The story of how my Slobad, Goblin Tinkerer deck came to be began with Part 1 of An Artificer’s Tale, where I explained why I wanted to create a deck around this weird little Goblin, layed out some aims about how the deck would be built and began piecing the foundations of the deck together.

With a lack of solid artifacts of my own to work with, a trip to Grand Prix Manchester helped me out a lot. Part 2 detailed an extensive list of the cards I traded for that day, including reasons for wanting to include each in my deck. I also discussed a few cards I had my eye out for but unfortunately was unable to acquire that day.

Part 3 described some of the early deck testing, identifying what elements were missing from the deck and what I would need to do to make the deck stronger, thinking about what cards I might need to add in the future.

Today in Part 4 I plan to take a look back over Parts 1 to 3 and do a little self-analysis. How well have I stuck to what I wanted to do? Were there any cards I wanted/traded for which I have since cut from the deck? What did I not think about early on that has since become important? And finally, I’ll have a full 100-card deck list for you!

To begin with, lets consider the objectives I set out for myself to follow. These can be summarised into two main points:
- Building on a Budget. I have definitely been successful here; so far the total amount I have spent on cards for the deck is… £0! Thats right, nothing. Every. Single. Card. In the deck I either owned already or, more likely, traded for. I am yet however to buy a foil Slobad, which will set me back a whopping £1.50. In fact the only other cost so far was the £5 for 100 pink sleeves.
– No Net Decking. This meant that basically I would not just search the internet for any similar decks and steal ideas (although I did plan to use Gatherer and other card databases to look for cards that may be of interest to me). Rather than simply buying whichever cards I wanted, I planned to use those readily available to me and ones acquired from other players before I even considered looking online. All this was to ensure that the deck stayed my own, and I feel as though I have met these objectives almost perfectly.
(Admittedly, I have barely used Gatherer at all! Once I started looking through trade binders I found that the deck filled up fast and I guess the idea of having to search for interesting cards got kinda overlooked. The downside here is that it’s highly likely there’s a number of cards that might be great in my deck but I am yet to know about, let alone consider! So I could almost certainly benefit from re-visiting Gatherer.)

Rounding off Part 1 I hurridly threw together the beginnings of a manabase. Now, you’ll see that I included Terramorphic Expanse and Evolving Wilds, both a bit pointless in a mono-coloured deck surely? Well, my idea here (other than “deck thinning”, all be it a completely minimal effect) was that I would eventually have a Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle and these two would allow me to potentially do some extra damage in a turn. Now, the problem here is that both are completely useless when drawn early on. Since then, however, a friend suggested that the Alara Panoramas would be much better options for this role, and so these lands have since been replaced by the three Panoramas available to me (Grixis, Jund, Naya).

Part 2, as I’ve reminded you already, was all about my trip to GP Manchester and was all about where the bulk of my new deck came from. After a lot of trading I acquired a hell of a lot of new cards, all of which you can read about in the original post. All of the cards I acquired I am still happy with, as all are still in my deck. Unfortunately though Shimmer Myr just hasn’t ever been that exciting to cast, since in general I want to play stuff in my turn anyway (I’m ok with not breaking the rules of the game), so he may soon be dropped from the deck.
I also discussed a few cards I might like to acquire. Some (Molten Psyche) I have, some (Vulshok Battlemaster) I decided against and some (Sensei’s Divining Top) are still on my “to get” list. You’ll see more with the decklist below.
My current “to get” list is as follows:
Mystifying Maze – Darksteel Reactor – Howling Mine – Sensei’s Divining Top – Skullclamp – Myr Retriever – Chromatic Star

Part 3 summarised my early play-testing with the deck. The main thing that was evident from this was that the deck lacked card draw and quickly found itself in top-deck mode. This issue has since been addressed by adding a couple more draw effects (such as the newly printed Otherworld Atlas), and some additional Mana-artifacts and other ramp sources. Whether the deck now has too many of these effects.. time will tell.

And so finally, without further ado or any sort of hesitation what-so-ever, I present to you, more than a month in the making, the current version of my brand new EDH deck! (As ever, please feel free to comment and leave feedback on this or any other part of “An Artificer’s Tale” you may have read)

Enjoy!

General:
Slobad, Goblin Tinkerer

Artifacts:
Creatures – Pilgrim’s Eye, Shimmer Myr, Lodestone Golem, Solemn Simulacrum, Precursor Golem, Kuldotha Forgemaster, Steel Hellkite, Thopter Assembly, Myr Battlesphere, Pentavus, Platinum Angel, Bosh, Iron Golem, Darksteel Colossus, Blightsteel Colossus
Ramp – Everflowing Chalice, Wayfarer’s Bauble, Expedition Map, Sol Ring, Fractured Powerstone, Mycosynth Wellspring, Vessel of Endless Rest, Pristine Talisman, Foriysian Totem, Darksteel Ingot, Manalith, Dreamstone Hedron
Removal – Brittle Effigy, Relic of Progenitus, Oblivion Stone, Lux Cannon, Contagion Engine, Spine of Ish Sah
Draw – Ichor Wellspring, Temple Bell, Otherworld Atlas, Seer’s Sundial
Equipment – Umezawa’s Jitte, Lightning Greaves, Strata Scythe, Darksteel Plate, Bonehoard, Argentum Armor
Other – Liquimetal Coating, Cloud Key, Mimic Vat, Unwinding Clock, Myr Turbine, Mirrorworks, Eternity Vessel, Salvaging Station, Darksteel Forge, Crystal Ball, Voltaic Key

Red Stuff:
Hoard-Smelter Dragon, Trash for Treasure, Metallic Mastery, Chaos Warp, Molten Psyche, Devil’s Play, Blasphemous Act, Chain Reaction, Earthquake

Lands:
24 Mountains, Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle, Smoldering Crater, Forgotten Cave, Ghitu Encampment, Madblind Mountain, Great Furnace, Keldon Megaliths, Temple of the False God, Phyrexia’s Core, Inkmoth Nexus, Grixis Panorama, Jund Panorama, Naya Panorama