Magic: The Gathering is a very complicated game. Onboarding players has always been one of the trickiest parts of this hobby since the very beginning. Magic: The Gathering Arena takes care of a lot of the rules nuance for you nowadays, but what about the starter decks the game gives you from the get-go? Today we are discussing the best starter decks on Magic: The Gathering Arena.

Ranking the MTG Arena Starter Decks

Quick note: This ranking does consider upgrade paths, but the final ranking is based on how these decks play "out of the box." The point of this list is to give new players an idea of how the game works, with little to no investment on their part. At the end of the day, these starter decks are designed to help guide players to find playstyles they enjoy, as well as providing a deck for them to upgrade overtime.

1. Graveyard Gifts
2. Cat Attack
3. Arcane Aerialists
4. Learn from the Land
5. Vampiric Hunger
6. Might of the Legion
7. Wonderous Wizardry
8. Path of Power
9. Reckless Raid
10. Morbid Mechinations

10. Graveyard Gifts (Reanimator)

It is unfortunate to say, but Graveyard Gifts is an absolute mess of a starter deck. It is structurally similar to your run-of-the-mill Reanimator deck, but it only has two big Creatures to get back with Zombify. It's sort of a "mass Reanimate" value deck, but with just one copy of Rise of the Dark Realms. It also tries to be a Dimir control deck, but lacks the removal and card draw that control decks usually contain.

It's trying to do about three different things and does none of them well. What is Gleaming Barrier doing here?

It's hard to imagine what players can do to improve this deck beyond replacing almost every card. Which is not very useful advice for a starting player. Just don't play this deck and certainly don't try to improve it. Take your Kiora, the Rising Tide and move on.

9. Cat Attack (Tokens)

At the risk of offending the entire internet, there's nothing cute about the Cat Attack starter deck. Ironically, this deck possibly has the most straightforward and well-realized plan. Cat Attack asks you to make lots of cats and attack with them. Unfortunately, the execution of this game plan is awful. There simply aren't enough powerful cats to make a viable deck. One Arahbo, the First Fang is not enough to make this deck work.

Upgrading this is tricky. If really want to play cats, I'd start with more copies of Arahbo and more Anthem of Champions. Gloryheath Lynx is a decent budget option and Prideful Parent is a shocking omission from the original deck. Lean into the go-wide token deck, remove the pointless auras.

8. Arcane Aerialists (Flyers)

This is another deck with some interesting starter deck with some absolutely bizarre card inclusions. On the surface, it's a kind of Flying Kindred deck. Three Empyrean Eagle is a solid inclusion, so you have an obvious upgrade path. Indeed, most of the cards are on-brand for a fliers deck, but there is still many deck identity issues. Healer's Hawk and Curator of Destinies do not belong in the same deck. Fog Bank belongs in no serious decks, but it's especially out-of-place here.

There are clear paths to make this into something better. Ditch most of the expensive stuff, upgrade the mana base and grab some Seam Rips. The Angel tribal stuff is not something that you can build around in Standard, so that should probably go, too. Replace them with something like Aang, Swift Savior or Momo, Friendly Flier. If you're tight on wildcards, try Il Mheg Pixie and Spyglass Siren.

7. Learn From The Land (Landfall)

A lot of my research for this article felt like playing Jump-In. I never drew any of the rares when playing this deck, so I lost every single game. The only reason this isn't dead last is because I think it has some of these rares are actually good. Mossborn Hydra is a bona fide Standard staple and Primeval Bounty and Rampaging Baloths can take over a game if they actually get into play.

It's the cards surrounding these rares that hold the deck back. Almost all of them are just, like, there. Spectral Sailor is a fine card, but the "draw two" sub-theme of this deck is extremely undercooked. Upgrading this deck, I'd get rid of all of that and start building to something like the tier-one Badgermole Cub decks. Those are very wildcard intensive, but Sazh's Chocobo is an uncommon so maybe start there if you like ramping out lands and triggering Landfall.

6. Vampiric Hunger (Lifegain)

This is a slightly misleading name. There are a handful of Vampires, sure, but this is really just a Lifegain deck that doesn't really work. The deck contains Lifegain synergies spread across many different creature types and sub-strategies. It is a solid start to a Lifegain deck.

Still, this deck does have cards that mostly make sense if you ignore the name. It's underpowered, by design, but it's a theme you can build toward and have success. Start with a fourth Ajani's Pridemate and more copies of Hinterland Sanctifier. This is one of the better places to start, because it can easily turn into a Raise the Past deck. That deck can work with plenty of lower rarity cards, like Umbral Collar Zealot and Snarling Gorehound.

5. Might of the Legion (Aggro)

This deck need more burn. Get yourself at least a couple more Burst Lightnings. It also needs a better mana base. That is an issue with all of these decks in general, but in aggressive decks, having your Lands come into play tapped is crushing. Playing your two-drops on turn three, especially when they're as weak as Axgard Cavalry, is often game over.

Obviously, there are some strange cards to get rid of, too. Serra Angel is both underpowered and too slow and Axgard Cavalry is maybe the worst card in any of these decks. Still, beating down often doesn't need rares and mythics. Look at cards like Greasewrench Goblin and Lightning Helix as easy upgrades.

4. Wondrous Wizardry (Spellslinger)

Now we're getting into the decks players can actually win games with right out of the box. Yeah, everything above here managed zero wins combined. It probably helps that this is an Izzet deck, historically one of the most powerful color combinations ever to exist. With Wondrous Wizardry, you're going to be tossing cheap spells all over the place triggering Prowess and playing cheap Tolarian Terrors.

The Rares here are a mixed bunch, but you don't really need them. This deck wants to be winning relatively quickly, so Ovika, Enigma Goliath is an easy cut. I'd suggest going more aggressive, with Drake Hatcher if you can afford them and Eddymurk Crab either way. Izzet Prowess () is one of the best decks in Standard right now, so you have a great end goal if you like this deck.

3. Path of Power (Midrange)

Look, this deck is not very good. It shares many of the same problems with previous decks on the list. The mana is dismal, many of the cards are mopey and it's trying to do too many different things. Sometimes, though, you cast a Halana and Alena, Partners on turn three, and your opponent doesn't have removal. This is when the deck feels "good".

Really though, this is an aggressively-slanted midrange deck that wants to be attacking. Skyraker Giant is an easy swap-out, as is Mild-Mannered Librarian. Halana and Alena is the best card in the deck, but while you're building up rare wildcards, you can make-do with Giant Cindermaw and some more burn spells.

2. Reckless Raid (Raid)

This deck surprised is surprisingly powerful, even though parts of it are another mess of half-baked themes in an aggressive shell. Slumbering Cerberus and Goblin Boarders are awful. The Raid theme plays out well, though. This deck has one of the more coherent plans, and what it lacks in objective power, it somewhat makes up for in synergy.

The problem here, is that this deck doesn't build into a "real deck." None of the rares are really played in Standard. This was one of the better decks to play out of the box, but in terms of upgrading, it's another "strip for parts" scenario.

1. Morbid Machinations (Graveyard)

This is billed as a graveyard deck, but it's really not. It's a Golgari Midrange deck. There are cards that come back from the graveyard, but there's few ways to put things there and no real pay-offs for doing so. It just has Reassembling Skeleton as an extremely low-ball pay-off for casting Eaten Alive. That card is horrible in this deck, by the way, so there's your first upgrade - literally any other removal spell.

This is a reasonable approximation of a Golgari midrange deck in a purely philosophical sense. It shares basically no specific cards with good decks, but the concept of playing solid Creatures and killing everything your opponent plays is timeless. Unfortunately, these decks are often quite rare-intensive. This might be the best deck as-is, but it's probably the hardest to upgrade.

Conclusion

For an experienced player, these decks are miserable to play. Your wins will often came from misplays or bad draws from opponents. That said, testing them at Platinum MMR (which is what we did) is not really a fair test.

Lower down the ladder, the better decks on this list should have more success. This will be even more true once the mana bases are upgraded. Being able to play cards on time can feel like playing a whole new game. If there is one thing to take away from this article, it is that your Wild Cards are best spent on rare lands.