Recently I was checking the German event coverages on mor...

[g0dzillA]

Heh... I think the vast majority of the deck could be replaced with goblins and it would be a strictly better deck. Let's pretend for a moment that maindecked REBs and the deck's sideboard (including Naturalize) are what made it possible for it to take 1st in a competitive tournament, since the rest is basically just fat and burn.

Working under this assumption, how is a decklist like, say, this one not strictly superior?

Creatures:

4x Goblin Lackey
4x Goblin Cadet
4x Mogg Fanatic
4x Kird Ape
4x Goblin Piledriver
3x Siege-Gang Commander

Spells:

4x Lightning Bolt
4x Chain Lightning
4x Incinerate
4x Goblin Grenade
4x Red Elemental Blast

Lands:

5x Mountain
4x Taiga
4x Wooded Foothills
4x Bloodstained Mire

SB:

4 Gorilla Shaman
4 Naturalize
4 Pyrostatic Pillar
3 Crash

It's got the REBs, the Naturalizes, the Mox Monkies, etc., but it's much faster, much more consistent, and has much more direct damage. The only thing the R/G Stompy version has going for it is that its creatures have trample, which should be irrelevant in a competitive Type 1 meta. Any thoughts?

[Comrade Seraph]

I'll tell you one thing the initial deck list has over yours; goblins are the sukc vs. fire/ice, esp. on scepter. 3 toughness makes fire look bad.

Trample isn't usually very relevant but can come in very handy against those naughty little DoJ tokens.

I agree that most of the time the gob-list is superior, but I actually think the G/R stomp may have more game vs Keeper and esp. Chronic.

4 main deck REBs in the Gob-list is bad against most of the field. Those should be 4 Grim Lavamancers... fetch-chomping goodness.

[g0dzillA]

The only reason I included maindecked REBs was to illustrate the similarity to the originally posted deck. Frankly, I can't understand how the originally posted decklist did so well. The only conclusion can be that, as you suggested, the player expected to see a lot of Blue-based Control, thus maindeck REBs. They're only included in my list to prove a point.

As for what to replace if you took the REBs out of the maindeck, I'd yank 4 Fetches and 4 REBs for 4 Mountains and 4 Fireblast. Fireblast provides a much better finisher than Lavamancer. He's good in a predominantly green list with only 4 bolts, but in a deck already packing as much burn as this one, the extra damage provided by Fireblasts are superior, in my opinion.

Of course, at that rate, you might as well just make it mono red, and go:

-8 Fetches
-4 Kird Ape
-4 REB

+8 Mountain
+4 Jackal Pup
+4 Fireblast

...which is pretty much the standard Goblin Sligh build. It loses Naturalize, but gains resilience to non-basic hate. In any case, that's getting a little off topic. The decklist I posted was simply an illustration of a seemingly superior build. You're right though; assuming a Keeper-filled meta, it's much more understandable why the G/r deck did so well.

[SamuraiMike]

I think the important thing is to determine what this deck does that mono-green stompy doesn't.  Why would a person choose R/G over G?  Mono-green tends to be rather bad in most metagames right now (luckily, mine is a metagame where it's good   ).  Is R/G better?  If so, is it better by a large enough margin?

In order to determine the effectiveness of this deck we need to ask:
1.) Who is this deck good against?
2.) Who is this deck bad against?
3.) How consistent is the deck?

Answer those three questions and I think you will know whether the deck will work for you.  For example, here's my analysis of mono-green Stompy:

1.) Who is this deck good against? (Ankh Sligh, Keeper, Hulk, Weenie decks, most blue decks)
2.) Who is this deck bad against? (All combo, bigger creature decks, Stax/MUD)
3.) How consistent is the deck? (Very)

Now we look at my metagame.  Hmmm, Ankh Sligh, Goblin Sligh, Keeper, and bad blue control decks are common.  Combo, Stax and MUD are almost non-existent and the combo that exists gets destroyed by maindeck Null Rod.  In  this analysis Stompy's a winner!

We need to answer these same three questions for R/G builds, and then see how they fit the metagame we play in.

[g0dzillA]

At a glance, I'd say that the R/G build remains just as strong against all of the strong matchups you listed for Stompy, (even stronger against blue-based with the maindecked REBs), but has a much better matchup against Workshop.dec and combo (due largely in part to Gorilla Shaman and Pyrostatic Pillar in the side), and is much less likely to be screwed by Chalice for the same reasons. Both decks still have bad matchups against bigger creatures, but aside from Madness, the only upper-Tier aggro decks packing bigger creatures are TnT and Mask, both of which are a better matchup for R/G because of its sideboard.

In summation, R/G retains all the strong matchups that Stompy has, but has much stronger matchups against much of the rest of the field. Its only real disadvantage is succeptibility to non-basic hate, which in most metas won't be significant enough to outweigh its advantages.

[Binary]

I think the way to go here is to drop the two Blood Lust for two MD Naturalize, and replace those two sideboard slots with two Rack and Ruin. (At this point, you could probably afford to trim a Mox Monkey or two as well...)

Having access to both Naturalize and R&R gives you two different answers to Chalice X=1, neither of which actually cost 1 mana which is the bulk of your deck.

Having two Naturalize MD also gives you a chance of keeping your head above water a bit longer in the Dragon matchup.

[CAMooSE]

I really don't think the deck posted is the best r/g build to go with, i agree with everyone that said it was heavily teched aginst the metagame.  Here's what i believe to be, a bit stronger build.

// Lands
    4  Taiga
    4  Wooded Foothills
    4  Forest

// Creatures
    4  Rogue Elephant
    4  Skyshroud Elite
    4  Grim Lavamancer
    4  Kird Ape
    4  River Boa
    4  Quirion Ranger

// Spells
    4  Land Grant
    4  Briar Shield
    4  Giant Growth
    4  Rancor
    4  Lightning Bolt
    2  Winter Orb
    2  Naturalize

// Sideboard
SB: 2  Naturalize
SB: 4  Pyrostatic Pillar
SB: 4  Red Elemental Blast
SB: 2  Null Rod
SB: 3  Gorilla Shaman (1)

There are alot of things that could be changed to suit the meta, but this is one of the most efficent builds i have made.  

I don't know why quirion ranger wasn't in the build posted.  Like you guys said, it was very succeptable to nonbasic hate, this build isn't because of ranger.  The ranger is one of my favorite cards, it helps vs nonbasic hate.  It gets more mana, and untaps creatures in order to block.