Budget Food Chain Goblins

[Rastadon]

Can it be?! A budget deck that can actually be good in type one?! Erm, well...Not mine. Some suggestions?

Goblins:
4 Gempalm Incinerator
2 Gempalim Incinerators
2 Goblin Matron
4 Goblin Piledriver
4 Goblin Recruiter
4 Goblin Ringleader
1 Goblin Sharpshooter
3 Goblin Warchief
4 Goblin Warchief
2 Siege-Gang Commander
1 Siege-Gang Commander
4 Skirk Prospector
4 Goblin Lackey

Mana
3 Mountain
1 Strip Mine
4 Wasteland
4 Taiga
4 Wooded Foothills
2 Ancient Tomb
1 Forest
4 Karp Forest

Accelerators:
1 Chrome Mox
1 Lotus Petal
4 Elvish Spirit Guide

Other:
4 Food Chain

I just realized that Lackey was kinda cruicial. What should I take out for it?
Re-edited the decklist to accomodate the lackey and cut out the Karp Forests. I still can't play Ringleader for all it's card advantage due to the mana. What should I do? Test the deck out to see what I mean.

[dend51]

Are proxies allowed in your tourneys?

as far as what do take out you should really start and take out some of the lands, you have 23 lands. that is way too much for goblins. take out the karp forest and depending on your meta wastelands as well. you could play with some but you objective is to win fast. and in place of the wastelands put a forest and 2 mountains.try gemstone mines as well for the wastes but you do need one forest to be fetched if you are afraid of wastes(whatever you feel is better for you). you should be playing with 21-23 mana sources and about 15-17 lands. The ESGs are good only if you cant proxie power and the only power you need are 2 moxen and a lotus. if you can put in a mana crypt (speed).

for creature base, you have too many gempalms. drop that down to 1 or 2. you can now add your lackeys since you took out lands as well. that is the standard creature base. I do not run a sharpshooter or a siege-gang (my store does not need it), i am looking more into putting the sharpshooter back in.

As for answers, i run two maindecked Red blasts and have for the past 2 years, i was really afraid of blue. I also run 1-2 berserks depending on what i think will be at a tourney, you have the green and the best creature for it just in case you need a quick unseen win. a nice 26/2 trample pro blue goblin running around makes you feel good and the person you are playing just stare. i will post my list(i am at work right now so i dont have it)

[Razgreiz]

I always thought that Seige Gang commander was one of the best goblins.  I myself haven't played foodchain gobo's or any vintage gobo deck, but I think its good and it might be a good idea to put more in.  Another thing, Goblin warchief is excellent for a low budget gobo deck since its only uncommon and is amazing.  Its true that you definitly need lackey, 23 lands is too much, I think you need at most like 20, if not less.  I think one idea is to cut out some karpulsan forests, unless your metagame includes 7/10's too much.  But try to cut down lands for lackey.  Having a lackey in your hand means you don't need as much land to put insane goblins down.  This will also make your chrome mox more efficient, since having 23 lands makes your imprint choices just 3 card more limited than having 20.

[Rastadon]

THANK YOU! Wow, I knew Lackey was great, but I wouldn't expect 2nd turn Siege gang + Piledriver. Thanks so freakin' much, the deck is much better and far more reliable now.

I kinda got a seperate issue though. When I'm not comboing off, Ringleader is a kinda dead card. I usually don't have the mana for it. How do you guys usually play Ringleader, by hardcasting it for all 4? Play it off a Lackey? I don't know, Seething Song? My deck's mana base still needs work.

Also, is it just me or is goblin matron kinda blech?

[dend51]

I never usually hard cast a ringleader, the only thing they are good for is the draw and then sacking it for 5 mana. sometimes in bad games you have to hard cast it when you need better/cheaper goblins in your hand. the matron is not great but it is a searcher for the missing piece of goblin when you need it. but as far as your question goes on ringleader he is a dead draw for most situations. Did your proxie power? do your tournies not proxy? and the crypt? Seathing song is not great but i have seen some people play with it but not in Type 1 or at least in the better foodchain decks.

[The Chosen One]

If there is no proxies allowed, I would run some pentad prism in your deck. With r/g mana available to cast it, it gives you a 2 mana advantage next turn. Also, lackeys are essential to goblin. Funny note: firewhip on lackey=tap to deal 1 dmg and drop phat goblin. I would drop the prospectors for lackeys (if you can get your hands on some). Good luck

[The Chosen One]

also with being able to matron the incinerators into your hand, you minght as well cut them to 2. And fill those spaces with maybe some more matrons.

[Razgreiz]

I thought about it a bit more, I don't think seething song goes in your deck.  I just realized that you have skirk prospectors, which shuld help you mana accel enuf that you don't need seething songs.  Incinerators are really good, I know you can Matron them in your hand, but I would keep at least 3 since they are excellent against things like welder.  Your mana base does need a lot of work, I'm starting to think that the 1 lotus petal shuldn't be there.  Ring leaders are still very good even if your not trying to combo.  It gives you a 2/2 with haste and almost ancestral recall's you every time it comes into play.  I know 4 mana is hard to cast in your deck, which is why maybe you should cut it down to 3.  This will also give you more room for lackeys.  Just remember that your foodchain combo is probably going to be your alternate win condition most of the time.

[Rastadon]

I forgot to update the decklist for when I put in the lackeys, so there it is. Sorry 'bout that, you guys were giving advice on cards I already had taken out. My bad. I KNOW this deck has giant holes in it, here's a few cards that I'm having problems with:

Goblin Matron (When I don't have food chain out, it's a dead card)
Ancient Tomb (Just never seems to get me the right amount/color of mana, but great for comboing off)
Goblin Ringleader (Previously adressed)
Elvish Spirit Guide (Combined with the 5 strip lands, that's one screwy mana base)

Oh and by the way, thank you to whoever suggested 1x Forest. Brilliant idea vs Wastelands.

[Mark_Story]

From playing FCG extensively in the past I can see a few more holes in the deck.  The ringleaders can be dead in your hand, however, FCG is not a fast combo deck (not faster than good combo decks at least)  Without ringleaders you remove the primary way of comboing out.   You can stack your deck all you want with recruiters, it will do you no good if you can't draw all those goblins at once.  Also recognizing that ringleader is the primary way of drawing cards, will make you want to play it.  Goblins don't play any card draw.  There is no ancestral, gifts or thirst to put you ahead in the card race.   You will need every card you can off that ringleader, as you have no way of gaining card advantage outside of him and cycling an incinerator. Lastly without ringleaders you seriously are in danger of running out of gas, as you dump your hand.

Other things I would change, remove a siege-gang for kiki-jiki.  He's retarded in the deck, if he gets in play you can do so many abusive things its not fair.  (especially if your opponents let you copy their creatures!)  copying a piledriver, or a seige-gang is truly not nice.

Also I would advise against playing a forest, solely for the fact that it doesn't make R.  A lot of the goblins cost double red.  Last thing you want to draw when you need to drop a warchief is a friggin forest.  I think with more time you will find that the most aggravating card in the deck.  Also the deck needs one green mana once.  The Taiga's should be more then plentiful for that.  And with no ringleaders, the deck runs little to no chance of comboing with food chain.  If you aren't going to play ringleaders, there is absolutely no need for the forest or taiga to even be played, as the deck can't use food chain properly.

Check through the archives on the forums and find the primer.  The deck hasn't changed much since then.  Vegeta's primer is an excellent resource, explaining card choices, and how to stack the deck with recruiter once you have a chain in play.

[dend51]

Other things I would change, remove a siege-gang for kiki-jiki.  He's retarded in the deck, if he gets in play you can do so many abusive things its not fair.  (especially if your opponents let you copy their creatures!)

Kiki does not allow you to copy anything but your own creatures, but i have played with him, the cast cost is kinda rough but he is good if you still have more goblins coming out for the combo and are out of ringleaders. Or, if you do cast him without combo he is also just good to have an extra anything in the deck for the most part.

Also I would advise against playing a forest, solely for the fact that it doesn't make R.

as far as the forest goes it is to help with the mono-blue or any deck that is going to waste your tiaga. i think the last thing you would want is to only have non-basics out against most T1 decks. it is only to fetch and sometimes you do get caught with it and you need a red but hey that is life.

for the deck there are just cards you need four of and ringleader is one of them so i agree with mark_story on that, and i think most foodchain players would agree.

another non-green card that could be used to finish someone off is Fling, just throw your piledrivers at them and that will hurt twice as much. (other than berserk since it is mostly off-color)
good luck with the build

[Rastadon]

I tested out Kiki. It works like a charm in this deck. Double a piledriver, double a seige gang, double a lackey, double anthing you want. With all the CIP effects this deck has it's amazing.

I decided to cut the 2 Ancient Tombs. The mana base is rocky enough without adding colorless lands that mana burn me. I need red mana more than anything, so when I use it I get 2 damage PLUS the other 1 colorless mana I didn't use. I like my build a whole lot better, it consistently wins on turn 4, combo on turn 3. Ringleaders are a whole lot more accessible now. I don't know why, but  I can now hardcast Ringleaders.

I cut the Forest because people here don't play wastelands. Plus I found that it tripped me up too much.

Fling sounds like a decent idea. I'll check it out.

I read the primer and I'm interested about the alt kill condition, the Prospector/Seige-Gang/Sharpshooter kill. The primer made it sound like you can do that off a Food Chain combo. I don't see how, all four ringleaders get you a total of 16 goblins, plus you have to sac the 4 ringleaders for mana. Someone explain?

And now an updated list:

Lands:
6 Mountain
1 Strip Mine
4 Taiga
4 Wasteland
4 Wooded Foothils

Acceleration:
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Chrome Mox
1 Lotus Petal

Gobs:
2 Gempalm Incinerator
2 Goblin Matron
4 Goblin Piledriver
4 Goblin Recruiter
4 Goblin Ringleader
1 Goblin Sharpshooter
4 Goblin Warchief
1 Siege-Gang Commander
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
4 Skirk Prospector
4 Goblin Lackey

Da Chain.
4 Food Chain

Just an afterthought: Does Goblin Goon have a place in this deck? I don't see it ever failing to attack, seeing as we flood creatures like diaherrah.

[Moxlotus]

Play Kiki-Jiki.  Just play him.

Turn 1 Lackey.
Turn 2 attack, drop Kiki, cast Piledriver.  Opponent at 19 life
EOT copy piledriver.  Kiki's effect ends "At end of turn".  This is after the "At end of turn" trigger.  If it said "until end of turn" it wouldn't work.  But it does.
Turn 3 copy pile driver.

Attack with lackey, piledriver, and 2 piledriver tokens.  Opponent at -1

And if you can't cast a Piledriver, attack with 3 Lackeys and drop your hand.

[dend51]

for the alt kill with the sharpshooter. What you need is a couple of commanders with the sharpshooter out, when you combo out and have all your gobs in play just off the mana generated by the ringleaders (can only be used to cast creatures). you have lets say 3 commanders in and there for 9 gob tokens. you sac those tokens to the prospector for a Red mana (tokens hit the graveyard and get removed, but they do hit for a second therefore untapping anything that triggers off that ability). Then you hit them with the sharpshooter, and keep doing that. I dont know the exact numbers you need but that is how it works. Just remember foodchain removes creatures from game, they dont go to graveyard, so you cant untap the sharpshooter with foodchain.

It is fun to play around with what you can do with the sharpshooter and other combos, weenie decks just make you so happy when you sit down across from them with 2 sharpshooters out.

good luck

[Rastadon]

dend51: I know how to do it, I just don't see how it's possible to do it when comboing off.

Moxlotus: In your build, how often does that scenerio work?

What do you guys think of these cards:
Goblin Goon
Goblin Vandal
Mogg Fanatic
Fastbond

I think more 1 drops are a good idea.

[Moxlotus]

I don't have a build, but I've had it happen against me.  I shit myself because I didn't know I could die so fast from a deck running mountains.  Play Kiki-Jiki.

Vandal is good considering how popular Stax is.  The other cards don't do enough for you.

[Anusien]

Non-mana source, non-Food Chain, non-Goblins don't go in the deck.  I would put every slot towards maximizing the combo.  This means no Fling, because it's absolutely awful anyway, especially with Meandeck Gifts running Misdirection, and because you'll never draw it; all your draw comes from Recruiter/Ringleader/Matron.

Seriously, play Kiki-Jiki.  He also gives you double Sharpshooter if you need, and can just randomly win the game.  KJ on Piledrivers or Ringleaders for the win.

Let's see - I'd fix up your manabase.  You're probably having Ringleader problems because you have too few durable mana sources.  Try this, straight from the primer:
// Mana
1 Strip Mine
4 Wasteland
1 Lotus Petal
2 ESG
1 Chrome Mox
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
4 Taiga
4 Wooded Foothills
6 Mountain

And then your creature base would be something like this:
// Creatures
1 Goblin Sharpshooter
2 Siege-Gang Commander
2 Goblin Matron
3 Gempalm Incinerator
3 Goblin Warchief
4 Goblin Ringleader
4 Goblin Recruiter
4 Goblin Piledriver
4 Skirk Prospector
4 Goblin Lackey

You just need to fit 1 Kiki-Kiki, and I'd probably cut an Incinerator for him; Incinerator definitely seems like the weakest link in the deck.

I don't know why there's so much question over the right goblins, Veggies has a great primer [urlhttp://www.themanadrain.com/primers/fcg.htm[/url which already covers all the hard stuff.

[Mark_Story]

My previous comment about using kiki-jiki to copy your opponents creatures, was a bit of sarcasm regarding Zaun's shenanigans at one of the SCG P9 tournies.

As for the list of goblins you had, goon is out.  He has a conditional attack, and when you are swinging for the win you don't need him anyways.  Fanatic is good, but usually not necessary.  Vandal is great against stax.  Personally I perfer artifact mutation, as it makes more men.


The alternate or moat kill requires prospector, sharpshooter and seige gang obviously.  It works out so you need 13 goblins other than sharpshooter to do it. The details are as follows:

Shoot with sharpshooter (-1)
Sac a gobbo to prospector for R, untap and shoot with shooter.(-2)
Sac a gobbo to prospector for R, untap and shoot with shooter.(-3)
Sac a gobbo to seige gang(-5), untap and shoot with shooter (-6)

Repeat four times.  Each iteration of the mini combo does 5 damage and uses 3 goblins. You need 9 goblins to pitch, sharpshooter, siege gang and prospector in play to win.  If you have mana untapped you can do more damage with less goblins, as each pitch to seige gang can do 3 damage if you use sharpshooter as well.

Hope that helps.

[Rastadon]

Oh. Okay, thanks Mark, I see it now.

THANK YOU ANUISEN! Wow, I didn't think a 2nd turn kill was possible with goblins! The build you posted is strictly better than mine, and I'm trying to figure out analytically the difference between your deck and mine was. It'll probably take me a good 3 years.

I've been doing alot of testing with this deck recently, and I've been figuring out all the mini combos in the deck, like 1st lackey 2nd turn recruiter and Ringleader. I've also ditched the 2 ESG's for Brightstone Ritual. They're great. They're usually dark ritals for red, but even when they produce just RR, it makes a huge difference. It's the difference between a warchief on the 3rd turn or a warchief and 2 piledrivers on the 3rd turn. I really don't find myself pitching ESG's anyway.

Thoughts?

[Xyre]

ESG gives you mana for free, and doesn't require multiple goblins to work. A free green mana is generally better than the matching RR for R.
Food Chain may not be the best use for a card. It generally takes twelve cards out of a deck which would be more consistent (if slower in certain circumstances) without them. That will also cut you back to a single color. Sometimes, you just don't need the Chain to win. It gives you a backup route, but the deck is straightforward enough as it is.
Oh, and definitely run Kiki. Extra goblins from Siege-Gang, extra Piledrivers-even a second Matron search or Sharpshooter will do you good. At least one copy would be recommended.