Thirty years of cardboard.
A game that is equal parts deckbuilding, probability, and sitting around a table with friends. I build more decks than I get to play.
Academy
Tolarian Academy into artifact mana, Helm of Awakening to make the whole thing cheap, then Prosperity to draw the rest of the deck.
- 60 cards
Kavu Predator
Kavu Predator grows every time the opponent gains life, so the whole deck is built to give life away — Invigorate and Skyshroud Cutter are free if you do, and Wall of Shards hands over one every upkeep.
- 60 cards
Burn
Twelve burn spells and three one-drops, all aimed at the face. Fireblast is the reach — sacrifice two Mountains and it costs nothing, which is why the mana is 14 basics.
- 60 cards
White Weenie
One-drops backed by a lifegain engine: Soul Warden and Guide of Souls turn every creature into life, and Ocelot Pride turns that life into free Cats. Armageddon closes it out once the board is ahead.
- 60 cards
Scion of the Ur-Dragon
Five-colour reanimator. Entomb or Buried Alive puts a dragon, angel or sphinx in the graveyard, and one of eight reanimation spells brings it back years ahead of schedule.
- ⌘ Scion of the Ur-Dragon
Vivi Ornitier
Izzet spellslinger. Vivi taps for mana equal to his own power, and every noncreature spell makes him bigger — equip Aettir and Priwen to set that power to your life total and one Crackle with Power ends the table.
- ⌘ Vivi Ornitier
UG Madness
Won an Odyssey-era Type 2 tournament in 2002, then an Extended one while Odyssey was still legal. Discard is the engine rather than the cost: Wild Mongrel and Merfolk Looter turn Basking Rootwalla and Circular Logic into free spells, Quiet Speculation buries Roar of the Wurm so each 6/6 Wurm costs four mana instead of seven, and Wonder gives the whole board flying from the graveyard.
- 60 cards
Elves
Priest of Titania and Gaea's Cradle scale with a board of one-mana Elves, so the deck's third turn produces mana a fair deck can't match. Survival of the Fittest spends it: every Elf is a tutor for the one the board needs, and the cards it pitches are the payoff — Squee comes back each upkeep to keep activating, and Anger gives the whole team haste from the graveyard. Wirewood Symbiote and Quirion Ranger untap Priest for a second helping the turn it lands.
- 60 cards