It's Friday night. You eat a balanced dinner, sleeve up your best deck, and head to your LGS for that evening's Constructed event. As you pay your entry fee, handing over your hard-earned dollars to the LGS owner, you wonder to yourself, "Can this deck get the job done and win this event?"

That's when it hits you. You should have play-tested your deck before entering this tournament. The concept makes sense, but the methodology may be unclear.

I've got you covered this week - I'll take you through the best ways to play-test your Magic: the Gathering deck so you can be most prepared for the metagame and all those corner case interactions that always seem to arise during the most critical moments in a tournament.

Option 1: Arena or MTGO

Nowadays, the most popular method of play-testing MTG is by leveraging one of the officially supported online platforms: Arena and MTGO.

MTGO, or Magic: the Gathering Online, is the original official online platform for the card game. While the cards cost money in the form of "tix," you technically own these cards and can use them to jam all sorts of formats. I hear content creators joke that playing MTGO is a little like playing Magic in Microsoft Excel, but the upside is you can play-test any and all formats on the platform.

Arena is the place to go to play-test Standard and Pioneer because the cost of entry is basically $0 if you've done enough grinding to earn wildcards. All you need to do is craft your deck with these wildcards, and within minutes you can start jamming games.

What's more, Arena offers fairly competitive play, especially as you hit the higher ranks, giving you a realistic view of the metagame.

Creating a new deck on Arena to play-test with is easy, especially if you're interested in testing the popular metagame choices. If you're wondering what to sleeve up, you can find all the most competitive MTG deck ideas for a format with a simple google search.

For example, I searched "best Standard decks MTG" and found MTGGoldfish, which ranks the Standard metagame based on actual play data. MTGdecks.net provides a similar summary.

These sites even offer a convenient feature to make play-testing on Arena a cinch. Many of them feature a menu option when viewing the deck that ciHere are step by step instructions on how to import decks into MTG Arena.

First, you click on the deck you want to play.

Next, on the lefthand menu scroll down to "Export to Arena" (see highlighting below).

Clicking this button brings you to a separate page with a simple set of instructions to follow. Essentially, you end up copying text, opening Arena, navigating to the Decks page, clicking Import, and crafting any cards in the deck you were lacking in your collection. In less than 60 seconds you'll be play-testing for your next Standard event.

Option 2: Free Online Platforms

Let's say you don't want to play Magic on MTGO because you don't want to invest in digital cardboard. You also don't want to use Arena because you are relatively new to the online platform and don't want to spend weeks grinding wildcards. These are both fair pushbacks. Fortunately, there are options out there to play-test MTG against other live players for free.

One popular option is Xmage, a "fully free and open-source app that allows to play Magic against one or more online players or computer opponents. It includes full rules enforcement for over 30,000 unique cards and more than 75,000 reprints from different editions." According to Xmage's site, the platform supports single matches and tournaments for various formats.

Other options for free, online play-testing include Cockatrice, Untap.in, TappedOut, Archidekt, Moxfield, and Forge. I have never tried any of these platforms myself to voice an opinion on which are the best. I suspect it varies based on personal preferences around what you're looking to get out of the experience.

My preliminary research indicates that Moxfield and Forge offer solo and AI practice, whereas Untap.in and Cockatrice allow for convenient multiplayer play.

There are additional options to explore if you're simply looking for an MTG deck tester. One of the popular options is to use Topdecked, the self-proclaimed "best way to practice." You can test two decks against each other or goldfish a deck by yourself. TappedOut and DeckCheck are other options to test decks out by yourself digitally before investing a dime in a piece of cardboard.

The best platform for you will depend on the interface you prefer, the format you wish to play, and the tradeoffs between flexibility and rule enforcing within the platform. Whatever your preferences, there are plenty of available, completely free online platforms that allow you to play-test your MTG deck before your next big tournament.

Option 3: Practicing in Paper

Let's face it, not everyone wants to deal with the complexity of downloading software and learning a new platform. While Arena makes the onboarding process as pain-free as it can, the reality is playing Magic on a new digital platform can be intimidating. What are your options to test deck ideas with physical cards?

The simplest approach is the traditional solo goldfish method. Shuffle up your deck, draw a fresh hand of seven cards, and take the first few turns by yourself to see how the deck feels.

This approach obviously has its limitations. For simple evaluations of typical opening hands, a deck's curve, and how frequently certain cards are drawn, this approach is difficult to beat. This is especially true if you appreciate the tactile feel of shuffling physical cards.

To take this one step further, you could shuffle up a second deck to simulate a one-on-one matchup. Granted, you'll have to control both sides of the match (it can be awkward deliberately playing into your "opponent's" counterspells), but it gives you a reasonable view to how well one deck holds up against another. The downside here is you need to own multiple decks, preferably of comparable power level, to best leverage this approach.

If you only have one Standard deck, you could use a free online platform to simulate the second deck. Better yet, you could purchase an inexpensive preconstructed deck to give you something reasonable to practice against.

Then there are the advanced options. In May 2024, I wrote an article talking about the various ways to play Magic: the Gathering solo. One option I discovered in my research was Garruk the Slayer, a Planeswalker opponent with a fixed set of abilities. Each turn, Garruk the Slayer activates one of his abilities that you must contend with.

You still need to make all decisions for Garruk, so it's not a perfect system. While Garruk the Slayer is still a far cry from playing against an actual opponent, it offers a light upgrade to strict goldfishing.

If you want something more sophisticated, you could try out Mark Rosewater's Mana Maze Solitaire variant. While I'm sure the page full of rules offers a more challenging, life-like game experience, I have to wonder... at what point is it simpler to just download an online platform and learn that system? I suppose if you really want that paper experience, but also want a solitaire challenge, Mana Maze could be for you.

Wrapping It Up

One thing is certain: if you are interested in play-testing MTG decks before committing your hard-earned cash on cardboard, there are plenty of options. Arena and MTGO offer official, Wizards of the Coast supported platforms for online play. Other websites have created their own free versions with various features and testing capabilities. For the more traditional players, there are even various paper options for testing.

Then, if you're struggling to come up with deck ideas, there are numerous online resources to help you research popular and powerful decks representing the current metagame. MTGGoldfish offers a breakdown of the top Standard decks, including dozens of variations and unique twists. There's even a separate section for budget decks, for those with limited wildcards.

With all these options available, there truly is no reason not to attend a tournament with at least some level of preparation. Not all your options will fully prepare you for every interaction and board state, but the days of showing up to an event completely unsure how your deck will perform are largely gone. You just need to do a bit of research beforehand.