The statement is: "I want to see this card every single game."

Hes asking you what cards in your deck fit that description.. then he's going to.tell you to cut all the cards that don't.. and he's right. You have a bunch of stuff in here that makes.no sense.. like 1 Sigiled Paladin and 1 Wall of Omens. Crusader of Odric in a sac deck? Wtf? That makes no sense at all. Creepy Doll, Galvanic Juggernaut, Felidar Sovereign..none of those.make any sense either.

The two Aura cards used are Arrest and Armored Ascension. Arrest is for removal, and I do not think this is the Aura card questioned.

For a mono-white deck, Armored Ascension is a very good powerful card that delivers a lot of damage plus flying. Personally, I would recommend including Armored Ascension in all white mono-colored decks for this game version.
Felidar is a strong stand-alone card (even w/o its 40 life ability) provided in this game version.

The creature equipped with Armored Ascension and Felidar can be sacrificed to Blasting Station, if needed, to deliver the extra damage for the win (this has happened on more than one occasion).

Not Creepy Doll or Mausoleum Guard atleast. Not sure what Aegis Angel does here either tbh. I'm of the opinion that you usually should either max out on a card, or not include it at all. (With some exceptions, of course.) Makes for the most consistent decks anyway.

Wait what? You realize Blasting Station doesn't work like Fling, right?

the thing is having one ofs lowers the reliability of your deck, we're not playing EDH here

I wouldn't advocate 3 reprisals either.. It is actually one that you SHOULD run as a 1of or 2 of at most.

Take it back!!

Gotcha!
My thought pattern for certain cards followed more along this line, “x ≤ 1”.
Variable x represents certain cards I would like to see one of or none.

Overall, I’m a bit surprised by the response. Nevertheless, appreciate the feedback and after some thinking, have edited this deck some more to try and make it stronger: swiped out Aegis Angel for something else among other changes. Will updated soon, and provide more of an explanation as to what is going on. Thanks again!

Eliza I think DJ is wrong in a general sense. For certain decks (e.g. control) running cards at 1-3 copies can be worthwhile. Certain cards are powerful but so specialized you do not want many copies (e.g. reprisal).

However I think it is more important to stick to basics when you are new to making your own deck. Come up with a plan - like BIG CREATURES or TOKENS or BLASTING STATION. Then pick cards that work with that plan. Try to have a mana curve. Try to figure out what works and what doesn't and revise your deck accordingly.

I think that new players arrive at the "one of" formula for deckbuilding because they are indecisive. You think one card might be good, but aren't sure, and there is another card that might be good, but you aren't sure, so you run both. Instead, try testing with more copies.

The most obvious thing to go with blasting station is tokens, and I think you need more in your deck to make it work. Mausoleum guard is a poor man's sprouting thrinax.

White is also good at first strike - first strike + blasting station + a mausoleum guard on the board can make combat a nightmare for your opponent.

I think any new player should know about the Rule of Nine. I'm going to link to a top-rated Google article about it, but basically the rule is that you play 24 land in a deck and nine unique cards at four copies each to make a sixty-card deck.

http://www.starcitygames.com/article/11804_Der-Gangsta-Rebbe--Deckbuilding-for-Beginners--or-the-Rule-of-Nine.html

Obviously Duels of the Planeswalkers screws with the Rule of Nine because of rarity restrictions or whatever, but I think that the main thing you should do when building decks for the first time is to max out on the cards that you want to play. Then play the game and let your experience guide you from there.

Another thing I will add is that the most important thing you can do as a builder is recognize the mana curve. Here is another top-rated Google article:

http://archive.wizards.com/Magic/magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/lo/292

Otherwise just play the game a lot and always evaluate your losses. You have more control over RNG than you think if you build and play your decks properly.

Those are great articles for new builders and people who have been building already without a keen thought on the deeper workings of solid decks. (Always good to know what works and why to refine your craft deeper and deeper)

Updated the Blast to Martyrdom deck and sharing. This deck is a lot stronger than the first (thank you for the feedback and questioning certain cards like Reprisal and Aegis Angel).

This is a mono-white deck utilizing Blasting Station, buffs, and certain synergies for the win.



An overview of the workings of this deck:
Included 4 Raise the Alarm and other token generating creatures to pump up Crusader of Odric, create card draw advantage if Mentor of the Meek is on the battlefield, and sacrifice to Blasting Station to remove problematic smaller creatures or deliver direct damage to the other player.

Galvanic Juggernaut is a monster when casting at 4 Plains. However, the draw back is that it only untaps when another creature dies, so if my opponent has flying/or no creature dies, it is dead (that is why I only have one copy in my deck). The idea is to sack one of my tokens (either through Blasting Station or chump blocking), which then untaps Galvanic Juggernaut.

Hall of Triumph (it is legendary so only one copy is needed) and Paragon of New Dawns are used to buff up all my white creatures. Captain of the Watch is also used to buff the soldier creatures in addition to generating tokens.

3 Reprisals is much (this deck was able to handle smaller creatures, but not larger, hence the initial inclusion of 3 Reprisals) and not a fan of this removal spell to begin with. So removed all the Reprisals and included Angelic Edict: a more versatile removal spell.

Armored Ascension, very powerful Aura that is a must for mono-white decks in this game version, and its staying power increases if equipped on Creepy Doll.

Creepy Doll’s abilities keep non-flying creatures at bay and if there are exalted creatures on the battlefield, Creepy Doll can deliver a bit of damage.

Now for the one ofs such as Wall of Omens, Akrasan Squire, and Mausoleum Guard, do not want to see more than one on the battlefield and/or in hand.
-Wall of Omens is a good blocker and provides card draw, but it has defender and just sits there (can’t win by sitting), so one is enough.
-Akrasan Squire is cheap and good for second and maybe third turn attacking and provides exalt to other attacking creatures, but I found this card to be weak on its own, so one copy is enough (there are stronger exalted spells such as Sigiled Paladin).
- Mausoleum Guard works well with Blasting Station and generates tokens. It is a bit expensive so I found one to be enough.

In general, the weakness with this game version is the limited amount of cards provided to build certain theme decks, so I found combining a couple of themes create better decks for this game version. At first, I was going with a more of a white sacrificial type deck centered around Blasting Station, tokens, and buffs. Then through test plays, made a lot of edits. The one ofs were not included in the deck out of indecisiveness but because I only wanted one or none.

"White is also good at first strike - first strike + blasting station + a mausoleum guard on the board can make combat a nightmare for your opponent." -- rage quit.

Thank you for the suggestions and reinforcing basic concepts to deck building.

Sidenote - Just want to throw this out there that I have been playing Magic the Gathering for some time.

I've been playing Magic for more than 20 years and I still don't have a firm grasp of basic deckbuilding concepts. I'm the worst builder ever