MTG Arena deck building guide: Tips to get you started

To a first-time player, Magic: The Gathering Arena decks can be difficult to master. There are tons of cards to wade through and since not all of them work together, getting the harmony of your deck’s cards can take some time to assemble and get used to.

What MTG Arena deck suits you best?

Before you do anything, you want to determine what format you will be playing. If you are looking to play the most recent sets, then Standard is what you would be building for. Any card (except for banned ones) from the most recent sets will work. 

• Use some of the MTG Arena codes for a good headstart

Since you’re pulling from a bunch of different fantasy timeframes and rules, make sure you know what the mechanics are from those sets, which will help you make the most of them when assembling your perfect deck.

There are also Historic and Brawl formats, which you can focus on when constructing. History makes assembling easier by allowing all the sets currently available on Magic: The Gathering Arena, as well as curated cards from Magic’s history. Brawl sees you building an MTG Arena deck around a specific legendary creature or planeswalker from Standard and then duelling it out in one-on-one battles.

What to focus on when you are building your own MTG Arena deck?

When assembling a deck, it’s obviously a good place to start focusing on colour. Putting the deck together requires you to determine how your mana will be able to cast spells and summon creatures, so limiting yourself to two or three colours is a good place to start.

• We described the MTG Arena's ranks and ranking system in detail

Some players even choose to only stick to one colour, but that’s depending on the strategy that will be used. For example, Blue can be used if you want to focus on countering spells (creatures, sorcery, etc) and draw cards quickly.

Take care of your mana!

Mana is the lifeblood of every deck, and you’ll want to plan accordingly, regarding the creatures and spells that you have, and how many to include. The general rule of thumb is to have between 20 and 26 lands in a 60 card deck, but you need to know your plan first.

If you have some heavy-hitting creatures which require more mana to summon, you’re going to want to increase that number a bit. You don’t want to find yourself short on mana either, however, or you’ll be sitting there with no way to summon your amazing hand.

What creatures to use in your decks and how?

Creatures are likely going to be the way that you are attacking your opponent the most, but there are some things you need to know about them as well. You can only have four copies of a card in a deck, but sometimes, that is too much.

Think about it this way: if you’re wanting to see at least one copy of that card each game, you need to put four of them in. If not, then either use effective cards that let you summon other cards out of your deck, or put in less of that particular card.

There’s no perfect way to tell someone how to create the right MTG Arena deck, but there’s plenty to learn from studying how others do so. You can check out Magic’s official decklists to see what more advanced players are using and perhaps use that as a jumping-off point.

Magic: The Gathering is incredibly diverse, so take some time to play some rounds and get a feel for it, then see what the game can offer you by working out the perfect deck to wreck opponents with.