Aggro, Control, or Combo?
Ask anyone that’s played Magic the Gathering for a significant length of time. They will tell you that there are three primary deck archetypes. Aggro decks that take advantage of incredible speed, or strength. Control decks that can take over a specific aspect of the game, or lock out your opponent. Combo decks that group specific cards together to achieve game breaking effects. Quite often this results in a Rock, Paper, Scissors situation. Where Aggro beats Control, Control beats Combo, and Combo beats Aggro. Deck choice is usually a matter of personal preference. Lately though playing whichever deck is winning major events most often is the popular choice. The alternative is to design, and play the Scissors to the currently popular Paper. Most Players have a particular preference towards a certain style of deck. In the beginning I preferred building, and playing Aggro decks. They were quite easy to build, play, and could earn you a quick victory if your opponent got off to a slow start. As my skills at the game improved. I learned to enjoy playing all three archetypes. I now enjoy all three equally.
When designing a new deck. The archetype used to determine the deck’s primary path to winning. The Aggro deck just needed to be faster than the opponent’s deck. The Control deck just needed to be able to stop the opponent’s deck from doing what it was designed to do. The Combo deck had to reach it’s combination of game breaking cards before the opponent defeated you.
In today’s game your real goal should be to achieve some insurmountable advantage. In Magic the Gathering there are two primary forms of advantage that can be had. The first is Card advantage, and the second is Board advantage. Each of the three archetypes can be utilized to achieve either of the two major advantages. I’m not saying that a fast deck can’t win just because it’s fast. Of course it can. What I’m saying is that a fast deck, that also gains you Board, or Card advantage will win far more often. One of the best early examples of this is the Swamp-Dark Ritual-Hypnotic Spectre first turn play. A first turn 2/2 flying is fast. Add in the Card advantage that’s created when the Hypnotic Spectre forces your opponent to discard a card, and you have a game winning situation. A similar comparison can be made for Control, or Combo decks. Be mindful when designing your next deck that it does have the capability of creating a significant advantage. If it doesn’t, then all you are essentially doing is gambling. Obviously if you only copy netdecks, then this doesn’t apply to you. Still understanding why certain decks succeed is important to know if you hope to actually defeat them. There have been some very successful Magic the Gathering decks. Most of them will sound familiar to even newer players. Necropotence, Prosper-bloom, High Tide, Affinity, Copycat, and the list goes on. What made these decks great was there ability to create massive advantages in the game. If you can’t create a deck that can do the same? Then save yourself so cash and just play Rock, Paper, Scissors for free.