There's a three and a half year old thread about this subject but I decided to start a new thread because I was wanting to discuss them in a different context.
Specifically with regards to mono black control decks, do Dark Ritual and otherblacktemporaryrampspells have a place? Obviously they can be nuts in combo but I've never actually tried them in a control shell before and I was wondering about different opinions and experiences with them. When I first got into the format I considered them pretty bad because temporary ramp seemed weaker than permanent ramp in a format where games tend to go 10+ turns, particularly so in big mana control decks. However, I'm in the process of transitioning from Chainer to Erebos at the moment and I started thinking about ways to get him out as early as possible. Of course Mana Vault made the cut immediately, and the fact that it's often described as a colorless Dark Ritual made me reconsider my position on Rituals in general.
In Erebos, it seems like they pull double duty as ramp to ensure an early God and effective card draw by getting an extra activation or two out of him if they're drawn in the mid or late game. I'm definitely going to give Dark Ritual, Cabal Ritual, and Bubbling Muck a shot as they're likely the best of the bunch. I don't think the sac rituals are worthwhile unless a deck is capable of fully exploiting them, like Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder or Ghoulcaller Gisa.
What do you guys think? Are they combo only or do they belong in other decks as well?
Just turn that mana into a black or blue steady source of card draw and you will feel like you are inside the matrix. Do you think that is mana you are breathing?
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I have dyslexia, no I am not going to spell check for you, yes you have to live with the horrors of it.
In EDH, typically I'll add Ritual effects if they directly correlate to getting my general out early, for example, I'd run Dark Ritual in a Liliana, Heretical Healer EDH because then having Dark Rit and a land in my opener means I can T1 Liliana.
Obviously I'm being kinda vague by just saying "if extra mana lets me play my general early I do it" but it's kind of a personal opinion thing. Is it worth running Bubbling Muck in order to T3/T4 your Sheoldred, Whispering One general? I'd say by T4 there's enough moving parts that it won't matter anymore, but others would disagree. On the case of Muck specifically, I do run High Tide in my Talrand, Sky Summoner so I can either Isochron Scepter it or tutor it out when I'm trying to crank up a good Mind's Desire. Obviously that's a blue example, but Sceptre, Muck and Tendrils of Agony are all legal in EDH and would set up a similar, although less effective shell
My gut instinct is to say the card disadvantage isn't worth it. But I could be very wrong. I too find myself playing Mana Vault with some frequency, and it's very similar in effect to Dark Ritual. Vault can be re-used, but I honestly can't remember the last time I untapped it by actually using its ability, so the point might be moot.
I would say... be careful. I don't think all rituals are created equal. Dark Ritual seems like the flagship best one. A lot of the cards you mentioned, like Burnt Offering or Sacrifice or Songs of the Damned aren't universally good in my opinion because it's hard to use them to accelerate in a way that other cards can't. Is playing a 3-drop and sac'ing it going to be better than playing a 3-mana ramp artifact like Coalition Relic? You take hits in both CA and consistency for slightly higher burst mana. Of course, a lot depends on what you're ramping out, but in general I'd say that the later you're ritualing, the less impact it's likely to have. Cabal Ritual has the downside of requiring threshold. I can see Bubbling Muck being okay in mono-black.
I really don't think cracking a Lotus Petal turn one to play a Night's Whisper is awesome. You're spending two cards to get two cards, and trading known quantities for unknown. I think I'd be more comfortable taking a mulligan at that point... of course, if your deck is trying to enable Threshold, or delirium, or flip a Jace, or something, that's a different matter.
It's also worth mentioning that Black has access to another really good way to cheat on mana costs in reanimation. I think that's going to be better for large number of cards that you're trying to get into play. So, rituals if they're important for getting your Commander very early. Or non-creature permanents.
But getting your Commander early can be kind of a trap. What Commanders want to be out early? Sure, you can play Erebos on turn two, but what purpose does that serve if you have to tie up your mana to recoup the CA in the following turns?
I'd be careful with the conditional and varying effectiveness rituals (Cabal Ritual, Burnt Offering etc.) outside of combo (including AN) decks, but the good old fashioned Dark Ritual is usually well worth a deckslot for me, and in mono-black, Bubbling Muck is reliable enough to go alongside it. They're card disadvantage yes, but it can give you a lot of additional options in how you play things out. While plays like T1 Necropotence are the holy grail of rituals, I've gotten plenty of less splashy plays that matter of them - e.g. in my Chainer deck, being able to reanimate for one mana instead of three is often well worth having to use an extra card, especially as people will often play assuming I can't reanimate that Agent of Erebos or Shadowborn Demon in my yard.
And with Erebos in charge, worst case, you can basically cycle Dark Ritual for 2 life (it adds 2 mana over it's cost, which is enough for an extra card draw) while muck only needs 4 swamps to do the same.
I run Lotus Petal in my UBR stax deck, as part of a Salvaging Station package. I run Petal, Dark Ritual, and Songs of the Damned in my UBRG landless deck, although as mentioned, that's more of a combo deck than a control deck. I don't run any cards like that in my mono-black deck, but that's neither control nor combo.
Mox Diamond is a strong card for a mono-color deck. Giving up a swamp to power out something early is a small price to pay.
Speaking of giving up swamps, Lake of the Dead? I've seen it used in a couple of combo decks, but I've never used it myself. The decks I see it in run it instead of Cabal Coffers, likely on the thought process that LotD reduces Coffers' output, plus they want to win before Coffers becomes effective (4 swamps + Coffers + 2 to make it effective).
I know that using Vintage staples makes you look like a pro, but honestly there are so many better cards than the rituals that already don’t see play as is. Quick list of them that you might want to look at:
Soldevi Adnate – A repeatable Burnt Offering for Black/artifact creatures. Also can sacrifice itself for the refund.
Priest of Yawgmoth – Same thing as above for artifacts and artifact creatures.
The thing that distinguishes these from things like Ashnod’s Altar, Krark-Clan Ironworks, etc, that already get run in Black extensively is that they are self-contained and easily recurrable. Of course, the more commonly seen cards are more commonly seen because they have a high performance ceiling, but these are somewhat more reliable on their own and accessible earlier.
The only real advantages to the Cabal Ritual set of cards are: 1) never unusable, i.e. high performance floor, 2) consistently mana-positive in terms of the flow of the entire game, not just a single turn ramp, and 3) synergy with Instants/Sorceries. So really, I would only consider them in decks where the tempo flow of the entire game is very fast, opening hand textures are important, and there is no special use for creatures as a card type. Understandably, most non-combo, non-Voltron EDH decks fail to meet these criteria. Exceptions are those decks that can translate early mana into cards or permanent mana production, like the stuff mentioned above like Liliana, Heretical Healer, Oloro, etc.
For the typical Erebos deck, either traditional ramp like Wayfarer’s Bauble or the creatures above will just probably work better, or even something like Expedition Map that will help you tutor for Cabal Coffers and output mana over the long of the game. That’s because his ability, unlike Oloro or similar that tends to work a limited number of times per turn, will use whatever mana you can give him.
Regarding Mana Vault and why it’s seen so often, it’s both about 50% better on the turn it's than Dark Rit (color of mana notwithstanding), and synergizes with artifacts (Voltaic Key,etc). Really, there are a ton of decks that care about artifacts.
Dark ritual is the nuts in your opening hand in most Mono-Black decks. Who doesn't want to play their turn 3 on turn 1? It's pretty good on turn 3 and 4 too, often allowing you to power out a 6 or 7 CMC threat absurdly early. In those cases, the advantage is totally worth being down a card.
The problem of course is that it's a dead card on turn 10. So you have two solutions. Either make a deck that is never planning to see turn 10, or make a deck that is planning to have so much card advantage by turn 10 that a dead card doesn't matter. As it turns out, most of my heavy black decks tend to fall into one of those two categories....
I know that using Vintage staples makes you look like a pro, but honestly there are so many better cards than the rituals that already don’t see play as is. Quick list of them that you might want to look at:
Soldevi Adnate – A repeatable Burnt Offering for Black/artifact creatures. Also can sacrifice itself for the refund.
Priest of Yawgmoth – Same thing as above for artifacts and artifact creatures.
I disagree strongly. Three of the five cards you've listed have to lose summoning sickness before you can get mana out of them, and the other two don't even refund their whole casting cost, much less produce more mana than they cost. The kind of decks that generally want rituals want the mana now, not next turn.
I know that using Vintage staples makes you look like a pro, but honestly there are so many better cards than the rituals that already don’t see play as is. Quick list of them that you might want to look at:
Soldevi Adnate – A repeatable Burnt Offering for Black/artifact creatures. Also can sacrifice itself for the refund.
Priest of Yawgmoth – Same thing as above for artifacts and artifact creatures.
I disagree strongly. Three of the five cards you've listed have to lose summoning sickness before you can get mana out of them, and the other two don't even refund their whole casting cost, much less produce more mana than they cost. The kind of decks that generally want rituals want the mana now, not next turn.
I think we agree on analysis then.
Dark Rit and friends are net positive on mana right away, while the others take more mana than they refund but get you to a higher count on the turn they're used. That's why in Constructed where the "critical turn" is a lot more important, Dark Rit and such are all-stars while Soldevi Adnate doesn't see play.
So if in your assessment any and all decks that want Rituals all want the mana upfront and without paying extra on previous turns, then sure. It's just that in my mind, lots of more *traditional* decks want a boost in mana, and lots of them are ok with sacrificing immediacy in favor of reusability and other perks in return. Sort of how lots of decks in EDH will play stuff like Shriekmaw over Slaughter Pact for the same reasons. The Erebos deck mentioned in the OP seems more like one that values the long game than one that just wants to spend the cards in hand as soon as possible.
Card advantage is not the same thing as card draw. Something for 2B cannot be strictly worse than something for BBB or 3BB. If you're taking out Swords to Plowshares for Plummet, you're a fool. Stop doing these things!
So, after a week or so of steady testing, I've come to some conclusions:
1) Rituals that aren't named Dark Ritual are mostly terrible. Cabal Ritual was cut almost immediately, but Bubbling Muck stuck around for a bit and never really did anything useful. Sure, once it got me a Pestilence win a turn early, and I got one nutso Yawgmoth's Will turn, but it feels too winmore to hold a precious deckslot.
2) Darcykun was right; Ritualing into your general isn't great if it doesn't do anything immediately. I can Dark Ritual into Erebos on turn 2, but outside of slipping him in past countermagic the play isn't particularly worthwhile because I then have to spend the next turn recuperating the card disadvantage. Normal 2cmc mana rocks are a turn slower, but at least the rock hangs around and powers out my other spells earlier.
3) Regardless, Dark Ritual is very good, especially in Erebos where it's never a dead card. Jusstice is wrong about his application of the critical turn here. Yes, EDH is slower than other formats and consequentially the critical turn(s) will be later, but churning out bombs like Necropotence, Caged Sun/Gauntlet of Power, Myojin of Night's Reach, Mind Twist, or a kicked Sadistic Sacrament early is incredibly powerful. Rituals ultimately accelerate your critical turn(s) which typically translates into winning more games.
So far, I've been satisfied with running plain ol' Dark Ritual. In Erebos, it's never bad and has the potential to make backbreaking plays that much earlier. I strongly advise MBC players to give it a shot.
Lotus Petal is very good and I run it in every EDH deck I have.
In the right deck, Dark Ritual is very strong. Being able to play a 3 drop on turn 1 (Turn 1 Phyrexian Arena) or a 4 drop on turn 2 is incredibly powerful.
*snip*
Regardless, Dark Ritual is very good, especially in Erebos where it's never a dead card. Jusstice is wrong about his application of the critical turn here. Yes, EDH is slower than other formats and consequentially the critical turn(s) will be later, but churning out bombs like Necropotence, Caged Sun/Gauntlet of Power, Myojin of Night's Reach, Mind Twist, or a kickedSadistic Sacrament early is incredibly powerful. Rituals ultimately accelerate your critical turn(s) which typically translates into winning more games.
*snip*
A turn-1 Sadistic Sacrament can break a combo deck's soul. It doesn't necessarily need to cripple the deck to be completely tilt-inducing.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I had a wordy signature here once.
URGRiku, Sorcerer SupremeGRU Who needs permanents anyways? WUBRGDeckbuilder's ToolboxGRBUW Warning:Contents include 34 decks and growing
You don't play Muck to get a spell a turn early. You play it to storm out.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Card advantage is not the same thing as card draw. Something for 2B cannot be strictly worse than something for BBB or 3BB. If you're taking out Swords to Plowshares for Plummet, you're a fool. Stop doing these things!
Specifically with regards to mono black control decks, do Dark Ritual and other black temporary ramp spells have a place? Obviously they can be nuts in combo but I've never actually tried them in a control shell before and I was wondering about different opinions and experiences with them. When I first got into the format I considered them pretty bad because temporary ramp seemed weaker than permanent ramp in a format where games tend to go 10+ turns, particularly so in big mana control decks. However, I'm in the process of transitioning from Chainer to Erebos at the moment and I started thinking about ways to get him out as early as possible. Of course Mana Vault made the cut immediately, and the fact that it's often described as a colorless Dark Ritual made me reconsider my position on Rituals in general.
In Erebos, it seems like they pull double duty as ramp to ensure an early God and effective card draw by getting an extra activation or two out of him if they're drawn in the mid or late game. I'm definitely going to give Dark Ritual, Cabal Ritual, and Bubbling Muck a shot as they're likely the best of the bunch. I don't think the sac rituals are worthwhile unless a deck is capable of fully exploiting them, like Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder or Ghoulcaller Gisa.
What do you guys think? Are they combo only or do they belong in other decks as well?
[Primer] Erebos, God of the Dead
HONK HONK
Obviously I'm being kinda vague by just saying "if extra mana lets me play my general early I do it" but it's kind of a personal opinion thing. Is it worth running Bubbling Muck in order to T3/T4 your Sheoldred, Whispering One general? I'd say by T4 there's enough moving parts that it won't matter anymore, but others would disagree. On the case of Muck specifically, I do run High Tide in my Talrand, Sky Summoner so I can either Isochron Scepter it or tutor it out when I'm trying to crank up a good Mind's Desire. Obviously that's a blue example, but Sceptre, Muck and Tendrils of Agony are all legal in EDH and would set up a similar, although less effective shell
I would say... be careful. I don't think all rituals are created equal. Dark Ritual seems like the flagship best one. A lot of the cards you mentioned, like Burnt Offering or Sacrifice or Songs of the Damned aren't universally good in my opinion because it's hard to use them to accelerate in a way that other cards can't. Is playing a 3-drop and sac'ing it going to be better than playing a 3-mana ramp artifact like Coalition Relic? You take hits in both CA and consistency for slightly higher burst mana. Of course, a lot depends on what you're ramping out, but in general I'd say that the later you're ritualing, the less impact it's likely to have. Cabal Ritual has the downside of requiring threshold. I can see Bubbling Muck being okay in mono-black.
I really don't think cracking a Lotus Petal turn one to play a Night's Whisper is awesome. You're spending two cards to get two cards, and trading known quantities for unknown. I think I'd be more comfortable taking a mulligan at that point... of course, if your deck is trying to enable Threshold, or delirium, or flip a Jace, or something, that's a different matter.
It's also worth mentioning that Black has access to another really good way to cheat on mana costs in reanimation. I think that's going to be better for large number of cards that you're trying to get into play. So, rituals if they're important for getting your Commander very early. Or non-creature permanents.
But getting your Commander early can be kind of a trap. What Commanders want to be out early? Sure, you can play Erebos on turn two, but what purpose does that serve if you have to tie up your mana to recoup the CA in the following turns?
Draft my Peasant Cube.
And with Erebos in charge, worst case, you can basically cycle Dark Ritual for 2 life (it adds 2 mana over it's cost, which is enough for an extra card draw) while muck only needs 4 swamps to do the same.
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
Mox Diamond is a strong card for a mono-color deck. Giving up a swamp to power out something early is a small price to pay.
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
Soldevi Adnate – A repeatable Burnt Offering for Black/artifact creatures. Also can sacrifice itself for the refund.
Priest of Yawgmoth – Same thing as above for artifacts and artifact creatures.
Basal Thrull, Basal Sliver, Blood Vassal, etc – Better a lot of the time because they are easier to recur.
The thing that distinguishes these from things like Ashnod’s Altar, Krark-Clan Ironworks, etc, that already get run in Black extensively is that they are self-contained and easily recurrable. Of course, the more commonly seen cards are more commonly seen because they have a high performance ceiling, but these are somewhat more reliable on their own and accessible earlier.
The only real advantages to the Cabal Ritual set of cards are: 1) never unusable, i.e. high performance floor, 2) consistently mana-positive in terms of the flow of the entire game, not just a single turn ramp, and 3) synergy with Instants/Sorceries. So really, I would only consider them in decks where the tempo flow of the entire game is very fast, opening hand textures are important, and there is no special use for creatures as a card type. Understandably, most non-combo, non-Voltron EDH decks fail to meet these criteria. Exceptions are those decks that can translate early mana into cards or permanent mana production, like the stuff mentioned above like Liliana, Heretical Healer, Oloro, etc.
For the typical Erebos deck, either traditional ramp like Wayfarer’s Bauble or the creatures above will just probably work better, or even something like Expedition Map that will help you tutor for Cabal Coffers and output mana over the long of the game. That’s because his ability, unlike Oloro or similar that tends to work a limited number of times per turn, will use whatever mana you can give him.
Regarding Mana Vault and why it’s seen so often, it’s both about 50% better on the turn it's than Dark Rit (color of mana notwithstanding), and synergizes with artifacts (Voltaic Key,etc). Really, there are a ton of decks that care about artifacts.
The problem of course is that it's a dead card on turn 10. So you have two solutions. Either make a deck that is never planning to see turn 10, or make a deck that is planning to have so much card advantage by turn 10 that a dead card doesn't matter. As it turns out, most of my heavy black decks tend to fall into one of those two categories....
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
I think we agree on analysis then.
Dark Rit and friends are net positive on mana right away, while the others take more mana than they refund but get you to a higher count on the turn they're used. That's why in Constructed where the "critical turn" is a lot more important, Dark Rit and such are all-stars while Soldevi Adnate doesn't see play.
So if in your assessment any and all decks that want Rituals all want the mana upfront and without paying extra on previous turns, then sure. It's just that in my mind, lots of more *traditional* decks want a boost in mana, and lots of them are ok with sacrificing immediacy in favor of reusability and other perks in return. Sort of how lots of decks in EDH will play stuff like Shriekmaw over Slaughter Pact for the same reasons. The Erebos deck mentioned in the OP seems more like one that values the long game than one that just wants to spend the cards in hand as soon as possible.
I would generally prefer Ashnod's Altar or Krark-Clan Ironworks over something like Priest of Yawgmoth, just because tokens can get in on the fun.
On phasing:
1) Rituals that aren't named Dark Ritual are mostly terrible. Cabal Ritual was cut almost immediately, but Bubbling Muck stuck around for a bit and never really did anything useful. Sure, once it got me a Pestilence win a turn early, and I got one nutso Yawgmoth's Will turn, but it feels too winmore to hold a precious deckslot.
2) Darcykun was right; Ritualing into your general isn't great if it doesn't do anything immediately. I can Dark Ritual into Erebos on turn 2, but outside of slipping him in past countermagic the play isn't particularly worthwhile because I then have to spend the next turn recuperating the card disadvantage. Normal 2cmc mana rocks are a turn slower, but at least the rock hangs around and powers out my other spells earlier.
3) Regardless, Dark Ritual is very good, especially in Erebos where it's never a dead card. Jusstice is wrong about his application of the critical turn here. Yes, EDH is slower than other formats and consequentially the critical turn(s) will be later, but churning out bombs like Necropotence, Caged Sun/Gauntlet of Power, Myojin of Night's Reach, Mind Twist, or a kicked Sadistic Sacrament early is incredibly powerful. Rituals ultimately accelerate your critical turn(s) which typically translates into winning more games.
So far, I've been satisfied with running plain ol' Dark Ritual. In Erebos, it's never bad and has the potential to make backbreaking plays that much earlier. I strongly advise MBC players to give it a shot.
[Primer] Erebos, God of the Dead
HONK HONK
In the right deck, Dark Ritual is very strong. Being able to play a 3 drop on turn 1 (Turn 1 Phyrexian Arena) or a 4 drop on turn 2 is incredibly powerful.
UBRKess, Dissident MageUBR - Controlling Dissidents
GRhonas the IndomitableG - Indomitable Four Drops
WUBOloro, Ageless AsceticWUB - Loot & Renanimate
A turn-1 Sadistic Sacrament can break a combo deck's soul. It doesn't necessarily need to cripple the deck to be completely tilt-inducing.
URGRiku, Sorcerer SupremeGRU
Who needs permanents anyways?
WUBRGDeckbuilder's ToolboxGRBUW
Warning:Contents include 34 decks and growing
On phasing: