The first "Magic Memories" thread I started here was for Dark Ritual. In that thread, Melkor and I both commented on the striking disappearance of Dark Ritual in aggro decks, as for most of the 1990's, the card was strongly associated with black aggro decks. I raised that topic again in the more recent Hypnotic Specter thread, so I don't want to overdo it. However, there's tangential relevance to Rite of Flame, a card that was first printed
after the shift of Dark Ritual from an aggro card to an aggro/control card and finally to a combo card had already fully manifested. Because it came out in 2006, Rite of Flame was already viewed as a combo card right away. For tournaments, anyway.
Actually, as an aside, I should note that most of the casual usage of Rite of Flame I witnessed, prior to my own adoption of the card, was in instances of bad, newbish deck design. If inexperienced deckbuilders were still pulling Rite of Flame out of their packs today, we'd see the same thing. Something like "First turn Mountain, Rite of Flame, Rite of Flame, Rite of Flame, cast this big dragon." These "living the dream" scenarios are predicated on unattractive levels of variance, and it tends to be inexperienced players who go in for this sort of thing. More experienced deckbuilders are keen to how unreliable these fantasy scenarios are, so they tend to dismiss them and focus on more consistent methods.
Except Psarketos. He knows better, but that doesn't stop him. A madman, I tell you!
As another aside, with Dark Ritual falling out of favor in Eternal formats except in Storm combo decks, and with most imitators being less efficient, and therefore only succeeding in that same little niche, I suspect that WotC R&D came to a distorted view of the general power level of mana burst "ritual" effects. As they're some of my favorite cards, of course I find this development unfortunate. Is Rite of Flame too strong for Modern? I'm the wrong guy to ask, as I've been advised, confidently and repeatedly, that
Counterspell is too strong for Modern, a statement I find so bafflingly alien that I experience reflexive revulsion at the very concept. So I'll talk about Modern. Of course I'll talk about Modern: it's a popular format and one of my principle values as a person who pretends to be an "analyst" of the game is to encompass a broad scope of different formats/variants/environments/playstyles/whatever. I'll talk about it, but with the dramatic, bold-faced Surgeon General's warning:
No one should listen to what this man has to say.
But we've gotten off track. And where the track
was leading was back to a highly competitive deck from the Extended format. It was perhaps the longest-running and most successful Rite of Flame deck in the format's history. And it wasn't a Storm combo deck. "And what," you ask, "was this mysterious deck?" To which I respond, "Did you not read Post #14 of this thread? I already mentioned it there." And then you either say, "Oversoul, you're a jerk" or perhaps "Oh, it must be Demigod Stompy." One of those two responses, I assume. Anyway, let's focus on the second one...
Demigod Stompy did use Empty the Warrens, but it wasn't remotely like most Storm combo decks. I called it aggro-combo before, but that's an unusual designation and it didn't have much in common with other decks I've thrown into that category. And unlike what one might expect from a red aggro deck, it didn't use cheap, efficient creatures, nor direct damage spells. But hey, it worked. The real game is more complex than our theoretical classification systems. So, here's a sample decklist from 2008.
3 Magus of the Moon
4 Demigod of Revenge
4 Deus of Calamity
4 Simian Spirit Guide
4 Desperate Ritual
4 Seething Song
1 Shattering Spree
3 Empty the Warrens
4 Rite of Flame
3 Blood Moon
1 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Trinisphere
4 Chrome Mox
19 Mountain
Sideboard:
3 Chalice of the Void
2 Dead // Gone
1 Magus of the Moon
4 Martyr of Ashes
2 Shattering Spree
2 Smash to Smithereens
1 Umezawa's Jitte
The concept is fairly transparent, but doesn't really use most of those cards in the way that other tournament decks used them. Rite of Flame, Chrome Mox, Simian Spirit Guide, Seething Song, and Desperate Ritual let the deck consistently jump ahead on mana, deploying threats. From there, Magus of the Moon, Blood Moon, and Trinisphere proactively hinder most responses that opponents would use to deal with these threats. Demigod of Revenge, and to a lesser extent the swarms of goblins created by Empty the Warrens, are "sticky" threats that aren't easily dealt with by a lot of the common answer cards used against creatures. But this isn't a robust, controlling "attrition" kind of deck. It does try to close out games quickly. It just happens to protect itself with some of the same tools that more controlling "red prison" builds also use. Not an archetype that defies description, but one that doesn't really fit into the more common molds. This archetype might be a cousin of the Legacy "Dragon Stompy" or "Mono-Red Prison" decks. Where Demigod Stompy had to rely on rituals to accelerate its gameplan, the Legacy versions have Ancient Tomb and City of Traitors. The Legacy decks also employ more control tools, such as maindeck Chalice of the Void and Ensnaring Bridge. Demigod Stompy, in contrast was more of an all-or-nothing approach.
Well, Demigod Stompy is interested, but if you are inclined to dismiss it as "just another combo deck" then I'll fall back on Rite of Flame as a staple in old Extended Goblins decks, which were indisputably aggro decks. In both Demigod Stompy and in Goblins, Rite of Flame effectively relived the glory days of Dark Ritual as an aggro accelerant. And the demonstrable success of the card in a role that isn't fast combo is what I think sets it apart from similar cards. Yes, Seething Song is good. And I do love combo decks. But really, only two "ritual" cards in the history of the game have truly proven themselves as strong general mana accelerants that are worth using even when the goal isn't to chain spells into a fast combo kill. Those are Dark Ritual and Rite of Flame.