The worldwide cityscape of Ravnica is undoubtedly one of the most beloved settings across theMagic: The Gatheringuniverse. This is largely thanks to the city’s guilds which provide each color pairing with its very own theme and mode of play.

That makes for a lot of different archetypes for players to explore in Limited. While it’s certainly great to have choices, this bounty of options can prove a bit confusing to newer Limited players. Thankfully, players who familiarize themselves with what each color pair excels at will find it much easier to judge the worth of a card in the color pair they’re building.

White/Blue: Azorius Tempo

A combination offlying creatures, bounce effects, and the detain mechanicallows you to slow the opponent’s assault while you chip in for repeated damage. BetweenCondemn, Summary Judgement, and Devouring Light, white also hassome of the best removalin the set.

Incidental life gainfrom cards like Faith’s Fetters and Bulwark Giant can also buy you additional time to beat the opponent in a race. Signpost uncommons includeSphinx of New Pravh and Sky Hussar. Both are large fliers that will make life harder for the enemy by forcing them to spend additional mana or by essentially giving your battlefield vigilance for a turn.

Blue/Black: Dimir Control

This color pair goes for the good old-fashionedremoval and card draw pairingthatcontrol decksare traditionally made from. The surveil mechanic provides additional scry effects for better sculpting your hand, and both blue and black are home toa good amount of evasive flying creatures.

Signpost uncommons Nightveil Predator and Moroii can close out a game quickly once you get them into play. Be careful about playing them too early though, as it can be difficult to close out a game if one of these key creatures is removed.

Waiting to cast your signposts until the opponent uses their removal or until you have enough mana to back them up with a counterspell will sometimes be the right play.

Black/Red: Rakdos Aggro

This isone of the most aggressive color pairingsin the set. Spectacle meansyou want to be dealing damage to your opponent just about every turn, andhellbent only triggers once you’ve emptied your hand. In other words,Rakdos is an all-in strategy that will get stomped by decks with any amount of life gain.

The signposts for this color pair areMayhem Devil and Rakdos Firewheeler. Both are great for making it easier to trigger your spectacle cards.

Enabling the mana discount that spectacle affords is the easiest way to make a winning Rakdos deck.

This means cards that deal incidental damage likeGuttersnipe, Bomber Corps, and Stab Woundare especially good for this build.

Red/Green: Gruul Monsters

As per usual,Gruul is the color pairing home to the biggest creaturesin the format. Theriot and bloodrush mechanics allow you to buff your creatureseven more while also providing them with an extra bit of speed through haste where applicable. Unfortunately,this color pair will likely struggle against efficient removalfound in other colors.

While all decks benefit from finding rares in their colors, Gruul almost needs them to perform effectively. Big monsters likeUtvara Hellkite, Hellkite Tyrant, and Golgari Grave-Trollend the game very quickly if they’re not answered on the spot.

In other words,you can’t afford the board stalling outbecause your opponent will eventually draw their removal. It should also be noted that signpostsSunder Shaman and Rhythm of the Wild are among the best uncommonsin the set.

Green/White: Selesnya Tokens

Going wideis the name of the game.Convoke and populateboth provide great incentives to fill the battlefield with as many creatures as you can muster. Once you’ve filled the board,crack in for a devastating attackusing cards likeOverwhelmor Angelic Exaltation.

SignpostsConclave Cavalier and Selesnya Evangel play directly into the color pair’s strategyof flooding the board though it is unfortunate that Cavalier has to die before its effect goes off. You’ll often end up biding your time once you’ve filled the board as you wait to draw a card like Overwhelm that lets you alpha strike.

For this reason,it’s important to have some flying creaturesso you don’t die in the skies early.

White/Black: Orzhov Life Gain

A slow and painful death awaits opponents of the Orzhov guild. This is a deck thatexcels at racing opponentsas it hasmany sources of life gain whilst it simultaneously drains your opponent’s lifetotal. Thehaunt mechanicwill see your creatures extract value even after being sent to the graveyard, andwhite and black together provide you with the best removalthe set has to offer.

Thesignposts in Orzhov are very hit or miss. Both Cartel Aristocrat and Debt to the Deathless require you to have persuaded the game in a certain direction to be truly effective. Aristocrat’s effect is only worth using if you’ve got other cards that combo with it like Vindictive Vampire or a Haunt creature on the board already.

Meanwhile, Debt to the Deathless is pretty useless until you’ve lowered the opponent’s life enough and built up enough mana to drain the remainder of their life total or very close to it. That being said,they are both very powerful cards if you can set them up properly.

Red/Blue: Izzet Spells

Another classic color pair archetype. Izzet players will havemore instant and sorcery spellsin their decks than creatures. Pop off on opponents withdamage-based removal and impressive amounts of card drawbefore finally finishing them with a huge flier like Crackling Drake or Pteramander.

We’ve already seenthe absurd strength of the signpost Crackling Drakein other recent limited formats. This flier will easily attack for five or more damage in the air by turn six. The other signpostIzzet Charm has lots of welcome usesand showcases the versatility of this color pair.

Instants and sorceries you’ll want to keep a special eye out for when building Izzet includeLight Up the Stage, Homing Lightning, Remand, and Compulsive Research. You’ll need a lot of card draw if you don’t want to fizzle out.

Green/Black: Golgari Graveyard

The well-beloveddredge mechanicmakes a return in this set. Alongside thescavenge mechanic, you’ll be filling your graveyard with creatures that have effects you may take advantage offrom the graveyard. You can also make use of cards like Golgari Findbroker toturn your graveyard into a second libraryin a pinch.

SignpostsGolgari Findbroker and Putrefy are both great cards in their own right, graveyard recursion theme aside. The ease with which you may find value playing these cards makes this color pair especially attractive. Cards to watch out for when building Golgari includeWasteland Viper, Greater Mossdog, Golgari Thug, and Mausoleum Turkey.

Red/White: Boros Aggro

Boros is some kind of middle ground between Rakdos and Selesnya in this format. This isan aggressive deck that also seeks to go wide with tokens to take advantage of the battalion mechanic. Supplement your deck witha handful of combat tricks and flying creatures, and opponents will likely crumble before your relentless attacks.

SignpostsTruefire Captain and Lightning Helix are just generically good cardswhich as we saw with Golgari is a great boon. There’s also somenice synergy between the battalion and mentor mechanicssince you need to attack with multiple creatures to trigger both of them.

Furthermore, the multitude of direct damage spells in this set includingSkewer the Critics, Skullcrack, and Dogpilemean you canswitch gears to playing a burn deckin the late game. All in all,this appears to be one of the better color pairs.

Green/Blue: Simic Counters

Theevolve and adapt mechanics combine to provide you with a nearly endless source of countersfor your creatures. Buy enough time for your creatures to grow to unassailable sizes usingbounce effects and counterspells. Like Gruul,this color pair may also struggle to extract value from its creaturesbefore they’re hit by efficient removal.

Frilled Mystic is a nice signpost, but it suffers from the same issue as all counterspells: you’re waiting for your opponent to make a mistake. On the other hand,the Sharktocrab signpost is a great finisherfor this deck. Assuming you find ways to put counters on Sharktocrab after you use its adapt,it can win a game all on its own.

Five-Color Gates

The large number of signets and gates in this set make it possible tobuild a four or five-color good stuff deck. That being said,this is an ill-advised archetype for all but the bravest and most knowledgeable of players. Correctly building multicolored manabases is a difficult task: especially when you have to give up valuable card slots in your deck to find mana fixing.

You need to cast some very powerful cards if you’re going to make this strategy worth it. Good examples can be found in most of the set’s multicolored rares and mythic rares including cards like Utvara Hellkite, Niv-Mizzet Reborn; Rakdos, Lord of Riots; Ral Zarek, Protean Hulk, and Sphinx’s Revelation.

Fixing from cards likeOpen the Gates and Utopia Sprawl will also be a necessityif you want to be able to cast all of your cards with impunity. Again,this isn’t necessarily an archetype we recommend playing, but it’s out there and sure to offer a lot of fun if you want to risk going for it.