It's turn 3. You have Island and Swamp in play. Your hand consists of Intuition, Lion's Eye Diamond, Dark Ritual, Cabal Ritual and Lotus Petal with Mystical Tutor, Polluted Delta and Impulse in the graveyard.
Play Dark Ritual: storm 1, graveyard 4, BBB in the pool.
Play Intuition using 2 Black floating and the Island, fetching Ill-Gotten Gains one, two, and three: storm 2, graveyard 7, B in the pool.
Play the Lotus Petal: storm 3, graveyard 7, B in the pool.
Play Cabal Ritual using the Lotus Petal and the black floating: storm 4, graveyard 9, BBBBB in the pool.
Play Lion's Eye Diamond: storm 5, graveyard 9, BBBBB in the pool
Play Ill-Gotten Gains number one, sacrificing the Lion's Eye Diamond for black while Ill-Gotten Gains is on the stack. Get back Cabal Ritual, Lion's Eye Diamond and Ill-Gotten Gains number 2: storm 6, graveyard 7, BBBB in the pool.
Play Cabal Ritual: storm 7, graveyard 8, BBBBBBB in the pool.
Play Lion's Eye Diamond: storm 8, graveyard 8, BBBBBBB in the pool.
Play Ill-Gotten Gains number two sacrificing Lion's Eye Diamond in response for Blue getting back Dark Ritual, Ill-Gotten Gains number 3 and Lion's Eye Diamond: storm 9, graveyard 6, UUUBBB in the pool.
Play Dark Ritual: storm 10, graveyard 7, UUUBBBBB in the pool.
Play Lion's Eye Diamond: storm 11, graveyard 7, UUUBBBBB in the pool.
Play Ill-Gotten Gains number 3 sacrificing Lion's Eye Diamond for black while Ill-Gotten Gains is on the stack. Get back Dark Ritual, Intuition and Lion's Eye Diamond: storm 12, graveyard 6, UBBBBBB in the pool.
Play Dark Ritual: storm 13, graveyard 7, UBBBBBBBB in the pool.
Play Lion's Eye Diamond: storm 14, graveyard 7, UBBBBBBBB in the pool.
Play Intuition fetching three Tendrils of Agony: storm 15, graveyard 10, BBBBBB in the pool.
Play Tendrils of Agony causing your opponent to lose 32 life.
This is how the legacy deck called IGGy-Pop wins the game. The main goal of the deck is to get multiple copies of Ill-Gotten Gains into the graveyard using Intuition. Once there, you can cast two pieces of mana acceleration (Either Dark Ritual, Lion's Eye Diamond or Cabal Ritual), then use the Ill-Gotten Gains in your hand to get back the two pieces of acceleration and one of the IGGs in your graveyard. You do this one more time then with the last Ill-Gotten Gains you get back two pieces of acceleration and the Intuition in your graveyard and cast Intuition to fetch Tendrils of Agony for the win. The deck usually achieves this by turn 3 or 4 through the use of many tutors and card search effects like Mystical Tutor and Impulse.
When playing against a non-control deck, you can basically ignore whatever your opponent does then kill them on turn 3 or 4. One of the best aspects of this deck is that it does not rely on random effects while performing the combo. Unlike Vintage storm decks that rely on a draw seven or Legacy High Tide combo, which can simply not draw what it needs off of a Meditate, IGGy-pop either has the combo or it doesn't - you just have to do a little math to see if you can go off.
Lets say it's turn 3 and you have three land in play. Your hand has Intuition, Dark Ritual, and Lion's Eye Diamond. If you cast Intuition off of Dark Ritual and sacrifice Lion's Eye Diamond in response you are left with five mana floating and Ill-Gotten Gains in hand. You then cast Ill-Gotten Gains leaving one Black floating, you get back Dark Ritual, Lion's Eye Diamond and another Ill-Gotten Gains, but you can't continue the combo because you can't cast the Ill-Gotten Gains in hand off of the three Black you would get from Dark Ritual. The correct play would be to just cast Intuition for Ill-Gotten Gains this turn, then next turn attempt the combo so that after the first Ill-Gotten Gains you would have four mana floating and the loop would work.
The combo becomes more complicated when you have a Cabal Ritual in hand, because you have to keep track of threshold. If you are using Cabal Ritual and you can't maintain threshold during the combo, then you may not be able to combo out. You just have to count your graveyard and go through the Ill-Gotten Gains iterations in your head before you attempt it so that you don't lose the game because you didn't do the math properly.
Sometimes the combo requires you to have Tendrils of Agony in your hand or graveyard. This happens either when you don't have a Blue mana available at the end of the chain to cast Intuition or when you are working solely off of Dark Ritual. This is because Dark Ritual only nets you two mana, so two Dark Rituals can maintain the Ill-Gotten Gains loop, but don't gain mana with each iteration.
Single card Strategies:
Some of the cards in the deck have plays that may not be readily apparent or that people are simply not familiar with so I'm going to go over some single card strategies with the deck.
Lion's Eye Diamond
Play it as the last spell before your dodge effect (any card that puts cards into your hand and dodges the discard effect of Lion's Eye Diamond). This keeps your opponent from having priority while the Lion's Eye Diamond is in play so they cannot destroy it when you don't want to discard your hand.
Lion's Eye Diamond can be used to build threshold for Cabal Ritual by sacking it with Cabal Ritual and your dodge effect on the stack.
You must sac the Lion's Eye Diamond before passing priority on your dodge effect otherwise they can just pass back and the dodge will resolve without you being able to sac the Lion's Eye Diamond.
Lion's Eye Diamond does not have a tap cost. This means you can still sacrifice it for mana when it is tapped. This is useful when playing against cards like Root Maze and Tangle Wire.
Cabal Ritual
Cabal Ritual checks for threshold upon resolution so you can add to the graveyard with other effects like Intuition and Lion's Eye Diamond while it is on the stack.
Be aware that Cabal Ritual filters one mana into Black. Make sure you don't eat up the one Blue you need at the end of the chain to cast Intuition by casting a Cabal Ritual.
Always be aware of the number of cards you have in your graveyard. It is easy to screw up the combo by getting back Cabal Ritual when you don't have threshold any more.
Ill-Gotten Gains:
When resolving Ill-Gotten Gains, always look at your opponent's graveyard so that you know how to continue the loop. There are many non-counterspell answers to the combo that you have to be aware of. When your opponent discards their hand you have full knowledge of how to proceed.
When getting cards back from Ill-Gotten Gains you are the active player and have to pick first. This means they get to react to what you pick so you have to make sure to anticipate any plays they can make with cards in their graveyard.
Always make your opponent show you what cards they returned - it is illegal for them not to.
Be aware of your opponent's available mana when going off. The last thing you want to do is recur something like Lightning Bolt three times when your opponent has the mana to cast it and you are sitting at eight life.
Be aware of any draw effects they may recur. Just because they don't have an answer in hand doesn't mean that they won't after they Brainstorm three times because of the Ill-Gotten Gains loop.
Be aware of your threshold. Ill-Gotten Gains removes one card from your graveyard every time you loop.
Always remember that Ill-Gotten Gains is also a powerful discard effect. If you pull a hand that consists of fetchland, Dark Ritual, Lion's Eye Diamond, Lotus Petal, Ill-Gotten Gains and Chromatic Sphere, don't be afraid to just play your spells and cast Ill-Gotten Gains to Mind Twist them for four leaving you with land and Lion's Eye Diamond in play and Dark Ritual, fetchland and Chromatic Sphere in your hand.
Also, don't be afraid to simply use Ill-Gotten Gains as a three-card Regrowth. It is still pretty darn good for only four mana and can often times give you what you need to win.
Intuition
It adds three cards to threshold, always figure this in when considering when and how to go off.
If you have Ill-Gotten Gains in hand, use Intuition to fetch Ill-Gotten Gains, Ill-Gotten Gains, Tendrils so that you don't have to play Intuition at the end of the loop.
Don't be afraid to use Intuition as a Demonic Tutor instead of an engine. Fetching acceleration with Intuition can be very potent, especially if you fetch up Cabal Ritual.
If you plan on using Intuition to tutor for a card, be aware of how many are left in your library. You never want to be resolving an Intuition and realize there are only two copies of Ill-Gotten Gains or Tendrils left in your library.
Remember to play sideboard cards in sets of at least three so that you can tutor for them with Intuition.
Always remember that you need one Blue mana at the end of the chain to Intuition for Tendrils of Agony.
Mystical Tutor
This card acts like Dark Ritual and Intuition 5-8. If you aren't fetching one of those two cards with Mystical, you probably didn't have the best opening hand.
Mystical Tutor during your second-turn upkeep is an amazing play after a first turn Brainstorm. It shuffles away two bad cards from your hand and replaces one with exactly what you need.
Chain of Vapor
This is your answer to random maindeck hate cards. It bounces things like Meddling Mage and Rule of Law when you run into it game one.
This card can also be a potent storm engine. You simply bounce your Lotus Petals and Lion's Eye Diamonds to replay them and add to storm. Often times the land you sacrifice can get you to threshold for Cabal Ritual.
The Sideboard Cards
Pithing Needle is a very good answer to all kinds of hate. It shuts down Tormod's Crypt, Withered Wretch, Phyrexian Furnace and all kinds of other powerful cards like Time Vault and Auriok Salvagers.
Echoing Truth is your answer to permanent hate cards like Arcane Lab, Meddling Mage and Chalice of the Void.
Xantid Swarm/Defense Grid are your sideboard answers to control decks, and they both have their own strengths and weaknesses. Xantid Swarm is susceptible to creature hate and doesn't go active until the turn after it is played, but it allows you to go off safely. Defense Grid can be played around by leaving three mana up with a Force of Will in hand, but doesn't need Green mana and isn't as easy to kill. Its up to you which one you play. You also have the option of running Duress in the sideboard then boarding out Ill-Gotten Gains for Duress game two. This gets rid of the fast kill option, but also allows you to concentrate on the multiple Tendrils plan While making any graveyard hate they bring in almost irrelevant.
The debated slots in the deck:
After Nassim Ketita made top 16 in Philly, I think that Impulse has earned its spot in the deck over Lim-dul's Vault. Vault gave a faster goldfish but the fact that Impulse replaces itself in your hand gives you that extra edge against control. This leaves us with four debatable slots in the deck list I've given. I went with two Chromatic Spheres and two Strategic Plannings. Chromatic Sphere serves multiple roles, it filters mana at the end of the combo so that you can cast Intuition for Tendrils, it also has synergy with Mystical Tutor and Lion's Eye Diamond. Strategic planning acts like Impulse five and six only it gives a huge boost to threshold. These four slots are really up to you, they could be a couple more land or some other form of cantrip or they could be main deck disruption like Defense Grid it all depends on what you feel you need in your environment.
The Matchups
Landstill
Ill-Gotten Gains has an inherent weakness against any control deck simply because Ill-Gotten Gains recurs their counterspells for them. This is especially true with Force of Will. If your opponent has Force of Will and another Blue card in hand or graveyard, then you essentially cannot go off using the Ill-Gotten Gains chain. Landstill presents you with a very slow clock, so your basic strategy is to build up a hand that has multiple accelerants and two Tendrils in it. This is so that you can play out accelerants while they hold their counter spells to stop your Intuition or Ill-Gotten Gains. When you have built up eight mana and four storm you just double Tendrils them for the win. You can also build up a big single Tendrils for like 14 or 16 life then ride the life gain into a second Tendrils hand for the remaining 4-6 life points. Be sure to only fetch basic lands while building up your hand so that they don't wreck your mana base with Wasteland. Post board you get access to answers like Defense Grid or Xantid Swarm to make your game against control better. If you think they are going to bring in Arcane Lab, Rule of Law or some sort of permanent hate, then bring in your Echoing Truths. In this matchup you want to board out one Ill-Gotten Gains and some combination of the debated slots.
Solidarity
You are the faster deck, but they have Force of Will and they can also go off in response to your combo. Game one will probably go to them, but game two you get to bring in Defense Grid, which evens things out a lot more. Your strategy is essentially to either win turn 1 or 2 when they can't go off or to resolve Defense Grid so that they have to go off on their own turn. One thing you must be careful of when playing against Solidarity is that they can go off and Brain Freeze in response to your Intuition. This play will likely keep you from tutoring for what you want. I haven't had a player actually do this, but the better ones will.
Threshold/Grow
This is your nightmare matchup. It has more counters than Landstill and has a fast clock so you can't go with the multiple Tendrils plan reliably. On top of that, they pack maindeck hate in the form of Meddling Mage and sometimes Stifle. Your sideboard strategy is to take out one Tendrils, one Ill-Gotten Gains, one Chain of vapor, one Island, 4 debated slots for 4 Xantid Swarm, Tropical Island and 3 Echoing Truth. The Xantids allow you to ignore their permission and the Echoing Truths allow you to bounce their Meddling Mages or any other permanent hate they might bring in. Unfortunately Grow/Threshold decks performed very well at GP: Philly. This means that a very bad matchup will be more prevalent in the format, and Ill-Gotten Gains will receive splash hate from all the graveyard control people put into their boards to deal with grow/threshold.
RGSA
RGSA is pretty much a bye for you. They have a heavy aggro strategy and don't have many maindeck answers to your deck. When you sideboard you need to anticipate what hate they are going to bring so you can bring in the proper answer. It is tempting to bring in Pithing Needle to shut down Survival of the Fittest, but that will simply dilute your deck and won't stop theirs since RGSA can play just fine without Survival. Against control style Survival decks like ATS, Pithing Needle can be used more effectively.
Goblins
You have a very good matchup against goblins. You should win game one unless they draw a crazy hand and you keep something you shouldn't. This deck also runs Wasteland, so make sure to fetch basics. Game two they will bring in Blue Elemental Blast and sometimes Pyrostatic Pillar. Blue Elemental Blast can be a nuisance and may slow you down by a turn or two, but that is why you have Engineered Plague in your sideboard. This card gives you two or three turns against Goblins and can come down turn 1 thanks to Dark Ritual and pals. It's also pretty easy to get down double Engineered Plague thanks to Intuition. Pyrostatic Pillar isn't that big of a deal because going off simply doesn't deal that much damage to you under Pillar. Both Ill-Gotten Gains and Tendrils cost four and you can cast Tendrils early to gain some life back. The strong Goblins matchup is one of the main reasons to play this deck.
If you are interested in playing IGGy-Pop, first consider the meta you are going to play in. If it consists of a lot of agnro-control, then you probably do not want to play this deck. If it is either heavily aggro or mostly unknown, then IGGy-pop can be a very strong choice that people won't be prepared for. I definitely think that IGGy-pop is in contention with High Tide and Salvagers for the top combo spot in Legacy. Give the deck a try, learn to play it well, and I think you will agree.
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