I published over twenty lists for the new Standard in the last two weeks or so. One card that never made any of the lists, but was continuously in the back of my mind, is [scryfall]Psychic Intrusion[/scryfall].

It was a bit of a sleeper card at Pro Tour Journey into Nyx. The BUG deck by Channel Fireball: Pantheon featured one (and two of those decks made it into the top 8). I expected to see it in some Esper Decks in Standard for mirrors, but those died out in favor of the UW Cleansing deck. Probably not in the main deck, but in the sideboard.

The obvious problem is the high cost. You pay five and don’t even get to cast it for free. On the other hand, its (possibly) card advantage. Steal the [scryfall]Elspeth, Sun’s Champion[/scryfall] from your opponent and cast it. You want mind using 11 mana on it, if you can get an Elspeth and get rid of your opponent’s. Sure, you’re opponent doesn’t even have to use mana in this scenario, which is quite bad, but there’s a chance it doesn’t really matter.

Of course, its all going to be dependent on the metagame. If the metagame is full of three- and four-drop creatures, ramped into play turn (or two) early, this card is not going to do anything. If, on the other hand, Elspeth is the queen of the format and you expect long games, this might be exactly what you need to steal that key card from your opponents hand and turn the game to your advantage. Its very hard to say at this point.

This is a card you should still keep in mind. If the control decks are going to be UB (or Dimir) decks, this is one of those cards you might want to use every now and then. Sure, control isn’t going to be as strong as it was in the last Standard, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t going to be people out there, who’ll try to make it work. You know Guillaume Wafo-Tapa is trying to come up with something.

On the play, our card can steal plenty of different wincons, such as [scryfall]Nissa, Worldwaker[/scryfall], [scryfall]Stormbreath Dragon[/scryfall], [scryfall]Sarkhan, Dragonspeaker[/scryfall], [scryfall]Prognostic Sphinx[/scryfall] and so forth. Sure, its uses are quite narrow, but they are also quite powerful. And cards that cost five (plus whatever) should be powerful. In fact, they should be game changing.

If you do decide to go with this card, use it sparingly. More than one or two in your deck will spell disaster. At least its going to be cheap, though. There must be some in draft piles and such.