It's Luthervamplord versus Death_By_Beebles in a budget deck building challenge taken to the extreme. In Luther and DBB's latest mini-article series, which MDV Writer has got the stuff it takes to win a deck building challenge that only gives you $10 to make a deck? Check it out here!

Luther: "Come on DBB, one more game - I've just got to beat that deck or it's going to bug me all week!"

DBB: "Alright Luther, I can stand to trounce your deck again but I'm going to have to stop eventually - else it's just mean!"

Luther: "Yeah I know, your deck is far too quick for mine. But come on, you're running four Temple Gardens - I'll be lucky if I can get together two of that card for a deck, let alone a full play set!"

DBB: "It is true, I am running a few choice cards..."

Luther: "A few, I could probably pay my rent on the money that went into that deck! How many hours work went into getting that deck? That's what I want to know."

DBB: "Quite a few to be honest, I had to take on some extra hours at work to get the money to buy the Temple Gardens. I don't even want to mention what the Loxodon Hierarchs and the Glare of Subduals cost when I first bought them!"

Luther: "And here I am playing with nothing but commons and uncommons..."

DBB: "Oh, that's a load of malarkey, and you know it. I saw that Orim's Chant in there with your playset of Isochron Scepters. You can't fool me; you do the same things I do. Every Magic player wants to play with the best decks."

Luther: "Well, I suppose you've got a point. But I can't afford a lot of expensive rares like you can. It kind of seems unfair."

DBB: "What are you suggesting?"

Luther: "I'm suggesting that we both lay off the rares for a change. Here's something; how about you make a deck for less than $10 dollars to play against my deck."

DBB: "Heh! Not unless you do the same!"

Luther: "You sir, are on! At last; I'm so going to wipe the floor with you this time! Just you watch!"

DBB: "I think I'll be wiping the floor with you, good sir. Also, let's make this thing a little more interesting. No rares, whatsoever, (even if they only cost 20 cents), and only 5 uncommons. We'll do Peasant decks."

Luther: "And no ancient cards either. Hypnotic Specter used to be uncommon. Only cards from Invasion to Morningtide. Got it?"

DBB: "Extended Peasant decks, huh? Sounds good."

Luther: "I'll see you next week, and I'm going to crush you."

DBB: "We'll see about that."

When Luther challenged me to build a deck for under $10, I was pretty nervous. Even some of your best Pauper decks can end up costing more than $10. But, I set to the task, knowing I was in for some tough competition.

My first thoughts were that I’d like to take advantage of some really powerful cards, while still having a lot of longevity for the later game. My idea was that if I could use a card advantage engine of some kind, and couple it with other cards that could synergize with that engine, I’d be set to beat just about anything Luther threw my way.

With that in mind, I pulled from a few of the decks I’d been tinkering with for Raiding the Dollar Bins. Sure, I couldn’t use any rares like I normally do (since we were making Peasant decks), but I was up to the task. After a few minutes, I decided on one of the most powerful Commons in Time Spiral; Momentary Blink.

Momentary Blink is a powerful card for a few reasons. It’s a combat trick, letting you save your creatures from eminent death during combat; it allows your creatures to avoid removal; and most importantly, it has Flashback. Flashback makes this card two spells in one convenient package, and as long as you have the mana, it looks like your opponent is going to have to spend two cards to get rid of your one Momentary Blink. With that inherent advantage, I immediately added 4 to the decklist.

4x Momentary Blink: $1.16

Unfortunately, Momentary Blink wasn’t enough to make a powerful deck. I decided that the best way to abuse a card that moves creatures in and out of play was to pick powerful creatures with comes into play effects. Comes into play (CIP) effects are some of the most powerful effects creatures have. And, with the recent Evoke craze from Lorwyn and Morningtide, a lot of great creatures with CIP effects have been printed.

Mulldrifter is one of those great creatures. Mulldrifter is a great card because if you play it for five mana, you get two cards and a 2/2 flyer. In a pinch, you can also convert it into a Council of the Soratami; not great, but certainly not terrible. If, however, you add Momentary Blink into the mix, you get something amazing. Momentary Blink allows you to reset a creature. This creature loses all nasty enchantments, loses all of its damage, and basically becomes a new creature. If you Evoke Mulldrifter, it comes into play with two abilities; it’s draw 2 ability, and an ability that reads “If you paid the Evoke cost, sacrifice Mulldrifter.” Like I said, if you Blink a creature, it becomes a new creature. Thus, if you Evoke Mulldrifter and in response to its first ability, Momentary Blink it, two things happen.

1) You get an additional two cards (since Mulldrifter comes into play again).
2) You don’t have to sacrifice Mulldrifter, since the Mulldrifter that you played the Evoke cost on isn’t the same Mulldrifter anymore!

In short, playing Mulldrifter, then Blinking it nets you four shiny new cards, and a 2/2 flyer. And, to make it even better, you were able to play this little combo on the same turn you could hard cast the Mulldrifter. What’s not to like?

4x Mulldrifter: $1.00. Running Total: $2.16

After deciding to build a deck around the Mulldrifter/Momentary Blink combo, I quickly searched the Gatherer for any other comes into play effects that were in the current Extended pool, like Luther and I agreed upon. I quickly found one of my favorite creatures, and quite possibly one of the best uncommons to ever see print; Flametongue Kavu!

Flametongue Kavu does everything I want it to do in this deck. It is a 4/2 for only four mana, and it takes down an opposing creature when it comes into play. You can Blink it for instant speed spot removal. Expensive? Yes. Worth it? Totally.

3x Flametongue Kavu: $2.16. Running Total: $4.32

Another powerful card for this deck seemed to be Aven Riftwatcher, for a multiple of reasons. It has comes-into-play and leaves-play effects, making each Momentary Blink twice as effective. Also, Blinking an Aven Riftwatcher also resets its Fading… err Vanishing counters, letting it come in for more damage. I snapped up three to create the backbone of a my now solidly White and Blue deck(with a Red Flametongue Kavu splash).

3x Aven Riftwatcher: $0.15. Running Total: $4.47

For my final two uncommons I am allowed to have in the deck, (in Peasant Magic, you can have five uncommons in your decklist, but the rest have to be common) I decided to go slightly off the beaten path, and pick a card that I know will be useful in the early and late game. Riftwing Cloudskate is a marvelous turn two play, and it’s great at full price as well. With Blink in the mix, it turns the Cloudskate into Boomerang that can also fly in for two damage.

2x Riftwing Cloudskate: $0.50. Running Total: $4.82

As potential filler, I wanted a card that could come into play as a blocker, and still be able to take care of any meaty creatures that happen to attack the deck. Pestermite does both of these jobs very well. In your opponent’s combat phase, you can make a surprise blocker and tap one of their creatures. In your opponent’s upkeep, you can play Pestermite to tap one of their lands (which works great if they lose their 3rd turn.) Pestermite also comes down at their end of turn; Instant creatures are always good. This card is solid and fits well the theme of my deck, so in it goes!

4x Pestermite: $0.20. Running Total: $5.02

One of the main problems I have so far is that, although I have some powerful synergies, and some great CIP creatures, I don’t have any way to make use of Momentary Blink more than 8 times. Sure, that’s a lot, but I’d like to use it over and over again! I added Scrivener to the list for that reason. Scrivener gets me my Momentary Blinks back so that I can continue to blink Flametongue Kavu. At $0.20 for a playset, you really can’t go wrong.

4x Scrivener: $0.20. Running Total: $5.22

To bring down my mana curve a bit, I decided to go with Vodalian Merchant, an interesting card from Invasion. It allows you to filter your cards a bit, which is nice when you are willing to give up a creature for the 5th land you need to cast your Mulldrifter + Blink combo. It goes with the deck, and helps me get where I need to go.

2x Vodalian Merchant: $0.10. Running Total: $5.32

Finally, to add a little bounce to my creature package, I decided to add Silver Drake to the mix. Silver Drake is an effectively costed flier, and it packs a solid punch when on the offensive. It can also serve as a pseudo-Blink when you want to use Pestermite or Vodalian Merchant again.

3x Silver Drake: $0.06. Running Total: $5.38

With my creatures taken care of, I wanted to do something with the few slots remaining before land. My first thought was some removal, but not wanting to get more into red for something like Incinerate had me looking at things like Faith’s Fetters. Fetters unfortunately cost four mana, and that was one more than I wanted to spend. My mana curve is already too high! I opted for the much more expensive Oblivion Ring in Fetters’ place. It takes care of any pesky non-land permanents for only three mana.

3x Oblivion Ring (.96). Running Total: $6.34

Another idea I had when making this deck was that any type of bounce effects would be a great addition to my deck. All of my creatures have comes into play effects, and if there are opposing fatties in the way of my attack, What better way to take care of them than by returning them to my opponent’s hand? And, I can always use my creatures CIP abilities. But wait? Why not do both? Peel from Reality does just that. It’s quick, and it gives me tempo while rescuing one of my creatures (which can be reused to do some more CIP shenanigans).

4x Peel from Reality (.20). Running Total: $6.54

With that, it was time to deal with lands. I had a shaky mana base because of my Flametongue Kavu splash, so I decided to opt for a playset of Terramorphic Expanse. It’s a great fixing card, and it’s relatively cheap.

4x Terramorphic Expanse (.84). Running Total: $7.18

And, with that, I added an additional 20 lands, bringing the total of the deck to $9.18. Enjoy!

Until next time, this is Death_By_Beebles, promising that you can get plenty of Magic fun out of a measly ten bucks.

Building on a budget is a lot like shopping economy – you can still buy chocolate but it’s not quite as nice as the higher brand stuff. When building a deck to a budget you’ve got to be willing; to a certain extent at least, to forego on the power cards and really concentrate on what the deck is trying to do.

Now whilst $10 might seem like an impossible task, I’m going to show you that it is possible to build a deck that can hold it’s own in any peasant game. As a point of reference, if you wish to check the prices quoted in your own nation’s currency I suggest you swing over to www.x-rates.com/calculator.html. It’s a helpful little website that allows you to convert over currencies.

But anyway, back to the task at hand – I need an Extended Peasant deck that can play well. Now having been involved in quite a few games and tournaments on this format, I’ve come to see Green White decks as a good combination for the format – White has plenty of nice effects and creatures in the common’s rating and green has so many variables of the same effects that the weaker ones generally depreciate in value rather quickly over time.

Well, GW is generally the realm of static control and it might very well be possible to construct a deck around this idea. Now by static control I mean effects in play which prevent certain actions – countering and responsive abilities are known as dynamic control.

The first thing that concerns me is that we’re playing two colors; this means that we need a dependable means to grab the lands that we need and the sooner the better. After much consideration I settled upon a total of eight cards to do this job, meaning that around 13.5% of the deck is geared towards sorting the mana base out.

At first I was drawn to Terramorphic Expanse; as it’s quick to play and achieves the goal we’re after. But when you consider that it costs an average of $0.21 a card and that most land retrieval cards are uncommon or rare, the expanse starts to lose its appeal.

That’s when I came across Wanderer’s Twig, whilst slower it still achieved the same goal and also didn’t mind what land we had pulled previously making it a sound choice for a two colored deck. The fact that they sell at $0.05 a card is also a contributing factor here as the less money I spent here the more I have to play with later.

$0.21 a card or $0.05 a card.  Which would you choose?

+4 Wanderer’s Twig ($0.20)

Having managed to secure a versatile and quick land search card, I decided the other four cards needed to be more powerful and so I was willing to trade off on speed a little. There were several options, but in the end it came down to Harrow and Kodama’s Reach. Harrow is the faster and more affective of the two, no arguments there but that is reflected in the price – Reach goes at $0.19 a card, Harrow ships at $0.31 a card on average. Weighing up the pros and cons I decided upon reach for one reason; getting lands out of the graveyard is hard and costs more. Whilst I lose out on some raw power here, I still achieve the same relative goal and keep to a tight budget.

+4 Kodama’s Reach ($0.76)
Running Total: $0.96

Now that I had covered my primary concerns about mana, I then moved on to the control aspects of my deck. Bearing in mind that I was playing in Peasant and my budget was limited, I decided upon two things – One was that this was the most likely place for my uncommons to fill in my deck and two was that I needed to denote at least twelve cards to this function, meaning that 20% of the deck would fulfill the primary function of the deck.

Something you come to note about Peasant and indeed Pauper as formats is that the game play value of creatures increases significantly as there are many a solid common creature out there. With that in mind I settled upon the usual cap of twenty creatures, but I noted that they needed to link in someway to the other cards I would field.

Based upon that idea, I quickly picked Leonin Squire to tally up with the Wanderer’s Twigs – at just four cent a card, these guys essential function as an extra playset of the twigs and fill the duty of ‘chump blocker’ rather nicely.

+4 Leonin Squire ($0.04)
Running Total: $1.12

I needed something to act as stall, some way to keep me from being overrun by any beastly creatures my opponent might field. I had a few options to play with; primarily in the uncommons rarity though so I needed my choice to work consistently and effectively. I eventually settled for two Ghostly Prisons as they enable we to hold back my opponent whilst I build upon my own game plan.

+2 Ghostly Prison ($1.30)
Running Total: $2.52

But I still felt I needed another way to hold up my opponent, something that would affect cards outside of creatures. Whilst White does indeed have some form of counterspell and green has sufficient artifact & enchantment hate, I needed something far more universal – something to really grind the game down to a painful crawl and still be of some use to me. After much searching, I managed to find my answer in the form of Rule of Law. It was perfect, it helped me against burn, counter and even token decks; and at just twenty five cent a card I couldn’t really beat it.

+2 Rule of Law ($0.50)
Running Total: $3.02

Still feeling edgy about the control aspect of the deck I decided I needed some form of creature removal or hatred beyond the prisons – an answer to a creature I simply didn’t want to give the option of attacking to under any circumstances. Breezing swiftly through the list of cards available to me under the common rating I found a card that I always make the mistake of placing it as an uncommon: Oblivion Ring – potentially the best White common enchantment card to date for the Pauper/Peasant formats.

+4 Oblivion Ring ($1.28)
Running Total: $4.30

After this point I realized that I needed an answer to my own solution as well as some card to combat against enchantments. But I also needed it to fit into the theme of the deck, to meld seamlessly into the existing cards so that the flow and tempo was not ruined by its inclusion. Seal of Primordium was the answer, it allowed me to drop the answer o my problem down and leave it be until such time as I needed it; the fact it was an enchantment answer in a deck now sporting eight such cards already sealed the deal for me.

+4 Seal of Primordium ($0.12)
Running Total: $4.42

Switching attention back to the creatures, I decided to grab a creature that would have some form of synergy with the enchantments, seeing as I had already grabbed a creature to reuse the artifacts. At one point I had considered ditching my uncommon enchantments in favor of Eternal Witnesses until an old playing buddy of mine directed my attention to Odyssey and the Auramancer. Cheaper than the Witness by a very large margin, the Auramancer allowed me to retrieve the control aspects of my deck to ensure I could keep on top of my opponent’s actions.

+4 Auramancer ($0.12)
Running Total: $4.54

It was time to settle upon a beatstick; and I had pretty much decided in advance on a flying creature. The main issue I had was that the creature needed to serve some other purpose then to simple kick my opponent around as I knew there was little chance I could fit creature retrieval into my deck. After much searching and talking to some offsite friends I finally settled upon Aven Riftwatcher. Now whilst this is not a typical choice for a beatstick it served two functions – Firstly it allows me to regain some life which I quite helpful in a format with very little effective life gain. Secondly the fact that it does give me life back means that some decks might not wish to block it, even if they are able to. Whilst the Vanishing aspect does diminish this cards value somewhat, I felt that I could get enough use out of this card to make it worth the four places in my deck.

+4 Aven Riftwatcher ($0.80)
Running Total: $5.34

I needed some way to get more damage through, a creature that gave me more then the option to simply attack and pray it wasn’t blocked. Reading an old play log off of my old OCTGN files, I came across a mention of Angelic Page. Upon discovering the card was both a common rarity and was a flyer I quickly added four to the deck.

+4 Angelic Page ($0.12)
Running Total: $5.46

Keeping to the control and duel function aspect of the decks creatures, I set about looking for some means to increase both the control aspect of my deck and its ability to funnel damage through the small holes it would produce. It wasn’t long before I decided upon a tap-down ability and this almost immediately led me to Benalish Trapper; I say immediately because I had initial thought of Master Decoy but when I realized that the trapper was cheaper the choice was made.

+4 Benalish Trapper ($0.12)
Running Total: $5.58

Having completed the major part of the deck, I simply needed to add lands and be done with it. Upon close inspection it appears the lands from the Odyssey block sell rather cheaply and since the aim of the game was to build a deck that was cheap and not pretty I settled upon lands from that set.

+14 Plains ($1.40)
+ 6 Forest ($0.60)
Running Total: $7.58

I had done it; I had managed to craft a reasonable deck that could control the field to a fair degree and achieve victory. I was about to close the website and word down when I dawned on me; I still had practically a third of my budget left to play with!

Never one to miss throw away a chance to out-shine DBB, I set about creating a sideboard for my deck. Considering the deck carefully I started to notice some key deficiencies in the deck.

The first major problem was combat; if the enemy forced me into a game of speed I was bound to lose hard. I needed some way to level things out, take back control of the combat phase and stall of the enemies attack. Enter Armadillo Cloak; an enchantment which not only improves my ability to dish out the pain, but also gave me life back – the prefect way to counter an out and out aggressive deck.

+3 Armadillo Cloak ($1.53)
Running Total: $9.11

Having spent such a large amount of my remaining cash on such a powerful combat card I needed to keep a firm grip on the budget to counter the next problem; Burn. The deck would go down in a ‘Blaze of Glory’ against any burn deck, I simply had no way to stop them continually shooting me in the face with a fireball. Looking way back, I found an earlier print of Circle of Protection: Red were selling for seven cent a card; job done. Now before I get a large number of emails saying ‘The Circle is an Uncommon’; I would draw your attention to two small details – one is that in the case that a card has two rarity ratings, Peasant and Pauper always consider the lowest rating. And secondly, all of the Circles were commons right up until 8th edition, where R&D finally moved them over to uncommons.

+2 Circle of Protection: Red ($0.14)
Running Total: $9.15

Mana was the next problem, whilst I had a great means to get lands out of the deck I reasoned that a red player could easily keep me from ever using the twigs and the reaches alone were not enough. After a while I decided I needed some static means to achieve additional mana, something that I could reuse or at least get a great amount of use out of. Wild Growth fit the bill rather nicely; cheap, effective and an enchantment so even if I were to come up against a player with an answer to it I could simply reclaim it from my graveyard later.

+4 Wild Growth ($0.04)
Running Total: $9.19

The next major issue was mainly an issue with Black’s tendency to kill troublesome creatures with stat effecting cards and some kill-spells. I needed a way to ward off those style of attacks, but I also wanted it to be due functioning. Pentarch Ward was the card I finally settled down upon for three reasons: First is that it’s an enchantment, secondly is that it could work against any color saving me against Red’s Burn, Black’s Hate and Blue’s bounce and finally because it netted me a card in the process, something unique to this deck as it presently relied upon a system of ‘Draw ‘n’ Go’.

+3 Pentarch Ward ($0.03)
Running Total: $9.22

With both cash and space running low I decided the last point of call needed to be combat; I just felt that I could do more to ensure damage got through. Initially I though of cards that boosted a creature’s power or granted them trample but these all proved to be uncommon in rarity or just beyond my budget’s allowance. So instead, I settled upon a White solution in the form of Pacifism; it allowed me to get the damage through and stop any from coming my way.

+3 Pacifism ($0.03)
Final Total: $9.25

That leaves me with something like this:

Now I’m not an American so I can’t be sure, but I have a feeling that I could probably go around the corner and pick up a celebratory Coke with the remaining seventy-five cent I have left over. All in all I feel quite proud of this deck; it falls well within the budget and at least on paper would be reasonable deck to field in a Pauper game. I admit that there is room for improvement here and there, but when you consider this deck as a starting point instead of a finished article you might be able to appreciate it as much as I do.

Here’s hoping that this has both rid you of the belief that MTG is a game simply for those with more money than sense and has entertained you at least for a little while. But what I’d really like to know is, what would you have done differently? Given the same budget and same pricelist, do you feel you could have created a stronger deck?

On that note I’ll take my leave,

As always this is Luthervamplord, Signing Off

You can discuss this article in the MDV forums here.
Find other articles by this author (Death_By_Beebles) here.
Find other articles by this author (Luthervamplord) here.
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Articles Spotlights from 2008:
How to Win with Milling: A Guide to a Slow Painful Death
Memories of an Old Magic Player 10: The Outsiders Journal #3.
The Apprentice Magician, Part Three.
Class-Wars Deckbuilding Contest Results!
Tribal Coffee: The Smaller Tribes.
[Mini-Article] Controlling the Game: Without Blue.
Raiding the Dollar Bins: Return of the Vault Ninja.
A Fresh Perspective: Stasis - Part One.
More Evil Than Evil.
Memories of a Jarhead.