Help a rookie

Since you're starting out, here are a few general tips:

- Stick to 60 cards unless you feel that you have to go over no matter what.

- Try to stay clear of effectless creatures that don't have a higher power and toughness for the mana cost. For example, Zombie Goliath is a 4/3 for 5 mana. Cards like that would only really be effective against other players with few cards like yourself (as it seems).

- It may take a while to get this far if you're on a budget (so don't rush yourself), but search for cards that up your advantage by either making your opponent lose cards or gaining you more cards (for as little mana as possible, the less you have to pay the better the card). One of my personal favorite combos is the Phyrexian Obliterator + Ulvenwald Tracker combo. Like I said though, take your time on this one. There are plenty of cheaper cards than the ones I just mentioned that up your advantage.

- I like to keep the average mana cost of my deck to less than 4 unless I have more unusual means of playing many expensive cards. Reanimator is an example of a strategy that plays more high cost cards because it uses low cost cards to pitch them into the graveyard, and then bring them back to the field. Cards like Faithless Looting, Careful Study and Buried Alive are good examples of the first type. Exhume, Unburial Rites (since it can has flashback ), and Goryo's Vengeance (although risky, a turn 2 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn is just scary).

- Don't be afraid to look up other people's successful decks to get some ideas. You will learn a lot from other peoples' success about what works and what doesn't. But be creative and original in your approach. It's more fun that way.

Last edited by Sillvva (2012-09-11 04:12:36)

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It depends. If you're looking to build a specific deck, buying booster packs will take you ages to get the cards you need unless you have experienced friends who can trade them to you. If that is so, then perhaps you should buy booster packs.

I haven't until I came here, so I mostly bought singles since I would build my deck in places like this or http://www.mtgdeckbuilder.net and test them until they looked solid enough. Then I would only buy the cards I need. So I knew what I needed and didn't have many people to trade with.

On the other hand, if you're not looking to build a specific deck, then definitely buy booster packs as that will give you a wide variety of options.

Last edited by Sillvva (2012-09-11 04:19:10)

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I just looked at your black deck, and although I don't have any specific ideas, I would like to give a bit of general advice.  First, you need to cut out a few cards and put some multiples of the ones that work best together.  For example, Phylactery Lich is an awesome card, but if you read it you discover that you need artifacts.  Since I see no artifacts in the deck, it's an expendable card, and can be cut to add one of the cards that fits what you're trying to do with the deck.  Now, looking at the cards, it looks like you're trying for life gain and discard, so that would be your theme.  Don't try and do 500 different things with a deck.  Pick one or two and roll with it.  Anything that doesn't fit with your theme needs to have a reason to be in the deck, and if that reason isn't commonplace, it belongs in the sideboard.  For example, Murder doesn't fit the discard theme directly, but it can be used to get rid of your opponent's creatures and will feed Blood Artist, which DOES play into the theme.  Also, although it may never come into play, you can use it on your own creatures.  I can't think of anything in Standard that you would target it with, but something like Graveborn Muse can outlive it's usefulness, and it would be a great way to get rid of it.  Now, I'm gonna delve into Legacy for a situational card (since I'm really not familiar with Standard) and say Circle of Protection: Red for an example.  It's great...so long as you're playing against a red deck.  That's the kind of spell that shouldn't be in a main deck (unless you're running red and need to protect yourself from your own cards), but would see play in a sideboard.  And finally, you need to look at your mana curve.  Since you're not running any kind of mana acceleration, anything with over a 5 mana casting cost is probably not going to see substantial play time, as it would require at LEAST 7 turns (assuming you draw enough lands that fast) to get into play.

All that said, don't break the bank to get cards...what I do is build the deck I would like to build, and go buy/trade for the cards I don't have afterward.  So just because you don't have four copies of Sign in Blood doesn't mean you can't put them in your deck.  I will typically build a deck on here, then fish out the cards I have, and add what I don't have to my wish list.  From there, I'll print the list out when I go to one of the local game shops, and know what I need when I trade on here.  I will also prioritize my want list - that is, "I need X cards for deck A, Y cards for deck B, and Z cards for deck C."  If I'm a couple cards away from finishing deck A, I will try and get those cards first, and go in order of completion percentage, so that I can fully build deck A in as short a time frame as possible.  Also, take cards that you don't play that are reasonably sought after and put them in a binder, and take it with you when you go to buy cards.  You never know who might have a card you need that they'd trade for something you may not be wanting to use...just be sure you know what the cards are worth so you don't shoot yourself in the foot

Would I be better off adding artifacts to help it or cut it to add cards that match the theme

I'll take a look at the decks in a moment and will work to give you specific feedback on one or two.

But to your question about testing the decks, you can do a LOT on this site via the "Tools" tab (I guess it's a tab) in the upper right of the page when you're looking at a deck.  Click on the "Statistics" link and it will load up a new page that displays a wealth of information ranging from a simulated opening hand (and first six draws) to a graphical breakdown of your mana curve (also separated by color) to the optimal number of each land you should be running.

To this end, I normally piece a deck together and then will simulate 10-20 hands and try to imagine how the first few turns would play out given the draws.  Do you mulligan a lot?  Are you getting land screwed?  Can you consistently play cards from your opening hand or are you always waiting to draw something?  What are your win conditions that you hope to achieve?  How often do you draw a combo in your opening hand or pull it in the first six draws? These are the sorts of questions to ask at this point  - strategic decisions come later.  After all, in the constructed format, most games are pretty well in hand by the 6th or 7th turn (if not sooner).

Once you can get it moving smoothly, then start to consider how to protect your creatures versus removal or how likely you are to face a certain deck.  Begin to think about the combos your opponents are likely to play and how those affect what you're doing, etc.

At the end of the day, you can always download Cockatrice and "play" your deck against other decks you can build based off of what you see posted online (I think you can also do this sort of testing on TappedOut).  Then, if you're liking your results, it's time to piece it together and playtest the deck.  This is really where you will learn the most and ultimately where you either make or break a deck.

I'll give you feedback on the decks shortly but just let us know if you have more questions.  Good luck.

Alright, having just looked at your inventory, you're sitting on enough multiples of a LOT of really quality commons/uncommons that could power a solid deck.  Personally, if I were you, I would try to figure out what you want to go for and then I'd unload that Snapcaster Mage from your inventory as people will give their first born child for one - meaning you can likely pull a significant number of rares to piece together 1 or 2 less expensive decks.

I would scrap the idea of a mono-colored deck entirely.  I don't see enough quality pieces in just one color to take that route, but if you were to go for a two colored deck, your options are plentiful.

One option would be to go black-red (which will be the Rakdos guild in RTR - you'll get hooked up with good cards).
You're sitting on 3x Vampire Nighthawk, 4x Demonic Taskmaster (who would pair with those 4x Krenko's Commands quite well), 4x Murder (always a good sign), 4x Heirs of Stromkirk and 3x Stromkirk Captain to name a few.  That's already the basis for a pretty solid R/B vampire build.

Another would be to go white-green (which will be the Selesnya guild in RTR - another good option).
There you're sitting on some quality angels (Restoration Angel, Seraph of Dawn, Voice of the Provinces) and some other good token generator spells (Midnight Haunting and even one Lingering Souls) in white.  Those would all be a good start given the populate mechanic coming up.  In green you're sitting on 4x Arbor Elf, 4x Borderland Ranger and 3x Avacyn's Pilgrim for ramping.  You also have a wealth of other treasures in Elvish Visionary (which pairs BEAUTIFULLY with Roaring Primadox), Titanic Growth (which pairs nicely with Prey Upon), and Pathbreaker Wurm (which is underrated but can be a definite game winner, especially if you bond it with something nice).

In blue you're sitting on 4x Talrand's Invocation, 4x Stormbound Geist, 3x Mind Sculpt... lots of possibilities here to pair with red (for Izzet).

You're really sitting on a LOT of the pieces you would need to build a pretty good deck.  My suggestion would be to pick one of the color combos that will be represented by a guild in RTR so you can pull greater value when the set hits.  Then pick a few combos and run with them.  We'll help you flesh out the details once you get the framework of a deck put together, but it all hinges on how you like to play, what your style is, etc etc.  But, everything else aside, dual color is the way to go given what you have.

So lets start the bidding on Snapcaster Mage lol

I'm going to start that black/red deck and the white green and see what I like to play.  I appreciate all the help guys.

Count the number of mana symbols of each color and use that ratio. If you have a color that is hardly present, you could still shift the ratio a little in that color's favor to help with consistency.

Also the deck builder's statistics page here on deckbox also has a feature that will tell you how many of each basic land you should use. It uses the same technique I mentioned.

Last edited by Sillvva (2012-09-11 17:46:34)

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