[Deck] ANT (Ad Nauseam Tendrils)

[Chikenbok]

This is the list I've been testing. Probes have been very good to me in the Landstill and Merfolk matchups. The information you gain is worth the price of two life IMO. In most of my games I found that I would achieve threshold much faster when I was able to cast Probe on turn 1. Also you are able to make a better decisions on what to ship with the cantrip spells, such as holding onto or shipping the protection.

-4 Ponder
-4 Brainstorm
-3 Preordain
-3 Gitaxian Probe
-4 Durress
-3 Thoughtseize
-4 Dark Ritual
-4 Cabal Ritual
-4 Infernal Tutor
-1 Ad Nauseum
-1 Ill-Gotten Gains
-1 Tendrils of Agony

-4 Lions Eye Diamond
-4 Lotus Petal
-2 Chrome Mox

I'm running 16 land right now in the TNT build. I tried running the list from the GP with 14 land and found myself mulling too often just because of land tight hands rather than anything else. I'm not sure how 14 lands got that far, but cheers if you can draw hot.

[Chikenbok]

4 Dark Ritual
4 Rite of Flame
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
4 Burning Wish
3 Infernal Tutor
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
1 Ill-Gotten Gains
1 Ad Nauseam
4 Duress
3 Thoughtseize
3 Orim's Chant
1 Tendrils of Agony
2 Chrome Mox
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
4 Gemstone Mine
2 City of Brass
2 Scalding Tarn
1 Bloodstained Mire
2 Polluted Delta
SB: 1 Ill-Gotten Gains
SB: 1 Tendrils of Agony
SB: 1 Thoughtseize
SB: 1 Meltdown
SB: 4 Xantid Swarm
SB: 2 Echoing Truth
SB: 1 Wipe Away
SB: 1 Grapeshot
SB: 1 Hurkyl's Recall
SB: 1 Infernal Tutor
SB: 1 Pyroclasm


This is I guess what people nowadays are calling a TNT list. I cut the preordains and changed around the landbase to add in 3 chants into the mainboard. The rainbow land also allows for swarm to come back into the board over confidant which I've been very unimpressed with. I've added in 2 chrome mox back into Lord's TNT build for a higher success rate post AdN. I've also opted to keep 4 duress and 3 seize main along with the 3 chants as the meta has now shifted over to infinite_counterspell_jace.dec so 10 protection spells seems like it might make the post turn 3 game quite a bit more playable.

Any input would be much appreciated.

[mort-]

No. That is a TES list :)
http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...-Storm/page105

[Diprivan]

You are definitely wrong, much more fun to kill people when they are defenseless.

I'm really surprised you think this, as I acknowledge you as a good combo player. Every idiot can take this deck and win against aggro. Why prefer matchups that don't reward player skill?

On 10 protection spells main: I don't think this is such a good idea, you'll want to shoot yourself everytime you open with a hand of 3 protection spells only to get raced by steppe lynx or lackey.

[median]

I'm really surprised you think this, as I acknowledge you as a good combo player. Every idiot can take this deck and win against aggro. Why prefer matchups that don't reward player skill?

On 10 protection spells main: I don't think this is such a good idea, you'll want to shoot yourself everytime you open with a hand of 3 protection spells only to get raced by steppe lynx or lackey.

thoughtseize and chant can buy you turns against steppe lynx and lackey

[lorddotm]

We are not calling this TNT

Man, this list literally took all the bad parts about ANT and smashed them with all the bad parts about TES. The cantrips make Cabal playable, and the basics make ANT and TNT viable. Adding in slower rituals and a worse mana base is a really bad idea. Also, you will never, in your life, need more than 8 protection main. Ever.

I'm really surprised you think this, as I acknowledge you as a good combo player. Every idiot can take this deck and win against aggro. Why prefer matchups that don't reward player skill?

Why can't blue players be defenseless? After I turn sideways with a green dude, they are pretty defenseless.

I don't really think long drawn out games are that fun, whatever deck I'm playing. They don't really reward play skill too much, they just reward top decking. Bryant is a much better top decker than I am. TNT was designed to play a longer game, so there isn't much skill involved with that, you just wait until you can Seize them a few times with a Tendrils in hand. Even idiots can do that. What I like are turns 1-3 against a blue deck with TES. Knowing when to go off is the single most important thing against blue, so being able to read people for Force is important. If you let the game go too long, they get a clock down or they amass countermagic, if you go off too soon though, you just get Forced.

That being said, I always have to play against Junk in my clutch rounds, and get Hymned/Seized/Mull to oblivion. Literally, every single game that mattered against Junk, my opponent went Seize, Hymn. Without fail.

[lorddotm]

TNT is the next evolution of ANT. Noticing that the best part about ANT was that you got to play with Cabal Ritual and basics, a few of us set about to solve the dilemma of Grim Tutor. Not only is it unreasonably priced, the card itself is terrible. The initial mana cost of 1BB, along with the 3 life, made it extremely difficult to cast Ad Nauseam after using Grim Tutor, not to mention if Grim Tutor was the only tutor you flipped, it was smacking you for 6. Another problem that I noticed post Ad Nauseam when I cut the Grim Tutors was that LED or Tendrils had to be flipped over to win the game, and while this usually was not an issue, at lower life, it made Ad Nauseam completely worthless. This made me give up on playing ANT and kept me playing TES.

Here is where Iñaki Puigdollers saved the day by suggesting Burning Wish:

I
Lands 16

4x Polluted Delta
2x Bloodstained Mire
1x Misty Rainforest
1x Flooded Strand
1x Scalding tarn
2x Island
2x Swamp
2x Underground Sea
1x Volcanic Island

Cantrips 12

4x Brainstorm
4x Ponder
4x Preordain

Acceleration 16

4x Dark Ritual
4x Cabal Ritual
4x Lotus Petal
4x Lion's Eye Diamond

Protection 7

4x Duress
3x Thoughtseize

Bussiness 9

3x Infernal Tutor
3x Burning Wish
1x Ad Nauseam
1x Ill-Gotten Gains
1x Tendrils of Agony

Sideboard 15

4x Doomsday
1x Emrakul
1x Shelldock Isle
1x Wipe Away (or the 2nd Ad Nauseam)

2x Chain of Vapor
1x Hurkyl's Recall

1x Tendrils of Agony
1x Infernal Tutor
1x Deathmark
1x Meltdown
1x Thoughtseize

This was pre-Mental Misstep, so I ignored it since TES had been treating me well. However, once Mental Misstep had been previewed, I looked for alternative strategies to fight what I thought (and was proven correct) would be a metagame filled with slower blue decks. My thoughts returned to ANT, and I remembered the list that Iñaki posted. I disagreed with some of the choices after my usual 5 goldfishes (I goldfish every Storm list 5 times before I try any changes), and noticed that almost every time I had Preordain, I was digging for business spells, so I made that switch. One thing I was really liking though, was the 4 basics along with only 1 red source. I believe that adding another red land is a huge mistake that a lot of people are doing, with proper fetching, it is never an issue. My tip is this, whenever you fetch for a dual, expect it to be gone. Not to mention you should never be wasting fetches, but that is a whole other rant.

One thing that will seem strange to a lot of people is the Infernal in the board (if you read Bryant's primer, you will notice how he argues against this). In a faster Storm list like TES, the Infernal in the side is horribly wrong for game 1, however, once you decide to try to make turn 3 your kill turn, Burning Wish can be cast on turn 2 to set up for the turn 3 kill if you do not have the mana to cast it and grab the Infernal. Not to mention, this makes Burning Wish into an actual tutor, and not just a card that grabs Tendrils and fringe answers.

The sideboard needed a complete overhaul. I am personally not a fan of Doomsday, I have always found it to be overly complicated and never worth the trouble. With 6 slots freed up, I added in 2 more Tendrils, as siding them in is your best plan against the Uw Standstill decks seeing as how they have a huge problem beating the ol' 8 against 7 with Tendrils in your hand. I also cannot imagine not playing an Ill-Gotten Gains in the board, so I threw one in. The last three slots I have been debating a lot recently, but I am currently running 3 Dark Confidants. Traditionally, I have hated Bobs in Storm as they just dilute your normal game plan of Ad Nauseam, but with extra Tendrils, he seems like an extremely reasonable choice against the BUG decks. Also, three Bobs change with three Preordains very nicely. My current 75 looks like this:


4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
4 Burning Wish
3 Infernal Tutor
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
3 Preordain
4 Duress
3 Thoughtseize
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Ill-gotten Gains
1 Tendrils of Agony
4 Polluted Delta
2 Scalding Tarn
1 Misty Rainforest
2 Bloodstained Mire
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
2 Island
2 Swamp

1 Thoughtseize
2 Echoing Truth
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Wipe Away
3 Tendrils of Agony
1 Ill-gotten Gains
1 Infernal Tutor
1 Meltdown
1 Pyroclasm
3 Dark Confidant


One thing that people constantly ask me about is the lack of both Empty the Warrens and Diminishing Returns. Both are excellent in TES since TES has no problem producing RR for Burning Wish into Empty, and it has a lower land counter to go along with Chrome Mox to make Diminishing Returns more consistent.

One thing that always seems to stump people when playing combo is sideboarding, so here is a cheat sheet for my TNT list:


Against Zoo, Goblins, and other non blue Aggro decks:

-2 Duress
-(1/2) Seize

+2 Echoing Truth
(+1 Recall)
(+1 Wipe Away)

Only bring in the last two when there are going to be a lot of hate cards, or when you know Recall gets all their hate. I often don't bring in the Wipe Away.

Against aggro blue decks (Merfolk, Bant).

-1 Preordain
+1 Thoughtseize

You want more protection to fight against them, but you don't really want Bobs since they are dead off of Ad Nauseam, and can be a liability against the quick clocks these types of decks can pull off.

Against Slow (Standstill, Visions, etc.) Control

-1 AdN
-1 IGG
-3 Preordain
-1 Ponder

+2 Tendrils of Agony
+1 Thoughtseize
+3 Dark Confidant

The idea is to wait until you have 8 cards in hand, including a Tendrils, along with some Rituals and a couple of Duresses, then just empty your hand. This plan becomes considerably worse if they start playing Flusterstorm.

Against Hymn decks

-3 Preordain

+3 Dark Confidant

You don't want to overload on Duress effects, even against BUG, since they are really bad when you don't have a hand. Bobs help fight the good fight against Hymns. This match up is considerably easier if they do not have countermagic.

Feel free to just post any further questions, and I will constantly be updating this for you all.

[Diprivan]

thoughtseize and chant can buy you turns against steppe lynx and lackey

Ofc they can, but you'll lose games against aggro with too many protection spells clogging up your hand.

[Arew]

Thanks for the primer!

I really appreciate the sideboarding strategies, I normally just start shaving numbers like TES does when I sideboard with this deck. I have to say one of the things that made me fall in love with this build and Confidant in Storm in general, is against slow blue decks, watching them squirm against your Confidant is awesome The other thing is the fact that the mana base gives me infinitely less headaches that TES' did.

[Admiral_Arzar]

I tested this against one of the new BUW Esper Control lists (FOW, Misstep, Snare, Mystic, Bob, Mox Diamond, Jace, etc.) the other day for a couple of hours. While I won the first several games, once my opponent started to figure out where to throw his counters, it became rather bad for me, and I would have liked additional protection. The lack of chants becomes a huge issue against Spell Snare because that card destroys this deck, and Duress effects usually either get Misstepped or need to take FOW. IGG shutting off against heavy blue is also an issue, especially when your opponent plays T1 Mystic into T2 Batterskull and clocks you while gaining a ton of life.

The manabase was extremely consistent, which was excellent. I almost wanted SDT though, as it's slow enough for that card to actually matter (although cutting actual cantrips makes Cabal Ritual worse). I ran Empty in the board but never used it - boarding in a bunch of Tendrils worked occasionally (although I forgot to run Bobs, which might have improved things).

[Namida]

Could you elaborate a little further on the Ill-Gotten Gains in the sideboard? I understand a regular Ill-Gotten Gains loop with Infernal Tutor, but Burning Wish is exiled after you cast it. Is it specifically just for situations where Tendrils/Infernal Tutor just happens to be in the graveyard for a loop, or am I missing something?

[lambert101]

Trying out different builds of Ant:
4 Lotus Petal
4 Brainstorm
4 Infernal Tutor
3 Chrome Mox
2 Personal Tutor
4 Dark Ritual
4 Ponder
4 Duress
1 Ad Nauseam
3 Misty Rainforest
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
1 Tendrils of Agony
4 Polluted Delta
2 Swamp
3 Island
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Gitaxian Probe
3 Thoughtseize
2 Underground Sea

[practical joke]

So TNT = ANT with red splash (Burning Wish) or TES with duals (-Chants -ETW -DR)

It's a hybrid.

It uses the consistency of ANT's manabase and uses the versatility from TES's burning wish.
The ideas for a hybrid have roaming for a long time now and now it has finally made it's appearance.

I actually don't like the above decklist.

Because your ad nauseams are so strong now when you place ill-gotten gains and tendrils in SB, relying on your burning wish only to reach it and I think it can be played with less lands as well.

I'm not yet completely sold on the mainboard iggy it's been awkward for me since there's way to much blue and against aggro you should be able to either resolve a fast ad nauseam or get enough mana to get the combo out of your SB and finish it from there.

CB is near dead so doomsday plan is very optional:

I have MD differences atm (will change though)

-swamp
-fetch
- sea
- iggy
- tendrils

+ ad nauseam
+ infernal tutor
+ badlands
+2 chrome mox

SB currently:

pulverize
thoughtseize
4x xantid
tropical
etw
tendrills
iggy
pyroclasm (replaced deathmark)
diminishing returns.

SB and mainboard have room for improvement or small adaptions like first post list. It's not perfect, since the chains might be outdated..then again, they are really nice to play with in comparison to wipe away or rebuild.

[Koby]

Liam - Nice primer. It's great that you spelled everything out, especially sideboard strategies - as this was the one part that has always baffled me. It's been a while since I've played storm (2006? shit it's been that long?), and this list looks like one that I would like to pick up again.

Has any discussion taken place about a transformational sideboard into non-storm combo element? Would Hymn to Tourach be viable against control decks? Is it even necessary? Just some ideas to generate discussion.

[Admiral_Arzar]

Has any discussion taken place about a transformational sideboard into non-storm combo element? Would Hymn to Tourach be viable against control decks? Is it even necessary? Just some ideas to generate discussion.

I've actually been thinking about running Hymn, at the very least as a wish target (although my "this is bad" senses keep tingling). If Mind Twist is ever unbanned, I would run that in the board for sure as an additional protection spell.

[Koby]

I've actually been thinking about running Hymn, at the very least as a wish target (although my "this is bad" senses keep tingling). If Mind Twist is ever unbanned, I would run that in the board for sure as an additional protection spell.

Back when I used to play nearly mono-black Storm (budget, on MTGO) I would board into Hymn to Tourach, Dark Confidant, and other black control cards to be able to play the disruption + draw 8 cards - cast mini tendrils plan.

This deck has much stronger power level and much better mana acceleration, where this wouldn't be an issue. It is still an interesting option.

Mind Shatter is also available, as a slightly weaker Twist.

[4eak]

ANT + "Burning Wish ANT" (TNT) merged. Burning Wish doesn't make a new deck. Additionally, if you look throughout the thread, Burning Wish has been discussed and used before.

-4eak

[lorddotm]

ANT + "Burning Wish ANT" (TNT) merged. Burning Wish doesn't make a new deck. Additionally, if you look throughout the thread, Burning Wish has been discussed and used before.

-4eak

The reason was that a lot of people have been PMing me about my list, even though it can be found in the thread, it gets buried after a while.

Koby, I have tried Hymn, but in Storm, the only cards you care about are counters, and if you hit two random cards, they can still stop you.

About Spell Snare, yes it is an issue, but right now there is no reason to add in the extra colour and throw away the advantage of your deck choice (the white splash would just lead to turning this into TES, a weaker mana base cannot be expected to survive until turn 3 against Merfolk, so running more speed makes sense, good luck making a 4 colour mana base that can support the awesome amount of basics I do). My suggestion for that is to dig for extra tutors to go and find discard (Burning Wish into Seize, Infernal into more Duress, etc.)

@practical joke
How are you planning on getting 2 mountains against a deck like Stax when your only mountains are nonbasic. That seems like a flawed strategy. The IGGy has been insane for me, this deck can easily get enough mana to get back Duresses off of Iggy.

[GoldenCid]

Hi everybody! Looking for list i found the following:

// Lands
3 [ZEN] Scalding Tarn
2 [U] Underground Sea
4 [ON] Polluted Delta
2 [ZEN] Island (4a)
2 [ON] Bloodstained Mire
2 [ZEN] Swamp (2a)

// Spells
4 [DIS] Infernal Tutor
1 [SC] Tendrils of Agony
4 [TE] Lotus Petal
4 [MM] Dark Ritual
1 [ALA] Ad Nauseam
4 [FNM] Brainstorm
4 [MI] Lion's Eye Diamond
2 [MR] Chrome Mox
4 [M10] Duress
4 [LRW] Ponder
1 [US] Ill-Gotten Gains
2 [LRW] Thoughtseize
1 [ON] Chain of Vapor
3 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top
2 [AL] Lim-Dul's Vault
4 [TO] Cabal Ritual

// Sideboard
SB: 1 [ALA] Ad Nauseam
SB: 1 [LRW] Thoughtseize
SB: 1 [FUT] Slaughter Pact
SB: 1 [ZEN] Sadistic Sacrament
SB: 1 [DS] Echoing Truth
SB: 2 [ON] Chain of Vapor
SB: 1 [TE] Meditate
SB: 1 [10E] Hurkyl's Recall
SB: 4 [WL] Doomsday
SB: 1 [ROE] Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
SB: 1 [LRW] Shelldock Isle

It has the doomsday combo switch. Has anybody tested it?? Did it work? When??

[lavafrogg]

The doomsday plan was to beat counterbalance decks(without wasteland) but now the debate is whether doomsday is a good enough storm enabler to be a burning wish target and if the doomsday plan g2 is worth the amount of slots it requires.

I feel that the shelldock plan is not good enough right now but that doomsdays should be kept in the sideboard to help against discard decks where a resolved doomsday, with mana on the board, can win you the game. It also helps up your "bomb" number in attrition match-ups.