This Strange Esper Deck Just Won a Standard Event, and Nobody Saw It Coming

Standard has largely been dominated by Landfall, Lifegain, and Reanimator recently, but we’ve also seen some outliers put up strong performances. For example, a wild Esper deck focused on high-toughness creatures recently made the top four of a Magic Online event.

Now, it looks like a different flavor of Esper maximizing self-Mill and self-Bounce synergies unexpectedly managed to win an event, too.

Plethora of Synergies

This Esper strategy has a lot of moving parts, but Moonshadow is the card that holds everything together. While this creature starts out as just a tiny 1/1, it doesn’t take much before it becomes significantly more threatening.

The easiest way to offload this Elemental’s -1/-1 counters is to Mill yourself with Overlord of the Balemurk Overlord of the Balemurk Impending 5—{1}{B} (If you cast this spell for its impending cost, it enters with five time counters and isn't a creature until the last is removed. At the beginning of your end step, remove a time counter from it.)
Whenever this permanent enters or attacks, mill four cards, then you may return a non-Avatar creature card or a planeswalker card from your graveyard to your hand. or Dark Matter Manipulator Dark Matter Manipulator When this creature enters, mill three cards.
This creature gets +2/+0 for every seven cards in your graveyard. . To speed up the process even more, Mabel, Bitter Recluse Mabel, Bitter Recluse Deathtouch
When Mabel enters, remove up to three counters from another target creature or planeswalker. can also remove three of Moonshadow’s counters at once.

Nurturing Pixie Nurturing Pixie Flying
When this creature enters, return up to one target non-Faerie, nonland permanent you control to its owner's hand. If a permanent was returned this way, put a +1/+1 counter on this creature. then takes things a step further, resetting and replaying these Mill effects or Mabel for more value. This deck even incorporates Grim Bauble Grim Bauble When this artifact enters, target creature an opponent controls gets -2/-2 until end of turn.
{2}{B}, {T}, Sacrifice this artifact: Surveil 2. (Look at the top two cards of your library, then put any number of them into your graveyard and the rest on top of your library in any order.) as a bounceable piece of removal that you can sacrifice to buff Moonshadow.

Given how much this deck relies on Moonshadow and Pixie to apply pressure, Starfield Shepherd Starfield Shepherd Flying
When this creature enters, search your library for a basic Plains card or a creature card with mana value 1 or less, reveal it, put it into your hand, then shuffle.
Warp {1}{W} (You may cast this card from your hand for its warp cost. Exile this creature at the beginning of the next end step, then you may cast it from exile on a later turn.) plays an important role as a tutor for your best cards. Mockingbird comes in clutch as a tutorable target here, allowing you to create a Flying Moonshadow, if it weren’t already terrifying enough.

Speaking of Flying Moonshadows, one of the coolest things this deck can do is copy Moonshadow with Likeness Looter Likeness Looter Flying
{T}: Draw a card, then discard a card.
{X}: This creature becomes a copy of target creature card in your graveyard with mana value X, except it has flying and this ability. Activate only as a sorcery. once the one-drop gets Milled or killed. In this case, because Looter didn’t actually enter as Moonshadow, it won’t have any counters, giving you an easy path to a 7/7.

Once you’ve got yourself a formidable attacking force, a single Practiced Offense Practiced Offense Put a +1/+1 counter on each creature target player controls. Target creature gains your choice of double strike or lifelink until end of turn.
Flashback {1}{W} (You may cast this card from your graveyard for its flashback cost. Then exile it.) may enable a lethal hit in one shot. Thanks to this sorcery’s flashback ability, all you have to do is Mill it at any point, and you’ll have your finisher later on.

If your opponent successfully minimizes the effect of Offense by killing Moonshadow, there’s no need to fear, since Kaito, Bane of Nightmares Kaito, Bane of Nightmares Ninjutsu {1}{U}{B} ({1}{U}{B}, Return an unblocked attacker you control to hand: Put this card onto the battlefield from your hand tapped and attacking.)
During your turn, as long as Kaito has one or more loyalty counters on him, he's a 3/4 Ninja creature and has hexproof.
+1: You get an emblem with "Ninjas you control get +1/+1."
0: Surveil 2. Then draw a card for each opponent who lost life this turn.
−2: Tap target creature. Put two stun counters on it. attacks from a different angle. With access to so many hard-to-block one-drops, getting Kaito into play is easy as pie.

Versatility at Its Finest

Thanks to attacking on multiple angles, this Esper deck is very difficult to gameplan for. Most top matchups are winnable, though the deck leans on its key draws.

Decks that don’t feature much in the way of removal, such as Mono-Green Landfall, risk falling too far behind against multi-Moonshadow draws. With removal spells like Strategic Betrayal Strategic Betrayal Target opponent exiles a creature they control and their graveyard. and Sheltered by Ghosts Sheltered by Ghosts Enchant creature you control
When this Aura enters, exile target nonland permanent an opponent controls until this Aura leaves the battlefield.
Enchanted creature gets +1/+0 and has lifelink and ward {2}. in the sideboard, you’re well set up to stop Mightform Harmonizer Mightform Harmonizer Landfall — Whenever a land you control enters, double the power of target creature you control until end of turn.
Warp {2}{G} (You may cast this card from your hand for its warp cost. Exile this creature at the beginning of the next end step, then you may cast it from exile on a later turn.) and tempo out the opposition.

Playing the pure beatdown role against Lifegain is a lot harder, but Bauble + Pixie loops can do a ton of heavy lifting. By keeping Lifegain’s Soul Sisters effects off the board, you can disrupt their lifegain long enough for Practiced Offense to turn the corner.

Then, in grindy matchups like Dimir Midrange, you can repeatedly tutor Pixie with Shepherd and bounce the Shepherd back to your hand for seemingly endless value. By going wide, it’s then easy to stick Kaitos of your own while keeping the opponent’s Planeswalkers in check.

Going wide is usually a big weakness against Izzet Spellementals, but Moonshadow even has the bonus of being an Elemental. This makes Sunderflock Sunderflock This spell costs {X} less to cast, where X is the greatest mana value among Elementals you control.
Flying
When this creature enters, if you cast it, return all non-Elemental creatures to their owners' hands. much less concerning, and it doesn’t take long for Moonshadow to get out of Impractical Joke Impractical Joke Damage can't be prevented this turn. Impractical Joke deals 3 damage to up to one target creature or planeswalker. range. Still, even with one Elemental, this matchup does feel tough.

Of course, no deck is perfect, and the same goes for this Esper list, which can have a hard time against graveyard hate. Curious Farm Animals Curious Farm Animals When this creature dies, you gain 3 life.
{2}, Sacrifice this creature: Destroy up to one target artifact or enchantment. does help here, removing Rest in Peace Rest in Peace When this enchantment enters, exile all graveyards.
If a card or token would be put into a graveyard from anywhere, exile it instead. , as well as Pinnacle Starcage out of the artifact decks.

You only play one copy of Animals in your sideboard, but Starfield Shepherd can consistently tutor it up. Depending on how often you see these matchups, you could run more Curious Farm Animals if the metagame adjusts.

Altogether, this deck seems like a pretty strong option for Standard’s current metagame, and is well worth a try. That said, with MTG Star Trek now online, there’s a fair chance Standard will see some shake-ups. Whether this deck will stay in a good position as the meta evolves is yet to be seen.

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