Hi,
Mitotic Manipulation is certainly an interesting card. I had to check the ruling on it since the card itself isn't super clear (in case anyone is wondering, you can only put a card onto the battlefield if it shares a name with a permanent already on the battlefield).
So let's look at the pros and con's of this thing from a competitive standpoint.
Pros:1. Can cheat on mana (get that second
Torrential Gearhulk for 3 instead of 6)
2. Digs for a combo piece that is needed in pairs (
Myr retriever, mill pieces for Lantern Control)
3. Can use card name manipulation to cheat out threats (not sure if this is an actual application,
Mind Bend and
Spectral Shift were the closest examples I could fnd, but neither woul do what we need to
break open Mitotic Manipulation)
4. Can be really good in control type decks (finding extra copies of
Control Magic /
Threads of Disloyalty /
Vedalken Shackles).
5. Blue Ramp (this is one of the very rare blue cards that can ramp you on mana, even if you miss on everything else)
6. Sideboard tech (when playing a quasi-mirror match, the number of hits goes up)
Cons:1. Sorcery Speed (being able to play this at instant speed to find a
Snapcaster Mage would immediately make it playable)
2. Double Blue casting cost (1UU is a hard mana cost, especially since blue is so limited on permanents to begin with)
3. Doesn't fix mana (though it does ramp, it can't find a land you don't already have, so it doesn't really make a splash any easier)
4. Largely limited to your own permanents (your opponent is unlikely on any given game to have in play some of the same permanents as you)
5. Kind of slow (play this on T3 and at best you're hitting a 2 drop)
6. Can't hit a lot of the best targets (namely plainswalkers and Legendary Creatures)
While the upside is there, the Cons paint a pretty clear picture of why this doesn't see competitive play. Modern is the format where this could see play, but Modern is such a fast format that have a T3 spell that really can't do anything T3 is a big problem.
The deck where this card would shine would be in a deck heavy with controlling enchantments and artifacts. Maybe like a U/W prison deck with
Ghostly Prison,
Threads of Disloyalty,
Vedalken Shackles,
Proteus Staff,
Batterskull,
Celestial Colonnade, and mana rocks). I really like the idea of being almost exlusively blue just to make sure that
Mitotic Manipulation can at least always hit a land. The main problem though, this deck doesn't really exist because of it's
weakness to disruption and low speed.
This is a card I could REALLY get behind if it were instant speed.
Mitotic Manipulation into
Snapcaster Mage is a powerful enough interaction on it's own, and
Mitotic Manipulation into
Threads of Disloyalty could blow out combat. Unfortunately, at sorcery speed it feels too clunky. (as an afterthought,
Leyline of Anticipation in the U/W deck above could get around this).
Finally, the biggest problem with
Mitotic Manipulation seems to be consistency. The
odds of actually hitting a card that's already in play seems pretty low most of the time, unless it's deep in the late game, where you'd rather just draw action instead of a means to find action.
In the end, something like
Phantasmal Image is probably going to be better in nearly every situation. It only costs 2 mana, can copy anything creature on your side or your opponents. It solves a lot of the problems that
Mitotic Manipulation has at an easier mana investment.
Thanks for reading my novel of a comment, and I hope this answers your questions, and maybe inspires you to build that control deck, which is starting to seem pretty sweet! Good luck and Happy Hunting
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