[Brainstorming] Ad Nauseam

[sunshine]

hmmm... orb of insight gives zero hits for 'ad nauseum' or 'repeat this process'

[georgjorge]

I thought about 42Land too, but then realized that with Manabond, you'll discard it, and with Exploration, that's only turn three, enough time for about every deck to get rid of it. It would be sweet, but probably not going to happen.

[undone]

hmmm... orb of insight gives zero hits for 'ad nauseum' or 'repeat this process'

O really? odd.

Probably not a hox just a mistemplated card.

[Deep6er]

hmmm... orb of insight gives zero hits for 'ad nauseum' or 'repeat this process'

Yeah, I don't think the Orb interprets multiple words. I just input the following phrases: "Comes into play" and "deals damage" with zero hits.

However, I DID put in the word "Ad" and one hit came up. Same thing for "repeat".

EDIT: Turns out there is a hit for the word "nauseam". So, that's one for "Ad" and one for "nauseam". Seems pretty good to me. That's technically how the phrase goes.

[Xero]

There is one hit each for 3BB as well. That doesn't necessarily mean that the card is accurate as spoiled, but it does seem more likely. Of course, if we get another card with that CC, we will know something is wrong.

[undone]

It just occured to me, black gets single cards which make a mockery of magic.

I guess they have to keep the theme.

[BreathWeapon]

It just occured to me, black gets single cards which make a mockery of magic.

I guess they have to keep the theme.

Poor Blue, "They took your job!"

[Volt]

.

[undone]

Poor Blue, "They took your job!"

Na blue is meant to make a minor mockery of the format its being used in.

Black is normaly balanced, but every once in a while it flips the game off and mocks the world.

[Blade]

hmmm... orb of insight gives zero hits for 'ad nauseum' or 'repeat this process'

The orb can only search for 1 word at a time.

Ad - 1
Nauseam - 1
Repeat - 1
this - 69
Process - 1

---

Ok, well I just goldfished 3 games using a standard SI build replacing Infernal Contract with Ad Nauseam. I assume I always play 1st and my opponent does nothing. Lets see how it went:

Deck
2 Bayou
4 Shield Sphere
4 Phyrexian Walker
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Culling the Weak
4 Infernal Contract/Ad Nauseam)
4 Cruel Bargain
4 Infernal Tutor
4 Lotus Petal
4 Chrome Mox
4 Land Grant
4 Pact of Negation
2 Ill-Gotten Gains
1 Goblin Charbelcher
3 Tendrils of Agony

3 games with Ad Nauseam
Hand:
Shield Sphere, Ad Nauseam, Land Grant,Culling the Weak, 2xTendrils, Cruel Bargin

Play Land Grant, get Bayou. Play Shield Sphere, use bayou play Culling the Weak Use 3 to play Cruel Bargin -10 10 life. Draw Shield Sphere Tendrils, Pact and Walker. Nothing to do, pass turn (hand - Ad Nauseam, 3xTendrils, Shield Sphere, Pact Walker)

Next turn draw Cabal Ritual. Not enough mana so play Shield Sphere and pass (hand - Ad Nauseam, 3xTendrils, Cabal Ritual, Pact Walker)

Next turn draw Walker. Drop walker an pass. (hand - Ad Nauseam, 3xTendrils, Cabal Ritual, Pact Walker)

Next turn draw a Mox. Yay! Drop Mox, removing 1 Tendrils. Nothing to play though and only 4 cards in GY, so I pass. (hand - Ad Nauseam, 2xTendrils, Cabal Ritual, Pact Walker)

Its now turn 5. Had that Ad Naseum been an IC I could have drawn 4. Draw a Dark Ritual. Play dark ritual off of bayou. Use 1 mana from ritual and 1 from Mox to play cabal ritual. 5 mana. Play Ad Nauseam

Reveals:
Walker - 10 life
Dark Ritual - 9 life
Bayou - 9 life
Land Grant - 7 life
Belcher - 3 life.
I stop here (for those interested, the next card would have been Chrome Mox).

So I drew 5 cards for 7 life. Had I played IC it could have been 4 for 5, 1 turn earlier. Play Bayou. Not enough mana avalible to storm, so I play a walker and pass the turn. (hand - Walker Dark Ritual Land Grant Tendrils Tendrils PACT Belcher Walker)

Next turn draw Chrome Mox. I carefully look at the situation and realize that I cannot possibly combo this turn (turn 6 and I still haven't gone off.) I play the Mox removing another tendrils and pass. (Hand - Walker, Dark Ritual, Land Grant, Tendrils, Pact, Belcher Walker)

Next turn draw ANOTHER Ad Nauseam. I have the mana so I tap Bayou for dark rit and 2 moxen for Ad Nauseam:

Revealed
Infernal Tutor - -2, 1 life remaining.
Do I risk it? Why not?
LED! - 1 life remaining.
Now, if I can stay alive for 1 turn I can combo!

Next turn, draw lotus petal, play LED, tap 4 for belcher, LED => Belcher. Win after 8 turns.

-------

G2 -
2x Cabal Ritual, Walker, Pact, Dark Ritual, Lotus Petal, Land Grant

No draw but a decent hand.

Play Land Grant grabbing Bayou. Pass (Hand - 2xCR, Walker, Pact, Dark Ritual, Lotus Petal).

Next turn draw Culling the Weak. Still no draw. Pass (Hand - Culling the Weak, 2xCR, Walker, Pact, Dark Ritual, Lotus Petal)

Next turn draw another Cabal Ritual. Sigh. 8 cards so I play the Lotus Petal and pass.(Hand - Culling the Weak, 3xCR, Walker, Pact, Dark Ritual)

Next turn, draw Ad Nauseam. Play walker and tap bayou for Culling the Weak. Use to for Cabal Ritual. 5 mana, play Ad Nauseam

Revealed -
Infernal Tutor - -2 life, 18 life
Walker - 18 life
Infernal Tutor - -2 Life, 16 life
Walker - 16 life
Cruel Bargin - -3, 13 life
Infernal Tutor - -2, 11 life
Culling the Weak - -1, 10 life
Bayou - 10 life
Ad Naseum - -5, 5 life
Tendrils - -4, 1 life.

Wow, 10 cards for 19 life. Not bad actually.

Play Bayou and both walkers. Use Culling the Weak off of bayou: ( 4 mana , storm 9.) Play Cabal Ritual, Cabal Ritual, Dark Ritual, (12 mana, storm 12). Infernal Tutor for Tendrils. Play 2 Tendrils for lethal.

Wow, it looks like it works.

---

G3

Culling the Weak, 2XWalker, Cruel Bargin, Cabal Ritual, Belcher, Infernal Tutor
Not a good hand. Mull

Tendrils, 2x Lotus Petal, Bayou, Mox, Land Grant.

Better

Play Bayou and Land Grant. Pass. (Hand - Tendrils, 2x Lotus Petal, Bayou, Mox)

Next turn Draw pact. Nothing. Pass (Hand - Tendrils, 2x Lotus Petal, Bayou, Mox, Pact)

Next turn draw Belcher. Play 2 Lotus Petal, bayou and mox removing pact. Play belcher keeping 1 Lotus Petal. Pass (Hand - Tendrils)

Next turn draw Lotus Petal. Go off on belcher.

No draw that game so its hard to tell.


conclusion
Average turn going off - 5.333...
Average cards drawn total - 7
Average cards drawn off Ad Naseum - 5


3 games with Infernal Contract

G1 -
Cabal Ritual, Land Grant, Tendrils, Infernal Tutor, pact, Culling the Weak, Cruel Bargin

Ugh. I keep but not happy about it.

Play Land Grant for Bayou. Drop Bayou. Pass (Hand - Cabal Ritual,Tendrils, Infernal Tutor, pact, Culling the Weak, Cruel Bargin)

Next turn, LED. Drop LED and pass (Hand - Cabal Ritual,Tendrils, Infernal Tutor, pact, Culling the Weak, Cruel Bargin)

Next turn Belcher. Pass (Hand - Cabal Ritual,Tendrils, Infernal Tutor, pact, Culling the Weak, Cruel Bargin, Belcher)

Next turn Mox. Play mox removing Pact. Tap out for Cabal Ritual into Cruel Bargin. Draw LED, Mox, Shield Sphere, Lotus Petal. 10 Life.

Drop Mox removing tendrils. Drop Shield Sphere, Lotus Petal and LED. Tap mox for Culling the Weak. Use 4 mana to play belcher. Use LED for belcher with 1 land in deck. Belcher hits for 22.

---

G2
LED, Walker, Dark Ritual, Tendrils, Mox, Pact, Bayou.

Drop Bayou and pass (Hand - LED, Walker, Dark Ritual, Tendrils, Mox, Pact)

Next turn draw another mox. Pass.(Hand - LED, Walker, Dark Ritual, Tendrils, 2x Mox, Pact)

Next turn walker. Play the Walker and pass. (Hand - LED, Walker, Dark Ritual, Tendrils, 2x Mox, Pact)

Next turn Cabal Ritual. Need draw... Play other walker and pass (Hand - LED, Cabal Ritual, Dark Ritual, Tendrils, Mox, Pact)

Next turn, IGG. Play LED and pass. (Hand - IGG, Walker, Dark Ritual, Tendrils, 2x Mox, Pact)

Next turn, Infernal Tutor. Perfect. Play Mox removing pact and another removing tendrils. Play cabal ritual and dark ritual and tap mox (6 mana in pool, storm 4). Play IGG and respond with LED. Retrieve Tendrils, Tutor and LED. (4 mana in pool, storm 5). Play LED. Play Infernal Tutor and respond with LED. Fetch IGG (5 mana in pool storm 7). Play IGG getting Dark Ritual, Cabal Ritual and Tendrils. Use last mana for Dark Ritual then Cabal Ritual Tendrils for 20.
---

G3
LED, Tendrils, 2xSS, 2xIC, Lotus Petal.

Play Lotus Petal and pass (Hand - LED, Tendrils, 2xSS, 2xIC)

Next turn, Mox. Play mox removing IC and pass. (Hand - LED, Tendrils,
2xSS, IC)

Next turn Mox. Play mox removing Tendrils. Draw Land Grant, IGG, 2XCR. Pass (Hand - Land Grant, IGG, 2XCR)

Next turn Dark Ritual. Use mox to cast 2xCR and Dark Ritual and grab a bayou with Land Grant (mana 6 storm 5). Play IGG, respond with LED (mana 5, storm 6). Get back Dark Ritual, LED an IC. Play Dark Ritual and LED (mana 7 storm 8). Play IC and respond with LED (mana 7 storm 8). 5 life draw: Land Grant, Dark Ritual, Mox, Walker. Nothing useful and lethal mana in pool. You lose.


Conclusions
Average turn going off - 4.666...
Average cards drawn - 1.333...
Average cards drawn from IC - 1.333...

Overall
This test seems to suggest that Ad Nauseum does indeed work quite well. More testing is needed, but it looks awesome

After more extensive testing with this build it seems that Ad Nauseam reads pay 19 life: draw 10-11 cards. Amazing.

[The_Red_Panda]

What I think you're missing is that that is a pretty lousy build to put AdN into. What you need is a TON of low-cost cards, and
1x Belcher
3xTendrils
2x IGG
4xAdN,
4x Cruel bargain
seems like too much. I would even go so far as to say optimal builds with AdN will not run any cards over 2 mana that aren't Tendrils, 1x IGG or AdN. And your 2-mana Cards are probably going to be Infernal tutor x4 and Cabal Ritual x4. The rest of your deck should probably be at or below 1cc. Plus, the nega-synergy wafting off of Cruel Bargain + AdN is horrendous. You want a full 20 life when you start flipping with AdN. I might even look into Grapeshot, if only for having 2 less CC than Tendrils. It probably won't pan out for shit, but still, you get the idea.

I'm already getting sick of Ad Nauseam.

ba-dum-ch

It's as if all these posts are repeating the same thing, over and over; AdN is busted, AdN is busted, AdN is busted, AdN is busted.

[undone]

A better fast build would be something like

4 tall men
4 tall men
4 C mox
4 L pedel
4 Pact of negation

4 duress
4 dark ritual
4 Culling of the weak
4 mystical tutor
1 bounce spell (either chain of vapor, or wipe away)
4 Cabal ritual

4 Tendrils
4 Ad Nauseum

11 gold lands (COB Gemstone and Orcherd)

Try that, you get more cards and can more easily use these and you get amazing disruption.

Total CC is 61, however you are sure that you are going to draw your ad nauseums for sure, as well as having duress and you have tutors for tendrils after you finish your ad nauseum Keep in mind the following.

"Cast adnauseum in upkeep, now still during upkeep cast mystical -> tendrils/whatever" It leads to insane BS.
EDIT: LED does not play well with adnauseum, unless your tutoring for it.

[rufus]

If you really want to play a draw-4, it might as well be Meditate - it's not a big stretch for the manabase to be modified to 2U and the lost turn is going be less painful than the lost life.

[raharu]

If you really want to play a draw-4, it might as well be Meditate - it's not a big stretch for the manabase to be modified to 2U and the lost turn is going be less painful than the lost life.

Or not play a draw-4 at all and play something like undone's list, which is, IMO, the best concept, and most likely the best list for Ad Nauseum. srsly, cheap shit + a metric fuckton of draw that works best with cheap shit = ++win. The average cmc is fucking 0.9016393442622950819672131147541.

That's an appreciable amount less than one. Imagine a hand like this:

Land, D Rit, Tall Man, Tall Man, Culling, Mystical, Petal.

~2 cards of chaffish (Robots). Open with:

Land, Robot, Mystical, go.

t2:

Draw Ad Nauseum (did I really even have to tell you what I was tutoring for???). Robot, Culling, D. Rit, Ad Nauseum, draw 15 comfortably, assume a Tendrils is in the top 1/3 of your deck that you drew, along with some mana, fucking win.

It's that simple. Have access to Ad Nauseum, use it to gain access to cheap mana, win conditions, and protection, and fucking win. Stop making it complicated with Belchers and IGG and shit. You seriously don't need that when you draw A WHOLE FUCKING THIRD OF YOUR DECK.

[Forbiddian]

Hi, I tested Ad Nauseum in Draco.dec.

Here's how the testing went:
Turn 1: Land
Turn 2: Land
Turn 3: Land
Turn 4: Land
Turn 5: Land, Ad Nauseum into Draco, Autochthon Wurm. Oops. I die.

Result: Suicide goldfish. Ugh! Ad Nauseum is so bad!

Turn 1: Land, Ritual, Spoils of the Vault for Ad Nauseum, go to 13. Ad Nauseum, flipping over Sundering Titan and stopping. Top card was Draco, thank god I stopped, but I still lose.

Uhm. Yeah, try building a deck that doesn't put you at 10 life before you even cast Ad Nauseum, and try in a deck that doesn't have 4 mana random cards like Charbelcher (you design a deck that plays Russian Roulette on every draw?). Why did you bother testing with a deck like that?

Try running one of the builds that was linked before. They're really unoptimized (no offense to the creators, the card concept has only been around for like a week), but they goldfish on turn 1 a LOT, and resolved Ad Nauseum is game. The weakness of this deck is countermagic or Thoughtseize or w/e, not goldfishing power.

And yeah, it draws more like 15-20 cards for 19 life. It should be well into the realm of 95% win ratio after resolution. If it's less, probably lower your mana curve.



Hope it gets banned, though, this is a lot stronger than Necro.

[The Rack]

What would be Wizards reason for printing this anyways? There can be arguably no good to come out of it. Are they trying to mess with the eternal formats?

[raharu]

Uhm. Yeah, try building a deck that doesn't put you at 10 life before you even cast Ad Nauseum, and try in a deck that doesn't have 4 mana random cards like Charbelcher (you design a deck that plays Russian Roulette on every draw?). Why did you bother testing with a deck like that?

Try running one of the builds that was linked before. They're really unoptimized (no offense to the creators, the card concept has only been around for like a week), but they goldfish on turn 1 a LOT, and resolved Ad Nauseum is game. The weakness of this deck is countermagic or Thoughtseize or w/e, not goldfishing power.

And yeah, it draws more like 15-20 cards for 19 life. It should be well into the realm of 95% win ratio after resolution. If it's less, probably lower your mana curve.



Hope it gets banned, though, this is a lot stronger than Necro.

15 cards + 7 in hand = 21 cards. 21 ~ 1/3 of 60. A first or second turn Ad Nauseum is pretty much 1/3 of your deck, if not more or randomly less because of 2 or 3 high cmc cards in a series of flips. I seriously doubt you even need 15+ cards though. Draw mana, hit a win condition, win. Easy.

[Dark_Cynic87]

0cc--26
4x Shield Sphere
4x PhyWalker

4x LED
4x Chrome Mox
4x Lotus Petal
1x Bayou
1x Taiga

4x Pact of Negation

1cc--12
4x Duress
4x Dark Ritual
4x Culling of the Weak

2cc--14
4x Land Grant
2x Cabal Ritual
3x Diabolic Intent
2x Burning Wish
3x Infernal Tutor

3cc--2
1x Cruel Bargain
1x Infernal Contract

4cc--3
1x IGG
1x ToA
1x Belcher

5cc--3
3x AdN

Maybe something like that? I think you guys are playing WAY to many win-cons. I think that between 2x Wishes (Castable via Taiga and Petals; not a huge stretch when you look at the AdN draws you can have; It's nutz.).

Wishes also give you access to some of the same stuff that TES uses against hate, not to mention it gives you access to a Draw-4s (either a black one or in rare occasions, D. Returns, not too sure on how you would cast it but whatever).

If Intent + CotW = not enough creatures, there's always Ornithopter, so no biggie.

This also includes 8 pieces of disruption, 8 Tutors, 2 draw-4s and 3 AdN, with 2 win-cons in the maindeck, and a singleton IGG, although there should be a second one so that you could do the IGG loop ftw without hitting an AdN, I'm just not sure what to drop. I haven't tested this, but it seems a much more appropriate approach to the whole concept. Notice that almost 1/2 of the deck is 0cc. That's hawt. 38 of 60 cost one or less. If it works, it is sick. If not, eh. I tried.

Pce,

--DC

[Hanni]

I've never played (non-Belcher) storm combo extensively, and therefore I'm not really qualified to improve the archtype. However, Ad Nauseam has me really excited until it gets banned, so I've decided to try it out.

I looked over (recent) lists from the FT, TES, and SI threads for a starting platform. I threw something together, goldfished it for a bit, and then tried something else. I did this a few times and then settled (for now) with the following:

B/u AdN-T

// Lands
4 [ON] Polluted Delta
4 [ON] Bloodstained Mire
4 [R] Underground Sea
2 [US] Swamp (2)

// Spells
4 [TE] Lotus Petal
4 [MR] Chrome Mox
4 [MI] Lion's Eye Diamond
4 [R] Dark Ritual
4 [TO] Cabal Ritual
4 [FNM] Brainstorm
4 [6E] Mystical Tutor
4 [DIS] Infernal Tutor
4 [4E] Ad Nauseam
2 [SC] Tendrils of Agony
4 [7E] Duress
4 [FUT] Pact of Negation

I'm not sure if anyone else has posted anything close to this list yet but it has been goldfishing on turn 2 pretty often with either Duress or Pact backup. Turn 3 with either Duress or Pact happens very consistently. The average cmc of the deck is very low, with only 6 cards over 2cc and only 8 cards at 2cc. The deck has a considerable amount of 1cc cards as well, and I average 10+ cards per AdN.

Thoughts on this? Again, I'm no combo expert and opinions on this would be greatly appreciated. I posted this here cause I was unsure which combo thread to post it in (though it most closely resembles FT, I guess).

EDIT: Just 2-1'd U/G Madness... I know it's not really a good deck anymore, but he ran Tarmogoyf's and was running around 16 countermagic spells postboard. I went off through aggro + FoW, Daze, Spell Snare, Circular Logic, and (wtf?) Mana Leak. Duress/Pact seem pretty good at punching through most defenses, especially when the deck can drop multiple AdN bombs (if the first one gets countered). I see U/G/b Thresh being the decks hardest matchup.

[Dark_Cynic87]

I'm not sure if anyone else has posted anything close to this list yet but it has been goldfishing on turn 2 pretty often with either Duress or Pact backup.

Ummm....

ORIGINALLY POSTED BY ME:

0cc--25
4x Shield Sphere
4x PhyWalker

4x LED
3x Chrome Mox
4x Lotus Petal
1x Bayou
1x Taiga

4x Pact of Negation

1cc--12
4x Duress
4x Dark Ritual
4x Culling of the Weak

2cc--16
4x Land Grant
1x Cabal Ritual
3x Diabolic Intent
2x Burning Wish
4x Infernal Tutor
2x Night's Whisper

4cc--4
2x IGG
1x ToA
1x Belcher

5cc--3
3x AdN

Yes, I did just change it a bit as I remembered a decent card (read: night's whisper) that would ideally be better than the original draw-4's, but there is a list almost like the one you posted, but I feel that that many lands is just a bit worse than the 2-land versions, as now every card you hit will be closer to playable than a land.

It makes plays like Land Grant, Bayou, D. Rit, Night's Whisper with B floating to continue the chain, or leaving you the option of Duressing as well possible.

I would like to have ESGs, but 3cc is a downer for me. If I added them, I would also want to add Xx Manamorphose, and that could possibly lead to adding in RoF's/Desperate Rituals...IDK, is this going in the right direction? I think TES is doing something with it. I think they should, it would be pretty cool.

The thing I hate about TES is the reliance on Draw-4s and the Draw-7s they run. I like to KNOW what I'm getting. However, if my Draw 4/7 actually drew me 10 for only 1 more, I'd probably be okay with that...

I really would like some feedback on the list I posted if anyone is interested...

Pce,

--DC