this looks great; please let us know how it does!

A few thoughts:

• Tricks of the Trade may be worth considering if there are a lot of flyers in your meta (which will nerf Cartouche of Knowledge).
• Maybe some graveyard hate for your sideboard? I'm a fan of Crook of Condemnation but Sentinel Totem is great too.
• Depending on your meta, the extra versatility of Perilous Voyage (compared to Unsummon) may be worth the extra mana.

Draw well!

Thanks for the suggestions and upvote, clayperce. I will definitely consider the graveyard-hating artifacts you recommended; I have managed to avoid seeing many God-Pharaoh's Gift decks at my local LGS since the recent energy ban, and this deck tends to outrun the midrange token decks I've faced. I'm leaning more towards the Sentinel Totem if I need to alter my sideboard, possibly swap it in for Confiscation Coup which hasn't proven its usefulness.

I wouldn't have thought of Tricks of the Trade out of the Welcome Decks. The relatively high CMC might hinder it in this deck, but it gives a little more reach that might otherwise be lacking in certain circumstances. I don't think Perilous Voyage will replace Unsummon since I use it around 2/3 of the time to bounce my own creature when I don't have a Blossoming Defense, or to avoid a Settle the Wreckage. I'll see how my first real tests go tonight and track how I end up using my maindeck Unsummons to see if there is more potential I may be missing.

djnewellmit,
Makes sense. Good luck (and good skill) this evening!

Last night didn't end up being the blowout I had hoped for, but I did end up 2-2 on the night (and earned a Showdown booster). The first two rounds were against sub-tier decks and I had no problem taking them out 2-0 each.

Round 3 was a very painful and controlling UR build where I just couldn't get my creatures through the opponents counter-magic and removal; I also misplayed a Bristling Hydra into a Censor late in the game, even my opponent expressed his sympathy. I may have to consider sideboarding Prowling Serpopard to get through the control matchup. Even landing one Hydra would have been a game-changer.

Round 4 was against the omni-present mono-red. I managed to snatch the first game due to a slow start from the opponent that saw me land 3 Hydra's between turns 3-5. Games 2 and 3 went his way as he landed a turn 1 Daring Buccaneer into 2x Rigging Runner to quickly close out the games by turn 4 and 5. I just couldn't get enough creatures out to survive the Shocks and Magma Sprays.

Overall, the biggest issue I ran into was the aggro-style decks. This build doesn't have quite enough bodies to put on the ground to stop the aggro swarms. I will be looking to make some changes for Friday night; I am considering energy creatures Aether Swooper, Empyreal Voyager, Shielded Aether Thief and even Thriving Turtle as possible additions. Along with not having enough bodies, the maindeck Aethersphere Harvester and Rhonas the Indomitable had a couple instances where they were the only thing left on my board, rendering them useless. So a I think a few more bodies is key. I could also add more Trophy Mage to get the combo set up. I could also maindeck the Greenbelt Rampager as they ended up coming in for me on most of the games 2 and 3.

Possible reductions to make room for the extra bodies would be 1x Unsummon, 1x Aethersphere Harvester, and 1x Glassblower's Puzzleknot.

Hey man! Sorry to hear the deck didn't hold up how you thought, but those definitely seem like tough matchups. Chart a Course may be better in place of Lifecrafter's Bestiary just because 3 mana to set up in this deck seems a turn too slow. Maybe even more important than card draw would be Dive Down to protect your key pieces. Maybe change out Glassblower's Puzzleknot with Woodweaver's Puzzleknot. It's main strength is providing that key third energy whereas glassblower has only 2. However, the life gain can be enough to survive another turn against those agro decks to give yourself time to either stabilize or have the time to win. Before I can get better judgement of this deck, what were the decks it performed well against?

Thanks Pabs4444. I considered Chart a Course but currently have Glassblower's Puzzleknot kind of filling that slot. I could see swapping the Lifecrafter's Bestiary from the sideboard for Chart a Course (or Prowling Serpopard). I've also considered Shielded Aether Thief for the ability to generate a few card draws from spare energy. I'd really love to play Glimmer of Genius, but the 4 CMC is really a downer for this deck. I could possibly sideboard Glimmer over Chart a Course in place of the Bestiary.

Woodweaver's Puzzleknot would be in if I didn't have the Glassblower's Puzzleknot; I've found the scry 2 to be useful more often than an extra 3 life. And the energy generation of the deck was not an issue at all throughout the night - I even managed to brute force a Pummeler for the kill using no pump spells. I'll think about it for Friday though - the life gain would help against the early aggro hits while I'm trying to get 2- and 3-drop creatures down to stabilize.

I originally ran Dive Down when I started with blue, but I've found Unsummon to be as good of a protection piece (at the expense of another turn of summoning sickness), plus it can be used offensively as a tempo play or a token killer. And Unsummon is pretty much the only answer to Settle the Wreckage.

If settle is a big problem in your meta, I would highly suggest Admiral's Order. It was probably printed exclusively to counter Settle the Wreckage.

Yes! I just dove to my binder to pull out my prerelease promo of Admiral's Order for the sideboard.

Good luck with the deck! Just a reminder, sideboard needs to be at most 15 cards. Maybe take out both harvesters. I'd put one of them into the mainboard to have 2 total and take out Rhonas to keep main board at 60. Rhinos is just hard to trigger because the only creature you have with high enough power to activate it is Bristling Hydra. Assuming you haven't played a pump spell. Looking forward to hearing how the deck performs!

Thoughts on Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive?

I like the idea of Tetsuko. Unfortunately she's a non-bo with all the pump spells other than Blossoming Defense and Rhonas's ability (Larger Than Life, Cartouche of Knowledge, Hadana's Climb  ^Flip). I think it would be possible to re-build around her, using Highspire Infusion as a possible replacement for Larger that can be played after blockers are declared. Or go UR to have Invigorated Rampage to use after blockers.

I do think Red has more of the instant speed pump spells. Built to Smash as well. Fair enough.

I had brewed up an Izzet Pummeler brew a while back, Izzet Pummeler where Tetsuko could be more useful. I would move the 4x Whirler Virtuoso to the sideboard, and replace with 3x Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive and 1x Saheeli Rai.

Sounds sweet. I'll check out that deck

I took the updated deck with Untamed Kavu to my LGS's Standard Showdown last night and bull-dozed my way to a 4-0 victory and 1st place out of 16 competitors. I played against two notionally tier-one decks (mono-red and UW Approach) and two tier-two competitive decks (WB knights and mono-blue Djinn). The newer players were caught completely off-guard when I fired off Pummelers for the win.

First round was against mono-red. Fanatical Firebrand and Goblin Chainwhirler kept my Pummelers from doing anything. In game 1, I had a handful of Sage of Shaila's Claim and drew into two Bristling Hydra, which allowed me to stabilize against his board of 2x Soul-Scar Mage, Earthshaker Khenra, and Hazoret the Fervent. I eventually found Hadana's Climb  ^Flip and sent one kicked Untamed Kavu over their heads as a 12/12 flying, vigilance, trample. For Games 2 and 3, I sideboarded out 3x Electrostatic Pummeler since he had so many easy answers with burn spells, Fanatical Firebrand, and Goblin Chainwhirler. I brought in 3x Greenbelt Rampager in their place, but did not see an elephant through games 2 and 3. In game 2, the opponent got land screwed and I beat him down with a Cub, Kavu, and Hydra. He was stuck on three lands; he revealed his hand after I killed him to show his Chandra, Torch of Defiance, 2x Verix Bladewing, and 1x Glorybringer.

Second round was against a (newish) player with WB knights. The deck had a full 4x History of Benalia, but I did not see any Lyra Dawnbringer. In Game 1, he got out the combo of Knight of Grace + Knight of Malice , which made blocking very difficult. I played out several Sage of Shaila's Claim, a few other blockers, Hadana's Climb  ^Flip, and one Electrostatic Pummeler. I managed to survive History of Benalia's third chapter while he had 2x Benalish Marshal, 2x Knight of Grace, 1x Knight of Malice, and the two knight tokens by chump blocking everything I could to leave my Pummeler alive. I was down to 2 life and hit him on the crack back with Electrostatic Pummeler + Larger Than Life for 54 damage, which he did not see coming. Game 2 was another easy win as I matched his knights with chump blockers, and kicked a Kavu into a flipped Hadana's Climb  ^Flip again.

Round 3 was a good player running a mono-blue Djinn/Throne of the God-Pharaoh deck. He had a lot of 1 power flyers and unblockables, but no answer to my Pummelers. In both Games 1 and 2, I managed to field 2x Electrostatic Pummeler while holding 2x Larger Than Life. I played one Larger Than Life on each robot, then swung in with both to play around a possible Unsummon. I pumped the unblocked Pummeler for lethal.

Round 4 was a typical UW Approach running both Karn, Scion of Urza and Teferi, Hero of Dominaria. The deck and player were both very good. I over-played my creatures in Game 1 as I was trying to race him landing his planeswalkers or Lyra Dawnbringer. He Fumigate'd, leaving me holding a couple Blossoming Defense but no creatures. He eventually double-Approached for the win. I sideboarded in 2x Negate to counter Approach, but I did not see Negate or Approach of the Second Sun in Games 2 or 3. In Game 2, I landed a turn 3 Cub, turn 4 Hadana's Climb, and turn 5 Hydra while playing around Censor and Syncopate and was able to kill Teferi when he played him. Flipped Hadana's Climb  ^Flip, and finished him off with the Cub + Hydra. Game 3 was almost identical, just replace the Cub with a Kavu.

Overall, I was surprised by the first place finish. I would have been happy with 2-2 when I saw my first opponent drop Fanatical Firebrand + Mountain . The mono-red match-up was very unlucky for my opponent, otherwise it could have easily run this deck over. The other three matches felt very fair, and my deck won by being bigger and faster than my opponents. I was drawing a good number of Blossoming Defense through out the night, saving my creatures from several Cast Out and Seal Away. Untamed Kavu worked great in the deck; I was never unhappy to see it. I played it several times on turn 2, and several times kicked. The Kavu works amazing with Hadana's Climb  ^Flip, especially if the Kavu was kicked. This deck does not go wide very well. The vigilance was critical in a couple games to allow me to send the Kavu to attack with pump spell backup and have it available to block as well.

I feel like red still offers more than blue. Red gives access to Fling, Invigorated Rampage, and Built to Smash. I'm curiuos how viable the pummeler strategy still is or if it can be used in some new way like with God-Pharoah's Gift (which I have to admit I've been on a bit of a kick with lately).

Stazeeee I agree that red offers more cards than blue to support the Pummeler combo, but I played RG Pummeler for almost a year and a half before switching to UG. The RG version is primarily an aggro deck with the combo finish; it is very weak to any disruption or creature removal. If the combo with Pummeler is stopped by any instant-speed removal, the deck is dead. If I were to play a RG version right now, I have an New Life for the Pummeler based off of Danimrebel's list from MTGO several months ago: MTGO decklists, 2018-03-26.

The biggest problem with Pummeler in the current meta is the proliferation of Fanatical Firebrand, Goblin Chainwhirler, and Walking Ballista. The RG version is dead in the water against any of those threats as the deck is relying on the Pummeler combo for the win. The BG version still has Hydra and Cub with flying via the Cartouche of the Climb to go over their heads while also surviving the one-damage pingers.

I have found UG to play more like a midrange deck. It doesn't need to start doing damage immediately like the RG version does. I've had just as many wins due to the Hydra or Cub as I have with the Pummeler. Cartouche of Knowledge provides much needed card draw, which RG is completely lacking. And Hadana's Climb  ^Flip works great with the Hydras, Cubs, and now the Kavu if Pummeler gets removed.

I think Pummeler would be a very interesting add to a God-Pharaoh's Gift mono-red or RG deck. But you would have to build the deck with a few more energy sources than it is currently playing.

I have been looking at Arcane Flight as a 1 mana way of getting Pummeler out of Goblin Chainwhirler range.

Here is a 5-0 where someone succeeded with Arcane Flight in a UG Pummeler deck:

Here's the link, for some reason it disappears if I try to make it clickable:

https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/mtgo-standings/competitive-standard-constructed-league-2018-05-07

Thanks for sharing the link, Ultra_Magnus (I also have problems sharing links to non-TappedOut domains). I had not seen that decklist, but it tracks with the other lists from back in the Winter before Pummeler disappeared; both Arcane Flight and Llanowar Elves are a new look. The list you shared appears to be slightly more all-in on the Pummeler; I've been having amazing success with my build which is almost a mid-range Hadana's Climb  ^Flip deck now. I love Llanowar Elves, but I don't necessarily want to ramp into a Pummeler on turn 2, since the opponent is very likely to have a handful of removal.

I have been playing this deck again with devastating results. I am working on an updated write-up of my results and sideboard. The short version is I've only lost one round total in 5 consecutive events, including beating mono-Red (or BR) four times in that span. I have found Goblin Chainwhirler to be a non-issue vs this deck, or at least as inconsequential as any other red burn spell against Electrostatic Pummeler.

Stazeeee, I wanted to follow-up to your previous posts. I have been play-testing my RG version of this deck on MTG Arena, and I have been getting destroyed by the amount of main-deck removal currently available and played in the meta. The mid-range characteristics of the Simic version have provided much better results. Hadana's Climb  ^Flip provides an excellent secondary win condition that pairs perfectly with the other threats in the deck thanks to their affinity for +1/+1 counters: Bristling Hydra, Longtusk Cub, and Untamed Kavu.

djnewellmit,
So cool to see a Pioneer update on your deck; would +1 again if I could!

My latest is over at Pioneer Pummeler ... it's very similar (as you might expect), but with a few changes:

• I had to play 3x Rootbound Crag in a row one game, and decided I officially hate the card. Seriously, I'd rather just run Basics :-)
• Maximize Velocity seemed good but not great. The pump was often just not quite enough, and I often was just 1 mana too short for the Haste effect. You may be better off though, considering you're running Servant of the Conduit .
• Veil of Summer is perhaps my new Favorite Sideboard Tech :-)

I had totally forgotten about Aethersphere Harvester ; thanks for reminding me! How's it working for you?

Similarly, I've been thinking about Rhythm of the Wild but haven't gotten around to testing it yet. How's it doing?

Cheers!

Thanks for the suggestions clayperce. I haven't had a chance to play the deck, but I plan on hitting up a Pioneer event at my LGS this Wednesday.

• I 100% understand your pain with Rootbound Crag . I may consider dropping it as you did before I play on Wednesday. I'm playing a little riskier at 19 lands, but I'm hoping the Servant of the Conduit will help accelerate me.
• Maximize Velocity is there primarily for the haste. I just looked up some other similar 1-CMC options to give our buddy haste: Cartouche of Zeal (or it's clone, Hammerhand , Claim the Firstborn , Expedite , Fervent Strike , Messenger's Speed , and Samut's Sprint . I'll have to see how the format lines up with removal to re-evaluate if I need the hastiness. I am considering swapping in 1x Rhonas the Indomitable for 1x Maximize Velocity .
• I would have several Veil of Summer in the sideboard if I had them. Instead, I've added Heroic Intervention ($$, but I already own a playset) and Ranger's Guile , the poor sibling of Blossoming Defense for more spot-defense.

I'll let you know how the sideboard works out on Wednesday. Aethersphere Harvester is there to out-gun any burn-based decks. Rhythm of the Wild might also be a good option for me to replace the second Maximize Velocity in the main deck.

FYI, I will probably brew a UG version to see if those colors still hold some opportunities, maybe even bring in back to Temur. But with the price of Mana Confluence , the mana base may struggle to fit the requirements.

Do you think Simic is better than Gruul? Also, Attune with Aether seems like a must now. Attune into cub is a powerful line like it was in Standard, especially with all of the pump spells. I also suggest updating the legality to Pioneer

Whelp, looks like Veil of Summer got the banhammer. Bummer ...