10 More Quick Tricks for Better MTG Decks

You have built a few decks. You know the basics — run the right number of lands, keep your deck to 60 cards (or 100 in Commander), and pick a strategy. Good. You are past the starting line.

But your decks still feel… inconsistent. Sometimes they pop off. Sometimes they do nothing for five turns while your opponent runs you over. That gap between “decent deck” and “deck that actually performs” is where these 10 tricks come in.

This is the sequel to our 10 Quick Tricks for Better MTG Decks. If that post was about laying the foundation, this one is about tightening the bolts. These are the habits that separate a pile of good cards from a deck that wins games.

Let’s get into it.

1. Build in Redundancy

Here is a mistake that bites every deckbuilder eventually: you build your entire strategy around one card, and when you do not draw it, the deck falls apart.

The fix is redundancy. For every key effect your deck needs, include 2-3 cards that fill the same role. If your deck depends on a creature that draws cards when it deals combat damage, do not just run four copies of that one creature. Find other creatures that do something similar.

Example: A deck that needs card draw from creatures might run Toski, Bearer of Secrets alongside Ohran Frostfang. They are not identical, but they both reward you for attacking. If one gets removed, you still have a backup plan.

In Commander, where you are limited to single copies, redundancy is even more critical. You cannot run four copies of your favorite card, so you need to find three or four cards that accomplish the same thing.

The rule of thumb: If your deck cannot function without a specific card, you need more cards that do what that card does.

2. Respect the Mana Curve

Your mana curve is the distribution of mana costs across your deck, and it is one of the best diagnostic tools you have. Every online deck builder — Moxfield, Archidekt, MTGGoldfish — will generate a visual curve for you. Use it.

For most decks, you want a bell curve that peaks at 2-3 mana. That means the majority of your spells should cost 2 or 3 mana to cast, with fewer cards at 1 mana and progressively fewer as costs go up to 4, 5, and beyond.

Why? Because in the early turns of the game, you have limited mana. If your hand is full of 5-drops and 6-drops, you are doing nothing while your opponent builds a board. On the flip side, if your curve is too low, you will run out of gas in the late game.

A practical target for a 60-card deck:
– 1-mana spells: 6-8
– 2-mana spells: 8-12
– 3-mana spells: 6-10
– 4-mana spells: 4-6
– 5+ mana spells: 2-4

These numbers shift depending on your strategy — aggro decks lean lower, control decks lean higher — but the bell shape is almost always right.

Commander players: Your curve will naturally be higher since the format is slower, but you still need cheap interaction and early plays. Do not fill your deck with nothing but 6-mana haymakers.

3. Think in Packages

Stop looking at your deck as 60 (or 100) individual cards. Start thinking in functional packages — groups of cards organized by what they do for your deck.

Most decks need some combination of these packages:

Threats — Cards that win the game (creatures, planeswalkers, finishers)
Removal — Cards that deal with your opponent’s threats (destroy, exile, bounce, counter)
Card draw / selection — Cards that keep your hand full and find what you need
Mana base — Lands plus any ramp or mana fixing
Utility — Cards that support your strategy (protection, recursion, tutors)

When you build this way, it becomes obvious when something is off. “I have 20 threats and 2 removal spells” is a red flag you can spot immediately. “My card draw package is one Divination” tells you exactly what to fix.

For Commander decks, a classic starting framework is: 10 ramp, 10 card draw, 10 removal, 35-38 lands, and the rest in your theme. Adjust from there based on your commander and strategy.

4. Sideboard with Purpose

In formats with sideboards (Standard, Modern, Pioneer, Legacy), your 15 sideboard cards should not be an afterthought. Every card in your sideboard should have a specific matchup or problem it addresses.

Before building your sideboard, ask yourself:
– What decks will I face most often?
– What cards or strategies give my deck the most trouble?
– What do I bring in against aggro? Against control? Against combo?

Bad sideboard: 15 cards you thought were cool but did not make the main deck.

Good sideboard: 3 cards for aggressive matchups, 3 for control, 3 for graveyard strategies, 3 for artifacts/enchantments, and 3 flexible answers.

Each sideboard card should be clearly better than something in your main deck for at least one matchup. If you cannot identify what you would take out to bring it in, it does not belong in your sideboard.

Commander players: You do not have a traditional sideboard, but you can apply the same thinking with flex slots. Keep a short list of cards you swap in and out depending on your playgroup’s meta. If your group is heavy on graveyard strategies, keep that Bojuka Bog and Rest in Peace handy.

5. Learn When to Mulligan

A hand of seven cards that does nothing is worse than a hand of six cards with a plan.

This sounds obvious, but so many players keep bad hands because they are afraid of going to six. Modern mulligan rules (the London Mulligan) are generous — you see seven cards every time and put one back on the bottom. Use them.

Keep a hand when it has:
– Lands (at least 2, usually not more than 4-5)
– A play in the first two turns
– A clear path toward your deck’s game plan

Mulligan a hand when it has:
– Zero or one land
– Five or more lands
– No plays before turn 3-4
– Cards that do not work together (all removal but no threats, or all threats with no mana to cast them)

The key is asking: “Can this hand win a game?” Not “Does this hand have some good cards?” A hand with two great cards and five blanks is still a bad hand.

In Commander, the stakes are a bit different since the format is multiplayer and slower, but the principle holds. A hand that does nothing until turn 5 while three opponents are developing their boards is going to leave you behind.

6. Don’t Fall in Love with Bad Cards

We all have that card. The one with incredible art, or the one you pulled from your very first booster pack, or the one that won you that one memorable game three years ago. You keep putting it in decks even though it underperforms every time.

Cut it.

Ruthless editing is what separates decent decks from great ones. Every card in your deck needs to earn its slot. After each game, ask yourself: “Which card did I draw and wish was something else?” That card is a candidate for removal.

A practical test: If a card sits in your hand doing nothing more than half the games you play, it is not pulling its weight. Replace it with something your deck actually needs.

This does not mean you should strip every ounce of personality from your decks. Playing Magic is supposed to be fun, and pet cards are part of that. But be honest about the trade-off. If you are running Moonsilver Spear because you love the art, acknowledge that a different equipment or threat would probably win you more games.

The best deckbuilders review their lists after every session and make small adjustments. Get in the habit of cutting one underperformer and testing one new card every time you revisit a deck.

7. Balance Threats and Answers

A deck full of threats and no answers will lose to the first opposing creature it cannot block. A deck full of answers and no threats will answer everything and then have no way to actually win.

You need both, and finding the right ratio is one of the most important deckbuilding skills.

Aggro decks lean toward threats (maybe 70/30 threats to answers), using speed to stay ahead of whatever the opponent is doing. The removal they run is usually cheap and efficient — Lightning Bolt, Fatal Push — to clear blockers.

Control decks lean toward answers (maybe 30/70), with a few hard-to-deal-with finishers that close the game once they have stabilized. Think Hullbreaker Horror or Torrential Gearhulk.

Midrange decks sit somewhere in between, with threats that double as answers. Cards like Bonecrusher Giant or Fury that kill a creature AND give you a body are premium in these strategies.

If you find yourself consistently losing because you cannot close out games, you need more threats. If you are losing because your opponent’s board runs away from you, you need more answers.

8. Use Card Advantage Engines

One-shot card draw spells (like Divination or Read the Bones) are fine. Repeatable card advantage engines are significantly better.

A card advantage engine is any card that draws you extra cards or generates extra value turn after turn without additional mana investment. Once it is on the battlefield, it just keeps working.

Classic examples:
– Phyrexian Arena — Draw an extra card every upkeep for just 1 life
– Esper Sentinel — Taxes opponents or draws you cards in white, every turn
– Welcoming Vampire — Free card every time a small creature enters under your control
– Beast Whisperer — Draw a card every time you cast a creature spell
– Bident of Thassa — Draw cards whenever your creatures deal combat damage
– Smuggler’s Copter — Loots every time it attacks, smoothing your draws

The difference between a one-shot draw spell and an engine is staggering over the course of a game. Divination draws you 2 cards once. Phyrexian Arena, left unchecked for five turns, draws you 5 extra cards. That is the kind of advantage that wins games.

When building your card draw package, prioritize engines over one-shot effects. Include a mix — some cheap cantrips to smooth out early draws and 2-3 engines that take over the mid-to-late game.

9. Respect Your Color Requirements

Every color you add to your deck comes with a cost. One color is easy on your mana base. Two colors is manageable with good dual lands. Three colors requires real mana base construction. Four or five colors needs dedicated fixing or you will lose games to your own lands.

The question to ask before adding a color: “Is this splash worth the consistency I am giving up?”

Splashing a fourth color for a single card is almost never worth it. That card might be powerful, but you will draw it in maybe 40% of your games, and in some of those games you will not have the right mana to cast it. Meanwhile, your mana base now stumbles more often, making your other 59 cards worse.

Practical guidelines:
– Mono-color: All basics, maximum consistency, limited card pool
– Two colors: 8-10 dual lands, very consistent, most formats’ sweet spot
– Three colors: 12+ dual lands, needs careful construction, watch for double-pip costs (like casting a card that costs WW and another that costs BB in the same deck)
– Four+ colors: You need a specific reason and a dedicated mana base (fetch lands, triomes, mana rocks/dorks)

In Commander, five-color decks are popular, but they require significant investment in your mana base. If your land base is mostly basics and a few tap-lands, stick to one or two colors until you can upgrade your mana fixing.

A final note on double pips: Cards that cost 1BB are harder to cast in a three-color deck than cards that cost 2B. When you are stretching your mana, pay attention to how many colored pips your spells require, not just their total mana cost.

10. Study Winning Decks (But Understand Why)

Copying a deck list is easy. Understanding why every card is in that list is what actually makes you a better deckbuilder.

The best free resources for studying decks:
– MTGGoldfish — Tournament results, metagame breakdowns, deck price tracking for Standard, Modern, Pioneer, and more
– EDHREC — The definitive Commander resource. See what cards are most popular for any commander, and why
– Moxfield — Public deck lists with detailed descriptions, tags, and community ratings

When you look at a winning deck, do not just copy the 75 cards. Ask questions:

Why is this deck running 3 copies of this card instead of 4?
What role does each sideboard card fill?
How does this mana base support the deck’s color requirements?
What is the game plan on turns 1, 2, 3?
Why was one removal spell chosen over another?

The answers to these questions teach you deckbuilding principles you can apply to every deck you build, not just the one you are looking at.

A good exercise: Find a top-performing deck in your favorite format, read it card by card, and write one sentence about why each non-land card is included. If you cannot explain a card’s purpose, research it. This single exercise will teach you more about deckbuilding than a dozen games.

Putting It All Together

These 10 tricks are not one-time fixes. They are habits. The more you build decks with redundancy, respect the curve, think in packages, and study what works, the better your decks will get over time.

If you missed the first post in this series, start with 10 Quick Tricks for Better MTG Decks for the foundational tips every player should know. And if you want to go even deeper, our Ultimate Guide to Building an MTG Deck covers everything from choosing your first card to tuning a finished list.

The best deckbuilders are not the ones who memorize card lists. They are the ones who understand why cards belong in a deck and when to make changes. Keep tinkering, keep testing, keep cutting the cards that are not working.

Your decks will thank you.

Frequently Asked Questions

How many copies of a card should I run in a 60-card deck?

It depends on how important the card is to your strategy. Run 4 copies of cards you want to see every game, 3 copies of cards that are good but not essential early, 2 copies of situational cards, and 1 copy of cards you only need in specific scenarios. In Commander, you are limited to 1 copy of each card (except basic lands).

What is the ideal mana curve for a Commander deck?

Commander curves tend to be higher than 60-card formats, but you still want most of your spells between 2-4 mana. A common guideline is an average mana value of 3.0-3.5 for a well-tuned Commander deck. Anything above 4.0 average means you are probably too top-heavy.

How do I know if my deck needs more removal or more threats?

Track your losses over several games. If you are dying to your opponent’s creatures or combos you cannot stop, you need more removal. If you find yourself stabilizing but never closing the game, you need more threats. Most decks want at least 6-8 removal spells in a 60-card list.

Should I always follow the mana curve guidelines?

No — the guidelines are a starting point. Aggro decks want an extremely low curve (peaking at 1-2 mana). Ramp decks can support more expensive spells because they accelerate their mana. Control decks need cheap interaction early and expensive finishers late. Your curve should match your strategy.

How often should I update my deck?

Review your deck after every 3-5 play sessions. Cut the worst-performing card and test a replacement. Small, incremental changes are better than overhauling the entire deck at once. Keep notes on which cards overperform and underperform so your changes are data-driven, not just gut feelings.

What is the best way to study winning deck lists?

Start at MTGGoldfish for competitive formats or EDHREC for Commander. Focus on understanding card choices rather than copying lists wholesale. Read articles that accompany deck lists, watch gameplay videos featuring the deck, and try to identify the role every card plays in the strategy.

Tag: card advantage