Introduction

Welcome to ArcaneMetriX, the advanced deck-building laboratory for Magic: The Gathering.

ArcaneMetriX isn’t just a place to list your cards; it’s a precision tool designed to help you understand the deep synergies, probabilities, and evolutionary history of your decks.

Why ArcaneMetriX?

• New Player Friendly: A tutorial walkthrough of the app can be found on the Home page. Each card is scanned for common terms and keywords that are linked to in a comprehensive glossary.
• Synergy First: Our Genome visualization give you an intuitive look into interactions within your deck.
• Data-Driven: Deep and actionable stats alongside real-time Playtest tracking and Monte Carlo opening-hand analysis.
• Evolutionary: Track every change and see how your deck has matured and changed over time.
• Format References: Current banlists for every major format and a Commander brackets guide, kept up to date automatically.

Tip

This guide is served directly from the app! You can revisit it anytime by clicking the Help button in the top header.

Tip

On a desktop-sized window the app is a workspace: a navigation rail, a second pane you can put any view into, one command bar per panel, and a Ctrl+K command palette. If something in this guide does not look like your screen, start with The Desktop Workspace.

Getting Started

Starting your journey in ArcaneMetriX is as simple as importing a list or searching for your first card.

Importing Decks

ArcaneMetriX supports importing from the most popular MTG platforms:

1. Plain Text: Paste a standard deck list (e.g., 1 Sol Ring). This is the most robust method as virtually every other online service has a way to export a plain text deck list that can be pasted into ArcaneMetriX.
2. CSV or Text Files: You can also drag and drop a .csv or .txt file to import a decklist in the standard format.
3. Archidekt: Copy the URL of your public deck and ArcaneMetriX will extract the deck for you!
4. Moxfield: Moxfield links cannot be imported. Moxfield blocks automated deck access for public and unlisted decks alike. Open the deck on Moxfield, choose Export, then copy and paste the decklist text here instead.

For more details on the expected formats, check out the Import & Export Formats Guide.

To import:

• Click the Import button in the Deck panel (from the command bar’s overflow menu, the hamburger at its right, or from the Deck tab itself if it is currently empty). You can also press Ctrl+K and type import.
• Paste your URL or list.
• Watch as the Deck tab begins to populate with your cards.

Navigation Basics

On the home screen of the app, there is a “Take a Tour” button. This will take you through a step-by-step guide of the application’s basics.

Here is a brief overview of the application:

• Navigation Rail (Desktop): Every tab lives in the rail down the left, and each one lists its views underneath it while it is open. A click opens a view on the right; Shift+click, or a drag onto the left pane, opens it on the left instead, so you can read Stats or Synergies beside the deck you are editing. On mobile the same tabs are a bar along the bottom. The desktop workspace as a whole has its own chapter: The Desktop Workspace.
• Main Tabs: Use the tabs to switch between Home, Builder, Library, and Collection.
  • Home: The landing page of the application. It’s an easy-entry dashboard where new users can quickly get started, and also links out to Import, Browse (Library), Articles, and Games.
  • Search: Your gateway to the entire Scryfall database. You can search for cards by name, type, color, mana cost, and more. It starts docked in the left pane, so the + on a result adds to the deck you are already looking at. You can move it to the main pane, or put something else in the left pane, at any time. On mobile, Search is its own tab in the bottom navigation.
  • Builder: Manage and view the currently selected deck. From this main tab, you can access the following sub-tabs:
    • Deck: View and edit the current deck list in List, Grid, Stack or Free Form view, with drag-and-drop between the deck, sideboard, maybeboard and command zone. You can also access basic deck functions like Deck Notes, Generated Deck Suggestions, Saving, Exporting, and Sharing. See the Deck Builder & Free Form View chapter for the views, drag-and-drop and keyboard shortcuts.
    • Stats: View detailed statistics and metrics about your deck.
    • Genome: View the genome visualization of your deck. All synergies are drawn as nodes and edges here for the more visual builders. You can see complex synergies, redundancies, combos, and tutor lines.
    • Synergies: This is the list view of synergies of your deck. It is really just a list format of the Genome tab’s information.
    • Combos: This is the list view of combos of your deck. Each combo comes with a walkthrough of how to execute it.
    • Test: Run Monte Carlo opening-hand analysis to estimate keepable hands, mulligan outcomes, and draw-goal probabilities. Use Playtest deck from this tab to open an interactive battlefield, get live statistics, and log the actions you take.
    • Evolution: View the changes your deck has undergone over time. This is exclusive to PRO members.
  • Library: This is where all decklists can be found. Within this section are three tabs:
    • My Decks: This is where all your saved decks can be viewed and edited.
    • Favorites: This is where all your favorited decks can be viewed.
    • Discover: This is where all public community decks can be viewed.
  • Collection: PRO users can track owned cards, import and export collection inventory, organize cards by physical location, review collection stats, track set completion, and filter deck/search results by owned or unowned status.
• Header: The bar at the top of the app has a few useful buttons beyond the main tabs:
  • About & Legal and User Guide (this guide, opens in a new tab) are available to everyone.
  • Signed-in users also get a Notifications bell showing unread system and account notifications, and a user menu for Profile, Billing & Plan, Preferences, Account & Privacy, and a shortcut into Games.
• Games: ArcaneMetriX also has a separate site of daily Magic puzzles, reachable from the Home page or the user menu. See ArcaneMetriX Games for details.

Note

The “working deck” is automatically saved to your browser’s local storage, but we recommend creating a Free account to sync them across devices.

The Desktop Workspace

On a desktop-sized window ArcaneMetriX lays itself out as a workspace rather than a page: a navigation rail down the left, one command bar per panel, and a second pane you can put any view into. The rail and the second pane are desktop-only: a phone keeps its bottom tab bar and its Search tab. The command bar is not — a phone gets the same row, and the end of this chapter says how it differs there.

The Navigation Rail

Every tab is in the rail, and each one lists its own views underneath it while it is open. The tab and its views sit on a single tinted block so the group reads as one thing, and the bar down the block’s edge says which pane is showing it: the right edge for the main pane, the left edge for the side pane.

The Builder’s tab wears the deck’s card count where the other tabs wear an icon. A small badge on its corner counts what the deck carries but does not count toward it: sideboard, maybeboard and companion cards. A deck with a rules problem turns the count red and lists the problems in the tab’s tooltip.

Two Views at Once

The rail is how you put something in the side pane:

Anything can be docked, including a second copy of what the main pane already has. Drag the divider between the panes to resize; each pane keeps a minimum width so neither can be squeezed into uselessness.

Split the side pane in two by dragging a view onto the top or bottom third of it. The pane then holds two stacked slots, each with its own header and close button, and a handle between them you can drag. Dropping onto the middle third replaces the whole pane instead.

The side pane, its split and its width are remembered between sessions.

The Command Bar

Each panel has one row of controls at the top of its pane: the deck’s name and format, its counts, then its filters, view options, tools and actions. What a bar holds belongs to the view you are looking at, so switching from Deck to Stats changes the row.

The bar adapts to the room it has. As a pane narrows it drops labels for glyphs, folds the counts down to numbers, and finally moves its controls into the overflow menu at the right, all without wrapping to a second line. The menu always keeps a Layout & Sort row, so the view options are reachable even when the bar has no room to show them, and Clear is always set apart at the bottom.

When the same tab is open in both panes, the things both bars would say identically (the deck’s name, its counts, a pod’s name, a collection’s value) are drawn only by the pane with more room. The narrow pane spends its bar on what is actually different about the view it holds, and if that leaves nothing at all, it draws no bar.

On a phone

A phone gets the same bar, with one difference: it has no width to trade away, so it never folds anything into the overflow menu. The row spans the screen, sticks to the top of the content as you scroll, and scrolls sideways instead. A glowing edge tells you there is more bar that way, and it fades out when you reach the end. Everything the view can do is on that one row, so nothing is more than a swipe away.

The Command Palette

Press Ctrl+K (⌘K on a Mac) anywhere in the app to open the palette. Type a few letters of what you want and press Enter. It matches loosely, so svdk finds Save deck and gen finds Go to Builder › Genome.

The palette knows two kinds of thing:

• Where to go: every tab and every view, as Go to …, and the same list again as Dock … in the side pane so you can open something on the left without reaching for the rail.
• What to do: the actions available for whatever is on screen; save, import, the exports, copy, share, undo and redo, the view modes and sort orders, Genome’s zoom and physics, the Library’s filters, the Collection’s exports, and more.

Arrow keys and Tab move through the results, Enter runs the selection, Escape closes. An action that belongs to another view brings that view up first, so Genome: zoom in is one step from the deck list rather than two.

Usage Tips

Tip

Build with the numbers in view. Shift+click Stats to dock it beside the deck. Every edit updates it live, so you can watch the curve and the color balance move as you cut and add, instead of switching tabs to check.

Tip

Keep Search on the left while you build. Search is the side pane’s usual occupant. Leave it there and the + button on a result adds to the deck you can see, with no tab switching at all.

Tip

Three things at once. Drag a view onto the bottom third of the side pane to split it: deck on the right, Stats and Synergies stacked on the left. Drag the handle between the two slots to give whichever one you are reading more room.

Tip

Two views of the same deck. Dock the Builder beside itself and put the left one on Synergies and the right on Deck. Both are the same deck, so a cut on the right updates the analysis on the left as you make it.

Tip

Ctrl+K beats hunting. The palette reaches anything on screen, including controls the bar has folded away on a narrow pane. It is usually the fastest route to an export or a view you have not opened yet.

Tip

A narrow pane is not a lesser one. Every panel reflows rather than clipping: the Genome’s card details move from the right of the graph to a sheet along the bottom, the Card Detail Modal’s sections drop to one column, and the command bar sheds detail in a fixed order. Dock freely and resize to taste.

Deck Builder & Free Form View

The Deck tab of the Builder is where a list becomes a deck. This chapter covers how cards move around it and also reviews the Free Form view in detail.

Four Ways to See the Deck

The toggle beside the search field switches between views. All four show the same deck; only the presentation changes.

The sort control next to the toggle (Type, Mana Value, Color, Tag, Set, Rarity, and more) groups the first three views. In Free Form the similar groupings are available as Arrange presets from the toolbar.

Moving Cards Around

ArcaneMetriX is drag-and-drop throughout on desktop:

• Search → Deck: drag a card from the Search panel and drop it on the deck list to add it. Drop it on the Sideboard or Maybeboard section to add it there instead.
• Deck → Sideboard / Maybeboard: pick up a card from the deck and phantom drop strips appear for the other lists. Drop on one to move a copy there; drop on the Delete strip to remove a copy.
• Command zone: in Commander formats, dropping a legendary creature (or any card that can lead a deck) on the command zone makes it the commander. Cards that cannot lead a deck are refused with a message.
• Search → Playtest: while Playtesting, cards from Search can be dropped straight onto the battlefield; dropping one on the Deck Notepad inserts a link to it.
• Touch: on phones and tablets the same moves work with press-and-hold, and a floating preview follows your finger.

Every card also has a right-click context menu (long-press on touch) with the same moves, plus tags, highlights, and “Open card details”.

Undo, Redo and Quick Save

Every edit to the deck is tracked as an action and can be undone.

Undo and Redo are also in the command bar’s overflow menu, between Share and Layout & Sort. Quick-save needs you to be signed in; the full Save button opens the Deck Saved dialog where you can rename the deck, change its format, copy a share link or post it, playtest it, or create a snapshot (if PRO).

Note

A save is refused while any Free Form sticky note contains explicit language; the note is badged Can’t save, and the message names it. Edit the note and save again.

Card Suggestions

The Suggest button in the toolbar opens the suggestion strip: a row of cards the intelligence engine believes fit the deck you’re building, each with a plain-language reason (“Pairs with Bitterblossom: turns every token into two cards”). Deck cards named in the reason are clickable, and hovering a tile shows the full list of interactions it enables. Add puts the card straight into the deck; the × dismisses a suggestion for the session.

For Commander decks, the Bracket target selector keeps suggestions inside the bracket you’re building toward; no Game Changers past the bracket’s cap, no forbidden categories, and no cards whose raw power would push the deck’s estimate above your target. This also shapes the suggestions’ character too: cEDH targets lean into cheap ramp, efficient repeatable draw, low-cost interaction and combo pieces, while low brackets favor fun, thematic picks. The choice is remembered per deck.

Suggestions are entirely optional. Hide the strip (the Hide button or the toolbar toggle) and the choice persists. While hidden, the builder makes no suggestion requests at all.

The Free Form View

Free Form is the fourth view: the whole deck on one table, with the Command Zone, Sideboard and Maybeboard as boxes on that table. It exists for two kinds of people; the builder thinking through a list with cards spread out, and the streamer or content creator showing a deck to an audience. The arrangement is saved with the deck, so it is there next session and travels with a public share as a visual primer.

Getting around

The controls are the same as Playtest’s battlefield:

• Drag the background to pan. Scroll to zoom about the pointer, or use the − / % / + control (click the percentage to reset). The fit button (or F hotkey) fits everything on screen, and the view always opens fitted.
• Click a card to select it. Ctrl/Cmd-click or Shift-click adds to the selection. Shift-drag across the table draws a marquee that selects everything it crosses including cards, notes, frames, arrows and widgets.
• Drag a card to move it. Dragging a selected card moves the whole selection together.
• Right-click anything for its menu; right-click empty table for the table’s own.
• Double-click a card to open its details, or open the context menu and select “Open card details”

Piles

Copies of the same card stack exactly on top of one another and wear a count badge, like the Stack view. Drop a copy within one grid cell of its twin and it squares itself up on the pile automatically. Tidy snaps everything to the grid and squares up any near-piles. Stack and Spread act on the selection (two or more cards).

Zones

The Command Zone, Sideboard and Maybeboard are boxes you can drag by their header and resize by their corner. Dropping a card inside one moves it to that list of the deck; dragging it out onto the open table brings it back to the main deck. A zone’s menu offers Select everything here, Tidy into a grid, Move all to main deck and Remove all.

Annotating the table

Beside the Note button on the toolbar are the tools that turn a layout into a primer. They all go under the pointer when it is over the table (or the center of the view), always on a clear patch of table so nothing you have arranged is disturbed, and the view scrolls to show what you just added.

Everything is an object in the same selection: select any mix, then move, nudge with the arrow keys, color it from the toolbar swatches, Duplicate (Ctrl/Cmd + D), Delete, or Bring to front from the context menu. Arrows paint above everything by default so they can point at notes and widgets.

Note

A table holds up to 100 notes, frames, arrows and widgets in total. This keeps a deck’s saved data small; the toolbar tells you when the table is full.

Highlights and spotlight

With cards selected, the toolbar shows six highlight colors. Spotlight dims everything except the current selection to highlight specific cards during presentation.

Presenting

Present (or P) fills the screen with the table on a clean surface, collapses the tools into a floating strip, and shows whatever card is under the pointer large beside the table with its text so viewers can read along. Double-faced cards show the face that is up; split, adventure and other multi-mode cards show every mode. The filter bar is available while presenting, and card details and the Stats explainers open on top of the stage.

Keyboard shortcuts

Shortcuts apply while the Free Form view is on screen and you are not typing in a note or caption.

On desktop the deck’s controls are one row at the top of the pane, the command bar. It never wraps: as the pane narrows it drops labels for glyphs, folds the counts down to numbers, and finally moves its controls into the overflow menu at the right, where Layout & Sort is always available. See The Desktop Workspace.

Saving and sharing

The table saves with the deck. Ctrl/Cmd + S or the Save button includes every card’s place, the zone boxes, notes, frames, arrows, widgets and paint order, all stored compactly. A public deck shows its table to everyone who opens it when it is public as a way to create visual primers for players. Reset throws the arrangement away and deals the deck out by type again.

Import & Export Formats

ArcaneMetriX supports several ways to import and export your decklists, allowing for seamless and high-fidelity transfers between different MTG tools while maintaining metadata like specific printings (set/collector number) and deck zones.

What happens when you import

Every import creates a new deck. It does not merge into the deck you currently have open. Importing a second deck gives you a second deck.

• The deck currently open is replaced. If it has cards in it, the import window warns you before you commit. Save it first if you want to keep it.
• If you are signed in, the imported deck is saved to your library automatically. You do not need to find Save afterwards; it is already there when you open the Library tab.
• If you are not signed in, the deck stays in your browser and is not saved anywhere. Sign in and save it to keep it.
• The deck keeps its name from the source where the source provides one. Pasted lists and CSV files have no name of their own, so they arrive as Imported Deck and can be renamed.

You can start an import from the Home tab, the Library tab, or the deck menu.

1. Direct Links (URLs)

ArcaneMetriX natively supports importing decks directly from popular deckbuilding websites via their URLs. Simply paste the URL into the Import Deck modal.

Supported Sites:

• Archidekt: e.g., https://archidekt.com/decks/12345
• ManaBox: e.g., https://manabox.app/decks/abcdefg
• ArcaneMetriX: e.g., https://arcanemetrix.com/deck/12345

Moxfield links are not supported. Moxfield blocks automated access to decks at their edge, so a Moxfield URL fails for public and unlisted decks alike. It is not a privacy setting you can change, unfortunately. Use the export-and-paste route below instead.

When using a supported URL, ArcaneMetriX automatically fetches the decklist with all its high-fidelity data, including specific printings, quantities, and board sections (Mainboard, Sideboard, Commander, etc.).

ManaBox links

To get a link, open the deck in ManaBox, tap the three-dot menu, and choose Share. Sharing a link requires a ManaBox account.

Two things worth knowing:

• ManaBox links are snapshots. If the deck changes afterwards, the owner has to update the link in ManaBox before those changes appear here.
• ManaBox decks have no sideboard. Any card ArcaneMetriX cannot place moves to the Maybeboard, where it is easy to see and adjust, rather than being dropped or silently added to your main deck.

If a ManaBox link ever fails to import, use ManaBox’s text export instead. That path does not depend on their website at all.

Moxfield links

Moxfield URLs cannot be imported. Moxfield blocks automated deck access, and it applies to every deck — public, unlisted, or private — so there is no setting on the deck that makes a link work.

To bring a Moxfield deck across:

1. Open the deck on Moxfield.
2. Choose Export and copy the decklist text.
3. Paste it into the Import Deck window here.

The pasted text keeps its set codes, collector numbers and foil markers, so you get the exact printings and finishes you picked rather than arbitrary ones. See Standard Text Format below for the format.

2. Standard Text Format

You can paste standard text-based decklists directly into the import box or drag-and-drop a .txt file. The parser expects the following standard format:

[Quantity] [Card Name]

Example

1 Command Tower
1 Sol Ring
4 Lightning Bolt
18 Mountain

This is also the format ManaBox produces when you share a deck as text (three-dot menu → Share → text), so a ManaBox text export can be pasted or dropped in directly.

Notes:

• Empty lines are ignored.
• If a quantity is omitted, it defaults to 1.
• Set and collector number in parentheses are used to pick the printing, so 3 Verdant Catacombs (MH2) 260 imports that exact art and edition rather than an arbitrary printing. Non-numeric collector numbers (promos, variants such as 65s) work too.
• A *F* marker imports the card as foil, and *E* as etched — 1 Sol Ring (LTC) 284 *F* gives you the foil LTC printing.
• *CMDR* marks a commander, and // Sideboard, // Maybeboard, // Commander headers assign the following cards to that zone.

Archidekt & Moxfield text exports

Archidekt’s text export adds a per-card category list, and it is supported as-is. You may paste it without editing anything out:

1x Sol Ring (sld) 2807 [Late Game Ramp]
1x Kynaios and Tiro of Meletis (sld) 2806 [Commander{top},Everybody Draws]
1x Curse of the Swine (soc) 192 [Maybeboard{noDeck}{noPrice}]
1x Beast (plst) TIKO-10 [Tokens & Extras{noDeck}]

• The 1x quantity style and Archidekt’s non-numeric collector numbers (STH-101, 1012a, 252p) are both handled.
• Categories decide where a card lands: Commander, Sideboard and Maybeboard go to those zones, and everything else goes to the main deck.
• {noDeck} is Archidekt’s “not part of the deck” marker, used for tokens and the maybeboard. Those cards import to the Maybeboard. They are kept, but they do not inflate your deck’s card count.

Moxfield export pasted as text keeps the printings and finishes you chose, which is what makes the export-and-paste route a full-fidelity substitute for the URL import Moxfield does not permit.

3. CSV Format (High-Fidelity)

ArcaneMetriX supports importing and exporting decklists and collections using the CSV (Comma Separated Values) format. This allows for high-fidelity transfers between different MTG tools while maintaining metadata like specific printings (set/collector number) and deck zones.

General Structure

A valid CSV should contain a header row followed by data rows. ArcaneMetriX uses a flexible header detection system that supports multiple common naming conventions from tools like Archidekt, Moxfield, and ManaBox.

ManaBox CSV exports work as-is. Export your collection from ManaBox and drop the file straight in — its Name, Quantity, Set code, Collector number, Foil, Scryfall ID, Condition, Language, Binder Name, Purchase price, and Purchase price currency columns are all recognized. Columns ArcaneMetriX has no use for or are not compatible with (rarity, ManaBox ID, misprint, altered) are ignored rather than treated as an error.

Supported Headers

Zone/Section Handling

ArcaneMetriX recognizes the following values in the Section or Zone column:

• Mainboard: Main, Mainboard, Deck, Main Board
• Sideboard: Side, Sideboard, Side Board
• Maybeboard: Maybe, Maybeboard, Maybe Board
• Commander: Commander, Command, General
• Companion: Companion

If no section is specified, the card is imported into the Mainboard.

Example CSV Formats

Minimum (Name only)

Name
Lightning Bolt
Opt
Island

Standard Decklist (Quantity + Name)

Count,Name
4,Lightning Bolt
4,Opt
22,Island

High-Fidelity (With Printings and Zones)

Count,Name,Set,Collector Number,Section
1,Thrasios, Triton Hero,C16,46,Commander
1,Tymna the Weaver,C16,48,Commander
30,Island,ELD,254,Mainboard
1,Lurrus of the Dream-Den,IKO,226,Companion
4,Duress,M19,94,Sideboard

Exporting from ArcaneMetriX

When exporting a deck as a CSV, ArcaneMetriX will include all available metadata to ensure the deck can be re-imported with 100% accuracy into ArcaneMetriX or other compatible tools:

1. Count
2. Name
3. Set
4. Collector Number
5. Scryfall ID
6. Section

When exporting a PRO collection as CSV, ArcaneMetriX includes collection inventory fields:

1. Quantity
2. Name
3. Scryfall ID
4. Oracle ID
5. Set Code
6. Collector Number
7. Finish
8. Condition
9. Language
10. Location
11. Tradable
12. Acquired On
13. Purchase Price
14. Currency
15. Source
16. Notes

Import Troubleshooting

• Encoding: Ensure your .txt or .csv file is saved in UTF-8 encoding.
• Multiple Matches: If a card name matches multiple printings and no Set/ID is provided, ArcaneMetriX will prioritize the most recent or popular printing.
• Failed Cards: If a card cannot be found, ArcaneMetriX will provide a summary of failed names at the end of the import process.

Card Search

ArcaneMetriX provides a powerful search interface that goes beyond simple card names. You can use natural language and/or advanced logical operators to find exactly the cards you need for your deck. We use the default Scryfall query syntax for advanced searching as our foundation. This query language can be used in the search bar, however, we also provide a more user-friendly, natural language interface for common search queries.

Basic Search

By default, typing into the search bar will suggest card names, keyword categories, and other card attributes.

• Card Names: Typing a partial name will suggest matching cards.
• Triggers: Search for common card effects like “Blink”, “Draw”, or “Ramp”.

Categorical Search

The search bar automatically categorizes suggestions into sections for easier navigation:

• Sets: Search within set releases across Magic’s history (e.g., “Theros Beyond Death”, “Seventh Edition”).
• Keywords: Search for specific abilities (e.g., “Flying”, “Trample”).
• Types: Filter by card types (e.g., “Artifact”, “Instant”).
• Tribes: Find cards matching specific creature types (e.g., “Elf”, “Dragon”).
• Colors: Filter by color identity using mana symbols, names, or clan names (e.g., “W”, “Boros”, “Grixis”).

Logical Operators

You can use prefixes to apply additional logic to your search categories. By default multiple search categories are joined with an AND. This means a search is exclusionary by default. So if you search “white” and “enchantment” you will only get cards that are both white and an enchantment.

Exclusionary Search (NOT Search)

To exclude a category from your search, use any of the following prefixes: not , no , non, without , or -.

Exclusion suggestions are highlighted in Red in the dropdown and appear as Red Chips in the search bar.

Example: zombie and not black will search Zombie type cards that exclude any black in their color identity.

Inclusive Search (OR Search)

To include cards that match either one term or another, use the or or | prefix.

OR suggestions are highlighted in Blue in the dropdown and appear as Blue Chips in the search bar.

Example: flying and or trample will find cards that have either flying or trample.

Combining Filters

You can mix and match standard, exclusive, and inclusive filters to create complex queries.

• Standard Filters (AND) must match all terms.
• Exclusive Filters (NOT) are applied to exclude terms from the entire query.
• Inclusive Filters (OR) are applied to include terms in the query.

Example Terms: unearth, or flashback, not red

• Finds cards with unearth OR
• Finds cards with flashback excluding anything with red in its color identity

Notice here that order matters as we do see cards with red in its color identity in the results. This is because use of or splits the query and a not modifier will only apply to the respective section of the query (in this case, no red flashback spells).

Advanced Search Interface

To access the advanced search interface, click the “Advanced Search” button in the search bar. This will open a menu with buttons, dropdowns, and text inputs to build your query. This will be applied in addition to any existing chips in the search bar to help narrow down your search. This interface give you a few search options that are not currently available from the search bar’s autocomplete such as price ranges, power/toughness ranges, and rarity. This also allows you to easily differentiate between exact vs inclusive color searches as well as cost vs color identity.

PRO users with Collection Tracking can also use Owned Status in Advanced Search:

• All: Search the full card database.
• Owned: Show cards currently present in your collection.
• Unowned: Show cards that are not currently present in your collection.

This filter is hidden for signed-out and non-PRO users.

Power User Tips

Search Bar Hotkeys

The ability to quickly search for what you need just using the search bar is completely possible without even reaching for your mouse.

• Use arrow keys to select options based on your search in the dropdown
• Clear all current search terms with Shift + Enter while the search bar is focused
• Already know what you want? Add a card directly to your deck from search autocomplete options with Alt + Enter while highlighting the desired card

Advanced Raw Queries

For power users, the search bar also accepts raw Scryfall query syntax to build even more complex queries.

Example Search: t:legendary -t:land id<=esper usd<=10.00 o:/^{T}:/ would find all legendary cards that are not lands, falling within the esper (white, blue, black) color identity, costing $10 or less, and have a tap ability with no other payment (found using regex).

If you want more details on the Scryfall query syntax, please refer to the Scryfall Search Reference documentation

Tip

Search is a view like any other. On desktop it starts in the left pane, but you can click Search in the rail to open it full width in the main pane when you are reading results rather than adding to a deck, then Shift+click it to send it back. Its own views, Card Search and Glossary, are listed under its rail tab.

Tip

Press / to jump into the search field of whatever panel you are in, and Ctrl+K for the command palette, which reaches every view and every action without leaving the keyboard. See The Desktop Workspace..

Card Detail Modal

Left-click any card anywhere in the app (Search results, your Deck, Collection, Genome, anywhere a card appears) to open its detail modal. On mobile, use a tap instead. This is the single deepest view into a card, and it adapts to whatever context you opened it from (e.g. Collection lot editing only appears when you open a card from your Collection).

Arrange It Your Way

Every section in the modal has a grip at the left of its header. Drag a section by that grip and where you drop it decides what happens:

• On the top or bottom half of another section, it takes a row of its own above or below it.
• On a section’s left or right edge, it sits beside that section, sharing the row. A row holds two sections at most, so one-wide and two-wide rows mix freely and there is nothing to set up.

The eye at the right of a header hides that section entirely, which is different from collapsing it with the chevron. The gear in the modal’s title bar opens its settings: a chip for every section, struck through when hidden, that brings it back where it was, plus Reset layout to return to the default order.

Your arrangement is remembered on this device.

Always-Visible Sections

• Collection / Deck actions: If the card is in your PRO collection or your current deck, edit its quantity, finish, condition, or zone directly from the modal. You can also mark your copies as proxies. They stay tracked and counted, but stop counting toward your deck’s or collection’s value, and show a dashed-outline marker beside the name wherever the card is listed. See Collection Tracking for lot details.
• View Card In…: Quick-navigation shortcuts that jump straight to this card’s entry in Search, Deck, Genome, Synergies, or Combos.
• Prices: Regular and foil market prices, with quick purchase links to TCG Player and Card Kingdom. You can click on the regular or foil widget to change the card to that version in your deck or collection if it’s available. If your copy is marked as a proxy, a small notice reminds you that the quoted price is for the actual card, not your proxy.
• Salt Score: EDHREC’s community “how much does this card annoy your playgroup” rating, where available. This data is fetched via Scryfall.
• Format Legality: At a glance legality across supported formats. ArcaneMetriX primarily focuses on Commander, however, if your favorite format is not available let us know and we will do our best to implement it. What each format bans right now is in the format banlist guides.
• Tags: View and edit the card’s functional tags. See Card Tags for the full tagging system and workflow information.
• Keywords & Abilities: Every keyword and detected game concept on the card is linked to a glossary definition, so you never have to leave the modal to look up an unfamiliar mechanic.
• Printings: Browse and switch between every printing of the card, filterable by set name or code.

Research Sections

Three heavier sections sit with the rest, each collapsed until you open it. None of them fetches anything until its first open, so a card’s modal stays fast no matter how much is underneath.

Similar Cards

A horizontal track of functionally similar cards, anchored on the card you opened, with a price delta shown for each candidate. If the card is in your current deck, use Swap into Deck to replace it with the highlighted candidate without leaving the modal. This is hidden for basic lands, where “similar cards” isn’t a meaningful comparison.

Explore This Card

Advanced searches generated specifically from this card’s play patterns. Some entries include things like cards that enable it, cards that benefit from it, valid targets for its abilities, and cards that follow the same design pattern. Each result shows:

• A plain-language summary of why the search is relevant.
• How this query works, an expandable breakdown of each clause in the generated query.
• Copy query to grab the raw search string.
• A Run related search button that opens the query directly in Search.

Toggle Deck legal to restrict these searches to your current deck’s format and color identity, or All cards to search the full database.

Oracle Text Rulings

Official Wizards rulings for the card, straight from Scryfall.

Tip

The three research sections only fetch their data the first time you open them, so a card’s modal stays fast even though there is a lot more to explore underneath. Once opened, the data stays loaded while you collapse and reopen.

Tip

Build the modal around what you actually use. If you never read Salt Score or Printings, hide them with the eye and the modal gets that much shorter for every card. If you compare prices constantly, drag Prices to the top and put Salt Score beside it so both fit on one row.

Tip

Hiding a section is per-device, not per-card: a lean modal on a laptop can sit alongside the full one on a desktop. See all printings will scroll you to that section if it is out of view and ensure its opened to browse.

Card Tags

ArcaneMetriX attempts to categorize cards with a tagging system for easy retrieval. This tagging system allows you to sort your deck by functionality of the cards within it by selecting “Tags” in the sort dropdown.

Note

Tags are just one section of the Card Detail Modal, which also covers prices, printings, rulings, and more.

Tip

Generated tags are checked by hand against the cards; see How Accurate Is the Intelligence? for the current numbers.

Custom Deck Tags

The tagging system allows you to customize your own tags to easily view anything that you find to be important. To edit tags, you can open the modal with the edit button in the “Tags” section of either the card detail popup (by hovering a card) or the card detail modal (left clicking a card).

While in this new modal, you can simply type any desired tag into the input field and click the “+” button to add it to the card. Similarly, if you don’t want to see an existing tag pre-generated by ArcaneMetriX, you can remove it from the “Current Tags” section. When a deck is saved, any tag edits are saved along with it.

Making Tagging Better

The app does its best to categorize cards, but it turns out Magic is complex and we can sometimes tag cards incorrectly. However, there are a few things you can do about this.

• You can remove them and add your own custom tags as described above
• You can alert admins of tags that aren’t quite right by using the “Suggest Tags” button

If attempting to do the later you can either alert admins that a tag is incorrect and should be removed by clicking the “Remove” button on any of the currently applied tags. You can also suggest a new tag by selecting a category and a tag found in that category. If a category/tag does not exist for the desired tag, feel free to get in contact with us at [info@arcanemetrix.com] with an explanation as to what should be added and why. You can also suggest new tags on our official Discord server.

Deck Statistics

Deck statistics is a tab that provides a comprehensive overview of your deck’s performance and characteristics. It is a great way to see how your deck is likely to perform and how it can be improved.

Stats Widgets

Each widget provides a different perspective on your deck’s performance and characteristics. Some of the widgets include:

• Mana Curve: Shows the distribution of mana costs in your deck.
• Color Distribution: Shows the distribution of colors in your deck.
• Card Type Distribution: Shows the distribution of card types in your deck.
• Reliability Diamond: Shows the values for the “four pillars of consistency” for decks. These are:
  • Tutors: Increases the probability of finding a specific card or combination of cards in the desired order.
  • Card Advantage: Similar to tutors, but card advantage does not guarantee the order of the cards. However, it increases the resources you have available to you.
  • Ramp: Increases the rate at which you can cast your spells.
  • Interaction: Allows for disruption of your opponents’ plans or protection of your own plans.
• Deck Archetype: Shows the general archetype of your deck based on the number of cards tagged with specific types.

And many more! We’re constantly working on ways to think about how data can be used to represent the functional characteristics of a deck, so if you have any ideas, let us know!

Tip

Hover nodes in many of the widgets to see more information about the data being displayed.

Tip

Keep the numbers open while you cut. Shift+click Stats in the rail to dock it beside the deck: every add and cut redraws the curve, the color balance and the price as you make it, so you can steer by the shape you want instead of checking after the fact. See The Desktop Workspace.

The Genome Visualization

The Genome Visualization gives users the ability to visualize the interactions between cards within their deck.

Understanding the Visualization

In the Genome Panel, you’ll see a web of connections:

• Synergy Links: These are represented by solid lines. The connected nodes are cards that have some synergy with one another. This can be many different kinds of synergies ranging from “Sacrifice Outlet” and “Death Trigger” to “Merfolk Tribal”.
• Combo Links: These are represented by dotted line. The connected nodes are the combo pieces identified.

Filtering

You can filter out synergies that you are not interested in seeing by using the Filters menu in the Genome’s command bar, which also carries the zoom control. The rest of its tools including focus mode, physics, fullscreen and PNG export can be found in the overflow menu beside it.

You can also display only the interactions you are interested in such as combos, synergies, or tutors.

Tip

Click on any node in the Genome web to focus the analysis on that specific card and its primary synergies.

Tip

The details follow the room they have. In a wide pane a focused card’s interactions open as a drawer down the right of the graph. In a narrow one (like when a Genome is docked in the side pane) they open along the bottom instead and take the full width, so the entries stay readable. Either way the graph pans so the card you focused stays clear of them.

Tip

Genome beside the deck. Shift+click Genome in the rail to dock it, then edit the deck on the right. The graph redraws as you cut and add, which makes it easy to see a cluster thin out or a new card join one. See The Desktop Workspace.

Synergy Analysis

Synergy analysis is a tab that provides a list of all synergies that have been detected in your deck.

Tip

Wondering how much to trust these? How Accurate Is the Intelligence? explains how every synergy sentence is checked and what the current measured accuracy is.

Synergy Results

All synergies are listed in a widget format where each individual widget is a card in your deck with a list of all synergies that card is involved in. Each synergy is categorized by color and type and shows a description of the synergy and why it exists.

Synergy Suggestions

Both the Synergy and Combo tabs have an ‘Explore additions’ button that changes the mode to researching new cards that might be good for a deck rather than reviewing current synergies.

Opening to this mode will show cards that have synergies with cards already in your deck. The synergy suggestion intelligence layer is experimental in the beta, so it may not be perfect. Let us know if you have any feedback!

Tip

Read the synergies beside the list. Shift+click Synergies in the rail to dock it on the left and leave the deck on the right. A cut on the right updates the pairs on the left immediately, which makes it easy to see what a card was actually holding together before you commit to removing it.

How Accurate Is the Intelligence?

ArcaneMetriX has what we call an “intelligence layer”. This is a deterministic, advanced oracle text parser that reads every card and turns it into two kinds of data you see all over the app: tags on a single card (Sol Ring is “Ramp”) and synergies between two cards in your deck (Grave Pact wants creatures to die and Viscera Seer sacrifices them). This page explains how we check those claims, what the current numbers are, and what they do and do not promise so you can decide for yourself how much weight to put on them.

Note

The numbers below are measured, not estimated. Every figure comes from a random sample that a person reviewed by hand against the actual cards, and the review ledgers are saved in the project’s repository so any single call can be reevaluated.

The current numbers

Some rows are marked defensible: the claim is true, but a stricter reader could argue with the description’s wording. For example, Skullclamp’s “Card Draw” tag is defensible because the draw needs a creature to die first. We count those in our favor in the headline, and we publish the strict figure (correct only) alongside it in the ledgers so nothing is hidden in the definition.

How a claim gets checked

The development team cannot check every claim the intelligence layer makes. The app makes about 34,000 tag claims and 68,000 synergy claims across just the the 186 preconstructed Commander decks that make up the measured population. So we try to do what a careful editor does: pull a random sample, read the cards, and mark each claim right or wrong. This is about as accurate as we can get for now, however, we are continuing to improve the system over time. If you see any tag or synergy inconsistencies, let us know!

Two rules keep this honest:

1. Every synergy is asked two questions. Is the pairing real, given the full text of both cards (including the predicate restrictions like “nontoken”, “another”, “you control”, “with power 4 or greater”)? And is the sentence we show you actually true given the data? A correct pairing explained with a wrong sentence still counts as wrong.
2. Every round uses a fresh sample with a new random seed. Re-checking the rows that prompted a fix would only prove that those rows were fixed. Drawing new rows is the only way to learn whether the rate of mistakes moved.

When an invalid row is found, we do not patch that one card. We find the shape of the mistake (say, “a card that only affects an opponent’s creatures was matched against a card in your own deck”) fix it for every card that shape touches, add a test so it cannot come back, and add a detector to the census (below) so we can count how many synergies that shape was affecting.

The road to 99.5 %

Synergy sentences are the harder claim, and they started a long way from where they are now.

The first measured sample was 86.5 % correct, and most of those errors were one template bug in how the sentence was worded. The middle of the chart shows a plateau around 93 – 95 % where fixes kept landing and the number would not move: each sample turned up different rare mistakes, so a sample could tell us what kinds of mistakes existed but not how many of each there were.

What broke the plateau was the census. Every mistake shape we had ever found was written down as an automatic detector and run over every synergy the engine produces, not a sample of them. That gave each shape an exact count, showed that the real problem was in shapes nobody had seen yet, and let us fix by size rather than by anecdote. The last stretch came from three rules that removed whole classes of error at once, most importantly: if the engine cannot verify a requirement from a card’s printed properties, it drops the synergy rather than guessing, and the sentence never states a condition the engine did not actually check.

Two consecutive fresh samples of 800 then landed exactly on 99.50 %, the target we set, and every wrong row in both was fixed before the work was closed.

At close, all original 36 mistake shapes ever found count zero across all 67,878 synergies. The 56 edges (0.08 %) still flagged belong to a few documented open shapes and none of them produced a wrong row in the last two samples.

Tags followed the same method and reached 99.95 % after nine rounds:

What these numbers do not promise

• They cover the cards we measured. The population is 186 preconstructed Commander decks which is only 6,288 distinct cards across every recent set. A card outside that set has not been sampled. We did run the engine over the full 21,952-card database to find cards it says nothing about: 60, of which 57 were lands whose mana ability appears only as reminder text (since fixed).
• Right is not the same as complete. These figures say the tags and synergies we show are true. They do not say we show every one that would be true. We plan to continue expanding coverage over various mechanics and strategies throughout Magic’s history, but turns out there are a LOT of synergies that develop over 30 years between +30,000 cards. If you see something we missed that you want to see worked on, let us know in our Discord.
• True is not the same as important. How strong a synergy is is a separate question and a separate, ongoing piece of work.
• The reviewer is fallible. Verdicts have been revised when a stricter reading showed one was wrong, always with the reason recorded in our ledgers. However, though we know a lot about Magic, we can occasionally be wrong so keep this in mind. Again, this is an ongoing process, so as we continue iterating we will push towards more synergy coverage with even higher accuracy. Your feedback helps!

If you find a wrong tag or synergy

You can remove or replace any tag on a card in your deck (see Card Tags), and every synergy explanation is written so you can check it against the cards yourself. When you find one that is wrong, tell us through Community & Feedback. A single reported card usually points at a shape of mistake, and fixing the shape is what moves these numbers.

Combo Detection

Combo detection is a tab that provides a list of all combos that can be performed with the cards in your deck.

Combo Results

This combo tab not only detects combos, but it also provides a step-by-step walkthrough of how to perform the combo, what result the combo produces, and lists the cards required for the combo.

Data on combos is provided from Commander Spellbook.

Combo Suggestions

Both the Synergy and Combo tabs have an ‘Explore additions’ button that changes the mode to researching new cards that might be good for a deck rather than reviewing current combos.

Opening to this mode will show card that provide an additional combos line with cards already in your deck.

Tip

Keep the lines beside the deck. Shift+click Combos in the rail to dock it, then cut and add on the right. A line that disappears as you cut tells you which piece was carrying it.

Opening Hand Simulator

The Test tab runs deterministic Monte Carlo samples against the current main deck. It helps identify why opening hands fail, how mulligans affect final hand quality, and which deck-composition changes are most likely to improve consistency.

Simulation Inputs

• Iterations controls the sample count used by the baseline and every what-if scenario. Values are limited to 10–9,999 to keep browser-side analysis responsive.
• Keepable Hand combines the land range with every added tag minimum. All conditions must be true for the opening seven to be keepable. Counts are limited to the seven-card opening-hand size, and the minimum land count must remain below the maximum.
• Mulligan Settings control the maximum number of paid London mulligans, the optional multiplayer free mulligan, and the turn through which natural draws are analyzed.
• Draw Goals track lands, tags, or a specific deck card by a chosen turn. These goals do not affect whether an opening hand is keepable.

Commander and Brawl decks default to one free mulligan. Other formats default to no free mulligan, and the setting can always be changed.

Results

The headline Opening Keepable % is the chance that the initial seven-card hand satisfies every keep condition. Mulligan Success is separate: it is the chance that an optimized London mulligan finds a qualifying final hand before the configured limit.

The dashboard also reports:

• Exclusive reasons that opening hands failed.
• Exact opening-land and configured-tag count distributions.
• Average mulligans, average final hand size, forced keeps, and final hand-size distribution.
• Chances of making each land drop on the play and on the draw.
• Play/draw success rates for every configured draw goal.
• Size-preserving what-if estimates for lands and configured keepable-hand tags.
• The final sampled hand, using the same interactive card previews as the rest of the app.

Modeling Assumptions

Draw analysis uses natural draws only. It does not assume ramp, tutors, scrying, special draw effects, or gameplay decisions. MDFCs use the simulator’s normal type-line land classification.

What-if results are composition estimates, not literal deck edits or legality recommendations. Each scenario keeps the library size fixed by swapping virtual matching and nonmatching slots; the saved deck is never changed. The displayed impact score equally weights the change in overall keepability and the change in the adjusted requirement’s opening-hand probability; both component deltas remain visible beside the chart.

Playtest Mode

Playtest Mode is ArcaneMetriX’s interactive tabletop for goldfishing a deck. It gives you a full battlefield, game zones, turn and resource tracking, undo/redo, and a live performance read without changing the saved decklist.

Start a Playtest

Open a deck in Builder, choose the Test subtab, then select Playtest deck.

Every new game begins with an opening-hand flow:

1. Choose a mulligan ruleset. You can use the format default, a matching rule from your Pod, a named preset, or custom draw, bottom, scry, and free-mulligan values.
2. Deal the opening hand and choose Keep this hand or Mulligan. The button tells you when a mulligan is free.
3. If the rules require bottoming or scrying, mark the required cards and confirm the choice before the battlefield opens.

Mulligans are a pre-game decision, so there is no mulligan button on the table. Use New game in the bottom action bar whenever you want to shuffle up and run the opening-hand flow again.

The Table

The battlefield fills the play area so cards have room to spread out. Command Zone, Sideboard, and Library sit on the left rail; Graveyard and Exile sit on the right. The hand fans across the bottom, with Life, Mana, Dice, and the action bar floating above it.

Use the zoom control at the top of the battlefield when you need more room or larger cards. The Actions button in the header collapses or restores the bottom action bar.

The action bar is grouped by purpose:

• Hand draws a card.
• Tokens opens token search.
• Game advances the turn, provides undo and redo, opens Deck Performance, and starts a new game.
• Board switches between Free placement and Snap placement. Free leaves a card exactly where you drop it; Snap aligns cards and stacks to the table grid.

On supported touch devices, the Board group also offers Default and Landscape orientation. Landscape expands Playtest and asks the device to stay sideways. If the browser cannot lock orientation, rotate the device manually when prompted.

Playing Cards and Using Zones

Drag cards between the hand, battlefield, graveyard, exile, command zone, and library just as you would move physical cards. Clicking a permanent taps or untaps it. Dragging from the Search panel onto the battlefield adds a test copy without adding that card to the saved deck.

Right-click a card for its context menu. Depending on the card and zone, you can open card details, attack, flip the card, clone it, add counters, deal damage, or move it to another zone. On a phone or tablet, press and hold instead.

Right-click a zone for zone-wide actions. The Library menu can draw or mill a chosen number, look at the top cards, search or shuffle the library, manifest the top card, or resolve Manifest Dread. Clicking the Library pile opens library search directly. Newly milled cards are briefly highlighted in the Graveyard so you can see what moved.

Double-faced cards show a flip control on the card image. Cards printed to be read in another orientation, such as Kamigawa flip cards or aftermath halves, show a rotate control. Battles, split cards, and Rooms are displayed in their readable orientation automatically.

Selecting, Moving, and Stacking Groups

Hold Shift and drag across the battlefield to box-select several cards. You can also hold Ctrl/Cmd or Shift while clicking cards to add or remove them from the selection.

Actions applied to one selected card apply to the selected group. You can move the group together, tap or attack with it, add counters to every card, duplicate the selection, send it to the Graveyard, or use Stack Group from the context menu. Press S to stack the current selection quickly.

Life, Mana, Dice, and Counters

The bottom drawers keep common table bookkeeping close to the hand:

• Life tracks your life, the goldfish’s life, poison, energy, experience, rad counters, and commander damage.
• Mana tracks each color in the current mana pool. Click a mana symbol to add one and right-click it to remove one.
• Dice rolls common die sizes in any quantity.

Counter badges sit directly on cards. Left-click a badge to add another counter of that type; right-click it to remove one.

Deck Performance and the Action Log

Choose Insights in the Playtest header, or the Deck Performance button in the Game group, for a live read on how the current test is going.

Deck Performance reports cards seen, land drops, curve usage, stranded cards, average hand cost, board power, spells cast, storm count, damage, cards drawn, mana efficiency, action velocity, commander casts, the odds for the next card type, and the tags still represented in the library. These are observations about the current game, not a claim that the deck is correctly built.

Select View full action log at the bottom of Deck Performance to review or export the turn-by-turn history.

Closing, Resuming, and Resetting

Playtest state is saved locally per deck, including unsaved drafts. Closing the modal or browser by accident does not reset the game; reopening Playtest restores the battlefield, zones, totals, and current turn. Undo and redo history also survives closing and reopening Playtest during the app session.

Use New game when you intentionally want to clear the table, reshuffle, and choose a new opening hand.

Important

Playtest never changes the saved decklist. Test copies, tokens, zone changes, and game actions stay inside the Playtest session.

Keyboard Shortcuts

Shortcuts are ignored while you are typing in a text or number field.

Deck Evolution

Deck Evolution is a feature that allows you to track the changes and metrics of your deck over time. It is a way to see how your deck has evolved and how it is performing. This is a PRO user feature.

How it Works

The Deck Evolution works similar to source control for code. Every time you save your deck, it tracks the differences between the current version and the previous version. You can then view the changes between versions and see how your deck has evolved over time. Just like most source controls tools, these discrete states allow you to revert to previous versions.

Advanced Tips

• Branching: You can create branches of your deck to test different strategies or tweak public versions of someone else’s deck.

• Make Public: You can make your deck public to share it with the world. This is a great way to get feedback on your deck or to share your ideas with others and allow them to use your deck as a starting point for their own.

Collection Tracking

Collection Tracking is a PRO feature for managing the cards you physically own. It tracks inventory at the printing and lot level, so a card can carry details such as set, collector number, finish, condition, quantity, storage location, and whether it is marked for trade. Copies can also be marked as proxies from the Card Detail Modal: proxied copies stay in your inventory and counts, get a dashed-outline marker beside the name, and are excluded from your collection’s market value, cost basis, and tradable value.

Free and signed-out users can still browse the app’s normal card and deck tools, but collection inventory, collection analytics, and collection-aware filters are only shown to active PRO users.

Collection Subtabs

The Collection panel is organized into four subtabs:

• Cards: Browse your owned cards using the same List, Grid, and Stack views used by the Deck subtab. You can sort by name, type, price, set and number, or physical location.
• Stats: Review collection totals, estimated value, tradable value, finish and condition distributions, most-owned cards, and cards that appear across your saved decks.
• Completion: Track set completion across the printing catalog and open a visual binder in collector-number order.
• History: Review adds, imports, quantity changes, finish and condition edits, trade-status changes, location changes, and reversible collection operations where supported.

Adding and Editing Cards

You can add cards to your collection from card search results, deck entries, or collection import. When editing an owned card, the collection lot can track:

• Quantity
• Printing or version
• Finish, including nonfoil, foil, and etched where available
• Condition
• Physical location
• Tradable status
• Acquisition metadata such as purchase price, source, date, and notes when imported or exported through CSV

Cards marked as tradable display a trade icon in collection views.

Physical Locations

Use Manage Locations from the Collection Cards menu to create storage locations such as binders, boxes, sections, rows, or pages. Locations can be nested, and sorting by Location renders those nested locations as physical containers around the cards they contain.

Location-aware sorting is useful for answering questions like:

• Which cards are in this binder?
• Which section or row contains this printing?
• Which cards are still unassigned?
• What is the value or tradable status of cards in a storage area?

Collection-Aware Deck Building

PRO collection data is available in Deck and Search workflows:

• In the Deck subtab’s filter panel, use Owned Status to show All, Owned, or Unowned cards in the current deck view.
• In Advanced Search, use the same Owned Status filter to search specifically for cards you already own or cards missing from your collection.
• Owned quantities appear on card data where available, helping you distinguish cards in inventory from cards you still need to acquire.

These filters are unavailable for signed-out and non-PRO users.

Importing and Exporting

The Collection Cards menu supports importing and exporting collection data. CSV import accepts common tracker columns for card identity and collection metadata, and CSV export preserves ArcaneMetriX collection fields for backup or transfer.

For exact supported columns, see Import & Export Formats.

Tip

Shop your own shelves while you build. Shift+click Collection in the rail to dock it beside the Builder: you can see what you already own as you fill out a list, instead of switching tabs to check. The collection’s value sits in whichever pane is wider, so the narrow one spends its bar on the view’s own controls.

Pod Pass

A Pod is your playgroup inside ArcaneMetriX. It gives a regular table one shared place for its house rules, its game history, its play schedule, and its trade offers.

Pod features are PRO-gated. Access can come from your own individual PRO membership, or from a Pod Pass — a group subscription whose owner supplies PRO access to members through four subsidized seats. Members with their own individual PRO do not consume a seat.

Signed-out and non-PRO visitors see a preview of the Pod tab rather than any pod data.

Creating or Joining a Pod

Any individual PRO member can create a pod from the Pod tab. The creator becomes the owner and controls the subscription, the membership list, and the house rules.

Owners invite people two ways:

• By account: search for an ArcaneMetriX username or email and send an in-app invitation. The invitee accepts from their notifications.
• By email: for someone who has not created an account yet.

While an invitation to a non-PRO person is pending it reserves one of the pod’s subsidized seats, so a pod cannot over-commit its four seats by inviting five people at once.

You can only belong to one pod at a time (for now).

The Hub

The Hub subtab is the pod’s overview.

Members

Each member row shows their role, whether their PRO access is individual or supplied by the Pod Pass, their status, when they joined, and their collection-sharing preference.

Collection sharing is per-member and opt-in. Turning it on lets the rest of the pod see what you own in card lookups and the Trade subtab, and lets them open your decks from Pod surfaces. It is yours to change at any time, and it only ever applies inside this pod.

House Rules

House rules are how a pod records the things it has agreed on. They are a social guardrail, not an enforcement mechanism. Nothing is blocked, but the app will tell you when a deck disagrees with them.

Five kinds of rule are supported:

• Banned cards — a card your group does not play, even where the format allows it.
• Allowed cards — a card your group does play, even where the format bans it.
• Bracket requirement — the range of Commander brackets the pod plays at, shown against the full 1–5 scale.
• Mulligan rule — how mulligans work at your table (see below).
• Custom — anything else, written in your own words.

Card rules can apply to all formats or to one specific format.

Once a card rule exists, that card is highlighted in a warning color wherever you build (in the Builder’s grid, list, and stack views, and in Search) and the card’s detail modal explains the ruling underneath its Format Legality badges. The badges themselves keep reporting the format’s real legality; the pod’s ruling is shown alongside it, never instead of it.

Mulligan Rules

The mulligan builder records the mechanics of a mulligan: how many cards you draw, scry, and bottom to start, how each of those changes per mulligan taken, and how many mulligans are free. Presets for the Original, Paris, Vancouver, and London mulligans fill the fields for you, and you can edit from there.

You can set one mulligan rule per format, so a pod that plays London for Commander and something else for its cube night can record both. A rule with no format set is the pod’s default.

Your pod’s mulligan rule drives the Opening Hand Simulator automatically: open a deck’s Test subtab and the simulator uses the rule matching that deck’s format, showing which rule it applied. You can override it for a session if you want to compare.

Note: Scry is recorded on a rule but is not yet simulated. When a rule uses scry, the simulator says so rather than quietly reporting a number that ignores it.

Scheduled Sessions

Schedule a play session with a date, time, time zone, format, and either a physical venue or an online platform. Members RSVP as Going, Maybe, or Can’t make it, and anyone going can share the decks they expect to bring.

Every session offers one-click calendar export to Google Calendar, Apple Calendar, Outlook on the web, or a downloadable .ics file. No calendar account access is required.

Sessions stay visible for seven days after they happen, with a shortcut to log the games that were played.

Game Log

The Game Log records what actually happened at the table. A minimal entry is just the players and their finishing order; everything else is optional and can be filled in when it matters.

Per game you can record the format, starting life, turn count, notes, and for Commander, a bracket target, the power level the table agreed to play at. Setting a bracket target sorts each player’s decks so matching ones are suggested first, without preventing anyone from bringing something else.

Per player you can record:

• Finishing placement, set by dragging players into order
• Deck played, including decks borrowed from another member
• Ending life total and poison counters
• Commander and partner cast counts
• The turn they were eliminated, and who eliminated them (including themselves)
• Commander damage taken, per opposing commander

Guests and Unpublished Decks

Not everyone at a table has to have an account, and not every deck has to be saved in ArcaneMetriX. The Game Log handles both:

• Guest players can be tracked by name and later linked to a real member if they join, which moves their whole game history onto the member’s record.
• Tracked decks let you log a deck that only exists in paper, and later link it to a published deck without losing the games already recorded against it.

Stats

The Stats subtab turns the game log into a picture of how your pod plays.

• Member win rates and a head-to-head matrix, including how often each player has personally knocked each other player out.
• Deck win rates, with filters by name, format, and player.
• Pod totals — games logged, average game length, eliminations, commander damage.
• Who does what — share of eliminations, average survival turn, commander damage dealt, poison handed out, and life lost.
• Finishing positions — each player’s spread of 1st through 5th-plus.
• Favourite decks — each player’s most-sleeved list.
• Pace — average turn count per format, broken down by bracket target for Commander.
• Superlatives — a title for each player, one each, based on what they do at the table.

Trade

The Trade subtab is where the pod’s cards move.

• Pod wishlists — what everyone is looking for, browsable with the same List, Grid, Stack, sort, and filter tools as Builder and Collection.
• Collections and trade binders — every shared printing, with a “tradable only” filter. Private details such as notes, acquisition costs, and storage locations are never shared.
• Recent wants — each member’s five most recent wishlist additions.
• Ready to match — potential player-to-player trades, ordered by approximate value, with a note on how close each side is.

Only members who have turned on collection sharing appear in the collection browser. Value estimates are a starting point for a conversation, not an appraisal; you should confirm condition and price together before trading.

Leaving and Removing Members

Leaving a pod, or being removed from one, splits your data in two:

• Your logged games stay with the pod. A shared game log is the group’s history, and removing past results would corrupt every win rate and head-to-head record built on them.
• Your personal data leaves with you. Your decks can no longer be opened from any Pod surface, and your collection disappears from the Trade subtab.

Former members remain listed as inactive so historical stats still resolve to a name. A pod owner can additionally choose to erase a former member’s play data entirely, which removes their games from the pod’s history and drops them from the member list.

If you are the owner of a pod backed by a Pod Pass, you cannot leave without transferring it; the oldest eligible individual-PRO member becomes owner.

ArcaneMetriX Games

ArcaneMetriX Games is a set of free daily Magic: The Gathering puzzles, separate from the deckbuilding app. Open it from the Games action button on the Home page, or from Games in your user menu.

A free account is all you need to play! Sign in to track your scores and streaks.

Chain Forge

Each puzzle is a chain of card names where the last word of one card starts the name of the next. Some entries in the chain are revealed as clues; you fill in the hidden ones as fast as you can.

• Scored up to 10,000 points, weighted by how quickly you complete the chain.
• The timer starts the moment you click Begin Puzzle. It pauses if you navigate away, but it never resets so you can always finish a puzzle you started earlier that day.

Specter

A hidden card is described through up to seven progressive clues, revealed one at a time. Type a guess after each clue.

• Guessing correctly on an earlier clue scores higher; the formula is (8 - clues used) x 1,000.
• Guesses are checked as you submit them, so you always know immediately whether you found the card.

Art Sleuth

A card’s illustration is shown zoomed in and gradually zooms out across five stages. Guess the card name after each stage.

• Guessing correctly on an earlier stage scores higher; the formula is (6 - stage used) x 2,000.

Leaderboard

The Leaderboard tab ranks players separately for Chain Forge, Specter, and Art Sleuth, plus a Combined ranking across all three. Toggle between Daily standings and All-Time totals.

Playing Past Puzzles

By default, you can only play the current day’s puzzle for each game. PRO members get a calendar on each game’s start screen for jumping back to any previous day’s puzzle they haven’t finished. Scores from past puzzles still count toward your all-time leaderboard total.

Tip

Chain Forge, Specter, and Art Sleuth all reset at the start of a new day (Pacific time), so there’s a fresh puzzle to solve every day.

User Settings

User settings are available for users who have an account (Free or PRO) that are logged in. These can be accessed by clicking the user name/icon in the top right corner of the application and selecting any of the setting options listed.

Profile

The profile tab is where you can view and edit your profile information. This profile information is used to identify you in the application only when you have made deck information public. Tell other users all about yourself and your playstyle!

Billing & Subscription

The billing & subscription tab is where you can manage your subscription plan. This includes upgrading or downgrading your subscription plan, as well as updating your payment information. All payment information is handled securely through Stripe and will redirect you to their site to complete your transaction or update your subscription information.

Application Settings

The application settings tab is where you can manage settings specific to how you experience the application. This includes things like the color theme of the application, card preview image language, preferred currency, and more.

Account & Privacy

The account & privacy tab is where you can view and manage your account information. Here, you can change your password or default email address. You can also delete your account or download all data associated with your account. This will provide a JSON file with all of your data, including your decks, collections, and saved searches.

Community & Feedback

We’re building ArcaneMetriX to be the best deck analysis and playtesting tool available, but we can’t do it alone. Your feedback, suggestions, and bug reports are crucial for making this happen.

How to Reach Us

• Discord: Join our official Discord server to chat with the developers and other users. Request features, report bugs, or just hang out.
• Email: Send us an email about anything at [info@arcanemetrix.com].

Note

Please include as much detail as possible when reporting a bug, including steps to reproduce it and any relevant screenshots or deck lists.