Commander can become an expensive version of Magic to play. Fans of the format will spend £100s and £1000s of pounds on foil versions of rare cards for to complete their decks.
Wizards have done a fantastic job of creating pre-constructed Magic decks that don't cost the earth and are fairly playable out of the box.
They are often less focused than they could be and can be customised as you play with and realise how you want the deck to work.
But what about if you're building a deck from scratch?
I'm also aware that some play groups set a budget for a deck to level the playing field and make building the deck more challenging.
To that end, I too am going to try and build a budget deck. I'm hoping it'll force me to play some cards I might otherwise completely skip when looking to build the deck.
Here is my one and only rule.
1. With the exception of my commander no card shall be worth more than £3.00.
To check my prices I'm using Magic Madhouse. They are one of the biggest single card sellers in the UK. Not the cheapest I might add but that makes my choice seem fairer.
I confess I did a search on Google for suggestions for budget build commanders and I ended up settling on Grand Arbiter Augustin IV
He'll cost me £4.99 or if I want to get him in foil he's £7.99. As we go through my chosen cards I'll show the price for each with the price for the foil, where available in brackets.
With that out of the way let's take a better look at him:
He has a CMC of 4 which isn't bad and means we should be able to get him on the board fairly early in the game.
He is a Human Advisor. I confess I actually looked on the Gatherer to see just how many advisors there are. There are more than I expected. There's actually more than one in this deck it transpires. There aren't enough to go tribal, though. Yes, I could choose to go Human tribal but Augustin isn't the card for that.
His abilities are why I chose him. By making my spells cheaper and my opponents' spells more expensive he helps to speed me up and stall them.
Here is my one and only rule.
1. With the exception of my commander no card shall be worth more than £3.00.
To check my prices I'm using Magic Madhouse. They are one of the biggest single card sellers in the UK. Not the cheapest I might add but that makes my choice seem fairer.
I confess I did a search on Google for suggestions for budget build commanders and I ended up settling on Grand Arbiter Augustin IV
He'll cost me £4.99 or if I want to get him in foil he's £7.99. As we go through my chosen cards I'll show the price for each with the price for the foil, where available in brackets.
With that out of the way let's take a better look at him:
So the first thing I want to do is add cards that increase the effect of either making my spells cheaper or my opponent's spells more expensive.
Sapphire Medallion - £2.99
Pearl Medallion - £1.99
Warden of Evos Isle - £0.10 (£0.35)
Jace's Sanctum - £0.50 (£2.49)
Stone Calendar - £1.99
Now I would be the first person to admit that there are better mana rocks available at lower casting costs than Stone Calendar. But I'm already playing some of those and this card is more part of the theme of the deck.
All of the cards here are self-explanatory, Warden of Evos Isle and Jace's Sanctum do lead me towards playing more flying creatures and plenty of instants and sorceries.
Aura of Silence - £0.75 (£7.99)
Monastery Seige - £.075 (£2.99)
Thalia, Heretic Cathar - £2.99 (£7.99)
Spelltithe Enforcer - £0.75 (£1.99)
Thalia, Guardian of Thraben would probably have made it into this deck but she's £9.99 due to being played in other formats.
So between these nine cards and my commander my spells should be cheaper to cast and their spells more expensive.
But that's not going to win me any games and it's going to make me unpopular as well.
So what I decided to do was find so alternative win cons and see If I could fit them into the deck.
Celestial Convergence - £0.75 (£2.49)
Felidar Sovereign - £0.50 (£1.49)
Azor's Elocutors - £0.40 (£1.49)
Sadly Test of Endurance, at £5.99, was outside of my budget. But these three will do even if I don't seem any of them in a game.
To keep me in the game for long enough to win, one way or another, I need to be able to protect myself...
Counterlash - £0.30 (£1.49)
Overwhelming Denial - £0.99 (£3.99)
Desertion - £0.40 (£1.49)
Spelljack - £2.99 (£14.99)
Summary Dismissal - £1.49 (£3.99)
Swift Silence - £0.40 (£1.49)
I have to admit that making the choice of what counterspells to include gave me a lot to think about. Something to note; Summary Dismissal counters even uncounterable spells like Overwhelming denial. It also helps to ruin your opponents day when they go ultimate with a Planeswalker.
In addition to the above counter spells I've also chosen to run the following 4 instants.
Devouring Light - £0.20 (£1.25)
Fated Retribution - £0.40 (£1.49)
Ray of Distortion - £0.10 (£0.49)
Banishing Stroke - £0.35 (£0.99)
Dismantling Blow - £0.35 (£2.99)
I think all of these are negotiable except Fated Retribution. An instant board wipe that gets rid of planeswalkers and can let you Scry 2 as well. Yes, it has a cost to match but this deck is built to make that cheaper. You may want to use blue instants that bounce cards to the hand, especially if your meta contains a lot of token-based decks.
In addition to these, I'm running three sorceries and a trio of Enchantments as well.
Descend upon the Sinful £1.49 (£4.99)
Inundate £1.25 (£2.49)
Fumigate £2.99 (£4.99)
Three sorceries, three ways of wiping creatures from the board. In addition to these and the earlier instant, Fated Retribution, I've also opted for at least one creature that will wipe the board for me as well.
Faith's Fetters £0.25 (£1.49)
Reparations £0.99
Imprisoned in the Moon £0.40 (£2.49)
Faith's Fetters was previously my favourite way to shut down my enemy's commander, Imprisoned in the Moon might just get close to matching it thought. Reparations is just a fun card that says; sure you can target me or my creatures but I'm going to get another card out of it.
Next, let's look at the artifacts I chose:
Azorius Cluestone £0.10 (£0.49)
Sol Ring £1.99 (£24.99)
Azorius Keystone £0.20 (£0.49)
Darksteel Ingot £0.35 (£2.49)
Seer's Lantern £0.10 (£0.25)
There's nothing too surprising here I don't think. I chose Seer's Lantern as I like the idea of being able to Scry if I've got unused mana.
Mask of Avacyn - £0.75 (£0.99)
Swiftfoot Boots - £0.49 (£4.99)
Crawlspace - £2.49 (£7.99)
Two cards to protect my commander. I would have liked more but the price budget wouldn't allow it as Lightning Greaves are £6.99. Crawlspace is just a great way to limit my opponents, especially those who want to attack with token armies.
Speaking of armies, here's the rota of creatures I chose for this deck...
Aerial Responder - £0.49 (£2.49)
Angel of Serenity - £1.25 (£7.99)
Angel of the Dire Hour - £2.99
Aerial Responder is one of many creatures I've picked that focus on Lifelink. I did have more selected but I chose to drop them if they didn't have flying as well. There were, alas, plenty of creatures I had to dismiss as they were way out of budget.
There's a lot of Angels in this deck, they tend to have quite powerful abilities and not be too expensive to purchase and the deck helps to lower their casting costs as well.
Angelic Arbiter - £0.99 (£1.99)
Angelic Skirmisher - £0.99 (£2.49)
Arbiter of the Ideal - £0.40 (£0.30)
It's worth noting that Angelic Skirmisher gives an ability at the beginning of every combat phase not just your own. Useful to give your creatures First Strike for example if you might end up being the defender.
I love Arbiter of the Ideal's ability so much so I've included another card to help make it work better.
Archon of the Triumvirate - £0.40 (£0.50)
Azorius Guildmage - £0.99 (£2.49)
Battlegrace Angel - £1.25 (£2.49)
Archon is alright but I think it would be better in a deck that can flicker it. Eldrazi displacer is currently £3.99 which is just out of reach of my budget. The Guildmage is just useful to have around and Battlegrace Angel is nice if you're just using a single attacker.
Cloudblazer - £0.35 (£1.49)
Dawnbringer Charioteers - £0.40 (£1.49)
Drogskol Reaver - £1.99 (£5.99)
Cloudblazer is just a cheap creature with a nice ETB effect - if I needed a slot in the deck it would probably be one of the first cards I'd consider dropping. The Charioteers are a decent flying Lifelink creature and Drogskol Reaver is just nuts.
Gustcloak Savior - £0.40 (£1.49)
Isperia, Supreme Judge - £1.49 (£3.99)
Medomai the Ageless - £1.49 (£2.49)
Gustcloak Savior I included because I love attacking and then watching my opponent work out all the match-ups which I can promptly back out of if they are not in my favour. He also works well with Arbiter of the Ideal. Isperia punishes people for attacking me by letting me draw a card for each creature they attack with. While Medomai is just a useful creature to be able to play during a game.
Sky Hussar - £0.75 (£2.49)
Sphinx of Magosi - £0.30 (£1.49)
Sphinx of the Final Word - £1.49 (£4.99)
Sky Hussar I chose more because it's a nifty way of drawing cards and some of my favourite gotos are beyond my budget. Sphinx of Magosi, however, is not beyond my budget and has an excellent reusable ability.
Sphinx of the Final Word is there to help stop people countering my spells which, in turn, saves my counters for countering my opponent's spells.
Windbrisk Raptor - £0.99 (£1.49)
Windreader Sphinx - £1.49 (£2.99)
Curious Homunculus - £0.49 (£2.49)
Windbrisk Raptor, despite the horrible artwork, is a great way to give any of my attacking creatures Lifelink.
Windreader Sphinx is yet another great way for me to draw cards.
Curious Homunculus is alright but it's his flip side I'm really interested in:
Voracious Reader - really probably should have included this as part of the spells that marry up with my chosen commander but he ended up here, I think because I was focussed on his normal side and not his flip side.
Last up I guess, unusually for me, I should talk about lands as even they had to adhere to my budget. Therefore, a lot of the big money fetches, duals, filters etc aren't going to be seen in this deck.
Command Tower - £0.99 (£24.99)
Arcane Lighthouse - £2.49
Reliquary Tower - £2.49 (£3.99)
Hopefully, these are all self-explanatory.
Evolving Wilds - £0.10 (£1.49)
Terramorphic Expanse - £045 (£1.99)
Unfortunately, Myriad Landscape is outside of my budget so only these two could be included.
Lonely Sandbar - £0.10 (£3.49)
Drifting Meadow - £0.10
Halimar Depths - £0.99 (£3.99)
New Benalia - £0.20 (1.25)
If you are going to play lands that come into play tapped it is better that they do something useful and not something useless like let you gain 1 life. Theses two both let you look at the top card/s of your library - it's very useful to be able to sort out what your next draw will be.
Glacial Fortress - £2.99 (£3.99)
Port Town - £2.99 (£3.99)
Prairies Stream - £2.49 (£4.99)
Shimmering Grotto - £0.20 (0.49)
Temple of Enlightenment - £2.00 (£6.99)
To finish off we have five variations on dual lands and Shimmering Grotto, which is probably more useful in a 3 or more colour deck but I included it here because it's cheap.
SUMMARY
What I've ended up with is a reasonably good deck that could do with more focus if more money could be spent on it.
As it is it came in at £82.06 including the cost of a non-foil version of my commander. If I want to foil as many of the cards as possible then it'll set me back £241.30 not including foil basics and costs for buying other bling replacements for the cards where no foil is available.
Overall I'm quite happy with how the experiment went, however, it was very time consuming putting it all together and then writing it up as a blog.
Until next time may you only spend slightly more than you intended on cards.
Phil
