Sometimes $100 is too expensive for commander player who are are a limited budget. Budget alternatives provide the Take Ten a similar build and an affordable alternative to the series. If you have not seen the Faceless Menace upgrades you may do so here.
The Cost
As of August 11th the cost of the Take Ten replacements for Faceless Menace on Card Kingdom was $100.66. While reasonable compared to some commander decks that cost well over $500. In the Take Ten Budget Series, cardsare used that reduce the cost of the deckbuild dramatically. Whether a high school student or a new player consider these substitutions. They are as follows…
The Substitutions
Replace Vedalken Orrery $34.99 for Dimir House Guard $ $0.25. We do not care about the creature as the house guard is a three mana tutor. The guard will search for our four mana spells like Leyline of Anticipation or Erratic Portal. These two cards will turn on the efficiency of the deck.
Replace Cloudstone Curio $29.99 with Erratic Portal $5.99. Erratic Portal bounces only 1 face up card not many per turn. However, it is a lot less expensive than the Curio. It also can be tutored with Dimir House Guard.
Replace Thrasios Triton Hero $21.99 with Azure Mage $0.25. A mana sink for the same cost though it does have blue in it’s casting cost. It is also card draw and not ramp. Still it is a mana sink and we want at least one in the deck. It is inefficient in its cost for drawing cards. In a situation sink where it is use the mana or lose it the cost is good enough.
Replace Fabricate $4.49 for Hour of Promise $0.49. We have card draw replacing ramp when we replaced mana sink for mana sink above. So to keep the categories balanced we will replace a card draw slot with a ramp card. Fabricate loses it’s value with Vedalken Orrery and Cloudstone Curio removed from the deck. Hour of Promise will fetch any two land cards which will fix your mana. This leaves the rest of your basic land fetches targets.
With these replacements the deck substitutions are much more affordable for any budget at $16.18
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