Tips: Efficient deck building

There are a few "rules" that are good to follow to build your deck efficiently. There is many other ways ... Adapt them according to your feelings and needs.

Choose your color(s)

When having a lot of cards, you can simply pick the ones you really want to play and build the rest around ... However, with a small collection, let's say something under 300 cards, you have to forget about those awesome rares you got and look at what is available to you in a more general way.

While reading the following keep in mind you shouldn't play more than 3 colors, and it's better if you can stick to 2 (or even 1).

Some of the most important things to look at are the "fixers" yout got. A fixer is a card that can solve a trouble, like a creature removal. Those are especialy important since most decks built from small collection are usualy using a lot of creatures. A fixer is usualy a spell, but some creatures / artifacts are considered as one too. Once you know how many of those you have in every colors, you should have a better idea of what you are going to do.

Then, have a look to your creatures. You shouldn't decide to play a given color because it has awesome ones ... But you may discard one because it has too few or really bad creatures. Keep in mind that a well balanced deck will need both early and late game creatures. Also, creatures with some evasion skills like flying, fear or trample, are way better than others as they can break thru a stalled game. You will need some.

If you are still undecided, last thing to consider are those cards that have a huge impact on the game. Usualy they don't fix a problem (and hence aren't considered as fixers), but they rather add a big one to your opponent. In many cases, you'll have to deal with them too as those cards might have a general impact on the game. They aren't easy to use and are not mandatory, but if you have the tools to build a deck around them it might become a very interresting and powerful one.

Pick the right cards

Stick to the minimum. First tournament ask you to build a deck with at least 40 cards, to get the best out of your collection you shouldn't go higher than that. The following is written for a 40 cards deck.

Start by adding the fixers, you should preferably have 5 to 10 of them dealing mostly with creatures. But being able to remove an artifact or an enchantment can really save a game as well.

Then add your creatures, something from 10 to 15 of them. As I already stated, for a balanced deck you need some cheap ones (2 mana or lower to cast) but also some strong ones. Also keep in mind you need as much evasion (flying, trample, fear and such) as you can get.

Now time to add the lands. It's a rather tricky part ... Not as easy as it seems. A strong minimum is around 13, but you may only have that few if playing mono-color with a strong early game (cheap cards overall) and that's it. If playing 2 colors, 15 to 16 (preferably) sounds like playable. For 3 colors, you'd need more something like 18 or 19 lands (yes, almost half your deck).

To decide more accuratly, it's important to know how expensive your deck is and what is its mana breakdown. If you are using MWS you can check those informations with tools >> base analysis >> color / mana breakdown. A deck with a lot of cards costing 2 manas or lower is a fast one. A last note, some artifacts or creatures can produce mana and you may count them as lands or not, depending mostly on how expensive they are to cast.

You should still have some room left for some other cards. Try to stick with those often usefull but not necessarily cheap, keep balancing your deck for early and late game.

Summarize

Important things to keep in mind:

• Don't pick a color cause you have a very good card in, it's the overall quality that matters
• Stick to the minimum, the fewer cards you have the better quality you get
• Make sure you have enough fixers to deal with your opponent's cards
• Evasion skills (flying, trample, fear and so on) are very important when choosing your creatures
• Balance your deck for it to be effective in both early and late game
• Removing a land to get a room for a card you really want to play isn't an option, stick to the number you decided according to your deck's needs
• Those aren't rules to be followed blindly, they are more like pointers. If you came up with a great idea for your deck that is not compatible with them, go on !

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