MtG Deck Doctor (Part 1)

Tap those lands, fly out your 6/6 trample, haste badie and stomp! Repeat as needed.

That's a good place to start as any, but there is so much more to Magic than bringing in the big guns late game and stomping. Check out the Magic Link for more info on deck building, guilds, colors, and other great info about our favorite game before diving into the Deck Primer below.

 Before throwing your best money cards together, adding some land and swinging for 6 turn 8 with Akroma, ask yourself these questions:

1. What is my deck trying to do?
2. Are 127 cards too many to have in my deck?
3. Are 18 lands too many to have in my deck? (after all they take up space my Ajani could otherwise occupy) 
4. Are twelve 6 mana cards too many? After all the bigger the better, right?

Answers: 1) Win 2) Yes (a very big yes) 3) No- more lands might be needed 4) See answer 2


The first question actually sets the direction your whole deck will take, the colors you'll run, spells you'll play and creatures you'll stomp with. Is your deck trying to control the game; mill a player's library to 0; attack with a swarm of little guys and overwhelm; build up with mana boosters to play bigger and bigger threats turn after turn; or simply burn, burn, burn?

The best way to plan your attack is look at what other people are playing and modify your deck accordingly.

~ CORE DECK TYPES ~

Aggro ~ (short for "aggressive") decks attempt to reduce their opponents from 20 life to 0 life as quickly as possible, rather than emphasize a long-term game plan. Hit with creatures and bolts to quickly count to 20 and win. Main Colors: Red and White.

• Affinity ~ Also called "Robots" is an artifact based aggro deck that gets out a hoard of small creatures with evasion (flight, protection...) and/or infect and equips them to pound you as early as turn 2 (Primer & Article)
• Bogle ~ Hexproof anyone? By turn three trying to pin down Slippery Bogle can be... rather difficult when he's a 5/3 with trample (Rancor) and First Strike (Ethereal Armor); Hexproof + Auras = massive fun on a budget. (Extra, Extra!)
• Burn ~ Utterly destroy your opponents with a barrage of fire (Primer ~ Essence of Burn)
•  RDW (Red Deck Wins) does this through creatures and burn) 
• White Knights ~ Raise an army to defend the kingdom. White Knights gets rolling fast with First Strike, Protection, and by turn 3, Indestructible followed by turn 4 +3/+3 Flying. What's not to like?
• Zoo ~ Ever gone to the zoo and wondered what would happen if ALL the animals got out at once? What if that local zoo included crazy big elephant men with sledge hammers? Zoo looks to release low cost creatures that get supersized to swarm you for lethal mid-game.

Control ~ attempts to gain a decisive advantage using control cards to hinder the opponent and protect its victory condition. A control deck makes sacrifices in speed in order to improve chances of playing past an opponent's defenses. Main Colors: Blue and Black

• Black/White Tokens ~ Gets out a swarm of 1/1 flyers and pumps them up while controling an opponent's hand with targeted removal. (Another take on it can be found here)
• Blue/White Control ~ Blue for counter spells and card draw; white for removal and creatures to smash. A lot of the game is played during an opponent's turn as they are instants allowing you to "control" whatever plans they try to get past you. 
• UWR Control ~ THE control deck to beat. It has an answer for most everything an opponent can throw your way and Burn to back it up. 

Combo ~ uses the interaction of two or more cards (a "combination") to create a powerful effect that either wins the game immediately or creates a situation that leads to a win. Combo decks include "ramp" decks, which quickly generate mana in order to resolve powerful threats. Combo decks value power, consistency, and speed.

• Death & Taxes ~ A VERY popular high-end deck that "flickers" creatures into play many times to get the comes into play abilities to trigger, and trigger, and trigger. "Taxes" refers to all the tricks different combos of cards that shut down your opponent's deck; "Death" is what followed afterward. 
• Dredge Vine ~  Every try to root out Japanese Knotweed? It's a scourge that should you leave ANY part of the root untouched WILL come back again and again and overrun you.  Dredge Vine does just that by mulching recurring creatures into the graveyard to keep pounding you over and over. 

• Infect ~ The little engine that could. Take a small 1/1 with infect (deals damage in poison counters- only takes 10 counters to win) and pumps it fast with Giant Growth or other Enlarge effects for the win. 
• Splinter Twin ~ puts creatures with an Untap ability onto the battlefield, copies it with Splinter Twin or other clone cards. Each copy put into play untaps the creature that generated the copy creating a near infinite number of creatures with haste to finish you off. 
• Storm ~  Plays a series of mana rampers that trigger the Storm which allows you to copy a spell, say Grapeshot, and hit you for 20+ burn; upside you can check your texts once the storm goes off as you wait for the final blow. 
• Tron ~ Builds up a huge mana advantage with Urza lands to play into cards that lock your opponents out or stomps with a threat they can't deal with. 

 

~ HYBRID DECKS ~ 

Midrange ~ a cross between ramp and aggro. It starts out the game with a little bit of ramp, but stops after it reaches 4 to 6 mana, which is where it plays its threats.

• Population Nation ~ the battle plan here is to build an army of Green/White tokens (Centaurs, Wurms...) and populate them before the opposition can recover. A good budget deck in Standard and very fun to play and modify. 
• Goblins ~ "The act of throwing Goblins at the opponent regardless of the situation to defeat a rational opponent with often-irrational creatures.' Nice deck. Goblins you.'" 
• Naya Midrange ~ ramp with Arbor Elves and Pilgrims into bigger and bigger threats until your opponent turns pale as a Thragtusk swings in followed by Huntmaster of the Fells and Restoration Angel.