Gameplay of the collectible card game Magic: The Gathering is fueled by each player's deck of cards, which constitute the resources that player can call upon to battle their opponents in any given game. With more than 20,000 unique cards in the game, a considerable number of different decks can be constructed. Each card is designed to have certain strengths (and sometimes weaknesses) and therefore a significant part of the game is determined by which cards a player chooses to include in their deck. Broadly speaking, decks can be loosely classified based on their play style and mode of victory. The game's designers often explicitly create cards which are intended to fuel one or more of these given archetypes, in order to create competitive balance and diversity.Aggro, Combo, and Control by Jeff CunninghamPojos Unofficial Total Magic: The Gathering
While the deck types listed below are specific to Magic: The Gathering, these concepts also extend to other collectible card games.
Deck archetypes Most classifications of decks begin from one of four major strategies: aggro, control, combo and midrange.Next Level Deckbuilding Sneak Peek: The Sixteen Archetypes Of Magic by Patrick Chapin
Aggro Aggro (short for "aggressive") decks attempt to reduce their opponents from 20 life to 0 life as quickly as possible, rather than emphasize a long-term game plan. Aggro decks focus on converting their cards into damage; they prefer to engage in a race for tempo rather than a card advantage-based attrition war. Aggro generally relies upon creatures as its accumulative source of damage. Aggro decks can quickly overwhelm unprepared opponents and proceed to eke out the last bit of damage they need to end the game. Aggro decks also generally have access to disruptive elements, which can inhibit the opponent's attempts to respond.Playing Against Aggro by Jeff CunninghamArcane Teachings - Project Hollywood by Tom LapilleDeconstructing Constructed: Processing the Process by Josh SilvestriYour First Aggro Deck by Billy Moreno
Example cards: , , , ,We've Got the Beatdown by Mark Rosewater Example decks: White Weenie, which uses small, efficient creatures such as , , and Playing White Weenie In Vintage by Pedro Godinho Affinity, which uses the affinity mechanic and large numbers of artifacts to quickly play spells such as and , while efficiently dealing damage using and .The Daffinitive Affinity Guide by Mark Young Zoo, which uses low-cost, high power creatures such as and to kill the opponent quickly.The Return of Wild Nacatl by Luis Scott-Vargas Sligh, which utilizes its mana as efficiently as possible to kill the opponent quickly, using low-cost cards such as and .Famous Red Decks in Magic History by Alex Shvartsman Suicide Black, which uses efficient but dangerous cards that cost life such as , , , and . Suicide Black epitomizes Black's philosophy—win at all costs—and treats even its life total as an expendable resource.Vintage on a Budget: Suicide Black 2K9 by Stephen Menendian
Control Control decks avoid racing. They attempt to slow the game down by executing an attrition plan. As the game progresses, control decks are able to take advantage of their slower, more powerful, cards.Playing Against Control by Jeff Cunningham The primary strength of control decks is their ability to devalue the opponent's cards. They do this in four ways:Your First Control Deck by Ben Rubin
Answering threats at a reduced cost. Given the opportunity, Control decks can gain card advantage by answering multiple threats with one spell ("clearing"/"wiping" the board), stopping expensive threats with cheaper spells, and drawing multiple cards or forcing the opponent to discard multiple cards with one spell. Not playing threats to be answered. By playing few proactive spells of their own, control decks gain virtual card advantage by reducing the usefulness of opposing removal cards. Disrupting synergies. Even if control decks do not deal with every threat directly, they can leave out whichever ones stand poorly on their own; e.g., an enchantment which gives a bonus to creatures will never need attention if all enemy creatures are quickly neutralized. Dragging the game out past opposing preparations. An opponent's faster, efficient cards will become less effective over time.
Example cards: , , , , Example decks: Tezzeret Control, which controls the game using counterspells such as , builds card advantage with cards such as , and ends the game using to find and activate it for infinite turns.The Anatomy of Vintage Tezzeret by Stephen Menendian Mono Blue Control, which uses a heavy suite of counterspells alongside card-drawing such as , removal such as , and a win condition such as . This class of deck is nicknamed "Draw-Go," because most of its players' spells are instants designed to be played during his or her opponents' turns. Blue-White Control, which is similar to Mono-Blue Control, but features more board-control cards such as , and .Chicago-Style U/W Control by Zvi Mowshowitz , supplemented by card-drawing like and a number of disruptive spells.Giant-Sized Regionals Primer: Psychatog by Mike Flores Astral Slide, which uses large numbers of cards with cycling, including those with added benefits such as and , to power and .Astral Slide in the New Standard by Gabe Walls Mono-Black Control, which uses removal spells such as and to control the board, and to kill the opponent with spells such as .The Power of the Dark Side by The Ferrett It can also use cards like to put the opponent on a timer. The Deck, which uses card drawing such as and deck searching cards such as to find powerful cards that are highly effective against particular strategies (such as , , and ), alongside a Blue base of counterspells to control the game and obtain an insurmountable lead.You CAN Play Type I #17: The Control Player's Bible, Part I by Oscar Tan
Combo
Combo decks use the interaction of two or more cards (a "combination") to create a powerful effect that either wins the game immediately or produces an overwhelming advantage. Combo decks value consistency, speed, and resilience: the deck should be reliable enough to produce the combo on a regular basis, the deck should be able to use the combo fast enough to win before the opponent, and the deck should be able to withstand disruption and still win.
Many decks have smaller, combo-like interactions between their cards, which is better described as synergy.
Example cards: , , , , . Example decks: The Perfect Storm, which utilizes and artifact mana to draw cards and fuel a lethal , all the while disrupting the opponent with and .The Perfect Storm by Stephen Menendian Painter Combo, which uses and chooses Blue to permit to destroy any permanent or counter any spell, while also allowing to put the opponent's entire library into their graveyard.Jack Kitchen's Painter SCG Premier IQ -Baltimore by Shuhei Nakamura Worldgorger Dragon Combo, which revolves around the infinite loop triggered when is animated from the graveyard using an enchantment such as . The loop generates mana and card drawing which is then used to end the game.The 2010 Guide to Vintage by Stephen Menendian Belcher Combo, which uses free and efficient mana acceleration to play and activate , preferably on the first turn. Because the deck has two or fewer lands, one activation of will almost always kill the opponent. Hulk-Flash, which is dedicated to casting and putting a into play and then into the graveyard, allowing the player to find a combination of creatures which will kill the opponent instantly. and are used to find the combo pieces, while and protect the combo.The Ultimate Vintage Primer by Stephen Menendian Steel City Vault, which uses "Draw 7" spells such as to rapidly assemble the - combo for infinite turns. The deck also uses several cards such as and to efficiently deal with , the most effective answer to the Vault-Key combo.The Steel City Vault Deck Unleashed by Brian DeMars Hexmage Depths, which uses to inexpensively remove the counters from and put a flying, indestructible 20/20 creature token into play as early as the first turn.Busting Cthulhu Out of Dark Depths by Doug Linn
Midrange A typical midrange deck has an early game plan of mana ramp and control, but begins to play threats once it reaches four to six mana. A midrange deck will often seek to play a reactive, attrition-based game against aggro decks and a more proactive, tempo-based game against control decks. Colloquially, this is referred to as "going bigger" than aggro and "getting in under" control. Example cards: , The Midrange Archetype by Ken Nagle Example decks: Jund Midrange (BRG), a powerful and flexible deck with virtually zero bad matchups thanks to the access of the most powerful cards that each color can offer: black gives and powerful discard cards like and , red a reliable removal in and the green some of the best creatures like and . Abzan Midrange (WBG), which is similar to Jund, but trades speed for powerful white based cards like , and . Jeskai Midrange (UWR), which has more control elements, using to draw into a very large number of cards and to end up swarming the board with tokens. Temur Emerge (GUR), which leverages the Emerge mechanic introduced in Eldritch Moon to efficiently use ramp creatures such as and for their land-smoothing abilities while sacrificing them to Emerge board-stalling threats such as as early as turn 4, also filling the graveyard to make playable on turn 7.Deck of the Day – Temur Emerge Deck Guide By Eric Froehlich, ChannelFireball.net Tron, which tries to build the triplet of lands known as "Urzatron" (, and ) as quickly as possible and then uses the massive amount of mana to play powerful cards like and as early as turn 3.
Hybrid strategies
Aggro-Control Aggro-control is a hybrid archetype that contains both aggressive creatures and control elements. These decks attempt to deploy quick threats while protecting them with light permission and disruption long enough to win. These are frequently referred to as "tempo" strategies, as they are built with a sense of timing. Tempo players look to control the game early and take advantage of a strong board state. Where purely control decks look to out class players with more quality in the later stages of the game, tempo looks to keep opponents off balance from the very start.
Example cards: , , , , Example decks: Blue-Green Madness, which uses cards like , and .Giant Sized Regionals Primer: Blue-Green Madness! by Mike Flores Naya Lightsaber, which uses powerful creatures like and removal like , many of which also provide card advantage.Naya Lightsaber RUG Delver, which uses cards like , and .RUGs (But Not All Delvers) by Mike Flores Fish, which uses mana denial such as and , alongside disruption such as , , and , to keep the opponent off-balance long enough that creatures such as and win the game.The Guide To Vintage's Landscape – Attacking The Red Zone by Mark Hornung Bob/Gush, which draws enough cards using ("Bob") and to overwhelm the opponent with attacking creatures and disruption such as and .The Guide To Vintage's Landscape – All Things that Gush by Mark Hornung Delver, which uses the efficient threat alongside disruption such as and .Building The Best Delver Of Secrets by Gerry Thompson
Control-Combo Control-Combo is a control deck with a combo finisher that it can spring quickly if need be. A notable subtype of Control-Combo is "prison," which institutes control through resource denial (usually via a combo).
Example cards: , , , , Example decks: Stax, a prison deck which uses to destroy opposing permanents, to replay permanents to feed the , and and to tie up an opponent's mana and prevent them from ever playing spells. Stasis, which uses and cards such as or .Deconstructing Stasis by Brian David-Marshall Scepter-Chant, which uses and .