I haven't found the guts to play liquimetal. I made a list with 3, and goldfished it against the wall lots of times. But it lacked stability, I found that any counterspell could break my "combo". Liquimetal alone does nothing, shaman is poor in lots of matches (at least in my meta), as viashino. However I agree that shaman and viashino can win games by themselves so I'm happy to play them.
I think 4 is how many liquimetals you want. 3 makes it less consistent. With 4, +2 tutors, + bob/SoFI draws, + 3 welder/3 dredgers, you usually get one in play despite counters. If they are countering coatings, then they're not countering other threats - and you'll recover the coating with welder eventually anyway. The combo, in my build at least, is liquimetal + half the deck. liquimetal + shaman does what you want to do with pilliage. Liquimetal + charm, spree, and heretic do it too. If they DO manage to keep liquimetal off the table, the critters alone have enough utility to cause trouble. The SoFIs make them a better threat too.
I hate when I have liquimetal as the only permanent and draw another liquimetal. Since my list is different I play faithless looting, but lots of times does not come when needed.
Yes, it does suck to rip 2 or 3 liquimetals, unless you have multiple heretics, or a shaman, or a spree, or welder + heretic. The abilities do stack when trying to kill 2 lands a turn when you face fetches. The consistency of drawing at least 1 is worth it since a single one on the table makes so many cards kill any permanent. Looting is fine, but better to run bobs. Drawing 2 a turn mitigates drawing multiple liquimetals. They also can weld out for anything when you don't want multiples.
This list can't obviously play null rod, but COTV is poor playing so many CC1 and CC2 cards. I'm considering playing it with 3 vexing susher. Susher is again conditionally useful (wonderful against slow blue openings, landstill, MUD's COTV, but a 2/2 vanilla at times). But as cavern would get nullified by magus lots of times, maybe it's even better, specially against jace (since jace would fill hand of counters, but susher goes trough it).
With this deck, I don't mind chalice at all. Caverns push through any critter, and if a magus is on the table, I have 2 charm, 1 spree, 2 heretic, 2 EE, DT for chalice @1 - and 3 shaman, vamp, 2 EE, 3 welder, 2 heretic, 1 spree for chalice @2. Even chalice @1 and 2, still have the EEs, spree, and heretics besides the caverns. CotV can't stop any of my deck. Susher seems worthless to me, because I am never fearing counters moreso that blue bombs that get topdecked. Cage and charms kill graves vs yawg will, and 3 welder or active heretic hit BSC. Jace can be an issue, but the uncounterable critters + bolts + liquimetal/charm/spree solve that problem too (not to mention any weenie + SoFI).
I'm definitely trying Pillage. With magus, I find really annoying when opponent plays a basic land. Against dredge you are getting rid of bazaar, and against mud you take out any permanent. Against white thrash and Oath is poorer, I know.
Pilliage is interesting. I try to eat basics with shaman+coating. Coating really makes the majority of cards really powerful, so you should run 4 if you run any. I don't have so much a problem with white trash as I do stony silence. Cutting off SoFI, EE, and coating makes the deck MUCH slower. Obviously null rod can't do this since we can kill rod easily. It's only SS. Between that and oath, Dystopia can be viable, but it's not optimal.
Is white trash your biggest problem? How many WT are played in your meta? Big creatures (lodestone golem,lord of shatterskull pass, flametongue kavu...) and mass removals are great in this matchup, but probably I won't focus on it unless you expect a lot. Hey, now I remember Pyre Zombie from a release, looooooooooooots of years ago. While being mana intensive, you can get rid of any bear! And well, I played saturday Masticore (yes, the old masticore) in my red shops deck and it crushed white weenie, but it sided out stony silence. What about white protection creatures? Or just sulfur elemental, not only kills thalia or kataki on the spot, it can instantly block and kill lots of creatures, and play it at the end of opponent's turn when facing a jace.
Pyre Zombie is neat, but so slow. Darkblast and bolts seem better. Heretics are also good at blocking, as are the imps. I can't see coatings really working without black. Without bobs, you can just topdeck a coating and draw dead for the turn. With extra draw though, if one of your 2 cards is a second coating, you're still doing fine. With dredgers too, you also flip them more for welder. And when you really need an answer or a piece of the combo, black tutors make a difference. Duress makes them resolve. Rakdos charm is stupid good in this deck too. You lose so much of the consistency and versatility by playing monored.
I probably won't play explosives maindeck. I would rely on liquimetal+artifact destruction (for example against oath), or maybe play ratchet bomb. It is slower, but recoverable with welder. Oh well, and ratchet bomb is countered by COTV 2. But still, you want to maximize liquimetal combo, and these cards weaken it.
The "slower" is why I play EE. If I need to sweep a voltaic key or pair of bears, or an oath off the table, I often need to do it THAT turn, for RB2 or R2/B2. If I drop bomb and have to wait for 1-2 turns to kill key or oath, they probably already won. Also against a swarm of bears like tarmgoyfs...2 turns can be too late and pridemage/trygon/relic-warder can kill the ratchet before it has any effect. It's nice that it can be recovered, but its slowness makes it more problematic than it's worth. WithOUT welder on the table, ratchet is almost always worse than EE, too.
Have you played the deck lately? Didn't you had problems assembly liquimetal combo most of the time against prepared opponents?
I never have problems with the combo - because I have 1 more coating, 2 more tutors, more draw spells, dredge 5 critters that make welder put it in play...and also more artifact destruction to always take advantage of it.
I have found that bobs have to be killed in time, since I run 10 cards with cc3, and 10 cards with cc2 (subtracting the one bob that would be in play). Usually I can get to lethal before bob kills me, but sometimes I need to kill my own bobs. The inability to draw-fix hurts at times, but sensei top by itself was often too slow and unproductive. If I've drawn 4-5 cards and took 10 damage, I can usually afford to kill the bob and be in good position anyway.
I think to get the best out of liquimetals, you need to run 4 and also run all that black has to offer.
