Sideboarding

Preamble

In this chapter we will present the concepts and elements to consider when building your sideboard and against some of the more resilient archetypes to meta shifts. Obviously with new printings or different metagames these concepts may change so please consider what decks you expect to face and amend accordingly. Some of this will overlap with what is discussed in the Playing Around Interaction section.

List Assumptions

There will need to be some assumptions made on the list you are playing, even despite flex slots available. These assumptions are that you will run, at a minimum, the following cards in your main deck configuration:

• 4-8 Doomsday
• 4 Dark Ritual
• 2-3 Lotus Petal
• 1-2 Street Wraith
• 1 Edge of Autumn
• 1 Lion's Eye Diamond
• 4 Force of Will
• 3-8 Other interaction slots such as discard effects or Daze
• 0-3 Pile cards such as Ideas Unbound or Pact of Negation
• 8-12 Cantrips
• 1 Consider
• 8 fetchlands
• 0-3 Basic lands
• 4-6 Dual lands

Your list may look very different but hopefully the principles of how to calculate what to board in/out remain universal enough that it will still apply, whether you are a running a Turbo list or a Control one.

Sideboard Tools

Generally, when constructing your sideboard, you need to both have a good grasp on what the metagame you are expecting to face looks like and to have cards that are applicable to multiple matchups where possible. Trying to run silver bullets for archetypes which you have a bad matchup with, but whose meta penetration is very low, is a misuse of potential card slots. Likewise, dedicating too many slots to a deck that is considered tier 1 could mean you get overrun by all the other decks that you are likely to face in a normal, healthy metagame.

Most sideboard tools at your disposal can be attributed to dealing with certain types of opposing interaction or game plans, although in some cases, there are slots that fulfil multiple roles. Knowing what weaknesses you need to shore up in what matchups, and when to respect something and when to accept or ignore it, is a key skill in general deck construction.

The following categories should be consider broad sub-groups and, like our maindeck configuration, are based on some assumptions of what is being run. As the deck can have many splash colour options it is good to be familiar with what tools you might be able to work with to achieve an effect under each group in order to have the required tools available. It should be mentioned that diversifying your tools, even with similar effects is a good idea if you expect cards like Meddling Mage to be prominent.

Permanent Removal

Permanent removal is anything that can deal with hateful interaction such as Chalice of the Void, Deafening Silence, Counterbalance, Trinisphere or Narset, Parter of Veils. Normally it can also deal with creature based interaction too but not always. There is a lot of overlap between the two categories however the permanent removal section is generally a bit broader. Often is is favourable to have only permanent removal then maybe 1 additional flex slot of creature removal depending on what is expected to be faced or what your colour requirements allow.

One item on the list which may look out of place is Force of Negation (FoN). FoN provides dual utility in being able to be brought in against opposing combo decks as part of the 4. Anti-Combo package but also can function as pseudo removal by preventing problem permanents like Trinisphere from ever entering the battlefield in the first place.

You probably want 2-4 slots dedicated to this role. If running four FoN then you can consider adding maybe 1-2 extra slots at most or to save those for creature removal options.

Creature Removal

Creature removal is normally more dedicated for just creatures. A lot of the tools listed above can also be used to remove them but below are some of the more dedicated options which haven't yet been listed.

You likely want only 1-2 slots dedicated to this role.

Anti-Blue

These are cards that tend to be biased towards stopping blue-based strategies from interacting favourably. Some may have relevance in other matchups but that is their main purpose.

You probably want 1-4 slots dedicated to this role.

Anti-Combo

These are cards that tend to be geared towards preventing other proactive combo decks from initiating or implementing their plans. They tend to be cheap disruptive cards that are designed to interact with the opponent.

You probably want 2-4 slots dedicated to this role. As mentioned before you can overlap these slots alongside the 1. Permanent Removal slots in the form of FoN.

Anti-Graveyard

These are cards designed to interact with the graveyard. They tend to remove cards from a graveyard, either in a targeted or non-targeted fashion. They should be thought of as Hard anti-graveyard cards or Soft anti-graveyard cards. Hard hate tends to remove the usage of graveyards entirely whilst soft temporarily removes either a graveyard or few targeted cards from the graveyard.

If using Leyline of the Void you likely want to run 4, if not then 1-3 slots should suffice. Some tools like Flusterstorm or FoN have very good utility in a lot of the matchups that utilise the graveyard so in some circumstances you may be able to fight those type of decks without dedicated interaction to bring in.

Mana Assets

These are cards that help reinforce your manabase in some way. They may be an extra instance of a splash colour, additional basis to fight against Wasteland strategies or other mana based tools to use.

This role is the most dependant on your main deck configuration and thus you may want between 0-3 slots dedicated to this role.

Alternate Win Conditions

These are cards that can provide an alternate way to win that supplements the primary Doomsday plan or, in the case of a complete transformative sideboard replaces it entirely. Some of the cards have additional utility such as a second Thassa's Oracle increasing your blue card count by effectively two (as you can now pitch either Oracle to a Force effect). This is good vs matchups where you know you want to maximise having free interaction.

There isn't a recommended number to run for this role however if you are doing a full transformational sideboard, it may take up the majority of your sideboard so be mindful if choosing this strategy.

Sideboarding Strategies

Below we shall present some primary archetypes of legacy decks that you will likely encounter in the meta and present some general sideboarding theories to follow when facing them. These have been crowd-sourced from some well established players with plenty of experience behind them.

The archetypes will be listed with some key deck examples of the archetype. Hopefully, even if the metagame changes, these high level archetypes will still be applicable. Each archetype will have a brief description followed by the sort of cards you want to bring in and take out post-sideboarding. Often, if you are unsure of how to gain a space in the deck to board in an additional card it is worth considering removing a Lotus Petal or Preordain depending on the matchup. Finally a brief guide to what sort of hands to keep and what sort of game plan to have will be written, accompanied with some examples of the archetype.

Graveyard Strategies

Graveyard strategies can normally be considered quite fast / explosive. They tend to rely on the graveyard for advantage but can sometimes have a plan B that allows them to circumnavigate its usage. This is the key matchup set to bring in the Anti-Graveyard tools, probably all of them, from your sideboard. You generally want to trim some of the slower elements from your deck as you want to aim for a swift kill. If you have tools like Cavern of Souls or Pyroblast in the main deck, then these can be taken out as often they will not interact with what the opponent could bring in. You can also trim a land, often a basic Island, and potentially one or more copies of Predict (unless Predict is your only pile draw card). Your mana base will not be pressured so you can aggressively fix by fetching dual lands and not need to worry about not being able to achieve for Ideas Unbound (if you run it). If the opposing deck includes a lot of hand disruption then bringing in cheap interaction such as Veil of Summer, Force of Negation or Flusterstorm if you have it can also help buy time to allow you to combo off. Normally removal is not effective against these strategies.

If you are running Leyline of the Void then either mulliganing aggressively for it or for a fast combo is a good idea. If you are on a mix of the softer graveyard permission like Surgical Extraction or Tormod's Crypt then finding a hand with one of these and / or some light permission like Daze can be effective. Again, trying to achieve a quick win is favoured as often the graveyard decks can skimp on stack based interaction however do be mindful of tools like Mindbreak Trap which can be be brought in or opposing Surgical Extractions or similar. If you end up with a slower hand then mitigate their disruption with your soft permission and try and find a Doomsday as quickly as possible.

Examples of this archetype include:

• Dredge
• Reanimator
• Hogaak variants

Blue-Based Control

Blue based control can represent a number of archetypes however they generally use a mix of cantrips, removal spells and countermagic to draw out the game and gain advantage through it going long. Normally the win conditions utilised are not very fast to deploy or are slow to get going, often relying more on defense than aggression. Bringing the tool suite from the anti-blue package is normally most effective with some consideration given to needing to bring in Permanent Removal too as often you can face cards like Deafening Silence, Counterbalance or Back to Basics. Boarding out cards that are effective in fast games is a good idea as these matches will tend to be longer. Cards like Lion's Eye Diamond, Lotus Petal, Daze, Lim-Dûl's Vault, Baleful Strix and Unearth are good considerations for taking out.

You want to keep any hand that has a good mix of serviceable spells and relevant lands. Having at least one piece of 1 for 1 interaction like Pyroblast, Duress or Veil of Summer is really strong here. You need to be mindful of what is worth fighting over in these matchups so as not to be distracted on your own gameplan. It is better to hold on to your interaction to protect your own combo than to disrupt some of the grindy control elements your opponent might use. Things like a first casting of Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath or the playing of a Null Rod can often be ignored (hand permitting). There is some consideration with preventing something like Sylvan Library or Jace the Mind Sculptor resolving if you expect the game to go on too long but otherwise these can also be disregarded in favour of progressing your own plan. Threats you should consider fighting are cards like Leovold, Emissary of Trest as this disrupts our combo and provides a not-insignificant pressure on our life total. Often, if presented with the opportunity with an early Doomsday you should take it. Cavern of Souls means that you can commit to a pass-the-turn pile across multiple turns and still manage to circumnavigate the majority of what interaction they can bring.

Any green based examples of this archetype also tend to run Endurance so watch out when trying to aggressively go off in the face of no countermagic.

Examples of this archetype include:

• Bant Control
• Miracles
• Sharkstill
• Stryfo Pile
• Jeskai Mentor

Delver Strategies

Delver strategies are one of the most common found in legacy and one of the more difficult ones for Doomsday to face against. The archetype tends to land a cheap, aggressive threat which can then close out the game, backed up by cheap disruption. Racing these decks is difficult due to the high amount of interaction they bring but falling into the long game can result in one of their threats providing heavy pressure. You want to bring in some elements of the anti-blue package however consideration could also be more focussed on Mana assets.

Delver strategies try to limit your resources so bring cards like Carpet of Flowers in means you negate their soft permission and mana denial plan. Some pilots like to bring in creature removal for their threats however a lot of the time, trying to fight the Delver player on the ground results in wasting time and playing into their strategy. If on a more control style build you should consider slowing down a little to ensure resilience against their disruption and take out cards like Lion's Eye Diamond, Lotus Petal, Lim-Dûl's Vault and Personal Tutor. Force of Will and Daze are both considerations for removal too, however you should decide to keep one or the other and this could be dependent on being on the play vs being on the draw or how much you feel your mana is constrained.

Some pilots prefer to try and utilise speed to their advantage. This can either be through trying to resolve Doomsday as quickly as possible or, trying to resolve Doomsday and avoid passing the turn. For this latter one, maximising free cycle effects and adding in mana efficient interaction like Pact of Negation can be important.

If possible you want to avoid keeping a hand that is too all-in and preferably have multiple mana sources at your disposal as Wasteland and Stifle can both be a concern. Aggressively fetching your basic lands is advantageous unless you think you have enough resilience to ignore any Wasteland effects. Try not to feel pressured to jam too quickly but be mindful that cards like Lightning Bolt and Berserk with Invigorate can give them the extra reach required to finish you quickly. Stifle is the scariest tool in the arsenal of these decks as it gets around Cavern of Souls and Veil of Summer so removing that via discard is a priority. Try to avoid playing into Daze and avoid fighting over their threats if you have the luxury to do so.

Examples of this archetype include:

• Delver
• Ninjas
• Stiflenought
• Infect
• Shadow

Creature-Based Strategies

These look to both disrupt and pressure the opponent via a large creature presence. Often these decks rely on tools like Aether Vial or Green Sun's Zenith to increase the speed and likelihood that they can commit their threats to the board. They tend to not run stack based or hand based disruption, instead relying on permanent based interaction. You want to bring in your permanent and creature based removal for these matchups. You can likely trim elements such as Duress, Thoughtseize, Cavern of Souls, Pyroblasts or Veil of Summer type effects.

If you have a fast kill in hand you can keep that with a reasonable chance of getting there. The only potential disruption to consider is Mindbreak Trap, Endurance or Surgical Extraction effects for same turn wins and something like Deafening Silence, Ethersworn Canonist, Thalia, Guardian of Thraben or Choke for pass-the-turn wins. Having a piece of removal in your starting hand is favourable but not something you should mulligan too aggressively towards. Try to avoid needing to go for Unearth based wins as they could run tools like Elvish Reclaimer or Knight of the Reliquary that could fetch Bojuka Bog or have an on-board Scavenging Ooze or Containment Priest. Speed is normally better in these matchups.

Examples of this archetype include:

• Death and Taxes
• Goblins
• Maverick

Fast Combo

These decks are on a plan similar to ours. Get the opponent dead fast and preferably in a single turn. They tend to feature similar disruption in order to circumnavigate opposing countermagic or interaction. Often they use cards like Thoughtseize, Duress, Unmask, Veil of Summer and Defense Grid to try and get their combo through. If they are blue based combo then they will rely on countermagic, perhaps in conjecture with other tools, in order to force through the win. Against non-blue based combo you should focus on balancing defense with offense. As much interaction as is relevant should be brought in. Cards like Flusterstorm, Veil of Summer, Spell Pierce and Mindbreak Trap should be brought in.

If the opposing combo has a single key combo piece or a reliance on the graveyard then Surgical Extraction can also be considered to be brought in. Take out things like Cavern of Souls, basic Island, slower cards like Lim-Dûl's Vault, maindeck Pyroblasts, any maindeck removal and potentially Predict/Unearth if you are running Ideas Unbound. If you are against blue based combo then the anti-blue suite should be brought in as well as other disruption. Remove things like Lion's Eye Diamond, Lim-Dûl's Vault, Unearth, Predict, basic Swamp and maindeck removal.

You want to keep a hand that is either fast or heavy in disruption. Depending on the matchup and speed of the opposing combo you may wish to mulligan aggressively for Force of Will when on the draw however this could leave you with an unplayable hand so it is more sensible to keep a balanced 7 and accept that you might get Force checked in the first turn of the game. Many combo decks aim to reduce your life total to 0 therefore it can be risky progressing a pass-the-turn pile as it may give them the opportunity they need however you could be under threat of having your combo pieces discarded if you don't take an opportunity.

The specific matchup and your hand composition should help inform you of the decision to take. Try to balance finding your own plan whilst disrupting theirs and again work out the threat assessment of certain cards. Cards like Daze will lose value as the match develops so consider using them aggressively unless you have a Force of Will to pitch them to. It might be better to use your mana to hold up disruption over using your cantrips to full turn efficiency.

Examples of this archetype include:

(Non-blue based)

• ANT
• Belcher
• TES
• Turbo Depths

(Blue-based)

• Omnitell
• Sneak and Show
• Doomsday
• High Tide

Stompy Strategies

Stompy strategies are defined by trying to utilise cards like Chalice of the Void and Blood Moon coupled with fast mana from cards like Ancient Tomb, City of Traitors, Chrome Mox and Simian Spirit Guide to try and lock out the opposing deck and deploy fast-ramping threats like Goblin Rabblemaster, Thoughtknot Seer or Arcbound Ravager to end the game. They normally run a suite of permanent based disruption cards and, if in , Pyroblast effects to disrupt our strategy. It is best to bring in permanent removal to deal with their static disruption. You should consider taking out cards like any maindeck Pyroblast effects, Veil of Summers, Flusterstorms and cards like Thoughtseize, Duress and maybe some number of Preordains. Cavern of Souls stays in as sometimes they can deploy a Chalice of the Void X = 2 which Cavern gets around.

You want a hand that can prevent their disruption if deployed early or circumnavigate it by either having a quick (and resilient) kill or having a slightly slower but deterministic one. Be mindful that they may have a threat heavy hand with little disruption or a disruption heavy hand with no threats. Knowing which it is can be difficult but you should try and assess what pieces you can ignore and what must be dealt with. The scariest card from a Stompy deck is probably Thoughtknot Seer as it represents both disruption and pressure in a single card. Force of Negation is one of the best tools for beating this strategy.

Examples of this archetype include:

• Moon Stompy
• Initiative
• 12 Post

Hybrid Archetypes

Not every deck can be nicely categorised and often decks will exhibit elements from multiple of the archetypes listed. When facing them you have to try and assess which parts of their strategy you most need to interact with in order to facilitate your gameplan or to prevent theirs. At the end of the day this comes down with experience and if a tool you have seems to fit against a deck that is sligtly spicy or counter-intuitive to what has been written above then do not be afraid to go with your gut. Just be mindful that you cannot hedge against everything without severely diluting your primary gameplan. Accepting that sometimes you will lose to an oddball card or a very specific silver bullet like Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver is fine.

Below are a few examples of decks that could fit multiple archetypes and the elements to consider when facing them:

8-Cast

Part Stompy deck and part blue based control deck. This deck can be difficult to deal with. They will have both Force of Will and Chalice of the Void post board so you will want to consider balancing out permanent removal and your anti-blue suite for the match. Better to focus on the 8+ counterspells post board than the 4 Chalices.

Esper Vial

Part creature based deck and part blue based control, their disruption suite tends to be a mix of Force of Wills and Force of Negations coupled with cards like Meddling Mage and other hatebear type effects. You will definately want your anti-blue suite along with some additional permanent and/or creature removal to help face them. Disguising what deck you are on pre-board can help avoid any relevant Meddling Mage naming against you.

Aluren

Part combo deck and part blue based control, they tend to rely on just pitch countermagic coupled with cards like Leovold, Emissary of Trest. You want to bring in anti-blue cards but be mindful they can play a relatively fast combo to win.

Elves

Part creature deck and part combo deck, they can kill swiftly but often have a lot of creature based interaction they can deploy. Having 1 for 1 answers to their combo items is effective but consideration should be given to other permanents they can run. Some lists may also run discard effects. With the printing of Allosaurus Shepherd these decks can bypass a lot of your disruption suite so aiming for a quick combo is pretty key.

Another example of this combination would be Depths.

Oops All Spells

Part graveyard deck and part combo deck, they are popular and more resilient with the modal double faced land cards. You should be okay boarding in a similar fashion when facing reanimator to maximise early disruption and interaction and play a slightly more controlling role.

Closing Words

Hopefully this guide provides some of the thought processes needed to approach matchups. When you get a list that you like and become familiar with I would recommend having a go at a sideboard guide writing exercise. Even if you would rather try to netdeck one for convenience and end up disregarding your own, it's a good way to consider how to approach a matchup and what the relative value of the cards in your list, both main and side, have. If you still find you struggle with the theory behind a given matchup then please don't be afraid to ask for help but remember, the best help is learning how to work it out yourself rather than following a guide by rote!

Next Steps

Next it's finally time to put everything you have read into practice! Some small puzzle scenarios, some drills to try. A little bit of homework if you will. But don't worry, it's all open book so remember to re-visit previous chapters if you need to!