Cube Archetypes
Generic Good Stuff
You may find that your cards don't really fit into the specific archetypes below. In this case you may decide to go with a midrange/tempo strategy. These are usually Black, Blue and some other color to splash. With Black you get a lot of creature removal and discard. With Blue you get a lot of card draw and counterspells. You will look to have a good amount of these as well as something from your third color. Be warned, your manabase is going to be tricky with 3 colors and you'll need to make sure the man fixing you have works with the good cards in your deck. If your mana can't support 3 colors you're best sticking with the best 2 colors you can make.
Generic Blue:
The focus of a generic blue deck should be using counterspells and interactive cards to disrupt your opponent while you build up your mana. Use draw spells to find your finishers or cards that take over the game. In addition, any cards that make up the powered list are always the best cards you can draft.
Counterspells/Interaction: Remand, Mana Leak, Counterspell, Glen Elendra Archmage, and Treachery
Mana: Izzet Signet, Dimir Signet, Ancient Tomb, and Coalition Relic
Draw Spells: Fact or Fiction, Compulsive Research, Thirst for Knowledge, and Chart a Course
Finishers: Consecrated Sphinx
Take over the game: Karn Liberated and Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
Mono White:
Mono white, also commonly called “white weenie,” is full of small, low-cost creatures that combine to make a strong deck. Prioritizing 1- and 2-drop creatures lets you quickly gain board presence and start pressuring your opponent. It also uses disruption to keep them on the back foot. Mana destruction is another technique this archetype uses to press the advantage. If you pick up a Stoneforge Mystic, this archetype can also be a good home for the strong equipment
1- and 2- drops: Mother of Runes, --Usher of the Fallen, Student of Warfare, Adanto Vanguard, and --Seasoned Hallowblade
Disruption: Thalia, Guardian of Thraben,--Vryn Wingmare and Lodestone Golem
Mana Destruction: Wasteland and Strip Mine for early, Armageddon and Ravages of War once you've filled the board with creatures
Random: Mana Tithe
Equipment: Batterskull, Umezawa's Jitte, or the cycle of Swords
Mono Red
This archetype wants to attack your opponent with 1-drops while disrupting their mana so that you have enough time to get their life total low enough to finish them off with burn spells. Any 2-drop creatures or higher need to do more than just attack, they need to be able to push damage or facilitate an advantage like generating red mana to cast more spells. Red also benefits from land disruption and cheap artifact removal. After your small creatures have dealt 8 - 12 damage, you can start to close out the game with multiple burn spells.
1 Drops: Goblin Guide, Monastery Swiftspear, --Soul-Scar Mage and Grim Lavamancer
Land Disruption: Wasteland and Strip Mine
Cheap artifact destruction: Ancient Grudge
Burn Spells: Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, --Banefire, Fireblast, and Fiery Confluence
Other Good Cards: Shrine of Burning Rage and Sulfuric Vortex
Mono Green Ramp
Mono green ramp wants to use mana-producing creatures (mana dorks) and artifact mana to ramp out a larger finisher.
Mana dorks: Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary, Birds of Paradise, Joraga Treespeaker, and Noble Hierarch (there are tons of different ones)
Finishers: Karn Liberated, Ugin, the Spirit Dragon, Woodfall Primus, Progenitus, Primeval Titan, Avenger of Zendikar, Craterhoof Behemoth and the Eldrazi
Other Great Options: Natural Order, Channel, Upheaval, and Opposition. if you have Channel, you’ll want to prioritize the Eldrazi and other colorless finishers
Big Mana
Big mana wants to use fast mana producing artifacts to take advantage of draw sevens, cast board reset and wipe spells, or turbo out a game warping finisher. All your additional artifact mana will help cast more spells from the draws than your opponent and hopefully one of those spells is your finisher. This archetype also loves Mana Drain because it can use the mana so efficiently to out-resource your opponent.
Mana Artifacts: Sol Ring, Mox Sapphire (or any moxes), Mana Crypt, Ancient Tomb, Mana Vault, Gilded Lotus, Thran Dynamo, Coalition Relic, Izzet Signet (any signets, but preferably blue ones followed by the red signets). This archetype doesn’t function without the artifact ramp and you want at least 5
Draw Sevens: Timetwister, Wheel of Fortune, Time Spiral, and Memory Jar
Board Resets/Wipes: Upheaval, Wildfire and Burning of Xinye
Finishers: Consecrated Sphinx, Inferno Titan, Karn Liberated, and Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
Blue Artifact
This archetype is big mana with a package of big game-winning artifacts. It uses artifact mana ramp to win the game or to cheat out a huge artifact. This archetype essentially needs to have Tinker in order to function well.
Game-Winning Artifacts: Blightsteel Colossus, Sundering Titan, Inkwell Leviathan, Sphinx of the Steel Wind, Myr Battlesphere, and --Bolas's Citadel
Other Good Picks: --Urza, Lord High Artificer, Tolarian Academy and Mishra's Workshop
Mono Brown
This is another version of big mana. It uses all the artifact mana to take advantage of board wipes and then out resource your opponent. Casting a huge artifact finisher (or cheating it into play) is another angle for victory. Having a high density of artifacts lets you maximize artifact ramp cards to cast your big artifacts or draw sevens and then dump your hand to take over the game. This archetype can also be a prison-style deck to attack your opponent’s mana while taking advantage of your non-land mana producers.
Board Wipes: Balance, Wildfire and Upheaval
Artifact Finisher: Blightsteel Colossus, Sundering Titan, or Inkwell Leviathan
Artifact Cheaters: Tinker and --Kuldotha Forgemaster
Artifact Ramp: Metalworker, Tolarian Academy and Mishra's Workshop
Prison Cards: Strip Mine, Smokestack, Tangle Wire, Winter Orb, Wasteland, and Crucible of Worlds
Azorius Control
Blue brings card draw, counterspells, and big finishers. White brings sweepers, creature interaction, and its own finishers. This archetype likes to counter your opponent’s cards, use sweepers to deal with creatures, and then finish the game with one of its closers, all while using the card draw to find what’s needed.
Card Draw: Fact or Fiction, Compulsive Research, Thirst for Knowledge
Counterspells: Counterspell, Force of Will, Remand There are many options
Big Finishers: Consecrated Sphinx, Baneslayer Angel and --Approach of the Second Sun
Sweepers: Wrath of God, --Settle the Wreckage, and --Doomskar
Creature Interaction: Swords to Plowshares, Path to Exile, Banishing Light There are many options
Sneak and Breach
Sneak and breach is a dependable combo archetype that only relies on two cards. It uses Sneak Attack or Through the Breach to cheat out a big finisher.
Finishers: Emrakul, the Aeons Torn, Griselbrand, Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre, Kozilek, Butcher of Truth, Woodfall Primus, Sundering Titan, or Blightsteel Colossus
Other Sneak Options: Shallow Grave or Corpse Dance would require you to discard the cards somehow
Kiki/Splinter Twin
This is another combo archetype that relies on two pieces. Its goal is to make an infinite number of creature tokens with haste to kill your opponent in one turn. Other than Splinter Twin and Restoration Angel, pairing either of the copiers with one of the un-tappers will combo off. This deck likes card draw spells that help you find your combo and creatures that have good ETB triggers, which make good copy targets when you can’t assemble the combo. With most of the cards being blue or red, this combo package can fit nicely into any blue deck as well as a Sneak and Breach deck. (See combo section for explanation of how to go off)
Copiers: Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker and Splinter Twin
Un-tappers: Deceiver Exarch, Zealous Conscripts, Restoration Angel, and Pestermite
Storm
The goal of Storm is to cast enough spells in one turn so that when you cast one of the storm cards it copies enough times to win the game. The key to a functioning storm deck is being able to make excessive amounts of mana and draw as many cards as possible. Yawgmoth's Will is an all-star in this archetype because it lets you chain spells together as you cast them from your hand and then your graveyard. In general, storm is a bit of a glass cannon. If your wincon storm card is disrupted, then you likely won’t get a second chance at storming off. However, a good storm deck generates a ton of mana and draws a ton of cards. So if you’re achieving that, then the deck can have multiple built-in win conditions since it isn’t too hard to win a game when you have all your cards and enough mana to cast them. All the complex corner case possibilities for winning a game that only come up in storm are why it’s such a popular archetype.
Storm Cards: Tendrils of Agony or Brain Freeze
Mana Generators: Mana Flare, Dark Ritual
Card Draw: Time Spiral, Wheel of Fortune
Reanimator
This archetype wants to get a huge monster in the graveyard and then cheat it into play with a reanimation spell. Griselbrand is the best giant monster to have in the deck since it ends games when it sticks on the battlefield, stabilizes the board, and redraws your hand to potentially combo again. You also want cards that help you put the creatures in the yard. This archetype is heavily black or even mono black, but if you set yourself up to splash the blue and red draw/discard spells, you can also pick up a Sneak Attack or Through the Breach as an additional way to cheat out your creatures.
Best Cards: Entomb and Griselbrand
Reanimation Spells: Reanimate, Animate Dead, Shallow Grave, Corpse Dance or --Necromancy
Other Reanimation Targets: All giant monsters. For Eldrazi you need instant speed because of shuffle trigger
Get Creatures in Graveyard: Frantic Search, Chart a Course, and Faithless Looting
Tutors: Demonic Tutor
Tokens
This archetype often lives in Selesnya (Green-White). It uses token makers (backbone of the deck) to go wide and then strike with a huge board. Cards that pump your board are phase two of the deck that let you swing for the finishing strike. It’s great staring your opponent down from across a sea of creatures, but you need to be careful not to play into wrath effects because that is this archetype’s Achilles heel.
Counters
This archetype is also heavy Selesnya (Green-White), and it can be an alternate lane to the token deck. It uses +1/+1 counters to make a board of a handful of big creatures or a few giant creatures that quickly get too large for opponents to deal with. You want to pick up all the cards, especially creatures, that add counters. You also want cards that increase the counters that get generated. Otherwise, inexpensive creatures with good abilities like flying, first strike, or trample are great here. Like the token deck, you need to be cautious of sweepers. But you’re frequently winning well before your opponent reaches their big late-game board wipes when this archetype goes off.
Common Combos
- Natural Order - Get to sacrifice any green creature and get any green creature. You are usually looking for Progenitus, Craterhoof Behemoth or Woodfall Primus
- Upheaval - This is typically combined with mana rocks or dorks (signets, Llanowar Elves, etc.). You float a bunch of mana, bounce everything back to everyone's hand, use your floating mana to replay as much stuff as you can. This doesn't typically win on the spot (though it can), but you are basically resetting the game with you being multiple turns ahead of your opponent
- Opposition - Used to slow your opponent down. Works well with lots of small creatures to tap opponent's mana before they can do anything with it. Want to tap their mana in their upkeep. Can also use to tap creatures before they're declared as attackers
- Craterhoof Behemoth - You want to cheat this into play (or cast it) when you have a good number of creatures on the battlefield. You typically want to win the turn this comes down so make sure to do your math right!
- Stripmine + Crucible of Worlds - Pretty straightforward, with crucible on the battlefield you can keep looping stripmine or another land like that to keep your opponent from growing their mana. Late game this may be too little too late. Remember, you are slowing your mana growing since this takes up your land drop every turn
- Winter Orb, Tangle Wire, Smokestack - More pieces to slow your opponents down, but remember these slow you down too. They need to be played in the right deck to make sure they don't screw you up too
- Sundering Titan - Great against decks that play a lot of colors and/or lots of dual lands. BE CAREFUL! If possible, you must select one of each land type. This means if you have a forest on your battlefield and your opponent doesn't you MUST sacrifice your forest
- Blightsteel Colossus - Infect damage is different than regular damage. You only need to deal 10 infect damage to your opponent to win which means this can kill in one attack. Infect deals damage to creatures as -1/-1 counters, meaning if your opponent has a big creature that blocks this you can make it much smaller
- Sneak Attack + Show and Tell - Use these to cheat in your big fatties, simple as that. BE CAREFUL! Show and tell is both people, they get to bring their fatties in too. Sneak attack you have to sacrifice at end of turn so make it count. Neither of these count as "casting" the creature
- Splinter Twin - This combo goes infinite and wins the turn you play it. Use one of your "copiers" to copy an "untapper". When the new untapper comes into play you untap your copier and make a new untapper. You repeat this process an infinite number of times and then attack for a bajillion damage
- Storm - Every spell cast during that turn before you cast your storm spell replicates that spell. This counts any spells your opponents cast too. If you cast a storm spell, and other spells are cast while it is on the stack, this does not count towards storm count. When doing math make sure to count the card you're casting!
If storm count is 9, and you cast Tendrils of Agony it will drain your opponent for 20 life (10 spells x 2 life per spell)
- Reanimator - Very similar to Sneak attack/show and tell except you typically get to keep your creature at the end. Again, this also does not count as "casting" the creature.
