Format Variant 1v1 Best of one
Momir Basic
The Magic format for when you do not want to build a deck. You get sixty basic lands and one avatar. Everything else is a dice roll you pay for.
At a glance
- Players Two
- Deck Sixty basic lands
- Deckbuilding None
- Avatar Command zone, all game
- Creature Random, mana value X
- Quick Play Yes
How it works
- Your deck is generated for you: twelve of each basic land, sixty cards, identical for both players. You never submit a list and there is no sideboard.
- Momir Vig, Simic Visionary Avatar starts in your command zone, where it stays all game. It cannot be removed, countered or stolen.
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Its ability reads
{X}, Discard a card: create a token copy of a random creature card with mana value X. Once each turn, and only as a sorcery. - The creature is drawn from the engine's whole card pool, so an eight costs you eight mana and could be anything printed at eight.
The tension is real, and it is all yours
Momir looks like pure luck for about two turns, and then it stops being that. Every land drop is a decision about which number you are buying into. Fours are consistently playable; fives are a real step up; sevens and eights are where the format's blowouts live, but spending a turn on a seven that rolls badly can simply lose you the game. You are discarding a land to do it, so the curve you are climbing is one you are also dismantling.
Because both players have exactly the same resources, nothing about the result is attributable to a collection, a budget, or an afternoon of deckbuilding. It is the closest Magic gets to a fair fight between two people and a random number generator, and it is a very good way to learn what cards actually exist at each cost.
Good to know
Momir Basic is available from Quick Play against Forge's AI, so you can start a game immediately without waiting for an opponent. It is a best-of-one format with no sideboarding.