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Budget Sleepers in the Shadows

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Welcome back to some more budget goodness! Today we are going to take a break from Kaldheim to focus on some cards from Shadows Over Innistrad. Hopefully, you will take note of these gems by the end of this article!

Bygone Bishop
The first card on today's list is Bygone Bishop. Currently, its price comes in at $0.50 for the non-foils, $1.10 for the foils, and $1.95 for the prerelease foils (mtgstocks.com). This card can be used in multiple meta decks in Pioneer, budget Commander decks, and should be considered for other budget brews as well!

Starting off with Pioneer, we can put this baby into Spirit Aggro, Sram, Senior Edificer, and White Weenies for potential card advantage. The inclusion in Spirits should go without explanation, seeing as it is a spirit. Personally, I've had problems in certain situations with Spirit Aggro running out of gas. Having Bygone Bishop on the board gives us an opportunity to stock up on clue tokens to use when needed. With a CMC of three it is not a huge gamble to throw two or maybe even three into the mainboard to test out.

Regarding Sram, Senior Edificer we can use the clue tokens to help beef up our creature(s) wearing All That Glitters. We will also have to option to use those tokens for additional card advantage if need be. If we used a card like Zirda, the Dawnwaker, the activation cost for those tokens would be zero! What more does this deck want than other forms of free card draw! White weenies could utilize this in the same way as the Sram, Senior Edificer decks.

Hanweir Militia Captain
Sigarda, Heron's Grace

Hanweir Militia Captain is our next card to go over. With a price of $1.00 for the non-foils, $2.25 for the foils, and $2.56 for the prerelease foils, this still has room to grow. I brought this up about a year ago and it has gone up a little bit since then. It is being brought up again for similar reasons. First, in Pioneer this should be used in humans, White Weenies, and any other creature heavy brew. One thing that makes this so intriguing is that it is not legendary, so we can use more than one on the board. It is very straight forward, but the mid to late game upside is there. We also need to consider the token creation ability once it transforms. Anything in our deck that utilizes "Enter the battlefield" effects would love the free token trigger.

Speaking of humans, our next card we are going to touch on is Sigarda, Heron's Grace. The current price is $1.00 for the non-foil, $3.08 for the foil, and $6.03 for the prerelease foils. I'm bring this one up for a couple reasons, and one is its price. Any Mythic Rare card with limited printings and a low price should be considered as a binder pickup. At $1.00 for the non-foils, it would not hurt you to trade into or even buy four of them to stash. Even if it only goes up to $3.00 you now have $12.00 in trade! Using this in a human build that with Cryptolith Rite, we can potentially get Sigarda, Heron's Grace out quicker to help defend our creatures. I do not think this is going to jump to the $20.00 range but given its current price it is hard to not pick up!

Seasons Past
Descend Upon the Sinful

Our next card, that happens to synergize with what we just talked about, is Seasons Past. The current price is $3.57 for the non-foils, $10.45 for the foils, and $11.83 for the prerelease foils. The non-foil is the one we are targeting here today. However, if you have the funds or trade available to pick up the prerelease copies you should consider it. For a 6-drop sorcery, it has potential to help in the later stages of a game to recur our creatures. We could easily put two of these in the mainboard of not only human decks but also elves. The downside is that we need to cast the creatures again, but that should not be a deterrent. In Commander this should be a contender for the ninety-nine as well. Dredge-style brews should almost auto include this to recur anything we have in our graveyard. Overall, it is just a solid sorcery to regain any creatures we want or need on the battlefield.

Next up is Descend Upon the Sinful. The current price is $0.90 for the non-foils, $2.18 for the foils, $0.55 for the Commander 2020 copy, and $3.89 for the prerelease foils. This one is straight forward, but it needs to be in your binder. Not only is it a sweeper, but it exiles everything. With Commander having a bunch of situations where you might want to exile rather than destroy, this gives you that ability. For its current price , you should consider picking up any of the copies from Shadows Over Innistrad!

Hermit of the Natterknolls

Hermit of the Natterknolls is next on the list. The current price is $0.31 for the non-foils and $1.28 for the foils. This has promise in both Pioneer and Commander for card advantage. How many times have you gone up against a deck that loves casting cards on your turn? What is the one thing that a control deck does not like for you to have, card advantage! This will give you card advantage by just sitting there being a body for only three mana! The upside here is that it can force you opponent to play cards on their turn to prevent it from transforming! The last thing they are going to want you to see is a 3/5 creature out there that can give you two cards instead of one. A Human build might seem like the best fit, but you could use this to compliment any Green brew you have in mind!

Pious Evangel

Last on the docket, it's time to talk about Pious Evangel. The current price comes in at $0.28 for the non-foils and $0.61 for the foils. First things first, the front side of this card gains us life every time we have a creature enter the battlefield. Secondly, it can transform into a beefed-up version of Zulaport Cutthroat. Now, one could argue the mana cost is too high. However, at three it's really not that big of a deal. Not to mention, once it transforms it becomes a 2/4, taking it out of bolt range. We can slot this into any build that not only wants life gain, but also wants to punish our opponents for removing our creatures.

Looking further into the price point, this has potential to hit over the $2.00 if it sees play. It only has one printing whereas Zulaport Cutthroat has 7 total printings! Not to mention, one of those reprints is in a secret lair! Being able to hold onto its foil pricing over $5.00 with all of this in front of us, Pious Evangel has an opportunity to move in price.

That's all we have for today, and I hope you found all this insightful for your budget minded needs!

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