Explaining All The Most Popular Formats in MTG Easily and Plainly

unlike other card games magic has a ton of different ways you can play it these formats each have their own card pulls and occasionally their own rules for deck construction so to help newer players with the way around the game we're going to go over each of these formats how and where to play them and the pros and cons of each format starting with the weakest formats and going to the strongest starting off with the weakest of all magic formats we have limited which is split into two different formats draft and sealed limited is a format that's played by opening packs of magic sets as nearly every magic set is designed to enable limited play at an event and building decks out of what you open and playing with the deck for the rest of the event this is different from other formats called constructed formats where you build your deck before the event and have full control over what cards you get the difference between draft and sealed is how the cards are divided up amongst the players in a sealed event each player is given a number of draft packs usually six and they open those packs and build a 40 card deck with the cards they open as well as with a number of basic lands which should be provided by whoever is running the event because sealed like all other limited formats are so restrictive as to what cards you can play there are special deck construction rules as mentioned before you only need 40 cards in your deck but there also isn't a playset rule so if you open five typhoid rats you can play all five typhoid rats in your deck also every card you open that you don't play is considered a part of your sideboard so if you're playing a best 203 after the first game you can take any number of cards out of your deck and replace them with any other cards you opened as long as you still have at least 40 cards in your deck afterwards the other type of limited format is draft as opposed to sealed where you're given a number of packs and open them all by yourself instead a pod of between 6 to 8 players sit around a table and each open one pack take one card from it and then pass all the cards to the players on the left they repeat this until all the cards in the pack are gone and they open the next pack and do the same thing once all the packs have been drafted you build the deck out of the cards you choose the same deck building rules with sealed applied so any number of basics no playsets and 40 card decks draft is generally more popular than sealed for a few reasons first off it usually has a higher power level as the process of drafting means that people will usually end up with a lot more cards and they can actually play in their deck when you open a sealed pool your pulls will usually be evenly split amongst all five colors since you'll probably only be playing two colors about three fifths of all your pulls won't be usable in a draft however even though you're opening half as many cards you'll be drafting way more playable cards so your deck will be better overall it's also more skill testing as the process of drafting is its own skill that players have spent years getting better at so what are the pros and cons of sealed and draft some of the pros are that it's generally pretty cheap to buy in buying the packs needed to draft is usually around twelve dollars and six packs were sealed is usually just twenty four dollars which really isn't that much when compared to the cost of a full deck and since every set is basically a whole new limited format there's constantly new and interesting things to learn lots of the very weak cards that normally wouldn't see play are key parts of the limited environment limited is the place where commons and uncommons really shine additionally every set also has its one mechanic specific to that set and sometimes these cards don't transfer over to constructed formats where the power level is too high for them to compete limited is a great place to play with mechanics like party or dungeons which didn't end up making a splash in standard the formats are also relatively low power level which is either a pro or a con depending on what kind of gameplay you prefer some of the cons are the fact that you do have to buy new cards just about every time you try to play limited as you do need packs to open so it's not like constructed where you just buy a deck and you can play it whenever you want you also need other people who are willing to draft with you which can be harder than finding someone who just has a deck built not to mention that doing a draft can also take some time where can you play draft and sealed you can play them at your local game store on magic arena or on magic the gathering online moving on to the constructed formats we're going to start off with standard standard is as the name implies the standard magic format and what the majority of the releases are tailored to standard is magic's only rotating format how this works is that every year wizards will release four standard sets standard will always have five to eight sets in it and when the would be ninth set is released the oldest four sets rotate out so you're playing with the last two-ish years of cards released standard is played with the typical deck building rules playsets of four for everything except for basic lands 60 card deck and 15 card sideboards what are the pros of standard standard is the primary format wizards designs cards for so it's usually more bound to a lot of the other formats it being a rotating format helps keep things interesting new decks are always coming out and older annoying decks that you've gotten tired of will rotate out eventually it also is a very creature based format where combo decks are rare so if that's the kind of magic you want to play it's the best format for that it's also the second cheapest constructed format as all the cards have been printed recently so there's ample supply for the demand what are the cons of standard rotation means you'll have to buy a new deck every couple of years at least it can also have a bit of a turbulent meta as having such a small card pull can lead to there not being answers for certain threats or strategies where can you play standard at local game stores on magic arena and on magic the gathering online next up we'll be doing the arena formats or formats that are mainly played on magic arena first up is alchemy alchemy is basically standard but with some special arena only cards that do things that you can't do in paper like permanently changing the stats of a card even if it gets shuffled into the library or something and balance patches instead of the ban list these new cards are released as special versions of sets a little after the release what are the pros of alchemy due to there not being a banned list you don't have to worry about your deck being banned out from underneath you even if they do get nerfed they'll still be somewhat playable it also has the same upsides and downsides of being a rotating format as standard what are the cons of alchemy well if your deck gets nerfed and the deck is made bad enough to not be able to see play anymore you won't get your wild cards back unlike with a banning now we're trying to be objective here but it is worth mentioning that the community generally doesn't like alchemy very much so there will be less resources available if you try to build a deck or look for metagame data where can you play alchemy you can play alchemy only on magic arena the next format is historic historic is a format that uses standard deck construction rules and consists of every card that's on magic arena besides the banned cards of course this includes every card in standard that has gone through standard and some other cards that wizards has added through historic anthologies and remaster sets as well as the digital only cards what are some of the pros of historic there's no rotation so your deck will never rotate out you can also use all of your old cards that aren't in standard anymore if you happen to really like a deck while it wasn't standard you can play it in historic after it rotates although you'll need to upgrade it quite a bit to make it more competitive what are some of the cons of historic historic isn't what wizards has in mind when they print sets so you'll get cards that are far too good for the format but not great at standard or sets with nothing strong enough for the format this is something that's true of every non-rotating format so i'll quickly mention it a few more times in the video the higher power level means that weaker decks have an even harder time competing though this will be true of all higher power level formats the higher power level means that decks can also be harder to get the cards for as they're more likely to be higher rarity where can you play historic historic is exclusive to magic arena the next format is explorer explore is basically just historic but without the digital exclusive cards it uses standard deck construction rules and includes every card in arena so in summary standard is a rotating format without digital cards alchemy is standard with digital cards explorer is non-rotating format without digital cards and historic is a non-rotating format with digital cards what are the pros of explorer similar to the pros of historic so your dac won't rotate out and you can play with all of your old cards what are the cons of explorer again the format is similar to historic so it has the same issues or weaker decks not being able to compete as easily and decks sometimes being harder to get the cards for as well as wizards not balancing the standard sets around a format where can you play explorer explore is also exclusive to magic arena the final arena format is historic brawl this is a format that has unique deck building rules like the rest of the constructive formats we mentioned so far in historic brawl you can only play one copy of each card besides basic lands so it's what's called a singleton format you also have a 99 card deck as opposed to a 60 card deck and players start at 25 life as opposed to 20. you also get to choose one legendary creature or planeswalker as what's usually called a commander named after the commander format which we'll talk about a little bit later this commander starts outside your deck in the command zone and you can cast it from the command zone as if it were in your hand anytime you would leave the field you return to the command zone to play it again but you have to pay two extra mana to play it again additionally you can only play cards that are the same color identity as your commander color identity is basically the color of a card plus all the colors of the mana symbols that appear in the card's text so a card like jodah archmage eternal is a blue white and red card but has a color identity of all five colors because they're all five mana symbols in its text and as the name implies the format has the same card pool as historic so any card in arena can be played in historic brawl though both formats have their own banned list and there are different cards in the two bandlists what are the pros of historic brawl brawl is a more casual format and the higher life total and less consistent decks allows more expensive cards to be viable without making the format extremely weak it also lets you build around any legendary creature planeswalker you want which leads to a very different deck building process you can play cards specifically because they synergize your commander whereas in other formats you wouldn't know that you'd have access to that card this means people build decks more synergizing with a certain theme rather than just playing all the best cards i have access to for example if you're playing a legendary creature like falco sparrow pact weaver as your commander you'll be playing lots of cards that synergize with counters to make the most of his ability what are the cons of historic brawl games of historic brawl are often very grindy and long due to their higher life total which can be a negative it's also a less competitive format so there aren't big competitive events for the format if you're looking for that where can you play historic brawl historic brawl is exclusive to magic arena now that we're done with the arena formats we're moving on to pioneer pioneer is an eternal format that includes every card that's been in standard starting from return to ravnica printed in 2012 and including all of the standard cards since then it uses the normal deck building rules 60 card deck play set of four cards and a 15 card sideboard it's worth mentioning really quickly that non-standard set releases like commander legends do not go into pioneer what are some pros of pioneer pioneer is basically the historic or explorer for paper and magic online it has the upsides of not rotating in a higher power level as well as getting to use your favorite old standard cards what are some of the cons of pioneer it is usually a bit pricier than standard to buy into because all the cards are older and often are played in other formats meaning they're both less supply and a higher demand driving up prices and like other non-rotating formats wizard isn't designing a round pioneer where can you play pioneer you can play pioneer at your local game store and on magic online next we have popper popper is a non-rotating format with the normal deck construction rules but instead of including every card in a set rotating from one point forward it includes every common card in every set it also includes side sets unlike formats like pioneer and modern which only include standard sets what are the pros of popper popper is by far the cheapest constructed format it also doesn't have a rotation so after you build a deck you won't ever have to get a new one this makes it an even cheaper format to play what are the cons of popper only having commons means that some effects are missing from the format it doesn't mean the format is necessarily weak as more than enough strong commons exists for it to be around the same power level as pioneer it just means that some splashy effects like extra turn spells don't exist in the format at all it's also not the most popular format so you have a little bit of trouble finding games where can you play popper you can play popper at your local game store and on magic online the next format is modern modern is a non-rotating format that uses the standard deck construction rules and includes all the cards that have gone through standard starting with 8th edition printed in 2003 as well as the cards printed in modern horizon sets remember the only side sets that are included in modern are modern horizon cards things like commander legends do not go into modern what are the pros of modern modern has both a very high power level and a very diverse meta game especially when compared to formats like standard it also has combo strategies that wouldn't be fair in weaker formats available it also has a very diverse meta game with aggro combo mid-range and control decks all have in their own niches if you want to format where mono red burn can compete with some of the wildest combos in the game modern is great for that what are some of the cons of modern modern is very expensive because the cards that see play are even stronger than in formats like pioneer there are less viable cards the cards are older and more people need these specific cards meaning there's even lower supply the cards and an even higher demand where can you play modern you can play modern at your local game store and on magic online the next format is commander commander is what historic brawl is standing in for an arena you have a 99 card deck with only one copy of each card besides basic land and a commander which is specifically a legendary creature not a planeswalker like in historic brawl and all your cards had to be within the creature's color identity players also start with 40 life instead of 20. commander is also one of the only multi-player-focused magic formats usually played in pods of four but you can play with other numbers of players what are the pros of commander commander is a non-rotating format so you don't have to build new decks if you don't want to you also get to build your deck around a legendary creature which opens up different deck building options the higher starting life total also makes more expensive cards more viable commander is also the most popular magic format so it's pretty easy to find games what are the cons of commander the format is very casual so there aren't competitive tournaments for it players can often disagree with the power level the format should be played at which can lead to lopsided games on top of that commander can be a very unbalanced format at times combo decks are far far stronger than aggro mid-range and control decks which really compounds the lopsided nature of some gains as one player goes off and wins and no one else happens to draw an interruption to stop them where can you play commander you can play commander at your local game store or on magic online the next format is legacy legacy is a format with standard deck building rules and where every card that has ever been released is legal except for the banned cards of course this includes cards in non-standard sets such as commander legends or even commander precons and the like what are the pros of legacy it's a non-rotating format and it has the highest power level of any format with the bandless this makes some of the most complex and interesting games and magic you can play there were combo decks that can kill you on turn one tons of zero mana spells very powerful stack cards fast mana just about every busted effect ever printed so while the cards that are playable are more selective there's a more varied set of strategies that are viable other formats simply can't allow these strategies to exist because the tools aren't there to deal with them for example ftk or first turn kill decks are banned in every format except a legacy in vintage because formats like modern don't have zero man interactions necessary to keep them in check what are the cons of legacy legacy is very very expensive far more so than modern lots of important cards in the format are on the reserved list meaning wizards can't reprint them leaving staples at hundreds of dollars a copy additionally aggro isn't quite good enough to compete and it's a bit rare in the format so if you're a big fan of burn decks maybe stick to modern or pioneer where can you play legacy you can play legacy at your local game store or on magic online the last format is vintage vintage is legacy but instead of a banned list you have a restricted list where cards are limited to one copy instead of banned what are the pros of vintage vintage is the strongest format in all of magic and it's not even close if you want to see what magic at its most powerful is like look no further than vintage what are the cons of vintage it is ungodly expensive i know i've said that a lot but nothing compares to vintage going off of mtg goldfish blue tinker the best deck in vintage right now cost 86 478 in paper this is several orders of magnitude more expensive than any other format where can you play vintage you can theoretically play it at your local game store but realistically you're planted on mtgo where the cards aren't the price of a car and those are the most important mtg formats there are a few other formats as people make up their own from time to time but both of them don't last very long so these are the most common ways people play magic [Music] you

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Keywords: magic, mtg, magic the gathering, tcg, card game

Id: q4BC8dCiYJg

Length: 16min 45sec (1005 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 15 2022