I guess I can't really speak for the competitive side, but between the keywords used for most cards (such as Flying, Trample, Proliferate etc.) and the generally much simpler text most cards have it shouldn't be too hard to figure out, and when I've played with peeps they've been happy to explain.
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if you have tabletop sim and you can rope people in, there's a mtg mode that people have made where you can import decks to play around with