[Deck] Affinity Revisited

[Thug]

Just for taking out Shamans and Welders Pyrite Spellbomb seems a lot better than Cursed Scroll. I' not sure in what kind of version you want to stick them into, but mine never has time to avtivate a scroll before turn 4.

If you want a card that kills welders and shamans (shamans are much more of a threat IMO, since an early one can rape your mana base) either go with Pyrite Spellbomb or Schrapnel Blast.

Off course when your facing White Weenie all day Cursed Scroll might be better, but in a competetive environment I doubt it.

And the sideboard should have a good number of BEB to battle welders, shamans, rack and ruins, mutations and REB's at the same time.

The deck could be build so that it doesn't scoop to null rod, but right now the deck doesn't even scoop to null rod, only if it comes down on their second turn before yours, otherwise you still have many ways to battle it.

Not every decks plays Null Rods, actually you can probably not even count on facing Null Rods once in every four rounds or something, so why slow down the whole deck? That means weakening other matchups for a single matchup.

Koen

[Ric_Flair]

I think with the SCG tournament results and the popularity of Fish for performance and budget reasons you absolutely need an answer to Null Rod.  

Reducing the main deck dependency on artifact lands by including Workshops is a necessity.  I am still not sold on the Welders as they seem a little bit "extra."  I also think that Demonic Tutor is not an ABSOLUTE requirement.  Cursed Scroll makes this deck even MORE dependent on avoiding Null Rod and therefore should be a sideboard card at best.

[kirdape3]

You have two very good answers inherent in the design.  The first is Myr Enforcer.  You'll still get to 7 artifacts pretty easily (remember by Type 1 standards Fish takes absolutely forever to kill you so you have time). and a 4/4 body is pretty savage against them.  The second is to have a Ravager already on the board, and then sacrifice your entire board in response to the Null Rod hitting and bash them with a creature that way.  Sure, having a dedicated answer is nice, but it's not like you have no outs to a resolved Null Rod.

[Matt]

I'm not so sure that that the all-in Ravager (A.I.R.) plan is reliable enough to call it an 'out' versus Null Rod. How many artifacts are you realistically going to have on turn two (or turn one if Fish went first)? In my experience it's usually about two o three on turn one and four or five on turn turn two, and while it's an issue for Fish it's not a problem in the sense that a Spiritmonger or some such would be.

Alson of note is that if you do go with the A.I.R. plan you pretty much forego your chances at the Enforcer/Frogmite plan.

[Methuselahn]

I think with the SCG tournament results and the popularity of Fish for performance and budget reasons you absolutely need an answer to Null Rod.

I also think that Demonic Tutor is not an ABSOLUTE requirement.

I'm not so sure.  In the testing that I have done, an early Demonic for Tolarian Academy is probably your strongest play.  In an environment with so much Null Rod about especially.  If you can get them to waste your other non basics first, you may be able to keep it around for a couple of turns.  And a couple of turns is all you need to really explode against Rod decks.

[rozetta]

This thread has been dormant for a while, but upon looking over it, there are a lot of good ideas here. I'm sure I'm probably not the only one who's been thinking about this deck again after seeing it do well in Extended recently. There are some very relevant points to note about that success, too:

- Due to the fact that most of the teams discarded the idea of playing affinity due to it's possible susceptibility in the extended environment, there wasn't as much sideboard hate aimed at the deck as there could have been. However, Canali did win 4 out of 7 games with a resolved Energy Flux on the table and ploughed through a lot of other decent artifact hate like Meltdown, Pulverize, Powder Keg and Pernicious Deed to win.

- Canali's finals match was actually in favour of the opponent's deck, seeing as how it had a lot of answers to his creatures (Seal of Fire, Cursed Scroll, Grim Lavamancer, Mogg Fanatic, Ensnaring Bridge) and Wastelands to cut him off his coloured mana. Despite this, the power of Ravager and Disciple swung those games in his favour to a 3-0 victory. Note that Type 1 does not even have the same amount of creature removal found in extended decks, on the whole.

- As pointed out by many experienced players, Aether Vial is quite key to this deck. It not only speeds the deck up, but it fixes coloured mana issues (like casting Disciples and Meddling Mages), helps strengthen the control matchup and allows surprise combat tricks. This is a card that hasn't appeared in any listings on this thread so far. Has anyone tried it?

- Note that despite the relatively large card pool available in Extended, (including things tried here like Goblin Welder, Ancient Tomb, etc.) his build was really not all that different to the builds seen in Standard (excepting the sideboard). I think this illustrates that the synergies in the original deck seem to be stronger than adding fancy cards or straying too far from the original concept.

For reference, here's the deck:

Mana: 19
4  Seat of the Synod
4  Vault of Whispers
2  Ancient Den
2  Glimmervoid
4  Darksteel Citadel
1  City of Brass
2  Blinkmoth Nexus

Creatures: 26
4  Arcbound Worker
4  Disciple of the Vault
4  Frogmite
4  Arcbound Ravager
4  Meddling Mage
3  Myr Enforcer
3  Somber Hoverguard

Other: 15
3  Cranial Plating
4  AEther Vial
4  Chromatic Sphere
4  Thoughtcast

Sideboard: 15
3  Kami of Ancient Law
3  Engineered Plague
3  Chill
1  City of Brass
2  Seal of Removal
3  Cabal Therapy

What can we learn from this build?

- you need a high enough creature count to keep up pressure and overwhelm control

- creatures which do not die to artifact removal are important (Hoverguard, Mage)

- first turn vial is an extremely strong play with this deck

- 3 of each of Myr Enforcer and Cranial Plating - the deck does not want too many of these, since they're both a little conditional

- the maindeck answer to "problem" cards here was Meddling Mage which is castable via Aether Vial

However, this deck is not really the whole story. Aside from the obvious differences between Extended and Type 1 metagames, Affinity in Type 1 has access to a card that changes the whole design of the deck - Skullclamp.

For an insight into how we might "borrow" from the pros here, let's look at a couple of Online Extended decklists used during the invitational before SkullClamp was banned:

Jens Thoren
MI04 Online Extended Deck

Mana: 20
4  Blinkmoth Nexus
4  Darksteel Citadel
4  Island
4  Seat of the Synod
4  Tree of Tales

Creatures: 24
4  Arcbound Ravager
4  Arcbound Worker
4  Frogmite
4  Myr Enforcer
4  Ornithopter
4  Silver Myr

Other: 16
4  Genesis Chamber
4  Opposition
4  Skullclamp
4  Static Orb

Sideboard: 15
3  Naturalize
4  Quicksilver Behemoth
4  Somber Hoverguard
4  Stifle
15 sideboard cards

Jin Okamoto
MI04 Online Extended Deck

Mana: 18
4  Glimmervoid
4  Great Furnace
4  Seat of the Synod
2  Sulfurous Springs
4  Vault of Whispers

Creatures: 24
4  Arcbound Ravager
4  Arcbound Worker
4  Disciple of the Vault
4  Frogmite
4  Myr Enforcer
4  Ornithopter

Other: 18
4  Cabal Therapy
4  Shrapnel Blast
4  Skullclamp
4  Thoughtcast
2  Welding Jar

Sideboard: 15
4  Electrostatic Bolt
4  Engineered Plague
4  Overload
3  Stifle

Mattias Jorstedt
MI04 Online Extended Deck

Mana: 18
4  Glimmervoid
4  Great Furnace
3  Seat of the Synod
4  Tree of Tales
3  Vault of Whispers

Creatures: 20
4  Arcbound Ravager
4  Arcbound Worker
4  Disciple of the Vault
4  Frogmite
4  Myr Enforcer

Other: 22
4  Artifact Mutation
4  Chromatic Sphere
3  Pyrite Spellbomb
3  Shrapnel Blast
4  Skullclamp
4  Thoughtcast

Sideboard: 15
4  Engineered Plague
3  Furnace Dragon
3  Genesis Chamber
2  Mana Leak
3  Naturalize

There were more than 3 different builds played in that tournament, but I'm showing these because they differ enough as to present some interesting ideas. Again, Online Extended is not like Type 1, but we can borrow ideas from these decks. You can see that there's quite a lot of room to maneuver when building an affinity deck with Skullclamp. I'm not sure if the reason these Online Extended decks do not contain Aether Vial is because it was not needed or because it was undiscovered tech back then (maybe someone can help me answer this?) They also don't contain Cranial Plating, but perhaps 5th Dawn was not released then. Look, again, at the recurring theme with creature count. It seems to be about 24 on average.

With the expected fall in number of Fish players (and therefore Null Rods) coupled with the expected rise in Forbidden Orchards due to a lot of people jumping on the Oath bandwagon after it's recent success, this seems to be a relatively decent path to explore now. The deck needs to become resilient to it's two nightmares - Trinisphere and Null Rod. If these weaknesses can be shored up between maindeck and sideboard, this deck looks like having a chance to compete. Some ideas might be to go for a more lock-focused build (see Jens Thoren's deck) or one packing maindeck Artifact Mutations (like Mattias Jorstedt's build) which are anyway good with Skullclamp and either Myr Enforcer or Frogmite (and undoubtedly good in an artifact-heavy field).

Interesting links (it you haven't read them):

An explanation on the power of affinity: http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=mtgcom/daily/af25

Mike Flores on Aether Vial:
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=mtgcom/daily/mf14

Analysis of the finals match between Nakamura and Canali:
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=mtgevent/ptcol05/dtfin

Online Extended decklists from the invitational:
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=mtgevent/mi04/deck4

Information on Pro Tour Columbus including decklists and tournament reports:
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=mtgevent/ptcol05/welcome

[walkingdude]

The acceleration vial gives you is less powerful in type one because you have the acceleration of moxen available to you.

I did however make a vial build for type one after Zvi suggested it on brainburst but before other people realized Zvi was right that vial needed to be in the deck. At the time I abandoned it because I was having too much trouble with null rod, so its fairly untuned but it might be a decent type 1 starting point.
        4 Skullclamp
        4 Chromatic Sphere
        4 Myr Enforcer
        4 Myr Retriever
        4 Frogmite
        4 Arcbound Worker
        4 Arcbound Ravager
        1 Time Walk
        1 Ancestral Recall
        4 Disciple of the Vault
        4 AEther Vial
        4 Thoughtcast
        3 Darksteel Citadel
        4 Vault of Whispers
        4 Seat of the Synod
        1 Mox Sapphire
        1 Mox Ruby
        1 Mox Pearl
        1 Mox Jet
        1 Mox Emerald
        2 Underground Sea

This was made at a time when there was a lot of artifact hate like rack and ruin, oxidize, etc and so the deck has tons of card advantage and draw to overcome that. Looking at his now on first glance I might cut spheres for genesis chambers and thoughtcasts for draw 7s but I’d need to test that to be sure.

[rozetta]

One thing that occurs to me is that Aether Vial allows you to dodge Trinisphere quite well. Getting that out turn 1 if you're going first, especially. I can't really decide whether builds with Workshop in are better or worse, but it certainly shores up the Workshop matchup quite a bit. The danger is building the deck around Workshops too much, which means you're screwed if you don't draw one (i.e. playing too many Arcbound Crushers, etc.).

In my opinion, the draw-7s seem to be too high casting cost for the deck and I might honestly prefer the Thoughtcasts. Obviously against Null_Rod.dec, you want to get as much action going before the Null Rod drops and hopefully ride that to a win, since you'll have very few useable mana sources available after Null Rod hits. It seems that a lot of builds which shun the artifact lands in favour of being less susceptible to Null Rod are losing out on the synergy they have with the rest of the deck, and hence often speed. The problem with running answers to Null Rod and Trinisphere is essentially a problem of actually having the right mana available to cast them.

I was trying to rack my brains as to whether there's an equivalent creature to Kami of Ancient Law for artifacts, but the closest thing I could think of off the top of my head was Scavenger Folk. Unfortunately, vialing out even a 1-mana answer to a Null Rod is potentially not going to happen. The worst case scenario is they play first and go turn 1 Fetch, Lavamancer, turn 2 Null Rod, making anything like Scavenger Folk a dead play unless you're lucky enough that they didn't get a Wasteland or you drew 2 City of Brass. Cabal Therapy looks like it might actually be a better proactive answer to the rod, but that probably needs testing. Artifact Mutation looks too colour intensive.

One other thought I had was Chalice of the Void. With Aether Vial, you could potentially lock out the 1 and 2 mana slots and still be able to play your cheap creatures. If anything, it's a cheap artifact to up Affinity count, can be easily sacced to a Ravager if it get's in your way and can potentially stop Welders, Null Rods, Oaths, etc. It's a possible out game 1 versus combo, too. This would naturally fit best into those designs running Workshops.

Honestly, Darksteel Citadel looks good. It's Wasteland-proof which helps ramping up mana under a Sphere.


I agree with cutting the Chromatic Spheres. In goldfishing, they just seem to slow the deck down.

[Matt]

Here's a decklist I made a LONG time ago.

//Threats
        4 Ornithopter
        4 Frogmite
        4 Myr Enforcer
        4 Somber Hoverguard

        4 Cranial Plating

//Force
        4 Force of Will

//Draw
        4 Thoughtcast
        1 Ancestral Recall
        1 Timetwister
        1 Wheel of Fortune
        1 Windfall

        1 Time Walk
        1 Demonic Tutor
        1 Mystical Tutor

//Mana
        1 Black Lotus
        1 Mana Crypt
        1 Sol Ring
        1 Mox Pearl
        1 Mox Emerald
        1 Mox Sapphire
        1 Mox Jet
        1 Mox Ruby

        4 Seat of the Synod
        1 Vault of Whispers
        1 Great Furnace
        1 Tolarian Academy
        4 Glimmervoid
        3 Underground Sea
        2 Wasteland
        1 Strip Mine

I wanted to find a way to beat Null Rod. So I upped the blue count enough to work in Force of Will and increase the number of Rod-proof mana sources, up to eleven. The sacrifices I had to make for that to happen include dropping Clamp entirely. The count is still low, at only 17, enough to use Force once (but that may be enough). The Hoverguards also are very strong against the Null Rod (Fish) decks.

The deck is very centered on Plate, as evidenced by the eight flyers. Plate is better than Clamp in Type One because killing faster is more important than being resilient. Also, you get more artifacts out quicker, so it's deadlier too - almost always worth 7 damage by the time you use it.

[The Atog Lord]

Do you ever show up at an event and think, "Gee, I sure wish I had thought of that deck!"? That's exactly what happened to me in Columbus. I had spent a lot of time working on a Ravager list, but nothing I created was on par with the list that ended up winning the event. The closest I'd come was cutting Red for White for Armageddon.

I want to give my thoughts on Extended Affinity, in the hopes that doing so will lead to insights on how the deck may be ported into Type One.

The White list really solves a number of problems that the more aggressive red versions have. Meddling Mage is a superb answer to the major theats against Affinity, such as Energy Flux. He also has the bonus of really slowing a number of decks in the format. Kami of Ancient Law is a brilliant sideboard card that stops cards like Flux and Serenity.

Cutting Red is not as bad as it first may sound. I had figured out in my Extended testing that Aether Vial was necessary. Running three colors, even with four Chromatic Spheres, requires something like Aether Vial or Mox Diamond to smooth the mana costs. And Vial tested much, much better than Diamond. In addition, while we didn't expect much counter magic in the format, it is nice to know that Vial dodges what counter magic there would be. Beyond even that, having a one casting-cost artifact is not terrible in an affinity-based deck either.

Once Vials are in the deck, Shrapnel Blast looks less appealing. Vial requires that a certain number of creatures be in the deck to put into play using vial. Most Vial affinity builds require around four more one-two casting cost creatures than non-vial builds. It becomes difficult to fit Blasts into such a build.

The other main reason for playing Red is to run me. Don't get me wrong, Atog is the best creature ever printed. However, because so many decks in the format have either targetted removal or a whole lot of chump blockers, Atog isn't amazing in extended. It is my suspicion that Type One has no lack of removal spells for an atog, either.

Finally, Red offers Goblin Welder. Welder is a very strong creature, and second only to Atog on my list of favorite red cards. However, Welder does very little to reduce the opponent's life total in this deck. Sure, he can help you fight around targetted removal spells, but too often in our testing he was just a costly Welding Jar that didn't add to the Affinity count. The main reason to run Red was actually for Rack and Ruin for Mirror Matches.

I hope this is useful for helping to think about the deck in Type One. Meddling Mage might be viable in this format, too -- he would slow a number of decks in the format. In addition, playing White would give the deck access to cards that may be very powerful in Type One. Balancing after sacrificing all of your land, or playing True Believer to counter a Hurkyl's Recall come to mind. Finally, I believe that Aether Vial may well be worth testing in Type One. The card, despite being unamazing on its surface, adds tremendous consistency to the deck. I'd rather replace Citadels with Moxen than the Vials. And, of course, the deck would need the other cards it gains by being played in Type One -- Ancestral, Time Walk, and Clamp.

[rvs]

@Matt: I had a similar decklist prior to GenCon, only with Duress over FoW, which always worked better for me. Also, my manabase was a tiny bit different.

[rozetta]

@The Atog Lord:

Thanks for sharing those valuable insights into your extended preparations regarding Affinity. To be honest, I don't have a lot of experience with Affinity, not having played Type 2 or Extended. I've seen the deck in action and have seen many type 1 variants (it really seems to be one of those decks that has sooo many possibilities).

I tend to agree that Welder is a little out of place in the straight affinity deck. I looked over at some of the other Affinity builds which were played at Columbus and the builds varied quite a bit. Some had Tangle Wires main and Welders in the side.

I also agree that Aether Vial seems to have been overlooked. If there were Goblin decks in extended running the Vial, it shows that the card has potential.

To me it seems the underlying principals can actually go in many directions:
 - Crusher-based aggro control with Workshops (Crushing Chamber)
 - Ravager-based aggro control Dump Truck style (Canali's build)
 - Ravager-based straight aggro (type 2 style)
 - Matt's list
 - Crusher-based "gro" deck
 - Ravager-based combo style (Long's deck)
 - [Ironworks]

To the top of the list are more straight Aggro and Aggro-Control (Crushing Chamber, Canali) whereas to the bottom of the list are more combo ("gro" and Long). All can kill with the attack phase,  some can kill with Disciple or even Tendrils.

Also, with the variety of gameplans, it is difficult to nail down exactly what cards are "definitive' outside of perhaps Frogmite, the SoloMoxen, Crypt and Academy. All the cards have a certain synergy with the others and finding a build with a great deal of synergy doesn't seem to be hard. I think the main problem is consistency - finding a way of making the deck fast enough while at the same time having options against various disruption is the biggest challenge.

Here's something I put together for pure speed. It can't really combo, but it seems fast enough to put out a big threat by the average time that a Null Rod would be dropped. If there's a Crusher on the table at that point, it can be grown for free and if there's a Ravager, just hoover up all those artifacts to make it too big to handle. It shouldn't have a lot of problems versus Trinisphere, since there are Workshops and Ancient Tombs, and if you're lucky enough to get a turn 1 Crusher, they will grow it for you.

// other
        1 Ancestral Recall
        1 Time Walk
        1 Timetwister
        1 Tinker
        1 Memory Jar
        2 Cranial Plating
        4 AEther Vial
        4 Skullclamp
        3 Genesis Chamber

// creatures
        4 Arcbound Crusher
        4 Frogmite
        4 Arcbound Ravager
        4 Arcbound Worker
        4 Myr Servitor
        1 Triskelion
        1 Darksteel Colossus

// mana
        2 Ancient Tomb
        4 Seat of the Synod
        4 Mishra's Workshop
        1 Tolarian Academy
        1 Black Lotus
        1 Sol Ring
        1 Mana Vault
        1 Mana Crypt
        1 Mox Sapphire
        1 Mox Ruby
        1 Mox Pearl
        1 Mox Jet
        1 Mox Emerald

[Dante]

Having played AGAINST a bunch of decks like these (Crushing Chamber and Skullclamp/Affinity, multiple times each) at the various GenCon tournaments, you really need maindeck Sphere of Resistence, at least not to die to good combo.  I was playing Dragon vs these decks and in every case, Sphere of Resistence turned a 2-0 win for me into an 0-2 loss (always by 1 turn every game).  The games that I played against the decks without Spheres, they got crushed.  And dragon is the slowest of the good combo decks.

[rozetta]

Since this is in the Vintage Forum, some people with ideas who couldn't post here PM'd. Here they are.

This first one is a more combo-oriented version:

From:     MisterShark
To:    rozetta
Posted:    Fri Nov 05, 2004 6:37 pm
Subject:    for your review..    

I can't post to the forum but I figured my build might be worth putting up for inspection; I'll leave it up to you whether or not to throw it up there:
RAffinity-7
// Lands
4 Seat of the Synod
2 Vault of Whispers
1 Tolarian Academy
2 Glimmervoid
2 City of Brass

// Creatures
4 Disciple of the Vault
4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Frogmite
1 Darksteel Colossus
4 Arcbound Worker

// Spells
1 Lotus Petal
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Mana Vault
1 Mana Crypt
1 Lion's Eye Diamond
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Emerald
1 Memory Jar
3 Genesis Chamber
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Timetwister
1 Wheel of Fortune
1 Tinker
4 Thoughtcast
1 Black Lotus
4 Skullclamp
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Burning Wish
1 Crop Rotation
1 Sol Ring

// Sideboard
SB: 1 Mind's Desire
SB: 1 Vindicate
SB: 2 Naturalize
SB: 3 Annul
SB: 1 Tendrils of Agony
SB: 2 Blue Elemental Blast
SB: 1 Mind Twist
SB: 1 Triskelion
SB: 1 Time Spiral
SB: 1 Duplicant
SB: 1 Balance

This deck is FUN to play with all the drawing spells, and once one resolves it's usually game over with an attack phase being optional. The Disciples paired with a Ravager's appetite generally do the job after laying down all the artifacts you will have likely drawn.
Chaining TimeTwister into Wheel etc.. is not uncommon.

regarding the manabase:
- Mana Vault, Mana Crypt, Petal, and Moxen are auto-inclusions, providing great acceleration and Storm count uppers.

regarding the main deck:
- Tinker must be included for Jar, the lone Colossus, and the sideboarded Duplicant and/or Triskelion.


regarding the board:
- Mind's Desire, Mind Twist, Tendrils, Timetwister, Balance and Vindicate are all accessible via Burning Wish.
With the obscene amounts of mana that can be generated via Academy (with Crop Rotation to help find it) all of those Wishable sorceries become viable.
- Admittedly Energy Flux was always a problem and Kami of Ancient Law or Meddling Mage are most likely good additions to this board. Annul's slots may be up for this trade.
- Trisk for Welders, which can be played off Tinker.
- Duplicant for Platinum Angel which also can be played off Tinker.
- Balance is great to respond to with one Ravager (and perhaps one Disciple) on the table with which to eat your own artifact lands & creatures, leaving only the Ravager himself and perhaps a City of Brass or Glimmervoid in play. Gotta be sure that the opponent lacks a StP though.

I'm glad to see this topic unearthed. The deck is fun to play and I think with all the Oath decks about to see play, a lot of people's boards will surrender a few artifact hate slots to enchantment solutions, hopefully making things a little easier for us.

The next PM I received is regarding Hearth Kami as a possibility for artifact removal - something I hadn't thought about. This seems like a really good idea.

From:     ReAnimator
To:    rozetta
Posted:    Fri Nov 05, 2004 7:43 pm
Subject:    Aggressive artifact destruction creature?    
Have you thought about Hearth Kami?

1R
2/1
X,sacrafice: destroy target artifact with CC X or less.

a lot of T2 rav decks have them in the SB and MD, for the mirror match and vs sideboarded Relic barriers and imi statues.

it is pretty aggressively costed and it is never dead as you can kill random moxes if its dying, its easy to cast and to vial out, it is probably better than any other red card for this deck.

I would have posted this in the Vintage forum but i dont have a full membership, and seeing as you seem the most interested you got PM'ed

Have you thought about myr moonvesal over the other 1cc 1/1 artifact creatures? he works really well with clamp and rav probably better than servitor.

Feel free to post this in the thread or bits of it, just give me credit if you do

hope this is useful

-Andrew

The reason I chose Myr Servitor over Myr Moonvessel is that you can occasionally get lucky and draw multiples which allows for the following cool tricks:
- Myr Servitors returning to play trigger Genesis Chamber and growing Arcbound Crusher
- You have guaranteed card draw every turn with the servitors and clamp
- You can play stack tricks during your upkeep if you have a ravager in play, pumping it multiple times. (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=mtgcom/daily/mg127)

If you don't draw multiples, it seems to be only very slightly worse than Myr Moonvessel as a clamp target.

As far as the versions which run maindeck Sphere of Resistance, they also often run a full set of strips and Crucibles. I might prefer to address the combo matchups in the board with a combination of things like Chalice of the Void, Seal of Removal, Aether Spellbomb or Tormod's Crypt.

Perhaps this thread should be moved to the Open Vintage forum, since it seems there are several people interested in participating who don't have access to the normal Vintage forum?

[Purple Hat]

This thread has once again lain dormant for a while but since it's still on the first page and I was bored tonight and playing with an affinity list I figure I'll put up a thought and see what people think.

I was wondering why people don't play gaea's Cradle in affinity builds.  Having spent a TON of time this summer designing Crushing Chamber and never actually looking into it I was wondering if other people had also missed it.  In testing with Crushing Chamber and in goldfishing the following, admittedly rough, list I found that it frequently was like having another academy.  I could frequently tap the Cradle for 4-8 mana to activate skullclamps and do whatever else I wanted to.  It can obviously be a bad turn one drop but so can academy.  anyway here's a list.

// Lands
    1  Tolarian Academy
    3  Gaea's Cradle
    4  Seat of the Synod
    4  Vault of Whispers
   
// Creatures
    4  Disciple of the Vault
    4  Arcbound Ravager
    4  Arcbound Worker
    3  Myr Enforcer
    4  Frogmite
    3  Ornithopter

// Spells
    3  Cranial Plating
    1  Mox Pearl
    1  Mox Ruby
    1  Mox Sapphire
    1  Black Lotus
    1  Mox Jet
    1  Sol Ring
    1  Mana Crypt
    1  Mana Vault
    1  Timetwister
    4  Skullclamp
    4  Genesis Chamber
    1  Ancestral Recall
    1  Mox Emerald
    1  Time Walk
    1  Memory Jar
    1  Crop Rotation

I don't know if that's better or worse than some of the other lists up here.  I just threw it together but the cradles seemed to be a good innovation.  With a chamber they're just insane.

Hale

[rvs]

There is a reason Aggro-Affinity builds do NOT work. It required attacking for more than 1 turn, which is a very poor gameplan in T1 IMHO.

[Zherbus]

To add to what Rudy said, if you plan on using the attack phase over multiple turns to win, you'll need to make sure you have the game locked down. That's the reason why 5/3 works since it often gets you in a strangle hold for just long enough to swing 3-4 times.