So I barely know anything about MTG but I want to get cards for myself and a couple friends. What's the easiest way to get into this? (I know there's the video game but I wanna go real cards). I see there are two deck starter kits which seem cool, maybe I get one of those for each of us and then some booster packs? Like $30 per person is what I'm going for. Are the starter decks balanced against each other? Is there other stuff I should know?
The Arena starter kits are pretty good at showing how the game works, but in order to make it cheaply they only include one copy each of the cards that are real game-changers.
If you want to have big games with your friends, the Commander starter decks run about $45 each last time I checked, and those will get them up to speed on the most popular casual format.
It looks like some of the commander decks are even cheaper now! I didn't realize there were different formats and degrees of casual popularity so this is helpful! Buying a single deck plus maybe boosters seems easier to wrap my mind around than buying multiple starter kits.