Magic: The Gathering Formats

Before we go over building your first ever magic deck you'll need to know which format you want to play. A format is a game mode or game type in Magic: The Gathering. Magic has a multitude of formats to choose from, each with its own set of rules. It's important to know which format(s) you want to play in as this will heavily affect your deck building philosphy. Each format has its own set of rules with regards to the game and your deck. Some games allow for 60 card decks, others require a 100 card deck. So knowing what format you like and want to play is the first thing you have to know before you build your deck. While these 4 formats that we are going to list are not the only ones available to play, these are 4 important ones to know for beginners.

Standard:

Standard is the largest offically sanctioned format by Wizards of the Coast. It is what's know as a constructed format, meaning you build your own constructed deck based on the rules of the format your playing. Standard is a rotating format, you can build your deck only using cards from the 4 latest sets released by Wizards of the Coast. In this format you have a starting life total of 20 life, and play against one opponent. It's a best of 3 rounds game. Each deck has to be a minimum of 60 cards and can only have a maximum of 4 copies of the same card. Standard also has a ban list of cards not allowed to be used or put into your standard deck. Your deck can have any assortment of colours 1 or 2, it's entirely up to you. You may also have a sideboard of 15 cards. A sideboard are extra or spare cards, that you can swap out for other cards in your deck between rounds.

Modern:

Modern is a highly competitive and expensive constructed format. All cards in the modern format have the modern magic card frame, which was first used in the Eighth Edition set in 2003. So every card released in and after that set is legal in modern. That is a lot of powerful cards to choose from! Like standard, you start off with 20 life, each deck has a minimum of 60 cards with no more than 4 copies of one card, and it's best of 3 rounds. And again you can have as little or as many colours in your deck as you like. A sideboard of 15 cards can also be used. A lot of decks in modern are designed to win as quickly and effciently as possible, more so than any other format. To build a modern takes a lot of money, planning and knowledge of magic as a whole. This format is definitely not suitable for beginners!

Commander:

Commander is the king of the casual formats and has recieved a lot of attention and popularity in the past few years. In this format you have 100 cards in each deck. One card in your deck will be the center piece of the deck. This card has to be a legendary creature card. It will be your commander. It sits in a special zone called the command zone, where it can be cast anytime you could normally a creature card. Your commander's colour identity will dictate what colour cards you can have in your deck. For example if your commander is a blue red card, you may only have blue and red cards in your remaining 99 cards. If your commander dies, you may choose to put it into the graveyard or the command zone. But everytime you cast your commander from the command zone after the first time, a commander tax of 2 generic mana is required each time. This is paid aswell as the ordinary mana cost. So if your commander dies twice and you send it to the commandzone each time and recast it, the next time your commander will cost an extra 6 generic mana. Like all other formats, you may have any number of basic lands, but you can only have one single copy of a card, no duplicates. This makes commander a singleton format. You can play against up to 3 opponents in commander and your starting life total is 40 life. So commander games will take much longer than modern or standard! But you'll get more time to cast big spells and have more time to strategize. Commander was first concieved by magic players after a tournament. Back then it was originally called Elder Dragon Highlander(EDH) and still can be called that to this day. Elder dragon refering to their commanders, the elder dragons, and highlander referring to the Sean Connery movie of the same name where the line "There can be only ONE" is famously shouted. A competitive version of commander is also played, this is called CEDH (Competitive elder dragon highlander) and like modern is fast and expensive to play!

Pauper:

Pauper is a very unique and cost effective casual format. Similar to standard and modern, you start off at 20 life, play against one opponent, and need a constructerd deck of 60 cards minimum. Again, you can only have a maximum of 4 copies of one card, besides basic lands. The catch with pauper is that every card in your deck must have the common rarity. A relatively new format, but quickly growing one, pauper has much to offer magic players not looking to break the bank.

Building your First Deck

As you can see, there are so many formats in magic, that building your deck depends very much on the format you want to partake in. But once you've choosen what format(s) you want to build a deck for, here are a few deck building tips and tricks to help you build your first deck:

• Start with your win condition. Figure out how your deck will win, and what you need to do to get the win. Combat damage, casting damage spells, and life draining are all good strategies to think about. You can use cards that have "You win the game" type effects in their rules text. Getting your opponent to discard all his/her cards into their graveyard so no cards are left in their library is a win condition. If an opponent goes to draw on their upkeep with no cards in their library, they lose the game. Have a clear idea of what your win condition is.
• Having an efficient mana base is an absolute must in every deck. For 60 card formats, anywhere between 16 - 25 lands is a good starting place. 100 card formats, 36 - 45 lands is the sweet spot. But these numbers will depend on your strategy and your converted mana costs. You'll want to have enough lands in your deck to be consistently drawing lands, but not too many lands as you'll need to be consistently casting spells each turn. Magic is all about resource management!
• Card draw is a highly under rated strategy for new players. Card draw is the ability to consistently draw cards outside of the first card you draw per turn. You need card draw to dig through your deck and see as many cards as you can, so you can get the ones you need to win. Try and include more reliable and consitent instances of card draw. For example, a permanent card that draws you cards every turn is better than a once off instant or sorcery that draws you 2 cards once. This is very generally speaking, and is subject to change depending on your decks strategy.
• Interaction in magic means spells that interact with your opponent or thier permananets or their game plan. It can be anything from a kill spell to a counterspell. Your deck will need some form of interaction, otherwise your opponent will walk all over you with his. Have enough interaction to be able to stop your opponent from winning on a single turn.
• Every deck in magic should have a theme. Your theme can be anything from a gameplay mechanic (eg. your deck wants to play cards from the graveyard) to a flavour theme (eg. your deck only has creatures with the zombie creature type). It's important not to stray too far from the central theme of your deck, as you'll fall into the jack of all trades master of none trap. Similar to your win condition, you need to clear idea of your decks theme. This ensures your deck will play consitently well and will achieve it's end goal.
• But before you head off building a deck for the Magic: The Gathering competitive circuit, we recommend you build a casual deck. In magic casual decks are just random thrown together decks. They can be anything. It's a good idea to just make your own deck with your own ideas and see how it pans out. You can steadily improve it game after game. Ask any other magic player for a casual game with your casual deck! Slowly but surely you'll get the hang of it. Make sure to have fun!