[DTB] Vial Goblins

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Originally Posted by true story

So... How many of each do you run? Are they MD or SB? Just curious

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You shouldn't focus on cute combos in goblins at all, b/c they are not very reliable. I'm back to the Red/Green version since I like the stability of the mana base. Since landstill has been on the rise, I found it once again to run rishadan port necessary.

The only kinda new goblin that I play is stingcourger which has been pretty amazing. I made the switch right before the GP and have been happy with it ever since. I still run 1 tin street and 1 sharpshooter b/c in situations they have been very good to me.

If you want some good suggestions you can always PM me.

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Originally Posted by nickrit2000

If you want some good suggestions you can always PM me.

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Do you still play magic? Lol. I'm sure you've figured out who I am by my name. I really could use some suggestions cause I'm getting headaches trying to perfect my deck. I trust your opinion more than most cause I know you and know you've played Goblins alot. I'll have to get your number from Jap Foil.

Anyone thought about not playing Vial. It has been pretty lame lately. It only seems good against blue control matchups. Against everything else it seems like its slowing me down?

Sry but you must play 4 Vials. Its soo good in so many ways!

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Originally Posted by true story

Anyone thought about not playing Vial. It has been pretty lame lately. It only seems good against blue control matchups. Against everything else it seems like its slowing me down?

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This is simply not true. Contrary to popular belief, goblins doesn't have to win on turn 3, even though it's nice. The reason we can run the amount of wastelands/ports we do is because we have stuff like lackeys, warchiefs and vials to get stuff into play cheaply.

Goblins has an insane midgame, stringing ringleader into matron into ringleader, which would be alot harder without the aid of vials. Even if it sometimes feels like you're 'wasting' your first turn dropping a vial and even if it runs behind your landdrops in the first 2-3 turns, it will prove itself time and time again once you progress a bit further into the game, allowing you to drop multiple men onto the table in an obscenely short timespan.

Reasons you can't cut Vial:
-Countertop and control decks rip you unless you have enough pressure - 1-drops like Vial are necessary for this.
-Aggro-decks rip you unless you can play the control-game. To this end, Vial allows you to spend your daily mana allotment slowing down their beats while Vial eventually gives you sufficient mana lead to use your bigger spells and win.
-I can't stress enough how much you want those Matrons & Ringleaders to resolve.
-It gives you an enormous resilience to non-Deed sweepers by just refilling the board when they're all gone. Also works great vs. Sorcery-removal in general.
-Vialing out SGC is insane - you've got all your mana open to start pinging stuff and a lot of fuel to ping with. This is how I usually finish off white/blue control-players from behind their Moat/Propaganda/Ghostly Prison/whatever non-Humility effects (and it's handy even against Humility to get those last few points in).
-Vial is a non-land "mana" source you can use to pay for all your Goblins. It gives you tons of resilience to mana disruption strategies (majority of my wins vs. Aggro Loam are a direct consequence of Vial, for example).


If you wanted to take the deck into a more aggressive direction, you could play with cutting the Vials, but frankly, without Vials all your 3+ spells become much worse and the deck becomes much more reliant on Lackey, which presently isn't at all reliable. And Lackeying out Piledriver just isn't all that gamebreaking.

Okay so i have been playing the mono-red build for a little bit and was wondering how others felt about the other builds that splash and what they bring to the deck any imput would be nice to hear as im trying to make up my own mind as to what colore i want to add . :)

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Originally Posted by neon_havoc

Okay so i have been playing the mono-red build for a little bit and was wondering how others felt about the other builds that splash and what they bring to the deck any imput would be nice to hear as im trying to make up my own mind as to what colore i want to add . :)

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You could, you know, read the thread. More than half of all discussion is about what to splash. But I'll break it down very simply.

Black: Warren Weirding, Wort.
Green: Tin Street Hooligan, Krosan Grip.
White: Swords to Plowshares
Blue: Not Goblins.
Multiple Colors: Engineered Explosives

Of course there are some other things but those are the main ones.

Fair enough, well then what colore is superior if any in your opinion ?

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Originally Posted by neon_havoc

Fair enough, well then what colore is superior if any in your opinion ?

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That's the same question, just asked differently. The answer is: none. Some people play RB because they like to get rid of tarmogoyfs, mongeese and other stuff (and sometimes they play wort). Some people play RG because they prefer the monored approach, but want to play tin street hooligan and have some stuff in their sideboard such as krosan grip, apart from that it's pretty much monored. Some people play RGB because they want both, at the cost of rishadan ports (you're not going to play 8 colourless lands in 3-colour goblins).
Some people play RW because they are stuck in 2006
Some people play monored because they like the consistency and explosiveness (monored is still the fastest) even though they will lack some general utility.

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Originally Posted by neon_havoc

Fair enough, well then what colore is superior if any in your opinion ?

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All versions mono red and splashed one, has their own way to get rid of different problems. Here's a small comparisson:

RB = Warren weirding is used to clear the path for lackey in the first turns, RR uses stingscourger for this aim and incinerator for the mid game.

RG = Krosan grip / Tin street holligan are used for cracking artifacts, RR use goblin tinkerer for this aim. Krosan grip is also used to destroy enchantments (plagues mostly) RR use goblin king and goblin goon to reduce the plague effect.

So...i think that this is a matter of the player with color use.

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Originally Posted by neon_havoc

Fair enough, well then what colore is superior if any in your opinion ?

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It all depends on your metagame. A few of the guiding factors:

1. Presence of Tarmogoyf.
2. Presence of Engineered Plague and other Enchantments.
3. Presence of Stifle/Wasteland and/or Landstill.

These are the three decisions that generally guide the decision as to what color to splash. Evaluate what your metagame is like, how much of each these three there are, and then adjust the splash as you see fit. Each splash usually has a problem with one of the above three. For a general metagame I recommend RG: It can deal with #2 and #3 just fine...or possibly RBG, because #3 is probably less of a concern than #1 and #2 (RBG loses port which is a big help in the landstill matchup). RB is generally hit or miss, because it does do a good job of domination against #1 and #3 but having to dig for one of your 3 almost-answers to plague is never good, so it loses to #2 very badly. MonoRed has problems with #1 and #2. However, the philosophy of a monored player is a little different, and the deck is just a little different as a whole as monored. Funny enough, RW technically has answers to all 3: it has disenchant for #2, swords to plowshares for #1, and is only 2colors so #3 is not really much of a problem at all.

There is also a fourth factor:
4. Presence of Combo.

But this usually only alters your sideboard, and most of the good combo hate cards nowadays (pyrostatic pillar and chalice of the void being the most played) are on color. (Do not get me started on Earwig Squad being an "effective answer" to combo)

Currently cased up for me is RBG: Engineered Explosives is very good against many countertop decks, and with krosan grip provides a strong force to combat engineered plague. And of course warren weirding with the hundreds of goyfs in my meta.

But this could all change in an instant. If I see a lot of stifle/wasteland or landstill, I might just go rb. Or if I'm seeing something else, I'll go to something else, or whatever whatever, you see what I'm saying.

For what it's worth, White still does have a few advantages.

One is that Swords to Plowshares is a one mana spell, which makes a huge difference in your tempo. It means that not only can you clear the path for a Lackey like you can with Scourger/Weirding, but you can also be using a Wasteland, dropping a Vial, etc. with your other land. STP's also an instant. Don't get me wrong. It's probably not nearly enough to make up for the fact that Warren Weirding is a Goblin. But it's noteable.

Also, white also offers you what green can do, just worse. Seal of Cleansing's a poor substitute for Grip.

White also gives you whatever combination of Chant/Canonist you might want.

So White's probably the most versatile splash color. It's the only color that can add removal, answer artifacts/enchantments, and improve combo hate. It just doesn't have the strongest cards to get.

Has RBW been considered at all? Vindicate is a great solution to... almost everything. You get to keep wierding, but if you need targeted creature removal you get STP.

I think this should be considered because vindicate could play the role of krosan, possibly better because it kills a lot of stuff. Including lands to support the wastelands.

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Originally Posted by THEchubbymuffin

Has RBW been considered at all? Vindicate is a great solution to... almost everything. You get to keep wierding, but if you need targeted creature removal you get STP.

I think this should be considered because vindicate could play the role of krosan, possibly better because it kills a lot of stuff. Including lands to support the wastelands.

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Vindicate has been explored by Tacosnape in the thread. Playing vindicate, stp, vials, and potentially more is a lot of nongoblins, and there are things that can do what vindicate does on color. Asking for one splash color at a time (For example, wort, grip, etc.) isn't that difficult, but asking for black AND white can be difficult at times. The effect better be earth-shattering, and for me, Vindicate just doesn't get there. Vindicate + Weirding + StP is, in my opinion, too much removal for the deck, as well as too many nongoblins pre or post board. Plus you probably aren't going to be playing EE in that deck with so many nongoblins, and to me EE is one of the strongest factors towards a 3 color build, being as it rapes the 2cccentric meta.

The other card that has been suggested that is in two off-colors is Ray of Revelation, so I'll just get that out of the way right now. Suffers the same problems as vindicate in that it is too mana intensive for an effect that is already covered well enough by one color.

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Originally Posted by FoulQ

Vindicate has been explored by Tacosnape in the thread. Playing vindicate, stp, vials, and potentially more is a lot of nongoblins, and there are things that can do what vindicate does on color. Asking for one splash color at a time (For example, wort, grip, etc.) isn't that difficult, but asking for black AND white can be difficult at times. The effect better be earth-shattering, and for me, Vindicate just doesn't get there. Vindicate + Weirding + StP is, in my opinion, too much removal for the deck, as well as too many nongoblins pre or post board. Plus you probably aren't going to be playing EE in that deck with so many nongoblins, and to me EE is one of the strongest factors towards a 3 color build, being as it rapes the 2cccentric meta.

The other card that has been suggested that is in two off-colors is Ray of Revelation, so I'll just get that out of the way right now. Suffers the same problems as vindicate in that it is too mana intensive for an effect that is already covered well enough by one color.

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I wholeheartedly agree here. I say, engineered explosives solves all the problems that vindicate does (albeit, obviously, usually a turn slower) and more. Not only does EE allow you to splash the colours you really want (black and green) instead of subpar white (even though taco has some points about white being a nice allround colour, I don't think we need it, *ever*), but it also takes care of random shittiness like double plague, a board full of zombietokens etc.
So yeah, if you want to destroy more stuff than weirding/grip allows you to, go for the explosives instead, but keep them in the board :)

On the subject of running Vindicate, has anyone considered running RGB goblins builds and using the new Maelstrom pulse. You have access to both of the best splashes as well as being able to deal with multiple tarmogoyfs at the same time.

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Originally Posted by Mr.T

On the subject of running Vindicate, has anyone considered running RGB goblins builds and using the new Maelstrom pulse. You have access to both of the best splashes as well as being able to deal with multiple tarmogoyfs at the same time.

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To me this is similar but not quite the same to vindicate. EE can destroy multiple goyfs as well as counterbalance, bob, and many popular cards outside of the 2cc range. EE only takes 2 colors to be effective but becomes even better with 3. Maelstrom Pulse is going to take all 3 or otherwise it is uncastable (as you probably aren't going to have black and green but not red). Now, the effects aren't equal, and you could make an argument that placed side by side maelstrom pulse is better than EE, but the amount better I don't think is worth it for the mana cost. Both are great at some things and average at others, but they both have the goal of killing pesky permanents.

But of course, I can't really say how good maelstrom pulse is going to be, in goblins, in eva green, in other decks. I haven't even tested it in goblins because I have tested vindicate and hated it. Obviously you get green instead of white with the pulse, but you could just run more synergistic warren weirdings to deal with goyfs.

And I know I shoot down a lot of ideas, but I'm not saying we should not continue innovation within goblins. Just that the deck is so established and so tested that few ideas really can make the cut. Shadowmoor and Shards all brought pretty much nothing, and Lorwyn brought a lot less than you'd expect when goblins are central theme of the block. Maelstrom Pulse definitely deserves testing, but only because, sadly, no other new cards really look promising at all and MP does have potential.

Pulse seems okay to me, here in Germany VG Players splitted their Removal up like 2/2/3 Incinerator/Weirding/Terminate. Pulse seems to be strictly better than Terminate, but it needs both splash colors. Normally you don't care if your opponent wastes one of your Taigas G1, but if you play Pulse, you have to watch carefully after your two green producing lands.

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Originally Posted by Joon

Pulse seems okay to me, here in Germany VG Players splitted their Removal up like 2/2/3 Incinerator/Weirding/Terminate. Pulse seems to be strictly better than Terminate, but it needs both splash colors. Normally you don't care if your opponent wastes one of your Taigas G1, but if you play Pulse, you have to watch carefully after your two green producing lands.

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This is the reason why pulse will be unplayable. The deck is red, with a light splash to either or both green and/or black for extra niceness. Nobody even runs basic land besides some mountains and the appropriate fetchlands. Sticking in heavy off-colour requirements like MP seems like suicide, since you'd need to retool your entire manabase (play more duallands, maybe stick in some random basics that will pop up when you dont need them and will only be fetchable with 50% of your fetchlands, which are of course the ones you're not holding right now) to be able to actually play them.

As much as I'd love to run some cool new gimmick, I'm afraid we're not getting it with this set which is sad :( since goblins seemed to be a big part of the flavour of Jund, and I really got excited when they released the rare razerunners and goblin-eating dragon in conflux since it could mean we'd get more!