[Deck] ANT (Ad Nauseam Tendrils)

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Originally Posted by HPB_Eggo

Please learn to spell?

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Spelling nazi...?

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Originally Posted by HPB_Eggo

More importantly, while Krosan Grip is good against Counterbalance, especially when you can Mystical Tutor it up in response, winning with Doomsday and Emrakul is just plain better. When in doubt, choose to win.

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DD/Isle/Emrakul has only one advantage: Its better as long, as they don't have Counterbalance, cuz its easier to doge Pierce/Daze.
But I wasn't able to resolve DD in the first 2-3 Turns with protection vs. Daze/Pierce/Fow/Canonist.
I would never cut Grips for Isle/Emrakul especially since I'm plying no Duress, wich means, that I would have zero answers to CB.
I also don't want to sacrifice additional SB slots to CBT, wich isn't that popular in NRW contrary to Fish and Combo.

My first comment was maybe to polemical and Emrakul/Isle is qute good but I think its inferior to Grip.

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Originally Posted by lordofthepit

Another question: do you guys tend to save your zero mana artifacts until the last moment (i.e. when about to go off for storm) to build up the storm count, or do you dump them as quickly as possible to avoid hate like discard effects or lock pieces like Chalice, Thorn of Amethyst, etc. that might get dropped? What situations would steer you towards one direction versus the other?

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You should dump your LEDs as soon as possible, if you know that your opponent plays discard, lock decks or Dredge (sometimes even vs Counterbalance).

LED + Top is great vs discard decks.

Use Lotus Petal and Chrome Mox to avoid Daze.

In most other situations, it's better to keep them in your hand. You need the artifacts to build Storm, or should wait for a Brainstorm to shuffle them away. 0 mana artifacts are also a nice way to "test" a blind Counterbalance.

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Originally Posted by Valdez

Spelling nazi...?

DD/Isle/Emrakul has only one advantage: Its better as long, as they don't have Counterbalance, cuz its easier to doge Pierce/Daze.
But I wasn't able to resolve DD in the first 2-3 Turns with protection vs. Daze/Pierce/Fow/Canonist.
I would never cut Grips for Isle/Emrakul especially since I'm plying no Duress, wich means, that I would have zero answers to CB.
I also don't want to sacrifice additional SB slots to CBT, wich isn't that popular in NRW contrary to Fish and Combo.

My first comment was maybe to polemical and Emrakul/Isle is qute good but I think its inferior to Grip.

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The problem with Grip is that you are far from done when you have destroyed their CB. You have most likely time walked yourself by Mystical Tutoring for the it and now you also need to win through their counterspells, and if they also have other forms of hate in form of Meddling Mage/Canonist, winning becomes impossible. With Doomsday + Emrakul you can ignore everything they have, except their counterspells, and you only have to resolve 1 spell to win.

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The problem with Grip is that you are far from done when you have destroyed their CB. You have most likely time walked yourself by Mystical Tutoring for the it and now you also need to win through their counterspells, and if they also have other forms of hate in form of Meddling Mage/Canonist, winning becomes impossible.

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Thats the reason, why I play 3 Grips and you also have to win through MM/Canonist + Counterspells with DD into Isle/Emrakul, but i admit, that it is easier to win vs. Canonist, as long as they dont have any counterspells left in their hand.

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With Doomsday + Emrakul you can ignore everything they have, except their counterspells, and you only have to resolve 1 spell to win.

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And you don't have any options v.s. a resolved CB.

Except that you don't care? Unless they flip a 3cc the game's over when you cast doomsday.

The main advantage of isle/emrakul is that most CB players just dont expect it. Normally CB decks can just let the dd resolve and counter the card drawing spell. If they do that in case of an isle/emrakul DD pile they have just given the game away.

I like the idea of Shellmakrul, but don't a lot of CB decks play swords? Am I missing something obvious? (it is totally possible I am missing something obvious ;) )

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Originally Posted by junkdiver

I like the idea of Shellmakrul, but don't a lot of CB decks play swords? Am I missing something obvious? (it is totally possible I am missing something obvious ;) )

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What you're missing: Emrakul has protection from colored spells.

Can Emrakul played via Shelldock Isle be prevented by Gaddock Teeg?

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Can Emrakul played via Shelldock Isle be prevented by Gaddock Teeg?

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Don't think so. Teeg specifically says noncreature spells.

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Originally Posted by Lego

What you're missing: Emrakul has protection from colored spells.

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That's crazy, I read the card at least a few times, and just couldn't see that... thanks...

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Originally Posted by whienot

Don't think so. Teeg specifically says noncreature spells.

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Ouch. Owned.

Would this really work lol?
Woudn't they always wasteland it??
What then?

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Originally Posted by BantFTW

Would this really work lol?
Woudn't they always wasteland it??
What then?

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Since when does CounterTop play Wasteland?

Hi! I'm just learning the ropes on ANT/TES/NLS and still have a few questions after having read the last 5-10 pages or so of this thread. I'll use emidln's curent list as a basis for the discussion:

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Engine and Win (4)
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Doomsday
1 Meditate

Tutors and Draw (16)
4 Brainstorm
4 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Burning Wish
4 Mystical Tutor

Protection (7)
4 Duress
3 Thoughtseize

Acceleration (18)
4 Dark Ritual
4 Simian Spirit Guide
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
2 Chrome Mox

Land (15)
4 Polluted Delta
2 Bloodstained Mire
2 Scalding Tarn
2 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
1 Badlands
1 Island
1 Swamp

//SB (15)
Engine, Win and Draw (9)
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Empty the Warrens
1 Grape Shot
1 Infernal Tutor
1 Ill Gotten Gains
1 Doomsday
1 Infernal Contract
1 Diminishing Returns
1 Balance of Power
//Hate (6)
1 Telemin Performance
1 Thoughtseize
1 Pulverize
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Firespout
1 Echoing Truth

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I'm happy to see that it's possible to cut Ponder and only run Brainstorm and SDT as cantrips. No MD Infernal Tutor/IGG seemed strange at first, but when I thought about it, you might as well go Mystical -> Burning Wish -> IGG as you can go Mystical -> IT -> IGG. Since you probably only want IT as a Mystical target to get IGG as you crack LED, it seems very tight and reasonable to go with IT/IGG in the SB. I love tight and reasonable, so this makes me entirely happy with the first 20 cards of the list.

The 7 discard effect seems like a natural result of cutting white, and perhaps that Counterbalance is a bigger threat to the deck than a hand with multiple counters. Since I have no actual play experience with the deck, I reserve judgement if precisely 7 protection cards is optimal, and if it's optimal for all of them to be 1-for-1 discard. Thoughtseize does seem bad MD though, what with AdN, and DD not exactly being the picture of health either. I guess you simply try to cram in as much protection as you can, and optimize the slots for your meta.

The acceleration department gives me the most twitches. I'd like to cut Chrome Mox entirely. I also note with some surprise that neither Rite of Flame nor Cabal Ritual is in there, but SSG is. I get that SSG has the whole no mana investment thing going for it, but it doesn't build storm and is 3cc for AdN. Cabal Ritual does indeed seem antisynergistic with Mox and SSG not building threshold, but I guess what I'm basically asking is: Could you simply replace the 6 slots of Mox + SSG with a combination of Rite and Cabal? I think I'd prefer that more, but I suppose I'm missing some hidden tech here.

Next I wonder about mana ratios. How was it determined that precisely 15 lands and 18 acceleration was optimal? Play experience and general consensus? Does the 15/18 ratio vary depending on what lands and acceleration you decide to run? Assuming you want to maximize the number of fetches to abuse SDT, going with a 8/7 split of fetches and targets seems unnecessarily "secure". A 10/5 split with 1 each of the duals + island + swamp should be sufficient, no? How often do you need to fetch more than 5 land in a game? If exactly 8 fetches is optimal for another reason, I'd like to know what the rationale is.

Finally some questions re: the sideboard. How much does the lack of green and white hurt when it comes to sideboard choices like Xantid Swarm etc? I assume that it would be simple to change around a couple of the MD duals if it was a big issue.

The "spare engine parts" in the SB seems overly redundant. How important is the extra copy of Tendrils when you could just wish for Infernal Tutor to grab (or IGG to recur) the MD copy, or go for an early EtW instead? How important is Grapeshot as an extra wincon - or is it simply the prefered creature hate over something like Deathmark? Why would you EVER want to run something like Infernal Contract over Meditate? Worrying about REB seems silly when loosing half your life twice against a deck packing red isn't a bit more attractive (the IGG engine seems a better option here) - especially since the deck is obviously not very afriad of throngs of more common blue counters either. Finally, how useful is Diminishing Returns when you could simple IT for the MD AdN instead? Having the opp draw 7 seems more problematic than producing the extra 2 mana for the IT route, when you don't want the IGG/DD engines instead. I also wonder how often one really uses Balance of Power.

A tighter SB engine obviously leaves more room for more situational hate like Sadistic Sacrament etc. that could be really useful on occasion. I have to ask though, why is Pulverize prefered over Shattering Spree, and what's the use of Firespout at all? Doesn't this deck stomp aggro already? Not running a single bounce spell MD seems risky - wouldn't a singe Wipe Away be at least as useful as discard #7 against CounterTop, and more versatile in general too?

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The acceleration department gives me the most twitches. I'd like to cut Chrome Mox entirely. I also note with some surprise that neither Rite of Flame nor Cabal Ritual is in there, but SSG is. I get that SSG has the whole no mana investment thing going for it, but it doesn't build storm and is 3cc for AdN.
Cabal Ritual does indeed seem antisynergistic with Mox and SSG not building threshold, but I guess what I'm basically asking is: Could you simply replace the 6 slots of Mox + SSG with a combination of Rite and Cabal? I think I'd prefer that more, but I suppose I'm missing some hidden tech here.

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Personally I would never cut chrome mox. For the simple reason that it's really ideal when you go for AD nauseam, its requires no mana investment, makes any color you want (most of the time) and adds an extra storm.
I agree when you don't go for ad nauseam it's alot worse, but I still see it as a must. SSG is an awsome card against daze, instant speed mana, can't be countered, no mana investment required, etc. But I agree that somethimes the +4 cards with CC 3 can hurt your ability to succesfully Ad Nauseam.
That's why personally I somethimes play a 2-2 or 3-1 split with cabal. I wouldn't recommend rite of flame in NLS because you need to play atleast 3 of them because of its synergetic effect with copies and it only makes red mana (I would recommend them if you play TES though).

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Finally some questions re: the sideboard. How much does the lack of green and white hurt when it comes to sideboard choices like Xantid Swarm etc? I assume that it would be simple to change around a couple of the MD duals if it was a big issue.

The "spare engine parts" in the SB seems overly redundant. How important is the extra copy of Tendrils when you could just wish for Infernal Tutor to grab (or IGG to recur) the MD copy, or go for an early EtW instead? How important is Grapeshot as an extra wincon - or is it simply the prefered creature hate over something like Deathmark? Why would you EVER want to run something like Infernal Contract over Meditate? Worrying about REB seems silly when loosing half your life twice against a deck packing red isn't a bit more attractive (the IGG engine seems a better option here) - especially since the deck is obviously not very afriad of throngs of more common blue counters either. Finally, how useful is Diminishing Returns when you could simple IT for the MD AdN instead? Having the opp draw 7 seems more problematic than producing the extra 2 mana for the IT route, when you don't want the IGG/DD engines instead. I also wonder how often one really uses Balance of Power.

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Personally I think the extra copy of tendrils is quite important. It allows you to get to tendrils either by mystical tutoring for it or burning wishing for it.
I've also had situations before where I could win by removing one tendrils for chrome mox and still have a tendrils left to win. But those situation come up less frequently.

The nice thing about grapeshot is that it can't be countered and kills hatebears (it can also reduce the amount of storm needed) .Nevertheless I think it's a card that could be removed from the sideboard to make room for other options.

DReturns is the "last out" option, the reason why it's played is because it cost alot less then the IT>AdNauseam option. If you have to burning wish for IT, then IT for Ad Nauseam it will cost you 9 mana 2 for BW, 2 for IT, 5 for AN. you can still win if you only have 6 mana open (and for instance facing lethal damage next turn) going for BW > DReturns. As for Infernal contract, I do believe it's optional. It has it's uses, for instance when you only have black/red mana available you can go for DD>IC, or when like you said you're facing REB. I think it's really up to you if you believe that's worth a sideboard slot or not.

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you might as well go Mystical -> Burning Wish -> IGG as you can go Mystical -> IT -> IGG

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Keep in mind that Burning Wish removes itself from the game. So going through the Igg-Pile with Burning Wish is different than with an Infernal Tutor and the IGG maindeck.

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The acceleration department gives me the most twitches. I'd like to cut Chrome Mox entirely. I also note with some surprise that neither Rite of Flame nor Cabal Ritual is in there, but SSG is. I get that SSG has the whole no mana investment thing going for it, but it doesn't build storm and is 3cc for AdN. Cabal Ritual does indeed seem antisynergistic with Mox and SSG not building threshold, but I guess what I'm basically asking is: Could you simply replace the 6 slots of Mox + SSG with a combination of Rite and Cabal? I think I'd prefer that more, but I suppose I'm missing some hidden tech here.

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It's not about mana acceleration, it's about having initial mana. What's the use of Rite and cabal if you'll never be able to produce R or B. That's why Chrome Mox and SSG are chosen. Emidln actually ran a list with 4 Rite before and changed it.

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Next I wonder about mana ratios. How was it determined that precisely 15 lands and 18 acceleration was optimal? Play experience and general consensus? Does the 15/18 ratio vary depending on what lands and acceleration you decide to run? Assuming you want to maximize the number of fetches to abuse SDT, going with a 8/7 split of fetches and targets seems unnecessarily "secure". A 10/5 split with 1 each of the duals + island + swamp should be sufficient, no? How often do you need to fetch more than 5 land in a game? If exactly 8 fetches is optimal for another reason, I'd like to know what the rationale is.

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All I know is that people originally ran 14 lands and 3 Chrome Mox. The 15th land got added and the 3rd Chrome Mox got shipped.
As for fetches. There's no real consensus. I run 9 while other run 7. But seeing that there are a lot of Wastelands I wouldn't count on having 1 dual of each being sufficient.

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The "spare engine parts" in the SB seems overly redundant. How important is the extra copy of Tendrils when you could just wish for Infernal Tutor to grab (or IGG to recur) the MD copy, or go for an early EtW instead? How important is Grapeshot as an extra wincon - or is it simply the prefered creature hate over something like Deathmark? Why would you EVER want to run something like Infernal Contract over Meditate? Worrying about REB seems silly when loosing half your life twice against a deck packing red isn't a bit more attractive (the IGG engine seems a better option here) - especially since the deck is obviously not very afriad of throngs of more common blue counters either. Finally, how useful is Diminishing Returns when you could simple IT for the MD AdN instead? Having the opp draw 7 seems more problematic than producing the extra 2 mana for the IT route, when you don't want the IGG/DD engines instead. I also wonder how often one really uses Balance of Power.

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Tendrils can be Wished for. Sometimes you just don't have the mana for the Wish - Infernal - Tendrils.
Grapeshot is used to kill hatebears by Wish -> Grapeshot. But it adds another benefit. With Helm of Awakening you can go infinite with a Doomsday pile which can win you games against life gain combos.
I've never played with Diminishing returns so can't tell.

Thanks for the informative replies.

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Keep in mind that Burning Wish removes itself from the game. So going through the Igg-Pile with Burning Wish is different than with an Infernal Tutor and the IGG maindeck.

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Ouch! Didn't realize that. This makes me think that IGG should be MD anyway. Or rather, it awakens a bigger questions: what engines to run.

Doomsday: This seems to be the Soviet tank of engines. It's resilient against blue, useable against most aggro scenarios and you can build piles to defeat pretty much anything. You'd probably want to abuse SDT anyway, so I'm not counting that as an opportunity cost. The only downside seems to be that it can be a tad slow.

IGG: Costs no life at all but relies on the GY and bad against blue. Still so versatile as to deserve its slot IMO.

Ad Nauseam: My general impression from reading storm threads is that AdN is the default option in MUs that aren't actually that difficult. If you're pressed for life against non-blue, better to IGG. If you're up against blue, better to Doomsday. So when does AdN actually trump the other engines? Because if the tight spots can be won without it, it seems like the easy games could be won as well. And of course, the gain of cutting it would be much greater than freeing up a slot - it would mean never worrying about the cmc of a card, and being able to optimize the other engines accordingly instead.

Diminishing Returns: If this is used much in the same way as AdN, with similar effectiveness, no life cost, without taking up any space MD, and most importantly with no deck building opportunity cost, why use AdN at all? If it's not anywhere near as good as AdN, aren't people just kidding themselves devoting a precious SB slot to it then?

No "engine": Many of the lists I've seen are perfectly capable of just playing out some acceleration, cantrips and fetching EtW, Belcher-style. That's yet another option that sometimes presents itself. How many do we realistically need?

Maybe I'm being to hard on Ad Nauseam. After all, it seems AdN Tendrils has made a bigger impact on the meta than IGG and DD-FT did in their day. I'm not sure that necessarily signifies that Ad Nauseam is a better engine. I also get a feeling that it's easy to get carried away, wanting a storm list to able to "do everything", rather than having a solid plan against everything (another amibition entirely). Does Ad Nauseam really bring that much to the table here? Because the opportunity cost of running it sure is something to consider.

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It's not about mana acceleration, it's about having initial mana. What's the use of Rite and cabal if you'll never be able to produce R or B. That's why Chrome Mox and SSG are chosen.

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I can understand this need when you only have 5 mana and use AdN, having dropped land for the turn. And I assume 4 Lotus Petal aren't enough in that situation, and that LEDs are sometimes hard to use if you AdN? Without AdN, it seems just having a couple of lands on the board would be sufficient to get the ritual effects going, especially with LEDs and petals.

How much initial mana is enough though? Because I've seen lists with no SSG and 2 Chrome Mox, as well as lists with 4 SSG (4 petals and leds in all of course). ALL your acceleration certainly doesn't have to be initial mana, and you can't play Dark Ritual of an SSG either. 2x Chrome Mox only seems useful as Petals #5-6 when you AdN - is it really that necessary to run them?

In my experience Ad Nauseam is the best engine against decks packing heavy discard and against random hate other than Chalice/Canonist/Teeg. It needs the least setup amongst all engines, essentially only requiring five mana to win, and drawing you into the bounce to hit that Meddling Mage or Runed Halo or what have you.

You don't really have to run Chrome Mox, but foregoing it makes Ad Nauseam quite a bit worse. You either have to go in with mana floating or accept that a decent percentage of the time you won't hit enough initial sources to win that turn. I'm with you on the Chrome Mox sucks bandwagon, but there's really not anything else to play there.



How do you guys handle Reanimator? I seem to have no luck against the deck. When I have fast hands, they have a fist full of disruption for it; when I have slow hands with Duress effects and bounce, they drop Iona turn two with Force backup through it. It is very similar to Counterbalance decks, in that it plays Force and Daze (and Thoughtseize) and can lock you out of the game as early as turn two. I tried running TES instead of NLS in an effort to race it in a tournament this afternoon, and got crushed by back to back turn two Iona. Is it worth running Faerie Macabre or going with a more extreme transformational board to Helm/Leyline?

Hi all. I'm getting back into Legacy (and Magic in general) after a bit of an absence and I'm looking to find myself a new Legacy deck. I'm really liking the look of this kind of deck, but I've been tinkering with it some and for the life of me can't figure out what the deck is trying to do sometimes.

I've played Iggy Pop in Legacy a decent bit, enough to be familiar with the interactions among LED, IGG, and Infernal Tutor (though more with IGG chains than a singleton in that deck), and I'm familiar with some of the other more obvious strengths of this deck (interaction of Brainstorm/Ponder/Top with Fetches and the general I-win-ness of Ad Nauseam).

But I cannot for the life of me figure out what makes Doomsday such a win card. Could someone give me a couple pointers on what the deck wants to set up with DD for the win? I've been pouring over the cards and honestly I just feel like I'm missing something with the interactions.

For reference, this is the build I was tinkering with (lifted from about 2 pages back):

1 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
3 Underground Sea
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Tropical Island
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Scalding Tarn

3 Cabal Ritual
3 Infernal Tutor
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Ill-Gotten Gains
2 Ponder
4 Brainstorm
3 Chrome Mox
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Meditate
1 Doomsday
1 Wipe Away
4 Duress
2 Thoughtseize
4 Mystical Tutor
3 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Dark Ritual
4 Lotus Petal

Sideboard
2 Doomsday
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Echoing Truth
1 Krosan Grip
3 Xantid Swarm
1 Bayou
1 Extirpate
2 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
1 Shelldock Isle
1 Deathmark

So for something like this, what does a winning DD pile look like? What are the situations where you want to fire off the one IGG (other than the obvious one where the Tendrils ends up in the yard or something)? What is the one random Meditate for? My guess on Meditate is that it's to be the top card of the DD stack, but again, I'm just having trouble picturing what the DD stack looks like.

And finally, a question more about the playstyle of the deck. Given the following opening hand, what the opening play look like?

Brainstorm
Top
Lotus Petal
Duress
Underground Sea
Polluted Delta
Dark Ritual

Does the deck want to drop the Top turn one to go ahead and get it online? If so, does it activate the Top before the next draw? Do you wait to pop the fetch land until after the Brainstorm? Do you just hit them with Duress? Do you blow the Rit to drop Duress followed by Top with activation, possibly using the Petal to Brainstorm depending on what you find? I'm trying to figure out how the deck likes to balance out efficiency with explosiveness.

I realize it's a lot of big questions, but thanks to anyone who responds! I'm really looking forward to trying to get into the intricacies of the deck.

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Originally Posted by urdjur

I'm happy to see that it's possible to cut Ponder and only run Brainstorm and SDT as cantrips. No MD Infernal Tutor/IGG seemed strange at first, but when I thought about it, you might as well go Mystical -> Burning Wish -> IGG as you can go Mystical -> IT -> IGG. Since you probably only want IT as a Mystical target to get IGG as you crack LED, it seems very tight and reasonable to go with IT/IGG in the SB. I love tight and reasonable, so this makes me entirely happy with the first 20 cards of the list.

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The real reason you want IT 90% of the time is that it's the third most efficient way of casting Ad Nauseam (behind Ad Nauseam and Mystical->Ad Nauseam). That it sometimes destroys decks that otherwise couldn't beat you anyway with little thought is just a bonus. That said, I'm not impressed by it as a third option and found myself in situations where I couldn't AdN but didn't want to IGG either. This made Wish->Doomsday very attractive, and Wish provides alternate benefits in protection, removal, additional win conditions, and varying bombs.

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The 7 discard effect seems like a natural result of cutting white, and perhaps that Counterbalance is a bigger threat to the deck than a hand with multiple counters. Since I have no actual play experience with the deck, I reserve judgement if precisely 7 protection cards is optimal, and if it's optimal for all of them to be 1-for-1 discard. Thoughtseize does seem bad MD though, what with AdN, and DD not exactly being the picture of health either. I guess you simply try to cram in as much protection as you can, and optimize the slots for your meta.

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This doesn't make sense. Why is losing two life bad with Ad Nauseam in the deck? There is nothing that forces you to win with Ad Nauseam and given so many initial mana sources and win conditions you often don't need as much life to win the game. Doomsday requires 2 life to combo off with. It is completely orthogonal to Doomsday since anytime you need protection after Doomsday you use Duress in your pile.

Discard providing hand information, the ability to punish mulligans, and the ability to remove permanent-based threats is far more important than dealing with decks that run multiple hard counters (given that they largely don't exist besides Landstill, which you can't lose to anyway unless they side in 8+ cards that are Mages plus Counterbalances). Tempo Thresh is on a large decline, and UW Tempo and Merfolk are both extremely vulnerable to discard effects. Not splashing into a 4th or 5th color is a further benefit to the 7-8 discard.

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The acceleration department gives me the most twitches. I'd like to cut Chrome Mox entirely. I also note with some surprise that neither Rite of Flame nor Cabal Ritual is in there, but SSG is. I get that SSG has the whole no mana investment thing going for it, but it doesn't build storm and is 3cc for AdN. Cabal Ritual does indeed seem antisynergistic with Mox and SSG not building threshold, but I guess what I'm basically asking is: Could you simply replace the 6 slots of Mox + SSG with a combination of Rite and Cabal? I think I'd prefer that more, but I suppose I'm missing some hidden tech here.

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Rite of Flame and Cabal Ritual, at least 80% of the time, provide a net mana of one. Rite of Flame causes an initial mana investment of R (an off color) and Cabal Ritual requires an initial investment of two but in the primary combo color. Neither are good off Ad Nauseam without first seeing initial mana sources. Further, Cabal Ritual providing 5 mana is something that is required more by UB ANT since it lacks most of the ability to properly abuse LED vs discard strategies by way of 4 SDT. SSG provides most of what Rite of Flame and Cabal Ritual do while acting as an initial mana source and helping to combat Daze and Spell Pierce.

In regards to the issue of it costing three, count the total CMC of the deck and subtract 5. Now compare to the Grand Prix lists. Note where NLS has more and cheaper win conditions while providing more initial mana and a comparable average mana cost (avg mana cost = (total CMC - 5)/59). I have never lost a game soley due to flipping a lot of Simian Spirit Guides. I've lost a lot of games where I didn't run SSG and didn't hit enough initial mana to win that turn.

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Next I wonder about mana ratios. How was it determined that precisely 15 lands and 18 acceleration was optimal? Play experience and general consensus? Does the 15/18 ratio vary depending on what lands and acceleration you decide to run? Assuming you want to maximize the number of fetches to abuse SDT, going with a 8/7 split of fetches and targets seems unnecessarily "secure". A 10/5 split with 1 each of the duals + island + swamp should be sufficient, no? How often do you need to fetch more than 5 land in a game? If exactly 8 fetches is optimal for another reason, I'd like to know what the rationale is.

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Fewer than 3 red duals completely rules out Pulverize. To be honest, Pulverize really wants 4 red duals, but the value of shuffle effects and basics is greater to me than the games I lost because I can't cast Pulverize due to double waste. I've played 7, 8, and 9 fetches. I feel that I like 7 or 8 the best.

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Finally some questions re: the sideboard. How much does the lack of green and white hurt when it comes to sideboard choices like Xantid Swarm etc? I assume that it would be simple to change around a couple of the MD duals if it was a big issue.

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If you want to, you can replace a fetchland or an underground sea with a Tropical Island and/or Bayou. Green gives you Xantid Swarm and to a lesser extent (due to Shelldock Isle+Emrakul) Krosan Grip. If you feel like 8 duress isn't enough and pyroblast isn't good enough, by all means play Swarm. I don't.

White is awful. If you want a chant effect, play Xantid Swarm. Chant is bad vs Counterbalance and significantly worse than Xantid Swarm vs Merfolk. The only place where it's notably better is vs Dredge, but you don't really need much help in that matchup, and anything you play is worse than a Ravenous Trap. Vs Storm, you can't side enough chants to turn into the control player and you don't want to really ruin your engine. It's better to use Duresses as necessary to play offense and defense and setup eot Ad Naus or wish->combo bullet.

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The "spare engine parts" in the SB seems overly redundant. How important is the extra copy of Tendrils when you could just wish for Infernal Tutor to grab (or IGG to recur) the MD copy, or go for an early EtW instead? How important is Grapeshot as an extra wincon - or is it simply the prefered creature hate over something like Deathmark? Why would you EVER want to run something like Infernal Contract over Meditate? Worrying about REB seems silly when loosing half your life twice against a deck packing red isn't a bit more attractive (the IGG engine seems a better option here) - especially since the deck is obviously not very afriad of throngs of more common blue counters either. Finally, how useful is Diminishing Returns when you could simple IT for the MD AdN instead? Having the opp draw 7 seems more problematic than producing the extra 2 mana for the IT route, when you don't want the IGG/DD engines instead. I also wonder how often one really uses Balance of Power.

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Your reasoning here shows you have never even sleeved up the deck/goldfished it on MWS.

Wish->Tendrils is extremely common and one of the reasons NLS has better Ad Nauseams than anything besides TES (which, incidentally, also runs Wish->Tendrils). It's useful in LED Doomsday piles to add storm for free and serves as an out to increasingly common hate like Sad Sac.

Grapeshot is only necessary if you're playing Helm of Awakening. It's rare that you'll wish for it if you have Deathmark in your sideboard since Deathmark requires less setup to kill hate bears and is cheaper (doesn't tend to require burning accel). Wish->Grapeshot then play Tendrils is extremely rare and not something I've encountered since play some of the original TES builds.

If you examine the list, I'm playing Meditate. Infernal Contract is a wish target that lets you turn Burning Wish into a draw4, particularly efficient when paired with Doomsday. I use Wish->Draw4 constantly and would posit that anyone who doesn't do it with NLS is missing turns where they could win had they thought through their situation. Further, the black draw4 is sided in vs blue/red tempo decks (Tempo Thresh and Dreadstill) so that it doesn't get REB'd. These decks will rarely keep in many Lightning Bolts vs you since they have so many other, far more effective cards and REB is not something that you can afford to waste Duress effects on.

Diminishing Returns is extremely useful for pushing the goldfish speed vs aggro. You can't simply IT->AdN because that costs a total of 9 mana. Wish->DReturns costs 6 mana for a crapshot and 7-8 mana for a nearly guaranteed win. If you have 9 mana, go for the Ad Nauseam, but making 9 mana doesn't always happen, especially in the early turns where it would be useful vs aggro (decks that largely cannot punish you for a failed DReturns anyway).

Nobody will play Balance of Power now that Recurring Insight is legal. Balance of Power never realy came up for me since anytime I wanted that card (only vs control), I could either afford to wait to get to a total of 6 with SDT in play(for Doomsday), cast ETW (because it's early), or cast DReturns (again because it's early). If it's mid to late game, you probably have SDT and even without it, Doomsday or Infernal Contract are both likely to be better for you. If it's early, DReturns can screw them out of a hand that was good enough to keep without a way to counter your Wish->Bomb or ETW can put you in a good position vs non-EE blue. Recurring Insight fits into the strategy as it's a mana cheaper than Wish->IT->Ad Nauseam, and doesn't penalize you if you fail (although if you fail with 10+ cards, you probably deserve to).

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A tighter SB engine obviously leaves more room for more situational hate like Sadistic Sacrament etc. that could be really useful on occasion. I have to ask though, why is Pulverize prefered over Shattering Spree, and what's the use of Firespout at all? Doesn't this deck stomp aggro already? Not running a single bounce spell MD seems risky - wouldn't a singe Wipe Away be at least as useful as discard #7 against CounterTop, and more versatile in general too?

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Why do you need a bounce spell? If they resolve Counterbalance you have a one turn window to Mystical Tutor and hope it doesn't get countered. Further, if they do it on turn two, you have to hope they don't have some sort of manip (say, SDT), to just hang a 3cc on top during their end step each turn (since upkeep Wipe Away to avoid the 3 isn't practical (they just replay CB that turn). Your plan vs Counterbalance is to Duress them or go all-in on ETW/Ad Nauseam very fast. Game 2 you side in Shelldock Isle/Emrakul/additional Doomsdays and hope they don't have a lot of threes. The counterbalance matchup is about 50/50 preboard (vs Pro Bant) and favorable postboard with the Shelldrazi plan.

Wipe Away isn't more versatile than discard. All maindeck played permanent-based hate (with the exception of Enchantress stuff) is removable game one via Burning Wish. If you play Pulp_Fiction or Vroman's list (aka include the UU sorcery bounce spell), even enchantments are answerable. Discard lets you resolve your bombs. If you can resolve your bombs, you can deal with any permanent-hate except for Counterbalance, which you might not even be able to deal with effectively if you do have Wipe Away (you have to find Wipe Away, have to assemble a kill, and do this before they land a SDT and find a 3 to camp out on top of their deck). You're better off trying to setup bait for them to tap out of a 2 so you can Wish->ETW, and if you can't do that fast, better off scooping in game one to save time in your match.

Again, to play this deck you need to do math. Do the math on the mana cost of Pulverize, Shattering Spree, and then compare the two. Now, if you still don't understand, you probably will want to find another deck to play because NLS isn't it for you.

Firespout, as explained in the pages you claimed to have read, was due to Breathweapon (and myself) not having better cards to play in the sideboard.

@ Ad Nauseam

It's the most efficient storm engine. Nothing is cheaper than 3BB, as reliable, and only one card. Doomsday is close, but has a lot of conditionals and ends up costing either extra mana or extra cards/permanents to setup. IGG costs a lot of extra mana and imposes a graveyard condition and needs a way to find Tendrils (IT, extra Burning Wish, Mystical + draw spell). DReturns appears cheaper, but to be reliable to kill that turn will require additional mana floating (1-2) to get the win. Further, DReturns is generally played the turn it is found via Burning Wish, making its actual cost 3UUR (although there are some scenarios where it's correct to Wish->Returns, pass to set it up for next turn). ETW is vulnerable to other combo decks and cheap sweepers (the major one being EE) and is highly dependent on your opening hand. If ETW is not playe early, it opens itself up to a myriad of hate.

The reason we play the other stuff is that you don't always open up Duress + Mystical/AdN + 5 mana. There are games (even without SDT in the deck, say in a UB Saito list) where you spend a couple turns playing Cantrips/Mystical Tutor to assemble the combo. These games can end up diasterous in a lot of matchups and you quickly find yourself playing really shitty backup plans like double Tendrils (+ a healthy dose of prayer), mini tendrils Tendrils into 5 more mana for Adn, or losing. DReturns helps vs aggro. Doomsday helps vs randomness and attrition. ETW helps in certain blue matchups, and as an opportunity plan, is still effective. IGG comes in vs the heavy discard decks and allows Doomsday to be more effective in game ones vs certain hate (Chalice @ 1, heavy discard).

So I just noticed the link in emidln's sig about Doomsday piles. This has answered a large majority of my questions already. Oops. :smile:

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Your reasoning here shows you have never even sleeved up the deck/goldfished it on MWS.

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That's correct, and I hope I never have to. However, I want to have a fundamental understanding of storm archetypes and their card choices - partly to be able to SB better against them, and partly as a purely theoretical exercise.

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Again, to play this deck you need to do math. Do the math on the mana cost of Pulverize, Shattering Spree, and then compare the two. Now, if you still don't understand, you probably will want to find another deck to play because NLS isn't it for you.

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The benefits of Pulverize are obvious of course, but since some lists run SS as a fetch target and others run Pulverize, it's difficult for a non storm player to understand if uncounterability or being free is more important. Especially since there seems to be no concensus on bounce cmcs either - by your reasoning, it would seem best to avoid the 3cc ones. Since I have no real interest in playing the deck in a near future, and more experienced people have already done the math and considered every card choice carefully (I hope), I thought it more efficient to simply ask away. Might help a few other lurkers that hesitate to ask stupid questions in the process too.

To be more precise, I'm not questioning if this or that wish target , build strategy or engine has its uses or not. Obviously it does. If it didn't, it wouldn't be played. I'm just trying to wrap my head around why so many options are needed (apart from satisfying the need to stroke one's genius, as it were, in solving the puzzles that present themselves). For example, let's return to the engines:

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@ Ad Nauseam
It's the most efficient storm engine. Nothing is cheaper than 3BB, as reliable, and only one card. Doomsday is close, but has a lot of conditionals and ends up costing either extra mana or extra cards/permanents to setup.
[...]
The reason we play the other stuff is that you don't always open up Duress + Mystical/AdN + 5 mana.

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It seems to me that your initial argument to run Ad Nauseam is that it's so cheap and efficient. Then you say that you play the other stuff because you don't always get 5 mana. Why would a more costly engine help if you have a lack of mana?

theintangiblefatman commented on the tactical worth of Ad Nauseam like so:

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In my experience Ad Nauseam is the best engine against decks packing heavy discard and against random hate other than Chalice/Canonist/Teeg.

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So I go "OK", but then you say:

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IGG comes in vs the heavy discard decks and allows Doomsday to be more effective in game ones vs certain hate (Chalice @ 1, heavy discard).

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So then it seems that IGG and Doomsday - not AdN - are your prefered methods of fighting heavy discard?

To me, this implies that you can fight heavy discard in a number of ways (to be expected in a deck packing 347 or so different options), using any of the three engines, but theintangiblefatman prefers the AdN route. That's still not a strong argument for the "need" to run AdN.

That leaves cheap and effective, but you mentioned the other options were good when you didn't have enough mana to even AdN, so that makes me confused as to the worth of a particularly cheap engine (obviously, other storm decks in the past have managed to make ends meet without it). As for effective, I guess my lazy ass will simply have to trust the combined math and experience of the pilots posting here, but it seems the other two engines let you elimate any random factor (such as what you happen to flip) on your part at least. For example:

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It needs the least setup amongst all engines, essentially only requiring five mana to win, and drawing you into the bounce to hit that Meddling Mage or Runed Halo or what have you.

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But with Doomsday, you have absolute certainty of drawing that bounce. And it's no more expensive, as you'll realistically have to Mystical Tutor for that bounce unless you plan on flipping a lot.

Could somebody explain to me, in a rational and non-anecdotal fashion (so that a 5 year old could understand it) why an AdN hybrid build is more effective than throwing AdN out the window and optimizing you build for DDay, IGG, Burning Wish and friends? Having no experience with storm, I find it hard to wrap myself around that it's worth going to all the trouble just because it's 1 mana cheaper.

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Originally Posted by urdjur

Could somebody explain to me, in a rational and non-anecdotal fashion (so that a 5 year old could understand it) why an AdN hybrid build is more effective than throwing AdN out the window and optimizing you build for DDay, IGG, Burning Wish and friends? Having no experience with storm, I find it hard to wrap myself around that it's worth going to all the trouble just because it's 1 mana cheaper.

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Actually that one mana makes all the difference in the world, here are some examples

Some Common plays

Land - > Ritual -> Ritual = 5 Mana

Land - > Land - > Threshold Cabal Ritual - > Ad Nauseam = 5 Mana

Land - > Land - > Dark Ritual - > Cabal Ritual - > Ad Nauseam = 5 Mana

Land - >Land - > Ritual - > Lion's Eye Diamond - > Infernal Tutor - > Ad Nauseam = 7 Mana

If it was 6 mana it would either take one turn more to play another land or it takes another mana accelerator. To simple it down the Ad Nauseam is there for the early wins, and the unconditional wins as long as you are over 11-13 life, although it is possible to win with lesser life it greatly increases your chances of death. It is good against discard because those decks are often slow, and it only takes an Ad Nauseam to win, the most unconditional win there is.
Positive - Requires only 5 mana, and no further requirements except life
Negative - It requires at least 11-13 life

The Doomsday is there for the long games where you want to wait a couple of turns and set up a good hand, this is where Ad Nauseam don't work since the longer you wait the lesser life you get. The downside of Ad Nauseam is it's requrements. You almost always need an draw spel when playing it, unless you want to go for the pass the turn pilse, although then you open yourself up to a world of difficulties.
Positive - you Can wait longer than Ad Nauseam, there are a world of possibilities with the right setup
Negative - It requires some setup to win - hence not being as unconditional as Ad Nauseam

Ill-Gotten Gains This is mainly here since the old Ad Nauseam days although it has some practical usefullness. It is good against all non blue decks providing at least 3 extra storm. It brings back Tendrils that have been discarded and other useful cards that might be needed to win and it plays well with multiple ritaul or LED effects together with Infernal Tutor -> tap 2 land play LED play Ritual play Infernal Tutor pop led discard hand search for Ill-Gotten Gains and play it bring back LED Ritual and infernal tutor -> play ritual LED and infernal tutor into Tendrils - together with an extra ritual or LED it is possible to search with infernal tutor 2 times bringing the storm up high enough for a kill. It utilizes LED and Infernal Tutor in an effective way and can discard the opponents hand if played first turn ;)
Positive - it generates extra storm from the sources that you already have access to, utilizes LED and Infernal Tutor very well
Negative - it is really bad against decks that can return FoW blue card and Spell pierce

Diminishing Return - It is an Ooooh shit button as someone pointed out, only requiering a few mana after an Burning Wish - that can't Fetch AD Nauseam or when you are low on life. In my personal opinion it is not needed together with Doomsday so I've cut it from the board


Edit
forgot to ask, how has the Shelldock Emrakul worked out so far? How much does it improve your CB matchup?
And on the reanimate matchup, maybe you should try Telemin performance in the board and one sorcery bounce to fetch with Burning wish, the Telemin Performance is also good against the mirror and Solidarity. Although the match is hard anyway it might better it slightly.

The "don't always have 5 mana for Ad Nauseam" has an implied "early" attached to it that most people should be able to figure out. As the game goes longer, your life total lessens (sometimes very quickly), and you end up not being able to use Ad Nauseam. In this mid to late games situations, Doomsday costing 4 mana but needing extra cards in hand or cantrips, or playing DReturns not needing life start to look very attractive.

AdN, Doomsday, and IT->IGG are all tactical options against discard that I would not want to be without. Ad Nauseam requires an discard deck to hit you with early targeted discard and won't abuse LED very well (one of your best plays against discard decks is to dump artifact mana and wait for the ability to use a mystical tutor or topdecked bomb). Doomsday and IT->IGG both allow you to win the game using LED mana + lands, something that is not usually possible without SDT for AdN if you pass turn 2.

Thanks a lot Wave, that really sorts out the pros and cons for me. Go Sweden!

Well well, look what won Atlanta SSG... http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...p?DeckID=32454

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Originally Posted by JonBarber

Well well, look what won Atlanta SSG... http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...p?DeckID=32454

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That list looks like some delicious copy pasta.

*sigh*

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Originally Posted by Nidd

That list looks like some delicious copy pasta.

*sigh*

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Why fix whats not broken? (Actually, its super broken, but requires no fixing ;D)

He did add an IGG sideboard, which is far from a terrible idea.

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Originally Posted by cdr

He did add an IGG sideboard, which is far from a terrible idea.

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Yeah, I'm actually a big fan of that idea.

Emidln-> Can you tell us what your current sideboard is pls? I will try to play NLS at a local tournament, but I have some problems with my sideboard.

How does NLS win against dragon stompy and stax? I can see that neither BreathWeapon or Emidln have Hurkyl's Recall in the sideboard (even before Emrakul). Is it just good enough to play Burning Wish->Shattering Spree? I don't think Pulverize looks very good against trinisphere. Echoing Truth helps a bit in those matchups of course.

If you want a card tho win against stacks/stompy decks you can always add 1 Rebuild to your sideboard. I've always found rebuild the most effective answer against those decks. But it's an instant ofcourse.A lot of people removed it from the sideboard because those decks are just to rare to waste SB slots on.

My current sideboard is:

1 Extirpate
4 Spell Pierce
3 Misdirection
2 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
2 Blazing Archon
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Deathmark
1 Show and Tell

Of course, this is for a different deck as I no longer play this deck due to thinking UB combo-control with Forces, Doomsdays, and Show and Tells is a better call.

More importantly, sideboarding is a metagame decision that the pilot needs to make themselves. My sideboard for NLS wouldn't help you. If I ran NLS, I'd try to fit in a mix of the cards below. The cuts would probably be at Eye of Nowhere, 3rd Doomsday, and either Infernal Tutor or Recurring Insight (but keep one of them).

1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Empty the Warrens
1 Ill-Gotten Gains
3 Doomsday
1 Diminishing Returns
1 Recurring Insight
1 Infernal Tutor
1 Infernal Contract
1 Thoughtseize
1 Pulverize
1 Eye of Nowhere
1 Deathmark
1 Shelldock Isle
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
1 Chain of Vapor

I don't feel the need for more than 8 discard vs blue. Some people like/want Xantid Swarms, Pyroblasts or Vexing Shusher. I think the Discard + Doomsday plan into Emrakul is the best thing ANT has vs CB and definitely would include it. Your choices in these matters might vary. Further, you might enjoy a different bounce spell rather than Chain of Vapor, but I like that one.

Look at how much Shattering Spree costs under Trinisphere:

2R or RRR (depending on whether or not Chalice at 1 is in play).

Look at how much Pulverize costs with Trinisphere in play:

3

Here's a question for you: are you willing to pass the turn after blowing up their artifacts? I'm not. I won't do it until I'm sure I can combo off afterwards. That makes the lands I'd sac to Pulverize already used to pay for Pulverize.

Here's another question: what happens to your Shattering Spree if they have Chalice @ 1, Trinisphere and something else (maybe another Trinisphere, a diff Chalice, etc)? Pulverize doesn't care.

What do you guys think about this list - it's more of a target list for me. I like Chant in the deck just as additional protection. Let me know what you think.

3 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
3 Scalding Tarn
1 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
1 Tundra
1 Scrubland

3 Orim's Chant
2 Thoughtseize
4 Duress

3 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Mystical Tutor
3 Infernal Tutor

2 Ad Nauseam
2 Tendrils of Agony

4 Cabal Ritual
4 Dark Ritual
4 Lotus Petal
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
3 Chrome Mox

I also recently picked up a Meditate for ~2$, so I'm tinkering with the idea of DDANT, with the following changes:

Out:

1 Chrome Mox
2 Orim's Chant

1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Meditate
1 Doomsday

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With Top on the board...pile would be:

Meditate, Dark Ritual, Dark Ritual, Tendrils of Agony, Ponder(could be placed farther up to garner one additional storm).

Have BBBU on the board: Flip top, meditate, ritual, ritual, agony - with an additional mana you can add 1-2 storm, depending on if it's one or two mana, and if any is blue.

Thanks for the help.

What is your current list Emidlin? You can PM it to me if it is more appropriate.

I feel like B/U(w) ANT and NLS need different threads. They perform pretty differently and most NLS players don't care too much for the B/U list and vice versa. I'd also be curious to see the difference in finishes between both lists. Maybe its just me, but I don't tend to hear about NLS placing as often as the more stand ad nauseam list.

Here's a pretty trivial logistical question: how do you guys keep track of mana and storm count? I'm thinking of using dice the next time I play, but I don't want to give away that I'm playing storm. Do you just keep everything away until you're ready to "go off"? Or do people already know you guys as "the combo guy"?

If you're making cuts to Emidln's SB, I find the Infernal Contract and Eye of Nowhere are the least used cards FWIW - altho' Infernal Tutor is a very close 3rd.

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Here's a pretty trivial logistical question: how do you guys keep track of mana and storm count? I'm thinking of using dice the next time I play, but I don't want to give away that I'm playing storm. Do you just keep everything away until you're ready to "go off"? Or do people already know you guys as "the combo guy"?

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Most people know me as a combo guy.
But if I'm facing strangers I keep my dice in my bag. Then when I am going off I grab them and start using my dice.
Not everyone with dice is a combo player though. An Ichorid player around here has a bunch of Zombie tokens with several Goblin tokens on top of them. So if the opponent ever catches a glimpse of it they'll think he's a Goblin player. You got to ignore such things from good players.