I'm curious how many of us actually played serum visions?
I never liked it in faeries, and while I did see some people play it, I don't remember it being super widespread.
While opt is potentially better, I don't think its good enough to convert most of the non-serum crowd.
I've played serum visions for a while now and am definitely switching to opt. Instant speed is super relevant and leaving up interaction is always important to me.
For those on AV, I think it's going to be a difficult option with switching. Wait and see what takes over, this could be really strong but there's also a possibility that it could flop quickly and be underpowered.
Wooooow! That sideboard tech is AMAZING!
Congrats on all the hard work you came up with something very useful and comprehensive. I would have recommended to do it in an spreadsheet format to be able to sort the best cards for a given match-up. But that's already great.
Looking through it I just realized that, in my opinion, you give way too much credit to pithing needle in the ad nauseam match-up. Probably more than 90% of the ad nauseam field plays a copy of laboratory maniac in the main. So while pithing needle is not a total blank, it has a very limited use.
Cheers!
PS: Let me know if you are interested in a spreadsheet format for your sideboard guide, I could lend you a hand and prepare you a template.
When we play against the discard heavy decks (jund, junk, grixis, BW tokens etc), we sideboard in the 4 Leylines.
How aggressively do you mull for them? Does it affect your mull knowing the white discard decks also board in stony and the red ones might have slaughter games? How about the decks with Liliana?
I am not talking about mulling a ***** 7 with no leyline. That is automatic. I am talking mulling great 7s and 6s without Leyline trying to get 5 with a leyline.
Have discussed this with a local and fellow Ad Nauseam player and we defo do not agree.
I would pretty much almost mull a 7 with no leyline against BGx. It is irrelevant how good your hand is since post-board they have probably around 10 targetted discard (thoughtseize/inqui/brutality). 7-cards Hands I would consider keeping is no combo pieces with cantrips and scry lands, as they won't be able to discard your combo pieces, but if you managed to maintain all the combo pieces in the library, then your chance of recovering are OK.
It is important to see how back breaking leyline of sanctity is for Jund (less for abzan as they run white enchantment hates, but still).
This is not justified about SSG ban, but we don't have to talk about it in this thread (there's a thread for that). However, if that would ever happen, the only way out I see is to combo out at 7 mana with Memnite and Infernal Plunge and we'd lose the instant speed win. Having more Gemstone Caverns also would be a necessary thing to ensure fast starts. But up to that point, I'd have to find something to make mana in order to keep the deck at instant speed.
Cheers!
If they ban SSG I think the deck what we all play here would be simply dead competitively. You could still play it with the Memnite/Infernal Plunge tech but your control match-up has gone from favored to bad/unfavored (now they can dump card at the end of our turn safely). And BGx gone from unfavored to dreadfull. I don't know how many Memnite/Infernal Plunge but you can't afford to play one of each as you would pretty much scoop if one gets discarded.
Well, there's only one card that can replace SSG and it's Mox Opal, so the deck would need to be redesigned. For exemple, more artifact and a list like that :
It's a starting point... Because the overall CMC of the deck is so incredibly low, you can actually realistically kill opponents by just casting Ad Nauseam without an Angel's Grace, drawing a ton of cards and flashing back a large Conflagrate. The combo deck that previously required 2 cards now only needs 1 (although it's obviously guaranteed if you have both)! You also gain some equity by confusing your opponent who may just let your Ad Nauseam resolve believing that you can't actually kill them without having cast the Grace first. You also get to play Mox Opal to replace some of the Simian Spirit Guides while speeding up your combo a bit.
Or maybe another kind of list more like ANT or TES in Legacy in order to grapeshot for lethal with 0 CMC cards. Ad Nauseam for value and fill the hand, play 0 drops and Grapeshot for lethal. Just trying to find ideas.
Cheers!
That's a very interesting idea and that's not the first time that I see an ad nauseam list trying to use mox opal. However I don't see any phyrexian unlife and i beleive that the card gains value in a deck that can't use SSG/Lightning storm at instant speed. The reason is that even with a Memnite and Infernal Plunge deck tech you could still afford to "combo" at "instant speed" with phyrexian + Ad Nauseam. Whatever the timing of your ad nauseam, draw the deck, then wait until your next main phase to place the combo with multiple pact back up along the way.
This is not justified about SSG ban, but we don't have to talk about it in this thread (there's a thread for that). However, if that would ever happen, the only way out I see is to combo out at 7 mana with Memnite and Infernal Plunge and we'd lose the instant speed win. Having more Gemstone Caverns also would be a necessary thing to ensure fast starts. But up to that point, I'd have to find something to make mana in order to keep the deck at instant speed.
Cheers!
If they ban SSG I think the deck what we all play here would be simply dead competitively. You could still play it with the Memnite/Infernal Plunge tech but your control match-up has gone from favored to bad/unfavored (now they can dump card at the end of our turn safely). And BGx gone from unfavored to dreadfull. I don't know how many Memnite/Infernal Plunge but you can't afford to play one of each as you would pretty much scoop if one gets discarded.
They are all the same mainboard focused strategy which seems to be the one that puts up results regularly on MtGO and big events. They pretty much all have different sideboard options, but that should not be your concern if you just want to "get familiar with the deck" first.
But my original post isn't even about what turn to cast thoughtseize. I feel like I keep repeating that haha. I was only trying to raise a question of philosophy on the sequencing of scry + thoughtseize or thoughtseize + scry on the same turn regardless of what turn that actually is. Scrying with perfect information, or plucking a card based on what is coming up in your next draw.
Oops I went a bit off topic indeed. That's still an interesting question And I would say pretty much the same. If I take the following situations:
1- I have a prism in play and 3 non-basic lands, and both grace/nauseam. I thoughtseize first, I see Blood Moon and Chalice. THis is a spot where I would have preferred the scry before, as if I reveal a plain, I would 100% remove chalice. If I reveal echoing truth I would 100% remove blood moon.
2- I play against jeskai control, I have Ad nauseam/pact of negation in hand. I scry first and reveal another pact. This is a spot where I would have preferred to thoughtseize first. I need to find another piece of combo. And I am not sure If I will need the second pact. Seeing my opponents hand would have been helpful. However, If I reveal Boseiju, then I am very happy to have scryed first, as I don't need to worry about discarding counter spell and I can just discard nahiri for example.
Based on situation 2, I would say there is no optimal choice.
In your latest video, I wanted to start a conversation on scry lands and Thoughtseize. This is something I remember being discussed back in Theros block.
You had a Thoughtseize and Temple of Enlightenment in hand. You can either scry first to set up your next turn and then Thoughtseize away whatever you are weak to, or you can Thoughtseize first and then scry for what you can't answer. In this situation, you knew you were looking for land, so it probably wasn't as critical, but I can imagine many instances where you may want perfect information before you scry.
I have no criticism of this particular play, I just wanted to start some discussion.
Well that is a very interesting question but I would simply answer that it heavily depends on the context. I would not commit to a general answer to the question "Thoughtseize or Scry?". However, I could break down into two scenarios:
- Opponent is likely to be faster than you
- Opponent is not likely to be faster than you
Against infect for example, you will definitely turn 1 thoughtseize as you can potentially simply win the game on that single action if you remove their only creature and they can't top deck it fast enough. However against interactive/control deck, there is nothing really that you have to remove turn 1. Against decks that play slaugther games/blood moon etc..., you actually want to wait as long as possible before doing toughtseize so you can also monitor their first draws. Against pure control no rush, you simply want to thoughtseize a counter spell so it does not really matter when you do it.
As I mentioned it is difficult to enter the discussion without starting by setting up a very specific context. But I guess that's a start.
A lot of talk about SSG being banned. How hurtful would this be for our deck?
Sinec WotC announced that Modern is not a Pro Tour format anymore we can assume that bans will only happen when absolutely necessary. My view on that matter is that SSG is not a necessary ban as no decks pklaying SSG are crushing the modern meta (far from that actually, I believe no SSG in Tier 1 decks). However I think the talks around banning SSG are legitimate since the card allow "unfair" gameplans and increase the variance in the deck. In a nutshell and to caricature a lot: a deck relying on SSG will either do nothing or do something absolutely unfair very quickly. Even though these types of decks are not oppressive it is not a good enough reason to let them be without questioning.
The fact that is some decks can cast a blood moon turn 1 or chalice with one counter turn 1. Even though they are not oppressive, I believe this is relevant to ask the question whether this is something good to have in the diversity of our format. And I would not be surprised to see SSG gone
It's been a while since I've been active on this thread. I bounce from deck to deck, but I've recently decided to go back to Ad Nauseam, which I first fell in love with during Eldrazi winter. I've played a couple of different variations, but right now am back to a basically stock spoils list inspired by the recent high-profile finishes of fairly stock lists on the SCG Tour.
About the only thing that could be considered remotely spice is the Urborg main, which I stole from Samuel Jadin. (Also because I can't bring myself to play the full 6 temples--something I've discussed with @BatHickey on reddit.)
So questions: Has anyone tested Blessed Alliance out of the board for infect? I see a lot of talk about Collective Brutality, but rather than try to strip a pump out of their hand and discard another of our own cards just to try to kill their creature (that they can save with another pump spell) wouldn't it be better to let them load that creature up with pump spells and and then make them sac it? Also relevant that they can't save it with Vines of Vastwood or Blossoming Defense. Sure, if they're wise to you they could attack with multiple creatures, but it's rare for infect to do so naturally.
Also, this crazy 4 Bring to Light version of the deck from Guangzhou. Has anyone else been testing with this? I saw a post from @TomCourtenay about the list, and earlier in the thread posts from Lam who played it in the tournament. But does anyone have an update? Is that mana base really feasible? And why is that a better deck for Crovax? You can't cast Crovax off of Bring-to-Light, the mana cost is too high. You still need to find it naturally and cast it off of mana ramp (none of which can be found with BtL either), which I'm sure is why the deck runs 3 in the board. What am I missing?
I used to be big on the Wish version of Ad Nauseam, so I love me some BtL. Just wondering if that list is really feasible or not.
Cheers!
I love the idea ob BtL in ad nauseam since I have realized how easy we can handle 4 city of Brass. With 4 gemstones, 4 brass and the full suite of mana rocks, I think we can play very easily the 4 BtL. The fact that it is a sorcery ad nauseam is already almost good enough, but what very impact cards at cmc 5 or less could we abuse? Most of the killer cards that are "staples" are 6cmc (Grave titan, crovax, dromoka) or non targetable (elspeth).
I will definitely try a mainboard BtL in my next league in MtGO, if you are interested that would be League #8
@Deeprod
During ur L06 M2 at 14:04, i highly recommend to go for ADN at 8 life. Chances are much higher to find 3 lands (one untaped) bevor u dealing 8 damage urself. 3 Gemstones, 4 Citys, 2 basics and all fastlands left. Even waiting against an death shadow deck on 8 life sounds bad.
I don't see how you make that line of play work. Because if I want to go for Ad Naus at this stage, I need to exile both SSG and use on coutner on Prism. If I do that, even if I draw a bunch of untapped land, I am left with only 2 mana (1 from prism, 1 from new land grabbed from ad naus) and I need to pass turn without the ability to cast Lightning storm during is turn at all. Am I missing something?
Lokking for "deck" ideas, i would love to see couple games with SB 2Spellskites and smoe with 1 Teferi in it somehow. And for second, i would like to hear someone talk about basics. 1 island, 1 plains or 2 pains or even with 1 swamp some guys playing.
Also im interested in seeing someone playing Crovax or NoSB against some infect matches.:D I havnt time to test well during my ~2 FNM a month^^
About Crovax... I just don't see it working at all. I consider that 6cmc means bloom or pentad prism, which means that the card needs to be completely game breaking. Here the pay 2 life ability is amazing on paper but we won't be able to cast it twice if we need to bounce it to our hand. I would highly suggest the card Night of Souls' Betrayal as it has the effect that we want for 4cmc and we can reasonably cast it turn 3 (SSG, PRism) while still maintaining our mana count. On top of that, Black is easier than white.
This is pretty run-of-the-mill and I'm thinking of ditching the Sudden Shocks purely because they're Infect hate and my meta isn't packing so much meta anymore.
Any spice I can add to it? I know 'spice' is meta-dependent but doesn't hurt to ask for anything cool in the MB.
Also I'm thinking of dropping out a Peer Through Depths and/or adding in a Nephalia Academy.
My current spice is Gigadrowse and Nephalia Academy
Gigadrwose is very verstaile and can be a bomb agaisnt control, while still being sorta relevant against aggro to get a fog effect-ish. It is a must against aggro/tempo deck or strategy that plan on putting threat early and hold counter spells (UR aggro, Merfolks, Affinity etc...) so you can benefit from both tapping out lands and creatures.
Nephalia is underwhelming at best for me but BGx needs to be answered beyond 4 leylines and it's as good as it gets so far in my experience.
I would also get rid of the singleton Peer through depth. Given the build of your deck (4 scry lands, 4 phyrexian, 2 win cons etc...) I think you should benefit more from a third Spoils of the vault. Nephalia main is purely a meta call in my opinion, spoils is purely combo oriented and will help you access your combo pieces against all decks, which is why I believe Main board should be very focused. Given that Game 1 your opponent dont know what you play, even BGx might keep hands without discad and good removals, which means you can go under game one without any hate. Things that won't happen Game 2/3
@Deeprod
During ur L06 M2 at 14:04, i highly recommend to go for ADN at 8 life. Chances are much higher to find 3 lands (one untaped) bevor u dealing 8 damage urself. 3 Gemstones, 4 Citys, 2 basics and all fastlands left. Even waiting against an death shadow deck on 8 life sounds bad.
I don't see how you make that line of play work. Because if I want to go for Ad Naus at this stage, I need to exile both SSG and use on coutner on Prism. If I do that, even if I draw a bunch of untapped land, I am left with only 2 mana (1 from prism, 1 from new land grabbed from ad naus) and I need to pass turn without the ability to cast Lightning storm during is turn at all. Am I missing something?
@Deeprod
thanks again for more and more videos to watch.
I am glad to see that there is a few regulars that follow all the videos! More to come I am currently recording my league #7.
Please don't hesitate to give me some ideas on new deck techs to try.
Cheers!
Can people explain why you are playing 1 Maniac/1 Storm in the mainboard and not just 2x Storm and the Maniac in the SB? With Spoils I always play 2 Storm as I want to be able to combo off at instant speed and with 2 Storm even if I exile one off Spoils I can still combo.
In Game 1, I just don't see any relevant scenario's where Maniac is that good. Dredge, Infect, Jund, and Burn are the most popular decks and you don't want Maniac in any of those. Some people will say Spellskite but I've rarely had problems combo'ing off with Storm against Spellskite, even without a Slaughter Pact. It's not like Abzan Company is even popular anymore.
Maniac just seems like more of a SB card when decks bring in Leyline or against decks with lifegain.
Too me, the fact that Maniac allow you an alternative win con (Spoils+Maniac+Grace/Unlife) without Ad Nauseam (!) is a good enough explanation for having a Maniac main instead of doubling storm. However, even if you are not running spoils, Here are a few corner cases where Mania is good in the MAIN (as you are already convinced that it is necessary in the side):
- Merfolks (Kira redirect tech cannot be answered with main deck tools, maniac is the only way)
- Affinity (Vault Skirge/Cranial Plating can put your storm out of the game)
- Abzan Company
- Soul Sisters (for obvious reason of heavy life gain)
- Boggles (Daybreak Coronet)
- BW Tokens (Auriok Champion/Timely reinforcement)
- Ad Nauseam (Lightning storm kill can be cancelled by angel's grace, Maniac kill can be cancelled but only for one turn)
- Lantern Control (Pithing needle in the main)
All together, I believe it outweighs the fact that it loses the instant speed feat. Which is mostly relevant against pure control decks.
I wanted to answer the question “What are my chance of winning when I cast spoils of the vault for ad nauseam in a very standard scenario?”. Please find below my attempt at answering the question in a very specific scenario:
This is game 1 and you are on the play with the following opening hand:
Turn 1:
You decide to keep as it is a very decent hand with good potential, just a simple ad nauseam top deck and you good to go as early as turn 4. Opponent keeps his 7 cards as well and you put things in motion by opening with seachrome coast and serum visions. You draw a gemstone mine and scry Pact of Negation + Spoils of the vault. Given that you don’t know what you are up against, you decide to “top/top” and draw pact of negation first, then spoils of the vault. Before passing you suspend lotus bloom. Opponent drops a misty rainforest, fetch immediately for a breeding pool, shock and cast Noble Hierarch.
Turn 2:
Draw Pact of negation, drop your Temple of Enlightenment, confirm that spoils of the vault is on top of the library and pass turn. Opponent plays a forest, cast Blighted Agent and pass.
Turn 3:
You draw your spoils of the vault. Not the greatest of all match-ups, but if you can survive his turn 3, you will have a window to combo off. You play Darkslick Shores, cast Phyrexian Unlife and pass. Opponent kicks vines of wastwood (leaving a blue mana open), then swing with blighted agent, cast mutagenic growth for a total of 8 Infects damage! You are alive, but a simple attack next turn will finish you off thanks to noble hierarch’s exalted trigger.
Turn 4:
You first resolve your lotus bloom and then draw Temple of Deceit (bleh…). This is it, you will die next turn and don’t have a choice, if you want to win, you need to tutor for ad nauseam with spoils of the vault. You are good on mana, since phyrexian unlife is in play, you will use BBB from lotus bloom for both Spoils of the vault and Ad Nauseam, the rest of the mana will be used by lands already in play. To maximize the chance of winning, you need to do it now, in your main phase, as this is the only way to win through laboratory maniac. Since you have not used a land drop yet, you can draw the deck, land drop, exile SSG (at least 3), Prism, Maniac, Visions. However, it will only be possible if you don’t exile too many of the cards just mentioned while attempting to tutor for Ad Nauseam with spoils of the vault.
So the question is: what are the odds of Winning/Losing here? The results imply that our opponent attempted to spell pierce our ad nauseam, and we pact of negation it in response.
The answer is: The chance of winning is 85%
Please find the details of the different scenarios below:
Wooooow! That sideboard tech is AMAZING!
Congrats on all the hard work you came up with something very useful and comprehensive. I would have recommended to do it in an spreadsheet format to be able to sort the best cards for a given match-up. But that's already great.
Looking through it I just realized that, in my opinion, you give way too much credit to pithing needle in the ad nauseam match-up. Probably more than 90% of the ad nauseam field plays a copy of laboratory maniac in the main. So while pithing needle is not a total blank, it has a very limited use.
Cheers!
PS: Let me know if you are interested in a spreadsheet format for your sideboard guide, I could lend you a hand and prepare you a template.
I would pretty much almost mull a 7 with no leyline against BGx. It is irrelevant how good your hand is since post-board they have probably around 10 targetted discard (thoughtseize/inqui/brutality). 7-cards Hands I would consider keeping is no combo pieces with cantrips and scry lands, as they won't be able to discard your combo pieces, but if you managed to maintain all the combo pieces in the library, then your chance of recovering are OK.
It is important to see how back breaking leyline of sanctity is for Jund (less for abzan as they run white enchantment hates, but still).
That's a very interesting idea and that's not the first time that I see an ad nauseam list trying to use mox opal. However I don't see any phyrexian unlife and i beleive that the card gains value in a deck that can't use SSG/Lightning storm at instant speed. The reason is that even with a Memnite and Infernal Plunge deck tech you could still afford to "combo" at "instant speed" with phyrexian + Ad Nauseam. Whatever the timing of your ad nauseam, draw the deck, then wait until your next main phase to place the combo with multiple pact back up along the way.
If they ban SSG I think the deck what we all play here would be simply dead competitively. You could still play it with the Memnite/Infernal Plunge tech but your control match-up has gone from favored to bad/unfavored (now they can dump card at the end of our turn safely). And BGx gone from unfavored to dreadfull. I don't know how many Memnite/Infernal Plunge but you can't afford to play one of each as you would pretty much scoop if one gets discarded.
http://modernnexus.com/examining-banlist-complaints-clarifications-suggestions/
Any list from the MtGTop8 data base:
http://mtgtop8.com/archetype?a=355&meta=51&f=MO
They are all the same mainboard focused strategy which seems to be the one that puts up results regularly on MtGO and big events. They pretty much all have different sideboard options, but that should not be your concern if you just want to "get familiar with the deck" first.
Oops I went a bit off topic indeed. That's still an interesting question
1- I have a prism in play and 3 non-basic lands, and both grace/nauseam. I thoughtseize first, I see Blood Moon and Chalice. THis is a spot where I would have preferred the scry before, as if I reveal a plain, I would 100% remove chalice. If I reveal echoing truth I would 100% remove blood moon.
2- I play against jeskai control, I have Ad nauseam/pact of negation in hand. I scry first and reveal another pact. This is a spot where I would have preferred to thoughtseize first. I need to find another piece of combo. And I am not sure If I will need the second pact. Seeing my opponents hand would have been helpful. However, If I reveal Boseiju, then I am very happy to have scryed first, as I don't need to worry about discarding counter spell and I can just discard nahiri for example.
Based on situation 2, I would say there is no optimal choice.
Always glad to hear that! thanks a lot!
Well that is a very interesting question but I would simply answer that it heavily depends on the context. I would not commit to a general answer to the question "Thoughtseize or Scry?". However, I could break down into two scenarios:
- Opponent is likely to be faster than you
- Opponent is not likely to be faster than you
Against infect for example, you will definitely turn 1 thoughtseize as you can potentially simply win the game on that single action if you remove their only creature and they can't top deck it fast enough. However against interactive/control deck, there is nothing really that you have to remove turn 1. Against decks that play slaugther games/blood moon etc..., you actually want to wait as long as possible before doing toughtseize so you can also monitor their first draws. Against pure control no rush, you simply want to thoughtseize a counter spell so it does not really matter when you do it.
As I mentioned it is difficult to enter the discussion without starting by setting up a very specific context. But I guess that's a start.
Sinec WotC announced that Modern is not a Pro Tour format anymore we can assume that bans will only happen when absolutely necessary. My view on that matter is that SSG is not a necessary ban as no decks pklaying SSG are crushing the modern meta (far from that actually, I believe no SSG in Tier 1 decks). However I think the talks around banning SSG are legitimate since the card allow "unfair" gameplans and increase the variance in the deck. In a nutshell and to caricature a lot: a deck relying on SSG will either do nothing or do something absolutely unfair very quickly. Even though these types of decks are not oppressive it is not a good enough reason to let them be without questioning.
The fact that is some decks can cast a blood moon turn 1 or chalice with one counter turn 1. Even though they are not oppressive, I believe this is relevant to ask the question whether this is something good to have in the diversity of our format. And I would not be surprised to see SSG gone
I love the idea ob BtL in ad nauseam since I have realized how easy we can handle 4 city of Brass. With 4 gemstones, 4 brass and the full suite of mana rocks, I think we can play very easily the 4 BtL. The fact that it is a sorcery ad nauseam is already almost good enough, but what very impact cards at cmc 5 or less could we abuse? Most of the killer cards that are "staples" are 6cmc (Grave titan, crovax, dromoka) or non targetable (elspeth).
I will definitely try a mainboard BtL in my next league in MtGO, if you are interested that would be League #8
About Crovax... I just don't see it working at all. I consider that 6cmc means bloom or pentad prism, which means that the card needs to be completely game breaking. Here the pay 2 life ability is amazing on paper but we won't be able to cast it twice if we need to bounce it to our hand. I would highly suggest the card Night of Souls' Betrayal as it has the effect that we want for 4cmc and we can reasonably cast it turn 3 (SSG, PRism) while still maintaining our mana count. On top of that, Black is easier than white.
My current spice is Gigadrowse and Nephalia Academy
Gigadrwose is very verstaile and can be a bomb agaisnt control, while still being sorta relevant against aggro to get a fog effect-ish. It is a must against aggro/tempo deck or strategy that plan on putting threat early and hold counter spells (UR aggro, Merfolks, Affinity etc...) so you can benefit from both tapping out lands and creatures.
Nephalia is underwhelming at best for me but BGx needs to be answered beyond 4 leylines and it's as good as it gets so far in my experience.
I would also get rid of the singleton Peer through depth. Given the build of your deck (4 scry lands, 4 phyrexian, 2 win cons etc...) I think you should benefit more from a third Spoils of the vault. Nephalia main is purely a meta call in my opinion, spoils is purely combo oriented and will help you access your combo pieces against all decks, which is why I believe Main board should be very focused. Given that Game 1 your opponent dont know what you play, even BGx might keep hands without discad and good removals, which means you can go under game one without any hate. Things that won't happen Game 2/3
I don't see how you make that line of play work. Because if I want to go for Ad Naus at this stage, I need to exile both SSG and use on coutner on Prism. If I do that, even if I draw a bunch of untapped land, I am left with only 2 mana (1 from prism, 1 from new land grabbed from ad naus) and I need to pass turn without the ability to cast Lightning storm during is turn at all. Am I missing something?
I am glad to see that there is a few regulars that follow all the videos! More to come I am currently recording my league #7.
Please don't hesitate to give me some ideas on new deck techs to try.
Cheers!
Too me, the fact that Maniac allow you an alternative win con (Spoils+Maniac+Grace/Unlife) without Ad Nauseam (!) is a good enough explanation for having a Maniac main instead of doubling storm. However, even if you are not running spoils, Here are a few corner cases where Mania is good in the MAIN (as you are already convinced that it is necessary in the side):
- Merfolks (Kira redirect tech cannot be answered with main deck tools, maniac is the only way)
- Affinity (Vault Skirge/Cranial Plating can put your storm out of the game)
- Abzan Company
- Soul Sisters (for obvious reason of heavy life gain)
- Boggles (Daybreak Coronet)
- BW Tokens (Auriok Champion/Timely reinforcement)
- Ad Nauseam (Lightning storm kill can be cancelled by angel's grace, Maniac kill can be cancelled but only for one turn)
- Lantern Control (Pithing needle in the main)
All together, I believe it outweighs the fact that it loses the instant speed feat. Which is mostly relevant against pure control decks.
I wanted to answer the question “What are my chance of winning when I cast spoils of the vault for ad nauseam in a very standard scenario?”. Please find below my attempt at answering the question in a very specific scenario:
This is game 1 and you are on the play with the following opening hand:
Turn 1:
You decide to keep as it is a very decent hand with good potential, just a simple ad nauseam top deck and you good to go as early as turn 4. Opponent keeps his 7 cards as well and you put things in motion by opening with seachrome coast and serum visions. You draw a gemstone mine and scry Pact of Negation + Spoils of the vault. Given that you don’t know what you are up against, you decide to “top/top” and draw pact of negation first, then spoils of the vault. Before passing you suspend lotus bloom. Opponent drops a misty rainforest, fetch immediately for a breeding pool, shock and cast Noble Hierarch.
Turn 2:
Draw Pact of negation, drop your Temple of Enlightenment, confirm that spoils of the vault is on top of the library and pass turn. Opponent plays a forest, cast Blighted Agent and pass.
Turn 3:
You draw your spoils of the vault. Not the greatest of all match-ups, but if you can survive his turn 3, you will have a window to combo off. You play Darkslick Shores, cast Phyrexian Unlife and pass. Opponent kicks vines of wastwood (leaving a blue mana open), then swing with blighted agent, cast mutagenic growth for a total of 8 Infects damage! You are alive, but a simple attack next turn will finish you off thanks to noble hierarch’s exalted trigger.
Turn 4:
You first resolve your lotus bloom and then draw Temple of Deceit (bleh…). This is it, you will die next turn and don’t have a choice, if you want to win, you need to tutor for ad nauseam with spoils of the vault. You are good on mana, since phyrexian unlife is in play, you will use BBB from lotus bloom for both Spoils of the vault and Ad Nauseam, the rest of the mana will be used by lands already in play. To maximize the chance of winning, you need to do it now, in your main phase, as this is the only way to win through laboratory maniac. Since you have not used a land drop yet, you can draw the deck, land drop, exile SSG (at least 3), Prism, Maniac, Visions. However, it will only be possible if you don’t exile too many of the cards just mentioned while attempting to tutor for Ad Nauseam with spoils of the vault.
So the question is: what are the odds of Winning/Losing here? The results imply that our opponent attempted to spell pierce our ad nauseam, and we pact of negation it in response.
The answer is: The chance of winning is 85%
Please find the details of the different scenarios below: