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

[Bryant Cook]

Ok, since I picked up a good chuck of the deck for a reasonable price some days ago I got a little interested in this. I'm still getting used to the deck so I wanted to ask some more experienced players for advice:

On the play versus an unknown opponent, you have a turn 1 Ad Nauseam in hand:
-Do you go for it?
-Do you go for it if you have Duress but have to delay AN to turn two if you play it?
-Do you go for it if you have Ponder/Brainstorm but have to delay AN to turn two if you play it?

Wipe away in the board:
I'm not sure about this one, it is flexible, but it hardly seems like the perfect answear. A CoV or Hurkyls seems better.


tnx in advance

Yes.
No. Wait.
Go for it.

It's there for Counterbalance/randomness. Where those cards don't resolve through counterbalance.

[JonBarber]

I went 2-2 with TES today at my local. I beat the mirror game 1, I lost to survival top decking mindbreak trap, I lost to U/R control, and I beat dragon stompy. I'll be playing it again tomorrow. Land base felt kinda shaky, but idk if its worth adjusting. 4 of Chrome Mox is pretty ballin' at times.

[loop]

I brought TES to a legacy fnm yesterday and went 3-1, my loss being to UW merfolk packing Canonists and Meddling Mages.

I didn't know he had hatebears so I sided 3 REB's for... 1 IT, 1 mox, 1 IGG,.
I duress'ed him and was about to go off turn3 chant-protected but he dropped Canonist, and I couldn't find an answer in time.

So now I'm trying to come up with a decent boarding plan in this kind of situation. I don't want to dillute the deck too much and REB's do seem sexy, but then again I dont want to lose to Canonist either so bringing anti-hate seems mandatory, can't rely on BWish alone. So how would you people sideboard?

My SB for the event was

1 Tendrils
1 EtW
1 IGG
1 D. Returns
1 Pyroclasm
2 Shattering Spree
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Echoing Truth
1 Wipe Away
2 Deathmark
3 REB

[Bryant Cook]

I brought TES to a legacy fnm yesterday and went 3-1, my loss being to UW merfolk packing Canonists and Meddling Mages.

I didn't know he had hatebears so I sided 3 REB's for... 1 IT, 1 mox, 1 IGG,.
I duress'ed him and was about to go off turn3 chant-protected but he dropped Canonist, and I couldn't find an answer in time.

So now I'm trying to come up with a decent boarding plan in this kind of situation. I don't want to dillute the deck too much and REB's do seem sexy, but then again I dont want to lose to Canonist either so bringing anti-hate seems mandatory, can't rely on BWish alone. So how would you people sideboard?

My SB for the event was

1 Tendrils
1 EtW
1 IGG
1 D. Returns
1 Pyroclasm
2 Shattering Spree
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Echoing Truth
1 Wipe Away
2 Deathmark
3 REB

1.) Don't play Ill-Gotten Gains maindeck.
2.) Grapeshot > Pyroclasm.
3.) Pyroblast > REB. You can Pyroblast a land in order to get Hellbent.
4.) I usually take out -1 Infernal, -1 Mox, -1 Ponder, if I need to take out more...-1 Brainstorm, -1 Empty

[Vacrix]

2.) Grapeshot > Pyroclasm.

I brought TES to a legacy fnm yesterday and went 3-1, my loss being to UW merfolk packing Canonists and Meddling Mages.

Might Pyroclasm be a better call given the specific bears he is facing? Cannonist makes Grapeshot pretty bad, especially if you have to deal with multiple bears.

[magicplaya10]

Might Pyroclasm be a better call given the specific bears he is facing? Cannonist makes Grapeshot pretty bad, especially if you have to deal with multiple bears.

That's where Deathmark comes in, if you're running it. Cannonist, being an artifact, also dies to your Shat Sprees and Grips.

[jin]

3.) Pyroblast > REB. You can Pyroblast a land in order to get Hellbent.

Sorry, am I missing something.. could you please elaborate on this? How can you pyroblast a land?


EDIT: n/m, I googled it.. that's interesting..

[loop]

1.) Don't play Ill-Gotten Gains maindeck.
2.) Grapeshot > Pyroclasm.
3.) Pyroblast > REB. You can Pyroblast a land in order to get Hellbent.
4.) I usually take out -1 Infernal, -1 Mox, -1 Ponder, if I need to take out more...-1 Brainstorm, -1 Empty

Thanks for the fast reply. About that:
1) Yeah, I've never been a big fan of EtW but I guess it does make sense, I will try it.

2) I've rarely ever done fancy tricks with Grapeshot, at least not often enough that I felt it warranted a slot in my wishboard, while Clasm was a surefire way to deal with several hatebears (I mean it will get me out of tough situations like Canonist + Teeg, etc). Is that less relevant than the possible grapeshot plays somehow? I've read about some plays you've pulled off in your reports, but overall it seems pretty rare. I'm interested in hearing more about this tho.

3) Yeah, I actually play Pyroblasts, just typed in REB not really thinking about it since it's functionally identical and that wasnt the point I was asking advice about. Totally agree tho.

4) Ok, thanks. So let's say you played against a similar build, Merfolks with Canonist/MM, would a SB plan like -1 IT -1 Mox -1 Ponder -1 BS -1 EtW +3 Pyro +2 Deathmark seem ok to you? Lots of answers to MM but I'd still feel a bit unprepared for Canonist which is the real issue here, counters and MM arent that scary.

[NQN]

Srsly, how often will you face Merrows with Mmage AND Canonist? Even one is a rare occasion. I´d not care too much about that.
I´m back to TES too, loved the deck back then when ANT wasnt printed and I´m somehow happy and I can pick it up without hating myself for not playing ANT anymore :)

[loop]

Srsly, how often will you face Merrows with Mmage AND Canonist? Even one is a rare occasion. I´d not care too much about that.
I´m back to TES too, loved the deck back then when ANT wasnt printed and I´m somehow happy and I can pick it up without hating myself for not playing ANT anymore :)

Well it's an example : it applies to basically any opponent bringing heavy hate with countermagic backup, and I do feel it's important. I generally try to answer everything but I fear I might go a little overboard and dillute the deck too much, hence my asking.

[Bryant Cook]

2) I've rarely ever done fancy tricks with Grapeshot, at least not often enough that I felt it warranted a slot in my wishboard, while Clasm was a surefire way to deal with several hatebears (I mean it will get me out of tough situations like Canonist + Teeg, etc). Is that less relevant than the possible grapeshot plays somehow? I've read about some plays you've pulled off in your reports, but overall it seems pretty rare. I'm interested in hearing more about this tho.

4) Ok, thanks. So let's say you played against a similar build, Merfolks with Canonist/MM, would a SB plan like -1 IT -1 Mox -1 Ponder -1 BS -1 EtW +3 Pyro +2 Deathmark seem ok to you? Lots of answers to MM but I'd still feel a bit unprepared for Canonist which is the real issue here, counters and MM arent that scary.

I do things other than show-boat with Grapeshot.

A few weeks ago I Burning Wish -> Grapeshotted for 6-7, then casted the Tendrils in my hand versus blue. Where nothing else would've helped me out of my wishboard at that time. But grapeshot won the game.

Grapeshot kills a hate bear and deals the remaining damage to your opponent which is huge, in my top 4 versus Jesse Hatfield with Zoo I was unfortunately one damage short of killing Teeg + Him, Infernal, Tendrils. Too bad he never fetched that game...

There are some other examples in reports too.

...and it's fucking awesome to kill people with Grapeshot.

[Jim Higginbottom]

Yea no one wants to die to grapeshot, hence why I scooped to you at the last Vestal tournament.

[Jeff Kruchkow]

Well it's an example : it applies to basically any opponent bringing heavy hate with countermagic backup, and I do feel it's important. I generally try to answer everything but I fear I might go a little overboard and dillute the deck too much, hence my asking.

EtW seems good in that matchup if you can get it early since merfolk has like no mass removal save ET

[Dark Ritual]

Yeah going grapeshot then ToA'ing for lethal is awesome since you can theoretically do it without drawing any cards or using any engines if you can muster enough mana with your hand something along the lines of this sample hand:

Wish, tendrils, dark ritual x2, LED, petal, rite of flame.

And killing someone with grapeshot is so hilarious like Bryant says its especially hilarious when they have MM on ToA only to get grapeshotted for 20 to the head.

And merfolk with mage and canonists would be a rare occurrence unless your entire meta was combo decks and it required that many slots to beat combo. That many hatebears would be a nightmare though unless you ran pyroclasm in place of grapeshot which is IMO suboptimal.

[GreenOne]

Is this going to have an impact?
It's probably better suited for decks with more fetchlands/duals, since they're usually running Krosan Grips, Swarm or carpet of flowers.

Obviously this is not going to work against opposing Chants, Stifles, Lightning Bolts or whatever. Just counters.

[Jonathan Alexander]

Basically strictly worse than Chants. You can't chantwalk them (which means you can be hit by discard), it still doesn't stop counterbalance, you are going to run into chant and there are a lot of other things, this thing does worse than Chant or discard.

[Bryant Cook]

If it said by spells or abilities I'd be all over it. Sadly, it doesn't.

[Lorgalis]

Did you see the new white Leyline? I don't know if it will see play, but...it screws Tendrils pretty hard. Not EtW though.

[tyleredw]

Did you see the new white Leyline? I don't know if it will see play, but...it screws Tendrils pretty hard. Not EtW though.

Seriously? I would hope people think that hoses tendrils and sideboard that. It's no more difficult to get rid of than a True Believer, provides 0 pressure, and since it's a Leyline, they'd have to mulligan to find it in order to make it relevant, so there would be the possibility of them starting with even less relevant cards. Sure, go ahead and board those.

[JonBarber]

Seriously? I would hope people think that hoses tendrils and sideboard that. It's no more difficult to get rid of than a True Believer, provides 0 pressure, and since it's a Leyline, they'd have to mulligan to find it in order to make it relevant, so there would be the possibility of them starting with even less relevant cards. Sure, go ahead and board those.

Haha seriouslyy. They are playing white, I'm already boarding in bounce for their canonist. Now I have to bounce their shitty enchantment AFTER I ad nauseam? I'm so screwed!