Hi guys,

This time I will talk about a deck that I think is very underestimated, Ad Nauseam. Modern season has begun and it’s time to find the right deck for the win.
Ad Nauseam has all the characteristics to be the right deck to play: it is not too well known, it has 90-10 matchups and obviously is a combo deck (combo decks are always awesome).
As many of you already know the goal of the deck is to play Angel’s Grace followed by Ad Nauseam drawing all the cards in your deck without losing the game. Once you have drawn all the deck the possible ways to finish the opponent are different copies of Simian Spirit Guide paired with Conflagrate or Lightning Storm
The first thing I would like to underline, before presenting the decklist is that this is the kind of combo deck that may use the two combo pieces (Ad Nauseam or [card]Angel’s Grace[card]) in many different ways. Imagine for example that you are facing storm, it will be very difficult to lose the game if you have an Angel’s Grace in your hand. In general having 4 copies of Angel’s Grace gives you an important edge against a lot of combo decks. On the other end, Ad Nauseam is very good against decks with a lot of early disruption, in particular hand disruption. In fact, if you are not under pressure on the board, Ad Nauseam can easily draw you 5+ cards being able to recover your hand.

A standard online decklist is this one:

Lands

4 Gemstone Mine

4 Marsh Flats

2 Temple of Enlightenment

2 Temple of Deceit

1 Swamp

1 Seachrome Coast

1 Plains

1 Tolaria West

1 Island

1 Hallowed Fountain

1 Watery Grave

1 Boseiju, Who Shelters All

Creatures

4 Simian Spirit Guide

Spells

4 Serum Visions

4 Sleight of Hand

4 Ad Nauseam

4 Angel’s Grace

3 Pact of Negation

2 Mystical Teachings

1 Slaughter Pact

1 Peer Through Depths

1 Lightning Storm

4 Pentad Prism

4 Lotus Bloom

3 Phyrexian Unlife

1 Conjurer’s Bauble

Sideboard

1 Slaughter Pact

2 Steel Sabotage

2 Silence

2 Pithing Needle

1 Patrician’s Scorn

3 Leyline of Sanctity

1 Echoing Truth

1 Disenchant

2 Drown in Sorrow

 

I played the deck in many different formats and to me some important changes are needed in order to improve this list.
Starting from the mana base I don’t think that Gemstone Mine is good. You are playing Pentad Prism and Lotus Bloom and a lot of dual lands, there is no need to run Gemstone Mine. In particular, in post sideboard games, this land is horrible. This is because the odds that the game lasts longer are higher and you really don’t want to lose value by finishing the counters on Gemstone Mine.
Boseiju, Who Shelters All I also don’t like. I see it more as a sideboard card, you already have Pact of Negation to protect your combo.
Pact of Negation is the best card you can possibly ever have in this deck. It is so versatile, it can protect your combo, you can pay the 5 with a Lotus Bloom (entering the battlefield on your upkeep) or with a mix of Pentad Prism and lands, but the best thing you can do is to counter their key spell the turn before you win and pay the pact by casting the Angel’s Grace you are gonna use before going off with Ad Nauseam. For all these reasons I recommend to play no less than 4, it is the MVP of the deck.
Another very good card is Peer Through Depths. It is infinitely better than Mystical Teachings which I find really too slow for the modern format.
Finally I will cut at least 2 copies of Phyrexian Unlife. It has a lot of disadvantages; first of all it can be destroyed or bounced, second it costs three mana which means that you won’t have time to cast it and search for a combo piece at the same time and third against Affinity it is not as good as it seems mainly due to Inkmoth Nexus
Talking about the sideboard I always want 4 copies of discard effects (Thoughtseize is the best one) and 3 copies of Leyline of Sanctity which is very good against Zoo and Jund. The 9th card is the combo piece I’m not using in my maindeck (I like more playing Conflagrate maindeck and Lightning Storm in my sideboard because it sometimes happens that you need to cast Conflagrate to slow down the opponent’s race or to kill a Thalia, Guardian of Thraben for example).

According to what I said this is my decklist:

Spells

4 Ad Nauseam

4 Serum Visions

4 Sleight of Hand

4 Peer Through Depths

4 Lotus Bloom

4 Pentad Prism

4 Angel’s Grace

4 Pact of Negation

1 Conflagrate

1 Phyrexian Unlife

Creatures

4 Simian Spirit Guide

Lands

1 Steam Vents

1 Hallowed Fountain

1 Watery Grave

1 Godless Shrine

1 Plains

1 Swamp

3 Island

4 Marsh Flats

4 Scalding Tarn

1 Seachrome Coast

2 Temple of Enlightenment

1 Temple of Deceit

1 Tolaria West

Sideboard

3 Leyline of Sanctity

4 Thoughtseize

1 Hurkyl’s Recall

1 Slaughter Pact

1 Pithing Needle

1 Echoing Truth

1 Swan Song

1 Phyrexian Unlife

1 Tolaria West

1 Lightning Storm

 

SIDEBOARD PLANS:
1) AFFINITY
+1 Hurkyl’s Recall
+1 Slaughter Pact
+1 Pithing Needle
-1 Phyrexian Unlife
-1 Sleight of Hand
-1 SIMIAN SPIRIT GUIDE

This matchup is not bad and is relatively easy to play. You don’t have many choices, the game is die roll dependent.

2) TRON
+1 Pithing Needle
-1 Pact of Negation
The matchup is very good. GR tron basically doesn’t interact with your strategy, the needle is good to stop all their artifacts.

3) SCAPESHIFT
+4 Thoughtseize
+1 Swan Song
+1 Tolaria West
-1 Simian Spirit guide
-2 Sleight of Hand
-2 Lotus Bloom
-1 LAND

Game 1 you have a lot of time to assemble your strategy with multiple pacts backup. In fact it is not easy for them to go off due to your Angel’s Graces and your Pact of Negations. You have to pay attention especially to Cryptic Command and Remand

4) ZOO/JUND
+3 Leyline of Sanctity
+1 Phyrexian Unlife
-1 Simian Spirit Guide
-2 Sleight of Hand
-1 Pact of Negation

I usually keep 3 Pacts because some Zoo decklists run Negate of Swan Song post sideboard. Leyline is very good to stop all their burn spells and the Unlife is obviously great.
The sideboard strategy against Jund is more or less the same.

5) SPLINTER TWIN
+4 Thoughtseize
+1 Swan Song
+1 Slaughter Pace
+1 Tolaria West
-1 Simian Spirit Guide
-3 Sleight of Hand
-1 Lotus Bloom
-1 Land
-1 Phyrexian Unlife

You have to focus on their counters (Dispel, Remand) and their own combo trying to sideboard a lot of disruption.

6) UWR CONTROL
+4 Thoughtseize
+1 Swan Song
+1 Tolaria West
-1 LAND
-1 Simian Spirit Guide
-3 Sleight of Hand
-1 Phyrexian Unlife

The goal here is to protect your combo as much as possible.

The Echoing Truth and the Lightning Storm in my sideboard are for, respectively, cards like Rule of Law or Cranial Extraction effects.
I suggest you try the decklist and become familiar with it. It is very important to pay attention to details in order to dig through your deck as much as possible if you miss a combo piece. For example don’t fetch randomly if you know the last two cards of your deck (because you used a Serum Visions).

I hope you enjoyed, Marcello.