[Deck] Affinity

[Oiolosse]

damn guys, y'all wanna drop your hand so fast then run top deck mode? Bunch stuff hitting the field with no oomph. Gotta have another draw card in here. I hope they print one this set that is compatable with Affinity. Thoughtcast is incredible but topdeck mode'ing into frogmites, Mox Opals, Memnites, etc is bad. Thirst for knowledge needs to be a two of for now. I am back and forth on it but I feel it helps more often than hurts.

[4eak]

@ Infinitium

It's an (almost) unblockable 2/2 for 3 with (almost) troll shroud. It won't see play in this deck, no matter how cool it might look.

Obviously, I'm not claiming it merits widespread play in Affinity. It is conceivable (although unlikely, as I said) that very specific metagames could merit it. This is why I suggested "testing" it against his gauntlet. Note my skepticism even for this card.

Scepticism is the foundation of a scientific mindset and all, but insinuating this might not see play in affinity is ridiculus. Except for the rather minor Legendary drawback (ravager, disciple, not a 4-of), this is a strictly better Springleaf Drum that might very well accelerate mana turn 1.

My scepticism is well-earned; few people know this outdated, tier-4 deck as well as I do. Obviously, that isn't something to be proud of (unless you think Magic history is a scholarly activity) -- it is mere happenstance that I have an opinion about the matter which you shouldn't take lightly. Honestly, I'm only willing to argue about the deck because I enjoy playing and tinkering with it (casually, but still looking for the best build), not because it will ever be good again.

Seriously, we're arguing about how to improve a Tier 4 deck to the point where it might be a Tier 3 deck -- this is an academic exercise.

Mox Opal isn't strictly better than Springleaf Drum. I'll grant that if I only have a single piece (and thus not multiples), either Drum or Mox Opal, I'd usually prefer it was the Mox. This doesn't mean it is strictly better, though, as I can think of exceptions pretty easily.

Take this hand (excluding what you draw): City of Brass, Springleaf Drum, 2x Disciple of the Vault, Ravager, Frogmite, Cranial plating. You'll go Land, Drum; Disciple, Disciple; 2cc Bomb (depending); The 2nd bomb, etc. If Drum was Mox Opal, you have to play Land, Mox, Disciple; Disciple; ... You are waiting for a Land or a 0-1CC artifact. Hopefully you can see that it isn't clear at all that Mox Opal is strictly better than Drum, and depending on what you draw, it can be quite worse.

If you mulled into this hand--City of Brass, Springleaf Drum, Springleaf Drum, Ornithopter, Arcbound Ravager, Cranial Plating. This hand is keepable, whereas if we had substituted Drums for Mox Opals, it isn't keepable at all. Here, the Legendary rule is clearly relevant, as it prevents you playing out your hand. We would actually prefer to have one of each here. That "rather minor" Legendary drawback is part of what keeps the card from being the auto-4x that I've seen people claim.

Which explains Vials prevalence in Survival and Zoo?

Survival (a black sheep of an archetype if I ever saw one) is on the edge of being called a combo deck itself. To be fair, though, 15% of Survival decks on Deckcheck actually do play Aether Vial and, considering the very wide range of configurations of Survival, that is fairly decent.

Zoo's lack of Aether Vial doesn't counter what I said. "When Aether Vial is not worth playing in your eyes," perhaps because Zoo is going to clean your clock (and Zoo has GREAT matchups against the majority of Aether Vial-based decks), you should be playing combo or a deck that beats combo (such as a control deck with a decent game against Zoo and Combo). If there are enough blue-based control decks (built to keep combo and Zoo at bay), then Aether Vial is going to be worth playing. This is where Vial Affinity has the best shot at being competitive, and removing Vial in these metagames is a patent mistake.

Well, time's they are a changing, especially as the deck as is cannot compete in its current form.

I have been claiming that Affinity isn't competitive anymore (and, unless a series of amazing cards come out [SoM isn't amazing], I doubt it ever well be again). It is essential that you understand the severe limitations of Affinity's construction and the unlikely case for its evolution. Modifications to the deck aren't going to make it competitive again -- in fact, the vast majority of suggestions provided make the deck generally worse.

Implementing the Mox, Memnite and Blast might not be enough to make it competitive again, but it will add speed and reach whilst maintaining the artifact count courtesy of the all-artifact manabase.

Rebuilding Sligh/Burn around Raging Goblin, Blazing Shoal, and Myojin of Infinite Rage can certainly improve the fastest possible win speed (turn 1) with the deck. It doesn't add to the AVERAGE kill speed though and, more importantly (and different, but often related), it doesn't improve the average win percentages of the deck. That is the problem I have with the cards being suggested (and many, many get suggested); there are some uniquely strong plays they can make, but often the card will be less useful than what they've replaced. I certainly appreciate the beauty of the new cards that have come out, but they aren't as strong as you seem to think.



peace,
4eak

[Muscari]

i'm wondering, but wouldn't something like silver aggro/artifact aggro/whatever be more appropiate for the deck now? it's seems like people are going to hardly play any affinity cards in the deck, with the adition of scars.

btw, that anvil looks awesome, but no in here

[GreenOne]

Anvil is completely unplayable in Affinity. Don't forget that it is -2 cards, that means that you won't have aynthing left in your hand to play, especially after playign acceleration plus free spell on turn 1. Not saying it can't be broken somehow, but not in this deck.

QFT.

@ Modus Pwnens: You'll find my thoughts and the answer to your questions in this post.

@ Mox Opal
Ok, let's do some math.

Probability of drawing exactly one mox in your starting hand and on turn 4:
Playing 1 - T1:12% - T4: 18%
Playing 2 - T1:21% - T4: 30%
Playing 3 - T1:28% - T4: 38%
Playing 4 - T1:34% - T4: 42%

Probability of drawing exactly one mox in your starting hand and on turn 4:
Playing 1 - 0%
Playing 2 - T1:1% - T4: 3%
Playing 3 - T1:3% - T4: 8%
Playing 4 - T1:6% - T4: 15%

You actually want the mox to show up in your starting hand, but not in multiples, so the obvious choices are playing 2 or 3.
Since the card is not THAT game changing and defining, I don't want to risk like 5% of my games of having an automatic mulligan. Yeah, it's gonna be an automatic mulligan cause having 2 moxes in hand means that you gotta have at least a land and a 0-1 artifact drop, or 2 0cc drops in your remaining 5 cards. And even if you do, you still have an actually useless card in hand. And don't say shit like "you can eat it to Ravager so it's still good!", so does Spellbook, but noone wants to ever draw it.
So, I tested with 2 cause it seemed a nice number

Now, for it to be really good, you want to use it on the first turn.
Here's the chance (in a list with Orni, Memnite,16 artifact lands, 4 drums, 2 other 1cc drops in worker or vial) of having at least:

Mox + 2x0cc artifacts: 4%
Mox + an artifact land and a 0cc or 1cc drop: 15%

So, in the end you get this on your starting hand, playing 2 moxes:
You draw them 21% of the time.
The make you mull (sort of) 1% hands, for double mox.
You will use them on the first turn somewhere between 17% and 18% of your games, so you will have it in your starting hand and not use it on your first turn in 3-4% of the matches.

So, here comes the point.
Why are City of Brass better than Mox, and why cannot we plain substitute them?

Mox is actually better (no lifeloss, acceleration, affinity factor, Plating, Ravager, MoE, blah, blah..) than city of brass 18 out of 21 times you draw it, in 100 starting hands. I see it being quite good with this math in mind, BUT you still have to notice that Mox is counterable, while a land is not, and that City of Brass is wasteable, while Mox is not.

@other cards:
Memnite in the initial testing seems nice, much better than Worker, for it's obvious juicy action with Drum, Mox, Frog and Enforcer.
Etched Champion seems quite good on paper, but is he better than worker, or vial? These are actually the only slots in my list that I feel debatable. The list I'm playing right now is:

// Lands
4 [DS] Darksteel Citadel
4 [MR] Vault of Whispers
4 [MR] Seat of the Synod
4 [MR] Tree of Tales

// Creatures
4 [DS] Arcbound Ravager
4 [MR] Disciple of the Vault
4 [MR] Frogmite
4 [MR] Ornithopter
4 [MR] Myr Enforcer
4 [ALA] Master of Etherium
4 [SOM] Memnite

// Spells
4 [FD] Cranial Plating
4 [MR] Thoughtcast
4 [LRW] Springleaf Drum
2 [SOM] Mox Opal

// Debatable Slots
2 Aether Vial or Arcbound Worker

// Sideboard
SB: 4 [SOK] Pithing Needle
SB: 2 [ALA] Relic of Progenitus
SB: 2 [CH] Tormod's Crypt
SB: 3 [6E] Perish
SB: 0-2 [FD] Engineered Explosives
SB: 2-4 [TSP] Krosan Grip

With all the 0cc cards i feel like Drum should be maximized, and this makes up for a faster version of the deck, that doesn't lose much resilence. The thing I cannot come up with is if I should drop Vial entirely (it has only 12 targets to vial in effectively now, and all with different CC) to play a couple Workers (or even test a couple Etched Champions).

[raudo]

Have you tested without Disciple of the Vault? I have run a deck without him and it is more explosive. He might be even a win-more card? If you don't agree, give it a test at least.

[kombatkiwi]

i'm wondering, but wouldn't something like silver aggro/artifact aggro/whatever be more appropiate for the deck now? it's seems like people are going to hardly play any affinity cards in the deck, with the adition of scars.

btw, that anvil looks awesome, but no in here

TBH for a first post this is going to look a bit cynical, and this is not a personal attack on you, but whatever
There are a lot of people posting in this thread, for what seems like every single card that is spoiled in scars, who go OMG OMG OMG we should run *this*

You can tell just by reading these posts that these people have no idea how this deck works

The best cards in the deck (or, alternately, the cards that 'make the deck')
Cranial Plating
Ravager
Disciple
ThoughtCast

These four cards are why the deck plays the terrible-in-a-vacuum-but-amazing-here Ornithopter
Most Aggressive decks don't have a two mana equipment that costs 1 to equip and grants creatures +7+0
Most Aggressive decks can't turn every permanent, even lands, into damage
Most decks can't draw 2 for one mana

Frogmite seems like just a bear, and enforcer seems like just a dork, but
they're artifacts
they're free!

The free part is so relevant because you have all these other really good non-free spells that you need to play as well (disciple, ravager, and so on)

etched champion seems ok at first, but its a 2/2 unblockable for 3 mana. Ornithopter is basically a 0/2 unblockable for zero mana. If you're blocking with etched champion, you're probably dead anyway. It doesnt have vigilance or anything. Just like if you start blocking with ornithopter, you're probably dead.

People are suggesting cards like painsmith, galvanic blast, but the deck's never run lightning bolt. Most versions don't run shrapnel blast. Glaze fiend is basically strictly better than painsmith and nobody runs Glaze Fiend

Theres been (wait... i got this) 1,2,3,4,5.... 6 blocks since mirrodin. 99% of the cards in the deck is from mirrodin. Yes, this is an artifact based set, and yes it is called 'scars of mirrodin', but the only non-mirrodin cards that have been added to the deck in all that time are springleaf drum and master of etherium.

Of COURSE the deck is still going to run affinity cards

I would run mox as a one of
What the deck needs is:
Another thoughtcast type card (ie., actual card advantage) (Even something like U: Sorcery Draw cards equal to the number of artifacts you control divided by three and then rounded, uh, up? Nah it would have to be rounded down)
Something better to use over arcbound worker (a 1 drop, I mean) (Imagine if it was like spinal parasite and was like -2/-2 to start with and came into play with 3 +1/+1 counters. It would be so much better).

This is all we can realistically expect for the deck IMO
PS. Run mox as a one of

Greenone I think you have the right Idea
Memnite I think can be definitely considered

I would go with this

16 // Lands
4 [DS] Darksteel Citadel
4 [MR] Vault of Whispers
4 [MR] Seat of the Synod
4 [MR] Tree of Tales

28// Creatures
4 [DS] Arcbound Ravager
4 [MR] Disciple of the Vault
4 [MR] Frogmite
4 [MR] Ornithopter
4 [MR] Myr Enforcer
4 [ALA] Master of Etherium
4 [SOM] Memnite

12 // Spells
4 [FD] Cranial Plating
4 [MR] Thoughtcast
3 [LRW] Springleaf Drum
1 [SOM] Mox Opal
4 Aether Vial

And I would test a balance of frog/mem/worker because these seems to be the most debatable slots in the deck

[Marke]

Mox opal is a must of in any of the new affinity lists.
2 or 3 probably is the right number because drawing 2 indeed sucks AND running too many will cause problems with your lands. You generally run mox instead of a few lands but mox hardly gets online without a artifact land, so a good distribution will probably be 16 artifact lands and 3 mox. 3 seems right because drawing it on your opening turn does give the deck a tremendous boost and with 16 land the chances of doing this are still fine.
Opal being multicolor is great as it tremendously helps the manafixing so you won't need city of brass or glimmervoid anymore, substituting it for them is therefore the obvious choice.

Now i read the post about the'math on opal but it seems to be done in a bit of a weird way.

The proper way to calculate it is to do a conditional probability calculation, ie. what is the chance if i have opal in hand that I can use it as well, in other words what is the chance the other 2 cards include a artifact land and a 0/cc guy or a artifact land and a 1cc artifact.
Given that opal is in your opening 7 you have 6 other cards to have a artifact land (ill assume 16) and a 0 guy or drum.
This leads to:
16/59 * 12/58 * 15 = 84%.
Which is actually about the same as posted below me as 17/21 = ~0,84

Given that opal does the most with a 0cc guy i'd definately go with 4 memnite and 4 ornithopter as it increases the chance of a turn 1 plating or ravager by a ton.

Imo the basis of any affinity deck after SoM will be:
15-16 artifact land
3 mox opal

4 ornithopter
4 memnite
4 springleaf drum
4 frogmite
4 thoughcast

leaving 21-22 cards for other stuff.
One way to go is just the aggro route in which case I'd go with 4 myr enforcer, 4 master of etherium 4 ravager, 4 plating, 4 disciple and 1-2 somber hoverguard. Ravager, plating and disciple are just the solid foundation of affinity and arguably only get better as the manabase is ALL artifact now instead of the few 5color lands affinity was forced to play before. Also the chance of a turn 2 active plating increases by a huge amount because of opal and the combination of 8 0cc guys with drum. Disciple is also easy enough to cast early now with 11 black sources early on. Master also still rocks and enforcer/hoverguard are alot easier to get out early now because of the all artifact mana base and better speed so running them gets alot better.
Other cards like galvanic blast could be used but do dilute the core so you can question how much you need it.

Vial is definately not great anymore in this deck. First of all the decks speeds up so vial will become dead far too fast, any hand with drum or opal will usually let you dump your hand before you even get to use vial. Also memnite is just better then worker so the chance you will use a vial with 1 counter lowers tremendously. Vial isn't a bad card but it lowers the threat density and doesn't actually speed up the deck that much, it simply isn't needed anymore. And to all those that say vial puts stuff into play uncounterable etc etc, against the decks that want to counter you're just better off playing more actual threats. Even if you have a vial out they will still be able to counter stuff like plating and thoughtcast anyways.

edit: some thopter foundries instead of ravagers can actually work quite well. With opal you often dump your hand by turn 2-3 so you get to use all your mana on making thopters. It conveniently puts all spare opals, lands, memnites, springleaf drums etc. to use and doesn't have the disadvantage of anti-synergy with MoE and plating which ravager does have. With this in mind 4x synod, ancient den and vault of whispers + 3-4 darksteel citadel looks good.


Erayo affinity also gets more appealing but is much more different to build. It probably includes a few phyrexian walkers and some more focus on cheap stuff. It does get tremendously easier to activate erayo with opal though so this build might become better (it's naturally a lot sturdier against combo).

[SillyMetalGAT]

I've been having tremendous success running this list:

16 Seat/Vault/Furnace/Citadel
1 Glimmervoid
1 Nexus

4 Ravager
4 Memnite
4 Etched Champion
4 Frogmite
4 Thopter
4 Disciple

4 Thoughtcast
3 Mox
4 Springleaf
4 Plating
3 Galvanic Blast

I run the blast since I seem to run into trouble with Goyf and it's nice to have an answer that costs R and doesn't cost an artifact. Mox is just going in no questions asked, the ability to drop a turn 1 plating is now so easy its stupid not to run it, plus if you draw one, float a mana from the first and sac to rav. Etched champion is such a great hatrack for plating it should be obvious why he is in here, Master is too slow. Even if you can drop it 2nd turn what is it really doing? Pumping up your men for what? your still losing them to merfolk and gobs and whatnot. Here you have a creature that WILL swing in unblocked and WONT get stp'ed and if he does, scoop because your losing. Someone mentioned not need disciple and I've thought about it, but what goes in for him? He still just can win you the game out of nowhere, I like him in here. Scars has done great things for this deck people, expect to see its popularity rise again

On a side note: 4eak have you tried not running vial lately? Vial really isn't as stellar as it used to be... waiting until Turn 4 to vial in a master is just silly to me when you could have revolved your strategy around getting plating online as early as Turn 2. I've found Drum to be quite a suitable replacement for Vial even though my highest CC for a creature is 4. Vial is just too clunky and to be honest, fight through the FoW man. Good players will be FoWing your Platings anyways, and vial isn't going to help a plating, springleaf may though.. dropping it as early as possible ensures it hits the board. Just some food for thought and if you have valid points in vials defense please let me know.

[Oiolosse]

...
etched champion seems ok at first, but its a 2/2 unblockable for 3 mana. Ornithopter is basically a 0/2 unblockable for zero mana. If you're blocking with etched champion, you're probably dead anyway. It doesnt have vigilance or anything. Just like if you start blocking with ornithopter, you're probably dead.
...

Yeah, unblockable is nice but Ornithoptor eats it from shock even, not to mention ALL playable removal.

[SillyMetalGAT]

So after my post last night, I got to thinking and I'm going to put Masters back in for further testing. I was using the argument that he was too slow, but in reality you can drop him easily on 2nd turn as a 4/4-6/6. It's kinda like Plating 5-8 in creature form. Plus it's always nice to equip him with a plating too. Master also makes it nice to bait out a FoW for your platings or sideboard cards since a lot of players don't want to see one hit play. I'll come back with a better post when I get a better feel for it here.

[Marke]

It's just wrong not playing myr enforcers in a aggro list with opal and memnite imo.
It just gets too easy to drop him turn 2-3 for free or nearly free. Also 18 lands AND 3 opals is surely too much, 16 and 3 opal will do really. The opal's are just lands that can be played on the same turn as a other land really.

[SillyMetalGAT]

Myr Enforcer is just a vanilla 4/4... even if he is free he's not a potential 1st turn drop like frogmite, and you gotta extend an awful lot to make him drop 2nd turn for free. He has no evasion for plating and he's just not as good as he used to be. Etched Champion certainly trumps over him, even if you have to pay 3 for it when enforcer is free. As far as going to 16 lands.... you may be right, you may be wrong. Haven't tried it so I can't say, but you can't make the argument that mox should count as a land because if you have no ravager, it's going to sit in your hand.

[Justin]

Myr Enforcer is just a vanilla 4/4... even if he is free he's not a potential 1st turn drop like frogmite, and you gotta extend an awful lot to make him drop 2nd turn for free. He has no evasion for plating and he's just not as good as he used to be. Etched Champion certainly trumps over him, even if you have to pay 3 for it when enforcer is free. As far as going to 16 lands.... you may be right, you may be wrong. Haven't tried it so I can't say, but you can't make the argument that mox should count as a land because if you have no ravager, it's going to sit in your hand.

I agree with this. I think Etched Champion will be better than Myr Enforcer in most cases. Enforcer is not so hot in a format that has so many Goyfs running around at easily get up to 4/5 and bigger. Although, Enforcer can be "free," you are usually going to have to pay 3 mana or so if you want him on the board by turn three. Champion can also be vialed in more easily and avoid countermagic.

[Caspid]

Cool story:

Opponent plays Oblivion Ring targeting my Arcbound Worker (idk why). In response, I Vial in a Ravager, then use its ability to sac Arcbound Worker, getting me a +1/+1 counter and Disciple trigger.

Opponent plays StP targeting my Ravager. I sac it in response to trigger Disciple and redistribute the counter.

Opponent ragequits in response.

[kicks_422]

Isn't that how the deck normally works?

[Marke]

Etched champion just sucks. The deck isn't interested in a conditional 2/2 unblockable with troll-shroud. It's just too clunky and is only good in conjunction with plating which stuff like ornithopter etc already is. Not too mention champion + plating isn't even that hot as they kind of sit in eachother's way at the mana curve.. Only with mox or springleaf drum can you actually attack the 3rd turn with a champion with plating on it and then all your masters and ravagers etc still sit in your hand. The card simply sucks.

Myr enforcer only became a lot better in this deck now because of opal and memnite so if going the aggro route it's a very logical card to play. Sure 4/5 goyf trumps any of the 'free' creatures in the deck but enforcer is still gold against anything like merfolk or a controllish matchup.

Also only 2nd moxes sit in your hand if you have no ravager/thopter foundry. With 3 moxes the chance of a 2nd mox is quite small and even then if you do you are most likely manaflooded anyway. Having 4 lands in hand or 2 land and 2 mox really doesn't make that much of a difference as far as mana goes, the 2 mox hand is just tons faster.
There is no reason not to substitute mox for the worst lands in the list (ie. glimmervoid etc.). Mox is easy to get online if you have at least 1 land, if you have none it sucks usually but having only 1 land also sucks usually so it doesn't really matter much.

[Bigface]

Etched champion just sucks. The deck isn't interested in a conditional 2/2 unblockable with troll-shroud. It's just too clunky and is only good in conjunction with plating which stuff like ornithopter etc already is. Not too mention champion + plating isn't even that hot as they kind of sit in eachother's way at the mana curve.. Only with mox or springleaf drum can you actually attack the 3rd turn with a champion with plating on it and then all your masters and ravagers etc still sit in your hand. The card simply sucks.

Myr enforcer only became a lot better in this deck now because of opal and memnite so if going the aggro route it's a very logical card to play. Sure 4/5 goyf trumps any of the 'free' creatures in the deck but enforcer is still gold against anything like merfolk or a controllish matchup.

Gold vs Merfolk? A deck with 8 to 12 lords? They grow bigger than Enforcer in no time. Against Control decks it can be bounced/removed/whatever, IF it comes into play, obv. Not to mention the fact it's smaller than a lot of the most played creatures. Hell, even Goblins can simply cycle Gempalm Incinerator and kill it. Not to mention that with normal hands you still play it on turn 2 or 3 (same as Champion).

Also, I didn't think it was that hard to understand, but: TROLL SHROUD IS NO MINOR FACTOR. In a meta full of Qasali Pridemages, StP, L.Bolts and many, MANY other removals that basically hit everthing Affinity plays, Troll Shroud makes a difference. It's not simply an umblockabe guy. It's hard to kill. Which is something Affinity desperately needs, since everything with a Plating on tends to be killed ASAP (and without Ravager in play, that sucks hard). It's also a definitely better topdeck/defender in desperate cases than Enforcer, since it can stop some big mean motherhubber from tearing you a structurally superflous new behind, while Enforcer dies trying to block pretty much any guy in Legacy.

Affinity has been BEGGING since it cycled out from Standard and saw play in Extended for a guy that simply didn't die to any printed artifact removal AND that was capable of driving through enemy defences. And that guy is Etched Champion. Testing will tell who's right, but I think it is a great substitute for Enforcer.

[sporenfrosch1411]

Can one explain to me what makes Memnite better than Phyrexian Walker?
With or without Plating - i think they are on an even level.
But noone has ever played Walker in Affinity -> so why are all hyping about Memnite?

:)

[Marke]

Gold vs Merfolk? A deck with 8 to 12 lords? They grow bigger than Enforcer in no time. Against Control decks it can be bounced/removed/whatever, IF it comes into play, obv. Not to mention the fact it's smaller than a lot of the most played creatures. Hell, even Goblins can simply cycle Gempalm Incinerator and kill it. Not to mention that with normal hands you still play it on turn 2 or 3 (same as Champion).

Also, I didn't think it was that hard to understand, but: TROLL SHROUD IS NO MINOR FACTOR. In a meta full of Qasali Pridemages, StP, L.Bolts and many, MANY other removals that basically hit everthing Affinity plays, Troll Shroud makes a difference. It's not simply an umblockabe guy. It's hard to kill. Which is something Affinity desperately needs, since everything with a Plating on tends to be killed ASAP (and without Ravager in play, that sucks hard). It's also a definitely better topdeck/defender in desperate cases than Enforcer, since it can stop some big mean motherhubber from tearing you a structurally superflous new behind, while Enforcer dies trying to block pretty much any guy in Legacy.

Affinity has been BEGGING since it cycled out from Standard and saw play in Extended for a guy that simply didn't die to any printed artifact removal AND that was capable of driving through enemy defences. And that guy is Etched Champion. Testing will tell who's right, but I think it is a great substitute for Enforcer.

Merfolk needs 3 lords in play to comfortably bash past myr enforcer, that's usually not happening all too soon and before that it stops them cold. Enforcer is also really easy to get into play through a counterbalance or daze something champion does not.

Champion just completely sucks on it's own unless it is in a 2 card combo with plating. Even then you are unlikely to attack before turn 4 and if you want to do that you usually need to play champion before plating in which case plating just gets countered. The plating is still a easy target for qasali pridemage etc and a etched champion itself can easily be raced, it doesn't even kill many creatures when blocking...
Sure a untargetable, unblockable target for plating would have been nice but not at 3 mana (which is alot for affinity) and with almost no influence the turn it comes into play... If affinity really needed such a guy it would have just played silhana ledgewalker which is just better...

Lots of problems you are mentioning will still haunt affinity and is part of the reason why affinity is nowhere near tier 1/2 in legacy. Etched champion does nothing to help this really. So far the only card that helps affinity alot from SoM is mox opal, memnite will be ok as well but a minor upgrade.

Go ahead and test it and you will find out in a few games what I just told you, etched champion sucks balls.


As for memnite vs phyrexian walker, memnite has 1 power which is a world of difference as it at least gets to bash against all the decks that don't care about creature on creature combat, something walker never did. Memnite isn't fantastic and might not even last in the new affinity but it sure is better then walker.

[sporenfrosch1411]

Memnite on the other hand dies to everything, while walker could survive some stuff :)