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Thread: [Deck] Vial Goblins

  1. #1761

    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Quote Originally Posted by jrw1985 View Post
    3-3 Matron-Ringleader.... I'm not actually missing the extra ones! Part of why I made the cuts is that I had too many Ringleaders draw into Matrons and ringleaders that I could not cast that turn. So far I'm liking it.

    Stronghold - Just picked one up. Totally forgot about it and it will be a fine replacement for 1 Port I'm sure. How's that as a solution to cutting a Ringleader and Matron?

    Settler - I just cut it. When it's good it's amazing, but it was developing SGC syndrome where it sits in your hand all game and you don't have the mana to spend it, and by the time you do have the mana it's not as impactful as it would have been earlier. Really, unless Settler comes in off Lackey T2 on the play it's probably not making an impact on the game. I think cutting it for now is fine. Plus, I'm packing the WWs and Stingscourger to take care of Merrit Lange (potentially).

    Chalice - I've won too many games against Miracles with Chalice to count, but I see your point. Miracles brings in answers to permanents G2, so they'll have more Disenchants, etc, once Chalice comes in than they did before. But they'll have less Counters, making REB better against Jace and Snap. I dig it. I normally don't like leaving mana up for REB but we'll see if I can make the adjustments.
    I'd give it a few months then make a decision on the matron thing

    You've got exactly the idea I have. They side out countermagic, bring in permanent hate like Disenchant. Chalice is a fantastic G1 card against Miracles, but siding it in plays into their postboard plan, while also weakening ours. REBs solve the true problem (B2B, while also snagging a crucial part of their engine; Snapcaster, Jace, sometimes AK). It's also gonna be a much better topdeck in the lategame.
    https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...it?usp=sharing

    Post DRS Goblins MTGO Leagues Only Data

  2. #1762

    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Quote Originally Posted by jrw1985 View Post
    3-3 Matron-Ringleader.... I'm not actually missing the extra ones! Part of why I made the cuts is that I had too many Ringleaders draw into Matrons and ringleaders that I could not cast that turn.
    When that happens, aren't those games we're steamrolling? I don't think I've ever regretted Ringleadering into more card advantage. My opponents groan. What matches is that sequence losing for you? It only seems bad against combo, but Ringleader into anything can be too slow vs combo, and we cut Ringleaders anyway.

    I also don't understand how you can play a toolbox with less than 4 Matrons. You're the more experienced player... but doesn't that have a big impact on your probabilities?

    I like GoblinLackey1's tech. Discard helps with combo better than Chalice (Chalice on the draw without sol lands/mox = facepalm). Volrath's is really really strong at grinding out, especially against decks like Grixis and Miracles with 0 land destruction. The top 2 things I return with Volrath's are Ringleaders and Matrons, unless I need a situational answer. Running fewer than 4 copies means a lower chance of having one to recur.

    I like your Grenzo tech and low curve. I'll have to try out some of those cards. I too have found Gray Ogre and Squire underwhelming in grindy matches.

    Settler seems bad without Kiki. Its main role is to WInstigate free wins (WInsitigator drops Matron, fetch Kiki, drop Kiki. EOT copy Matron, fetch Settler. Then play Settler and copy, opponent concedes). As 1-shot land destruction it's too high variance. We have Wasteland and Port vs Dark Depths. See my post a few pages back about how Port can buy critical tempo against Dark Depths.

    Would Thorn win those same games against Miracles that Chalice did? Or Mountain? How much worse did your Miracles matchup get that you needed to lean on Chalice against them?

  3. #1763
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    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    @GoblinSmashmaster
    Steamrolling?
    Not necessarily, especially when you need an answer or a piece of removal, you have limited mana, and you draw a 3 or 4 drop instead. Matron(this turn)>Toolbox(next turn) isn't so great when you need that toolbox card this turn.
    Yes, running fewer Matrons and Ringleaders lowers your probabilities, but the idea was running lower curve with more CA from RRGrenzo and to make up for it.
    Settler is pretty good without Kiki, but only when you're on the play. That's the real weakness of Settler; it's really only good on the play with a Lackey.
    Chalice vs Miracles: Chalice is much better than Thorn against Miracles, just because Chalice is super powerful against any deck running that many 1-drops. It counters 25% of their deck, and those cantrips and plows are what enable their Miracles, Mentors, Predicts and Snapcasters, so there's a lot of collateral damage there.

  4. #1764
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    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    All right, bois, I need to talk about this card for a second...



    While Goblins continues to have raw CA in spades (Matron, Ringleader, Gempalm, MWM, Krenko, Grenzos) it is falling further and further behind in the realm of Card Selection and Mudbutton Clanger seems to have some value in helping Goblins sort through our draws. Everyone familiar with Legacy knows that Brainstorm and Ponder are such good cards because they help blue mages find and play the best card for the moment. They do nothing to help a mage win in and of themselves, but they maximize the efficiency of the other cards in the deck. What I have been wondering is: How does Goblins get some card selection of its own?

    I've been tinkering with lower curve decklists that try to gain relative CA through having a lower land count (18 lands, like a Delver list). While this does help your Ringleaders and such hit more Goblins it makes your mana situation much more precarious, as you easily lose games to Wastelands and regular old screw. The annoying thing about losing to mana screw with 18 lands is that you also lose to mana flood with 24 lands. If there's a way to avoid these situations I want to find it! It was also common in lower curve decks to have a hand of underpowered Goblins that we not going to be impactful late-game. If we could fix draws a little to give us a better chance of hitting an impactful goblin or a sideboard card, that would be huge!

    Here's where Mudbutton seems to have potential:
    1) Fetchlands- If you run it with a fetch-heavy build you can potentially use the Kinship reveal the same way Delver players use that reveal to shuffle away chaff. This won't fix your draws necessarily, but it will shuffle away a card you do not need, giving you the potential to draw a better card off the top (whether that card is a land, goblin, or sideboard card).
    2) Vial Counters- You will know whether or not to up your vial counters if you stack the triggers correctly.
    3) Vial Activations- If you have a Vial set up for Matron or Ringleader you can get a Matron shuffle in upkeep to avoid a dead draw, or you can activate for a Ringleader in upkeep to guarantee one goblin draw if you know a goblin is on top.
    4) 2/2 beater for R if you want it to be! I would think that normally I would chose to not reveal, but if I'm just jamming a hasty goblin anyway I don't see the downside of revealing it.

    Mudbutton is only going to work though if you can jam enough shuffle effects into a decklist to enable its selection. Blade Control decks run a whopping 21 shuffle effects (if Snap>Ponder) +3 Fateseal options in Jace. But we've all been on the receiving end of Jace-lock to know that controlling the draw step is a huge advantage. UR runs a relatively paltry 12 shuffle-like effects (Preordain) by comparison. It would not be difficult to match the UR numbers when you remember the Matron shuffles give you 4 effects, so 8 fetches would get you the same number of shuffles. What I'm just wondering now is whether it will have enough of an effect on the outcome of a game.

    Has anyone had experience playing this card, and could you share your thoughts?

  5. #1765
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    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    It's a cute card but it just doesn't feel like it does enough. 2/2 for R is not even remotely interesting as it just gets outclassed by pretty much everything in Legacy - we're way past the time where Isamaru was a creature we cared about (and even that was mostly in conjunction with Karakas). I did discover the same problem as you back in the day but ultimately, my solution was just to make my lands do more. That's why we have Wastes (and Ports, which I frankly prefer to Wastes in this deck aside from the anti-Dark Depths function) - you essentially run 16 actual lands and then 8 land/spells. I did tinker with stuff like Mutavault, Tower of the Magistrate, Karakas, etc. but ultimately I found that doubling up on the mana denial/tempo plan lead to more wins than the other options. Of course, you can always run a few more utility lands if you go up to 24 mana sources; I've found 14 red sources sufficient much of the time as you only need double-R relatively late and Vial/Lackey can cast your stuff regardless of the manacosts.

  6. #1766

    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Quote Originally Posted by jrw1985 View Post
    @GoblinSmashmaster
    Steamrolling?
    Not necessarily, especially when you need an answer or a piece of removal, you have limited mana, and you draw a 3 or 4 drop instead. Matron(this turn)>Toolbox(next turn) isn't so great when you need that toolbox card this turn.
    When you need an answer immediately, yes drawing a Matron or Ringleader instead is too slow, but so is any other non-answer card. Unless you cut Matron/Ringleader for more answers, you're not changing those odds (and you could also cut any other slot for answers instead). Then you have to weigh that against the games where it does draw you into gas while some other single card wouldn't have done it. In my experience there is a strong positive correlation between the number of times I Ringleader into Matron/Ringleader and winning the game.

    Clanger seems weak. Years ago I ran a 1-of Sensation Gorger as gas. Kinship can be useful, but the opportunities for card selection are so minimal (Kinship isn't Clash) that it doesn't make up for running a creature that's bad on its own. Goblins is mana hungry and can't afford to leave uncracked fetches hanging around like 1cc tempo decks. The rare card selection you get does not make up for running a do-nothing body. It's only worth it as an additional ability on a creature that is otherwise useful. I would consider Gorger before Clanger, and Gorger is still probably too slow/weak to make the cut.

  7. #1767
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    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Quote Originally Posted by GoblinSmashmaster View Post
    Goblins is mana hungry and can't afford to leave uncracked fetches hanging around like 1cc tempo decks.
    ^^^

    This. I've done some goldfishing with a Mudbutton build and this reality made Mudbutton's potential moot.

  8. #1768

    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    So you guys are already looking at Chalice of the Void and Blood Moon and changing up the core cards. Has anyone here considered Goblin Stompy? It must have amazing matchups against those multicolor control decks.


    //Lock Pieces: 11
    4 Chalice of the Void
    4 Blood Moon
    3 Trinisphere

    //Goblins and Goblin Accessories: 23
    4 Legion Warboss
    4 Goblin Matron
    4 Imperial Recruiter
    4 Moggcatcher
    1 Goblin Cratermaker
    1 Stingscourger
    1 Goblin Chainwhirler
    1 Goblin Settler
    1 Goblin Trashmaster
    1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
    1 Siege-Gang Commander

    //Mana Sources: 26
    4 Simian Spirit Guide
    4 Chrome Mox
    4 Ancient Tomb
    4 City of Traitors
    10 Mountain

    //Sideboard: 15
    4 Leyline of the Void
    3 Thorn of Amethyst
    2 Umezawa's Jitte
    1 Goblin Trashmaster
    1 Goblin Cratermaker
    1 Goblin Sharpshooter
    1 Phyrexian Revoker
    1 Magus of the Moon
    1 Stingscourger


    Stompy decks usually suffer from inconsistency, but there are 12 tutors.

  9. #1769
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    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Quote Originally Posted by GoblinSmashmaster View Post
    So you guys are already looking at Chalice of the Void and Blood Moon and changing up the core cards. Has anyone here considered Goblin Stompy? It must have amazing matchups against those multicolor control decks.


    //Lock Pieces: 11
    4 Chalice of the Void
    4 Blood Moon
    3 Trinisphere

    //Goblins and Goblin Accessories: 23
    4 Legion Warboss
    4 Goblin Matron
    4 Imperial Recruiter
    4 Moggcatcher
    1 Goblin Cratermaker
    1 Stingscourger
    1 Goblin Chainwhirler
    1 Goblin Settler
    1 Goblin Trashmaster
    1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
    1 Siege-Gang Commander

    //Mana Sources: 26
    4 Simian Spirit Guide
    4 Chrome Mox
    4 Ancient Tomb
    4 City of Traitors
    10 Mountain

    //Sideboard: 15
    4 Leyline of the Void
    3 Thorn of Amethyst
    2 Umezawa's Jitte
    1 Goblin Trashmaster
    1 Goblin Cratermaker
    1 Goblin Sharpshooter
    1 Phyrexian Revoker
    1 Magus of the Moon
    1 Stingscourger


    Stompy decks usually suffer from inconsistency, but there are 12 tutors.
    That's just Dragon Stompy using Goblins. Completely different deck. When I worked on Mogg Stompy I posted the information to here. The mods on this site, years ago, decided that that was the place to post Stompy stuff.

    The deck was a lot of fun, but has a really rough time against Miracles and D&T (probably not D&T anymore due to new cards). I ultimately sold out of the deck when my $60.00 City of Traitors were suddenly $250.00.

    If I edit a post without an explanation, I am just correcting typos and / or formatting.
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  10. #1770
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    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Quote Originally Posted by jrw1985 View Post
    All right, bois, I need to talk about this card for a second...



    While Goblins continues to have raw CA in spades (Matron, Ringleader, Gempalm, MWM, Krenko, Grenzos) it is falling further and further behind in the realm of Card Selection and Mudbutton Clanger seems to have some value in helping Goblins sort through our draws. Everyone familiar with Legacy knows that Brainstorm and Ponder are such good cards because they help blue mages find and play the best card for the moment. They do nothing to help a mage win in and of themselves, but they maximize the efficiency of the other cards in the deck. What I have been wondering is: How does Goblins get some card selection of its own?

    I've been tinkering with lower curve decklists that try to gain relative CA through having a lower land count (18 lands, like a Delver list). While this does help your Ringleaders and such hit more Goblins it makes your mana situation much more precarious, as you easily lose games to Wastelands and regular old screw. The annoying thing about losing to mana screw with 18 lands is that you also lose to mana flood with 24 lands. If there's a way to avoid these situations I want to find it! It was also common in lower curve decks to have a hand of underpowered Goblins that we not going to be impactful late-game. If we could fix draws a little to give us a better chance of hitting an impactful goblin or a sideboard card, that would be huge!

    Here's where Mudbutton seems to have potential:
    1) Fetchlands- If you run it with a fetch-heavy build you can potentially use the Kinship reveal the same way Delver players use that reveal to shuffle away chaff. This won't fix your draws necessarily, but it will shuffle away a card you do not need, giving you the potential to draw a better card off the top (whether that card is a land, goblin, or sideboard card).
    2) Vial Counters- You will know whether or not to up your vial counters if you stack the triggers correctly.
    3) Vial Activations- If you have a Vial set up for Matron or Ringleader you can get a Matron shuffle in upkeep to avoid a dead draw, or you can activate for a Ringleader in upkeep to guarantee one goblin draw if you know a goblin is on top.
    4) 2/2 beater for R if you want it to be! I would think that normally I would chose to not reveal, but if I'm just jamming a hasty goblin anyway I don't see the downside of revealing it.

    Mudbutton is only going to work though if you can jam enough shuffle effects into a decklist to enable its selection. Blade Control decks run a whopping 21 shuffle effects (if Snap>Ponder) +3 Fateseal options in Jace. But we've all been on the receiving end of Jace-lock to know that controlling the draw step is a huge advantage. UR runs a relatively paltry 12 shuffle-like effects (Preordain) by comparison. It would not be difficult to match the UR numbers when you remember the Matron shuffles give you 4 effects, so 8 fetches would get you the same number of shuffles. What I'm just wondering now is whether it will have enough of an effect on the outcome of a game.

    Has anyone had experience playing this card, and could you share your thoughts?
    While I don’t have experience with this Card I did work on a Decklist with lower CMC. That was mainly because we have access to a lot of CMC=2 due to some recent prints.

    Piledriver
    Winstigator
    Mogg War Marshal
    cratermaker
    Sparksmith
    Grenzo RR
    Grenzo RB
    Dark Dweller Oracle

    If you want to squeeze a lot of those cards in there with the goal to improve your curve you ultimately have to cut some lords, matron and ringleaders though. I didn’t find a list that I like yet.

    On a different note: I came across an interesting combo that I’m using in my Commader deck.
    Grenzo, Dungeon Warden

    +

    Mana Echoes

    Revealing a goblin with grenzos ability will grant you at least one more activation for free. Things can spiral out of control pretty quickly if you are revealing something like mogg War Marshal or SGC, or if you starting point is more than just Grenzo+another creature.

    I‘m wondering if that’s something we could work with.

    Cheers
    -GL
    Mountain Caverns, Lackey, Go.

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  11. #1771

    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Quote Originally Posted by GoboLord View Post
    While I don’t have experience with this Card I did work on a Decklist with lower CMC. That was mainly because we have access to a lot of CMC=2 due to some recent prints.

    Piledriver
    Winstigator
    Mogg War Marshal
    cratermaker
    Sparksmith
    Grenzo RR
    Grenzo RB
    Dark Dweller Oracle

    If you want to squeeze a lot of those cards in there with the goal to improve your curve you ultimately have to cut some lords, matron and ringleaders though. I didn’t find a list that I like yet.

    On a different note: I came across an interesting combo that I’m using in my Commader deck.
    Grenzo, Dungeon Warden

    +

    Mana Echoes

    Revealing a goblin with grenzos ability will grant you at least one more activation for free. Things can spiral out of control pretty quickly if you are revealing something like mogg War Marshal or SGC, or if you starting point is more than just Grenzo+another creature.

    I‘m wondering if that’s something we could work with.

    Cheers
    -GL
    HAH, that combo is hilarious. Unfortunately it costs 8 mana total to start. 2 for grenzo 4 for echos 2 for first activation. But I think it would be pretty damn hilarious to pull your entire deck out from the bottom of your library.

  12. #1772

    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Hello everyone.

    I have been playing this and only this deck in Legacy for the past 9 years. After taking a break of about 4 years from the game, I recently have been back giving these funny creatures a little testing and twisting every now and then.
    I am playing a slightly revisited version of the decklist I used for many years (credit to Jim Davis for inventing this amazing build). It is in my opinion the most solid one, optimized for giving you a chance against almost any deck in the classic Legacy metagame environment and scenarios, although also being BY FAR the hardest one to play:


    Main Deck:

    4x Aether Vial

    4x Goblin Lackey
    4x Goblin Matron
    4x Goblin Ringleader
    4x Goblin Piledriver
    4x Goblin Warchief
    4x Gempalm Incinerator
    3x Mogg War Marshal
    1x Goblin Trashmaster
    1x Goblin Cratermaker
    1x Stingscourger
    1x Siege-Gang Commander
    1x Goblin Sharpshooter
    1x Skirk Prospector

    4x Wasteland
    4x Rishadan Port
    4x Cavern of Souls
    4x Scalding Tarn
    4x Mountain
    2x Wooded Foothills
    1x Plateau

    Sideboard:

    2x Relic of Progenitus
    2x Mindbreak Trap
    2x Pyrokinesis
    2x Containment Priest
    3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
    2x Surgical Extraction
    1x Goblin Trashmaster
    1x Goblin Chainwhirler


    There are few slots I am still not 100% sold on that require more testing as I am relatively new to the actual metagame, but for the most part this is what I will be working with and will use for providing inisghts, thoughts and anecdotes (on a not so regular basis ).

  13. #1773
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    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    @spiffy
    Welcome back, old friend. I’m looking forward to hearing how your build treats you.


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  14. #1774
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    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Learned something new today. You can pull off the Kiki-Crafter combo with Trashman as the sac outlet so long as there is one artifact in play. You can do this because the Champion triggers happen after the Trashman activation, so you can copy, Champion, Crafter copy activate and sac before the first Trashman activation resolves. You can have infinite Trashman activations all targeting the same artifact, so the infinite damage combo works.


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  15. #1775

    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Hey there!!

    I want to start to build other decks and considered Goblins (the BR version, gotta put to use my badlands...), after some time playing several versions of the antiquities war decks. I found Goblins gameplay very satisfying and fun from what I have seen (I also played Zombardment, funniest deck ever, for quite some time, but the deck is just bad situated in my city's metagame, too many Eldrazi).

    The other option would be Slivers, do you guys have any suggestions? Apparently Slivers is the stronger of the two but Im not sure if the gameplay is what I like.

  16. #1776
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    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Well, Goblins are always a metagame call. Slivers have the advantage of being able to run Force and blue cards in general while Goblins tend to prefer staying red. Slivers are just dead to non-basic hate while Goblins are pretty resilient to it. The biggest problem with this deck is obviously the combo match-up (just check out the sideboards, it's usually 12+ cards against various combo strategies and that doesn't suffice to bring those up to 50% generally). Perhaps the biggest exception is Show'n'Tell, which isn't that bad particularly if you have some number of Cratermakers and Stingscourgers in your 60 and some more in your 75. Storm is naturally the hardest since nothing you have interacts with it in any meaningful way (but Cabal Therapy is a great card). Well, Belcher is even worse but that deck is so bad against most of the format that nobody cares enough to play it.

    If you have a lot of fair decks in your meta, such as the Eldrazi you mentioned, you can definitely craft Goblins to do well there. Eldrazi in particular is a nice example since Cratermaker is such a house there, blowing up their Chalices where necessary but also killing any of their creatures and even general utility stuff. They also don't particularly shine in answering your Lackeys. Thus, some anti-big-creatures build would be real nice in an Eldrazi-heavy environment assuming it's mostly the usual suspects otherwise in Delver/Grixis Control/D&T (Cratermaker is also a house here as they rely on their equipment against us)/Miracles/Combo. Though be warned, Goblins is a deceptively complex deck and figuring it out takes a lot of experience. I do think you'd want to run Waste/Port as anti-land effects are one of the better tools against Eldrazi and most control strategies, but you can fit that all in alongside black lands.

  17. #1777

    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Quote Originally Posted by Eldariel View Post
    Well, Goblins are always a metagame call. Slivers have the advantage of being able to run Force and blue cards in general while Goblins tend to prefer staying red. Slivers are just dead to non-basic hate while Goblins are pretty resilient to it. The biggest problem with this deck is obviously the combo match-up (just check out the sideboards, it's usually 12+ cards against various combo strategies and that doesn't suffice to bring those up to 50% generally). Perhaps the biggest exception is Show'n'Tell, which isn't that bad particularly if you have some number of Cratermakers and Stingscourgers in your 60 and some more in your 75. Storm is naturally the hardest since nothing you have interacts with it in any meaningful way (but Cabal Therapy is a great card). Well, Belcher is even worse but that deck is so bad against most of the format that nobody cares enough to play it.

    If you have a lot of fair decks in your meta, such as the Eldrazi you mentioned, you can definitely craft Goblins to do well there. Eldrazi in particular is a nice example since Cratermaker is such a house there, blowing up their Chalices where necessary but also killing any of their creatures and even general utility stuff. They also don't particularly shine in answering your Lackeys. Thus, some anti-big-creatures build would be real nice in an Eldrazi-heavy environment assuming it's mostly the usual suspects otherwise in Delver/Grixis Control/D&T (Cratermaker is also a house here as they rely on their equipment against us)/Miracles/Combo. Though be warned, Goblins is a deceptively complex deck and figuring it out takes a lot of experience. I do think you'd want to run Waste/Port as anti-land effects are one of the better tools against Eldrazi and most control strategies, but you can fit that all in alongside black lands.
    I started to get the pieces but it will take a while until I have everything. The Meta is full of other Goblins, DnT, Eldrazi, Miracles, Grixis, some Burn and with combo we have a couple turbo depths, many reanimator and a small number of show n tell. There is just one player with storm (but most of the time he plays Pox). The last monthly tournament we had around 50 ppl, and more than half were fair decks. I guess is just about adjust the deck to the meta.

    I really liked the approach of BR with volrath's stronghold and using cabal therapy on the sideboard. Also loved that Earwig Squad dude! And Grenzo looks like an incredibly fun card. Also Oath of Ghouls is something I'm drawn to.
    The ideas about CA and no piledriver/hastelords provided by jrw1985 also intrigued me a little bit. I tend to like the weirdest builds of the decks I play =)

  18. #1778

    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Few notes about the combo matchup post-board

    Qur primary goal to have a chance vs them is still to set up a fast enough clock to put pressure.
    We should not try to fight his gameplan the hard way by spending our early turns to only cast spells whose aim is to merely disrupt them.

    This is why I think cards like Chalice of the Void & Thorn of Amethyst are suboptimal in a classic build, and that we should ALWAYS run 4 Piledrivers maindeck.
    Those guys are the only hope we have to bag a combo matchup, and they don't really make our deck worse vs fair ones.

    All in all, I think the best build to optimize our chances in a unknown/diverse metagame is to add a black splash.
    Earwig Squad and Cabal Therapy are insanely powerful cards to deploy vs Storm combo. Surgical Extraction and Mindbreak Trap follow them (I'd put Thalia and Relic of Progenitus in the 3rd tier).

    Dredge is also possible to tackle thanks to cards like Pyrokinesis, Skirk Prospector, Gempalm Incinerator, Tarfire and Goblin Cratermaker that can get rid of Bridges.
    Some degree of grave hate post-board is obviously needed (they can go off as early as T1 fairly frequently, so again Surgical shines here), but we can steal a decent amount of games without it if they go past the 2nd turn.

    As far as the Reanimator matchup, I think we just have to accept the fact that we'll be toasted most of the time and there's very little we can do about it.
    Sure Stingscourger, Karakas, Cabal Therapy and so on can give us a bit of hope, but don't expect to be good very often.

  19. #1779
    Faerie Godfather

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    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    Honestly, with how bad the combo MU is, I feel like MD Cabal Therapy might be warranted. It's not bad in fair match-ups either (you can often guess a good card to name off their first land). Nowadays more and more decks are reliant on specific few cards against us instead of just trading 1-for-1 and trying to come out on top; see e.g. Stoneforge Mystic for D&T and Stoneblade decks, Kolaghan's Command for Grixis, Buried Alive for Phoenix, Terminus for Miracles (though of course, trying to snipe cards from Miracles is a bit of a thing as they just play the top of their deck; there you have to brute force their cantrips).

    It does make your Ringleaders worse, and you can side it out where you expect to grind the opposition out the traditional way but I don't think going G1 without a hope of beating combo (short of Prowling an Earwig) is really the way to go. A single Therapy can snipe two key cards or a card through counter vs. Storm/Show'n'Tell/Turbo Depths (though that isn't even such a bad MU)/Reanimator/Elves (though here, removal creatures are more effective) buying you the time you need to get there with Lackey & co. Obviously your best card in all of these MUs is Lackey since they can't block nor remove it (usually), and it single-handedly gives you a turn 3-4 kill pretty reliably, and frees your mana up to disrupt them instead of needing it to cast your stuff.

    I feel like a build without MD non-Goblins is better in a vacuum but in a metagame with a significant combo presence, I feel like MD interaction is warranted. And yeah, Earwig Squad is a nice bullet to Lackey > Matron for in combo MUs as well; Storm folds to it, Elves loses Hoof, Show'n'Tell...depends on their hand but you can see what they're holding from how many of each they have in their deck and remove 3 of the other piece, and even stuff like Miracles, Phoenix and Blade-decks lose much of their main gameplan (Terminus, Phoenix, equipment respectively). It's not perfect, nothing ever is, but it's surprisingly good if you have enough small dorks to somewhat reliably attack with.

  20. #1780

    Re: [Deck] Vial Goblins

    I wanna address a couple of comments just made regarding our combo matchups.

    I've got 500 matches logged in MTGO leagues as of today (including a 5-0 today, woop woop). My datasheet's in my signature. MTGO is combo hell, and I think I've learned how to beat the combo decks more than anything else on MTGO. To be terribly honest, our combo matchups are legitimately better than we're willing to give ourselves credit for. Storm and Reanimator are the most popular decks on MTGO, and guess what? I'm just over 50% against Reanimator, and under 50% against Storm. The only combo matchup that I've been doing atrociously bad against is Sneak and Show (35%), but I've just had a lotta bad beats. I'm over 50% against Depths, solidly positive vs Dredge, etc. Being 40-55% against a wide range of combo is...really not bad. For the majority of my play, I've been playing RB builds with Cabal Therapies in the board, but sometimes I've gone without. I LOVE Therapy in the deck, and if you've got a lot of combo and control, it's strong, but maindeck therapies opens you up to a lot of problems. You get weaker against Miracles, and significantly worse against the Stompy decks. I'm got a 14 win record against mono red stompy, and 16-2 against Eldrazi. Without the strengths of the conventional builds, you're gonna lose some points in what should be our byes.

    Also, I cannot emphasize enough how important it is to DIVERSIFY YOUR HATE. Don't be 1-dimensional. Hit from every angle possible.
    https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...it?usp=sharing

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