Army of Magic (AOM) - A Rarity Restricted Format for Magic: the Gathering

Unlike many of my peers growing up in the 80's, I wasn't exposed to Dungeons & Dragons, trading card games like Magic: the Gathering, and other such fantasy RPG forms of entertainment.  I didn't even own a gaming console such as the much coveted Nintendo or Sega Genesis.  Because of this, I evolved as a proud member of the PC Master Race with Ultima VII being my favorite RPG, but I never missed an opportunity to play Super Mario Bros. 3 on a friend's console.

As a 30-something, I've had to play catch-up.  Some dear friends (you know who you are) allowed me to try my hand as a DM, guiding a small band through treacherous caverns fighting evil Duergar and minotaurs.  An obsession for a while was this tremendously fun and varied card game published by Wizards of the Coast: Magic: the Gathering.

MTG Zones

The MTG Color Wheel

If you're not already familiar with MTG, I recommend simply getting someone in the know to show you how to play or at least watching videos on YouTube.  Figuring out the basics by reading "the instructions" was difficult for me--and I consider myself to be fairly intelligent with above-average reading comprehension.

But I digress.  The purpose of this blog post is to share a new format I've come up with for deck construction and play.  What I've found in playing various formats (constructed, limited, 2-headed giant, EDH) is that there's a natural tendency toward imbalance in decks, with typically the most "expensive" or "rare-heavy" decks having a significant advantage over "cheaper" or "common-heavy" decks.  There are answers to this of course, some of which are discussed at some depth by blogger "Cabel the Pauper" on Reddit and his blog, but the predominant answers seem to involve removing Rares altogether to level the playing field, with formats like "Pauper", "Peasant", and "Silverblack".

I personally feel that Rares, Mythic Rares, and special cards like Planeswalkers add a tremendous level of variation to MTG gameplay, allowing "interesting" effects to go off and challenge the other players to come up with appropriate answers.  I feel that removing these cards from play altogether would put a damper on the game.  Instead, I propose a format in which each level of card rarity has a different and specific restriction--hopefully not so much restriction as to make deck construction too difficult or time-consuming, but enough control to foster extremely selective creativity in the use of meager resources.  As I mused on my potential solution, I decided to pull features from the Modern Constructed rule set and some from the highly popular variant EDH/Commander.  Thus, I give you: Army of Magic, or AOM.  (I'll probably make another post that jumps straight to the rules.)

Army of Magic

Philosophy: for everyone to have fun.  AOM is designed as a casual play format, and probably won't take off on the tournament circuit.  I play with my girlfriend, our kids, and our friends, and the idea is for everyone to have a shot at winning every game if they play their hands right.

Deck Construction: remember the numbers: 3 - 6 - 9 - 12.  Remember these numbers and you can most likely remember the limits of deck building.

• There are no color restrictions in AOM.  Include whatever colors/color identities you feel you can play with the lands and deck sizes available.
• Up to 3 Generals.  Generals can be 1 to 3 creatures of your choice.  Rarity, Legendary status, and color don't matter except in keeping up with the totals below.  Just remember that these creatures will be available to play from your Command Zone similar to a Commander in EDH at an increasing cost every time you play one.  You can only cast a General when no other General is in play.  Planeswalkers cannot be Generals, even if the card says "[this] may be your Commander".  These are Generals, not Commanders.
• Generals are singletons, regardless of rarity.  You cannot include more than 1 copy of each General in your deck.
• Up to 3 Mythic Rares, only 1 copy of each.  Any mythic rare spell, including a General, counts toward this total.  Planeswalkers are typically of Mythic rarity, so they can be in your deck, just not as Generals.
• Up to 6 Rare Lands, only 1 copy of each.  Other than this cap, see Lands below.
• Up to 9 Rare Spells, with no more than 3 of those Mythic.  So 3 Mythic + 6 Rare = 9 total Rare slots.  If your deck has 1 Mythic Rare, you can have 8 Rares; 2 Mythic, 7 Rare, and so on.  Again, Rares and Mythic Rares are Singletons--you can only have one of each in your deck.
• Up to 12 Uncommons, at most 2 copies of each.  "Two-ofs" can be included of Uncommons, but there is a firm maximum of 12.  So an AOM deck could have 6 distinct Uncommons with 2 copies of each, or it could have 12 Uncommon Singletons, or any mix in between.
• No maximum of Commons, at most 4 copies of each.  So you can add any number of distinct Commons, and you can have 1-ofs, 2-ofs, 3-ofs, and 4-card sets of each specific Common.
• Lands: no maximum on Basic Lands; at most 4 copies of each Uncommon Land; up to 6 Rare Lands, only 1 copy of each.  So lands do not count toward spell rarity totals.
• Generals count toward rarity restrictions.  Example: 1 General is Mythic Rare and 2 are Rare: the deck may contain up to 6 additional Rares, with at most 2 of those being Mythic Rares.
• Deck size >= 80 cards.  No maximum deck size as long as you can shuffle it.

Legality / Ban List:

• Modern-legal cards follow the deck construction restrictions above.
• Commander-legal cards are allowed, but count as Rare regardless of the printed card rarity.
• Land Destruction is Banned.  This might just be a personal bias seeping in, I don't care.  Land destruction and any card that says "destroy ___ land(s)" is strictly forbidden.  Land control (tapping land, taking control of a land, etc.) is perfectly legal within the deck construction limits.

Gameplay:

• Unless otherwise noted or I missed something, the game is played following Standard Constructed MTG rules or the house rules your playgroup has agreed to follow.
• Players begin the game with 30 Life.
• Mulligans: each player draws 7 cards, and may mulligan by laying down the cards drawn and drawing 7 again, repeating this process until an acceptable hand is drawn.  Players should not abuse this privilege.
• Players roll dice to see who goes first; the starting player draws a card on his/her first turn.
• Generals: each player will have chosen 1 to 3 creatures as Generals.  These champions will begin the game face up in the Command Zone, which functions identically with the zone of the same name in the Commander/EDH variant.
• A single counter representing all 1-3 Generals should be kept in the Command Zone for each player and incremented each time a General is played.  Each time a General spell is cast (whether the spell resolves or not), the mana cost is increased by {2} for each time a General was previously cast by the owner.
• A General may only be cast when no other General is in play (on the battlefield) under its owner's control.
• If a situation arises in which a player controls more than 1 General he or she owns, one General must be chosen by the player to be immediately sent to the graveyard or back to the Command Zone.
• If a General would be put into a library, hand, graveyard or exile from anywhere, its owner may choose to move it to the Command Zone instead.  This is a replacement effect, so triggers such as "dies", "goes to graveyard", etc. do not apply.

That's it!  I hope that players will give this variant a go and give feedback on what the play experience is like.  I enjoy deck building almost as much as playing the game, and I believe this format will foster serious creativity in construction and some intensely balanced multiplayer duels.  Thoughts, suggestions, and rants are all welcome.

--Joe