Ritual Gifts

[desolutionist]

I want to open the discussion about this deck because I have a strong understanding of how it used to work.  It is responsible for one of my proudest achievements.  One thing I really liked about this deck was that it had a perfect game plan. Plan A was Yawgmoth's Will and plan B was Yawgmoth's Bargain; the rest was interaction with the opponent.  The result was a deck that was really good at controlling the opponent until it could execute a quick win.  The current Doomsday deck has nearly the same strategy.

There are a few cards in the deck that used to be much better. First I want to look at Wheel of Fortune and Timetwister. In 2006, I used these cards as a form of robust card draw. It worked like this:

1. Empty your hand onto the board so that you have more permanents than your opponent
2. Duress away any Force of Will
3. Draw7

This tactic kept me ahead on cards and let me see a lot in the process.  Today this strategy wouldn't work because:

1. More permanents such as Pyromancer and Delver are going to make it too difficult to get ahead
2. Better countermagic such as Misstep and Flusterstorm makes giving your opponent cards counterproductive

The other two cards that I believe should be excluded are Lion's Eye Diamond and Recoup. Together they combined to form the deadliest Gifts piles, but 4x Brainstorm was largely responsible for shuffling them away after I've drawn them.  There isnt a Brainstorm replacement, so the days of playing situational cards are over.  

Instead the deck can be built more streamlined so that it is consistent and fixing is not as important.  I believe this requires taking a step towards more blue based.

Black Ritual Base:

4 Dark Ritual
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Yawgmoth's Bargain
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor

Omitting Thoughtseize/Duress from this part of the discussion, thats all the black required to be an explosive Ritual Gifts deck.  Any more and you run the risk of having too many dead cards.

This is where I am at with Ritual Gifts at the moment.  Im looking forward to coming up with the blue shell after I hear some ideas.  I think the biggest hurdle will be identifying the best card draw.

[Hrishi]

I really look forward to this discussion. When I built my deck I remember specifically looking at your SCG P9 list and got a lot of ideas from it. It is far from optimal, of course, and I'd love to see where this discussion goes. I love the way the deck is supposed to function (it is similar to Doomsday, just like you said!), and I would be very interested in helping test and contribute to the development of this deck.

I am unsure about Recoup and LED, on one hand you are completely correct and having no Brainstorms meant they stayed dead in my hand more often than was optimal. On the other hand, it made Gifts piles easier when one of the pieces was already in your hand.

(For reference, I hope you don't mind me linking the list I built based off yours! : http://www.tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=16001&iddeck=119313)

I'd like to suggest what I used, it was not a 4x Brainstorm replacement by any means, but I liked the 1x Brainstorm, 1x Ponder, 2x Preordain setup. I was right where you are, there is simply no real good blue card draw available for this purpose. One idea I had was running Night's Whisper, but it's not blue and our blue count is already hard pressed to support Forces. It also has dis-synergy with Bargain, for what that's worth.

Do you think the Black Ritual Base should not have 1 Necropotence in it?

[desolutionist]

Ponder/Preordain is interesting because a lot of cantrips into Treasure Cruise/Dig Through Time is obviously an overpowered draw engine in every format.  Why only 2 Preordain?  

Hypothetical Dig draw engine for Ritual Gifts:

25
1 Ponder
1 Brainstorm
4 Preordain
4 Mental Misstep
4 Force of Will
1 Treasure Cruise
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Ancestral Recall
3 Dig Through Time 2 Dig Through Time
1 Time Walk
3 Gifts Ungiven
2 Rebuild 1 Rebuild
1 Merchant Scroll

12
3 Thoughtseize
4 Dark Ritual
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Yawgmoth's Bargain
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Tendrils of Agony

23
1 Black Lotus
1 Mana Vault
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Pearl
4 Polluted Delta
1 Flooded Strand
1 Bloodstained Mire
2 Island
1 Swamp
4 Underground Sea
1 Tolarian Academy

Gush, Time Walk, and Merchant Scroll probably belong in there as well.  Necropotence is limited as a game ender because you have to pass the turn but it also has potential in the deck obviously.

[Hrishi]

That could certainly work. What sort of Gift piles are you looking at to ensure you are able to cast Will without including Recoup in your deck? That was honestly the only reason I was dead set to include it. It turned Gifts into a one card combo.

As for 2 Preordain, that's all the room I had. If I could play more, I would have. I really liked the card to fix my draws.

[JarofFortune]

If you run probes over preordain then you could consider adding a singleton doomsday to the list as another bomb to gifts for. You won't even need yawgmoth's will to win off it a lot of the time, because if you have enough artifacts you can include hurkyls in the doomsday pile to generate lethal storm. Probe is also even more effective at enabling delve spells.

[desolutionist]

I plan to get Yawgmoth's Will with Vampiric, Mystical, and Demonic Tutor.  I intend to cast the Gifts fairly aggressively to tutor for mana, but could also just tutor for

Time Walk, Black Lotus, Ancestral Recall, Demonic Tutor
Dig through Time, Force of Will, Mental Misstep, Tolarian Academy
Dark Ritual, Merchant Scroll, Brainstorm, Treasure Cruise

It depends on the situation, the possibilities are enormous.  You could have a Bargain and have your opponent give you a Dark Ritual and Mana Crypt.

[TendrilsFTW]

I've played ritual decks to a good amount of success for a long time.  I'm a big fan of adding 1 cabal ritual for what I believe is the best mana pile of dark ritual, cabal ritual, mana crypt/tolarian, black lotus. I like have a misdirection and a flusterstorm for the same style of counter pile.  Are you running rebuild over hurkyl's because of cycling?  In the end I think our lists would be fairly different because I would probably add necro, tinker/bot, and mind's desire.  Also if you run probe it would make running seal much better.  There are a ton of different ways to build this deck.

[WhiteLotus]

how can treasure cruise and dig through time earn so many slots in a ritual ywill deck when cards like Necropotence and Mind's Desire are excluded?

This may be harsh but seems to me like there are Lots of flaws in that list. I would recommend going back to basics to a tps list and swap a few cards like twister for gifts but not try to reinvent the deck.
You are trying to build a blue ritual deck too much and applying rules from big blue decks instead of playing into the strengths of the ritual shell.

[desolutionist]

how can treasure cruise and dig through time earn so many slots in a ritual ywill deck when cards like Necropotence and Mind's Desire are excluded?

Treasure Cruise and Dig Through Time are a hypothetical blue based draw engine cards for this deck.  Necropotence and Mind's Desire are fringe playables because they don't do anything by themselves and if you do manage to pull one off, there isn't a gaurantee that anything relevant will happen.  Those aren't the type of cards that have been successful in a Ritual Gifts deck before and certainly now with less Brainstorms, they're even worse!

Fact: People always auto included Desire and Necro into Ritual Gifts before and those people never won.

This may be harsh but seems to me like there are Lots of flaws in that list. I would recommend going back to basics to a tps list and swap a few cards like twister for gifts but not try to reinvent the deck.
You are trying to build a blue ritual deck too much and applying rules from big blue decks instead of playing into the strengths of the ritual shell.

I did note that it was a hypothetical list and Im not reinventing the deck; this isn't TPS. Im omitting the Ritual Gifts draw spells that are outdated (Twister, Wheel, Brainstorm) for new ones. Maybe you could explain why a "blue ritual deck" is a bad thing.

And yes, the cycling mechanic (Rebuild) is obviously very good at enabling Treasure Cruise

*edit* TPS was actually created in the shadow of Ritual Gifts and has been suboptimal for years.  It doesnt make sense to start with a failed experiment.

[WhiteLotus]

Well imo if you are going to play rituals, you might as well play into the strengths of dark ritual which are speed, explosiveness and threat density. If you want a slower storm deck but more controlish and blue based I think Gush storm is what you want. Gifts is amazing in that deck too.

I don't agree that any of the restricted ritual bombs are outdated apart from maybe windfall, you just have to adjust certain things accordingly (ie use draw 7s with defense grid to mitigate how worse they have gotten due to better counters).
Necro has gotten worse than before that's undeniable but it's still extremely powerful and leads to easy wins, it's nowhere near being as bad as "fringe playable". Desire takes a lot of setup so I can see why you would eschew it especially with a lower threat density it becomes more inconsistent.

While treasure cruise can be good at reloading vs a control deck that pushed you into the long game, it's not a bomb that is going to win you the game like say Necropotence and it requires a lot of your resources. I've tested the delve spells in ritual decks and while they may serve some function I don't think you'd ever want to run that many and certainly not at the expense of running Game winning bombs.

EDIT: When I mention TPS it is more to refer to the deck's strategy as opposed to Long variants, and your list is heavily influenced to be of the former rather than the later.

[Hrishi]

From initial testing, I am really liking the cantrip+Dig shell. I'm not even sure I want Treasure Cruise and would almost prefer a third Dig. Often I'd rather have 2 specific cards than 3 random ones.

[desolutionist]

Well imo if you are going to play rituals, you might as well play into the strengths of dark ritual which are speed, explosiveness and threat density. If you want a slower storm deck but more controlish and blue based I think Gush storm is what you want. Gifts is amazing in that deck too.

I think there is actually less mutualism with Gush than there is with Gifts.  I'm in the mindset of U/B Ritual Gifts; classic combo control.  Certainly I want to be using things like basic Swamp and Tolarian Academy, so Gush is a card I would add as part of the blue based draw as a support.  I said originally that it probably belongs in the deck.

I don't agree that any of the restricted ritual bombs are outdated apart from maybe windfall, you just have to adjust certain things accordingly (ie use draw 7s with defense grid to mitigate how worse they have gotten due to better counters).
Necro has gotten worse than before that's undeniable but it's still extremely powerful and leads to easy wins, it's nowhere near being as bad as "fringe playable". Desire takes a lot of setup so I can see why you would eschew it especially with a lower threat density it becomes more inconsistent.

Yeah, I don't want to play Defense Grid because Force of Will and Mental Misstep are a big part of the strategy.  Those cards aren't set in stone but there should definitely be some good permission spells.  Grid is fine in linear combo, but this isn't linear combo.

While treasure cruise can be good at reloading vs a control deck that pushed you into the long game, it's not a bomb that is going to win you the game like say Necropotence and it requires a lot of your resources. I've tested the delve spells in ritual decks and while they may serve some function I don't think you'd ever want to run that many and certainly not at the expense of running Game winning bombs.

Whether or not the delve draw engine works in this deck remains to be seen.  I just don't think Necropotence is a game winning bomb; Oath, Shops, Delver, Storm, Humans, Mentor, and Gifts would all love the fact that you just passed the turn with only 10 life.  Then you will probably have to pass the turn again just so you can resolve a Gifts Ungiven.  If you're willing to admit that Necropotence has issues, then you can see the core values of the strategy.



Will and Bargain are the best game ending bombs because they essentially allow you to play every card in your deck.  Fueled by Dark Ritual, better than Cabal Ritual, are the above game ending bombs and these tutors.  



The Ritual side of this deck is very minimalistic; I've cut away the fat and just left the muscle  

[Hrishi]

I think there's something to be said about playing to Ritual's strengths. However, that does not necessarily mean it's only strength is being explosive and fast. Rituals give you the ability to switch between both roles and explode at the right time. Dark Rituals help Will, builds storm and even fuels Delve.

The reason I would be hesitant in including Gush is that having basic swamps in your deck greatly helps against mana denial, and storm decks typically come under attack there.

Grids would be awful in this sort of deck, not only because Forces and Missteps are a big part but also because of the card Gifts itself.

I think Desire has a place in this deck, because it is a way to end the game when your life total is too low to deploy Bargain and there is a Cage or something in play preventing the use of Yawgmoth's Will. Desire might not be the answer here, but I've found I have sometimes needed a Plan C when Will is not possible and your life total isn't high enough for Bargain.

[desolutionist]

I think there's something to be said about playing to Ritual's strengths. However, that does not necessarily mean it's only strength is being explosive and fast. Rituals give you the ability to switch between both roles and explode at the right time. Dark Rituals help Will, builds storm and even duels Delve.

Yeah it also casts Bargain, Tendrils, and Gifts Ungiven.

The reason I would be hesitant in including Gush is that having basic swamps in your deck greatly helps against mana denial, and storm decks typically come under attack there.

I agree with you mostly, but I think 1 Gush could be fine even with a basic Swamp and Academy.

I think Desire has a place in this deck, because it is a way to end the game when your life total is too low to deploy Bargain and there is a Cage or something in play preventing the use of Yawgmoth's Will. Desire might not be the answer here, but I've found I have sometimes needed a Plan C when Will is not possible and your life total isn't high enough for Bargain.

If there are any two bombs that could be added to the deck it would be Necro and Desire.  It would be nice to have someone to test with.  I'm in the beginning stages of getting some of the locals to play Vintage vs. me.

[WhiteLotus]

So far in my testing it seems like Ritual Gifts is much stronger in a Burning Wish shell than UB shell. You get a more explosive and consistent deck all the while red splash gives you acess to real shop hate and pyroblast.

Cabal Ritual which was unreliable most of the time prior to last B/R list update, is made super strong with gifts and should be auto include in any ritual based gifts list imo.

[DuKeLiO]

It's also my feeling about Burning Wish and Cabal Ritual, but I'm not sure why you need Pyroblast, because you can use Flusterstorm and I doubt you need more than 4 Fow+4-6 Discard+4 Flusterstorm.