[Deck] T.E.S. - The EPIC Storm

Played a Win-a-Mox this weekend:

Beat ANT. I think I'm X-0 lifetime against ANT.
Lost to UWR. This was basically a stack of Geists, Delvers, and every possible card you could want against a storm deck. I think this was close to hopeless.
Beat a Counterbalance brew with Countertop, Jaces, Punishing Fire + Grove, and a giant stack of countermagic. I just got lucky here by drawing the nuts in two games. Game three I Gitaxian Probe, he Spell Pierces, I Gitaxian Probe again, Gitaxian Probe a third time, Gemstone Mine, Lotus Petal, a Second Lotus Petal, Rite of Flame, Dark Ritual, Cabal Therapy naming "Abandon Hope", make a 20 Goblins. He missed a three-outer (some combination of Engineered Explosives and maybe Echoing Truth).
Lost to Hive Mind. He was much faster than me and I was never in a position to interact at all via Silence. I think I probably should have just tried to mulligan for really explosive hands.
Beat Imperial Painter. Blood Moon/Magus of the Moon is pretty devastating. I got lucky here in a game where I Duressed a Trinisphere, she had Welder and bricked on an artifact long enough for me to Grapeshot the Welder.

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Originally Posted by thefringthing

Played a Win-a-Mox this weekend:

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Thanks for the report. I wouldn't say UWR is hopeless, Bryant won a couple of matches in Edison against UWR I believe. I'm sure it's a difficult matchup though. Interesting that you describe Hive Mind as way faster. Maybe he just had abnormally good hands? They are a 3-card combo. I think Silence is going to be key in the Painter matchup. I'm finding it more and more useful against non-U hate-permanent decks.

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Originally Posted by phazonmuant

Thanks for the report. I wouldn't say UWR is hopeless, Bryant won a couple of matches in Edison against UWR I believe. I'm sure it's a difficult matchup though. Interesting that you describe Hive Mind as way faster. Maybe he just had abnormally good hands? They are a 3-card combo. I think Silence is going to be key in the Painter matchup. I'm finding it more and more useful against non-U hate-permanent decks.

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Yeah, time-walking against Thoughtseize, Hymn, Thalia, Teeg and Counterbalance is key

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Originally Posted by phazonmuant

Interesting that you describe Hive Mind as way faster. Maybe he just had abnormally good hands? They are a 3-card combo. I think Silence is going to be key in the Painter matchup. I'm finding it more and more useful against non-U hate-permanent decks.

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I think he went off on turn two or three both times. I guess he just had the nuts.

I am pretty new to the deck, but i have had decent luck with the list so far. I'm playing a stock list and it has been performing great for me. I guess the question I am trying to get around to, with out sounding like an complete idiot is what elements do are you supposed to look for in an opening hand to know your going on the wish plan for past in flames, Ill-gotten gains, or diminishing returns? Please for give me if the question is really stupid, I am just trying to get better at the deck and I have been having trouble finding resources that explain these lines of play.

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Originally Posted by PartyMonster

I am pretty new to the deck, but i have had decent luck with the list so far. I'm playing a stock list and it has been performing great for me. I guess the question I am trying to get around to, with out sounding like an complete idiot is what elements do are you supposed to look for in an opening hand to know your going on the wish plan for past in flames, Ill-gotten gains, or diminishing returns? Please for give me if the question is really stupid, I am just trying to get better at the deck and I have been having trouble finding resources that explain these lines of play.

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Past in flames requires 2 tutors most of the time and a mass amount of non artifact mana. Ill Gotten Gains always needs 2 tutors, and usually 2 Leds. DReturns is not generally your first plan. That is generally your play to get a new hand.

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Originally Posted by Megadeus

Past in flames requires 2 tutors most of the time and a mass amount of non artifact mana. Ill Gotten Gains always needs 2 tutors, and usually 2 Leds. DReturns is not generally your first plan. That is generally your play to get a new hand.

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Thank you for a polite and timely reply, that helps a lot.

Heart of the Storm Vol. 4 is now online!

Suit up and enjoy the show!

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Originally Posted by PartyMonster

what elements do are you supposed to look for in an opening hand to know your going on the wish plan for past in flames, Ill-gotten gains, or diminishing returns? Please for give me if the question is really stupid, I am just trying to get better at the deck and I have been having trouble finding resources that explain these lines of play.

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You may check out the links in my signature for more than enough examples for IGG, PIF and DR

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Originally Posted by PartyMonster

Thank you for a polite and timely reply, that helps a lot.

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Just remember those are generally the most basic needs. With a ton of mana and a lot of draw spells in the yard, sometimes you dont need two tutors in the yard as you can use your draw spells to find them. Also with IGG with a lot of rituals you sometimes just need two rituals instead of LEDs. And Diminishing returns is such a situational card that there isnt really a specific situation for it.

Also remember with Ill Gotten your opponent gets cards back so it is usually pretty bad against a non silenced blue opponent when they get their force of wills back

It's pretty impossible to setup clean scenarios for those cards.

However, Megadeus framed the basic requirements for IGG correctly. It's a way to expand your stormcount if you don't have enough mana for a pure Tutor-chain but requires 2 Tutors in total.

PIF needs at least 3 Rituals in your grave but enables crazy tricks with flashbacked Infernal Tutors for mana-gain tutoring LED's. I use it for forceful comebacks against discard-heavy matchups.

Diminishing Returns is an Option to refill your hand turn 1-2 after you dropped mana artifacts or don't see PIF/IGG working and EtW not being an Option due to low stormcount or facing cards like maelstrom Pulse, Deed, Engineered Explosives etc.

Ok, so I've been testing a lot on Cockatrice to ready my body for SCG Nashville. Something that comes up a lot for me:

How often do you mulligan one-landers? What are the things you look for in no-lander keepers?

For example, would you keep a no-lander with Chrome Mox and 2 cantrips as well as some rituals and a business spell? Does it change if you also have a Lotus Petal?

For example, I kept the first hand and bricked on my Ponder, then died like 6 turns later. I kept the second hand and Probed, whiffed, Lotus Petal into Ponder, drew a land, and was able to use the Mox later when I was going off. It was a close call between Probing and imprinting Probe. What would you have done?

I'm looking to get some opinions from the people on this thread. Hopefully you can help me mulligan sketchy hands (doubtful).

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Originally Posted by phazonmuant

Ok, so I've been testing a lot on Cockatrice to ready my body for SCG Nashville. Something that comes up a lot for me:

How often do you mulligan one-landers? What are the things you look for in no-lander keepers?

For example, would you keep a no-lander with Chrome Mox and 2 cantrips as well as some rituals and a business spell? Does it change if you also have a Lotus Petal?

For example, I kept the first hand and bricked on my Ponder, then died like 6 turns later. I kept the second hand and Probed, whiffed, Lotus Petal into Ponder, drew a land, and was able to use the Mox later when I was going off. It was a close call between Probing and imprinting Probe. What would you have done?

I'm looking to get some opinions from the people on this thread. Hopefully you can help me mulligan sketchy hands (doubtful).

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Phew, I do a lot better to evaluate hands knowing all cards and have additional infos like which game it is, what matchup you face etc. Landless hands can be anything between Petal + 2 LED's or just a Chrome Mox.

The first example depends on the exact combination of rituals and tutors. Is it enough to go off turn 1-2 if you find an Initial manasource? Is the Cantrip you opt to cast a Ponder or a Brainstorm? A cantrip Combo of Probe + Brainstorm sucks in such a scenario. If you have a Ponder to cast off the Mox and can Infernal/Wish with 4+ mana float the same turn or the following, I would keep that hand on the play game 1 because you have a total of 5 draws to find mana (3 off Ponder, 1 off the shuffle&draw, 1 off the drawstep). With the Petal in addition this is a Keeper.

In the second example you have to imprint the Probe. It's a random draw which CAN give you a land but more likely/important is that casting it forces you to burn an important Petal to advance unless the Probe gives you another cantrip to imprint. I would not gamble on that in this situation.

I really hate chrome mox only hands. If I have an LED plus a ritual then maybe, but sometimes it just sits there as a blue mana and does nothing...It is a gamble I have been burned on too many times. Basically the only time I will keep a chrome mox only hand as my initial mana source is if all I need is the land for my hand to really go off. Petal is a bit different, but probably similar in that I really do not want to be burning my IMS on HOPING to find a land or two. Again it depends on the hand, but it is tough to fight through a taxing deck when you can't draw your lands :/

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Originally Posted by Megadeus

Just remember those are generally the most basic needs. With a ton of mana and a lot of draw spells in the yard, sometimes you dont need two tutors in the yard as you can use your draw spells to find them. Also with IGG with a lot of rituals you sometimes just need two rituals instead of LEDs. And Diminishing returns is such a situational card that there isnt really a specific situation for it.

Also remember with Ill Gotten your opponent gets cards back so it is usually pretty bad against a non silenced blue opponent when they get their force of wills back

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thank you that helps alot

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Originally Posted by Lemnear

It's pretty impossible to setup clean scenarios for those cards.

However, Megadeus framed the basic requirements for IGG correctly. It's a way to expand your stormcount if you don't have enough mana for a pure Tutor-chain but requires 2 Tutors in total.

PIF needs at least 3 Rituals in your grave but enables crazy tricks with flashbacked Infernal Tutors for mana-gain tutoring LED's. I use it for forceful comebacks against discard-heavy matchups.

Diminishing Returns is an Option to refill your hand turn 1-2 after you dropped mana artifacts or don't see PIF/IGG working and EtW not being an Option due to low stormcount or facing cards like maelstrom Pulse, Deed, Engineered Explosives etc.

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thank you for the insight

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Originally Posted by phazonmuant

How often do you mulligan one-landers? What are the things you look for in no-lander keepers?

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It's game two and I'm on the draw. I won game one.

My opener is:
Ad Nauseam, Dark Ritual, Rite of Flame, Ponder, Duress, Silence, Gitaxian Probe

I kept it. Drew Lotus Petal. Probed. Drew a land.

Won the match.

I'm inclined to keep zero landers when all I need is to draw a petal or land to win. Generally having probe in hand makes me more inclined to keep these.

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Originally Posted by RaNDoMxGeSTuReS

It's game two and I'm on the draw. I won game one.

My opener is:
Ad Nauseam, Dark Ritual, Rite of Flame, Ponder, Duress, Silence, Gitaxian Probe

I kept it. Drew Lotus Petal. Probed. Drew a land.

Won the match.

I'm inclined to keep zero landers when all I need is to draw a petal or land to win. Generally having probe in hand makes me more inclined to keep these.

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Drew the runna-runna, that's nice. I would not keep that one because you need 2 initial manasources. You have 2 draws here but Chrome Moxen or U.Sea still don't deliver red mana even if you drew those as sources.

I keep a lot of no-landers, usually with the thinking that they're pretty good if they draw a land so I can cantrip into another mana source to go off. That burns me reasonably often though, so I'm trying to find a better heuristic.

If the goal is to have to mulligan fewer no-landers, we probably should be playing more lands. But that doesn't seem right. Maybe I should just be more willing to go to 6?

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Originally Posted by phazonmuant

Maybe I should just be more willing to go to 6?

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Dunno, I'm the Margaret Thatcher of mulligans