It depends on what you wanna do with the game. Play constructed? FNM? Commander?
You can go to the store and simply tell your story and ask for the newcomer's decks. Possibly all five. The new decks actually have cards you can use long term besides lands, so that's a start without dropping a penny. Drafting (and raredrafting and picking leftovers after the games) is also a good way to "justify" spending money on packs. You get fun, experience, and cards in one go.
If you can budget yourself, you can just buy the singles and proxy the rest/use alternative cards if doable till you get the deck if constructed is your plan. Keld Mono red for standard seems pretty good for the buck and probably will be doable after rotation. You could morph it to wizards if Izzet gets decent cards. Mono blue and mono green also seem potentially Ok after rotation. Probably not that good because the next sets will be multicolor focused, but you can slowly grind your way to a decent tricolor deck later.
Modern actually can be cheaper in the long term even if the deck is half a grand. Still lot of decks are actually cheaper than some of the most expensive decks in Standard and pretty decent overall. Storm, mono red, Soul Sisters, 8wackers are all $250 or less. Storm could be even cheaper if you use a budget land base and sideboard options. If you are fine with janky but fun options, you may find lot of sub-150 decks as well.
If you just want casual fun, just look for a commander precon (it doesn't need to be the newer ones, some of the old ones are still affordable) and slowly customize them to your liking.
People like Honor Basquiat are borderline disingenuous when he/she doesn't understand why people are against the RL and calling them contrarian. Instead of just trying understand the reason of some of the arguments, he/she warps and downplay it so badly and ignore the complete fair ones.
The argument of just 600 cards being in it and people being obsessed over it would be fine if Legacy was not a real competitive format and some of the cards in the reserve list are essential with no proper substitute. Saying dual lands aren't essential is laughable at best, dishonest even. Imagine if these cards weren't in reserve list? Legacy could be more widespread. Even that absurd argument about P9, he or she ignores that Vintage is also a super fun format that anyone who could have any access to it with real cards would jump to it in a heartbeat.
Also reprints don't mean reprint it to death and introduce them to formats where they don't belong, just like any reprint ever done. It's really nerving the way that poster ignores reality. P9 if it was ever reprinted in some alternate reality could be introduced as prizes for PT/worlds, so not many copies would be in the wild per year. Legacy reprints could be done in a similar fashion to Eternal masters.
Also, I dislike people saying that most of RL are garbage anyway as argument. Casuals would love to be able to play some of that "garbage". They are unique and deserve to be played as well. With the buyouts, not even hot garbage like Ramirez del Pietro will be at normal reach for casuals eventually. I imagine some people would like to play with it for laughs, but without paying overpriced premium for it.
Bottom line the real argument is should this be a game first or a collectible first. Can a balance be struck? I'm a collector first and I'd be ok with the RL gone. It served its purpose, it doesn't serve its original purpose now because buyouts just warp the market in an insidious way.
I understand the reason and history of the RL. Some cards like P9 should stay as a relic of the past and become antique items basically. However, some cards have no reason to be there (like retroactively adding cards from "newer" sets like Urza block). Intelligently done reprints don't hurt the value of collections.
The RL isn't a monolithic thing. It was revised a couple times. Sadly it become unnecessarily strict. I think at least the functional reprint rule could be easily abolished. It could piss off some powerful collectors, but eventually I think they would accept it as not that harmful to their "investment". Lot of cards are super valuable not because they are playable or are in the RL per se. Just look at Alpha/Beta reprints.
Letting functional reprints to be made could also make people stop bugging about the RL.
Alternatively, just banning most of the playable RL cards from Legacy or even Commander would be also a "solution", but a bad and distasteful one as well.
Sadly, our opinions matter too little in this matter. Even if 99% of the playerbase were in unison against the RL and were actively voicing it would not cause much change to it. People/organizations with real influence over WotC are the ones who pull the string and they favor status quo for RL matter. I don't see much shake up in this matter anytime ever.
I collect first and play second. I like to collect complete sets. Sometimes I get months of break from playing and I live in an area where I can find plenty of places to play. It's hard to get time to play as you get older and involved in other aspects of life. As collecting, it doesn't take that much time and it's basically collecting stamps, figures, games, or whatever. It's a different pleasure, but I'm content enough for that.
Yeah, it is a big money sinker. You may justify it as an investment (with dubious returns and liquidity) or something that you may leave at any time. I don't think it's a (total) waste of money per se thou, well at least compared to other hobbies where I will never get any return back ever. At very least, my cards have some value. Well at least that's how I rationalize it.
I did encounter similar people in Tracking, Soccer, and Basketball. They may be slightly different in unpleasant manners compared to other hobbies like gaming, but toxic people are everywhere. Actually I find less toxic people in real life MTG than other gaming and non-gaming activities. I guess I'm just lucky or I got good at avoiding these people.
The behavior described as an example why MTG community is toxic doesn't seem like a big deal or even unique within it. I have seen way worse behaviors than that (within and outside MTG) and in some cases borderline criminal. People take their hobbies anywhere more serious than needed. It's basically a big part of their identity and it may be very unpleasant. However, If you can't stand this, I think it's quite hard to delve deep in any hobby that requires a lot of interaction with other people. It's just people being people.
I have all cards from Revised up to now (and a little bit of older sets as well), so my collection is ginormous. I just use one wall with binders organized by block/set. For commons, I use card house boxes, also organized by block/set. Sadly, I think this is the best way to organize when you get this big of a collection.
In the past I would use shoeboxes or those old fancy premium boxes like they release during Visions I think and just separate by color and rarity. After a while it starts to get hard to keep track which cards you have and how many do you have and the problem can get worse if you lend/borrow cards as well. Also, no more moving your collection anywhere for me. An acquaintance uses a couple 5000 storage boxes to move his collection of playable cards.
Maybe give the second player a free mulligan. It's not really a tangible advantage in some cases as the player may get a good initial hand anyway, but it is some insurance for players going second.
Combo decks usually wanna go first, but with a free mulligan, maybe they would be more incentivized to go second.
You could go to any local game store and get free decks for newcomers. They are super simple to play and folks there probably will be glad to guide you.
If you don't wanna venture in those places yet, duel decks are fine value and entertainment wise. It's not a bad start as well.
Yes, you should be able to ask for welcome decks. You could explain your situation and the store may give you extras. Some game stores may be scummy and charge for that, so avoid these ones. If you find a good LGS that helps you with that (and maybe some locals donate draft shafts and bulk cards, I do occasionally), you could buy booster box from them and organize drafts (well probably online would be cheaper, but you know give and take).
Now, I don't know how highschool handles club activities, so I can't help with that. In university I had a playgroup of 4 ~ 8 people. We had our spot and official time although it wasn't really a club. We occasionally would have drafts and small tournaments with penalties as "prize". Ideally everyone should be on similar spending power. Everyone could contribute for the draft pool and you could discuss on how to share the cards afterwards. Just having a space and time should be more than enough in the beginning.
Yeah, if the set has staples, it may seem like a good bet overall. However, you really need to be mindful about print runs. I have some KTK sealed products (just a booster box and half a case of fat pack now) and they were "bad" "investments" overall (well compared to pre-RTR). They have fetches for pete's sake! An acquaintance of mine was worse off with heavy amounts of RTR booster boxes. I can't imagine Kaladesh, BFZ, and AKH being any different from these in 5 years.
Unless you bet in an explosion of playerbase, might as well bet on some of the more expensive products as they would grow much better in that situation plus they will appreciate much better if the playerbase grows slowly and steadily or just stagnate.
Of course, if you find a good offer like very close price to what stores pay, sure, it's not a bad deal, but I have a hunch that they will need to sit in the dark for a really long time before the time to move them comes. Space and tying up your money into these products are real opportunity costs. I kinda regret not stopping hoarding sealed products after RTR. It's not like I "lost" money, but I didn't really gain something back for just sitting on them after 5 years. I will still sit on them more 5 years probably (at these rates) before thinking in moving them. After all in 5 years something crazy could happen. WW3 could start and MTG becomes the worse thing to put your money on or Arena triple the paper playerbase and all of a sudden BFZ boxes are 500 bucks a pop or it's just about the same and print runs are so high that the box just jumps from $80 to $120 in 5 years.
I would say I had more success with fat packs that sealed booster boxes. However, that was pre-KTK. Print runs are too big to make a nice returns on them if you are using this as investment.
For instance, I made insane returns from Zendikar sealed products. I got a case of RoE fatpack for 25ish a pop. I unloaded them when they were 150ish. They are like way more than that, but I got a really nice return anyway. You can't have this kinda jump in short period anymore. I still sitting on KTK fat packs. They are about 60 and I got them around 30. It seems like a good return, but it's not. There is a cost to unload them and it's been so many years already (and they have fetches). I imagine most of the fat packs will grow slower or similar rate (there are exceptions like BFZ fat pack, but it was the exception than the rule). KTK booster boxes fare worse than fat packs, so I will assume all booster boxes are as bad.
In this case, it may have less returns than regular investments right now. However, if your capital is small, it's fine to invest in boxes, but unless the playerbase has another boom similar to Innistrad/RTR era, I don't think there is that much room for growth. The only thing boxes have going for them is you probably won't "lose" money unless MTG suddenly dies. You just weight the probabilities of each of those event. Just try get boxes for around $85 maximum and you should be fine...I think.
Personally I would avoid sets with poor print quality and no staple. Unless people in the future have a fetish for bad printings, I think they aren't good long term. Ixalan block is a big no for this reason. No fetch like cards, no lottery, no nothing. The only set I really like from the today's time is Eldritch Moon. It has lot of potential cards that could explode in price and the print run may not be that large compared to sets of this era. BFZ/Kaladesh block may be OK because of Expedition/Masterpieces. Amonkhet block is kinda iff, it's almost as bad as BFZ block and people aren't exactly in love with Incantations. It may change in the future, but its printing quality sux (printing quality issues probably started in Kaladesh to be fair).
Still just look at boxes from RTR era. They have shocklands and prices didn't move at all or moved at glacial pace. For a long time you could get them for $80 during bargain sales. It's been almost over 5 years already. If you bought them around $75, you probably lost money overall (as shipping and fees would eat profits). I imagine most of the sets post BFZ era would move at similar pace. Yeah masterpiece kinda cards may change the equation, but I probably would bet on not a factor to be safe.
As for Alpha Investments videos. They are insightful. However, you need to watch them with his prospective x yours and it will/may be vastly different. As with any speculation, anyone will be wrong/right about things eventually. As long you try to understand why things happens, his videos can be useful not so much on what you should invest in, but on how he sees the market flow and his actions based on that. He is there to entertain us (and himself) and show his point of view on things and think for yourself.
Well, nowadays card back isn't an issue, DFC kinda proves that. People play with sleeves anyway. The only problem is making sure it's opaque.
However, I dislike changes just because of trying to revitalize logos and so on. There is no need for that, specially if that is the proposal.
If they need to change it because of counterfeit measure or maybe even insert microchips, that'd be a reason. Maybe not a good reason, but at least a reason for it. Just changing it just to have a freshier looking logo is just frivolous.
Yeah, dino can be OK as long they don't drop banner or anthem. I finally got a mythic WC. I ended up making a scab god. Loving it.
Game seems lighter as well. Not that slow. With the coming April update, I'm getting more optimist about the game. Not satisfied, but definitively more positive overall.
I'm having a somewhat success with Crested Sunmare as well. I made a BW token/life gain/semi vampire shell, not many WC spent on it. You just need to save your removal as much as possible while hoping they won't see the Sunmare coming. It even stand toe to toe against a Scarab God (well just one, dunno about two). I have Liliana as back up and get it back if it gets destroyed.
I wonder what folks here are brewing in Arena. As people know, the reward system is a bit slow paced, so you really need to focus your resources in one deck. At least the first one. Maybe you can work a second deck along side the first one depending on your pulls.
I started working on UB control as I opened Search for Azcanta and Liliana and I was working on UB before the wipe. I like the archetype, but if you wanna grind, you may wanna skip this one. Games gonna take long. I kinda started to jump to Mono Red, but sadly I wasted most of my WCs on UB already.
Some opinions on each options:
UB Control
Pro: the precon comes with a good base for this deck. The real deck needs a lot of cards for all rarities, but you can get by alright with a lot of 1 to 2 ofs, specially your finishers. You don't need 2~3 Scarab Gods to make it function. Still you probably need at least 2 Vraska's Contempt and 1 extra big threat like a PW or Scarab God to get enough edge in the mirror. Most of the cards you use your WCs on are useful in other archetypes.
Cons: games gonna be glacial paced specially the mirror. Although super fun, grinding will be a chore with this deck.
Mono Red
Pro: I think it's the best for grinding. You can mix with white or green while your card pool develop. You do need a good amount of uncommons. Rares and mythics like Earthshaker, Glorybringer, and Hazoret greatly help, but they aren't needed that much. I think you get more mileage for your commons and uncommons compared to other options.
Cons: some of the cards aren't really usable in other archetypes or be rebanned like Ferocidon and Ruins, so maybe you should avoid prioritizing them. Just having 2ofs may not cut it, you have to go deep. Still Lightning Strike, Abrade, and Glorybringer should be fine.
Approach
Pro: I think there are so many ways you can build this one. You can be UW, mono W, or even a wacky RW. I believe you can get away with just 1 to 2 of lot of key cards initially and still function like a full Approach deck.
Cons: I think you need too many of the rares if you want the full deck. Not having access to Fumigate and have to use suboptiomal options like Hour of spells as your sweeper hurts the deck a bit.
GW
Pro: I'm only highlighting it because the precon actually gives a lot of 2-of rares and they can be pretty powerful. You could go full token/embalm/eternalize. You could morph it to UW version. It's fun as well.
Cons: Probably not that competitive in the long run.
BW Vamp
Pro: I think it has a decent enough matchup vs UB and Mono Red overall depending on how you make it. You can skimp the rares a bit.
Cons: sadly the precon is horrendous. You really need a lot of uncommons to make it to work properly. It lacks even basic commons. Any WC used here will be too focused for Vamp. Maybe the anthem could be reusable in cat deck or some of the weenies in an aura deck.
Merfolk and dinos seem like trap to sink your WCs in. They aren't strong enough in the long run and the precons are a joke. Also the cards don't work that well with other decks. Maybe if you started dino, you can jump to GR monsters, but that deck needs so many rares and mythics to be really a thing.
GB Explore is actually semi decent and don't need too much to be decent. Probably not good in the long run, but you could move some of the pieces to other decks like Sultai.
Pirates, well any version of this tribe is garbage and the precons are even worse. It could be a base for RB aggro. However, the omissions from Kaladesh really hurt this archetype.
GP Gift may also be an interesting option, maybe UB version can be very good and don't lose much from lack of Kaladesh compared to UW or RW versions. It seems a bit narrow.
Aura even without Sram could be a good budget beatdown deck. Fast for grinding. You could just invest all your commons and uncommons into it and save rares and mythic WCs for your real deck. If you decide to invest in Legion's Landing, you could jump to token or vampires later. It seems a promissing option.
Cycling deck around Draken Haven could be a thing as well. You can mix with Approach. The only problem is I think it won't work with just 2ofs or even 3ofs.
Mono Green is surprisingly powerful, but at the same time it's a little heavy on rares and mythics.
You can go to the store and simply tell your story and ask for the newcomer's decks. Possibly all five. The new decks actually have cards you can use long term besides lands, so that's a start without dropping a penny. Drafting (and raredrafting and picking leftovers after the games) is also a good way to "justify" spending money on packs. You get fun, experience, and cards in one go.
If you can budget yourself, you can just buy the singles and proxy the rest/use alternative cards if doable till you get the deck if constructed is your plan. Keld Mono red for standard seems pretty good for the buck and probably will be doable after rotation. You could morph it to wizards if Izzet gets decent cards. Mono blue and mono green also seem potentially Ok after rotation. Probably not that good because the next sets will be multicolor focused, but you can slowly grind your way to a decent tricolor deck later.
Modern actually can be cheaper in the long term even if the deck is half a grand. Still lot of decks are actually cheaper than some of the most expensive decks in Standard and pretty decent overall. Storm, mono red, Soul Sisters, 8wackers are all $250 or less. Storm could be even cheaper if you use a budget land base and sideboard options. If you are fine with janky but fun options, you may find lot of sub-150 decks as well.
If you just want casual fun, just look for a commander precon (it doesn't need to be the newer ones, some of the old ones are still affordable) and slowly customize them to your liking.
Pauper is also an option if your LGS hosts them.
The argument of just 600 cards being in it and people being obsessed over it would be fine if Legacy was not a real competitive format and some of the cards in the reserve list are essential with no proper substitute. Saying dual lands aren't essential is laughable at best, dishonest even. Imagine if these cards weren't in reserve list? Legacy could be more widespread. Even that absurd argument about P9, he or she ignores that Vintage is also a super fun format that anyone who could have any access to it with real cards would jump to it in a heartbeat.
Also reprints don't mean reprint it to death and introduce them to formats where they don't belong, just like any reprint ever done. It's really nerving the way that poster ignores reality. P9 if it was ever reprinted in some alternate reality could be introduced as prizes for PT/worlds, so not many copies would be in the wild per year. Legacy reprints could be done in a similar fashion to Eternal masters.
Also, I dislike people saying that most of RL are garbage anyway as argument. Casuals would love to be able to play some of that "garbage". They are unique and deserve to be played as well. With the buyouts, not even hot garbage like Ramirez del Pietro will be at normal reach for casuals eventually. I imagine some people would like to play with it for laughs, but without paying overpriced premium for it.
Bottom line the real argument is should this be a game first or a collectible first. Can a balance be struck? I'm a collector first and I'd be ok with the RL gone. It served its purpose, it doesn't serve its original purpose now because buyouts just warp the market in an insidious way.
I understand the reason and history of the RL. Some cards like P9 should stay as a relic of the past and become antique items basically. However, some cards have no reason to be there (like retroactively adding cards from "newer" sets like Urza block). Intelligently done reprints don't hurt the value of collections.
The RL isn't a monolithic thing. It was revised a couple times. Sadly it become unnecessarily strict. I think at least the functional reprint rule could be easily abolished. It could piss off some powerful collectors, but eventually I think they would accept it as not that harmful to their "investment". Lot of cards are super valuable not because they are playable or are in the RL per se. Just look at Alpha/Beta reprints.
Letting functional reprints to be made could also make people stop bugging about the RL.
Alternatively, just banning most of the playable RL cards from Legacy or even Commander would be also a "solution", but a bad and distasteful one as well.
Sadly, our opinions matter too little in this matter. Even if 99% of the playerbase were in unison against the RL and were actively voicing it would not cause much change to it. People/organizations with real influence over WotC are the ones who pull the string and they favor status quo for RL matter. I don't see much shake up in this matter anytime ever.
Yeah, it is a big money sinker. You may justify it as an investment (with dubious returns and liquidity) or something that you may leave at any time. I don't think it's a (total) waste of money per se thou, well at least compared to other hobbies where I will never get any return back ever. At very least, my cards have some value. Well at least that's how I rationalize it.
The behavior described as an example why MTG community is toxic doesn't seem like a big deal or even unique within it. I have seen way worse behaviors than that (within and outside MTG) and in some cases borderline criminal. People take their hobbies anywhere more serious than needed. It's basically a big part of their identity and it may be very unpleasant. However, If you can't stand this, I think it's quite hard to delve deep in any hobby that requires a lot of interaction with other people. It's just people being people.
In the past I would use shoeboxes or those old fancy premium boxes like they release during Visions I think and just separate by color and rarity. After a while it starts to get hard to keep track which cards you have and how many do you have and the problem can get worse if you lend/borrow cards as well. Also, no more moving your collection anywhere for me. An acquaintance uses a couple 5000 storage boxes to move his collection of playable cards.
Combo decks usually wanna go first, but with a free mulligan, maybe they would be more incentivized to go second.
If you don't wanna venture in those places yet, duel decks are fine value and entertainment wise. It's not a bad start as well.
Now, I don't know how highschool handles club activities, so I can't help with that. In university I had a playgroup of 4 ~ 8 people. We had our spot and official time although it wasn't really a club. We occasionally would have drafts and small tournaments with penalties as "prize". Ideally everyone should be on similar spending power. Everyone could contribute for the draft pool and you could discuss on how to share the cards afterwards. Just having a space and time should be more than enough in the beginning.
Unless you bet in an explosion of playerbase, might as well bet on some of the more expensive products as they would grow much better in that situation plus they will appreciate much better if the playerbase grows slowly and steadily or just stagnate.
Of course, if you find a good offer like very close price to what stores pay, sure, it's not a bad deal, but I have a hunch that they will need to sit in the dark for a really long time before the time to move them comes. Space and tying up your money into these products are real opportunity costs. I kinda regret not stopping hoarding sealed products after RTR. It's not like I "lost" money, but I didn't really gain something back for just sitting on them after 5 years. I will still sit on them more 5 years probably (at these rates) before thinking in moving them. After all in 5 years something crazy could happen. WW3 could start and MTG becomes the worse thing to put your money on or Arena triple the paper playerbase and all of a sudden BFZ boxes are 500 bucks a pop or it's just about the same and print runs are so high that the box just jumps from $80 to $120 in 5 years.
For instance, I made insane returns from Zendikar sealed products. I got a case of RoE fatpack for 25ish a pop. I unloaded them when they were 150ish. They are like way more than that, but I got a really nice return anyway. You can't have this kinda jump in short period anymore. I still sitting on KTK fat packs. They are about 60 and I got them around 30. It seems like a good return, but it's not. There is a cost to unload them and it's been so many years already (and they have fetches). I imagine most of the fat packs will grow slower or similar rate (there are exceptions like BFZ fat pack, but it was the exception than the rule). KTK booster boxes fare worse than fat packs, so I will assume all booster boxes are as bad.
In this case, it may have less returns than regular investments right now. However, if your capital is small, it's fine to invest in boxes, but unless the playerbase has another boom similar to Innistrad/RTR era, I don't think there is that much room for growth. The only thing boxes have going for them is you probably won't "lose" money unless MTG suddenly dies. You just weight the probabilities of each of those event. Just try get boxes for around $85 maximum and you should be fine...I think.
Personally I would avoid sets with poor print quality and no staple. Unless people in the future have a fetish for bad printings, I think they aren't good long term. Ixalan block is a big no for this reason. No fetch like cards, no lottery, no nothing. The only set I really like from the today's time is Eldritch Moon. It has lot of potential cards that could explode in price and the print run may not be that large compared to sets of this era. BFZ/Kaladesh block may be OK because of Expedition/Masterpieces. Amonkhet block is kinda iff, it's almost as bad as BFZ block and people aren't exactly in love with Incantations. It may change in the future, but its printing quality sux (printing quality issues probably started in Kaladesh to be fair).
Still just look at boxes from RTR era. They have shocklands and prices didn't move at all or moved at glacial pace. For a long time you could get them for $80 during bargain sales. It's been almost over 5 years already. If you bought them around $75, you probably lost money overall (as shipping and fees would eat profits). I imagine most of the sets post BFZ era would move at similar pace. Yeah masterpiece kinda cards may change the equation, but I probably would bet on not a factor to be safe.
As for Alpha Investments videos. They are insightful. However, you need to watch them with his prospective x yours and it will/may be vastly different. As with any speculation, anyone will be wrong/right about things eventually. As long you try to understand why things happens, his videos can be useful not so much on what you should invest in, but on how he sees the market flow and his actions based on that. He is there to entertain us (and himself) and show his point of view on things and think for yourself.
However, I dislike changes just because of trying to revitalize logos and so on. There is no need for that, specially if that is the proposal.
If they need to change it because of counterfeit measure or maybe even insert microchips, that'd be a reason. Maybe not a good reason, but at least a reason for it. Just changing it just to have a freshier looking logo is just frivolous.
Game seems lighter as well. Not that slow. With the coming April update, I'm getting more optimist about the game. Not satisfied, but definitively more positive overall.
I started working on UB control as I opened Search for Azcanta and Liliana and I was working on UB before the wipe. I like the archetype, but if you wanna grind, you may wanna skip this one. Games gonna take long. I kinda started to jump to Mono Red, but sadly I wasted most of my WCs on UB already.
Some opinions on each options:
UB Control
Pro: the precon comes with a good base for this deck. The real deck needs a lot of cards for all rarities, but you can get by alright with a lot of 1 to 2 ofs, specially your finishers. You don't need 2~3 Scarab Gods to make it function. Still you probably need at least 2 Vraska's Contempt and 1 extra big threat like a PW or Scarab God to get enough edge in the mirror. Most of the cards you use your WCs on are useful in other archetypes.
Cons: games gonna be glacial paced specially the mirror. Although super fun, grinding will be a chore with this deck.
Mono Red
Pro: I think it's the best for grinding. You can mix with white or green while your card pool develop. You do need a good amount of uncommons. Rares and mythics like Earthshaker, Glorybringer, and Hazoret greatly help, but they aren't needed that much. I think you get more mileage for your commons and uncommons compared to other options.
Cons: some of the cards aren't really usable in other archetypes or be rebanned like Ferocidon and Ruins, so maybe you should avoid prioritizing them. Just having 2ofs may not cut it, you have to go deep. Still Lightning Strike, Abrade, and Glorybringer should be fine.
Approach
Pro: I think there are so many ways you can build this one. You can be UW, mono W, or even a wacky RW. I believe you can get away with just 1 to 2 of lot of key cards initially and still function like a full Approach deck.
Cons: I think you need too many of the rares if you want the full deck. Not having access to Fumigate and have to use suboptiomal options like Hour of spells as your sweeper hurts the deck a bit.
GW
Pro: I'm only highlighting it because the precon actually gives a lot of 2-of rares and they can be pretty powerful. You could go full token/embalm/eternalize. You could morph it to UW version. It's fun as well.
Cons: Probably not that competitive in the long run.
BW Vamp
Pro: I think it has a decent enough matchup vs UB and Mono Red overall depending on how you make it. You can skimp the rares a bit.
Cons: sadly the precon is horrendous. You really need a lot of uncommons to make it to work properly. It lacks even basic commons. Any WC used here will be too focused for Vamp. Maybe the anthem could be reusable in cat deck or some of the weenies in an aura deck.
Merfolk and dinos seem like trap to sink your WCs in. They aren't strong enough in the long run and the precons are a joke. Also the cards don't work that well with other decks. Maybe if you started dino, you can jump to GR monsters, but that deck needs so many rares and mythics to be really a thing.
GB Explore is actually semi decent and don't need too much to be decent. Probably not good in the long run, but you could move some of the pieces to other decks like Sultai.
Pirates, well any version of this tribe is garbage and the precons are even worse. It could be a base for RB aggro. However, the omissions from Kaladesh really hurt this archetype.
GP Gift may also be an interesting option, maybe UB version can be very good and don't lose much from lack of Kaladesh compared to UW or RW versions. It seems a bit narrow.
Aura even without Sram could be a good budget beatdown deck. Fast for grinding. You could just invest all your commons and uncommons into it and save rares and mythic WCs for your real deck. If you decide to invest in Legion's Landing, you could jump to token or vampires later. It seems a promissing option.
Cycling deck around Draken Haven could be a thing as well. You can mix with Approach. The only problem is I think it won't work with just 2ofs or even 3ofs.
Mono Green is surprisingly powerful, but at the same time it's a little heavy on rares and mythics.