Hey everyone,
I'm seeing some discussion here about this for post-KTK meta, but can we take a moment to talk specifics about sideboards? My next major event (aside from the GP trial) is GPNJ. What do people expect the meta at large to look like? Personally, I'm expecting UR Delver and Burn in droves, in addition to the usual mix of Miracles / Big 3 Delver strategies / S&S. Soft counters & wastelands seem to be on a downswing, so ANT, Reanimator, and other combo look more appealing. I'm currently looking at several flex spots in the board:
1 Karakas (maybe not necessary?)
1 Empty the Warrens
1 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Xantid Swarm
4 Abrupt Decay
3 Chain of Vapor
2 Flusterstorm
1 ?
I'm thinking either 2x Pyroclasm for the UR / Burn match ups, or 2x Surgical Extraction as a hedge against Reanimator. I'm also considering dropping an abrupt decay, but fear doing so for the Miracles match up. For reference, the main is the same as Kotter's from the 'Stormboarding' article, except -1 Preordain +1 Cabal Therapy.
Thoughts?
http://www.tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=15070&iddeck=112028
I cant' understand this list... IGG over Pif? Badlands and volcanic island when he is not running any red card? i sometimes feel that the most stupid ones always have luck...
I think this is either a mistake made at registration or while typing it for the webpage. It makes no sense to run Badlands + Volcanic Island but no PIF. It's interresting to find out if he either made T18 with an illegal deck due to listing the wrong card or not ;)Originally Posted by Surfinbird
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Anyways, playing badlands + volcanic when he's not playing pyroclasm, pyromancers aor any red card more than pif deson't make much sense...
With the sideboard you played at Ovino9, I would sideboard the way you proposed.I agree with all of you guys saying that these new UR Huang lists are a really favorable match-up for us. I was thinking about what to board in the match-up and I thought that not boarding at all would be a fairly good solution for me. But there are some cards we don't want, just like Top, and maybe Ad Nauseam. I don't think I'll add specific sideboard cards like Carpet of Flowers, but it's really good, and Empty the Warrens is too. From a standard board I would bring in 2 Flusterstorms for a Top and Ad Nauseam, and, if I have it, I would be bringing in also EtW.
Talking about how Treasure Cruise and UR affect the metagame: I saw a lot of non-red (or not completely) delver decks, like BUG, which is shifting from a more midrange plan to a full tempo plan, with stifles and cruise, and often no discard like Sawatarix said. Also I saw some 4-colours Delver, which is rising in popularity. Those decks have cruises, which means less room for denial spells and taxing counters. A lot of times they will have no Snare and a few Spell Pierces.
Also I don't think that Miracles is going away, because it's still the go-to deck for loads of people who saw the amazing performances it had just some weeks ago. Also because it has a good match-up against UR "Huang" I think. And also, I see Deathblade spreading a bit, but that's good news for me, since it's a pretty good match-up
However, I think you should change your sideboard.
(for reference: Your Ovino9 sideboard vs Miracles:
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Xantid Swarm
2 Sensei's Divining Top
Miracles - Drawing Abrupt Decays "Faster" than they draw Counterbalances
Although you've got 8 cards here, I actually don't think it's enough. At 3 Abrupt Decays + 3 SDT, you're not a clear favorite to knock counterbalance off the table. Remember, Miracles goal is to get two Counterbalances in play. They have more ways of fighting your Top than you have ways of fighting their Tops, and their Brainstorms / Ponders / Jaces will resolves while your cantrips will get sniped by a Counterbalance.
Remember, Miracles is the favorite game 1 (especially if they know you're playing ANT), so you need to have a good chance to win games 2-3 if you want to win the match. At 3 Abrupt Decays + 3 Tops, you will lose a significant number of games to "he drew 2 Enchantments before I drew Abrupt Decay." Also, consider that Miracles has access to other permanents that card good against us. (such as Rest in Peace). You will be unable to fight RIP with this sb.
In other words, your strategy of "knocking Counterbalance off the table" to win is slightly too slow at drawing Abrupt Decays to reliably let you beat Miracles. You need to do one of two strategies, which have been debated on the forum in the "Pithing Needle / Krosan Grip / Sensei's Divining Top" debates.
Slow down Counterbalance's draws
This means adding Pithing Needle.
Examine SloshTheDark's Ovino9 board.
Check Lemnear's arguments on page 65:
http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...m-Combo/page65
Increase your Counterbalance-answer density
This means adding Abrupt Decay / Krosan Grip. Check out Kai's board from Ovino9.
Conclusion About Your Board Vs Miracles
At minimum, I strongly advise that you +1 Krosan Grip.
I personally prefer the Pithing Needle plan, but if you stay on the Sensei's plan I'd suggest +2 Krosan Grip and use Kai's Strategy.
Despite all this, I think you may be better off with a Tendrils in your board.
Not only does it allow the powerful grinding station strategy, you can board it in against UR Delver. I would rather have a 2nd Tendrils over a the first Flusterstorm against post-Treasure Cruise delver.
This is because Gitaxian Probe's value has gone up tremendously for Delver, meaning it's now very common for us to encounter Delver lists w/ 4x GPs. This wasn't the case pre-Treasure Cruise, where the only Delver variant which regularly used 4x GP was Grixis Delver. (note: Tendrils was very good against Grixis Delver because many of those lists ran Thoughtseize. Between Thoughtseize, Gitaxian Probe, and Fetchlands, natural storm ToA is a very realistic strategy. You will have games where your opponent loses with interaction in hand which he couldn't play.).
Note to self: Do not bring engine combo deck you're horribly out of practice with to a session where you don't have much time. These misplays will haunt me ;__;
Garritano, I'm becoming addicted to your super-precise analyses
First of all, on saturday at Ovino9, after talking to Kai I really considered putting the grips in my board too. The thing that made me not do it was the "affinity" I had with my board after testing it for long time, and I really didn't know what to drop. One Top, and that was ok, but I really wanted my 3rd Chain. And also I was liking a lot the Flusterstorms. So I thought "I'll test it after this Ovino". Right now If I'll have a tournament tomorrow I think I would play my same board just -1 Top -1 Chain +2 Krosan Grip. Or would you drop the Flusterstorms instead? I really liked them, and basically right now I'm trying different things to realize what I really like in order to build my next sideboard.
Your point about Miracles is absolutely right, but I started realizing it only after the tournament. That's why tomorrow I would play with 2 Grips. Your suggestion about the second Tendrils in the board interested me a lot last time, and that's what I did in the time between Ovino9 and today, testing a 3 pyromancers 1 tendrils grinding board against Miracles
Right now I'm considering every possibility and trying everything seems interesting
"You must believe you are the best, and then make sure you are" Bill Shankly
Hi guys, I'm planning on playing at SCG Oakland this weekend since it's actually only a couple hours away. I believe I'll be playing this deck, but I need help with the sideboard. Suggestions/criticism welcome.
4 Polluted Delta
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Underground Sea
1 Tropical Island
1 Bayou
1 Volcanic Island
1 Island
1 Swamp
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Brainstorm
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Ponder
2 Preordain
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Duress
4 Infernal Tutor
1 Grim Tutor
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Past in Flames
1 Tendrils of Agony
Sideboard:
4 Abrupt Decay
2 Pithing Needle
2 Xantid Swarm
2 Massacre
1 Karakas
2 Chain of Vapor
1 Surgical Extraction
1 ? (Empty the Warrens/Tendrils of Agony/Xantid Swarm/Krosan Grip/Echoing Truth/Chain of Vapor/Karakas)
I'd vouch for a 3rd Xantid Swarm, against the Grisel-decks I want to be slamming them asap. you either land them and they buzz you to victory, or they're hymn to tourachs, and thats fine too
Today I played locals, 16 ppl so 4 rounds
LANDS 15
4 Polluted Delta
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Underground Sea
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Volcanic Island
1 Tropical Island
1 Bayou
SPELLS 45
4 Lotus Petal
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Infernal Tutor
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Duress
3 Cabal Therapy
1 Preordain
2 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Past in Flames
1 Tendrils of Agony
SIDEBOARD
2 Massacre
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Chain of Vapor
3 Xantid Swarm
1 Tendrills of agony
2 Carpet of Flowers
2 flusterstorm
(Other cards I thougt of 1 sensei and 2 Krossan)
SO ended wining (wiiiii) and making some cool moves.
BWG Confidants, stonforge, discard and some hatbears. 2-0
g1 he has 2 dark confidant, a drs, and a lilian. I have 2 lands and 2 senseis. With a cabal ritual, petal and led in hand. But he is at 10 thanks to confi with +2 from gaining life due to a discarted creature. I just end up drawing the infernal and tendrills him for 12.
g2 He seizes me, I massacre his ozze and drs and past in flames him to dead.
Slivers 2-1
g1 I ad nauseam him second turn to dead.
g2 HE drops a turn 2 spine and now I set up a tutor chaon with 2 dark ritual, a led and 4 cabal ritual. On my last turn I cast dark ritual he spell pierces and I hace only one land so I loose. He also had a medling on tendrills but i had 3 infernal in grave so I could wish for answer.
g3 He spines me again, but I chain of vapour it paying for his pierce and go off.
GWb zenith
g1 he has like a mull to 6 with stf, reliquary, 2 savanah, stp, wasteland. he plays savanh and passes. I play sensei, he wasteland (wich is good for me cause I had 2 mose lands) Then he end up casting SFM and I go off the turn after.
g2 He starts with zenith on driad, I have 2 massacre. So I therapy for zenith but he has stp, cannonist, thalia, and sylvan. He plays thalia. I play land and ponder, he plays cannonist. I massacre his 3 guys and go crazy with ad nauseam.
ur burn, 2-0 the second game is pretty cool
G1 I have a turn 2 ad neauseam with no protection but he also has no pressure so I wait. He drops pyrodude and I ponder shuffle find a duress. Cast ritual with a land up for daze. resolves, then cast duress and he forces, then I just go for it and he dosnt have second force.
g2 I have a hand of 2 decays and no bussines, He pyroblast my gitaxian turn 1 played for mana and still has no creatures. We play draw go and he drops cage. When I have 7 cards I decay the cage so that i dont have to discard. Then he finds a pyrodude wich I decay again. After that this is the scenario:
I draw brainstorm and after resolvign it that is what I have:
tropical
swamp
misty
led in play
and in hand:
3 cabal ritual
duress
pif
tendrills
2 dark ritual
2 gitaxian
I put cabal on top over pif cause he had anther cage and 16 lives
Cast gitaxian seeing 2 bolts, 2 fow, fluster and ponder. with him having 4 lands.
I draw cabal
Cast dark ritual (storm 3)
resolves
then fetch and cast another gytaxian drawing island
(storm 4)
then casting duress (storm 5 BB floating and and usea untapped)
he forces with ponder (storm 6)
Cast cabal ritual (storm 7)
he forces and I just go dark ritua, dark ritual tendrills.
BUT if he would have not forced we would come to this scenario.
I have 5 black, and usea untapped, a led in play. A island in hand ammong 2 cabal and a dark ritual.
I would have played the island and tendrills him for stom 8 with 1 black in pool
Worst case scenario he can bolt bolt me and cast flusterstorm for 11.
I let him resolve his storm and with all the copies con the stack:
B into ritual BBB
this into 2 cabal BBBBBBBBB(9)
crack led 12 mana + 2 lands makes 14.
So I could just pay for all his flusterstorms and still win
Propts to me
Thanks for reading^^
If you're intent on running 1 Surgical + 1 Karakas + 2 Xantid Swarm, I would strongly recommend against the 2nd Karakas.
At 2 Pithing Needle, 1 Karakas, 2 Xantid Swarm, you already have plenty of cards to bring in against Sneak and Show.
You already have a dedicated hate slot that is only good against Dredge / Reanimator in the form of Surgical Extraction.
If your deck was running Silence or if Gaddok Teeg was a more important part of the metagame I would be more inclined to run Karakas, but I certainly would not run 2.
I think if you maindeck Ad Nauseum, you should be running 1 sideboard Tendrils or Empty the Warrens.
Your list basically doesn't have a board against Delver, which I suspect will be a large part of your metagame. Although you should have a good UR Delver match, it's such a large % of the field you should seriously consider having 1-3 cards against it. ToA/Empty/Carpet of Flowers are the natural choices.
I agree with Wonderpreaux on the power of Xantid Swarm.
Were you planning on boarding Karakas in against Death and Taxes / Gaddok Teeg decks? If that wasn't your plan, I'd swap -1 Karakas +1 Xantid Swarm.
The Show and Tell decks frequently sideboard Leyline of Sanctity. In the event that you draw a non-Xantid Swarm sideboard card and they open with Leyline, you will lose. (Leyline protects their hand from Duress, which means they'll be able to prevent you from storming with Flusterstorm / FoW). However, if they Leyline and you play Xantid Swarm, they either FoW or race you to deal 20, at which point you are a big favorite.
With your maindeck and starting with your board, I'd modify it as follows:
+1 Tendrils of Agony / Empty the Warrens (for the flex slot)
+1 Xantid Swarm
-1 Karakas
Lastly, I'd consider making the flex slot Empty the Warrens and swapping it with the maindeck Ad Nauseum.
Thanks for the kind words!Garritano, I'm becoming addicted to your super-precise analyses
First of all, on saturday at Ovino9, after talking to Kai I really considered putting the grips in my board too. The thing that made me not do it was the "affinity" I had with my board after testing it for long time, and I really didn't know what to drop. One Top, and that was ok, but I really wanted my 3rd Chain. And also I was liking a lot the Flusterstorms. So I thought "I'll test it after this Ovino". Right now If I'll have a tournament tomorrow I think I would play my same board just -1 Top -1 Chain +2 Krosan Grip. Or would you drop the Flusterstorms instead? I really liked them, and basically right now I'm trying different things to realize what I really like in order to build my next sideboard.
Your point about Miracles is absolutely right, but I started realizing it only after the tournament
Right now I'm considering every possibility and trying everything seems interesting
Tendrils serves double duty, as it replaces Ad Nauseum against aggro decks that run burn and it comes in against Miracles.
I think you can shave 1 Chain of Vapor and use Abrupt Decay in its place. You already have 3x Xantid Swarm which you can use to beat Leyline of Sanctity.
(Leyline's function is protect the Show and Tell player from Duress, but you bypass that with Swarm which allows you to cast Ad Nauseum which finds the Chain of Vapor to hit the Leyline of Sanctity, clearing the way for Tendrils of Agony)
I'd consider swapping Dread of Night and Massacre.
Massacre does a good job against Thalia / Mother of Runes, and really only has trouble against Gaddok Teeg.
(Although Dread of Night doesn't kill Teeg, it does kill Mother of Runes, which clears the way for your Abrupt Decay to target Teeg).
However, Massacre also has utility against Esper after game 1, where you can use it to kill Meddling Mage, Stoneforge Mystic, and Deathrite Shaman. (of course, Dread of Night is unplayable against Esper).
If you had 3-4 slots against white, I'd probably recommend Dread of Night because 4x Dread of Night is better than 4x Massacre vs D&T, but at 2x I think Massacre is very good in its place.
I'd consider
(minor swap on your anti-white cards)
-2 Dread of Night
+2 Massacre
-1 Chain of Vapor
+1 Krosan Grip
I really really want to fit Empty the Warrens / Tendrils of Agony in your sideboard.
At this point, we're at impasse as we run out of cards.
You either drop to 2 Xantid Swarms or 1x Flusterstorm, and both are kind of ugly.
I think I'd rather run 1 Flusterstorm 1 ToA/EtW over 2 Flusterstorm, despite how awkward looking it is to have a singleton Flusterstorm in the sideboard. You're going to run into a ton of UR Delver, where you'll want to board -1 Ad Nauseum +1 ToA. The question is whether you'll willing to lose some match win % against the mirror in order to "upgrade" Flusterstorm into Tendrils against UR Delver. I am personally okay with this.
Lastly, make sure you do more consideration of Pithing Needle. It really is an awesome card, but would require you to play a new strategy vs Miracles.
This was my deck. It was copied incorrectly. I played (and registered) 1 Past in Flames, 1 Ad Nauseum, 1 Grim Tutor. I have no idea how a Grim Tutor became a secod Ad Nauseum and a Past in Flames became an Ill-Gotten Gains.
Coverage guys playing chinese whispers... I was kind of hyped at least 2 AN would be true
1st time playing ANT, after i've been playing 2 years straight w/ tes.
won a 11-men, and a signed savannah =)
had to play w/ BG shockland, cause i dont have a bayou, and played -1 misty rainforest +1 volcanic island.
i changed you sideboard, using:
-2 carpet of flowers
+2 abrupt decay
-1 massacre (aint got 2 =/)
+2 krosan grip
-1 xantid swarm
(thks for the list, togores =) )
MUs:
natural order junk:
game1: natural tendrils
game2: AN turn 3 got me there
UR delver:
tight games here too. got Pif kill game 1, and natural tendrils on game 3.
UR delver (again):
games were very tight. lost game 2 due to a 2-fow, 3 daze keep by my opponent
Burn:
got burned by 1 stupid misplay, because i stacked wrong for an AN on game 2. but didnt need to win to move on , so that was cool =)
top 4
UR delver (2-0)
they were easier. went for the 2-tendrils plans. worked like a charm, while i was at 4, recovering back to 16 on both games.
Burn: (2-1)
got burned by eidolon game 1, so i got a t2 kill on game 2, and got a eidolon back to the hand through a chain of vapors.
props:
- this deck is way more consistent than TES. it`s better against UR delver, i guess i'll stick to it for a while
- 2 tendrils plan got me there. thrice!
- didn`t face miracles, that i wanted to check out the match w/ this sideboard ^^''
- SDT is really awesome!!!
flops:
- misstacking SDT was way embarrasing....
- got hurried due to miscounts on the storm count.. =/
- got criticized by the sllow plays, but i was 2 month away from storm decks =/
anyways, this thread (specially page 69) was very important for me to sleeve the deck. so thanks a lot, guys! o/
dont remember very well the matchs, cause i was very nervous.. sry... =/
Ur welcome
And congrats on your finish!
Just one question.
I already play 3 decay. U changed 2 carpets for 2 decay making the decay count to 5?
Dosnt seems right >.<
Something im trying to understand, why have a 2nd tendrils in sideboard? Also looking for some critique on my sideboard currently playing in a meta filled with a couple miracle players and tempo decks.
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Chain of Vapor
2 Xantid Swarm
2 Massacre
2 Pithing Needle
1 Empty the Warrens
1 Karakas
1 Echoing Truth
I don't like the Echoing Truth, the Karakas is a personal choice but I'm not the biggest fan and the 3rd Chain might be too much. I like all the other cards.
If those tempo decks include RUG and UWR (or other stifle/waste/daze decks) I suggest playing 2 Carpet of Flowers over the Echoing Truth and either the Karakas or the 3rd Chain.
37th GP Ams'11 | 80th GP Stras '13 | 5th BoM Paris '13 | 12th GP Lille '15
The additional tendrils is usually there for the Miracles matchup where their hard counters doesn't do much against the hard-casted Tendrils.
Also there for the bolts matchups
Burn
Parriot
Rug delver
Ur delver
Also for miracles and blade control decks.
U can assemble the win thru lots of hard counters by putting u in a a hand of 8 cards and make them counter or chain cantrips to end in a lethal storm.
Also vs delver decks it gets changed for the ad nauseam. There you can nake like brainstorm, led led petal. Gain 10 lives and go on. Then win with the other tendrillss.
Also you can infernal for one tendrills with the other.
So u can go. Ritual ritual petal therapy. Tendrilss tendrills. And win.
Here you can see how good the second tendrills is. I showboated a bit but there u can get the idea.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6yeF6n_F-0w
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