As many of you all know, I have been a long time proponent of the Affinity deck in Modern. I have played Affinity in every Modern event that I’ve attended
for well over a year and have been extremely happy about playing the archetype.
However, the last two events I’ve played in with Affinity have sort of tainted the high I’ve been riding about the deck. While I still believe that
Affinity is one of the most powerful decks in the format (Mox Opal and Cranial Plating are among the most powerful cards in the format) the time has come
for me to move on to bigger and bluer things.
It all comes back to playing a deck full of Ornithopters, Springleaf Drums, and Signal Pests.
NOT a good Magic card.
My opinion of these cards has certainly changed over the past year. At one point I very openly said I would never play a deck with Ornithopter because it
is simply a bad card. Then I played with the deck for a while and was super impressed with how powerful it was as a cohesive unit. While
Ornithopter is a card that probably isn’t making many draft decks, the synergy between many of the objectively weaker cards in an Affinity deck more than
overcomes the drawbacks.
The thing is that as I was playing more and more games with the deck, the phenomenon of going late into games and topdecking Ornithopters and other dead
cards and losing was very real. I played Affinity in a PTQ a couple of weeks ago and lost two matches to decks and opponents where if I hadn’t been playing
a deck without such a high discrepancy in power level between cards, I think I would have been much more successful.
I also lost games to Stony Silence and Shatterstorm. The vulnerability of the deck to sideboard cards that are completely devastating was another long time
issue with the deck that has now led me to change archetypes.
Don’t get me wrong. I still think that Affinity is a fantastic Modern deck. It is in my mind one of the most powerful decks in the format. However, I felt
like I needed to change decks for something that would give me a more consistent chance to perform well, round after round.
So, I started thinking about the decks where I had the most consistent success in old Extended and the first thing that came to mind was Faeries. I have
always put up consistent results with the archetype, and the unbanning of Bitterblossom in Modern is a factor that is simply too good to ignore for fans of
the fae.
It’s baaaack!!!
When I started looking at Faeries decklists I noticed that they were divided into two categories:
vs. 
Are we going to Shackles up, or not?
The decks were either Island heavy in favor of playing Shackles or based around playing the various two color lands for mana consistency and less damage,
like Secluded Glen and River of Tears. Obviously the painless fixing is nice, but the allure of Shackles is very enticing…
Here is an example of a Shackles-less U/B Faeries deck that I looked at:
Creatures (11)
Lands (25)
Spells (24)
- 3 Mana Leak
- 2 Spell Snare
- 3 Cryptic Command
- 3 Thoughtseize
- 4 Bitterblossom
- 1 Doom Blade
- 2 Inquisition of Kozilek
- 2 Sword of Feast and Famine
- 3 Dismember
- 1 Tragic Slip
Sideboard
And here is a really cool example of a BUG Faeries deck with Shackles that I looked at:
Creatures (13)
Lands (25)
Spells (22)
I liked a lot of what both of these decks were doing and the cards that they were playing. Ultimately, having played a lot of Faeries decks in my time, I
decided that I wanted to go with Vedalken Shackles because it’s simply a messed up powerful card, but that I also wanted to incorporate some of the
elements of the other Faeries deck.
In particular, I felt like the BUG Faeries deck didn’t have enough removal and/or cheap ways to interact with an opponent, so I made some changes to the
deck.
Creatures (12)
Lands (25)
Spells (23)
I simply mushed the two decks together taking the elements that I thought were the strongest of each and melding them into one cohesive deck.
I got to playtest quite a bit against various matchups last week and moved cards in and out to see what I liked and what I didn’t like and felt pretty
satisfied with the deck. I played the deck in a small local Modern tournament and ended up with a disappointing 2-2 record.
My first loss was completely my own fault. I got paired against a Mono-Green Goblin Charbelcher deck and had no idea what my opponent was doing. As a
result I made some pretty horrific plays and ended up losing a close match. The loss, however, was not my deck’s fault as it gave me cards that were more
than capable of winning.
My last loss was against the B/G Rock deck that has been doing very well recently. We played a pretty tight two game set, and I ended up coming up a little
bit short both times. I really underestimated B/G’s ability to grind through a lot of cards and come out with action at the end. In game 1, for example, my
opponent was able to win through my Bitterblossom and a Vedalken Shackles!
Was I a little bit flooded? Sure, but I was still really impressed with B/G’s ability to accomplish work as a game went on.
One of the things that I like about BUG Faeries is that it has a lot of the elements of a Rock deck, since it gets to play its own Tarmogoyfs and versatile
removal in the form of Abrupt Decay. BUG Faeries has a lot of the grindy elements of Rock, but in this specific matchup, I felt like I was ever so slightly
outmatched.
So, I went back to the drawing board…
Creatures (9)
Lands (24)
Spells (27)
So, the biggest difference between this list and any of the others…
I don’t care what you give me, I always GET what I want.
Gifts Ungiven is an amazing Magic card and can set up all kinds of combos and generate all kinds of awesome card advantage.
In my Faeries deck, Gifts Ungiven sets up a lot of synergies between Life from the Loam and Academy Ruins.
Artifact toolbox.
In a grindy game you can go and get (and then recur) any of these incredibly potent tools.
Lands! Lands! Lands!
Loam also does a few other cute tricks that are pretty awesome in this deck.
Lands worth playing a second, third, or fo
urth time…
Being able to recur manlands against decks like U/W/R Control or B/G is a pretty huge game. Assuming you can find Loam, this deck has a never-ending stream
of threats. Also being able to get back Tectonic Edge or Ghost Quarter allows this deck to take a straight up land destruction role against many decks
where that strategy is good.
The other thing that I love about Loam is that it makes Liliana of the Veil’s +1 ability pretty negligible, since Loam will draw you up to three cards
every turn.
I’m very much looking forward to firing this new Faeries deck this week at my local Legacy event in Livonia.
A few quick notes before I wrap up:
New comers I will probably be playing with.
Polluted Delta seems like an auto-include in these Faeries decks, seeing as I already play fetchlands and Delta is the best one for my deck! Pretty
obvious.
I also think that Sultai Charm is a card that I’d be interested in playing as a one-of in the deck. I like the flexibility and the modes seem incredibly
relevant in a deck like Faeries. I like that it kills Cranial Plating, Pyromancer Ascension, and also hits Restoration Angel and/or Kiki-Jiki, Mirror
Breaker!
Faeries seems like a pretty awesome deck so far, and I’m definitely looking forward to battling with it a lot in the future. To the skies!!!