Last Update - Jan 8th, 2009

I often get asked by people looking to get into the format what cards they should purchase to start. Normally when I get this question, I ask them how much money they are willing to spend and then suggest a deck or two. But lately I'd been asked by more than one person who wanted a list of ALL the cards they should get for classic. While I don't fancy myself typing that all out on the MTGO client, I thought it was high time I got around to a comprehensive list here.

I will note at this point that this article will continue to update. And while I'm pretty sure I could make a fairly accurate list of staples for every set from Tempest to Prophecy, we'll simply add those as they are about to be released on MTGO to avoid making an already long list more confusing to people who are new to the format.

So just what is a staple?

Well, it’s an odd term to use for what is known to hold pieces of paper together – but essentially, in terms of Magic, a staple is a card you don’t want to be without.  The goal of this article is to list, as comprehensively as possible, all the staples of the Classic format on MTGO. 

Some cards are staples in that you really, really need them to play in a lot of decks.  Like for example, Force of Will or Duress.  Some cards are staples in that you can’t build very popular decks without them – for example – Flash or Necropotence. And yet other cards are simply so versatile in usage that while there is possibly a replacement for them, they are the best at what they do and you should probably own them – Like Krosan Grip or Null Rod.

Also, I’ve listed several cards that are important for you to recognize as being used to some degree in the format - "pieces to have" if you want to compete with a changing Meta.  For example, you are unlikely to bee seeing a lot of different decks running Squee, Goblin Nabob, but it’s unique nature is something that is or will be seen and should be thought of when making deck choices.

So without further ado, here are all the choices, in order of the sets in how they appear of your MTGO Binder (MED2 at the bottom for now).  However, if you wish, you can skip that and go straight to an alphabetical and color sorted and coded listing

7^th Edition

Staples

• Arcane Laboratory – It’s a sideboard staple against storm combo.
• Counterspell – Yes it’s a staple, but keep in mind that it’s also due to be released with MED as an uncommon and in Tempest as a common, and thus probably isn’t worth picking up right now for a great deal of money.  There are other alternatives
• Duress – There isn’t anyway you can go with out this spell.  It is an absolute must have and we won’t get another one until Urza’s Saga is release in probably 2010.

Pieces to Have

• Engineered Plague – Is a fantastic sideboard card against Elfclamp or goblins and goes in and out of being used.  You can probably go without, but it’s probably a good idea to have this
• Goblin Matron – Fetches Goblin Recruiter - or any other goblin.  A quick word on Goblins – I didn’t list all their pieces since, really, the only make up one deck. Ringleader, Warchief, Sharpshooter, etc…  If you want to play goblins, you probably know the pieces

8^th Edition

Pieces to Have

• Merchant Scroll – There are a lot of good tutors already in classic that make Merchant Scroll’s place as sort of rookie looking from the sidelines.  Once they start restricting tutors (and it will come), then Merchant Scroll might find more of a home
• Blood Moon - Just a good card to have if you are running a deck that plays with at least some (if not all) basic lands.  Can absolutely ruin a deck and fits into sideboards.

9^th Edition

Pieces to Have

• Blood Moon – See 8th
• Jester’s Cap - The Cap is really the only thing that you can recur that will do this job.  Here’s the deal – the card works wonders in a format with restrictions when that same format also has Goblin Welder.  Definitely no need for it now, but who knows when it will get printed again.

10^th

Staples

• Hurkyl’s Recall – It’s not just affinity this card is great against – it’s practically anything with an artifact.  It’s use against practically all manner of decks is undeniable, and you should definitely have some for your sideboard
• Pithing Needle – You shouldn’t need to be told why this is a good enough card, but here is the biggest:  Turns off Necropotence. Turning it off without actually destroying it means they are stuck with whatever they have.
• Crucible of Worlds – This cards works wonders already with manlands, but it’s ability to wreck a mana base with wasteland will mean is sees more than sideboard play.

Pieces to Have

• Quirion Dryad - Thanks to Daze and Gush, playing a crazy amount of spells in a Grow-a-Tog deck means you can also Grow-a-Dryad
• Squee, Goblin Nabob – This is a stupid good enabler.  Dropping a Squee to any number of cards, getting it back, wash, rinse, repeat – it’s the only card like that you can use to feed Solitary Confinement, Jaya Ballard (see Painter’s Servant) and later Survival of the Fittest.
• Mogg Fanatic – Just a little pain in the butt, isn't he. He also happens to be a piece of a very complicated (but much less space-consuming) combo with Flash.

Jace vs. Chandra

Staples

• Daze – Free Force Spike. This allows you to run a control deck that has more than just Force of Will as an option when tapped out.
• Gush – Gush is stupid. Drawing cards for free (as an instant) is nuts. Drawing cards for free, retuning islands to your hand, playing Psychatog ability #1 four times and ability #2 two times for FREE is crazy. Especially with Berserk. And, god forbid we get Fastbond. It remains to be seen how long classic can live with Gush unrestricted.

Master's Edition

Staples

• Hymn to Tourach – Hymn might be a great card, but you are generally only running it in a concerted discard deck. However, it's just such a powerful spell, you could run it in just almost anything and be justified.
• Force of Will - The granddaddy of staples.  If you are running blue, you pretty much run Force of Will.
• Mishra’s Factory - The control player’s dream – a creature that’s only a creature when you want it to be.  Several decks will employ these.
• Pyroblast - There are a lot of good blue cards in classic and Pyroblast beats ‘em all (unless they have split second)
• Lightning Bolt - the Bolt fits in pretty much any deck that runs red mana, even if it’s the only card you are doing direct damage with 3 damage as an instant is just very, very useful.

Pieces to Have

• Animate Dead – Bring Worldgorger back from the graveyard, and continue to do so until you have enough mana to do whatever you need to do to smash your opponent in.
• Chains of Mephistopheles – It’s still a relevant card, the only reason it’s not used all the time is a) brainstorm costs less, and b) a lot of relevant “draw” cards don’t actually draw you cards – they reveal them and put them into your hand (Confidant) or they don’t reveal them and put them into your hand (Necropotence)
• High Tide – Part of blue combo decks to generate a lot of mana.  It’s not particularly used but there may come a time when it will.  It’s certain worth picking up at it’s cheap price.
• Hydroblast - Like Pyroblast, kills red cards – only problem is that red doesn’t have nearly as many relevant cards as blue, and really – blue has other options.  A handy sideboard card for the right Meta.
• Berserk - Berserk is a great combo card without a combo, and a great aggro card without an aggro deck to fit in right now.
• Moat - Practically the reason Wrath of God isn’t run in the format – Moat is better most of the time.  Save your targeted removal for anything that flies and then make the rest permanently useless with a Moat.
• Lim-Dul’s Vault – The great thing about this tutor is it’s ability to sometimes turn a hand with any two cards in it to the 3 cards you need next turn with a brainstorm. If you can find a 2 card combo next to a brainstorm in your deck (or if you have the brainstorm in your hand), you can use Vault to find it.

Master's Edition II

Staples

• Demonic Consultation – This card is insane.  The only time you probably DON’T want this in your deck is when you have a combo piece you can’t afford to remove from the game, like Flash or Dragon.  But if you are playing with 4x of everything you need – Consultation is the cheapest, best tutor available.  I can’t believe it will last long as a 4x.
• Imperial Seal – Already restricted.  It’s not nearly as good as Vampiric Tutor, but then, not many tutors are.  You should have one
• Necropotence – If I were to tell you all the ways in which you can use Necropotence, I’d have to write another article.  1 card = 1 life.  Ummm no.  I’m not sure this card will get restricted the next chance it gets, but eventually… it’s just too powerful.
• Brainstorm – If you are playing with blue, there is essentially no reason not to have brainstorm in your deck. It’s an all-star card forever.  I don’t foresee it getting restricted like it did in Vintage – at least for a long time.
• Counterspell – It’s Counterspell.  You know – “he’s got two untapped islands, I can’t play this card.”  You’ve seen it before, I’m sure
• Personal Tutor – It’s not nearly as good as Mystical Tutor, but then, I expect Mystical Tutor to be restricted relatively soon.  Personal Tutor may fill that whole – it does put Tendrils or Mind’s Desire on the top of your deck.
• Imperial Recruiter – I was going to put this a piece to have, but it really fits into so many decks.  Goblins, Painter combo…. It can fetch a variety of utility creatures.  Hell if there isn’t a lot in the graveyard, you can fetch a Goyf with it!
• Swords to Plowshares – The ultimate removal spell – it’s not just so good because it’s only one mana and it hits any creature, anytime – it’s also that it puts the creature where it cant be found.  Very handy against decks that like to recur from the graveyard or if you are staring down a Darksteel Colossus
• Mana Crypt – The 1.5 life a turn may hurt you, but most of the time it’s not important to the incredible mana boost.  The only decks that can’t use this card are control decks, where the life loss will catch up with them.  Its already restricted, so just 1 will do.
• Badlands, Savannah, Taiga, Tundra, Underground Sea – These are the starting point along with fetchlands from Onslaught of practically every manabase you'll ever use. If you don’t have 4 of each of these, you really, really are not playing competitive classic, or you are severely limiting your deck choices

Pieces to Have

• Elvish Spirit Guide – See Simian Spirit guide, Except green.
• Gorilla Shaman – Known as the Mox Monkey, while he doesn’t have a lot of moxes to eat, he does eat any number of tiny artifacts.
• Dance of the Dead – See Animate Dead
• Helm of Obedience – It’s so odd the combo with Leyline of the Void went unnoticed for so long, but there it is – one activation for 1 mana of this while your opponent’s graveyard is non-existent, and it will remove all their cards in their library from the game.

Mirage

Staples

• Dark Ritual – Three mana for 1.  The cornerstone of any black based combo or aggro, or… oh hell…a LOT of decks run black.
• Flash – You can’t run Flash without Flash.  It’s restricted, yes, but that just means you should have one
• Mystical Tutor – It tutors for an instant or a sorcery.  There are a LOT of very good instants or sorceries.  This card will eventually get restricted, it’s only a matter of when – though I guarantee once Yawgmoth’s Will is online, it will be.
• Lion’s Eye Diamond - Black Lotus Jr.  Provides mana in Storm and Belcher, drops your whole hand into the yard in dredge, and combos with Auriok Salvagers to provide infinite mana.
• Phyrexian Dreadnought - it’s a staple because Stifle & Trinket Mages are also staples.  12/12 trampling creatures are good on turn 2 no matter what the format.
• Enlightened Tutor – It’s not quite as good as its blue brother, so restrictions may not be as forthcoming, but it’s still damn good.  It get’s a lot of cards.

Visions

Staples

• Vampiric Tutor - Really the only true staple of this set.  It get’s anything for two life as an instant on top of your deck and really, that’s good enough to get restricted.  Get one.

Pieces to Have

• Fireblast - It’s insanely good in Burn or RDW decks.  A free 4 damage – if you have a couple of extra mountains anyway, it won’t even hurt if it get’s countered.  Note: I have NEVER seen this spell hardcast
• Helm of Awakening - A combo piece of both Sensei, Sensei and Easter Tendrils.  It’s actually a good combo piece altogether.
• Goblin Recruiter - Sure it finds the right Goblins, but it also lines up 20 goblins for the Charbelcher, too.
• Necromancy – Like Animate Dead, except you can pull the Worldgorger Dragon combo off as an instant, which is very, very handy.

Weatherlight

Staples

• Gemstone Mine - In a lot of combo decks, you aren’t tapping a land more than three times anyway.
• Null Rod – Turns off artifacts. Yeah, it beats affinity, but that’s just the half of it. It beats Skullclamp, Vedalken Shackles, Charbelcher- the list goes on.

Pieces to Have

• Doomsday – You can make a lot of really fun Doomsday decks, but so far, none are too competitive.  The lack of Ancestral Recall and Black Lotus to fuel the Doomsday turn hurt.  This card is just at the lowest end of things you might want to have.  It’s highly unlikely there will ever be a Doomsday deck which is simply THE combo to beat, but you never know. How many other cards let you tutor for 5 cards?
• Gaea’s Blessing – It’s wonderful as a way to stop Painter / Grindstone combo and Sensei, Sensei, unfortunately it’s not so good against Helm of Obedience/Leyline of the Void. But that’s not the only reason to run Blessing.  It’s also a maindeck piece to Oath of Druids based decks.
• Abeyance – It’s a great stall against storm combo, though there are much better ways to hit storm combo – this is definitely a good way for a deck with a white base or splash.

Tempest

Staples

• Intuition – Intuition is generally abused with a triumverate of cards that assures you get the one you want. In a way, it's a blue instant tutor that costs 2U, which is like having a blue Vampiric Tutor that puts the card in your hand and doesn't cost you any life for 2 more mana. Only some decks will ever be able to take advantage of Inutiion, but there are enough of them out there that it should probably be something you have a playset of.
• Grindstone - It combines with Painter's Servant to create a 2 card win condition. Two card win conditions that total 3 mana and are easily tutorable by several methods make for a win condtion that fits into enough decks you should probably have at least a couple of these.
• Lotus Petal - Free mana of any color. I hear combo decks especially like free mana, but then, pretty much any deck likes free mana. The only question with a card this useful is should you get 1 because it will be restricted or should you get 4. It's a common. Get 4. If it gets restricted at a later date, don't sweet the cup of coffee you could have had instead.
• Wasteland – It's effect on the meta might not be as pronounced while great lands like Mishra's Workshop and Bazaar of Baghdad are personna non-grata, but never-the-less Wastland is an important part of mana-denial strategy.

Pieces to Have

• Diabolic Edict – Indestuctible? Untargetable? No problem. Diabolic Edict can get the job done and as an instant, which puts it well over the top of it's lesser versions, Cruel Edict and Chainer's Edict.
• Chill – Red Deck Wins getting you down? Lets see them pay 3 for Lightning Bolts and have to tap the two mountains they sac for Fireblast. It's also randomly good against other decks you might see, like Goblins or Dragon Stompy or even Goblin Charbelcher. A very meta dependant hoser, but very effective at it's job if you aren't running white.
• Humility – In the same way Moat is like a permanent Wrath of God for anything that can't fly, Humility accomplishes the same sort of thing. Arcbound Ravagers are just 1/1 creatures than can't sac artifacts anymore, Grim Lavamancer is just a 1/1. Morphling is just a 1/1. You get the picture.
• Ancient Tomb – Lands that tap for 2? Sign me up. It's greatest benefit is being able to put down a turn 1 Chalice of the Void (where x=1) to really throw a wrench into the plans of a combo deck.

Invasion

Staples

• Fact or Fiction - This is really the only staple from this otherwise great set.  It’s just simply that all the other good cards from Invasion are slightly under the curve.

Planeshift

Staples

• Meddling Mage – The UW Fish decks main man, it stops your opponent from playing that nasty combo piece.  It can also be used in practically any deck that runs it’s colours for the same purpose.

Pieces to Have

• Goblin Ringleader - It's Goblin Recruiter's Best friend! Find all the goblins in your deck, put them all on top, then draw 4 free cards by putting Ringleader every 4th (or 5th, depeinding on your tactics) card.
• Rushing River - It’s great because it can return two pesky control devices from the board, including a Chalice of the Void set to 1 or 2, which is something that Repeal and Echoing Truth can’t say.
• Orim’s Chant - See Abeyance, though Orim’s is actually better at making sure your opponent can’t pull off a nasty piece of trickery when you are trying to run YOUR combo since it’s half the mana.

Apocalypse

Staples

• Pernicious Deed  - It’s not really a staple – it’s more a centerpiece.  There are lots of different decks that play Deed, but they pretty much all revolve around abusing deed. You don’t just throw deed into a deck.  And you really can’t play deed any other way.  It’s place becomes a bit outmoded in the face of storm combo, since storm combo places practically nothing but lands

Pieces to Have

• Vindicate - It’s odd, but even though it’s 3 mana and it’s a sorcery and it’s never better than 1 for 1 – Vindicate is still good.  It’s hard to say what deck would run this (Deadguy Ale, which is a bit outdated) but it’s equally hard to say what deck wouldn’t want to run this (assuming it had the colors).
• Fire/Ice – It’s not really a staple in that if you don’t have it there will be some decks you can’t run, but it’s a very versatile card – much like Vindicate
  

Odyssey

Staples

• Entomb – if you want to pull off graveyard shenanigans, Entomb is the quickest way of getting something in there
• Standstill – Generally, Standstill is used with decks that run a lot of manlands (Manstill), but it can be abused in other ways.

Pieces to Have

• Ghastly Demise – The only removal as efficient mana-wise as Swords to Plowshares that can 1 for 1 with your opponent.  It’s still far worse than Swords to Plowshares, but if you aren’t running white, it’s a good option.
• Skeletal Scrying – Cards for mana and life.  This is a fine card that can get a Necropotence-like shot in the arm without having to dedicate to black to run – if such a thing is possible.
• Careful Study – Draws two cards for 1 – but it’s only really good if you want to put two of the cards in your hand in the graveyard.
• Psychatog – Much like Deed, if you are playing tog, you are probably playing a Tog deck.  However, Tog actually fits into a couple of other situations where you might want one of the best creatures ever printed.

Torment

Pieces to Have

• Deep Analysis – Drawing 3 cards for 2 mana is worth 3 life sometimes.  It’s a very handy card in several situations, especially in a full graveyard.
• Ichorid – The proverbial cat that comes back the very next day.  It is essential to the Dredge archetype.

Judgement

Staples

• Cabal Therapy – Goes into a lot of decks.  And it’s much better when the meta is more solidified and you can tell what the opponent is running after they play their first card. but it’s even better when you have token creatures you’d like to sac.  Dredge obviously loves this, since it can sac creatures and make more creatures out of them, but it’s a great way to get rid of those pesky Forbidden Orchard Tokens your Oath of Druids wielding opponent wants you to have.
• Burning Wish – Sure it’s a bomb in storm combo, but really, it fetches Yamgmoth’s Will (esp. if you’ve already played it and removed it from the game) so it’ll be restricted to make sure you can’t pull that trick more than once.

Pieces to Have

• Cunning Wish – Like Burning Wish. Except most of the cards you want to win the game with are actually sorceries, so it’s better as a “wish-board” enabler.
• Worldgorger Dragon – The bad boy that, coupled with an animate-dead style permanent, keeps on coming back over and over again – and providing mana (in the form of untapped lands) each and every time it does. 
• Solitary Confinement – In conjunction with Squee, this forms on heck of a lock. To quote Cuzco - no touchy touchy! Also slips into much less competitive Enduring Ideal decks
• Nantuko Monastery – This is a card that can be run in both manlands based decks or just as an option in a threshold deck.  It’s not always used in either, but it’s very good in both.

Onslaught

Staples

• Smother – Unsurprisingly, Classic is filled with creatures with a converted mana cost of 3 or less.  This card will become much less useful once Oath of Druids is available, but for now it’s definitely a staple
• Chain of Vapor – Here’s the thing about chain – quite often, you don’t HAVE any permanents for them to bounce.
• Flooded Strand, Polluted Delta, Bloodstained Mire, Windswept Heath, Wooded Foothills – The 5 fetchlands are the 5 best lands in the game.  The can turn themselves into dual lands or into basics if you think you’ll see non-basic land hate.

Pieces to Have

• Exalted Angel – The Angel is one of the few fattys who are worth laying down on the table.  You’ll find yourself wanting Angel as a alternate win method in a couple of decks.
• True Believer – What this card really says is “deal with me before you combo off”.  It also helps slightly against that turn 2/3 targeted discard.

Legions

Pieces to Have

• Akroma, Angel of Wrath – The angel is just a great fatty to cheat into play. Cheating things into play is good, especially if they have haste

Scourge

Staples

• Tendrils of Agony – Magic best and most trustworthy win condition – short of not being able to be targeted, the essentially uncounterable an unpreventable life loss from agony is the main piece behind many storm-based decks.
• Mind’s Desire – It’s not even restricted.  One great way to build up storm count is to play cards for free.
• Stifle – What doesn’t this card do?  It’s mana-denial on Fetch lands, it’s an storm activation killer on Tendrils of Agony, it’ll stop Deed, it’s a stall on Goblin Charblecher – oh, and it brings 12/12 creatures into play without having to sacrifice anything.  An all-star card.
• Xantid Swarm – Like a little repeating Orim’s Chant.  I’d say you are going to want to have these in your combo deck at some point – especially vs. very controlling deck.  Oh – and it’s important to yell out “BEES IN YOUR FACE!” when they attack.

Pieces to Have

• Brain Freeze – Like Agony, except generally, you need to build up much more storm count – generally only used in Sensei, Sensei or High Tide Decks, and the later aren’t competitive for the time being.
• Pyrostatic Pillar – Just about the only defense a red deck has for storm.  I wouldn’t count on it work, but you can try…

Mirrodin

Staples

• Disciple of the Vault – Like Tendrils, the ability for this guy to cause unpreventable life loss is very handy.  Fits in a bunch of different decks.
• Chalice of the Void – It’s underutilized at the moment, but being able to shut off a whole casting cost is very handy – especially if that cost is 1 and you are playing against Storm.
• Chrome Mox – It’s still the only moxen we have, and it’s still good in combo and aggro decks.
• Goblin Charbelcher – It’s not just a deck of it’s own – it’s also an alternate win condition that gets around Moat, Engineered Plague in any goblin deck with a Recruiter in it.  Also works just fine with Mana Severance.
• Thirst for Knowledge – Instant card draw and artifacts in your graveyard? Sign me up. TFK is already a great draw spell and just keeps getting better as ways to abuse artifacts in your graveyard will only increase in number as we get more sets.

Darksteel

Staples

• Echoing Truth – It’s just fine against one pesky problem, but it’s also great against, say 22 pesky problems of the same name.  You need to have this card in you sideboard for most combo decks. 
• Aether Vial – It can be used in Fish Decks to get more control creatures out at once, or it can be used with Goblins to put uncounterable Ringleaders into play… hell – Uncounterable creatures coming into play as an instant is just good.
• Skullclamp – It’s not banned, it’s not restricted – it’s hard to ignore the most notorious (not biggest, but most notorious) mistake of all time. And it’s not like they cost a lot – no one else can use them!

Pieces to Have

• Darksteel Colossus – Simple thinking here – Oath will bring him into play. Tinker will bring him into play.  And once he’s in play, the Iron Giant is simply unbelievable.
• Serum Powder – The go for broke card.  This is the kind of card you want when your combo requires a pretty specific hand, and you don’t have to worry about restricted cards to make it go. Belcher decks employ this, but conceivably, many decks could use it.
• Sundering Titan – It’s just a wrecking ball of a card.  It eats your opponent’s dual lands.  It’s true – it’s rough to get into play, but it can be used in Oath decks or later once Goblin Welder hits the scene
• Trinisphere – I’ll leave this card on any of these lists, because it’s so very dangerous.  There are ways to abuse it.  True, with Mishra’s Workshop, it’s so abusive that it’ll probably get restricted, but that doesn’t mean you can’t try it without the Workshop

Fifth Dawn

Staples

• Trinket Mage – Trinket Mage fetches so many useful cards (Sensei’s Divining Top, Phyrexian Dreadnought, Engineered Explosives, Chalice of the Void, Skullclamp, Tormod’s Crypt, etc…) that you can practically build a deck around it.  That being said, he fits into a lot of decks because he’s such a great tutor on a 2/2 body.
• Crucible of Worlds – See 10th
• Engineered Explosives – This one card just blows up everything.  With real dual lands now available, it’s easy to play Explosives for 0, 1, 2 & 3.  Other decks can get it to 4 and 5. Recurring it with Academy Ruins is just downright nasty.
• Vedalken Shackles – Gimme your creatures.  Now - preferably before your Tarmogoyf gets too big.

Pieces to Have

• Auriok Salvagers – it is a pretty useful card, but it generally just sees play in Bomberman, a deck designed to produce infinite mana with it and Lion’s Eye Diamond

Champions of Kamigawa

Staples

• Gifts Ungiven – It’s a tutor – for two cards.  A damn good one too. Works well with Eternal Witness and later, it goes and grabs other disgusting cards, like Yamgmoth’s Will, Tinker – you get the idea.  This card will become a true staple once we have enough mana acceleration, but even now is worth having in your arsenal. At worst, you can just go get 4 blue cards, keep 2, pitch one to force of will and still have something useful left in your hand.
• Sensei’s Divining Top – It’s keeps your Confidant pain limited to 1 a turn at most.  It searches your deck with shuffle effects, it combines with Counterbalance to REALLY drive your opponent crazy. 

Pieces to Have

• Forbidden Orchard – It’s a fine enough card on it’s own – as a rainbow land in a deck it’s passable. But where it really shines it to make sure your opponent has a lowly 1/1 creature in play for when you want Oath of Druids to trigger.
• Samurai of the Pale Curtain – Like a Leyline of the Void that you don’t have to mulligan to make sure you can play it in a reasonable time.   Goes right into fish-style decks.

Betrayers of Kamigawa

Staples

• Umezawa’s Jitte – Much like when it was in standard, Umezawa’s Jitte outshines this whole set.  It’s still so incredibly versatile, that even though it’s slow it’s worth having one or two in your aggro or control deck to keep the opponent off-balance.

Pieces to Have

• Threads of Disloyalty – Control magic is a good card, but even so, Threads of Disloyalty steals most of the creatures you are going to meet, just as smother kills most of them. And just like Smother, it becomes a little harder to use on creatures once Oath of Druids is around.

Saviors of Kamigawa

Staples

• Pithing Needle – See 10th

Pieces to Have

• Erayo, Soratami Ascendant – When Lotus Petal hits the ground, it should be relatively easy to hit a turn 1 Erayo, which is difficult to deal with.
• Ideas Unbound – You draw three cards for 2 mana.  Who cares what happens at the end of your turn?  There shouldn’t BE an end of your turn.  However, it’s still tough to use.

Ravnica

Staples

• Dark Confidant – The card advantage machine man himself, affectionately known as Bob, is the defacto method for drawing cards (without actually drawing them). Even if you hit a force of will once in a while, the advantage he gives is huge.
• Overgrown Tomb, Sacred Foundry – Be careful here.  We only have the 5 allied dual lands, but you know the next 5 (which are strictly better than these) are coming soon.  IF your deck needs them, then it needs them, but then your deck might be at a disadvantage.

Pieces to Have

• Life from the Loam – There are some decks that abuse the fact that this card put 3 cards in hand at the cost of 1 to create a sort of card advantage engine.
• Putrefy – Creatures or artifacts? Sign me up – short of destroying lands it’s practically an instant Vindicate.  It’s power is only slightly lessened in that it doesn’t remove Necropotence – but really, once Necro hits the board it’s often too late.

Guildpact

Staples

• Leyline of the Void – No graveyard for you!  Not only is this card a great sideboard card, it’s a 2-piece combo with Helm of Obedience
• Godless Shrine, Steam Vents – See Overgrown Tomb & Sacred Foundry.

Pieces to Have

• Repeal – it’s a bounce spell that replaces itself.  This is nice in two ways.  1, you can bounce that annoying Tormod’s Crypt or Chalice of the Void (so long as it’s not set to 1) and you just got yourself some breathing room and a card.  But also, you could bounce your Mana Crypt after you tapped it for 2 mana, replay it and tap it again for 2 mana, which is a +1 mana advantage, no card disadvantage, and +2 storm count.  Sweet.
• Shattering Spree – Can kill just about any artifacts, including the fact that you can use the triggered ability to even hammer a Chalice set to 1 (Chalice only counters the first spell, but the copies are safe)
• Burning-Tree Shaman – Even you are going to make a respectable stab at a deck featuring Red and Green, it's best if you have some Shamans to make people pay for using Sensei's Divining Top or even activating Necropotence.

Dissension

Staples

• Spell Snare – There are so many cards at CMC 2, snare counters them and provides relief from going second, or it afford you the opportunity to play something of you own and leave one mana untapped.
• Breeding Pool – See Overgrown Tomb & Sacred Foundry.

Pieces to Have

• Infernal Tutor – They key here is hold down shift when you play it, then pop your Lion’s Eye Diamond (discarding your hand) and it becomes the Demonic Tutor you’ve always wanted.  It’s great in Storm decks.  At worst, you can go get another dark ritual and up your storm count by 2 for free.
• Tidespout Tyrant – The more controlling versions of Oath of Druids will want this card.  Attaching a boomerang to each and every spell you play is crazy.  And while you’re sending their permanents from whence they came, you are beating with a 5/5 flyer.

Coldsnap

Staples

• Counterbalance – Quite possibly the most annoying card ever produced. It’s a worse lock with Top than Stasis + Kismet only because it looks like there is a chance you might get to play another card again.  You should have 4 – this control measure fits in a lot of decks.
• Rite of Flame – 1 mana for 2, then 3, then 4 – hey this Is pretty good.  It’s acceleration for aggro and for combo.

Pieces to Have

• Soul Spike – Soul Spike is an integral part of Necropotence decks. It serves a couple of purposes. Firstly, once you play Necropotence, you generally will draw far more card than you can keep in your hand. Soul Spike turns these excess cards in to 4 life for you (handy when you've just lost umpteen life) and 4 life loss for your opponent. Secondly, with only 7 cards next turn for the win, the 4 or 8 life loss makes it much easier for you to hit a critical Tendrils of Agony.
• Jotun Grunt – It’s pretty good in fish, where it can beat for 4 for a couple of turns, but where is really shines is against Thresh decks .  It can stand up to Mongeese (Sorry Cownose), and it shrinks Tarmogoyf in a hurry.

Time Shifted

• Tormod’s Crypt – Remove a graveyard for free.  This is really, really handy, and works in all colors
• Gemstone Mine – See Weatherlight

Pieces to Have

• The Rack – Some Pox decks will run this card for the extra damage it provides while both your hands and life are ravaged by Pox and Smallpox.

Time Spiral

Staples

• Academy Ruins – Recurring artifacts is good.  Recurring artifacts like Engineered Explosives or Tormod’s Crypt (against Thresh/Dredge) is awesome.
• Trickbind – Play the Dreadnought, wait for player to pass (thinking to counter the stifle), play Trickbind instead.  It also buys a turn vs Necropotence, as unlike Stifle, the player can’t use the ability any more that turn (If the player forgets to hold down shift)
• Krosan Grip – Kills any artifact or enchantment – with no chance for parole. It stops Necro, Countertop (as long as a CMC 3 is not on top), Deed, Engineered Explosives, Tormod's Crypt, and so many others.

Pieces to Have

• Wipe Away – This card becomes more important as control decks start cheating things into play.  They’d just love to counter your Echoing Truth, Chain of Vapor or Repeal.  Wipe Away – not so much.

Planar Chaos

Staples

• Extirpate – It’s not really as useful as it looks, but it’s generally handy against any deck that’s got something you don’t want to se again.  For example, removing that Engineered Explosives from recurring is nice.

Pieces to Have

• Simian Spirit Guide – It’s an important piece of Belcher decks that want mana but don’t want land. 

Future Sight

Staples

• Tombstalker – It’s a 5/5 flyer – nothing special until you consider getting 5-6 cards in your hand and using dark ritual can power it out on turn 2 or so.  It also trades well with Goyf (since you might be able to bring down Goyf’s P/T by removing cards from your graveyard.
• Pact of Negation – You lose next turn? So what.  They lose this turn.  Get 4.
• Tarmogoyf – The beater of choice.  Most of the time, you can’t even bring this guy out as anything less than a 2/3 if you tried, and often a 3/4 (Fetchland, Duress, Brainstorm all in the yard somewhere).  Sure it dies to most removal, but then, it’s not like you spent a lot of mana on it either.

Pieces to Have

• Delay – Sure, you have many other counter options.  But this is a hard counter for 3 turns (and a total hard counter if the spell it countered was, in fact, as counter), and 3 turns is just enough to beat your opponents life total to oblivion by swinging with Dreadnought twice, or get all the cards you need to combo out.  3 turns is a LONG time in classic.
• Magus of the Moon – See Blood Moon.  Attach a 2/2 body.
• Protean Hulk – It's the reason Flash is so damned good. If flash is resolving, It'll go to the graveyard, do not pass go and do not collect $200. The number of things you can do with 6cc of creatures tutored into play is insane.

Lorwyn

Staples

• Ponder – Like Brainstorm, expect that it’s sorcery, so its helps make your Goyfs bigger. I don’t foresee it getting restricted like it did in Vintage – at least for a long time.
• Thoughtseize – Will see a lot more play once we get shiny new non-pain dual lands.  Taking ANYTHING from their hand is so worth 2 life.
• Thorn of Amethyst – It's a aggro player's dream - a card whose synergy is broken if you are laying down creatures.

Morningtide

Pieces to Have

• Bitterblossom – It’s difficult to tell what will become of Bitterblossom.  It’s generally a card engine with Skullclamp, but it’s not quite as efficient as Necropotence.  I think it’s possible that Elfclamp remains competitive as a more controlling build.
• Reveillark – It does some nasty things with Flash Hulk, though many people will still use the 4 Disciple of the Vault version as it also runs an alternate win condition with Stifle/Phyrexian Dreadnought.

Shadowmoor

Staples

• Painter’s Servant – it’s not really known how well this card will perform in the post MED2 pre-Tempest Meta, but it’s safe to assume it will perform well once we get Grindstone.
• Manamorphose – It goes in Belcher, it goes in storm – hell it could go in anything – it essentially cutting your deck down to 56 cards and fixing mana while your at it.

Pieces to Have

• Guttural Response – In case you haven’t noticed, there are a LOT of blue instants on this list.  Also works in Painter combo.
• Vexing Shusher – An underused anti control card, who also happens to beat down.  It’s worth having this ready in your sideboard for any time the meta swings toward heavy amounts of counters.  Cheating it into play via Vial as an instant is just plain mean.

Eventide

Nothing – this set has zilch.

Shards of Alara

Staples

• Ad Nauseam – One of those truly Eternal cards - it just doesn't work in any other format - mostly because other formats don't have access to a lot of cheap mana accelerators to amass a huge amount of cards and storm count.
• Tezzeret the Seeker – Untapping artifact is pretty good. Tinkering artifacts into play is really, really good. Maybe he's not 100% abuseable yet, but there is no doubt he will be at some point.
• Wild Nacatl – It's pretty much a 3/3 creature for one mana, thanks to dual lands.
• Ethersworn Canonist – An Arcane Lab on legs? Sign me up!

Pieces to Have

• Executioner’s Capsule – Fetch with Trinket Mage, recur with Academy Ruins/Auriok Salvagers.
• Hellkite Overlord – The newest fatty to get with Oath of Druids. Why? Because at 8/8 with haste, it only needs to attack 3 times to Akroma's 4. And with the red ability, possibly only twice.

Full Card List

bold denotes staple
regular denots piece to have