Cliff (@WordOfCommander) has been writing for MTGPrice since 2013, and is an eager Commander player, Draft enthusiast, and Cube fanatic. A high school science teacher by day, he’s also the official substitute teacher of the MTG Fast Finance podcast. If you’re ever at a GP and you see a giant flashing ‘CUBE DRAFT’ sign, go over, say hi, and be ready to draft.
I’m supposed to write 2,000 words, though, so I’m only half done. What could this mean for us financially?
The Card
Persistent Petitioners is a card that has its rules text printed on it and since I posted a pic of the card, you can read all of the rules text. If you’re using a screen reader for some reason, that’s cool, thanks for patronizing our website. Persistent Petitioners taps for 1 to mill a player for 1, you can tap 4 untapped advisers to mill someone for 12 and, most importantly, there is no cap on the number of petitioners you can play in a deck. That rule has extended to EDH so you can play more than one copy, and lots of players do. The plan is to get a lot of these in play and mill everyone out, which can happen quickly. You only need 7 or 8 activations per player, fewer if they’re drawing greedily, and it’s easy to untap your side (though it was easier with Paradox Engine – R.I.P. in Peace, Doxy Boi).
While it makes sense that a card that needs to be purchased 30 cards at a time is selling well, I think it’s significant that no card sold better than this. 60 card casual players are helping this out a lot, it’s not just EDH, but I think it’s worth revisiting this card since I wrote about it when it was first spoiled. I’ll walk you through how I use EDHREC to look at what matters, while I’m at it since I basically show everyone how to do it one time and then never come back to it later and you could get lost if you haven’t read everything I’ve written the last 5 years. Let’s get going.
The $1.50 to $2 block seems a little cheap for this card. There aren’t collector boosters in this set which means everyone needed to come by their foils honestly. Since people foiling the deck would need to buy about 20 or 30 copies at a time, all of TCG Player’s inventory would be gone in about 2 decks’ worth if more people decided to pursue the deck, and at merely double the cost, it’s almost not worth it not to buy foil.
Petitioner is very difficult to reprint, the rest of the decks it’s in are usually pretty cheap and we have foils of similar cards to look at.
Rats has multiple foils printings versus just the one for Petitioners. Petitioners themselves might not be the worst buy right off the bat, especially in foil, which isn’t something I typically advocate. Let’s look at EDHREC for some more clues.
To get started, it’s as easy as typing the name of the card into the search bar.
That takes you to the page with some stats about the card. Since it’s not legendary, there’s no option to toggle between the card viewed as a commander or viewed as part of the 99, so just scroll down.
Below that is a list of all of the commanders that run the card. It’s ranked by percentage of elgibile decks that run it rather than raw number of inclusions, which I think is more instructive. 0.005% of Atraxa decks could run a card and have 10 instances of a card that’s in 100% of 9 decks. Sorting by percentage tells you the likelihood a deck runs a card, not which commander has more decks in the database. Both numbers matter, though, so note that while a higher percentage of Arcum Dagson decks run the card, it occurs more often in Grand Arbiter decks. Let’s look at both of those and Kami of the Crescent Moon for ideas.
Kami used to be much more expensive than it is and thanks to a Conspiracy printing, it’s more affordable. The advantages to Kami for your Petitioners deck is you draw more fodder and you subtly mill them by depleting their library in a way they don’t mind at first. Giving them stuff to beat you with isn’t terribly competitive, but this deck isn’t that.
Looking at Kami of the Crescent Moon first (as a commander, not as a card), we see that it got some new cards that pertain to milling. Folio is one of the best mill cards ever created and if that made someone look into how to mill in EDH, that would bring them to the same pages we’re on and working backwards, we can figure out what else they might buy.
One last trick – Let’s take another look at the top part of the page.
Finally, let’s use our trick from a few weeks ago where we click the “layout button” on the right side,
change the lists to text and import the lists into a program to compare all 3 to see if there are common themes.
Arcane Denial
3
List A, List B, List C
Brainstorm
3
List A, List B, List C
Counterspell
3
List A, List B, List C
Dramatic Reversal
3
List A, List B, List C
Elixir of Immortality
3
List A, List B, List C
Fabricate
3
List A, List B, List C
Fellwar Stone
3
List A, List B, List C
Halimar Depths
3
List A, List B, List C
Intruder Alarm
3
List A, List B, List C
Lightning Greaves
3
List A, List B, List C
Mind Stone
3
List A, List B, List C
Mystical Tutor
3
List A, List B, List C
Negate
3
List A, List B, List C
Paradox Engine
3
List A, List B, List C
Persistent Petitioners
3
List A, List B, List C
Ponder
3
List A, List B, List C
Sol Ring
3
List A, List B, List C
Swan Song
3
List A, List B, List C
Thrumming Stone
3
List A, List B, List C
Paradox Engine is banned and some of these are staples, but some of these cards bear looking into.
Vannifar hype from a year ago is dying down but I am 100% a buyer on these when they bottom out and it appears they have. The overall trend is down but the price is fluctuating pretty rapidly. I like the other art better but as a spec, you can’t go wrong with this card.
Stone’s decline is another trend to watch. Petitioners made it spike last year and it’s unlikely the same card does it again but this spikes a lot as a result of a new card with the unlimited inclusion ability and it never goes back down to where it was. This is also a reprint candidate in a way Petitioners is not, not to mention Intruder Alarm.
Looking at cards in 2 of the 3 lists gives me more hits.
This is not a bulk rare and Standard clearly has nothing to do with it. Looping Petitioners or just playing every one you draw is an excellent source of “chip” mill.
This tanked after Petitioner hype died down but I think it could go back up as the result of something else. I doubt Petitioner makes this go up again, though, but it’s worth keeping track of unique, powerful, tribal effects.
Petitioner didn’t even cause the biggest spike in this card’s history so there’s no reason to think other cards couldn’t do it again. As this tanks, I’m ready to pounce.
All in all I think this analysis took me 15 minutes. Once you get better and don’t have to follow a guide to do it, you’ll be able to check quickly when you see an interesting tweet. I saw some cards that are likely to spike again as the result of a card with an ability like Petitioners’ being printed and having a gameplan ready for that rather than trying to figure out a whole decklist on the fly when you should be buying cards is what separates the quick from the dead. Be quick because you did the figuring out work ahead of time. That’s it for me. Until next year!
Happy holidays everyone, and welcome to the Christmas edition of the Watchtower. WotC already gave Pioneer players their Christmas gift last Monday with the banning of Oko, and the format is finally starting to feel like it has an identity other than “two or three decks with cards that should obviously be banned.” It sounds like ban list changes are going to be falling in line with the new, “not every week but whenever we feel like it” timeline as well, which means that they believe the format is hitting its stride. One suspects that once we reach this point, plenty of players scared off by the constant churn will begin to more seriously buy in.
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Travis Allen has been playing Magic: The Gathering since 1994, mostly in upstate New York. Ever since his first FNM he’s been trying to make playing Magic cheaper, and he first brought his perspective to MTGPrice in 2013. You can find his articles there weekly, as well as on the podcast MTG Fast Finance.
We are on the cusp of real Theros: Beyond Death previews, to start around the second week of the New Year. It’s the time when we’re mostly done with Throne of Eldraine, but don’t have another set to deal with.
Our plan, though, is to prepare and stock up on Eldraine cards while they are cheap. Supply is at a maximum for the regular cards and the assorted Showcase cards, we’re not going to see a huge influx of Storybook cards out of nowhere.
There’s a case to be made to buy everything, but that’s for those who have deep pockets and unlimited organization skills. Instead, let’s focus on the cards that could gain quite nicely over the 18 months between now and when Eldraine rotates…
One thing to notice, that I think I’m going to have to research more carefully: The prices aren’t in line with what I expected. Generally speaking, the nonfoil special version (extended art or storybook) is a bit more expensive than the foil version of the regular card. That’s likely the new reality, at least until they change the distribution numbers on us. The prices have had a couple of months to settle out, so I believe these.
To be fair, I’m not shocked that the prices line up, as having just one or two foils can cause your competitive deck to be called out for warped foils, but the Showcase nonfoils are an upgrade that’s inexpensive and less worrisome.
James and I talked about this card on the most recent MTG Fast Finance, and there’s two cases to be made for this card. First, it’s the only wrath effect that survives Standard rotation next October. We might get more of such effects, but I like this as a spec for just that reason. James pointed out that what we might get in Theros is an influx of playable Giants, which turns this card into an uneven effect. We already have Bonecrusher Giant, it wouldn’t take too many more Giants for me to be all over such an unfair deck.
Even better, it’s a mythic that can be had for a dollar. Yes, there’s a lot of copies out there, but buying for a dollar means that when you buylist them for $4 each in store credit, you just turned $25 into $100.
Bonecrusher Giant //Stomp ($2.50/$3/$4/$7)
As you can see, I’m on board with the ‘Giant deck is good!’ line of thinking. Really, this is an amazing card, as point removal and a very aggressively costed creature. Remember, it’s a 4/3 for 3 mana and its ability is to punish your opponent for spending a spell on it! For those stats, I’d expect a ‘can’t block’ or other drawback.
Murderous Rider // Swift End ($6/$7.50/$8/$15)
Removal is good. This is very good removal with wonderful upside. I’ve written about this before but would have felt silly leaving it out of this list. I especially like the foil Showcase versions for long-term growth, but the play I’m making is trading for every regular nonfoil I can find.
Gilded Goose ($6/$8/$14/$38)
The little goose that could is making waves in most formats. There’s a lot to be said in the older formats for a one-mana creature that comes with a free artifact. Paradoxical Outcome decks that use Urza for mana really love this too, as does a few other strategies. Really, we should have seen this coming.
The price ramp is real on this, too. I think that the play is in the Showcase nonfoil, but we’re in a Standard that has no other mana accelerant on turn 1. If you’ve ever has the feeling of putting down your three-drop while your opponent simply played a tapped shockland on their first turn, you know the joy of being super far ahead.
The really lovely thing about Goose as a spec is that no one plays less than four. Or they shouldn’t, at least. So when someone needs to pick these up, they will pick them up four at a time, making this a much more in-demand card when the deck shines. Get your regulars for Standard and fancier ones for long-term holds.
Robber of the Rich ($2.50/$5/$6/$25)
If you’re thinking that it’s a big jump from $6 to $30, you’d be right. TCG has about 15 copies under $25, but 30 more above that, so the price is a bit of a moving target. If you get to play one extra card off of this, it seems amazing, being that it’s likely gotten in for 4-6 points of damage. I’d love to see this in Burn mirrors, but that’s me being greedy.
Rankle, Master of Pranks ($8/$11/$17/$50)
Rankle’s big draw is as a top-end finisher in Pioneer’s version of Mono-Black. That deck lost out on Smuggler’s Copter but has kept on being very very good, and Rankle is a backbreaker as a top-end threat. There’s a few Standard decks that want to play the hasty Faerie, but the main draw is currently in the nonrotating format.
Fabled Passage ($17/$24/$37/$98)
Fabled Passage is the fourth-most popular land in Standard. It’s ahead of Plains, Mountain, and every shockland. Decks generally aren’t playing the full four, but it’s in all of them for at least 2 copies. It’s also the only fetchland that’s Pioneer-legal, and that’s accounting for a big part of this price.
I want to reiterate that this is the price when the card is at max supply. There’s a lot of room for it to grow, and if you play Standard at all, I strongly urge you to get your playset now, rather than waiting till it’s $25 or $30 for the nonfoil regular. Remember, this has TWO YEARS to get popular in Standard and it’s already popular in Pioneer.
Cliff (@WordOfCommander) has been writing for MTGPrice since 2013, and is an eager Commander player, Draft enthusiast, and Cube fanatic. A high school science teacher by day, he’s also the official substitute teacher of the MTG Fast Finance podcast. If you’re ever at a GP and you see a giant flashing ‘CUBE DRAFT’ sign, go over, say hi, and be ready to draft.
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