Hello folks and welcome to another little piece for our new and upcoming Duelyst superstars-to-be.

I put up some budget decks up last time – Economy Class Duelyst – and our good man GrincherZ (Grincherz Stream Link) updated his set too – Decks here. One of the things I noted from both discussion on these posts and on the Duelyst Official Discord channel (Invite link to the channel) is that a lot of questions focused on ‘replacements’. Replacing a higher rarity card for a lower rarity one that did not totally upend the macro-strategy of the deck. So this one looks at some of the cheaper to acquire stars of the Duelyst field.

Starting with the obvious, perhaps, is the best way here. Each card or set of cards has a reason given for its potential inclusion in your deck. One of the big things about building cheap decks when you start out is to stick to simple strategy and strong value. We all have our fanciful plans but a lot of them require specific cards and often without them the strategy will be half-baked and you will find yourself frustrated at trying to make it work. As you progress through the game you will find the correct faction and the correct strategy/archetype that suits your style of play, and at that point you can move to the more specific cards (an example is Flameblood Warlock – you won’t run it in every deck, but when you need it in a specific plan it does its job very well). The article mainly focuses on neutrals with some extra stuff on the side.

Basics

Looking for solid turn 1 play – Healing Mystic

Single target dispel – Ephemeral Shroud

Dealing damage – Bloodtear Alchemist, Sabrespine Tiger, Young Flamewing

Preventing damage – Repulsor Beast, Primus Shieldmaster

Divine Bond – Hailstone Golem, Brightmoss Golem, Stormmetal Golem

You can actually play a fully basic Lyonar deck with these cards, for example –



Now I’m not advocating you go out there with this deck (even if it works and is my go-to deck for explaining game mechanics to newbies) – because the following list is perhaps even more useful.

Commons

These cards form the spokes and gears of many a good deck. They cost 40 spirit to craft, and you will open many of these in your time playing. Some of these, however, are well worth the early crafting cost.

Solid turn 1 play and good trade enabler later – Primus Fist, Maw, Jaxi

Good minion for the cost with card draw – Blaze Hound

Extremely good mid game minion with trading power – Dancing Blades

Global minion to target enemy threats – Wings of Paradise

Global damage and trade enabler – Blistering Skorn

Area of effect damage – Frostbone Naga, Gnasher

With mostly commons and basics, Magmar is also quite comfortable –



And again – this works, but with a few choice additions from the next list, you can build even more efficiently. A lot of the strongest faction-specific cards in Duelyst are actually rare, common or basic. Every faction has at most one or two epics that can be considered staple, and generally speaking legendaries are useful in specific archetypes and often, not run in a full set of three. Faction rares are often the glue for your deck, and neutral rares are good value for their cost.

Rares

These cost 100 spirit each, and also give the lowest spirit return of any rarity, so try not to disenchant any, to avoid spirit losses. Rares have another important reason to be specially noted. Every faction has a legendary Sister card, and three copies of this card can be unlocked by getting all the faction’s rares from the Core Set (Shim’zar rares do not count). There is a neutral Sister too – Sworn Sister L’kian – and to unlock this card you need to have 3 copies each of 6 different rares in the Neutral minions Core Set. Rather serendipitous then, that I am about to give you a list of good Rares that you can craft 3 each and play in your rapidly evolving decks!

Multi target dispel – Lightbender

Effective early mid game threat – Sunsteel Defender

Mid game card-draw – Sojourner

Aggressive deck focus – Flameblood Warlock

Growing threat minion, works with general spell – Owlbeast Sage

Good body with useful card draw-like effect – Grincher

If you went with Mechaz0r! as one of your deck type choices, consider Sword of Mechaz0r! and Cannon of Mechaz0r! as good rare additions. Crossbones, the mortal enemy of this deck, is also a useful rare.

Battle Pets

Every faction has one good battle pet that is in the budget range. Use them if you get them because they do actually provide good value with their effects.

Pets that fit into the overarching strategy of both faction generals – Pax, Xho, Icy, Gro

Pets that fit into decks for one of their two generals – Fiz, Ooz, Gor

So that’s a short sweet list of priority neutral minions to aim for, and the reasons why they’d fit in your deck. Plenty of good players and deck builders put their ideas up on Reddit, forums and so on – one of the things that’s worth noting is that some choices they make are not wrong or right, but that they are different, play style focused ones. I know two high level Cassyva players, one who runs 3 Rites of the Undervault and one who runs none. The first runs 0 Vorpal Reavers, the second all 3. Both of them have found what works for them – and that’s at least partly what this article is getting at. Identify your style and use the general guidelines to then try and build a deck that you feel invested in, that grows with you as you climb ranks. Use the replacements to fill your deck and see if it can perform the strategy you are aiming for, and then with that information you can choose what Legendary cards you need to complete the best deck for your style. Have fun all!