Embedded Files
ELP Edition
Written By - Thomas NeilsonOctober 13th, 2025
Legions Realms At War currently has 17 different warlords, and even more archetypes, competing for your interest. But when you're just starting out and learning the game, what deck should you try out first? What decks are easy to learn, and great at teaching you the game, without breaking the bank?
Whilst any Warlord can reward a new player looking to jump right into a specific archetype/realm/strategy, I consider these 5 decks to be some of the best lists for a new player looking to learn the game. Attached to each of these warlords is also a budget version of a top competitive deck, letting you learn the deck and game, at an easier entry price-point, whilst also being competitive options to bring to your local/online campaign events.
Important to note, is that these decks are all designed to be competitively viable, even if the build itself has to be adjusted for budget. As such, the decks I've chosen aren't reliant on high-rarity cards outside of what's already included.
Now, in each list I've included The Twilight Gardens and Majik Void Hollow. These are fantastic competitive staples that are already accessible, and will only be getting more accessible in the upcoming Ravaged Lands Legacy Packs! That being said, I've got every list at at least 52 cards, so if you can't find The Twilight Gardens or a Majik Void Hollow, you can still run the list without.
Clicking on the link for each deck will bring you to an example of a budget build for the respective warlord.
Budget Starting Decklist Links
Budget Starting Decklist Links
Castiel is a Burn/Tempo deck built entirely around Castiel's powerful Special Ability: Oblation
Oblation removes all counters from the field to deal that much damage (-4) to your opponent.
To best make use of this ability, the deck is built to take control of the game in the early turns, and quickly turn over to a burn based kill with Oblation on turn three when you pierce your veil using Holy Counters.
Holy Counters are an angel exclusive mechanic which allows you to protect your cards in play. Whenever a warrior with Holy Counters on it takes damage, the Holy Counters go first in soaking up the attack. If a card with Holy Counters on it would be destroyed, a Holy Counter is removed instead.
Castiel uses these holy counters to control the game early, before turning the counters into a huge amount of burn damage.
The budget version of this deck isn't too expensive, with only one renowned card being necessary, your Guardian: Sigrid, Avenger Of The Lost Messiah. Sigrid is great in Castiel since off the start of the game, you get to eradicate a Lost Messiah or Chaos Divine Card. Most commonly, you'll want to use this to eradicate Oath To The Lost Messiah to set Empyrean Empire Of The Lost Messiah up at the start of the game.
The other most important renowned card in the deck is Helios & Luna, Chaos Divine Lovers. This powerful warrior shuts off warrior attacks, and keeps itself protected with holy counters. Many decks can struggle immensely to take Helios & Luna off of the field, and others will usually need to jump through hoops to get through.
The most recent Renowned addition is Sanctum Of The Ascendants, as another on-board negate that pairs with your synergy, Astral Gates Of The Ascendants, and Lance Of The Lost Messiah.
For lovers of burn and tempo, Castiel might scratch that itch with flashy kill power and plenty of tools to stop your opponents in their tracks.
Pros +
Pros +
Lost Messiah Tempo is a notably cheap deck to play. Apart from The Twilight Gardens and Majik Void Hollow, the only Exalted card truly missing from this list is Radiant Orb Of Divine Light, a strong control tool and board buff.
The linear gameplan and win condition of the deck helps to allow new players to have a clear goal in sight and more flexibility in navigating the board state and decision points to get there.
This leads to a deck that can be easy to pick up, but carries plenty of strategic depth to improve performance.
Cons -
Cons -
The deck can be somewhat more metagame reliant, which can make tournament successes more hit or miss.
Whilst most matchups for the deck are even or favored, the list can struggle a bit more against Demons and Dwarves.
The deck can be very swingy: many games will be based on obtaining an early advantage in the early game to snowball into your veil pierce turn. As such many games with the deck can be lost as early as turn one if the deck cannot pick up board control.
The deck does however have the ability to grind through a slower start into an explosive rebuild on turn 3.
Tips & Tricks
Tips & Tricks
Chaos Divine Reconnaissance is the best starting card in hand. Recon will often let you draw 3-5 additional cards during your first turn, and will continue to generate card advantage on future turns.
Help From The Chaos Divine is another powerful starting piece, being able to grab two copies of Bartholomew to put two warriors into play and draw two additional cards. Help can fail to provide enough card advantage alone however to take control in the early game, but is usually powerful enough in conjunction with other strong pieces to find a strong starting board state.
Lost Messiah Burn can quickly empty out key pieces from it's deck with Army Of The Lost Messiah and Help From The Chaos Divine removing warriors, and with Empyrean Empire removing Lost Messiah and Chaos Divine cards from your deck. Make sure to keep track of what you have left, and space out your resources to avoid burning out before you can finish off your opponent.
Check out the Lost Messiah Burn primer here on >-LRAWSnapshot-> for more tips and strategies with playing the deck.
Your Veil is one of the most powerful pieces available for the deck. By eradicating Freelia, you can destroy a fortified card on your opponent's side without them being able to respond. Your "Chaos Divine" selection of cards can tutor for Help From The Chaos Divine or Chaos Divine Reconnaissance to help generate card advantage, or Acceleration Into The Chaos Divine to trigger important eradication effects from hand, especially Halo Of The Lost Messiah.
Upgrades
Upgrades
Majik Void Typhoon
Majik Void Typhoon is an unassuming Sideboard card that gets a whole new purpose in Castiel. Whilst Typhoon is normally used as a tech piece against mill decks like Black Magic, Castiel can use Typhoon to shuffle back and reuse key cards like Halo Of The Lost Messiah, Acceleration Into The Chaos Divine, and Lost Messiah Corrupt-Sword, Freelia.
For builds leaning away from any bounty Unified cards, Mysterious Mechanism can also fill this role.
Radiant Orb Of Divine Light
Radiant Orb is a powerful negate and board buff, although it can be another tax on your AP, so getting more than one use out can be difficult sometimes.
Archon, Avenger Of Light
Archon is a great beater in the deck, able to attack your opponent on an entirely different axis from your standard oblation kill.
The hottest deck in the metagame, Sh'Lara Mystic Fire Midrange is a token focused deck able to generate tons of value, shatter boards, and push in for explosive early kills. Additionally, a ton of the deck's power is found in cards from the original Battle deck.
The deck focuses on Phoenix Hatchling Warrior Tokens, using them to sacrifice for value, and to buff up to swing in for big damage.
If you're a fan of Token or Zoo style strategies, Sh'Lara might just fit the bill for you.
In combination with it's token power synergies, Sh'Lara wields the explosive destructive strength of the Magical Realm, letting you easily upend your opponent's board state over and over again.
This list features no Renowned cards, and only a single Exalted: Abraxis, The Mystic Fire Sphinx. While you can get away without Abraxis, it's a fantastic piece for the deck to both break through your opponent's board, and to let you reset your own.
While other Exalteds like Serenasada and Golden Urn offer solid considerations, the Renowned slot for the archetype is currently completely clear, although Majik Void Collapse is a strong Warrior hate control piece that fits perfectly into your Token-centric strategy.
Ultimately though, none of those cards contribute to the core strategy of the archetype, and you'll be able to pull off the same explosive starts without missing a thing.
Pros +
Pros +
The deck is very accessible without a single Renowned needed to run, and only one Exalted with Abraxis.
The deck has consistently been a meta-staple, with the ability to push through most decks in the metagame.
The explosive capacity of the deck can make it easy to goldfish, helping to allow you to test out the deck on your own time and to learn various play patterns.
Cons -
Cons -
The deck has quite a few tutors, and when you start out, it may be a little bit overwhelming to look at the variety of options the deck provides at almost any game state
The deck can be vulnerable to a few specific meta decks, including Mortis Grimm Midrange and Michael Seraphim Control.
While the deck doesn't rely on a large number of Exalteds, some of the ones outside of Abraxis can be a bit more difficult to get your hands on between Serenasada, The Secret Soothsayer, and Majik Void Collapse.
Tips & Tricks
Tips & Tricks
Awakening The Mystic Fire is one of your key cards to keep around in the archetype.
Several cards in the deck, including Mystic Fire Offspring, Sprouts From The Mystic Fire Ashes, and Flame Of Mystic Fire Origin all get stronger if you control a copy of Awakening The Mystic Fire. As such, finding one and keeping it on board is a clean way to boost up several cards in your deck, while also being an incredibly strong way to draw cards over time.
Mystic Fire Arena and Phoenix Flames Conflagration make for a powerful board buff in the mid-game, that can also let you push in for the win.
Arena gives your "Mystic Fire" Warriors a +1 Atk buff for each Phoenix Hatchling Token you control, while Phoenix Flames Conflagration turns your Phoenix Hatchlings into "Mystic Fire" Warriors. With both in play, a board of Phoenix Hatchlings can push in 35 damage. If you're able to attack, and then clear your own board, you're looking at upwards of 70 Damage at your opponent.
Two cards in your deck care about counting cards across an entire turn. Mystic Fire Beast Power is a Unified that gives your Mystic Fire Warriors +1 Atk for each card destroyed by a Mythical Beast card effect in a turn, while Feathers In The Wind is a Fortified that draws you 1 card for each Mythical Beast Warrior destroyed in a turn.
Try to get in the habit of tracking how many card's you've blown up on your turn, and how many of your Warriors have died on your opponents, so you don't have to try to backtrack later on.
Upgrades
Upgrades
Serenasada, The Secret Soothsayer
Serenasada is a nice Guardian option, with the ability to provide more card selection in what can be a deck that can struggle with clunkier/more specific opening hands.
Majik Void Collapse
A powerful control tool, Majik Void Collapse is a card that isn't run often, but only due to it hurting a huge number of decks by shutting down on-board and entry keyword abilities on non-token Warriors. In Sh'Lara, a lot of your crucial Warriors focus on Perish abilities, and you're able to easily remove your own Majik Void Collapse if you need to use a Warrior like Abraxis.
Golden Urn Of Mystic Fire
Urn is a solid fortified option for the archetype, giving you a bit of board presence and healing, which can really excel in a longer attrition focused game.
Sharn is currently one of the strongest decks in the metagame, as an aggro deck with a consistent setup and a plethora of options to reward learning and improving.
Sharn has plenty of key lines and play patterns, and practicing Sharn with goldfishing can be a great way to improving your skill with the deck, and with playing LRAW overall.
Even as one of the strongest decks in the game, Sharn can be built at a strong level on a budget, with only 1 Exalted card, and 1 Renowned card.
Zelfor'Tork, The Fatal Frenzy is our budget-breaker of choice, as a powerful piece that does it all. On entry, Zelfor'Tork lets you sacrifice two Orcbane Warriors to draw 2 cards, and on his Perish, you get to blow up 2 of your opponent's cards. In any board state you'll be able to get some great impact out of Zelfor'Tork.
Visceria, The Vicious Vixen is this deck's Renowned card, being needed to run other powerful cards like We Bleed For This and Malicious Bloodbath. While both are expensive in terms of AP/DCM, they can also be the deciding factor in games. We Bleed For This also has a in-discard ability to buff up your board, making it a key way to threaten a win before your Veil Pierces.
For any fans of Aggro Strategies, Sharn Wartorn is a highly recommended deck to try, with plenty of aggressive power and quick finishers.
Pros +
Pros +
Sharn is one of the strongest decks in the game, and will be able to threaten a lot of power even as you learn.
The deck has an incredibly high skill ceiling. Because of this, Sharn will reward players who stick with the deck to learn the playlines through and through.
The deck is great for learning solid playlines and play patterns that can help with learning new decks in the future.
The deck can perform incredibly well with minimal upgrades, right out of the starter deck, as many of the budget pieces included in the Starter Deck are core parts of the deck.
Cons -
Cons -
Can be a touch more complex, and effective play will rely on learning at least the basic combos, although these are easier to learn.
The most competitive versions of Sharn utilize a variety of Bounty tech pieces alongside Orc Exalted cards. Luckily many of these are unnecessary to the success of the deck.
Uthrall, The Blood Shaman is one of the strongest Exalted additions, being able to punish your opponents for spending Bloodbourne, and healing back your own. Serenasada is another powerful addition for setting up early game power, although at the trade off of losing access to Visceria's locked cards.
Many of the other Exalted pieces seen in builds of Sharn are more utility pieces then crucial additions.
Tips & Tricks
Tips & Tricks
Sildud's Call Of The Orcbane and Reservoirs Of Revival Ooze are some of the best cards in your opening hand, with Sildud's Call letting you grab copies of Pride Of The Orcbane to discard and draw, and Ooze letting you access a toolbox of warriors, including Mogak for Plunder, and Lambug for Retrieve.
We Bleed For This is one of your strongest removal cards, able to take out potentially 3 of your opponent's fortified cards to let you push in. Don't forget about it's in-discard ability though. While your main kill potential will be powered by your synergy, We Bleed For This can let you push in early!
Pay attention to what is cost and what is effect on some cards, if you're looking for a refresher, check out our article on Mastering The Sequence!
Upgrades
Upgrades
Gluronk, The Sinister Spite
Gluronk is a strong Warrior for keeping your Orcbane Warriors stuck to the board, stopping your opponents from easily removing them. Plus, since we're running Visceria, we get an additional bonus to protect our Zelfor'Tork as well.
Essence Of Ancient Rancour
Essence is a great way to bolster your existing engine, while also boosting up the potential damage the deck can push in early on in the game. Do note that the 1st mode can destroy one of your opponent's cards, but can also blow up your own stuff, like Zelfor'Tork's Orcbane Feeding Frenzy!
Another powerful Midrange deck, Mortis Grimm is arguably the most difficult deck on this list, with its combo style setup turns, but these combo style turns can be very linear and consistent, making it much easier to learn, especially for anyone with previous experience playing TCGs.
As previously mentioned, the combo self mill synergy of Mortis can be much easier to learn through gold-fishing, the process of testing a deck on it's own or playing against yourself. You won't need to have the strongest knowledge against the other lists you'll be fighting against to be able to make powerful plays with Mortis.
The self mill combo style game play can be incredibly fun, and Mortis is a simpler floor for learning these styles of play.
The deck remains cheap with only three necessary Renowned cards.
Meg'Saria, Princess Of Lost Souls is a solid guardian, sending a warrior to the discard pile at the start of the game. Just as importantly, Denial By Doomfire is a great negate that can be activate in the discard pile, but requires an Undead Gaurdian. That alone makes Meg'Saria worth a slot in Mortis. If you're unable to track down a copy of Meg'Saria, Belladonna The Putrid Nightshade also gives you access to Denial By Doomfire, but her abilities are less useful for Mortis.
Esmerelda, The Grimm Necromancer is a great warrior for every aspect of Mortis's gameplan. When comboing or setting up, Esmerelda lets you loop and bring back warriors to generate value and fill your discard pile with cards. On the defensive end, Esmerelda and Prysm, Soul-Collector Of The Grimm form a Warrior reviving loop, forcing your opponent to find a way to break the loop apart, or to find another way to end the game.
Graveyard Of The Doomdrake is one of your best removal tools, able to get rid of cards like Topaz Amulet that can shut down your gameplan. While not crucial for the functioning of the deck, it's a relevant piece to have available when your opponent tries to throw a wrench in your gameplan.
For mill and combo players alike, Mortis offers powerful openers and combo-centric playlines to blow your opponents out of the water.
Pros +
Pros +
It's easy to practice playing the deck on your own time, since many of the important play lines aren't dependent on action/interaction from your opponent.
Playing the deck is a great way to familiarize yourself with the Sequence/Second Sequence system, and to learn how the Sequences build and resolve.
The base build of the deck isn't too expensive, and there's plenty of room to upgrade with additions like Invitation To The Masquerade, Death's Doorstep, and Vampire Baby Doom. Whilst all of these cards are powerful, they aren't needed at all to build a competitive version of the deck.
Cons -
Cons -
The deck can have a more linear gameplan and due to this the deck can have more swingy matchups. Decks like Sharn can easily Rampage over your Warriors, and other lists like Castiel can Eradicate some of your key cards, limiting your ability to loop resources and access key win conditions.
The linear game plan also makes the list weaker to certain mill hate cards like Close The Gateway and Spirits Of The Brackus Pond. Majik Void Collapse can also hurt, turning off many of your important Warrior keywords.
Tips & Tricks
Tips & Tricks
Grimm Wish For More Life is one of your best pieces for churning through your library since it keeps your DCM topped up and can be easily retrieved and chained with Sir Grimm Crimson, The Undead Prince.
The Prince himself is also one of the strongest cards in your deck, able to bring back any important Unified and Fortified cards, and letting you bring back Grimmace, The Grimm Princess for removal and card advantage.
Prysm, Soul-Collector Of The Grimm and Esmerelda, The Grimm Necromancer are great warriors, letting your revive your Grimm Warriors over and over again. One especially powerful piece is that Prysm and Esmerelda can revive each other, locking out a variety of battle focused decks from being able to push in damage if they're unable to turn off your loop.
Haunted Labyrinth can be a powerful control piece, since the mill is for cost. If your opponent's library is empty, or only has one card left, they won't be able to conscript or attack with Warriors.
Upgrades
Upgrades
Mortis' Grimm Skeleton Key
This is the best piece to pick up for the deck outside of the Renowns currently included, and backs up the removal capabilities of Graveyard Of The Doomdrake, while also offering more pure mill power.
Death's Doorstep
Death's Doorstep is an interactive piece for the Undead Realm, letting you steal your opponent's perish effects to give you their benefits, or just to stop them from activating. Doorstep isn't a necessary part of your gameplan, but is a strong piece against a variety of decks reliant on Perish effects.
Vampire Baby Doom
Baby Doom can help pick up card advantage through your revives over the course of a game, but not being a Grimm warrior makes it only a small upgrade over a card like Agatha, Ancient Girl Of The Grimm who can be revived with Esmerelda and Prysm.
Blastforge Aggro is a classic aggro deck, which floods out swarms of Warriors to dig through cards, while bouncing Warriors back to hit em quick! The deck can be a crash course in learning the Sequence, but the skills you learn here will reward you with any other deck you play!
Into The Blastforge is the core of this deck, and whenever you conscript a Blastforge Warrior, you get to flip the top card of your deck, if you hit another Blastforge Warrior you get to conscript it again, and potentially repeat!
While it can be a bit of a higher learning curve at times, the deck is also much more accessible for it's competitive version!
This list features only a single Exalted with Kindle-Haust, The Blastforge Fire-Sparker. Kindle-Haust has both Shockwave and Gust, and when he dies he does both again, letting you repeatedly destroy and bounce your own Warriors to keep your engine going!
Additionally, Kindle-Haust was reprinted in Empires On The Rise, making second edition copies easier to find and pick up!
If you like hitting the ground running, Blastforge Aggro has a ton of explosive power to sweep your opponents off their feat and run away with the game!
Pros +
Pros +
The deck's aggressive combo kill is great for teaching play patterns/lines, and for understanding when a window of opportunity is open.
The deck's win condition offers a clear goal to work towards, with variety in the play patterns required to get there. This means that newer players can have success starting out with the deck, and can see meaningful improvements with better learning these common playlines, and being aware of when they show up.
The sequence is a core mechanic in LRAW, and this deck will help you learn it very intimately!
Needing only a single Exalted that's already seen a reprint, this deck is incredibly accessible to pick up.
Cons -
Cons -
At first, the deck can be a bit overwhelming, with tutors like Blastforge Xtreme and Keltorr's Explosive Kit letting you pick from over 60% of your deck.
The deck is pretty heavily all-in on it's strategy, with little room to adjust to a different playstyle. If you're a fan of aggro or combo strategies, this is a great deck to learn, but if you're looking for something a bit slower you'll likely want to look elsewhere.
Tips & Tricks
Tips & Tricks
Try to look for either Blastforge Xtreme or Keltorr's Explosive Kit in your opening hand. These tutors will help you find anything else you need.
Galterius, The Wayfaring Knight is a Guardian who's abilities get amped up when you're going second. Since you can't attack when going first anyways, this deck is often looking to go second intentionally to draw extra cards, and
Kindle-Haust's Shockwave and Gust abilities happen independently. You can use both, one, or neither when Kindle-Haust enters play.
Kindle-Haust's Perish ability however requires a target for both the Shockwave and Gust ability, meaning it cannot be activated with only one target in play.
Check out the LRAW Snapshot Guide to Mastering The Sequence!
Upgrades
Upgrades
Serenasada, The Secret Soothsayer
Serenasada is a great Guardian for Quartzheart. While she sacrifices the aggressive power of Galterius, her start of game ability lets you better shape your hand to find key starting cards like Keltorr's Explosive Kit and Into The Blastforge. Her Consume ability works great with Quartzheart's special ability as well, letting you dig for cards 4 turns in a row, or to dig twice in one turn.
Gehildr, Sage Of The Stormclan
Two Guardians? That's right, Blastforge Aggro can make strong of several different Guardians, and each gives the deck a different benefit. For Genhildr, he plays into a similar strategy, but trades off a little bit of immediate card advantage, for the powerful Unweathered Devotion. This card has a few different stages, and the first one buffs up your board by +1, while the second gives Plunder to all of your Blastforge Warriors that you pull off of Into The Blastforge.
Sunrise, Consumed By Courage
Sunrise is a powerful interaction piece, that can help the deck deal with various control tools, especially ones that are hard to destroy, or that hang around in the discard pile. Additionally, with access to Gust, the deck can bounce Sunrise back to hand to reuse her enter play ability.
Budget Starting Decklist Links
Budget Starting Decklist Links
Page updated
Google Sites
Report abuse