Don't wanna be all by my s-ELF

Blue players hate him! Find out his secret recipe!

Sometimes building a deck is like light beer, its cheap and you have it just lying around so you might as well do something with it. This deck is like that. It's pretty bad and pretty cheap, but it makes for a fun and regretful night.

You wake up the next morning to a confirmation for your order of a playset of zodiac animals

Go (el)F Yourself

This deck is just stupid dumb elf cards I had lying around that I scrapped together. Origins being released last summer makes building something similar to this super easy. Origins had the small sub-theme of BG elves and most of them are commons. Elves are everywhere in magic and can be scrapped up from all sets so how you build it depends on your level of magic budget. to really make a viable elf deck, you need (some) elf synergy.

You lose target friends respect equal to the number of elves you control

Even if you're on a "Sometimes I skip meals just to have money for new magic cards" level of budget, this card is necessary. It will be cheap and should be pretty easy to get from your LGS, or if you're brave enough, other people. Do you understand how this card is good with elves? Well if you're reading this for deck building advice than probably not. It's simple: have elves, deal damage. If all your deck consists of is a bunch of random elves and 4 of these with spells splashed in, you will sometimes maybe win a game in a casual setting.

Now if you're in more of a "The allowance my mom gives me every week funds my addiction" financial bracket, then these are two budget staples. Step one: drop elves like they're hashtags on instagram and step two: #play wirewood lodge #WAIT at your end step #omg tap your wellwish #tap to untap smh #ive never needed life this badly #sorry not sorry #shittydecksunday (that was supposed to be a joke but even as a joke I died a little typing that)

Now if your a money bags of the budget world living on a "my girlfriend buys me food so what little money I earn I put to magic cards (hahaha girlfriend, I meant mom)" then here's a couple more cards that I would debate are budget must haves (I just happened to have these so they ended up on my budget must haves but they're pretty good). If you manage to get your hands on four Lys Alana's and manage to get a couple on the field then your butt hole is going to hurt from all the elves you're about to shit out. Now throw in a Heedless One and you have a giant trommple beast. Now I know your excited, but don't read Heedless One's flavor text and get the wrong idea. It's just a card and I'm not 100% convinced that art is a girl.

So you're thinking "what about me?" because you've got a "I'm budget middle classe and this is the only thing I do other than get into arguments with strangers on the internet but that's free" income. Here are two more cards I run that add some zazz to your deck but are a little more bottom of the list on necessity. Use that good 'ol toot toot to call in more elves with your Sylvan Messenger. Then when your wave of elves is whelming enough, tap a trapper to give a couple death touch.

And finally for the "I have enough money to buy whatever magic cards I want so reading about a budget deck seems unnecessary since I can build a much better elf deck" I recommend these two as finishers. If you've managed to hit this tier and are adding these cards then it's safe to assume you have thrown out  a lot of 1/1 cannon fodder elves, and have the ability to give things death touch. With these now you have 2/2 less foddery elves and a menace elf that you can add death touch to for extra kills. 

If this was a Christmas tradition you either need a new tradition or to quit celebrating Christmas.

So if you're serious about getting into some mischief and have a thing for shelves, I recommend starting in Origins and then looking at green cards in Onslaught. Those both have a lot of cheap elves that are made to work with other elves. Then as you have money for, go out and buy more elves. If you don't have money, just fill your deck with green and black cards you have in that shoe box that's on top of all of your mom's Victoria Secret catalogs that you stole.

-Gaige

Like the elf idea? Have a different budget elf deck you want to show off? Think your budget Cephalid deck is better? (It isn't) Let us know how you feel.


Dan:

I own a single shiny Elvish Mystic, and that's the entirety of my elf collection.