Affinity
Affinity is a keyword ability that reduces the mana cost of a spell by the number of permanents of a certain type that the player controls. It first appeared in the Mirrodin block.
Although Affinity by itself doesn’t change converted mana costs it reduces the amount of mana to be paid by each type of that permanent reduced by .
From the Comprehensive Rules (November 8, 2024—Edge of Eternities).
- 702.41. Affinity
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- 702.41a Affinity is a static ability that functions while the spell with affinity is on the stack. “Affinity for [text]” means “This spell costs you {1} less to cast for each [text] you control.”
- 702.41b If a spell has multiple instances of affinity, each of them applies.
Some of the most notable appearances of Affinity
- Thougcast
- Frogmite
- Mycosynth Golem
- Emry, Lurker of Loch
- Soujurner’s Companion
History
The first appearance of Affinity occurred on the Mirrodin Block October 2, 2003. primarily featured for Artifacts, Affinity for Artifacts and for Darksteal set Golems cycle of cards featuring Affinity for each basic land type. at the times Affinity was a particularly strong mechanic, with cards like Thoughcast, meaning you could draw more cards and play cheaper spells per turn even at cost and the presence of artifact lands helped the mechanic to be heavily encouraged and many combos found their way into competitive metagame.
By June 2004 the metagame was affinity oriented and considered to be the second Combo Winter at the time the DCI promptly banned 6 card combo that was heavily present, involving artifact lands cycle, Arcbound Ravager and Skullclamp, making it fast paced and highly draw redundant.
Forms of Affinity
Affinity was designed at first for artifacts in mind in a heavily artifact oriented set, but later on came appearances bound to other types of permanents, even for single instances like Tomik, Wielder of Law that has Affinity for Planeswalkers.
Affinity may be present in the unkeyword form, that were errata’d later on such is the case for The Circle of Loyalty.
