Within the affinity community, I've seen a lot of people crying about the mox opal ban. Yes, Stony Silence is a card. Yes, Mox Opal being banned sucks ass and Urza should've been banned instead. Yes, Whirza became a thing. But through it all, Affinity will not die.
Here we've got the classic affinity shell:
Our 0 drops appear in the form of Memnite, Ornithopter, and Darksteel Citadel to try and fill the board, with a guest appearance from Mox Tantalite as a temporary replacement for Mox Opal. Yes, it's obviously nowhere near as good, but it can still help fireup nexus's, buff cranial plating, help hangarback walker, or even just be sac'd to ravager.
Our 1 drops are here with Springleaf Drum (arguably a 0 drop), Vault Skirge (Our evasive life-linker), Signal Pest (Let's buff up our machines!) and Galvanic Blast to burn through any blockers.
Our 2 drops are where things get really fun: We have Cranial Plating, which can both drain a ton of life with Vault Skirge and burn out the game with Inkmoth Nexus, Arcbound Ravager, the classic heavy better, Steel Overseer, who not only pumps our little guys, but buffs up Arcbound Ravager in case of death, and Hangarback walker--speaking of which, Hangarback walker gives us something to do when we have dead draws as well as a solid beater and token generator, for both go tall and go wide strategies.
In the sideboard, we've got Etched Champion as a blocker for go-tall decks as well as other aggro lists
Leyline of Sanctity for burn, Primetime, and Goblins
Relic for dredge and storm,
Sorcerous spyglass for control and goblins, spellskite for burn, goblins and primetime
Surgical extraction for basically everything
Finally wear/tear for Stony Silence, Ensnaring Bridge, and Blood Moon.
Yes, my friends, Mox Opal is banned. It sucks hardcore and the prices of our decks are plummeting. But we can recover from this. Let's get out there and kick some Whirza ass.
