One of the big complaints about Hearthstone is the price to pay (to play) when you first start. There are a ton of Legendaries released, and if you are unlucky you may have not received much in the way of playable cards. This is unfortunate, so we’ve gone ahead and created some budget decks that should serve you well if you are in the Bronze or Silver divisions. Some of the stronger builds should be viable throughout Gold and possibly even Platinum if you master them. We don’t recommend those decks in Diamond or to attempt a Legend climb, unless you replace some of the budget cards and turn them into actual meta decks. You CAN hit Legend with some of them, but you would really need to master them and play very well, and by that time you most likely will have enough resources to build a full version anyway.
The game is in a better state than it was a few years ago. The free Core Set, as well as the current rewards system, are both pretty generous (at least by the old Hearthstone standards). We’re also commonly getting other free stuff like packs, Legendaries etc. during expansion releases, events, and from outside of the game (e.g. Twitch drops). While things have gotten much better for new and F2p players, it’s hard to deny that the game is still quite expensive to get into. F2P players should easily be able to build a few meta decks per expansion, but the issue is that they can’t play whatever they want. So once they commit to crafting certain cards, if they want to switch to another class – tough luck! That’s why we think that those budget decks can come really handy. No matter if you want to do Daily Quests for another class, test a deck before crafting a full version, or just play around with different options, they should be a good option for new and F2P players alike.
Defining a Budget Deck
We’re trying our best to keep the budget decks as cheap as possible while making them as strong as we can. Overall, there’s no hard cutoff, but we try to keep the decks within the 2-3k Dust range (Dust cost listed next to decks below isn’t always accurate, since it includes cards that are given away for free). However, their real cost is usually much lower, because players tend to own a lot of Commons / Rares used in them already.
When it comes to Commons & Rares – it’s simple, all of them are allowed. It’s very easy to get a full Common & Rare collection (doubly so with the recent addition of Catch-Up Packs), and even if you’re missing some of them, they’re cheap to craft.
As for the Epics – if it’s not possible, we try to not include them. If a deck can be built with no Epics at all, that’s great. However, that is sadly quite rare. Epics are often key cards in a given build, so removing them is either impossible or would drop the deck’s win rate by a lot. Even in the worst-case scenario, we try to keep it down to a couple of Epics, but if choosing between a deck that has to include a few Epics and a completely unplayable deck, we’ll choose the former. Playing a deck that virtually can’t win any games is just not fun.
Legendaries are completely excluded UNLESS they are available for free. This includes all of the Core Set Legendaries, as well as Legendaries that were given out for free in the current Standard rotation. To unlock those free cards, you either have to open a single pack from a given expansion, or finish a simple achievement like owning 30 cards from a given set. It also lines up quite nicely with the fact that you’re guaranteed a Legendary in your first 10 card packs from each set. For this reason, if you are a new player or you just came back after a long break, your first priority should be buying up to 10 card packs from each Standard expansion. This will give you plenty of free Legendaries that you can use in all your decks, many of which are genuinely powerful.
Into the Emerald Dream Update
I’m sorry that this update came so late – usually I try to release them within a couple of weeks after expansion’s launch, but I had some real life stuff holding me back. Budget decks update is always a big time committment because I try. With that out of the way, let’s talk about budget decks.
Emerald Dream is the first expansion of a new Standard year, so I had to basically redo all of the budget decks completely because of the rotation. 4 expansion metas are usually very tough to build budget decks for because the card choice is limited. Many of the budget staples are no longer playable in Standard, and others got nerfed in one of the latest balance patches. However, this entire batch of decks was saved by a single card Blizzard added to the Core this year – Menagerie Jug. It activates many Aggro/Midrange strategies by adding a serious win con package.
However, Jug can’t solve every problem. Menagerie strategy works better in some classes than the others (depending on the rest of the available toolkit). I had a few problematic classes that didn’t really work with the Menagerie package. For Druid, I built a much better and more fun alternative if you’re willing to craft one Legendary. But for classes like Warlock and Warrior I simply couldn’t find a bettter budget alternative, so even though they aren’t great, there’s simply nothing else that I could think of.
I know that focusing on the Meangerie strategies means that the diversity of budget decks went down, but despite sharing the same package, they still have their own playstyle quirks
If you’re wondering which of the budget decks are the strongest, I think that Death Knight, Hunter, Paladin and Rogue are the best ones this time (also Druid if you count the semi-budget Imbue version). Demon Hunter, Mage and Priest are also okay. The rest I would stay away from unless you really need to play the class to complete some quests etc. because they felt the weakest during playtesting.
Cheap Hearthstone Decks
- Format: raptor
- Posted By:
2,760
Handbuff Death Knight is one of the strongest budget builds in this expansion. The deck works quite well in the current meta, and it can be easily built with no Legendaries – the only card you’re realistically missing is Nightmare Lord Xavius. It’s not necessary, but honestly I recommend crafting it anyway, because it’s one of the best cards from the set.
The basic idea is very simple – buff your Undead while they are in your hand, then play big minions, preferably with extra effects. Your key card is Amateur Puppeteer, which between the main body and the Mini gives +4/+4 to all Undead in your hand. It’s even better if you can play both parts together with Brittlebone Buccaneer to give it Reborn. But realistically you’re usually going to drop the first part alone and keep the Buccaneer for the mini (unless you get both in the late game). Other sources of handbuffs include Lesser Spinel Spellstone and Blood Tap.
Once you have your big Undead, it’s time to push. The best part is that most of your tools work well in all matchups. For example, Darkthorn Quilter (especially when combined with Poison Breath) and Gnome Muncher can be used as board clear, but they can also push a lot of face damage. Nerubian Swarmguard puts a big wall vs Aggro they might not be able to get through, but it’s also great vs slower decks as it summons three bodies, essentially tripling all the handbuffs you put on it.
One last thing I have to say is that you shouldn’t go all-in vs slower decks. Balancing between board pressure and resources is very important. You only have a handful of buffed minions, so play them conservatively. Drop them together with new, unbuffed minions you draw, try to play both value cards (like Chillfallen Baron or Toysnatching Geist) together with your big bombs. Don’t put yourself in a situation in which a single board clear is going to get rid of all your biggest minions.
- Format: raptor
- Posted By:
- 2,520
Menagerie Aggro Demon Hunter is a surprisingly solid deck, but what you see here is not how it’s normally built. Usually you go for a mix with Priest thanks to Aranna, Thrill Seeker‘s Tourist effect. This way you get access to some great early game minions/burn cards (e.g. Brain Masseuse and Acupuncture). However, the budget version is still decent and it should serve you quite well. If you want a full meta Demon Hunter build, however, I would go in the direction of Cliff Dive version instead. Despite somewhat falling off, it’s still one of the better decks in the game at the time of writing.
Anyway, back to the budget build. As with the other Menagerie decks, your strategy is to build an early game tempo lead and then capitalize on it with Menagerie Jug. If you manage to hit 3 minions, that’s an instant +9/+9 to your board that you can immediately take advantage of (to do some good trades or push face damage, depending on the matchup). Even just hitting two buffs is usually enough. One buff depends heavily on the situation. This deck has an unique advantage of being able to set up Dreadseeds and Dangerous Cliffside, making it easier to hit many targets with Jug. Dreadseeds are Dormant, so your opponent can’t clear them, and they come with two minion types (Undead and Beast). The downside is that since they are Dormant, you can’t attack with them immediately, but it’s still a great tempo push. Cliffside is a Location so you can activate it on the same turn you play Jug, and it’s even better because the Pirates you summon have
Other than the Menagerie package, Dreadseeds are pretty good standalone cards. While you probably won’t win the game from them alone, they make for some nice mid game distraction for your opponent, and Hound Dreadseed in particular can help you close out some games thanks to extra damage. If you combine it with other sources of damage like Chaos Strike or Gan'arg Glaivesmith, you can have some serious from-hand burn. And if you manage to stick Sock Puppet Slitherspear on board, all of that damage is doubled.
Finally, the deck runs an extra solid mid game tool – Ravenous Felhunter. Since the only Deathrattles you run are Ball Hog and Dreadsoul Corrupter, you’re guaranteed to resummon them. And a 5 mana 5/3 that summons two 4/4’s or 3/3’s with extra effects is really strong. Extra Ball Hogs are particularly good vs Aggro because of Lifesteal and Corrupters make it incredibly sticky (opponent first needs to clear a 5/3, then two 4/4’s, then two Dreadseeds they summon).
- Format: raptor
- Posted By:
- 2,680
Usually, Druid would be a great fit for the Menagerie package. The class is known for its early game Token cards, and you can usually get a good few minion types out of the Druid cards. However, the rotation left little to no early game/Token oriented tools, so it has to heavily rely on the Neutral cards. I did some playtesting and while it wasn’t the weakest budget deck, it left a lot to be desired. That’s why if you can afford to craft a Legendary card, take a look at the deck below it. If not, let’s continue.
As with the other Menagerie decks, the idea is to build a sturdy early/mid game board and them get a massive buff with Menagerie Jug. What Druid has going for is Innervate, letting you drop Jug one turn earlier than usual. Against Menagerie decks, opponent is usually trying to, but they might not expect it a turn earlier (or rather, even if they expect it, they might not be able to do anything about it).
Sadly, the only board-wide buff left in Standard for Druid is Power of the Wild, but it still has some uses. You want to flood the board anyway, so even if it’s just +1/+1, buffing multiple minions at the same time has its uses. For example, if you already have some board, it can make a nice combo with Distress Signal on Turn 4. Living Roots and Fire Fly are other good ways to summon multiple minions for the sake of board-wide buff.
If you don’t have Jug, you can try to set up Cosmic Phenomenon as an alternative Turn 5 play. If you manage to keep 4 minions alive, you get a MASSIVE power spike. Not only you give your existing board +1/+1, but you also summon three 3/4 Taunts. That’s a big push, but the downside is that it’s hard to set up because opponent will of course try his best to clear your board. Thanks to Innervate, if you’re missing just one or two minions, you might still be able to get enough for that extra effect.
The deck has SOME reach in form of Living Roots (2 damage option) and Swipe, but overall you shouldn’t rely on it – you have to deal most of damage through your minons. Don’t save those for face and use them to clear enemy board if necessary, but sometimes that little bit of extra damage from hand might be enough to close out the match.
- Format: raptor
- Posted By:
- 5,640
Imbue Druid is an almost perfect budget deck. It’s actually pretty strong in the current meta and it can be built for very cheap. But I said “almost” perfect because you just NEED to play Hamuul Runetotem – he’s the reasons why this entire deck works in the first place. So if you want to play Druid, refer to the Menagerie build above. But if you can spare 1600 Dust (or you happened to open Hamuul), this is a great choice.
The idea is to mulligan for cheap Nature spells and Imbue cards, play as many of them as quickly as you can, and then start summoning mid/big minions from your Hero Power every turn. You usually don’t bother with the Hero Power until it’s 4/4 – summoning a 2/2 or a 3/3 for 2 mana isn’t particularly powerful. The only exception is vs Aggro (in a combination with Dreambound Disciple to get some early game tempo so they don’t run over you) or when you literally have nothing else to do.
Even though Hero Power gives you “infinite value”, you usually don’t want to stretch the games very long. Against late game decks, summoning one big minion per turn usually isn’t enuogh with how many removals they have. And you can’t exactly answer their board, so they will just turn the game around on you. Try to play as aggressively as you can and go for big mid game pushes. On Turn 5-6, try playing a few minions at the same time, or doubling your Hero Power with Sing-Along Buddy. Try to build a big board they can’t clear and push as much damage as you can.
- Format: raptor
- Posted By:
- 2,520
Egg Hunter is another example of a great budget deck. While it was slightly stronger before a recent nerf patch, even in its current form it should serve you very well. The only card that you’re really missing is Zilliax Deluxe 3000 (Pylon + Ticking form, so AoE Attack buff that gets cheaper the more minions you have). You can also consider Amphibian's Spirit, but after the nerf it’s no longer a staple. You might also try adding a small Zerg package (including Kerrigan, Queen of Blades), but stats show that it’s more of a sidegrade than an upgrade.
The deck plays similarly to other Menagerie builds (you build the board of different minion types, then buff them with Jug to push a lot of extra damage or make some great trades). However, this one has one extra twist in form of Eggs – Nerubian Egg (+Terrible Chef, but this one doesn’t need an “activator”)) and Extraterrestrial Egg. Egg decks are almost as old as Hearthstone itself, and their strategy is always the same – play the Egg, which is useless by itself, and then activate it.
When it comes to Egg activators, you have two routes – buffs or Deathrattle triggers. This deck runs both. The best one by far is Terrorscale Stalker, which lets you straight up get the Deathrattle off while also coming with a 2/3 body itself. And when it comes to buff route, by far the best option is Cryopractor. Freezing an Egg is not really a big deal (since it wouldn’t be able to attack anyway otherwise), and you turn it into an actual threat by making it 3/5. At this point you just treat it as a normal minion – don’t try to proc the Deathrattle at all cost. In fact, it’s often a good idea to keep it on the board as long as you can as an insurance vs AoE damage. If your opponent clears the board, you will still have a minion to attack with next turn.
Alternatively, you also have Leokk (from Patchwork Pals) and, in similar vein, Zilliax if you run him. Technically the version using Amphibian's Spirit has an easier time activating Eggs, but in the budget version I had to pick between that and R.C. Rampage, but from my testing the latter is a better card in this deck.
- Format: raptor
- Posted By:
- 3,960
Protoss Mage has been a pretty controversial deck – some love it, others hate it. However, I really wanted to include it here because it’s quite unique for a budget deck. As you’ve probably realized by now, most budget decks are Aggro/Midrange, because those usually aren’t built. Of course, this specific deck could really benefit from a Legendary card too (Artanis), but it’s not strictly necessary to run. You can find some full Protoss Mage builds here.
The general idea is quite simple – Colossus is your main win condition. It deals more damage as you play more Protoss spells (you can recognize them by the Protoss icon under the mana cost, like Shield Battery). Each Protoss spell = 2 more damage from Colossus. So your goal is to stall the game while playing as many Protoss spells as possible and then finish things off with Colossus. While you technically have only 8 Protoss spells, Resonance Coil generates extra ones so the number goes up. You can also get extra copies from Tidepool Pupil (try to get extra Coils for even more spells). And finally, sometimes you might be able to Discover more from Primordial Glyph and Tide Pools.
What’s great about this strategy is that you don’t need to “OTK” your opponent. Because Colossus also clears the boards, it’s very common to play him with let’s say 7-8 damage if you need a board clear. With two copies of Colossus and two Youthful Brewmasters, you should have enough late game damage to close out the game anyway. Talking about Brewmasters, while you want to keep them for Colossus in some matchups, in others you might want to use them on Sleet Skater or Bob the Bartender to get more stall. After all, what’s good of more late game damage if you don’t survive until the late game.
Oh, and one final thing – as you can see, Colossus costs 12 mana so you can’t play it normally. Even with two Photon Cannons discounting it to 10, it’s still very expensive. That’s why you run Warp Gates – each use of the Location decreases the cost of your next Protoss minion by (3). Early in the game you can use it to get out a buffed Void Ray, but later you want to stack a few Discounts and play a cheap Colossus. Sometimes Warp Gates will even let you play two on the same turn.
- Format: raptor
- Posted By:
- 2,700
Shanty Paladin, also known as Drunk Paladin, is one of the most popular and strongest decks on the ladder at the time I’m writing this. Of course, since we aren’t allowed any Legendaries, we can only focus on one of the two main win conditions of the deck. Full build also runs Ursol + Shaladrassil combo (which is what put it on the radar in the first place), and if you own those cards or can afford it, be sure to add it in. The combo Corrupts Shaladrassil and then puts all 5 Corrupted Dream cards in your hand for 3 turns in a row. It’s very powerful late game tactic. However, Sea Shanty still remains the main way to close out games even in the full build, and that’s what we’re focusing on here.
The idea is that Sea Shanty gets cheaper and cheaper whenever you play spells that target a character. It doesn’t matter what character – your Hero, enemy hero, any minion. In this build, it mostly comes in a form of buffs, most notably Divine Brew and Lifesaving Aura. Both of them provide 3 mana discount to Shanty, although with Aura you have to wait a few turns to get all the spells. In a perfect scenario, you play a small minion early, keep buffing it, then play a cheap Shanty in the mid game which your opponent might not be able to answer.
This deck is very light on minions, that’s why it uses Libram of Clarity with no other Libram synergies. It’s just a 3 mana draw 2 minions, but getting your minions is important so you have targets for your buffs. In particular, tutoring Flickering Lightbot is a good thing, since the 3/3 will become free very quickly (after you cast just three Holy spells). Another inclusion that might seem weird is Aegis of Light + Dragonscale Armaments combo. But Aegis is just a good 1-Cost card that also happens to be Holy so it makes your Lightbot cheaper, and Armaments is a great follow-up after you use your Imbued Hero Power (then it draws 2 cards for 1 mana + summons a random cheap Dragon).
The perfect curve with this deck is a minion on Turn 1, buffs on Turn 2 and 3 (as many as you can), then Ursine Maul on Turn 4 to tutor your Shanties, and then ideally play a few more buffs on Turn 5 and play your Shanty for cheap. Your goal is to get out the 5/5’s as fast as you can, NOT to discount Shanty to 0 mana. Of course, that would be ideal, but it won’t happen very often – you will usually play it while it still costs 3-6 mana (from my experience). The earlier you play it, the harder it will be for the opponent to clear it. Many decks simply can’t answer three 5/5’s in the mid game + whatever you already had on the board, so they will leave something behind for you to hit with. And even if they manage to clear it, you follow it up with another Shanty. Sadly without the Ursol + Shaladrassil combo, the deck has no late game power push, so you need to make those 5/5’s count.
- Format: raptor
- Posted By:
- 2,080
Here’s yet another Menagerie deck, and it’s somewhere in the middle of the bunch – it’s not as good as some of them, but it’s still decent. To the dissatisfaction of Priest players, the class has been getting a bunch of solid Aggro tools over the last few sets, so we’re obviously talking advantage of the Pain package or Orbital Halo. Sprinkle some Menagerie flavor and the deck is ready. If you’re looking for a full build, the biggest difference is that you use Chillin' Vol'jin to get access to some Hunter cards like Trusty Fishing Rod or Catch of the Day, but otherwise it’s quite similar. If you have Vol’jin, try out something like this.
The budget version, however, operates similarly to other Menagerie decks – play your different minion types, try to keep them alive, buff with Jug. In this case, you have another, smaller reason to keep your board alive – Shadow Ascendant. While it only gives +1/+1 per turn, if you keep it rolling early in the game, it can really make a diference by the mid game. Ideally, you want to protect it with Power Word: Shield or Orbital Halo to make it more difficult to clear.
Thanks to the Pain package, the deck has some reach from hand, so take advantage of that. Try focusing face as much as you can, doing some risky plays to get more face damage might be the way to go, because if you get your opponent low enough, you can often finish them off with Acupuncture and Hot Coals. Hopeful Dryad might also give you some extra burn in a form of Ysera Awakens or Nightmare.
One cool combo this deck has is Illusory Greenwing + Scale Replica. It might seem weird to run two Scale Replicas with just Greenwings as your Dragons, but it makes sense. If you haven’t drawn Greenwing yet, you can use your first Replica to draw both of them. Then once you trigger Greenwing’s Deathrattle, you shuffle two more 4/5 Dragons into your deck that get summoned when drawn. If you draw them with second Replica (or first if you didn’t have to use it earlier), they get instantly summoned on the board and you draw another card instead. It’s a great tempo push + hand refill package.
- Format: raptor
- Posted By:
- 3,120
Pirate Rogue is one of the most staple Hearthstone decks. We’ve seen it before in many shapes and forms, but they always shared a similar playstyle. High tempo, aggressive, usually combined with weapon synergies. While weapon synergies are pretty light this time around, the deck is back and it’s actually looking quite good. And more importantly – it can easily be played on the budget. The main difference is that the full version runs Shaladrassil, which is a nice finisher, but it’s definitely not a must-have card. It also runs Lucky Comet which is surprisngly good (the pool of Combo minions is pretty strong right now), but, again, not necessary.
As you can probably imagine, the goal of this deck is quite simple – play minions, go face, win the game. But it has a few standout cards I want to talk about. First one is Toy Boat – it’s a card that makes you not run out of steam. Later in the game, play it together with your 1-Cost Pirates, Bargain Bin Buccaneer for some cheap draws. It’s also great with Watercannon – the Pirate you summon from attack will draw you a card. If you can afford to combo it with Sandbox Scoundrel, that’s even better – the discounts from Scroundel will let you play other Pirates, so you can easily draw 5+ cards. If you have other things to do, you’d rather keep it for the late game, but with nothing else, dropping in on curve is not that bad (you have other card draw anyway – like Preparation + Raiding Party / Dubious Purchase).
The other important card is The Crystal Cove. The standout combos here are, once again, Bargain Bin Buccaneer and Watercannon. With Buccaneer, it makes you summon two 5/5’s with Rush – great tempo push. With Watercannon, the 1/1 that immediately attacks turns into a 5/5 that immediately attacks. Great way to push face damage on the empty board while leaving a solid body behind. While not as good, you can also use it with your 2/1 1-drops to just turn them to 5/5’s. That’s still +3/+4 buff for one Charge of the Location.
The deck has pretty limited burn damage capabilities, but it can sneak in lethals here and there. As I’ve alredy mentioned, Location + weapon is a great way to push extra damage. If you have a Pirate on the board (especially one previously buffed by Location), giving it Windfury with Sailboat Captain is great. You can even combine it with Hozen Roughhouser to give the minion +2/+2 (and deal 3 extra damage in the process). There’s also a single Eviscerate, but you don’t have to save it for burn damage, you will often find it more useful as a board control tool instead.
- Format: raptor
- Posted By:
- 4,200
At the time I’m writing this, Shaman is by far the worst class in the game, with zero viable decks. Even if we dig deep and try playing the nerfed Nebula Shaman, it’s a rather costly deck that makes no sense as a budget option. Sadly Shaman also doesn’t make a great Menagerie class. So I thought that we might as well have some fun and go for a wacky Evolve Shaman deck. I’m saying wacky because despite Blizzard’s efforts to make it a thing in this expansion, it has fallen completely flat. The deck is just weak, it doesn’t have. But admittedly, Imbue decks are quite fun to play, so even if you won’t win a lot, at least you can enjoy your losses and sometimes high-roll your way to victory.
Your game plan with Imbue Shaman is to, well, Imbue your Hero Power and then keep Evolving your minions. It starts off slowly, it’s usually not worth to spend 2 mana on a +1 or +2 Evolve. But once you get it up in the +4 and more range, it starts getting interesting. For example, dropping your Living Garden and Evolving it into Ragnaros the Firelord. Or turning your Creature of Madness into Cairne Bloodhoof or Beached Whale. As you can imagine, those are high rolls, but they obviously do happen from time to time.
However, your main problem is that it’s hard to survive early/mid game to get the Hero Power rolling. You have some control and stall tools, but you really need to mulligan for some low-cost minions, try to get some decent trades, and hope that high-rolls bring you back. One way to high-roll earlier than you should is Plucky Podling. It’s a 1-drop, but it counts as a 3-drop for the sake of Evolve effects. You can often drop him on Turn 3 or 4 alongside already Imbued Hero Power and hope to get something big.
Overall, there’s not much else I can say about this deck. Evolve is the main focus of Shaman in this expansion, but so far it’s just too weak to play seriously. Maybe the mini-set or some future balance patch fixes it – I’ll be glad to revisit this deck once it happens.
- Format: raptor
- Posted By:
- 1,440
Last year, Warlock had access to a pretty decent budget option in a form of Pain Warlock. However, not only the deck was nerfed while it was still in Standard, now that both Molten Giant and Imprisoned Horror have rotated out, it makes zero sense to play it. The payoff for damaging your own Hero just isn’t there. That makes building a budget deck problematic, because in the meantime the class didn’t get any good, cheap strategy to replace it.
The reason I’m telling you this is because this Menagerie deck is once again the best I could come up with, but it’s not something I would recommend playing unless you really need those Warlock games for Quest or something. It has almost no strengths over the other Menagerie builds, so it’s just better to play them instead. The only real advantage of this deck is card draw. Between Mass Production and Eat! The! Imp!, you’ll probably never run out of cards. This way you can find your Jug more consistently, and even score some easy Meteor hits from Moonstone Mauler.
Well, another small unique aspect is the small Zerg package. I opted to run Ultralisk Cavern + Consume combo, and Nydus Worm as a way to tutor them. Usually the way it goes is that you play Cavern on Turn 3, use it to deal 1 AoE damage, then on Turn 5 you use it again and Consume the last charge to heal up + immediately trigger Deathrattle. So in total, you’re getting 2 AoE damage + 8/8 with Rush + 8 healing. That’s a great small combo, against faster decks the AoE and Rush minion will do nice job, and against slower decks the 8/8 body migth be hard to clear on Turn 5. The problem is that it’s not good enough by itself and it doesn’t exactly fit this type of deck – but after trying it out, it’s still better than an alternative of running random weak minions of different types.
- Format: raptor
- Posted By:
- 5,400
Warrior is another class that’s historically very hard to build on the budget. Most of the time, it leans towards slower Midrange or Control strategies and those usually require multiple expensive cards to build. Sadly, this time is no different. While it got some light Dragon synergies this expansion, the whole package feels really underbaked. So once again, this is not a deck I would exactly recommend playing unless Blizzard adds more Dragon synergies soon or buffs the currently existing ones.
Still, I tried to make this Warrior the most Menagerie decks out of them all. Usually, Menagerie decks don’t run THAT many small minions with different types – just enough to make Jug consistent. But this one is different. For one, it runs the other Menagerie cards like Menagerie Mug and The Curator. But more importantly, it utilizes Adaptive Amalgam as a way to make them all more consistent.
Since Amalgam has all minion types, it will always fill the “missing” types you need for your Mug and Jug. It makes using those cards way easier. Similarly, The Curator is a bit hard to fit into those decks, because by the mid game you often don’t draw 3 cards from it. With Amalgams, you can consistently get all three cards, just like from All You Can Eat. And that’s great about them is that they will keep all the buffs you gave them after they die. So if you buffed it to 4/5 with Jug, when you draw it again it will already be a 4/5.
When it comes to Dragon package – you use Darkrider and Brood Keeper. Both of them are decent cards, but in general not enough to warrant going for Dragon synergies. However, thanks to Amalgams, you don’t have to run AS many Dragons as you normally would, because they also count as them.
And last, but not least, similarly to Priest, the deck has a cute Illusory Greenwing synergy with Quality Assurance. Once your Greenwing dies, you can tutor the copies you summon with Assurance, get instant 4/5’s on the board and draw other cards instead. It’s a cool combo, but as you can probably imagine, not enough to carry the deck.
vai lançar outro deck hoje?
Escreve em inglês, gênio…
Even in low ranks there are alot of meta decks
The only difference is that those players don`t know how to pilote them
And sometimes they are missing 1 or 2 of the more expensive cards
Budget decks were just updated for Descent of Dragons meta! While some of the decks didn’t change that much, I offer two alternative builds that would need some Epics to work better – Deathrattle Rogue & Aggro Overload Shaman.
Let me know what you think!
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Where did you post Deathrattle rogue and Aggro overload shaman? I can’t find it.
Click on the name of a given deck to get redirected to a full guide with mulligan, strategy etc.
In the Rogue & Shaman guides, I’ve added those alternative builds at the bottom
Thanks for clearing that up!
Do you think any of Galakrond’s Awekening cards can be added to these decks?
Wild cards will return soon and everyone gets copies. So will you update decks inluding these?
Hey! When is this going to be updated? I’d like to make a budget deck, but I don’t want to use all my dust to create one that is much weaker now… I hope you see this comment
Keep up the great work!
The aggro paladin deck has been surprisingly successful I climbed from rank 20 to rank 10. Thanks for the decks Stonekeep. ????
why did it turn my emoji into question marks >:(
What emoji did you try to put? Maybe it’s not recognized on our site or something (not sure).
But I’m glad that you had a nice climb with the deck
Awesome work
(looking forward for your disenchanting and crafting guide for the new expansion)
Budget decks were just updated for Saviors of Uldum meta! I really like this batch, I think that we have some really strong options.
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When can we expect an update?
Update budget deck pls
Absolutely adore this site, and since finding it a few years back, I haven’t touched any other Hearthstone sites since! The degree of professionalism placed into every guide and the speed at which this site’s content is updated after huge game updates and expansions is unrivaled by any other sites out there.
Necessary praise aside, will these budget decks need updating after the Rise Of Shadows nerfs and the new classic set cards, or have there been minimal changes to the meta and included cards?
Considering Archmage Vargoth is given to everyone for free, is he not a good option for budget token druid?
Yes, you’re right, and it’s discussed on the deck’s page! If you have Vargoth (and everyone who plays the game right now does), replace Cult Master with it.
However, it’s a limited time promotion (you can only get it until July AFAIK), so it’s better to not assume that everyone has it in case someone checks out the budget guides after it runs out
I have to say: crafting Whizbang is probably the smartest decision I’ve made in this game, if for no other reason than he keeps my games entertaining.
That said, I do truly appreciate these budget deck lists–especially this new format with the strategy and upgrade/sidegrade information. I’m already seeing so many things I want to try out… Thank you all so much for doing this and for writing it so quickly.
Budget decks were just updated for Rise of Shadows meta! Big thanks to Martian & Roffle for doing it so quickly.
Comments below this one might be outdated.
We’re currently working on the new budget decks! They should be ready some time next week.
Thank you guys and gals! No rush. The new expansion has only been out for 2 days. It takes time to see where the meta will be going, and to learn how to incorporate new cards. Keep up the hard work.
Hi,
Will these decks be updated for Rise Of Shadows/Year of the Dragon?
Thanks.
EDIT: Please ignore my comment above.
I completely forgot that I’d already asked this on you “Rise Of Shadows Deck Lists” article.
Didn’t mean to spam, lol.
Thank you for this!
Murloc deck seems to be the cheapest for me.
I dusted a golden legendary earlier and thought i should craft a midrange Hunter without Rexxar but there are so many viable budget decks out there, which makes me think if there is a better budget deck that suit a newbie like me…
P.s: i have Uther, Jaxxarus along with Bloodmage Thalnos and Harrison Jones as well.
You can go budget otk paladin but it takes some learning fun deck and you can turn it into a tier 1 deck
I’m going to ask at risk of sounding like an idiot, But are the dust cost based on what you would get if you disenchanted the deck? Because none of theses decks cost anywhere near those prices to craft. And if so why mark the price like that? I don’t understand.
No the dust cost just means how much it would cost to craft every single card in the deck.
So, the best budget decks from this list are Midrange Hunter and Zoo Warlock. And if i mean the best, i mean the best by far.
We’ll be working on updating these soon after the expansion is released!
It would be nice
If you can, please include more cards replacements in each deck. Obviously if someone is forced to make budget deck, he doesn’t have all cards. Not only all legendaries and epics but also not all commons and rares.
Budget decks can be already considered “replacements” for meta decks. If you don’t have some cards, just craft them. The very reason for budgets is that you can build one from scratch for around 1500 dust.
if someone has some legendaries and epics put some of them to replace a common or a rare to the descriptoon of the deck
Can we please have multiple budget decks for each class?
Can you add each deck bbcode ?
nevermind i got it
Any changes after the nerfs to Giggling Inventor???
Stonehill Defender for value generation
Rotten Applebaum for cost/benefit taunt
You put token Druid twice under deck recommendations.
Hello, please, when will be updated for new expansion ? Thanks a lot.
Being worked on currently!
Ok. Thank you. Warlock seems to be a greatest choice for new players
Right you are
Hi,
Thanks for this guide, it helps a lot !
Dude Paladin deck is very dependent of “LightFused Stegodon” and “Lost in the Jungle” cards, that will be soon unavailable due to extension turn over.
Would you have some tips to replace these cards ?
Btw, you probably want to replace the current midranged hunter deck with the other more secret oriented deck that used Spellstone and only 7 minions. You could replace Deathstalker Rexxar with a highmane or something.
Really good idea. Your deck is much better than the version from budget list.
I am sorry but I don’t know where to post regular questions so I will post this here.
I want to build a secret mage style deck I have looked into deck formulas listed here and have not found anything within that vein so if someone can post a budget secret mage that would be awesome ps I have a little over five hundred dust saved so feel free to add some non budget cards near that amount thanks!
Do you have any epic or legendary mage cards?
If you look up the “non budget” tempo mage, how far off are you from this?
What secrets do you have?
Let me know and will make you a list.
Thank you (:
In answer to your question I have written down every Mage related epic and legend I have as well as every Standard legend and epic
I built Tempo mage once and did not like the flow of it yet I do want to play mage as I have heard she is an important class to learn.
Anyway here is the list
Mage Epic:
Book of Specters x2
Primordial glyph x2
Arcane Keysmith x2
Pyroblast x 2
Counterspell x2
Other secrets:
Explosive Runes x2
Frozen clone x2
Mirror Entity x2
Ice Barrier x2
Mage Legends:
Frost Lich Jaina x1
Aluneth x1
Archmage Arugul x1 (sorry I pulled one of these and was only able to craft one of the other two)
Standard Epics:
Doomsayerx2
Nightmare Amalgramx2
Blaze Callerx2
Spiteful Summoner x2
Primordial Drake x2
Charged Devilsaur x2
Mountain and Sea Giant x2
Standard Legends:
Prince Keleseth x2
Genn Greymane x1 not to brag but he is a gold genn btw lol lucky pull
Countess Ashmore x2
Baku x1
The Lich King x1
hope this helps and thank you so much!
Hello
I crafted the Budget Elemental Mage Deck a few days ago. It is so much fun
I am a new player and haven’t got aluneth yet and no dust left. I enchanted all of my free legendaries for this deck.
My question is at this point, if it is still worth it to collect dust for Aluneth even, if this card will leave the rotation with the new expansion coming next year. I don’t know how long it will take to collect that much dust. How much dust do you get if a legendary leaves the rotation and become a wild card?
Thanks a lot
Basicly, average dust cost of a pack is one hundred, and due to quests you usually can collect 180 – 170 gold in three days. So, if you will win six to nine games, while completing the tasks, you will collect 1600 dust in 24 days. This will leave you with a really useful legendary for the next eight (Isn’t it?) month. I think, that’s worth it, at least, if you’r going to use it)
(Btw, this sounds hard, but crafting a legendary in a month is really not so hard)
(I’m not really an english speaking man, so often do either logical, or grammatical mistakes, sorry)
Yep, sorry mate
Okay, thank you very much
As a new player, you don’t want to sink dust into a legendary card. For starters, a deck can eaisilly get boring, and you might want to play something else. So while it might take only 24 days to save up for a legendary, you’ll be getting NO cards in that period of time, to further expand and enhance your collection, or to make new decks. Also, this deck is not very powerful, with no meta version. I’m doubting Aluneth’s place in this deck. In addition, that legendary card fits in little or no decks outside of this one, and could easily faze out of the meta. So overall, crafting a legendary can totally ruin your experience, and until you get a larger collection, I’d only recommend dusting cards that you never expect to use. (Sorry for typos, I typed this quickly on a phone)
Elemage is not a strong deck right now. However you can still buy aluneth for secret tempo mage that is stronger.
Don’t bother crafting aluneth,it’s not worth it,the best legendaries to craft right nowpath are probably Baku/Genn.
First let me say thank you so much for this guide! The decks are not only cheap to build but also very easy to pilot.
Would you mind putting up a budget murloc deck please?
That would be awesome
Thank you again!
They could do so but the deck won’t be strong enough.
Murloc package in a budget would lack in power to finish the game.
You would miss so much “Warleader” and “Gentle Megasore”.
For the priest deck would lady in white work?
it could, the only minions who would suffer is the bone dragons
that is unless she overides the Twilight drakes (i dont know how they interact with her)
the twilights will become 1/1 and still get the hand buff though so you could have a 1/7 twilight with LIW
just crafted your preist dragon deck and it worked like a charm (: I mean sure it all depends on the draw ie you can’t win them all but when this goes off it is hard to stop thanks much!
guys, best budget decks right now are midrange hunter, dude paladin, tempo mage (not this elemental mage), combo priest and zoolock. Combo priest is inconsistent and a very tricky deck to play.
here is the meta tempo mage http://www.hearthstonetopdecks.com/decks/witchwood-tempo-mage-deck-list-guide-standard/
Is Budget rogue a good deck to craft for, Im currently using budget mage, but i also want to use rogue from time-to-time, or is mage just a wayy better option.
Спамеры совсем ебанулись. Это англоязычный сайт по игре, алло, гораш!
+
Muitobom os Deck Budget , adorei .. Valeu <3 , Um abraço aqui do Brasil !
The decks are great, good job, love the website
Just a question: Could we get some tips on upgrades to these decks? Expensive cards that we might have to use in these decks. Or this doesn’t makes any sense? haha ty!
Look at the meta versions of these decks (most of them have a meta version), and make substitutions based on the cards with the highest winrates.
Examples:
Rogue – Prince Keleseth and vilespines
Druid – Whispering woods and branching paths – malfurion too eventually
Mage- Jaina and blazecallers (Jaina has insane synergy with elementals)
Priest – Shadow visions (alternatively you could build the spiteful deck with spiteful summoners and free from amber)
Warlock- Hooked reavers, Prince keleseth, Gul’dan
Shaman – different class is a good upgrade
Paladin – Call to arms (insane card for that deck) and later sunkeeper tarim
Warrior- Town criers are a good craft for that deck
Nice list. I would also add that although Warlock is currently very strong, it’s decks are also very expensive. If you are short on mana and are looking to upgrade a single class, I would suggest Druid, Rogue, Mage or specially Paladin instead. Priest isalso good, but it doesn’t have a tier 1 deck right now. As for Shaman and Warrior, both classes remain at the bottom and are not worth the investment if you are a FTP or budget player with low mana avaliable.
Lady in White dragon deck is amazing…
Lady in White turned out to be a bad deck for many reasons, best priest deck rn is control priest with mind blast
I have lady in white from firsts packs and I really love to see her play. For.me it’s amazing card but most of the time she doesn’t work… Of course it’s nice to throw on the table 9/9 steambot but too often she is too slow… She works as a nice additional card for deck with double heal and inner fire ( steambot cost 4 and have 9 health so it’s possible to do otk with it). I have in this deck weapon for priest and lyra as well so it sometimes works ( but most of the time lady in white is far in the deck to have any usage from her).
What you are playing with LiW.that is so good? Maybe I’m doing something wrong?
Lady in White could be good with more support but mind blast control is best right now.
Hi All im noob here. Good post! Thx! Thx!
If any new player see my comment, plz do not make the midrange hunter deck, it is not the hunter’s world.
Midrange Hunter has been a budget staple for a long time, so I’m not sure what you are talking about.
I did not judge your article, it is very helpful, I made my decks based on it, the problem is not hunter, no one can form a better budget deck for hunter, but in current environment, hunter is just too weak, New player would switch to other class after he beyond the newbie level.
Anyway, these decks are not expensive, and play different class would be more interesting and helpful.
i got rank 15 for the first time with a slightly upgraded midrange hunter. I used a 4k dust elemental mage and tried different variations of mage but i was hardstuck rank 16. 1.2 k dust midrange hunter got me rank 15
Every dude paladin deck user should uninstall heartstone so the normal people can enjoy it.
Dude Paladin has been a thing since forever – they’ve just swapped Quartermaster for Tarim, Level Up and/or Lightfused Stegadon; it’s always been a “normal” HS archetype – it’s just a bit stronger now than it has been for a long time.
It’s still beatable mind; I have few problems with it when running Control Warlock – especially with Despicable Dreadlord. Taunt-heavy decks generally do well too.
And who are you to judge whet other people should play? If you don’t like playing this deck than don’t. I can say the same about cubelock, about face Hunter, face mage, quest rogue or any other deck if I don’t like them. If you are playing ranked than you use every opportunity to take down your opponent. If you don’t like that style you can always play normal and give up if you face ‘cancer’ deck. But don’t tell other people why should they play. They will play with the deck that’s give them fun and satisfaction. That why hearstone was made , to give fun (and of course money to blizzard).
Yeah and cube locks they make the games not even fun and impossible to rank up
These are great. Would be nice to have some budget odd and even decks (if they exist). Budget odd decks seem to be quite good, and baku is a good legendary for budget players.
If you own Baku, I belive odd Paladin is the cheapest deck. Odd hunter can be good too, yet weaker than Paladin and you may need Leeroy Jenkins.
Thank you so much for this list. It helps a lot.
I LOVE THIS BUDGET DECK SECTION! Thank you so much for writing this up and caring for us, F2P players. Please keep this section up-to-date as the meta changes and perhaps provide a 2nd/3rd alternative for each class whenever possible. Keep up the good work!
Just a heads up: Elemental Mage is still listed with the Secret Mage deck list.
Fixed, thanks!
Can we get some updates please?
We’ve updated four decks, we still need time to finish the rest.
You guys are doing great! Thanks for the work you do in updating, on top of playing yourselves!
Can we please get updates on these decks, pirates are almost non existent with patches nerf yet almost all these decks contain Golakka. It was nice to see them get rid of the creeper after nerf but golakka is somehow still in these decks and needs to be removed as well.
Yeah, i’d also love to see all of these decks get slightly adjusted and maybe even a new deck or two.
I’ve asked for it also few weeks ago, but with no response. I assume that this will be updated after next patch.
Can we get some update for post-nerf decks?
Which of these decks is the strongest? Please answer
Secret Mage and Zoo I would say.
I disagree, though secret mage is very strong in ladder indeed this version doesn’t run alluneth (the 6 mana mage weapon) which really hurts the deck.
In my opinion inner fire priest is the best closely followed by zoo warlock and midrange hunter. After that mage and druid and the other decks are pretty trash.
Inner fire without Shadow Visions I really disagree… Zoo is strong, surely if you manage to put in Keleseth and maybe Gul’Dan.
Elemental mage (not secret tempo, check ‘other budget options’) with Jaina and Baron Geddon (?) also works really well for me.
I already have the full Budget Midrange Hunter deck and I am loving it, great guide! But, Is it worth crafting Secret Mage now or should I wait until April 2018 for the rotations and then spend my dust on updated budget decks? I suppose what I’m asking is, will these deck lists be updated very soon after the rotation or will they remain outdated until a few weeks after the rotation, if I’m making any sense? Thanks for any helpful repsonses.
Whoops, forgot to ask if these lists will be updated to address the nerfs to Patches and Creeper etc. Sorry for the unintentional spam, just really interested to hear from site admins and better players!
Mage won’t be viable after the rotations I don’t think, except if blizzard make a few new cards that support it. If you do have the dust or most of the cards you could craft it but I wouldn’t recommend this version as it doesn’t run the weapon which hard carries quite a few games.
Cuse I dont have raza it’s realy bad but is it any deck I can came to rank 10-5 with?? Now I dont use ut at all, I’m playing the Budget jade deck
I got shadowreaper anduin as free deth night.Is it any good Budget deck with him?
Uh u can play with a budget dragon-filled deck
Hi there,
built Midrange Hunter and im quite happy with the Deck. Recently crafted 2 Corridor Creepers as you recommended. Is cutting Hounds really the way to go? Quite liked the Synergy with huner’s Mark and helped to turn some lost games into wins. I felt like cutting the Hyena… good idea or is it definetly Hounds? And why is it Hounds?
Yeah I would also consider replacing hyena, I also tried it and it is very difficult to make it work. Hounds is much better right now.
If you do end wanting to rank with the mage i made it to rank 11 in about 3 days. I played this game for a few months a few years ago and with that knowledge and this deck its been enjoyable experience. Thanks i hope to push to rank 5 by the end of month. I hope it’s possible