T8 @ Feinstein's with GPS

[Negator13]

So I've been playing some iteration of Global Pwnage System (GPS (Gush Perfect Storm)) since I got back into the game shortly after Gush's unrestriction. I split a couple local 8 mans, top 8'd ELD's last month, and went 5-2 at Waterbury with it. The versions I had been playing were just UBg and ran traditional TPS bombs ala Necro, Bargain, Twister, and Desire. After ending up a disappointing 25th or so at Waterbury, losing a close 3 to Kowal with GAT and getting savagely raped by my own mulligans two games in a row against probably my best matchup, Slaver, I decided that Necro, Bargain, and Timetwister are absolutely terrible and that Misdirection and REB are the absolute nuts in this format. I saw desolutionist's list that he t16'd Waterbury, as well as a few other lists at Myriad and ELD. From these I tweaked and tested my own in preparation for Feinstein's tournament until I ended up with this:

GPS

2 Island
2 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
1 Library of Alexandria
2 Flooded Strand
3 Polluted Delta
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mana Crypt
1 Lotus Petal
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Chain of Vapor
4 Brainstorm
1 Time Walk
4 Merchant Scroll
1 Rebuild
1 Fact or Fiction
4 Gush
4 Force of Will
2 Misdirection
1 Mind's Desire
3 Dark Ritual
4 Duress
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Empty the Warrens
1 Fastbond
1 Regrowth

SB:
1 Hydroblast
1 Echoing Truth
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Brain Freeze
2 Red Elemental Blast
1 Pyroblast
1 Pyroclasm
1 Submerge
1 Darkblast
1 Massacre
4 Leyline of the Void

This deck is pretty much the stone cold nuts. After the tournament I felt like the maindeck was pretty much absolutely perfect and there wasn't a card I would change. The sideboard was also very good, though there are a few tweaks I have made since. REBs were amazing, and Pyroclasm ended up being absolute gold, allowing me to tap 2 fetchlands to kill boards full of Magi of the Moon and go off. I thought the Leylines were a necessary evil for the Flash matchup, but I only ended up playing against one Flash deck and the Leylines ended up being completely irrelevant. They clog up your draws with complete blanks and Flash always has a plan for them. Against everything else they are completely worthless. Your Flash matchup is already extremely good, with 6 free counters, 4 Duress, 3 REB, and various 0-1 mana creature removal/bounce spells. My new sideboard is as follows:

1 Hydroblast
2 REB
1 Pyroblast
1 Pyroclasm
1 Fire/Ice (Amazing... Scrollable answer to Magus/Mindcensor/Goblins, pitches to FoW, cycles)
1 Brain Freeze
1 Empty the Warrens (Too good against Stax/GAT not to have a 2nd copy)
1 Snuff Out (Best answer to Dryad/Plats/Heart Sliver/etc)
1 Massacre
2 Extirpate (Pushes the GAT matchup from a coinflip to in your favor, takes FoWs/Drains out of the equation against blue decks)
1 Echoing Truth
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Undecided (Could be Misdirection, Submerge, Tormod's Crypt, Darkblast, 2nd Pyroclasm, etc)

Anyway, back to the maindeck. This deck is basically GAT, minus bad cards, plus good cards. Essentially, you trade 5 creatures, which have no purpose other than to reduce your opponent's life total over time, for 3 Ritual, 1 Tendrils, 1 Mind's Desire. In my opinion, GAT is best played as a combo deck, usually finding Fastbond and chaining Gushes into a Yawgmoth's Will. At this point, GAT usually draws a ton of cards, casts Dryad or Tog at some point and plays Time Walk, or if it already has a creature in play, Cunning Wishes for Berserk. However if you accept this as your optimal gameplan, then it makes more sense to replace the essentially dead weight of creatures with Rituals and Tendrils. The Rituals actually further your gameplan of casting a winning Will earlier and with more mana available afterwards, and the Tendrils allows you to win in one turn without needing both a WC and Time Walk/Cunning Wish. Now the advantage of Dryad is obviously that you dont necessarily need to combo out in order to win with it (you can play it early and play Aggrocontrol), but that's where Empty the Warrens comes in. With things like Rituals, Gushes, Moxen, and a host of 1 mana Tutors/Drawspells in your deck, you can very easily play a turn 2 or 3 Empty for at least 4 or 5 Storm. This is your plan B, and it is very reliable. However you must keep in mind that the Plan "A" of both decks, Fastbond--> Gush --> Will, is much easier to accomplish and happens earlier with GPS, due to the presence of Rituals and the absence of vanilla green creatures.

GPS also has a huge advantage over GAT against Stax and other lock decks such as those with Magus of the Moon, with 2 basic Islands and Chain of Vapor and Rebuild maindeck.

As for the tournament itself, I ended up first after the Swiss with a 4-0-2 record. Here's a quick rundown of my matches:

Round 1 against Oath:
Game 1 he kept a very shaky hand and I opened up with Library, and rode the overwhelming card advantage to a win.

Game 2 I don't really remember but I know I completely blew him out.

2-0, 1-0

Round 2 against Belcher:
Game 1, she's on the play and Empties for 8 goblins turn 1. I take 8 and cast an Empty of my own the next turn for 14 goblins. A couple turns of attacking later, I finish her off with a Tendrils for 6.

Game 2, she Emptied for 10 goblins turn 1. I had Echoing Truth in hand, but only 1 land and the following turn she ripped Wheel of Fortune to make my discard it. My 7 was terrible and I died to the goblins next turn.

Game 3, I keep Lotus Petal, Gush, DT, 4 land on the play. It's risky against Belcher, but I figure if she doesnt have the nuts turn 1 I can tutor for Ancestral and draw 5 extra cards next turn, which should be enough. I cast Petal, DT for Ancestral, and pass, and she plays Taiga, Mox, SSG, Seething Song, Belcher. So I'm on a one turn clock. I untap, draw Yawgwill, cast Ancestral drawing Mox, Mox, X, and Gush drawing Lotus, X. Pretty much the nuts. I end up Willing and Emptying for 15 storm, casting Time Walk, and Brain Freezing her for 48 cards or so.

2-1, 2-0

Round 3 Against Flash

Game 1, he has a slowish hand and we play somewhat of an attrition war. I don't remember the exact details but I think I ended up sucessfully MisD'ing his Ancestral and riding it to the win.

Game 2 was very interesting. He apparently transformed into some sort of Ritual storm deck. About turn 3 or so, I cast Ancestral with a pretty stocked hand, intending to combo out that turn. He has 5 mana up including 2 moxen, so he Pacts the recall. I consider MisD'ing back and continuing on as planned but I see a new avenue of attack. I allow his Pact to resolve, and cast Merchant Scroll, finding.. Chain of Vapor. I Chain his Mox, and he cycles Quicken in response. I should have passed the turn here but I do a couple unnecessary things like Gush and i think Brainstorm and drop Lotus Petal, then pass the turn with FoW in hand in case of any shenanigans. EOT, he casts Dark Ritual. ...okay? I just glaze over it and allow it to resolve, confident I can deal with whatever he's got with my FoW. Nope. Instant speed Tendrils for 20 off Quicken. I look at my hand and there's nothing I can do. If only I hadnt played that completely unnecessary Gush, or had countered the Ritual like a good player. I have to admit though, I'm impressed.

Game 3 was a very long drawn out affair. Basically we fought and fought over countless draw spells, it went to time, he got down and ESG that beat me down to 1 and I couldn't pull out the win during my Will turn in turn 3 of extra turns because I had boarded out Tendrils. So we draw.

1-1-1, 2-0-1

Round 4 against Trinket Magus/Mindcensor.dec (He top 8'd as well)

Game 1, I kept a one lander on the draw because it had I believe Brainstorm, Gush, and Lotus. He drops a turn 1 or 2 Magus of the moon and I never see another land.

Game 2, I thought I had won it on like the second turn, where he cast Ancestral, I Misd'd, he FoW'd, and I Ancestraled in response drawing X, X, REB for his FoW, and took his Ancestral too. However he ended up sticking a Magus of the moon which brought me all the way to two. I had to Empty for 0 storm just to make 2 1/1 blockers. He Scrolled for Truth to get them out of the way, I had the FoW, going to 1. I draw for turn, and see Pyroclasm. GG. Tap 2 fetches-turned-mountains to Pyro his Magus away, Ritual-Ritual-YawgWill for the win.

Game 3 I don't remember much of but I pretty much sat on Library all the way from turn 1 and probably outdrew him at least 3 to 1.

2-1, 3-0-1

Round 5 Against RW TMWA

Game 1 he mulls into a hand with Sol Ring, Chalice @ 1 and never casts another spell. I rebuild turn 2 and go off the next.

Game 2 he casts turn 1 Glowrider off Lotus. I answer with an Empty for 6 tokens a couple turns later, they go all the way.

2-0, 4-0-1

Round 6, ID

So I end up 4-0-2 and in first place after the Swiss.

In top 8, I get paired against Jigglypuff with GAT, pretty much the only matchup I didn't want to face as it's a coinflip.

Game 1, I mull on the draw and win turn 1. Trop, Fastbond, Sea, Mystical for Gush, Gush, Gush, Scroll for Gush, Gush, Will, Gush, Gush, Gush, Tendrils.

Game 2, I lose because I failed to play around Disrupt, which I didn't know he had. Turn 2 or so I pass the turn with only Petal up because I have REB in hand, keeping a Mox Emerald in hand so I can add it to storm later. He EOT Brainstorms, and I REB. Down comes the Disrupt. I am forced to FoW it, pitching FoF, so that he doesnt just draw 4 cards and completely blow me out. We're both low on cards, but he topdecks well and I lose.

Game 3 was a hard fought attrition war. We both fought over draw spells, I came out on top but was stuck on two lands. He's down to pretty much no cards so I just cast Regrowth on Ancestral and pass the turn. He has the Duress, and drops back to back Dryads. They remain as 2/2's the entire game and end up taking it home as I proceed to draw nothing but lands and counterspells for the rest of the game. Ah well.

There was a pretty interesting turn early on in that game, however. Its about turn 3, his turn. I have 1 mana up, my hand is Brainstorm, Brainstorm, FoW, Duress, Ritual, Regrowth. I know he has Ancestral in hand. He Duresses me with one mana up, i think 2 or 3 cards in hand including Recall. I have the option to Brainstorm in response. I choose not to. He takes a Brainstorm, and casts Ancestral, I foW pitching the other Brainstorm. I then Regrew my Ancestral and he Duressed, and I drew nothing afterwards.
After the game, a bystander commented that I had misplayed by not Brainstorming in response. I disagree. I needed to keep FoW and a blue card in my hand for his Ancestral. If the top 3 cards of my deck didn't have a blue card, he would have just taken the other Brainstorm and I would have had no card to pitch for FoW, costing me the game. There was no need to "hide" the regrowth (the most valuable card in my hand) because I knew he had to take the 2nd Brainstorm with his Duress in order to not get blown out, as he was very low on cards. I am quite certain I made the right play and it's only due to bad luck that he had the 3rd Duress for my Regrowth, plus I could've drawn and land to cast the Regrown Ancestral that turn but didn't.

So that's that. I ended up getting a foil promo WoG, and textless Psi Blast, Lightning Helix, Pyroclasm, Mortify, Condemn, Cruel Edict x2, and Recollect x3 for my efforts. Not a bad haul. Congrats to my teammates Ross Merriam who also t8'd and Matt Mcnally who split the finals. A good day for TPS all around. The tournament was excellently run and had great attendance, 6 rounds and the entire top 8 were efficiently fit into about 8 hours, and the prize support was great. Mad props to Feinstein for his first run.

[zeus-online]

Couldn't he just have taken the fow and then resolved ancestral?

Resolving ancestral >>> Resolving 2 brainstorms.

Also, i think you're missing the point with GAT, many successfull gat players play it as a control deck...It's the ability to switch to either combo, aggro or control that makes GAT so powerfull. If you plan on going combo with it then you should definetly play another deck...I rarely play the combo route unless i got the stone cold nutz. (like turn 1 fastbond with multiple gush and scrolls).

/Zeus

[Shock Wave]

There was a pretty interesting turn early on in that game, however. Its about turn 3, his turn. I have 1 mana up, my hand is Brainstorm, Brainstorm, FoW, Duress, Ritual, Regrowth. I know he has Ancestral in hand. He Duresses me with one mana up, i think 2 or 3 cards in hand including Recall. I have the option to Brainstorm in response. I choose not to. He takes a Brainstorm, and casts Ancestral, I foW pitching the other Brainstorm. I then Regrew my Ancestral and he Duressed, and I drew nothing afterwards.

After the game, a bystander commented that I had misplayed by not Brainstorming in response. I disagree. I needed to keep FoW and a blue card in my hand for his Ancestral. If the top 3 cards of my deck didn't have a blue card, he would have just taken the other Brainstorm and I would have had no card to pitch for FoW, costing me the game. There was no need to "hide" the regrowth (the most valuable card in my hand) because I knew he had to take the 2nd Brainstorm with his Duress in order to not get blown out, as he was very low on cards. I am quite certain I made the right play and it's only due to bad luck that he had the 3rd Duress for my Regrowth, plus I could've drawn and land to cast the Regrown Ancestral that turn but didn't.

I find scenarios like this one very intriguing. I'm not really sure why he allowed you to keep your Force of Will and instead chose Brainstorm. In my opinion, the fact that he allowed you to keep your FoW implies that he wanted to trade 2 for 1 with you, although I'm not sure why. I don't know what was in his hand, but my guess is that resolving Ancestral was important, especially if he did not have a FoW of his own, which baffles me as to why he would let you keep your 1 permission spell.

Being on your side of the table, I think the right play was to Brainstorm for these reasons:

- You have a high blue card count, therefore the odds are good that you'll find a blue card to support your FoW
- You'll be able to develop your hand a little better, regardless of whether or not the AR resolves
- You may draw the nuts, in which case he would have to draw a FoW from his Ancestral to stop you (and make the right play of countering your Ritual on your turn)
- You have a Duress in hand, which makes the possible resolution of his Ancestral a lot less severe

By not casting Brainstorm, you've put yourself in a position where you have not advanced your game plan. Since it was your intention to counter the AR in the first place, you knew that at the end of his turn, you weren't going to end up with a resolved Brainstorm, thereby reducing yourself to topdeck mode.

Here's the way I see it:

- If Ancestral resolves, that's bad. You have to stop it.
- If you Brainstorm first, you up your chances of having a better play on your turn, but hinder your chances of stopping the AR. However, you also open up the possibility of being able to stop the AR -and- have a strong play on your turn.

To be honest, this is really a "numbers" play, and you'd have to work out the probabilities in order to figure what would be optimal down the stretch. However, considering the information you've given (the fact that he was low on cards, your Duress in hand, and a fair enough chance of drawing a blue card), I personally would've cast the Brainstorm.

I don't know if that's the right play by the numbers, but that's what feels right to me. In any case, that's very interesting, I appreciate it when players share these sorts of scenarios.

[Vegeta2711]

I don't know what was in his hand, but my guess is that resolving Ancestral was important, especially if he did not have a FoW of his own, which baffles me as to why he would let you keep your 1 permission spell.

If he knew he had another Duress in hand, taking BS and then having how FOW -> Pitch BS on Ancestral means he's got nothing relevant left in his hand (since sure he regrowths, but then gets pegged by Duress anyway). At that point GAT is far more likely to win a topdeck war than a combo deck with two lands out and a pretty much dead Dark Ritual in hand.

This deck is basically GAT, minus bad cards, plus good cards. Essentially, you trade 5 creatures, which have no purpose other than to reduce your opponent's life total over time, for 3 Ritual, 1 Tendrils, 1 Mind's Desire.

I dislike Dryad a lot in GAT, but gaining what amounts to one really broken card in exchange for what 3/4 Dryad and a Tog brings in certain matches seems hilarious.

Like you've taken out 5 creatures, gained 3 Dark Rituals which you wouldn't need with a normal GAT deck, gained a Tendrils which of course is slightly better than Dryad or Tog on a combo turn and Mind's Desire which is a legit threat a little later in the game. In exchange for some amount of versatility. *shrug* doesn't seem as cut and dry as you make it sound.

[Shock Wave]

If he knew he had another Duress in hand, taking BS and then having how FOW -> Pitch BS on Ancestral means he's got nothing relevant left in his hand (since sure he regrowths, but then gets pegged by Duress anyway). At that point GAT is far more likely to win a topdeck war than a combo deck with two lands out and a pretty much dead Dark Ritual in hand.

Hrm. I think it's a debatable play. When the GAT players seems 2 Brainstorms, he should be counting on his opponent casting at least one of them. At that point, the combo player has already seen 3 new cards. The impact of resolving a 2nd Brainstorm seems rather negligible. If he takes the FoW, he can almost be sure that his Ancestral resolves. It's hard to gauge the impact the Ancestral would have had (had he seen a FoW yet, was he running Daze, etc), but resolving it almost forces the combo player to win on their turn or almost certainly lose. That seems as reasonable a proposition, if not better, than entering a topdeck war, even if GAT is slightly favourable under those circumstances.

Also, if GAT placed such a high premium on the opponent losing their Brainstorm to FoW, then it certainly was the right play to cast Brainstorm in response to the Duress. That way, you're giving yourself the most opportunity to have something relevant to do on your turn. If it turns out that you can't FoW the Ancestral, at least you're giving yourself a chance to win on your turn by seeing 3 new cards and hiding 2. That seems pretty good.

[MirariKnight]

I was your round 4 opponent. Yeah that game sucked when you got 2 Ancestrals lol. And good play with the Empty for 0 storm. That pretty much saved you I think. Also good call boarding Pyroclasm. That wrecked me game 3.
I was curious about what was in that prize. That probably was the best pile after all (I got the 3 Heaths).
As for the Brainstorm play in question I had to leave before this happened but from what you said I think that Brainstorming in response would probably have been good. There's a pretty good chance of seeing a blue card in the next 3. However I can't say your play was bad either, as it sounds like it pretty much hinged on the Ancestral resolving (either his or yours).

[Dxfiler]

Justin- thanks for the great report.  Good to see you play in what has been ages :p

Your deck looks very strong and I'm sure if you play again with it you'll once again do well.

Feel free to come to my next one on Oct 7th :p

Glad to see the mystery pack was good to you.

As for the not brainstorming in response to Duress play, I think what you did is definitely defensible.  Why gamble off finding a blue card with brainstorm when you already have one in hand to pitch and give Nate a very hard choice of what to take?  I mean I'm a gambling man so I might've just brainstormed :p, but I can definitely see why you played it the way you did and appreciate you taking the time to go over the entire scenario.

Thanks again for the report and your support of my tourney.

- Dave 

[breed]

@Negator13: Thanks for your report!

As I'm also a Gush Tendrils player, I tested your list and felt it was really good. But I have some questions.

In my tests, 2 cards were not really usefull: Fact or Fiction and Mind's Desire. I know that Mind's Desire is a pure bomb, but I never had to use it for the win, I'm thinking in cutting these cards.

You didn't play Imperial Seal, but it seems quite nice in this deck, why did you remove it? Also, was LOA really usefull? As it is a great card, in my tests, It seems not so much usable.

Your sideboard seems really good, Pyroclasm roxx!

Thanks for your answers!

 

[ashiXIII]

I definitely think I play one of the BS's in response to the Duress. If you don't find a blue card, you're a little unlucky, and if you don't find a land either, you're a lot unlucky, but as long as you find one, you're probably in pretty good shape.

Also, by responding with BS you give your opponent an opportunity to make a mistake by playing Recall in response to your BS. It's unlikely he would do so (unless he's pretty bad) but if he does, you pretty much win on the spot, because you Force it, then your BS resolves, and you hide Regrowth, and he hits your Ritual, then you untap, Regrow AR and cast it.

A lot of my strategy in the control mirror revolves around giving my opponent plenty of opportunities to mess up. It probably comes from playing a lot of poker.

[Negator13]

@Negator13: Thanks for your report!

As I'm also a Gush Tendrils player, I tested your list and felt it was really good. But I have some questions.

In my tests, 2 cards were not really usefull: Fact or Fiction and Mind's Desire. I know that Mind's Desire is a pure bomb, but I never had to use it for the win, I'm thinking in cutting these cards.

You didn't play Imperial Seal, but it seems quite nice in this deck, why did you remove it? Also, was LOA really usefull? As it is a great card, in my tests, It seems not so much usable.

Your sideboard seems really good, Pyroclasm roxx!

Thanks for your answers!

 

My latest list cuts FoF for Timetwister, and I dropped down to 1 Ritual in favor of 2 Opts. Rituals are pretty much dead early and often unnecessary. Having 1 in the deck allows you to tutor for it to speed up a Will or a Desire, while not clogging your early game with useless draws. The Opts add consistency and smoothing, and get the deck's mana saturation to exactly where it needs it without adding extra lands.

Imperial Seal is just straight up not a good card. It is automatic card disadvantage and unless you have something in hand to combo with it it gives your opponent a full turn to react. LoA is quite amazing and wins games on its own, I won at least 3-4 games on the day on the back of Library.


The Duress/Brainstorm play was pretty much a coinflip, I felt confident that what I did was correct although now looking back on it I can definitely see the advantages of Brainstorming in response. You're right that seeing either a blue card or a land would have put me in a pretty good spot; I just didn't want to risk it because I thought I didn't need it. Looking back, I wish I had.

[Kowal]

Not to take a knock at your deck, but I just wanted to point out that it was very easy to predict how this report was going to end.  Any report that says anything other than "first place!" inevitably features a last round loss to GAT.

You mention this is a "coinflip" matchup, which I mostly agree with.  Though I have to ask, in a metagame where GAT is so clearly the most dominant deck, what drives you to play this sibling of it rather than GAT itself? 

[Negator13]

Well honestly I feel this deck is literally better than GAT, especially with the latest changes. But the biggest thing is it simply fits my play style better. I am a natural combo player, I've played TPS since the dawn of time and I feel really comfortable with storm decks. Compared side by side, the differences in the decks are:

GAT:
4 Dryad
1 Tog
2 Mana Drain
1 Metagame Slot

GPS:
1 Tendrils
1 Empty
1 Desire
1 Ritual
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Rebuild
1 Mana Crypt
1 Timetwister

With GPS you cut the 5 win conditions and 2 reactive spells and cut it down to two win conditions, 2 legitimate bombs, Ritual which makes Will better earlier, Chain of Vapor which is all around useful, Rebuild which at worst cycles, and Mana Crypt. GPS is much better at comboing out and winning in one turn, though it still retains the ability to Empty for 5 or 6 storm early and win that way. I think GPS abuses both the Gushbond combo and Yawgmoth's Will better than GAT does. Mind's Desire provides a very viable alternative to Will in the presence of graveyard hate, otherwise, Will wins the game, in one turn, for this deck every time.

Its very hard for me to explain exactly why I think GPS is the better deck, in written form. But I just want to say that while Steve and others have claimed they tried Storm versions of the Gush Engine, only to determine that GAT was superior, I don't think they gave it the time it deserved. I have been trying to do this. I've done nothing but constantly tweak and improve the deck, until finally getting it to a point where I can confidently say: "This deck is at least as consistent and powerful as GAT, if not more, and gains the ability to run more powerful bombs and can always kill in one turn." I just don't think essentially vanilla creatures are the best way to abuse a storm/mana/card generating engine...... storm cards are.

[Negator13]

I also want to point out that when I lost to GAT I lost to the same cards that my deck runs... in other words they didn't have anything I didn't. Furthermore, I most likely lost due to my own (lack of) playskill, such as the Duress decision above. Had I Brainstormed in response, I probably would have won... a better play than I would probably have a better record against GAT.

[breed]

My latest list cuts FoF for Timetwister, and I dropped down to 1 Ritual in favor of 2 Opts. Rituals are pretty much dead early and often unnecessary. Having 1 in the deck allows you to tutor for it to speed up a Will or a Desire, while not clogging your early game with useless draws. The Opts add consistency and smoothing, and get the deck's mana saturation to exactly where it needs it without adding extra lands.

Imperial Seal is just straight up not a good card. It is automatic card disadvantage and unless you have something in hand to combo with it it gives your opponent a full turn to react. LoA is quite amazing and wins games on its own, I won at least 3-4 games on the day on the back of Library.

Thanks for answers.

After more testing, cutting FoF seems quite good, but I'm not sure playing only 1 Dark Ritual will be enough. Also, I'm not a huge fan of Opt, but I will try. Also, playing Timetwister main deck seems quite risky. Against Fish, GAT, TimeTwister can give them more disrupt than bombs for you.

About ISeal: of course, it's Ritual card disavantage, but it can tutor anything you want. I use it in my current tests and I am always happy to get it.