[Deck] ANT (Ad Nauseam Tendrils) Storm Combo

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Originally Posted by Lemnear

IoK can't rip FoW ... that's a no-go

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I meant it as an answer to hatebear. Unless I'm mistaken, it was played in sb year or so ago.

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Originally Posted by Grand Superior

Very nice deck, Sloshthedark! Makes me wish there was a black-bordered Grim Tutor out there. I recently took the $200 plunge and bought a copy for my ANT deck, but it drives me crazy that it's the only non-dual land white-bordered card in the deck (though it is quite the nice looking card).

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A sharpie and some tape can fix that for you.

Get someone to do an alter for you...will look awesome and custom!

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Originally Posted by Technicolor Mage

Get someone to do an alter for you...will look awesome and custom!

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+1

I've seen a couple of these, and a guy here on the source has gone so far as to alter new-bordered cards to look like old-bordered cards. His Tendrils deck is a work of art, but I can't remember if he posted it in this thread or the pimp thread.

While we're at the topic of discard: I'm going to test Hymn to Tourach in place of the Duress/Thoughseize this week in a field with very diverse disruption to make some value trades in attrition wars and wanted to ask the Hive mind about opinions and previous experiences with the card. Thx

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Originally Posted by Lemnear

While we're at the topic of discard: I'm going to test Hymn to Tourach in place of the Duress/Thoughseize this week in a field with very diverse disruption to make some value trades in attrition wars and wanted to ask the Hive mind about opinions and previous experiences with the card. Thx

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Deck needs more Natural Order.

EDIT: Seriously, though, I'm skeptical. But then again, I've played basically only Elves for a while now, so my touch on Storm is lacking atm.

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Originally Posted by Zombie

Deck needs more Natural Order.

EDIT: Seriously, though, I'm skeptical. But then again, I've played basically only Elves for a while now, so my touch on Storm is lacking atm.

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Need a fresh point of view. I'm burned out by playing TES and the local meta just looks forward to fragile manabases and I don't want these uphill battles atm

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Originally Posted by Lemnear

While we're at the topic of discard: I'm going to test Hymn to Tourach in place of the Duress/Thoughseize this week in a field with very diverse disruption to make some value trades in attrition wars and wanted to ask the Hive mind about opinions and previous experiences with the card. Thx

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I've thought about it a year ago. I had a "4 Bob plus, 4 Hymn" side in mind, but that's about it, I never forced myself to test it. I think that Hymn is bad in Storm, but surprise us!

Has anybody playing the Pre-Ordain or Lim Dul's Vault versions ever tried Impulse? I figured the dig 4 and "scry" justifies the 2 mana cost, I really dislike Grim Tutor and Burning Wish so I've been looking at other options lately. I'll probably stick with Pre-Ordain, but I thought if Lim Dul's Vault was playable than Impulse probably fits the bill too.

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Originally Posted by Final Fortune

Has anybody playing the Pre-Ordain or Lim Dul's Vault versions ever tried Impulse? I figured the dig 4 and "scry" justifies the 2 mana cost, I really dislike Grim Tutor and Burning Wish so I've been looking at other options lately. I'll probably stick with Pre-Ordain, but I thought if Lim Dul's Vault was playable than Impulse probably fits the bill too.

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Online I'm now playing 0 Preordain, 1 Grim Tutor, 1 SDT, 1 Chain of Vapor, 3 Duress, 4 Cabal Therapy.

I'm running Dread of Night in my sideboard now.

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Originally Posted by Lemnear

While we're at the topic of discard: I'm going to test Hymn to Tourach in place of the Duress/Thoughseize this week in a field with very diverse disruption to make some value trades in attrition wars and wanted to ask the Hive mind about opinions and previous experiences with the card. Thx

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This seems pretty crazy. I think we care about 1-2 cards in the opponent's hand on average, and if their hand is loaded with hate, they'll just hit it with soft countermagic like they would a 1-mana discard spell (but now you are timewalked on turn 2 with some number of nonbasic lands in play). Playing Hymn carries the following negatives:
-Slows down kill
-Makes you fetch a nonbasic
-Doesn't always hit the 1 or 2 cards you need to hit
-Is easily Dazed and Spell Pierced
-Is very difficult to cast as part as the combo turn

Positives:
-Might mise the 2 good cards you care about in your opponent's hand

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Originally Posted by Patrunkenphat7

This seems pretty crazy. I think we care about 1-2 cards in the opponent's hand on average, and if their hand is loaded with hate, they'll just hit it with soft countermagic like they would a 1-mana discard spell (but now you are timewalked on turn 2 with some number of nonbasic lands in play). Playing Hymn carries the following negatives:
-Slows down kill
-Makes you fetch a nonbasic
-Doesn't always hit the 1 or 2 cards you need to hit
-Is easily Dazed and Spell Pierced
-Is very difficult to cast as part as the combo turn

Positives:
-Might mise the 2 good cards you care about in your opponent's hand

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Pretty much agree with this analysis. I'd add to the list of negatives that it doesn't give you perfect information. If you Hymn an opponent with a 6 card hand and you are able to grab a Spell Pierce and land, how do you move on from there? He still has 4 cards in hand. Do you play aggressively now and assume he doesn't have a force + blue card? I think in most cases I'd rather be one mana richer and be able to cherry-pick the most troublesome card in my opponent's hand as well as know that the coast is clear.

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Originally Posted by Patrunkenphat7

This seems pretty crazy. I think we care about 1-2 cards in the opponent's hand on average, and if their hand is loaded with hate, they'll just hit it with soft countermagic like they would a 1-mana discard spell (but now you are timewalked on turn 2 with some number of nonbasic lands in play).

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I Wish that was the case. At times I saw 3+ counter in opponents hands after they dropped a Delver and it's just fucking annoying to make it through such a hand without the ability to generate cardadvantage. I'm well aware of the Wasteland-Topic however ... It was just an idea, I wanted to try the upcoming tourney(s) to see if it's a total brainfart or not (aka IF I can make it to a tourney which I did not the whole month so far...)

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Originally Posted by Lemnear

I Wish that was the case. At times I saw 3+ counter in opponents hands after they dropped a Delver and it's just fucking annoying to make it through such a hand without the ability to generate cardadvantage. I'm well aware of the Wasteland-Topic however ... It was just an idea, I wanted to try the upcoming tourney(s) to see if it's a total brainfart or not (aka IF I can make it to a tourney which I did not the whole month so far...)

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Game me a minute pause, but came with the same arguments as mentioned above, the biggest for me is information, it turns precise play into lottery, i'd MD creatures before that, as a spicy SB choice seems better but still not that hot, you can just play single discard 7-10 or Confidant to net you card advantage... In your case I'd start with 2nd Pif instead... Ehh I'm slowly getting to my list... Anyway I'm interested in your take on Ant, PM me if you don't mind

I finished building ANT last month (my wife got me the 4x LED, 3x Infernal Tutor and 4x Cabal Ritual I needed to finish it out for me on my birthday), I ended up building it right before a legacy event at my LGS, pulling cards out of my legacy binder and sleeving them up right before the event.

I won my first match without having played or even goldfished the deck (and then promptly went 1-2, 0-2, 1-2 in my next three matches, because I am a terrible player)

I've been traveling on a business trip since then but am pretty excited to get home tomorrow, get my hands back on my new deck and run through some of the goldfishing, etc. suggested in some of the links on the OP. This is a very nice thread :)

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Originally Posted by anomie-p

I finished building ANT last month (my wife got me the 4x LED, 3x Infernal Tutor and 4x Cabal Ritual I needed to finish it out for me on my birthday), I ended up building it right before a legacy event at my LGS, pulling cards out of my legacy binder and sleeving them up right before the event.

I won my first match without having played or even goldfished the deck (and then promptly went 1-2, 0-2, 1-2 in my next three matches, because I am a terrible player)

I've been traveling on a business trip since then but am pretty excited to get home tomorrow, get my hands back on my new deck and run through some of the goldfishing, etc. suggested in some of the links on the OP. This is a very nice thread :)

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That's some awesome birthday present! Hope you have fun playing the deck :) I started playing it around 7-8 months ago and the first month or so (depending on how disciplined you are and how many games you can manage to clock) will be littered with hard lessons and mistakes. But once you get through that the rewards really come :)

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Originally Posted by Sloshthedark

Anyway I'm interested in your take on Ant, PM me if you don't mind

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I will, my friend. Allow me to make some tests first and make up my mind about the deck in the current metagame, now that riding T1/2 Goblins in TES is a less successful trait.

If you need to push thru' counters I think playing the /g fetchlands and SBing a Dryad Arbor could do the trick, you rarely fetch Volcanic Island anyway.

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Originally Posted by Final Fortune

If you need to push thru' counters I think playing the /g fetchlands and SBing a Dryad Arbor could do the trick, you rarely fetch Volcanic Island anyway.

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Played that before PiF was released, not worth messing with the manabase imo and arbor is superawkward card if drawn

Wait, can someone clarify? I'm super sleep-deprived and Arbor seems crazy. For Therapy flashback?

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Originally Posted by Zombie

Wait, can someone clarify? I'm super sleep-deprived and Arbor seems crazy. For Therapy flashback?

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Nah, for natural Order

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Originally Posted by Lemnear

Nah, for natural Order

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Nah, 1-of Culling the Weak to play around Surgical Extraction.

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Originally Posted by Lemnear

Nah, for natural Order

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You could Natural Order in a Verdant Force for even more flashbacked Cabal Therapies ;)

https://www.wizards.com/mtg/images/d...progenitus.jpg

Kills in two swings... or in one AdN flip.


Ok, back on tracks. Was the Dryad Arbor idea meant seriously? Becasue I find it really interesting!

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Originally Posted by Bed Decks Palyer

Ok, back on tracks. Was the Dryad Arbor idea meant seriously? Becasue I find it really interesting!

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Yeah it was interesting with Diabolic Intent and other creatures MD ...G means half of your fetches can't get certain colors when you need them and the other half can't fetch the Arbor... and now imagine you open 7 with the Arbor as your 1st/2nd land...

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Originally Posted by Bed Decks Palyer

https://www.wizards.com/mtg/images/d...progenitus.jpg

Kills in two swings... or in one AdN flip.


Ok, back on tracks. Was the Dryad Arbor idea meant seriously? Becasue I find it really interesting!

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Yes I meant it, I've been experimenting with different ideas between Green Sun's Zenith, Summoner's Pact and Dryad Arbor lately in Veteran ANT and think having the utility to turn lands into disruption is one of the best things about that deck, the alternative man plan with Natural Order into Progenitus is another direction but there are a lot of strategies that come very close to having innate synergy like Green Sun's Zenith accelerating with Dryad Arbor or tutoring for Xantid Swarm or generating the 11 mana to tutor for Progenitus.

It'd take a lot of space in your SB, but just think about what having 4 Green Sun's Zenith, 1 Dryad Arbor, 1 Xantid Swarm, 1 Tropical Island, 1 Bayou would let you do potentially, because suddenly Natural Order is in reach and nobody keeps Swords to Plowshares MD or SBs in Golgari Charm vs ANT.

I'm sure the above posters were just being dicks, but I think tightly weaving Green Sun's Zenith into a Storm shell is really interesting because even tho' it does so inefficiently the tutoring for Xantid Swarm or destroy target artifact/enchantment creature is pretty utilitarian and it effectively is a Llanowar Elf or another Cabal Therapy or both.

It's one of those ideas that people are going to instantly shoot down because they're all like "lol, that's an aggro-control card" but if you look at it from the perspective of being a card that lets you accelerate, disrupt or answer the board while compacting those functions around a single tutor instead of 4 Xantid Swarm or 3 Abrupt Decay or 2 Chrome Mox or whatever it makes some sense to trade efficiency for versatility and I guaranteed you nobody will see it comming at the very least.

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Originally Posted by nevilshute

That's some awesome birthday present! Hope you have fun playing the deck :)

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Yeah, definitely was. I think for this Christmas I start asking for power :)

I've started gold fishing (without mulliganing) as suggested in the Carsten Kotter 'Storm Regimen' article, I have a notebook I am writing all plays in, but I am also keeping a google spreadsheet w/ the hands and some stats.

Don't know if it will be useful to anyone but I figured I'd link it just in case:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/...2c&usp=sharing

I am going to try to get in at least 3 goldfishes a day, work etc. permitting, we'll see how that goes.

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Originally Posted by anomie-p

I finished building ANT last month (my wife got me the 4x LED, 3x Infernal Tutor and 4x Cabal Ritual I needed to finish it out for me on my birthday), I ended up building it right before a legacy event at my LGS, pulling cards out of my legacy binder and sleeving them up right before the event.

I won my first match without having played or even goldfished the deck (and then promptly went 1-2, 0-2, 1-2 in my next three matches, because I am a terrible player)

I've been traveling on a business trip since then but am pretty excited to get home tomorrow, get my hands back on my new deck and run through some of the goldfishing, etc. suggested in some of the links on the OP. This is a very nice thread :)

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Who goes out of town for business without taking their deck with them?

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Originally Posted by Bed Decks Palyer

https://www.wizards.com/mtg/images/d...progenitus.jpg

Kills in two swings... or in one AdN flip.

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Seems pretty bad bro.

Adding creatures that aren't Bob or that flying insect seems like a way to turn on their removal. Why not just kill them?

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Originally Posted by gregtron

Who goes out of town for business without taking their deck with them?

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I thought about taking it, but decided not to because I didn't really want to drag that much money in cards six thousand miles without knowing for sure I'd be playing in something.

(I probably should have brought the deck, though, it would've given me the option of a side trip to scrub out in GP Paris ;) - My plan was to just draft on Fridays at a store a few blocks from the hotel, that turned into 'someone you just met spots you a pod deck so you can play in the modern because no one is drafting, then you go drinking with your opponents afterward', which was pretty sweet, to be honest)

Edit: Took the deck out to my weekly LGS legacy event tonight (second time playing it), four rounds, went 2-0, 1-2, 2-1, 0-2 (one more match than I won last time), had a ton of fun (playing matches with this deck sort of kicks my adrenaline up, there's a lot of suspense, I like it).

@sloshthedark:

Well done at the gp,i saw you on day 2 crushing michael bonde after my other friend defeated him with sneak show :-)
I'm Kai by the way,the guy with foil TES.We played against each other during Bazaar of Moxen in novembre on the sunday event,i was there together with lemnear and we both played the exact same 75 TES during the Bom.

I personally took my beloved 4c delver deck into battle but unfortunately went not very well on the main event although i had many good results the weeks before.
Well happens.
So from now on i'm gonna sleeve up my 3rd deck,ANT.
Probably gonna play it at the next Bazaar of Moxen,see how it goes.

Your current list looks interesting by the way,
Why don't you run ad nauseam anymore?
Isn't it just crazy in the mirror or let's say against any combodeck?

Lightning bolt md to akr care about thalia g1?
I instantly thought about magma jet,as it also scrys for 2 but has a drawback in it's manacost.

This is my current list by the way:

http://img.tapatalk.com/d/14/02/26/asyjuseh.jpg

http://img.tapatalk.com/d/14/02/26/9u9eqyra.jpg

(Sry for the really bad picture quality)


- Team RUG-STAR Berlin -

Hello, i picked up the deck recently and so far i'm enjoying it and having decent results with it.

My list is pretty stock with 3 preordain, 4 Duress and 3 Cabal therapy and my SB is
3 Xantid Swarm
3 Carpet of Flowers
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Chain of Vapor
3 Dread of Night
1 Empty the Warrens

The matchups that i am struggling the most are Patriot, RUG and DeathBlade (this last one is really a PITA), but surpsingly i'm also having a lot of trouble against Jund/Junk and sometimes Shardless BUG.

The main reason for that is the presence of Surgical Extraction/Extirpate in the sideboard of this decks. What is your main strategy against this cards? I try to keep brainstorm up agains the discard, but i find it very difficult to play around the card, it just makes it quite difficult to win via a PIF loop and with all the discard that is played against us it makes it difficult to win via a natural Tendrills. Not to talk about the situations where you end up with a Tendrills in your hand and you end up with no win condition because it is removed from the game. This happened to me 3 times during the GP Paris, it is quite frustrating.

I have been thinking about adding dark confidant in the SB and one top to the main for this matchups, but that doesnt solve the extraction problem. I play with one ETW to play around it but so far it is not working. Yesterday i thought about adding a single burning wish to the side and another tendrills, this way i can side one burning wish and still have one out.

So a new side would be:
3 Xantid Swarm
3 Abrupt Decay
1 Chain of Vapor
3 Dread of Night
3 Dark confidant
1 Burning Wish
1 Tendrills of Agony

What do you guys think?

Thanks

Sideboarding question here. I see lists with 3 Carpet + 3 Xantid Swarm in the SB (Timo's GP Paris list for example). Aren't these competing slots against tempo/blue counter decks? How do you sideboard when you are running with both?

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Originally Posted by Higgs

Sideboarding question here. I see lists with 3 Carpet + 3 Xantid Swarm in the SB (Timo's GP Paris list for example). Aren't these competing slots against tempo/blue counter decks? How do you sideboard when you are running with both?

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Hey, they don't compete with each other, usually you dont sideboard the Xantid Swarm against tempo decks, because usually they still have bolts in that can kill them, i just side them against Sneak and Show and Merfolk for example, they are awesome in this match ups.

Siding BW is wrong, I played two main about a year ago and it wasn't completely bad. It helps against hatebears and extracton effects, and when you paly only two, it won't clog your hand.

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Originally Posted by Bed Decks Palyer

Siding BW is wrong, I played two main about a year ago and it wasn't completely bad. It helps against hatebears and extracton effects, and when you paly only two, it won't clog your hand.

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Why is siding in BW wrong? You only bring it in if you smell extraction effects from your opponent.
Of cause this makes only sense if you play a second Tendrils in the SB, but personally I hate the idea of being just dead if Tendrils gets extracted.

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Originally Posted by NoizeMe

Why is siding in BW wrong? You only bring it in if you smell extraction effects from your opponent.
Of cause this makes only sense if you play a second Tendrils in the SB, but personally I hate the idea of being just dead if Tendrils gets extracted.

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What has to happen for your opponent to be able to cast a Surgical Extraction targeting Tendrils of Agony? You would have to have Tendrils in your graveyard against an opponent that you already "smell extraction effects from."

Basically, you'd be devoting two sideboard spots (that can be used for a better effect) to a situation that shouldn't be occurring with too much frequency.

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Originally Posted by Namida

What has to happen for your opponent to be able to cast a Surgical Extraction targeting Tendrils of Agony? You would have to have Tendrils in your graveyard against an opponent that you already "smell extraction effects from."

Basically, you'd be devoting two sideboard spots (that can be used for a better effect) to a situation that shouldn't be occurring with too much frequency.

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What has to happen? Discard :D.
Sometimes you just draw Tendrils and it gets hit by Hymn + Extraction. Also none of this SB slots is wasted.
The second Tendrils comes in handy in matchups like Miracles were games tend to be grindy and firing Mini-Tendrils with help of there counter spells becomes an option.
Burning Wish can come in combo matchups as a 5th business spell.

Sure, I would prefer to have two additional SB slots, but a) I do not want to be dead against discard + extraction effect and b) they are not dead slots.

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Originally Posted by Lordofthestringz

Hello, i picked up the deck recently and so far i'm enjoying it and having decent results with it.

My list is pretty stock with 3 preordain, 4 Duress and 3 Cabal therapy and my SB is
3 Xantid Swarm
3 Carpet of Flowers
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Chain of Vapor
3 Dread of Night
1 Empty the Warrens

The matchups that i am struggling the most are Patriot, RUG and DeathBlade (this last one is really a PITA), but surpsingly i'm also having a lot of trouble against Jund/Junk and sometimes Shardless BUG.

The main reason for that is the presence of Surgical Extraction/Extirpate in the sideboard of this decks. What is your main strategy against this cards? I try to keep brainstorm up agains the discard, but i find it very difficult to play around the card, it just makes it quite difficult to win via a PIF loop and with all the discard that is played against us it makes it difficult to win via a natural Tendrills. Not to talk about the situations where you end up with a Tendrills in your hand and you end up with no win condition because it is removed from the game. This happened to me 3 times during the GP Paris, it is quite frustrating.

I have been thinking about adding dark confidant in the SB and one top to the main for this matchups, but that doesnt solve the extraction problem. I play with one ETW to play around it but so far it is not working. Yesterday i thought about adding a single burning wish to the side and another tendrills, this way i can side one burning wish and still have one out.

So a new side would be:
3 Xantid Swarm
3 Abrupt Decay
1 Chain of Vapor
3 Dread of Night
3 Dark confidant
1 Burning Wish
1 Tendrills of Agony

What do you guys think?

Thanks

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I'm considering running Bob in the Side also. But i think it's either Bob or Xantid Swarm. They compete for slots, since you want both in the same matchups (Combo Mirror / Esper / Miracles). Would you aggree? I still don't know if Bob is the real deal. People turned away from it for a reason in Storm... Why do you think Bob has become more present in ANT Sideboads in the last weeks?

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Originally Posted by NoizeMe

What has to happen? Discard :D.
Sometimes you just draw Tendrils and it gets hit by Hymn + Extraction. Also none of this SB slots is wasted.
The second Tendrils comes in handy in matchups like Miracles were games tend to be grindy and firing Mini-Tendrils with help of there counter spells becomes an option.
Burning Wish can come in combo matchups as a 5th business spell.

Sure, I would prefer to have two additional SB slots, but a) I do not want to be dead against discard + extraction effect and b) they are not dead slots.

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So your opponent has the discard, the Surgical, and you haven't been able to effectively protect yourself by using your cantrips to avoid putting Tendrils in your hand. I wouldn't blame you for not wanting to be dead against this, but I don't think it should be happening with so much frequency that you would need to bring sideboard cards in for it.

Also, what else are you going to have in your sideboard to make Wish into a business spell?