Budget Vampires - $20 (Standard)

Part 1 - Vampires

This series is aimed at providing budget versions of popular standard decks. This is being done, both as a brewing exercise for myself, and also to give newer players some fun decks to try out.

These will all try to be less than $20, and a sideboard of typically $5.

So let's break down the choices for this Vampire deck.

Introduction:
The two colours are Black and Red, otherwise known as Rakdos. The main mechanic here is called 'madness'. When a card with madness is discarded, you can cast that card for its madness cost and use it/put it on the battlefield, often for cheaper than it would cost on its own - if you don't, it goes into the graveyard. We want cards that discard cards, and also ones with madness, both creatures and other spells in order to generate value and speed.

Lands:
Twenty two lands is a good number, particularly since the maximum number we need in the field is five - this is so we can generate value with madness enablers that cost mana to begin with.

In terms of duel lands, in order to save on cost, two Foreboding Ruins and two Cinder Barrens are here. Note that for Foreboding Ruins not to enter tapped, you can't reveal Cinder Barrens as it technically is not a swamp or mountain.

The single Geier Reach Sanitarium, gives us a last ditch effort to try and draw cards we want, whilst also being a madness enabler.

Spells:
We run quite a lot of spells, a lot of them with madness, so we want to be discarding them with enough mana to then cast them for their madness cost. When we do this we cast really powerful spells for cheap.

For instance, Fiery Temper is an absolute powerhouse here, a potential 1 red cost for 3 damage can flat out destroy a lot of creatures at about turn three and turn four, or it can be flung straight to the face of our opponents!

Stensia Masquerade can become a massive problem for opponents if left alone. It grants each attacking creature first strike, meaning they all deal combat damage to blockers first, often times killing a creature before it even deals damage back. If a vampire (which all our creatures are) deals damage to a player, we put a PERMANENT +1/+1 counter on each vampire that dealt player damage, and it can be madness-cost in!

The last of our madness spells is Distemper of the Blood. It pumps a creature with a +2/+2 and grants it trample, meaning if it deals more damage than a blocker's toughness, the difference carries over to the player, and it has a madness cost of just 1 red mana.

Of course we run a few spells that help us discard, we kinda have to, and they are Lightning Axe and Tormenting Voice. Lightning Axe deals 5 damage to a creature for 1 red mana, if you discard a card, otherwise it costs 6 total. 5 damage is enough to kill basically everything in the format right now, aside from truly massive threats, and you can discard and pay for Fiery Temper to deal a further a 3 damage for just another red mana - truly gross. Tormenting Voice is our main card draw, allowing us to pay 2 mana, discard a card, and then draw - in this deck it just screams value.

Finally I added one card from the Kaladesh set and that is Rush of Vitality. Although not a madness card or madness enabler, it is a cheap instant speed +1/+0 that grants both lifelink, healing us for the damage dealt by the creature, and indestructible, so it isn't destroyed by creature damage, or spells that 'destroy' our creature.

Creatures:
They're all vampires.

But really though. Insolent Neonate is a great, cheap 1 mana cost creature. It's a 1/1, but it has menace, meaning it can only he blocked by two creatures, and can give us a free way to discard a card and draw card if we sacrifice Insolent Neonate.

The next card is the absolute MVP of the deck. Heir of Falkenrath is a star, first providing a 2 cost 2/1, with the ability to discard a card for free and transform it into a flying 3/2, which is only then blockade by other flying creatures, or creatures with reach. This card over-performs constantly.

Furyblade Vampire is another 2 cost, free discard outlet. A 1/2 that becomes a 4/2 with trample till end of turn is just gross.

Incorrigible Youths. A 5 cost vampire with a madness of just 3 - it has haste. Let that sink in for a second. On turn 3 you can be attacking with both Incorrigible Youths and possibly two other creatures form your two turns before for huge damage. This is your win condition.

Olivia's Dragoon is another free discard outlet that turns it into a flying creature until end of turn. Acting as a weaker Heir of Falkenrath, it allows yet another madness enabler on turn 3.

Lastly Bloodhall Priest is a huge problem when you have no cards in hand. It deals 2 damage to target creature or player when it enters the battlefield if you're empty handed, and the same again every time you attack with it.

Curve Order:
Assuming you play a usable land on each turn, your ideal turns should be:
Turn 1 - Insolent Neonate
Turn 2 - Heir of Falkenrath
Turn 3 - Discard Incorrible Youths to Heir Falkenrath and madness it in.

So far you dealt 1 damage on turn 2 and 7 on turn 3. Use turn four to madness cost in Fiery Temper with Insolent Neonate and seal the game.

Sideboard:
Alms of the Vein when discarded from our hand it costs 1 black; the card can give us 3 life whilst draining our opponent for 3 and can really help versus early aggression.

Biting Rain helps us deal with a wide, creature heavy board, and it bypasses indestructible, with a madness cost - it will kill almost all of our creatures however.

Avacyn's Judgement is another for us to deal with lots of creatures too, either doing 2 damage, or more if we can afford to pay for madness and make use of the 'x' cost.

Call the Bloodline gives us another discard option that generates a token with lifelink for us too - good if need a lot of blockers to survive early agressiion.

Harsh Scrutiny is one of the only Kaladesh cards here and for 1 black cost allows us to look at a player's hand and discard a creature of theirs, then we can scry and look at the top card of our library and decide if we want to put it back, or put it to the bottom of our library instead.

1 Lightning Axe helps bring the total up to 4 if really need to see it.

Murderous Compulsion is a cheap destroy creature card with a madness cost on it, but only if that creature is tapped.

Lastly we can add another 2 Stensia Masquerade, again if we really need to see it.

Closing Thoughts:
This deck is fast. Really fast. It can deal a massive amount of damage both to creatures and to the player in another number of different ways. But it loses steam very quickly and if you have no cards in hand and no creatures then you're faced with a massive problem. The deck is weak to creature removal.

Remember though, ANY card with a madness cost is can technically be played at instant speed, and so can any creature ability.