MTG: Best Red/White Deck Archetypes

Boros (red/white) is one of the two-color combinations available in Magic: The Gathering. They have appeared across many formats at various levels of playability, with some coming and going from the metagame.

Boros has the capability to play out very explosive turns, dealing massive damage very quickly. Often, it is a very combat-focused color pairing, with a lot of its best archetypes relating to the combat phase. Boros’ biggest weakness comes with card advantage. While it can get aggressive, Boros suffers from a low amount of good card draw, which can lead to you stalling out in the later game.

Updated November 30, 2023 boy Johnny Garcia: Boros has had a big boost in power thanks to set releases such as Wilds Of Eldraine and The Lost Caverns Of Ixalan. Although in Commander it is looked at as one of the weakest two-color combinations, in other formats like Pioneer and Legacy it stands as some of the best decks in the format. With so many new set releases, the power of archetypes rises and gain more consistent toys to play with. In addition, new sets release more cards that are injected into the card pool which can create entirely new archetypes that stand with the strongest ones in the Boros combination.

17 Tapping Matters

Idle Artifacts Into Value

In Lost Caverns Of Ixalan, an entirely new archetype was created in tapping matters. This takes advantage of tapping artifacts and creatures on the battlefield to gain useful effects. These usually put +1/+1 counters on themselves, or in the case of Caparocti Sunborn it can lead to discovering a card from your library to cast for free or get it into your hand.

There are plenty of artifacts that do not need to do anything once they hit the battlefield. Since you don’t need to tap them for their effects, you can tap them for the tapping matters cards to get more mileage out of them.

Sample Decks: Caparocti Sunborn Commander, Boros Artifacts

16 Discover

Discover New Combos

Discover is a mechanic introduced in Lost Caverns Of Ixalan where you exile cards from the top of your library until you exile a card with a specific mana value, and you can either cast it without paying its mana cost, or put it into your hand. Although every color can discover, Boros has access to the highest number of cards that can discover.

This mechanic created multiple combo decks that utilize clone effects to keep discovering creatures until you have a giant battlefield of creatures. These combos either burn the opponent with Quintorius Kand or give all the creatures haste to win on the turn the combo starts.

Sample Decks: Quintorius Kand Combo, Discover Evolution Combo

15 Treasure

Get Rich With Tokens

Red is one of the best colors when it comes to creating Treasure tokens. White has support for generic artifacts (as well as a Treasure token generator in Smothering Tithe), which allows the two colors to go hand-in-hand when it comes to using it as a main strategy.

While Boros struggles with card draw and ramp, Treasure decks help to solve the latter problem by creating sources of mana. At higher mana value, cards like Big Score and Unexpected Windfall both help to get you card into your hand as well.

Sample Decks: Duke Ulder Ravengard Commander, Boros Ramp

14 Blink

Blink And You’ll Get A Powerful Win

Blink decks are ones that want to temporarily exile their creatures to return them to the battlefield to get more usage out of their enter-the-battlefield effects. The archetype exists in multiple formats such as Commander and Pauper.

Ephemerate is a staple as you get to cast it for one mana and then for free on your next turn thanks to its rebound. There are plenty of strong blink targets such as Felidar Guardian, which has plenty of combos with it, and Spirited Companion to have a constant source of card draw.

Sample Decks: Boros Venture, Feather, The Redeemed Commander

13 Historic

Gain Historic Wins

Historic refers to spells that are either artifacts, legendary, or Sagas. These are all present in Boros, with most of the historic support being on the white side of the color pairing. However, red has access to plenty of more artifacts that can benefit from historic support.

Historic decks often are good at controlling the board state and generating card advantage. Thanks to how many strong pieces of historic spell cards there are in the Boros color pairing, Historic decks can snowball rather quickly. They have a fair bit of recursion, allowing them to recover from board wipes and removal more easily.

Sample Decks: Boros Legends, Cadric, Soul Kindler Commander

12 Legends

A Legendary Style

There are plenty of strong Boros legends. This refers to the legendary creature typing, and Boros has plenty of ways to cheat them out and keep them protected. One of the easiest ways to do so is with Djeru And Hazoret, which benefits from playing a deck with only legends.

Legend decks have plenty of solid cards to pull from, especially in Boros colors, such as Loran Of The Third Path, Aurelia, The Warleader, and Yoshimaru, Ever Faithful. There are powerful legend cards both at high and low mana costs, making Legend decks very strong.

Sample Decks: Boros Legendary Creatures, Djeu And Hazoret Commander

11 Convoke

Turn One Creature Into Dozens

Boros Convoke suddenly became an archetype thanks to Knight-Errant Of Eos from Phyrexia: March Of The Machine. The convoke archetype is all about flooding the battlefield with easy-to-cast creatures that often also come with token ones. This can then be used to cast much larger spells that have convoke that lets you use creatures to pay for their mana costs.

The two biggest cards for this are Knight-Errant Of Eos and Venerated Loxodon, the latter of which gives a stat boost to all the creatures it convoked. With the right openings, Boros Convoke can win in just a few turns.

Sample Decks: Boros Convoke, Boros Tokens

10 Tokens

Go-Wide With Creatures

One of Boros’ biggest strengths is the plethora of token enablers they have. They are mostly on the white side of the color pairing, where there are plenty of cards that can create tokens. Meanwhile, the red half of the equation helps to give your creatures boosts to deal out massive damage in just one turn.

Boros has a ton of cards that offer battle tricks that give extra keywords like double strike from Blade Historian or prevent combat damage along with giving menace with Iroas, God of Victory. There are plenty of ways to cheat out creatures with tokens as well, most notably Winota, Joiner Of Forcers.

Sample Decks: Boros Dogs, Winota, Joiner Of Forces Commander

9 Initiative

Venture Into A Win

Initiative was a mechanic released in Commander Legends: Battle For Baldur’s Gate that allows you to venture into the undercity where you get a new effect each time you start your turn with it. You can only lose it if you take battle damage. While this is common in Commander, in other formats it is much easier to keep the Initiative.

This is why it is so strong in one-on-one formats, entering Legacy as a top deck. It’s all about turboing out cards that give you the Initiative and keeping it by controlling the game with cards like Thalia, Guardian Of Thraben and Archon of Emeria.

Sample Decks: Boros Initiative

8 Reanimator

Keep Creatures Around

Though black is generally known as the color, white also has plenty of options for it. Cards like Karmic Guide, Late To Dinner, and Breathe Of Life. The red part of Boros reanimator allow you to dig through your deck and set up your graveyard by drawing and discarding cards with cards such as Faithless Looting, Thrill Of Possibility, and Big Score.

White and red both have powerful creatures with high-casting costs that reanimator spells help to cheat out with little mana investment such as Aurelia, the Warleader and Gisela, Blade of Goldnight.

Sample Decks: Velomachus Lorehold Commander, Vikya, Scorching Stalwart Commander

7 Auras

Enchanting Combat Tricks

White is the main color of Auras, allowing it to shine as a Boros archetype. Aura decks are built around stacking Auras onto creatures, usually just one or two to make them massive threats that can take an opponent out in just one turn. There are white creatures that support Auras well, allowing you to draw cards whenever you cast them to get around one of Boros’ biggest weaknesses.

There are plenty of fantastic options, with white Auras offering protection and red Auras letting you gain powerful abilities such as trample and Treasure production. There are many Boros cards with heroic effects as well, allowing their stats to grow whenever they’re targeted by a spell, something that all Auras have to do.

Sample Decks: Wyleth, Soul of Steel Commander, Tiana, Ship’s Caretaker Commander

6 Burn

Direct To Face

Red is often the color of burn, and when mixing it with white, you have one of Boros’ best archetypes. By adding in white to a burn mix, you get access to more sideboard options to help ensure your game plan never gets interrupted. Boros Burn is a staple of budget Modern decks, with Boros giving access to Boros Charm, Lightning Helix, and Path To Exile.

Thanks to having red, Boros Burn decks can easily stack effects that double, if not triple the amount of damage dealt by your permanents and spells. This makes a normally rather average burn spell spectacular, capable of acting as burn damage to an opponent’s life, or used as removal. White will also give you access to enchantment removal, something that red normally can not take advantage of.

Sample Decks: Modern Boros Burn, Firesong and Sunspeaker Commander

Never Stop Attacking

Boros is generally a heavily combat-focused color pairing, being one of the things it excels at. As such, Extra Combat decks are a fantastic archetype for it as you get to utilize the powerful combat effects that Boros has access to. Boros is the color pairing that has the most cards that grant extra combats. In some cases, there are even creatures that trigger the extra combat simply by attacking.

Boros decks can easily put down permanents that lead to more damage being dealt and grant indestructible to attacking creatures. You can even prevent your opponents from playing spells on your turn, making it even harder to interact with your extra combat triggers. With how many Boros cards have good abilities like double strike, vigilance, and trample, it’s not hard to deal massive damage, potentially enough to take an opponent out of the game in just one turn.

Sample Decks: Velomachus Turns, Aurelia, the Warleader Commander

4 Heroic

Pump Up Creatures

Heroic is an archetype that is built around the heroic ability. Heroic will give an effect whenever a creature is targeted by a spell. Many of the creatures played have a low casting cost, with the archetype built around flooding the battlefield with them so you can take advantage of the triggers right away. Boros is the color-pairing with the most access to powerful heroic enablers.

Feather, the Redeemed is the face of what the decks want to be doing, and allows you to recycle all the spells you just cast. Other powerful cards include Tenth District Legionnaire and Mirrorwing Dragon. The spells in a Heroic deck often have a low casting cast, seldom costing more than two. These generally give powerful boosts such as trample or a lot of attack. With the right permanents on the field, it can even be easily recycled and reused repeatedly.

Sample Decks: Feather Heroic, Tenth District Legionnaire Heroic

3 Artifact

Utilize Utility

Artifacts in Boros got a big boost with the introduction of Lorehold in the Strixhaven set, giving the color-pairing plenty of tools for a formidable deck built around them. While the artifact theme in Boros isn’t explored in too many formats, it’s a very strong one in Commander where plenty of powerful ones are playable.

Boros has access to a ton of artifact support cards, capable of recycling artifacts that may get removed or sacrificed to continue accumulating value. Thanks to how much artifact recursion Boros has, it’s easy to take advantage of plenty of artifacts with strong enter the battlefield or leaves the battlefield triggers. There are plenty of commanders, such as Osgir, the Reconstructor to bolster up the artifact archetype in the Commander format.

Sample Decks: Osgir, the Reconstructor Commander, Zabaz, the Glimmerwasp Commander

2 Vehicle

Drive To Victory

Vehicles are one of the best archetypes that Boros can support. Thanks to the release of Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty, white has gotten a ton of Vehicle support that makes crewing vehicles incredibly easy. Thanks to red’s synergy with artifacts, both Vehicles and generic ones, it allows Boros Vehicles to truly shrine as a star Boros archetype.

With new Vehicles being introduced in nearly every set, the power of Boros Vehicles only grows. Boros has access to many synergies with cards that want to be tapped, turning crewing a Vehicle into an advantage. Cards such as Hotshot Mechanic and Astor, Bearer of Blades help to crew with just one creature, letting Vehicles become threats while working around the downside of having to tap a lot of creatures to do so.

Sample Decks: Astor, Bearer of Blades Commander, Depala, Pilot Exemplar Commander

1 Equipment

Come Prepared To Battle

Equipment is one of the staple archetypes when it comes to Boros. In Commander, it’s one of the most popular themes, and saw some success in formats as well. There is a plethora of powerful Equipment support in Boros, with many of the best allowing you to equip them to creatures while paying little to no mana. Cards like Puresteel Paladin, Bruenor Battlehammer, and Stoneforge Mystic all help support the archetype, allowing Equipment that would be a hefty investment to instead barely hurt your mana pool at all.

Thanks to how good Boros is at combat, it can easily take advantage of stat boosts that Equipment provides. They can help them with survivability, as well as damage output, and in certain formats, one Equipment is enough to take an opponent out of the game.

Sample Decks: Bruenor Battlehammer Commander, Koll, the Forgemaster Commander