Magic: The Gathering supports an immense number of different playstyles and strategies for the player to choose from. The #1 strategy that has always intrigued me above all has been Graveyard manipulation. There are two ways that a player can engage in this type of playstyle. The first is milling opponents’ libraries until they have no more cards to draw, and lose via default rules of the game. The second is manipulating your own graveyard for value and cheating expensive creatures into play. This is what I’ll be referring to in this post, and the first commander that I wanted to lead with this sort of gameplay is The Mimeoplasm.

At first glance it’s obvious that this ooze wants to have creature cards in graveyards. The preconstructed deck that The Mimeoplasm originally helmed: "Devour for Power" tried to strike a balance between milling your opponent’s library and your own. I’ve learned that I would rather trust in the creatures that I put in my deck rather than trying to mill my opponents for targets. It’s certainly more consistent this way. How do you now achieve getting the most creature cards from your library into your graveyard then? Luckily, we have access to blue mana and an underrated creature: Mirror-Mad Phantasm

This little known mythic rare creature from the original Innistrad set isn’t something you’re going to find on edhrec.com's top 50 creatures for The Mimeoplasm, but I believe it’s grossly underrated. For 5 mana you get a 5/1 flying spirit… ok… bad in 2024. But the ability is why this spirit shines. Once this seemingly innocuous creature is in play our engine for self-mill is set, and if we keep 2 mana open our opponent’s will only be able to watch as we become the problem. The ability shuffles this creature into your library and then you mill yourself until the Phantasm is revealed. It then goes directly back into play, and if you have any additional blue mana you can try again! Risky? Absolutely. Possible whiffs? Certainly. Awesome edge of your seat all in gameplay? Definitely. This creature is a one card powerhouse for any self-mill deck strategy.

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