My Type 4 Stack

I built this Type 4 stack to provide the exciting Magic gameplay that I had been missing recently. I always like to describe playing Type 4 as "playing the exciting turns of an EDH game."

Gameplay

The rules I play by:

• Players have infinite mana of any color (and colorless) available at all times.
• Each player can only cast one spell on each turn.
• Players start the game with only 5 cards (since they don't need to play lands for mana).
• Players start with 20 life.
• For mulligans, players may set aside any number of cards from their opening hand and then draw that many cards. The set-aside cards are then shuffled into their deck.
• Hand size is still 7 cards.
• If the game is multiplayer, the first player does get to draw on their first turn
• Players have their own library (it's just easier to split it up)

Details

I usually just end up shuffling up a big stack of the 300 cards and splitting it between players evenly. You could theoretically draft it, but I always just want to get to the games! This stack plays best with 3+ players, though I often end up playing with only 2. It's just a little unbalanced with only 2 players, as one player can usually resolve a key spell and then keep protecting their board advantage for the win.

Most games end up being a balancing act of threat assessment, as you try to run your opponents out of relevant cards before you stick your best threat (or card draw spell). Also, it immensely helps to know all the intricacies of the comprehensive rules, as some very weird stacks can happen in this format. That being said, this is a great format to learn all those intricacies as well.

Design

I used the following constraints when designing this stack:

• No errata - one spell per turn means one spell per turn
• No tokens (ok, two tokens)
• No tutors (ok, one tutor)
• No infinite power creatures or infinite damage to players
• No oppressive board presence cards (e.g. Legacy Weapon)
• Reduce the amount of time players spend durdling while others wait on them
• Encourage a back and forth playstyle instead of allowing easy wins, or needing specific answers
• Cards must be cheap enough that I don't care how others treat them

Details

Unlike many lists I've seen, I didn't try to skirt the rules on the cards using errata - this makes it easier for new players to learn the rules without explaining a bunch of exceptions. For the "one spell per turn" rule, you won't find any Cascade, Diluvian Primordial or Possibility Storm-type effects here. One spell means one spell. Activated abilities on the other hand... Also, morphs still count towards your one spell per turn, and I didn't include cards that require you to have any basic lands, like Anger or Walk the Aeons.

I designed this list to be fairly portable, so I didn't include any token makers or tutor effects. Tokens make it hard to tell what's what, unless you want to go through the trouble of finding the right token from a pile you always need to bring along. Since I don't draft my stack, tutoring can be really boring, as everyone then needs to wait for the player to read every card in their "deck." I've found increasing the amount of card draw and reducing the must answer threats has made tutoring unnecessary.

I've also tried to keep the format free of "I win" type cards. Legendary Eldrazi, Memnarch, Polukranos, and Griselbrand need not apply. I've greatly restricted hard to kill or hexproof cards, as they always require specific answers that may not come up (which ties in with the lack of tutors above). I tried to include a number of removal and counterspells that have interesting restrictions, meaning they won't kill or counter everything. I specifically avoided cards that create oppressive board presences as well, as being oppressed isn't very fun. Only a few permanents have/give haste, so you also don't have to worry as much about dying out of nowhere.

Another thing that ended up being degenerate when I was building this was excessive card draw (suprise). I ended up cutting a lot of the repeatable large card draw, to make it more of a struggle for resources. Also, when players have access to a large number of cards, turns take longer, as each player has to evaluate each card as another thing they could do. That being said, I have a lot of cantrip removal and counterspells, and many cards give two-for-ones, so there are still ways to get card advantage. Planeswalkers are also out, as they are just too hard to deal with using simple attacking (sticking a creature is hard in my stack), and I don't want to include a bunch of cards solely to deal with them.

I also included a light reanimation theme, but tried to make it more of a way to make games come to an eventual end, instead of making it a strong early win strategy. Along with this, I tried not to include too much graveyard recursion, as I didn't want to include a bunch of slots to fight graveyard effects. Similarly, I made artifacts (and to a lesser extent, enchantments) harder to destroy than normal, but didn't include very many of them either. This is mainly to balance for their effects not really providing a tangible effect on the board the turn they are cast.