Ritual Monsters have been on the comeback trail since Saffira, Queen of Dragons was released in Duelist Alliance. Since then, each booster has had at least one new Ritual Monster in it. Secrets of Eternity has 2 – Malacoda, Netherlord of the Burning Abyss and Nekroz of Gungnir. Nekroz of Gungnir probably raised some eyebrows since the only other “Nekroz” monster right now is Dance Princess of the Nekroz, but it’s actually the first Ritual Monster from a new theme entirely dedicated to Ritual Summoning that will launch next Friday in The Secret Forces!

While the Nekroz monsters are a big focus in The Secret Forces, we wanted to make sure that all the Ritual Summoning strategies have access to basic cards that have been used to pull them together for years. These cards have been scattered throughout the game’s history and many of them regularly go through years of unavailability at a time, so we’re taking the opportunity gather these cards together in one place! Here are just a few of the cards that will be reappearing in The Secret Forces.

At first, you needed to use Sonic Bird and Senju of the Thousand Hands together in your Deck to make sure you got your Ritual Monsters and Ritual Spells. Having a Spell and a Sonic Bird with no monster made you sad. Having a Ritual Monster and a Senju with no Ritual Spell also made you sad. Years later, Manju of the Ten Thousand Hands from Invasion of Chaos fixed those hands with its ability to add a Ritual Monster or a Ritual Spell from your Deck to your hand, and has been a mainstay of Ritual-based Decks ever since.

Advanced Ritual Art was originally from Strike of Neos and it single-handedly created the Normal Monster-fueled Ritual strategy. Decks based around Advanced Ritual Art saw great success twice in the game’s history. Once on the back of the incredible destructive power of Demise, King of Armageddon, and again with the lockdown ability of Herald of Perfection. The New Challengers had a new form of Herald of Perfection called Herald of Ultimateness that added the ability to negate Special Summons on top of the Herald of Perfection ability to negate any card or effect that was activated. It’s likely only a matter of time before Advanced Ritual Art appears again.

How many Ritual Monsters should I play? How many associated Ritual Spells should I play? What should I do with the rest of my cards once I’ve actually Ritual Summoned? The answers to these questions all changed when Preparation of Rites hit in Stardust Overdrive more than 5 years ago. It’s still just as important to Ritual strategies today as it was back then, if not more.

Also from Stardust Overdrive, the Djinns have been a big part of Ritual strategies ever since. They serve a dual-purpose. First, they can be banished from the Graveyard as part of a Ritual Summon and will count towards the Level requirement for the Summon. This lets you get two uses out of one monster without having to spend any extra cards to bring it back to your hand. More importantly, however, they grant extra bonuses while a Ritual Monster they were used to Summon is face-up on the field. They’re a lot like the Yang Zing in that way, but the kinds of bonuses you get are almost all completely different.

This card, Djinn Releaser of Rituals, prohibits your opponent from Special Summoning for as long as the monster you Ritual Summoned with it is face-up on the field. Note that this card’s text and functionality has changed since 2009 – even if your opponent nabs your monster with Snatch Steal, they still can’t Special Summon. Other Djinn powers include a Don Zaloog-like discard effect, Synchro Monster effect negation, a Darknight Parshath-esque drawing ability, Trap immunity, and immunity to being targeted by enemy card effects. That last one is Djinn Demolisher of Rituals from Duelist Alliance, which is a pretty nice ability to have right now.

This one isn’t directly Ritual-related, but it comes up a lot in Ritual-based Decks. There are many times that you’ll just have Level 4 monsters on the field left over. Maybe it’s a Manju, maybe it’s a Gishki or two, or maybe it’s a new Level 4 WATER Ritual Monster from The Secret Forces. Whatever monsters are left behind, you need to make the most of them, and Abyss Dweller has been a very popular choice in such scenarios for the last 3+ years. Actually it’s been a very popular choice in any Deck that can field 2 Level 4 monsters for the last 3+ years.

Now that you have an idea of the kinds of cards you’ll be easily able to support your Ritual strategy with when The Secret Forces comes out, it’s time to come up with a cool Ritual strategy to play them in! Nekroz are an obvious pick, but even right now this minute there are cool Ritual Decks to play. Saffira, Queen of Dragons has been teamed up with Malebranche monsters to great success already, but what if she also teamed up with Malacoda, Netherlord of the Burning Abyss? Now that could truly be a terrifying team!

The Secret Forces launches on February 13th