MTG Salvation

So in the spirit of Halloween, me and my friends decided to come up with a fun idea to keep us entertained this season. Spending only 20$ max, we are supposed to come up with a deck idea then buy the cards for the deck (if the cards are not already owned) then battle it out on Halloween! The only rule is that the net worth of your deck cannot be over 20$ (basic lands don't really count). Well, I figured I would tell all of you about what deck I've been brewing, because frankly I think it could use some help, but as it stands it seems really fun! Being the clever devil I am, I wanted to play a deck that was also Halloween themed. I paged through my card binders, thinking of ideas, and then suddenly, it hit me.

Living Death.

How perfect! Not only did it fit the Halloween theme, but Living Death runs around 2.50$ a piece, so I was left with 10$ to fill up on other goodies for my deck. Ten dollars might not seem like a lot to work with, but you'd be surprised with what you can do with ten bucks. I quickly began constructing a decklist, and this is what I have so far:

Night of the Living Death


I debated adding Blue or Green to have better graveyard-milling capabilities, but I really like using Gray Merchant of Asphodel and Mogis's Marauder, as both cards are all-stars in this deck. Essentially, your first few turns should be spent throwing out creatures and blocking if necessary, or purposefully getting them slaughtered. Filling up the graveyard is important, and as you can see there's quite a few cards that do it. As soon as you can cast a Living Death that's worth your time, go for it. Aside from sweeping the board, this nightmare of a card will usually land you with more creatures than your opponents will have, and the game could be sealed up from there. Like I said, it's pretty budget, but that's the point.

What do you guys think? Should I add blue or green?

Feel free to post your own budget decks!

Just a quick question before I begin posting decks. Do the deck shave to be Halloween themed, or will any budget $20 deck do?

I don't have a deck in mind right now but for a Halloween theme on a budget, you could try these cards.

Bogbrew Witch
Bubbling Cauldron
Festering Newt

You can post any budget deck, mine just happened to be Halloween themed.

I suggest BW Humans tribal, where you can use cards like village cannibals, Thraben Doomsayer, Xathrid Necromancer, Skirsdag High Priest.

What an interesting choice! Awesome deck design!

I'm assuming you are following the Legacy ban list, so I'll go from there. My favorite $20 deck is probably Aura Gnarly.



The strategy should be pretty easy to pick up. Just play as many auras as you can and pump up your hexproof creatures while your other creatures get bigger and bigger off of their natural growth.

This next one is a mono black reanimator deck that has a focus of destroying your opponent's lands.



Those are just some examples of some cheap fatties, really you can play whatever you want. This deck is around $17

How does your playgroup feel about combo decks?

Quote from -spooky- »

I'm assuming you are following the Legacy ban list, so I'll go from there. My favorite $20 deck is probably Aura Gnarly.

Creedmoor's DeckMagic OnlineOCTGN2ApprenticeBuy These Cards
Creatures [16] 4 Aura Gnarlid 2 Boon Satyr 2 Gladecover Scout 4 Silhana Ledgewalker 4 Yavimaya Enchantress	Spells [26] 4 Ancestral Mask 2 Forced Adaptation 4 Canopy Cover 2 Keen Sense 4 Rancor 2 Spider Umbra 4 Utopia Sprawl 4 Wild Growth	Lands [18] 18 Forest

The strategy should be pretty easy to pick up. Just play as many auras as you can and pump up your hexproof creatures while your other creatures get bigger and bigger off of their natural growth.

This next one is a mono black reanimator deck that has a focus of destroying your opponent's lands.

Creedmoor's DeckMagic OnlineOCTGN2ApprenticeBuy These Cards
Creatures [14] 4 Pelakka Wurm 4 Petradon 4 Putrid Imp 2 Terastodon	Spells [28] 4 Animate Dead 4 Blackmail 4 Buried Alive 2 Dance of the Dead 4 Doom Blade 4 Duress 4 Exhume 2 Funeral Charm	Lands [18] 18 Swamp

Those are just some examples of some cheap fatties, really you can play whatever you want. This deck is around $17

How does your playgroup feel about combo decks?

I really like your deck! I am a huge fan of Pelakka Wurm and I was actually going to try a Black/Green version of my Living Death deck featuring him in it.

My group is okay with combo decks, but we never really have any that can result in a turn 1 combo kill.

My favorite deck I just recently finished after a month or so of off-and-on work on it. It is budget (except for Gravercrawlers, but they were cheaper when I bought them), but it works and is fun. I played it a dozen times without having to mulligan once, no matter how many lands I got (1-5), probably just lucky. It's mono-black reanimation:

The strategy is pretty simple (but cool): Attack earl and strong w/ gravecrawler and diregraf ghoul and then put down an undercity informer. Next, just sac your creatures to mill yourself and use victimize and ghoulcaller's chant to pull them back from the graveyard. Steel Hellkite is for artifact/enchantment removal, and fleshbag marauder (which can be reanimated for more use) and victim of night as creature removal. Dark prophecy, Falkenrath Noble, and Gray merchant of Asphodel for maintaining a sizable hand and damage(victimize: lose a creature, gain two creatures, draw a card, and You gain lots of life and your opponent loses life too.)

If you have any suggestions, I'd be happy to hear them. I am considering removing Falkenrath Noble, but I like flying for the easy damage (kill their flyers) and last ditch kills (sac all of your creatures with the undercity informer to deal damage). I am also considering adding a few board wipes to the sideboard for multiplayer games: would be VERY fun with falkenrath. (Played a game where this happened. The other guy had two of them out, and 10 creatures died. Sad day for the board wiper.)