MTG Salvation

Instead of talking about specific sideboards, let's talk about the must have core set of cards that belong in every sb, ie the minimum. The idea behind this would be so that you can quickly make changes with the "flex spots" in your sideboard without worrying about the core so much right before a tournament.

Which is generally considered better; Candelabra or not?

That's a good point. I had always assumed I was lucking out whenever I rocked dredge, but now that I think about it we have a lot of ways of interacting with them. All of our creatures trade with ichorids, and removal for our own creatures is nasty on the bridges. Also, as of late Dredge has become more of a combo deck than ever, with LED + Looting being the top build for the deck. I find that just countering everything that isn't LED (assuming they don't have Cephalid Col and you don't have stifle is usually a sure way to slow them down enough for you to get there in time.

Joshua, what's your reasoning behind only 2 grave hate? Most people would say that it's 4 or nothing against dredge.

Most people prefer rough/tumble to pyroclasm, it gives you a one sided wrath against aggressive decks trying to clog up the board. It gets boarded in against Maverick.

And it is very nice to know that If I trade all of my standard stuff for legacy stuff, It will be incredibly simple to keep or even gain value.

In my experience, most people don't want to trade Legacy stuff for Standard stuff

Reanimator and Dredge are the main reasons to hate the 'yard, but are they even worth dedicating 4 slots to beat, where you could be dedicating 4 slots to solidify matchups against the rest of the field?

My side right now looks like:
2 Pyroblast
2 Spell Pierce
2 Rough//Tumble
3 Submerge
2 Tormod's Crypt
2 Surgical Extraction
1x Ancient Grudge
1x Flex

Edit: Seriously just considering dropping the yard hate and upping my percentages against everything else.

So what do you guys think of Engineered Explosives as a 1 of in the board. I mean usually we play a few pyroclasm effects, and I sort of like EE as a flexible board option that has a lot of interactions. It whipes tokens, premptively answers KotR, etc, etc. I think more than one is almost always wrong, but one could be quite valuable.

Edit: So cutting Stifle isn't really a good idea, but I thought about it more and it's really frustrating how Spell Pierce is a card you want in just about every matchup but there's no room for it in the maindeck - Sigh?

So like there's combo, force of will, and fair no blue decks. If we want to beat non-blue decks, then we have to not just get blown out by wasteland. 4 ponder is nice, but 4 ponder and 4 waste is what allows the deck to cheat on lands like what he's talking about. You've just reduced your curve and number of lands. Each lands value is higher, but you'll draw less of them. Stifle and ponder are what lets you not get blown out by waste constantly.

If you flesh out the idea of card advantage by not drawing in to "dead lands" you have this: 4x Ponder to act as a land drop when you're land tight, but act as business later. Super low curve so that we have both resistance to an opponent's wastelands, but also so that we have more options (card advantage theory is part of the larger options theory), and finally stifles to act as both offensive disruption tools, but also protection for your own manabase. They disrupt when waste isn't an issue, and protect when it is.

I wouldn't say Pyroblast is stricktly better to REB, REB has to target a blue spell, and that can sometimes be relevent against hivemind.

You can't Snapcaster back daze, but dazing after Snapcaster is good for getting that land back.

Opinions on Rough/tumble and EE from my post above?

Brainstorm is a card you need to constantly reevaluated. Sometimes, brainstorming to flip delver will be correct. Sometimes, it won't. It's all about the rest of your hand and the deck your playing against. In an abstract, I wouldn't say bs to flip delver is optimal. But if said deck has inevitability against you, and you need to race, then perhaps brainstorming is the right play. Phantom has the right shortcut, as opposed to always casting brainstorm to foip delver, but considering all possible angles is what separates the pros.

Also, when do you like engineered explosives in the sideboard.
Rough/tumble vs pyroclasms?

Exactly, Brainstorming aggressively is almost always wrong with this deck.