Are Battle Decks balanced against each other? Which ones should I get?
These are, in my experience, some of the most frequently asked questions about Battle Decks.
People that are planning to buy a bunch of Battle Decks wonder which combination would yield the most balanced games. Similarly, people who already have some, would like to know what other Battle Decks should they add to their collection and still have a well balanced mix.
The purpose of this section of the site is to (try to) answer those questions (and not to rank BD based on their win %).
Not enough data.
There are more than 100 BDs, which menas thousands of 1 vs 1 combinations, and the number is constantly growing. I did not keep track of all the games I played between Battle Decks, I did log some results and would like to use those as a starting point.
I will not be able to play/witness/log enough matches to build a significant sample if I don't get external help.
Battle Decks change over time.
Multiple versions have been sold over time of most BDs. People customize their BDs. They use sideboards.
We wil have to establish some simple rules for the analysis:
We will not distinguish between different unmodified versions of the same BDs. If it was issued under the same BD name, then it's the same thing...
Sideboarded games are fine (as far as you use offical BD sideboard cards)
Customizations instead are much more difficult to gauge and I'd prefer to exclude them from the analysis
I have no way of enforcing the rules, so I count on you as a contributor.
Limited Community
I don't know how many BD players exist out there. I think it is fair to assume that the number is small. Extremely small, compared to the number of players of even the least popular of the Magic formats.
I have hope though that out there there's enough interested people that will make this exercise possible.
I'm sure I'll have fun trying.