MTG Glossary

A strategy that tries to win quickly by attacking with efficient creatures and pressuring the opponent's life total before they stabilize.

Aggro decks want a low mana curve and reach to finish games.

The list of cards that cannot be played in a given format because they warp the environment. Banned and Restricted announcements from Wizards of the Coast update these lists.

A ban can instantly change which decks are viable in a format.

A spell that destroys, exiles, or otherwise removes most or all creatures (and sometimes other permanents) in play, resetting the board state. Common in slower control decks and a key tool against wide, aggressive boards.

A Commander-style format built from Standard-legal cards, with a designated Commander and singleton deck construction.

Brawl gives Commander players a way to use the current Standard card pool.

The prices a store or vendor will pay to buy cards from you, usually lower than retail because they resell at a margin.

Buylist prices are a floor and retail prices are a ceiling for what a card is worth.

Ending up with more usable cards than your opponent through drawing extra cards, trading one card for two, or generating value from a single permanent.

A spell that kills a creature and draws a card is generating card advantage.

When you cast a spell with cascade, you exile cards from the top of your library until you exile a nonland card with lesser mana value, then may cast it for free. The exiled cards not cast go to the bottom in a random order.

A cascade spell is two spells for the price of one, which is why it is popular in Commander.

Competitive Elder Dragon Highlander: an optimized, high-power subset of the Commander format built around fast, resilient combos and efficient interaction, played with the explicit goal of winning rather than casual multiplayer fun. The Commander Format Panel defines cEDH within its Bracket System.

A specific card in a set valuable or sought-after enough that collectors specifically buy product hoping to pull it, driving box-opening demand independent of that card's actual gameplay power level.

In Commander, a card's color identity includes the colors in its mana cost and rules text, and every card in your deck must fit within your Commander's color identity.

A card with a red mana symbol in its rules text cannot go in a mono-green Commander deck.

The design philosophy that assigns each of the five colors its own strengths and weaknesses: for example green ramps and grows creatures while blue draws cards and counters spells.

The color pie explains why red is good at burn but cannot draw cards as well as blue.

Two or more cards that work together to produce a powerful result, often winning the game outright. An infinite combo repeats a loop with no limit.

Pieces of a combo are often ordinary cards on their own and only win when assembled.

A special zone where Commanders start the game and can be cast from. If a Commander would go to another zone, its owner may put it back in the command zone.

Your Commander is always available to recast from the command zone, at a cost.

A singleton, 100-card multiplayer format built around one legendary creature (or planeswalker) that defines the deck's color identity and sits in a dedicated 'command zone.' The most-played way to enjoy Magic casually as of 2026, and the main format Wizards designs precon products around.

A system from Wizards of the Coast that groups Commander decks into numbered power-level brackets to help players find well-matched games. Bracket rules can change, so check the official announcement for the current version.

Telling your table which bracket your deck is in speeds up Rule 0.

A player who has been dealt 21 or more combat damage by the same Commander loses the game, regardless of life total.

Commander damage gives aggressive Commanders a second way to win.

Each time you cast your Commander from the command zone, it costs {2} more for each time you have previously cast it from the command zone this game.

Casting your Commander a third time costs {4} more than its normal mana cost.

A strategy that answers the opponent's threats with removal, counterspells, and board wipes, then wins later with a few powerful finishers.

Control decks trade resources 1-for-1 until they can take over with card advantage.

A spell that counters another spell so it does not resolve. Counterspells live in blue and are the core of reactive control strategies.

Holding up mana on your opponent's turn signals a counterspell.

Any amount of damage a source with deathtouch deals to a creature is enough to destroy it. Paired with trample, only 1 damage per blocker needs to be assigned before the rest goes through.

A 1/1 deathtouch creature is a real deterrent because it trades with almost anything that blocks or attacks into it.

A Limited format where players open booster packs, pick one card at a time, and pass the rest, then build a deck from what they picked.

Drafting rewards reading which colors are flowing from the players passing to you.

Shorthand for 'enters the battlefield,' the trigger condition on abilities that fire the moment a permanent comes into play, such as a creature that draws a card or deals damage when it enters. When an event puts one or more permanents onto the battlefield, all permanents there, including the newcomers, are checked for matching ETB abilities.

You may use Solemn Simulacrum's ETB trigger to search your library for a basic land card, put it onto the battlefield tapped, and shuffle when it enters.

A keyword ability that lets a card be cast at instant speed, i.e. any time a player could cast an instant, including during an opponent's turn. Flash creatures and spells are prized for ambushing opponents and holding up interaction without losing tempo. Flash is a static ability that functions in any zone from which you could play the card.

Sphinx of False Conclusions has flash, so a player may play it any time they could cast an instant.

A creature with flying can be blocked only by creatures with flying or reach. It is one of the most common evasion keywords.

If your opponent has no fliers or reach creatures, a flier is effectively unblockable.

A card printed with a shiny finish. Foil versions typically sell for more than non-foil copies, though the premium varies by card and treatment.

Check whether a listed price is for the foil or non-foil version.

A keyword that lets a creature attack and use tap abilities the turn it enters the battlefield, ignoring summoning sickness.

Haste is why a red deck can deploy a big creature and hit for damage the same turn.

A permanent or player with hexproof cannot be the target of spells or abilities your opponents control. It does not stop effects that do not target, such as board wipes.

Hexproof protects a Commander from targeted removal but not from a wrath effect.

An optional additional cost you can pay as you cast a spell to get a stronger version of its effect. A spell can only be kicked as it is cast.

Kicker cards are flexible: cast them cheap early or pay more late for extra value.

An ability word for abilities that trigger whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control. Landfall decks reward playing extra lands from ramp and fetch effects.

A landfall creature grows every time you play a land, so ramp spells double as triggers.

An eternal Constructed format that allows almost every Magic card with a banned list, making it one of the most powerful and expensive formats.

Legacy decks lean on powerful older cards that are not legal in Modern.

If you control two or more legendary permanents with the same name, you choose one and put the rest into the graveyard.

Playing a second copy of a legendary creature usually just replaces the first.

Damage dealt by a source with lifelink also causes its controller to gain that much life. It applies to all damage, not only combat damage.

Lifelink swings a race: hitting for 4 is also a 4-life swing in your favor.

Formats where players build a deck on the spot from a fixed pool of cards opened at the table, either by drafting packs pick-by-pick or opening sealed product. Tests raw card evaluation and deckbuilding skill more than a prebuilt constructed deck.

The original digital version of Magic: The Gathering, where digital cards can be bought and traded and are used in online tournaments.

Some competitive events are played on Magic Online rather than in paper.

The lands in your deck, including how many you play and how well they produce the colors you need. Good mana bases balance land count, color sources, and utility lands.

A three-color deck needs more dual and fixing lands than a mono-colored one.

The distribution of a deck's cards by mana cost, usually visualized as a bar chart from 1 mana up to 6+. A smooth curve weighted toward cheap spells lets a deck reliably do something on every turn instead of flooding out on expensive cards.

Drawing too many lands and too few spells. Card draw and mana sinks help a deck recover from flood.

Running utility lands and mana sinks reduces the sting of flooding out.

Not drawing enough lands to cast your spells. The opposite problem is mana flood.

Keeping a two-land hand on the draw is a risk of mana screw.

The total amount of mana in a card's mana cost, ignoring colors. Formerly called converted mana cost. X counts as its chosen value while the object is on the stack and as 0 everywhere else, including on the battlefield.

A card costing {2}{U}{U} has mana value 4.

The mix of decks players are actually bringing to a format at a given time, and the way that mix shifts as players adapt.

Wizards' October 8 Metagame Mentor ranked Izzet Spellementals first at 9.0% of the winner's Standard metagame, and it was the most-registered deck in the Magic Online Challenges BaseMTG counted from October 1 to 12, yet its mtgpile match record from September 29 to October 13 (our October 13 snapshot) was 122-126, or 49%: the deck everyone prepares for is not always the one winning.

A flexible strategy that plays efficient threats and answers, adapting between aggro and control depending on the matchup.

Midrange decks have good cards at every point on the curve.

A nonrotating constructed format that includes every card printed from the Eighth Edition/Mirrodin era onward, giving it a much deeper and more stable card pool than Standard. Games are one-on-one, with a main deck of at least 60 cards and a sideboard of up to 15 cards. Apart from basic lands, the combined deck and sideboard can include no more than four copies of an individual card.

A Modern player with four copies of a nonbasic card in the main deck cannot add a fifth copy to the sideboard, because the combined deck and sideboard may not hold more than four of any individual card.

Wizards of the Coast's official free-to-play digital client for Magic, supporting Standard, Historic/Explorer, and Limited play with its own economy separate from paper card collections.

The process of shuffling an opening hand back into the library and drawing a new one. Under the London Mulligan rule, a player draws a fresh 7 each time but puts one additional card on the bottom of the library per mulligan taken. In multiplayer games and Brawl, the first mulligan does not count toward the bottom-card count.

You have an opening hand that does not fit your plan, so you choose to mulligan. Shuffle it back into your library, draw a new hand equal to your starting hand size, then put cards on the bottom equal to the number of times you have mulliganed. Once you keep, you cannot mulligan again.

Physical, printed Magic cards played at a table, as distinct from digital clients like MTG Arena. Paper is where the secondary market, local game stores, and most Commander play still live.

A format restricted to cards that have been printed at common rarity in paper or on Magic Online, popular for its low cost and strong interaction.

Pauper is a budget-friendly way to play a Constructed format.

A non-rotating Constructed format that allows sets from Return to Ravnica (2012) onward, with its own banned list.

Pioneer sits between Standard and Modern in card pool size.

A preconstructed deck sold ready to play, most commonly Commander decks released alongside sets: five Foundations Commander decks came out with Reality Fracture on October 2, 2026. Players often upgrade precons with better cards.

A precon is a good first Commander deck that you can improve over time.

An event held shortly before a set's official release where players open sealed product and play with the new cards early.

A prerelease is the first chance most players get to play a new set.

Wizards of the Coast's top-level invitational competitive circuit, where the strongest qualified players compete in high-stakes constructed and Limited events that shape the broader tournament metagame.

Effects that generate extra mana or put additional lands into play, letting a player cast bigger spells ahead of schedule. Central to green strategies and most Commander decks, which need enough mana to cast expensive singleton bombs.

Regional Championship Qualifier: a competitive event whose winners earn a qualification toward a Regional Championship.

RCQ results are one signal players use to gauge a Constructed metagame.

Any spell or ability that destroys, exiles, bounces, or otherwise neutralizes an opposing permanent, most often a creature. Efficient removal (low mana cost relative to what it answers) is one of the most valuable resources in constructed formats.

The likelihood that a card's secondary-market price will drop because Wizards reprints it in a new set, Secret Lair, or Commander product, increasing supply. A core concept for anyone buying singles as a long-term hold rather than to play immediately.

A policy from Wizards of the Coast of never reprinting certain older cards in a functionally identical form. It keeps some cards, such as original dual lands, scarce and expensive.

Reserved List cards cannot be reprinted, which supports their prices.

The periodic process by which older sets stop being legal in Standard as new sets release. Non-rotating formats such as Modern and Pioneer are not affected.

Cards that are about to rotate often drop in price.

The Commander convention that pregame discussion is part of the rules: players agree on expectations for power level, combos, and banned cards before playing.

Rule 0 conversations prevent a mismatched power level at the table.

A Limited format where each player builds a deck from a fixed number of opened booster packs without drafting.

Prerelease events are usually Sealed.

A direct-to-consumer product line of alternate-art reprints and occasional new cards, sold in limited drops outside the normal set-release calendar. A frequent source of reprint risk for cards that were previously scarce.

A set of extra cards, usually 15 in Constructed tournament play, that players can swap in between games of a match to adjust to their opponent.

Sideboard cards like graveyard hate are only useful in specific matchups.

The weeks before a set releases when the new cards are revealed to the public, driving early set reviews and speculation.

Prices of cards from a new set are most volatile during spoiler season.

The rotating constructed format that only allows cards from a defined recent window of sets (roughly the last two to three years), refreshed as new sets enter and older ones rotate out. The primary format Wizards designs new Standard-legal sets to support. A main deck needs a minimum of 60 cards and may use a sideboard of up to 15 cards. Once per year, after the first premier set Prerelease of the year, the six oldest sets in Standard rotate out.

A Standard player brings a 60-card main deck and a 15-card sideboard to a best-of-three match.

A strategy that uses resource-denial and tax effects to slow everyone down while the stax player is less affected. It is contentious at casual tables.

Stax pieces make opponents pay more or do less, so talk about them in a Rule 0 conversation.

A creature cannot attack or use abilities that require tapping it unless you have controlled it continuously since the start of your most recent turn. Haste removes the restriction.

A creature you cast this turn can block on your opponent's turn, but it cannot attack until your next turn.

A tournament pairing system where players are matched against opponents with similar records each round, so nobody is eliminated after one loss.

After the Swiss rounds, top players often advance to a single-elimination playoff.

The advantage gained by proactively developing board presence and pressure while forcing an opponent to react, as opposed to trading resources evenly. A tempo play might not be the most 'efficient' card individually, but it costs the opponent a turn to answer.

The last-in-first-out zone where spells and abilities wait to resolve. Because the stack resolves top-down, the most recently cast spell or activated ability always resolves first, which is why responses can 'fizzle' or change the outcome of something already on the stack.

A ranking of decks or cards into tiers by strength, usually based on tournament results or community consensus.

A tier list is a snapshot and changes as the metagame evolves.

The single-elimination bracket stage of a tournament that begins once Swiss rounds conclude, taking the eight highest-ranked players or teams. A deck's 'top 8 rate' at recent events is a common shorthand for how strong it currently is in the metagame. For Premier tournaments, 17-32 players require 5 Swiss rounds, while 410+ players require 10 before the Top 8.

An attacking creature with trample that is blocked assigns lethal damage to its blockers and can assign the excess to the player or planeswalker it is attacking.

A 6/6 trampler blocked by a 2/2 still pushes 4 damage through.

Any effect that searches your library for a specific card. Tutors increase consistency and are heavily restricted or discouraged at casual Commander tables.

Tutors let a combo deck find its missing piece instead of hoping to draw it.

Wizards of the Coast's branding for Magic sets built around licensed non-Magic intellectual property, such as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Marvel, The Hobbit, and Star Trek in the 2026 schedule. Since 2025, new Universes Beyond booster sets are legal in every Constructed format, Standard included, while new cards from their Commander decks are legal only in Commander, Legacy, and Vintage. Hasbro credited Universes Beyond sets, along with backlist and Secret Lair, for Magic's 59% revenue growth in 2025.

The most permissive Constructed format, allowing nearly every card. Instead of banning many powerful cards, it uses a restricted list limiting them to one copy.

Vintage is where the most powerful and expensive cards in Magic's history are played.

Whenever a permanent with ward becomes the target of a spell or ability an opponent controls, that spell or ability is countered unless the opponent pays the ward cost. Ward taxes targeting rather than preventing it.

Ward 2 means your removal spell costs 2 more, or it is countered.

The specific way a deck plans to win the game, such as combat damage, a combo, or decking an opponent.

A Commander deck with no clear win condition tends to stall out on the battlefield.