Young Pyromancer

[MaximumCDawg]

How often did that deck lose because you had stranded FOWs in hand. Also were you running power? lastly.... No Skullclamp?????

Also just realized: Quiet speculation -> 3 Cabal therapy allows you to PROBABALY hit them with Ravenous trap that turn as well, which makes a dude.

The deck didn't do as badly as you all seem to be thinking, really.  In answer to your question, no, Force was never dead.  The disruption suite did a fine job of keeping me in the long game.  I would just run out of gas and had no quick way of putting the game away.  The deck lacked "gas," was the problem.  It didn't help that everyone but me was fully powered that day!  So here's the rundown:

Match 1 - Salvager, using Angel of Restoration (loss)

I was doing fine against the deck until I go to Dart his Clique, and he pulls an Angel of Restoration out of his butt.  Then does it again.  6 damage in the air out of bolt range finishes the game long before my army of 1/1s can accomplish anything.  Game 2 was more of the same, with his superior creatures moving too fast for me to stop.

Match 2 - Shops, using Gorilla Shaman // Welder // Liquimetal Coating (Loss)

This deck was hilarious and awesome and I love it.  I was fairly well-suited to dealing with all of his 1/1s, which was nice, but ill-suited to dealing with... anything else.  He had Golems and Wurmcoils in the main and Masticores in the board.  I could stop him initially, but he would just keep dropping bombs until I was overwhelmed.

Match 3 - UWb control (vault key and friends) (tie)

This was my best matchup.  Virtually all of my hate was live against him.  Game one he resolved an early Ancestral, I believe, and I couldn't keep up.  Game 2 I keep him bottled up with Shaman and got there.  Game 3 I mull to 3 to find colored land, but he draws nothing BUT land for 8 turns so we're in a long game.  Eventually, on Turn 5 of turns, his Bob puts him at one life... and I forget I have Lava Dart in the yard.  I fail at life.

Match 4 - BUG Fish (with Goyfs instead of Ooze) (loss)

This list can't beat Goyf.  It really can't beat three Goyfs.

Match 5 - Rb Burn (legacy oldskool) (loss)

This matchup felt fine, since my long game is better.  We trade games, and then we end in a situation where I can dart him from the yard twice and bolt him, but he's at 10 life, I'm at 3 life, and he's in topdeck mode.  He rips the Chain Lightning and sends it my way.  I miss the fact that if I dart twice out of the yard, and bolt, I would have enough storm to Flusterstorm the Chain.  Because I am dumb.

So, all said and done, the deck didn't feel THAT bad.  It's just not a good build because it has no way of sealing the deal and spends too much time on control.  

I don't think Skullclamp is an auto include, I think it really depends on if you're going Combo or not. If you're playing a Gush-Combo style Pyromancer deck then you don't really need Clamp as you'll probably be very creature light. If on the other hand you're going for control or Fish where the Pyromancer is just there for value, then you can happily include a Skullclamp as you'll probably have other targets to Clamp besides the Pyromancer or the tokens he makes. Skullclamp is more mana intensive than Gush is though, and it's better to have Trinket Mages to find it than to include more Clamps, and Trinket Mage isn't great in combo decks.

Yeah, that's actually my thoughts on why clamp wasnt in my list. I totally get it that, with 12 x/1s and Pyromancer, an active Skullclamp is sexier than hell.  The problem was, in goldfishing, I'd have disruption firing first out of my hand to stop the enemy from winning, then Pyromancer drops midgame, and by then I'm lucky if I can find enough spells to make him worthwhile while keeping up with the Jones.  Topdecking Skullclamp was such a feel bad I cut it.  If I tried this again, though, I'd replace Jave with Clamp because Jace is fugly in a deck with so little mana acceleration.

FAKE EDIT:  Here's another thought; what about Food Chain / Phyrexian Altar?  Is being able to turn your Young Pyromancer into a Lotus Cobra useful at all?

How do you feel about Grixis Charm?I am testing the card now.

I love that card, but it's just too slow.  You can't cast it with off-color mana, you'll never cast it against shops, yadda yadda.

[Demagoguery]

While it's cool to just end the game by casting it with a few tokens in play, I don't think it's very good. None of the effects are particularly awesome at 3 mana, and the first two are semi-redundant, although they'll have unique applications at times too. My bigger issue with the charm is that it's all three colours and an opponent can really easily lock you out of one of those colours if they so should choose, making it uncastable. Then again maybe I'm wrong and the utility will outweigh the restrictive, and somewhat high, casting cost, but I just don't feel it's good enough as it is.

Edit: MaximumCDawg, you should play Snuff Out, not only is it a free spell but it kills Goyf and actually stops a turn one Lodestone Golem as long as you have a Swamp or a Fetch in hand. I wouldn't max it out but a one or two of in the main is pretty good in any deck with enough Swamps. It also kills Angels.

[MaximumCDawg]

Edit: MaximumCDawg, you should play Snuff Out, not only is it a free spell but it kills Goyf and actually stops a turn one Lodestone Golem as long as you have a Swamp or a Fetch in hand. I wouldn't max it out but a one or two of in the main is pretty good in any deck with enough Swamps. It also kills Angels.

As a matter of fact, I did have three plus a Swamp in the board.  I am in love with that sideboard package since the Bazaar of Moxen clued me into it.  Turns out that 3 removal spells in a deck that can't dig very fast are not enough.

[Demagoguery]

Gitaxian Probes are good for that, they're free and let you dig deeper while enabling early Therapy plays without having to do it blind. Plus as the guy who played the Nivmagus deck said, Probe, into Snapcaster, into Probe turn 1 is pretty big game as you haven't lost any cards in hand and filtered through 2. 

[serracollector]

I really like the grixis plan of 4 pyromancer, 4 bob, 2 snaps, and 2 trinket mages with a trinket package of 1 clamp, 1 pithing needle, 1 sensies top,  and ofc your moxen/lotus etc.  This allows you to run 2-3 cavern of souls and possibly even 1 expedition map to find a cavern or strip/ waste/dual/bojuka bog, since map can be found with trinket mage. 4 preordains, brainstorm, ponder, acall, walk, and 4fow should be auto includes, and probably 1 misdirection with all the abrupt decays and bolts and stps bouncing around. Misdirecting an abrupt decay or bolt can be just as game changing as doing it to Ancestral.