Shuhei Nakamura's 6-0 Gifts deck

[hi-val]

I love Gifts a lot, and it was neat to see that Shuhei had success with the deck, a 6-0 run in Modern at Worlds. I'd like to talk about his list, why I think he did well, and where I'd take the deck from here.

Deck

1 Blood Crypt
1 Breeding Pool
1 Darkslick Shores
1 Forest
2 Graven Cairns
4 Grove of the Burnwillows
1 Island
2 Misty Rainforest
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Stomping Ground
2 Swamp
1 Tectonic Edge
2 Twilight Mire
3 Verdant Catacombs
1 Watery Grave

2 Eternal Witness
2 Kitchen Finks
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Snapcaster Mage

1 All Suns' Dawn
1 Consuming Vapors
2 Damnation
1 Doom Blade
1 Duress
2 Engineered Explosives
4 Gifts Ungiven
1 Go for the Throat
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Life from the Loam
3 Liliana of the Veil
3 Punishing Fire
1 Raven's Crime
1 Rude Awakening
1 Smother
2 Thirst for Knowledge

Sideboard:

2 Ancient Grudge
2 Combust
1 Extirpate
1 Obstinate Baloth
2 Seal of Primordium
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Thoughtseize

Things I like a lot

Liliana + Punishing Fires. What a good discard combo!

TFK + Fires. Shuhei really knows how to get the most out of his Fires, including using them to fuel TFK.

Liliana in general: I'm not entirely sold on her, but she offers so much against so many decks.

ASD: What a freakin' beating. Talk about a card that can put games away!

LFTL + Crime: I am usually dismissive of this combo, since it takes a long time and you practically have to Gifts for it. How often am I going to Gift up this combo? In testing, though, it's brutal against a deck that is attempting to stockpile some cards in hand.

What I don't like

No real answers for Nacatl. He runs a Smother, GFTT, Doom Blade, and EE, but those are all slooooowww and will still let a Nacatl crank in for 6-9 damage. I'd love some Lightning Bolts in here.

Only 1 Snapcaster: This has been a crucial part of a lot of my Gifts piles, and I'd like a lot more of it.

Finks: Is this the right deck for these guys?

No Academy Ruins: seriously?

Really awkward early color requirements: do you end up fetching green early with the hope that you'll land STE? Can we sustain the GG needs for Finks?

No Cruel Ultimatum: which is strange, because Rude Awakening is in there and it's just a wincon - you'll never cast it without lethal lands on the board. I'd rather Cruel people apart, since I can Snapcast it, too.

No counters: no Cryptic, no Negate, no Flashfreeze. Nothing to stop an opponent from dropping a gamewinning spell like Birthing Pod. Nothing to really attack their lands. No Detritivore, no Maelstrom Pulse to mop up. If we're not running Academy Ruins, why not junk EE for Pulses?

Why I think this wins

This deck reminds me of Gifts Rock. It'll just attrition people apart. Stick Liliana and grind her, use Fires, etc. If you get a minute to breathe, you compile absolutely brutal Gifts piles.

I bet this struggles with Teachings decks. You've got a bunch of dead stuff in the deck and they have solid counters, Teachings to Extirpate your Fires, a reliable draw engine and more.



Has this deck caught your eye? Have you tried it out at all? I'd love to talk about this deck with some folks!

[SpikeyMikey]

Has this deck caught your eye? Have you tried it out at all? I'd love to talk about this deck with some folks!

Has it caught my eye? Of course. It was one of only 4 6-0 decks at Worlds. Hard for it not to catch your eye. However, I don't understand it. I can't look at it and see how it works, so I've more or less ignored it. It doesn't look overtly powerful and it looks too ponderous. But of course, the record speaks for itself.

[mojoiskewl]

Pilot factor?

maybe only shuhei can pilot shuhei.dec

[Mr. Safety]

I was thinking the same thing: I noticed it, but it seemed like such a gelatinous mass of jank-a-roo that I sort of dismissed it.

If I were to build a Gifts control deck (which I have done in BUG colors) with P-Fires/Groves, this would be my starting point:

4x Grove of the Burnwillows
4x Punishing Fires
2x Raven's Crime
1x Life from the Loam
4x Spell Pierce
4x Gifts Ungiven
4x Birds of Paradise


The rest could be goodstuff elements, but honestly I'd probably go with a reanimator package along with Vigor Mortis/Unburial Rites. Iona, Sphinx of the Silly Win, Angel of Despair, and Bogarden Hellkite.

[hi-val]

It does do a really good job of blanking the board and making sure the opponent isn't holding any cards. The big issue I found is that Liliana's ultimate is terrible in this deck and you often get her up to it efficiently. So you have a planeswalker that's just a pile of Edicts. The deck is simply slow to win. Cards like Creeping Tar Pit, Lavaclaw Reaches and more would be pretty good for sealing things up.

[Mr. Safety]

With green in the mix, I think Treetop Village may be your best man-land. Cost/power ratio is better than everything save Mutavault.

Looking at the list, it seems like there are some minor upgrades that can happen. Viridian Emissary > Sakura-Tribe Elder and Spell Snare should be in there somewhere. It has value througout the match considering the high-density of 2-mana power plays (Bob, Goofy, removal, Desperate/Pyretic Ritual, Mana Leak.)

I guess I'm just thinking that splashing blue for only Gifts is a missed opportunity. Sure, Gifts is the best draw spell in the format now that the cantrips are banned...but just because the countermagic is bad doesn't mean it isn't neccessary.

[Litorers]

Well...

After seeing the deck, I decided to build a list that would hopefully dodge the potential punishing fire ban. It's a BUG list, instead of what Mr. Shuuhei played, and has been testing fairly well. Zoo does not come up as often as it should on cockatrice, however.

Maindeck: 60 cards

Artifact:
1x oblivion stone

Creatures: 10

2x eternal witness
4x sakura-tribe elder
2x shriekmaw
1x snapcaster mage
1x vendilion clique

Instant: 17

1x consume the meek
2x doom blade
2x dismember
4x gifts ungiven
1x go for the throat
1x spell burst
2x mana leak
2x negate
2x spell snare

Sorcery: 8

2x inquisition of kozilek
1x all suns' dawn
1x damnation
1x life from the loam
1x raven's crime
1x profane command
1x maelstrom pulse

Lands: 24

1x snow-covered swamp
1x swamp
1x snow-covered forest
1x forest
1x snow-covered island
1x island
1x breeding pool
1x buried ruin
1x creeping tar pit
1x ghost quarter
1x misty rainforest
1x okina, temple to the grandfathers
1x overgrown tomb
1x urborg, tomb of yawgmoth
1x watery grave
1x woodland cemetery
2x hinterland harbor
2x verdant catacombs
4x river of tears



Sideboard: 15 cards

2x nihil spellbomb
1x surgical extraction
3x kitchen finks
2x mindbreak trap
3x spell pierce
2x Thrun, the last troll
2x inquisition of kozilek


This deck has more of a solid base, I find, but gives up the power given to red (fires + ancient grudge). Some kind of naturalize effects should find their way into the sideboard, once I figure out which pieces to cut. I'm leaning towards the mindbreak traps as of right now because I have yet to need them. The oblivion stone has been a very nice catchall, and the buried ruin sets up a similar lock to one achievable with academy ruins, while still allowing you to loam back lands to fuel raven's crime. Profane Command makes a very nice addition to any gifts stack, allowing you to get back a snappy or a witness with ease, and generating even more board dominance, as well as providing an alternate win condition.Spell burst gives the deck even more late game, and the counter magic makes the deck feel more comfortable in general. Punishing fire hits this deck pretty hard though, so unless those kinds of decks lose popularity or get banned it seems like a risk.

Thoughts?
The list feels pretty unrefined, does anyone see any clear improvements to be made?

[hi-val]

Responses are in-line.

Also, thanks for auto-carding your deck, that's awesome for people who may not be familiar with the deep card pool.

Artifact:
1x oblivion stone

I like this thing, but it's also really slow. It's a big board wipe, but if you're running this to take out generally annoying things, just run more Maelstrom Pulses instead!

Creatures: 10

2x eternal witness
4x sakura-tribe elder
2x shriekmaw
1x snapcaster mage
1x vendilion clique

This layout gives a lot of pressure, which is nice. I think you'll eventually cut a Witness; they're really bad to draw in the early game and one is enough to Gift for. You should consider Kitchen Finks if you're going to go this green. They buy a lot of time.

Instant: 17

1x consume the meek

Outside of getting this with Teachings, there are better alternatives. Black Sun's Zenith, Consuming Vapors, etc.

2x doom blade

You should think about Smother. Doom Blade has only been uncastable a few times for me - it can't kill a Tidehollow Sculler, for example. I like Smother a lot, but both of those cards are probably 95% effective for what we want them to do.

2x dismember

I haven't been impressed with these. Gifts doesn't have a lot of life to just toss around and if you pay retail for this, you're spending BB1 on a kill spell. If I'm spending that, I want Sudden Death!

4x gifts ungiven

If you're looking for extra space, you can probably trim one of these and get away with it.

1x go for the throat

Love this - "your Spellskite won't protect you now!"

1x spell burst

Has this worked out for you? I don't like it in Gifts decks because you can't Snapcast it and buy it back. I recognize that this spell + 8 mana is a serious beating, but it just seems painfully slow.

2x mana leak
2x negate
2x spell snare

I keep talking about Flashfreeze and I feel like a voice in the wilderness. You might give it a try. I don't think there's much worth Spell Snaring in Modern. Your only real draw is the draw step, and I don't want to draw conditional cards if I can avoid it.

Sorcery: 8

2x inquisition of kozilek
1x all suns' dawn

This will recover, at most, three cards from your graveyard. If you have Kitchen Finks to recur as well, it might be a little nicer. That said, I don't think you'll want to spend five mana on this very often.

1x damnation
1x life from the loam
1x raven's crime

I love this combo; it's so punishing to get at an endstep when someone is hoarding cards against you.

1x profane command

This seems painfully slow. I want it to work, sure. Spending five mana to kill a Nacatl and then recur my Eternal Witness is saucy for sure.

1x maelstrom pulse

I find I'm running two of these in a lot of decks with Gifts because I just love to see it all the time.

Lands: 24

1x snow-covered swamp
1x swamp
1x snow-covered forest
1x forest
1x snow-covered island
1x island
1x breeding pool
1x buried ruin
1x creeping tar pit
1x ghost quarter
1x misty rainforest
1x okina, temple to the grandfathers
1x overgrown tomb
1x urborg, tomb of yawgmoth
1x watery grave
1x woodland cemetery
2x hinterland harbor
2x verdant catacombs
4x river of tears

You've got a lot of weird cards that I can tell that you've split for Gifts piles. You probably don't need to bother. If you're Gifting, you have four mana. You also have a lot of better lands to grab than basics. Your Okina pumps up a Clique and that's it - I'd cut it. If you ran a few Finks, you could definitely make a case for Oran-Rief, since it combines amazingly with Persist dudes.

I think you'll end up cutting River of Tears. It's so awkward in my experience. You want black mana on their turn so you can EOT GFTT them or something similar. You might experiment with Darkslick Shores, Sunken Ruins or other UB lands.

[Litorers]

Thanks for the reply! The list was really rough, and I've moved away from a lot of the counter magic for more removal and some experimental pieces. Barter in blood has been testing great so far, because I rarely have a guy out early and it can hit creatures that are almost impossible otherwise, although I don't know if it's better than a sweeper.
The oblivion stone and spellburst require some explanation. Both of them are basically the endgame of the deck. The most brutal gifts pile against an empty board or if you have a lot of mana has been to get o-stone, loam, buried ruin, and raven's crime. They're effectively not able to do... anything. creeping tar pit can go into the gifts pile for anything you've actually drawn, to help finish off the game. I find I'm often casting spellburst as a cancel of sorts, and then getting it back later with witness or all suns' dawn. Speaking of which, I've been thinking of cutting it, since the "ultra-value" pile of all suns'/snapcaster/witness/profane command hasn't really been that good. The deck really just wants to survive into the "un-winnable" late game mode, where it can pretty much mop up with any random dork. The extra maelstrom pulse is sounds great! It'll help dealing with planes-walkers, as I've found the only real way to deal with them other than attacking with random dorks I happen to have out is to o-stone them, which isn't always present :/. Because of this, I might even add another creeping tar pit. Kitchen finks should absolutely find their way to the main deck. The manabase is a war zone xD, although the river of tears haven't been that awkward, as they count as .75 islands when I math my manabase out :/.The sideboard has been undergoing quite a bit of changes as well, so when I'm happy again with both the main deck and the sideboard I'll re-post it.
Thanks for the input!
What kind of list are you currently running?

[Mr. Safety]

Not to interrupt the conversation, but this is a thread I started for using Gifts in a BUG setup.

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?21872-Deck-BUG-Gifts

It has been on-again, off-again good. It seems to do really well against combo, great against anything resembling control, and generally not so great against zoo. It's there as a reference, should you be interested.

[Litorers]

I saw you thread but the deck really feels more like Shuuhei's in play style. Surviving the first few turns is your #1 goal, because it leads to crushing gifts piles. Granted, the list I posted is a bit different to my current one, so I could see where you're drawing the similarities.