Multicolored

Multicolored (also "multicolor", "multi-colored", "multi-color"; as opposed to "monocolored", "mono-colored" "single-colored") cards were introduced in the Legends set, and use a gold card frame to distinguish them. For this reason, they also can be referred to as "gold" cards. 
==Description==
Multicolored cards require mana from two or more different colors to be played. Multicolored cards tend to combine the philosophy and mechanics of all the colors used in the spell's cost. For example, <c>Quicksilver Dagger</c> or <c>Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind</c>, which combine blue's ability to draw cards with red's ability to deal (direct) damage (aka "pinging").
Two-color hybrid cards have costs that can be paid with either of the card's colors (as opposed to both), and were introduced in Ravnica: City of Guilds. While their mana costs can often be paid with only one color of mana, they are still considered to be multicolored. This means that, for example, if a card has a mana cost of , it has a converted mana cost of 1, but the card is considered both a red card and a green card. The design of hybrid cards revolves around the mechanics and philosophies that the two colors have in common. The cards are distinguished by a gradient frame with those two colors.
Multicolored cards tend to be more powerful compared to single-color and hybrid cards, due to the restriction of requiring the player to use all the colors in the mana cost. For sets where multicolor is the major theme, there is usually some form of mana fixing at common to facilitate playing the multicolored cards at common. 
Invasion block, all sets on Ravnica, Shadowmoor block, Alara block, Khans of Tarkir, Fate Reforged, Strixhaven: School of Mages, Modern Horizons 2 Streets of New Capenna, and Dominaria United are the sets where the design is focused on multicolored cards. Alara Reborn was the first, and so far only, Magic set in which all of the cards are multicolored.
==Color pairs==
Color pairs are typically used to structure the Limited environment and does a lot for development to create a better product. The color pairs' official names were given in Ravnica: City of Guilds, with each pair being named after a Ravnican guild.
===Allied colors===
==== White-Blue====
White-Blue is slow and steady. Typical white-blue decks stall the game and let the users cast their major spells in the late game.
Common mechanics: Flying, Flash, tapping, effects that prevent creatures from attacking or blocking, returning permanents to hand, counterspells, temporarily exiling permanents
Common creature types: Birds, Kithkin, Wizards
Ravnica guild: Azorius Senate
Colloquial name for color combination: Azorius
==== Blue-Black====
Blue-black is related to secrets and forbidden knowledge. Blue's emphasis on information and black's solitary nature combine to create a very secretive color pair. The opponents of Blue-Black decks often realize that they are going to lose when it is too late.
Common mechanics: Milling, card draw, discard, library manipulation, casting from graveyard, large creatures with big drawbacks, unblockable.
Common creature types: Merfolk, Faeries, Rogues, Assassins, Wizards
Ravnica guild: House Dimir
Colloquial name for color combination: Dimir
==== Black-Red====
Black's will for power at any cost with Red's speedy energy combine to create a very fast and powerful color pair, although with drawbacks. Black-red decks typically prefer overwhelming opponents at all costs, often at the expense of their creatures and even their users' life total.
Common mechanics: Menace, Haste, spells and creatures that are undercosted but have drawbacks that hurt their controller, sacrifice, direct damage/life loss, disallowing life gain, power boosting (e.g. +X/+0 or +X/-X effects), Wither
Common creature types: Demons, Elementals, Goblins, Devils
Ravnica Guild: Cult of Rakdos
Colloquial name for color combination: Rakdos
==== Red-Green====
Red-Green is very unthinking because it has red's impulsiveness and green's preference for instinct over the mind. Red-Green decks are typically highly aggressive and attempt to overwhelm their opponents with pure strength.
Common mechanics: Trample, Haste, Reach, Fight, Bite, +X/+X effects, Fast mana, direct damage to flying creatures, Aggressive creatures, Land removal
Common creature types: Warriors, Shamans, Goblins, Beasts
Ravnica Guild: Gruul Clans
Colloquial name for color combination: Gruul
==== Green-White====
Green-White detests black's individualistic attitude and is the color pair of group and unity. Green-White thrives in being in groups. 
Common mechanics: Vigilance, creature tokens, protecting creatures, creature boosting/pump, life gain, enchantments
Common creature types: Elves, Centaurs, Knights
Ravnica Guild: Selesnya Conclave
Colloquial name for color combination: Selesnya
===Enemy color===
==== White-Black====
White-Black as a color pair can represent corruption or dishonesty under the clever veil of mercy and/or kindness. It may also represent the balance of good and evil, where the world is seen as a grey area in times of war or strife. As a mechanic, White-black is about gradually killing one's enemies, with white slowing the game down and black destroying the opponent's creatures and draining their life totals.
Common mechanics: Lifelink, parasitism, life gain, return creatures from graveyard, massive removal, permanent exiling, extort
Common creature types: Spirits, Clerics, Knights, Vampires
Ravnica guild: Orzhov Syndicate
Strixhaven college: Silverquill
Colloquial name for color combination: Orzhov
==== Blue-Red====
After combining Blue's desire for progress and Red's impulsiveness, Blue-Red is a color pair that focuses on innovation. 
Common mechanics: Prowess, Jump-start, Power/toughness switching, reusing instants/sorceries, time manipulation (e.g. taking additional turns), copying spells and abilities, changing targets of other spells and abilities, looting, gaining control of permanents
Common creature types: Wizards, Weirds, Noggles, Dragons
Ravnica Guild: Izzet League
Strixhaven college: Prismari
Colloquial name for color combination: Izzet
==== Black-Green====
Black-Green embodies the cycle of life and death and thrives on exploiting the cycle. Black-Green capitalizes on creatures that slowly grow over time or those that have special effects when they die.
Common mechanics: Deathtouch, +1/+1 counters, reusing creature cards, exiling from graveyard, destruction of non-land permanents, return cards from graveyard (any), Regeneration, Undergrowth
Common creature types: Zombies, Insects, Elves, Plants, Shamans
Ravnica Guild: Golgari Swarm
Strixhaven college: Witherbloom
Colloquial name for color combination: Golgari
==== Red-White====
Red-White represents enforcement of justice, as a mixture of red's readiness to take action and white's insistence on honor.
Common mechanics: First strike, Double strike, small creatures, bonuses to attacking creatures, damage to attacking or blocking creatures 
Common creature types: Soldiers, Giants, Warriors, Angels
Ravnica Guild: Boros Legion
Strixhaven college: Lorehold
Colloquial name for color combination: Boros
==== Green-Blue====
Green-Blue is the color pair of progress. Both green and blue enjoy seeing the world evolve. However, the former prefers reaching it by natural selection while the latter prefers artificial means. 
Common mechanics: Flash, Adapt, Shroud, Hexproof, card draw, search library, +1/+1 counters
Common creature types: Wizards, Beasts, Mutants, Merfolk
Ravnica Guild: Simic Combine
Strixhaven college: Quandrix
Colloquial name for color combination: Simic
==Color triples==
Several sets have had major three-color themes, most notably in Alara, Tarkir, Ikoria, and Capenna sets. The Alara block focused on the shards in Shards of Alara, but had a strong five-color theme in Conflux and focused more on two-color gold cards in Alara Reborn with its all-gold gimmick. The Khans of Tarkir block only focuses on wedges in its namesake set Khans of Tarkir. As such, three-colored cards can show up now and again in other sets. Starting with the Tarkir block, the new default for showing three color costs is to place a pair's mutual enemy in the middle.
===Shards===
Shards are sets of three colors (a color and its two allies) that form an arc or an obtuse triangle. Originally called an "arc," the term "shard" was established in the 2008 block Shards of Alara, and each shard was given a colloquial name based on Alara's major locations:
*Bant ()
*Esper ()
*Grixis ()
*Jund ()
*Naya ()
Within Alara, the color that is allied to both of the other colors was considered the "primary" color of the shard by the design team; for example, Bant's primary color was White.These names were subsequently picked up by the Magic community and used frequently in place of the color combination.
Streets of New Capenna introduced an alternative to the shards in the form of five criminal families. Much like the Alaran shards, the Capennan factions have the central color as their focus. Players have generally not shifted to using these names to refer to the color combinations over the Alaran shard names.
*Brokers ()
*Obscura ()
*Maestros ()
*Riveteers ()
*Cabaretti ()
===Wedges===
Wedges are sets of three colors (a color and its two enemies) that form a wedge shape, or an acute triangle. The term "wedge" has existed since antiquity, but each wedge was finally given colloquial names in the 2014 set Khans of Tarkir based on Tarkir's major factions: 
*Abzan () 
*Jeskai ()
*Sultai ()
*Mardu ()
*Temur ()
Within Tarkir, the color that is left-most of the allied colors, when looking from the base of the triangle to the tip, was considered the "primary" color of the wedge by the design team; for example, the primary color of Abzan was White. The "center" color was dropped after pivotal defeats led to rulership by elder dragons in Dragons of Tarkir. As a condition of surrender, the Abzan were forced to cease worship of their ancestors (and their ties to Black) as a practice that could foster rebellion. Similar fates befell the Jeskai losing Red, etc.
While not as large a focus, wedges also saw heavy use in the set Ikoria: Lair of Behemoths.
==Color quadruples==
Four color cards are hard to design and are thus the least prevalent cards, relative to other color combinations, as they need to justify why each is explicitly not a full WUBRG card. There are no given names for four color combinations yet, nor have colloquial names caught on among players.
The Nephilim from Guildpact were the first four-colored cards. In some circles, these Nephilim creatures have become the nicknames for the different 4-color decks:
*Yore (, )
*Glint (, )
*Dune (, )
*Ink (, )
*Witch (, )
Commander 2016 introduced a second cycle of four-colored cards. For the first time, a named mechanical theme was given to each four-color combination, which became alternative nicknames for 4-color decks: 
*Artifice (, )
*Chaos (, )
*Aggression (, )
*Altruism (, )
*Growth (, )
For three of these combinations, their cycle components are the only four-color representatives printed, with the other two having more, for a total of fourteen. The fourth iteration of Omnath, an elemental that gained a color with each new card, produced a card in Zendikar Rising as <c>Omnath, Locus of Creation</c>. 2023 had the most non-cycle four color designs starting with a new Atraxa card (<c>Atraxa, Grand Unifier</c>, ) in Phyrexia: All Will Be One, followed by <c>Aragorn, the Uniter</c> () in The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth, and most recently, the Secret Lair Drop Series: Doctor Who: Regeneration introduced <c>The Fourteenth Doctor</c> ().
Additionally, there are four non-legal four-color commanders from gimmick printings. <c>Sol, Advocate Eternal</c>, <c>Elusen, the Giving</c> are from Heroes of the Realm 2018 and 2022, adding one to () and () respectively, and then Mystery Booster 2, <c>Anax and Cymede & Kynaios and Tiro</c> as () and most recently <c>Halana and Alena and Gisa and Geralf</c> as , being the first card to neither be from Commander 2016 or Guildpact.
Given how distinctive the four-color costing is, most cost exactly those four mana. Only four cards that are four colors have casting costs that are not four: <c>A-Omnath, Locus of Creation</c> (mana value 5), <c>Atraxa, Grand Unifier</c> (mana value 7), <c>The Fourteenth Doctor</c> (mana value 3, with hybrid mana) and <c>Anax and Cymede & Kynaios and Tiro</c> (mana value 5).
==All colors==
The first card with five colors () was <c>1996 World Champion</c>, the first one that was legal for sanctioned play was <c>Sliver Queen</c>. The colloquial name for five colors is WUBRG, referencing hite, Ble, lack, ed, and reen.
==External links==
*Magic: The Gathering Combination Names: Tool that allows selecting colors to show the name for the particular color combination, as well as a representative symbol if available.
==References==