What about sword of light and shadow? I know its not as good as fire/ice in our deck, but isn’t the returning a creature card from GY to hand pretty damn relevant for our deck? I am FOR SURE not saying to run it instead of fire/ice, but alongside with? Maybe there is just no room for one more equipment?
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Well, I should be able to start playing my Wort deck at local EDH tournaments within a week or so. I'm still deciding on a finalized deck list (meta tuned since I know 90% of the decks I'll play against), but I'll post it here when I am done. I think the deck is pretty solid and should place well provided I don't make too many play mistakes : ) I'll post a report when I can.
What about sword of light and shadow? I know its not as good as fire/ice in our deck, but isn’t the returning a creature card from GY to hand pretty damn relevant for our deck? I am FOR SURE not saying to run it instead of fire/ice, but alongside with? Maybe there is just no room for one more equipment?
It's a little overkill. The deck doesn't rely on the graveyard->hand/play recursion, it is just a nice side effect for late game if tempo has slowed down, but Wort provides the same effect on a nice 3/3 fear general body. I'd rather run something else, personally.
I have no idea why this deck caught my attention, as I hate attacking with creatures, especially little ones. But I've been testing it (card for card the list on page 1) for a few days.
The blue deck matchups are all pretty good. I had a bit of a scare against Jhoira earlier today, but I've been taking most of my matches against the U/x decks.
The problem I've run into, however, is 2 fold. First, the cards in this deck all suck. It is most certainly the most effect swarm deck I've seen for EDH, but if you can't get a swarm going from turn 1, its real easy for the control deck to soak up some damage, wrath, and take over. Secondly, I feel like I'm always fighting more against my own deck than the opponents. 36 land is too low, I think, and at the same time I have issues drawing creatures. When the wheels get rolling, the deck is really good, but getting them rolling takes the EDH equivalent of nuclear fusion.
As an aside, this deck is really cold to Uril. More edict style removal might be helpful.
As for card choices, Goblin Tinkerer has been a blank for me, Goblin Vandal got activated once in a game that was already a blowout against Captain Sissay (which appears to be a good match, for the record), Cabal Slaver is borderline. If the goblins get cut they need to be cut for more goblins, but not really sure what would take their slots. Slaver could just be an extra land, or Goblin Assault, or Bitterblossom, or maybe even Dralnu's Crusade
Finally, the combo kill just feels clunky. I've used it maybe once. If you opponent is half conscious they can see it coming the second you reveal your recruiter targets, and from there they have 2-3 turns to figure out a way to stop it, or just kill you. Obeyline might just be the better plan B, and focus the goblins on aggro.
Edit: Have you considered Skirk Drill Sargent or Brass Herald for more CA (and the Herald's pump is nice, too).
Glad you picked up the deck Lennon. It sounds to me like you need more practice with it though.
Quote from LennonMarx »
First, the cards in this deck all suck. It is most certainly the most effect swarm deck I've seen for EDH, but if you can't get a swarm going from turn 1, its real easy for the control deck to soak up some damage, wrath, and take over.
That's quite an exaggeration. Many of the cards in this deck are among the most powerful ever printed. A few of the goblins are pretty bad on their own, but make up for it through internal synergies. The cards are good enough to get the job done.
Also, if you're just thinking of this as a swarm deck, you're missing most of its utility. It can be a swarm deck...but it can also be a control or combo deck (or set up a kind of aggro-combo alpha strike with Piledriver). If you do get wrathed, the plan changes a little, but it doesn't really stop you. If you're playing against white or black, you should be anticipating the sweeper anyway, and planning around it.
Quote from LennonMarx »
Secondly, I feel like I'm always fighting more against my own deck than the opponents. 36 land is too low, I think, and at the same time I have issues drawing creatures. When the wheels get rolling, the deck is really good, but getting them rolling takes the EDH equivalent of nuclear fusion.
I know the feeling, but again, you might be approaching the deck in the wrong way. I win most of my games with only 4-5 lands in play...but I win, and that's what counts. Unlike basically every other deck in this format, this one really doesn't need a lot of mana to operate. In fact, if you draw too many lands, you're likely to lose, because you really need to be hitting plenty of spells to feed things like Aether Vial and Warren Instigator.
Under the old mulligan rules, we would need more land...but with the Normandy mulligan, it's not difficult to find a starting hand with 2-3 lands and some action. That typically works out fine for me. Since getting a quick start is so important with this deck, I suspect that mulliganing properly is probably one of the biggest factors affecting success. I mull quite aggressively to find workable hands, and almost never keep a hand without a plan of what I'm going to do.
Here are some sample goldfish hands. I'll walk through my mulligan decisions.
I'll note that these were the worst starting hands I could find--in order to get to these 3 examples, I passed up around 15 perfectly keepable hands with 3-4 mana sources.
With a hand like this, the first priority to to make the mana work. The last 3 cards are duds for sure, while the first two are good. In this case, I'll probably keep the Imp Seal, despite the card disadvantage, and mull the Recruiter (as much as I want it). I drew into Wooded Foothills, Lightning Bolt, and Blood Moon. That hand looks fine now--with SDT and 3 shufflers, including a tutor, I shouldn't have a problem. I even have removal and a Moon.
How awkward. Urborg and 6 red spells. Though the spells are all pretty good, in this case I mull all of them, searching for something playable. I draw Mountain, Badlands, Duress, Mad Auntie, Living Death. That's a little slow, but I'll keep it. I can make that work.
This one is really interesting, because I'm actually tempted to keep it. On the draw, I probably would keep it. We have a tutor with the mana to cast it, and 5 aggressive goblins. It's hard to say what I'd mull because it depends on the matchup, but in most cases I could probably drop ]Sparksmith, Skirk Prospector, and Goblin Warchief. That drew me into Auntie's Hovel and Mountain, which not only makes the hand pretty good, but means keeping the whole thing would have been fine too.
Again, I passed up many, many more good hands looking for these bad hands. I was actually surprised by how many of the hands were fine. Even when I did get these dodgy hands, a single mulligan was enough to fix all of them...and if it hadn't been, I could easily have mulled again (I'll mull even more aggressively on a second mulligan than on the first one).
Anyway, I don't know how helpful this was, but it confirms my initial belief that the mana is probably fine. While it's low by EDH standards, it works in this deck, because we can easily afford to miss land drops.
Quote from LennonMarx »
As an aside, this deck is really cold to Uril. More edict style removal might be helpful.
I went 2-0 against 2 different Uril decks on MWS yesterday (he's pretty popular right now). None of the games were even close. We don't need more edicts, because the one we have is a goblin, and thus very easy to tutor for and recur. One of the decks I played against was pretty much all-in on Uril, whereas the other had more of a Naya aggro thing happening...in both cases, by playing the control deck, I had no problem killing all the other creatures and Warren Weirding Uril. I don't consider it a hard matchup.
Quote from LennonMarx »
As for card choices, Goblin Tinkerer has been a blank for me, Goblin Vandal got activated once in a game that was already a blowout against Captain Sissay (which appears to be a good match, for the record), Cabal Slaver is borderline. If the goblins get cut they need to be cut for more goblins, but not really sure what would take their slots. Slaver could just be an extra land, or Goblin Assault, or Bitterblossom, or maybe even Dralnu's Crusade
Give Goblin Tinkerer more of a chance...he's very good. I've had many games where he's been important. I agree that Goblin Vandal is mostly useless though, and that Cabal Slaver is borderline (though he's been fairly good for me recently). I'm more often than not happy to see the Slaver, so I think he can stay for now. I've also been unhappy with Unearth, which just gets cycled most of the time, so I'm currently testing Boggart Mob and Changeling Berserker over Unearth and Goblin Vandal.
None of the cards you suggested as possible replacements for Slaver really do enough. I don't think I need more land. Goblin Assault is actually horrible for this deck...1 token a turn isn't bad, but forcing all my goblins to attack every turn is horrible, and will lose you games. Bitterblossom and Dralnu's Crusade just don't do enough, though they're cards I've considered.
Quote from LennonMarx »
Finally, the combo kill just feels clunky. I've used it maybe once. If you opponent is half conscious they can see it coming the second you reveal your recruiter targets, and from there they have 2-3 turns to figure out a way to stop it, or just kill you. Obeyline might just be the better plan B, and focus the goblins on aggro.
This is why I say you need more practice and you must be playing it wrong. The combo isn't clunky. I've probably played ~50 games with this deck by now, and I win with the combo about half the time. Sometimes, I can only win through the combo. It's not easy to stop--only counterspells or removal really do the trick, and you've likely exhausted both by the time you go for the combo. Even if you do get disrupted, Wort means you can just do it again next turn. Even when I telegraph the combo through Recruiter, hardly anyone is able to stop it, especially considering the other goblins I line up. I always try to make a pile that can kill someone through aggro or through combo, and I've yet to see anyone survive both. (Also, you should never be giving anyone 3 turns to find an answer, at least not if combo is the main plan. With Ringleader, I can frequently land the combo the turn after I play Recruiter (depending on the game state, of course).
It sounds to me like you're trying to play this as a more-or-less pure aggro deck. That works fine against blue decks, but isn't usually enough against sweepers. Embrace the combo, embrace the control aspects, and you'll have much better success against the field.
Quote from LennonMarx »
Have you considered Skirk Drill Sargent or Brass Herald for more CA (and the Herald's pump is nice, too).
I've considered Skirk Drill Sergeant. I never tested it, because I was pretty sure it sucked (to be honest, I've been misreading it...I always though it put the goblin to your hand, not to play, which made it pretty horrible). Now that I've caught my mistake, it might have potential. I'm still pretty iffy on it because 3 mana is quite a lot in this deck, and it's only really good after Recruiter (which makes it win-more, basically). I might try it out now, but I don't think it's that good.
Brass Herald is too expensive. For 6 mana, a spell needs to win me the game singlehandedly, or it shouldn't be in here. This is basically just a bad Goblin Ringleader, and that's not something I need (as Goblin Ringleader is really easy to reuse through Wort or Kiki-Jiki).
"Pure swarm strategy" is a mistake. Part of the reason this deck is so good is because it can play any role. Cards that only help the aggro plan dilute your other strategies, and so are pretty bad here (although Eldrazi Monument may have potential, as it's defensive as well).
I'll admit that in the Uril match I lost, I kept a slow hand game 1, game 2 he kept a slow hand and got his hand destroyed by Slavering Nulls, and game 3 he crushed me. Game 3 was in regards to the point I'm making about the deck. We obviously do have an answer to Uril, and 6 tutors to find it, 4 of which are top-deck. We have no real relevant draw engine to speak of, and Uril comes down on turn 4 which makes him lethal on turn 6 (assuming all-in type of deck). It's not a large window to find an answer, especially when most of our answers are slow. Further testing is obviously required, but I fail to see it being favorable.
And, how exactly does this deck play control? By keeping a 3/3 on the board? And maybe a few other 1/1s? Great control cards there, buddy. Our removal is not all that good, save for Terminate and Weirding. This deck needs to end the game somehow. To that end, the combo kill is useful, but clunky as all hell. The only way I can reasonably see comboing off the turn after a recruiter setup is having either a ton of mana (unlikely), or having a lacky/instigator connecting. In 20+ games, I've never connected with a lackey, and the only time I did get there with an instigator, it was just to get a bunch of Jitte counters as I had no goblins in hand. And unless your opponent is playing a creatureless deck, those guys shouldn't be connecting into the mid-game. This gets back to my point on creatures, they all suck, except maybe Bob and the recruiter twins. Tribal synergy is really cool when the stars align and you actually get to dump a bunch of dudes into play, a few lords, and get there with a host of hasty 4/4s.
And how, precisely, is this deck supposed to play around wraths? Most of our creatures have 1-2 power. Our opponents have 30 life. We need to commit at least 3 dudes (a lord and a few 2/2s) to have a reasonable clock. If we don't hit a lord, the commitment goes up. Any card of card Disadvantage is brutal, and Wort isn't going to help much when all she has to do is die once and then be uncastable. And we have the 3 tutors and 2 living death effects, which are very nice, but now we are both hitting on color issues, mana amount issues, and having them actually be lethal before the next wrath. Obviously careful planing is helpful, but the best laid plans of mice and men, and all that.
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Your experiences don't match up with mine. At all.
Shall I start saving gamelogs? When I read your comments, I go and play a few matches, looking for the weaknesses that you see...and I just don't find them.
Quote from LennonMarx »
We obviously do have an answer to Uril, and 6 tutors to find it, 4 of which are top-deck. We have no real relevant draw engine to speak of, and Uril comes down on turn 4 which makes him lethal on turn 6 (assuming all-in type of deck). It's not a large window to find an answer, especially when most of our answers are slow. Further testing is obviously required, but I fail to see it being favorable.
There's a lot more room to find Warren Weirding than you imply, considering that we know we're going to need it before we even draw our first hand. There are actually 9 tutors that can find it (Demonic, Vampiric, Imp Seal, Shred Memory, Matron, Recruiter, Harbinger, Liliana, Imp Recruiter -> Recruiter). When you're looking for it, it's not too difficult to find a hand that will get it for you. Usually, it doesn't even disrupt your main plan, as we always want Goblin Recruiter, and Goblin Recruiter can grab you Warren Weirding fast enough. Also, you shouldn't be scrambling for WW when Uril hits--again, you know you're going to need it all game. I've only played 4 games against Uril, but I've managed to have WW ready in my hand every time he's been played.
Also, Uril shouldn't be hitting play on turn 4. We do have some LD and removal, and we know that we're going to need to need a clear board for WW to work. I have gladly burned a turn 1 BoP against Uril, and would do so again. With the land disruption, I don't think I've even had an opponent be able to replay Uril before I won yet (though I've had WW ready to go again, just in case).
All you need to beat Uril is a couple of removal spells. It's not tough.
Quote from LennonMarx »
And, how exactly does this deck play control? By keeping a 3/3 on the board? And maybe a few other 1/1s? Great control cards there, buddy. Our removal is not all that good, save for Terminate and Weirding. This deck needs to end the game somehow.
We play control against general- or creature-based strategies by drawing an extra removal spell, every single turn. I have yet to play the deck that can withstand that. All we have to do is keep Wort on the board, which is not very difficult with smart play (I don't even play Wort in most of my games--it's better to save her for when you need her).
Our removal is fine--it may not be classically powerful, but between the various tribal spells we can kill anything we need to. Most of it (all except for Fodder Launch, which has a niche role) is cheap and instant speed. I've not been dissatisfied with any of them.
Quote from LennonMarx »
To that end, the combo kill is useful, but clunky as all hell. The only way I can reasonably see comboing off the turn after a recruiter setup is having either a ton of mana (unlikely), or having a lacky/instigator connecting. In 20+ games, I've never connected with a lackey, and the only time I did get there with an instigator, it was just to get a bunch of Jitte counters as I had no goblins in hand. And unless your opponent is playing a creatureless deck, those guys shouldn't be connecting into the mid-game.
Usually, a combo the turn after Recruiter happens because of Lackey or Instigator. I can't believe that you've never connected with Lackey in 20+ games. I just can't. I connect at least once with Lackey/Instigator around 90% of the time I play them, especially early game. If you have a hand with Lackey and any removal spell, it's almost impossible for it not to connect. They get through for me, all the time, even midgame. My opponents aren't creatureless, but I kill their creatures (or sometimes I make them unblockable with Goblin King and a Moon, if necessary). Something really weird is happening if you can never get them through. (Also, even when you can't get them through, they can still be useful as a threat--I played a game last night where I was getting through 8 damage a turn because my opponent was afraid to chumpblock something else and let Lackey through).
Quote from LennonMarx »
This gets back to my point on creatures, they all suck, except maybe Bob and the recruiter twins. Tribal synergy is really cool when the stars align and you actually get to dump a bunch of dudes into play, a few lords, and get there with a host of hasty 4/4s.
The lords aren't really that important. Just play creatures and beat, when that's what is called for. 30 life isn't that much. I've been routinely doing 40 without problem. I frequently attack for 15+ a turn without Piledriver, so the creatures can't suck that badly.
Quote from LennonMarx »
And how, precisely, is this deck supposed to play around wraths? Most of our creatures have 1-2 power. Our opponents have 30 life. We need to commit at least 3 dudes (a lord and a few 2/2s) to have a reasonable clock. If we don't hit a lord, the commitment goes up. Any card of card Disadvantage is brutal, and Wort isn't going to help much when all she has to do is die once and then be uncastable. And we have the 3 tutors and 2 living death effects, which are very nice, but now we are both hitting on color issues, mana amount issues, and having them actually be lethal before the next wrath. Obviously careful planing is helpful, but the best laid plans of mice and men, and all that.
It's really not that hard (and again, you're overrating the lords). I won a match against Horde of Notions control last night where I got hit by Pernicious Deed, Consume the Meek, and Damnation, and still incrementally aggroed him out. I didn't even need to play Wort once. Next game it was Damnation and Mindslaver (twice), same deal. I wish I had saved the logs for you, because they were pretty epic games. Between Ringleader, Phyrexian Arena, and Skullclamp, I frequently have more gas in my hand than I can even play, which makes Wrath recovery not so tough.
You seem to be underestimating the aggro impact of cards like Siege-Gang Commander, Kiki-Jiki, and Earwig Squad as well, which provide significant clocks more or less by themselves. Sword of Fire and Ice and Umezawa's Jitte also do this. I've been playing with Boggart Mob and Changeling Berserker recently too, both of which are pretty fat.
Anyway, here's an example of a game I JUST played against a Reaper King control deck. I can give details because I still have the window open.
Game 1 was long and grueling--I had a slow start, curving Tinkerer into Imperial Recruiter...not exactly exciting. Tinkerer did eat a Sol Ring though. Recruiter got me Magus of the Moon, as he had all nonbasics (but he popped Krosan Verge for a couple basics in response). He played Lightning Greaves, which I opted not to trade Tinkerer for, and then Reaper King, which I did trade for (in response to equip). I played Matron, getting Recruiter, setting up a stack of Warchief, Settler, Kiki-Jiki, Piledriver, Siege-Gang Commander, Warren Weirding, Skirk Prospector, Lightning Crafter (I had Ringleader in hand already). He played Grim Poppet, which was annoying, and Debtor's Knell the next turn, which was even more annoying. After that...I basically started playing out my stack while not killing the Poppet. He played Damnation after the Piledriver, then got back Grim Poppet, replayed Reaper King, and STPed my following Siege-Gang Commander. It looked like he was in complete control...and then I played Patriarch's Bidding, and attacked for about 50 damage, including a really big unblockable Piledriver. That's what Bidding is for.
Game 2 had 2 sweepers and no Bidding, but I still won (by a larger margin too). I had an even slower start than last time--turn 3 Sword of Fire and Ice was my first play, followed by turn 4 Tuktuk Scrapper (hitting Reaper King). He played Pernicious Deed, but I just played Matron for Recruiter and forced him to pop the Deed to deal with the equipment (after taking a hit from it). I played Mad Auntie and Goblin Recruiter, getting a pile of Ringleader, Instigator, Warchief, Goblin King, Piledriver, Kiki-Jiki, Skirk Prospector, Lightning Crafter, Siege-Gang Commander. Reaper King got replayed, I Terminated it and cast Ringleader. I started the aggro, with Warchief and Changeling Berserker (championing Ringleader). I only attacked with the Berserker, as he had some blockers up. If he Wrathed at this point, he'd only get Warchief, Berserker, and Recruiter, and I'd get Ringleader back. Not bad for me. Next turn, I played Goblin King (to get around blockers), Warren Instigator, and activated Mutavault for the hell of it. I attacked for 18 unblockable damage, putting him to 8 (dead if we were playing with 30 life). I put in Kiki-Jiki (keeping Skirk Prospector, Goblin Piledriver in hand). This time he did Wrath, and I copied the Changeling Berserker to hide Kiki-Jiki, thus keeping Kiki-Jiki and Ringleader in play. Next turn I drew Lightning Crafter and went infinite (though I'm sure I could have done 8 more damage anyway).
So, that's how you beat wraths, I guess. In both games, Goblin Recruiter allowed me to craft a lethal board that was resilient to sweepers, without even needing recursion from Wort. (By the way, against decks with sweepers, you should almost never play Wort until after at least the first wrath. The idea is to play her as late as possible, and only if they've dealt with everything else. This way, you've very likely exhausted their removal by the time you play her, and Wort just dominates the late-game when she sticks.
Anyhow, that was my match against a control deck with sweepers. One of many, and they all turn out pretty much the same way (victory).
Without seeing exactly what you're doing, it's hard to say what's going wrong, but again, your results don't mesh with mine at all, so I suspect that you're probably taking the wrong (aggro) approach. It's just not about playing a couple dorks and a lord and getting in there, and it doesn't surprise me if you lose when that's your gameplan.
It might be weird statistical variance? I should keep track of the cards I draw, as I rarely see SoFI, Clamp, Arena (never cast this, I know for a fact), and I've never been in a position to relevantly connect with one of the broken dudes (I got to put a tinkerer into play off of lackey earlier today before it ate a swords... how broken...).
As far as your game logs go, game 1 is a no brainer. Of course you win an attrition war with a resolved bidding. I understand why the cards are there, and a few days ago I won a similar game after getting wrathed twice and using both living death and bidding to get back. The only reason I had access to both was because my opponent let Liliana stay on the board for like 4 turns.
I will say that I have been playing Wort too early. This whole actually using your general thing is new to me.
Also, in regards to your game logs, they hinge on Goblin Recruiter, which while I don't think it is the best card in the format (that likely goes to Channel for me), it is very very very strong and probably top 3 in power, regardless. I have won a few games off of just turn 2 or 3 recruiter into warchief into ringleader into swarm, which is nice.
You are also right in that our experience with the deck is by a wide margin different. I don't think I'm playing bad, just when I have lackeys I have no goblins, and when I have goblins they are never very good, or never very many. When they wrath I have no tutors, I have no removal when they have dudes and I and I have guys that need to get through. It goes on, but you get the idea. I still kind of have hope for the deck, as the games where it gets rolling are pretty cool.
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3 more matches, 3 more 2-0 wins. I beat Doran, Rofellos, and Karn. I did not have to cast Wort a single time in any of these games.
I also played another Karn deck earlier, but that one hardly counts, as he quit after I went turn 1 Chrome Mox, Warren Instigator, turn 2 attack, netting Siege-Gang Commander and Boggart Mob (imprinting SGC). It's good to have the potential for broken starts, even if they don't happen every time.
Doran was a simple battle of attrition. At no point was I even close to losing, despite not doing anything really broken. At one point towards the end of game 2, I had in play 4 lands, Piledriver (Skullclamped), Lightning Crafter (imprinting Warren Instigator), and Mad Auntie. My hand consisted of Warren Weirding and Lightning Bolt, and he had nothing but lands in play.
This is a good example of a game where my creatures may not be particularly good, but they're more than enough to get the job done. That's 10 damage a turn, with a lot of potential to kill anything he might cast. Even if he killed my guys, I'd still be in a fine position. Almost any random assortment of aggressive goblins can apply this kind of pressure (stuff like Goblin Tinkerer and Goblin Sharpshooter doesn't, but those are just removal spells disguised as goblins). It doesn't matter if all your guys aren't hyper-efficient attackers, because you should be able to make plenty of time for them to win, either through removal or wrath-recovery/card advantage.
Game 1 against Rofellos was hilarious. I won the roll, and saw a hand of Sparksmith, a land, and some stuff I didn't care about. I mulled a couple times, found a couple lands, played turn 2 Sparksmith, and just won (the turn 3 Goblin Sharpshooter was insult to injury). I just beat him down with random dorks while my removal guys kept him from developing any kind of board position at all. Game 2 wasn't really that different...I had removal for Rofellos the first time, removal for Rofellos the second time, and by then I had found Sparksmith. I had a more aggressive draw this time and killed him by turn 6 or so.
Game 1 against Karn I had one of the best hands I've seen--Mountain, Cabal Pit, Goblin Lackey, Aether Vial, Goblin Warchief, Imperial Seal, Cabal Slaver. Can't really complain about that. I led with Lackey, and decided to Imp Seal for Dark Confidant when I didn't draw a land. Unfortunately, he accelerated into Oblivion Stone shortly after, but I made it work. I got some pressure in with Piledriver and Slaver while he tried to build enough mana to pop the Stone. I started Skullclamping my own guys when he hit 4 mana, to recoup some card advantage (if I had found a 3rd in one of the top 6 cards I could have used Tuktuk Scrapper, but it was not to be). Anyway, I drew 8 cards total off Skullclamp, he popped Stone when he was at 11, I saved Warchief with a Vialed in Changeling Berserker, and I won shortly after with the goblins I had drawn. Game 2 I mulliganed to a terrible 5 card hand (Chandra, Wasteland, 3 other lands) and Wastelanded his turn 1 Workshop. However, I topdecked Recruiter (with 2 lands in play and 1 in hand). I went for the all-in combo pile of Warchief, Ringleader, Warren Instigator, Skirk Prospector, Kiki-Jiki, Lightning Crafter (and ended with Goblin Tinkerer and Tuktuk Scrapper, just in case). He couldn't stop it, so I went infinite on turn 6. There was nothing clunky about it, considering that I'd have to get Warchief and Ringleader anyway.
So yeah, more wins. I'm quite comfortable playing this deck by now, and it's been very consistent, at least for me. There are tons of decisions to be made in every game, but it's been my experience that everything I've played against is consistently beatable. I suppose it's possible that I'm just a better player than all my opponents, but I doubt it--several of the people I've been testing against I know to be very good players.
Quote from LennonMarx »
It might be weird statistical variance? I should keep track of the cards I draw, as I rarely see SoFI, Clamp, Arena (never cast this, I know for a fact), and I've never been in a position to relevantly connect with one of the broken dudes (I got to put a tinkerer into play off of lackey earlier today before it ate a swords... how broken...).
I tutor for card advantage engines all the time. If you've never cast Arena, you're definitely not playing the same way I do, because Arena is probably my 2nd most common tutor target (after Recruiter). If I only have access to 3 lands early on, I'll almost always get Arena to see some more cards.
Lackey/Instigator definitely don't always do broken things...but sometimes they do. Often, you can get some advantage out of them even if you don't have anything juicy, because your opponent will always assume that you do, and do their best to prevent them from hitting. Even if you only get a small boost off of Lackey, that's still a big tempo boost for a 1 drop...and if you keep it around, odds are good that you'll draw into something worth putting into play before too long.
Quote from LennonMarx »
Also, in regards to your game logs, they hinge on Goblin Recruiter, which while I don't think it is the best card in the format (that likely goes to Channel for me), it is very very very strong and probably top 3 in power, regardless. I have won a few games off of just turn 2 or 3 recruiter into warchief into ringleader into swarm, which is nice.
Yep. Lots of games do hinge on Goblin Recruiter. It's the core of the deck, and the deck would be so much less powerful without it. I don't see the problem in trying to get Goblin Recruiter to do the heavy lifting against wraths and such. He's certainly not the only way to win--I win plenty of games without ever finding him. He almost always makes the win easier and more resilient though. If you're not using him as much as you possibly can, you should be using him more.
Quote from LennonMarx »
You are also right in that our experience with the deck is by a wide margin different. I don't think I'm playing bad, just when I have lackeys I have no goblins, and when I have goblins they are never very good, or never very many. When they wrath I have no tutors, I have no removal when they have dudes and I and I have guys that need to get through. It goes on, but you get the idea. I still kind of have hope for the deck, as the games where it gets rolling are pretty cool.
Well, having goblins for a turn 1 Lackey is somewhat luck-based (though you can tweak this a little with mulligan decisions). The others...well, you can affect these factors more than you think. The goblins vary in efficiency, but they can all be "good enough"--they all have a clock. Whether that clock is fast enough is often dependent on other factors in the game state more than the goblins themselves. Real damage races rarely happen in EDH--you either have control, and you're the one getting damage through, or you're in a losing position and need some disruption to get ahead. Any goblins can get there (though, again, don't think of stuff like Goblin Sharpshooter as real "goblins", they're actually just removal spells with synergy).
When they wrath, you ought to be able to see it coming. All Is Dust might catch you by surprise in some decks, but usually you know when there's a risk of it happening. If you always play like they have a Wrath against sweeper-based control decks, you'll almost never get blown out. You can hold back creatures, you can hold back a Bidding, you can try to get leverage out of Wort late-game...there are a lot of options. Most crucially, Recruiter doesn't really care that much about sweepers, so you can just go for the Recruiter -> Ringleader thing and find enough gas to win the game twice over.
You have lots of tutors, and you can find anything you need (even just lots of goblins, via Recruiter). If you're having trouble later on because you haven't planned for a wrath or for removal, it's very likely because of a tutoring mistake early game. This deck frequently tutors in the first couple of turns, because the mana is too tied up with goblins afterwards. Usually, you have to plan ahead with the tutors, because you probably won't need anything immediately. If you can plan ahead well enough to anticipate what you're going to be needing later, then you won't have problems. (You can also plan ahead like this even with the Plan A of Recruiter--I'll frequently toss a random Warren Weirding or Gempalm Incinerator into my stack, even if there's nothing I need to kill immediately, because I anticipate that I might need to kill something before I can win and I'm not holding removal. Often, I'm right.
A deck with this many tutors (and with the most powerful tutor ever printed at the core) can't be that inconsistent, at least by EDH standards. You do have the tools to have access to the cards you need, when you need them: you just need to have the foresight to know what you're going to need.
i cant get my hands on imperial recruiter/seal, are there other effective goblins "skirk drill sarg maybe?) to run in their place? i know they are KEY fetches, but 400$ for 2 cards is a bit much...
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Standard:
Retired.
Modern:
Blitzhelix! RW
EDH (1v1): I am a jerk! RG Tiny Leaders (1v1): BURN! R
I don't really advocate trying to make 1-for-1 substitutions. The non-goblin cards chosen for this deck are all there because they're cheap enough (in terms of mana) to actually work with this deck's strategy. If you can't get them, replacing them with more expensive tutors isn't necessarily going to be any good, so just add the next best couple of cards you can find. You could try Skirk Drill Sergeant if you like (though I don't think it's consistent enough to be much good). You could also just add a couple of cards I've recently cut (like Goblin Vandal and Unearth)...they're not quite good enough to be in the top 99, but they're still good. Hymn to Tourach and Persecute are two other cards I've been wanting to try, which you might do well with.
Any thoughts on skirk fire marshal I had an old wort deck that was a little more focused on free for all and he was an all star in there and i think he could work well in here too. Im also considering gamble in place of imperial seal based on $ thoughts on this would be welcome as well. And one final card i think could have potential in here is torrent of souls, getting back a guy and pumping the team seems powerful to me especially with haste tossed on. Thoughts?
The following are cards that aren't good enough for the main deck but might be added depending on the current meta. I keep all of these as a pseudo sideboard in-between tournaments. Cursed Totem, Darkblast, and Magus of the Moon are the most common changes. Blood Moon, Inquisition, Leyline, and Tormod's are the cards most frequently taken out of the main deck.
This is using the original post list, his deck might have changed since then.
-Boggart Mob
-Chandra Nalaar
-Changeling Berserker
-Imperial Recruiter
-Goblin Wizard
-Magus of the Moon
-Lightning Bolt
-Liliana Vess
-Sparksmith
+ Hero's Demise
+ Bloodghast
+ City of Brass
+ Hymn to Tourach
+ Leyline of the Void
+ Null Rod
+ Persecute
+ Tainted Peak (Why aren't you playing this, Khy?)
+ Tormod's Crypt
There's some subtle differences between how Khymera and I built our decks. Obviously 90% of the goblins are shoe-ins, as well as many of the Black/Red spells. The big difference is that he plays more aggro cards where I prefer disruption. I don't think the buff goblins are altogether necessary, though they do considerably reduce your clock. In my meta it's necessary to play the disruption because the increased clock time doesn't matter when the other play combos out to win (especially when most of those combos clear my board, particularly Iname).
Persecute, City of Brass, Tainted Peak, and Hymn have all been great, especially Persecute. Hero's Demise has been OK, but not amazing. Worth keeping, though. Bloodghast has done well in my limited testing (Bloodghast + Skullclamp is retarded) but I still need to play with it some more.
I really need the grave hate in my meta. Just about every single deck abuses the grave (myself not excluded), so having all these effects is pretty much necessary. Some examples: Evergreen's Iname deck, mutedequilibrium's Jaya deck (Shard Phoenix and Jaya+Squee are especially good against Wort), Sharuum, Braids, Rofellos (Genesis/Survival). Having both Tormod's and Leyline is kind of nice because I can use a tutor for Tormod's and have a free spell to stop the combos, but turn 1 Leyline is great, as well.
There's enough artifacts and equipment in our meta to make Null Rod worthwhile. Additionally, it's a great lock against Iname with Leyline in play (the only way out is hardcasting spirits or All is Dust, which Evergreen doesn't play).
At the moment I'm not bothered by taking 1 for the mana, but I have never activated either of these lands; it's either not needed or I don't have Threshold. My meta is currently devoid of blue-based control decks, so Stronghold has not been spectacular, either. These will all likely stay in until I can find better nonbasics. I was considering another man land for Stronghold, probably Mishra's Factory. Barbarian Ring could likely stay, but I don't like losing the black mana from Cabal Pit under Blood Moon/Magus.
A bit cheaper and has legs. I don't think the creature type clause is altogether amazing considering that Balthor's color clause is probably going to be more one-sided in the majority of games. I'm pretty sure about this change but I haven't tested Balthor yet.
Haven't decided what should go in this slot but Redcap has been generally lackluster in most of my games. I have plenty of removal besides him, so I think I could find another creature for <4cc that's more useful.
I really can't decide which of these should be in the deck. I've never actually resolved Sorin so I want to give him more of a chance before I cut him. The main problem is that with a good aggro and combo gameplan I rarely actually need Sorin. The other problem is that by the time he comes out the opponent may very well have lost close to 20 life; the effect of that ability is greatly lessened. On top of that I have a very competitive meta that is high on land destruction and prison strategies; triple black (or six mana in general) can be a challenge. I'm still giving him a chance, but I feel like I will eventually cut him.
Has been generally lame for me. Most situations I get it I'd rather it just be a burn spell to take out a creature, or another tutor, etc. Going to test it a bit more, but I feel it's one of the weakest Goblins in the deck.
Your list looks good, of course. It's only 10 cards off mine and you haven't cut anything crucial, so I'm sure it works just fine.
I don't agree with all of your choices, but it's definitely possible that they make sense for your meta. Tormod's Crypt and Leyline of the Void are two cards that I really, really don't want to play in this deck--they contribute absolutely nothing towards your own gameplan, and only truly effective against a handful of decks in this format (though it's not very representative, only about 25% of the decks in my 1v1 compendium really care about graveyard hate, and that's excluding several other good decks that don't use the graveyard, like Jhoira, and Zur).
If half of your games are against Iname or Sharuum, I guess it makes sense for you, but I don't think it's a good choice at all for a varied meta (also, you really shouldn't need these against decks like Jaya or Rofellos. The recursion they're capable of isn't consistent enough or scary enough to be worth running such 1-dimensional cards.)
I don't see any particular need for Null Rod in a red deck. I have so many cards to destroy artifacts, including several that can take out multiple artifacts. There usually isn't anything important left on the board to nullify. Also, the splash damage from Null Rod on ourselves is not insignificant--we don't have too many artifacts, but the ones we do have are quite important. Again, I guess if you play nothing but Iname and Sharuum it's okay, but I don't think it's very strong even there (Iname plays Null Rod itself...). I would not play this here.
Hymn to Tourach and Persecute are both fine. I've been testing Hymn and will probably officially add it to my list soon. I'm not sure how much I like Persecute here...I play it in some other decks, and to be honest it disappoints me much more often than not. I play against quite a few 5-color and artifact-centric decks, and even against 2-color decks I find that it often only gets a card or two. 4 mana is also when this deck hits critical mass with the goblins--I'd rather be establishing board presence during these early turns.
Inquisition of Kozilek is crap in this deck. The cards I'm concerned about when I play this deck almost exclusively cost 4 or more mana (usually I want to take sweepers or debilitating enchantments like Humility or Night of Soul's Betrayal). I'm completely opposed to playing a discard spell that will often be unable to hit the only relevant card in an opponent's hand.
Hero's Demise is usually worse than Lightning Bolt, in my opinion. Most generals that demand spot removal die to Lightning Bolt as easily as Hero's Demise. Lightning Bolt is more efficient for that purpose, but, more crucially it also takes out key non-legendary creatures. I frequently use it to kill stuff like Dark Confidant and Mother of Runes. Between Warren Weirding, Fodder Launch, and Gempalm Incinerator, it's usually not too difficult to kill bigger legends in the late-game. Lightning Bolt is just more versatile overall. Flame Slash is better than Hero's Demise too (though sorcery speed makes it not quite as good as Bolt).
Bloodghast seems...okayish. Not exciting. It's only any good with Skullclamp, which is not usually a card I frequently tutor for in this deck. I guess I'd probably tutor for it if I had Bloodghast, but at that point I'm stuck with a useless spirit if I don't have a spare tutor. Frankly, I think Bitterblossom would be a much better choice if you really want a buddy for Skullclamp...but I played Bitterblossom for a while, and found it wanting overall. There's not enough other synergies for this little combo to work well here.
Tainted Peak is terrible. All the Tainted lands are. It's not a true dualland at all. Look at this way: if you don't have a swamp, it's horrible. If you do have a swamp, you're relatively unlikely to need more black mana (the first is by far the most important), so it's hardly better than a mountain at that point. I would rather just play another Mountain any day--when Tainted Peak is good, a Mountain is just as good 90% of the time, and when Tainted Peak is bad (which is reasonably often) a Mountain is much better.
I don't like City of Brass here, though it's not terrible. I just don't think that the difference between 1 more dualland and a basic makes much difference with the current manabase. It's already robust enough. In a normal meta (i.e., not ALL combo), the number of games that you lose to City of Brass will be non-negligible, as this deck does a fair amount of self-inflicted damage. The last game I played, I won with 7 life remaining. If my first land had been City of Brass, I could easily have lost because of the extra damage. The risk outweighs the reward, I feel.
As for the cards you're not playing...
The "buff" champion goblins Changeling Berserker and Boggart Mob are probably better than you think. They're definitely much better than I expected before testing them. I initially added Changeling Berserker mostly because I wanted to try a second Goblin Ally to go with Tuktuk Scrapper...and it's okay for that, but the combination of champion + strong attacker has proven very potent, and far trickier than you'd expect. Every time I drew it, Changeling Berserker was doing something great for me--it's actually one of the best cards in the deck for dealing with sweepers. I've frequently been able to force a sweeper just by playing it out there...no one can really afford to take many hits from it, so they have to deal with it quickly or lose. And when they do, you get a good goblin back, ready to rebuild. Championing something like Siege-Gang Commander or even Goblin Lackey is a really solid play, and is incredibly hard for most decks to deal with.
Also, the champions are ridiculously good with Aether Vial, Kiki-Jiki, or Moggcatcher, essentially countering anything your opponent tries to do to stop you and leaving you in a good position no matter what happens. I was so impressed with the many uses of Changeling Berserker that I added Boggart Mob too, and I haven't regretted it at all. It simply wins if it's not dealt with quickly, and even if it is dealt with, it leaves you in a pretty good position. It's really easy to underestimate these guys--I certainly did, at first. They are great aggro cards...but they're a lot more than that as well. I think you may need to actually try them out to get a sense for how well they work.
I'm assuming Imperial Recruiter is cut for availability reasons? I don't see any other reason to cut it.
Cutting Magus of the Moon seems wrong for most metas, though you do seem to play against predominantly mono-colored decks. The effect just wins enough games for me that I'm loathe to cut it, especially as I play Imperial Recruiter (Imp Recruiter and Magus both get significantly better if you have the other one in the deck).
Chandra Nalaar and Liliana Vess are reasonable cuts, though I'm fond of them. I like them for the degree of inevitability they provide, which is something that tends to be lacking in an aggro deck like this. They do cost more than we really want to be paying though.
I've had a few really good experiences with Goblin Wizard, including at least 2 games he definitely won for me. He is somewhat narrow in his use and so is potentially okay to cut, but both abilities are deceptively useful. Curving Warchief into Wizard is really good, and he speeds you up by at least one turn when you're trying to combo off of Recruiter. He also stops quite a bit of removal, and occasionally makes your guys unblockable or into invincible blockers. Niche uses, to be sure, but still a lot of uses for one card.
I really like Sparksmith. It's frankly the best card in the deck against Rofellos, Braids, Arcum, guys like that. I didn't play it for a while, but now I think it's just too good to pass up. He single-handedly wins games against several competitive archetypes.
You're also not playing Sensei's Divining Top or Goblin Tinkerer. I don't see any reason not to run SDT, unless you're going by the time-sensitive tournament list where it's banned. It helps smooth out the mana a great deal, and is part of why I'm comfortable running 2 less lands than you (if anything, I get flooded more than I get screwed...). I've covered the pros and cons of Tinkerer elsewhere in this thread, but I'm still quite satisfied with him overall.
As for changes you're considering:
It's funny...I played 4 games before writing this (2 against Azusa and 2 against Niv-Mizzet), to take a fresh look at some of the cards you brought up. I went 4-0 (though Azusa is actually a really tough matchup and I was lucky to win). A few of the cards you're considering cutting were instrumental to these games: Sorin Markov almost single-handedly won me game 2 against Azusa, Stingscourger helped me win game 1 against both Azusa and Niv-Mizzet, and Murderous Redcap was the card I needed to win game 2 against Niv-Mizzet (I actually Moggcatcher'd for it). All of these cards are somewhat niche in their uses...but they definitely have valuable, unique uses.
Volrath's Stronghold would be a reasonable cut. I almost never use it...but I don't think I've ever lost a game because of it not producing colored mana either. There are a few situations where it could potentially be of game-winning use, so I'm basically keeping it around just in case.
I don't see any real reason to cut Cabal Pit and Barbarian Ring. I've used them both a few times on important targets. I've never lost a game because they weren't basics. They shouldn't really be thought of as removal...but occasionally they are very useful. Also, while I never count on my opponent misplaying, I find that a lot of people don't pay much attention to lands late-game. I've had quite a few people make really bad plays against me because they either forgot I had the land + threshold, or they were hoping that I had forgotten. The benefit from these is pretty significant when it happens, and the risk is pretty slight. (Cabal Pit going red under Blood Moon has never been an issue for me. It's just something you take into account before playing Blood Moon, and plan accordingly.)
I'm pretty certain that this is not a good call. It's true that Balthor's effect is, if anything, probably a little better on the whole, but he's definitely not cheaper. I've tested him a bit, and it is almost always a mistake to play him and pass without activating him (or at least with mana up). He effectively costs 7 mana, which is just too high. You have to protect him, so his having legs is not really relevant. The cheaper cost on Patriarch's Bidding is much more important. I've also tested Twilight's Call, which, as you might expect, is better than Balthor and worse than Bidding, being costed between them. Overall, I think that Living Death and 1 other mass reanimation spell is the right number, and Patriarch's Bidding is the clear winner due to its cheaper cost.
You can never have too much removal, especially when it's a goblin. Redcap is definitely pretty unexciting, but he's just solid in a lot of ways. He's removal (at least once, often more), and he plays very nicely with cards like Skullclamp, Skirk Prospector/Siege-Gang Commander, and Moggcatcher. He's rarely great when you draw him, but he's never that bad, and sometimes he's just what you need.
Sorin is a win condition unto himself. He's here mostly as a late-game tutor target when you haven't been able to make much of a dent in your opponent. He can take someone from very comfortable to just a turn or two away from death instantly. It's true that he's not useful in a large majority of your wins...but the games he does win you are usually the ones that you have no business winning. He steals games, and I think that's a worthwhile use of a slot.
Stingscourger is basically a tempo card. It's true that he's fairly mediocre much of the time, but at least he's very rarely useless. He's also excellent value with Skullclamp. The reason I keep him around though is that sometimes he can answer threats none of your other goblins can. If you need to deal with a creature with toughness greater than 5, your opponent has other creatures, and you're not swimming in goblins, Stingscourger is your only easily tutorable/recurrable way to do so. This situation doesn't occur very often...but when it does, it's usually a creature that you REALLY need to deal with, or lose. It also has a nice interaction with Wort, letting you tie up that creature indefinitely. It's not a card that you really want to use, but sometimes it's the card that you have to use. Stingscourger is similar to Sorin in that sometimes it wins you games that you probably don't deserve to win.
As far as I can tell this hasn't been updated for a while, but I worked off your list and added Spikeshot Elder and Contested Warzone (over a basic). Not sure on Goblin Wardriver, what are your thoughts?
I also play Weiss Schwarz, Chaos, Vanguard and Wixoss.
Weiss Schwarz Sets
Accel World, Angel Beats, Familiar of Zero, Gargantia on the Verdurous Planet, Guilty Crown, Kill La Kill, Robotics;Notes, Sword Art Online.
Chaos Partners
Arpeggio of Blue Steel: Iona, Kirishima, Kongou.
Dangan Ronpa: Asahina, Togami.
Freezing: Vibration: Chiffon, Satelizer.
Vanguard Clans Favoured
Angel Feather, Dark Irregulars, Genesis, Neonecter, Pale Moon, Shadow Paladins, Tachikaze.
As far as I can tell this hasn't been updated for a while, but I worked off your list and added Spikeshot Elder and Contested Warzone (over a basic). Not sure on Goblin Wardriver, what are your thoughts?
Heya,
I don't really like the warzone, and spikeshot I am kind of iffy on. However, I am really debating getting wardriver in, can be a great tutor target when pushing damage is the path to victory...
how has spikeshot and warzone been working for you?
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Standard:
Retired.
Modern:
Blitzhelix! RW
EDH (1v1): I am a jerk! RG Tiny Leaders (1v1): BURN! R
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What about sword of light and shadow? I know its not as good as fire/ice in our deck, but isn’t the returning a creature card from GY to hand pretty damn relevant for our deck? I am FOR SURE not saying to run it instead of fire/ice, but alongside with? Maybe there is just no room for one more equipment?
Standard:
Retired.
Modern:
Blitzhelix! RW
EDH (1v1): I am a jerk! RG
Tiny Leaders (1v1): BURN! R
It's a little overkill. The deck doesn't rely on the graveyard->hand/play recursion, it is just a nice side effect for late game if tempo has slowed down, but Wort provides the same effect on a nice 3/3 fear general body. I'd rather run something else, personally.
d.g
Also, getting my hands on imperial seal os going to be damn near impossible lol. 250-300$ any replacement options?
Standard:
Retired.
Modern:
Blitzhelix! RW
EDH (1v1): I am a jerk! RG
Tiny Leaders (1v1): BURN! R
The blue deck matchups are all pretty good. I had a bit of a scare against Jhoira earlier today, but I've been taking most of my matches against the U/x decks.
The problem I've run into, however, is 2 fold. First, the cards in this deck all suck. It is most certainly the most effect swarm deck I've seen for EDH, but if you can't get a swarm going from turn 1, its real easy for the control deck to soak up some damage, wrath, and take over. Secondly, I feel like I'm always fighting more against my own deck than the opponents. 36 land is too low, I think, and at the same time I have issues drawing creatures. When the wheels get rolling, the deck is really good, but getting them rolling takes the EDH equivalent of nuclear fusion.
As an aside, this deck is really cold to Uril. More edict style removal might be helpful.
As for card choices, Goblin Tinkerer has been a blank for me, Goblin Vandal got activated once in a game that was already a blowout against Captain Sissay (which appears to be a good match, for the record), Cabal Slaver is borderline. If the goblins get cut they need to be cut for more goblins, but not really sure what would take their slots. Slaver could just be an extra land, or Goblin Assault, or Bitterblossom, or maybe even Dralnu's Crusade
Finally, the combo kill just feels clunky. I've used it maybe once. If you opponent is half conscious they can see it coming the second you reveal your recruiter targets, and from there they have 2-3 turns to figure out a way to stop it, or just kill you. Obeyline might just be the better plan B, and focus the goblins on aggro.
Edit: Have you considered Skirk Drill Sargent or Brass Herald for more CA (and the Herald's pump is nice, too).
and something like maybe coat of arms or eldrazi monument would be better for a pure swarm strategy?
Standard:
Retired.
Modern:
Blitzhelix! RW
EDH (1v1): I am a jerk! RG
Tiny Leaders (1v1): BURN! R
That's quite an exaggeration. Many of the cards in this deck are among the most powerful ever printed. A few of the goblins are pretty bad on their own, but make up for it through internal synergies. The cards are good enough to get the job done.
Also, if you're just thinking of this as a swarm deck, you're missing most of its utility. It can be a swarm deck...but it can also be a control or combo deck (or set up a kind of aggro-combo alpha strike with Piledriver). If you do get wrathed, the plan changes a little, but it doesn't really stop you. If you're playing against white or black, you should be anticipating the sweeper anyway, and planning around it.
I know the feeling, but again, you might be approaching the deck in the wrong way. I win most of my games with only 4-5 lands in play...but I win, and that's what counts. Unlike basically every other deck in this format, this one really doesn't need a lot of mana to operate. In fact, if you draw too many lands, you're likely to lose, because you really need to be hitting plenty of spells to feed things like Aether Vial and Warren Instigator.
Under the old mulligan rules, we would need more land...but with the Normandy mulligan, it's not difficult to find a starting hand with 2-3 lands and some action. That typically works out fine for me. Since getting a quick start is so important with this deck, I suspect that mulliganing properly is probably one of the biggest factors affecting success. I mull quite aggressively to find workable hands, and almost never keep a hand without a plan of what I'm going to do.
Here are some sample goldfish hands. I'll walk through my mulligan decisions.
Here's what you do when things go wrong though.
Hand 1:
Bloodstained Mire, Sensei's Divining Top, Imperial Seal, Goblin Recruiter, Goblin Matron, Siege-Gang Commander, Living Death
With a hand like this, the first priority to to make the mana work. The last 3 cards are duds for sure, while the first two are good. In this case, I'll probably keep the Imp Seal, despite the card disadvantage, and mull the Recruiter (as much as I want it). I drew into Wooded Foothills, Lightning Bolt, and Blood Moon. That hand looks fine now--with SDT and 3 shufflers, including a tutor, I shouldn't have a problem. I even have removal and a Moon.
Hand 2:
Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth, Skirk Prospector, Warren Instigator, Goblin Chieftain, Tuktuk Scrapper, Moggcatcher, Shattering Spree
How awkward. Urborg and 6 red spells. Though the spells are all pretty good, in this case I mull all of them, searching for something playable. I draw Mountain, Badlands, Duress, Mad Auntie, Living Death. That's a little slow, but I'll keep it. I can make that work.
Hand 3:
Swamp, Goblin Lackey, Skirk Prospector, Sparksmith, Goblin Warchief, Goblin Piledriver, Vampiric Tutor.
This one is really interesting, because I'm actually tempted to keep it. On the draw, I probably would keep it. We have a tutor with the mana to cast it, and 5 aggressive goblins. It's hard to say what I'd mull because it depends on the matchup, but in most cases I could probably drop ]Sparksmith, Skirk Prospector, and Goblin Warchief. That drew me into Auntie's Hovel and Mountain, which not only makes the hand pretty good, but means keeping the whole thing would have been fine too.
Again, I passed up many, many more good hands looking for these bad hands. I was actually surprised by how many of the hands were fine. Even when I did get these dodgy hands, a single mulligan was enough to fix all of them...and if it hadn't been, I could easily have mulled again (I'll mull even more aggressively on a second mulligan than on the first one).
Anyway, I don't know how helpful this was, but it confirms my initial belief that the mana is probably fine. While it's low by EDH standards, it works in this deck, because we can easily afford to miss land drops.
I went 2-0 against 2 different Uril decks on MWS yesterday (he's pretty popular right now). None of the games were even close. We don't need more edicts, because the one we have is a goblin, and thus very easy to tutor for and recur. One of the decks I played against was pretty much all-in on Uril, whereas the other had more of a Naya aggro thing happening...in both cases, by playing the control deck, I had no problem killing all the other creatures and Warren Weirding Uril. I don't consider it a hard matchup.
Give Goblin Tinkerer more of a chance...he's very good. I've had many games where he's been important. I agree that Goblin Vandal is mostly useless though, and that Cabal Slaver is borderline (though he's been fairly good for me recently). I'm more often than not happy to see the Slaver, so I think he can stay for now. I've also been unhappy with Unearth, which just gets cycled most of the time, so I'm currently testing Boggart Mob and Changeling Berserker over Unearth and Goblin Vandal.
None of the cards you suggested as possible replacements for Slaver really do enough. I don't think I need more land. Goblin Assault is actually horrible for this deck...1 token a turn isn't bad, but forcing all my goblins to attack every turn is horrible, and will lose you games. Bitterblossom and Dralnu's Crusade just don't do enough, though they're cards I've considered.
This is why I say you need more practice and you must be playing it wrong. The combo isn't clunky. I've probably played ~50 games with this deck by now, and I win with the combo about half the time. Sometimes, I can only win through the combo. It's not easy to stop--only counterspells or removal really do the trick, and you've likely exhausted both by the time you go for the combo. Even if you do get disrupted, Wort means you can just do it again next turn. Even when I telegraph the combo through Recruiter, hardly anyone is able to stop it, especially considering the other goblins I line up. I always try to make a pile that can kill someone through aggro or through combo, and I've yet to see anyone survive both. (Also, you should never be giving anyone 3 turns to find an answer, at least not if combo is the main plan. With Ringleader, I can frequently land the combo the turn after I play Recruiter (depending on the game state, of course).
It sounds to me like you're trying to play this as a more-or-less pure aggro deck. That works fine against blue decks, but isn't usually enough against sweepers. Embrace the combo, embrace the control aspects, and you'll have much better success against the field.
I've considered Skirk Drill Sergeant. I never tested it, because I was pretty sure it sucked (to be honest, I've been misreading it...I always though it put the goblin to your hand, not to play, which made it pretty horrible). Now that I've caught my mistake, it might have potential. I'm still pretty iffy on it because 3 mana is quite a lot in this deck, and it's only really good after Recruiter (which makes it win-more, basically). I might try it out now, but I don't think it's that good.
Brass Herald is too expensive. For 6 mana, a spell needs to win me the game singlehandedly, or it shouldn't be in here. This is basically just a bad Goblin Ringleader, and that's not something I need (as Goblin Ringleader is really easy to reuse through Wort or Kiki-Jiki).
"Pure swarm strategy" is a mistake. Part of the reason this deck is so good is because it can play any role. Cards that only help the aggro plan dilute your other strategies, and so are pretty bad here (although Eldrazi Monument may have potential, as it's defensive as well).
And, how exactly does this deck play control? By keeping a 3/3 on the board? And maybe a few other 1/1s? Great control cards there, buddy. Our removal is not all that good, save for Terminate and Weirding. This deck needs to end the game somehow. To that end, the combo kill is useful, but clunky as all hell. The only way I can reasonably see comboing off the turn after a recruiter setup is having either a ton of mana (unlikely), or having a lacky/instigator connecting. In 20+ games, I've never connected with a lackey, and the only time I did get there with an instigator, it was just to get a bunch of Jitte counters as I had no goblins in hand. And unless your opponent is playing a creatureless deck, those guys shouldn't be connecting into the mid-game. This gets back to my point on creatures, they all suck, except maybe Bob and the recruiter twins. Tribal synergy is really cool when the stars align and you actually get to dump a bunch of dudes into play, a few lords, and get there with a host of hasty 4/4s.
And how, precisely, is this deck supposed to play around wraths? Most of our creatures have 1-2 power. Our opponents have 30 life. We need to commit at least 3 dudes (a lord and a few 2/2s) to have a reasonable clock. If we don't hit a lord, the commitment goes up. Any card of card Disadvantage is brutal, and Wort isn't going to help much when all she has to do is die once and then be uncastable. And we have the 3 tutors and 2 living death effects, which are very nice, but now we are both hitting on color issues, mana amount issues, and having them actually be lethal before the next wrath. Obviously careful planing is helpful, but the best laid plans of mice and men, and all that.
Shall I start saving gamelogs? When I read your comments, I go and play a few matches, looking for the weaknesses that you see...and I just don't find them.
There's a lot more room to find Warren Weirding than you imply, considering that we know we're going to need it before we even draw our first hand. There are actually 9 tutors that can find it (Demonic, Vampiric, Imp Seal, Shred Memory, Matron, Recruiter, Harbinger, Liliana, Imp Recruiter -> Recruiter). When you're looking for it, it's not too difficult to find a hand that will get it for you. Usually, it doesn't even disrupt your main plan, as we always want Goblin Recruiter, and Goblin Recruiter can grab you Warren Weirding fast enough. Also, you shouldn't be scrambling for WW when Uril hits--again, you know you're going to need it all game. I've only played 4 games against Uril, but I've managed to have WW ready in my hand every time he's been played.
Also, Uril shouldn't be hitting play on turn 4. We do have some LD and removal, and we know that we're going to need to need a clear board for WW to work. I have gladly burned a turn 1 BoP against Uril, and would do so again. With the land disruption, I don't think I've even had an opponent be able to replay Uril before I won yet (though I've had WW ready to go again, just in case).
Oh, and no relevant draw engine? Phyrexian Arena, Dark Confidant, and Skullclamp would like to have words with you.
All you need to beat Uril is a couple of removal spells. It's not tough.
We play control against general- or creature-based strategies by drawing an extra removal spell, every single turn. I have yet to play the deck that can withstand that. All we have to do is keep Wort on the board, which is not very difficult with smart play (I don't even play Wort in most of my games--it's better to save her for when you need her).
Our removal is fine--it may not be classically powerful, but between the various tribal spells we can kill anything we need to. Most of it (all except for Fodder Launch, which has a niche role) is cheap and instant speed. I've not been dissatisfied with any of them.
Usually, a combo the turn after Recruiter happens because of Lackey or Instigator. I can't believe that you've never connected with Lackey in 20+ games. I just can't. I connect at least once with Lackey/Instigator around 90% of the time I play them, especially early game. If you have a hand with Lackey and any removal spell, it's almost impossible for it not to connect. They get through for me, all the time, even midgame. My opponents aren't creatureless, but I kill their creatures (or sometimes I make them unblockable with Goblin King and a Moon, if necessary). Something really weird is happening if you can never get them through. (Also, even when you can't get them through, they can still be useful as a threat--I played a game last night where I was getting through 8 damage a turn because my opponent was afraid to chumpblock something else and let Lackey through).
The lords aren't really that important. Just play creatures and beat, when that's what is called for. 30 life isn't that much. I've been routinely doing 40 without problem. I frequently attack for 15+ a turn without Piledriver, so the creatures can't suck that badly.
It's really not that hard (and again, you're overrating the lords). I won a match against Horde of Notions control last night where I got hit by Pernicious Deed, Consume the Meek, and Damnation, and still incrementally aggroed him out. I didn't even need to play Wort once. Next game it was Damnation and Mindslaver (twice), same deal. I wish I had saved the logs for you, because they were pretty epic games. Between Ringleader, Phyrexian Arena, and Skullclamp, I frequently have more gas in my hand than I can even play, which makes Wrath recovery not so tough.
You seem to be underestimating the aggro impact of cards like Siege-Gang Commander, Kiki-Jiki, and Earwig Squad as well, which provide significant clocks more or less by themselves. Sword of Fire and Ice and Umezawa's Jitte also do this. I've been playing with Boggart Mob and Changeling Berserker recently too, both of which are pretty fat.
Anyway, here's an example of a game I JUST played against a Reaper King control deck. I can give details because I still have the window open.
Game 1 was long and grueling--I had a slow start, curving Tinkerer into Imperial Recruiter...not exactly exciting. Tinkerer did eat a Sol Ring though. Recruiter got me Magus of the Moon, as he had all nonbasics (but he popped Krosan Verge for a couple basics in response). He played Lightning Greaves, which I opted not to trade Tinkerer for, and then Reaper King, which I did trade for (in response to equip). I played Matron, getting Recruiter, setting up a stack of Warchief, Settler, Kiki-Jiki, Piledriver, Siege-Gang Commander, Warren Weirding, Skirk Prospector, Lightning Crafter (I had Ringleader in hand already). He played Grim Poppet, which was annoying, and Debtor's Knell the next turn, which was even more annoying. After that...I basically started playing out my stack while not killing the Poppet. He played Damnation after the Piledriver, then got back Grim Poppet, replayed Reaper King, and STPed my following Siege-Gang Commander. It looked like he was in complete control...and then I played Patriarch's Bidding, and attacked for about 50 damage, including a really big unblockable Piledriver. That's what Bidding is for.
Game 2 had 2 sweepers and no Bidding, but I still won (by a larger margin too). I had an even slower start than last time--turn 3 Sword of Fire and Ice was my first play, followed by turn 4 Tuktuk Scrapper (hitting Reaper King). He played Pernicious Deed, but I just played Matron for Recruiter and forced him to pop the Deed to deal with the equipment (after taking a hit from it). I played Mad Auntie and Goblin Recruiter, getting a pile of Ringleader, Instigator, Warchief, Goblin King, Piledriver, Kiki-Jiki, Skirk Prospector, Lightning Crafter, Siege-Gang Commander. Reaper King got replayed, I Terminated it and cast Ringleader. I started the aggro, with Warchief and Changeling Berserker (championing Ringleader). I only attacked with the Berserker, as he had some blockers up. If he Wrathed at this point, he'd only get Warchief, Berserker, and Recruiter, and I'd get Ringleader back. Not bad for me. Next turn, I played Goblin King (to get around blockers), Warren Instigator, and activated Mutavault for the hell of it. I attacked for 18 unblockable damage, putting him to 8 (dead if we were playing with 30 life). I put in Kiki-Jiki (keeping Skirk Prospector, Goblin Piledriver in hand). This time he did Wrath, and I copied the Changeling Berserker to hide Kiki-Jiki, thus keeping Kiki-Jiki and Ringleader in play. Next turn I drew Lightning Crafter and went infinite (though I'm sure I could have done 8 more damage anyway).
So, that's how you beat wraths, I guess. In both games, Goblin Recruiter allowed me to craft a lethal board that was resilient to sweepers, without even needing recursion from Wort. (By the way, against decks with sweepers, you should almost never play Wort until after at least the first wrath. The idea is to play her as late as possible, and only if they've dealt with everything else. This way, you've very likely exhausted their removal by the time you play her, and Wort just dominates the late-game when she sticks.
Anyhow, that was my match against a control deck with sweepers. One of many, and they all turn out pretty much the same way (victory).
Without seeing exactly what you're doing, it's hard to say what's going wrong, but again, your results don't mesh with mine at all, so I suspect that you're probably taking the wrong (aggro) approach. It's just not about playing a couple dorks and a lord and getting in there, and it doesn't surprise me if you lose when that's your gameplan.
As far as your game logs go, game 1 is a no brainer. Of course you win an attrition war with a resolved bidding. I understand why the cards are there, and a few days ago I won a similar game after getting wrathed twice and using both living death and bidding to get back. The only reason I had access to both was because my opponent let Liliana stay on the board for like 4 turns.
I will say that I have been playing Wort too early. This whole actually using your general thing is new to me.
Also, in regards to your game logs, they hinge on Goblin Recruiter, which while I don't think it is the best card in the format (that likely goes to Channel for me), it is very very very strong and probably top 3 in power, regardless. I have won a few games off of just turn 2 or 3 recruiter into warchief into ringleader into swarm, which is nice.
You are also right in that our experience with the deck is by a wide margin different. I don't think I'm playing bad, just when I have lackeys I have no goblins, and when I have goblins they are never very good, or never very many. When they wrath I have no tutors, I have no removal when they have dudes and I and I have guys that need to get through. It goes on, but you get the idea. I still kind of have hope for the deck, as the games where it gets rolling are pretty cool.
I also played another Karn deck earlier, but that one hardly counts, as he quit after I went turn 1 Chrome Mox, Warren Instigator, turn 2 attack, netting Siege-Gang Commander and Boggart Mob (imprinting SGC). It's good to have the potential for broken starts, even if they don't happen every time.
Doran was a simple battle of attrition. At no point was I even close to losing, despite not doing anything really broken. At one point towards the end of game 2, I had in play 4 lands, Piledriver (Skullclamped), Lightning Crafter (imprinting Warren Instigator), and Mad Auntie. My hand consisted of Warren Weirding and Lightning Bolt, and he had nothing but lands in play.
This is a good example of a game where my creatures may not be particularly good, but they're more than enough to get the job done. That's 10 damage a turn, with a lot of potential to kill anything he might cast. Even if he killed my guys, I'd still be in a fine position. Almost any random assortment of aggressive goblins can apply this kind of pressure (stuff like Goblin Tinkerer and Goblin Sharpshooter doesn't, but those are just removal spells disguised as goblins). It doesn't matter if all your guys aren't hyper-efficient attackers, because you should be able to make plenty of time for them to win, either through removal or wrath-recovery/card advantage.
Game 1 against Rofellos was hilarious. I won the roll, and saw a hand of Sparksmith, a land, and some stuff I didn't care about. I mulled a couple times, found a couple lands, played turn 2 Sparksmith, and just won (the turn 3 Goblin Sharpshooter was insult to injury). I just beat him down with random dorks while my removal guys kept him from developing any kind of board position at all. Game 2 wasn't really that different...I had removal for Rofellos the first time, removal for Rofellos the second time, and by then I had found Sparksmith. I had a more aggressive draw this time and killed him by turn 6 or so.
Game 1 against Karn I had one of the best hands I've seen--Mountain, Cabal Pit, Goblin Lackey, Aether Vial, Goblin Warchief, Imperial Seal, Cabal Slaver. Can't really complain about that. I led with Lackey, and decided to Imp Seal for Dark Confidant when I didn't draw a land. Unfortunately, he accelerated into Oblivion Stone shortly after, but I made it work. I got some pressure in with Piledriver and Slaver while he tried to build enough mana to pop the Stone. I started Skullclamping my own guys when he hit 4 mana, to recoup some card advantage (if I had found a 3rd in one of the top 6 cards I could have used Tuktuk Scrapper, but it was not to be). Anyway, I drew 8 cards total off Skullclamp, he popped Stone when he was at 11, I saved Warchief with a Vialed in Changeling Berserker, and I won shortly after with the goblins I had drawn. Game 2 I mulliganed to a terrible 5 card hand (Chandra, Wasteland, 3 other lands) and Wastelanded his turn 1 Workshop. However, I topdecked Recruiter (with 2 lands in play and 1 in hand). I went for the all-in combo pile of Warchief, Ringleader, Warren Instigator, Skirk Prospector, Kiki-Jiki, Lightning Crafter (and ended with Goblin Tinkerer and Tuktuk Scrapper, just in case). He couldn't stop it, so I went infinite on turn 6. There was nothing clunky about it, considering that I'd have to get Warchief and Ringleader anyway.
So yeah, more wins. I'm quite comfortable playing this deck by now, and it's been very consistent, at least for me. There are tons of decisions to be made in every game, but it's been my experience that everything I've played against is consistently beatable. I suppose it's possible that I'm just a better player than all my opponents, but I doubt it--several of the people I've been testing against I know to be very good players.
I tutor for card advantage engines all the time. If you've never cast Arena, you're definitely not playing the same way I do, because Arena is probably my 2nd most common tutor target (after Recruiter). If I only have access to 3 lands early on, I'll almost always get Arena to see some more cards.
Lackey/Instigator definitely don't always do broken things...but sometimes they do. Often, you can get some advantage out of them even if you don't have anything juicy, because your opponent will always assume that you do, and do their best to prevent them from hitting. Even if you only get a small boost off of Lackey, that's still a big tempo boost for a 1 drop...and if you keep it around, odds are good that you'll draw into something worth putting into play before too long.
Yep. Lots of games do hinge on Goblin Recruiter. It's the core of the deck, and the deck would be so much less powerful without it. I don't see the problem in trying to get Goblin Recruiter to do the heavy lifting against wraths and such. He's certainly not the only way to win--I win plenty of games without ever finding him. He almost always makes the win easier and more resilient though. If you're not using him as much as you possibly can, you should be using him more.
Well, having goblins for a turn 1 Lackey is somewhat luck-based (though you can tweak this a little with mulligan decisions). The others...well, you can affect these factors more than you think. The goblins vary in efficiency, but they can all be "good enough"--they all have a clock. Whether that clock is fast enough is often dependent on other factors in the game state more than the goblins themselves. Real damage races rarely happen in EDH--you either have control, and you're the one getting damage through, or you're in a losing position and need some disruption to get ahead. Any goblins can get there (though, again, don't think of stuff like Goblin Sharpshooter as real "goblins", they're actually just removal spells with synergy).
When they wrath, you ought to be able to see it coming. All Is Dust might catch you by surprise in some decks, but usually you know when there's a risk of it happening. If you always play like they have a Wrath against sweeper-based control decks, you'll almost never get blown out. You can hold back creatures, you can hold back a Bidding, you can try to get leverage out of Wort late-game...there are a lot of options. Most crucially, Recruiter doesn't really care that much about sweepers, so you can just go for the Recruiter -> Ringleader thing and find enough gas to win the game twice over.
You have lots of tutors, and you can find anything you need (even just lots of goblins, via Recruiter). If you're having trouble later on because you haven't planned for a wrath or for removal, it's very likely because of a tutoring mistake early game. This deck frequently tutors in the first couple of turns, because the mana is too tied up with goblins afterwards. Usually, you have to plan ahead with the tutors, because you probably won't need anything immediately. If you can plan ahead well enough to anticipate what you're going to be needing later, then you won't have problems. (You can also plan ahead like this even with the Plan A of Recruiter--I'll frequently toss a random Warren Weirding or Gempalm Incinerator into my stack, even if there's nothing I need to kill immediately, because I anticipate that I might need to kill something before I can win and I'm not holding removal. Often, I'm right.
A deck with this many tutors (and with the most powerful tutor ever printed at the core) can't be that inconsistent, at least by EDH standards. You do have the tools to have access to the cards you need, when you need them: you just need to have the foresight to know what you're going to need.
i cant get my hands on imperial recruiter/seal, are there other effective goblins "skirk drill sarg maybe?) to run in their place? i know they are KEY fetches, but 400$ for 2 cards is a bit much...
Standard:
Retired.
Modern:
Blitzhelix! RW
EDH (1v1): I am a jerk! RG
Tiny Leaders (1v1): BURN! R
Standard:
Retired.
Modern:
Blitzhelix! RW
EDH (1v1): I am a jerk! RG
Tiny Leaders (1v1): BURN! R
Sharuum the Hegemon
Mayael the Anima
Wort, Boggart Auntie
Sliver Overlord
Drana Kalastria Bloodchief
99 mountain Ashling
1 Wort, Boggart Auntie
Lands (38)
1 Ancient Tomb
1 Arid Mesa
1 Auntie's Hovel
1 Badlands
1 Barbarian Ring
1 Blood Crypt
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Cabal Pit
1 City of Brass
1 Dragonskull Summit
1 Graven Cairns
1 Lavaclaw Reaches
1 Marsh Flats
7 Mountain
1 Mutavault
1 Polluted Delta
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Strip Mine
1 Sulfurous Springs
6 Swamp
1 Tainted Peak
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Volrath's Stronghold
1 Wasteland
1 Wooded Foothills
Creatures (31)
1 Bloodghast
1 Boggart Harbinger
1 Cabal Slaver
1 Dark Confidant
1 Earwig Squad
1 Frogtosser Banneret
1 Gempalm Incinerator
1 Goblin Chieftain
1 Goblin King
1 Goblin Lackey
1 Goblin Matron
1 Goblin Piledriver
1 Goblin Recruiter
1 Goblin Ringleader
1 Goblin Ruinblaster
1 Goblin Settler
1 Goblin Sharpshooter
1 Goblin Warchief
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
1 Lightning Crafter
1 Mad Auntie
1 Moggcatcher
1 Mogg War Marshal
1 Murderous Redcap
1 Siege Gang Commander
1 Skirk Prospector
1 Slavering Nulls
1 Stingscourger
1 Tuktuk Scrapper
1 Warren Instigator
1 Blood Moon
1 Leyline of the Void
1 Phyrexian Arena
Planeswalkers (1)
1 Sorin Markov
Spells (19)
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Duress
1 Fodder Launch
1 Hero's Demise
1 Hymn to Tourach
1 Imperial Seal
1 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Living Death
1 Nameless Inversion
1 Night's Whisper
1 Patriarch's Bidding
1 Persecute
1 Shattering Spree
1 Shred Memory
1 Tarfire
1 Terminate
1 Thoughtseize
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Warren Weirding
Artifacts (7)
1 Aether Vial
1 Chrome Mox
1 Null Rod
1 Skullclamp
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Umezawa's Jitte
The following are cards that aren't good enough for the main deck but might be added depending on the current meta. I keep all of these as a pseudo sideboard in-between tournaments. Cursed Totem, Darkblast, and Magus of the Moon are the most common changes. Blood Moon, Inquisition, Leyline, and Tormod's are the cards most frequently taken out of the main deck.
This is using the original post list, his deck might have changed since then.
-Boggart Mob
-Chandra Nalaar
-Changeling Berserker
-Imperial Recruiter
-Goblin Wizard
-Magus of the Moon
-Lightning Bolt
-Liliana Vess
-Sparksmith
+ Hero's Demise
+ Bloodghast
+ City of Brass
+ Hymn to Tourach
+ Leyline of the Void
+ Null Rod
+ Persecute
+ Tainted Peak (Why aren't you playing this, Khy?)
+ Tormod's Crypt
There's some subtle differences between how Khymera and I built our decks. Obviously 90% of the goblins are shoe-ins, as well as many of the Black/Red spells. The big difference is that he plays more aggro cards where I prefer disruption. I don't think the buff goblins are altogether necessary, though they do considerably reduce your clock. In my meta it's necessary to play the disruption because the increased clock time doesn't matter when the other play combos out to win (especially when most of those combos clear my board, particularly Iname).
Persecute, City of Brass, Tainted Peak, and Hymn have all been great, especially Persecute. Hero's Demise has been OK, but not amazing. Worth keeping, though. Bloodghast has done well in my limited testing (Bloodghast + Skullclamp is retarded) but I still need to play with it some more.
I really need the grave hate in my meta. Just about every single deck abuses the grave (myself not excluded), so having all these effects is pretty much necessary. Some examples: Evergreen's Iname deck, mutedequilibrium's Jaya deck (Shard Phoenix and Jaya+Squee are especially good against Wort), Sharuum, Braids, Rofellos (Genesis/Survival). Having both Tormod's and Leyline is kind of nice because I can use a tutor for Tormod's and have a free spell to stop the combos, but turn 1 Leyline is great, as well.
There's enough artifacts and equipment in our meta to make Null Rod worthwhile. Additionally, it's a great lock against Iname with Leyline in play (the only way out is hardcasting spirits or All is Dust, which Evergreen doesn't play).
Current things I'm considering changing:
Volrath's Stronghold, Cabal Pit, Barbarian Ring -> ?, ?, ?
At the moment I'm not bothered by taking 1 for the mana, but I have never activated either of these lands; it's either not needed or I don't have Threshold. My meta is currently devoid of blue-based control decks, so Stronghold has not been spectacular, either. These will all likely stay in until I can find better nonbasics. I was considering another man land for Stronghold, probably Mishra's Factory. Barbarian Ring could likely stay, but I don't like losing the black mana from Cabal Pit under Blood Moon/Magus.
Patriarch's Bidding -> Balthor, the Defiled
A bit cheaper and has legs. I don't think the creature type clause is altogether amazing considering that Balthor's color clause is probably going to be more one-sided in the majority of games. I'm pretty sure about this change but I haven't tested Balthor yet.
Murderous Redcap -> ?
Haven't decided what should go in this slot but Redcap has been generally lackluster in most of my games. I have plenty of removal besides him, so I think I could find another creature for <4cc that's more useful.
Sorin Markov -> Liliana Vess or ?
I really can't decide which of these should be in the deck. I've never actually resolved Sorin so I want to give him more of a chance before I cut him. The main problem is that with a good aggro and combo gameplan I rarely actually need Sorin. The other problem is that by the time he comes out the opponent may very well have lost close to 20 life; the effect of that ability is greatly lessened. On top of that I have a very competitive meta that is high on land destruction and prison strategies; triple black (or six mana in general) can be a challenge. I'm still giving him a chance, but I feel like I will eventually cut him.
Stingscourger -> ?
Has been generally lame for me. Most situations I get it I'd rather it just be a burn spell to take out a creature, or another tutor, etc. Going to test it a bit more, but I feel it's one of the weakest Goblins in the deck.
d.g
I don't agree with all of your choices, but it's definitely possible that they make sense for your meta. Tormod's Crypt and Leyline of the Void are two cards that I really, really don't want to play in this deck--they contribute absolutely nothing towards your own gameplan, and only truly effective against a handful of decks in this format (though it's not very representative, only about 25% of the decks in my 1v1 compendium really care about graveyard hate, and that's excluding several other good decks that don't use the graveyard, like Jhoira, and Zur).
If half of your games are against Iname or Sharuum, I guess it makes sense for you, but I don't think it's a good choice at all for a varied meta (also, you really shouldn't need these against decks like Jaya or Rofellos. The recursion they're capable of isn't consistent enough or scary enough to be worth running such 1-dimensional cards.)
I don't see any particular need for Null Rod in a red deck. I have so many cards to destroy artifacts, including several that can take out multiple artifacts. There usually isn't anything important left on the board to nullify. Also, the splash damage from Null Rod on ourselves is not insignificant--we don't have too many artifacts, but the ones we do have are quite important. Again, I guess if you play nothing but Iname and Sharuum it's okay, but I don't think it's very strong even there (Iname plays Null Rod itself...). I would not play this here.
Hymn to Tourach and Persecute are both fine. I've been testing Hymn and will probably officially add it to my list soon. I'm not sure how much I like Persecute here...I play it in some other decks, and to be honest it disappoints me much more often than not. I play against quite a few 5-color and artifact-centric decks, and even against 2-color decks I find that it often only gets a card or two. 4 mana is also when this deck hits critical mass with the goblins--I'd rather be establishing board presence during these early turns.
Inquisition of Kozilek is crap in this deck. The cards I'm concerned about when I play this deck almost exclusively cost 4 or more mana (usually I want to take sweepers or debilitating enchantments like Humility or Night of Soul's Betrayal). I'm completely opposed to playing a discard spell that will often be unable to hit the only relevant card in an opponent's hand.
Hero's Demise is usually worse than Lightning Bolt, in my opinion. Most generals that demand spot removal die to Lightning Bolt as easily as Hero's Demise. Lightning Bolt is more efficient for that purpose, but, more crucially it also takes out key non-legendary creatures. I frequently use it to kill stuff like Dark Confidant and Mother of Runes. Between Warren Weirding, Fodder Launch, and Gempalm Incinerator, it's usually not too difficult to kill bigger legends in the late-game. Lightning Bolt is just more versatile overall. Flame Slash is better than Hero's Demise too (though sorcery speed makes it not quite as good as Bolt).
Bloodghast seems...okayish. Not exciting. It's only any good with Skullclamp, which is not usually a card I frequently tutor for in this deck. I guess I'd probably tutor for it if I had Bloodghast, but at that point I'm stuck with a useless spirit if I don't have a spare tutor. Frankly, I think Bitterblossom would be a much better choice if you really want a buddy for Skullclamp...but I played Bitterblossom for a while, and found it wanting overall. There's not enough other synergies for this little combo to work well here.
Tainted Peak is terrible. All the Tainted lands are. It's not a true dualland at all. Look at this way: if you don't have a swamp, it's horrible. If you do have a swamp, you're relatively unlikely to need more black mana (the first is by far the most important), so it's hardly better than a mountain at that point. I would rather just play another Mountain any day--when Tainted Peak is good, a Mountain is just as good 90% of the time, and when Tainted Peak is bad (which is reasonably often) a Mountain is much better.
I don't like City of Brass here, though it's not terrible. I just don't think that the difference between 1 more dualland and a basic makes much difference with the current manabase. It's already robust enough. In a normal meta (i.e., not ALL combo), the number of games that you lose to City of Brass will be non-negligible, as this deck does a fair amount of self-inflicted damage. The last game I played, I won with 7 life remaining. If my first land had been City of Brass, I could easily have lost because of the extra damage. The risk outweighs the reward, I feel.
As for the cards you're not playing...
The "buff" champion goblins Changeling Berserker and Boggart Mob are probably better than you think. They're definitely much better than I expected before testing them. I initially added Changeling Berserker mostly because I wanted to try a second Goblin Ally to go with Tuktuk Scrapper...and it's okay for that, but the combination of champion + strong attacker has proven very potent, and far trickier than you'd expect. Every time I drew it, Changeling Berserker was doing something great for me--it's actually one of the best cards in the deck for dealing with sweepers. I've frequently been able to force a sweeper just by playing it out there...no one can really afford to take many hits from it, so they have to deal with it quickly or lose. And when they do, you get a good goblin back, ready to rebuild. Championing something like Siege-Gang Commander or even Goblin Lackey is a really solid play, and is incredibly hard for most decks to deal with.
Also, the champions are ridiculously good with Aether Vial, Kiki-Jiki, or Moggcatcher, essentially countering anything your opponent tries to do to stop you and leaving you in a good position no matter what happens. I was so impressed with the many uses of Changeling Berserker that I added Boggart Mob too, and I haven't regretted it at all. It simply wins if it's not dealt with quickly, and even if it is dealt with, it leaves you in a pretty good position. It's really easy to underestimate these guys--I certainly did, at first. They are great aggro cards...but they're a lot more than that as well. I think you may need to actually try them out to get a sense for how well they work.
I'm assuming Imperial Recruiter is cut for availability reasons? I don't see any other reason to cut it.
Cutting Magus of the Moon seems wrong for most metas, though you do seem to play against predominantly mono-colored decks. The effect just wins enough games for me that I'm loathe to cut it, especially as I play Imperial Recruiter (Imp Recruiter and Magus both get significantly better if you have the other one in the deck).
Chandra Nalaar and Liliana Vess are reasonable cuts, though I'm fond of them. I like them for the degree of inevitability they provide, which is something that tends to be lacking in an aggro deck like this. They do cost more than we really want to be paying though.
I've had a few really good experiences with Goblin Wizard, including at least 2 games he definitely won for me. He is somewhat narrow in his use and so is potentially okay to cut, but both abilities are deceptively useful. Curving Warchief into Wizard is really good, and he speeds you up by at least one turn when you're trying to combo off of Recruiter. He also stops quite a bit of removal, and occasionally makes your guys unblockable or into invincible blockers. Niche uses, to be sure, but still a lot of uses for one card.
I really like Sparksmith. It's frankly the best card in the deck against Rofellos, Braids, Arcum, guys like that. I didn't play it for a while, but now I think it's just too good to pass up. He single-handedly wins games against several competitive archetypes.
You're also not playing Sensei's Divining Top or Goblin Tinkerer. I don't see any reason not to run SDT, unless you're going by the time-sensitive tournament list where it's banned. It helps smooth out the mana a great deal, and is part of why I'm comfortable running 2 less lands than you (if anything, I get flooded more than I get screwed...). I've covered the pros and cons of Tinkerer elsewhere in this thread, but I'm still quite satisfied with him overall.
As for changes you're considering:
It's funny...I played 4 games before writing this (2 against Azusa and 2 against Niv-Mizzet), to take a fresh look at some of the cards you brought up. I went 4-0 (though Azusa is actually a really tough matchup and I was lucky to win). A few of the cards you're considering cutting were instrumental to these games: Sorin Markov almost single-handedly won me game 2 against Azusa, Stingscourger helped me win game 1 against both Azusa and Niv-Mizzet, and Murderous Redcap was the card I needed to win game 2 against Niv-Mizzet (I actually Moggcatcher'd for it). All of these cards are somewhat niche in their uses...but they definitely have valuable, unique uses.
Volrath's Stronghold would be a reasonable cut. I almost never use it...but I don't think I've ever lost a game because of it not producing colored mana either. There are a few situations where it could potentially be of game-winning use, so I'm basically keeping it around just in case.
I don't see any real reason to cut Cabal Pit and Barbarian Ring. I've used them both a few times on important targets. I've never lost a game because they weren't basics. They shouldn't really be thought of as removal...but occasionally they are very useful. Also, while I never count on my opponent misplaying, I find that a lot of people don't pay much attention to lands late-game. I've had quite a few people make really bad plays against me because they either forgot I had the land + threshold, or they were hoping that I had forgotten. The benefit from these is pretty significant when it happens, and the risk is pretty slight. (Cabal Pit going red under Blood Moon has never been an issue for me. It's just something you take into account before playing Blood Moon, and plan accordingly.)
I'm pretty certain that this is not a good call. It's true that Balthor's effect is, if anything, probably a little better on the whole, but he's definitely not cheaper. I've tested him a bit, and it is almost always a mistake to play him and pass without activating him (or at least with mana up). He effectively costs 7 mana, which is just too high. You have to protect him, so his having legs is not really relevant. The cheaper cost on Patriarch's Bidding is much more important. I've also tested Twilight's Call, which, as you might expect, is better than Balthor and worse than Bidding, being costed between them. Overall, I think that Living Death and 1 other mass reanimation spell is the right number, and Patriarch's Bidding is the clear winner due to its cheaper cost.
You can never have too much removal, especially when it's a goblin. Redcap is definitely pretty unexciting, but he's just solid in a lot of ways. He's removal (at least once, often more), and he plays very nicely with cards like Skullclamp, Skirk Prospector/Siege-Gang Commander, and Moggcatcher. He's rarely great when you draw him, but he's never that bad, and sometimes he's just what you need.
Sorin is a win condition unto himself. He's here mostly as a late-game tutor target when you haven't been able to make much of a dent in your opponent. He can take someone from very comfortable to just a turn or two away from death instantly. It's true that he's not useful in a large majority of your wins...but the games he does win you are usually the ones that you have no business winning. He steals games, and I think that's a worthwhile use of a slot.
Stingscourger is basically a tempo card. It's true that he's fairly mediocre much of the time, but at least he's very rarely useless. He's also excellent value with Skullclamp. The reason I keep him around though is that sometimes he can answer threats none of your other goblins can. If you need to deal with a creature with toughness greater than 5, your opponent has other creatures, and you're not swimming in goblins, Stingscourger is your only easily tutorable/recurrable way to do so. This situation doesn't occur very often...but when it does, it's usually a creature that you REALLY need to deal with, or lose. It also has a nice interaction with Wort, letting you tie up that creature indefinitely. It's not a card that you really want to use, but sometimes it's the card that you have to use. Stingscourger is similar to Sorin in that sometimes it wins you games that you probably don't deserve to win.
Main Decks
Diaochan, Iroas, God of Victory, Kaalia, Marton, Ulasht, Volrath,
Kaervek, Prossh, Titania
Amusing or Themed
Progenitus
Pauper Guildmages
Azorius Boros Dimir Golgari Gruul Izzet Korozda
Orzhov Rakdos Rix Maadi Selesyna Simic Skarrg Zameck
I also play Weiss Schwarz, Chaos, Vanguard and Wixoss.
Accel World, Angel Beats, Familiar of Zero, Gargantia on the Verdurous Planet, Guilty Crown, Kill La Kill, Robotics;Notes, Sword Art Online.
Chaos Partners
Arpeggio of Blue Steel: Iona, Kirishima, Kongou.
Dangan Ronpa: Asahina, Togami.
Freezing: Vibration: Chiffon, Satelizer.
Vanguard Clans Favoured
Angel Feather, Dark Irregulars, Genesis, Neonecter, Pale Moon, Shadow Paladins, Tachikaze.
Wixoss - Just trial decks for now!
Heya,
I don't really like the warzone, and spikeshot I am kind of iffy on. However, I am really debating getting wardriver in, can be a great tutor target when pushing damage is the path to victory...
how has spikeshot and warzone been working for you?
Standard:
Retired.
Modern:
Blitzhelix! RW
EDH (1v1): I am a jerk! RG
Tiny Leaders (1v1): BURN! R