Gifts Ungiven piles

[Willoe]

Hi everyone :)

My friend got this very casual gifts deck that simply sucks. What he'd like to add was card that was functional identical (like grizzly bears and bear cub). Fucntional identity means to the unknowing people that two cards do exact exact the same but have different names.

Obviously, the advantage of this concept is to be sure to grab what he wants. Also, if we can find four cards that has functional identity, we can be sure to gain i.e. 2 threats with gifts.

If some of you can suggest cards that that exists in at least three different copies, I'd be pleased as he will reward me with a Grindstone xb

[Madmaniac21]

Reanimate, Exhume, Dance of the Dead, Animate Dead.

[Nightmare]

It depends on what card he's trying to duplicate.

Throwing Regrowth and Recoup into Gifts Piles assures you get both of the other cards.

[from Cairo]

What colors are you looking for?

Thinking of Gifts Rock, I know they often run a combination of...

Eternal Witness +

Innocent Blood / Chainer's Edict / Shriekmaw - for killing single targets
Pernicious Deed / Damnation / Engineered Explosives - for sweepers
Genesis / Gigapede / Tarmogoyf - for getting threats/threat recursion
Life from the Loam / Academy Ruins / Volrath's Stronghold / Cephalid Colloseum - for varying utility

Other than the really powerful cards most of those are 1 ofs; like Eternal Witness, Goyf, Pernicious Deed and Shriekmaw are multiples but the more limited utility is intended mainly for Gifts piles.

[Silverdragon]

Wild Jhovall, Tor Giant, Barbarian Horde, Hill Giant, Ogre Warrior

Portal reprints ftw :D

edit: There are also lots of Grizzly Bear reprints fyi. Anyway if you are looking for more competitive options not just stupid trivia I think from Cairo has listed some really good ones.

[Willoe]

Silverdragon, this is exactly what I'm looking for! What I need:

1/1's or higher at 1cc
2/2's or higher at 2cc
2/3 or higher at 3cc
3/3 or higher at 4cc

I could use that reanimator pile. What about this:

Gifts Ungiven
Exhume
Akroma, Angel of Wrath
Careful Study

With the first, then if the opponent gets me Akroma and Exhume in the yard, I gifts for four reanimation pieces. It's casual people! :D

Those fancy recursion piles does not suit my friend. I just phoned him about that Recoup/Regrowth one. He said "fuck recursion, I want vanillas!"

But I'm sure he'll like that reanimator one. After all, Akroma wins the game in casual :D

[andreotti16]

i got a couple suggestions. The rules actually say you can find 1,2, or 3 cards and fail to find anymore. A friend of mine did a cruel trick by finding anger and glory and failed to find anything else, so i was forced to send both to his graveyard. The 4 cards i might suggest with equal abilities are:
Eternal witness
Mindslaver
Bringer of the white dawn
Acadamy ruins.

Thats a cruel choice for an opponent and your getting mindslaver back no matter what.

[b4r0n]

For green...


1/1's or higher at 1cc

Jungle Lion, Tattermunge Maniac, Skyshroud Elite, Wild Dogs


2/2's or higher at 2cc

Wild Mongrel, Safehold Elite, Vexing Shusher... and Tarmogoyf :tongue:


2/3 or higher at 3cc

Nessian Courser, Call of the Herd, Gnarled Mass, Trained Armodon


3/3 or higher at 4cc

Ravenous Baloth, Brooding Saurian, Chameleon Colossus, Cytoplast Root-Kin

Is that what you're asking for? They're not completely identical, but they each have decent stats for their converted mana cost.

[Madmaniac21]

Also use intuition.

The clear answer here is a reanimation.dec - every timmy loves playing with huge fatties, and that's how you do it.

[Versus]

I'm always happy when I play against a Vintage deck with gifts. They search up Vamp Tutor, Yawgs Win, Eternal Witness, Imperial Seal and I just shake my head in disgust.

I don't have answer to the question, but I just wanna say I hate Gifts. It's the one spell you can play against me where I'll audibly groan in detest. I just sit there and stare at the cards moving them back and forth between piles. I might as well let them take both, as my choice will almost always be the wrong one.

[rufus]

People here are typically looking for game winning combos off of Gifts rather than just beaters, so you're going to see fancier stacks.

That said, your friend could pull:
1x Animate Dead/Shallow Grave/Whatever
1x Volrath's Shapeshifter
1x Beef
1x Beef

...I wonder if there are any good Spellweaver Volute stacks -- of course, that does qualify as recursion.

[freakish777]

If he's playing with artifacts, he can always Gifts for the following cards in addition to the artifact(s):

Rootwater Diver
Academy Ruins
Goblin Welder
Drafna's Restoration
Reconstruction
Agrivian Find
Ritual of Restoration
Myr Retriever
Mine Excavation
Junk Diver
Treasure Hunter
Trash for Treasure
Skeleton Shard (has to also be a creature)
Argivian Archaeologist
Hanna, Ship's Navigator
Argivian Restoration
Moriok Scavenger
Roar of Reclamation
Bringer of the White Dawn

say he's playing with Memnarch and Grim Poppet, early in the game you pitch Grim Poppet to a Thirst for Knowledge or something, you play Gifts for Memnarch and the other 3, they give you Argivian Find and Reconstruction letting you get back Memnarch and Grim Poppet when you've got enough mana.

Other casual cards to go with Gifts:

Relearn (keep it mono-blue!)
Sage's Knowledge (so terrible)
Tutors (Mystical Tutor allows you to Gifts for a combo that involves an instant or Sorcery and if they don't give you that card, you can always go grab it with Mystical anyways)
Reclaim/Recollect/Hana Kami (like how it was done in Standard)
Sins of the Past
Elven Cache (this card is soooooo bad)

Do X damage:

Fireball/Invoke the Firemind/Fanning the Flames/Blaze

Draw X Cards:

Invoke the Firemind/Brain Geyser/Mind Spring/Stroke of Genius

Get Mirari's Wake (or a ghetto version of it requiring 2 card):

Mirari's Wake/the green version of Mana Flare from Kami/Glorius Anthem/Replenish

Take Extra turns:

Time Warp/Beacon of Tomorrows/Time Stretch/Temporal Manipulation/Time Walk/Walk the Aeons/Capture of Jingzhou


Get lands back:

Life from the Loam
Crucible of Worlds
Cartographer

Blow up lands:

Decree of Annihilation/Burning of Xingye/Wildfire/Armageddon/Ravages of War

Play extra lands:

Exploration/Burgeoning/Rites of Flourishing/Fastbond

Destroy Creatures:

Wrath of God/Damnation/Decree of Pain/Austere Command

Combo's with Niv-Mizzet:

Curiosity/Keen Sense/Ophidian Eye


Get back an enchantment and have a blocker!

Auramancer
Monk Idealist
Tragic Poet

Get back an instant or sorcery and have a blocker:

Izzet Chronarch
Anarchist
Scrivener

Get back a creature and have a blocker:

Gravedigger
Gravescrabbler
Exhumer Thrull
Hell's Caretaker (it's Goblin Welder but for creatures!)
Karmic Guide
Lord of the Undead
Order of the Whiteclay
Oversold Cemetary (doesn't exactly block though)
Pit Keeper
Recurring Nightmare (doesn't exactly block)
Sylvan Hierophant
Warren Pilferer's
Wort, Boggart Auntie

Other reanimation possibilities (since they're reusalbe):

Dawn of the Dead
Corpse Dance
Reya Dawn Bringer
Dreams of the Dead
Genesis
Goryo's Vengeance
Strand's of Night
Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed (reanimate him each turn with Corpse Dance to get a regrowth for black cards every turn)!

[Willoe]

For green...



Jungle Lion, Tattermunge Maniac, Skyshroud Elite, Wild Dogs



Wild Mongrel, Safehold Elite, Vexing Shusher... and Tarmogoyf :tongue:



Nessian Courser, Call of the Herd, Gnarled Mass, Trained Armodon



Ravenous Baloth, Brooding Saurian, Chameleon Colossus, Cytoplast Root-Kin

Is that what you're asking for? They're not completely identical, but they each have decent stats for their converted mana cost.

Yay, these piles rock :D I can keep it UG :D I'll post a list here on of the other days :) Don't look forward to a format-breaking one. Just one that can at least win against random legacy stuff :P

Freakish777, thanks a bunch for your suggestions, I'll brew something with the cards you posted there :D

[mercenarybdu]

reanimate, stich together, kokusho, recurring nightmare

[Thehunter820]

I doubt it'll be much use but Blue Elemental Blast\Hydroblast and Red Elemental Blast\Pyroblast same cost same effect, different name.

[Lego]

People here are typically looking for game winning combos off of Gifts rather than just beaters, so you're going to see fancier stacks.

That said, your friend could pull:
1x Animate Dead/Shallow Grave/Whatever
1x Volrath's Shapeshifter
1x Beef
1x Beef

...I wonder if there are any good Spellweaver Volute stacks -- of course, that does qualify as recursion.

Gifts Ungiven goes on top of whatever Beef makes it into the graveyard, so Volrath's Shapeshifter won't work here.

[freakish777]

A casual Gifts rock deck seems like it could be a ton of fun, while not necessarily doing the whole "All 4 of my cards do the exact same thing, but they're similar."

Something like:

//Lands
13 Snow-Covered Forests
2 Snow-Covered Swamp
2 Snow-Covered Island
4 Frost Marsh

//The "My lands are soooo good" pile:
1 Scrying Sheets
1 Mouth of Ronom
1 Terramorphic Expanse
1 Academy Ruins

//The "This deck is mana hungry" pile
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
3 Into the North
1 Kodama's Reach
1 Coldsteel Heart

//The Tutoring Engine of Rediculousness
4 Gifts Ungiven

//The board sweepers pile
1 Engineered Explosives (Plague Boiler if you want to keep the cost down)
1 Pernicious Deed
1 Oblivion Stone
1 Nevinyrral's Disk

//The dudes that keep coming pile
1 Genesis
1 Gigapede
1 Grave-Shell Scarab
1 Necroplasm (an additional "sweeper" that clears the way for Giga/Scarab)

//The Flashback Pile aka "I get 6 spells no matter what you do!"
1 Chainer's Edict
3 Think Twice
2 Moment's Peace
1 Call of the Herd

//The "I really want to get rid of Akroma/Simic Skyswallower NOW!" pile (with Chainer's, obviously, maybe the other card is Moment's Peace against a fatty with Haste)
1 Cruel Edict/Innocent Blood
1 Diabolic Edict

//Recursion is awesome... pile
3 Eternal Witness
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Life from the Loam



Some piles in this list that seem fun:

Crucible + Loam + Academy Ruins + Terramorphic/Mouth of Ronom. You eventually get Crucible + Terra/Mouth to make land drops every turn or kill a 4 toughness dude every turn.

Academy Ruins + Loam + EE/OStone + Think Twice (Think Twice gives you a draw for dredging or to get the EE after using Ruins to put it on top)


Variations:

Replace a land with Dark Depths for a gigantic flyer of doom! (if they Echoing Truth it, you can Gifts for the Crucible pile to be able to restart the gigantic flyer of doom process whenever you want).

Replace a land with Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth for extreme mana fixing (additionally play with Corrupts & Tendrils of Corruptions for life gain, and Nightmare for a big beater).

Replace a land with High Market (allows you to Gifts for Genesis, Loam, Witness and High Market, you eventually get Genesis in your graveyard and High Market in play, giving you an Eternal Witness effect, chump blocker, and 1 life every turn).

Replace a land with Volrath's Stronghold (seems redudant with Genesis though).

Replace Necroplasm with the "I love this creature so much" of your choice (for instance Kokusho).

Replace the Edicts with Eyeblight's Ending, Rend Flesh, Chill to the Bone, Putrefy, (targetted removal spells or bounce spells of your choice, I personally hate the non-black clause on most targetted removal, if you use bounce spells, definitely use Temporal Spring).

Replace Edicts with discard spells of your choice (I suggest Cabal Therapy, Ravenous Rats, and Chittering Rats, a Chittering Rats recursion Gifts pile would be very annoying).

Replace Edicts with Green land "destruction" of your choice (Creeping Mold, Plow Under, Temporal Spring perhaps?).

Last note:

As a casual deck this seems like a lot of fun, especially because you don't just roll over and die if don't draw Gifts (you should do just fine with the other cards by themselves), with 25 lands and 9 accelerants you shouldn't ever get mana screwed, there's other engines/mini-combos besides Gifts (recursion with Crucible/Genesis/Academy Ruins, Into the North for Scrying Sheets to get some extra cards), and there's flashback cards to earning some card/tempo advantages (to dig into Gifts).

[Killer_Joe]

I have casual deck that I play with in a multiplayer casual monthly game. Our deckbuilding rules say the minimum deck size is 75 cards. Anyway, with that said, I built a UBG Gifts deck:

Lands (30)
4 Watery Grave
4 Tropical Island
4 Overgrown Tomb
1 Verdant Catacomb
1 Polluted Delta
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Reflecting Pool
1 Miren, The Moaning Well
1 Volrath’s Stronghold
1 Maze of Ith
1 Academy Ruins
3 Island
3 Swamp
4 Forest

Creatures (16)
4 Eternal Witness
2 Kokusho, the Evening Star
4 Mystic Snake
2 Spiritmonger
4 Wall of Blossoms

Spells (27)
1 Abundance
2 Call of the Herd
2 Capsize
1 Cursed Totem
2 Damnation
4 Demonic Tutor
3 Gaea’s Blessing
4 Gifts Ungiven
4 Naturalize
1 Null Rod
4 Propaganda
1 Sylvan Library


My "gift package" is Kokusho/Eternal Witness/Demonic Tutor/Miren, the Moaning Well

[The deck is strictly for multiplayer (5+ players) and there is no banned & restricted list for our games]