[Deck] Vial Goblins

[Cringe]

Thank you for the input! I don't know much about white in the format. I just finished play testing 12-post and the ability to vile in new Thalia in response to Show and Tell so that if they aren't playing Emrakul it bosses them around for a turn. I only have the Thalia main board as of now. I'll be working on the sideboard tomorrow. I'll post to get more opinions and what not. Saturday's is legacy testing at a local shop so I'll show results then. I went 0-4 with nyxfit due to a rough meta there :(

[jrw1985]

My gut-feeling says yes, but truth to be told: I have Sharpshooter in my sb for a long time. What's your build right now?

I went 0-2 drop today. Fortunately there is another tourney in about 12 hours I'll be going to. My draws just didn't help me out today. I mulled to 6 on 4 out of the 5 games I played. Here's the list I wound up running...

4 Vial
4 Lackey
4 Matron
4 Ringleader
2 Warchief
2 Chieftain
3 Piledriver
2 Tarfire
2 Warping Wail
1 Tuktuk
2 Stingscourger
2 Gempalm
3 MWM
2 Siege-Gang Commander
1 Sharpshooter (61st card)
10 Mountain
4 Waste
4 Port
4 Cavern
1 Karakas

Side
4 Chalice
3 Pithing Needle
3 Surgical Extraction
3 Blood Moon
1 Tuktuk
1 Krenko

R1 Shardless BUG
G1 Mull to 6. There was a point where it was clear that he had the Deluge and I was effed. I was also punished for playing Sharpshooter this game as I drew it far too late for it to be of any value.
G2 I sided in 3 Moon and Krenko, sided out the Piledrivers and Tuktuk. I kept a 7 with Vial, Moon and 3 Ringleaders. Moon got thoughtsiezed, but then I drew another. Ringleaders made this one look easy.
G3 I sided out the Moons for Pithing Needle this time, figuring that Moon would be too slow on the draw and that my opponent would prioritize fetching for basics anyway. I mulled to 6 again and kept a hand with Lackey, Needle, and Matron. Matron got Thoughtseized and I was drawing dead from there. 0-1

R2 DnT
G1 I mull to 6, opponent mulls to 5. He's on the play and leads with Waste, pass. I Waste his Waste. He plays Plains, pass. I play Vial. He plays Revoker. I draw another Vial. He plays big Thalia. I play my third and final land drop and can't get any removal for the Revoker before he plays a Mom. That Revoker crushed me this game. Sharpshooter would have been of no help, due to THalia.
G2 I sided out Stingscourgers and 2 Piledrivers, brought in Tuktuk, Krenko and 2 Needles. I figured I don't want to be bouncing Recruiters, SFMs or even Revokers, so Needle seemed better than Stings. I mulled to 6 again and kept a hand with Warping Wail and Tuktuk and Needle but no Vial or Lackey. Opponent lead on Vial. I didn't Needle it. He played a Thalia which I Warped. THen he played a Sword of F&I, with three lands in play. I effed up and on my fourth turn I Tuktuked the Vial. My thinking was that he would need Land+2 drop in order to get Sword equipped on his turn, and I bet he wouldn't have both to make that play. I would be able to Needle his Sword the next turn. Turns out I was wrong in that line of play. He played a Thalia and Equipped it. I looked at the Needle in my hand like a maroon. I misvalued the Equipment and should have just killed the Sword instead of Vial Had my opponent missed a land drop it may have been another story and Vial might have been the better target. Alas, he did not. He played and equipped a Jitte the following turn. I scooped (though looking back that was bit premature since I still had an out in Karakas). Had I Tuktuked the Sword he would have still put a Jitte on Thalia, but I would have had Needle for Jitte and a chance to grind out the game.
0-2 Drop

Playing tomorrow. hoping not to Mull so much this time around

[kinda]

I definitely wouldn't side out piledriver vs shardless. He can't be blocked or bounced by strix/shardless agent/tnn/Jace and Drs dies it he blocks piledriver. That leaves only goyf and they have two options, leave goyf back to block and hope you can't swing with 3 dudes or attack and open themselves up to a big counterattack. In your list I would bring in krenko and moons, take out TUk Tuk sharpshooter definitely and then 1 stingscourger or the Karakas.

Edit: How is warping wail?

[woodjt5]

I got to play Legacy for the first time in a while this weekend at SCG Baltimore. My team finished 54th @ 6-3. I also went 6-3 with Goblins. These were my matches:

Death and Taxes (Loss)
Elves (Loss)
Death and Taxes (Win)
Burn (Win)
Death and Taxes (Win)
Sneak & Show (Win)
Reanimator (Loss)
Sylvan Plug (Win)
Infect (Win)

I played 4 Piledrives (usually play 3) because I was worried about True Name Nemesis. Never saw BUG or Miracles, both of which I consider to be good match-ups. The Round 1 loss to D&T was very frustrating and felt unlucky--I took 15 in the air from a naked Serra Avenger in the deciding game because I couldn't find a removal spell. But I absolutely smashed Infect in the last round, which is usually a tough pairing, so it all evened out in the end.

[Olaf Forkbeard]

I definitely wouldn't side out piledriver vs shardless. He can't be blocked or bounced by strix/shardless agent/tnn/Jace and Drs dies it he blocks piledriver. ...

I leave 1-2 in. Until lists start to run multiple Leovold's consistently I see no reason to leave more than 2 in post board. They are really good at pressing the assault, and by coincidence, checking Leovold. If one of those two things aren't happening then Piledriver is either close to alone, or close to alone and looking at a goyf. This is of course helped along by Toxic Deluge.

I tend to win the match in 1 of two ways, and that is:
1) Lackey advantage (I still board some to all out on the draw because of that stupid squire).
2) Ringleader value. Piledriver only assists in the rarer way to win.

There is a third and that's Krenko, if my list runs him. I personally really only want Krenko for this match-up, in general I prefer Siege-Gang Commander.

[woodjt5]

I got to play Legacy for the first time in a while this weekend at SCG Baltimore. My team finished 54th @ 6-3. I also went 6-3 with Goblins. These were my matches:

Death and Taxes (Loss)
Elves (Loss)
Death and Taxes (Win)
Burn (Win)
Death and Taxes (Win)
Sneak & Show (Win)
Reanimator (Loss)
Sylvan Plug (Win)
Infect (Win)

I played 4 Piledrives (usually play 3) because I was worried about True Name Nemesis. Never saw BUG or Miracles, both of which I consider to be good match-ups. The Round 1 loss to D&T was very frustrating and felt unlucky--I took 15 in the air from a naked Serra Avenger in the deciding game because I couldn't find a removal spell. But I absolutely smashed Infect in the last round, which is usually a tough pairing, so it all evened out in the end.

For reference, here's my list from this weekend:

4 Goblin Lackey
4 Goblin Piledriver
1 Mogg War Marshal
1 Stingscourger
4 Goblin Matron
4 Goblin Warchief
3 Goblin Chieftain
2 Gempalm Incinerator
4 Goblin Ringleader
2 Krenko, Mob Boss
1 Tuktuk Scrapper

4 Aether Vial
3 Tarfire
1 Pyrokinesis

12 Mountains
4 Cavern of Souls
4 Wasteland
2 Rishadan Port

Sideboard
3 Ashen Rider
3 Tormod’s Crypt
2 Grafdigger’s Cage
2 Chalice of the Void
1 Goblin Sharpshooter
1 Tuktuk Scrapper
1 Gempalm Incinerator
1 Pyrokinesis
1 Pithing Needle

Krenko wins games. This list plays 7 haste enablers to make him as effective as possible. If you aren't playing him, you're doing it wrong. The difference in power level compared to Siege-Gang Commander is staggering.

[jrw1985]

Wish I could say I had as much success as woodtj5 yesterday but all I could manage was a 2-2 performance at a 30 player tournament. I changed up my decklist significantly from Saturday to Sunday and decided I wanted to just grind every match. I cut Piledriver entirely and upped the MWM count to 4. I upped Gempalm count to 4 as well and added 2 Skirk Prospectors Maindeck so I could have the line of T1 Skirk, T2 MWM>Gempalm on an x/2. I cut Siege-gang for Krenko and took Sharpshooter out of the main, reasoning that I wanted to be as consistent as possible and Sharpshooter is just a dead draw too often. I put him in the side. I cut Warping Wail for more Goblin shaped removal and for consistency, since I don't want to be stuck with 2 Mountains and a Wail or 2 Cavern and a Tarfire. Finally, I played a full set of Chieftains as my haste-enablers, figuring their +1/+1 was more significant when building a swarm.

The list...

4 Vial
4 Lackey
4 Matron
4 Ringleader
4 Chieftain
3 Tarfire
1 Tuktuk
1 Stingscourger
4 Gempalm
4 MWM
2 Krenko
2 Skirk Propsector

10 Mountain
4 Waste
4 Port
4 Cavern
1 Karakas

Side
4 Chalice
3 Pithing Needle
3 Surgical Extraction
3 Blood Moon
1 Tuktuk
1 Sharpshooter

R1 Storm
G1 On the Draw I saw an opening 7 of 5 red cards with a smooth curve, Port and Vial. My opponent has generally been on midrangey decks in the past so I figure this is as good as any six. I get Duressed T1 and lose my Vial and I don't do anything relevant G1.
G2 I side out removal for Chalices. I contemplate whether to side in Surgical. Surgical has been a real dog when I've sided it in in the past, and when I do side it in it seems to be the only piece of hate I ever draw. I leave Surgical in my sideboard. I lead with a Lackey into T2 Chieftain, Port. I port him on upkeep. T2 he plays a fetchland. My T3 I have a MWM in hand and have to chose between casting it Pre-combat for 4 extra damage OR Porting my opponent again. Since he has a fetchland out I can't actually keep him off a color, so I decide to get in with damage. I didn't take time to do math, which I should have. He was at 17 life. If I attacked him for 4 with Chief and Lackey that puts him to 13, then I'd swing for 8 the following turn with MWM as well meaning I'd have 4 mana to cast enough goblins to do the last 5 damage that turn. I'm not sure that line would be a winner. Krenko or Chieftain are the only cards that get me there. However, it does give me an extra turn to draw a Chalice or even another POrt. So... I think I was overly aggressive in casting MWM pre-combat to set up the kill. Given the power of Storm I needed to cut off routes to victory, which meant I should have ported and played control there.
0-1
Regardless, I attacked my opponent down to 9 life which turned off my Port. He went off his next turn, T3.

R2 Miracles, new player, 2-0. He Counterspelled a Matron cast off CAvern G1. G2 he cast Ponder into Chalice @ 1.
1-1

R3 Standstill
G1 I had a Lackey and a MWM eat a Swords T2, leaving me with a lone token. THen my opponent played Standstill with 2 Faerie Enclaves. I just drew a bunch of Ports and Ported his Faeries and played a ton of lands. My lone goblin token did 7-10 damage before opponent finally cycled Decree of Justice for a couple Soldiers. At his next end step I Tarfired the tokens and broke the Standstill. I had 7 cards already and my opponent was about to discard anyway, so I really reduced the value there. From that point I just dumped my hand and won.
G2 I actually didn't bring in Blood Moon, which was probably a mistake, but I could see myself getting locked out by Jace so Needle seemed better. Looking back, I think Moon was the way to go. Anyway I won G2 without much difficulty.
2-1

R4 Eldrazi Taxes
If you haven't run into this deck just think of it as DnT with Eldrazi Displacer and Thought-knot Seer, plus a few Eldrazi lands in the manabase. I was feeling pretty confident going into this one.
G1 My first 7 cards were good for a Grindy matchup, plus I had a T1 Lackey. Lackey ate a Swords. I Ported him T2, then he started Wasting me. He played a Sword of FIre and ICe and I had Tuktuk in hand but he kept me at 2 lands with Wastes. Woof. That killed me this game.
G2 I sided in Needle and sided out Vial. I figured that this was going to be a grind so I needed to keep my creature count as high as possible. Also, his deck has multiple ways to disrupt Vial anyway. I led with T1 Lackey which again ate a Swords. Then a T2 Lackey ate a Swords as well. THen I never drew a Mountain, my CAvern got Wasted, and i ended the game with Port-Waste in play and a hand full of red cards. Oh, and he played a Containment Priest in there as well.
2-2

I misplayed against Storm by under-valuing Port, but that's not a matchup we're supposed to win anyway. THe wins against the two control decks felt inevitable and I had handfuls of goblins at the end of both games. The loss to Eldrazi Taxes is eating at me because both games my manabase took a shit on me, not unlike my Saturday tourney where I went 0-2. I'm now 2-4 over the past two days with 3 of those losses coming from my own deck. That needs to be addressed.

woodjt5 ran a minor tweak to his manabase that I'm going to implement. He cut 2 Ports so he could run 12 Mountains. That means 1/5 of his deck is basic Mountains. Being able to play a basic Mountain T1 is very important to our deck. We need to curve out since we're so heavy on 3 and 4 drops. Basics give you resilience against Waste which is extremely important for the tempo of the game. Think of an opening hand with Cavern and Mountain. If you play Cavern first (say, to cast uncounterable Lackey) you leave yourself open to Wasteland meaning T2 you can only cast a 1-drop. If you lead with Mountain you cannot guarantee that your Lackey is uncounterable, but you do guarantee that you'll have 2 mana on T2 to cast a Piledriver or MWM. We need our deck to be un-fuck-with-able as possible. We aren't playing ridiculously powerful or broken cards the will reward all-in approaches. We're playing 1/1s that grind. We need to be as consistent as possible.

Speaking of consistency, the cards I am least happy with right now are the Lords. They eat spot removal and generate 0 CA. I'm almost trying to play a deck with no good spot removal targets so that removal spells are card disadvantage for my opponent. If a Swords or Bolt or Decay is directed at MWM, Matron, Ringleader, SGC or an activated Krenko your opponent has lost CA. Yes, they got a 1:1 on cards for cards, but they killed a creature that already produced more creatures for you. So running Piledrivers or Lords seems bad since it makes their spot removal better. Piledriver is easily replaced with MWM, but there aren't any decent facimilies for Lords (Rabblemaster would be a fanastic replacement for Lords if he didn't come with the deal-breaking Must Attack text).

[kinda]

For reference, here's my list from this weekend:

4 Goblin Lackey
4 Goblin Piledriver
1 Mogg War Marshal
1 Stingscourger
4 Goblin Matron
4 Goblin Warchief
3 Goblin Chieftain
2 Gempalm Incinerator
4 Goblin Ringleader
2 Krenko, Mob Boss
1 Tuktuk Scrapper

4 Aether Vial
3 Tarfire
1 Pyrokinesis

12 Mountains
4 Cavern of Souls
4 Wasteland
2 Rishadan Port

Sideboard
3 Ashen Rider
3 Tormod’s Crypt
2 Grafdigger’s Cage
2 Chalice of the Void
1 Goblin Sharpshooter
1 Tuktuk Scrapper
1 Gempalm Incinerator
1 Pyrokinesis
1 Pithing Needle

Krenko wins games. This list plays 7 haste enablers to make him as effective as possible. If you aren't playing him, you're doing it wrong. The difference in power level compared to Siege-Gang Commander is staggering.

I like this list a lot. Congrats!

[woodjt5]

woodjt5 ran a minor tweak to his manabase that I'm going to implement. He cut 2 Ports so he could run 12 Mountains. That means 1/5 of his deck is basic Mountains. Being able to play a basic Mountain T1 is very important to our deck. We need to curve out since we're so heavy on 3 and 4 drops. Basics give you resilience against Waste which is extremely important for the tempo of the game. Think of an opening hand with Cavern and Mountain. If you play Cavern first (say, to cast uncounterable Lackey) you leave yourself open to Wasteland meaning T2 you can only cast a 1-drop. If you lead with Mountain you cannot guarantee that your Lackey is uncounterable, but you do guarantee that you'll have 2 mana on T2 to cast a Piledriver or MWM. We need our deck to be un-fuck-with-able as possible. We aren't playing ridiculously powerful or broken cards the will reward all-in approaches. We're playing 1/1s that grind. We need to be as consistent as possible.

You're dead on with my reasoning here. Because I run the 7 haste enablers that cost 1RR, I've found that 8 colorless lands is too many. Further, 12 lands that can't cast Tarfire is too many when I'm running 3 of the removal spell. I've found that the trade-off works great, but I'm not comfortable running Warping Wail with this manabase.

I always lead with mountain whenever possible. The only exception is if I have a lackey and want to keep it from getting countered against an unknown opponent or a blue-based deck. That being said, I'd always prefer to lead on Vial instead of lackey in an unknown match-up. So its mountain if vial or no turn 1 play, cavern only if lackey and no vial and the opponent is unknown or a blue deck.

[kinda]

I'm a fan of 4 wasteland and 2 port plus 4 warchief and 2-3 chieftain, I ran this combination back in 2010 . List: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...ght#post486314

Krenko wasn't an option in 2010 and tarfire/tuk tuk weren't needed in the meta as goyf was enemy #1 (or not even printed I don't remember). Otherwise pretty much the same list. So much nostalgia.

-1 mogg war marshall, -1 chieftain, -2 krenko, +3 siege gang commander +2 warren instigator
-3 tarfire -1 pyrokinesis +4 swords to plowshares

[woodjt5]

I'm a fan of 4 wasteland and 2 port plus 4 warchief and 2-3 chieftain, I ran this combination back in 2010 . List: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...ght#post486314

Krenko wasn't an option in 2010 and tarfire/tuk tuk weren't needed in the meta as goyf was enemy #1 (or not even printed I don't remember). Otherwise pretty much the same list. So much nostalgia.

-1 mogg war marshall, -1 chieftain, -2 krenko, +3 siege gang commander +2 warren instigator
-3 tarfire -1 pyrokinesis +4 swords to plowshares

I don't know how much you're playing now (I only drift in and out of this board occasionally), but I can't suggest Krenko highly enough. That dude is the truth. He totally elevates the power level of the deck when you build around him. My buddy has been playing Reid Duke's BUG list and we've been jamming a lot of games, and Krenko is most often the difference. Same thing against D&T. This weekend I took an Emrakul hit and shrugged it off easily because of Krenko.

[kinda]

I haven't played goblins since 2011 in a tournament I think. I would want to play 2 krenko 1 sgc today. Matron into sgc with 0 board presence can win the game late, much harder with krenko. But in general I agree krenko is better.

[1GoblinLackey]

Hey everyone,

Looking at some of the discussion above, and given that my order for cabal therapies and EWS came in the mail today, I finally have a reason to put the black splash I have access to to use.
I definitely understand kinda and wood's dislikes of the current mana base, and I've felt burned by my own deck somewhat often. Getting stuck on red sources in your mono-red (or close enough) might be the worst thing about Goblins. That being said, 4 wastes and 3 ports feels right to me, unless you're on 100% mono colors (no fetches) and no splashed utility land like Karakas or Pendelhaven, in which case 4 ports seems good.

Anyway, I'm testing out a new configuration for this week's legacy event. I might also go to a Bazaar of Moxen trial in Edinburgh this weekend, budget permitting. If I do that, I'll have to broaden out my deck significantly (which will probably involve adding Piledrivers, adding Relics to the board because of presumed Goyfs, etc).

My local meta (from what I can tell after 2-3 weeks), is best summed up with "combo decks (Storm, Reanimator, Burn, Elves), niche decks ( 4 color Nic Fit, Grixis Thieves, Enchantress, Maverick) and a whole crap-ton of Stoneforge Mystics (D&T, multiple Deathblade variants)". There's also a few Delver decks, and a few people are about to finish their own legacy decks (Miracles, Lands, Infect, and another BR Reanimator) so when building for my meta I still consider them present. There is a significant lack of Goyf, which is really nice. Eldrazi is present too.

There a few weaknesses/issues with my maindeck and sideboard that I'd like to ask the forum about. I realize it probably seems like I can't sit on a decklist longer than a week (which is kinda true), but Goblins feels like such a deckbuilding puzzle that's begging to be solved and I can't quite solve it. So here I am once more with a list!

Current List:

Creatures: 29
4 Lackey
4 Matron
4 Ringleader
3 Warchief
3 Mogg War Marshal
3 Gempalm Incinerator
2 Krenko
1 Sharpshooter
1 Skirk Prospector
1 Chieftain
1 Stingscourger
1 Tuktuk Scrapper
1 Earwig Squad

Artifacts: 6
4 Aether Vial
2 Smuggler's Copter

Instants: 2
1 Tarfire
1 Pyrokinesis

Lands: 23
6 Fetches
4 Mountains
4 Wastelands
3 Rishadan Port
3 Cavern of Souls
1 Plateau
1 Badlands (will become 2 in the near future hopefully, replacing a Mountain. Also possible I just get a 4th Cavern as another black source for EWS)
1 Karakas

Sideboard:
3 Thalia
2 Pyrokinesis
2 Blood Moon
2 Wear//Tear
2 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Cabal Therapy
1 Piledriver
1 Surgical Extraction

Maindeck concerns: There's a couple cards I'd like to try to fit into the maindeck, but not sure how.

I'd really like to have a singleton piledriver just to have it on as a matron target. Sometimes when an opponent is tapped out it just gets there. The cut I'm leaning towards is a MWM. While it's great in a lot of matchups, I often end up taking out 1 in postboard games anyway just to make room. I could also swap the piledriver and the 3rd pyrokinesis, but I'm concerned about that as well, for reasons mentioned below.

An additional tarfire would be very good against all the stoneforges I see. My internal debate is that (my most likely cut, Pyrokinesis) is just better, and gives me game 1 chances against Elves. I would also love to up the Goblin count to 31, my ringleaders haven't been great lately.

Sideboard concerns: I cut the Mindbreak trap and Warping Wail for the 2 Therapies, which I'm undecided on the correctness of. I'd really like to get the Trap back in the 75. I like Warping Wail a lot (more than most I think), and am also looking to fit it back in. Part of my uncertainty lies in the Therapies themselves. I have them in there for Combo decks, but they are also good against a lot of fair decks. Where I struggle is identifying which fair decks its worth bringing in against.

I'm trying to do this more methodically as Olaf does a great job illustrating a few pages back. So here's a breakdown of my likely meta, and the sideboarding choices I would make against them. A couple decks are omitted because I think the sideboarding is somewhat straightforward.

D&T: (on play): +2 Pyrokinesis, +2 Wear//Tear, +1 Therapy;
-1 Stingscourger, -1 Krenko, -1 Warchief, -1 War Marshal.
Same on the draw?
Missing Pithing Needles I used to have.

Storm: +3 Thalia, +2 Therapy, +2 Cage, +1 Piledriver, +1 Surgical;
-3 Ringleader, -1 Pyro, -3 Gempalm, -1 Stingscourger, -1 Karakas.
If I see a dread of night game 2, I'll also bring in 2 Wear//Tear for -1 Tarfire, -1 MWM. Play and Draw are the same. As many cards as I have with this matchup, I'd love Mindbreak trap and Warping Wail for this, as some of the cards I'm bringing in are not that impactful.

BR Reanimator: +3 Thalia, +2 Therapy, +2 Cage, +2 Wear//Tear, +1 Piledriver, +1 Surgical;
-3 Ringleader, -2 Gempalm, -1 Tarfire, -1 Sharpshooter, -1 Pyro, -1 Copter, -1 MWM, -1 Tuktuk
Same on the play and draw. Same deal as Storm, would love Mindbreak and Warping Wail for this matchup.

Lands (I'm very inexperienced in this one, so my boarding plans might be wrong here): +2 Blood Moon, +2 Wear//Tear, +1 Surgical;
-2 Gempalm (leave 1 for Tireless Tracker?), -1 Tarfire, -1 Pyro, -1 Sharpshooter.
No changes come to mind play vs draw. Does Therapy have merit here? Pithing needle would be very strong.

Deathblade: (play) +1 Pyro, +2 Blood Moon (it's a greedy version), +2 Cabal Therapy, +2 Wear//Tear;
-1 Stingscourger, -1 Sharpshooter, -1 MWM...not sure what else to take out. Definitely at a loss here and need some help.
(draw, additional changes); -4 Lackey.
Maybe Piledriver in at some point? If so, play or draw? Also, should Blood Moon only come in on the play?

Elves: +2 Pyro, +2 Cage, +1 Piledriver
-1 Stingscourger, -1 MWM, -2 Ringleader, -1 Tuktuk (maybe leave it for Needle or Jitte? If so, take what else out?)
No changes play or draw. Missing Mindbreak and Warping Wail here too. Needles of my own would be good too.

Maverick: (play) +2 Wear//Tear, +2 Blood Moon, +2 Therapy, +1 Pyro
-1 Warchief, -1 Stingscourger, -1 MWM, not sure what else. Everything else seems good. Maybe the therapies are overboarding here. Still need to find 2 cards though.
(draw changes) -4 Lackey. Makes things a lot easier.
Wail would be nice here for DRS and more importantly, Mother of Runes. Also Toxic Deluge. Not sure what I'd be taking out for it. Pithing Needle would be strong too.

Burn: +3 Thalia, +2 Wear//Tear, +1 Pyro, +1 Piledriver
-3 Ringleader, -1 EWS, -1 Karkas, -1 Krenko, -1 Tuktuk.
Once again, I miss Warping Wail.

Nic Fit: +2 Cage, +1 Pyro, +2 Wear//Tear
-1 Sharpshooter, -1 Tarfire, -1 Warchief, -1 MWM, -1 EWS
Needle would be nice here.

Eldrazi: +2 Pyro, +2 Blood Moon,
-1 Tarfire, -1 Sharpshooter, -1 EWS, -1 Stingscourger
Therapy is an option here, unsure what to take out.

So! Given this breakdown, what can I assess?

-Blood Moon is underutilized in my meta, perhaps I don't need it. However, it's such a knockout when it lands that I'm inclined to leave it in. Without it, I'd feel pretty dead in the lands matchup, and much worse about Eldrazi and Shardless (which will likely show up at some point).

-Surgical isn't doing too much, other than giving me outs against Reanimator's nut draw. It does help a lot with Lands though.

-The card I put a premium on fitting back in the board is Warping Wail because it covers so many bases. I could do a 1-1 split with Therapy, but I really dislike sideboards that are a whole bunch of one-ofs.

-I get the feeling I'm inclined to over-board. Not sure what to do to fix that. I understand my Ringleaders get much worse in postboard games against decks where they really matter, but am not sure where to draw the line.

As it stands, if I could fit the Piledriver back in the maindeck, I'd be relatively happy. I don't think I have any wasted board space, aside from possibly blood moon. Pithing Needle is another strong contender; Ideally, I'd like to fit 1 Mindbreak, 1 Warping Wail, and 1-2 Needles.

Based on what I see here, my conclusion is that my board should look something like this (assuming Piledriver makes it into the maindeck)
3 Thalia
2 Pyro
2 Wear//Tear
2 Blood Moon
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Warping Wail
1 Mindbreak Trap
1 Pithing Needle
1 Cabal Therapy

Lots of one-ofs, which I don't like, but this is the best I can come up with. Hope you all can give me some advice on this!

Thanks everyone

[jrw1985]

I just made a minor adjustment to my deck which I'm very happy with. I took out 2 Ports and put 2 Mountains into the MD. Now I'm rocking the following manabase...

12 Mountain
4 Waste
4 Cavern
2 Port
1 Karakas

I ran a little exercise where I broke my deck down into 7 card piles and just looked through them to see how many were good hands. I built my deck with a focus on a low curve and it really paid off. I did the same with 6 card piles to see how mulled hands look, and I was pleasantly surprised. I'm playing in another tourney in a few hours so I'll let ya'll know how it goes.

[woodjt5]

I just made a minor adjustment to my deck which I'm very happy with. I took out 2 Ports and put 2 Mountains into the MD. Now I'm rocking the following manabase...

12 Mountain
4 Waste
4 Cavern
2 Port
1 Karakas

I ran a little exercise where I broke my deck down into 7 card piles and just looked through them to see how many were good hands. I built my deck with a focus on a low curve and it really paid off. I did the same with 6 card piles to see how mulled hands look, and I was pleasantly surprised. I'm playing in another tourney in a few hours so I'll let ya'll know how it goes.

@JRw - I'm all about 12 Mountains. I support this choice.

@1GoblinLackey - The black splash is cool. I prefer mono red, but I'm all for trying out different options. I hope you do well. The one big critique I have is only playing 3 Goblin Warchiefs. You need to play 4. This deck is only good because it gets to cheat on mana. Without Warchief and Vial, the deck is way too fair. We can't compete with the degenerate Legacy metagame without getting ahead on mana. Please cut anything and play a 4th Warchief. Actually, scratch that, cut anything EXCEPT a Krenko.

[jrw1985]

I just got back from my third tournament in 3 days and it went horribly! It was a repeat of my losses from yesterday. 0-2 against ANT and Eldrazi Taxes. 0-4 in games!

To reiterate, my list...

4 Vial
4 Lackey
4 Matron
4 Ringleader
4 Chieftain
3 Tarfire
1 Tuktuk
1 Stingscourger
4 Gempalm
4 MWM
2 Krenko
2 Skirk Propsector

12 Mountain
4 Waste
2 Port
4 Cavern
1 Karakas

Side
4 Chalice
3 Pithing Needle
3 Surgical Extraction
3 Blood Moon
1 Tuktuk
1 Sharpshooter

R1
I was paired against the exact same Eldrazi Taxes player form yesterday. I had a great start with a Lackey connecting into Ringleader, but then Revoker turned off my Gempalms and I got stuck on 2 lands with three Gempalms in hand. Ugh. Redundancy killed me here.

G2 I again sided in Sharpshooter, Tuktuk and 2 Needles, taking out Stingscourger, a Lackey and a couple Vials (he has too many ways to shut own Vial and I don't want MY Needles to be symmetrical either, plus this should be a grind). He had a strong mid-game but ran out of gas. I was about to take the game over, then he top decks a SFM with Vial @ 2 and 5 lands so he plays and equips Sword of Fire and Ice. I lose from there. Super duper salty.

Because DnT is able to fuck with our setup so much it makes me think that being more diversified in the MD wouldn't be such a bad thing. I built my deck for super consistency, which is great, but being consistent CANNOT also mean being predictable. I suffered from that this game as Revoker made my multiples of Gempalm dead draws. Part of my theory for running so many Gempalms and MWMs was that they were built-in CA, but decks like DnT punish redundancy.

R2 Storm (ANT)
G1 I mulled to a 6 with Lackey, Matron and Port. My opponent mulled to 5. I hit him with Lackey and put in Matron, tutoring a Chieftain. T2 i Port his swamp and he plays an Underground Sea and goes off. Must be nice to play a good deck.

G2 I side in 3 Surgical Extraction, 4 Chalice and Sharpshooter. I draw a 6 with 2x Surgical Extraction and Lackey, Krenko and Chieftain on top. I hit with Lackey and put in Chieftain while opponent sculpts with three BS. He Goes off T3 and casts Cabal Ritual with 7 cards in the GY. I Surgical the 3 BS to keep him from Threshold. This messes up his plans, but he still has enough mana to Grim tutor for Ad Nauseum to go off. Here's the thing... my brain tells me I've lost after his Ad Nauseum so he chains tutors together and wins. But on my drive home after the loss it occurs to me.... I HAD A SECOND SURGICAL! I should have been able to Surgical his Tutor and cut off his win con. But after the first SE failed to stop him from going off I just sorta forgot about the second.... I don't play enough Magic, really. Corner cases like this are going to get me because I play 2 or 3 times a month and don't have a playtesting group, so I really rely on my brain to find the right line. Well, I done fucked up.

I wound up losing the the same two decks I lost to yesterday. It's frustrating.

There is room for improvement in my list. It is too redundant which hurt me against DnT.
4 MWM should probably be a 2-2 split with Piledriver.
4 Gempalm should only be 2. A Sparksmith or Sharpshooter would be great for filling the other slots. Just having a little more variety would be very beneficial. Well, now I'm reminding myself how dreadful Sharpshooter was when I played against Shardless on Saturday, but I think the 2 Skirks I'm running now make Sharpshooter much more valuable as they give him an untap mechanism.
I'm torn on the singleton Karakas. I like having 23 lands AND having the extra out against Show n Tell and Reanimator, but it could easily be a removal spell as well, something like Pyrokinesis. Still, it is the best removal "spell" against legends.
3 Tarfire should only be 2. The third should be a Pyrokinesis. Pyrokinesis is no worse than Tarfire against combo, and in many scenarios it can be much better.
4 Chieftain should be 4 Warchief. If you're running Piledrivers the +1/+1 is less relevant, and if you're running utility goblins the cost reduction is more relevant (1R Matron into whatever).
I still like 2 Skirk in the maindeck. They are a strong 1-drop and the sac-outlet should not be under estimated.
2 Krenko still seems strong as well. I like Krenko more than Siege-Gang because I don't see us racing combo these days anyway.

With this in mind, I think I would make the following changes to my deck for next time...

4 Vial
4 Lackey
4 Matron
4 Ringleader
4 Warchief
2 Tarfire
1 Pyrokinesis
1 Tuktuk
1 Stingscourger
2 Gempalm
1 Sparksmith
1 Sharpshooter
2 MWM
2 Piledriver
2 Krenko
2 Skirk Propsector

12 Mountain
4 Waste
2 Port
4 Cavern
1 Karakas

Side
4 Chalice
3 Pithing Needle
3 Surgical Extraction
3 Blood Moon
1 Tuktuk
1 ?

I'm not loving my gobbos too much right now, having gone 2-6 over the long weekend. But I cannot deny the pilot error that lost me multiple games. Look, Goblins is not a good deck, not by a long shot. No FoW means no catch-all trump card. But I fucked up in games that I could have won. I'm not done with the deck yet. It's not as good as Grixis Delver, Miracles, Sneak and Show, or ANT (which I've been playing the past few months), but I do not get the same joy playing them, plain and simple. I'll keep brewing.

[Chatto]

That sucks big time, Jon... Had the same feeling after a bad streak last year. I'm at this point I think i can pick up Gobbo's again, but only at smaller tournaments, and as a break from my normal routine (RGCL, that is).

[GoboLord]

Goblins feels like such a deckbuilding puzzle that's begging to be solved

Honest congratulations to accepting one of the simple truths of the deck.
This puzzle keeps me addicted to the deck. I spend 60% of my time with the deck just tinkering and 40% checking if my build works "in field".
Unlike most decks goblins has a whooping 0 SB cards pre-defined - so I always analyse the current metagame before I start building the list.
It's always the same process:
1. analyse metagame
2. build MD
3. check side-out cards
4. build SB
5. get stuck
6. ask Sandro, ScatmanX and Steamflogger for help
7. start over with step 2 or 3

[Sandro95]

My local meta (from what I can tell after 2-3 weeks), is best summed up with "combo decks (Storm, Reanimator, Burn, Elves), niche decks ( 4 color Nic Fit, Grixis Thieves, Enchantress, Maverick) and a whole crap-ton of Stoneforge Mystics (D&T, multiple Deathblade variants)". There's also a few Delver decks, and a few people are about to finish their own legacy decks (Miracles, Lands, Infect, and another BR Reanimator) so when building for my meta I still consider them present. There is a significant lack of Goyf, which is really nice. Eldrazi is present too.

Current List:

Creatures: 29
4 Lackey
4 Matron
4 Ringleader
3 Warchief
3 Mogg War Marshal
3 Gempalm Incinerator
2 Krenko
1 Sharpshooter
1 Skirk Prospector
1 Chieftain
1 Stingscourger
1 Tuktuk Scrapper
1 Earwig Squad

Artifacts: 6
4 Aether Vial
2 Smuggler's Copter

Instants: 2
1 Tarfire
1 Pyrokinesis

Lands: 23
6 Fetches
4 Mountains
4 Wastelands
3 Rishadan Port
3 Cavern of Souls
1 Plateau
1 Badlands (will become 2 in the near future hopefully, replacing a Mountain. Also possible I just get a 4th Cavern as another black source for EWS)
1 Karakas

Sideboard:
3 Thalia
2 Pyrokinesis
2 Blood Moon
2 Wear//Tear
2 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Cabal Therapy
1 Piledriver
1 Surgical Extraction

I like your maindeck. It's quite similar to my own. I would definitely like to see the fourth Cavern of Souls, and I agree that more Tarfires would be good, but all in all I like it.

With regards to the sideboard I don't like playing both Cabal Therapy and Thalia. You bring them in in the same matchups and they require different splash colors. So if you're playing against Storm for example, it will be unclear what land to fetch at times. Sometimes you will have an opener with both Therapy and Thalia, but with only one fetchland and no Cavern, and then you will be unable to cast one of your best cards in the matchup. Other times you will have to play the guessing game early on, and then if you topdeck the wrong piece of disruption its value will be reduced a lot. Personally I would go with therapies over Thalia, since they are better against Sneak & Show and Reanimator imo, and because you already want black for Earwig Squad when playing against Storm. I have been very happy with Chalice of the Void as a complement to the therapies in the sideboard. They play a similar role to that of Thalia against Combo, and can be very effective against Delver decks as well.
I'm not a fan of the SB Piledriver either, as I believe your sideboard slots to be more valuable than that.
Other than that your sideboard looks like a solid configuration of good cards, with some justified metagame calls.

Hope that helps!

[woodjt5]

I like your maindeck. It's quite similar to my own. I would definitely like to see the fourth Cavern of Souls, and I agree that more Tarfires would be good, but all in all I like it.

With regards to the sideboard I don't like playing both Cabal Therapy and Thalia. You bring them in in the same matchups and they require different splash colors. So if you're playing against Storm for example, it will be unclear what land to fetch at times. Sometimes you will have an opener with both Therapy and Thalia, but with only one fetchland and no Cavern, and then you will be unable to cast one of your best cards in the matchup. Other times you will have to play the guessing game early on, and then if you topdeck the wrong piece of disruption its value will be reduced a lot. Personally I would go with therapies over Thalia, since they are better against Sneak & Show and Reanimator imo, and because you already want black for Earwig Squad when playing against Storm. I have been very happy with Chalice of the Void as a complement to the therapies in the sideboard. They play a similar role to that of Thalia against Combo, and can be very effective against Delver decks as well.
I'm not a fan of the SB Piledriver either, as I believe your sideboard slots to be more valuable than that.
Other than that your sideboard looks like a solid configuration of good cards, with some justified metagame calls.

Hope that helps!

Play the 4th Cavern. I didn't notice you only had 3. I cannot fathom a reason to go below 4.