The main set of Final Fantasy is out and being bought and sold fast. I’m not trying to keep up with much from that, nor am I interested in thinking about Standard until after the bans come on the 30th. The Pro Tour Top 8 being 4 Izzet Cutter and 4 Mono-Red, with Cutter being a huge metagame chunk, means that some bans are inevitable here.

What I’m thinking about is this: 

This Fallout version of Mystic Monastery, and the Dr. Who version, are both at $5+ in surge foil, and they are excellent examples of a phenomenon where the surge foils (or in the case of Modern Horizons 3, ripple foils) from the Collector versions of the Commander decks are the most expensive version of a card, or notably expensive.

Let’s get into the four decks, the cards they have, and which ones are most likely to gain some value.

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Final Fantasy has four Collector decks, and they are themed in terms of art, mechanics, and even which Final Fantasy game they are influenced by, and each of the decks has all new art, even for the reprints. Let’s look at some of the cards that are new, and some that are reprints, but worth getting right now as people crack the decks and sell the singles. 

All of these are surge foil picks. There’s going to be waves of the regular decks out there, and if they pop up at Costco the way LOTR decks did, I will absolutely pick those up for cheap, but the plan right now is to focus on the surge foils as people are cracking decks for singles. 

We’ve got to talk about the special conditions around this set. In case you didn’t know, there’s a lot of serious Final Fantasy collectors out there, and these folks have really come out in support of the cards/art that depict their favorite characters or scenes. Examples include the FFX’s Farewell or Protection Magic, Tifa’s Lightning Greaves, and basically anything with Cloud, like Arcane Signet 0333, Dispatch, or Clever Concealment. 

Also keep in mind that these cards come out of decks currently going on TCGPlayer for $170-$250. That’s a big bite, to open up a set like this and sell off the singles. A lot of these decks either won’t get opened as collectibles, or they will get opened by people who want the cards for their own deck. We’ve got a glut on the market right now, but that won’t last long. 

This list is also focused only on the reprints. I’ll talk about the new cards soon, but this list will be long enough. 

The Dominaria Common lands (Geothermal Bog, Idyllic Beachfront, etc): The only other foils are from DMU, and these are sweet. They get more play in Commander decks than you’d think. I don’t think these will get wildly expensive, but if you buy a dozen at under $1 and buylist them for $3, that’s easy money. 

Arcane Sanctum ($1.50) – Important art and only one other foil to compete with, it’ll hit $5 before the end of the year. 

Arcane Signet (0334) ($7) – The 0333 version is over $20, but that’s showing Cloud with the Buster Sword, and frankly, that is some iconic stuff. Anything with Cloud or Sephiroth gets more attention from collectors, and don’t forget we still have one more FF7 game coming on PS5. This version is Tidus’s medallion (his dad’s tattoo) and is also relevant to the collectability. 

Archmage Emeritus ($8) – There’s no other alternate art version, and while it doesn’t have main character art, it’s got big demand for the card. 

Bane of Progress ($7) – The Commander Collection: Green foil is $16, and this is a nicer foiling. I won’t be shocked when this is the most expensive version of the card in six months. 

Bonder’s Enclave ($1.50) – It’s in 151k decks online, there’s no other special version and the chocobo art is not to be underestimated. 

Command Tower 0485 and 0486 – These are super underpriced for their art and setting, and should easily break $10 before too long. 

Cultivate ($6) – There’s other special versions, but discount Aerith at your own risk. 

Inspiring Call ($3) – The other surge foils of this card are all at least double, and this has Tidus and Yuna being adorable together. 

Jungle Shrine ($2) – The only other surge foil is from Fallout, and it’s $12. This only has flavor text from Aerith, but again, we’re gaining some serious value by getting in at a buck plus shipping.

Mask of Memory ($2) – Another iconic moment in the FF7 games, we’re getting in at half the price of the 40K surge foil. 

Mind Stone ($4) – Some versions of this card are over $10, and they are far less pretty than this is. I think this is supposed to be Celes, but it doesn’t matter. Magic cards don’t have a lot of gorgeous art like this.

Morbid Opportunist ($3) – Commander staple, good art, awesome foiling, price is far too low. 

Nomad Outpost ($2) – Feeling the theme here? Surge foil lands will get expensive. 

Path of Ancestry ($2) – I like Red XIII being on the cliff here, but I also love a special version of a card in 130,000 decks on EDHREC getting a special version so cheap. Dr. Who’s version is at $4, Fallout at $10.

Path to Exile ($9) – Another mega-staple, we can see that the Fallout version is now over $20 and that one doesn’t even have Tidus on it.

Protection Magic (Extended Art Foil) ($4) – The Surge Foil regular frame is $10 and this is the same art. When the sweet shiny version is so much higher, I’d rather take a flier on the same art and different finish. 

Pull From Tomorrow ($2) – The whole father/son thing with Jecht and Tidus is going to move some prices on mediocre cards like this. 

Rise of the Dark Realms ($10) – We definitely don’t get enough group photos, and this is art I’d love to have on a playmat. 

Seaside Citadel ($2) – Yes, all four of them are on the list of things you should stock up on. 

Skullclamp ($20) – If you think the sealed Commander deck can reach $400 (and I do) then this will be one of the surprisingly $40+ cards in the deck. Cool moment, cool art, Sephiroth connection. 

Slayers’ Stronghold ($2) – This is in a lot more decks that you think, and aside from the SL version that’s all in black, one of the only special versions out there. 

Sublime Epiphany ($8) – One of the themes we’ve learned in the past year or two is ‘don’t ever underestimate the waifu cards’ and this should be one of those examples. 

Swiftfoot Boots ($9) – Pretty shoes are also not to be underestimated.

Tireless Tracker ($3) – Almost every card with both Tidus and Yuna on it is already pricey, but this isn’t and I want to get a few copies while they are cheap.

Final Fantasy is out this weekend, and that’s the start of a wild time in Magic finance. We’ve never seen prices like this for the premium products, on top of the markup Wizards was already frontloading in. 

Given the influence of outside collectors, I don’t feel great about recommending cards right now. If you want some of the really chase stuff, I still think you should wait a week or two before moving in. 

What I do want to talk about is a phenomenon I’ve noticed when it comes to Secret Lairs. I’ve been looking over some recent lairs that sold out and didn’t, and there’s a trend that may or may not change how I approach my budget for such Lairs. 

Come with me and explore the idea of Dump Week.

The core idea here is that when a drop sells out, there is a large group of people who want to get their profit margin out as fast as possible, so they can re-invest in the next drop or whatever else they are going to do. Sometimes, they are selling the sealed drop for something like $45 or $50, but that’s barely enough to cover the taxes, fees, and shipping. 

The singles, however, represent a very different opportunity. Let’s start with a relatively recent example: Counterspell from the Spongebob Internet Sensation drop.

Like most cards that are released, the initial pre-order prices are crazy high, and then as the number of copies in circulation grows, people (both vendors and individuals) get their cards in hand and sell the extras. Which is good, as it looks like people were getting about $13 per foil copy. Within a month, that was up to $20 a copy, and it’s crept upwards a bit more since then, into the $23-$25 range. 

This is one data point, but it’s got me thinking: If I know which lairs sold out, that means I can know when Dump Week is going to be. And if I know that, I should be able to get in very cheap on the most desired singles. 

And as an add-on to that hypothesis, that I might be able to explore in the future: Should I focus the money I was spending on sealed Lairs on the most in-demand singles during Dump Week instead? For a lot of Lairs, the value is clearly there if I can get them at cost, but even if I miss out on a Lair, can I make good money on singles too?

Before I can have an answer, though, we need to do some research on other examples. I’m going to work chronologically backwards, looking at the Lairs that sold out (mostly) to see where we are at on this idea.

One of the cards that got me thinking on this path is the raised foil Underworld Breach, from the Vroooooom! Lair that didn’t, and still hasn’t, sold out. I put the Breach as a card to watch this week on MTG Fast Finance, because even though it’s banned basically everywhere, it’s a low-supply $40 card that will cost $100 to get the Lair which contains it. Seems like a decent formula for a card to be a hold for about a year till it hits $75. 

The graph hasn’t started to rise yet, but there’s other factors to consider. It’s a new price point and foiling type, it hasn’t sold out, and there isn’t a lot of demand for it. I don’t think it’s a good indicator of the factors I want to look at, but it’s a data point I want to be aware of, in case my supposition is wrong. 

Another card I’ve picked recently is Deadpool’s Deadly Rollick:

This stings a little, because I picked it at $17 and it’s gone to $15 since. I still believe in the card, though. We can see Dump Week happening right away, as the price falls like a rock, then starts to rebound, and then it careens up and down some. If this wasn’t quite so recent, then we may have had a chance to see a smoother overall graph. 

Gary the Snail as Toxrill is exactly what I’m looking for here. Immediate dive, recovered quickly, has trended down a little since that big recovery but still on point for the pattern I’d like to find. This is all from people upgrading their current Commander to the cartoon art, though, and that’s not a huge growth market. 

Swan Song in Rainbow Foil, though, is a fantastic example of what I want to find. Dumped hard the first week down to $24 or so, and up about $10 in the four months since, with no sign of slowing down. This was a Lair that didn’t sell out immediately in English foil, too, but the quantity dumped that first week was great enough to push the price down nicely. If I can pick out the cards most likely to drop and then recover, this should work out very profitably.

Flawless Maneuver is the right set of conditions, but the graph isn’t as, well, flawless. The first week, it took a dive, but fell a bit further still. I can’t believe I didn’t ever pick this card when it was a $7 foil. Still, it demonstrates the concept that even if I missed out on the Marvel drop, as lots of people did, I could have made great money by picking up $7 foils. 

Not every Marvel card has this growth pattern, but we’re not expecting that. We’re looking for the ones that got really cheap as the market got flooded, and then they rebounded. This is going to happen faster with staples, and slower for cards with lesser adoption rates. Another great example, Wolverine’s version of The Ozolith: 

It went straight down to $25 the first week as people sought to list theirs and sell immediately, but it’s been pure growth since then. Not all the cards have shown this pattern, or this amount of growth, but I think the concept is sound.

So with that in mind, let’s look at a couple of examples in the Summer Superdrop that have sold out, and as a result, there’s one big wave of inventory to land. We’re looking for staples, preferably without special versions, and we’re looking to get in cheap. We don’t know how cheap these will be, as they haven’t all arrived yet. I think there’s a couple of cards that meet the criteria, but only time will tell if I’m right.

Since these are all from the summer superdrop, they don’t have a big chunk put online yet, but they should in the next couple of weeks. My price predictions are pure speculation, so while I’m planning on buying these cheap, I’m fully willing to admit that the actual buy price might be quite different.

I think that as the most popular card in this drop, and a gorgeous piece of art in its own right, this version of Zulaport should get there. It helps that there’s another SL version already, but that’s from 2020, a different era of Secret Lair. Hopefully this gets below $10 in foil, we’ll see.

The cheapest nonfoils of Rift in RVR were about $37 last year, and they are pushing $45 now. The original copies can be had at NM for under $35, indicating people like the new art. The Final Fantasy version should be one that people are looking to dump quickly and extract fast profit, so I’m hoping for nonfoils to go near $25 and foils for $40. If these don’t get cheap, I’ll have to evaluate again.

Toxic Deluge gets a lot of play, and there’s already a borderless foil going for $32. It doesn’t have the hype that Final Fantasy has, and while this doesn’t have a super popular character on the art (Kefka is an iconic villain, that 8-bit laugh haunted my dreams) I am counting on the number of people who play the card to help this recover and get expensive. 

Cliff (@WordOfCommander at Twitter and BlueSky) 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 co-host 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.

On Monday, we’re getting the Summer Superdrop for 2025, and it’s got six groups of cards. Three of those drops are Final Fantasy cards, and I covered all of those just a couple weeks ago. 

We need to go over the other drops hitting on June 9, as well as an additional drop coming on June 16. This feels like a lot of Secret Lair because it is, and while I didn’t buy any of the Pencil Superdrop, I’m already planning on a big spend for Final Fantasy, and adding to that with some of these other drops too.

So let’s look at what’s in here, what it compares to, and why the additional drop is really worth watching. 

For these drops, I want to look at the EDHREC data and the other premium offerings, to get a sense of what’s already there and how much demand is present. As ever, EDHREC is a useful dataset but it isn’t the only one. An enormous number of people don’t post their lists to the site, and so we can’t look at this data and think that’s the whole story. It’s helpful, but it’s not something all-knowing.

Artist Series: Phil Foglio

Card	Current EDHREC #	Other Premium Versions
Goblin Bombardment	185,000 decks	Monty Python SLD ($16 nonfoil, $17 foil) Enchanting Tales ($3/$5)
Orcish Lumberjack	24,000	None, no foil ever.
Constant Mists	40,000	None, no foil ever
Song of the Dryads	63,000	Etched Foil $8

On the one hand, we’re really mining the reprint equity here. Aside from the Bombardment, these are four cards that have never gotten a premium treatment, and in two cases, barely any reprints at all. On the other, these are regular-frame cards from an iconic artist. I’ve ranted before about how much I want for artist series drops to be able to really showcase the art, and Foglio’s art isn’t given that chance to really shine.

What really stings is that this drop comes along in the same release as two other artists who can use the whole card frame, and this is also coming out at the same time as the Final Fantasy Through the Ages subset, which has no frame at all, just floating text. This happened recently with Jesper Ejsing too, and these artists deserve better. Break the frame!

As for the value, Lumberjack is not really a relevant card for almost all decks, Bombardment has multiple cooler versions, and Constant Mists is a card that will have a table itching for your blood. Song of the Dryads is a worthwhile way to shut down a commander, but really, this is a very middling lair and if you really want something from it, the singles should be your target in about two weeks.

Featuring: Imiri Sakabashira

Card	Current EDHREC #	Other Premium Versions
Consecrated Sphinx	142,000 (Game Changer)	Etched Foil $44 Invocation $200 Borderless Foil $45 SLD Rainbow Foil $42
Resculpt	135,000	None
Mirage Mirror	90,000	None
Scion of Draco	30,000	Borderless Foil $20 Retro Frame Foil $6

This is an awesomely abstract drop, with cards worth the interest. I had no idea Resculpt was so popular in decks, but cheap, flexible removal comes at a cost. Mirage Mirror surprised me too, and this is a fun way to add another premium Scion of Draco out there. (I’m getting close to taking it out of my Ur-Dragon deck, I must admit.)

And as much as I like this art, I have to say that the singles are likely your best bet here too. Consecrated Sphinx’s Brain Dead version is over $40 now, but when the drop first got into peoples’ hands, it was available under $15. I like these cards, and am likely to spec on them, but I don’t feel a burning need to buy this as a sealed set. 

The Art of Frank Frazetta: The Second Exhibition

Card	Current EDHREC #	Other Premium Versions
Deadly Dispute	350,000	WPN Retro Frame $1 FIC ??
Murderous Rider	69,000	Showcase Foil $1.50
Zulaport Cutthroat	284,000	TSR Retro Foil $47 2020 SLD Foil $27
Aggravated Assault	111,000	Confetti WOT $67 Invocation $45 40K SLD Foil $25
Desperate Ritual	70,000	None, pack foils $10-$15

First of all, my apologies to the artist, whose name I have repeatedly misstated as Franzetta instead of the proper Frazetta.

This is a fantastic drop on all counts. We know from the last Frazetta drop that the art is popular, and the borderless look with this art is just amazing. There’s also no duds in this set of cards, because while I don’t think that many people play Desperate Ritual in Commander, we’ve got plenty of folks who play four copies in Storm-style decks and that will soak up a lot of demand.

The Rider deserves lots of play, and Dispute/Cutthroat have earned their numbers. This drop is something I’ll be getting the max of foils for.

So on top of my plans for Final Fantasy purchases, I’ll be adding the max of the Frazetta foils to my purchases. The rest can wait for singles. 

Once you’re done spending that money, you’ll get another chance a week later. Magic has teamed up with the National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures (NALAC) for a charity-driven drop that will be print-to-demand. You’ll have one month to make your purchases, from June 16 to July 13. Best of all, the price is $30 nonfoil/$40 foil, and this is unusual for the charity drops. Let’s talk about the cards: 

Secret Lair Presents: Nuestra Magia

Card	Current EDHREC #	Other Premium Versions
Tireless Provisioner	311,000	none
Sylvan Library	294,000	DMR Retro Foil $30 DMR Borderless Foil $65
Ancient Greenwarden	118,000	Pack FEA $19
Expressive Iteration	92,000	SPG foil $20 SLD Showdown foil $10
Xenagos, God of Revels	76,000 (plus 6k as commander)	SLD Constellation Foil $30
Lightning Greaves	1,521,000	MB2 foil $40 SLD Rainbow Foil $8 SPG Foil $22 SLD Galaxy Foil $40 PIP Surge foil $25 2XM Borderless Foil $21
Sol Ring	5,123,000 (lol)	Too damn many to count

The only fly in this ointment is that Iteration is banned in Pioneer and Legacy, otherwise, this is another banger of a drop. The least-included card here is Xenagos, a card that’s tough to get rid of and makes everyone at the table very hesitant to make a move, because you don’t know when something huge and hasty is going to show up and bash away. 

The Sol Ring deserves mention here as something that will get expensive, the art is just too good and it doesn’t matter that there’s already two dozen great pieces of art for that card. (I didn’t count, there’s just too much.) Sylvan Library is full-scale cheating in Commander, letting you do everything you want for only two mana, and the prices on that alone make this drop have a floor of breaking even, in both foil and nonfoil. I also adore the chancla being removed, because if you know, you know.

I also really appreciate that this is available in your choice of languages for the text. As I’ve aged into being a Magic boomer, I want to be able to read my cards. This drop strikes a great balance between the cultures and the languages. 

This is available for a month, so there’s no hurry. Your wallet has a chance to recover a little from Final Fantasy expenditures, and there’s a good chance you can buy the singles while the Lair is still on the site, too. I plan on buying several copies of this lair, in foil and non, plus some singles once supply maxes out. 

Cliff (@WordOfCommander at Twitter and BlueSky) 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 co-host 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.