Do YOU know what your deck does?
Features
BrianH369
21 June 2012
4428 views
21 June 2012
4428 views
Hello there! Before we get to the good stuff, a short introduction:
I've been playing Magic off and on for 10 years now and I love every aspect of the game, but the thing nearest and dearest to my heart is deck building. I consider deck building to be the strongest part of my Magic game, and the most enjoyable for me. It is the very reason I was drawn to this site, as I'm sure is the case for a lot of the readers.
I'm no pro, though I have had consistently successful finishes at the events I've attended which include countless FNM's, Gamedays, and Pre-Releases, several SCG IQ's, a 5K or two, and soon to be a PTQ within the month. So my credentials aren't staggeringly impressive, but I feel my content will prove more than worth reading. Just give me a shot. :)
I intend to write a few articles a week on this site that all focus on a single aspect of the art of deck building. If you want me to cover a specific aspect of this very broad subject, please leave a message in the comments. Also, I'd really appreciate feedback of any kind, so feel free to comment after giving this a read. :)
Enough of that. Let's start the Magic!
In Magic, consistency is highly rewarded. Consistently playing well, leads to consistent winning, which can lead to consistent Top 8's, which as you may know, consistently feels pretty good. ;) All of this consistency translates directly into deck building as well. The best decks perform well because they stick to their game plan with the utmost consistency. This can be achieved by cramming a bunch of 3 or 4 ofs in your deck to make sure you are always drawing the cards you need. In singleton formats, such as EDH we, see consistency through the use of tutor effects that ultimately “cheat” the singleton rules by allowing you more opportunities to find your key cards. . Clearly, the general consensus throughout the Magic community is that if you want to win, you need to make sure your deck always does what it needs to as consistently (ugh... enough of that word....) as possible.
Yet one of the most common mistakes I see would-be deck builders make is including cards that simply don't add anything to their Plan-A.
A very basic example of this is somebody sticking some Plague Stingers into a RB Zombies deck: its a dead card 95% of the time, and will almost always be better as just another card that does what your deck wants to do, in this case, eat brains and then set fire to the remains.
And that’s the rub. That's the WHOLE point of this article (I was in fact going somewhere with all of this :P) Knowing what your deck wants to do. Clearly, the example I gave is typical of a newer player, but the over all idea of this fallacy is something I see time and time again from players who you think would know better. So, I'm here to be the mediator between Player and Deck: I'm going to help you understand what your deck wants.
As alluded to before, different decks want different things. So what are the different decks? In Magic there is seemingly an infinite number of decks. This for our purposes is clearly not useful. So we're going to think broad. The three so-called "Macro-Archetypes" in Magic are Aggro, Control, and Combo. There are of course different variations of these archetypes (tap out control v. draw go control), hybrids (aggro control, mid-range), and a zillion other sub-types, but generally, you can at least loosely ascribe any combination of cards that calls itself a “deck” to one of those basic archetypes. So we will use these.
Each of these archetypes has a way that they want to win pretty firmly associated with them. I'm sure that everyone knows that Aggro decks want to smash face and lower your opponents life as fast as possible, Control decks are more concerned with not letting your opponent win and then following up with something too powerful for your opponent to handle, and combo decks want to put specific cards together that do something so unfair that they just win/cannot possibly lose.
The concept I feel that might be lost on a lot of players, even the ones who know not to put Tome Scour in their Delver deck, is that these decks all have a specific TIME that they want to win as well. As a general rule Aggro wants to win in the early game, combo wants to win in the early-mid game, and control wants to win in the late game.
What does this mean? In short, the reason you don't see Grave Titan in a pro's RB Zombie deck is because they won't have the time or mana to cast it. And in fact, they don't want to. Not because they think that their cards are more powerful than Grave Titan (which they aren’t), but because by the time they could cast it they'd rather have already won the game. And if the time comes that they CAN cast it, they probably have already lost.
The same is true in reverse. Guess how many successful Grixis Control decks ran Goblin Guide? The answer is none. This is because the rest of their deck was geared toward eventually casting Cruel Ultimatum, or something similar in power level that would just win the game by itself. The damage done by the Goblin Guide at that point is completely negligible.
In Magic you only need to win the early, late, or middle game, not all three, so any deck builder worth his/her salt knows when that is and plays all of their cards to support winning then. If you randomly just throw cards into your deck that are geared towards winning games during a point in the game other than the one you intend to win, you might as well just be discarding cards from your hand every time you play.
*A Quick Disclaimer
I’m not advocating the idea that every card is a predetermined “Aggro Card” or “Control Card”, etc. There are plenty of cards that fit into a myriad of strategies perfectly well, including but certainly not limited to Snapcaster Mage, Lightning Bolt, and Lingering Souls. These cards are among the best in the game, and have proven themselves in many different decks with many different strategies. The warning is to avoid cards that are intrinsically powerful, but with narrow applications that your deck won’t benefit from.
So now is the point where I point out some frequent offenders. These are cards that I see in all kinds of decks that just don't want them to be there:
Delver of Secrets Flip
Ah, Delver of Secrets Flip. What is it? An Aggro card... in a control deck?
Yeah, sort of.... The traditional Delver build is what is called an Aggro-Control deck.
"But you JUST said NOT to put Aggro and Control together!"- (This is what you say, and then storm out of the room, all put-off like. Except we're not in a room together...)
Well no, I merely meant to caution players about trying to win at multiple points in the game when they simply don’t need to. An Aggro control deck is sort of the exception to the rule (because there always is one in Magic). It’s a totally different animal that gains strength through its adaptability. When it needs to be the Aggro deck (to beat control decks) it can do that and win the short game. When it needs to be the control deck (to beat Aggro and Combo decks) it can do that too and win the long game. It does not try to win at BOTH points in the game simultaneously. The player decides which point the deck wants to win, and then uses the flexible cards in the Aggro-Control deck to win when it seems like it would best serve them. I'll explain more about this very complicated archetype in a later article I'm sure.
Let me be clear though: throwing Delver into your Solar Flare deck does NOT suddenly transform it into an Aggro-Control deck. Aggro-Control decks are typically among the best in magic (look at Fairies, Caw Blade, and Delver), but only when they are successful. They are THE hardest decks to both build and play imo, and shouldn’t be attempted by just smashing the best Aggro stuff with the best Control stuff into a deck. These decks are hyper-meta conscious, and require a tremendous amount of effort and play testing to get right. But they are of course, very rewarding.
And so I ask you Magic community at large, please, stop just throwing this card into every deck that has the ability to produce blue mana. Yes, it is a very powerful card. No it should not be in your Sun Titan Deck.
The Titans
Another format defining set of cards. They can absolutely win games on their own, and are of course a lot of fun to cast.
But my Grave Titan example from earlier should give you an idea of what I think about putting them in fast Aggro decks with low mana curves.
Besides that however, make sure you aren’t just using them blindly as finishers for decks that don’t need their triggered abilities. Take a look at the Titans, and then imagine what how bad they would be without their ETB and “when attacks” triggers. I’ve seen lists that basically turn these cards into that. Grave Titan and Inferno Titan are usually not as much the problem because generating a bunch of guys or hitting for extra damage is seldom irrelevant, but I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen a Primeval Titan that functions as a slightly better Yavimaya Wurm, or a Sunt Titan that is just a glorified Kemba Legionaires. Make sure your deck WANTS the Titan before you invest effort into playing with it. Sometimes you want Consecrated Sphinx over Frost Titan. Make sure you know when that is.
Planeswalkers
I have a similar problem with planeswalkers that I have with Titans. It seems that just because they are powerful and in the right colors, people will just toss 2-3 copies of any old planeswalker into their deck. Do not fall for the trap. RB Zombies benefits very little from Liliana of the Veil, and Chandra, the Firebrand does nothing in Naya Pod. If you don’t need them you can save yourself the money and game losses by playing something else.
Day of Judgment
This card is typically not in the mainboard of the decks that don’t want it, but for some reason I see it in a lot of Tribal Humans deck’s sideboards. If you are pumping out 2-3 guys and overextending into your opponent’s Days already, then you are never going to want to have Days of your own. It is counterproductive to your plan, and there is NO matchup where it won’t be.
Well, that’s about it for my first article. I hope you enjoyed it enough (or at least didn’t hate it too much) to possibly give whatever I write next a read.
That's definitely true, and part of the reason I personally tend to shy away from things like combo decks. I've found that a general rule in Magic is that if a card is not powerful enough to play on its own, it isn't worth using at all, even in a very powerful combo.
And thank you for leaving a comment :)
June 21, 2012 2:01 p.m.
snazzycool says... #3
Good intro article! I would definitely like to see more like this, especially on how to maintain consistency within decks (outside of running 4 of every card you run :P).
I think play-testing is also really important with deck building. Whether that means by yourself or with friends, doesn't matter. What does matter is that noticing what cards you don't play very often, and then replacing them with more useful cards is something everyone should learn how to do.
June 21, 2012 2:03 p.m.
Thank you!
And you are way ahead of me, as I was thinking of possibly writing an article in the future on the best ways to effectively playtest, as well as how to get the most out of your playtesting.
And the point you bring up I feel is very true, especially in regard to building sideboards. If you never bring a card in, don't waste an extremely valuable sideboard slot. I think the next thing I write will probably be about building sideboards, because I feel it is often overlooked when it is really quite crucial to the success of a deck.
June 21, 2012 2:27 p.m.
Don't you love when a player's deck is named after their weakest card?
June 21, 2012 2:31 p.m.
Haha! Is that a slight directed toward Delver decks by any chance?
Yeah, I've seen some people build around specific "pet cards" that they want to try and make work end up as worse versions of other existing decks simply featuring their pet as the namesake. It is funny that people sometimes can't separate themselves from their "brilliant" ideas i order to see that, even when it is often very obvious to other players.
PS I don't REALLY think Delver is the worst card in Delver..... but I think it is definitely worse than some people realize.
June 21, 2012 2:46 p.m.
aMNKYonSTEROIDS says... #7
What do you suggest when it comes to telling people who are in this situation? I'm not a pro, so I'm not saying my opinion is fact, but I know when something works and when someone just puts something in there because it's nice. One of my friends has a birthing pod deck and he just throws random things in there (Spider Spawning , loads of artifact/enchantment destruction [like Naturalize ] [I also think this is because I used to run an Artifact deck], Blunt the Assault . He even wants to throw in card:Life's Finale so he can "Benefit the most out of Spider Spawning") and I've tried convincing him that he could do better things with his deck than add those cards. Another friend runs Black/Blue zombies, and it was generally an amazing deck. But then he started throwing things in there like Phantasmal Image , just because it can copy stronger creatures, and Ratchet Bomb (which is a nice card, but his Grimgrin, Corpse-Born can do something much nicer).
Long story short, how do you convince someone that this card and that card can be replaced with something better, or are just outright unneeded?
June 21, 2012 4:01 p.m.
As far as UB zombies is conderned,
Phantasmal Image is amazing in UB zombies, and it always has worthy targets, from card:Geralf's Messenger to Diregraf Captain especially if you have all 4 UB duals. Ratchet Bomb can be in the sideboard, since it does answer some problems, (it ruins tokens, which i think is an unfavorable matchup for zombies);
Grimgrin, Corpse-Born , on the other hand, normally doesn't do you much until turn 6, I run a singleton in my UB zombies deck, because he is fun when you do get to use him, but the most competitive of zombies decks don't run grimgrin.
June 21, 2012 4:51 p.m.
Unfortunately EDH seems to be combo-city. Many times when a deck wins it's a sweep by a combo deck. And people still wonder why I run so much control.
I have a feeling that it's becoming less and less of a "just make a better deck to beat them" situation and more of a "just join them already and stop wasting money" situation.
Dang I hate combo decks.
June 21, 2012 6:54 p.m.
Wow, this is sort of a tough question.
Clearly, you should just link them to my article :)
But seriously, all I can really say is that people are going to play what they want to play for whatever reasons that they want to play it. If they think its good and they want to win, they're gonna do it until proven wrong, but in the case of your first friend it sounds like this might not really apply. From his choice of cards, I feel like he might be a casual player, and these players don't play just to win, they play to do the fun stuff they like to do, and there is nothing wrong with that.
If I'm misreading him and he is in fact a more competitive player, then like I said, you're gonna have to prove to him that he is doing something wrong. If you have a competetive Delver deck or can get your hands on one, play test it against him. You can even play on Cockatrice and LackeyCCG if you want a free way to play online. I doubt he'll do very well. At this point, if he doesn't already know this, remind him that statistically, this is without a doubt the best and most popular deck in the meta. If you're serious about being competitive in Standard right now you need to at least have an average matchup to Delver, if not better. If he still doesn't get it, he's a lost cause.
Also, I agree with what Sam_I_am is saying about Phantasmal Image and Ratchet Bomb . Image has become a staple in UB Zombies and Phyrexian Metamorph is frequently seen in RB Zombie lists filling a similar role, especially if it is a variant featuring the Blood Artist + Killing Wave plan. And yes again to Ratchet Bomb being an excellant sb card for a bad matchup. Zombies has a rough time getting through tokens.
June 21, 2012 7:41 p.m.
Ohthenoises says... #11
In my EDH building I have found that the best way to win is to have a main strategy and a side that CAN win just in case your main plan gets foiled. Helix Pinnacle with Omnath, Locus of Mana , Sanguine Bond + Exquisite Blood , and Mikaeus, the Unhallowed + Triskelion Two card combos that, if they happen, are nice to have just in case.
Standard however is a very different beast. I am HUGE on my consistency when it comes to any of my goblin decks (I run 3-4 of every card in the deck) because I can't stand having a inconsistent game. The only exception to that rule is my pod deck as you can tutor for anything you need.
(I really need to make a signature that has my decks written in it lol.) For reference the decks I mentioned are: deck:elfballin, Team Blade, Krenko's Commandos/Boom goes the goblin!, and Crazy Dave's Worst Nightmare.
June 21, 2012 7:47 p.m.
metalmagic says... #12
Pretty good first article. Just a couple things from a fellow (casual) writer: Proofread. I noticed a few spelling mistakes that ended up making two card tags not function, and I'm sure others have noticed as well. I wouldn't normally say anything about one or two spelling mistakes, as we all miss things, but it's a bit more important when they are for card tags, especially ones used in examples. It makes the reader able to read the article more easily, and they will be more likely to read more of your articles (which I look forward to). I have no stance on acronyms.
The ending of the article was VERY abrupt. No real conclusion was present, and while you did have a couple concluding statements, the conclusion is generally used as a space to summarize the main points of the article so they stick in the readers' heads. I'm sure you know this; I'm just reiterating it to you.
And lastly, this point has nothing to do with the article itself. Doing 'a few' articles per week is tough work. I'm not sure if you plan to do two, three, four, or even more somehow, but unless you just REALLY have a lot to say, a good chance is present that you will get burnt out and run out of ideas more quickly than you would prefer. An article per week is a good pace, and it gives readers time to mull over what you have to say each week. We haven't really had many user-submitted articles lately like we used to, so I still encourage you to keep up the writing (which I would do even if we weren't in a slight decline of articles).
All in all, this was a good article. These types of articles are great for the newer players, and I'm sure they appreciate the time you put into this and the time you will put into future articles. I look forward to reading them as well! I can learn and be reminded of very simple concepts just like the rest of us, so it is good to have material like this to read.
June 21, 2012 8:23 p.m.
Thank you for the critique. To be honest, when I submitted this article to the higher ups on Tapped Out, it was pitched as a sort of "sample article" to give them an idea of my writing style and overall knowledge of the material. I didn't even know that they were going to submit it really until I came home from work and I saw it on the site (although I'm glad they did ).
Had I known it was going to be on the site, I would have spent a bit more time spell checking and fleshing out the ending, but you raise very valid points and I will certainly take your advice into consideration for my next article.
June 21, 2012 9:23 p.m.
aMNKYonSTEROIDS says... #14
I totally just realized how new I am to Magic. It's only been a few months, and I'm not all too familiar with the terminology. Aggro and control I'm familiar with, but Combo? I'm not sure what exactly that means... I feel like all decks have some sort of combo in there somewhere... Explain please?
June 21, 2012 10:49 p.m.
Ohthenoises says... #15
"combo" is in reference to decks that will kill you instantly once the combo starts. A good example was a deck called "Deceiver Twin" from when zendikar+mirroden was standard. That deck used Deceiver Exarch and Splinter Twin to kill you instantly. It did so by playing Splinter Twin on the Deceiver Exarch and tapping him to make another of himself and using his ETB ability on the original Deceiver Exarch untapping him and making another copy over and over. All of these copies have haste so they would just make enough creatures to kill you.
June 21, 2012 10:55 p.m.
Great article, it is really useful while considering how to improve my token deck .
Thanks for the advice
June 21, 2012 10:56 p.m.
Ohthenoises says... #18
Fun to play but it still wasn't the best deck of the time. one of the best at the time (until she got banned for it) was Stoneforge Mystic + Batterskull . Turn 3 Batterskull just is not fun to play against.
June 21, 2012 11:09 p.m.
metalmagic says... #19
BrianH369 - Yeah, they will submit an article by pretty much anyone given it has something to contribute to the community. Knowing now that you didn't intend for it to get featured, the ending and all that don't seem as big, but it's just something to keep in consideration anyway. Hopefully you will be more consistent with your articles than I am with mine, haha. I'm about two months overdue, but my laptop is pretty dead right now and I need to get it fixed so I can finish up an article and get back in the groove of things. I'm glad the article went through as well, though. It has some really good topics and points in it, all of which I think most people can agree. Just make the next one at least as good!
June 22, 2012 1:19 a.m.
doinitwrong says... #20
Great article, can't wait to read more.
While I agree that the cards you mentioned are over/misused, they can be useful as barometers to compare to other cards. When I'm making new decks (one of my favorite parts of Magic as well), I find myself drawing a blank as to what cards to include annoyingly often, so I fill the gaps with the cliche cards. Then I playtest to analyze how well the cards do in different scenarios. This gives me good guidelines when looking for better/more useful cards to put in. The overused and cliche cards are good for this because every player is likely to be familiar with them, so any player can use them as a starting point.
June 22, 2012 1:43 a.m.
What are your thoughts on multiple copies of the same spell with different restrictions as far as consistency goes? For example, if I wanted 6 kill spells in my deck, instead of going for 4 Go for the Throat and 2 Doomblade, I went for 2 of each as well as 2 Victim of Night. All kill spells with different restrictions.
June 22, 2012 10:45 a.m.
It's generally good to have a mix of kill spells, and you want to be able to ship the wrong ones away to your sideboard when playing against the wrong decks(Doom Blade and Victim of Night are generally dead cards against the zombies deck)
you also have card:Geth's Verdict for hexproof or pro-black guys, Sever the Bloodline for tokens, card:Black Sun's Zenith for swarmy decks(or even killing large creatures) etc.
June 22, 2012 11:28 a.m.
Having a variety of options is of course always optimal, but don't put something into your deck just because it has different restrictions if it is not great in the meta you expect. Victim of Night is not only tough on the mana, but in the current meta, it isn't even all that good. Huntmaster of the Fells Flip is prominent, and as Sam_I_am pointed out, the card is almost completely dead against an entire deck, and a popular one at at that. Against the deck where it does work, its really no better than Go for the Throat , especially if you aren't mono black or close to it, in which case it is worse.
I'd recommend something like 2 Go for the Throat , 2 Doom Blade , and depending on the deck either 2 Tragic Slip , 2 card:Geth's Verdict, or 2 Dismember . I might even consider 3 Go for the Throat and 1 Doom Blade atm because there are fewer artifact creatures seeing play than black ones.
June 22, 2012 4:22 p.m.
JamesHughes says... #25
I'm running a deck, G/B/W Fiend of the Shadows (With Optional Color!), and I don't know when my deck is supposed to finish. I was wondering if you or someone else could check it out and explain how I can make it better and more suited to the base cards?
June 22, 2012 7:31 p.m.
spectre501st says... #26
Awesome article, really understood where you were coming from. I typically am a very careful deckbuilder, only using what I think I will need. I totally got what you were saying with Day of Judgment having turned down that card after much agonizing and debating whether it would actually work or not. If you want, check out the deck Everyday I'm Splicing( opinions wanted)
June 22, 2012 8:59 p.m.
I really liked your article. I'm a "non-competitive casual player" and love to build a deck for a theme rather than a win, but I also understand that should I ever want to attend FNM I should bring something that is build with synergy in mind. I will admit, I'm guilty of running my one-of planeswalkers in a deck, but often its filler when I don't own the 3rd or 4th of a card I would prefer. That doesn't make it right, it just makes me poor lol.
June 22, 2012 11:02 p.m.
thejadejedi says... #28
One of the first articles I have read on here and I really enjoyed it. I would like to echo what metalmagic said about the ending. It could have used a better ending. But still, was a very well written article. Can't wait for your next one :)
Also, I've been having a few issues with this exact issue myself. I'm currently trying to reformat my deck and I'm often unsure if cards that don't bring me any closer to victory (In this case Asceticism ) are worth running in my Aggro/Combo deck Ezuri's Harvesting Wave. I have a few one-of creatures as well and am unsure if they need to be removed, changed to different creatures or increased in number.
Anyway, I liked the article and it definitally helped me see one of the reasons why I got 6th last night at FNM than 3rd (or better).
June 23, 2012 2:39 p.m.
Wow i love the article, how can i follow more articles you put out in the future?
June 23, 2012 9:21 p.m.
Good work, i really enjoyed reading your article as you state your points clearly and with appropriate examples. Keep it up!
June 24, 2012 7:11 a.m.
I'm very guilty of some of these things...
I've been conditioned to put in multiple win conditions, but too often those win conditions are so far separate from each other that they don't actually benefit each other, and it just pulls away from my main win con. But when I focus exclusively on my main win con, I find I have no room left to add another and need to cut stuff out.
Trying to win at all stages of the game is a real issue for me. Talking to some experts I realized I have a natural inclination towards mana curve without even thinking, but I don't have a deep understanding of where I want my curve to be for different decks. I just naturally put in cards of varied mana costs, which usually leads to all my decks attempting to be midrange aggro decks, even if they want to be combo or control.
June 24, 2012 2:39 p.m.
evilsofthepast says... #32
I originally started out like this, then as I came along, I began to see that some cards just weren't worth putting in. Besides some of them not having any real benefit for the deck, putting in the wrong cards can lead to an overflowing deck where you find it impossible to draw the right card when you need it.
So, I turned my deck-building strategy into this. Step 1, what do I want my deck to do. Step 2, Does this card fit with what I want my deck to do. Step 3 (And the most important), if yes to Step 2, does it work with the other cards within the deck itself, or is it a stand-alone card. And finally, step 4, how many of the card do I need to let my deck run effectively.
That strategy led me to build thishttp://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/there-and-back-again-2/
Take a look and tell me if it's up to snuff. It actually works really well. The only time it was beaten is when I played my friend who runs a 'turn-two kill' infect deck.
June 24, 2012 5:31 p.m.
I don't think that I've ever put more thought into a deck than I've put into Hybrid Elves. I know what I want to do on turn 1, I know what I want to do on turn 2, I know what I want to do in turn 3, and I know what I want to be doing in the longer control match-up.
And really, "theme" is the wrong word for deck construction. The real question you should ask yourself is "how does this card help my PLAN"
June 25, 2012 8:55 a.m.
i like the blunt advice, ppl (including me) need to kno when, and when NOT, to add a good meta game card to an already decent deck list, aka delver, or a titan. nice inclusion at the end about DoJ, its insane to run a weenies deck and have a sweeper like that, its totally counter productive!
June 26, 2012 2:40 a.m.
aeonstoremyliver says... #35
I dig the article BrianH369. In my genesis as a MTG player I was often at fault for evilsofthepast's mistakes as well. Deckbuilding is as much a science as it is chance as it is how you pilot the deck. I have some of my own ideas and inclusions that I'll be writing about in the forums.
June 26, 2012 11:08 a.m.
aeonstoremyliver says... #36
I posted a blurb in the General Forum section: Deckbuilding 101
June 26, 2012 3:30 p.m.
Thank you for this article, it's very interesting and helpful. I've been playing magic for many years but never at your level and it help to get some tips some times. Would you help me a little more by looking at my deck ? I've been juggling with a black and green zombie deck (Death by numbers) for some times and I feel like there is still some things that could be done to make it better. Do you see cards in my deck "that just don't want (...) to be there" ? lol
Anyway, good article !
June 26, 2012 9:52 p.m.
I think what happens with the DoJ in swarm decks is that people are thinking of the mirror match. Yes, it's good against the enemy in a mirror... but it still hurts yourself waaay too much to consider in the main, and possibly even in the side.
June 26, 2012 10:08 p.m.
I read this article, changed up my deck andI started winning more instantly. My problem is that there is so much fun stuff to do, I try to do like four things at a time. I narrowed it to two things that support each other and that gave me a much stronger deck. Thanks and I'm looking forward to your next article!
June 27, 2012 7:27 a.m.
Great article. i believe i have made the "perfect" deck as far as consistency goes and if you can check it out and let me know what you think that would be great man. keep it commin!
http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/redblue-clean-slate-rush-m13/
Mpz5 says... #1
Nice article man. I too have seen many cards just thrown in and I always ask why it's there. The answer I usually receive is that either it's powerful, at which point I agree but tell them that it doesn't fit the theme of the deck, or they tell me that when they have it and such and such a card art the same time, they are unstoppable. If you are running things just for the off chance that you will draw them with specific other cards in play, do yourself a favor and don't. The inconsistency is not worth it.
June 21, 2012 11:45 a.m.