I've recently gotten interested in the game because of a friend. Played a couple of games with some of his own decks, which made me get a little idea on how each color works, but I'm still not sure, since this could all just be my own misconceptions.
Although I'm new to MTG, I'm not really a stranger to card games. My play style in other games is usually swarm/weenie decks and/or decks that revolve around emptying my opponent's field(destroy/bounce/remove from play...etc) of monsters/units/creatures so I can, to a degree, get a free shot on him.
From the couple of games I played, it seems like White(cheap units, exile effects) and Blue(tokens, lots of tokens) seem to satisfy my needs to a certain degree.
So...I'd like to request people to help me out...
Are these 2 colors the right colors I'm looking for?
Where should I start?(which set, pre-constructed decks, starter packs...etc)
well we are getting a whole new stack of cards at the end of the week... then a new set of intro packs and eventually event decks after that so wait a week or two.
I suggest Black/white token decks they are pretty strong right now.
based around Lingering souls
Blue/white are the strongest colours in magic in standard there are several decks that use those two colours.
W/u humans white with blue splash and U/w Delver of secrets blue with a white splash their are token variants of these decks.
I don't think there is anything you can buy for Delver decks, Humans have the "hold the line" event deck that is pretty good.
the black/white tokens intro deck isn't very good unfortunately.
there is going to be a blue/White event deck in a few weeks for the new set but we don't know what is in it yet.
Almost every color has a bunch of tribes that allow you to swarm/weenie the board with creatures to kill your opponent.
Red has goblins, white has kithkins, green has elves, black has vampires, blue has merfolk,... There are more examples in each color (and in multi colors), but I don't know them all
Your color preference will probably be determined by the additional flavor they have. Every color achieves swarming in a different style and has different tools to achieve its goal.
The same goes for clearing the board. Overall most colors can manage to wipe the board and then play 1 huge fatty to kill your opponent.
So the answer is: every color is the color you are looking for, but your choice will depend on the different flavor/style they have.
As for where to start... When new players ask me that question I usually tell them to go drafting at the local store. Or to visit a prerelease (coming up this weekend :p)
- This will help build your collection
- You will learn a lot about drafting / deckbuilding / card choices / ...
- People are willing to help you out with the above, so take pointers
From the couple of games I played, it seems like White(cheap units, exile effects) and Blue(tokens, lots of tokens) seem to satisfy my needs to a certain degree.
So...I'd like to request people to help me out...
Are these 2 colors the right colors I'm looking for?
Where should I start?(which set, pre-constructed decks, starter packs...etc)
Green has much more/better token creation than Blue does. Unless you're trying to make token copies of something (Rite of Replication, Followed Footsteps, etc.), you're generally better off with Green than with Blue. Green's tokens tend to be 1/1 or 2/2, but you can more easily make a lot more of them (and Green also has Doubling Season and Parallel Lives to double up on the tokens). Of course, all the colors have a handful of strong token-creation cards.
As for weenies (cheap, efficient creatures), white is excellent for that; there's even a common deck archetype called "white weenie". White also comes with a number of board-wide "anthem" cards (named for Glorious Anthem, though there are others and they're not all called "anthem" -- see Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite) which helps the weenies become a threat. Black also has its own share of weenies, including several popular because of their ability to come back time and time again after dying:
As a general rule, here is a brief description of the colors.
White focuses on order and justice.
Blue is about trickery and manipulation.
Black is about death and destruction.
Red cares about fire and passion.
Green likes life and nature.
In Magic, you will see a lot of small human soldiers that are cheap to cast in White, which fits your weenie strategy. (Recent examples: Elite Vanguard, Champion of the Parish.)
In general, however, Blue doesn't necessarily fit the weenie strategy. Blue is the color of control, gaining incremental advantages in long drawn out games. Blue has counterspells and library manipulation, but Blue rarely has any worthwhile creatures. (Recent examples: Mana Leak, Cancel, Ponder.)
However, a new expansion of Magic (called Avacyn Restored) will be released on May 4 and this expansion contains 244 cards. As I am typing this, 203 of these 244 cards are known. You can find them on the banner of any MTGS page.
Based on what we know so far about Avacyn Restored, a combination of White/Black or White/Red seems to be your best bet right now. (A different color combination may be best at a later date: new cards are released four times per year, so the game is always evolving.)
As far as where to start concerning your collection, it really depends on your budget and how competitive you want to be.
Let us suppose that you want to invest little money into the game and you don't care about playing competitively. If you and a few of your friends are all new players and you guys just want to mess around on your kitchen table, then pre-constructed decks are a great choice. They're very cheap and expose you to many different types of cards that Magic has to offer.
However, if you want to play competitively, then pre-constructed decks are garbage. Even at a small tournament like your local store's FNM, you will get trounced if you are playing a pre-constructed deck.
Earlier in this post, I mentioned the Standard format. This is the most common format at small tournaments and allows only cards from approximately the most recent two years. Go to the Standard Deck discussion pages here on MTGS, find a decklist you like, and order the cards individually.
dgschess really just explained everything you would need to know. The only thing i don't really agree with is that if you find a deck you like try to put your own spin on it. Now if you really don't know what to add then don't but some people frown upon "net decking".
As a general rule, here is a brief description of the colors.
White focuses on order and justice.
Blue is about trickery and manipulation.
Black is about death and destruction.
Red cares about fire and passion.
Green likes life and nature.
More like:
Blue cares about gaining knowledge and denies all who are not like minded
Black cares about personal gain and power at all costs
Red cares about freedom and is wreckless
Yeah, I'll probably start as a, as www123 put it, "kitchen-table player". Sadly, AFAIK, there's no official support for the game over here. So I'm not really sure about the size or how "competitive" the scene is. But from past experiences, as long as it's big enough, the players will be up to date with meta, whether there is official support or not.
Anyhow, I think I'll go with the W/B token deck as some of you suggested for now and see what I can do later on after I get more accustomed to the game. Looking at the cards some of you mentioned and looking at the card lists of the recent sets, it seems like I should be investing in in all of the recent sets(Dark Ascension, Innistrad and 2012) more than I should Avacyn Restored for this.
Yeah, I'll probably start as a, as www123 put it, "kitchen-table player". Sadly, AFAIK, there's no official support for the game over here. So I'm not really sure about the size or how "competitive" the scene is. But from past experiences, as long as it's big enough, the players will be up to date with meta, whether there is official support or not.
Anyhow, I think I'll go with the W/B token deck as some of you suggested for now and see what I can do later on after I get more accustomed to the game. Looking at the cards some of you mentioned and looking at the card lists of the recent sets, it seems like I should be investing in in all of the recent sets(Dark Ascension, Innistrad and 2012) more than I should Avacyn Restored for this.
Where do you live? I'd be willing to bet that you have a scene there! I didn't think there'd be anything here, and it turns out friday night magic gets 30 people!
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I've recently gotten interested in the game because of a friend. Played a couple of games with some of his own decks, which made me get a little idea on how each color works, but I'm still not sure, since this could all just be my own misconceptions.
Although I'm new to MTG, I'm not really a stranger to card games. My play style in other games is usually swarm/weenie decks and/or decks that revolve around emptying my opponent's field(destroy/bounce/remove from play...etc) of monsters/units/creatures so I can, to a degree, get a free shot on him.
From the couple of games I played, it seems like White(cheap units, exile effects) and Blue(tokens, lots of tokens) seem to satisfy my needs to a certain degree.
So...I'd like to request people to help me out...
Are these 2 colors the right colors I'm looking for?
Where should I start?(which set, pre-constructed decks, starter packs...etc)
Thanks in advance! =]
I suggest Black/white token decks they are pretty strong right now.
based around Lingering souls
Blue/white are the strongest colours in magic in standard there are several decks that use those two colours.
W/u humans white with blue splash and U/w Delver of secrets blue with a white splash their are token variants of these decks.
I don't think there is anything you can buy for Delver decks, Humans have the "hold the line" event deck that is pretty good.
the black/white tokens intro deck isn't very good unfortunately.
there is going to be a blue/White event deck in a few weeks for the new set but we don't know what is in it yet.
Pioneer:UR Pheonix
Modern:U Mono U Tron
EDH
GB Glissa, the traitor: Army of Cans
UW Dragonlord Ojutai: Dragonlord NOjutai
UWGDerevi, Empyrial Tactician "you cannot fight the storm"
R Zirilan of the claw. The solution to every problem is dragons
UB Etrata, the Silencer Cloning assassination
Peasant cube: Cards I own
Red has goblins, white has kithkins, green has elves, black has vampires, blue has merfolk,... There are more examples in each color (and in multi colors), but I don't know them all
Your color preference will probably be determined by the additional flavor they have. Every color achieves swarming in a different style and has different tools to achieve its goal.
The same goes for clearing the board. Overall most colors can manage to wipe the board and then play 1 huge fatty to kill your opponent.
So the answer is: every color is the color you are looking for, but your choice will depend on the different flavor/style they have.
As for where to start... When new players ask me that question I usually tell them to go drafting at the local store. Or to visit a prerelease (coming up this weekend :p)
- This will help build your collection
- You will learn a lot about drafting / deckbuilding / card choices / ...
- People are willing to help you out with the above, so take pointers
As for weenies (cheap, efficient creatures), white is excellent for that; there's even a common deck archetype called "white weenie". White also comes with a number of board-wide "anthem" cards (named for Glorious Anthem, though there are others and they're not all called "anthem" -- see Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite) which helps the weenies become a threat. Black also has its own share of weenies, including several popular because of their ability to come back time and time again after dying:
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
White focuses on order and justice.
Blue is about trickery and manipulation.
Black is about death and destruction.
Red cares about fire and passion.
Green likes life and nature.
In Magic, you will see a lot of small human soldiers that are cheap to cast in White, which fits your weenie strategy. (Recent examples: Elite Vanguard, Champion of the Parish.)
In general, however, Blue doesn't necessarily fit the weenie strategy. Blue is the color of control, gaining incremental advantages in long drawn out games. Blue has counterspells and library manipulation, but Blue rarely has any worthwhile creatures. (Recent examples: Mana Leak, Cancel, Ponder.)
In the current Standard format, White/Black tokens is a top-tier deck at the moment. Some of the major cards in this deck are Champion of the Parish, Gather the Townsfolk, Lingering Souls, Honor of the Pure and Intangible Virtue. You can find a detailed decklist in the Standard section of these forums.
However, a new expansion of Magic (called Avacyn Restored) will be released on May 4 and this expansion contains 244 cards. As I am typing this, 203 of these 244 cards are known. You can find them on the banner of any MTGS page.
Based on what we know so far about Avacyn Restored, a combination of White/Black or White/Red seems to be your best bet right now. (A different color combination may be best at a later date: new cards are released four times per year, so the game is always evolving.)
As far as where to start concerning your collection, it really depends on your budget and how competitive you want to be.
Let us suppose that you want to invest little money into the game and you don't care about playing competitively. If you and a few of your friends are all new players and you guys just want to mess around on your kitchen table, then pre-constructed decks are a great choice. They're very cheap and expose you to many different types of cards that Magic has to offer.
However, if you want to play competitively, then pre-constructed decks are garbage. Even at a small tournament like your local store's FNM, you will get trounced if you are playing a pre-constructed deck.
Earlier in this post, I mentioned the Standard format. This is the most common format at small tournaments and allows only cards from approximately the most recent two years. Go to the Standard Deck discussion pages here on MTGS, find a decklist you like, and order the cards individually.
More like:
Blue cares about gaining knowledge and denies all who are not like minded
Black cares about personal gain and power at all costs
Red cares about freedom and is wreckless
Yeah, I'll probably start as a, as www123 put it, "kitchen-table player". Sadly, AFAIK, there's no official support for the game over here. So I'm not really sure about the size or how "competitive" the scene is. But from past experiences, as long as it's big enough, the players will be up to date with meta, whether there is official support or not.
Anyhow, I think I'll go with the W/B token deck as some of you suggested for now and see what I can do later on after I get more accustomed to the game. Looking at the cards some of you mentioned and looking at the card lists of the recent sets, it seems like I should be investing in in all of the recent sets(Dark Ascension, Innistrad and 2012) more than I should Avacyn Restored for this.
Where do you live? I'd be willing to bet that you have a scene there! I didn't think there'd be anything here, and it turns out friday night magic gets 30 people!