I'm trying to figure out what color and style of deck would be good for my friend who's on a mega tight budget right now, And by that I mean he has like 20 dollars on him
He knows how to play he's just getting back into the game after about 5 years. So what can he do?
I think the only reasonable option here is the all-in mono red with only cmc 1 and 2 creatures and 18 lands. The only rares are ash zealot and firedrinker satyr and they are cheap.
I built the deck out or crap I had laying around and thought if he put 20 bucks into he could have a decent white heroic deck but I don't know if there is a way to splash black and keep it in his price range.
What did he play before? Did he like what he played? Is he more concerned about having fun or winning?
The following aggro decks can be done for filthy cheap, ordered by my personal opinion of their strength given the budget.
aggro
Mono white weenie
17 lands red (placed as such because you can prettymuch make the whole deck in the budget, just skimping on some but not even all the ash zealots. Thing is that the deck has a somewhat short shelf life...)
Rakdos aggro
U/W or W/R heroic
Red deck wins (Yes, RDW places this low in my estimation. The reason being is the budget taking mutavault out of the equation and not being able to fill out ash zealot. The deck is fundamentally cheap but you can't do a more curve up version the requires more pricy cards, leaving you at something closer to creature blitz. A lot of the budget goes out the window when you start looking at rakdos cackler, burning-tree emissary, and firedrinker satyr. At that point, your budget is almost gone. Effectively, you'd end up cutting BTE in the end. But firefist striker is significantly weaker in absence of BTE, mutavault, and ash zealot.)
Or you could try to blindside people with silly gruul bloodrush.
midrange
This is generally a toughie since midrange tends to equate to goodstuff and goodstuff tends to equate to expensive. But whatever it is would probably be including green, probably green black.
control
Good luck with that but I think that UB post BNG would be your best bet.
Don't try 3 colors without the dual lands and don't try to fill the gaps with guildgates. It is generally a bad idea. The two best decks you can do for a 20 dollar budget with black of the top of my head are rakdos aggro and poor man's mono black devotion post BNG.
well he more or less just hangs out and plays casually with me and a few other people but he doesn't really get out to event much. so If I can get him a fun deck that can win 2-3/5 of the time. he use to play black then with Ravnica he went Rakdos, but all were subpar and lost to just about every thing I throw at it so.
I don't have either of them. I try to help him get cards that he needs for his decks to preform the best they can on a budget but right now all I have is that mono white deck and these.
For mono white weenie, these are the semi-pricy cards.
4 soldier of the pantheon (roughly $2.50 each)
4 precinct captain (roughly $2 each)
4 imposing sovereign (roughly $1 each)
2 spear of heliod which you have
You can run Ajani if you want but that's a horrible use of budget.
And the rest of the cards to consider are....
dryad militant
judge's familiar
boros elite
daring skyjek
azorius arrester
banisher priest
Brave the elements
Fortify
At least those are the ones that come to mind. You could also use a frontline medic if you want.
But white weenie can be done filthy cheap. Whereas many other decks lack replacements for things, soldier of the pantheon can sorta be replaced one one of the other one drops and it'll be ok. However, I suggest filling out on precinct captains if possible and trying to get at least 2-3 imposing sovereign. It is a great annoyance. The rest of the deck can mostly be found in a jank box or borderline made from a night of begging. (I slightly exaggerate this but not in the chances of it realistically happening. Rather the fact that most of the other cards are common enough that you'll be able to find someone who just has too much stuff and would give it to you if you asked, sometimes saying something like "Buy me a soda and we'll call it even." And getting all the cheapo stuff for your deck for a dollar or so isn't a bad deal.)
It wouldn't be worth the budget to play him. If you have 5 bucks to spend, just track down the other 2 soldiers. The thing is that weenie's creatures effectively cap at cmc 2 with most of their 3 slot just being tech. And we all know that banisher priest is tech.
I started with Theros and played a Heroic deck because it seemed cheap and explosive. I typically go 4-1 or 3-2, and more often than not drag matches out to three games.
White's typically the core, and the most effective splashes are blue, red, and potentially black with BNG. There's a primer that just hit page 19 that I recommend you skim through. I'm sure you can keep your budget of $20 if you skip out on the shocklands.
This is the first draft of a budget mono black aggro deck. I didn't know if Doom Blade or Ultimate Price would be better, since it depends on the meta, so I chose the 2-2 split. Bile Blight would on of the better removal spells, but IDK if that is so cheap, if you can I would probably run a four of, or a 3-1 split of it and Doom Blade The most expensive card is the Herald of Torment, but the rest are commons and uncommons, except for Liliana's Reaver which is about a dollar. Basically the deck should be an aggro deck that will curve into Gray Merchant for reach. I have tested it against mono-blue a bit and have been able to beat it.
RDW is probably the best option for the budget player. You can build a tournament winning (we at least top 8) deck for very cheap. Then you can upgrade it as you win store credit, make trades etc.
If he was at my lgs I would literally give him everything on this list for about 5$
Rakdos Cackler x4
Firefist Striker x4
Magma Jet x4
Lightning Strike X4
Burning Tree Emissary x4
Gorehouse Chainswalker x4
Fanatic of Mogis x4
Mountains
Other red cheapstuff to finish it out.
This link has a $20 RDW decklist, I have played one match with it and won, so it definately isn't a bad deck, and I like it.
I agree that mono-red is the way to go. It can be pretty easy to learn how to play RDW, and it has strong cards for cheap!
I also have my personal list, that used to be a budget deck, but then some of the cards shot up because they started to see a lot of play. However it can definitely be budgeted.
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Current Decks:
Standard-
Modern (Semi-retired)- RBudget GoblinsR WBudget Death and TaxesW
He knows how to play he's just getting back into the game after about 5 years. So what can he do?
for the awesome sig.
BGU Control
R Aggro
Standard - For Fun
BG Auras
3x Rogue's Passage
20x Plains
Creatures 23
3x Hopeful Eidolon
4x Favored Hoplite
3x Azorius Arrester
3x Cavalary Pegasus
4x Phalanx Leader
3x Observant Alseid
3x Dawnstrike Paladin
3x Gods Willing
4x Divine Favor
4x Aerial Maneuver
3x Gift of the Orzhova
3x Last Breath
3x Celestial Flare
3x Auramancer
3x Rootborn Defenses
3x Dauntless Onslaught
I built the deck out or crap I had laying around and thought if he put 20 bucks into he could have a decent white heroic deck but I don't know if there is a way to splash black and keep it in his price range.
for the awesome sig.
The following aggro decks can be done for filthy cheap, ordered by my personal opinion of their strength given the budget.
aggro
Mono white weenie
17 lands red (placed as such because you can prettymuch make the whole deck in the budget, just skimping on some but not even all the ash zealots. Thing is that the deck has a somewhat short shelf life...)
Rakdos aggro
U/W or W/R heroic
Red deck wins (Yes, RDW places this low in my estimation. The reason being is the budget taking mutavault out of the equation and not being able to fill out ash zealot. The deck is fundamentally cheap but you can't do a more curve up version the requires more pricy cards, leaving you at something closer to creature blitz. A lot of the budget goes out the window when you start looking at rakdos cackler, burning-tree emissary, and firedrinker satyr. At that point, your budget is almost gone. Effectively, you'd end up cutting BTE in the end. But firefist striker is significantly weaker in absence of BTE, mutavault, and ash zealot.)
Or you could try to blindside people with silly gruul bloodrush.
midrange
This is generally a toughie since midrange tends to equate to goodstuff and goodstuff tends to equate to expensive. But whatever it is would probably be including green, probably green black.
control
Good luck with that but I think that UB post BNG would be your best bet.
Don't try 3 colors without the dual lands and don't try to fill the gaps with guildgates. It is generally a bad idea. The two best decks you can do for a 20 dollar budget with black of the top of my head are rakdos aggro and poor man's mono black devotion post BNG.
for the awesome sig.
for the awesome sig.
4 soldier of the pantheon (roughly $2.50 each)
4 precinct captain (roughly $2 each)
4 imposing sovereign (roughly $1 each)
2 spear of heliod which you have
You can run Ajani if you want but that's a horrible use of budget.
And the rest of the cards to consider are....
dryad militant
judge's familiar
boros elite
daring skyjek
azorius arrester
banisher priest
Brave the elements
Fortify
At least those are the ones that come to mind. You could also use a frontline medic if you want.
But white weenie can be done filthy cheap. Whereas many other decks lack replacements for things, soldier of the pantheon can sorta be replaced one one of the other one drops and it'll be ok. However, I suggest filling out on precinct captains if possible and trying to get at least 2-3 imposing sovereign. It is a great annoyance. The rest of the deck can mostly be found in a jank box or borderline made from a night of begging. (I slightly exaggerate this but not in the chances of it realistically happening. Rather the fact that most of the other cards are common enough that you'll be able to find someone who just has too much stuff and would give it to you if you asked, sometimes saying something like "Buy me a soda and we'll call it even." And getting all the cheapo stuff for your deck for a dollar or so isn't a bad deal.)
for the awesome sig.
3x Rogue's Passage
20x Plains
Creatures 20
3x Hopeful Eidolon
4x Favored Hoplite
4x Soldier of the Pantheon
4x Phalanx Leader
3x Daring Skyjek
2x Imposing Sovereign
3x Brave the Elements
3x Gods Willing
3x Divine Favor
3x Aerial Maneuver
3x Gift of the Orzhova
2x Spear of Heliod
3x Last Breath
1x Aerial Maneuver
1x Divine Favor
3x Celestial Flare
4x Rootborn Defenses
3x Dauntless Onslaught
for the awesome sig.
-3 rogue's passage
-3 divine favor
-3 aerial maneuver
-3 gift of orzhova
-1 brave the elements
+1 gods willing
+4 judge's familiar
+4 ethereal armor
+2 dryad militant
+2 pacifism
Or something like that.
White's typically the core, and the most effective splashes are blue, red, and potentially black with BNG. There's a primer that just hit page 19 that I recommend you skim through. I'm sure you can keep your budget of $20 if you skip out on the shocklands.
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=544432
3x Gray Merchant of Asphodel
4x Herald of Torment
1x Liliana's Reaver
4x Mogis's Marauder
4x Rakdos Cackler
4x Rakdos Shred-Freak
4x Thrill-Kill Assassin
4x Tormented Hero
2x Doom Blade
2x Ultimate Price
2x Read the Bones
This is the first draft of a budget mono black aggro deck. I didn't know if Doom Blade or Ultimate Price would be better, since it depends on the meta, so I chose the 2-2 split. Bile Blight would on of the better removal spells, but IDK if that is so cheap, if you can I would probably run a four of, or a 3-1 split of it and Doom Blade The most expensive card is the Herald of Torment, but the rest are commons and uncommons, except for Liliana's Reaver which is about a dollar. Basically the deck should be an aggro deck that will curve into Gray Merchant for reach. I have tested it against mono-blue a bit and have been able to beat it.
If the deck needs to go even cheaper, I would cut Heralds and replace them with Agent of the Fates and then take out the Read the Bones, and replace it with the new Grisly Transformation, and cut the Reaver and replace it with another Boon of Erebos or Grisly Transformation. Maybe even get rid of one removal spell, for another Boon of Erebos or Grisly Transformation.
Standard-
Modern (Semi-retired)-
RBudget GoblinsR
WBudget Death and TaxesW
EDH-
RWBAlesha, Who Smiles At DeathRWB
GGGFreyalise, Llanowar's FuryGGG
UBW$100 Sharuum the HegemonUBW
If he was at my lgs I would literally give him everything on this list for about 5$
Rakdos Cackler x4
Firefist Striker x4
Magma Jet x4
Lightning Strike X4
Burning Tree Emissary x4
Gorehouse Chainswalker x4
Fanatic of Mogis x4
Mountains
Other red cheapstuff to finish it out.
BEEEES!
Rabble Red
Modern
Burn
Infect
for the awesome sig.
This link has a $20 RDW decklist, I have played one match with it and won, so it definately isn't a bad deck, and I like it.
I agree that mono-red is the way to go. It can be pretty easy to learn how to play RDW, and it has strong cards for cheap!
I also have my personal list, that used to be a budget deck, but then some of the cards shot up because they started to see a lot of play. However it can definitely be budgeted.
Standard-
Modern (Semi-retired)-
RBudget GoblinsR
WBudget Death and TaxesW
EDH-
RWBAlesha, Who Smiles At DeathRWB
GGGFreyalise, Llanowar's FuryGGG
UBW$100 Sharuum the HegemonUBW