MTG Slang & Jargon
More to explore · beginner
The shortcuts Magic players use. Most of these are not in the official rules.
| Term | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Ramp | Mana acceleration. Anything that gets you more mana faster than land drops. |
| Removal | A spell that destroys, exiles, or otherwise neutralizes opponent permanents. |
| Wipe / board wipe | A spell that kills/removes many things at once (e.g. Wrath of God). |
| Tutor | A spell that searches your deck for a card. Demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor. |
| Wheel | A spell where everyone discards their hand and draws 7. Wheel of Fortune, Windfall. |
| Aristocrats | A deck strategy that benefits from sacrificing creatures repeatedly. |
| Voltron | A deck that wins by piling auras/equipment onto its commander to deal commander damage. |
| Stax | A deck that locks the table down with mana denial and resource attrition. |
| Tax | An effect that makes opponents' spells cost more (e.g. Thalia, Guardian of Thraben). |
| Ping | Repeatedly dealing 1 damage. Prodigal Pyromancer "pings" creatures. |
| Bolt | Used as a verb: "I bolt your creature" (cast Lightning Bolt or similar). |
| Counter | Verb: counter a spell. Noun: a +1/+1 counter, charge counter, etc. (Two unrelated meanings!) |
| Etb / ETB | "Enters the battlefield." Triggered abilities that fire on entry. |
| LTB | "Leaves the battlefield." Triggers that fire when something leaves. |
| CMC / MV | Converted mana cost / mana value. The total mana of a card's cost. |
| Deck out | Lose by trying to draw from an empty library. |
| Mill | Put cards from a deck into the graveyard. |
| Goldfish | Play a deck against no opponent to test how fast it goes off. |
| Threat assessment | Figuring out which player is the biggest danger in a multiplayer game. |
| Open mana | Mana you have that you haven't used, so you can cast something on opponents' turns. |
| Tempo | The pace of the game. Spending a turn doing nothing is "losing tempo." |
| Card advantage | Drawing more cards than opponents. The currency of long games. |
| Tutoring up | Searching for a specific card via a tutor effect. |
| Pop the seal / break the seal | Activate a Seal of [X] enchantment. |
| Goes off | A deck successfully executes its win condition combo. |
| Combo | A set of cards that produce a winning effect together (e.g. Thassa's Oracle + Demonic Consultation). |
| Combat math | Calculating who wins a fight based on power/toughness/keywords. |
| The pile | Disparaging term for a deck with no cohesive strategy ("just a pile of good cards"). Not to be confused with the Pile in this site's deck builder, which is simply a holding area for cards you are still considering. |
| Politics | Multiplayer dealmaking. Asking opponents not to attack you, etc. |
| Archenemy | The single most threatening player in a multiplayer game. The other players often team up against them. |
| Win con / win condition | The card or strategy that actually wins the game for a deck. |
Format slang
| Term | Meaning |
|---|---|
| EDH | Old name for Commander. Still widely used. "Elder Dragon Highlander." |
| cEDH | Competitive EDH. Tournament-grade Commander. |
| Rule zero | The pre-game discussion about house rules and power level. |
| Bracket | The B1-B5 power-level system. |
| Precon | A pre-constructed deck product. |