Abomination of Desolation has seen an increase in play since the release of The Early Church expansion. The release of quality greek characters (Epicurean Philosophers, Stoic Philosophers, The Priest of Zeus, Demetrius the Silversmith), strong search options (Demetrius the Silversmith, Worldly Wisdom, Shrine of Artemis), quality battle winners (Adjourn, Seized by Rioters), and new forced draw options (Kindness, Titus, Areopagus, and Hellenistic Jews) have push the themed to a level where it has seen of tournament success this season winning and placing at many tournaments in T1 and T2.
When play against an Abomination of Desolation your opponent will force you to draw through cards such as Kindness, Areopagus, Mayhem, The Generous Widow, and Martha hoping to trigger Abom multiple time during their upkeep phase, and also during the battle phase. One way to counter these forced draw abilities is to protect your deck from opponents cards (Simon the Zealot, Self Control, etc.). By protecting your deck from your opponents they can no longer force you to draw to trigger Abom.
A second option to counter Abom is to remove it from your territory via discard (I am Grace, King Hezekiah, Seraph with a Live Coal, Passover Hymn, Gamaliel’s Speech, etc.), shuffle (Nathan, Shrine of Artemis, etc.), add it to hand (Abraham’s Descendant) or underdeck (Ethiopian Treasurer) abilities. Discard is probably the worst option to get Abom out of play as Stoic Philosophers protects black Enhancements in territories from discard while it is active. One option to circumvent this is to activate Covenant with Death to negate Stoic Philosophers and use a cannot be negated discard ability on a Hero such as Seraph with a Live Coal or by playing an Enhancement during the battle phase to discard Abom.
A third option is to protect cards in your territory from opponents cards. For example, if Abomination of Desolation is played on an Evil Character of */4 ( or less you can protect your Corinth Heroes from Abomination of Desolation with Titus Justus. Your missionaries in play (or set-aside) have the added benefit of being part of the church you control with the most church members so they could possibly be protected as Corinth Heroes by Titus Justus as well.
A fourth option is to punish your opponent cards with forced draw ability with cards such as Rain Becomes Dust, or Golden Cherubim. The problem with these anti-draw counters to Abom is your opponent will likely target the counter with their first Abom trigger to discard it. Glory of the Lord can protect Golden Cherubim from opponents. This will allow you to search for a card on forced draw trigger. Most Abom deck will not run Nazareth as that shuts down their ability to search for Abom, High Places, or Greek Evil Characters (Demetrius the Silversmith, Worldly Wisdom, Shrine of Artemis) so the search should work pretty well against the forced draw. However the Glory of the Lord + Golden Cherubim counter does take a valuable Dominant slot.
A fifth option is to protect your opponent’s deck from search abilities. If you can stop you opponent from search for the cards to setup Abom you can set them back (Nazareth, Hezekiah’s Signet Ring). Hezekiah’s Signet Ring also stops the recursion of Abom through Pride of Simon or The Goat with Horn.
When playing against Abomination of Desolation my number one goal is to draw through my entire deck as quickly as possible before Abom is placed in my territory and The Priest of Zeus is active. Many time your opponents forced draw option will help this goal. If you can deck before your opponent can setup their only forced draw option will be Hur and Feast of Trumpets putting you in a great position to win the game.
Hopefully after reading this article you have some fresh ideas to counters Abom.
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