This is really how bad the format is.  This is the true impact of Flash.  Mark Trogdon is playing Islands!

What is the list you are running?  Because frankly I'm not very impressed with these results.

hello all... today i am writing my very first post here on the mana drain, but i have been a long time reader.  after reading these forums as guest one too many times, ive decided to get myself a username and throw in my two cents.  first i would like to thow in a disclaimer and tell you i am years out of the loop in the tourney curcuit, and over one year out of playing a game. 

but this deck is something i have dreamed of for a long time... as a player in the days of ice age, i have always wondered on the power of a three one for one that never actually gets cast... and never really goes away.  sadly, like many great cards in this game it was sidelined on the "hey, this guy should be great" shelf with blokes like lions eye.  as lions eye demonstrated, it only takes one new goofy trick to make übercrap great. 

the mere fact this discussion is the longest running now... eight pages on how 4xgolgari troll can possibly be vintage material?  and the debates go on.  this is why i love this game evan though i never play... i turn my head away for a moment and the entire object has changed.

ok, enough introductory words, i would now like to share my thoughts on the ichorid deck.  i will not claim to know any kind of meta, so there is no sideboard for this list.

to start, it seems there is much debate on the value of hermit druid.  personally i think this version is  too much waiting around on summoning sickness for a deck revolving around hasted critters.  get 2 mana.... cast druid....... activate druid........ at the beginning of upkeep.............  WW Orims Chant with kicker  GG (or just a tendrils to the head somewhere in there)

as for the debate on power... some suggesting that even the last mox leave for concistency, my thought is more mana means more options... timewalk and balance are both instant (or rather sorcery) gameovers.  in a deck lacking that final je ne sais quoi, removing the two instant win sorceries seems a mistake to me.  i consider these two a two off in the 2cc win slot, and the remainder of the deck must therefore follow. 

2cc sorceries like moxes, but to cater to a 2 cc sorcery requires more than one.  therefore, i would go with the tolarian winds plan.  the winds give the biggest bang for the buck over cstudy and bstorm, potentially dumping twenty-odd cards in the yard for a ghoulish next turn.  4x winds with twalkbalance means 6 2cc sorceries, at which point supporting a  X 1  manabase begins to get appealing.  thus, the deck so far consists of:

4x tolarian winds
1x balance
1x timewalk

8x rainbow lands
5x mox
lotus, petal, chrome
(46 cards remaining)

next, the creature base.... first off, i despise this nonesense of 4x troll.... a card that does absolutely nothing but dredge? /(and count as a critter laying on a ghoul, but that barely counts).  ichy and skrachy though, are a given, as is the stinkweed imp.  the main threats heed a pile of black dudes in the yard, and not much else, so there are 12 slots in 3 auto fours.
(34 cards remaining)

4x bazaar
1x ancestral
1x crop rotation
1x vampiric tutor
these are the broken dudes that allow you to get everything and activate the dredge engine.  i refuse to use inperial seal.  sorry, im a purist and portal doesnt exist.  besides vamp is bad enough with the waiting, the thought of waiting a turn on a sorcery that will make me wait a turn is too much waiting, and i hate to wait for things except maybe trams that go somewhere i can sleep.
(27 cards remaining)

therefore, i will use the other instant speed B tutor.  why no entomb?  no really, i leave this question to the magic gurus, but why does not one single ichy deck use entomb.  its about getting things to the graveyard, right?  in the yard is as good as in the hand for half the cards in the deck, and entomb acn grab a dredger, put a deathstroke in hand next turn, pop a ray of revelation, or turn into a cabal therapy in a pinch.  thus, the following is a short entomb board.
1x entomb
1x deathstroke
1x ray of revelation
1x life from the loam
(loam goes along with the full power plan and x1 sorceries, and turns bazaar and winds into midgame draw engines)
(23 cards remaining)

disruption:
4x chalice (and setting to one is not a shot to the foot)
4x Unmask
4x cabal therapy
2x chain of vapor
i agree with every last word the experts have spoken on this section of the deck
(9 cards remaining)

stripmine
3x nether shadow
2x deep analysis
1x galgari grave troll (just to cast off the lotus)
2x undiscovered paradise

there are my thoughts on the ichy deck.  but the real question, for those of you gurus who have read so far,  is why on earth doesnt anyone use entomb?  there must be a simple reason.

tschüß

I think it's pretty ridiculous to assume that you know what your opponent is sideboarding in.  I always change my sideboard for each new tournament to reflect the regional metagame, so if you get my decklist off Star City and think you know what I'm boarding in based on that information, then you are probably wrong.  MORE IMPORTANTLY - The person who is playing the deck will often have a different sideboard strategy than another player playing the same archtype.  I played against THE EXACT SAME DECK with THE EXACT SAME SIDEBOARD played by two different individuals at the same tournament and faced COMPLETELY DIFFERENT sideboard cards. 

The quote stated above suggests that there is a predetermined sideboard plan that you will use in every match vs a given archtype.  If that were the case, then there wouldn't be a lot to think about, you'd side your cards in, he sides his cards in and you play a textbook match-up just like in your testing scenarios.  In real life it doesn't work that way, so you can just side in your cards, attempt some kind of bluff by sideing in more cards and then siding them out, or just side in the full 15.  I think the safe bet is to just to put the 15 in there and not really give your opponent any extra info.   

Of course if your opponent is a random n00b you probably can guess their sideboard, but then again, if they're a random n00b you'll probably win anyway, so why even worry about that?

While it's true that there may be some "obvious" cards that decks board against other decks, there are often new/tech/obscure cards that some people use, and like someone mentioned earlier, if you can cause your opponent to think you are borading in cards when infact you are not, you have gained an advantage.