Easy Deck Pimping

Heya Zoners!

For most, pimping out an EDH deck means going foreign, foil, or both. Obviously, that's not going to come cheap.

So today, I'd like to run down a few subtle, less expensive ways to improve the deck aesthetic.

LANDS

Getting a uniform mana base is one of the cheapest ways to make your deck look nice. Strategically, this is more relevant in decks that run green. This is because your opponents can actually keep track of your land if they can remember the artwork and set. For example, the Zendikar full art lands, or any of the white border lands tend to stick out if someone goes to search for them. Unless the deck is playing all Zendikar lands, or they're all white-bordered, this could be easy to see.

Still, this is not just color-specific. While having a varying mana base can be a great way for you to count cards and study your own shuffle mechanics, it can also create distraction for you and your opponents. So there is value to collecting basics from each set, if that's what you like.

My favorite way is to try and collect lands with the same art and design template. Wizards of the Coast frequently reprints lands, so the set symbol won't necessarily matter more than the condition of a card.

With most basic lands and some specialties like Zendikar full art, obtaining uniformity might be a little trickier, so if you can't do it, focus on template more than artwork at first. Remember to pay special attention to "T" for tap versus the tap symbol, or just the big symbol in the box, etc. The more uniform the lands look, the less distracting and more impressive it looks on the battlefield.

Picking an artwork you like is cool (I'm partial to Ravnica and Return to Ravnica basics myself), but there is a further step you can take here- matching it to your Commander.

Mirage Plains Version C, which is here to my left, is one of the closest I found to matching the color palette for my Lin Sivvi deck. Not only is does it match color wise, but it's also a land from an older template, so it's yet another level of pimping.

Although it's a relatively old set, the only challenge is getting enough of them together for a mono-colored deck. Most of the old lands can be bought for less $.25, so re-doing lands won't cost more than $20 US plus shipping.

Doing multiple colors could be even easier, as the number of lands per color decrease, so you won't have to trade or buy from multiple places.

ALTERNATE ARTWORK

Although there are many played cards re-printed at FNM, GameDay, Prerelease, and for Judges, most of these cards are either a few bucks more or astronomically more than their originals. Obviously, we're not talking about old-bordered Swords reprints, or a full art Doran, or the new bordered Force of Will scheduled to come out soon.

What I'm talking about is something like altered Sakura-Tribe Elder, Elvish Visionary, or like the Everflowing Chalice below.

Between Duel Decks, Commander Products, and From The Vault, Wizards is always coming out with cool, different versions of cards every year. Like my old-bordered Dromar deck, having a deck featuring all alternate artwork has started to become a design theme, which is a nice way to be pimp without breaking the bank. Also, it's a lot more doable if you play multiple Magic formats and do well in those environments.

Back to this Everflowing Chalice. Some times, the color of the art is also more on theme. To me, this version is a lot better to look at, but the original artwork has more pink, so it might look nicer in an Aurelia deck, if we're going off of the Commander background.

Older sets also had different artworks for a lot of the same cards. Fallen Empires has three different copies of Hymn To Tourach. Additionally, there are many Core Set reprints for basic utility spells, like Naturalize and Disenchant. Now, I'm not condoning a huge compromise for themes, but picking out versions of cards that have a more aligned visual cohesion with your deck is more impressive to me than just finding whatever you can in foil.

SLEEVES

The last way, and perhaps the overall cheapest way to pimp a deck, is with sleeves.

I'll admit I'm a sleeve snob. Though they tend to break a lot, and are cut even worse, I prefer the color and texture-back Ultra Pro sleeves. I played a lot of Player's Choice and KMC at the beginning, but Ultra Pro tends to last better, I don't have artwork to protect, and they don't get "sticky."

As we've been talking about pimping, the ultimate principle of pimping has been to align and cater our stuff to fit our Commander. This is no different.

My requirements aren't so picky, but I do tend to avoid sleeving up a deck when my Commander looks bad in a certain color of sleeves. My original mono-colored decks all have sleeves that match their color identity, and my multi-colored ones have aesthetically pleasing alternatives.

Another great way to match up sleeves with your deck is to make them align with your theme. Recently, I've strayed from my loyalties to Ultra Pro and purchased these sweet House Stark sleeves as a pretty nice home for my new Isamaru deck.

Although he's not a direwolf, the artwork on the 2/2 hound and the backs of these sleeves have a similar menacing pose which, once again, really ties the deck together.

Now, I know none of this really should have an effect on how you play any deck, be it good or bad.

Still, any and all of these are little tweaks and adjustments you can make to help further your "connection" with the deck. This all about staying excited and wanting to keep certain decks around, and most times, just finding the right sleeves is enough to renew vigor in a deck you may have lost interest in playing.

If you have any cool ways to pimp out your deck that I've missed, or you'd would like me to help you pimp something out, leave me a comment below.

Have a great one. Turn's to you.
-UL