Do you think of type 1 as a format where a good deck costs somewhere around $1000 to build and needs all the cards from Power 9, along with several other expensive and restricted cards? If you do, this is the article for you.

First of all, I’m going to use the term Power 9, or P9, quite a lot in this article — so I think I should explain it to those of you who don’t know what it is. If you do, then just skip this next paragraph.

The term refers to the nine cards that are commonly thought of as the strongest cards in Magic. These are:

• Ancestral Recall (U, Instant; Target player draws three cards)
• Time Walk (1U, Sorcery; Take an extra turn after this one)
• Timetwister (2U, Sorcery; Each player shuffles grave and hand into library and draws seven cards)
• 5 Moxen (One for each color. Costs 0, artifact; Add one mana of the color to your mana pool)
• Black Lotus (Artifact, costs 0; Tap, sac: Add three mana of any single color to your mana pool).

There is also not-so-commonly used term"Power 10" that also includes Library of Alexandria (land; Tap: add 1 to your mana pool, Tap: draw a card, use this ability only if you have seven cards in your hand). What all of these cards have in common is that they either give you either card or tempo advantage, or both.

Some days ago I talked with a friend of mine. He’s a pretty good player, but even he seems to think that Type 1 is all about turn 1 kills and Power 9. It kind of popped my eyes open. He was so convincing when he spoke that had I not known better, I would have believed him. Why is it that many people think that you can’t play Type 1 unless you spend a thousand dollars to buy the most expensive cards in Magic?

The main reason for this, I suppose, is the fact that only high-level tournament where type 1 is played is the Invitational — and, of course, players there are able to borrow any cards they want, so they put them in, and naturally you then think that a good deck needs those. I’m going to show you later in this article a cheap and viable T1 deck that can beat a deck full of Power 9 and other restricted cards.

Do you know how many restricted cards there are currently in Type 1? There are 49, and it’s obvious that you can’t use all of them. Keeper most likely uses the largest number of these cards and for example, Darren DiBattista’s"Franchise," which is a Keeper variant, uses nineteen; his deck is listed later in this article. Then, of course, there are decks that use maybe one or two. It is true that almost every deck uses some cards from the restricted list — but why wouldn’t they? Hell, they wouldn’t be restricted if they weren’t good, would they? You should, of course, remember that most of these cards are really very affordable. For example, Balance, which is one of the strongest cards ever printed, costs $4.95 here at StarCity. For a card that can easily turn the tide of game in your favour, it is a small price, isn’t it?

And hey, you don’t need to use any of the restricted cards; you can always play with a T1 card pool with your friends just for fun! As I already said before, there are dozens of viable deck types in Type 1 and new decks are developed weekly. This, for me, is THE reason why Type 1 is my favorite format. Just imagine all the possible deck types! For example, is there any kill in Type 2 — or any other format, for that matter — that gives you the blast that switching your life with Mirror Universe when Lich is in play gives. It’s even possible to play the once-terrifying Academy deck... But thanks to restrictions, even that deck can’t consistently kill until maybe turn 4. Last time I played in a type 1 tournament, there were just two decks out of maybe twenty total that could be thought as the same archetype, and those both were almost Power-Nine-lessKeepers. If I recall correctly, one had Ancestral Recall and the other one had Time Walk, and the total number of Power 9 cards in the tournament was less than a dozen (and eight of that came from one deck). A basic Stompy deck won other tournament!

Here are decklists for two really different decks, one being an extremely expensive control deck and other is an aggressive and cheap deck that can beat the former most of the time. To make comparing these decks easier, I’ve marked all the restricted cards with an asterisk. (Warning: These decklists might be somewhat outdated!

The Franchise, by Darren Di Battista (19 Restricted cards)

LAND:
4 Underground Sea
3 Tropical Island
4 Tundra
4 City of Brass
4 Wasteland
1 Tolarian Academy *
1 Strip Mine *
1 Library of Alexandria *

ARTIFACTS:
1 Black Lotus *
1 Mox Sapphire *
1 Mox Pearl *
1 Mox Jet *
1 Mox Emerald *
1 Sol Ring *
1 Tormod’s Crypt
1 Zuran Orb *

BLACK:
1 Demonic Tutor *
1 Vampiric Tutor *
1 The Abyss
1 Mind Twist *

GREEN:
1 Regrowth *
2 Gaea's Blessing

WHITE:
1 Moat
1 Balance *
2 Swords to Plowshares
1 Dismantling Blow

BLUE:
2 Morphling
4 Mana Drain
4 Force of Will
3 Fact or Fiction
1 Mystical Tutor *
1 Ancestral Recall *
1 Timetwister *
1 Time Walk *
1 Stroke of Genius *

The Sideboard:
2 Misdirection
4 Annul
1 CoP: Red
2 Disenchant
1 Swords to Plowshares
1 Diabolic Edict
1 CoP: Blue
2 Oath of Druids
1 Jester’s Cap

Keeper decks have come a long way since the original 5-Color control: Brian Weissman’s The Deck. The original idea was simply to survive until one of its few kill cards was dropped. The Deck used Serra Angel as its kill card, but nowadays every version uses Morphling as its victory condition, with Franchise and several other decks having Gaea’s Blessings as alternative path to victory (decking). A lot of Keepers run Yawgmoth’s Will instead of Blessings, but that’s not significant when comparing one deck to another. Keeper and Mono-Blue, or Accelerated Blue, are the most-played control decks in current type 1 environment. What is common in these decks is that they run very few victory conditions, usually two to four, and try to survive until they can drop and protect Morphling.

Stompy, by Sylvester (sorry, I don’t know your real name)

(2 Restricted cards)

LAND:
14 Forest
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine *

GREEN:
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Quirion Ranger
4 Rogue Elephant
4 Skyshroud Elite
4 Skyshroud Ridgeback
4 Hidden Herd
4 Rancor
4 Giant Growth
4 Bounty of the Hunt
4 Briar Shield
1 Berserk *

Sideboard:
4 Powder Keg
4 Elvish Lyrist
3 Emerald Charm
4 Null Rod

First of all, you shouldn’t count Strip Mine or Wasteland as a land in this deck, because 33 cards of this deck cost only one green mana to play and thus it’s rare that you can use the mana produced by these cards. Also note that Elvish Spirit Guides are used almost always to produce mana and only rarely do you see one being cast. Actually, all of the spells in this deck cost only one mana to play or have an alternative casting cost, such as Bounty of the Hunt, so this deck can drop ANY of its cards on turn one — which really makes this deck tough match-up for a control deck that aims for a long game. Best of all, this deck is really cheap to build because you can live without the most expensive card of this deck (Berserk), and it alone costs about as much as rest of the deck! Actually, I’m pretty confident that there aren’t too many Tier One Type 2 decks that are cheaper to construct. Of course, if you find it hard to acquire some of this deck’s creatures, you can easily replace them by using other effective one-mana creatures such as Ghazban Ogres or Wild Dogs.

Don’t forget that you can always play Type 1 online with Apprentice for free to get a good view of the format, as you can use all the power cards you can imagine and build exactly the deck you want! Build yourself a deck for apprentice and go play a mini (small online tournament) or just some games for fun. Maybe the easiest way to find such a tournament or someone to play against is to go to newnet server on irc and come to #BDchat, #Apprentice or #minimadness. Remember it’s just for fun, as it has no prizes. I promise that you won’t be disappointed!

Oh, and don’t worry if you are losing a lot of games early on. That just shows that building and playing a deck for Type 1 isn’t anywhere as easy as in Type 2. Also, I’m sure that you are most welcome to #BDchat to ask anything about Type 1 and everyone there is more than happy to help you. Same goes for Beyond Dominia discussion board at the www.bdominia.com Type 1 discussion mill. Go there to get a good view what type 1 is nowadays! And welcome what Magic is really all about!