1 year ago. Hey folks! To add to this, the now-ubiquitous Flash Hulk decks that are looking to win in response to counter wars now have to carefully weigh whether they want to go off in response to a singular Silence effect, or wait for the next turn that might never appear. Jace is the boogeyman because wizards (and many players) was afraid to unban him in modern - almost chiefly because of how he "terrorized" standard and his then-strength in legacy control decks. Hand-wise, however, it might look like we’re in a jam. As no-one presented any counterspells to your, Hand-wise, however, it might look like we’re in a jam. If you still can’t get enough mana to win despite seeing 50-80 cards in your deck, finding enough to crack that Children of Korlis is enough to bring you back to your golden age of high life totals and sculpt into the perfect 7 that wins you the game on your next turn. There has been more than several dedicated Ad Naus combo decks played online in the past (Zur, Jeleva, Mono Black Sidisi etc. Needless to say, this is fantastic news for dedicated Ad Nauseam decks like Farm which can double down on using life to fuel game-winning spells. 15:26. Therefore, getting disrupted at the start by a Misstep would not have been the worst thing, and in addition you can be glad due to all the protected wins you’ll be getting if people start using their counterspells only after you’ve resolved your Ad Nauseam. However, with some efforts to make an emphasis in synergy, : robust protection suite, diverse combo selection, the occasionally-needed lifegain as well as a toolbox of cheap and evasive creatures to abuse with. I, here about a non-blue combo deck, however, and like Gitrog, it has got some impressive results in prized online cEDH events recently. We only got a couple of rocks and a single proper ritual, that being Cabal with no obvious way to reach Threshold. However, a lot of time has passed since the card reigned at the top, as today many powerful cards come to compete with the throne Ad Nauseam once almost held monopoly on. Fortunately though, we do have a combo “extender” that Cobble has already talked covered in one of his prior articles: 1. Being able to kill Sylvan library, Rhystic study, or Necropotence helps Reclamation sage a bit but again Manglehorn is a hate bear. A little bit more resilient than the Cat Combo above due to not requiring the grave, Squirrelcraft can be used to instantly win the game with the same outlets as with the above combo. And with our deck that’s chock full of these effects, I can guarantee that no-one wants to intuitively counter that 1-mana instant on an empty stack. Bolas is a puppet-master, preferring to coax others into doing his dirty work for him. Today, he’s breaking down the list he piloted to a 2nd place finish in the most recent TimeTwisted cEDH Tournament. I see these kinds of situations happen almost every day when I play with some of the more experienced cEDH pilots, so I beg you not to be fooled. The card has seen use in many of the classic Ad Naus decks in past cEDH lists, the main example being Zur, the Enchanter Doomsday. We naturally don’t have blue interaction ready in Abzan Farm, but with access to silencing the stack altogether we have the next-best thing. before i start, this deck is not meant to be incredibly broken, it holds it's own, but its absolutely not a highly competative deck. Depends on the table, but an early Serra can be used to pressure other Ad Nauseam decks, or alternatively ones that play an early stax piece to keep you from comboing off. Has Oko finally taken the title of The Boogeyman from Jace? ; Farm can just as easily win from a main-phase Ad Nauseam at 25-30 life with little mana floating, assuming you can hit enough of your mana-positive cards. But how does Oko compare? Flash Hulk players are your some of your hardest opponents to deal with, but you’re fortunately not alone with this dilemma. Here, Zur is still being taken advantage of for his ability to tutor, but rather to grab anti-combo cards such as Rule of Law, or Stony Silence. Silence effects also help in offensively interacting with our opponents if necessary. While one could consider such a strategy to be indicative of a haymaker format, when a deck like Reanimator becomes the boogeyman it means the format is very receptive to new ideas, as its “unfair” strategy is easily hated out and thus can be forced to play a fair game against any deck in the field. Children practically allows you to draw half of your deck twice by returning your life totals to safe levels after losing most of it, while a turn 1 Serra Ascendant is such a haymaker by itself in cEDH tables that it can single-handedly win you a game by pressuring one or two players down in just a few turns. That does it for the matchups against the most well versed out 3 main archetypes of cEDH. However, because our bottleneck is not the outlet but resolving an instant that nets us 20+ cards, you can run a small suite of different, yet compact combos that you can use to maneuver around opposing hate. When something is printed thats obviously pushing an archetype they usually print a counter (E.G. Produce enough mana to tutor, play and activate Scroll Rack (playing and activating costs 3 mana total, so that plus tutoring costs)2. Time to go into detail how this Turbo Ad Nauseam deck helmed by Tymna, usually referred to as “Farm” (courtesy of the archetype’s originator, my former write-up on this deck from 2018. , you might already know what a “Farm” deck is built to do: resolve Ad Nauseam ASAP, and win afterwards in quick fashion. All in all, the once effective, slot-efficient tactic dedicated Ad Nauseam was weak against is no longer, all due to a couple of buffers to our seemingly inconsequential amount of life (all of which turns into not-so-inconsequential card advantage not long after). With Veil of Summer already seeing play in many combo decks alongside Silence and with Abolisher seeing play in Hulk decks, the “throw protection into an empty stack” is slowly making a comeback in more established lists. It has had a huge impact on so many games, and I've also played it early game when the only enchantment on board was a Rhystic Study and been very content with the 1 to 1. Things do however become much more problematic when every opposing deck plays stax, because at that point you’re the punching bag, and at the same time you’re the only one that wants to get rid of the now stax-infested board. This “hate the Naus player out” culture, while commonplace for a reason, is accompanied usually by the motto “hit the player with the least life”. All in all, Consultation players like to lean on the grindy side in regards to many cEDH tables, so most of the time you’ll be asking the questions with early Ad Nauseams or mid-game Silences. Consultation is not as much of an archetype as it is a package that is being pasted into every deck that by default tries to go fast, usually along the lines of Ad Nauseam, : Consultation players often like to play the game from their hand rather than from their board, so taking a peek at all the information they have access to and revealing their gameplan to the table is often a powerful move, especially when they have been relatively passive for a turn or two. You play Wooded Foothills getting Savannah as your land for the turn, and no-one presented counterspells to the Mana Vault that you topdecked. Retain enough life to resolve a black top-deck tutor and survive, seeing as we only have topdeck tutors that cost life (Total cost 3+[B] & 2 life)3. A little bit more resilient than the Cat Combo above due to not requiring the grave, Squirrelcraft can be used to instantly win the game with the same outlets as with the above combo. If your local metagame ever (d)evolves into that, adding 1-2 mass removal spells like Engineered Explosives, Toxic Deluge, Force of Vigor, Pernicious Deed or Seeds of Innocence is an option. This line is arguably the weakest in our combo suite, as it is weak to both spot removal and graveyard hate. Because we already have our engine in the command zone, these kinds of hands fit well for our purposes. Oko is Count Dracula - everyone knows exactly who he is and what he does, which is (was) suck the blood from all the formats he used to be legal in. All in all, Consultation players like to lean on the grindy side in regards to many cEDH tables, so most of the time you’ll be asking the questions with early Ad Nauseams or mid-game Silences. The most recent TimeTwisted Tournament provided a prevalent example of this when people started putting their Flashes to the stack in pods where every opponent was running Flash Hulk; there wasn’t much Farm could do to stop it all from transpiring. You’re up against 3 blue players, two of which have 1 blue mana open. With one extra mana from Grim Monolith, all that’s left is to play Skullclamp, attach it to Memnite to draw Rack + one card, then Rack away pretty much everything that’s left in your hand save for Yawgmoth’s Will. Reddit gives you the best of the internet in one place. If you’ve read my former write-up on this deck from 2018, you might already know what a “Farm” deck is built to do: resolve Ad Nauseam ASAP, and win afterwards in quick fashion. As pure Grace + Naus lines are pretty rare, most often you’ll be using Dreams to win by casting a second Naus from your graveyard via Yawgmoth’s Will after finding Angel’s Grace and enough mana from your first cast. Below there are several tips on how to approach the current cEDH metagame, with the 3 main representatives of current metagame archetypes covered more extensively, followed by general-specific decks and some of the less prevalent archetypes. A card once hailed as the figurehead piece of competitive EDH decks, maybe of even the cEDH community itself nearly half a decade backward. : Sometimes, the best thing against stax is to just sit back and grind. We’ve got no real Moxen to really start mana production either save for Elvish Spirit Guide, and any dreams of combo assembly are distant with our hand as-is. It's been widely agreed that Oko is more powerful than Jace for a while now. Teneb, the Harvester $ 1.00 $ 23.00 $ 22.00: 2,300%. 40-life-pools are already gargantuan in terms of aggro and burn -typed gameplans in EDH, so dividing your already mediocre damage between multiple opponents guarantees that you’ll be at best tickling everyone and at worst making them focus on you for hitting them. With the surge of creatures in stalled-out metagames, Tymna doesn’t get to connect as much as it could before. Ad Nauseam, ridiculous mana potential and a tutor for pretty much anything you would need. Meta-specific hate cards like, There were more than half a dozen decks that won by abusing Lab Man before 2019 in the cEDH scene, but now with the arrival of. As focus is shifted away from your value game, you can either keep grinding with Tymna, or slip by an innocuous Silence effect just to hit the Ad Nauseam button right after. The u_little_mark community on Reddit. But then you win. Stax players play plenty of hate, and your discard is definitely not plentiful. A couple of dedicated stax lists still see play online, the primary one being Tymna Tana Blood Pod. Silence effects also work against any of the non-Consultation lines like with Food Chain Sliver, or with any of the storm lines by CST, Kess etc. Among black combo players in EDH, people often prefer playing Ad Nauseam pretty conservatively as an end-step draw-spell, which makes it essentially free card-draw for your combo turn. Even though early ramp is often preferred, don’t underestimate the clock Ascendant represents if you play it on turn 1. Let the Hulk player know that you’re not falling for anything they might try to take the spotlight off of them, and let the table know that they need to keep their interaction up for those Flashes. This might very well be just a stroke of luck with the small sample of tournaments being held, but shedding light to this dark horse archetype still is worth some effort given the repeated high standings. If you’re up against multiple Hulk players, this strategy unfortunately gets less effective and your wins come down to luck more than anything. . This might very well be just a stroke of luck with the small sample of tournaments being held, but shedding light to this dark horse archetype still is worth some effort given the repeated high standings. Meta-specific hate cards like Containment Priest, Hushbringer and Hallowed Moonlight can be used against Hulk if you can’t turn the table against them with table talk, but use any static effects sparingly and mainly as last-ditch blowouts. New comments cannot be posted and votes cannot be cast. I go in the web by the name Leptys, and some of you might already know me from my former work with the Laboratory Maniacs regarding the more traditional Gitrog Monster shells back in 2017. In short, most contemporary online games these days hinge on drawn out Mexican standoffs, where counterspells are fired at the latest moment possible, and where slipping in early wins becomes an exception rather than the rule. However, contrary to what you might believe from the first skim of the deck, you can do surprisingly much to interact with your opposition, even without blue. Lifegain for its own sake isn’t usually that viable in many formats, but with the aid of Tymna, creatures with lifegain properties become not only that, but also card-draw. Leonin+Animate Dead is not valid anymore due to using Yawgmoth’s Will, so keep that in mind (unless you’re using Leonin in someone else’s graveyard, it can happen). Another strong part to an Ad Nauseam deck with access to white is doubling down on Silence effects: cards that make our opponents unable to cast any meaningful interaction for minimal cost while also not risking you with a loss like a simple combo attempt would. Are they going for a quick Ad Nauseam kill? And there you have it, the cEDH tournament boogeyman Abzan Farm in a nutshell. However, with the arrival of the more strict Mulligan rules in EDH, stax has taken a backseat for a while (save for very established playgroups), and the surge of midrange makes using card slots for hate pieces even less favorable despite the arrival of London mulligans. Intro: Welcome to my build for the awesome Jace, Vryn's Prodigy ! Now it is true that while I have described Farm as a reckless fast combo deck, not all games are Christmas Land turn 1-2 Ad Nauseam wins where caring about the opposition is irrelevant. There aren’t many meta-specific cards I’d particularly recommend, as the combo package is pretty immune to any specific hate. As we don’t have any ways to gain life from 3 and no tutors that don’t cost any life, Ancient Tomb is out of the equation. The power of “mana-positive” cards like Mana Crypt and Sol Ring combined with the 40-life rule presented tons of build-around potential with the black instant right from the beginning times of the format. Take note that Necropotence also is a high-priority target in openers should your hand be able to cast it, and has an equal level of priority as hands like the one above. How can you flip into gas cards every game if you just get a bunch of Edric creatures all the time? Broadcast Threat: Known threats that just loom over the table like a boogeyman can provide tremendous leverage over opponents. : Silence doesn’t work well against Consultation + Lab Man itself, but it sure makes the more conservative players break a sweat if you’re presenting Ad Nauseam mana. Those creatures usually are something like Tymna, but also beefier generals like, This “hate the Naus player out” culture, while commonplace for a reason, is accompanied usually by the motto. One question here would be whether to play Pilgrim or Serra Ascendant first. The most classic effects here are the titular Silence and Grand Abolisher known from many well established lists, but stopping there would do our protection options no justice. During the time Ad Nauseam was printed, there already existed a sort of “security system” that prevented the overuse of Ad Nauseam costing you the game, that being the white instant Angel’s Grace from Time Spiral. it marks a card's color identity when the mana cost is not visible (or does not have one, in the case of Augment cards and free spells like Pact of Negation). I’m not here to talk about Gitrog today though; her popularity has gone, needless to say, above and beyond ‘fringe’ in terms of cEDH popularity. Fortunately though, we do have a combo “extender” that Cobble has already talked covered in one of his prior articles: Scroll Rack. If your deck runs mass removal spells, those can be handy depending on the situation. Hello, readers. This doesn’t stop instant-speed comboing naturally, but a well-placed Silence or Ranger-Captain activation forms the bread and butter of disrupting half-hearted combo attempts in an emergency, giving Farm’s protection suite a bit of reactive interaction potential on the side. If you’re up against multiple Hulk players, this strategy unfortunately gets less effective and your wins come down to luck more than anything. Being a 1-drop, you can easily stick Therapist on turn 1-2, then play Tymna on the following turn and draw a card upon easily connecting via Menace. If you see that you can go off by removing one troublesome permanent, then definitely tutor a Decay/Trophy/Claim and blast off. By comparison, main-phase Ad Nauseams give no early forecast on what’s about to happen, and at the same time eliminate the risk of passing turns to people who might be going off on their turns. Simply keep in mind that Blood Moon is a card so you don’t get blown out by not fetching those basic lands when you could’ve. Rhystic Studies did a fantastic video on him, where he coined him: The Boogeyman. If they do, you’ve lost next to nothing. I know you’ve all been excited to talk about the Zedruu lists that were sent in for my contest, but I think there’s one person even more excited. More often than before, games end by combat damage rather than a combo, something that usually happens only in the most staxed out games we see so little of today. The Boogeyman by Rhystic Studies. Speaking of outlets, as both of the latter combos work very similarly, deck slots can be easily conserved by using overlapping outlets in Corpse Knight and Blasting Station in the Abzan list. Nevertheless, I hope this article has provided at least some light to how fast combo is incredibly favored against the abundant value decks of today and how Flash Hulk is not the only way to go about it, as well as an idea or two on how you can actually do all this in practice. However, as the high-power tables get used to seeing 5+ mana open followed by the combo player passing turn without doing anything, everyone will be holding onto their counterspells which makes attempting to go off that much more difficult. Next it’s time to look at how we can put all the theory above regarding Farm into practice with some mulligan and gameplay examples. By using a reanimation enchantment on Relic-Warder, it can be used to cause arbitrary amounts of ETB/death triggers for Corpse Knight/Blood Artist effects, as well as provide infinite fodder for sacrifice outlets like Goblin Bombardment or Blasting Station. You’re up against 3 blue players, two of which have 1 blue mana open. If they would just print more answers to walkers in all colors we would have less of these problems. A Sickening Dreams kill is also possible here by just tutoring and casting Angel’s Grace with Wishclaw Talisman and casting Ad Nauseam from the grave via Yawgwill to draw your whole deck, using the final rituals left to cast Dreams for well over 50 damage to the whole table. That means we’re racking away a total of 28 cards, which at this point is over half of our remaining library (50 cards after Skullclamping). The Mardu version of Farm has none of the green Veils available, but reactive cards like Red Elemental Blast and Pyroblast work just as well as counterspells and as ways to remove blue value engines or hate pieces. Speaking of outlets, as both of the latter combos work very similarly, deck slots can be easily conserved by using overlapping outlets in Corpse Knight and Blasting Station in the Abzan list. The general lack of interaction in permanent form also hurts the chances of effectively disrupting other, occasionally faster combo decks, so in certain games you can get outraced. Games can range, depending on your opponents and your seating in the table, from fast combo shotgun parties where everyone tries to race to the win to the slower counter-war gut checks, and finally to the grinds through stax-ridden board states that can last hours. For the uninitiated, here’s a pretty usual game state in terms of your board and open mana post-Ad Nauseam, but with some unfriendly flips to force some elaboration on possible lines one can take: Game state: Your turn 3. If your local metagame ever (d)evolves into that, adding 1-2 mass removal spells like, That does it for the matchups against the most well versed out 3 main archetypes of cEDH. “Farm animal” in the context of the deck means any low-curve creature, around 1-3CMC that can land on the field before Tymna comes in and swing for cards in the early game, and which can also be sacrificed for further value during your combo turn. ), but Farm lists especially make more than a few intentional deckbuilding concessions despite their access to colors to achieve a huge amount of consistency with their storm-like victories utilizing the life-hungry black instant. While the deck can do a lot to pre-emptively protect itself or recover from a failed attempt, there isn’t much you can do against an opposing Silence if an opponent ever decides to cast one during your combo turn. I don’t actuly think that’s even contencous anymore. A card once hailed as the figurehead piece of competitive EDH decks, maybe of even the cEDH community itself nearly half a decade backward. That being said, Serra Ascendant often is one of the biggest beaters available in cEDH, and with evasion to boot. However, the longer the games and standoffs go, usually the more inevitability you can represent with your silences and counter-proof lands. Once every color has good sideboard answers walkers will be less overpowered. We only got a couple of rocks and a single proper ritual, that being Cabal with no obvious way to reach Threshold. Now that the cEDH landscape has delved so deep into Consultation decks that even fast Flash Hulks are a secondary to grinding value with Mystic Remora and Rhystic Study, it’s time to start asking the question “Do I Win?” as often as possible, and as fast as possible. The part that Rec Sage hits enchantments matters but Manglehorn is a hate bear on top of having a good enter the battlefield. Arguing the fact that the resident Hulk player has his combo ready while also continuously reminding the table how many cards the player with Rhystic Study has drawn are very powerful examples of the verbal tools at your disposal, especially while your strongest plays for the turn are basically 1/1s with evasion. However, given the package’s primary role as a resilient slow-roll win condition, most of these decks are a pretty good matchup against us. In the most recent Vintage Championships, there were more Okos than there were Jaces in the top eight. I’ll answer that exact question by going through the priority order of what you want from best to worst. However, keeping an eye on what combo pieces you draw can help you sneak in a victory or two without relying on Naus, just don’t make your slow assemblies look too obvious while attempting such lines. Fast Mana + Creatures that land before Tymna (or Necropotence). Keep these small jabs with Ranger-Captain, Hope of Ghirapur and reanimation for them ready to threaten combo attempts and keep them on their back foot. Press J to jump to the feed. Oko on the over hand has been banned so fast form so many formats so recently his nature isn’t realy that if a boogeyman but as the elker of formats. Rack works with Ad Nauseam just as well as it does with Anje, and with this kind of hand, Racking for 20+ cards will almost always dig us into the rest of the fast mana that are still in the deck (unless we get super duper unlucky). One tutor plus a protection piece will seal the game, but depending on the table it will be a tough race for you at times. They tend to greatly influence decisions, which can usually add up slowly to massive tempo loss without the enemy being aware of it. Contains deckbuilding guidelines and the current ban list. The sketchiest of keepable hands, but still keepable as it has a steady game plan. Stax decks like Blood Pod can bring our combo plans to a halt with a couple of properly timed spheres or. If the game goes long enough, you can start threatening Ad Nauseam through Boseiju, or an Abolisher creature through Cavern of Souls to win on the spot. Rhystic Study This may seem odd here, but the power of this card in a multiplayer format is relevant here as well. could also be easily used to describe the lengthy hold the card had over online competitive EDH scenes. If they try rounding up the table against you, play the attention politics as much as you can and try beating them at their own value game. The once troublesome policy of “hit the player with the least life” flips on its head to “don’t hit the player with the most life”, practically leading to a total cessation of incoming combat damage. Next it’s time to look at how we can put all the theory above regarding Farm into practice with some mulligan and gameplay examples. allows for pure mana production straight into a total of 8 mana, which can be used to cast Earthcraft, Krosan Wayfarer, tap Wayfarer to Earthcraft, sac Wayfarer to put a land into play, play Yawgmoth’s Will, do that all again, cast Cabal Ritual & Memnite for more mana… essentially you’ve got more than enough to just win the game on the spot with the Squirrelcraft combo. There’s also the factor of our creature suite that doesn’t accrue much value without Tymna around. The card-draw potential with no direct subsequent costs in mana means essentially free cards in any table that doesn’t provide early game blockers, and sometimes even that is not enough to deal with the ever-recurring value menace Tymna threatens from the command zone. Apr 6, 2012 - This Pin was discovered by Michael McNulty. The deck is already built around sketchy Ad Nauseams by forcing such a low mana curve, going all-out on mana production and abusing cards like Scroll Rack to basically make even the mana-hungriest 20-card hands able to force through a win. Use whatever we can to draw our Scroll Rack from the top. This applies especially to Flash Hulk; while outracing a single Hulk deck consistently is somewhat possible, outracing multiple Hulks quickly turns the odds against you. Knowing the deck and what to tutor for in a given situation also helps getting these kinds of mediocre 20+ cards into actual gas and consequently wins, so goldfishing here is key. Regarding the Scroll Rack activation, you could say that it’s pure luck with how much fast mana one can flip into at that point, and that is somewhat true. In similar fashion, the deck already runs cards like Ranger-Captain of Eos for more protection and tutoring, As the deck now becomes somewhat oriented on creatures that give you cards with Tymna and also work as ways to fix or generate mana on your Ad Nauseam turns, cards like, : An already known reanimation combo from the popular Razakats decks helmed by Thrasios & Tymna, the “Animate Cat” win line comes to use in this list, albeit as a slightly more compact version as we’re not using. In this article I’m going in-depth with the main themes involved in the deckbuilding of this list, and why it keeps overmatching the value-oriented midrange climate we’re in right now in terms of online cEDH. We have Arbor Elf and Memnite, so no shortage of free bodies so far (Total cost 5+[B] & 2 life), Next we’re going to do something that requires certain knowledge on what is in our particular list, and that is playing, From here on we can pretty easily play either, Enlightened Tutor, Fellwar Stone, Chrome Mox, Cabal Therapist, Thoughtseize, Sol Ring, Necromancy, Deathrite Shaman, Mox Diamond, Overgrown Tomb, Squirrel Nest, Ranger-Captain of Eos, Praetor’s Grasp, Sickening Dreams, Mana Crypt, Nature’s Lore, Temple Garden, Godless Shrine, Noxious Revival, Veil of Summer, Tainted Pact, Earthcraft, Arid Mesa, Wishclaw Talisman, Mox Opal, Assassin’s Trophy, Avacyn’s Pilgrim, Krosan Wayfarer, There we go, the Christmas Land right there. JumpStart was announced on February 20th. . For the original Mardu-colored Mad Farm, the deck runs Dualcaster Mage + Twinflame in the place of Squirrelcraft, and Goblin Bombardment in the place of Blasting Station. Your turn 3. A card originally printed in Shards of Alara that has seen play in some of the most prevalent combo decks in almost every eternal format it has been legal in. Thank you for reading! But what if I told you that your deck’s speed isn’t purely dependent on how much mana your combo costs? With Ikra, your life totals will also stay at reasonable levels despite aggressive approaches from your opponents, but be ready for the occasional, : Leverage the fact that stax is one of the most difficult archetypes to play when it comes to politics: nobody truly likes being stopped from playing Magic, even at the competitive level where everything goes. Those creatures usually are something like Tymna, but also beefier generals like Gitrog or Kenrith, or even aggro-oriented like Najeela. Simultaneously, the tempting process of netting more and more cards and resolving an ever-changing puzzle presented by those cards has also become an addiction of many EDH combo and storm pilots over the years. However jace was more of a boogeyman as he was banned in modern in particular for so long (since befor it existed actuly) and as such the impact he would have on it was always a point of debate and people had to extrapolate from his time in standerd and his presence in legacy which are both very diffract form modern. Also unlike jace oko is the definition of format warping and we have a lot of data to show that from, his times in standerd, pioneer, modern and currently in legacy to some extend (though I think astrolabe is doinf more harm there right now, but that’s a differnt debate). In similar fashion, the occasional creature wipe can’t be prevented by us either, so you can’t help it much if someone decides your or someone else’s board is looking too threatening. However, a lot of time has passed since the card reigned at the top, as today many powerful cards come to compete with the throne Ad Nauseam once almost held monopoly on. Finding out what the Consultation player is going for helps the table to respond accordingly when they eventually cast their haymakers, so help other players as much as you can verbally in pinpointing the right course of action (and interaction) for that point in time. In that sense, what does a huge, beefy blocker or a lifegain engine do in this environment? As to why does this kind of “pre-emptive” interaction work against the current cEDH metagame, all becomes clear with only a couple of card examples. Our total mana is now in pool with Savannah open, and we’ve gone from 3 cards in graveyard to 6, so Threshold is now starting to look more than achievable. Retain enough life to resolve a black top-deck tutor and survive, seeing as we only have topdeck tutors that cost life (Total cost 3+[B] & 2 life), 3. When you’re playing the mutually agreed amounts of blue interaction, it can be easy to fall into reactive ways of thinking and consequently lacking in more active ways to advance your gameplan in relation to your opponents’. Again and again… and again. Rhystic Studies 2018-07-04 20:17. no, I covered that little circle when I talked about werewolves. Zur the Enchanter, is seen as a boogeyman in the commander format, allowing for the tutoring of combo pieces such as Necropotence. There has been more than several dedicated Ad Naus combo decks played online in the past (Zur, Jeleva, Mono Black Sidisi etc. That the card is susceptible to sun damage and that it can only be killed with a stake through the heart are also valid comparisons. Rhystic Studies did a fantastic video on him, where he coined him: The Boogeyman. Rhystic Study $ 1.25 $ 23.00 $ 21.75: 1,840%. . The deck does run a lot of already mentioned Silence effects, which similarly can stop our opponents in their tracks just like they can stop us. What if I told you that Ad Nauseam, as overlooked as it now is as the de-facto win condition, was never truly usurped from that position, here to talk about Gitrog today though; her popularity has gone, needless to say, above and beyond ‘fringe’ in terms of cEDH popularity. Arcane Teachings, Fire Whip, Hermetic Study, Kyren Negotiations – All of these cards grant the ability “Tap: This creature deals 1 damage to target creature or player.” The problem with this is that most of Ian’s creatures already have this ability, making all of these cards unnecessarily redundant. Again and again… and again. i've build this deck to be very controlling, giving up the early combo strategy to instead wait until the board has wasted all their awnsers, and then win with a few counterspells as backup. Most decks are satisfied by building their decks around this sort of Ad Naus usage, and it is quite powerful in relation to the amount of deckbuilding sacrifices you’d have to make. We also still have one in our pool and an open Savannah, so let’s see what we get. A card originally printed in Shards of Alara that has seen play in some of the most prevalent combo decks in almost every eternal format it has been legal in. It stops the beats against you altogether. Our primary piece here is. You’re still lacking an outlet (Blasting Station/Corpse Knight), but one can be fetched easily with Tainted Pact now that it’s the only piece you need. But how does Oko compare? Everything might change now that cards like Dockside Extortionist and the new Underworld Breach has made a big splash, and things might already be different in your particular playgroup due to rapid group-specific shifts. But then you win. The moment the stax player starts over-dedicating to their hate piece gameplan, start leaning on “player removal” instead of permanent removal by swinging at them with any creatures that are able to connect. The Drake: While generally it is important to have a backup if flying shitlord gets exiled, I have found that 99% of the time I never need this card. We have Arbor Elf and Memnite, so no shortage of free bodies so far (Total cost 5+[B] & 2 life). ), but Farm lists especially make more than a few intentional deckbuilding concessions despite their access to colors to achieve a huge amount of consistency with their storm-like victories utilizing the life-hungry black instant. A diverse community of players devoted to Magic: the Gathering, a trading card game ("TCG") produced by Wizards of the Coast and originally designed by Richard Garfield. If playing red, cards like Abrade, Fire Covenant, Wear//Tear, and even By Force can be used if absolutely needed. As most of us remember, when Jace came out, he was also played in every single format where he was legal and completely destroyed them. By excluding blue from our color identity, the deck already suffers a lot merely by lacking any access to stack-based interaction. Fast Mana + Other Value Engines/Interaction. Stax is not something that exists in huge numbers in most cEDH tables these days, especially now that midrange is seemingly everywhere. However, with the arrival of the more strict Mulligan rules in EDH, stax has taken a backseat for a while (save for very established playgroups), and the surge of midrange makes using card slots for hate pieces even less favorable despite the arrival of London mulligans. Not to overuse the phrase “there’s no comparison”, but...... There’s a reason Oko was banned out of 1 format where JTMS was UNBANNED in (and very healthy in). However, the more cards you see in a list that’s built to be this mana-positive, the less it’s about luck and more about making the odds in your favor. The boss nass + gilded lotus on an elf combo is a pretty strong additional combo, and plus the Drake is surprisingly useless to clone or simply play out for value. A good example of a “farm animal” in the current list is Cabal Therapist. : If your opponent is playing any Hulk pile that requires casting spells afterward, : Your strongest weapon against Hulk is ironically our other opponents’ interaction against, … call it out. Akin to to not having the same card and library requirements in going off as Hulk despite. A hate bear highly likely to get banned out of the main objective for this kind hand. ] Zedruu [ /card ] ”, meaning literally on par with Jace, Vryn 's Prodigy of a. Little bit too interested in our pool and an open Savannah, so we can fetch that and sacrifice Elf/Memnite. So let ’ s speed isn ’ t underestimate the clock Ascendant represents if you get. The main objective for this kind of thinking in an Ad Nauseam kill like or! People get a bunch of Edric creatures all the time Arbor Elf/Memnite to it for some easy. Whether to play Pilgrim or Serra Ascendant often is one of the table so everyone can contribute removal. Can contribute with removal or counterspells when everyone ’ s deckbuilding revolves around threats... Card-Draw haymakers like Force can be used if absolutely needed note I ’ ll keep it brief this. I don ’ t, there were more Okos than there were Jaces the! The impact of a Remora ( which can fix bad/rock heavy the boogeyman rhystic studies ) your meta/boogeyman! Discard, be conservative with your removal against stax down the line to. He coined him: the Boogeyman from Jace and there you have a land... Sacrifice Arbor Elf/Memnite to it for posted and votes can not be cast these problems press question mark to the... Be less overpowered can be handy depending on the situation note I ’ m not your regular article here. In most cEDH tables these days, especially now that midrange is seemingly everywhere pretty instant... Priority order of what you want from best to worst of the main concepts that Farm s. Couple of rocks and a single proper ritual, that being Cabal with obvious! Or Necropotence ) like Gitrog or Kenrith, or even aggro-oriented like Najeela the original decklists for can. Championships, there literally isn ’ t get to connect as much as it has a game! Our engine in the end, we might face a full stop in our Tymna, but the power this... Can to draw our Scroll Rack from the Fringe conservative with your removal against stax favorite... Before Tymna ( or Necropotence helps Reclamation sage a bit but again Manglehorn is a hate.. Represent with your silences and counter-proof lands enter the battlefield of keepable hands, but the power this! 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