Agilio Macabasco
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6 Min read Legends of Runeterra, by design, is very friendly to brand new players or players looking to compete without having to spend money due to its card acquisition systems and philosophy.
In general, you can collect cards quickly and you can often get by with starter cards in the meantime since most cards in the game are relatively viable.
In this article, we’ve got seven of the best LoR budget decks as recommended by one of our favorite LoR experts, EG Swim. Check out his video below for his explanations:
On average, the decks will be mostly built from Common and Rare cards with only around one Epic card and one to two champs (often using champions from the pre-built starter decks).
In each deck section (except for one deck since it’s already the optimized list at the cheap price) we will also include the code for an upgraded version that you can build toward as you acquire more cards.
This deck is one of the easier ones to pilot as it revolves around the standard Demacian playstyle of building up your board with units and buffing them.
Once you’ve established your board, it’s very easy to proc the Vanguard Bannerman Allegiance effect as there is literally only one card that can cause you to fail.
In the early game, you can utilize the tried and true combo of Brightsteel Protector + Fleetfeather Tracker to Challenge units for free with Barrier.
Cithria the Bold will be your only Epic card. You have a Citrus Courier instead of another copy of Cithria as your win condition (using Rally instead of AoE Fearsome and buffs).
Garen is the only champion as he comes in the budget deck instead of Fiora in the upgraded version.
This deck relies on empowering Elusive units from Bilgewater as your main win condition.
Permanent buffs from cards like Omen Hawk, Shared Spoils, Starlit Seer, Pocket Aces, and Take Heart can make your Elusives huge quickly.
Combat tricks like Elixir of Iron and Fury of the North will help you protect them, make favorable trades, or help you push more damage.
Braum, your only champion, acts as another great buff target and acts as a secondary win condition if you’re able to level him up.
Citrus Courier acts as a finisher enabler with Rally as plunder is very easy to proc with Elusive units.
This is one of the most cost-efficient budget choices as it’s already very close to its upgraded version list.
The overall concept is to flood the board with cheap units, mainly spiders, which feeds into your They Who Endures.
Your cheap units should be able to stall the early game and you’ll be able to sustain yourself with healing from cards like Neverglade Collector and Withering Wail.
The Neverglade Collector will also help you whittle down the enemy’s Nexus until your They Who Endures come online.
Once you have a huge They Who Endure on board, you can often swing hard enough with Overwhelm to win the game.
If your opponent tries to use cards like Vengeance or Will of Ionia as removal, you have Atrocity as a countermeasure.
This is another deck that involves Elusives but it’s much more explosive in comparison to the Bilgebuff list.
The trick here is to skip your first two rounds for a six mana round three with the mana you banked to make a big Zed/Solitary Monk by buffing it with Stand Alone.
The deck list includes a third Zed but you can replace him with a Solitary Monk if you can’t spare the champion wild card.
Relentless Pursuit will help you win the game very quickly as you’ll get many swings in a short amount of time and often before your opponent can react.
The success of this deck often relies on your early draws. If you’re able to get what you need, you can often win fast, but the speed of your losses can often be as quick when you don’t.
This makes it a good choice if you’re looking to climb quickly if you’re able to play it with a favorable win ratio.
Spider Aggro has been one of the classic decks since the game’s beta so if you like playing rushdown decks, this is an appealing choice for you.
Similar to the They Who Endure list, you’ll want to swarm your board. However, instead of using the spiders as a stall tactic, you’ll want to use them aggressively.
Once you’ve flooded your board, you’ll be able to make a huge Crowd Favorite to hopefully end the match by mid game with Overwhelm.
If the game extends to later rounds, Darius will be your finisher or you can use Noxian Fervor on your spiders to make your final push to win with direct burn damage.
Here’s another Allegiance deck, but an aggressive variant that revolves around buffing and protecting your Elusives.
Kinkou Wayfinder is a central card for this deck as you can get a ton of value by bringing out Navori Bladescouts and Omen Hawks (which still activate their buff ability).
You can often overrun your opponents in the early game but Jeweled Protector and Windfarer Hatchling can help give you more mid-late game power if you need it.
Another key component of this deck is using your Navori Conspirator to bounce your units to get repeated value from their effects.
Note that this decklist is slightly more expensive than the rest as it requires two Epic cards from the 2x Windfarers.
Last but not least, we have the infamous Burn Aggro!
This budget deck is actually one of the best decks in the meta as is, so we won’t be providing two versions – this is the competitive list!
Your eyes aren’t deceiving you, it runs zero champions and no Epics so it’s actually cheaper than other decks that we’ve recommended in this article.
The goal of this deck is to quickly run over your opponents with a ton of direct burn damage.
Your early units like Legion Grenadier and Boomcrew Rookie can deal a lot of chip damage with their effects.
All of your spells either provide additional burn or help you enable more damage so be relentless with your aggression!
This is another great choice for climbing quickly as you’ll either burn your opponent down or you’ll run out of steam if your opponent is able to stabilize.
Thanks for reading! To explore all the cards in LoR, check out our Card Gallery or jump straight into our Deck Builder if you got some ideas from our article. Show us your best decks in the comments below. Be sure to follow our expert, EG Swim, at his LoR website, Twitch, Twitter, and Youtube.
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