[Budget] Affinity

[Shade]

It's been a while since I've picked up a Magic card, and even longer since I've played T1.  I last played Magic when Affinity was in it's humble beginnings, before the horror was unleashed that is Ravager.  I have tried to get into the other formats, but always end up back to T1.  Being a full-time college student with better things to spend $5000 on (if I had $5000, that is), such as food, clothing, and shelter, I would like to try out a viable budget deck.  I keep goldfishing with Affinity and thinking that it has as good a chance as any other budget deck out there, but I need some help fine-tuning it and constructing a SB for a diverse T1 meta.  Here's what I've got so far...

CREATURES (22)
4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Arcbound Worker
3 Disciple of the Vault
4 Frogmite
3 Myr Enforcer
4 Ornithopter

This is a pretty standard affinity creature package.  I'm not completely sold on Worker, but I love Thopter, especially with Plating in the deck.  I'd like to make room for Hoverguard as well, but just prefer the Enforcers in its spot.

NON-MANA SPELLS (17)
4 Cranial Plating
1 Crop Rotation
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Memory Jar
4 Skullclamp
4 Thoughtcast
1 Tinker
1 Windfall

Plating AND Skullclamp, then add some restricted goodness.  Yummy.

MANA (21)
4 Darksteel Citadel
4 Glimmervoid
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Sol Ring
4 Seat of the Synod
1 Tolarian Academy
4 Vault of Whispers

This seems pretty solid to me.  I'd like to add Factories/Nexuses (Nexi?) but don't know what to remove to make room for them.  Workshops are well out of reach on my budget.

Questions?  Comments?  Insults?  Bring 'em.

[Tash]

Uhm take out the Cranial Platings.
You already have enough stuff in there to go 'broken' without them in there.

Add a Vampiric Tutor, Wheel of Fortune, and Yawgmoth's Will... because those are crazy powerful.

And with the manabase i suggest City of brass over glimmervoid.
Reason:
Yes CoB hurts you, but if an energy flux or random "kill all artifacts" card shows up you dont lose them like you would glimmervoids.
And maybe ditch the Darksteel Citadels for the green/red artifact lands.

And no to the Manlands.


Edit: Maybe i should post the list i use for an example


        1 Tolarian Academy
        4 Seat of the Synod
        4 Great Furnace
        4 Vault of Whispers
        3 City of Brass
        1 Lotus Petal
        1 Mana Crypt
        1 Sol Ring
        3 Tree of Tales        
        1 Mana Vault
        1 Wheel of fortune        
        1 Yawgmoth's Will
        4 Thoughtcast
        1 Windfall
        4 Skullclamp
        1 Demonic Tutor
        1 Memory Jar
        1 Crop Rotation
        4 Disciple of the Vault
        4 Arcbound Ravager
        4 Frogmite
        4 Arcbound Worker
        4 Myr Enforcer
        2 Ornithopter
        1 Vampiric Tutor

Sideboard is conditional to your metagame but my MG looks like oath and affinity, plus some randomness, so my sb looks like
4 Ancient Den
4 Swords to plowshares (oath)
4 Hurkyls Recall (for the mirror)
3 Chill (random red decks)

[Matt]

To the guy who had 3 Disciple of the Vault: you lose.
To the guy who said to take out the Platings: you lose more.

Plating is Ravagers 5-8. I could see dropping to 3 but any lower is foolishness.

Anyway, what good is this deck? It's got no disruption and isn't that fast without Moxen. What do you honestly expect to beat?

[Tash]

Anyway, what good is this deck? It's got no disruption and isn't that fast without Moxen. What do you honestly expect to beat?

You're right. But in an underdeveloped metagame affinity is a beating. Trust me. Not everyone has to play against people playing Meandeck Oath, Psychatog, Doomsday, and Tendrils Combo.

And I still disagree with you on the plating. Plating is good if you can slap it on a random ornithopter. But a vampiric tutor/yawgWin/Wheel will do you much better in those slots. They get you card advantage (err.. ok so maybe not the VampTutor..). Which i hear is pretty good in this game called Magic.

[Rancor1]

This deck isn't designed to abuse card advantage: it's built to win fast. That is what Plating does. I would also replace the windfall with another draw seven, as you usually empty your hand pretty quickly. Timetwister would be best here, as it doesn't mess up your opponent's graveyard, and you don't really care about yours.

I agree with Matt, however. This deck really has no disruption at all, and goldfishes slower than combo, or the speed at which slaver gets out a Plat.

[fatalist.remix]

Have you tried Flinging Atogs against things other than Control?  It speeds up your goldfish by at least a turn.

[Matt]

This deck isn't designed to abuse card advantage: it's built to win fast. That is what Plating does. I would also replace the windfall with another draw seven, as you usually empty your hand pretty quickly. Timetwister would be best here, as it doesn't mess up your opponent's graveyard, and you don't really care about yours.

I agree with Matt, however. This deck really has no disruption at all, and goldfishes slower than combo, or the speed at which slaver gets out a Plat.

He doesn't have any power though, or else Twister is obvious.

Also, so why not play Platings+Draw7s instead of Platings+Clamp? Clamp honestly isn't that good. Look at your list - it can only work degenerately with Workers (which is good to do!), Disciples (very bad), or if you have an Arcbound Ravager to sac your clamped Frogmites to. In which case you're doing very well for yourself.

My point is that unlike say ElfClamp or Kobolds or similar, there's not a whole lot of situations that Clamp is truly effective. Way too many of your draws are going to make Clamp play like it was supposed to - you attach it and they just refuse to kill your guy.

P.S. why don't you have Tinker for your Jar?

[Machinus]

For a budget manabase, you don't have a lot of freedom. There are some mandatory choices.

4 Seat of the Synod
4 Vault of Whispers
3 Great Furnace
3 Glimmervoid
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Mana Vault
1 Sol Ring
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Crypt

This is 19 sources. You could definitely cut red from the deck, but you NEED artifact lands, and citadel can be pretty weak.

AEther Vial is a solid card, and can work well with SB tech, but it probably isn't fast enough for Vintage (even in a budget environment).

Core

4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Arcbound Worker
4 Frogmite
3 Myr Enforcer
4 Disciple of the Vault
4 Cranial Plating
4 Thoughtcast

The enforcers and thoughtcasts are the weakest cards here. Clamp is too slow for several reasons. One, enforcer and orinthopter are not 4-ofs in this deck. Clamp loses a lot of potency without them. Added to that is the fact that there is way less creature combat in Vintage, and you aren't maindecking shrapnel blasts (another way to sac -> draw).

Restricted

1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Tinker
1 Memory Jar
1 Windfall
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Wheel of Fortune
1 Black Vise

Duh.

This leaves 6 slots pretty wide open. I would seriously think about finding a way to make duress or some other disruption fit into this deck, it needs it really badly. There is probably a need for some more mana sources also.

[Matt]

As far as disruption goes, Cabal Therapy makes Clamp look a fuckton better. I should have mentioned this in my last post.

[crazynlazy]

I would suggest that you put in some artifact/enchantment removal, just because there are some cards in vintage that will just smash the hell out of manabases namely energy flux, null rod, b2b...

So I would: -4thoughtcasts (clamp is infinitely better) +4annul (maybe just in the board depending on your meta).

[Rancor1]

I wouldn't. Thoughtcast is better than clamp. Like Matt said, there aren't many things to clamp. In T2, the best move would be to clamp an x/2, so they'd have a bigger threat to deal with, and be forced to block/wrath, giving you two cards. Here, you won't be doing much blocking (and forget Wrath of God).

Annul is too narrow and reactive for this deck, but Cabal Therapy seems great.

It may be worth testing Tangle Wire, as with all the equipment, it won't effect you much. Probably too slow, though.

[Machinus]

You could just go, with 6 open slots

-3 Great Furnace
-1 Wheel of Fortune

+4 Tree of Tales
+4 Naturalize

and still have 2 slots open. With lotus petal that is 8 green sources. Annul blows.

[Shade]

Thanks for the suggestions.  I'm playtesting away, and I noticed many times how useless Clamp was in the deck (though it was fun as hell when it worked).  Right now, I goldfish turn 3-4 consistantly.  Must...speed...up...