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DDB Categories by Type |
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ALT-WIN is short for
alternative win. Any deck that utilizes specific cards or
strategies that win you the game without bringing your opponent down to
zero life or less are considered ALT-WIN decks. (Mill decks have there
own category) Two popular cards that fit this category are Test of
Endurance and Darksteel Reactor. |
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Beatdown
decks are also known as Stompy decks. These usually contain big
creatures and great mana acceleration. The aim is to overwhelm the
opponent quickly with creature damage. Popular cards include
Ravenous Baloth, Fires of Yavimaya, Thorn Elemental, Birds of Paradise,
Giant Growth and Erhnam Djinn. (Yes, these decks are usually green). |
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While
beatdown decks aim to overwhelm an opponent with big creatures, burn aims
to overwhelm an opponent with 'burn spells'. Burn spells can be
considered any spell that can deal damage directly to an opponent's head
or to one of his or her creatures. Popular burn spells in Lightning
Bolt, Shock, Fiery Temper, Glacial Ray, Kindle and Pyroclasm. These
decks are quick and efficient usually with a great finisher like Fireball
or Disintegrate. |
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Combo
decks are intricate and well established. The goal - get your two or
three card combo and run your opponent over with it. Every other
card in the deck is meant to keep your combo on the table or search your
library for it. A popular combo that once reigned over the
tournament scene was Donate and Illusions of Grandeur. Note: MDV has
a great combo section that you might want to check out before visiting
these pages. |
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A
great example of control decks is Draw Go. Draw Go plays out like
this. Draw. Done. Counter everything your opponent plays until
you can cast an evasive creature and then protect it with your
counterspells and kill them with it. These decks typically have
mostly cards that deny your opponent the standards of play like lands,
spells, cards, and/or creatures. |
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Eternal
decks
are decks that fall into the Vintage [T1] or Legacy
[T1.5] tournament scene also known as Eternal. These are playing
styles that use older cards to win games. Popular cards in these
formats include the moxes, Time Walk and Sol Ring. |
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Simply put, group decks are made for group play. When
I write group play, I mean any game where there are more than two
players. These decks have cards like Congregate, Syphon Soul and
other 'all players' spells. |
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Historical
decks
are sometimes staples or tournament winning decks that were played by
someone well known or well established in the tournament scene of Magic:
the Gathering. |
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Infinity
decks are really combo decks except that these can go infinite with
creatures, mana, damage, turns, or whatever. Note: MDV has a whole
section of the site devoted to Infinity combos. You may want to
check those out before visiting these decks. |
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Land
Destruction (LD) decks are really control decks except that they have
mainly one way to control your opponent - by destroying all or most of
their land backed up with a way to win. You win is usually efficient
hasty creatures or burn. A staple in most LD decks is Stone Rain. |
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Lite
decks simply imply that you can play this deck without spending a lot of
money. Much of today's tournament scene is about have four or more
of the cards that cost $15.00 or more. Lite decks can cost you
$20.00 or under to find and play with - and they are still fun and worthy
of playing. |
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My
favorite type of deck to play. Mill decks strive to make your
opponent run out of cards in their library. Cards like Millstone,
Whetstone and Stroke of Genius are key cards to accomplishing this.
I am thankful that WotC still makes new variation of cards that accomplish
this effect. |
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New
decks are decks that have been added to the database over the past two or
three months - all on one page. |
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Lockdown
decks are really combo decks that utilize popular cards like Solitary
Confinement, Stasis, Rising Waters or Winter Orb to prevent your opponent
from doing anything and thus winning by decking them or sometimes weenie
damage. |
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Recursion
decks utilize cards that pull cards from your graveyard to play -- quickly
-- so as to overwhelm then like a beatdown deck. Popular recursion
cards include Corpse Dance, Patriarch's Bidding, Living Death and Zombify. |
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Single
Card Strategy decks are decks that use an unusual card and find other
cards that compliment it. The card that the deck is all about may
use it as a win condition or a means to establish a win condition.
Also, some of these decks don't really fall into any other category. |
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Theme
Deck use crazy decks (that are not tribal) that use a common theme such as
eyes, artists, lightning or movies. These are always just for casual
play as they are usually weaker than any deck yet mentioned. |
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Tribal
decks use one creature (and sometimes two) type to overwhelm the
opponent. Coat of Arms and any enchantment (kind of) from Onslaught
block are almost always found in these decks. Brass Herald being my
personally favorite. MDV has the best Tribal selection of decks on
the net. |
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Any deck that uses Unglued or Unhinged cards is in this
category (and only in this category) |
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Unique
decks are decks that just don't fall into any other category. |
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Weenie
Decks are very similar to beatdown decks, usually with some control thrown
in (like Armageddon) to win the game.. except with small creatures.
The best color for this deck type is white. |
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