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Hello and welcome! Welcome and Hello! As always I'm pleased to bring you a new list from my collection, but I'm particularly excited this time, because it's a deck of my very favorite archetype: Combo Control. In the following I'll be going over three things in depth. The first is, "What is Esper Gifts?" The second is "Why should I play the deck?" Finally I'll be concluding with "How do I play Esper Gifts?" Now, most importantly the deck.
Esper Gifts is a combo control deck that has been around since the early days of Modern. Many of the key components to the deck including Snapcaster Mage, Liliana of the Veil and (most importantly) Unburial Rites were printed in Innistrad when Modern was really in its infancy. The deck gets its name from the card Gifts Ungiven which functions as a way to search for powerful win conditions, find control pieces and generate card advantage. Gifts Ungiven is an instant that costs three generic and one blue mana to cast. It reads . Our deck is designed around abusing that text in a few different ways. The first is through playing several cards with different names and similar effects. If you search for Wrath of God, Damnation, Supreme Verdict and another card there will be no way for your opponent to separate the piles so that you do not get a board wipe. Our second means of utilizing the card is to generate value from our graveyard. Making piles with Snapcaster Mage, Lingering Souls and a couple other useful cards can put your opponent in an awkward situation when deciding which cards to pitch. Putting a Lingering Souls into your graveyard is essentially giving you three out of the four cards in your hand, and pitching an instant or sorcery when your about to flip a Jace, Vryn's Prodigy is the same as handing it to you. Finally, we need a way to finish the game, and Gifts Ungiven can do that for us as well. Being that we can search for up to four cards with different names we can look for only two cards, and our opponent will be forced to put both into the yard. This comes in handy when you can search up Unburial Rites and either Iona, Shield of Emeria or Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite. Then all you have left to do is flashback your Unburial Rites and ride to victory on the back of your new best friend.
Playing any deck, or playing Magic in general for that matter, is all about having fun. Over the years the makers of our favorite trading card game have done a lot of research into what attracts certain players to Magic: the Gathering, and in their efforts they've broken players into several psychographic profiles in order to give each group something to play with. They decided to nickname the groups Spike, Johnny, Timmy, Vorthos and Melvin, so I'm going to address each group before giving my personal reasons for playing the deck.
- Spike, you like to win, and you like to show that you're the best player. This deck uses powerful cards like Liliana of the Veil, Inquisition of Kozilek and Path to Exile. It involves making difficult decisions, and forcing your opponent to do the same. Gifts Ungiven rewards talented players and punishes inexperienced ones. This deck can test your skills, and prove that you're the better player.
- Johnny, this deck is literally built around a one card combo. Beyond that you can find numerous interactions that generate value through your cards working together. Lili discarding anything with flashback, Snapcaster Mage plus Path to Exile to get your fourth land at instant speed. Go through the list. The possibilities are endless.
- Timmy, you want to play an Iona. You know it. I know it. Giant flying angel on the cheap? Make it happen buddy.
- Vorthos, at first glance this isn't your thing, but let's dig a little deeper into the lore. This deck provides opportunities to bombard complete strangers with explanations on why Iona and Linvala don't have their vision obscured by halos around their faces. You get to tell people how Jace had his planeswalker spark ignite, and where Kalitas got his awesome bone mask! Explain to your opponent why Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite is white when she appears to be inherently evil. This deck is oozing with flavorful moments from Magic's past, and you get to appreciate those stories all over again!
- Melvin, you know that you want to run Champions of Kamigawa copies of Gifts Ungiven. The original text read, That means you've got an opportunity to say "Well rule 701.17b says that if a player is searching a hidden zone for cards with a stated quality, such as a card with a certain card type or color, that player isnt required to find some or all of those cards even if theyre present in that zone."
Finally, there are many reasons why I play the deck, but the biggest is a walk down memory lane. I started playing Magic in Tempest, and one of my earliest exposures to blue was a card named Intuition. Three years later in Invasion everyone was playing Fact or Fiction, and you could hear players throughout the store saying, "EOTFOFYL". I wouldn't say that Gifts Ungiven is a modern Intuition or even a "fixed" Fact or Fiction, but if you've played those cards you'll know there's a feeling when it resolves. It's a sort of "Yes, I've got you now!" Gifts Ungiven will give you that feeling.
Piloting Esper Gifts can be a fun and challenging proposition for any player. It doesn't take long before you've got lots of options available and have to start making some big decisions. In short this isn't a deck that plays itself, and if you can begin to grasp some of the subtle nuances and intricate lines of play involved you are going to get a deeper understanding of magic theories like tempo, card advantage and utilizing the stack to your overall benefit. The first thing you need to know about piloting any deck is what an acceptable starting hand looks like. In this case there are a few things to remember. The first on the list is that you need access to three colors of mana, and that you have to play accordingly. Liliana of the Veil, Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet and Damnation all require double-black, Wrath of God and Supreme Verdict both need two white mana and you might need double-blue if you want to Snap into Mana Leak/Serum Visions. You really want to see three lands, because the rest of the cards in your hand don't matter if you can't cast them. Ideally your opening hand should have either Serum Visions or Inquisition of Kozilek. If you don't have a one-drop you should have a removal spell or a Mana Leak handy, so that you can play a tapped land on turn one and represent counter-magic on your second turn. Remember, if you see Iona or Elesh Norn in your opening hand it's actually a six card hand. From there the game can go in so many directions that I can't write about all of them, so in lieu of the longest list of "what ifs" ever I'm going to list a few tricks and tips below to help you use every part of the buffalo.
- Casting Gifts Ungiven at the end of your opponent's turn forces them to answer it immediately. If they have to counter it on their turn then they'll be tapped out on your turn allowing you to resolve sorcery speed spells.
- If you can stick a Kalitas before a board wipe you still get Zombies from the opponent's creatures dying.
- There are several ways to put your win conditions into your graveyard. If you draw Iona you can discard her to either Jace or Liliana.
- Jace, Vryn's Prodigy is great at stalling. You can even block with him, and activate his ability before damage to flip out of harm's way.
- If you have a Jace, Telepath Unbound in play you can cast Gifts Ungiven for full value. Search for four instants or sorceries, and no matter how they break it down you'll get to cast whatever you need to. The same goes for Snappy if you can afford the extra two mana.
- Although it won't come up often. If you're playing against Living End you can cast Gifts in response to Living End and sneak in your fatties.
That's all for this time around. As always win with grace, lose with humility and just be somebody that you'd want to be around. I'm Ox, and I hope you've enjoyed reading about my own little corner of the multiverse.
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| Top Ranked |
|
| Date added | 7 years |
| Last updated | 7 years |
| Exclude colors | RG |
| Legality | This deck is Modern legal. |
| Rarity (main - side) | 11 - 5 Mythic Rares 31 - 8 Rares 13 - 1 Uncommons 2 - 1 Commons |
| Cards | 60 |
| Avg. CMC | 2.75 |
| Tokens | Angel 4/4 W, Emblem Jace, Vryn's Prodigy, Spirit 1/1 W, Zombie 2/2 B |
| Folders | Excellent, zzInspiration (not own) |
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