Magic: The Gathering deck types

The game Magic: The Gathering requires each player to have their own deck in order to play. There are over ten thousand unique cards which can be used for this purpose; thus a considerable number of different decks can be constructed. However, decks can usually be loosely classified based on their play style and mode of victory.

Deck archetypes
Most classifications of decks begin from one of three major strategies: aggro, control, and combo. Ramp is another main strategy, however isn't as prominent as the other three. Aggro is most closely related with red and white, control with blue and black, ramp with green, and combo doesn't closely relate to any colours in particular, and generally by the combo pieces used in the deck.

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 tempo-based race rather than a card advantage-based attrition war. Aggro generally relies upon creatures as a cumulative source of damage. While strategically simple, 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.


 * Example cards:, , , ,
 * Example decks:
 * White Weenie, which uses small, efficient creatures such as, , and
 * Affinity, which uses the affinity mechanic and large numbers of artifacts to quickly play spells such as and, while efficiently dealing damage using  and.
 * Red/Green Beatz, uses low-cost, high power creatures such as and  to kill the opponent quickly.  It also utilizes mana denial such as  and.
 * Sligh, which utilizes its mana as efficiently as possible to kill the opponent quickly, using low-cost cards such as and.
 * Suicide Black, which uses efficient but dangerous cards that cost life such as, , , and . Suicide Black epitomizes Black's philosophy&mdash;win at all costs&mdash;and treats even its life total as an expendable resource.

Control
Control decks avoid racing and 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. The primary strength of control decks is their ability to devalue the opponent’s cards. They do this in four ways:


 * 1) Erasing 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 ("grinding"/"milling") with one spell.
 * 2) 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.
 * 3) 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., a creature enchantment which will never need attention if all enemy creatures are quickly removed.
 * 4) 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.
 * 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.
 * , supplemented by card-drawing like and a number of disruptive spells.
 * Astral Slide, which uses large numbers of cards with cycling, including those with added benefits such as and, to power  and.
 * Mono-Black Control, which uses removal spells such as and  to control the board, and  to kill the opponent with spells such as . It can also use cards like underworld dreams 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.

Combo
Combo decks the interaction of two or more cards (a "combination") to create a powerful effect that either wins the game immediately or creates a situation that subsequently leads to a win. Combo decks include "ramp" decks, which quickly generate mana in order to resolve powerful threats. Combo decks value power, consistency, and speed: the combo should be strong enough to win, the deck should be reliable enough to produce the combo on a regular basis, and the deck should be able to use the combo fast enough to win before the opponent.

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.
 * 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.
 * 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.
 * 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.
 * 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.
 * 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.
 * Monogreen Ramp, which uses cards like, , and to accelerate into cards like , , , , or.

Midrange
Midrange can be considered an archetype in its own right, but is essentially a cross between ramp and aggro. 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.
 * Example cards: ,
 * Example decks:
 * Jund Midrange, which used to get out  and  on turn 3, and overwhelm the opponent with them.
 * Naya Midrange, which is similar to Jund, but has access to and other cards in white.
 * Blue-White-Red Midrange (UWR), which has more control elements, using to draw into very large amounts of cards and  to end up swarming the board with tokens.

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 their control elements are often more temporary; for instance, they may return opposing creatures to their owners' hands rather than remove them entirely.


 * Example cards:, , , ,
 * Example decks:
 * Blue-Green Madness, which uses cards like, and.
 * Naya Lightsaber, which uses powerful creatures like and removal like, many of which also provide card advantage.
 * Threshold, which uses cards like, and.
 * 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.
 * Bob/Gush, which draws enough cards using ("Bob") and  to overwhelm the opponent with attacking creatures and disruption such as  and.
 * Delver, which uses the efficient threat alongside disruption such as  and, various red direct damage spells , card drawing and filtering , and other cheap, efficient creatures . Snapcaster Mage in particular allows keys spells to be reused from the graveyard, allowing for great flexibility.

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.
 * Scepter-Chant, which uses and.
 * Trix, which gains life using and then uses  to leave the opponent with the often deadly drawback.
 * Oath, uses and  to quickly put a large creature such as  or  into play.
 * Control Slaver, which accelerates powerful, high casting cost artifacts such as into play using, , or.
 * Drain Tendrils, which controls the game using, , and while drawing cards with the  +  engine to set up a lethal.

Aggro-Combo
Aggro-combo decks employ aggressive creature strategies along with some combination of cards that can win in "combo" fashion with one big turn. For instance, Ravager Affinity decks that include Disciple of the Vault can win by attacking with creatures and also with a combo finish of sacrificing multiple artifacts to Arcbound Ravager and killing the opponent with Disciple triggers.


 * Example cards:, ,
 * Example decks:
 * Fling Affinity, which uses or  and  along with.
 * Food Chain Goblins, which uses, and and.
 * Fires, which uses with  and.
 * Dredge, which uses and cards with the dredge mechanic (such as  and ) to fill the player's own graveyard. This enables free creatures such as  and, which can generate a large number of zombie tokens in conjunction with  and.

Aggro-Control-Combo
Aggro-control-combo decks combine efficient, creature-based damage, heavy disruption elements, and an ability to unleash an extremely powerful synergy that can end the game in "combo" fashion.


 * Example cards:, , ,
 * Example decks:
 * Gro-A-Tog, which generally wins by playing and protecting it with disruption such as  and  as it "grows," but can also win by playing  and chaining together  and  to draw many cards and instantly make  lethal.

Recent design philosophy
Traditionally, Aggro was seen as advantaged over Control, Control advantaged over Combo, and Combo advantaged over Aggro. Wizards of the Coast has sought to make high casting-cost spells more powerful than in the early days of Magic, and have also wanted to play up creature combat more - an aggressive deck should have to worry about blocking and opposing creatures even from Control and Combo decks. To that end, R&D member Zac Hill described an ideal metagame structured such that:


 * "Midrange" is advantaged over "Aggro"
 * "Aggro" is advantaged over "Control" and "Disruptive Aggro"
 * "Control" and "Disruptive Aggro" is advantaged over "Ramp" and "Combo"
 * "Ramp" and "Combo" is advantaged over "Midrange"

Each of these 4 categories would ideally occupy around 25% of a given metagame. In Hill's definition, Aggro refers most specifically to the fastest creature decks built to punish slow starts, ponderous Control decks, and aggressive decks who've substituted out damage for disruption. Midrange decks in this definition are slower creature-based decks who trump the speed of fast aggro with better quality from their somewhat more expensive spells. (Both of these would likely be considered "Aggro" in the traditional definition.) "Ramp" and "Combo" are conceptually similar as noted above; while the combo deck might seek to set up a combination of 2 or 3 cards for a powerful, game-changing effect, the ramp deck instead focuses on building mana as fast as possible and then casting game-changing yet expensive spells, or taking advantage of certain interactions that require a large manabase. A midrange deck often doesn't have the sheer speed to stop ramp or combo from either casting a huge spell or "going off" with the combo. Control decks can counter or otherwise answer the single big threat ramp decks and control decks provide while winning the long game. Similarly, "disruptive aggro" (equivalent to Aggro-Control in the classic archetypes above) can also stop the single threat Combo and Ramp offer while focusing on winning faster. These rules can change however as blocks cycle and meta shifts.