What if ... you can have any number of cards in your deck (mainly fewer than 40)?

[chamthabo]

I always love what if question, it's a nice way to learn some knowledge from people in community.
So here is mine.
What if deck size rule allowed you to have any number of cards in your deck (fewer than 40)?
It seems like people always hate to use deck with more than 40 cards. So another question arises.
What is the number of cards you think that will give your decks (with various strategies) most consistency?

I also have heard from somewhere that the rule of this game once allowed deck of fewer than 40 cards (I have heard > 30). Is this correct? Will it ruin this game if wulven suddenly changed it back again atm (with far more cards than in the past) ?

Please educate this noob!

[Gondorian]

Yes, we had 30 card minimum back in 2011. It made decks super-consistent. I'll leave others to share their stories ...

[Twio]

Yeah as Gondo said the decks were so consistent that Zaladar Spark rush was viable. Draw engines weren't even compulsory in some decks.

[Yvan Antoine]

Yes, mage rush was far more annoying and consistent, you always get the exact cards you need. Warriors also did very well because they can get a 2cc blood frenzy down almost every game and get all the cards they need most of the time.

[Misanthropic]

Quality vs. Quantity

A debate we have all been in. The lower the deck limit the more viable complex combos or 'must have' combos become. One turn wincons and rush deck become more mainstream and variety surprisingly can suffer. The more 'tuned' a deck is the stronger it becomes and in my opinion small decks tune the best.

If youd like to taste some of this try making some 30 card decks for the AI. Sure youll win but watch how your games become to look more and more alike as the same combo can be reliably summoned on time each time. The best example of this is the Shard rush deck built for the AI, it is so consistant amd fast it is easily one of the best gold farming decks.

In regards to minimum limit, a deck has to be as big as it needs to achieve its wincon. Some rush decks could do this in as few as 20 cards, other may require more.

Lastly, if Wulven dropped QM back to 30 I answer with my own question. Can you imagine a Zal Shard rush or Roth miracle that rarely suffered from bad draws and always had in hand the exact card it needed?


With great towers of cards comes the need for much luck.

[Khamya9]

Back in the very early days of magic there wasn't a card limit. People with money therefore built decks without land using only moxes, Sol rings, and similar. Adding the limit, and later inventing the "unique" limit (in magic, unique means one per deck, not one in play at a time), greatly improved the environment. Early magic was... Not at all well balanced. If a game lasted to turn 3 it was either two people with very casual decks or one person was goofing off. It really wasn't a whole lot of fun in my opinion.

Later games have pretty much all copied the card limit mechanic. I am not aware of any that have gone to a totally free build environment. Personally, I'm a fan of most rules that reduce consistency, because that takes the emphasis off what cards you own and how good a builder you are, and weights more to play skill. So I like the limit. I'd much rather see a minimum deck size of 50 with a limit of three of each card, than to go the direction of smaller, reliable decks. But I'm far in the minority.

[Airact]

Back in the very early days of magic there wasn't a card limit. People with money therefore built decks without land using only moxes, Sol rings, and similar. Adding the limit, and later inventing the "unique" limit (in magic, unique means one per deck, not one in play at a time), greatly improved the environment. Early magic was... Not at all well balanced. If a game lasted to turn 3 it was either two people with very casual decks or one person was goofing off. It really wasn't a whole lot of fun in my opinion.

Later games have pretty much all copied the card limit mechanic. I am not aware of any that have gone to a totally free build environment. Personally, I'm a fan of most rules that reduce consistency, because that takes the emphasis off what cards you own and how good a builder you are, and weights more to play skill. So I like the limit. I'd much rather see a minimum deck size of 50 with a limit of three of each card, than to go the direction of smaller, reliable decks. But I'm far in the minority.

Turn 1
Mountain -> Lotus -> Channel -> Fireball, kill you. Sometimes I do enjoy that kind of Magic but if we want to give people even the chance of killing people fast, we need to also give answers to that.


Like, sometimes I wish I didn't have to stuff my decks full of draw engines but having a lower than 40 min deck size would make the game be a lot faster than what it currently is.

[Khamya9]

Turn 1
Mountain -> Lotus -> Channel -> Fireball, kill you. Sometimes I do enjoy that kind of Magic but if we want to give people even the chance of killing people fast, we need to also give answers to that.


Like, sometimes I wish I didn't have to stuff my decks full of draw engines but having a lower than 40 min deck size would make the game be a lot faster than what it currently is.

Been there. I actually have one single tournament win before I got my first turn, so a turn zero win. Opponent pulls swamp lotus channel mind twist. I was holding three psychic purge causing him 15 damage when he discarded them from my hand.

Urzas saga gave some counterspels with discard costs instead of mama to answer turn 1 wins. The original set had a one blue counter that required the opponent pay one more mama or the spell failed, so you could stop one if went first and did nothing on your go. And there were the "elemental blast" counters both red and blue could use on turn one. Still, not a fun play environment at all. Basically turns the game into competitive coin tossing. "Ooh you go first? Gg, loved your deck. Shall we play again?"

[Daemon Rayge]

If anything, I would be on board on increasing mimimum size to 50 (49+Hero).

It allows slower Decks to thrive better in the face of Rush/full Aggro and more room for Techs without hurting consistency by having to trim out cards ir fattening the Deck when you want to maintain the minimum.

[Backer]

If anything, I would be on board on increasing mimimum size to 50 (49+Hero).

It allows slower Decks to thrive better in the face of Rush/full Aggro and more room for Techs without hurting consistency by having to trim out cards ir fattening the Deck when you want to maintain the minimum.

I'd like to see 40 Cards + 1 Hero.