He was anwesering a question...
Printable View
He was anwesering a question...
I finally got around testing Goblin Chieftain and its amazing. I replaced 3 Warchiefs and a Siege Gang with them. Chieftain + War Marshall = 6 power for 2 mana. I might even replace my maindeck Relics with something else, I might give the Caverns a shot now. On a different note, won a small 8 man tourney a few weeks ago taking home a Volcanic Island and thats the 3rd tourney on a row Goblins lead me to victory!
Double post, please delete.
Chieftain is definitely good, but I disagree with cutting Warchiefs for them. For a while, I was running a 3/3/3 split of Warchief/Matron/Chieftain, because I couldn't figure out how to fit 4 of each into the deck, and I didn't want to overload the deck with 3-drops anyway. After playing several matches, I could tell that Warchief was still the most important one, so I switched to a 4/3/2 split. Much better, imo.
Personally, I think Goblin Warchief is better than Goblin Chieftain in everyway imaginable. Warchief also gives haste, so that part no longer matters. If the +1/+1 mattered that much, more people would have ran Goblin King. As it stands, it was just an answer for Engineered Plague or occasionally wanting to Mountainwalk.
Would I rather my Goblin Lackey and Goblin Sharpshooter become 2/2 or would I rather my Goblin Ringleader and Goblin Matron cost one less?
It's a no-brainer to me. Using AEther Vial to put out a Warchief with only two lands in play happened to me a lot. Then suddenly those two lands can do a lot more things.
I generally agree with you P.S...However I find chieftain to be great in the aggro mirror. For instance, the goblins mirror, he just wins games hands down, and it becomes more about "who is playing more chieftains" than "who can draw more lands and win the land/vial war." Getting all those 3/3s and 2/2s makes a huge difference not only in combat but when your opponent brings in pyrokinesis sb.
He is also great against zoo for the sweepers postboard and being able to trade with nacatls, kill apes, etc. Same with merfolk obviously.
And those are three of the DTB so I think he deserves a place in the deck...if the meta warrants it. And there is definitely space, even just looking at my standard RG build:
4 Lackey, Matron, Piledriver, Ringleader, Warchief, Gempalm
3 Fanatic
2 SGC, Sting, Tin Street
23 Land, 4 Vial
Fanatic, Sting, Tin Street are all pretty easily cuttable, at least some numbers of them (and probably x1 piledriver as well), for x2 chieftain. At the very least I think he should be considered post sb for the creature mirror. My sb for RG is:
3 Grip
2 Needle
3 Kinesis
2 Chieftain (for the aggro match 4-5 alongside kinesis)
3-4 Relic
1-2 Meta spots
So chieftain can easily fit in the deck and helps against three DTB. (Well ok two DTB and one DTW but let's not nitpick)
I see your point but its a matter of priority, Warchief does some excellent things and Chieftain as well. you are probably not running War Marshall which makes Chieftain lose some of its strength, I do so the +1/+1 effect has priority for me. Also I run 4 Ports so colorless mana usually often isnt the limiting factor determining the number of Goblins that can be played during a turn, Warchief reducing colorless mana doesnt help me in those scenarios.
The comparison with Goblin King is extremely bad as haste is very relevant to Goblins while mountainwalk often means squat. The most important ability is haste anyway.
That said, I only tested about 6 matches so it might be a fluke.
@Volt: running less than 4 Matron is out of the question if you ask me, run 4 and 9 if you are comfortable with cheating.
@ PS: Goblin King gives that bonus to all goblins, which is definitely win-more. If you notice I do side in 3 pyrokinesis in addition to 2 chieftain. I'm not disagreeing that you should not run 4 warchief as I do that as well (but I run no war marshal so chieftain isn't quite as good). If you both side in pyrokinesis (and I see lots of goblins running it) then you mathematically want to have an advantage if you are evenly skilled players (in a vaccuum but still). Chieftain gives that advantage in the goblins mirror ALONGSIDE pyrokinesis. And he helps vs. zoo and merfolk.
@Volt: I second Mantis, you have to play 4 matron. Behind ringleader, vial, wasteland, it is probably my favorite/best card in the deck.
I personally think the incredible tempoboost granted by warchief makes it the single best card in the deck. Especially in the midgame a warchief that sticks around spells doom for your opponent, giving you those typical 'where the FUCK did all these dudes come from?' turns.
why is wort always played only as a one of? it seems insane getting back matron, ringleaders, warren weirdings etc.
If you have an active wort, you've probably already won the game. Same as SGC. Except SGC can bring you back much much better than Wort. Not to say Wort is bad because I think it is pretty good in Rb. Also, not sure if you are aware but she is legendary.
I cutted the SGC for a single lightning crafter. So, no more vials at 5, only 4, to play ringleadres, wort and crafter. Just saying Crafter is THE MAN against merfolks, alongside piledriver. It's more insane with a chieftain or a warchief in play to give him haste.
Other thing i did and i feel very strange about is including 3 Maze of ith :eek: .
Yes, Maze of Ith. I was tired of being beated by second turn dreadnoughts, tarmogoyfs, dreadstalkers and merfolks wearing jittes. They cant counter it, but is still going to be destroyed by a wasteland. But still, they won me ALOT of matches, saving me from impossible situations, buying me valious time to settle the late game control goblins, with the crafter, matron and the piledrivers to deliver the flashing blow. I'm posting my list later, because although i have tested it many many times, i cant still play a tournament with it (mostly because i don't have all the cards), so i dont think is a reliable list.
I'm really not a fan of the idea of running Maze of Ith in Goblins. The deck is one of the most mana hungry in the format. I really don't think it can afford to be using land drops on lands that cannot produce mana, as it's looking to make it's first 4 land drops consistently and needs to put as much mana as possible toward curving out when it doesn't get an active Vial.
Some combination of Warren Weirding, Stingscourger, or Tin Street Hooligan (for Dreadnought) seem like the best MD ways to address large creatures. Sideboard Krosan Grips (for Dreadnought), Terminates, or Shreikmaws could also help.
I agree completely with the mana issues. I didn't cut any lands, i still run 22 (or 23). The cards that you mention are indeed usefull in the right situation, is just that in my case, they have all failed me when i needed them :cry:
The thing about weirding is that you can throw it to your opponent's tarmo or dreadnought, but they can FOW it, Spell snare it, countertop it or just sacrifice a factory, trinket mage or mongoose. Plus, you are pumping the goyf. Is something like Nietzsche saying you: What doesnt kill me, makes me stronger :rolleyes: .
Stingscourger is GREAT. i mean it, at first i didn't like anything about it, but when you vial it to do nice combat tricks (for example against merfolks bouncing a lord and blocking the other one) is NICE. With a lord and haste, is almost a GG (piledrivers beating). Or bouncing the tarmo and wasting the tropical, or the dreadnought, or Stalker, or clearing the path to your innocent lackey:tongue: . That's why i run 3 in MD.
Hooligan.... It just fails so much to the deck in my opinion. With vial it sucks. With warchief it sucks again... Tinkerer seems better to me.
For me, Maze of Ith is great because it can't be countered. That's it. Oh, and also, It doesn't cost any mana (a land drop, that in the testing is irrelevant because you lose one turn but you gain so much valuable time).
It's just my own experience about the deck's weaknesses and how can we efficiently handle them. In the mean time, Maze fits very well to me.
I don't think you quite understood his post. It is not the actual land count he is necessarily talking about, but hitting your land drops 1-4 consistently. As in lands that produce mana. ETA: well actually you address this later in your post and I will too.
I'll be honest, maze of ith is absolutely horribly terrible in this deck and I don't need to test it. If the opponent is attacking you with tombstalkers, dreadnoughts, goyf, then you have already lost. Decks with threats like these you are almost ALWAYS the aggro deck in the matchup, they should be on the defensive. The counterspell argument is irrelevant as you can counter any freaking spell except for gempalm. In addition is the point from cairo made which makes this the exact opposite type of deck I would want to run the card in.
Onto hooligan. For the last freaking time, he is good if your meta warrants. Having problems with merfolks carrying jittes? NOT maze of ith. TSH, and x3-4 gempalm please. "But sux with warchief lol" is NO because your warchief will be the first to die off a jitte. Plus tinkerer is not runnable as 1 or 2 of most of the time because he is a reactive solution while TSH is proactive. Maybe in monored but. And vial synergy, well yeah that's true. But honestly people, he has been TESTED BY HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE AND HUNDREDS AGREE. He is playable if the meta warrants it. And it sounds like with merfolk AND goblins in your meta he is DEFINITELY maindeckable. (kills vial which is uber important, and jittes)
Time? Time is not what you should be looking for with the deck. Cmon, we are aggro in the matchups you highlighted Ith as a strength. Ith is control. And in the matchups where we assume the control role (such as zoo), missing a land drop like that is pretty devastating.You have so many bomb spells that counters should not be that big of a problem. Just place more of a priority on vial if you are really getting flustered by them.
It seems like your play style with goblins is fundamentally flawed. Why do you think we are playing 23 lands in the deck in the first place, sometimes 24? This is way higher than most legacy decks. It is because we have to hit all our land drops for our deck's engine to be effective. Which is why we run cards like vial. and warchief. and lackey. To reduce/cheat cost.
Anybody who cuts SGC in a standard build (read: not builds like media, and its starting to sound like not yours either) is wrong. Sorry. ETA: What I meant to say is, anybody who is cutting all SGC from builds that are NOT running x3 or x4 chieftain is building their deck questionably.
Cutting some number of SGC might be the right move. SGC has always been the late game "oh, shit" for our opponent, a card that gives the deck inevitability.
Time passed by, and new goblins were printed. Right now I'd prefer to be sure about landing a lord on turn 3, rather than having a SGC on turn 5. I'd still run 1 to have a tutorable one to give us reach and still dominate the late game, but running more than one might become overkill, cause Goblins is indeed a deck with already a huge late game, thanks to its draw engine.
@GreenOne: What is your opinion about the Warchief vs Chieftain debate?
@Maze of ith: my knee jerk reaction is to say terrible, however it might be really interesting. I will grant them some testing time and report back what I think of them as I have a hard time telling.
I'd max the number of Warchiefs before Chieftain, but this also depends on how's the new goblin like.
Right now we know that he's RR, so likely not getting any discount on mana. It also has double strike, so the +1/+1 seems juicy. If this thing end up being an automatic 4of, then I'll reconsider Warchief and Rishadan Port's roles in the deck. Maybe we can safely going down to 3 or maybe 2 chiefs, less seems unlikely. Port, on the other hand, might be definetly worse with circa 12 RR spells in the deck.
EDIT: in the end we will be better off playing both, like I'm doing now with a list with:
4 [SC] Goblin Warchief
2 [PLC] Stingscourger
4 [M10] Goblin Chieftain
2 [EVG] Mogg War Marshal
1 [SC] Siege-Gang Commander