Magic the gathering

[KhainiWest]

So my sister and her friends have really gotten into this and they have been nagging me for months to try. It's gotten so bad they said if I manage to beat her boyfriend then they will all watch one piece. CAN"T SAY NO TO THAT GUYS.

Anyway it has been awhile since I have gotten serious about a card game, outside of yugioh really. I'm just really looking for suggestions on what I should invest into it. I have read the general synopsis of it, but I'd rather gets people with experience's opinion on this. I'm not asking you to build me a deck, but give me a general direction of what I should be looking for. With like a $500 budget. But hey if you want to build me a deck, f`uck yeah bro you awesome.

I'm the type of troll player that likes control, and restricting. Gravity bind decks were my favorite. I also lean towards just straight beat down. Obelisk the tormentor decks were quick and destructive for me. Again just some guidance, maybe the game doesn't even work that way. I don't know. lol

[Baklava]

My friend got me into Magic and she managed to make me spend like $40 in a day for it. e_e

I haven't played since I left school, which was like 9 months ago, but if I remember right, Red & White cards would be your best suit. White specializes in control, Red specializes in brute force. The latest sets that have come out have guild/clan names assigned to specific color combinations and Red/White is Boros, so you should look for Boros cards.

White & Blue, the Arzorious guild, could also work, but that relies more heavily on control and turning opponents creatures against them.

[y0y0y0y0shi0]

My friend got me into Magic and she managed to make me spend like $40 in a day for it. e_e

I haven't played since I left school, which was like 9 months ago, but if I remember right, Red & White cards would be your best suit. White specializes in control, Red specializes in brute force. The latest sets that have come out have guild/clan names assigned to specific color combinations and Red/White is Boros, so you should look for Boros cards.

White & Blue, the Arzorious guild, could also work, but that relies more heavily on control and turning opponents creatures against them.

Boros isn't so much control as it is building a small but strong army and buffing it.

Azorius has a focus on control, Gruul (red/green) is moreso just beatdown, and a lot of the other color combinations are sort of niche picks that play their own specialized role but don't really fall into a simple category.
At least in the current sets, I should say.

Simic (blue/green) could also work for you. A mix of control and beatdown.

[Dusk]

Do you have any idea what sort of format you're going to play? Is it just casual anything goes, or are you playing Standard, Modern, etc?

[Words]

I'm gonna asume there's no format and it's just casual deck. Anyway, with a tight budget like yours I'd go with a single color deck. Since you like control I'd go with blue, some Delver of Secrets, some counters, brainstorm and that kind of draw cards and cool creatures like vendillion clique or snapcaster mage. Since it's just 1 color and, other than the last two I mentioned, every card is cheap you shouldn't spend all $500. I don't know the price of cards but I'd go with something like:

4 Mishra's Factory
14 Island
2 Vendilion Clique
3 Snapcaster Mage
4 Standstill
3 Cryptic Command
2 [Spell Snare
3 Crystal Ball
2 Daze
3 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Counterbalance
4 Vapor Snag
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Counterspell

That's just something I can think of quickly, but if you work on that and figure out what else you can afford to improve it, it should be cheap and annoying enough.

[KhainiWest]

$500 is a tight budget? The hell, what is considered an average priced deck?

[Polantaris]

$500 is a tight budget? The hell, what is considered an average priced deck?

Depends on the rarity of cards in the deck. Rarer cards can probably still go for hundreds.

It has been a long time since I've seriously played MTG, so I can't give any newer/recent examples, but I remember from my days of playing it that rare cards were worth A LOT.

http://magic.tcgplayer.com/db/magic_...ited%20Edition

Older cards are completely banned from Competitive play to my knowledge, but that's just an example of what the rarest cards can be worth. Black Lotus is kind of a bad example, considering it has always been insanely rare and always been insanely expensive (even when it was usable).

Edit: Awww man, I just looked up Ancestral Recall. It's worth over a grand....and I used to have it. I wonder if it's still in my old decks somewhere, I'd sell that in a heartbeat.

[Words]

$500 is a tight budget? The hell, what is considered an average priced deck?

I'm gonna link to some cards that could work on a deck like the one I posted above.

Force of Will, which it would need 4, are $60 each, which is the cheapest but also bad conditions.
Jace, which you would need at least 1 is $110, same as above.

$350 for just 5 cards. And format doesn't get any better... best cards in modern or standard or whatever are just too expensive.
And why bother getting the best cards if you're just going to play your sister and her friends?
Lands are the most expensive, if you're thinking of two colors+. Most efficient ones are just too expensive and why bother with less efficient decks if you can play a "good" one colored deck that isn't as expensive?

[Niernen]

$500 is a tight budget? The hell, what is considered an average priced deck?

I was about to ask that myself. Never played magic, but $500 for a deck seems... excessive. Hell, i made a decent yugioh deck for $40 last time i played.

[Mute]

You want cheap? Google "Pauper Magic Decks."
But if you just wanna troll? Blue has counterspells. Just run nothing but counter spells and cards that make them put cards in their graveyard from the library (i.e. Mill).

[KhainiWest]

Not going to lie, that severely is putting me off. I was hoping to go with a blue/white deck because the color combo is pretty.

[y0y0y0y0shi0]

If you're just planning on playing casually
honestly i'd just see if your sister & her friends would let you print off cards :P

Magic is such a useless money dump
especially considering its vast application in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margina...rginal_utility

[Dusk]

Words is suggesting something that is not only very expensive, but very hard to play. You can definitely build a good casual deck for 50 bucks. 500 is a pretty reasonable budget for a tournament quality Standard deck, and the only reason you'd need to spend more is because there's a bunch of old cards that are insanely overpowered that run over 100 bucks each.

By the way, check out tappedout.net for a place to build a deck and browse other peoples' decks. It calculates the price of the deck, too, if you end up wanting to buy it.

[Derosis]

Just do a RDW or a Blue discard deck.

[Niernen]

If you just want to play with friends.... couldnt you just print some cards off? If you are only intending to play one (or a couple) time(s) with your sister and friends, i dont see the point of wasting $500. If you like it you could always buy them later, but why not try it out with print outs first?

[Words]

Words is suggesting something that is not only very expensive, but very hard to play. You can definitely build a good casual deck for 50 bucks. 500 is a pretty reasonable budget for a tournament quality Standard deck, and the only reason you'd need to spend more is because there's a bunch of old cards that are insanely overpowered that run over 100 bucks each.

By the way, check out tappedout.net for a place to build a deck and browse other peoples' decks. It calculates the price of the deck, too, if you end up wanting to buy it.

Damn it, you're right. Just checked and they're really really expensive and I didn't know that... I used to have some of the cards listed in the deck when they were kinda cheap and I never thought they'd be so pineappleing expensive. I thought that deck I posted, other than the vendillion and snapcasters would be cheap, and would be $100 tops but holy crap this game is expensive. And even if it's hard, he said he likes control.... but yeah ignore my first post, KhainiWest.

I'm sure that if you look for "pauper mono blue delver" decks you'll find something very cheap, fun and control-ish.

EDIT: Also, $500 is enough for a competitive quality standard deck? Like tier 2 or tier 1? Seems cheaper than a year or two ago.

[Corn]

You're willing to spend $500 to make your sister watch One Piece?

[KhainiWest]

You're willing to spend $500 to make your sister watch One Piece?

It gives me incentive but I always enjoyed card games

[Dusk]

Damn it, you're right. Just checked and they're really really expensive and I didn't know that... I used to have some of the cards listed in the deck when they were kinda cheap and I never thought they'd be so pineappleing expensive. I thought that deck I posted, other than the vendillion and snapcasters would be cheap, and would be $100 tops but holy crap this game is expensive. And even if it's hard, he said he likes control.... but yeah ignore my first post, KhainiWest.

I'm sure that if you look for "pauper mono blue delver" decks you'll find something very cheap, fun and control-ish.

EDIT: Also, $500 is enough for a competitive quality standard deck? Like tier 2 or tier 1? Seems cheaper than a year or two ago.

I don't follow the pro scene much, but enough to win your local FNM, sure. And I'm sure the cheaper top decks do run in that range. Plus, good piloting and luck play a factor, too, so even cheaper decks can win on occasion. There was a Maze's End deck that placed Top 8 at some PTQ pretty recently.

[Malthe]

If you had some more experience/knowledge regarding building a deck i'd have suggested you to play in a limited format like Sealed deck or Booster draft.
Would put both you and your sister on equal ground in regards to deck and it's a really fun format to play.

This makes me realize how much i miss playing MTG.


Edit: Or get good cunk of cards(360+ i think?), and play cube. But that'd also be a big investment.