Rotation happens as of today, and as we say goodbye (finally) to Streets of New Capenna, Kamigawa, Neon Dynasty, and two Innistrad blocks, I want to take a moment and figure out what lessons the calendar can teach us. Rotation is going to happen every year, and we can’t say for sure what the exact date is, since Wizards likes to mess with release schedules and dates.
However, what we can do is look at heavily played Standard cards, and see when (or even if) their impending rotation caused people to sell on a card. This will impact what we do in the early part of 2025, as we look ahead to the next rotation.
When I say that the schedule changes, I mean it. Innistrad: Midnight Hunt was released on 9/24/2021, Dominaria United on 9/9/2022, Wilds of Eldraine on 9/8/2023, and now Bloomburrow on 8/2/2024. Those release days influence when rotation happens, and that’s a two-month window. I’ll be looking for a timeframe of ‘X months before rotation’ instead of February 28.
Another complicating factor here is that a card’s Standard use is not the only factor in its price. Commander drives most of the sales these days, but the other Constructed formats using a card will also affect its price and can make that card resistant to rotation dips. (See: Sheoldred, the Apocalypse) So when we’re looking at price trends, we want to find cards that aren’t seeing much use in other formats.
An example of unhelpful data is Xander’s Lounge:
This is an extremely good card, but because it’s all over the place in Commander, rotation is barely affecting the price. I would be surprised to find this price dropping, and considering its inclusion rate in Commander decks, I’d buy it up if the price were going down.
Most lands aren’t good indicators for the effect of rotation, because they are either on their first printing and getting wide use (triomes, the MID/VOW slowlands) or because they have been printed more than once and their price can’t move without major, major things happening (painlands).
Our first bellwether card is Wedding Announcement.
Wedding Announcement is not used in any other Constructed format, and it’s only listed in 19k Commander decks online. Which makes sense, this is a card that gives you one token a turn and then it’s an anthem. Commander can do better.
The high price for this card was at the beginning of the year, when it was close to $20. Now there’s hundreds of sub-$5 copies on TCGPlayer and plenty available close to $3 as people try to get what they can for the card. We’re looking at about six months for the card, and that’s a good starting point. It’s important to be early on this card: at the beginning of summer it was around $5.50, and that’s clearly too late.
Our second example is Topiary Stomper:
More than 74,000 decks have listed this card, which is more than I’d prefer for something like this but that’s still a mere 4% of decks that have been put online since it was released. Stomper has had some good times, most recently as part of assorted Domain strategies. Its drop is not just about the switch from the Domain deck to the Aftermath Analyst decks, there’s still plenty of Domain going around.
We see a similar price trajectory here, with the card being cheap most of its time in Standard, spiking at the first of the year, and trending down after that.
For the last example, let’s look at more of a format staple, something that saw play in a range of archetypes, The Wandering Emperor:
TWE is only in 18k Commander decks, and while she’s a player in some Pioneer decks, that hasn’t kept her price high. This graph shows only the last year, and her early price was above $40, trended down a little, then bumped back up to $30ish before reaching her current spot just above $10. There’s been times where she wasn’t as popular, but her price during her time in Standard never got below $15 until just recently. That is exactly the sort of trend I’m looking for.
As for what to buy now, I’m leaning away from singles from these four sets. Singles don’t appeal to me as much as the easy money of recent Secret Lair purchases, and it’s all too easy for me to see cards either languishing or getting reprinted.
I’m hesitant to spend money on things from the two Innistrad sets, because the Double Feature printing just put more copies out there. As an example,.Shipwreck Marsh has copies as cheap as $3 but there are enormous walls of the card on TCGPlayer. That might eventually pay off, but the quantities are too high and I’d avoid them as specs.
Many staples have already had reprints, such as Farewell, but I think the Legendary Lands from Neon Dynasty are strong contenders to start ticking upwards for a while, now that they are no longer Standard legal. They are too expensive for one Secret Lair set by themselves, that would be something like $60+ of cards even in nonfoil. There’s going to need to be a bonus set, or some reskinning, to get these reprinted. I like their growth potential, but the reprint is 100% coming.
Still, it’s good to know that there are cards that can be sold profitably when rotation hits, so we can plan for that around the beginning of the year with cards from DMU, BRO, ONE, MOM and Aftermath.
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.