I currently can't make infinite green so I need ways to utilize the black, and Drownyard Temple does that. I was only suggesting it and Bitter Ordeal.

I think I'd still prefer Bitter Ordeal, though, to Grasp 'cause Bitter costs one, as well as always hitting more cards than Grasp.

The lack of Realms was weird to me, though. I kinda get why you don't run it... ish. My meta isn't aggressive enough to need to win the second Get Good hits play.

Also: I didn't say Helldozer was good, I said it was fun. XD

DudelRok: Ahh, well that is a different problem entirely. If you don't have Elvish Spirit Guide/Riftsweeper/Necromancy/Culling the Weak or Crop Rotation/(Twilight Mire or Gaea's Cradle) to make infinite green, the best wincons are Geth's Verdict or Ebony Charm. You want something that has utility other than its function as a wincon.

Drownyard works as well, but requires you to run other cards you would rather not run. The cost of Bitter Ordeal is definitely better and the card is decent, but you don't get to play the cards you exile, so it doesn't let you grab Pact of Negation or something else to protect your combo (or tutor for it).

Yeah, definitely a meta call. My list is tuned for speed above all else, but any list a little slower would likely want Realms.

Also: I didn't say Helldozer was bad, I said it was casual. :P

Love the primer. I've learned a lot about comboing with the frog. My only question was why you use gaea's blessing instead of the second eldrazi titan. A pretty common move in my meta is to wait for my first titan to hit the graveyard and then attempt to exile it. In response I keeping dredging and hit the next titan so that the exile doesn't matter. I'm assuming you do the same thing with the blessing, but why take the chance of drawing it and being dead in the water!? Great guide!

Great Primer!

Something to note, you can also produce 'infinite' green at instant speed (though ONLY instant speed/end step) with Lotus Cobra, Necromancy, Dryad Arbor, and Culling the Weak and 'infinite' black mana. Discard Cobra, then Necromancy Cobra. Go to cleanup and sac the Necromancy. With the Necromancy sac trigger on the stack, proceed to reanimate and sac Arbor for one green mana.

Zyxan - Ad Nauseam is tough enough with one titan. Two makes it unplayable.

Zyxan: You are right about that being the purpose of having Gaea's Blessing in the list. As far as using another Eldrazi, merrowMania is right about Ad Nauseam being the main consideration. The other goal is to minimize the number of dead cards in the deck. Since rarely have enough mana to cast the titans, it is better to have the Gaea's Blessing, even if it is just a bad cantrip. Also sometimes you can mise value against reanimator strategies that are slow-rolling their combo. (Buried Alive pass. Feels really bad when we get to follow up with Gaea's Blessing lol)

merrowMania: Haha, that's a cool trick. I may add that to the primer if you don't mind. Nice if you don't have access to Riftsweeper or your double-green lands.

Go for it! More knowledge for the collective that is HypnoToad!

I usually use it to combo through Root Maze after losing Riftsweeper.

Just realized I forgot to give context to the loop. I went through this explanation several times, trying to write everything at once. It culminated in my giving up on explaining how to do it with Skirge Familiar still in play. Any part of my explanation that contains Skirge Familiar is basically superfluous, but I will leave it so you have the option of making it look pretty if you want to add it for when Oblivion Crown is exiled.......this kind of explaining is why I hate writing primers...reading what I have written, trying to make exceptions for Skirge Familiar makes the setup read terribly...

Setup:
You MUST (technically not, but you need 1 green mana in order to use Skirge Familiar) create your 'infinite' black mana by looping Dark Ritual/Cabal Ritual with your discard outlet. It is possible to perform this loop with Skirge Familiar, but you need to have a green mana as part of the startup cost (Elvish Spirit Guide does work). It is much easier to simply change the discard outlet with Oblivion Crown and loop rituals, since you will not need any green mana. If you used Skirge Familiar and are trying an end step kill, you must have used Necromancy already (otherwise you would be doing a sorcery speed kill because this kill requires using Necromancy twice (if you have access to two green mana, you can Nature's Claim the Necromancy twice to get it off the Familiar and on and off the Cobra so you can use it repeatedly on the Dryad Arbor)). It is not necessary since you can just change your discard outlet to Gitrog or a third creature with Oblivion Crown. Then you can go to cleanup, spend Green to Nature's Claim Necromancy, or cast Culling the Weak saccing Skirge Familiar (casting Oblivion Crown is mandatory for this line if you do not have another discard outlet) to get Necromancy back in hand. If you use the cleanup method to remove Necromancy, you must have a backup discard outlet or a green mana to cast Nature's Claim on the Lotus Cobra Necromancy. Regardless of your method, you must make sure to have 'infinite' black mana. Loop rituals into 'infinite' black mana again or use Skirge Familiar if applicable. Proceed to draw deck/graveyard with your discard outlet.

(Black and generic costs will be ignored for rest of explanation due to 'infinite' black mana)
Discard Lotus Cobra. Reanimate Lotus Cobra with Necromancy. If you have one green mana, cast Nature's Claim on Necromancy and continue in response to the sac trigger.

Beginning:
Step 1: Draw deck/graveyard.
2: Discard Dryad Arbor.
3: Reanimate it with Necromancy.
4: Landfall trigger from Cobra to produce one green.
5: Sac Dryad Arbor to Culling the Weak.
6: Return to Step 1.

AAAAAAND my perfectionist nature kicked in. The following is a clean(er) version of the loop without Skirge Familiar:

Setup:
You MUST create your 'infinite' black mana by looping Dark Ritual/Cabal Ritual with your discard outlet. If you made mana with a Skirge Familiar reanimated by Necromancy, cast Oblivion Crown on The Gitrog Monster or a third creature. Then you can go to cleanup (aka use Necromancy's own ability to sac itself), spend one green mana to Nature's Claim Necromancy, or cast Culling the Weak saccing Skirge Familiar to get Necromancy back in hand. Regardless of your method, you must make sure to have 'infinite' black mana. Loop rituals into 'infinite' black mana again or use Skirge Familiar if applicable. Proceed to draw deck/graveyard with your discard outlet.

(Black and generic costs will be ignored for rest of explanation due to 'infinite' black mana)
Discard Lotus Cobra. Reanimate Lotus Cobra with Necromancy. If you have one green mana, you may cast Nature's Claim on Necromancy and continue in response to the sac trigger. Otherwise, go to cleanup to make Necromancy sac itself and proceed to combo off in response to the trigger to sac Lotus Cobra.

Beginning:
Step 1: Draw deck/graveyard.
Step 2: Discard Dryad Arbor.
Step 3: Reanimate it with Necromancy.
Step 4: Landfall trigger from Lotus Cobra to produce one green.
Step 5: Sac Dryad Arbor to Culling the Weak.
Step 6: Return to Step 1.

Ramunap Excavator might be a good value add, so you have a fallback if someone exiles that Crucible of Worlds. ;) I see a ton of other ways to reclaim your lands in this deck, but it's still a cheap card, one that is guaranteed to cost more as time passes.

kozad I have actually cut Crucible from my paper version of the list because the way I play it is pretty combo focused, but in a meta where I needed to have that late game value grind power I would absolutely run both. I think if I add the Crucible effect back into my paper list I might actually just run Ramunap instead because it is much more tutorable for those games where I do actually need it. Double green makes it a tough call, but usually you are less tight on colored mana when going for Crucible-based lines of play rather than fast combo lines.

Great list and write-up. I'm putting together a Gitrog-land-combo deck and this is one of my best resources.One thing I noticed. Your infinite mana with Lion's Eye Diamond has to have 3 cards in your library to work. You can't dredge Dakmor with an empty library.

Excellent primer. Great job!

MRB_Alters: Thank you very much. Good catch with the LED loop, I'll have to come up with a new clean way to do the loop and update it.

The_Squirrel: Thanks! I appreciate it.

Hey man, love the deck. I've been playing a similar version (about 10 cards off) for the last few months. My question is, why no Peat Bog or Hickory Woodlot?

Hey man, love the deck. I've been playing a similar version (about 10 cards off) for the last few months. My question is, why no Peat Bog or Hickory Woodlot?

DJ_Danny_G: ETB Tapped. They just aren't worth the cost of not being able to use them right away. The deck is so fast, you need to wring every last big of mana out of it every turn and especially the early colored sources (lands). They aren't terrible, just not effective for the way I play the deck.

Love the deck, I used the combo lines to greatly improve my own Gitrog deck.

Just wondering if Vigor or Dread would be better than Kozilek, Butcher of Truth, it seems like he would never be cast unless you somehow had a huge amount of mana but no combo or cards in hand, I think shaving off 4 life from an Ad Nauseam would be worth it compared to this edge case.

Verbatiam Unfortunately Vigor and Dread only shuffle themselves back into the library whereas we need to shuffle our whole graveyard into the library. Otherwise you would be absolutely correct. Im just waiting for them to print a mana positive rock with Kozileks shuffle trigger.

When going for the sorcery speed win, after generating infinite black mana, what is your reasoning for playing Praetor's Grasp over Exsanguinate? I have been using Exsanguinate and have not seen a reason to switch.Thanks!

Exsanguinate has little use outside of being a wincon, while Grasp can get useful spells or Extract wincons from opponents. By not running Exsanguinate, we free up a deckslot for more useful cards.

@kiebitzen Oh wow, I can't believe I missed that, thank you for saving me $20 :P

DJ_Danny_G: merrowMania is spot on. Grasp is the wincon that is most relevant outside the combo turn which is why we choose it for that purpose. This minimizes the chances of drawing dead cards.

merrowMania: Thanks for answering, you are exactly right.

Verbatiam: Glad I could help. I really wish they would print another option for us.

Is there any way to play around/prevent someone forcing you to draw cards at instant speed in response to a kozilek/shuffler discard shuffle?

Usually, you combo in response. There are ways to generate a win at instant speed. Other lines include discarding Kozilek and using Noxious Revival to mill it again. If possible, it is easier to just mill farther until you hit Gaea's Blessing to shuffle in the Kozilek. These tricks work if your opponent is trying to mess with you in response to Gaea's Blessing.