Goblins Deck Does Well in a Big Tournament

August 21, 2012 | Posted by Dee

While browsing on MTG Salvation Forums, I found out that a Goblins deck did well in a big tournament earlier this month.

Three weekends ago, Jason Pongonis got 32nd place out of 629 players at the Starcitygames Standard Open in Washington, D.C. His record over ten rounds was 7-2-1 (seven wins, two losses, and one draw) and he earned a prize of $100.

I made a few changes to the deck and then I tested it for a couple of matches. It’s really explosive. It can kill very quickly with the haste and buff abilities of Goblin Chieftain.

Also, Goblin Grenade deals a ton of damage for just one mana so you can easily burn out your opponent once he gets low on life.

Krenko, Mob Boss helps you win the long game because he can generate a massive horde of Goblin tokens very quickly. Check out the decklist I’ve been playing below.

Mono Red Goblins
Creatures (22)
Spells (16)
Lands (22)
Sideboard (15)

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The only changes I made were:

+2 Brimstone Volley
-2 Burn at the Stake

+2 Cavern of Souls
-2 Mountain

On the forums, Jason said that Burn at the Stake was bad so I replaced it with Brimstone Volley.

He also noted that he wanted one more Cavern of Souls. He only had two in his original list. I felt like 18 Mountain was more than enough to cast the non-creature spells and activate Spikeshot Elder’s ability so I went with the full playset of the Avacyn Restored land.

The deck has 12 one-drop creatures to take advantage of Goblin Wardriver and Goblin Chieftain. With many cheap Goblins, you have a good chance of having another creature for the battle cry ability of Wardriver when he attacks on turn three.

Sometimes you’re able to play three one-drops by turn two and then swing for eight on turn three after casting Chieftain.

Goblin Arsonist combos well with Goblin Grenade. If I need to kill a one-toughness creature like Avacyn Pilgrim or a freshly played Delver of Secrets, I will often sac Arsonist to Grenade. For only one mana, this play kills my opponent’s creature and deals five damage to him.

Goblin Fireslinger gives the deck a way to deal damage without attacking. Also, it’s decent at taking down planeswalkers.

Spikeshot Elder is similar to Fireslinger. It costs mana to use but you can hit creatures unlike Fireslinger. I had one game against Blue/Green (UG) Infect where Spikeshot Elder dominated.

My opponent had Wild Defiance on the board but he had to spend instants on my turn to save his Blighted Agent because I kept pinging it with the Goblin. With this play, he couldn’t alpha strike on his turn because he didn’t have enough cards to use with Wild Defiance.

With the increase of power from Wardriver and Chieftain, you can deal more than one damage with Spikeshot Elder’s ability because it’s based on his power. Sometimes you’ll hit six mana and be able to activate his ability twice a turn.

Goblin Chieftain is definitely the best card in the deck. He gives your team haste, which makes the deck much faster. The haste ability from the Goblin lord is especially good with Krenko because you can start generating Goblin tokens right away and they can attack in the same turn.

Chieftain’s buff ability is very good with Krenko’s Command and Krenko because these cards give you multiple Goblin creatures. The two token generators are also good at giving you a lot of Goblin fodder for Goblin Grenade.

With the popularity of Zombies decks, Pillar of Flame is a great way to neutralize Gravecrawler and Geralf’s Messenger. It’s cheap so it can take out Birds of Paradise or Delver of Secrets on turn one.

I like the 2/2 split between Arc Trail and Brimstone Volley. Arc Trail is good against aggro while Brimstone Volley helps you deal the last couple points of damage against control at a low cost of three mana.

Goblin Grenade turns on morbid very well for Brimstone Volley. You can also Arc Trail a one toughness Goblin to achieve morbid while hitting your opponent for two damage.

If you like fast decks that can kill quickly, I recommend this deck for Standard tournaments like FNM (Friday Night Magic).

Filed Under Standard 

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7 Responses to “Goblins Deck Does Well in a Big Tournament”

  1. Jason Pongonis on August 21st, 2012 2:04 pm

    Thanks for featuring my deck. In hindsight I feel that I was very lucky in my matches at the SCG Open. I playtested the deck on MTGO for a few weeks after and I hit a lot more of the decks that are really hard for this to deal with. It certainly is a great choice for FnM, but I wouldn’t play it again at an Open event unless I did much more testing. I have a love for mono red though and I typically have done well with it in the past (Top 8 Baltimore June 2011). One thing that should be considered is Bonfire in maindeck instead of the volley. I didn’t play it because there are very few matches where you can bonfire for much more than 2-3 at most (with a lucky miracle). Brimstone seems to fit the curve a bit better. As Dee said though, this deck is extremely fast and if Krenko goes unanswered (especially with a Chieftain in play) its usually GG.

  2. Kevin on August 22nd, 2012 10:26 am

    What about something like Hellrider? Would that fit in well? If so, what would be removed to fit it in?

  3. Dee on August 22nd, 2012 8:20 pm

    Hellrider is good. I think it could be better than one or both of the Brimstone Volleys.

  4. Felipe Augusto on August 23rd, 2012 9:40 am

    Missing Torpor Orb! Breaks the current environment!

  5. matt on October 31st, 2012 12:46 pm

    I was thinking of throwint dynacharges in here. would you consider it? for 3 mana all your goblins get +2 / 0 when you attack, and with a goblin army, that can be quite nice.

  6. Dee on October 31st, 2012 1:20 pm

    @ matt

    That seems good. :)

  7. matt on November 2nd, 2012 12:36 pm

    also, taking my limited knowledge of goblin decks, i was curious, upon reading what some other people have been doing, your thoughts on goblin shortcutters?

    “Think of it this way, turn 2 you play Warren Instigator. Your opponent has no removal so summons a chump blocker, or worse, something that would eat Instigator alive. Turn 3 you play Shortcutter. Blocker rendered useless and you have a chieftain/siege-gang commander for free.

    Other situations such as your opponent having that 1 monster thats getting in the way. Chances are that 1 blocker could stop you winning the game this turn, and we all know that goblins need to win in as few turns as possible. This guy can render that blocker useless and you can win there and then. ”

    shortcutter is a 2 mana, 2/1 that has “when enters the battlefield, target creature cant block this turn”

    warren instigator is a 2 mana 1/1 with Double strike
    and has
    Whenever Warren Instigator deals damage to an opponent, you may put a Goblin creature card from your hand onto the battlefield.”

    which means with the double strike you can literally plop down 2 freebies from your hand.

    thoughts?