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.