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Open all six booster packs in your Prerelease Kit, build a 40-card deck using the strongest cards you can reliably cast, and add basic lands to complete it. A two-color deck with about 17 lands is a practical starting point; choose colors and adjust the land count to fit your actual pool.
What counts as your Sealed card pool?
Your pool is the cards from six unopened booster packs, plus any basic lands you choose to add. The cards opened from the packs that do not make your deck form your sideboard. Wizards’ Sealed Deck Format page sets a 40-card minimum and permits any number of basic Plains, Islands, Swamps, Mountains, and Forests, including lands you did not open.
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Prerelease Pack contents vary by set. As one dated example, Wizards’ 2026 The Hobbit Prerelease Guide lists six Play Boosters, one traditional foil promo card, a deck box, and a spindown die. It says the local game store supplies basic lands for the event; do not assume every set’s kit has identical contents.
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1. Open and sort the cards
Open all six boosters, then sort the cards by color. Keep multicolor cards, colorless cards, and lands in separate groups so you can see how much depth each color has and what mana fixing is available. This sorting approach appears in Wizards’ set-specific Prerelease guidance.
#1 Best Overall
- Contents: 6 Magic: The Gathering | Marvel Super Heroes Play Boosters Each Play Booster contains 14 Magic: The Gathering cards May contain these cards: MSH 1–384; MAR 41–100 1–4 cards of rarity rare o
2. Find threats and answers
Identify cards that can meaningfully win a game: powerful creatures or spells that can take over if left unanswered. Then look for removal and other interaction that can deal with opposing threats. Do not choose colors based only on one exciting rare; count the playable cards around it and consider whether the deck can develop at multiple points on the mana curve. Wizards’ general Sealed strategy article and its Foundations Prerelease Guide both emphasize balancing threats, answers, and curve.
3. Choose colors you can cast
Two colors are a useful default because they often provide enough playables without making the mana base difficult. Before adding a third color, check whether your pool has fixing—such as lands or other cards that help produce the needed colors—and whether the splash is worth the strain on consistency. A powerful card you cannot reliably cast may be less useful than a slightly weaker card in your main colors. There is no universal best color pair: the right build depends on the cards and fixing you opened.
If two builds both look viable, compare their threats, removal and other interaction, number of playable cards, mana consistency, and ability to affect the early game. These are useful evaluation dimensions, not an official scoring formula.
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4. Start with 40 cards and tune the lands
Forty cards is the minimum, and Wizards recommends exactly 40 for most Sealed builds so your strongest cards are more likely to appear. A standard first draft is 17 lands and 23 nonland cards. For a two-color deck, 9 lands of one color and 8 of the other is a reasonable starting split; shift the balance toward the color with heavier colored-mana requirements, while accounting for any fixing.
Seventeen is a guideline, not a rule. A low-curve deck with mana help may function with fewer lands, while a slower deck or one with several expensive spells may need the baseline or more. Let your curve, color demands, and fixing determine the final count. Wizards’ Foundations Prerelease Guide gives the 17-land, 23-nonland setup as general advice, not a requirement.
5. Check the curve and final list
Make sure the deck can make useful plays early and continue developing instead of relying on several expensive cards. One sample curve in Wizards’ Foundations guide, alongside 17 lands, is:
Rank #3
- Contents: 6 Magic: The Gathering | Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Play Boosters Each Play Booster contains 14 Magic: The Gathering cards May contain these cards: TMT 1–252; PZA 1–20 1–5 cards o
| Mana value | Sample number of cards |
|---|---|
| 1 | 1–2 |
| 2 | 7–8 |
| 3 | 5–6 |
| 4 | 3–4 |
| 5 | 2–3 |
| 6 | 0–1 |
This is a template, not a format rule or a substitute for card quality. A strong card may justify a departure from the counts; the point is to check that your list has plays at different stages of the game.
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What goes in the deck and sideboard?
Register at least 40 cards, including lands. Everything from your opened pool that you do not use in the main deck is part of your sideboard. Basic lands added to finish the deck are not limited by the contents of the six boosters. Review the final list for cards you cannot cast consistently, an overly crowded high end, or too few early plays before registering it.
How to use a Prerelease Kit as your pool
The kit supplies the boosters that form your pool; the exact non-booster contents depend on the set. For example, the 2026 Hobbit guide lists a foil promo, deck box, and spindown die in addition to six Play Boosters, with basic lands provided by the local store. Check the guide for the specific set you are playing rather than treating that example as a universal kit inventory.
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