Every so often I like to dig into an article about general Magic philosophy and strategy. As a full-time streamer who has to make countless decisions every day, there are a ton of questions and comments that repeatedly come up from different viewers. Eventually these questions and comments are made so frequently that I feel like they warrant their own discussion, perhaps in an article just like this one.

Well, that's exactly what I want to talk about today. Today I have two topics I want to give my insights on because I get questions on them so frequently. I'd like to explain my thoughts and beliefs on them and maybe I'll even enlighten you a little bit in the process.

Not Using Every Part of the Buffalo

There's an old saying attributed to Native Americans that talks about using every part of the buffalo. It means to use every part of something and let nothing go to waste. And that's what they did. They used the hide, the meat, the fat, the bones, the horns. Every part had a use, and to be honest, many parts of animals are still utilized in similar ways.

Well, the saying has a weird effect when it comes to thinking about Magic cards specifically.

The most recent example I can think of was within the last week, when I was playing a Masters Chaos Draft on Magic Online. I was pretty set in a deck with nothing to splash, and there was an Izzet Guildgate in the pack. I was extremely grateful for the card showing up, because it was the perfect land for our deck. Just perfect! I could think of no better land than an Izzet Guildgate for our deck. We have a deck that needs Blue and Red mana... this land produces exactly Blue and Red mana! What could be better?

...well, quite frankly, the Crumbling Necropolis in the pack. For some reason, because I couldn't use the Black portion of the land, the land seemed somehow worse to me. I almost overlooked it completely when I was scanning the pack.

This happens constantly, and not just to me.

Take something like Sword of Feast and Famine. One of our plays can be to equip the sword and attack with it, getting both of its triggers. While untapping all our lands seems great, we see that our opponent doesn't have any cards in their hand. I know because of this, there are some people who will see this as a bad choice simply because we can't take advantage of every aspect of the Sword. But we don't have to.

I know personally there have been more than a handful of times that I'll be streaming with Michael B, and because we can't take advantage of every metric of a card, I have to convince him that the metrics we can take advantage of are still worth it. Daretti, Scrap Savant is a perfect example. I know there have been times where, because we weren't in a deck with artifact synergies, I was told Daretti wouldn't be good in our deck. Afterall, if you can't use one of the loyalty abilities of a planeswalker, it has to be a bad pick, right?

I don't think so. Oftentimes, to better frame my argument, I'll remove the part we can't use and see if a card with only the usable parts is playable. Would I play a four-mana planeswalker who had a +2 of discarding and drawing up to two cards? What if it was an enchantment with an activation cost of zero? Yeah, I likely would. That's a good amount of card selection for no further investment.

Cards like Expansion // Explosion or Fire // Ice are also great examples. There are plenty of times I considered playing one of these in a Mono-Blue deck, and I would hear something like, "but we're not playing any Red." That doesn't matter. Half of each of these cards are Mono-Blue for all intents and purposes. While they may not be the best Mono-Blue cards ever, having access to only one half of either card is completely reasonable.

Another interesting cause of this might be Apophenia. For those who don't know, Apophenia is the tendency to perceive meaningful connections between unrelated things. It's a tendency to look for patterns in things and I do this constantly. I think it's human nature to want things to be elegant and symmetrical; in fact, I know the latter to be true when it comes to the perception of beauty standards. (It's well-documented that humans rate symmetrical faces as more attractive.)

This kind of connects to how my brain immediately went for the land that fit perfectly into our deck without any overlap. The Crumbling Necropolis left me with Black mana that I may not use - though strategically it was the better choice because it allowed a potential splash for Black cards - and this felt wasteful and sloppy. Why would I want a Grixis land in my deck? I'm not playing Black!

Ironically, the misstep here is thinking that you actually have to use every part of the buffalo. You don't, and the sooner you start conditioning your brain to realize this, the better strategic decisions you can make in these situations.

41: The Answer to Life, the Universe and Everything

If you've watched my stream for any amount of time, you'll know I can regularly be found playing 41 cards in my Draft decks. I've thought about this long and hard, for years, and I'll be honest about why I do this:

I simply don't care.

The most common justification for years, since Magic's inception perhaps, for playing the bare minimum of 40/60 cards in a deck has been the same: you want to maximize your chances of finding the best card or cards in your deck, and every card over those numbers decreases your odds.

Well, I'm no Frank Karsten (although people used to regularly get us confused), but the odds of drawing 1 card out of 40 is 2.5%. The odds of drawing 1 card out of 41 is about 2.44%. We're talking about a 0.06% difference, and for me, that's an acceptable risk.

But why would I even take such a risk when it diminishes my chances of drawing my best cards even slightly?

Well, that's the other thing. I play a good deal of Limited, and I don't actually think that's always an applicable claim. You see, the thing about Limited - as opposed to Constructed - is that you don't get to select the exact cards that go in your deck, nor the quantity of them. In Standard, for example, I can choose every card that goes in my deck, and the exact quantity I want. If I have counterspells in my deck, and I want one every game, I can maximize the number I play.

But Limited is a different beast. In Limited, any card may be your best at any given time. Sometimes that single combat trick may be the best thing you can draw. Sometimes you may need that Acidic Slime to kill an artifact. Maybe you need an equipment that grants flying. Because there are so many different situations that come up in Limited games, because your opponent is fighting on the same axis as you are, where neither of you can know exactly what you'll be facing, having a greater variety of options in your deck could actually benefit you.

Sometimes drawing your Plummet one turn later, because it was your 41st card, is actually better than not drawing it at all. Okay, maybe that's not the best example, because Plummet is often a card that can safely be relegated to the Sideboard, but I think you get my point. I don't mind adding a 41st card because sometimes I think having the option of drawing that card makes your deck stronger, rather than weaker.

For those wondering, you have a 64.9% chance of drawing three or more lands in your opening hand in a 40 card deck with vs. a 62.6% chance of drawing those same three or more lands in a 41 card deck. While 2.3% is higher than the 0.06% we were dealing with earlier, I think these are still acceptable odds.

But let me know what you think! Are you guilty of some of these thought patterns? Would you consider adding a 41st card when you feel every card has a situational use? As usual, leave your comments down below and let me know.

As always, thank you guys a ton for reading, I love you all, and I hope you're still staying safe! I'll be back next week, and be sure and use FRANK5 to get 5% off all of your holiday gifts from CoolStuff.

Frank Lepore

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