[Deck] Fetchland Tendrils

[GreenOne]

Petal helps in krosan gripping counterbalance on turn 2 on the play and then go off with the opponent tapped out.
I'd play your manabase wit -1 Petal +1 Land (Island probably)

[emidln]

emidln's list from the competition thread frees 4 slots for these spells. Initially he said something like "running 2 Doomsdays is mandatory" - probably changed his mind. Questions are:

- In which matchups do you want to have access to double Tendrils?
- Which matchups justify Brain Freeze being maindeck material?
- I've read somewhere that playing two IGGs helps against discard. Are they really necessary?
- Is anybody still playing 2 Doomsdays?

The list I've been putting through gauntlet testing plays 1 Tendrils, 1 ETW, 1 IGG, 1 Doomsday maindeck. It has 1 Doomsday, 1 Brain Freeze in the sb. I board in Doomsday#2 against heavy discard and when it's necessary to decrease the amount of cards in hand needed for combo (to fight the wars of attrition against some control decks). I'm playing 6 slots for protection in the maindeck (4 Chant, 1 Extirpate, 1 KGrip) with up to 10 of the same possible against troublesome matchups (4 Thoughtseize, 1 Abeyance, 2 Extirpate, 3 KGrip) in the sideboard. The full sideboard I'm testing looks like this:

//protection
4 Thoughtseize
1 Abeyance
2 Extirpate

//removal
3 Krosan Grip
1 Wipe Away
1 Echoing Truth
1 Rushing River

//alt win
1 Doomsday
1 Brain Freeze

My manabase is questionable right now. I have 17 lands, 1 Petal in this config, but I'm not quite sure about the the 8th fetch and what the 17th land should be (right now I have it as an Underground Sea). I want more basics (indeed I wish I had an 18th land, but I can't find the cut for it) and that's what the 2nd Sea or the 8th fetchland might become.

For reference:

4 Polluted Delta
4 Flooded Strand
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Plains
2 Underground Sea
1 Tundra
1 Scrubland
1 Tropical Island
1 Volcanic Island

So far I've been very happy with it, but I'm not very far into my gauntlet. I'll know more as I approach GP: Indy after the testing sessions.

Edit: Stuff about Lotus Petal

Lotus Petal is bad against Stax because you want to get to 3 mana to play a bounce/serenity. 14-15 lands + 4 petal yields almost exactly the same amount of mana sources as 17 lands + 1 petal but the 17 land version's mana sources aren't cut off by Trinisphere and Chalice of the Void. If they don't have Trinisphere, you should be comboing anyway so the other scenario doesn't matter much.

The only compelling places Petal is better are against black LD (Deadguy, Eva Green) and against Dragon Stompy. (Although to be perfectly honest, I'm still winning 50% of my games without Serenity and without the other 3 Petals because LED and Top are just that stupid good.)

[r0ckstAr]

Hello,

I'm new to this deck, and I'm wondering something : how do you use doomsday stacks ? Is it the mean to brainfreeze the opponent ?

Do you think leaving green for red and empty the warrens is a good choice in a meta where ichorid, aggro loam and the rock are widely represented (along with a lot of landstills) ?

[Shriekmaw]

Hello,

I'm new to this deck, and I'm wondering something : how do you use doomsday stacks ? Is it the mean to brainfreeze the opponent ?

Do you think leaving green for red and empty the warrens is a good choice in a meta where ichorid, aggro loam and the rock are widely represented (along with a lot of landstills) ?

In the above metagame with Ichorid, Aggro Loam, and The Rock; I would play Red over Green as a splash in the deck. I just prefer Red over Green because it has better cards against blue control decks. I think Serenity is a fine replacement for Grip in the board by cutting green.

I'm not sold on the new direction that some players have gone with this deck. I still like the first build of Fetch Land Tendrils before they added Sensei's Divining Top and Doomsday.

[Dark_Cynic87]

it's my opinion that most of you FT players don't realize something about this deck: The build you use is dependent on your meta. You don't have to mirror Emidln's build. That's the whole point of this list--versatility.

I hate repeating myself. Nick, if that build works for you in your meta, then by all means play it. However, it's been tested and found that Top is much better against control builds. Also, you should look at what you just said.

In the above metagame with Ichorid, Aggro Loam, and The Rock; I would play Red over Green as a splash in the deck.

You just said to play EtW in a metagame with a relevant amount of Deed present. Moreover, you said NOT to play Grip against a deck that runs LotV, a list that uses an enchantment as a kill-spell, and then Deed...See anything wrong here? How does Serenity solve these problems? Ichorid is a wierd matchup, and heavily dependent on opening hands for both sides (this is just in my opinion, if you guys have some method of beating them, I'd like to hear it), and EtW is a worse choice than Echoing Truth, however helpful game 1. Against Deed, K. Grip is necessary if you run EtW, and since you mentioned The Rock, they run Vindicates to rid you of your Serenity. Serenity isn't really a great answer by itself. Even against Counterbalance it's worse as their 2-spot is used by Goyf and it makes their counter spells relevant, not to mention their own K. Grips.

Don't get me wrong, I use Serenity, but K. Grip is by far the MVP when it comes to removal; you can tutor it up, and then keep it where it's at via Top until it becomes a necessary force, all while making their in-hand protection irrelevant. I run a 5-color list, and it does quite well. I use Tops also. But I do advocate others use what they need to to win. That is the point, right? Winning? Why is conformity becoming a driving force in this thread? I've never seen so many people determined to change peoples' minds into running xeroxed lists...Play what you need, discuss choices, but at the end of the day, leave it alone.

Pce,

--DC

[dlevsApiJ]

@ emidln,

How do you board with that SB against:

AggroControl with CB
AggroControl without SB
Control

Cause you have so many cards that are good in that MU's

[emidln]

Ichorid is a wierd matchup, and heavily dependent on opening hands for both sides (this is just in my opinion, if you guys have some method of beating them, I'd like to hear it),

My Ichorid strategy boils down the following:

1) Use Chant/Extirpate to keep Narcomoebas off the table (not always possible with Chant, but they have exactly 4 ways of non-spell card draw outside of draw step) and Cabal Therapy from smacking me in the fish.

2a) Use 2nd Extirpate/1st Echoing Truth on Ichorids (beats Ichorid completely considering without Narcos and Ichorids they'll never be able to put Golgari Thugs or Stinkweed Imps into play fast enough to race you). With Mystical Tutor or Lim-dul's Vault and 3 Extirpate postboard, this isn't terribly hard.

OR

2a) Win the game via Goldfishing (this happens more than "2a", but watching out for 2a is a good way to get easy wins).

[Nihil Credo]

1) Use Chant/Extirpate to keep Narcomoebas off the table

It's not clear what you mean here, but just in case: Narcomoebas's ability puts them into play rather than let you play them, so Orim's Chant won't stop them from coming into play (although it will prevent a DR/Therapy on that same turn).

[emidln]

It's not clear what you mean here, but just in case: Narcomoebas's ability puts them into play rather than let you play them, so Orim's Chant won't stop them from coming into play (although it will prevent a DR/Therapy on that same turn).

The not playing DR/Therapy is what I meant. The "not always possible with Chant" comment wasn't clear enough.

[dlevsApiJ]

@ emidln,

How do you board with that SB against:

AggroControl with CB
AggroControl without SB
Control

Cause you have so many cards that are good in that MU's

[moxpearl]

I board in Doomsday#2 against heavy discard and when it's necessary to decrease the amount of cards in hand needed for combo (to fight the wars of attrition against some control decks).

If heavy discard has obliterated your hand, and let's say you even have a top on the board, how do you do 20 points of damage with a Doomsday stack?

[Brehn]

With Doomsday in hand and Top on the board, you need either 3 other spells + BBBBBB (standard stack) or 1 other spell + 2BBBBBB (replace Petal with Top) to generate a storm count of 10. Note: Against "heavy discard" it's quite possible that you don't need to do 20 because those decks often pack Thoughtseize (also seen: Dark Confidant, Fetchlands). If they played 2 Thoughtseizes and you have Top + 3 lands in play, you only need 2 cards in your hand to win (Cabal Ritual [with 2 B-producing lands, 1 random land + Threshold] / LED [with 3 B-producing lands] + Doomsday).

Lotus Petal is bad against Stax because you want to get to 3 mana to play a bounce/serenity. 14-15 lands + 4 petal yields almost exactly the same amount of mana sources as 17 lands + 1 petal but the 17 land version's mana sources aren't cut off by Trinisphere and Chalice of the Void. If they don't have Trinisphere, you should be comboing anyway so the other scenario doesn't matter much.

The only compelling places Petal is better are against black LD (Deadguy, Eva Green) and against Dragon Stompy. (Although to be perfectly honest, I'm still winning 50% of my games without Serenity and without the other 3 Petals because LED and Top are just that stupid good.)

Hum.
So Petal is bad against Stax and good against Deadguy, Eva Green and Dragon Stompy. Again, those are more pros than cons. I'm still waiting for a good explanation why a playset of Petals shouldn't be played. The only reason I've heard from you so far is the Stax matchup, which on its own does not justify anything.

[emidln]

With Doomsday in hand and Top on the board, you need either 3 other spells + BBBBBB (standard stack) or 1 other spell + 2BBBBBB (replace Petal with Top) to generate a storm count of 10. Note: Against "heavy discard" it's quite possible that you don't need to do 20 because those decks often pack Thoughtseize (also seen: Dark Confidant, Fetchlands). If they played 2 Thoughtseizes and you have Top + 3 lands in play, you only need 2 cards in your hand to win (Cabal Ritual [with 2 B-producing lands, 1 random land + Threshold] / LED [with 3 B-producing lands] + Doomsday).


Hum.
So Petal is bad against Stax and good against Deadguy, Eva Green and Dragon Stompy. Again, those are more pros than cons. I'm still waiting for a good explanation why a playset of Petals shouldn't be played. The only reason I've heard from you so far is the Stax matchup, which on its own does not justify anything.

Lands are better than Petals vs Threshold/Fish and Landstill. In these matchups, you desperately need to use mana to setup with cantrips and tutors so being forced to mull hands with Petal, Ponder, Brainstorm and no lands really sucks. Hitting three lands against Landstill is critical to the ease of winning the matchup while hitting three lands agaisnt Thresh/Fish largely takes Daze out of the equation. These matchups are much more prevalent than any Chalice deck or black aggro deck.

If heavy discard has obliterated your hand, and let's say you even have a top on the board, how do you do 20 points of damage with a Doomsday stack?

You play LED and Top to the board. In such a situation you would only need 0-1 Rituals and Doomsday to generate lethal storm. This is accomplished blue cantrips or with multiple tops on the table + topdeck tutors. LED on the table

Let's say you have the following in play:

Swamp
Island
Plains
Sensei's Divining Top
Lion's Eye Diamond

You need 2BBB + 1 spell or 1 mana to generate lethal storm with a Tendrils stack (assuming an opponent hasn't been gracious enough to assist in their death) which with a board like the sample board would let you use either Dark Rit or Cabal Rit + Doomsday as the only cards in your hand.

Dark Rit (2BBB)
Doomsday (2 + LED = 2BBB)
Draw4 (2)
LED (2)
LED (2)
Top (1)
Top (0 + LED + LED= BBBBBB)
Top (BBBBB)
Top (BBBB)
Tendrils with 9 storm

This is the stack I used for that (a basic variation of my standard Cruel Bargain/Tendrils stack):

[top]
Cruel Bargain
LED
LED
Top
Tendrils
[bottom]

[Shriekmaw]

Against the blue control decks, I do agree that Top is better than both street wraith and lotus petal that I currently play. Doomsday is darn right terrible though. You usually play the long game hoping that you will be able to combo out against them.

In our metagame, the board has to be totally reworked since a lot of control decks are playing Orim's Chant in the board against us, usually along with extirpate to. This is why I had to go back to green for Xantid Swarm mainly.

Also, I'm going to start testing Bitterblossom in the board against control style decks which provides another way to win since a lot of them board there removal out. Maybe its just a terrible idea, but I want to explore it further.

[thefreakaccident]

I have played FT twice for my last two local tournaments... First time, I got third/fourth the first time I played it... only losing to stax out of four rounds, the next tournament, I went 3-0-1 and got first, not loosing a single game throughout the tournament (2-0, 2-0, 2-0, split)...

I mainly played it because I don't have the cards to build my other decks currently (selling regulars so as to pimp my shaz).

Here is the list I played (sub-optimal just looking at it myself, but it has done well for me).

lands//18 (OMG, that's a lot)
4 flooded strand
4 polluted delta
2 underground sea
1 island
1 swamp
1 plains
2 tundra
1 volcanic island
1 tropical island
1 scrubland

spells//42
1 lotus petal
4 lion's eye diamond
4 dark ritual
4 cabal ritual
4 infernal tutor
4 mystical tutor
4 brainstorm
4 ponder
3 sensei's divining top
3 orim's chant
1 tendril's of agony
1 ill-gotten gains
1 brainfreeze
1 empty the warrens
1 doomsday
1 wipe away
1 cruel bargain


sideboard (I had to build this deck last second, really terrible sideboard...)

4 serenity
3 extirpate
3 echoing truth
2 krosan grip
1 infernal contract
1 empty the warrens
1 pithing needle (this was a place holder for abeyance, and I was supposed to have 4 chants...)




Automatic changes I would want to make are these:

-1 plains
- excess win conditions (brainfreeze & ETW... at least in MD).

3 slots:

+1 orim's chant
+1 extirpate
+1 draw 4


At least, those are the changes I am tempted to make... although you guys know more about this deck than I (played it twice, ever)... So I want to get the cuts/adds from you guys to maximize the deck...

Also, the sideboard looks really shitty, so could I get some suggestions on that as well?

[Jaiminho]

Yeah, taking out one of the win conditions is the way to go, I'd say. Taking Brain Freeze to the sideboard seems just fine, as it is simply worse than the other wincons as it is there for dodging sideboard cards. Simply side it in when you need.

I'd also keep Top as a 4-of. I think it's better than Ponder as a 4-of, since it gets Doomsday running.

Keeping the basic Plains might be better than keeping the 2nd Tundra or Underground Sea. I can't really say much here, but fetching that basic for early time walks against Stax without being vulnerable to Wasteland and for playing Serenity over Moon seems worth it.

Draw4 in the sideboard makes no sense to me and Needle is just worse than Abeyance. One of the Echoing Truths should be a Rushing River for playing against Stax and Stompies -- you usually have enough lands to get the second bounce effect with no drawbacks. ETW in the sideboard also seems like a card you are never siding in, specially when you have made the cut from 3 to 2 win conditions in the maindeck.

[thefreakaccident]

I said the SB was terrible... which is why I asked for suggestions...

So, cut the brainfreeze for the fourth chant, and the 4th ponder for the fourth top in the MD?

I want to have 2-3 abeyances in my board (probably 2)... taking out needle and ETW... Take out the draw 4 for.. brainfreeze (moving it to board)...

The echoing truths have been good for me, but I will test one out for the river.

Thank you for the input.

[m03]

While we're sharing lists for criticism...
I got 2nd place in an 8 person tournament last week using the following list:

// Lands
4 [ON] Flooded Strand
4 [ON] Polluted Delta
1 [B] Swamp (2)
1 [B] Island (1)
2 [U] Underground Sea
1 [U] Tundra
1 [U] Scrubland
1 [U] Tropical Island
1 [U] Volcanic Island

// Spells
4 [B] Dark Ritual
4 [TO] Cabal Ritual
4 [MI] Lion's Eye Diamond
2 [TE] Lotus Petal
4 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top
4 [IA] Brainstorm
3 [LRW] Ponder
1 [PT] Cruel Bargain
4 [DIS] Infernal Tutor
3 [MI] Mystical Tutor
1 [AL] Lim-Dul's Vault
4 [PS] Orim's Chant
1 [PLC] Extirpate
1 [TSP] Wipe Away
1 [US] Ill-Gotten Gains
1 [WL] Doomsday
1 [SC] Tendrils of Agony
1 [TSP] Empty the Warrens

// Sideboard
SB: 4 [US] Duress
SB: 2 [WL] Abeyance
SB: 3 [TSP] Krosan Grip
SB: 2 [PLC] Extirpate
SB: 1 [TSP] Wipe Away
SB: 1 [PS] Rushing River
SB: 1 [WL] Doomsday
SB: 1 [SC] Brain Freeze

The field was (and will probably be the same next time): 1 Burn, 1 BU Tog Control, 2 BR/GR Aggro, 1 BG Discard/Pox, 1 Armageddon Stax, 1 Solidarity.

My only losses were to the Solidarity player...since I don't have much experience vs. Solidarity, I just wasn't sure how to best play against it. I didn't realize what he was running round-1 until High Tide hit the table. I tried to fetch Extirpate with Mystical Tutor (I had a Top in play), but as expected, he just responded with everything on top of me tapping Top.

The changes I plan on making for next week are:

-1 Lotus Petal
-1 Flooded Strand
+1 Island
+1 Swamp

I might do the following for the SB, but I'm not sure yet:

-1 Abeyance
+1 Echoing Truth

Given the competition, a singleton Plains doesn't seem necessary. Plus, I'm running less white than most other lists I've seen, so less sources are needed.

[Dark_Cynic87]

Do not drop a fetch, and 18 lands is too much. I'd stay at 16, and just drop a Sea for a basic Plains. Do drop a petal, though, and up the M. Tutor count to 4. Alternatively you could put in a K. Grip/Wipe Away main for a little help vs. stuff like chalice/CB/3sphere. In your board, I really don't think a second Doomsday or a 3rd Extirpate is necessary. I think the slots would be better as other things depending your metagame.

[_m03]

While I'm waiting for my regular account to get unbanned (I'm not a bot damnit!!!), I'll address some of the points:

Do not drop a fetch, and 18 lands is too much. I'd stay at 16, and just drop a Sea for a basic Plains.

I wouldn't be going to 18, I'd be going to 17, which is a fairly standard land count for FT.

Dropping a Sea for a Plains seems bad. I've already cut half of the white cards from the deck (well, the sideboard), and replaced them with black cards, so dropping a blue and black source for a white source doesn't seem like a good idea.

Do drop a petal, though, and up the M. Tutor count to 4.

I'm running 1 Lim-Dul's Vault in place of the 4th Mystical Tutor, so I'm good as far as Tutor count is concerned. I may cut LDV for the 4th MT at some point, but I haven't found a compelling enough reason yet.

Alternatively you could put in a K. Grip/Wipe Away main for a little help vs. stuff like chalice/CB/3sphere.

I've already got a Wipe Away main.

In your board, I really don't think a second Doomsday or a 3rd Extirpate is necessary. I think the slots would be better as other things depending your metagame.

The idea of Extirpate #3 was to combine with the Duress strategy in the sideboard...although, you may be correct. The third Extirpate and Doomsday may be better served by replacing them with bounce spells (Echoing Truth and Hurkyl's Recall being the most likely candidates).