Annul in U/R Fish

[GlockAndRoll]

Looking around at different decks the other day, I realised that annul can be amazingly powerful against almost any deck out there. Dont believe me? Here's a list of stuff seen in general T1 that it stops

- Food Chain
- Animate Dead/ Necromancy/ Dance
- Standstill
- Curiosity
- SoLoMoxen, all other artifact acceleration
- Hidden Gibbons
- Survival of the fittest
- Blood moon
- Back to basics
- Chalice of the Void
- Crucible of Worlds
- Goblin Charbelcher
- Isochron Scepter (you knever know...)
- Stasis (if someone has enough balls to play it )
- Most key cards of Stax, slaver etc.. besides TFK and Welder.

Especially now with Aggro workshop and workshop decks in general getting more popular, along with CoW, wouldn't Annul be a good card to maindeck in U/R Fish, or fish decks in general?
In ALOT of matchups, it could serve alot better than daze, or F/I that some people play. Don't get me wrong, I love daze, and see completely how it has a great place in fish, but I dont think that it would really hurt the deck to remove 1-2 daze, stifle or F/I and replace it with Annul. 2 Annuls, along with 2 crucible maindecked, and possibly an extra basic island could give a much better chance to fish against the crucible lock. I havn't really tested it, but i'm going to a t1 tourney on sunday(no proxies, so budget fish for me but i t8ed last time), and I plan on running 2 annuls maindeck.
Thanks for hearing me out and comments would be appreciated.

-GlockAndRoll

[HuntedWumpus]

I am a huge fan of annul and have been running it recently in several decks, but not fish. Here's why.

Annul is best used to take out a card played turn 1-2  that much mana acceleration was invested into, however. Fish should not have blue untapped during these turns. If you do, then there is something wrong with the build/hand.

Secondly in a deck that can run off low mana, an early Daze is usually not that problematic. I run annul in my builds because I cannot afford to be dazing in Landstill. Also look at daze in the situation presented in the above paragraph. It is strictly superior in that in can take out any spell and that It still allows you to start development of your dorks.

[Cross]

I recently ran three in my sideboard at great barrinton. I think this card is golden in the sideboard but I'm hardpressed to play it mainboard because of random.dec. I always had uses for it when I saw it, including countering a memory jar vs. charlbelcher and countering a mox that would instantly be welded into a platinum angel. i can attest that the card feinitely helped me into top 8, and will recieve a future sideboard space because crucible is the card of the moment, but it's application as you showed is much wider.

Edit: Also, it's very easy to sideboard in, which is sometimes a difficult task with fish...it's easily dropped in daze's slot.

[kill doug]

annul is a great card choice for the meta right know. you never know when a annoying little oath of druids will pop out and kill you right, but there are 2 problems with it.

1st annul is only a 1 st turn counter because second turn fish should be tapped out out. You must remember that fish is a aggro deck not control.

2nd the reason not to board them is fish has way to many choices in its board all ready (Rebs,Bebs,Rack and Ruin, Null rod,Energey Flux, Maze of ith,Fire/ice,Sword of fire/ ice, sigil of sleep) So many choices And annul just can't compare to racks and energy flux.

[Cross]

1st annul is only a 1 st turn counter

not true...theres always 3rd turn, 4th turn, 5th turn, etc.....

fish should be tapped out out. You must remember that fish is a aggro deck not control.

This is why you run force of will, and a great second turn play for fish is standstill....a control card.

2nd the reason not to board them is fish has way to many choices in its board all ready

I agree with you here....but if workshop is extremely prevelant in your metagame it's really worth fitting in. I prefer it over energy flux because something this can be welded in and out during your upkeep....or even sacrificed during your upkeep as with belcher and slaver. I'm not saying it's not a gamebreaking card, I'm just saying I prefer to run more annul than energy flux, which I do usually leave 1 space for.

[leviat]

1st annul is only a 1 st turn counter because second turn fish should be tapped out out. You must remember that fish is a aggro deck not control.

What do you tap out to play on the first turn in fish? The only card I've seen played first turn consistantly is Grim.  Everything else is 2cc. And if one were to stick with that same logic, Stifle would never have been played.

I think Annul is an excellent card because it's an answer for your first turn. Against a workshop deck that can drop Jugs and other 4/4's so easily on Turn 1 (before you go Cloud + Stanstill), you'll be hard pressed to find a better answer.

[KitzuneNinja]

The thing with Annul in Fish is:

You got the edge - You can nuke a win con/ troublesome permanent before it enters play/ etc etc

You dont have to drop something that possibly prevents you from breaking your opponents plan on turn 1-2, because you can stop it. This gives you the advantage of playing the "wait and see game". If your opponent tags along with you and play the same game you can drop a Cloud of Farie - You have gained virtual tempo, because now you have both put a threat into play and still can answer their possible threat.

Plus - The Mirrodin annuls looks cute foiled

[Nameless]

While I doubt it's a card you'd want in the main deck...  Considering the power level of quick Artifacts currently being used, and the lack of mana acceleration in Fish, having SB Annuls to increase the likelyhood of having a counter available ASAP isn't a bad idea at all.

[bebe]

I've tried Annul in Fish and other blue builds. I've never been a big fan. Even with the prevalence of targets i would rayther run Energy Flux in the side. In the finals of the ontario vintage championships won by Duncan MacGregor he pulled out Fluxes from the side to defeat Rich ( Shock Wave) in the finals who was playing a control workshop variant. It sealed the game for him.
I dropped Annuls in my side as well as a Collosus is better handled with a number of other solutions ( Echoing Truth, Hurkyls, etc.)

[doomhed]

if you look at my U/G decklist from Newington, you will see 3 maindeck annuls, this was the SHIT all day long. i countered the following with them

3 crucible
2 standstill
3 curiosity
6 moxes
2 animte enchantments
2 loti
1 bargain (on his first turn)

they are why I top 8'd. I was also the only U/G madness deck present.

[BreathWeapon]

After playing 4xAnnul MD in Landstill and Fish, I have to say that the card has single handedly kept me playing both Decks in the current Workshop-Aggro and Crucible Metagame. It's everything Stilfe always wanted to be, and it's a budget players Mana Leak. People should give this card much more respect than they are now.

What is this card bad against?

Lets use a scale from Bad->Good->Great->Fantastic. This scale is intended to be arbitrary, so don't rip my head off if you happen to disagree with any of the assigned values. However, do consider that Fish and Landstill players have used 2-3 Stifle MD in the past and then consider how much better Annul is vs the Field..

4cc (6 Mana Accelerants and 1-2 Crucible or Isochron Scepters) Good

HULK (6-8 Mana Accelerants, Perncious Deeds and Back To Basics) Good

Drain Slaver (8 Mana Accelerants, 1 Memory Jar, 2-3 Mindslavers, 2-3 FAT and SB Blood Moons.) Great

Mono-U (6-7 Mana Accelerants, 3-4 B2B, 3-4 Chalice, SB Propaganda, SB Control Magic) Great

Landstill (2 Mana Accelerants, 4 Disks, 4 Standstill, 1-2 Crucible) Good

Fish (1 Mana Accelerant, 3 Null Rod, 1-2 Crucible, 4 Standstill, 4 Curiousity) Good

U/g Madness (3 Null Rods, 1-2 Crucibles and SB Back to Basics) Bad

GAT (4 Mana Accelerants and SB Null Rods) Bad

FCG (5-7 Mana Accelerants, 4 Food Chains, SB Null Rods, SB Crucibles, SB Blood Moons) Good

Ravager (Their Entire Deck) Fantastic

Workshop Prison (Hard Counters everything but their Land and Draw Engine for U) Fantastic

Workshop Aggro (Same as above, except you can now Counter their "Draw Engines" such as Survival or Chains etc) Fantastic

Storm Combo (10-12 Mana Accelerants and Necro/Bargain) Good

Dragon (8 Mana Accelerants, 7-8 Animates, 3 Compulsions, SB Pernicious Deeds) Great

Belcher (10-12 Mana Accelerants, 4 Chromatic Spheres, 4 Belchers) Great

[Nastaboi]

This is slighty off topic, since it's about Annul in U/R fish. Yet my question is, is Annul still playable in U/R/G fish/WTF where you can run oxidize? Or in other words, is it better than Oxidize?

[Nameless]

This is slighty off topic, since it's about Annul in U/R fish. Yet my question is, is Annul still playable in U/R/G fish/WTF where you can run oxidize? Or in other words, is it better than Oxidize?

Well, Oxidize doesn't do much to stop Enchantments, so I'd have to give that a 'yes'.  I think 4 Annuls may be a bit much, as 2-3 seems a bit more appropriate, but at any rate it's obviously very good right now against the field.

[dicemanx]

This is slighty off topic, since it's about Annul in U/R fish. Yet my question is, is Annul still playable in U/R/G fish/WTF where you can run oxidize? Or in other words, is it better than Oxidize?

Well, Oxidize doesn't do much to stop Enchantments, so I'd have to give that a 'yes'.  I think 4 Annuls may be a bit much, as 2-3 seems a bit more appropriate, but at any rate it's obviously very good right now against the field.

Except that there are few Enchantments that WTF/URgFish needs to worry about, so Oxidize might be a bit better. The problem with Annul is that it doesn't do you much good if you top-deck one after a problematic artifact already hit play, or if an artifact enters play via a Welder. On the other hand, Annul is superior to Oxidize against artifacts like Trinisphere, Triskelion, Mindslaver, Sundering Titan if they get hard-cast.

If you run green, Oxidize might be a bit more flexible, and would probably have a slight edge.

[Chaos Blade]

That is what im messign with. Annul seems better right now as It can stop turn 1 spheres which shuts down WTFr. Also how are your results with Gayr verus workshops? Also Oxidize is sometime to hard to cast as your green source will be hit alot with strips, but you should have a blue source on the field.[/quote]

[Kerith]

You say, that Annul is good, partly because it can counter Moxen. But countering Moxen is horribly inefficent (CMC(Annul) > CMC(Mox)).
(edit: "you" != chaos blade, but all those who stated Moxen (or rather mana acc.) as possible Annul targets)

Also, since you have to keep blue mana open because they might have something costs you tempo. This is the same problem that causes Annul to be weak in Mirrodin block draft: While there are a lot of artifacts, you have to counter the first they play most of the time because you certainly don't want to give your opponent a free Time Walk by holding Annul (Time Walk because if you always keep U open you virtually missed a land drop).

So, Annul can be very good, but I rather play cards that are always good, at least in the maindeck.

[Chaos Blade]

I'll have to back that as I never wanted to counter moxen with it. Im beginning to think Annul is mainly useful verus workshop prison since it can counter a first turn Sphere and other stuff, but then again testing can only tell.

[BreathWeapon]

I have won entire games by Countering Moxen with Annul or Mana Leak, so I'm biased here.  Paying U to deprive the opponent of a Mana Source  is a potent tool, especially for a Tempo Deck.

Also, that argument is really hypocritical if you run Oxidize in WTF/r, because half of its original justification for being in the MD was Mox Removal.

Again, I think the virtual Tempo argument is also weak. The same can be said for any Answer in Magic. Plow is pretty bad when there are no creatures on the board, but that doesn't stop us from running it. If you think Annul's "Virtual" Tempo is bad (God I hate these Tempo Babble Terms), you obviously didn't play with Stifle which was much worse.

The card may not be Mana Drain, but I can assure it has single handedly turned around more games vs Stax and company than I care to remember. Fish needs more hard counters vs high threat density decks, and Daze doesn't cut it. If your not satisfied countering 4cc's Moxen and Crucibles, board Annul out for REB.

[xaltair]

Keeping the opponent's mana down is important when playing fish, that's why i always stifle their fetchland if i can, and i do sideboard 2 annuls. I didn't get a chance to use them, since i didn't draw them in the match-ups that i sided them in, but i'll still keep them in the sideboard, i believe they're very good since they're a hard counter.

It's important to counter the opponent's artifacts/enchantments especially when everyone plays with crucible these days.  

[Kerith]

I have won entire games by Countering Moxen with Annul or Mana Leak, so I'm biased here.  Paying U to deprive the opponent of a Mana Source  is a potent tool, especially for a Tempo Deck.

The only games you win, or rather don't lose, because you counter Moxen that I can think of are games where they have Welder and a target in their graveyard but nothing to exchange for it. But perhaps you can give me some examples?

Also, that argument is really hypocritical if you run Oxidize in WTF/r, because half of its original justification for being in the MD was Mox Removal.

The thread is about "U/R Fish", so I assume we are talking about Gay/r.

Again, I think the virtual Tempo argument is also weak. The same can be said for any Answer in Magic. Plow is pretty bad when there are no creatures on the board, but that doesn't stop us from running it. If you think Annul's "Virtual" Tempo is bad (God I hate these Tempo Babble Terms), you obviously didn't play with Stifle which was much worse.

To compare Plow in 4cc with Annul in Gay/r are is plain bad. Plow handles creatures that are in play, not just those that are being played (can you see 4cc running Remove Soul?), so you don't have to keep W open AND 4cc is not stricly a tempo based deck like Gay/r is.
Also I did play with Stifle (to be exact, never with less than 4 between maindeck and sideboard before CoW became popular) but Stifle is an answer to things that you have no other answers for.

The card may not be Mana Drain, but I can assure it has single handedly turned around more games vs Stax and company than I care to remember. Fish needs more hard counters vs high threat density decks, and Daze doesn't cut it. If your not satisfied countering 4cc's Moxen and Crucibles, board Annul out for REB.

Hm .. how often did you play the 4cc on Gay/r matchup, if I may ask?

[BreathWeapon]

Let me help you out here,

1) I'm not countering Moxen vs Workshops, I'm countering Moxen vs Control. Workshops have threats to be dealt with, like Trinisphere and Chalice=2.

2) I'm discussing all variations of Fish, because it's equally relevant to all of them. I was passively making a comment to Choas Blade, because we've had previous discussion on the matter.

3) I wasn't making a comparison between Annul and STP, that's obviously ignorant. I wast trying to imply that no matter what the card is, we except its weaknesses for its strengths.

Stifle is terrible right now. Can it Counter Trinisphere? Chalice=2? Blood Moon? Chains of Mephistophelese? Sundering Titan? Triskelion? Juggernaut? No. Stifle doesn't answer anything relevant right now, IMO.

As a side note, you can't cast Stifle from beneathe a Standstill either.

4) How long have I played Gay/r with MD Annul vs 4cc? Roughly 14 games I think, switching sides. How many games have I played Gay/r vs 4cc? Probably way too many over the course of Work/Study.

If your trying to allude that Daze or Stiflle would be better vs 4cc, I'd agree with you. I almost always board them out for REBs. However, Annul has proven sufficient in the match up as far as I'm concerned for game 1. If I lose a little ground vs 4cc and gain a lot of ground vs Workshops, I'm down.

[Nastaboi]

The problem with Annul is that it doesn't do you much good if you top-deck one after a problematic artifact already hit play

That's why Oxidize and Shatter are 1st pics in MD5 limited, while Annul being around 5th pick. You'll never have one when you need it, and if you signal it your opponent will just play nonartifact fatty instead. I know this is a whole different format, but same reasonings apply here. If Remove Soul costed U and removed countered creature card from the game, would 4cc players play it over STOP?

[Covetous]

The STP:Annul comparison is a little pointless--comparing removal and countermagic is not really fair due to the nature of the spell types and the strategies behind them.  Think about this--would you play Duress in Fish if it cost U?  True, Duress is not the same as Annul, but they both cost one mana and can deal with some of the same spells in a proactive manner.  I look at it like this:  Annul is good versus Workshop decks, which can cause trouble for Fish.  Considering the power of crucible (which is seeing play in 4cc) against Fish, Annul isn't dead vs. 4cc either (or of course it can be removed to FoW).  Any low-cost counter is good for fish, that's why it runs free counters like Daze even though they can really suck in many situations.  Annul is no different, except that it retains potency late-game unlike Daze.  Keeping U open for annul as opposed to stifle is similar, and yet generally annul will prevent the occurrence of threats that really hinder you or make you lose, while stifle is generally just used for tempo and sneaky tricks (not that such things are inconsequential).