Aaron's School of Higher Learning
(Deck Tweaks)

Hi, I was wondering if you would review my deck, and make some modifications where you saw necessary.

land:

5 mountain
5 island
5 plains
5 swamp
5 forest

Red:
1 Trained orgg
1 fire elemental
1 thunderscape familiar
2 bloodfire dwarf
1 lava axe
1 pyrotechnics
2 blaze
1 lightning bold
1 volcanic hammer
2 shock

Blue:
1 vizzerdrix
1 sibilant spirit
2 blizzard elemental
3 air elemental
1 coastal drake
1 empress galina
1 stormscape familiar
1 cloak of mists

White:
1 abbey gargoyles
1 staunch defenders
2 angel of mercey
1 tundra wolves
1 circle of protection: red
1 circle of protection: white
1 circle of protection: black

Green:
3 molimo, maro-scorcerer
2 scaled wurm
1 penumbra wurm
1 rhox
1 spined wurm
1 plated wurm
1 norwood ranger
2 Llanowar elves
1 natural spring

Black:
2 phyrexian reaper
1 nightscape familiar
2 raise dead

Artifact:
2 draco
1 treva's attendant
1 dromar's attendant
1 rith's attendant
1 darigaaz's attendant
1 crosis's attendant

Multi:
2 Dakkon Blackblade
1 shivan wurm
1 treva, the renewer
1 dromar, the banisher
1 rith, the awakener
1 darigaaz, the igniter
1 crosis, the purger
2 tsabo tavoc
1 noble panther
1 last stand
4 armadillo cloak
1 spinal embrace

------------


Building your first few decks is a great time in magic.  For most people, their decks tend to look like the above... throw a few different cards together that look interesting in with some lands and have at it!

However, there comes a time soon after where you often find yourself loosing more often than winning while playing decks like this.  You find yourself too often holding a fist full of red cards you can't play because you haven't drawn a Mountain.  Frustration sets in as you see your opponent continuously drawing the same cards every game and beating you senseless with them!

Overcoming this issue in deck building can be done by following two key concepts in deck building:

1.  Use NO MORE than 60 cards in a deck

and

2.  Play with multiples of good cards

By applying these principles to the above deck we would see a DRASTIC change!  More importantly the player of the deck will see a drastic change in his win/loss percentage as the deck will be much more consistent.  By playing with the minimum cards allowed in your deck (60) you greatly increase the odds of drawing the needed cards than in say a 100 card deck!  To further better your odds, run as many multiples of a card as you can given the format your in (you can use up to 4 of any non-basic land card currently in the Standard format).

When you have a tight deck built with the above 2 concepts you'll be amazed how much more reliable your deck becomes.  Suddenly your deck wins because it does what you built it to do, not because you got lucky!  That's what this game really all boils down to... statistics.  Once you can count on your deck functioning consistently EVERY game you'll be able to start working on your playing skills.  You'll be able to make educated decisions much more often and soon it will be your friends who will be the ones getting frustrated as you continuously pound them over the head game after game!  =)

Hope this helps... have fun!
Aaron