ANT 2011

[voltron00x]

Let's start a new thread for this deck also.

At one time I considered this deck a non-starter, but I've strongly reconsidered.  While I still haven't pulled the trigger on running this in a tournament, I can see why one would want to do so.  This deck is really, truly brutal.  Outside of a miserable game 1 against Workshops unless you win the die roll and pull a strong hand, there isn't much in the format that wants to sit on the other side of the table from this deck. 

Consider the damage ANT has done in the fall of 09 and into current, taking 2nd at Waterbury and quietly working its way into a few top 8s in PA, including a Finals at Bloomsburg, despite seeing almost no play at all.

This is the build I have in my deck file, as a starting point for discussion:

1 Black Lotus
4 Chrome Mox
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring
4 Ad Nauseam
3 Cabal Ritual
4 Dark Ritual
1 Demonic Consultation
1 Demonic Tutor
4 Duress
1 Imperial Seal
1 Necropotence
3 Tendrils of Agony
4 Thoughtseize
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Brainstorm
3 Chain of Vapor
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Ponder
1 Island
4 Polluted Delta
3 Swamp
1 Tundra
3 Underground Sea
1 Misty Rainforest


Sideboard:
1 Tundra
4 Serenity
1 Virtue’s Ruin
1 Pithing Needle
1 Tormod’s Crypt
4 Dark Confidant
3 Yixlid Jailer

[FunkyMo]

I'd like to give a nod to ANT too - I think in the hands of a skilled pilot it can surprise some people.

I started playing Vintage in November 2010 and chose ANT (over Dredge, the two cheapest I knew of) because it's fun and relatively easy to pick up for a combo deck.  I have to give a lot of credit to the discussion in this thread for helping me with card choices.  If I recall, I started with the old Meandeck ANT list and updated it such that our main decks are nearly identical.

So, knowing nothing, I took the deck to Blue Bell (11/20) and managed to get extremely lucky, both in play and matchups.  I lucksacked the crap out of my Oath opponent round 1, and faced only one Workshops deck (UbaStax, I was super confused when I saw Uba Mask for the first time) going 4-0-2 and getting blown out by Dredge in my quarterfinal match (oops).

Next I took ANT to Bloomsburg (12/11), where I played much better but managed to dodge Spheres left and right (my friend played against three Shops decks - what a bud).  I went 3-1-1 (the loss because my deck crapped out on me) and didn't face Shops until the finals, where I was fortunate enough to split against Espresso Stax.

I'll shut up now because I have few insights to offer other than if I can get super lucky and do well with the deck, starting from scratch in Vintage, then perhaps an experienced pilot can do even better.  (I get the feeling that the experienced players turn their nose up at the deck, choosing something more complex, like TPS.  Only babies pack more than one Tendrils.)

Deck lists: Blue Bell (-2 Flooded Strand, +2 Marsh Flats), Bloomsburg

[voltron00x]

Its interesting that you play no Bobs and no Xantid Swarms.  What made you decide to try that?  If you've been dodging Shops, it would appear that you've been beating blue decks, so perhaps you're showing that the Bobs / XSwarms aren't really necessary?

[mort-]

So I don't have anything to back my thoughts on this up, but I would like to take ANT in a different direction.
I did play ANT in Vintage a bit, but much more in Legacy (even without Mystical). The thing that was always bugging me is the density of threats. I think the deck is inferior to TPS or Bob Tendrils when it comes to a gamestate that isn't dominated by ANT's aggressivsness (oh my.. I'm sorry, I can't explain it better).
But now for my idea:

The Legacyversion I am currently playing plays 12 cantrips and two playsets rituals, together with eight fetchlands. What was pretty awesome is that you don't need your LEDs (which basicly just act as a land-discarder most of the time) anymore to use Infernal Tutor to it's fullest.
So what I am suggesting is a deck with a playset Infernal Tutor, maybe backed up by Frantic Research to discard lands, add stormcount and generally be awesome. The plus is that you don't have to play four Nauseam anymore and generally be able to search better for the things you need.

So, a pretty rough draft from the top of my head:

Lands (13):

4x Polluted Delta
4x Misty Rainforest
2x Underground Sea
1x Island
2x Swamp

Tutoring (7):

1x Demonic Tutor
1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Mystical Tutor
4x Infernal Tutor

Fastmana (17):

5x Moxen
1x Black Lotus
1x Lion's Eye Diamond
1x Mana Crypt
1x Lotus Petal
4x Cabal Ritual
4x Dark Ritual

Cardadvantage (12):

1x Brainstorm
1x Ancestral Recall
1x Ponder
3x Preordain
2x Frantic Search
2x Ad Nauseam
1x Necropotence
1x Yawgmoth's Will

Disruption (6):

3x Duress
3x Thoughtseize

Kill (2):

2x Tendrils of Agony

Which leaves us with three slots, being 1 Hurkyl and 2 Chain of Vapor I guess.

Like I said, I don't have anything to back up those thoughts / list but a single idea based on the resilience of Legacy ANT and the hope that Infernal can be ported to Vintage.

[voltron00x]

In my experience, Infernal Tutor does not translate well.  Without 4 LED, it just isn't effective enough.  A format full of MUD makes it even less effective, unfortunately.

[FunkyMo]

Its interesting that you play no Bobs and no Xantid Swarms.  What made you decide to try that?  If you've been dodging Shops, it would appear that you've been beating blue decks, so perhaps you're showing that the Bobs / XSwarms aren't really necessary?

It's entirely possible that no serious plan for blue-based control is a mistake.  When I first was getting familiar with the deck, I quickly became worried first and foremost by Shops decks, so I was thinking "omgomgomg need anti-Shops tech."  Thus, I ended up with the Serenity plan, which made my splash white.  I would've liked to add Xantid Swarms (and it's certainly still possible) but I figured the Shops matchup was way more important.

I guess against blue-based decks I've always just had enough Duress effects, although there were a few times where I had to go off without knowing several of my opponent's cards and just got lucky.  I've never thought of Bobs in the side, but that makes sense.  It could just be that the blue matchup doesn't need too many cards, and that any extra cards are just diluting the deck.

Just keep in mind that I don't have a good way to test, just whatever people have the night before I go to tournaments with them.  So I would be wary of thinking that I have some super-secret tech - I probably just got lucky again

[chingpaq]

Sirs, i used to play a lot of ANT and got some decent and not-so-nice results in the past. Voltron's main deck and board seems solid (some will really argue the inclusion of Xantid in the SB and i would be one of those)

If i would play ANT this year i would go for 3 Ad Nauseam and 1 Doomsday instead of the 4. Yeah, seems odd. But countless times that I went low on life (through attacks and sometimes through the ANT run itself). I would like an out for this and saw DD can fit the role.

[Commandant]

Matt,
Is there a reason why you don't include Preordain? I've seen complaints about lacking fast colored Mana of the correct type post Ad Nauseam; from my understanding this is why most people choose not to play off colored mox pushing Chrome Mox in their lieu. Preordain fits at 1 CC and can imprint blue. Granted most of the deck is black - still it seems like an excellent addition for supporting card quality and why we play Brainstorm/Ponder.

Correct me if I am wrong as I am curious and have limited experience with ANT.

[voltron00x]

Preordain is probably a good fit; then again I'm somewhat high on that card in general, at the moment.  I like it in Tezz, TPS, etc. and I've been playing it in Legacy ANT.  What do you think we could cut to play Preordain?

[Commandant]

Preordain is probably a good fit; then again I'm somewhat high on that card in general, at the moment.  I like it in Tezz, TPS, etc. and I've been playing it in Legacy ANT.  What do you think we could cut to play Preordain?

Funny you should say that as I thought it was utter shit when spoiled; fortunately I was smart enough to at least try it in a Gush Storm list and it has been phenomenal.

Again with the lack of experience but, how reliant is this deck on Cabal Ritual? I've never favored it/found a situation where it was necessary besides casting Bargain when running Confidant Tendrils or TPS (eventually cut it from pretty much every Storm list I've run in the past year). From the limited testing I did do with ANT I found it difficult reaching Threshold to a point where Cabal Ritual actually mattered. Either I was spent and the yard was full having no business to cast with CR or I was locked down/Mana flooded and it's significance was nil.

[FunkyMo]

Preordain is probably a good fit; then again I'm somewhat high on that card in general, at the moment.  I like it in Tezz, TPS, etc. and I've been playing it in Legacy ANT.  What do you think we could cut to play Preordain?

Funny you should say that as I thought it was utter shit when spoiled; fortunately I was smart enough to at least try it in a Gush Storm list and it has been phenomenal.

Again with the lack of experience but, how reliant is this deck on Cabal Ritual? I've never favored it/found a situation where it was necessary besides casting Bargain when running Confidant Tendrils or TPS (eventually cut it from pretty much every Storm list I've run in the past year). From the limited testing I did do with ANT I found it difficult reaching Threshold to a point where Cabal Ritual actually mattered. Either I was spent and the yard was full having no business to cast with CR or I was locked down/Mana flooded and it's significance was nil.

Cabal Ritual doesn't seem that impressive, but I think if you look at it more as a color washer than a +1 mana source (no threshold) then it pulls its weight.  Most importantly, it can cast a Necropotence off a black source and artifact mana.

Threshold is kind of hit or miss, especially since the games where you've reached threshold are probably the ones you're going to win, but as always you can point to a situation where a +3 ritual was the difference between winning and losing.  Keep in mind that threshold can be pretty easy if you sacrifice all of your lands to Chain of Vapor, or if you EOT Chain of Vapor your Necropotence so you can discard naturally.  In general, I look at CR as a +1 color washer that has the potential to be a (black) Black Lotus.

As for Preordain, I've found myself always wanting an extra cantrip after Ad Nauseam/Necroing and drawing a bunch of topdeck tutors.  Let's just say I've used Ad Nauseam to cantrip after a topdeck tutor.  Not fun.  So despite just defending Cabal Ritual, I'll probably swap in a Preordain for a CR.

If i would play ANT this year i would go for 3 Ad Nauseam and 1 Doomsday instead of the 4. Yeah, seems odd. But countless times that I went low on life (through attacks and sometimes through the ANT run itself). I would like an out for this and saw DD can fit the role.

You've piqued my interest, sir.  Unfortunately, I'm not feeling terribly creative right now so what does a Doomsday pile in ANT look like?  Do you add a few extra cards to the main to support it?  Also, now I'm thinking about adding some number of Doomsday and Emrakul/Shelldock Isle to the side for the Shops matchup, my thoughts being that your best engine against Shops is also BBB (Necro).  Unfortunately, that'll probably be too many SB slots.

EDIT:
The Doomsday/Emrakul/Isle SB plan against Shops is actually just bad.  Wasteland and Tangle Wire completely screw you, plus sphere effects still count towards casting Emrakul.  However, it could be worth it if you can EOT Hurkyl's, then Doomsday on your turn with a cantrip in hand to get Brainstorm.  Total cost: BBB (Doomsday) + U (cantrip) + U (Brainstorm) + 1U (Cloud of Faeries) = 1UUUBBB.  Ugh, maybe not (and it still dies to Wasteland and Tangle Wire).

[chingpaq]

If i would play ANT this year i would go for 3 Ad Nauseam and 1 Doomsday instead of the 4. Yeah, seems odd. But countless times that I went low on life (through attacks and sometimes through the ANT run itself). I would like an out for this and saw DD can fit the role.

You've piqued my interest, sir.  Unfortunately, I'm not feeling terribly creative right now so what does a Doomsday pile in ANT look like?  Do you add a few extra cards to the main to support it?  Also, now I'm thinking about adding some number of Doomsday and Emrakul/Shelldock Isle to the side for the Shops matchup, my thoughts being that your best engine against Shops is also BBB (Necro).  Unfortunately, that'll probably be too many SB slots.

A possible play would be

Hand: Dark Ritual, Doomsday, Brainstorm, 2 random cards, 2 other for protection(optional)
Mana: BU
Play:

Cast Dark Ritual or Black Lotus(1) into Doomsday (2) to form Library: Black Lotus, Yawgmoth's Will, Dark Ritual, Ponder/Ancestral Recall and Tendrils of Agony,
Brainstorm(3, Mana Left: 0) into Lotus, Will, Ritual and return random 2 cards(Library: 2 cards + Ponder, ToA). Cast Lotus(4) into BBB (ML: BBB), Dark Ritual (5, ML: BBBBB),YawgWill (6, ML: BB), Replay Lotus (7) into UUU (ML: BBUUU), Replay Ritual (8, ML:BBBBUUU), Replay Brainstorm (9, ML:BBBBUU) for Ponder/Ancestral Recall
(Library: 2 cards + ToA), then Ponder/AR (10,ML:BBBBU) for ToA, Finally Tendrils (11) using remaining mana (Note: let me know if i did this correctly?)

There are at least 2 other ways. Adding Preordain can also provide other means of enabling DD.

And if i happen to Ad Nauseam my life to 2 without any means of getting to ToA but have mana, drew DD and at least one useful cantrip, you can go down to 1 and use DD to find your way to Tendrils.

An insane way would be to Doomsday and have at least 9 life, cast Ad Nauseam(somehow) for Black Lotus, Lotus Petal, Dark Ritual, Yawgmoth's Will, and Tendrils of Agony which take your life total to 1. Cool