In the past year, Upper Deck Entertainment has done a great job making some of the best cards in the game more available to consumers. Expensive foils such as Torrential Tribute from Labyrinth of Nightmare and Ring of Destruction from Pharaonic Guardian are now easily available, paving the way for players on a budget to build competitive decks. Let's take a look at a low-budget deck that has the potential to win any matchup.

Monster Lineup

Unfortunately, many of the best monsters in the game are also the most expensive, so the budget gamer has to be creative when building his or her monster lineup.

We can begin with a few great starter deck commons. One of the new structure decks, Fury from the Deep, gives us access to Tribe-Infecting Virus and Mobius the Frost Monarch, two of the best Water monsters in the game. Older starters such as Zombie Madness and the Joey starter give us a few copies of Magician of Faith, Sangan, Spirit Reaper, Zombyra the Dark, and Mystic Tomato. With these cards, the core of the low-budget deck is set.

For the rest of our monster roster, we'll look to nifty commons and rares from other sets. The Invasion of Chaos set brings us Berserk Gorilla and Chaos Sorcerer, while Tournament Packs 5 and 6 have rare versions of Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer and Airknight Parshath. Meanwhile, the Magician's Force set gives us Roulette Barrel and Magical Merchant, two great Light monsters. Finally, we’ll call upon Dark Beginning 1 for a copy of Cyber Jar.

Monsters: 17

1 Chaos Sorcerer

1 Mobius the Frost Monarch

1 Airknight Parshath

1 Tribe-Infecting Virus

1 Sangan

2 Spirit Reaper

1 Mystic Tomato

2 Magician of Faith

1 Berserk Gorilla

1 Roulette Barrel

1 Magical Merchant

1 Zombyra the Dark

2 Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer

1 Cyber Jar

Spells for a Low-Budget Production

We're in luck, because some of the best spells in the game have been reprinted as low-cost alternatives, with the notable exception of Delinquent Duo. Even Graceful Charity appears as a starter deck super rare, so the construction of the spell lineup should be rather easy.

The only non-starter deck cards featured in this lineup are Smashing Ground from Invasion of Chaos and Book of Moon from Pharaonic Guardian.

Spells: 15

1 Pot of Greed

1 Graceful Charity

1 Premature Burial

1 Snatch Steal

2 Nobleman of Crossout

2 Smashing Ground

1 Heavy Storm

1 Mystical Space Typhoon

1 Swords of Revealing Light

1 Scapegoat

2 Book of Moon

1 Creature Swap

Low-Cost Traps

Again, some of the best traps in the game are easily available, with the exception of Mirror Force. Both Ring of Destruction and Magic Cylinder are IOC special edition promos that are available for less than five dollars each. You can find the rest of the traps in this lineup in various starter decks.

Traps: 8

1 Magic Cylinder

1 Ring of Destruction

2 Sakuretsu Armor

1 Torrential Tribute

1 Dust Tornado

1 Call of the Haunted

1 Ceasefire

The Thrilling Conclusion

This deck plays extremely well. Mystic Tomato and a bevy of flip effects will give you some great opening plays, and the spell and trap lineup practically mirrors what you see in some of the best decks at top-tier events. While this deck doesn’t run expensive cards such as Black Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning, Breaker the Magical Warrior, Lightning Vortex, Mirror Force, or Delinquent Duo, you should still be able to compete with some of the most viable decks.

Have fun building and testing out this deck. I'll be back next week with some more deck analysis.