[Deck] Goblins

[Olaf Forkbeard]

I think if Eidolon of the Great Revel had been a goblin things would be a lot closer to what we want. Could main 1, and side 3, in addition to other hate cards.

Warping Wail was really close, but ultimately it's too expensive to matter in this format. It's really, really good in Merfolk, but just kind of slow, and narrow for what our deck wants.

[Stevestamopz]

I think if Eidolon of the Great Revel had been a goblin things would be a lot closer to what we want. Could main 1, and side 3, in addition to other hate cards.

Warping Wail was really close, but ultimately it's too expensive to matter in this format. It's really, really good in Merfolk, but just kind of slow, and narrow for what our deck wants.

Eidolon still doesn't help us against the "derp some retarded creature that Maro thinks is ok into play".dec and I'm sceptical that it alone could change how horrendous the Storm matchup is.

I think ultimately many of you are oversimplifying why DnT works so well. It is not just Thalia or Containment Priest or Ethersworn Canonist. It is the package that is protected by Mother of Runes and Karakas or by equipment, that is also supplemented by cards like Revoker and then 3 maindeck Karakas.

Here's another thing: 2-3 years ago DnT would buzzsaw through ANT and Show and Tell decks. Now the format has changed with Delver having been knocked off the top perch by Miracles and DnT, so the combo decks have adapted to dealing with small creatures. DnT can get by because it's literally hatebears the deck. I started playing Imperial Taxes because I that then gave me access to a Hatebear Matron. A turn 1 Vial would let you have a turn 3 Recruiter -> Thalia.
My point in saying all this is that Goblins is never going to be able to fend off combo like DnT does with only 6-7 relevant cards in it's 75, and especially with no way to protect them.

I really do not understand why R+D has such a hard on for DnT and holds such disdain for Goblins.

Jim Davis' article wasn't enough to inspire WotC to throw us a bone back in 2014, so what hope do we have now?

[slave]

I really do not understand why R+D has such a hard on for DnT....

I don't get it either - white has been getting some very powerful cards for all formats over the last few years, including some terminal hate pieces that just completely turn off some decks completely.

[Olaf Forkbeard]

The new recruiter made the D&T match-up even trickier. They have access to late game Mother of Runes / Squadron hawk with Flickerwisp hitting Recruiter with Vial. It came up in a lot of games during testing. Sudden Shock's value went up a bit if anyone is intending to run that.

[crowe_1]

Eidolon still doesn't help us against the "derp some retarded creature that Maro thinks is ok into play".dec and I'm sceptical that it alone could change how horrendous the Storm matchup is.

I think ultimately many of you are oversimplifying why DnT works so well.

That may be, but I don't feel that Goblins has to morph into D&T to be successful either. Goblins has a wealth of tools all to its own in terms of card advantage, uncounterable creature removal, and most of all, speed. Goblins can kill on turn three sometimes, four regularly and five if everything doesn't work out. I'm not sure that Goblins would necessarily need to lock combo opponents out to the degree that D&T does; just slow them down one to two turns, long enough to clock thrice with Piledriver.
And it may be that 6-7 slots with new goblins wouldn't change much; or, depending what those goblins are, it could be that 6-7 new goblins in combination with SB Grafdigger's Cage, Relic of Progenitus, and/or Thorn of Amethyst would be enough to turn the tides.

They do need to lay off D&T tho...start giving red some love. I was really miffed when they started making Gremlins this set instead of Goblins.

[Sandro95]

combo

Last week I got to cast Ricochet Trap against a Storm player, redirecting one Tendrils of Agony. I survived at two life and won the game from there! :D

I agree that combo is tough, and that we's benefit from having access to some goblin-shaped hate.
Earwig Squad is great against Storm, but we often need something like a Chalice of the Void to slow them down too.
Cabal Therapy is great against all the combo decks, but only buys us time. If we can't find a way to win or lock up the game in that time, it doesn't do much.
It can also be tricky to play vs the faster combo decks, as they might win before you have the time to flash it back, especially if you miss on the first one.
Thalia's cool, but not enough to consistently beat Storm, and only slows down other decks.

My plan for now is to focus on other matchups instead. We can still beat combo a lot of the time thanks to us having EWS, a fast clock, or some sideboard hate.
Pure combo decks (i.e. Storm, S&S, Reanimator etc. not Infect, Elves or Aluren) only make up a small (albeit significant) portion of the metagame right now (at least where I play), and I feel that I can afford to have a bad matchup against them if I can expect to face ~1 in a five round tournament.

The most common ones, Storm and Sneak & Show, are also the easiest for us to beat. Storm is vulnerable to the most hate, and is especially weak to EWS. S&S is slower, and we can often race them if we get a good start.

[Olaf Forkbeard]

Some notes on combo.

Storm, Show & Tell, Depths, Reanimator, Dredge, and Elves are the current popular combo decks, of which we have sufficient tools to regularly handle Dredge and Elves. Storm and Reanimator are the toughest with Show & Tell being somewhere in the middle.

Down the line we have what we can't interact with and what we can:

Storm - Spell based aggro. We have burn and blockers.

Reanimator - A+B combo on the stack using the graveyard into fatties. The tools exist to interact, but they are really, really fast. It requires Surgical Extraction / Leyline of the void to reasonably get in there. As a fallback Stingscourger works, but they can reset.

Show & Tell - Resiliant A+B Combo on the stack. They are slower, and therefore we are more likely to interact because of so, but ultimately they have access to good sideboard tools for us (Pyroclasm / Through the Breach). Them casting Show and Tell is the easiest way to lose for them, but if they just go for the attacking option we are in a bad spot.

Dredge - The entirety of our sideboard just so happens to be good against them. It happens.

Elves - Creature based, so inherently we can interact, and we have some powerful tools in the match-up that act as 1 sided wipes.


From what I can tell we are simply losing to the speed of the decks. I often feel like if I had one more turn against both Storm and Reanimator I could have had a chance, but I didn't. That said, has anyone tried Mindbreak Trap against Reanimator? Does it matter? Do they just accidentally play around it? I'm going to test that later today. Otherwise we might just have to go back to Red Elemental Blast and actively attack their cantrips.

[apocolyps6]

Has anyone tried Ancient Tomb recently? Replacing 2ish Port with them might give you the one extra "turn" you need. It also makes Moons/Chalices/Thorns/etc better.

[GoboLord]

Some notes on combo.

Storm, Show & Tell, Depths, Reanimator, Dredge, and Elves are the current popular combo decks, of which we have sufficient tools to regularly handle Dredge and Elves. Storm and Reanimator are the toughest with Show & Tell being somewhere in the middle.

Down the line we have what we can't interact with and what we can:

Storm - Spell based aggro. We have burn and blockers.

Reanimator - A+B combo on the stack using the graveyard into fatties. The tools exist to interact, but they are really, really fast. It requires Surgical Extraction / Leyline of the void to reasonably get in there. As a fallback Stingscourger works, but they can reset.

Show & Tell - Resiliant A+B Combo on the stack. They are slower, and therefore we are more likely to interact because of so, but ultimately they have access to good sideboard tools for us (Pyroclasm / Through the Breach). Them casting Show and Tell is the easiest way to lose for them, but if they just go for the attacking option we are in a bad spot.

Dredge - The entirety of our sideboard just so happens to be good against them. It happens.

Elves - Creature based, so inherently we can interact, and we have some powerful tools in the match-up that act as 1 sided wipes.


From what I can tell we are simply losing to the speed of the decks. I often feel like if I had one more turn against both Storm and Reanimator I could have had a chance, but I didn't. That said, has anyone tried Mindbreak Trap against Reanimator? Does it matter? Do they just accidentally play around it? I'm going to test that later today. Otherwise we might just have to go back to Red Elemental Blast and actively attack their cantrips.

I'm just curious how you regularily handle Dredge and Elves? I consider both of them to be among our toughest MUs. Is Containment Priest really that good?
Also, as for Reanimator, while I accept the idea of losing against this deck (more than I do vs. Storm), I think that IF you were to do anything about the MU it would have to be GY hate at cost of 0 mana (Tormod's Crypt, Surgical Extraction, Leyline of the Void, Faerie Macabre). I don't think Mindbreaktrap is ever going to be castable against Reanimator. The more likely scenarios are EOT Entomb + Mainpahse Reanimation spells, OR Careful Study + Reanimation Spell on the Mainpahse. It's really rare for them to cast third spell like a cantrip before that (due to mana constraints) or Lotus Petal. What do you think?

[Sandro95]

I'm just curious how you regularily handle Dredge and Elves? I consider both of them to be among our toughest MUs. Is Containment Priest really that good?
Also, as for Reanimator, while I accept the idea of losing against this deck (more than I do vs. Storm), I think that IF you were to do anything about the MU it would have to be GY hate at cost of 0 mana (Tormod's Crypt, Surgical Extraction, Leyline of the Void, Faerie Macabre). I don't think Mindbreaktrap is ever going to be castable against Reanimator. The more likely scenarios are EOT Entomb + Mainpahse Reanimation spells, OR Careful Study + Reanimation Spell on the Mainpahse. It's really rare for them to cast third spell like a cantrip before that (due to mana constraints) or Lotus Petal. What do you think?

I just want to say that I agree fully with your statement that fast GY-hate is the way to go if we really want to beat Reanimator, especially if we're talking about the more explosive builds.

As for Dredge and Elves I have found that the matchups varies quite a bit in difficulty depending on the skill level of your opponent. The upside in both matchups is that we can often have a lot of good to great cards against them even without targeting those decks specifically.
Chalice of the Void, Goblin Sharpshooter, Pyrokinesis and Grafdigger's Cage are all cards that are good against Elves, as well as many other decks.
Goblin Sharpshooter, Pyrokinesis, and any GY-hate we have is good vs Dredge.

[Fourbirr]

Hi fellow goblins players,

As an amateur Legacy player, I follow this forum silently since years trying to learn and collect useful information on how to play goblins. My props to all contributors that help goblin players from around the world to show some green presence during tournaments.

I have a question about the mana base in the current meta. There could probably be some posts with tricks & hints about the mana base in the current meta, but I cannot find any posts. In Gobolord and ScatmanX last reports in GP Prague, where they both did quite well, it appears that they didn't use fetches. Is it because fetches feed Goyf or DRS and are subject to stifle? I thought we shouldn't be afraid of these anymore, since tarfire came to clean the path for lackey. Is it no more recommended to "thicken" the deck with fetches anymore? How much have you been a target to Price of progress lately?

These questions keep bothering me since I would like to make some XP at the Eternal Legacy Week-end in Paris coming soon.

Here is my decklist:

//Mana base
4 Wasteland
4 Cavern of Souls
4 Rishadan Port
3 Mountain
3 Bloodstained Mire
3 Wooded Foothills
1 Plateau
1 Taiga

//Core
4 Æther Vial
4 Goblin Ringleader
4 Goblin Warchief
4 Goblin Matron
4 Goblin Lackey
4 Goblin Piledriver

//Others / Flex-slots
2 Mogg War Marshal
1 Siege-Gang Commander
1 Krenko, Mob boss
1 Skirk Prospector

//Removals
2 Gempalm Incinerator
3 Tarfire
1 Goblin Sharpshooter
1 Tin Street hooligan
1 Stingscourger

//Sideboard
SB: 3 Pyrokinesis
SB: 3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
SB: 2 Relic of Progenitus
SB: 2 Pithing needle
SB: 2 Ashen Rider
SB: 2 Blood Moon
SB: 1 Grafdigger's Cage

Is Ashen Rider still efficient against Show & Tell or would you prefer Confinement priest?

Thirsty to learn more. Any comments, posts or articles I could read would be very appreciated?

Keep throwing stones ;-)
Fourbirr

[Olaf Forkbeard]

I'm just curious how you regularily handle Dredge and Elves? I consider both of them to be among our toughest MUs. Is Containment Priest really that good?
Also, as for Reanimator, while I accept the idea of losing against this deck (more than I do vs. Storm), I think that IF you were to do anything about the MU it would have to be GY hate at cost of 0 mana (Tormod's Crypt, Surgical Extraction, Leyline of the Void, Faerie Macabre). I don't think Mindbreaktrap is ever going to be castable against Reanimator. The more likely scenarios are EOT Entomb + Mainpahse Reanimation spells, OR Careful Study + Reanimation Spell on the Mainpahse. It's really rare for them to cast third spell like a cantrip before that (due to mana constraints) or Lotus Petal. What do you think?

I regularly handle NO Elves without issue. It's another match, In my records I've won about 60% of my matches against them. Chaos Elves is a much trickier as they have mid-range elements in addition to their combo.

Dredge I once had issues handling, but after playing with the deck, and finding a play test partner I no longer fear the match-up. Pretty much my entire sideboard comes in against them. Using the following list:

Main
1x Skirk Prospector
4x Goblin Lackey
4x Goblin Piledriver
2x Mogg War Marshal
1x Tin Street Hooligan
4x Goblin Warchief
4x Goblin Matron
1x Goblin Sharpshooter
4x Goblin Ringleader
1x Siege-Gang Commander
2x Gempalm Incinerator
1x Stingscourger
4x Tarfire
4x AEther Vial
3x Bloodstained Mire
4x Cavern of Souls
3x Mountain
1x Plateau
4x Rishadan Port
1x Taiga
4x Wasteland
3x Wooded Foothills

Side
3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
3x Pyrokinesis
3x Relic of Progenitus
2x Pithing Needle
2x Flex slots for meta (Containment Priest, Blood Moon, etc)
1x Stingscourger
1x Tin Street Hooligan

+3 Thalia, +3 Relic, +3 Pyro (+2 Pithing if Manaless Dredge)
-3 Ring, -2 Pile, -2 Tarfire, -1 Tin, -1 Gempalm (-1 Pile, -1 Siege if Manaless)

I don't need the extra Stingscourger, they are a 1 trick pony.

I just kind of crap all over them with my board, and my clock is still there. They have a surprisingly hard time against Wasteland. Manaless Dredge is a step easier to beat, they don't care about Waste, but they almost can't beat Thalia, and they literally can't beat Thalia + Sharpshooter unless they start drawing cards instead of dredging.

On Mindbreak Trap. Yea, I wanted to know if anyone had tried it. I played about 10 games yesterday with one just being in my hand before drawing the other 6, it was pretty much never relevant. I wanted to know if I had them in my board if I should bother bringing them in. It literally only stops the turn 1 Reanimate, which is their stone cold nuts. It does not matter in any other scenario unless their GBrand is already wailing on you, at which point it doesn't matter anymore. I'm honestly considering Grafdigger's Cage in addition to my Relic's (Relic's are in my board primarily to kill Goyf, with extra benefits). It bothers Storm, and is good against Reanimator, while being okay in other scenarios (Elves, Dredge). I found that Containment Priest was just.. too slow for Reanimator, while being on par for Show & Tell.

Really, the way I've been seeing, it is a pick two scenario, but worse. You can be "good" against S&T, Storm, Reanimator, fine against a second, and terrible against a third.


---

Hi fellow goblins players,

As an amateur Legacy player, I follow this forum silently since years trying to learn and collect useful information on how to play goblins. My props to all contributors that help goblin players from around the world to show some green presence during tournaments.

I have a question about the mana base in the current meta. There could probably be some posts with tricks & hints about the mana base in the current meta, but I cannot find any posts. In Gobolord and ScatmanX last reports in GP Prague, where they both did quite well, it appears that they didn't use fetches. Is it because fetches feed Goyf or DRS and are subject to stifle? I thought we shouldn't be afraid of these anymore, since tarfire came to clean the path for lackey. Is it no more recommended to "thicken" the deck with fetches anymore? How much have you been a target to Price of progress lately?

These questions keep bothering me since I would like to make some XP at the Eternal Legacy Week-end in Paris coming soon.

Is Ashen Rider still efficient against Show & Tell or would you prefer Confinement priest?

They didn't use fetches to hedge against Deathrite Shaman and opposing Wastelands, as the deck is mana hungry.
Fetches strictly for thinning isn't worth it FYI. The math works out that if you fetch 4 times with 30 goblins in your deck, and then cast a Ringleader it generates an extra Goblin (on average). Don't worry about it. Ashen Rider was ran when Show & Tell was something like 10% of the meta. You don't need to be that narrow today.

[Fourbirr]

Hi Olaf,

They didn't use fetches to hedge against Deathrite Shaman and opposing Wastelands, as the deck is mana hungry.

Yeah, I realized that afterwhile since they have 4 Chieftain MD.

Ashen Rider was ran when Show & Tell was something like 10% of the meta.

It seems that 2 Surgical Extraction could replace the 2 Ashen Rider in my SB.

Thank you for your explanations.

By the way, who is going to the Eternal Legacy Paris on the 22nd October?

Regards,
Fourbirr

[slave]

As for Dredge and Elves I have found that the matchups varies quite a bit in difficulty depending on the skill level of your opponent.
......
Goblin Sharpshooter, Pyrokinesis, and any GY-hate we have is good vs Dredge.

You baited me to insert my 0.02c

As a longtime LED-Dredge & Manaless dredge player, I won't say that Gobz can't beat LED-dredge, but I don't think Goblins is likely to win game1.
Of course, anything can happen. Running the white splash will have a bit more luck if you're running Wasteland, Thalia & Rest in Peace, but Cage can do the job.
Firestorm is a side card in some dredge decks, and they may field answers to terminal hate like Abrupt Decay, Nature's Claim, Chain of Vapor etc..
Dredge is faster. Cabal Therapy is the card that wins the Dredge player the game IME, it's the decks best card for me.

FWIW, even though Manaless Dredge is slower, it's more oppressive against *fair* decks like Goblins, given it's ridiculous threat density, especially now that Prized Amalgam is in there with Spy for the combo win, and Flayer of the Hatebound for their alt-win. Some of the manaless lists out there don't run Bridge from Below, but instead run Vengeful Pharaoh.
Manaless is a better deck than people might think, in the hands of someone who knows how to make it sing, even though it is a glass-cannon against a 1cmc "you can't play MTG" like Grafdigger's Cage

[DoorDie]

Reanimator player here. We're certainly not as frightened of you as we are of D&T, but there are some good focus points.

I don't think Mindbreak Trap is good, it's really designed for decks like Storm and Elves. It doesn't take much for us to "go off", and I'm usually casting just 1-2 spells per turn to do so. You're leaning too much on circumstance.

What is good is white hate. All of my tournament exits have been to a white deck. Most often it's a RIP or Containment Priest that lands and ruins my day. There are plenty of other answers though, Faerie Macabre is great for a color-neutral and Force-immune blowout.

Don't focus on answering nut draws because you're really not going to beat us that way. Every deck has bad matchups, Reanimator is tough for a lot of decks but the fair white players keep it in check.

[Olaf Forkbeard]

You baited me to insert my 0.02c

As a longtime LED-Dredge & Manaless dredge player, I won't say that Gobz can't beat LED-dredge, but I don't think Goblins is likely to win game1.
Of course, anything can happen. Running the white splash will have a bit more luck if you're running Wasteland, Thalia & Rest in Peace, but Cage can do the job.
Firestorm is a side card in some dredge decks, and they may field answers to terminal hate like Abrupt Decay, Nature's Claim, Chain of Vapor etc..
Dredge is faster. Cabal Therapy is the card that wins the Dredge player the game IME, it's the decks best card for me.

FWIW, even though Manaless Dredge is slower, it's more oppressive against *fair* decks like Goblins, given it's ridiculous threat density, especially now that Prized Amalgam is in there with Spy for the combo win, and Flayer of the Hatebound for their alt-win. Some of the manaless lists out there don't run Bridge from Below, but instead run Vengeful Pharaoh.
Manaless is a better deck than people might think, in the hands of someone who knows how to make it sing, even though it is a glass-cannon against a 1cmc "you can't play MTG" like Grafdigger's Cage

I can admit to not running into the match-up since Prized Amalgam came out. Guess I'll nab my dredge guy again and keep jamming.


---

Edit:

I figured you guys might be interested in this. I have recently been keeping track of any activity that is sanctioned or Ranked for posterity's sake. The idea is that hopefully I will learn something about my play-style and match-ups by using this. I have enough data now that I think I'll post it.

The link.

It should update as I update the Google Sheet it's data comes from.

[Sandro95]

I figured you guys might be interested in this. I have recently been keeping track of any activity that is sanctioned or Ranked for posterity's sake. The idea is that hopefully I will learn something about my play-style and match-ups by using this. I have enough data now that I think I'll post it.

The link.

It should update as I update the Google Sheet it's data comes from.

This is great! I've actually been doing something similar recently. Your results are quite impressive as well, even if the sample size is small.

If I read things correctly there seems to be something wrong with the shardless section though. It says you have played the matchup twice, but there's only one total win, draw, or loss listed.

Anyway, I'd love to keep seeing you update these statistics. Dare I hope for a post with your analysis of the data in the near future as well?

[Fourbirr]

Edit:

I figured you guys might be interested in this. I have recently been keeping track of any activity that is sanctioned or Ranked for posterity's sake. The idea is that hopefully I will learn something about my play-style and match-ups by using this. I have enough data now that I think I'll post it.

The link.

It should update as I update the Google Sheet it's data comes from.

Woot, thank you for these analysis Olaf. It helps a lot, at least for a casual Legacy player like me.

But there seems to be a mistake regarding the Goblin 1 decklist. On the MtgTop8 section, it mentioned you had Krenko, Mob Boss:
http://mtgtop8.com/event?e=12443&d=271577&f=LE

But in your google sheet decklist, you mentioned a Siege-Gang? Which one is correct?

I find it quite important, because in case of Krenko without Siege-Gang, a vial at 4 is enough. It avoids the dilemma to whether increase it at 5 for Siege-gang or keep it at 4 for Ringleader

EDIT: Ok, Krenko. I found the response in your report here: https://www.reddit.com/r/MTGLegacy/c...rd_on_goblins/

[Olaf Forkbeard]

Woot, thank you for these analysis Olaf. It helps a lot, at least for a casual Legacy player like me.

But there seems to be a mistake regarding the Goblin 1 decklist. On the MtgTop8 section, it mentioned you had Krenko, Mob Boss:
http://mtgtop8.com/event?e=12443&d=271577&f=LE

But in your google sheet decklist, you mentioned a Siege-Gang? Which one is correct?

I find it quite important, because in case of Krenko without Siege-Gang, a vial at 4 is enough. It avoids the dilemma to whether increase it at 5 for Siege-gang or keep it at 4 for Ringleader

EDIT: Ok, Krenko. I found the response in your report here: https://www.reddit.com/r/MTGLegacy/c...rd_on_goblins/

The Reddit post that was listed is the accurate deck list. AKA Krenko. I'll get that corrected.

Also, on the issue of Vial being on 5 not working. If you get vial to 5, and vial in a Siege-Gang, the game best be over shortly in any case. I tend to prefer Siege-Gang. Krenko was met with Karakas ALL day on that event.

This is great! I've actually been doing something similar recently. Your results are quite impressive as well, even if the sample size is small.

If I read things correctly there seems to be something wrong with the shardless section though. It says you have played the matchup twice, but there's only one total win, draw, or loss listed.

Anyway, I'd love to keep seeing you update these statistics. Dare I hope for a post with your analysis of the data in the near future as well?

I'll get that corrected. And the formulae are still being optimized. I didn't realize cross sheet references towards certain "hits" was so difficult until I tried it.


On Shardless:

I have:

ID	Opp Archetype	MP	MW	ML	MD	MI	MW%	GP	GW	GL	GD	GW%
17	Shardless	2	1	1	0	0	50.00%	4	2	2	0	50.00%

Matches played: 2
Match Wins: 1
Match Losses: 1

It adds up from what I'm seeing?

[jrw1985]

I recently made a spreadsheet plotting sideboard cards against the metagame decks I run into. It was enlightening! I found that Thalia, Pyrokinesis and Goblin Sharpshooter were playable in about 66% of our matchups. They had the highest playability percentage, as it were. No surprise then that those are all maindeck-able cards. I was surprised by one card though: Pithing Needle. It was playable in about 60% of matchups. I think Pithing Needle could be considered as a maindeck card. Worst case scenario you just name a fetch land with it.

Anyone ever played maindeck Needle?