I sculpt a hand with Tendrils, Cabal ritual, infernal tutor and 3 LEDs waiting to find a chain of vapor. I found and copied it with infernal tutor to not loose against a counterspell. Then i played my artifacts, chained them and leyline (the first chain got countered) and won with natural tendrils through his flusetrstorm thanks to the multiple LEDs.

Unfortunately, we didnt have time to play the 3rd match.

3. Painters 2-1

G1: Beeing on the play, i kept a hand with Dark ritual, Cabal ritual, Infernal tutor, LED, Duress, and 2 Gitaxian probe (I knew what he was playing). I didn't see a land in the next 5 draws and he milled me with grindstone.

In: 3 Abrupt Decay, 3 chain of vapor
Out: 1 Personal tutor, 1 Underground sea, 1 cabal ritual, 1 preordain, 2 gitaxian probe (Now i think that maybe I should have taken a Duress out instead of the second probe, but not sure since i want to discard his combo pieces and also lots of hate cards)

G2: I went off in my second turn after discarding his thorn of amethyst.

G3: I kept a hand with 1 Island, 1 Swamp, 1 underground sea, 1 Bloodstained Mire, 1 Duress, 1 Chain of vapor, 1 Dark ritual. Probably a bad hand, but i kept it after considering it would save me against T1 blood moons and early turn combos. My oponent started with T1 city of traitors, chrome mox and blood moon:tongue: I played swamp into Duress to take his grindstone, leaving him with only a painter's servant. I played for a couple of turns holding the chain and a decay (lotus petal in board) to prevent him form winning, and in the end i went of after decaying a trinisphere.

4. Junk 2-1

G1. I killed him in T1 after with 2 LEDs, 2 DR and Ad Nauseam.

In: +3 abrupt decay +3 chain of vapor +2 Massacre (Lots of removal for DRS, Gaddock teeg, Spirit of the labyrinth, Mother of runes and Ethersworn canonist)
Out: 4 Duress, 1 Cabal therapy, 1 cabal ritual, 1 preordain, 1 gitaxian probe

G2: He played a turn 2 Ethersworn canonist and turn 3 Gaddock Teeg. I sculpt my hand as in the second game against miracles to combo via chain of vapor, but my oponent topdecked a thoughtseize the turn before could go off and took my 2nd chain of vapor:(

G3: After decaying a Gaddock teeg i played an Ad Nauseam and stopped at 5 life after revealing Massacre,Abrupt decay, chain of vapor and lots of mana (but not lotus petal to start with), a brainstorm and a ponder but no infernal tutor. I massacred their confidant and stoneforge mystic leaving him a hand with only equipment and lands and i kept decay and chain of vapor to survive while digging for a tutor. I found it with tutor and won without problems.

I'm vary satisfied with the work of the last days and with the advice you've given to me, specially Slothofthedark and Cabal Therapy (I found your articles abaout storm very interesting and helpful:smile:). I'm stll unsure about some sideboard slots, but i'll keep working!

Also, i want to say that i'm quite happy with the Personal tutor working as a 5th Infernal. Playing more than one would be an error since seeing 2 of them in hand is horrible and having one when you already have an Infernal is sometimes a bit clunky (but then you can use your infernal to copy a ritual and PT to look for PiF!). In this tournament it helped me to assemble the combo as well as winning after Ad Nauseam.

I'm interested in your opinions, so keep talking and storming!

nevilshute

09-08-2014, 02:55 AM

he also lost G1 to himself weren't opp galant enough to pay 0 attention and scoop

Just watching it now... makes me wish even more that I was able to get over to America and play in some Opens :wink:

CabalTherapy

09-08-2014, 04:00 AM

he also lost G1 to himself weren't opp galant enough to pay 0 attention and scoop

The best move was nonetheless discarding the only kill-spell ToA because of Liliana against an active Deathrite Shaman.
Maybe he thought that he can win the race with his Confidants. :laugh:
Edit: Ah, the Shaman was played afterwards. I see.
And he still got 14th place. Thumbs up for this one.

I'm vary satisfied with the work of the last days and with the advice you've given to me, specially Slothofthedark and Cabal Therapy (I found your articles abaout storm very interesting and helpful:smile:). I'm stll unsure about some sideboard slots, but i'll keep working!

Thanks. Nice report and keep up the good work.

Sloshthedark

09-08-2014, 05:47 AM

The best move was nonetheless discarding the only kill-spell ToA because of Liliana against an active Deathrite Shaman.
Maybe he thought that he can win the race with his Confidants. :laugh:
Edit: Ah, the Shaman was played afterwards. I see.
And he still got 14th place. Thumbs up for this one.

Thanks. Nice report and keep up the good work.

yeah I wanted to add "and he'll top 16 nonetheless" but found it not worth the time for editing and improbable... and here we have him :D

makes me want to play in US, but I'm sure I'd lose to random kid with Burn just because... This can happen on camera, nervous and such, you lose track of lifes, I'm sure this has happend with GT to me too, but overall impression is really sad even comical... The thing is I can't remember a good Ant player on SCG streams, like literary every one made dumb mistakes... well maybe Rill wasn't that bad and Hunter Wilson you may say but I don't think he was on the stream outside of Invitational...

Surfinbird - nice report

P-E

09-08-2014, 06:44 AM

ahah it was funny to watch afterall ^^

Good job surfing bird

AsmodeusDM

09-08-2014, 11:20 AM

After a lot of Land decks started showing up a bunch of people in my local meta have shown up with Burn lists....

I always remember this being a fairly positive match-up for ANT....

Yesterday in 4 rounds I played Burn 3 times... and lost all 3 burn matches 0-6.

The culprit in many games was a turn 2 Eidolon of the Great Revel...

Between that card and the usual damage pressure.. I felt it was impossible to ever get to enough storm to combo off without killing myself.

My sideboard (aside from CoV) was not remotely prepared for this amount of burn? Any sideboard suggetsions?

My list:
3 Underground Seas
1 Volcanic Island
2 Islands
1 Swamp
4 Polluted Delta
4 Scalding Tarn

4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
2 Preordain
1 Sensei's Divining Top

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

4 Cabal Therapy
3 Duress

4 Infernal Tutor
1 Past In Flames
1 Ad Nauseum
1 Tendrils of Agony

s//b:
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Chain of Vapor
1 Tropical Island
1 Karakas
3 Xantid Swarms
1 Thoughtseize
2 Massacre
1 Empty the Warrens
1 Dread of Night

Togores

09-08-2014, 11:57 AM

AsmodeusDM

09-08-2014, 12:01 PM

Usualy I beat always burn, I usualy side out duress, sensei and ant nauseam. to side in chains, and my secodn tendrill and the rest of the cards i can in the form of decay. I also when starting dosnt therapy turn 1 I wait to make it turn 2. because so they only have 1 draw to get it.

Yeah I had 1 game where I therapy'd T1 (on draw) and another where I t2 therapy'd (on play) naming Eidolon... in both games no hit; and then top deck the very next turn!

Still.. it does seem like a very strong card against us.. especially game1 and they are running 4 of ... I have no answer game 1 to an eidolon at all.

Togores

09-08-2014, 12:55 PM

çu dont have an aswer like to a canonist or tegg. just race this decks, hope they dont draw or discard the thread. It will not always happen that they draw it.

wonderPreaux

09-08-2014, 01:02 PM

Another tactic to use is Empty the Warrens, if you can go off before their Eidolon for ~12 Goblins, you can just retire from playing spells for the rest of the game. If your Goblins force them not to play the Eidolon, since it's so bad when they're behind on board, you can then aggressively Therapy their creatures/burn spells to win the race, and also Abrupt Decay blockers.

sawatarix

09-08-2014, 06:09 PM

excuse me but there must be a misunderstanding:
burn is by far one of our best matchups ever,similar to elves.

they don't do anything relevant all the time.eidolon is the only theraphy target during all games and even if it hits the battlefield we have answers like chain of vapour/void snare (if you play burning wish)/abrupt decay/krosan grip/chain lightning (burning wish) to get rid of it.
notice that tendrils of agony is also a lifegain machine so you can even win while facing an eidolon.

ad nauseam against burn decks is really poor,especially if they have 2 mountains ->fireblast.
tutor chains and pif-loops are the way to go and they have no interaction.

honestly don't really know where the problem :D

nevilshute

09-09-2014, 05:09 AM

There's no doubt that Eidolon has given burn an "oops-I-win" ability against storm that it didn't have before, but I have to second what Kai is saying, in that Burn is still a pretty good matchup for us.

I would consider storm the favorite, though not a huge favorite. In a sense it feels very comparable to Elves in that it's a slower combo deck. It used to be that neither Burn nor Elves had any main deck way to disrupt us, which basically meant we were goldfishing against a slower combo deck - hence we were/are clear favorites. That doesn't mean that we can't lose. We are playing Magic after all.

Well Elves got Deathrite Shaman (and to a lesser extent Ruric Thar) as main deck ways of disruption and now Burn has got the Eidolon. I play 4 Cabal Therapies and that just seems to be more than enough to combat 4 out of 60 cards in a deck that has no way to tutor or manipulate. Yes, occasionally I will lose a game to Eidolon, but more often I just win. Either by therapying it on my first turn, or by them simply not having it.

I'm down to boarding in one Chain of Vapor against them, and I've even started to sometimes just not board in anything. The chance of randomly having my Chain in hand when they drop the Eidolon is very slim and even casting 2 cantrips to search for it usually means we lose.

I am always happy to face both Burn and Elves.

With that said, there are some Burn players (at least on mtgo) that really don't like losing to storm so they pack 4 Pyrostatic Pillar in the board on top of the Eidolons. But that is the exception rather than the norm I think.

AsmodeusDM

09-09-2014, 12:52 PM

I agree that match-up feels like it should be in our favor... but in certainly didn't feel that way for me Sunday.

Between D&T, Burn, and Elves dominating in my meta; that's why I'm almost always packing 4 Therapies and only 3 duress... I need to be able to hit those creatures!

Togores

09-09-2014, 01:10 PM

Just saw the round 6 of the last scg, jund vs ant. The ant guy just trows the 2nd game out the window for not going for ant with 2 leds a rit and a infernal.

phazonmutant

09-09-2014, 05:22 PM

Haven't had too much time to play lately, but made it out to a 30ish person local with a build similar to Slosh's. No Ad Naus main, 2 PiF, 1 Empty, 1 Grapeshot, 1 Tendrils, 6 discard, no Preordain, Tops, 2 Grim Tutor.

I did play some very grindy games, so the name Grinding Station is certainly fitting. R1 I lost to UG Infect who ripped insanely well - drawing a second Force for my attempt to off, then a Daze (out of Daze and Pierce as outs) for my re-attempt the next turn is an example. R2 played against Esperblade, had some very interesting games that all went long. Lost to not playing my LED t1 and then stumbling while he drew interaction. R3 lost to Maverick 0-2 who had several opportunities to GSZ for Teeg g1, declined, and still killed me. Dropped at a miserable 0-3. I didn't play particularly well, but did get a good feel for the list.

Overall I'd say I didn't like the second Grim Tutor and I boarded out the second Past in Flames pretty often to be more resilient to graveyard hate. There were several times when I drew a Grim Tutor or a redundant business spell and wished it were a Preordain or Top. Grapeshot was very good. It was awkward only once g2 against infect where he had an Inkmoth and I had to dump it for no value to get hellbent. Otherwise excellent. G1 against Esperblade I had a very weak hand, but I knew his hand didn't have much pressure. So I hid Grapeshot on top with a Brainstorm, he Snapcastered Thoughtseize, and I was able to Probe into Grapeshot to kill his Strix and Snapcaster, leaving him with nothing. That gave me enough time to grind through double Force, Spell Pierce, and double Thoughtseize, ending with flashing back Past in Flames and Grapeshot for 11. I didn't have enough mana to tutor for Tendrils, so Grapeshot was good - bought like 6 turns and killed him. Against Maverick I nuked his board of Mom, Deathrite, Thalia, and Dryad Arbor that was lethal in 2 turns, but had to blow my hand to do it. He killed me before I drew Past in Flames.

wonderPreaux

09-09-2014, 11:57 PM

I'd be interested to see your 75. I'm also testing Slosh's list, I have 2 PiF, 2 Tendrils, 1 Top/Grim, 6 discard, no preordain, no grapeshot. i've been enjoying it a lot, but i've been tinkering with trying to fit a 2nd top and maybe some sort of removal ability. like bolt or grapeshot. how do you like to board with your list? i find it pretty hard beyond the occasional removal of 2nd Tendrils/PiF/EtW or 4th petal/cabal/ponder

Surfinbird

09-10-2014, 09:51 AM

Which is the best number of discard spells in the deck? 6 or 7? which is the best combination? I want your opinion!

nevilshute

09-10-2014, 10:01 AM

There obviously is no world in which 6 is clearly correct and 7 clearly incorrect or vice versa.

I've always felt better with 7. And my combination is 4/3 Therapy/Duress. As long as I'm running 4 probes I prefer it this way.

CabalTherapy

09-10-2014, 10:58 AM

Surfinbird

09-10-2014, 11:38 AM

WHy do you prefer cabal therapy over duress? sometimes it's great, but i've lost some matches for having blind therapies instead of duress...

wonderPreaux

09-10-2014, 12:01 PM

therapy can hit multiple cards, it can hit creatures, it can be flashed back off of EtW tokens/Confidants etc. while it can miss, the general idea is that if you did miss, it's because they don't have whatever it is you were worried over. I feel Cabal Therapy suffers in a meta full of diverse threats/disruption, though. For example, RUG Delver and Merfolk that might pack cards like Spell Snare or Envelop that are hard to predict (Adamant Negation might be relevant on the horizon too). I also feel Duress is debatably better against Miracles because they could keep their most threatening cards protected by Brainstorm/Top and Duress at least let's you strip them of secondary threatening cards that you have to work through anyway.

lordofthepit

09-10-2014, 03:35 PM

Pelikanudo

09-10-2014, 05:01 PM

i don't usually read ANT opinions, I am TES player! but looking at this discussion for curiosity and with the aim to throw some light...
I for example in TES still don't understand why since the out of gitaxian we imediatly switched to 4 c.t. and EtW main. In TNT and as Timo said was brylliant, it's a card that challenges oneself and sure has no Price its reward, you can beat a hand with multiple FoW and Fluster with multiple Therapy, not with multiple duress... I've seen several blow ups 2 or even 3 Of with Therapys (Canonists, Hymns Delvers, etc).... much of us think that apart of AN and PiF, C.T. is the unique other card that provide us card avantage even in a Storm Deck!. and so many arguments I could say...

I believe Therapy is one of the bests cards in legacy.

Just a Storm Player opinion.

EDIT I was reading a few and really laughed at reading how you discuss the Burn archetype Ha ha ha! Joke.

Surfinbird

09-12-2014, 03:54 PM

saur

09-12-2014, 04:21 PM

I'm not liking Cabal Therapy as much recently. The advantages of the card are quite evident, and it has great synergy with Probe, but sometimes "naming the card that wrecks you" doesn't get there. Sometimes, you're forced to go off with only a Therapy as protection, and I've gotten wrecked quite a few times when I cast Force of Will when they are holding Flusterstorm or name Force of Will when they have Brainstorm and manage to Brainstorm into Force on my attempt to go off.

I miss the old builds that managed to run both Duress and Thoughtseize. Gitaxian Probe is probably powerful enough as a new inclusion to make the lifeloss from Thoughtseize prohibitively painful, but I noticed my ability to beat hatebears has been significantly worse since switching to the post-NPH version.

I just want to note that it's not completely random when you cast a blind Therapy. Any deck playing Flusterstorm/Spell Pierce is also playing Force of Will. If you notice them leaving an island untapped instead of playing a cantrip or a delver, you should be naming Flusterstorm. If they're tapping out to play Tarmogoyf or Jace, be ready to name Force of Will in addition to playing around a Daze. If they've been leaving islands untapped but you're not sure, weigh the amount of Flusterstorms you think they board in vs. the odds they have Force AND a blue card.

I probably call Flusterstorm 15% of the time, but I'm almost always right when I do.

phazonmutant

09-12-2014, 08:33 PM

I just want to note that it's not completely random when you cast a blind Therapy. Any deck playing Flusterstorm/Spell Pierce is also playing Force of Will. If you notice them leaving an island untapped instead of playing a cantrip or a delver, you should be naming Flusterstorm. If they're tapping out to play Tarmogoyf or Jace, be ready to name Force of Will in addition to playing around a Daze. If they've been leaving islands untapped but you're not sure, weigh the amount of Flusterstorms you think they board in vs. the odds they have Force AND a blue card.

I probably call Flusterstorm 15% of the time, but I'm almost always right when I do.

tl;dr: Play better.

I'd be interested to see your 75. I'm also testing Slosh's list, I have 2 PiF, 2 Tendrils, 1 Top/Grim, 6 discard, no preordain, no grapeshot. i've been enjoying it a lot, but i've been tinkering with trying to fit a 2nd top and maybe some sort of removal ability. like bolt or grapeshot. how do you like to board with your list? i find it pretty hard beyond the occasional removal of 2nd Tendrils/PiF/EtW or 4th petal/cabal/ponder

Hey sorry about not replying sooner. Here was the 75 I played, but I'm not advocating it.

4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Gitaxian Probe

3 Cabal Therapy
3 Duress

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

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

4 Polluted Delta
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
1 Badlands
1 Tropical Island
1 Island
1 Swamp

// Sideboard
2 Chain of Vapor
2 Flusterstorm
1 Massacre
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Lightning Bolt
3 Xantid Swarm
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Sensei's Divining Top

After playing with the list, I'm not totally sold on the Grinding Station parts of the deck. I really did like drawing exactly one Past in Flames (most times), but getting flooded on 4-drops is real. I think I might just cut the 2nd Grim Tutor and a PiF for a Preordain and a Top (or another Preordain). The board seems pretty solid so far.

CabalTherapy

09-13-2014, 04:32 AM

I've seen some people playing with a single burning wish in their maindeck (and some others with 2), what do you think about it? Do you think it is a good idea as a fifth tutor?

In a configuration with 1 BW I'd run this sideboard:

3 Xantid Swarm
2 Chain of vapor
2 Dread of night
3 Abrupt decay
2 Massacre
1 Empty the warrens
1 Past in flames
1 Tendrils of agony

I don't like it although I played with 3 Burning Wish some time ago. But in my opinion, Burning Wish does not provide another line of attack, but rather makes some draws cluncy in contrast to Preordain for example. Also, the pre-combo Wish targeting Past in Flames or a discard spell (which is probably the most frequent target; Thoughtseize) does not feel good at all because you literally tell your opponent that you want to combo off next turn with a certain route, thus he knows which cards are missing in your hand right now. You have to waste some sideboard slots eventually in order to support the Wish. (Tendrils/PiF/EtW/discard) something like that would be a BW configuration (Massacre is already a SB card). I know that it may work for some people and it certainly depends on the meta game. If you are searching for a 5th tutor just play SDT or invest in Grim Tutor.

Togores

09-14-2014, 04:38 PM

Someone tested and got results of Talrand and divert vs bug delver?

Some conclusions?

Surfinbird

09-15-2014, 05:51 AM

I haven't tested Talrand:( but i've been thinking about running 3 meekstone in the sideboard to beat canadian and bug delver... what do you think?

CabalTherapy

09-15-2014, 06:45 AM

I haven't tested Talrand:( but i've been thinking about running 3 meekstone in the sideboard to beat canadian and bug delver... what do you think?

You don't need additional cards against Canadian.
Deathrite Shaman still untaps under Meekstone and stuff like Liliana is not influenced at all. 100% wasted slots.

Surfinbird

09-15-2014, 07:37 AM

You don't need additional cards against Canadian.

About that, I sometimes feel that need some extra diacard or maybe xantids to deal with their amount of counters

CabalTherapy

09-15-2014, 08:29 AM

About that, I sometimes feel that need some extra diacard or maybe xantids to deal with their amount of counters

7 discard spells should be enough. Flusterstorm is a decent card here, whereas Swarm may be hit by a Lightning Bolt but of course also can provide enough protection for the kill.
Empty the Warrens is a solid option here, too.
With the phrase "additional cards" I meant that you don't have to have special cards against the Canadian MU in the SB.

nevilshute

09-15-2014, 08:36 AM

So, about one month ago I set out to start recording every match I played with ANT on mtgo. Even though these records are mostly interesting for myself, I decided to share my findings with you guys.

The time frame for this data collecting was one month. During that time I recorded the deck my opponent was playing and whether I lost or won. Note that these are matches, not games. I only played competitative matches, meaning either in 2-mans for tickets or in dailies.

I recorded 145 matches during this month.

Also note that you must accept some leeway when it comes to my categorizing of matchups. Esperblade decks, for instance, are called Esperblade regardless of whether they were deathblade variants or 'normal' esperblade variants.

Also note, that I am aware of the somewhat limiting aspect of 145 matches. Not too much - if anything at all - should be concluded merely on the basis of these data. Still, I thought it would at least give some indication of a) what the meta looks like for legacy on mtgo and b) roughly how ANT is situated against the different decks.

A final note on the deck I played: I frequently tried out new cards in the sideboard. Also the maindeck constellation changed from time to time. Sometimes running Ad Nauseam in the main, other times in the sideboard, etc. But by and large these were smaller changes.

So, first things first. Out of the 145 matches I managed to win 94 and lose 51, giving me a win percentage of 65 rounded up (64.82).

The four decks I faced the most were: Burn, 15 (11 wins, 4 losses), Miracles, 13 (5 wins, 8 losses), Esperblade, 11 (7 wins, 4 losses) and Elves, 10 (9 wins, 1 loss).

As you can see, I predicatbly fared well against Elves and Burn but did relatively poorly against Miracles... a matchup where I was hoping to at least be closer to 50/50 than what I ended up being. Esperblade at 7/4 feels about right.

You may be noticing that we are missing the delver decks. I decided to split them up into 4 sub Groups (BUG, RUG, UWR and BURG). When combined I faced one of these variants a whopping 18 times averaging a win percentage of roughly 55 % (10 wins 8 losses) which also feels about where I'd expect to be.

One curiosity was how well I managed to do in the mirror winning all 9 matches. I think this speaks more to how relatively unrealiable this type of data is so we probably shouldn't read too much into it :smile:

http://i.imgur.com/UN1xNGd.png

I can't be bothered but it would probably make sense to clean the data of the matchups I only faced once or twice.

Anyway, hope someone finds it interesting enough to look at :smile:

sawatarix

09-15-2014, 11:58 AM

wow, thank you Martin for your conclusion and ton of testings, i really appreciate it !

I believe in your storm skills (you finished well at BoM9)

so these results are perfect for analyzing all the matchups we can face in future tournaments.

what i would like to pick up from the diagram are miracles bug delver and stoneblade decks.
unfortunately these decks are popular so we need a way to somehow beat them constantly,we should aim a matchup percentage around 55:45,that would be ideal so i'm looking for a way to achieve it.
i'm also going to make a matchup analysis on my own in the next 2-3 weeks with a lot of experiments in the sideboard,hope that we get the perfect list until Ovino/ Danish Legacy Championship or Prague Eternal this Fall.

Tav

09-15-2014, 02:07 PM

Hey everyone, long time lurker of these boards and I figured it was time I finally made an account and started adding my own thoughts to some of the discussions here. I played TES for about a year before finally switching to the better deck at the beginning of this past year. It has performed great for me in events and this past weekend I played in a 90 person Buncha Duals tournament and went undefeated in the swiss before losing in the first round of the top 8.

The 75 that I registered was:

4 Brainstorm
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Ponder
2 Preordain

1 Ad Nauseam
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Dark Ritual
3 Duress
4 Infernal Tutor
1 Tendrils of Agony

1 Past in Flames

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

1 Badlands
1 Island
4 Polluted Delta
3 Scalding Tarn
1 Swamp
1 Tropical Island
2 Underground Sea
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Volcanic Island

Sideboard:
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Chain of Vapor
3 Dread of Night
1 Karakas
3 Xantid Swarm
3 Young Pyromancer

Round 1 - Enchantress:
First round I sat down across from a local player who I know I have played against in the past. We start chatting and he hints about how this is a terrible matchup for him, but I feel bad because I can't remember for the life of me what he is playing. Well game 1 starts and he leads off with the typical "forest, utopia sprawl" and I then proceed to do my thing and kill him on turn 3 or 4 (aka the exact way that game 1 of that matchup is supposed to go). Game 2 he opens with double leyline and so I start to sculpt a PiF hand that can CoV one EoT, then go off and flash it back on the second one, but on his last turn he rips a RIP (lol) and shuts off that plan entirely. He follows it up the next turn with a Helm and we are on to game 3. Game 3 he starts with another leyline but I am able to bounce it back to his hand, decay his gaddock teeg, and then AN relatively quickly.
2-1 (1-0)

Round 2 - Show and Tell
Sit down across from my next opponent, chat a bit, round starts and we both draw our 7. These notes are all from memory, but I believe he aggressively countered a discard spell with his flusterstorm to try and protect his SnT+SA+Emrakul hand, then I just killed him. Game 2 I dropped a turn 1 xantid swarm, tore apart his hand a bit while sculpting my own, then finally AN'd from 15 after he had dropped a blood moon (I had a petal though to crack for the black mana I needed). I ended up flipping my PiF while at 5 and put myself to 1, but I just played out all my discard spells to put him in topdeck mode, then passed the turn. We both played draw go for a couple of turns (I was only missing the LED/empty hand to loop my tutor that was in the yard after I drew my swamp), but I eventually drew into a petal for blue mana, played the PiF, flashed back all my rituals and the CoV that was in the yard to bounce the blood moon, then was able to flash back cantrips until I found the LED to win.
2-0 (2-0)

Round 3 - Reanimator
This was by far the hardest matchup of the day, but I didn't know what he was on at first after I won the roll, chose to play, played a ponder then passed. He drew his card then immediately went to discard and I start thinking he is on dredge, but then he discards a griselbrand. I get nervous about what is about to happen (I believe my hand was discard lite that game), and next turn probe him to have my fears solidified. His hand was Brainstorm, Ponder, Force, U Sea, Griselbrand x2, Reanimate. Oh boy. He cheats in the griseldaddy and a couple hits later I scoop to game 2. Game 2 I lead with a xantid swarm and do my best to discard and cantrip as fast as I can. Eventually I find a karakas which I play, and shortly after he scoops (I am still a long ways off from comboing at that point, but after asking him later he tells me he sided out the tidespout and had no answer to karakas in his deck). Game 3 is a crazy one that had me leading off with a xantid swarm once again and him reanimating an Iona pretty early on. I fell to 8 life quickly before I brainstormed into a karakas on my last possible turn. That let me bounce his Iona and earn myself an extra turn, however he thoughtseized my tutor and then drew a bunch off of a animate dead'd griselbrand. He passed the turn back and I had a hand that was DR, AN, Petal, LED and I knew I had duress and ToA on top of my library from the brainstorm. With 3 lands (1 of which being a fetch), and the xantid, I attacked (to which he blocked and brought himself from 4 up to 10), then was able to DR, Petal, LED, AN leaving the fetchland uncracked and using the LED in response, flip the ToA on top, go to 4, then crack the fetch to cast the tendrils for exact lethal. Not the cleanest game but against reanimator I'll take whatever I can get.
2-1 (3-0)

Round 4 - BUG Delver
I really wish I had more to say about this matchup, with this deck being as big of a problem in the meta as it is, but this was probably the most uneventful game. I had a couple of really nice brainstorms, but other than that he just didn't have the tools to beat me. Didn't see a non-summoning sick DRS in either game, and in both games I stripped one counterspell on turns 3/4, then went off. Pretty easy win.
2-0 (4-0)

Round 5 - BUG Nic Fit
Was afraid I was going to play against a local who I knew was on miracles this round, but instead got paired up against a friend of a friend who I knew was on nic fit. This made me pretty happy because I knew this would be an easy matchup and I could hopefully double draw into top 8 if I won. Game 1 I probed him early on and saw a bunch of irrelevant cards, although a cabal therapy off the top set me back. I actually got some pretty lucky top decks in this game if I remember and it was definitely closer than I prefer when playing against a deck with no md counterspells. Game 2 I drew out an early force, and with 2 cards in hand and a SDT on the field, I put him on not having another force + blue card between those 3 cards and was able to storm him out. After asking what his blue count for force was after the game I was surprised to hear that it was a lot higher than I expected at the time, but either way the gamble paid off. At 5-0 I was able to double draw and earn the number 2 seed going out of the swiss.
2-0 (5-0)

End of Swiss - 5-0-2

Top 8 - Miracles
Finally got paired against miracles and it was against another local player who I have played with in weekly events a couple of times in the past. We obviously both know what each other is on and neither of us were looking forward to playing against each other (the last time we played I had beaten him quite handily, however drawing literal perfect hands does help quite a bit ;) ). Game 1 I mulliganed to 6 and kept a cantrip heavy hand that also had turn 1 probe and discard. I looked at what he kept and saw double force, top, and four lands. I duressed the top away and just needed to find a therapy to strip the forces before I could go off, but I never saw one and he quickly drew into another top, more counters, and a relatively quick entreat for 3. By the end of the match he had triple force, blue card in hand with another blue card floating on top of his deck. Game 2 I kept a mediocre hand with some action and cantrips and a decay, but no discard. After decaying his turn 2 counterbalance, I hoped to cantrip into what I needed, but despite 2 ponders and a brainstorm or 2, I couldn't find a way to interact with his hand while he tore mine apart with an early clique and beat me down. Sadly the rampage ended here, but I was happy to at least lose to a local.
0-2

Overall I love how the deck is functioning right now. Thank you Sawatarix and everyone else who pioneered the young pyromancer tech, it has been nothing but amazing for me. As of right now I am completely behind the 1 of SDT over the grim tutor (I played with the tutor for a while and it hurts because that card is so bad). I liked where the sideboard is otherwise, although I am sure some people will disagree with the 3 Dread of Nights (I just don't like the idea of multiple 4 cmc massacres in the deck, but it is the next thing I need to test). I am super hyped for GP NJ and I hope to see plenty of storm there.

nevilshute

09-15-2014, 05:48 PM

Grats on the strong performance! And always nice to have another stormer chipping in with tournament reports :smile:

Could I ask what your sideboard plan is vs BUG delver with your current setup?

AsmodeusDM

09-15-2014, 06:19 PM

So we fill up our gyard like nobody's business....

What can the new KTK cards do for ANT?

Specifically:

Treasure Cruise - 7U
Sorcery
Delve
Draw 3 cards.

Dig Through Time - 6UU
Instant
Delve
Look at top 7 cards of library. Put 2 into your hand; the rest on the bottom of library in any order.

non-bo with PiF of course... but the upside is pretty nice! I've had 7+ cards in yard on turn 2 with routine consistency.

Tav

09-15-2014, 07:31 PM

Grats on the strong performance! And always nice to have another stormer chipping in with tournament reports :smile:

Could I ask what your sideboard plan is vs BUG delver with your current setup?

I believe I boarded +3 Young Pyromancer, -2 Preordain, -1 SDT

I think an argument could be made for preemptively boarding in the Chains just because it is rarely bad, but permanents worth bouncing are generally limited from them (their hate includes maybe a couple of graf cages and that is about it)

davelin

09-15-2014, 08:11 PM

Togores

09-15-2014, 08:23 PM

Question guys!

Usualy there are 3 matchups more or less I side out a basic land.

Sneak and show
And nauseam mirror
Miracles

Usualy I side out vs miracles the island cause I prefer to have more balc in the combo turn to cast multiple discard and rituals.

Against mirror match I side out the swamp cause I usuay only need one black on the combo turn and I also play flusterstorm so more blue sources are needed for this purpose.

But for sneak and show in not sure, I side in the tipical package of flusterstorm and xantids. So may be keeping the island would be correct.

In tha karsten article he aims of removin swamp. Im also thinking maye be removing an underground would be an answer to random bad players who wants free wins with blood moon.

I wanna know ideas or opinions on this 3 matchups and what u can say to it and reason to why say it.

Thanks in advance :3

nevilshute

09-16-2014, 03:14 AM

Against both Sneak and Show and in the mirror I side out my 2 basic lands (mind you I play 16 lands - if you are only running 15 then maybe only sideout 1 basic, in which case I'd probably prefer keeping in the island).

Incidentally I also do this vs Elves.

The logic is pretty simple... in combo matchups you need to generally be more balls-to-the-wall (not irresponsible or necessarily even more aggressive, just aware that your opponent's deck has the ability to end you at any point so you want to load up on business) and aim to close out games faster. You also don't have to worry about land hate usually. So trimming lands increases your odds of getting business cards. The trade-off is, of course, that it also increases your risk at getting mana screwed. But against decks with no wastelands and where we generally don't need more than 1-3 lands maximum to function it makes sense to make this disposition.

Against Miracles I don't side out any lands. Sometimes I get tempted to do so, but in my experience, the best games 2+3 vs miracles involves just making my land drops until I have 5-6 lands in play and then blowing them out with natural Empty the Warrens, Tendrils, or some combination of the two over the course of one or two turns. This plan is combined with Young Pyromancers to put them under increasing pressure. Getting screwed on lands against miracles is the worst feeling as in order for us to have a good shot at winning the long game we can't be stuck on 2 lands on turns 4 through 7 most often.

As I said, sometimes I get tempted to just go for the fast kill, but I don't think that's right after board.

CabalTherapy

09-16-2014, 07:48 AM

nevilshute

09-16-2014, 08:43 AM

We should not forget the Burn MU, where we have to board out the weakest dual land, Badlands or Bayou, respectively in order to dodge a midgame Price of Progress.
(Although I am not sure if Burn wants to keep PoP in against us postboard.)

I understand what you're getting at, but if the game vs burn gets to a midgame we're probably in a lot of trouble :smile:

I usually don't worry much about my lands in that matchup but of course sometimes it does become relevant. From my experience they still keep in some number of copies of PoP.

CabalTherapy

09-16-2014, 08:53 AM

I understand what you're getting at, but if the game vs burn gets to a midgame we're probably in a lot of trouble :smile:

I usually don't worry much about my lands in that matchup but of course sometimes it does become relevant. From my experience they still keep in some number of copies of PoP.

With the term "midgame" I meant the point of the game beyond the first two turns, in which we can win without worrying. On the other hand, they have certainly better cc2 cards against Storm than PoP. Nonetheless, Badlands/Bayou is not needed here.

nevilshute

09-16-2014, 04:44 PM

Btw,

I wanted to mention how I've been testing 2x City of Solitude in the sideboard against Miracles on mtgo. The results so far are cause for restrained optimism imo.

My experiences so far indicate that the Miracles player needs to be signifantly ahead on the board for CoS not to massively drag the game into our favor. It completely distorts their game plan seeing as how they can't even come close maximizing their Top. This, of course, is because they have to activate everything on their own turn, including fetchlands. It's also such a house against them because they have no way to get rid of it once it's on the battlefield. This last point makes it rather unique compared to it's green brethren, the Xantid Swarm.

The obvious downside is that at 3cmc it won't be able to (realistically) enter play until both Spell Pierce and Counterspell have become active. This means that we have to work harder at forcing this into play.

Just before I was playing against a miracles player. On turn two he taps out to play Counterbalance with a top out. I take my turn and play CoS. Being 3CMC also means that it's harder for them to counter it with counterbalance. After that it felt like a matter of time. He was stuck between fixing his top at CMC1 so that I couldn't cantrip, or CMC2 so that I couldn't tutor for a combo win. He chose CMC1 and before long I had amassed a hand with a tutor, a cabal ritual and an LED and won from there.

I've played maybe 5-6 matches against Miracles so far with CoS so still feel like it's too early to say anything definitive. But these have been my initial impressions.

Surfinbird

09-16-2014, 07:33 PM

I like the idea of city os solitude working as a xantid swarm and piThing needle... It could be good against team america to stop their counterspells in addition to their shamans, but i think that 2G is too much mana:(

Togores

09-16-2014, 09:14 PM

Agaianst miracles u can end up casting anything cause theyr clock is not really fast. But resolving a card that diez to abrupt decay vs a deck with discard all kind of soft cunters and wastelands dosnt seem really great.

This usualy is space. If u really wanna beat the miracles matchup u can play ton of cards like talrand and so. But they eat to much space in your SB for only one matchup.

nevilshute

09-17-2014, 01:39 AM

wonderPreaux

09-17-2014, 02:57 AM

For the reasons you both list I don't bring CoS in against BUG. It's simply too hard to reliably cast an off-color 3CMC enchantment against a tempo based abrupt decay deck. No, it's pretty much only there to come in against miracles

At that point, I think the question becomes: is having such a heavy hitter against Miracles worth the fact that it does little to other deck types and is that marginal value that much better than our current options.

Between Wear/Tear, Venser, and Council's Judgment, I don't think City of Solitude quite qualifies as exempt from removal, it's just less easily/often removed than other permanents like Xantid Swarm, and Young Pyromancer. Further, City of Solitude feels awkward to me for a number of reasons. The first is the mana cost, you already mentioned the vulnerability to countermagic that is presented there, but unlike something like Dark Confidant or Young Pyromancer you also have no ability to gainfully accelerate that City of Solitude into play. Using something like Lotus Petal for Confidant and Pyromancer would give you an extra 2 dmg from 1 turn of attacks, and an extra turn to accrue advantage, virtually "cycling" the Petal. With City, you can accelerate into it with Petals, or use Dark Ritual for City + Therapy/Duress, but then you have to sit there and rebuild the resources you used up, not really doing much other than forcing the opponent to have countermagic at a smaller window of time.

Moving from there, City of Solitude feels a lot like Pithing Needle, where it disables/hinders stuff, but requires you to likely have some other method of dealing with Counterbalance, since it can still get left on 1 or 2 and if your hand doesnt match up well you'd be outta luck. At that point you're still siding a high number of cards, which somewhat defeats the purpose of running high-power sidedeck cards. As your sb cards get more powerful, youd think youd get away with running only a few of them, like how 2-3 GY hate cards can be enough to keep Dredge in check because all the sb cards are silver bullets. But with City, I see myself still being in the position of siding 5-7 cards at which point it would be really painful to have some of them be so narrow.

Extending on that, I'm wondering if cards like Xantid Swarm or additional storm spells are so much less powerful that there usefulness in other matchups doesn't keep their overall value ahead of City of Solitude. For example, my list for ANT is stock 15 lands, 7 business, 16 accelerators, 7 discard, 12 cantrips, and then I play Grim Tutor and 2 SDT instead of Preordains (so, 8 business total). My boarding plan is as follows:

+ 3 Abrupt Decay
+ 1 Tendrils of Agony
+ 1 Empty the Warrens

- 2 Lotus Petal
- 1 Cabal Ritual
- 1 Cabal Therapy
- 1 Ponder

Depending on what I've seen, I'd also swap more Cabal Therapies out for 2 Xantid Swarms, or leave the Empty the Warrens in the side. At that plan, which, if any, of those cards I'm bringing in is contributing less, in all of the matchups its relevant in, than City of Solitude is contributing in Miracles, the sole matchup its found to be relevant in?

Now, there is one last thing to say, something I love about this card. City of Solitude carries our main gameplan, which is something that Pyromancer/Talrand don't do. Dude-generators detract from actually storming in exchange for giving us a back-door win-con of "fair-ish" play. I don't actually like that, Kotter mentioned this too in an earlier post, but detracting from the main plan just puts you, usually, "all-in" on something your deck is fundamentally not as good achieving. A parallel is Reanimator maining/siding Show and Tell: Reanimator isn't as good at being a Show-and-Tell deck, but it sure beats biting it to bullet hate cards. Aside from the rare Ethersworn Canonist, or SDT+Flusterstorm, though, Miracles doesn't really have a true "silver-bullet" that we're cold to, even the maniacs siding Leylines against Burn/Storm can still bite it to EtW. Miracles, in a somewhat exaggerated form, stillreally only has counters+hate permanents, like Stoneblade but slower in exchanged for more intense forms of countering, filtering, and disruptive permanents. There's nothing there that truly stops the Tendrils or Goblins, and City of Solitude doesn't make me pretend I'm another deck when my main plan is still valid, City of Solitude is probably the closest thing to a "hate card for hate" that isn't Storm spells themselves.

nevilshute

09-17-2014, 04:18 AM

At that point, I think the question becomes: is having such a heavy hitter against Miracles worth the fact that it does little to other deck types and is that marginal value that much better than our current options.

Between Wear/Tear, Venser, and Council's Judgment, I don't think City of Solitude quite qualifies as exempt from removal, it's just less easily/often removed than other permanents like Xantid Swarm, and Young Pyromancer. Further, City of Solitude feels awkward to me for a number of reasons. The first is the mana cost, you already mentioned the vulnerability to countermagic that is presented there, but unlike something like Dark Confidant or Young Pyromancer you also have no ability to gainfully accelerate that City of Solitude into play. Using something like Lotus Petal for Confidant and Pyromancer would give you an extra 2 dmg from 1 turn of attacks, and an extra turn to accrue advantage, virtually "cycling" the Petal. With City, you can accelerate into it with Petals, or use Dark Ritual for City + Therapy/Duress, but then you have to sit there and rebuild the resources you used up, not really doing much other than forcing the opponent to have countermagic at a smaller window of time.

Moving from there, City of Solitude feels a lot like Pithing Needle, where it disables/hinders stuff, but requires you to likely have some other method of dealing with Counterbalance, since it can still get left on 1 or 2 and if your hand doesnt match up well you'd be outta luck. At that point you're still siding a high number of cards, which somewhat defeats the purpose of running high-power sidedeck cards. As your sb cards get more powerful, youd think youd get away with running only a few of them, like how 2-3 GY hate cards can be enough to keep Dredge in check because all the sb cards are silver bullets. But with City, I see myself still being in the position of siding 5-7 cards at which point it would be really painful to have some of them be so narrow.

Extending on that, I'm wondering if cards like Xantid Swarm or additional storm spells are so much less powerful that there usefulness in other matchups doesn't keep their overall value ahead of City of Solitude. For example, my list for ANT is stock 15 lands, 7 business, 16 accelerators, 7 discard, 12 cantrips, and then I play Grim Tutor and 2 SDT instead of Preordains (so, 8 business total). My boarding plan is as follows:

+ 3 Abrupt Decay
+ 1 Tendrils of Agony
+ 1 Empty the Warrens

- 2 Lotus Petal
- 1 Cabal Ritual
- 1 Cabal Therapy
- 1 Ponder

Depending on what I've seen, I'd also swap more Cabal Therapies out for 2 Xantid Swarms, or leave the Empty the Warrens in the side. At that plan, which, if any, of those cards I'm bringing in is contributing less, in all of the matchups its relevant in, than City of Solitude is contributing in Miracles, the sole matchup its found to be relevant in?

Now, there is one last thing to say, something I love about this card. City of Solitude carries our main gameplan, which is something that Pyromancer/Talrand don't do. Dude-generators detract from actually storming in exchange for giving us a back-door win-con of "fair-ish" play. I don't actually like that, Kotter mentioned this too in an earlier post, but detracting from the main plan just puts you, usually, "all-in" on something your deck is fundamentally not as good achieving. A parallel is Reanimator maining/siding Show and Tell: Reanimator isn't as good at being a Show-and-Tell deck, but it sure beats biting it to bullet hate cards. Aside from the rare Ethersworn Canonist, or SDT+Flusterstorm, though, Miracles doesn't really have a true "silver-bullet" that we're cold to, even the maniacs siding Leylines against Burn/Storm can still bite it to EtW. Miracles, in a somewhat exaggerated form, stillreally only has counters+hate permanents, like Stoneblade but slower in exchanged for more intense forms of countering, filtering, and disruptive permanents. There's nothing there that truly stops the Tendrils or Goblins, and City of Solitude doesn't make me pretend I'm another deck when my main plan is still valid, City of Solitude is probably the closest thing to a "hate card for hate" that isn't Storm spells themselves.

Thanks for taking the time to reply in such depth. I will agree that it is dubious whether or not it is actually justified running multiples of a sideboard card that basically only comes in against one particular matchup. When it makes sense to me online, it is because Miracles is by far the most popular, competitive legacy deck on mtgo. Even if I end up really liking it I'm not completely sure it deserves a spot in my paper sideboard. With that being said, Miracles have had a rise in popularity during 2014 so I don't think it's necessarily unreasonable.

On to your analysis. I will concede that saying they have "no way" to remove it is a bit of a stretch, but out of the methods you mention I think only Venser deserves a fair mention. And it is, to my experience, a minority of miracles lists that run Venser. If the miracles player is siding in Wear//Tear (unbeknownst of the Storm player bringing in City of Solitude, but simply to kill a wayward LED) then I'd say that's wrong in the first place and that we shouldn't be hedging against bad sideboard choices by miracles players as it will be a minority that make them. The same can be said for Council's Judgment. What Miracles player in their right mind will keep any copies of that card in against Storm after sideboard?

I also think it's important to say that bringing City of Solitude does not mean I stop bringing in Abrupt Decays, Young Pyromancers or extra storm cards. For these reasons my miracles games tend to go semi-long and the plan is, that by the time City of Solitude is probably castable (turn 3-5) they have already lost some of their counter magic from discard or from burning it on other relevant spells such as Young Pyromancer. Either that, or I already have a Young Pyromancer in play, in which case sticking a City of Solitude puts them in a worse position than they are already in due to limiting their use of Top.

I agree that we'd still want to answer Counterbalance/Top lock, but as in my example, beating that softlock is quite possible with City out as they are being forced to either shut down our 1 or 2 mana spells. Shut down the 2 mana spells and we get to dig for decay. Shut down 1 mana spells and we get to either just go off with tutor, cabal rits and LED or drop a Young Pyromancer and get to work. Of course they can mind-game us and we can mind-game them and it's not a sure thing by any stretch that we will always come out on top. But given the slow nature of their deck I'd contend that it's a valid approach. As I said, unless they are very far ahead on the board - and by that I mean have a jace out + CB/Top or have a clock on us (like a Clique, or a batterskull or the likes) - then a resolved City of Solitude gives our game plan a pretty huge boost.

Now, with all of this said and done I'm not saying that City of Solitude is for sure the right fit, but I am enjoying what I'm getting to do with it here during testing and will continue to test it out for a while yet.

Surfinbird

09-17-2014, 07:02 AM

Hi! Today i've played a match against Deadguy Ale, losing the first game against 2 tidehollow sculler and winning the last two via Ad Nauseam.

I've done a curious play in the third game: My hand was 2 lands, ad nauseam, cabal ritual, LED, LED, ponder. I pondered and drawed a gitaxian leaving a chain of vapor and a duress in the top. He played a sculler taking my AN. In My turn 2, i play probe and saw he didn't have anything relevant. Then i played LEDs and bounced sculler, cracking LEDs in resp to cast Ad Nauseam with 2 mana left in the pool:) It's been nice!

Togores

09-17-2014, 11:48 AM

A bit of theory!!!!

We give an example that your hand is like:
led
DR
DR
Cabal ritual
Duress
therapy
Infernal and you have a underground in play and ********.

You play against miracles he has like 4 lands and 6 cards in hand, he has no counterbalance or sensei in play. He has been casting ponders and brainstorm only.

We go like this route:
dark ritual resolves.

NOW!

You play now the second ritual? or first discard?

If you choose to play discard in what order you would play the duress and the therapy and what cards would you name? (Its game1).

Think the discard order and what to name is interesting to see how ppl wuld aproach the game.

davelin

09-17-2014, 12:12 PM

Ghiwo

09-17-2014, 12:51 PM

Higgs

09-17-2014, 02:03 PM

I would play first Duress, so we have BB floating, then Cabal Therapy to be sure to hit even multiples and then with the remaining B Dark Ritual, Cabal Ritual, LED, Tutor --> PIF loop :)
Is that correct? :D

I would lead with Duress as well and am pretty sure it's most obvious yet the wrong option :) ok what if he fows the duress? Is he hiding a second fow (not likely), a flusterstorm (could be) or hiding a dead hand? It would be less likely to get countered if you lead with Therapy but then you can miss and be looking at a hand with Clique, Flusterstorms or whatever.

wonderPreaux

09-17-2014, 02:20 PM

Thanks for taking the time to reply in such depth. I will agree that it is dubious whether or not it is actually justified running multiples of a sideboard card that basically only comes in against one particular matchup. When it makes sense to me online, it is because Miracles is by far the most popular, competitive legacy deck on mtgo. Even if I end up really liking it I'm not completely sure it deserves a spot in my paper sideboard. With that being said, Miracles have had a rise in popularity during 2014 so I don't think it's necessarily unreasonable.
I can definitely relate to the online meta, I play solely on MTGO and encounter Miracles once per daily on average. However, you also have those Delver decks that come up, or fringe/midrange decks and the like, I can't help but feel that MTGO pushes versatility more than paper since events are more frequent and trying something off-beat is as simple as clicking a different deck.

On to your analysis. I will concede that saying they have "no way" to remove it is a bit of a stretch, but out of the methods you mention I think only Venser deserves a fair mention. And it is, to my experience, a minority of miracles lists that run Venser. If the miracles player is siding in Wear//Tear (unbeknownst of the Storm player bringing in City of Solitude, but simply to kill a wayward LED) then I'd say that's wrong in the first place and that we shouldn't be hedging against bad sideboard choices by miracles players as it will be a minority that make them. The same can be said for Council's Judgment. What Miracles player in their right mind will keep any copies of that card in against Storm after sideboard?
My thought process is that there's often a game 3 against Miracles and that the Miracles pilot would pivot to answer what hate they see. Much like you'd see more Terminus/StP from them once they've seen your Pyromancer game 2, I'd also expect to see enchantment removal if they've seen your City of Solitude. Wear//Tear is especially damning because it can not only remove City, but also allows them to fix Counterbalance on 1 AND 2 while they set up to seize control after removing your city (the latter reason being the rationale some use to bring in Wear//Tear blind). I'm not saying City of Solitude is bad because removal exists, I'm just saying that it is removable and that is an issue you have to confront.

I also think it's important to say that bringing City of Solitude does not mean I stop bringing in Abrupt Decays, Young Pyromancers or extra storm cards. For these reasons my miracles games tend to go semi-long and the plan is, that by the time City of Solitude is probably castable (turn 3-5) they have already lost some of their counter magic from discard or from burning it on other relevant spells such as Young Pyromancer. Either that, or I already have a Young Pyromancer in play, in which case sticking a City of Solitude puts them in a worse position than they are already in due to limiting their use of Top.
I understand that you're bringing in additional cards on top of the City, my point there is that you'd think having a big sideboard bomb would mean you wouldn't have to bring in so many cards, right? Like, my analogy was how GY hate for Dredge/Reanimator is all silver-bullets so you get away with running ~3 cards, but you're siding, what, 6~9 cards still with City of Solitude? If you're committing that much sb space to a matchup then I believe it would necessitate most/all of those cards being relevant to multiple matchups just for the sake of keeping your sideboard functional. If the greatest impact of City of Solitude is that it just gives you more bombs to drop, I can't help but feel you could still achieve that with cards that put in work in multiple matchups.

I agree that we'd still want to answer Counterbalance/Top lock, but as in my example, beating that softlock is quite possible with City out as they are being forced to either shut down our 1 or 2 mana spells. Shut down the 2 mana spells and we get to dig for decay. Shut down 1 mana spells and we get to either just go off with tutor, cabal rits and LED or drop a Young Pyromancer and get to work. Of course they can mind-game us and we can mind-game them and it's not a sure thing by any stretch that we will always come out on top. But given the slow nature of their deck I'd contend that it's a valid approach. As I said, unless they are very far ahead on the board - and by that I mean have a jace out + CB/Top or have a clock on us (like a Clique, or a batterskull or the likes) - then a resolved City of Solitude gives our game plan a pretty huge boost.
I understand you can beat Counterbalance on a fixed value, but every time you call it wrong, you're losing a card of varying relevance to you. Yeah it's great when you call it right and just wreck them, but when you're paying to interact and can lose roughly half the time, the EV of that makes it seem like a losing proposition in the long run, especially if you are paired against someone who does have a method of removing the City or has something like Batterskull.

Now, with all of this said and done I'm not saying that City of Solitude is for sure the right fit, but I am enjoying what I'm getting to do with it here during testing and will continue to test it out for a while yet.
I'll see about giving it a try too, like I said, I love what the card does, I'm just trying to figure how many slots it's worth and what slots it'd be replacing.

Surfinbird

09-17-2014, 07:48 PM

After some testing i've built this list. It seems very consistent and the sideboard is working fantastically:

1 Ad Nauseam
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal ritual
4 Brainstorm

4 Ponder
4 Gitaxian probe
4 Infernal tutor
4 Duress
3 Cabal therapy
2 Preordain
1 Past in flames
1 Tendrils of Agony

1 Sensei's divining top
4 Lion's eye diamond
4 Lotus petal

4 Polluted delta
2 Misty rainforest
2 Bloodstained mire
2 Underground sea
1 Volcanic island
1 Tropical island
1 Bayou
1 Island
1 Swamp

SIDEBOARD:

3 Xantid Swarm
3 Abrupt decay
3 Dread of night
3 Chain of vapor
1 Massacre
1 Sensei's divining top
1 Empty the warrens

Today i've been playing a couples of hours in cockatrice and i've won all the matches: Canadian, Team America, 2x Death and Taxes, Burning reanimator, bUrg Delver, BUG tempo (stifles), 2x Miracles.

I usually side in 2 chains of vapor against Team America to bounce shamans (and then go to pif kill) or ocasional null rods and graffidgers cage. Do you think it's correct? Should i do the same against Canadian? (they usually play 1-2 cages) I don't think so since we can prepare a tutor chain against them.

Togores

09-17-2014, 08:54 PM

sawatarix

09-18-2014, 03:43 AM

Yesterday i tested against 3 different miracle players and surprisingly i had good results.
2:0 + 2:0 + 2:1= 6:1:0 in games

while g1 was always the same (go off as quickly as possible before they drop counterbalance+ top)
i tested different sideboard options through all the postboard games.

against the first miracle player i boarded in:
+ 2 city of splitude
+ 3 Tendrils of Agony
+ 3 Abrupt Decay
- 7 discard
- 1 Ad Nauseam

it was far from ideal,i know.
all cities got countered obviously because i took out all discard spells.
however i won via double tendrils.

against the second miracle player i boarded:

+ 2 city of solitude
+ 3 tendrils of agony
+ 3 abrupt decay
- 4 LED
- 1 Ad Nauseam
- 2 theraphy
- 1 Lotus Petal

i doubled city of solitude with infernal tutor and cast them in my comboturn.The first one catched a force of will and the second one got also countered.in the same turn i won via tendrils played from my hand (natural tendrils are pretty good because they ignore countermagic except flusterstorm )

against the third miracle player
boardings changed again:

+ 3 Tendrils of Agony
+ 4 Abrupt Decay
+ 1 Krosan Grip
- 4 Lions Eye Diamond
- 2 Lotus Petal
- 2 Cabal Therapy

i cut city because in the previous games it was nothing more than a "discard-spell" which catches a counterspell.
instead, more outs to permanents came in.
basically you play "land go" until you have a full grip with 1-4 tendrils in your hand.
Cast decay on counterbalance at Eot and then go off on your turn,this strategy is called grinding station (nothing new but it still works pretty good).

overall i'm satisfied with the matchup how it is right now but also believe that there are also other ways to win against the most popular control deck.

Togores

09-18-2014, 09:39 AM

I have been playing the second tendrills in side since a while (I have cutted it niw to test other things) amd they came in prety often vs miracles, esper, canadian (changing for the nauseam) and burn where u can make a small tendrills to stay alive while u search for the other. They where generaly great. I played 2 then 1 in side. Obv this plan the mire tendrills the better.

The only problems where:
A flusterstorm
B ppl countering a ritual that makes not get to 8 mana.

Also a big problem is decay. Usualy you wanna decay eot. But then u dint have 8 cards in your turn to go off wich is the perfect aproach.

Also with this plan playing multiple sdt main makes it better.

Surfinbird

09-18-2014, 02:13 PM

How u sided vs bug delver?

also sidding chains can always be good. Its never gonna be a bad card, even bouncing a delver o making more storm. But usualy the card u shafe for this situational card are worser.

I sided in 2 chain of vapor, 1 empty the warrens and 1 sensei's divining top. 1 Gitaxian probe, 1 Cabal ritual, 1 Duress and 1 Bayou went out, but i'm still not sure about taking out the last 2 cards

Togores

09-18-2014, 02:56 PM

Takingg lands vs a deck that has so much fun discarting lands with hymn. Wasteland styfle and daZe seems a bad idea immo.
Weird out boarding that must be said >.<

Surfinbird

09-18-2014, 03:48 PM

Togores

09-18-2014, 04:40 PM

I didn't want to side out any preordains since we need the maximum number of cantrips to beat discard. Maybe i should take out another gitaxian probe, put they are too good:(

Which cards would you side out?

I already play 2 sensei main deck and 0 sb, Also I like a lot duress against decks with hymn, cause its a really good catch card to get rid of hymn or if they have not u can get any other card. Its a catchall in counterpart to Canadian where u just wanna a ton of mana and therapys to get rid of theyr fows.

I would side out 1x preordian, but I dont know if something else. Its really hard to side vs bug delver.

Some ideas?

Tav

09-18-2014, 11:35 PM

I said it on the last page but my board for bug is +3 pyro, -2 preordain, -1 cabal ritual. Bug delver is so good at attacking us from multiple angles, be it discard, mana, our gy, or our life, but it takes their nut draw to be able to hit us from all angles at once. That's why I like the pyros against them as it lets us diversify our threats. Say they keep a noncreature counter heavy hand, we can go to work on pyro, but if maybe they keep an aggressive hand we can attack via pif, or if they go for our gy we can look for a ad nauseam. It's all about not running face first into the plan that they are best prepared for.

As for what I bring out I fully believe preordain is still the weakest card in the deck, although maybe 1 preordain is better in than the 3rd cabal ritual.

EDIT: I actually said I took out the sdt the other day but I was tired and sick and that is just wrong.

Surfinbird

09-19-2014, 07:31 AM

Another question: Which is the best gameplan against Deathblade? How do you side against them?

I side like this:

+1 Sensei's divining top
+2 Chain of vapor (leaving the third in the sideboard, is it ok?)
+1 Massacre

-1 Gitaxian probe
-1 Bayou
-1 Cabal ritual
-1 Lotus petal

sawatarix

09-19-2014, 07:41 AM

there are some cards in the deck wouldn't board out - gitaxian probe is one of them, i've never ever boarded them out so far (only if i do crazy experiments but that doesn't happen that often)

Surfinbird

09-19-2014, 07:45 AM

there are some cards in the deck wouldn't board out - gitaxian probe is one of them, i've never ever boarded them out so far (only if i do crazy experiments but that doesn't happen that often)

How do you side against deathblade?

Togores

09-19-2014, 04:43 PM

Played locals today 4 rounds.

2-0 elfes (my opp g2 made pithing on my led yeay!)
2-0 affinity (here my opp made a chalice on one, i went, led, cabal ritual, infernal, cabal ritual crack led so my second has ******** and he goes envelope my infernal, ok gets countered by his chalice. PIf gg
0-2 elfes, Im missing a ritual to go off and my opp after i discarted his hand has just a visonary, driad, and drs. He draw atacks passes. Draws plays the fresh drawn cradle and the last turn natural order to hoof me.

I mull to 6 keeping, ritual, led, bayou, therapy, brainstorm, duress. I duress petal pass. He makes an elf I draw play the braisntorm of the petal, brainstorm lock me and die.
Would you have played the card in another sequence? or even mull that hand?

1-2 bug
g1 I just roll over him and his not fliped delver.
g2 I go eot and nauseam, he forces it (I knew this forcé) I had pif in grave due to and hymn, I go led cabal ritual pif and he had another fow and I die to his guys.
g3 I had 2 led 3 lands (i fetch) 1 petal and a therapy. I ponder seein petal, brainstorm, ponder keep the cards like so and draw the petal. I go petal therapy (he had: fow, pierce, Liliana, hymn, goyf and a unknown card) He forces with another forcé. and I drop all my artifacts going hellbent. he drops goyf, I brainstorm, keep ponder shuffle, Ponder, shuffle, draw another ponder play it, shuffle draw aritual that gets hymn. I draw another ritual. then draw a gitaxian If i draw a tutor I still live and he had drawn blue card and fow. So I just die.

I still dont know how to beat bug delver, fucking hate that deck...

So thas it, bad beats vs elfs and unlucky draws vs bug >.<

Surfinbird

09-21-2014, 03:56 PM

JamieW89

09-21-2014, 04:13 PM

I've been thinking a bit about our current mana base, which usually looks like this:

8 Fetchlands
2 underground sea
1 bayou
1 tropical island
1 volcanic island
1 island
1 swamp

We are playing 2 green duals only to play abrupt decays and sometimes xantid swarms. In game 1s, they are used as wasteable islands or swamps, and against pairnings where we don't side in either decays or xantids they do the same work in G2 and G3. Let's see the pairings where this cards are needed:

Abrupt decay:

- Miracles: They don't run wastelands, playing only a tropical should be enough.
- MUD, GWB Zenith: They run wastelands, but both are not tier 1, 2 or even 3.

Xantid Swarm:

- Reanimator, Omnitell, Sneak and Show, Merfolks: The same as miracles, they are not running wastelands.
- Canadian, Patriot: They run wastelands, but lots of players argue that they wouldn't bring in xantids against these pairings.

We all know the problems that we have against Delver decks like Canadian or specially Team America. I've thought that maybe running a mana base with 2 swamps and 2 islands would help a lot against this decks, running only a tropical island in the side against the pairings where we really need green mana.

Opinions?

I don't think I'd ever want the second swamp. Needing double black during setup doesn't happen all that often. The second Island definately has merit though, I have certainly missed it at points.

If you think it's unlikely to ever cast a second green spell versus a deck with wastelands (MUD, Maverick/DnT for Decay, maybe tempo if you have Carpets etc.) you can probably cut the Trop for the 2nd Island (Bayou is awkward sometimes, but 2 Islands, Trop, Volc vs 1 Swamp seems a little short on black). You could play 2/1 basics, 2 Sea, 1 Volc, 9 fetch with a trop sb as an alternative if you prefer more fetches (e.g. if you play more cantrips in preordains), or go for 2/1 basics, 2 Sea, Volc+Badlands, 8 Fetch with trop sb if you have EtW or 2 PiF main.

Surfinbird

09-21-2014, 04:18 PM

Against some decks (usually delver) we need 2 black mana sources, 1 to play the discard spell and the other to go off.

JamieW89

09-21-2014, 04:34 PM

Against some decks (usually delver) we need 2 black mana sources, 1 to play the discard spell and the other to go off.

But during your combo turn it's not hard to get extra black sources from petals and non-basics. The basics are mainly there for the setup. A second black is needed in that phase when you want to Grim Tutor for setup or if you want to Infernal for setup and cast another black spell (discard/2nd infernal). It is possible to have several combo turns in a row because they bottleneck the start of it once or twice. In those situations a second swamp helps, but it isn't always required anyways.

Surfinbird

09-22-2014, 08:13 AM

CabalTherapy

09-25-2014, 03:53 AM

Opinions? How do you side against deathblade?

Looks solid. But I wouldn't board out Bayou because of Wasteland and the fact that Deathblade is a slow deck where you can assamble the cards you need for a kill over some turns without getting raced. I want/like some land drops against them.

Surfinbird

09-25-2014, 04:50 PM

Ghiwo

09-25-2014, 05:48 PM

CabalTherapy

09-26-2014, 10:56 AM

Another question about sideboarding against deathbade: chains or decays? Maybe a mix?

Chains cost one mana less (this isn't too relevant in this MU) and can be used as a storm generator.

Abrupt decay cant be countered and kills the target, stopping their clock and giving us some extra turns.

I can't make a decision right now, what do you think about it?

Definitely Chains and no Decays.

I would board in the chains. They usually don't have so much counters, and you can pay a flusterstorm if you chain in mid or late game. Also, you got discard to get rid of them. I would board in Massacre rather than Decay, since it kills everything they may have on the board but Batterskull, so you can free yourself from pressure if it gets too painful. This makes AN a little bit worse, but maybe just a copy or two of Massacre could be good. You still can use it as a draw X at the end of their turn. Anyway, don't worry for the Deathblade match-up, I think it is good, you almost always win game 1, and their board is not enough to stop us game 2 and 3. Also they don't have a fast fast race. It could be considerable, but nothing to worry about in my opinion.

+1

Chaam

09-26-2014, 10:04 PM

Garritano

09-27-2014, 12:02 AM

I am currently thinking of picking up this deck. What do you guys think of the following list? I like the fact that TES has options for any situation because of Burning Wish. But, I also like the fact that ANT can play the grindier/"long" game. Burning Wish allows you to never to lose to a) funky stuff g1 or b) not side-boarding enough or the required anti-hate.
....

Chaam,
Running Burning Wish in non-TES storm is a respectable strategy, but it is currently unpopular due to the red mana requirements (BW -> Past in Flames requires access to double red). Normally, this variant is called "TNT," but I believe the TNT thread was merged with the ANT thread, so there is no dedicated place to discuss it. There was a small amount of discussion about using it as a sideboard card to beat Surgical Extraction effects, but this was also largely unpopular.

Mana Base
I think your list might need one additional land. I'd like to note that you're running fewer lands than most ANT lists, but run costlier cards (Burning Wish) with harsher mana requirements. You also have slightly less library manipulation.
In addition, I'd also consider adding / converting one land to Badlands.
Because some of your best wish targets are red cards, you'll find having access to two red sources in a game comes up more frequently than you'd need. With just Volcanic Island, you'll be reliant on Lotus Petal giving you a red mana against Wasteland decks.
Lastly, it smoothes out Island + Fetch Draws.
Of course, if you switch to running a Badlands, you must also swap Flooded Strand for Scalding Tarn.

Infernal Tutor in the board
A consequence of placing an Infernal Tutor in the board is you have access to one fewer maindeck, which is a tremendous cost.
Most TNT players use Grim Tutor the board-tutor slot so they can run 4x Infernal Tutor maindeck.

The 4th Burning Wish
You really don't want to see Burning Wish as much as a TES player. TES players, with their access to Rite of Flame and Chrome Mox can storm out tons of goblins turn 1, which is much harder for you to do.
In contrast, you want to draw one Infernal Tutor every game. I'd swap the 4th Infernal Tutor with the Burning Wish here.

Other than the Infernal Tutor, I like your sideboard a lot. It's noteworthy that you don't have an artifact removal in the board to stop Chalice for 1, but I think you made the correct call on that.

Burning Wish in General
Which matchups does your variant improve, and which does it hurt?
Does Burning Wish play well against Delver? When I play (non-TES) Storm with Burning Wish, I usually hate drawing it for tempo reasons.
Does Burning Wish add anything to the Miracles matchup? I think that innovation in Storm lists should be targeted at either those two decks, or being more robust against Chalice for 1. From what I can tell Burning Wish doesn't speed up the deck. However, it is plausible that it improves one of those matchups (or say, matchups with Hymn to Tourach).

Garritano

09-27-2014, 12:47 AM

I would board in the chains. They usually don't have so much counters, and you can pay a flusterstorm if you chain in mid or late game. Also, you got discard to get rid of them. I would board in Massacre rather than Decay, since it kills everything they may have on the board but Batterskull, so you can free yourself from pressure if it gets too painful. This makes AN a little bit worse, but maybe just a copy or two of Massacre could be good. You still can use it as a draw X at the end of their turn. Anyway, don't worry for the Deathblade match-up, I think it is good, you almost always win game 1, and their board is not enough to stop us game 2 and 3. Also they don't have a fast fast race. It could be considerable, but nothing to worry about in my opinion.

Another thing I would like to discuss with you guys: I saw some Miracles lists running a copy or two of Izzet Staticaster in the board. Do you think is it still convenient to board in Pyromancers? I think yes, because we can always shuffle away our Pyro if we see it, making it a dead card in their hand. Or discard it. Or also Decay it in response to the activation, in order to save the Pyromancer or the tokens. Also, they could not board it at all if they don't expect pyromancer in game 2. What do you guys think?

Miracles will always board in Izzet Staticaster
You can expect them to always sideboard Izzet Staticaster if they have it and understand their deck. I'd also expect them to keep it in game 3, even if you never play a creature game 2, and they'll always board it in the dark.
It's a more reliable answer to Xantid Swarm, Dark Confidant, Young Pyromancer, and Empty the Warrens than Terminus. It also Pitches to Force of Will, which is a huge advantage over Terminus.
Against ANT, Miracles usually doesn't go to 0 sweepers after game 1, they usually go to ~2 effects. As Izzet is an upgrade over Terminus, you should always expect them to run it.
The sweepers that work against ANT usually work against Elves, so whatever card they run should be coming in against us. (e.g., if they run Engineered Explosives over Izzet, they'll board that in)

Even if they did board out all of their Terminii, they should have enough room to board it in as their 6th-8th sideboard card.
If they're on the maindeck Vendillion Clique + Karakas list, they'll want to board out Council's judgement, a jace, 2x Entreat, 4x Terminus, which is already 8 cards. They typically only have 6 cards to bring in, 2x RIP, 1-2 REB, 2 Flusterstorms, meaning they have plenty of room for Izzet+1 Terminus.

Regarding Saving Pyro/ Tokens
Unfortunately, you'll always be saving the "wrong creatures" if you use Abrupt Decay to save one batch.
You'll be casting Abrupt Decay before your opponent activates Izzet Staticaster, meaning he'll have knowledge that he's about to lose his Staticaster before he makes his decision as to which type of creature to kill. This is because they'll cast it during your combat step so they can use it to block Pyromancer and then kill the tokens. The only conceivable reason to cast it mainphase is to play around Cabal Therapy or Abrupt Decay, which seems really unlikely.
Of course, the ability to do this is still relevant (e.g., if you attack with 3 tokens and a Pyro, you're guaranteed two damage, making your mini-Tendrils that much easier).

I'd expect the card to become more popular, as it is incredible in the Elves matchup, which appears to more relevant lately.

Garritano

09-27-2014, 01:12 AM

Another question about sideboarding against deathbade: chains or decays? Maybe a mix?

Chains cost one mana less (this isn't too relevant in this MU) and can be used as a storm generator.

Abrupt decay cant be countered and kills the target, stopping their clock and giving us some extra turns.

I can't make a decision right now, what do you think about it?

I second everything Ghiwo and CabalTherapy posted.

I'd like to add that Abrupt Decay in Storm is weak against Wasteland decks. Casting it on turn 2 is a bit of disaster. If you played Underground Sea and fetch Tropical Island, they'll Wasteland your Underground Sea, which can be very tough. Thankfully they can't capitalize on manascrewing you the way Delver can (Stifle, Wasteland), but the matchup is so unfavorable for them that they should always Waste you rather than develop their board on the off chance it wins them the game.
Playing Abrupt Decay against a Meddling Mage is fine, but it's poor against SFM - I'd rather just kill my opponent than answer it. In those cases, I'd rather just draw a random card.
Deathblade is one of Storm's best matchups. The deck is just too slow, has too few blue cards, and has lackluster hate. Meddling Mage / Stone Forge Mystic in a world of Counterbalances / Delvers is pretty timid.
I'm not sure why, but a lot of Deathblade players play Surgical Extraction, so keep that in mind.

wonderPreaux

09-27-2014, 02:45 AM

against the third miracle player
boardings changed again:

+ 3 Tendrils of Agony
+ 4 Abrupt Decay
+ 1 Krosan Grip
- 4 Lions Eye Diamond
- 2 Lotus Petal
- 2 Cabal Therapy

i cut city because in the previous games it was nothing more than a "discard-spell" which catches a counterspell.
instead, more outs to permanents came in.
basically you play "land go" until you have a full grip with 1-4 tendrils in your hand.
Cast decay on counterbalance at Eot and then go off on your turn,this strategy is called grinding station (nothing new but it still works pretty good).

overall i'm satisfied with the matchup how it is right now but also believe that there are also other ways to win against the most popular control deck.

I wanted to touch on this topic, as I've been testing it on my stream for the last couple days. My current list runs 14 lands, and sides in 2 green lands to go up to 16 in slow matchups.

My boarding plan looked like this:
+3 Abrupt Decay
+2 Tendrils of Agony
+1 Tropical Island
+1 Bayou
-4 Lion's Eye Diamond
-2 Cabal Therapy
-1 Ad Nauseam

Some thoughts on this:
* This plan tore right into stoneblade decks. I played against Stoneblade and Esperblade this week, won game 1 off the natural advantage in game 1, and they just bit it game 2, easy 2-0 both times. Lilliana and Surgical Extraction from Esperblade likely makes this plan worse, but overall this plan easily beats their counters as all you have to do is hit Flusterstorm and Meddling Mage typically hits Tutor, which you can ignore.

*I think I've been miss-boarding by taking Ad Nauseam out, I definitely missed it today even though I'd theoretically loath to lose all the extra life.

*IDK how deep to go on this plan, I have 3 Decay, 2 Tendrils, but adding more just seems so narrow for my board. Saw's example has 8 cards coming in for, what, 2 matchups? How would I have a balanced board in that case? Maybe something like this:

4 Abrupt Decay
3 Tendrils of Agony
3 Chain of Vapor
2 Xantid Swarm
2 Flusterstorm
1 Empty the Warrens/Xantid Swarm/Flusterstorm

And then I'd just run 15, maybe 16 lands, perhaps some number of mained Tops/Grim Tutors, idk. Any ideas?

*This plan feels very awkward to play against Miracles, actually. Jace can ult in your face while you try and build to lethal Tendrils, Batterskull is incredibly good against you, and having to shoot down Counterbalance or fight stuff like Batterskull and the occasional hate bear makes it really hard to build to 10. It might be because I wasn't running the Ad Nauseam, but it did just seem very awkward, especially when your hand is heavy on lands or discard; you can't mulligan and all that discard and land-dropping just sets you back about as much as it helps. Miracles just gets better every turn they get to do stuff, so it almost feels like this plan doesn't work that well, Pithing Needle might be good here to hit Jace/SFM and Top while you try to set up.

I'll continue to tinker with this as time goes on, just some thoughts I had, if Sawatarix or anyone else has some input, I'd appreciate it.

Regarding TNT builds, I'd also been interested in tinkering with it. I ran into some of the same problems mentioned, though. It's hard to get double red for Wish -> EtW/PiF and Ill-Gotten Gains is sadly too out-dated to act as the SB engine it once was. Ad Nauseam is also strained, especially in the build posted that mains EtW and Tendrils, I would only main the latter, imo. I can't help but wonder if it would be better to just try something line 2 Grim Tutor if you really wanted a lot of business spells, Wilson Hunter's invitational deck featured that, though he ran mained EtW and sided Ad Nauseam. It might be better the other way around at this point.

Surfinbird

09-27-2014, 01:36 PM

Ghiwo

09-28-2014, 04:28 PM

Miracles will always board in Izzet Staticaster
You can expect them to always sideboard Izzet Staticaster if they have it and understand their deck. I'd also expect them to keep it in game 3, even if you never play a creature game 2, and they'll always board it in the dark.
It's a more reliable answer to Xantid Swarm, Dark Confidant, Young Pyromancer, and Empty the Warrens than Terminus. It also Pitches to Force of Will, which is a huge advantage over Terminus.
Against ANT, Miracles usually doesn't go to 0 sweepers after game 1, they usually go to ~2 effects. As Izzet is an upgrade over Terminus, you should always expect them to run it.
The sweepers that work against ANT usually work against Elves, so whatever card they run should be coming in against us. (e.g., if they run Engineered Explosives over Izzet, they'll board that in)

Even if they did board out all of their Terminii, they should have enough room to board it in as their 6th-8th sideboard card.
If they're on the maindeck Vendillion Clique + Karakas list, they'll want to board out Council's judgement, a jace, 2x Entreat, 4x Terminus, which is already 8 cards. They typically only have 6 cards to bring in, 2x RIP, 1-2 REB, 2 Flusterstorms, meaning they have plenty of room for Izzet+1 Terminus.

Regarding Saving Pyro/ Tokens
Unfortunately, you'll always be saving the "wrong creatures" if you use Abrupt Decay to save one batch.
You'll be casting Abrupt Decay before your opponent activates Izzet Staticaster, meaning he'll have knowledge that he's about to lose his Staticaster before he makes his decision as to which type of creature to kill. This is because they'll cast it during your combat step so they can use it to block Pyromancer and then kill the tokens. The only conceivable reason to cast it mainphase is to play around Cabal Therapy or Abrupt Decay, which seems really unlikely.
Of course, the ability to do this is still relevant (e.g., if you attack with 3 tokens and a Pyro, you're guaranteed two damage, making your mini-Tendrils that much easier).

I'd expect the card to become more popular, as it is incredible in the Elves matchup, which appears to more relevant lately.

So, would you still board the pyromancers? I would, it is a 1/2-of that they have to search, if we sneak in an early pyromancer we can take the extra life we need to activate natural tendrils or maybe direct their cantrips into the staticaster instead of more contrast. What do you think about that? Would you prefer the Divining Tops against Miracles, like Carsten Kotter does?

Tav

09-28-2014, 11:04 PM

Couple of extra notes regarding TNT:

1) One of the biggest reasons that TES plays the IT in the board is so that you can grab AN off of only a wish in hand. This obviously requires quite a lot of mana and a deck that plays rites and chrome moxes can reach that threshold much faster than a deck like ANT/TNT.

2) Another thing TES has going for it is despite playing more 2 mana tutors, they are still the better ad nauseam deck, however several parts of your build detract from that.

EDIT: Having gone back and re-looked at your post after writing this I see that you have already edited your post since I read it last, and I like the changes. I still think that TNT is just weaker because of worse ad nauseams, less cantrips, a weaker manabase, and several lost sb slots, all just to gain an extra few outs in a couple of corner case scenarios.

wonderPreaux

09-29-2014, 01:10 AM

1) One of the biggest reasons that TES plays the IT in the board is so that you can grab AN off of only a wish in hand. This obviously requires quite a lot of mana and a deck that plays rites and chrome moxes can reach that threshold much faster than a deck like ANT/TNT.
I'd say this is debatable. Cabal Ritual can net loads more mana than a Rite of Flame would, and spending cards on Chrome Mox means, per card, youre not netting as much as even Rite of Flame. For the purposes of actually getting the Ad Nauseam and casting it, I think TNT and Cabal Rituals can be the better initial setup, whereas TES's Chrome Moxen and Rite of Flame are better to reveal when actual resolving the Ad Nauseam. The line of Wish > Infernal/Grim Tutor > Ad Nauseam is probably better served by Cabal Ritual as you only need 1 red for Wish, unlike PiF/EtW that would be better served by Rite of Flame because of the double red. If you're looking at the ability to chain a Wish into Ad Nauseam, I'd say a TNT build can be just as well equipped.

2) Another thing TES has going for it is despite playing more 2 mana tutors, they are still the better ad nauseam deck, however several parts of your build detract from that.
Yes, TES is the best Ad Nauseam deck, but TNT has better PiF ability with 4 IT and PiF in the main deck as well as Cabal Ritual having better synergy with PiF compared to Rite of Flame or Chrome Mox. TNT can play a better mid-range/long-range game with more lands and higher impact rituals compared to Chrome Mox or Rite of Flame. Further, 4 IT/3 BW main with Grim in the side allows you to consistently pull out more early game combos attempts between having PiF and Ad Nauseam and you have more effective options once you hit threshold.

I still think that TNT is just weaker because of worse ad nauseams, less cantrips, a weaker manabase, and several lost sb slots, all just to gain an extra few outs in a couple of corner case scenarios.
Saying TNT is weaker than TES because it underperforms at the one thing TES is designed to be good at seems like poor evaluation of a deck. with 4 IT and PiF main deck you have a generally high expected value of having some sort of combo attempt. further, burning wish does more than provides outs in a couple of corner cases. needing a business spell isnt a corner case, neither is answering a permanent or hatebear. Void Snare and EtW arent "lost slots" because you want to answer permanents and combo fast against tempo/hatebears anyway, this just stops you from having to guess on what to side in. Further, TNT can be more stable and grindy than TES, improving control matchups; yet still combo with speed and versatility so cards like Eidolon or Leyline dont stop you cold. I think TNT might be just the right deck for the MTGO meta, for example, where the top decks are Burn, Elves, BUG control and Miracles; 2 slow counter decks and 2 fast creature decks being pillars of the meta, along with all the other crazy stuff you can run into on MTGO, means it can pay to be balanced and versatile. High threat density and versatility certainly seems better than Preordain, imo.

Garritano

09-29-2014, 03:26 AM

So, would you still board the pyromancers? I would, it is a 1/2-of that they have to search, if we sneak in an early pyromancer we can take the extra life we need to activate natural tendrils or maybe direct their cantrips into the staticaster instead of more contrast. What do you think about that? Would you prefer the Divining Tops against Miracles, like Carsten Kotter does?

Sensei's Divining Top Against Miracles
Sensei's Divining Top is so good, that I think the decision to board it in should be made irrespective of your decision to board in creatures, regardless if you're boarding Young Pyromancers. I suppose an exception would be made if play a list without Abrupt Decay (which is plausible, but pretty rare in ANT).

I have played extensively with SDT against Miracles and strongly suggest sideboarding it.
Having an uncounterable method of digging for Abrupt Decay, digging for fetchlands, and sculpting a Tendrils kill is superb.
An important consideration for the Miracles match is that they'll cast multiple Counterbalances. They run 4 SDT and 4-8 cantrips, so if Counterbalance is up they dig significantly faster than you, making it possible for them to dig their 2nd CB faster than your first AD. Your own SDT helps offset that.

Turn 1 Decision on the draw without Abrupt Decay in hand: SDT or Duress?
I think that SDT is so good that you'd actually consider playing it turn 1 on the draw over Duress. (this is means you're willing to allow Counterbalance to hit play). If they have FoW + Counterbalance + Blue card, they're FoWing either play. Similarly, they're Spell Piercing either card. However, if they're on Brainstorm + Counterbalance, turn 1 Duress misses the Counterbalance, and you'll probably lose your turn 2 play to a Counterbalance.
Furthermore, they should be boarding in 2 Flusterstorms, which can hit Duress but can't hit SDT.

Comparing SDT vs Duress on turn 1:
Both Situations Equal
-CB + FoW + extra blue card
-CB + Spell Pierce
Favors Duress
-CB and no one mana spells / FoW
Favors SDT
-CB + Brainstorm
-CB + Flusterstorm

Creatures Against Miracles
I really like the idea of boarding in 1-2 creatures in theory.
I personally haven't tried Young Pyromancer yet as ANT vs Miracles, and have only tested Xantid Swarm and Dark Confidant. I greatly prefer Dark Confidant, but Xantid Swarm plays very well against Show-and-Tell variants and is probably the single-best card to board against them, so the choice between the two is meta dependent. I realize that many of the best ANT players use 3x Young Pyromancers and have written extensively about it, but Dark Confidant fits very well with my play style.
It facilitates the natural tendrils plan both by swinging for 2 damage, and by simply digging you into your Abrupt Decays / keeping you on 7 cards. I also run an unusual list in that I have access to 4x SDT, as I'm a recovering Doomsday player.

However, I have played against Young Pyromancer as Miracles vs ANT, and can say the card is pretty scary. I have lost games to Young Pyro while I had SDT + CB lock in play. The strategy is so powerful that the 3x Young Pyro plan might work despite your opponent knowing about it, and my comments regarding Izzet Staticaster being an auto-sideboard against ANT don't really change how good it is. I really can't say whether it's superior to the creatureless "grinding station" plan (which also seems quite good).
Izzet Staticaster doesn't dramatically change the landscape of Young Pyro's playability, as they're already running 2x Sweepers against you regardless if they run Izzet Staticaster...it's just Izzet is an upgrade that helps them mulligan less often.

Ghiwo

09-29-2014, 09:29 AM

Sensei's Divining Top Against Miracles
Sensei's Divining Top is so good, that I think the decision to board it in should be made irrespective of your decision to board in creatures, regardless if you're boarding Young Pyromancers. I suppose an exception would be made if play a list without Abrupt Decay (which is plausible, but pretty rare in ANT).

I have played extensively with SDT against Miracles and strongly suggest sideboarding it.
Having an uncounterable method of digging for Abrupt Decay, digging for fetchlands, and sculpting a Tendrils kill is superb.
An important consideration for the Miracles match is that they'll cast multiple Counterbalances. They run 4 SDT and 4-8 cantrips, so if Counterbalance is up they dig significantly faster than you, making it possible for them to dig their 2nd CB faster than your first AD. Your own SDT helps offset that.

Turn 1 Decision on the draw without Abrupt Decay in hand: SDT or Duress?
I think that SDT is so good that you'd actually consider playing it turn 1 on the draw over Duress. (this is means you're willing to allow Counterbalance to hit play). If they have FoW + Counterbalance + Blue card, they're FoWing either play. Similarly, they're Spell Piercing either card. However, if they're on Brainstorm + Counterbalance, turn 1 Duress misses the Counterbalance, and you'll probably lose your turn 2 play to a Counterbalance.
Furthermore, they should be boarding in 2 Flusterstorms, which can hit Duress but can't hit SDT.

Comparing SDT vs Duress on turn 1:
Both Situations Equal
-CB + FoW + extra blue card
-CB + Spell Pierce
Favors Duress
-CB and no one mana spells / FoW
Favors SDT
-CB + Brainstorm
-CB + Flusterstorm

Creatures Against Miracles
I really like the idea of boarding in 1-2 creatures in theory.
I personally haven't tried Young Pyromancer yet as ANT vs Miracles, and have only tested Xantid Swarm and Dark Confidant. I greatly prefer Dark Confidant, but Xantid Swarm plays very well against Show-and-Tell variants and is probably the single-best card to board against them, so the choice between the two is meta dependent. I realize that many of the best ANT players use 3x Young Pyromancers and have written extensively about it, but Dark Confidant fits very well with my play style.
It facilitates the natural tendrils plan both by swinging for 2 damage, and by simply digging you into your Abrupt Decays / keeping you on 7 cards. I also run an unusual list in that I have access to 4x SDT, as I'm a recovering Doomsday player.

However, I have played against Young Pyromancer as Miracles vs ANT, and can say the card is pretty scary. I have lost games to Young Pyro while I had SDT + CB lock in play. The strategy is so powerful that the 3x Young Pyro plan might work despite your opponent knowing about it, and my comments regarding Izzet Staticaster being an auto-sideboard against ANT don't really change how good it is. I really can't say whether it's superior to the creatureless "grinding station" plan (which also seems quite good).
Izzet Staticaster doesn't dramatically change the landscape of Young Pyro's playability, as they're already running 2x Sweepers against you regardless if they run Izzet Staticaster...it's just Izzet is an upgrade that helps them mulligan less often.

Thanks a lot, your experience, your precise replies, and your tips are really of huge importance for me, since I am preparing for a 300+ people tournament on saturday here in Italy. So, against Miracles would you board in a second top, supposing I already have one maindeck? The second post side would also improve the Team America match-up. I would like to abuse of your patience a little bit more :tongue: How would you board against Team America supposing I am running a classic list with 7 discard, a top and 2 preordains? Is adding a top post board enough, as long as our mainboard is already good at fighting that deck? Or maybe going more narrow with 2 divert or 2 flusterstorms would be worth it?
Thanks a lot, you're helping me, and us in general, really a lot!

nevilshute

09-29-2014, 09:54 AM

I'd say this is debatable. Cabal Ritual can net loads more mana than a Rite of Flame would, and spending cards on Chrome Mox means, per card, youre not netting as much as even Rite of Flame. For the purposes of actually getting the Ad Nauseam and casting it, I think TNT and Cabal Rituals can be the better initial setup, whereas TES's Chrome Moxen and Rite of Flame are better to reveal when actual resolving the Ad Nauseam. The line of Wish > Infernal/Grim Tutor > Ad Nauseam is probably better served by Cabal Ritual as you only need 1 red for Wish, unlike PiF/EtW that would be better served by Rite of Flame because of the double red. If you're looking at the ability to chain a Wish into Ad Nauseam, I'd say a TNT build can be just as well equipped.

Yes, TES is the best Ad Nauseam deck, but TNT has better PiF ability with 4 IT and PiF in the main deck as well as Cabal Ritual having better synergy with PiF compared to Rite of Flame or Chrome Mox. TNT can play a better mid-range/long-range game with more lands and higher impact rituals compared to Chrome Mox or Rite of Flame. Further, 4 IT/3 BW main with Grim in the side allows you to consistently pull out more early game combos attempts between having PiF and Ad Nauseam and you have more effective options once you hit threshold.

Saying TNT is weaker than TES because it underperforms at the one thing TES is designed to be good at seems like poor evaluation of a deck. with 4 IT and PiF main deck you have a generally high expected value of having some sort of combo attempt. further, burning wish does more than provides outs in a couple of corner cases. needing a business spell isnt a corner case, neither is answering a permanent or hatebear. Void Snare and EtW arent "lost slots" because you want to answer permanents and combo fast against tempo/hatebears anyway, this just stops you from having to guess on what to side in. Further, TNT can be more stable and grindy than TES, improving control matchups; yet still combo with speed and versatility so cards like Eidolon or Leyline dont stop you cold. I think TNT might be just the right deck for the MTGO meta, for example, where the top decks are Burn, Elves, BUG control and Miracles; 2 slow counter decks and 2 fast creature decks being pillars of the meta, along with all the other crazy stuff you can run into on MTGO, means it can pay to be balanced and versatile. High threat density and versatility certainly seems better than Preordain, imo.

I've played the TNT version of storm for an extended period of time about a year ago. Since then I've been on wishless-ant while occasionally reverting back to running Burning Wish but every time regretting it.

I think a detractor for Burning Wish is that it feels like it slows the deck down while also increasing the number of awkward "rainbow" hands. Not running Rite of Flame also can make it awkward going off as has been mentioned.

I think that for TNT to become the better build again the format needs to a) slow down and b) have more Gaddock Teeg.

I think the speed thing is especially relevant to stress. Playing with Burning Wish often (in TNT, not in TES) requires an extra turn. Either because you need an extra red mana or because you are using it to fetch a silver bullit in your board.

Against Elves? That's a negative value. We want haste here and don't need any silver bullit here.

Against burn? Honestly I think Burning Wish doesn't improve this match up at all. It's almost a red herring "having a game 1 out to Eidolon". Look, if Eidolon hits play game 1 you need to be having the Burning Wish in hand already for it to have a shot at being relevant. You can't be digging for it at 2dmg and 1 mana per cantrip. Let's say you have it (the wish) in hand when they resolve eidolon. If it's on turn 2 a realistic line for them have been dealing you 4 dmg with goblin guide. You might have fetched once which means you are at 15. Now you cast wish, drop to 13. Let's say you were on the play. In that case, as long as you've not missed a land drop, you will be able to cast Void Snare then. Dropping to 11. But then you need to be able win there and then or the burn player will just redeploy. I'd contend that that won't be possible very often. Instead you will pass the turn at 13 life. The burn player will take his 3rd turn, play his third land, attack you down to 9 (7) life and have 5 cards in hand. If they have Fireblast and any 3 dmg spell you are dead. They might just have 3 bolt/spike/chain spells to end it there. Price of Progress can also act as Fireblast if you've had to run out 2 non basics.

I play a lot (of ant) on mtgo. I'm always happy to face burn with wishless-ant. I feel it's a comfortable 60/40 matchup. Perhaps even better. They are significantly slower than us, goldfishing. Yes they now have 4 "oops I win" cards but no way to manipulate their draws or access to any tutor effects. And we have access to 4 therapy which I feel is more than enough to combat Eidolon. Losing to Eidolon on turn 2 is very frustrating but for the reasons mentioned I don't think it warrants running wishes.

I also don't see how Burning Wish significantly improves our matchup against miracles or delver decks. Not saying it makes those matchups worse (delver matchup can be debated here as I'd argue TNT is more vulberable against their mana denial).

The only matchups where I'd say Burning Wish really pulls some weight is against Thalia.decks. Especially Maverick as it runs Gaddock Teeg. But maverick is non-existent and has been so for a long time now. Against death and taxes I'd probably prefer running wishes but I have to say I feel fine in this matchup with straight up ant. If I'm expecting a d&t heavy meta (which certainly is not the case on mtgo) I'll have a sideboard plan including severeal Dread of Night and Massacre.

With all of this said and done I still think TNT is a fine choice and is a potent deck. It has better late game and the ability to contort your way out of weird game one dead-ends such as facing a game 1 white leyline or the likes. And yeah, if for some reason Teeg makes a real comeback I'll revisit TNT.

wonderPreaux

09-29-2014, 10:53 AM

I've played the TNT version of storm for an extended period of time about a year ago. Since then I've been on wishless-ant while occasionally reverting back to running Burning Wish but every time regretting it.

I think a detractor for Burning Wish is that it feels like it slows the deck down while also increasing the number of awkward "rainbow" hands. Not running Rite of Flame also can make it awkward going off as has been mentioned.

I think that for TNT to become the better build again the format needs to a) slow down and b) have more Gaddock Teeg.

I think the speed thing is especially relevant to stress. Playing with Burning Wish often (in TNT, not in TES) requires an extra turn. Either because you need an extra red mana or because you are using it to fetch a silver bullit in your board.

Against Elves? That's a negative value. We want haste here and don't need any silver bullit here.

Against burn? Honestly I think Burning Wish doesn't improve this match up at all. It's almost a red herring "having a game 1 out to Eidolon". Look, if Eidolon hits play game 1 you need to be having the Burning Wish in hand already for it to have a shot at being relevant. You can't be digging for it at 2dmg and 1 mana per cantrip. Let's say you have it (the wish) in hand when they resolve eidolon. If it's on turn 2 a realistic line for them have been dealing you 4 dmg with goblin guide. You might have fetched once which means you are at 15. Now you cast wish, drop to 13. Let's say you were on the play. In that case, as long as you've not missed a land drop, you will be able to cast Void Snare then. Dropping to 11. But then you need to be able win there and then or the burn player will just redeploy. I'd contend that that won't be possible very often. Instead you will pass the turn at 13 life. The burn player will take his 3rd turn, play his third land, attack you down to 9 (7) life and have 5 cards in hand. If they have Fireblast and any 3 dmg spell you are dead. They might just have 3 bolt/spike/chain spells to end it there. Price of Progress can also act as Fireblast if you've had to run out 2 non basics.

I play a lot (of ant) on mtgo. I'm always happy to face burn with wishless-ant. I feel it's a comfortable 60/40 matchup. Perhaps even better. They are significantly slower than us, goldfishing. Yes they now have 4 "oops I win" cards but no way to manipulate their draws or access to any tutor effects. And we have access to 4 therapy which I feel is more than enough to combat Eidolon. Losing to Eidolon on turn 2 is very frustrating but for the reasons mentioned I don't think it warrants running wishes.

I also don't see how Burning Wish significantly improves our matchup against miracles or delver decks. Not saying it makes those matchups worse (delver matchup can be debated here as I'd argue TNT is more vulberable against their mana denial).

The only matchups where I'd say Burning Wish really pulls some weight is against Thalia.decks. Especially Maverick as it runs Gaddock Teeg. But maverick is non-existent and has been so for a long time now. Against death and taxes I'd probably prefer running wishes but I have to say I feel fine in this matchup with straight up ant. If I'm expecting a d&t heavy meta (which certainly is not the case on mtgo) I'll have a sideboard plan including severeal Dread of Night and Massacre.

With all of this said and done I still think TNT is a fine choice and is a potent deck. It has better late game and the ability to contort your way out of weird game one dead-ends such as facing a game 1 white leyline or the likes. And yeah, if for some reason Teeg makes a real comeback I'll revisit TNT.

I think you're oversimplifying Wish here, while you can use it to remove harmful permanents it also provides you with 3~4 extra cards to go off with. If a burn opponents is on the play and goes land > bolt/guide > go, your only chances are going off or having Therapy for Eidolon. With Wishes you can have extra shots to go off, Burn often can't race 12+ Goblins and it turns their Eidolon against them if they play it. The same holds true for Thalia, you have increased chances of going off and then you also can pull Snare/Massacre while you wait for pieces to come together. Maybe I'm just salty losing to Burn thrice this past week because they always had Eidolon before I could go off, and I'm just missing having earlier kills and outs to "oops, i win" cards.

I also somewhat disagree with the idea the Wish makes you slower. In the scenario where you Wish for a bullet, like Massacre or the like, could you even go off with normal ANT? I think if you're in a condition where you NEED a bullet, youre probably not in a good place to go off and Wish allowing you to go off more slowly is probably "faster" than never being able to go off at all. I will agree that it makes colored mana awkward, though, especially TNT where the red card/chrome mox option is diminished, and thats somewhat an issue you can have with TES as well. I guess you can't quite have it all in a storm deck

Garritano

09-29-2014, 11:46 AM

Thanks a lot, your experience, your precise replies, and your tips are really of huge importance for me, since I am preparing for a 300+ people tournament on saturday here in Italy. So, against Miracles would you board in a second top, supposing I already have one maindeck? The second post side would also improve the Team America match-up. I would like to abuse of your patience a little bit more :tongue: How would you board against Team America supposing I am running a classic list with 7 discard, a top and 2 preordains? Is adding a top post board enough, as long as our mainboard is already good at fighting that deck? Or maybe going more narrow with 2 divert or 2 flusterstorms would be worth it?
Thanks a lot, you're helping me, and us in general, really a lot!

Happy to help :)
Divert
I absolutely would advise against boarding Divert.
This card has never been good, and has gotten worse in the last three years.
BUG Delver runs anywhere from 0-4 Hymn to Tourach, and you might not know whether they have Hymns after game 1. There are almost zero other targets for Divert other than Force of Will, Thoughtseize, and once-in-a-while Spell Pierce, and in general you want Duress more than Divert against these cards. (Thoughtseize can be played turn 2 behind DRS)

A million things go wrong with running Divert, the foremost being your opponent Turn 1 plays a card that lets him look at your hand.
If that card is Thoughtseize and you're on the play, you can attempt to Divert the Thoughtseize, which is good but not a total blowout. They'll discard a creature and the game will continue on.
If they turn 1 Gitaxian Probe you, you're totally screwed, because they'll cast DRS, then wait till turn 2 to Thoughtseize you or turn 3 to Hymn you with the 2 mana backup.
Lastly, if they don't see your hand, Divert still gets Dazed in the first two turns (unless you're on the play and play a Lotus Petal).

Sadly, divert is just bad. If your opponent played ~8-12 Hymn effects or a combination of Hymns and Sinkholes, I'd possibly consider it, but right now I would absolutely not play it under any circumstances. It's awful in every non-Hymn matchup, and is probably worse than Duress in BUG Delver.
Remember, if you really want to nail Hymn to Tourach, you can actually sideboard in Inquisition of Koziliek or even your own Thoughtseize. Now, I don't recommend you do this, but it's WAY better than Divert, because you can also board those in against other decks (for instance, Inquisition is actually amazing against Burn, giving you another way to nail Eidolon).

Top Against Miracles
If you have any Tops in your board, bring them all in!
If you ran 4 in your 75, I'd board in play 4 every day of the week against Miracles.
You're going to be boarding a ton of cards here, so it's hard for me to give SB suggestions. I think the people in this thread aren't totally settled on the boarding plan here, which makes sense because Miracles is such a hard matchup. I personally like slowing the deck down, shaving 1 Therapy, and going the "grinding station" plan.
Despite this, I think +3 Young Pyromancer +3 Abrupt Decay +1 SDT, and possibly +1-2 Tendrils is correct. That is A LOT of cards, and not all people are comfortably dedicating so many slots to Miracles, so you'll have to decide how you want to select your board. I think some people have speculated that you should board out LEDs, but I don't know if that works. I'd consider cutting 1, but don't like cutting them all.

When playing Against Miracles, keep in mind that game 1 you can instant speed Ad Nauseum during their upkeep to break a Counterbalance lock if they're stuck on lands. This is because they lose mana either during your endstep or during your upkeep floating their card so that they don't draw it during their draw step. (DR, when they spin / draw with top, DR in response, if they do it again, Cabal Ritual-> Ad Nauseum)

Flusterstorm
This card is very good and helps in other matchups. I don't know if it's going to help BUG Delver much, but it certainly is a powerful card that you can bring in a bunch of different matchups. If you play Flusterstorm against BUG Delver, although you intend to use it to counter Hymn you are likely going to be countering Brainstorm with it. Against BUG Delver, I'm actually not sure if Flusterstorm is better than Duress. If you're already boarding in 1-2 SDT, I don't know what you board out to make room for Flusterstorm. It certainly is better than Duress on the draw against Hymn against a Hymn+Daze, but your deck is capable of LP + Duress turn 1. On the play, Duress just seems better than Flusterstorm in the BUG matchups (including Shardless).
At some point in the future I'll write a simulation to examine that scenario.

However, Flusterstorm is awesome in a ton of over than matchups.
It is an uncounterable way of countering Show and Tell and most of Reanimator's combo pieces, and because it nails Ponder / Brainstorm, it is always a good draw.
A card which counters Brainstorm, Hymn, and Show and Tell, and also happens to crush in the mirror is a serious card.
Putting two of these in your sideboard may actually be a very good idea, but if you do, do it with Show and Tell / Storm Combo in mind.
(Also, you're playing SDT, and Flusterstorm floated with Sensei's Divining Top is basically the hard lock against ANT)

Sideboarding against BUG Delver
Definitely bring in top, it is awesome in this matchup. I think if you could pick your number of Tops to play game2-3, it's actually 4.
After that, I'm unsure what to bring in. The matchup is definitely winnable, but it's very hard.
Top lets you recover from all of their cards other than Liliana, and even then you can still get lucky. Their deck is very fast, but not so fast that you won't have time to Top 4-5 times and sculpt your draw.
It even plays very well against Vendillion Clique, which they bring in after game 1. You sometimes end up in state where both players know each others' hands, which includes them with a V Clique and 0 counters. Here, you can do stuff like stack your top 3 with [Mana Source / Infernal Tutor or piF / random card], draw your mana, activate your LEDs, then top SDT and Storm them through Vendillion Clique.

If you sideboard your Tropical Island, bring it in. A lot of players in this thread sideboard Young Pyromancer here, but I don't have experience about that and can't comment on it. I dislike playing 2 mana cards against BUG Delver, because one of their ways of beating you is Daze + Wasteland + Stifle, and two mana spells play badly against that. Also, keep in mind that most BUG Delver boards run 2 Golgari Charm, which happens to crush Young Pyro. They might be bringing in those against you thinking they'll be killing Empty the Warrens and accidentally hate your Young Pyros along the way.

Other than Top, I can't comment much on what works against BUG Delver, although I can advise you against Carpet of Flowers. Although Carpet is normally pretty good against Delver, and is insane against blue-based control, it is weak against BUG Delver. They run DRS, Bayou, and fetchlands, so they let it resolve and let you get 1 mana per turn, which isn't that good. They also have access to Abrupt Decay, and lastly Carpet of Flowers opens you to Wasteland in a weird way, because you'll be fetching Tropical Island / Bayou and they'll waste your other land to lock you off of blue or black.

I tried a green plan against them (Swarm / Abrupt Decay), and I didn't like it. I think -1 Preordain +1 Top is fine (and my preferred choice), but I think bringing in Decay or Pyromancer is respectable.

Expect them to sideboard in 1 Null Rod against you, and possibly Grafdigger's Cage. Null Rod is particularly annoying because it nails Top, but thankfully they only run 1 and it hits play after turn 1 discard.

As an aside, your turn 1 play against BUG Delver is really hard because they could be on Stifle, Wasteland, Hymn, Spell Pierce, Daze, or Thoughtseize, and depending on what they drew your turn 1 play is really different. (Specifically, if you they have Hymn you must Duress them, if they don't you want to get SDT in play before they have counter magic up)
Because of this, you should go ahead and Gitaxian Probe turn 1 pretty much every game, especially if you have Duress + Top + Fetchland in hand.
Also, if they lead with turn 1 DRS off of a dual, it's sometimes correct for you to have no turn 1 play if you have a 3 land hand.

Lastly, although they run DRS, the games you do win will often be PiF victories.

Good luck in your tournament! I hope you get paired against Elves all the way to the Top 8.

Garritano

09-29-2014, 12:01 PM

Hi guys! Today i've attended at a 80 people tournament and i've ended up a 4-2-1, losing the first match against Team america and the last one against the mirror, where my opponent simply had more luck than me. I drawed with miracles after a terrible g3.
I won against monoblack, esper blade, ur delver and gwb zenith.

I'm very concerned about the Team America MU. Unless i'm lucky, i feel completely unable to beat them, i'm losing to them every month (the catalan league is 1 tournament every month!).

The next three weeks i'm going to try all the silly ideas that i have. By mow i've thought about talrand, but also playing 4 empty the warrens in the sideboard could be good and also devastating vs miracles.

Other ideas? Opinions?

The "man plan" is a respectable strategy against Miracles, but it's not devastating.
The only way for Miracles to have 0 sweepers against you is if they decide to run 4 Swords, their max number of Jaces, and some number of Entreats.
Most Miracles players side out ~1 Jace and both entreats here, and I think they'll split their removal between 2 swords and 2 sweepers, and adjust their removal suite after they see what creature you boarded in. (Xantid Swarm, Dark Confidant, Young Pyro, or Empty the Warrens)
As Miracles, it's actually hard to sideboard out all your removal against Storm, and most Miracles players actually bring in anti-Goblin token cards. In the past, that card was Engineered Explosives, but Izzet Staticaster may replace it because it's better against Elves.

Against BUG Delver, I suggest you sideboard Sensei's Divining Top. It's probably my favorite card to see in my opening hand against them. I wrote about it extensively in my previous post so I won't repeat it here, but I advise you board SDT against both BUG Delver and Miracles. (assuming you have access to Abrupt Decay. If you don't have Abrupt Decay run 4 Young Pyros or 4 Empty like you planned, it can still win against Miracles and even beat a CB lock).

Togores

10-01-2014, 10:27 AM

Higgs

10-01-2014, 11:01 AM

Does anyone have a SB to go for the Grinding Station plan (a.k.a. overload their counters) rather than the critters plan?

Goobady

10-01-2014, 11:13 AM

Hello,

So I've been playing Legacy ANT for a few years now, currently on the Burning Wish version because I like the versatility and I find that when running Preordain 99% of the time I'm looking for a business spell with it so I might as well run Wish which basically is. Here is my list:

Fast Mana:
4 Lotus Petal
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
1 Chrome Mox
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual

Cantrips:
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder

Discard:
3 Cabal Therapy
4 Duress

Business:
3 Burning Wish
4 Infernal Tutor
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Past in Flames
1 Ad Nauseam

Lands:
2 Gemstone Mine
4 Polluted Delta
1 Flooded Strand
1 Scalding Tarn
2 Underground Sea
1 Tropical Island
1 Volcanic Island
1 Island
1 Swamp

Sideboard (15)
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Xantid Swarm
1 Void Snare
1 Cabal Therapy
1 Pyroclasm
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Past in Flames
1 Empty the Warrens
1 Massacre
1 Ill-Gotten Gains
1 Meltdown

Now that Treasure Cruise is out, I think that might be worth running. I know how poorly it synergizes with PiF and Cabal Ritual, but it might be worth it for such a powerful effect. You can always cast it after CRit after getting the threshold bonus, and we have plenty of cards we don't care about for PiF such as lands/artifacts/excess cantrips. For now I am going to test it as a 1 or maybe 2 of, over either Probe, Ponder, Burning Wish, or with it just in the SB as a Wish target (over Pyro or IGGy). I'll talk about it more once I can get some tests done, I'm not actually sold on it just yet but it is the kind of card worth thinking about. If you are running the Preordain version of ANT that is an obvious replacement worth testing.

davelin

10-01-2014, 12:10 PM

CabalTherapy

10-01-2014, 12:20 PM

Now that Treasure Cruise is out, I think that might be worth running. I know how poorly it synergizes with PiF and Cabal Ritual, but it might be worth it for such a powerful effect. You can always cast it after CRit after getting the threshold bonus, and we have plenty of cards we don't care about for PiF such as lands/artifacts/excess cantrips. For now I am going to test it as a 1 or maybe 2 of, over either Probe, Ponder, Burning Wish, or with it just in the SB as a Wish target (over Pyro or IGGy). I'll talk about it more once I can get some tests done, I'm not actually sold on it just yet but it is the kind of card worth thinking about. If you are running the Preordain version of ANT that is an obvious replacement worth testing.

Treasure Cruise is terrible here. Just look at this:

- Ad Nauseam
- Cabal Ritual
- early game cantripping
- against any kind of graveyard removal: Deathrite Shaman, RiP...

These points make TC a pretty bad card in ANT. Always Preordain > Treasure Cruise.

I can already see someone testing with TC, doing some fancy natural Tutor line without LED: Gitaxian Probe into Treasure Cruise into "I can't play this now!" :tongue:

Goobady

10-01-2014, 12:22 PM

Treasure Cruise is terrible here. Just look at this:

- Ad Nauseam
- Cabal Ritual
- early game cantripping

That is all we need, thus making TC a pretty bad card. Always Preordain > Treasure Cruise.Yea I know all that, which is why I'm not sold, just putting it out there for testing. I'm mainly focused on the Wish target, due to Ad Nauseam, but it might work there.

CabalTherapy

10-01-2014, 12:25 PM

Yea I know all that, which is why I'm not sold, just putting it out there for testing. I'm mainly focused on the Wish target, due to Ad Nauseam, but it might work there.

True, but I was rather referring to "If you are running the Preordain version of ANT that is an obvious replacement worth testing." I guess it would be ok as a Wish target. (see the TES thread)

Ghiwo

10-01-2014, 05:24 PM

I think +3 Young Pyromancer +3 Abrupt Decay +1 SDT, and possibly +1-2 Tendrils is correct.

Wouldn't you board in the Swarms? They protect you from Top + counter floating, otherwise you would need Abrupt Decay + discard. They're just week to Staticaster and Plowshares, but I think they're worth it. Don't you? Or maybe you just forgot them, don't know :tongue:

Anyway, I'm going to run a sideboard like that:

3 Abrupt Decay
2 Chain of Vapor
3 Young Pyromancer
3 Xantid Swarm
1 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Flusterstorm
1 Massacre

Maybe boarding 10 against Miracles is too much, I don't know.. What do you think? Are 3 Decays enough or should I go to 4? And I am going to board 6 or 5 vs. D&T and Maverick (2 chain 2/3 decay 1 massacre), this should be enough, doesn't it? The Flusterstorms are in for Show.dec, Reanimator, Storm, Canadian match-ups, absolutely not for Team America! Especially, vs. Reanimator I am going to apply this plan when boarding: -1 top -1 swamp -1 preordain -1 lotus petal -2 cabal therapy +2 flusterstorm +2 chain of vapor +2 xantid swarm. The question is: do we need another swarm in? Carsten does a pretty much similar plan against Show.dec, just -1 chain +1 swarm.

Good luck in your tournament! I hope you get paired against Elves all the way to the Top 8.

Ahaha! Thanks a lot, I hope so! I'll do my best to value all of your help!

@togores: sad to read this, it would have been great to meet you and also the german stormers. I'll do my best to headshot each one of my opponents as you wished. Maybe I'm not as good as Sawatarix and Cabal Therapy are, but I'll do my best! :)

Garritano

10-02-2014, 01:17 AM

Wouldn't you board in the Swarms? They protect you from Top + counter floating, otherwise you would need Abrupt Decay + discard. They're just week to Staticaster and Plowshares, but I think they're worth it. Don't you? Or maybe you just forgot them, don't know :tongue:

Anyway, I'm going to run a sideboard like that:

3 Abrupt Decay
2 Chain of Vapor
3 Young Pyromancer
3 Xantid Swarm
1 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Flusterstorm
1 Massacre

Maybe boarding 10 against Miracles is too much, I don't know.. What do you think? Are 3 Decays enough or should I go to 4? And I am going to board 6 or 5 vs. D&T and Maverick (2 chain 2/3 decay 1 massacre), this should be enough, doesn't it? The Flusterstorms are in for Show.dec, Reanimator, Storm, Canadian match-ups, absolutely not for Team America! Especially, vs. Reanimator I am going to apply this plan when boarding: -1 top -1 swamp -1 preordain -1 lotus petal -2 cabal therapy +2 flusterstorm +2 chain of vapor +2 xantid swarm. The question is: do we need another swarm in? Carsten does a pretty much similar plan against Show.dec, just -1 chain +1 swarm.

Ahaha! Thanks a lot, I hope so! I'll do my best to value all of your help!

@togores: sad to read this, it would have been great to meet you and also the german stormers. I'll do my best to headshot each one of my opponents as you wished. Maybe I'm not as good as Sawatarix and Cabal Therapy are, but I'll do my best! :)

Xantid Swarm vs Young Pyromancer
Before you construct your SB for Miracles, you need to choose which strategy you're going with. If you're playing Young Pyromancer, you are consciously deciding to let mini-Tendrils be a kill. This means drawing a midgame Tendrils is awesome, so simultaneously boarding Tendrils and Young Pyro makes sense. The Abrupt Decays are fine here, because EoT Abrupt Decay is still important even if you're only going for Tendrils for 4-5 (you still want DR / CR to resolve).
If you adopt a mini-Tendrils or Grinding Station strategy, you don't mind if your opponent has some form of interaction. You aren't trying to bring them to 0 counterspells on your combo turn. What you really care about resolving is DR / CR to get to 4 mana. If they counter some cards but let you reach 4 mana anyway, they lose to the extra storm they added.
Knocking them off floated Flusterstorm / FoW using Xantid Swarm is less useful for that goal.
Xantid Swarm and Young Pyro are completely at odds with one another. Normally you're crushing your opponent if you draw two sideboard cards in an opening hand, but in this case (Xantid + Young Pyro), the Xantid Swarm isn't adding much. If your opponent lands Counterbalance, you're still depending on Young Pyro to carry you until you get your AD.

When is Xantid Swarm Good?
Xantid Swarm crushes Show and Tell because they're all-in on the "beat you with Flusterstorm + REB + Spell Pierce + FoW" plan, but Miracles isn't like that. They can cast Counterbalance and walk away from the table, drawing nothing but useless 1 mana spells like Swords and easily win. If you resolve Swarm there, you might still lose. They even can play Clique in response and hope to nail a key card (e.g., all mana sources 1 business spell).
In addition, Show and Tell doesn't play removal. Their only way of answering Swarm turn 1 on the draw is FoW, after that they're all-in sideboard hate (Leyline of Sanctity) or racing your combo.
Now, if you decide that you want to kill your opponent with a non-Grinding Station plan, such as a standard Tutor Chain / Ad Nauseum / PiF kill utilizing LED, then yes, you have to make sure you don't lose to SDT floating a counterspell.
This is why some boards are 3-4 Xantid Swarms + ADs with 0 Pyros. I think Carsten Kotter recommends something like this.

Where does that leave everything?
After all of this reasoning, it's conceivable you'd still board in Xantid Swarm against Miracles. If you do, I absolutely would not bring in 3. You can't sideboard 10 cards and expect your deck to still work, you'd have to board out discard. When you do, Young Pyro gets worse and you become even weaker against CB. I have never played both Young Pyro and XS at the same time, so I can't comment too much on this, but maybe a 3/1 split is ok. My gut reaction is to do 3/0 or 0/3.
Lastly, there is a poker aspect to your sideboarding game. You're in an imperfect information game with your opponent, where you both blindly commit some number of slots to either removal or creatures. It's plausible you should randomize between 0-6 creatures with a distribution skewed towards 3 to optimally play against your opponent. I think a finding from game theory is that mixed strategies are typically the solution to games of this form, so keep that in mind. (i.e., committing to "always board X creatures" is probably wrong no matter which number you settle you. You're probably supposed to say "I will randomly choose a number from the set {0,1,2,3,4,5} with weightings {a,b,c,d,e}."
If you decide to go rogue and play a 6 creature board, consider going to 0-3 creatures game 3. If your opponent overboards, you can punish him.

Lastly, your sideboard has Young Pyros and 0 ToA. I don't really like this, as Young Pyro often doesn't go all the way but leaves your opponent at a dangerously low life total that you can mini-Tendrils. If you don't board in Tendrils, this is really hard to do.
I would rather board in AD, ToA, YP, and SDT. I think 3 or 4 AD is fine, even despite the 2 CB threat. I think 3x of 4 cards after game 1 is good.

You should decide how you want to beat Miracles then focus your board a little. Also, 3x Xantid Swarm may be too many, having 2 is fine. Having 0 is also fine. They're narrower in application than I'd like and you can consider other spells in that slot.
I think in live tournaments people play more white creature decks than online, you could consider making room for more hate spells there.

sawatarix

10-02-2014, 05:40 AM

@Garratino,couldn't agree more. +1

now i'm on my way to the airport, today is reserved for sightseeing. ( does anybody know a delicious restaurant in Milano? :D )

decklist: Check
sideboard: Check
confidence: Check

ciao amicos !Ovino here we go

http://tapatalk.imageshack.com/v2/14/10/02/2898d4533484df03cf65ec2251fc3782.jpg

CabalTherapy

10-02-2014, 05:49 AM

@Garratino,couldn't agree more. +1

now i'm on my way to the airport, today is reserved for sightseeing. ( does anybody know a delicious restaurant in Milano? :D )

decklist: Check
sideboard: Check
confidence: Check

ciao amicos !Ovino here we go

http://tapatalk.imageshack.com/v2/14/10/02/2898d4533484df03cf65ec2251fc3782.jpg

Good luck, mate.
Unfortunately, I am not able to attend this tournament but I am sure you will storm your way through Milano. Have a splendid day off.

Sloshthedark

10-02-2014, 06:03 AM

Right now I should be in a plane to fly to the ovino. But because of familly issues i had to cancel my flight last minute. Good luck to the german stormers and all other stormer. Would have liked to know you all there but another time it will be. Will be training here hard under a watterfall to in 2 weeks travel to usa and play in the scg and the eternal weekend.

So headshots for everyone is what i wanna read on monday.

Oh that's sad to read, wish you things settle down well...

I'm on the airport myself, hope to meet you guys, if we don't know each other and you see black korean foil PiF it's me killing you :)

GL everyone!

P-E

10-02-2014, 06:38 AM

I hope there'll be a coverage ^^

good luck everyone

Ghiwo

10-02-2014, 11:42 AM

Xantid Swarm vs Young Pyromancer
Before you construct your SB for Miracles, you need to choose which strategy you're going with. If you're playing Young Pyromancer, you are consciously deciding to let mini-Tendrils be a kill. This means drawing a midgame Tendrils is awesome, so simultaneously boarding Tendrils and Young Pyro makes sense. The Abrupt Decays are fine here, because EoT Abrupt Decay is still important even if you're only going for Tendrils for 4-5 (you still want DR / CR to resolve).
If you adopt a mini-Tendrils or Grinding Station strategy, you don't mind if your opponent has some form of interaction. You aren't trying to bring them to 0 counterspells on your combo turn. What you really care about resolving is DR / CR to get to 4 mana. If they counter some cards but let you reach 4 mana anyway, they lose to the extra storm they added.
Knocking them off floated Flusterstorm / FoW using Xantid Swarm is less useful for that goal.
Xantid Swarm and Young Pyro are completely at odds with one another. Normally you're crushing your opponent if you draw two sideboard cards in an opening hand, but in this case (Xantid + Young Pyro), the Xantid Swarm isn't adding much. If your opponent lands Counterbalance, you're still depending on Young Pyro to carry you until you get your AD.

When is Xantid Swarm Good?
Xantid Swarm crushes Show and Tell because they're all-in on the "beat you with Flusterstorm + REB + Spell Pierce + FoW" plan, but Miracles isn't like that. They can cast Counterbalance and walk away from the table, drawing nothing but useless 1 mana spells like Swords and easily win. If you resolve Swarm there, you might still lose. They even can play Clique in response and hope to nail a key card (e.g., all mana sources 1 business spell).
In addition, Show and Tell doesn't play removal. Their only way of answering Swarm turn 1 on the draw is FoW, after that they're all-in sideboard hate (Leyline of Sanctity) or racing your combo.
Now, if you decide that you want to kill your opponent with a non-Grinding Station plan, such as a standard Tutor Chain / Ad Nauseum / PiF kill utilizing LED, then yes, you have to make sure you don't lose to SDT floating a counterspell.
This is why some boards are 3-4 Xantid Swarms + ADs with 0 Pyros. I think Carsten Kotter recommends something like this.

Where does that leave everything?
After all of this reasoning, it's conceivable you'd still board in Xantid Swarm against Miracles. If you do, I absolutely would not bring in 3. You can't sideboard 10 cards and expect your deck to still work, you'd have to board out discard. When you do, Young Pyro gets worse and you become even weaker against CB. I have never played both Young Pyro and XS at the same time, so I can't comment too much on this, but maybe a 3/1 split is ok. My gut reaction is to do 3/0 or 0/3.
Lastly, there is a poker aspect to your sideboarding game. You're in an imperfect information game with your opponent, where you both blindly commit some number of slots to either removal or creatures. It's plausible you should randomize between 0-6 creatures with a distribution skewed towards 3 to optimally play against your opponent. I think a finding from game theory is that mixed strategies are typically the solution to games of this form, so keep that in mind. (i.e., committing to "always board X creatures" is probably wrong no matter which number you settle you. You're probably supposed to say "I will randomly choose a number from the set {0,1,2,3,4,5} with weightings {a,b,c,d,e}."
If you decide to go rogue and play a 6 creature board, consider going to 0-3 creatures game 3. If your opponent overboards, you can punish him.

Lastly, your sideboard has Young Pyros and 0 ToA. I don't really like this, as Young Pyro often doesn't go all the way but leaves your opponent at a dangerously low life total that you can mini-Tendrils. If you don't board in Tendrils, this is really hard to do.
I would rather board in AD, ToA, YP, and SDT. I think 3 or 4 AD is fine, even despite the 2 CB threat. I think 3x of 4 cards after game 1 is good.

You should decide how you want to beat Miracles then focus your board a little. Also, 3x Xantid Swarm may be too many, having 2 is fine. Having 0 is also fine. They're narrower in application than I'd like and you can consider other spells in that slot.
I think in live tournaments people play more white creature decks than online, you could consider making room for more hate spells there.

Thank you, now I understand your point. It makes great sense to me. So, I can drop the 2 Flusterstorms for 1 ToA and 1 more chain, as you suggested, to hate white hatebears. So, I'll try to handle Reanimator with just Swarms, Chains and discard. With a ToA in the board I can swap it for Ad Nauseam in the Canadian Threshold match-up, what do you think?

spartan117

10-02-2014, 12:59 PM

@Garratino,couldn't agree more. +1

now i'm on my way to the airport, today is reserved for sightseeing. ( does anybody know a delicious restaurant in Milano? :D )

decklist: Check
sideboard: Check
confidence: Check

ciao amicos !Ovino here we go

Could tell you a couple places where to eat some sweet italian food in Milano, unfortunately they aren't that close to the tournament location ^^

Also, it's "ciao amici" actually, "amicos" sounds kind of spanish :cool:

Have your sb plans ready against miracles, it's been the go-to choice for all of the top players here in Italy for the last 2 years.

See you there tomorrow in person, and for all the others, don't forget to watch the live streaming for some entertainment (mostly in italian but we'll have a few matches commented in english as well) :wink:

Bring your TheSource playmats with you guys, I'll be proudly showing mine!

Garritano

10-02-2014, 01:16 PM

Thank you, now I understand your point. It makes great sense to me. So, I can drop the 2 Flusterstorms for 1 ToA and 1 more chain, as you suggested, to hate white hatebears. So, I'll try to handle Reanimator with just Swarms, Chains and discard. With a ToA in the board I can swap it for Ad Nauseam in the Canadian Threshold match-up, what do you think?

I am always happy to help fellow storm players!
Hatebear Decks
White hatebears are a lot more dangerous than they look. In particular, Mother of Runes + Thalia is very strong against us and is hard to beat with CoV. (you need two). Thankfully these hatebear decks are becoming less popular (I think because of True-Name Nemesis making aggro difficult to play), and the recent Khans of Tarkir printings probably bias people towards blue decks this coming weekend.
I don't have a good feeling for the paper meta, especially in Europe, but having another card or two that you can board in against hate bears might be nice.
I have to warn you that this matchup actually has a lot of skill (for both players), so if you can get practice in it will really be valuable. This might all be obvious, but make sure you understand what instant-speed tricks they can do. The obvious ones are Swords to beat an exact storm or Aven Mind Censor to beat Tutor, but be mindful of Aether Vial on 2, it can flash Thalia, Canonist, or Spirit of the Lab.
In general, I think 3x CoV is awesome in ANT sideboards and am happy you are going up to 3.

Tendrils Against Canadian
This sounds pretty good. Carpet of Flowers is probably the best card here, but you don't run those, and I think it's fine to exclude them.
I have experimented with Xantid Swarm against Delver, and I didn't really like it. Btw don't forget they're always boarding in a Null Rod.
In the Delver matchups, natural Tendrils is most important against the Young Pyromancer builds, because they run 4x Gitaxian Probe. (and, if they run black, they actually also board Thoughtseize).
Historically Canadian has been an awesome deck, but it's possible that UR Delver or BUG Delver will become more popular this weekend thanks to Treasure Cruise.

Reanimator
Be really careful here. Reanimator is a very powerful deck and is very good against opposing combo decks. Chain of Vapor looks really good, but they often just Ioana blue or Griselbrand you. If they Griselbrand you, they're going to draw Daze / FoW / Spell Pierce on their draw 7 and will reanimate the following turn.
If you Chain of Vapor Griselbrand, you're still behind.
The color they name against you normally depends on if they're a former Storm player. I find that Reanimator players who have never played Storm name black, and those that have played Storm sometimes name blue. I think the correct decision should depend on each players' opening 7 (e.g., what did Duress show, did they open w/ Daze / FoW).

Over all, I'm afraid that Reanimator is favored in this matchup unless you put hate in your board. (Extirpate / Surgical Extraction / Leyline of the Void / Tormod's Crypt). Your overall match win percentage will be very unfavorable with the board you've posted, and you are probably unfavored in any game where you draw 2 CoV. (they're going to know the content of your hand because they run Probe + Duress, and they'll just draw 7 or Ioana you out)

Now, this doesn't mean you need to panic and change anything. You're playing a ANT because you want to crush all the Elves and (non-Counterbalance) control decks, having a bad Reanimator matchup might be a weakness you are fine with!

Dredge
While I'm mentioning graveyard hate, I want to mention Dredge. You are very favored int his matchup, especially if they're on Manaless dredge. (I have never lost a match to manaless dredge, the only games you lose are when they get LED + Street Wraith god draws).
Dredge is such a good matchup that you don't need to dedicate any sideboard hate to them.
I suggest you sideboard in CoV, because they will want to Dread Returns Ioana against you.
I'm writing all this about Dredge because it's important for you to know that graveyard hate against Reanimator isn't very useful in other matchups, because it's improving a matchup you're already favored in.

Chain of Vapor + Sensei's Divining Top
You probably already know this, but make sure you're aware of this interaction. If you know, please don't be offended by me restating the obvious, as it may help our fellow storm players. :)
There are two key tricks with Chain of Vapor and Sensei's Divining Top.
If you draw Chain of Vapor and would rather be digging for fresh cards, you can use it with SDT to cycle. Activate Sensei's Divining Top's tap to draw ability, and do not pass priority. With that on the stack, cast Chain of Vapor targeting SDT. If that resolves, Sensei's Divining Top goes to your hand. Then, Sensei's Divining Top's draw ability resolves, but it won't go to the top of your library (because it is now in your hand).
If you need to bounce something, you can extend this trick to get a few draw at the loss of a land / recasting Top.
Suppose your opponent has a Leyline of Sanctity in play, and you have Top. Activate Top to draw a card, hold priority, cast CoV targeting Top, and let CoV resolve. If CoV resolves, you may choose to copy it by sacrificing a land. Sacrifice a land, hitting Leyline of Sanctity. After that is bounced, your opponent can clone CoV (which he probably won't), then your draw ability finally resolves.

Lastly, you can get free storm when you CoV. (e.g., if your opponent has Leyline and you have a few zero mana artifacts, you can get play them, CoV them all, then have your final CoV hit Leyline).

Board in Chain of Vapor against Show and Tell
I assume you already know this, but it may help our fellow storm players so don't be offended if this is obvious.
Unfortunately, you need to board in at minimum 1 Chain of Vapor against Show and Tell decks. They board in Leyline of Sanctity, so don't let them get any free wins.

Xantid Swarm - Numbers
You're on 3 Xantid Swarms, and this is fine as it will give you a much better Show and Tell matchup and help you a lot vs Reanimator.
However, if you need another SB slot, you can shave one here. 2 Xantid Swarm is also really great.
The card is a weaker in multiples against Duress, because if you draw 2 they'll just slow you down with Duress and out-combo you.
Because you aren't bringing in many of them (or any, depends) against Miracles, they're not doing much work in your sideboard, so you can definitely cut some if you want.

Xantid Swarm vs Flusterstorm in the context of Duress and Sensei's Divining Top
One of the reasons Top is good is that it lets you float game-ending cards against discard decks (and Clique).
Unfortunately, Xantid Swarm doesn't work with that game plan. It is game-endingly good, but you can't float a Xantid Swarm and use it to counter combo the same way Extirpate does against Reanimator or Flusterstorm does against ANT.
Therefore, when you have access to SDT, you are slightly more inclined to use Flusterstorm as an answer against combo.
You can consider going to 0 Swarms and ~2 Flusterstorms. It'll make Show and Tell a much harder matchup, but it'll make ANT / TES significantly easier.

Flusterstorm Competes with Xantid Swarm in Show and Tell MUs
Because Show and Tell boards in Leyline, this causes Flusterstorm's value to go up a little. This is because your Duress / Cabal Therapy gets weaker after game 1. If they have LLoS + interaction, they can slow your combo down, and if you don't have Flusterstorm you can't punish them for trying to quickly combo out. Being able to threaten Flusterstorm is completely awesome, and it's particularly good against Mono-blue OmniTell (which can't Sneak Attack you).
Because they have LLoS + FoW, game 2-3 they're going to either have LLoS or FoW turn 1 pretty much every game. This means that Turn 1 Xantid Swarm is going to get FoWed OR you are going to need to CoV your combo turn, and that combo turn better happen turns 2-3.

Overall Conclusions
If you play 2 or 3 Xantid Swarms, they're both good and defensible. 0 or 2 Flusterstorms are also both defensible.
I personally love playing SDT and Flusterstorm fits my play style. I'd rather have the option to threaten floated Flusterstorm vs ANT than the improved Show and Tell MUs. You're playing in Europe where Storm is a bit more common. Flusterstorm dramatically helps in the ANT MU, and you basically don't have any board against them, so that might be a consideration.
You also might need to make room for Dread of Night or Massacre, depending on how make of the meta you think white is going to be. Both of those cards are phenomenal in the hate bears matchup (and Massacre comes in against Esper Deathblade) and if you're willing to lose slots you can make those decks an easy matchup. If you don't, the MU is 1000% time harder than you'd expect from a white-weenie deck. Although we're playing fast combo, Thalia really is that good and it means you need to be very careful, the MU is way harder than it looks!

Good luck man! Please post a tournament report and tell us how it went!
One last thing - how are you boarding against Burn? Are you boarding in the Abrupt Decays? You are going to up 6 spells that can answer Eidolon now that you've upped your CoV count so you have more options. The MU is favorable but not dramatically favorable. Game 1 really depends on each player's opening 7 and the die roll. (the entire matchup boils down to "did he get turn 2 Eidolon?")

Garritano

10-02-2014, 01:18 PM

@Garratino,couldn't agree more. +1

now i'm on my way to the airport, today is reserved for sightseeing. ( does anybody know a delicious restaurant in Milano? :D )

decklist: Check
sideboard: Check
confidence: Check

ciao amicos !Ovino here we go

Good luck!!!
Hope to see you take down another one. Please write a report, your reports have been really valuable.

Garritano

10-02-2014, 01:29 PM

Hello,

So I've been playing Legacy ANT for a few years now, currently on the Burning Wish version because I like the versatility and I find that when running Preordain 99% of the time I'm looking for a business spell with it so I might as well run Wish which basically is. Here is my list:

...

I really am excited by Burning Wish lists, but have had trouble with them myself.
My experience has been really similar to nevilshute's - I find that they hurt the Delver matchup.
Delver
Could you post your SB plan against Delver? You have enough wish targets that are good game 2-3 that I could imagine boarding -3 BW, -1 Ad Nauseum +1 Pyroclasm, +1 Cabal Therapy, +1 PiF, +1 ToA.
I have found BW builds open you up to Daze in a big way. Normally with ANT you get to see their hand and can construct a strategy to beat their conditional counterspells through sequencing / rituals, but with Burning Wish I find you become way more susceptible to Daze.
Chrome Mox / Manabase
Is the Chrome Mox necessary? TNT is so rare that it's hard to say what's normal in a list, but I have seen that Burning Wish ANT consistently uses 1. I unfortunately hate Chrome Mox. At 3x Burning Wish, I don't know if Chrome Mox-> BW is as important in your list as it is in the 4x versions.
Also, have you tried running any lists w/o Gemstone Mine?
Lastly, is the Ill-Gotten Gains necessary? I ended up cutting it from my TNT list, but I play TNT so rarely that my experience isn't that valuable.

gregtron

10-02-2014, 09:43 PM

True, but I was rather referring to "If you are running the Preordain version of ANT that is an obvious replacement worth testing." I guess it would be ok as a Wish target. (see the TES thread)

I would rather vomit into my deckbox than cash in 1RU, seven cards from my graveyard, and a tutor to draw three.

I would rather use BW to get a Strongarm Tactics to kill myself.

CabalTherapy

10-03-2014, 05:03 AM

I would rather vomit into my deckbox than cash in 1RU, seven cards from my graveyard, and a tutor to draw three.

I would rather use BW to get a Strongarm Tactics to kill myself.

I know such a list is long. :tongue:

Always Preordain > Treasure Cruise.

sawatarix

10-03-2014, 08:06 PM

i made TOP 8 today at the 7-round trial tournament with 100 Players at Ovino and got 1 Bye , wish me luck for tomorrow :)

Garritano

10-03-2014, 08:46 PM

i made TOP 8 today at the 7-round trial tournament with 100 Players at Ovino and got 1 Bye , wish me luck for tomorrow :)

Awesome!
glgl, hope you get paired against Elves all the way to the top 8! If you have time, take notes on the trial so you can include it in a report!

CabalTherapy

10-04-2014, 10:27 AM

I just went 3-1 in a small local tournament, winning against Grixis Tempo, Elves, Burn and loosing to the new Ur Delver list with Treasure Cruise.
My board was:
3 Chain of Vapor
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Tendrils of Agony
2 SDT
2 Massacre
1 ETW
2 Xantid Swarm

I wanted to try out the Grinding Station plan against Miracles but fortunately I didn't get paired against them.

Nonetheless, I hope that our dear Kai will have a better story to tell at the end of the day.

BrettF

10-05-2014, 02:41 AM

3-0 at LGS tonight. I'll post my sideboarding for critique:

4 Polluted Delta
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Bloodstained Mire
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Tropical Island
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
3 Cabal Therapy
3 Duress
4 Brainstorm
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Ponder
2 Preordain
1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Grim Tutor
4 Infernal Tutor
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Past in Flames

SB: 2 Sensei's Divining Top
SB: 4 Abrupt Decay
SB: 3 Chain of Vapor
SB: 1 Empty the Warrens
SB: 2 Massacre
SB: 3 Xantid Swarm

Boarding VS UG 12-Post:
-1 Sensei's Divining Top
-2 Preordain
-1 Duress
-1 Cabal Therapy
+3 Xantid Swarm
+2 Chain of Vapor

Boarding VS Esper Stoneblade
-1 Duress
-1 Cabal Therapy
-2 Preordain
-1 Cabal Ritual
-1 Lotus Petal
+2 Chain of Vapor
+1 Massacre
+2 Sensei's Divining Top
+1 Xantid Swarm (was feeling spicy!)

Boarding VS Painter's Stone
+3 Chain of Vapor
+2 Sensei's Divining Top
+1 Empty The Warrens
-2 Preordain
-3 Cabal Therapy (so hard to blind call VS this deck)
-1 Tropical Island

critiques!?

nevilshute

10-05-2014, 04:59 AM

Hey there Brett.

Looks solid. Only things I noticed was against painter: I'd prefer to side in Decay over Chain of Vapor here. Chain of Vapor gets countered by their 6+ blasts. Yes, if they resolve a painter then our trop can get blasted, but I also bring in removal because they often bring in Thorn of Amathyst or Revoker and we need to reliably be able to remove these, particularily the former.

Also, in this matchup I think I'd be looking to avoid Empty the Warrens. The most crudely drawn guideline I have with Empty is to not use it against other combo decks. Any deck that can go from zero to sixty in one turn and kill you out of nothing is not where you want to be making 10-12 goblins and then give them another 2 turns to find their missing piece.

Now this is coming from someone who plays Empty in his maindeck so I'm not a hater of the card, quite the contrary. But I would be siding it out against painter.

Surfinbird

10-05-2014, 07:10 PM

Hi! Today i've gone 4-0 in my LGS:)

I didnt expect any death and taxes but some miracles, so i changed 3 dread of night and 1 massacre for 4 young pyromancers :tongue:

My sideboard has been this one:

4 young pyromancer
3 xantid swarm
3 abrupt decay
3 chain of vapor
1 sensei's divining top
1 empty the warrens

The tournament wasn't important and I decided the sideboard at the last moment, don't take it as a reference:) My pairings:

R1: Junk rock (2-0)

G1: His hand was 1 mother of runes, 1 stoneforge, 1 Jitte, 1 zenith and 3 lands. I discarded the zenith with a therapy and went off two turns later via Past in flames.
SB: +3 abrupt decay +3 chain of vapor -3 Duress -1 cabal ritual -1 sensei's divining top -1 preordain
G2: T1: Deathrite shaman, T2: Dark confidant, T3: Oops, there wasn't any turn 3:laugh:

R2: Canadian threshold (2-0)

G1: My hand was had discard spells, lands, rituals but not a tutor. In my last turn i tried to win via past in flames (had it in hand) depending on a brainstorm to see the tutor. Fortunately, i saw it!
SB: +1 empty the warrens -1 sensei's divining top
G2: Thight game. His hand had 2 stifle and 2 daze, and during the game i saw a force and an spell snare too. In the end, i developed my mana base succesfully i was able to win, again, in the last turn.

R3: Goblins (2-0)

Both games were similar, i was faster than him
SB: +3 Abrupt decay +3 Chain of vapor, -2 cabal therapy -2 duress -1 sensei's divining top -1 preordain

R4: Nic Fit GBw (white only for a SB gaddock teeg) 2-0

G1: I discarded a zenith (which was going to search for deathrite shaman) a couple of turns later
SB: +4 young pyromancer +2 chain of vapor - 1 Duress -2 Cabal therapy -1 Bayou -1 preordain -1 cabal ritual
G2: He kept a hand with 3 mindbreak trap, 2 Duress and 1 extirpate (and a bayou). 2 Young Pyromancers did the job with the help of 2 chain of vapor that bounced 2 times a deathrite shaman to prevent him from reaching 5 mana to play a thragtusk.

After the tournament i've got two questions:

1. How many SB slots should we dedicate to Thalia decks? (in the LCLs there are 80-100 people, and the last time there were between 6 and 8 GWb/Death and taxes) Some people is running only 3 chains of vapor, but i feel that 3 dreads of night are necessary... Maybe 3 DoN +2 CoV is the best choice.

2. Which is your opinion about carpet of flowers? The biggest issue against delver decks is developing our manabase, and it helps a lot there. However, i feel that if we play correctly we don't need them at all...

Finally: 2 ANT players reached the top16 in ovino! lists there: http://www.mtgq.it/liste-top16-main-event-legacy/ Danila Leontiev is playing 3 decays +2 Krosan grips instead of 4 decays+1 krosan which sounds better to me, i imagine he is playing 2 krosans because it's a better answer to tops ... is that correct or another reason exists?

Sloshthedark

10-05-2014, 07:27 PM

I'm just back from the Ovino tornament (9R, top 16), finished 18/476 ... I'm pretty drained, I know Italians are not fond of punctuality but this was a purgatory (like 2 hrs lunchbreak due to reporter crash) , 9. round finished at 1:30, top 16 at 3 am !!! top 8 got delayed to the morning... ridiculous... so I keep it short

list:
http://i1082.photobucket.com/albums/j378/Sloshthedark/Storm/new/IMAG4059-801.jpg
http://i1082.photobucket.com/albums/j378/Sloshthedark/Storm/new/IMAG4061-800.jpg

Friday trial
2:0 UW w Snapcasters
1:2 Loam
0:2 S+T

8man
2:0 Omnitell
2:1 Infect
1:2 UBG DeedStill

Legacy Main
2:1 UR Omnishow
2:0 All spells
2:1 Miracles w REB
2:1 Miracles with REB
1:2 High Tide feat Dig (top16)
2:1 Manaless Dredge
2:0 Burn
1:2 Deathblade (top 8)
2:1 Merfolk

7-2 =18. place = 1ok +3 beaten Wooded Foothills =/

I'm happy with the MD, last second adding the CoVs was not that great,

my teamate Tomas Vlcek (remeber that name, you will read it on SCG next month) won the friday trial and lost the finals of the main event (after top 8 split) in pure 75 on 75 Miracles mirror due to 1 outer opp had for his Angels (which is SBed out normaly)

I will probably edit later and can elaborate on the rounds if anyone interested but now I'm heading to bed...

Goobady

10-05-2014, 10:39 PM

I really am excited by Burning Wish lists, but have had trouble with them myself.
My experience has been really similar to nevilshute's - I find that they hurt the Delver matchup.
Delver
Could you post your SB plan against Delver? You have enough wish targets that are good game 2-3 that I could imagine boarding -3 BW, -1 Ad Nauseum +1 Pyroclasm, +1 Cabal Therapy, +1 PiF, +1 ToA.
I have found BW builds open you up to Daze in a big way. Normally with ANT you get to see their hand and can construct a strategy to beat their conditional counterspells through sequencing / rituals, but with Burning Wish I find you become way more susceptible to Daze.
Chrome Mox / Manabase
Is the Chrome Mox necessary? TNT is so rare that it's hard to say what's normal in a list, but I have seen that Burning Wish ANT consistently uses 1. I unfortunately hate Chrome Mox. At 3x Burning Wish, I don't know if Chrome Mox-> BW is as important in your list as it is in the 4x versions.
Also, have you tried running any lists w/o Gemstone Mine?
Lastly, is the Ill-Gotten Gains necessary? I ended up cutting it from my TNT list, but I play TNT so rarely that my experience isn't that valuable.So the main issue I have with Preordain is that when I ran with it for a few months every time I cast it I was just looking for a business spell, which Burning Wish is. In a way for me Preordain was a 1UB Infernal Tutor or just a game loss because it wiffed, so it being 1R was a discount. The cantrips and discard I do run can fill up my pre-combo turns fine, it isn't like I'm passing turns with U up and an extra Wish in hand often, less often than I lost to Preordain finding nothing. I did try cutting IGGy for Treasure Cruise today. Cast it once, it was one of those games I was just sitting waiting for my hand to develop into something real so I wasted a turn casting Cruise for 3 mana 3 cards. It isn't spectacular, but I think it is worth a slot in the board for those kinds of situations, better than IGG or something like Reverent Silence.

Delver
I usually do -1 Infernal Tutor, -1 Probe, -1 Therapy for the 3 Xantid Swarm. I know they can still have bolts, but whatever, it seems to work. The Tutor goes into my sideboard all the time just so Burning Wish levels up and can singlehandedly win with Past in Flames. I've never actually thought about your plan, but I am interested in doing some testing. I don't feel that weak to daze, like I said earlier, Burning Wish essentially saves you 1 mana over Preordain->IT, and smart play can still weave through their soft counters. It can also be good bait, making them waste soft counters.

Chrome Mox and Manabase
It feels better than a land most of the time, and it gives me an extra out those times I'm forced to Ad Nauseum with nothing floating and no land drop. It did a lot of work today, twice for mana, once just to empty my hand for Tutor, and once just for Storm with no imprint. It usually pulls its weight for me, helping out some sticky lines, and when I don't like it there is always Brainstorm. If I do want it to be a land my hand is so full of spells I don't mind losing 1 to make it a land (well, don't mind a lot, obviously every spell matters).

Gemstone mine is pretty important IMO with my board. They have been great for me, very rarely dying so they just act as painless City of Brasses, and almost every time they die it has upside for Threshold or Treasure Cruise mana (did that today) Not being a fetch to shuffle sometimes matters, but there are times I want to be able to get UBRG out of 2 lands after SB. I am not as safe against Wasteland as ones that replace them with 2 fetches, or a fetch and Badlands, but it is a pretty marginal loss, and gives some marginal gain with extra fixing for Ponder into Abrupt Decay into Burning Wish. The Wishs tax my colored needs more than Preordain decks due to wanting to Wish for PIF, Meltdown, or Pyroclasm so RR is good and I don't like lands that don't make blue.

I just went to a local tournament, went 4-1, beating Tin Fins, Infect, RUG Delver, and Death and Taxes. I lost to Miracles but it was a weird game. Won G1, G2 I just had one of those natural 20 hands, but couldn't find a cantrip for 4 turns to bring it from 18 to 20. G3 I kept a no lander on 6 and never got there. No landers were the story of the day. Against RUG I kept 2 no landers in a row on 7 and won T1 and then a longer game G2. Against Infect the last round I did the same, T1 then T2ing him for exactsies thanks to Chrome Mox no imprint. D&T lost to BW Massacre both games for their army of Revokers and Thalia.