Hopefully, you don’t try to rig your deck. This is for the people that are interested in
making their MTG a game of chance. It’s
only natural to want to select certain cards, and often cards can be grouped,
such that in a 100 card Commander deck, or any deck for that matter, there are
certain formulas that can be used to determine things such as how many lands
one is likely to get in their opening hand, or how many elves one is likely to
have by turn three.
Let’s start with the basics.
We will start with the fraction ½.
In a Commander deck, there are 100 cards and a Commander. Consider that 99 cards might as well be 100
cards.
Where might this fraction, ½, be useful? The only time I have used the fraction ½ in
deck construction is with lands. That
is, if you have 49 or 50 lands out of 99 cards, that fraction is equal to
roughly ½. Keep in mind this is
probability so the fractions need not be exact, and one should round numbers
where it is appropriate. For, example,
just because one can use a rounding technique doesn’t mean that it should be
used.
Think of 50/99 cards as ½ even though 50/100 is ½. Why?
Because 50/99 is 1 away from being ½ and thus it is probably as close as
one can get, or one needs to get in deck construction.
Consider this, if one in every two cards is a land, then you
have a 50% chance of drawing a land.
This is important because it is almost always necessary to have 2 lands
in an opening hand. In an opening hand
one has 7 cards, and then possibly 8 cards if he or she draws on the first
turn.
First, consider 8 cards because it is easier than
considering 7 cards. If 1 out of every 2
cards, or roughly 50% of your deck is land, you can multiply 8 times ½, which
is 4. Thus, in an opening hand, one is
likely to have 4 land cards, and 4 other cards if 8 cards are drawn.
But, what about 7 cards?
7 is a lot less than 8. In fact,
in many instances it is a whole turn away from 8 cards. I like to figure my opening hand with respect
to drawing 7 rather than 8 cards because it is more conservative. In the case of drawing 7 cards, the formula
still follows, 50/99*7 or N/D*C where N is the Number of cards in your deck
that follow a certain scenario, such as land cards, D is equal number of cards
in your Deck, and C is equal to the number of cards you have drawn. What is important in this scenario is that
50/99*7<4, so conservatively consider that you will probably only have 3 land cards
in your opening hand though you may have a different number.
The question of whether you should round to 4 and assume
that you will have 4 land cards or 3 in your opening hand is entirely
yours. I tend to think of it as a not
very informed question. Why? Because usually you can only play 1 land on a
turn. Thus, consider on turn 1 you have
3 lands, but on turn 2 you have 4 lands.
Following the pattern, on turn 4 you will have 10 cards, and thus 50% of
10 is 5.
Though you want to have at least 2 lands in your opening
hand, sometimes it is more important to consider when you will run out of land
to draw. That is if you have played 1
land a turn, then on turn 4 you will still likely have more land to play in
your hand. So, it is also important to
understand when you will probably run out of land considering 1 out of every 2
cards is going to be a land.
Consider the following situation where there is no mana
acceleration, and 50 lands in a commander deck.
Turn 1, 7 cards, 3 lands, play 1 land, 2 lands left
Turn 2, 8 cards, 4 lands, play 2nd land, 2 lands
left
Turn 3, 9 cards, 4 lands, play 3rd land, 1 lands
left
Turn 4, 10 cards, 5 lands, play 4th land, 1 lands
left
Turn 5, 11 cards, 5 lands, play 5th land, 0 lands
left
Turn 6, 12 cards, 6 lands, play 6th land, 0 lands
left
Turn 7, out of land
In the same way. In a 60 card deck, half of that would 30 cards. In the same way, if you have 30 lands in a deck, then you also have a 50% of drawing a land.
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