💰 Budget Brew Wednesday — Standard Edition. Total deck price: $51.14 for all 60 cards. This week’s brew: Dimir Midrange, currently sitting at #4 in the Standard metagame (~8.4% of the competitive field).

Featured Card: Cecil, Dark Knight

Why This Deck — The Value Pitch

Dimir Midrange currently sits at #4 in the Standard metagame, carrying roughly 8.4% of the competitive field — right behind Izzet Spellementals, Mono-Green Landfall, and Jund Sacrifice. It wins with efficient black removal, patient blue tempo and card advantage, and a mana curve that never asks you to overextend.

The problem: the tournament-winning version leans on a full playset of Kaito, Bane of Nightmares, a copy of the $35 Wan Shi Tong, Librarian, and an expensive surveil-land manabase. This Budget Brew keeps the archetype’s actual game plan — remove their stuff, flash in tempo creatures, bury them in card advantage — and swaps those luxury pieces for commons and uncommons that do almost the same job. Total cost for all 60 cards: about $51.14.

Full Decklist — Total: $51.14 (60 cards)

Creatures (19) — about $13.64

  • 4 Dream Beavers
  • 4 Floodpits Drowner
  • 4 Spyglass Siren
  • 3 Cecil, Dark Knight
  • 2 Tishana’s Tidebinder
  • 2 The Wondrous Wasp

Instants & Sorceries (17) — about $21.32

  • 2 Bitter Triumph
  • 3 Requiting Hex
  • 2 Shoot the Sheriff
  • 1 Spell Pierce
  • 1 Spell Snare
  • 2 We Say Thee Nay!
  • 2 Enduring Curiosity
  • 2 Strategic Betrayal

Lands (24) — about $16.18

  • 3 Hidden Lair
  • 2 Restless Reef
  • 2 Soulstone Sanctuary
  • 8 Island
  • 9 Swamp

Paste-Ready Import Block

Deck
4 Dream Beavers
4 Floodpits Drowner
4 Spyglass Siren
3 Cecil, Dark Knight
2 Tishana's Tidebinder
2 The Wondrous Wasp
2 Bitter Triumph
3 Requiting Hex
2 Shoot the Sheriff
1 Spell Pierce
1 Spell Snare
2 We Say Thee Nay!
2 Enduring Curiosity
2 Strategic Betrayal
3 Hidden Lair
2 Restless Reef
2 Soulstone Sanctuary
8 Island
9 Swamp

Strategy Guide

Early (Turns 1-3): Deploy your cheap evasive threats — Dream Beavers, Spyglass Siren, and Floodpits Drowner — to start chipping away at life while generating value (scry, a Map token, a tapped-down blocker). Hold up Spell Pierce, Spell Snare, or We Say Thee Nay! on the draw to protect your board or stop an early bomb cold. Floodpits Drowner shines flashed in on their end step to tap down their best attacker before combat even starts.

Mid (Turns 4-6): This is where the removal suite — Bitter Triumph, Requiting Hex, Shoot the Sheriff — cleans house while Cecil, Dark Knight starts racing. Don’t be afraid of your own life total dropping: once you’re at or below half your starting life, Cecil flips into Cecil, Redeemed Paladin, a 4/4 lifelink that stabilizes the exact game you were worried about losing. Tishana’s Tidebinder flashes in to blank a key triggered or activated ability at the worst possible moment for your opponent.

Late (Turns 7+): Enduring Curiosity turns every unblocked attacker into a card, and even if it dies in combat it returns as an enchantment and keeps the card advantage flowing. Strategic Betrayal is your answer to a bomb you can’t otherwise deal with — it exiles the creature and their graveyard, so there’s no recursion plan to worry about.

Win Conditions & Combos

  • Death by a thousand cuts: Dream Beavers, Spyglass Siren, Floodpits Drowner, and a flipped Cecil all fly or dodge blockers, chipping in damage every turn while your removal suite keeps the board clear.
  • The Cecil flip: once Cecil, Dark Knight connects and drops you to half your starting life or below, he transforms into Cecil, Redeemed Paladin — a 4/4 lifelink Knight that turns your own aggression into a stabilizing engine.
  • Card-advantage overload: Enduring Curiosity plus any evasive creature means extra cards every combat, burying an opponent in resources a $51 deck has no business generating.

Upgrade Path (add as budget allows)

  1. Kaito, Bane of Nightmares (~$12 each) — add 2-3 copies for a ninjutsu/looting planeswalker that takes over long games.
  2. Wan Shi Tong, Librarian (~$35) — the full meta list’s bomb; a single copy as a 1-of payoff once budget allows.
  3. Upgrade the manabase: swap the basics toward a full Gloomlake Verge / Watery Grave package for smoother, faster draws.
  4. A 3rd and 4th copy of Enduring Curiosity for a more consistent card-draw engine.
  5. Sideboard package: Duress, Disdainful Stroke, and Day of Black Sun for targeted answers once you’re tuning for specific matchups.

That’s this week’s Budget Brew — a Tier-1 Standard deck for about the price of lunch. Read the full breakdown any time at manariotgames.com, and remember: a new Budget Brew lands every Wednesday right here. Follow Mana Riot Games so you never miss one.