Cloud of Faeries has been banned in Pauper. This card is very powerful and oppressive. It will shake up the metagame quite a bit as two of the top decks, both Delver and Esper Familiars play it. Will those decks still be able to carry on? Will Spellstutter Sprite still be playable? What could this mean for the metagame?

Here is the official banning announcement for those who would like a link as to Wizards reasoning behind the ban: http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/january-18-2016-banned-and-restricted-announcement-2016-01-18

Will decks with Cloud of Faeries be able to continue or are they goners? This is a hard question to answer in truth but we have seen delver decks before that were more of a tempo beat down deck than that of the spell stutter variety. I think Delver decks will be just fine though they might have to run Frostburn Weird, Cloudfin Raptor other cards but delver will find a way.

Esper Familiars and Cloud of Faeries Combo Tron decks however are going to be missing a big piece which will likely make them unplayable. Those decks may still be able to adjust, but they will never quite play the same way.I doubt they will be able to continue, but then again Esper Familiars came back after they thought the banning of Frantic Search would kill the deck, so maybe there is hope there.

Now the second biggest question is what about Spellstutter Sprite? Will people play other faeries to make up for the Cloud of Faeries? I don't think so though there is a small chance with a one drop faerie. I am not sure if Spellstutter Sprite will continue to be a thing. Often there isn't any other Faeries on board when countering a spell spellstutter and End of Turn Spellstutter Sprite so you can attack and ninjitsu Ninja of the Deep Hours didn't get much worse if at all.

As for the metagame in the short term, a lot of Delver players will just drop the deck in lieu of other options. This happened when other cards were banned as well. The players will probably come back to the deck once someone has proven that it will still be effective. With Delver out of the way in the short term, other decks will rise in the short term I am guessing. I think Burn is a lot stronger without Delver around as much, but many will play Soul Sister ww tokens deck to easily hate Burn out. It is hard to predict a world without a mainstay deck as it has been a mainstay deck since around the time Delver was printed. MUC will still be a thing and may come back in favor as it does not run Faeries, opting for more counters and additional card draw. It will be interesting what will happen at the very least.