Black Vise Affinity

[Next_rim]

1. Foreword

Ever since the banlist update, I've been toying with Black Vise and trying to find a new shell for it. I tried to put it into classic burn, BGx attrition decks and others, but the most successfull in my purely speculative testing has been UB Affinity.

My initial idea started with trying to combo Black Vise with Day's Undoing. The obvious synergy between the two cards allows to actually punish your opponent for the Day's mirror effect while reloading your hand. I struggled to find a good Ux shell for that where Black Vise would not be a dead draw turns 4+, and where Day's Undoing would actually benefit me. The final drop happened as I borrowed my friend's Modern Affinity deck and took it for a spin at a local event. I play almost exclusively legacy, and I was genuinely surprised by the firepower that the deck has, mainly its ability to quickly unload the hand. And thus this list was born.

2. The Deck

In Legacy, affinity is a typical aggro deck with some prison potential that dies to terminus and is generally a weak pick. Any delver or UG infect list hits faster and more consistently.

However, affinity sports truely explosive turns, and I want to exploit that. I feel like Day's Undoing and Black Vise combine to add more stupid openers to affinity, while not setting the deck back in any way. The idea is to combine the explosiveness of affinity with Ensoul Artifact and Tezz to provide a wide range of attack angles. You can stomp your opponent with good old Skirge + Cranial Plating, you can ult a Tezz, or you can put down a couple of Vises T1, reset hands T2 for more pings, and Ensoul Artifact them or Tezz -1 to turn the now ueseless rocks into virulent 5/5 beaters.

1) It has potential to dump the entire hand in one turn, black vise included, then either ult a Tezz, reload with Day's Undoing, or just stomp face with Cranial Plating.
2) Black vise is an artifact for 1, and provides synergy for Cranial Plating, Arcbound Ravager and Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas. So if Black Vise is not ticking during upkeep, it can be utilized for other purposes and is not a dead draw. Ensoul Artifact

Artifact (16)

4x Black Vise - the namesake of the deck and part of the whole plan.
4x Cranial Plating - your wincon.
4x Mox Opal - ramp
4x Springleaf Drum - more ramp

Sorcery (4)

4x Day's Undoing - the engine that sticks it all together.

Creature (16)

4x Arcbound Ravager - best artifact dude ever printed for the purpose of dodging removal.
4x Memnite - 0 mana ramp, food for ravager and Tezzeret, and he can carry Cranial.
4x Ornithopter - same as memnite, but flies.
4x Vault Skirge - lifelink and flying make this guy a desireable addition because he can race fair decks by pulling you ahead in life count. I consider it a flex slot - testing and time will tell what to add here. Maybe Thoughtcast is better.

Enchantment (4)

4x Ensoul Artifact - I want more tools to close games and make Black Vise useful late game. I heard the rule about not adding bad cards to make other bad cards work, but I don't consider Ensoul Artifact a bad card. We are sporting a handful of artifact lands, and this is a 5/5 for 2 - affinity's own version of Tarmogoyf in a sense. Possible a full set is not needed (as we have Tezz -1), but for now I'm testing full 4x.

Land (16)

4x Glimmervoid
4x Ancient Tomb
4x Seat of the Synod
4x Vault of Whispers

The manabase is pretty straightfoward. With opals and drums, we have 24 mana sources. Splashing white for sideboard options is possible.

Planeswalker (4)

4x Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas - the MVP of the deck. He replaces himself when he hits the table, and almost always requires immediate removal, or next turn his ult goes off for 20++ regularly (even off just artifact lands and mana rocks that are used to cast him, he can ult for 8). ]

3. Matchups

This is a WIP, and I've played maybe 35 online games with this list. It's too early to conclude which matchups are good or not, and how black vise + day's undoing engine help with classic affinity's bad matchups (miracles, midrange fair decks, unfair fast combos). I'm throwing the list out here in the hopes that the community will pick it up and provide some feedback. I will update the thread once I have more stats on how the list is doing in real games. For starters, some users on reddit have been posting their FNM reports with the list.

[Infinitium]

Mmm. This is pretty close to what I've envisioned (then again the deck pretty much builds itself). I'd probably go [-4 Tezz -4 Springleaf -4 Tomb -4 Skirge] [+4 Thoughtcast +4 Great Furnace +4 Disciple of the Vault +4 Galvanic Blast] as a starting point. Tezzeret is pretty clutch once it hits but necessitates an awful lot of acceleration in a deck that can't really use it otherwise, is dissynergistic with Day's Undoing and Blast + Disciple/Ravager should be reach aplenty. Obviously the splash color is up to preference but enabling Whipflare/Blasts postside is good in my book.

[rlesko]

Can you go into any match up details? What matches have you played, did they feel good or bad, etc. I see this deck struggling to combo, perhaps this can be addressed in the SB? I am interested in this list as I am looking for a reason to play Black Vise and a hyper aggressive shell seems like the best for Days' Undoing.

[Redkid43]

The good amount of blue cards makes Force of Will look pretty attractive--Days, Ensoul, perhaps some non zero amount of Thoughtcast. Then again, if you want to stay budget I totally understand.

What does Black Vise do here? Are you trying to make it into a burn source? I understand the combo with Wheel effects and draw sevens, but do you feel as though it can fit in Affinity?

[Next_rim]

Can you go into any match up details? What matches have you played, did they feel good or bad, etc. I see this deck struggling to combo, perhaps this can be addressed in the SB? I am interested in this list as I am looking for a reason to play Black Vise and a hyper aggressive shell seems like the best for Days' Undoing.

It's not THAT much different from classic legacy affinity. It struggles against miracles and fair midrange decks (jund, maverick, DnT, esperblade).

Compared to classic affinity, it has very cool interaction with combos - they keep a hand, dig for missing pieces, and you...just reset it with days. Against combo, you bring in sideboard ethersworn canonist, chalice and cabal therapy (or FoW).

I personally tested this list against DnT, BUG Delver, Shardless BUG and Reanimator. Black Vise felt like a lightning bolt for 1 colorless, and sometimes it delivered 5++ per game.



The good amount of blue cards makes Force of Will look pretty attractive--Days, Ensoul, perhaps some non zero amount of Thoughtcast. Then again, if you want to stay budget I totally understand.

What does Black Vise do here? Are you trying to make it into a burn source? I understand the combo with Wheel effects and draw sevens, but do you feel as though it can fit in Affinity?

Black vise is here to punish opponents at least a little bit when I resolve Days Undoing. However, in most decks, black vise is a dead draw on turns 3+. In affinity, there are a bunch of ways to leverage even a late game black vise (ensoul it, feed it to ravager, and it counts as an artifact for every purpose).

I'm not building a budget deck, I'm trying to make it as competitive as possible. I will try FoW, although in affinity specifically, chalice, trinisphere or ethersworn canonist cover the combo matchups, and we have the solid aggro plan against other decks that don't warrant a FoW.

The only thing that I might add at this point is Thoughtcast. Maybe cut a tezz or two.


Mmm. This is pretty close to what I've envisioned (then again the deck pretty much builds itself). I'd probably go [-4 Tezz -4 Springleaf -4 Tomb -4 Skirge] [+4 Thoughtcast +4 Great Furnace +4 Disciple of the Vault +4 Galvanic Blast] as a starting point. Tezzeret is pretty clutch once it hits but necessitates an awful lot of acceleration in a deck that can't really use it otherwise, is dissynergistic with Day's Undoing and Blast + Disciple/Ravager should be reach aplenty. Obviously the splash color is up to preference but enabling Whipflare/Blasts postside is good in my book.

Yeah, disciple is great, but he requires a ravager to work best. Tezz is a threat on its own, and he provides what affinity desperately needs - card draw.

[Redkid43]

Do you think that replacing Chalice with Vise is a feasible option?


I'm still very curious how this ends up.

[rufus]

Have you considered the other tezzeret?

Tangle Wire works with Vise and could be OK for a deck that drops lots of stuff quickly - maybe with some extra artifact sacrifice stuff like Trasmute Artifact.

Another card that can exploit board advantage is Standstill.

Walking Archive is probably too cute with Ravager and Vise, but I think you do get to stack the triggers the right way.

[(nameless one)]

What about Ahkn of Mishra in junction with Black Vise? They're both artifacts that can feed affinity.

[Next_rim]

What about Ahkn of Mishra in junction with Black Vise? They're both artifacts that can feed affinity.


Have you considered the other tezzeret?

Tangle Wire works with Vise and could be OK for a deck that drops lots of stuff quickly - maybe with some extra artifact sacrifice stuff like Trasmute Artifact.

Another card that can exploit board advantage is Standstill.

Walking Archive is probably too cute with Ravager and Vise, but I think you do get to stack the triggers the right way.

These move the deck into a stax direction, which dilutes the primary Cranial Plating plan. I want to build an aggro deck with options, not a stax deck with black vise.


Do you think that replacing Chalice with Vise is a feasible option?


I'm still very curious how this ends up.

Chalice should definitely be in the 75, I'm still not sure how many I will need, and if it should be in the maindeck.