[Deck] Goblins

[GoboLord]

Hello fellow Warchiefs,

this might seem a little off topic, but I wanted to share some of my (and ScatmanX's) thought processes on the current state of Goblins. I hope some of you find this interesting.

In the past weeks ScatmanX and I were sticking our heads together to work on a new decklist. Spoilers: the resulting decklist will look familiar to you.
Our starting point were a few simple truths about goblins. If we try to sum up what we know about the deck, we end up with the following:

(1) spells costs mana
(2) we don't win games when we don't resolve our spells
(3) we win games only by attacking

So we thought about how to approach our deck by following these rules.

The most obvious deduction we can make from these rules is that we need mana. This means we need lands, and whatever else produces mana. With a broader scope this means: Aether Vial, Goblin Lackey, Warren Instigator, Goblin Warchief. Since mana is so important to us we want save mana. The most resilient manasource in legacy is probably a basic Mountain. So, we want as many Basic Mountains, Vials, Lackeys, Winstigators and Goblin Warchiefs as we can get.

a bunch of basic Mountains
4 Aether Vial
4 Goblin Lackey
4 Warren Instigator
4 Goblin Warchief

Second, resolving spells means having mana. Having mana out of lands is not always a safe thing in a format with Wastelands and even less so when you don't play cantrips to look for lands when you need them. Therefore we have to (a) make sure we hit our landdrops without the help of cantrips - which means nothing less than running a suffienct number lands and (b) make sure our manasources are not easily taken from us - which means nothing less than playing a maximum number of basic lands. Another important deduction to make is, that we have castable spells at any point in the game - in other words: smooth out our manacurve. Let's take Burn as an example. It is such a dangerous and aggressive deck, because it basically never has a bottleneck for resolving its spells. They can use every single mana on each turn as long as they actually have a card left in hand. This is how you build aggrodecks. Come to think about it: how often are games lost due to missed landdrops? How often do we win games by playing a Lackey on turn 1, followed by a Piledriver on turn 2, a Warchief on turn 3 and then a Matron + Piledriver on turn 4 (the most important thing is that we have landdrops on each of these turns!!). How often do you overwhelm your opponent who just prays that he would have just one turn to catch breath - just one turn where you don't resolve a creature? Just one turn where you miss a landdrop. Or decide to activate Rishadan Port instead of dropping a creature. The lesson: resolve your spells or you will lose speed, aggression and ultimately the game. Don't waste (like in Wasteland) your mana.
Third, you can resolve Perishes against Elves. You can Port the hell out of Canadian Threshold. You can stack Chalices vs ANT. But all this is meaningless when you dont deal damage - when you don't attack your opponent. We have been talking about the different roles goblins can take, most often characterizing the deck as a controllish aggro- or aggresive controldeck. I actually thing that we can far more easily play in an aggressive stance while having latent combo-potentials. Looking at what roles we take in the MUs vs different archetype we can conclue the following:
* against combo we play as an aggro/combo deck. we need to be fast and we need to hit them hard with keycards. As the game progresses they get more dangerous. We have a short timeframe
* against control (basically Miracles is the only real CTRL deck out there, but whatever) we are the aggressor as well. If the game takes longer, they stabilize and win the game. We have a somewhat larger timeframe, but there still is one.
* against anything else (stoneblade-midrange-something.dec) we can approach the MU as a control deck, keeping the board clear with removal, locking their manabase, and slowly smother them with our CA engine. BUT, half of the time we win not because we have been controling their manabase, but rather because they were suprosed and overwhelmed by an early Lackey/Piledriver/hastelord combination. I would say that IF a game is over very fast then it is because we put on a suprisingly fast clock. Stated differently: in early game we are in favor in bascially any creature-based MU, as their job is to stay alive. As the gamestate moves forward chances get as close as 50:50 as they could be. In the late- and very-late-game we are favored because at some point we draw more cards than them.

So what to do with this information?

We thought that we are far more successful when we take the aggressive role in every matchup, not just vs. the creature-less decks. We don't think that it is correct to AIM for mid- and lategame in any MU, because this means that we waste our impressive early-game potential. The question was:

What does your most aggressive decklist look like?

After some back and forth we came up with the following core:

MANA (23)
4 Cavern of Souls
3 Chrome Mox
3 Wasteland
2 Pendelhaven
11 other manasources
(opting to add another Chrome Mox as a 24th manasource)

[b]CREATURES (37)
4 Aether Vial
4 Goblin Lackey
4 Warren Instigator
4 Goblin Piledriver
4 Stingscourger
4 Goblin Warchief
4 Goblin Chieftain
4 Goblin Matron
4 Goblin Ringleader
1 Krenko, Mob Boss

The idea is to play a maximum number of hastelords. Stingscourger, Piledriver and Krenko are as good as they can be in this configuration.

We have many ideas floating in our heads right now which needs some testing. Maybe some of you can join in - or at least leave a comment. Here is what we thought:

(1) remove Aether Vial, add more bombs (Krenko, Kikijiki, Earwig Squad and the like)
(2) remove Stingscourger in favor of Tarfire
(3) play 4 Sharpshooter as a removal suite
(4) Goblin Rabblemaster

Thank you for your attention. Comments are - as always - appreciated.

[seilaquem]

Hello fellow Warchiefs,

this might seem a little off topic, but I wanted to share some of my (and ScatmanX's) thought processes on the current state of Goblins. I hope some of you find this interesting.

In the past weeks ScatmanX and I were sticking our heads together to work on a new decklist. Spoilers: the resulting decklist will look familiar to you.
Our starting point were a few simple truths about goblins. If we try to sum up what we know about the deck, we end up with the following:

(1) spells costs mana
(2) we don't win games when we don't resolve our spells
(3) we win games only by attacking

So we thought about how to approach our deck by following these rules.

The most obvious deduction we can make from these rules is that we need mana. This means we need lands, and whatever else produces mana. With a broader scope this means: Aether Vial, Goblin Lackey, Warren Instigator, Goblin Warchief. Since mana is so important to us we want save mana. The most resilient manasource in legacy is probably a basic Mountain. So, we want as many Basic Mountains, Vials, Lackeys, Winstigators and Goblin Warchiefs as we can get.



Second, resolving spells means having mana. Having mana out of lands is not always a safe thing in a format with Wastelands and even less so when you don't play cantrips to look for lands when you need them. Therefore we have to (a) make sure we hit our landdrops without the help of cantrips - which means nothing less than running a suffienct number lands and (b) make sure our manasources are not easily taken from us - which means nothing less than playing a maximum number of basic lands. Another important deduction to make is, that we have castable spells at any point in the game - in other words: smooth out our manacurve. Let's take Burn as an example. It is such a dangerous and aggressive deck, because it basically never has a bottleneck for resolving its spells. They can use every single mana on each turn as long as they actually have a card left in hand. This is how you build aggrodecks. Come to think about it: how often are games lost due to missed landdrops? How often do we win games by playing a Lackey on turn 1, followed by a Piledriver on turn 2, a Warchief on turn 3 and then a Matron + Piledriver on turn 4 (the most important thing is that we have landdrops on each of these turns!!). How often do you overwhelm your opponent who just prays that he would have just one turn to catch breath - just one turn where you don't resolve a creature? Just one turn where you miss a landdrop. Or decide to activate Rishadan Port instead of dropping a creature. The lesson: resolve your spells or you will lose speed, aggression and ultimately the game. Don't waste (like in Wasteland) your mana.
Third, you can resolve Perishes against Elves. You can Port the hell out of Canadian Threshold. You can stack Chalices vs ANT. But all this is meaningless when you dont deal damage - when you don't attack your opponent. We have been talking about the different roles goblins can take, most often characterizing the deck as a controllish aggro- or aggresive controldeck. I actually thing that we can far more easily play in an aggressive stance while having latent combo-potentials. Looking at what roles we take in the MUs vs different archetype we can conclue the following:
* against combo we play as an aggro/combo deck. we need to be fast and we need to hit them hard with keycards. As the game progresses they get more dangerous. We have a short timeframe
* against control (basically Miracles is the only real CTRL deck out there, but whatever) we are the aggressor as well. If the game takes longer, they stabilize and win the game. We have a somewhat larger timeframe, but there still is one.
* against anything else (stoneblade-midrange-something.dec) we can approach the MU as a control deck, keeping the board clear with removal, locking their manabase, and slowly smother them with our CA engine. BUT, half of the time we win not because we have been controling their manabase, but rather because they were suprosed and overwhelmed by an early Lackey/Piledriver/hastelord combination. I would say that IF a game is over very fast then it is because we put on a suprisingly fast clock. Stated differently: in early game we are in favor in bascially any creature-based MU, as their job is to stay alive. As the gamestate moves forward chances get as close as 50:50 as they could be. In the late- and very-late-game we are favored because at some point we draw more cards than them.

So what to do with this information?

We thought that we are far more successful when we take the aggressive role in every matchup, not just vs. the creature-less decks. We don't think that it is correct to AIM for mid- and lategame in any MU, because this means that we waste our impressive early-game potential. The question was:

What does your most aggressive decklist look like?

After some back and forth we came up with the following core:

MANA (23)
4 Cavern of Souls
3 Chrome Mox
3 Wasteland
2 Pendelhaven
11 other manasources
(opting to add another Chrome Mox as a 24th manasource)

[b]CREATURES (37)
4 Aether Vial
4 Goblin Lackey
4 Warren Instigator
4 Goblin Piledriver
4 Stingscourger
4 Goblin Warchief
4 Goblin Chieftain
4 Goblin Matron
4 Goblin Ringleader
1 Krenko, Mob Boss

The idea is to play a maximum number of hastelords. Stingscourger, Piledriver and Krenko are as good as they can be in this configuration.

We have many ideas floating in our heads right now which needs some testing. Maybe some of you can join in - or at least leave a comment. Here is what we thought:

(1) remove Aether Vial, add more bombs (Krenko, Kikijiki, Earwig Squad and the like)
(2) remove Stingscourger in favor of Tarfire
(3) play 4 Sharpshooter as a removal suite
(4) Goblin Rabblemaster

Thank you for your attention. Comments are - as always - appreciated.

Hey, gobolord.

Your reasoning sounds sound xp (horrible pun intended). there are 2 observations i'll would like to state:
1- if you play a hyper-agressive decks, it looks like you are playing a bad combo, since it`s way slower than other combo decks.
2- however, i like the fact we are a kind of combo that is not stonecold dead to counterbalance/miracles, which is nice.

i'll give my 2 pennies about your 4 ideas:
1- i suppose we dont mess the vial plan, since we dont have great replacements on the 1-curve (i mean.. chirugeon, prospector , mogg fanatic, bushwhacker and legion loyalist seem worse than vial). flooding the other curves don`t seem wise on a hyper-aggro plan
2- the tarfire should solve the curve, but being locked to goyf is pretty nasty. i guess a 2/2 split (tarfire/sting) should do it
3- 4 sharpshooter seems off plan. i mean, it would be cool locking the opp out of the x/3 plan, but there are lots of removal that dont make this plan work. (besides only being to make 2 shooters on turn 4)
4- rabblemaster makes us more YOLO than we actually want to be, and it`s pretty slow. he is more solid as a midrange plan.



I sugested this a while ago, but i'll restate it: Instead of chrome mox, why not lotus petal?

Sure, they dont last long, and they make us mulligan more, but they dont remove a card we are trying to cast either.
Sometimes, you just need a little boost. Having to decide which cards to remove seems hard sometimes. (specially when the only card we can`t remove is aether vial, which is a card you either play early game, or just don`t want to see, at all)
Also, when you play the aggro role, you gotta muligan accordingly, so I dont see why not use lotus petal ( i play 2 nowadays)

I like playing the combo/control role, w/ the kiki+settler combo and other sheaneningans. But after reading your post, it is clear that approching the aggro role is the way to play the deck. I won 2 unwinable matches by killing my opps turn 3. (slivers and sneak&snow)

I'll take a spin on this train, since the deck curves smoothly, and it plays chiftain+winstigator xp

TL;DR
looks like and awesome idea. i'll make some changes and post the results later

[jrw1985]

Goblins on the stream!

http://www.twitch.tv/themeadery

[jrw1985]

Goblins on the stream!

http://www.twitch.tv/themeadery

welp.
nm

[goblinpiledriver]

welp.
nm

yeah he got blown out pretty hard. no artifact removal for that needle was gg considering the 2 lander

@Gobolord:

to address your last points:

1. definitely don't remove vial, it's the best card in the deck
2. I personally like a split (I have 3 tarfire/2 stingscourger). I definitely wouldn't ever go below 1 stingscourger, but I could see my self dropping tarfires
3. multiple sharpshooters seems like overkill. *maybe* two if you expect a creature heavy meta
4. the drawback on rabblemaster seems too rough. I could see it as a sideboard option at best against 0 creature decks

while your aggressive list looks very nice and focused, I think sacrificing the flexibility of the traditional builds is not where I want to be. Being able to port/waste is sometimes the only out against combo (especially game 1). removing artifacts seems too important to cut as well.

[Stevestamopz]

Gobolord- Goblin Guide seems almost better than Winstigator for what you propose.
If you're going all in on the lord plan, you could also find room for 2 Goblin Kings as well.

That said, I agree with Goblinpiledriver, but as always it's a matter of preference and what you expect to go up against.

[Quackers]

You mentioned mana being important to goblins, then what about skirk prospector?
And Carpet of Flowers...?

Edit: Also, wouldn't lightning crafter be better than trying to keep 2+ sharpshooters on the board? And lightning crafter is value if you champion a matron/ringleader/MWM unless they kill your only goblin with the champion trigger on the stack.

4x Cavern
3x Chrome
3x Wasteland
2x Pendelhaven
11 other mana sources

Something like this?

4 Aether Vial
4 Goblin Lackey
4 Warren Instigator
3 Goblin Piledriver
3 Stingscourger
4 Goblin Warchief
2 Goblin Chieftain
4 Goblin Matron
4 Goblin Ringleader
1 Skirk Prospector
1 Krenko
1 Lightning Crafter
1 Kiki-Jiki
1 Tuk-Tuk

[mrblueduck]

True true, you have been toying with Magus for months! How does your latest list look like, mrblueduck?

I don't play as much as I used to, but for the year my daily stats with Goblins are 22-9 (71% Win Rate)
1-2
4-0
2-2
2-2
4-0
3-1
3-1
3-1

They definitely got better with the banning of treasure cruise. Here is what I am currently playing

7 Red Fetches
4 Cavern of Souls
4 Wasteland
3 Mountains
2 Pendelhaven
2 Plateau
1 Badlands
4 Aether Vial
4 Goblin Lackey
2 Tarfire
2 Mogg War Marshall
3 Warren Instigator
1 Stingscourger
1 Grenzo, Dungeon Warden
2 Gempalm Incinerators
3 Goblin Chieftain
4 Goblin Matron
4 Goblin Ringleader
1 Tuktuk Scrapper
2 Goblin Settler
1 Kiki-Jiki
3 Pyrokinesis

SB:
3 Thalia
3 RIP
2 Blasts
1 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Magus of the Moon
1 Tuktuk Scrapper
1 Goblin Sharpshooter
1 Engineered Plague
1 Flex SB Slot

[Chatto]

@ Gobolord: I once made a simulair build, tested it for a bit and quickly made some changes:

+ 1 Tuktuk
+ 4 Tarfire (maybe 3)

- 1 Chieftain
- 3 Scourger
(- 1 WInstigator)

Tarfire has become a 4-off in all my Goblin-builds: in my opinion it's that good. Using Scourger as removal to clear the oath for Lackey can leave you with no mana. For instance, remove with Tarfire, connect with Lackey, drop Warchief, drop Piledriver. T3 ...

A Shatter-Goblin as a one-off is equally as important. I almost never wasn't happy to pack one in my 75, being even happier having one in my main. For consistency and not having to splash Green, I would go with Tuktuk.

One can argue dropping Wastes and Ports, but I would never drop the above. Eventually I always backtrack to a more Classic build.

Question: would an aggro-build like this be better with a black splash?

@ mrblueduck: thanks for sharing! Interesting to see Grenzo.

[Stevestamopz]

I dunno, I really think Rishadan Port is oftentimes our best card.

If you play 4x wastes 4x port, you have more mana denial than say Rug has Green sources.

[ScatmanX]

Gobbolord and mine's discussion were pretty cool, and I have some experimental builds I'll be trying.
The decision to go full on Sting was took after building a deck with 8 haste Lords, which would take full advantage on it, putting yourself ahead and the opponent behind, unlike tarfire that doesn't improve your board, despite of being cheaper. My logic behind it was pretty much like the menfolk one, that fight non blue decks without removal. They just make a bunch of huge dudes. Our plan is better as swarming and tempoing, so sting fits right in this build.
I understand that it may not be ideal, but for the thought process I started with 4. 1 Sparksmith is there as well now, because it seems awesome with 8 haste Lords.

On dropping vial, that was my idea, and again, a though process. If our plan is to win turn 3 or 4, vial is almost blank. Só I tried getting rid of it, upping the land count to 24, maybe even 25, and making the curve finish at 4. That's when Rabblemaster comes in. Yolo? Yes. Slow? Now. He is a damn 2 turns clock with just a Chieftain on the board. TWO DUDES bash for 21 in 2 turns! I seriously need to try that.
If it doesn't work, Goblin Goon is gonna be the next try. 6/6 on its own. Nice batter or goyf you have there. Sting helps him connecting, and without vial there are 35 or 36 creatures on the deck. Good luck having more on board.

As to 4 shooter, it was nice to think about it, but I guess for this list he would be too slow. Maybe running 3 would work in a classic build. Something to be investigated.

As to 0 artifact hate md, you can always throw a TSH there. No biggy. Just trying this list.

Again, not claiming this is the second coming of Christ, or even good. It was just a discussion and I'd like to see if it brings to some innovation, that we need. I really don't think the winner of the trial in Japan came up with that list out of the top of his head.

[goblinpiledriver]

What do you guys think of Akki Underminer?

3R

Whenever ~ deals combat damage to a player, that player sacrifices a permanent

1/1

[Macky984]

What do you guys think of Akki Underminer?

3R

Whenever ~ deals combat damage to a player, that player sacrifices a permanent

1/1

I personally think 4 mana is too pricey for that. Especially for just a 1/1.

[goblinpiledriver]

I personally think 4 mana is too pricey for that. Especially for just a 1/1.

Right, but keep in mind that between lackey, vial, and warchief we rarely pay full cost for any goblin. I think the fact that this is a mini-annihilator can be abused pretty heavily. Dropping him turn 2 or 3, clearing a path with stingscourger, and then swinging each turn can be brutal.

Also, settler is a 4 mana 1/1. Granted, we get to pick which land to destroy, but in many cases this will be similar if not better (for it's repeat ability)

[Chatto]

I dunno, I really think Rishadan Port is oftentimes our best card.

If you play 4x wastes 4x port, you have more mana denial than say Rug has Green sources.

True true, but I was thinking about this aggro-style deck.

[Stevestamopz]

Looks like Omnishow has already made it to 'Murica judging by the top decks from the last SCG 5k which means that it'll probably be everywhere else too, even in asscrack of the world countries like Australia.

So what's the plan guys? Ashen Rider seems like too much of a liability given their Cunning Wish--> Trickbind plan, plus having to mull to find it. Confusion in the ranks also doesn't seem that good either. Mercifully they're not playing pyroclasm, so we can try and aggro them out but the turn 3 kill is pretty rare, and even then might not be good enough. Do we start playing 4 red blasts? Do we start playing 3-4 Ethersworn Canonists?

I remember seeing Sandro absolutely decimate Omnishow with his list, so what are your thoughts on the matchup Sandro?

[ScatmanX]

Canonist with a destroy enchant card should do the trick.
Also, Krosan Grip is kind of awesome against the non enter the infinite version .

[OlegtheSuper]

Looks like Omnishow has already made it to 'Murica judging by the top decks from the last SCG 5k which means that it'll probably be everywhere else too, even in asscrack of the world countries like Australia.

So what's the plan guys? Ashen Rider seems like too much of a liability given their Cunning Wish--> Trickbind plan, plus having to mull to find it. Confusion in the ranks also doesn't seem that good either. Mercifully they're not playing pyroclasm, so we can try and aggro them out but the turn 3 kill is pretty rare, and even then might not be good enough. Do we start playing 4 red blasts? Do we start playing 3-4 Ethersworn Canonists?

I remember seeing Sandro absolutely decimate Omnishow with his list, so what are your thoughts on the matchup Sandro?

Iona, Shield of Emeria
Confusion in the ranks

[jrw1985]

Canonist with a destroy enchant card should do the trick.
Also, Krosan Grip is kind of awesome against the non enter the infinite version .

Yup, it may just be time to bring back the old White splash. Canonist has always been boss against Storm decks, and it is simply amazing against SnT as it can be put into play off SnT and still prevent any other spells from being cast. It might also be side-able against Prowess decks (maybe..........).

My current SB looks like

4 Chalice
4 Thorn of Amethyst
3 Surgical Extraction
2 Pyrokinesis
2 Krosan Grip

-4 Thorn
+4 Canonist

I can easily make adjustments to include Canonist. I currently run 3 Taiga main. I can just swap out one for a Plateau. Plateau + Cavern keeps Canonist castable, not that that's even a concern in the OmniTell MU.

I also want to try running 3 Chalice main. Has anyone tried it out? Generating sample hands has been promising so far, and it was surprisingly easy to find the slots for Chalice.

[GoboLord]

Looks like Omnishow has already made it to 'Murica judging by the top decks from the last SCG 5k which means that it'll probably be everywhere else too, even in asscrack of the world countries like Australia.

So what's the plan guys? Ashen Rider seems like too much of a liability given their Cunning Wish--> Trickbind plan, plus having to mull to find it. Confusion in the ranks also doesn't seem that good either. Mercifully they're not playing pyroclasm, so we can try and aggro them out but the turn 3 kill is pretty rare, and even then might not be good enough. Do we start playing 4 red blasts? Do we start playing 3-4 Ethersworn Canonists?

I remember seeing Sandro absolutely decimate Omnishow with his list, so what are your thoughts on the matchup Sandro?

I think the best card you can have vs. OmniTell is Cabal Therapy. The MU will still be unfavorable for us and I dont think that just 1 playset of any card will change this. We need a large amount of hatecards (I would say 8+) to ensure we actually have them in our opener, paired with a fast clock. For every extra turn you keep them alive you will need to drop another hatecard instead. I would Mull for a turn 3 kill, or a turn 4 kill that involves a hatecard that bis you an extra turn.