All posts by Cliff Daigle

I am a father, teacher, cuber and EDH fanatic. My joy is in Casual and Limited formats, though I dip a toe into Constructed when I find something fun to play. I play less than I want to and more than my schedule should really allow. I can easily be reached on Twitter @WordOfCommander. Try out my Busted Uncommons cube at http://www.cubetutor.com/viewcube/76330
Casual Fridays

Are We Buying the Secret Scare Superdrop?

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We’ve got a big drop happening a week from Monday, on the 13th, and there’s a lot to unpack. Ten drops, a range of prices, and an interesting choice of promos to reward us for every $200 spent. 

This is on top of the seven-drop bonanza coming to us two weeks later, and if you are trying to decide which drops here and new to get, don’t worry, I’ve got you covered. So let’s review the cards, the usage patterns, and decide what to buy.

For each card, I’ve listed the EDHREC inclusion rate (a reminder, EDHREC is not perfect data, but it’s all we’ve got) and the relevant special versions of the cards. I’m focusing on borderless things, because new art in the same frame doesn’t always move the needle, but a lot of these are getting their second Secret Lair treatment. 

Unless otherwise noted, these drops are all $30 for the nonfoil and $40 for the rainbow foil. 

Artist Series: Kieran Yanner 

Armageddon: (29k decks, Invocation $70)

Northern Paladin (837 decks!, no special version)

Lord of the Pit (5100 decks, no special version)

Demonic Tutor (708k decks, Game Changer, CMM borderless foil $120, STX JPN Alt Foil $300, Box Topper $90)

Frankly, this is one of the best values I’ve ever seen in a Secret Lair. The cheapest nonfoils are $45+, and you can get one here for $30. The art is stunning, worthy of being hung on the wall, and let me send a big thank you to everyone at WotC who decided to give artists a borderless frame and more to work with in the Artist Series lairs. The other three cards are gorgeous, but clearly the focus here is the Tutor. Buying this is a given and should be plenty profitable. I am also quite likely to get in on a few extra copies in Dump Week.

Secret Lair x Jaws: Terror of Amity Island

Jaws, Relentless Predator (n/a)

Descent into Avernus (115k, FEA $10) 

Reckless Endeavor (32k decks, no special version)

Sneak Attack (78k decks, 2XM Borderless foil $11, WOE Confetti foil $60)

Abrade (394k decks, INR Borderless Foil $2, FDN Borderless Foil $1.50, SLD Borderless foil $19)

Blood Token

This drop has the bonus pricing of $40 nonfoil/$50 rainbow foil, and that makes it a big iffy for me. I like the cards, I think Jaws is a neat commander to build around, especially because any player can trigger the ability, but none of these stand out as mega-value cards. I’d rather pick up the singles when people are dumping these early on. 

Secret Lair x The Office: Dwight’s Destiny 

Heliod, Sun-Crowned (102k decks plus 4200 as Commander, Constellation Foil $24, SLD Borderless Foil $21)

Steelshaper’s Gift (92k decks, CMM Borderless foil $10, SLD foil $12)

Swords to Plowshares (2 million decks, a million special arts)

Baral, Chief of Compliance (86k decks, plus 4100 as Commander, serialized $300, SLD foil $6, SLD foil $14)

Garruk Relentless (4500 decks, no special arts)

Reaper King (4000 decks plus 6500 as Commander, no special arts)

The cards here add up decently, but this is an odd choice, given that The Office ended twelve years ago and its peak was several years earlier. Should be an okay drop, but I don’t think the meme-ness of this will increase value like Princess Bride or Monty Python have done. Worth noting that if they preview some more Scarecrows in Lorwyn Eclipsed, I’ll likely buy a lot of very cheap Reaper Kings.

Dreaming Darkly 

Glen Elendra Archmage (75k decks, SLD foil $65)

Guardian Project (263k decks, RVR Borderless foil $54)

Roon of the Hidden Realm (2400 as card, plus 3100 as Commander, no special arts)

Soulherder (70k decks, no special arts)

Real hard to argue with a premium version of Guardian Project, plus the Archmage and the Herder. Roon is pretty weak as blinkers go, needing an extra turn, more mana, etc, but the Project is carrying the load here and should appreciate nicely. 

Secret Lair x Iron Maiden: Album Art 

Lethal Scheme (65k decks, PIP FEA $4)

Grave Titan (81k decks, PIP foil $11, SLD foil $15)

Animate Dead (322k, no special frames)

Temporal Trespass (39k decks, ACR FEA $4)

Unearth (112k, 2X2 Borderless Foil $1.50)

Lignify (54k, no special arts)

Once again, I must climb upon my soapbox and cry out for all the Zombie enthusiasts: Why isn’t Grave Titan a Zombie Giant?? There’s a decent amount of value here, and I appreciate that this is at the $30/$40 price point. This looks to be a slow gainer, although the Animate Dead is badass and popular. 

Secret Lair x Iron Maiden: Eddie Unchained 

Bruvac the Grandiloquent (45k decks, plus 6300 as Commander, RVR Borderless foil $47)

Windfall (421k decks, SLD foil $13)

Captain N’gathrod (12k decks, plus 14k as Commander, CLB FEA $70)

Nekusar, the Mindrazer (7600 decks, plus 14k as Commander, SLD $50)

Iron Maiden (9000 decks, no special version) – $9

Mindcrank (110k decks, no special version) – $11

I had no idea that the Captain was so popular, but this is a cool theme to build around. We’re getting sweet versions of cards that are already expensive, and that makes this a very good lair to buy. Mindcrank might end up as the best value here, and it’s also possible that the Iron Maiden’s special art carries it a lot further than we might expect. 

Trick or Treat 

Vito, Thorn of the Dusk Rose (185k decks, FEA $22)

Satoru Umezawa (20k as card, plus 12k as Commander, Borderless foil $3)

Voja, Jaws of the Conclave (3,000 decks, plus 18,000 as Commander, no special version)

Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver (30k decks, plus 20k as Commander, SLD Retro $95)

Liberator, Urza’s Battlethopter (89k, plus 2k as Commander, FEA $5)

Wilhelt and Vito are known and very good, plus we get a premium Voja, who wasn’t in the main set. Satoru already has a pretty amazing borderless to use, and Liberator is useful, but those first three legends should start at good prices and start trending upwards.

Secret Lair x Furby: Doo-ay Noo-lah

Distant Melody (153k, SLD $10)

Explore (300k, LTC foil $3)

Inspiring Call (263k decks, surge foil PIP $18)

Chromatic Lantern (611k, FIC foil $25, RVR Borderless $19)

Sol Ring (all of them, too many)

Secret Lair x Furby: The Gathering 

Sphere of Safety (143k, SLD foil $18)

Miscast (55k decks, no special versions)

Phyrexian Arena (553k decks, FDN Mana Foil $38, ONE FEA $3)

Tormenting Voice (75k decks, no special arts)

Tamiyo’s Safekeeping (193k, no special arts) 

Secret Lair x Furby: The OddBodies 

Hullbreaker Horror (263k, PIP Surge $44, DBL foil $60, INR Borderless $9)

Maddening Cacophony (70k decks, FEA $8)

Serum Visions (131k, SLD foils $2.50 each)

Umbris, Fear Manifest (5k as card, 7k as Commander, no special art)

Spellskite (115k, no special frame)

For these three lairs, we’re looking at $30/$40 like usual but there’s also some $60 confetti foils, which are probably the same treatment that the Enchanted Tales subset had back in Wilds of Eldraine. It’s a fun treatment, especially on cards like these, but there are still lots of confetti foils that are inexpensive. That subset also had anime art, which Magic players tend to love. I’m not sold on confetti alone being a reason to buy in.

The Sol Ring is the first one that jumps out at me, as there’s no shortage of this card at $30+, which is where I’d expect the super-cute, confetti-foiled version to land. We don’t tend to see the Rings grow in price over time, but the big unknown is the supply level. How many confetti foil versions did they make for this, is it half the number of rainbow foils? Or are they near to the same number, as what seemed to happen with the raised foils they sold for $99 not too long ago?

The rest of these cards, the art/cuteness/anti-cuteness is going to have to do a lot of heavy lifting if the price is to grow. The demand level isn’t there to make these skyrocket. One card that I’ll be eager to get cheap copies of is the Safekeeping, a card which is $3 as a nonfoil uncommon but one of the most popular ways to keep your stuff safe. That 193,000 number isn’t even inflated by being in a precon or some such; it’s just pure efficiency. 

Finally, there’s a Cryptic Command as a promo, you get one for every $200 you spend. I don’t have high expectations for this card, considering what the other promos have done and the competition from other special versions, including a gorgeous textless MPR from way back in the day. 

Given that Secret Lairs are now highly targeted by the bot networks and others trying to make the same sort of returns which Final Fantasy gave us, I expect this lair to sell out quickly, as the Spider-Man drops did. I’m not convinced of the long-term value, though, given that these are mostly mediocre cards. The Sonic Lairs are excellent examples, as aside from the drop with the Sol Ring, none of those have shot up in value. There’s a lot of buyers who are able to get at MSRP and want to resell immediately, as they can’t afford to hold products in stock. That’s how you get Lairs reselling at $35+$15 shipping, a model which gives very low profit but the turnover is constant. 

For this drop, I’m targeting two sealed drops: the Artist Series: Kieran Yanner and Iron Maiden: Eddie Unchained. Those are clearly the best value on the board, and given the velocity of releases, if you wanted to skip this drop and wait for Dump Week, it’s a defensible position. There’s only a couple of drops here screaming with value, and the rest is dependent on nostalgia, art, and those who need to collect everything. 

I can’t overlook the world in which confetti sells out fast, then FOMO kicks in, and everything else sells out relatively quickly too. The prices on the cards will then zoom way out of the realm of how good the cards are, which may end up happening for the Spider-Man drop. Those prices are high, but within expectations for the time right before Dump Week.

For this superdrop, I’m planning on looking for these cards to hit lows, in foil and nonfoil: Guardian Project, Tamiyo’s Safekeeping, Wilhelt, and of course the Tutor and most of Eddie Unchained. Not sure how low they’ll go, but those are the ones I’ll want.

If you want to discuss the things I’m buying and not buying, please feel free to stop by the ProTrader Discord and let’s discuss!

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 an event and you see a giant flashing ‘CUBE DRAFT’ sign, go over, say hi, and be ready to draft.

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Modern Potential At The Pro Tour

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Today, the Pro Tour starts, Edge of Eternities Draft and then Modern Constructed. I love Modern as a format, because it showcases old cards, fun interactions, and people who have favorite decks trying to go the distance. 

The Modern metagame is pretty healthy, considering that there’s no single best deck at the moment (subject to change if a deck rocks the PT) so people all have their preferred plans. It’s a race, maybe there’s interaction and maybe there isn’t, but people have what they like to do and they are good at it. 

So let’s go over the main decks and a little bit of the outliers, with an eye on what’s the best buy if one of the decks looks unstoppable. I’m going over the known decks, if something shows up out of nowhere then I advise you to hang on tight. 

For each of the decks, I’ve identified cards I think are good buys. The already-expensive cards might go to crazy expensive, but mostly I’m looking for things that are a little cheap and a lot of potential.

It’s also worth mentioning that as tournament cards, we have two big differences from most Commander-based specs. First, people buy these in fours, because you need a playset and preferably a matching set at that. Second, tournament players don’t always want the most fancy version. There’s a big chunk of tournament players who like nonfoils, to avoid warping and being called out for marked cards.

Esper Goryo’s 

Atraxa, Grand Unifier – Griselbrand might be the more powerful thing to reanimate, but Atraxa is a lifepoint swing AND a reload of cards in hand. There’s also a very spicy target in the FCA nonfoils and the step-and compleat foils. Both are good and this is one of the many cards that people would want by the playset.

Goryo’s Vengeance – As the namesake card, this does it all, and even comes in a sweet movie poster frame if you’re really feeling frisky. There’s other versions, but this one is both unique and very reasonably priced. 

Psychic Frog – The borderless is pretty pricey, so I’d be looking at the regular nonfoils. This has enough use in Legacy and Exile decks that I feel okay about picking up a couple of playsets. 

Tameshi Belcher 

Lotus Bloom – The only major reprint of this is the Time Spiral remastered one. There’s a retro foil version that’s the only special version, and that’s the one most likely to bump if the deck performs. 

Tameshi, Reality Architect – There’s a neon borderless version that I’d be after, because this is a great combo card in Commander as well. 

MDFC lands – Several of these lands are over $5, and if this deck takes off, then basically all of these lands are on the agenda. They were ‘only’ uncommons but it’s been more than a year and we can already see what Sink into Stupor’s price has done. I wish I could pinpoint better than this, but the 3 life lands seem to be a bit more prevalent here, both rares and nonrares.

Boros Energy

Guide of Souls – This had fallen down some since the recent bans but it’s back up in price. The card is still very very good and should the deck perform, this will go higher, though it’s a rare and not mythic. 

Phelia, Exuberant Shepherd – Phelia is amazing in just about any deck that can flicker its own things for value, but don’t overlook how good it is to just banish a blocker. The synergies are very strong in this deck and Orzhov Blink, so this might see copies go off this weekend. 

Voice of Victory – The regular nonfoils have doubled up since June, and this card has a long time to be good in both Modern and Standard. I can easily visualize matches on camera where interaction is just sitting in hand because of this.

Eldrazi Tron

Ugin, Eye of the Storms – Used to be that you got your seven mana, and then you had to activate Karn to get rid of something. Now you get to 7, you get an exile on cast, and if it resolves, you either get a card back or you add more colorless and cast a second thing, wiping out a second permanent. If Ugin has a good weekend, the sky is the limit.

Kozilek’s Command – I know this has been called out in articles and MTG Fast Finance, but it just gets better and better. No other deck wants this, yet it remains a powerful and flexible card in these decks. 

Sire of Seven Deaths – Foundations gave us a lot of ridiculous cards, but this one will cost your opponent seven life almost no matter what, and some good camera time could end up goosing this price pretty high.

Esper Blink

Ephemerate – I like the new Spider-Man secret lair version of this most, but when you’re maxing value on the first cast and the rebound, people pay attention. 

Emperor of Bones – Resetting the counters on this allows you to bring back cards, and this deck excels at maximizing the triggers involved. Look for some sick sequences on camera. 

Witch Enchanter – Quietly one of the most expensive MDFCs, if it keeps doing well, this could be a huge gainer. 

Other Decks

Pinnacle Emissary – Assorted Affinity decks are going off with this, using the warp cost of a single mana plus cheap artifacts to build some ridiculous turns. A good showing could have this taking off. 

Shifting Woodland – A backup piece in multiple combo decks, plus an incredible utility land in Commander, this has all the signs of breaking out. 

Phlage, Titan of Fire’s Fury – Another Boros card that survived the bans, look for this to do a lot of work this weekend, with likely price gains to match. 

Doorkeeper Thrull – A surprising number of decks have trouble with this card, and sometimes all you need is a turn or two. 

Blade of the Bloodchief – The Broodscale combo can end a game out of nowhere, and since this has had no reprints of note, there’s a lot of room for grown if the combo performs this weekend.

Allosaurus Rider – Neoform decks are trying to cheat this in and then sacrifice it for value, and as one of the core unfair cards, it might have a very profitable weekend. 

Consign to Memory – One of the top sideboard cards across the format, this has been climbing higher and higher since its release. Clearly it needs a reprint, but it hasn’t happened yet.

Wrath of the Skies – a pet card of mine, if you can turn one Tune the Narrative and turn two Wrath of the Skies, you can clean up lots and lots of problems. Matchup-dependent, yes, but very powerful.

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 an event and you see a giant flashing ‘CUBE DRAFT’ sign, go over, say hi, and be ready to draft.

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Choosing Which Final Fantasy Commander Foils Are Worth The Price

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I know all the hype and attention is on the Spider-Man set, especially as it premiers on Arena this week as Through the Omenpaths, but we can’t lose sight of the other things Wizards has put out from Final Fantasy. A little while ago I talked about the best FCA buys, and this week I want to focus on some of the Commander cards, the FIC set.

So let’s get into the cards, where you can get the different shiny versions, and what’s worth buying. 

There’s actually two different shiny versions of these cards that you can get, and it’s important to know both the difference in price and where the cards come from. 

Surge foils come from the Commander decks themselves. These have the regular frame, but the Surge treatment so they are awesomely shiny. However, there are also Extended-Art versions. Collector Boosters can give you one nonfoil EA from the set of 93 cards, but the foils can only be found in the sample packs. 

Additionally, the legendary creatures from those 93 cards can also be pulled in FEA from inserts in the bundles and gift bundles. Let’s not go thinking there’s a lot of them, though. There are 69 very nice legends in the FIC set in extended art, and the inserts contain two of those in foil. So to get one of these legendary creatures in FEA, you’ll need to open roughly 35 bundles or gift bundles.

The Collector Booster Sample Packs aren’t sold as their own product, so Wizards doesn’t have to release the drop rates. We do know that they *only* contain EA cards and also the eight borderless commanders of the four decks. The foil rate for those seems to be pretty low, though, which we can infer from the quantities available on card sites and the relative prices.

With no direct data, we can look at the prices of the different cards. For the eight cards I’m focusing on today, the legends are all more expensive in FEA than in Surge, and vice versa for the regular cards. I suspect that collectors are at work, wanting the FEA versions of legends from our favorite games, but I can’t confirm that at all. 

It also needs to be said that I’m pretty high on the FIC cards long-term, both because they are good and on-theme and because the Final Fantasy cards attract completionist gamers. These won’t see reprints for a long time, if ever. Plus the special versions can only be gotten from expensive Collector Commander decks or these special 2-card packs. We’re at max supply here. 

Aerith, Last Ancient – Surge is $9, FEA is $13 – If you’ve never had the displeasure of playing against a Meren deck, let me assure you, a commander with ‘return a creature from yard to hand’ per turn is pretty damn good. Meren’s ability is better than Aerith’s, but Aerith’s got so much good stuff to build around (ahem, lifelink, etb) that even if she weren’t a top-tier character, she’d have a long-term future. 

Cid, Freeflier Pilot – Surge is $6, FEA is $11 – Really, Cid should be higher on all EDHREC lists, considering that he allows you to replay the equipment and vehicles that get destroyed. And we all know FF7 Cid is the best Cid anyway.

O’aka, Traveling Merchant – Surge is $2, FEA is $5 – Tom Bombadil is currently the default commander if you want to build five-color Sagas, and that deck wants all the ways to remove counters at instant speed. That’s because the way the triggers are worded, you can put the last chapter ability on the stack, and then remove a counter to keep the Saga but get the last effect on the card. It’s a lot of value, and as a bonus, you’ll get to draw a card for getting that value! You’ll demonstrate this once, and then the table will always blast poor old O’aka.

Gogo, Mysterious Mime – Surge is $13, FEA is $20 – I am a big big fan of ways to get extra copies of my commander onto the field, and Gogo is one of the best, since it gains haste as well. So if your Commander has to attack for a sweet effect, but there’s no good attacks, send in the Mime! This is one of the priciest legends on this list, and because of this ability, one of the most fun to break. 

Protection Magic – Surge is $3, FEA is $2 – Now we’re getting into cards where the Collector deck version in Surge foil is the pricier card, and to start, we have a card with both Yuna and Tidus, something fans of FFX love. It also helps that this is a very cheap way to both save your creatures and start the ball rolling with proliferate and counters-moving tomfoolery, so get your copies cheap while you can. 

Summoning Materia – Surge is $2, FEA is $1.50 – While there’s not a lot of call for pure value engines like this, I can’t deny that it’s one of the best. It is certainly a card that demands an answer, given the stream of cards that could be produced off of the top of the library. Normally people just kill the creature and move on, but since you can re-equip, there’s value here. As a comparison point, the FEA version of The Reality Chip is over $12.

Espers to Magicite – Surge is $3, FEA is $1.50 – This is a card I want to put in a lot more decks, because it’s such a unique and incredible effect. Commander players put in a boatload of creatures with activated abilities and static abilities or even just good ETBs, and this allows you to nuke everyone *else’s* graveyard while getting some amount of value for yourself. It’s pretty easy to imagine you getting your four mana back with the token you create.

Yuna’s Decision – Surge is $4, FEA is $2 – I played through FFX as an impressionable younger person, and let me tell you, Yuna and Tidus have a great story to tell. I can’t even *look* at their Farewell without getting misty-eyed. Yuna’s Decision is all about the art and the collectors, though. Cards showing the relationship between the characters, and especially this tender moment in Lake Macalania, sell better than the actual power of the card. This is a pretty weak card, as a Magic game piece. The art, and who/what it shows, makes it worth having in a premium version. 

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 an event and you see a giant flashing ‘CUBE DRAFT’ sign, go over, say hi, and be ready to draft.

Casual Fridays

Should You Buy The Spider-Man Secret Lair Drop?

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There’s a Secret Lair drop arriving on the 22nd of September, and it features our friendly neighborhood Spider-Man!

As a Marvel character, and one of the biggest, there’s a range of stuff happening with this drop. Let’s go over the cards, the usage, and where the value is currency sitting for this drop.

For each card, I’m listing the EDHREC usage and the value of any premium versions of the card. That’s the most useful comparison, even if the old premium isn’t exactly as cool. Just a reminder about EDHREC: Their data is super helpful but it is by no means the one and only truth. Tons and tons of casual players don’t use the site, and there’s a bias towards preconstructed decks as people do variations on ‘precon with upgrades’ so some of the staples have staggering inclusion rates. 

Secret Lair x Marvel’s Spider-Man: Daily Bugle Breaking News

1x Fact or Fiction ($5 SLD foil, 171k decks)

1x Frantic Search ($21 SLD foil, $1 CMM Borderless Foil, 453k decks)

1x Scheming Symmetry ($16 SLD foil, 61k decks)

1x Blasphemous Act ($31 SLD foil, $5 SLD foil, 1.12 million decks) – 37 printings!

1x Impact Tremors ($16 SLD, $2 WOT foil, 339k decks)

First of all, I both love and loathe this frame. I love big bold card names, and this is so thematic it hurts, but it also looks like it’s got the same issue as the Creepshow SLD: If you make a frame with wrinkles and frayed edges (comic book, newspaper, etc.) then the cards always look like they are LP or worse. Aside from that, this is everything you want in a Lair: high inclusion rates, this looks different than the other premium versions, and the floor of $5 for some of these cards makes the others look pretty good.  

One thing you’re going to notice as a theme: All of these have more than one SLD printing already, and this is the third time around for Blasphemous Act. I picked the Deadpool version on MTG Fast Finance not too long ago, so my stack of those will take a bit longer to mature. That’s the usual pattern for repeat SLDs, and something to keep in mind with all of the new SLD versions. Older ones won’t lose value, but there will be slower growth in the future.

Secret Lair x Marvel’s Spider-Man: Heroic Deeds

1x Ephemerate ($30 JPN STA foil, 181k decks)

1x Three Visits ($42 SLD foil, 770k decks)

1x Lightning Greaves (INV foil $215, SLD foil $37, 2XM foil $19, SLD foil $16, LCC foil $22, SLD foil $6, 1.7 million decks)

1x Sol Ring (too damn many, all of them)

1x Command Tower (too damn many, all of them)

The Ephemerate and the Three Visits are doing a lot of work here. Three Visits especially is an outlier, as it’s the iconic, often-imitated Knights Who Say “Ni!” from the Monty Python SLD. If it wasn’t a collectible from that particular IP, I think it’d be cheaper, but that is the only special version until now.

Greaves, Sol Ring, and Tower have lots and lots of versions. Sol Ring has 111 printings, according to Scryfall, with 30 of those being $10 or more. Command Tower has 97 separate printings listed, but only 15 are $10+. Still, the Ephemerate and Three Visits are going to do the best here, and I’ll definitely be targeting those cards at Dump Week. 

Secret Lair x Marvel’s Spider-Man: Mana Symbiote

2x Plains, 2x Island, 2x Swamp, 2x Mountain, 2x Forest

These lands are reminiscent of the oil-slick lands from All Will Be One, and those range from $5 to $12 for the Swamp. Here, you’re paying $60 and getting ten lands, for a solid entry of $6 each. Supply on this will be constrained, and I expect the red and black ones to be the most popular. These look amazing, and I am hoping to pick up a nice stack during Dump Week but gives the higher price of this drop it’s possible that no one ever prices these cheaply. 

Secret Lair x Marvel’s Spider-Man: Venom Unleashed (Colors)

Secret Lair x Marvel’s Spider-Man: Venom Unleashed (Inks)

1x Damnation (MP2 foil $120, Textless foil $40, SPG foil $40, 240k decks)

1x Dark Ritual (SLD foil $140, MP2 foil $110, STA JPN foil $50, FCA foil $45, 808k decks)

1x Peer into the Abyss (FEA $16, 90k decks)

1x Surgical Extraction (2X2 borderless foil $8, OTP foil $2, 3700 decks)

1x Tendrils of Agony (STA JPN foil $4, 18k decks)

The ink version of a comic page is a true tradition in the collecting of comics, and this is an awesome set of art to showcase the difference. If you’re the type who likes to frame and display cards in a set, then putting these cards next to each other will look phenomenal. Damnation clearly is the big one here, but Dark Ritual is another one I’ll be on the lookout for cheap copies. 

Secret Lair x Marvel’s Spider-Man: Villainous Plots

1x Deadly Dispute (FCA foil $2, SLD foil $4, SLD foil $6, 409k decks)

1x Go for the Throat (PCBB foil $5, 233k decks)

1x Lightning Greaves (INV foil $215, SLD foil $37, 2XM foil $19, SLD foil $16, LCC foil $22, SLD foil $6, 1.7 million decks)

1x Sol Ring (too damn many, all of them)

1x Command Tower (too damn many, all of them)

I’m lower on this drop than I am with the Heroic Deeds version, as Dispute and Throat aren’t very pricey and as I said, these staples will hold a few bucks but are unlikely to become very expensive. Nothing wrong with $5 foils, but I’d be a lot happier if those three $5 foils came with a $15 and a $20 in my $40 set of cards. 

Overall, even with sweet art, this is a drop I’d be likely to avoid on the day of if this were six months ago. There’s nothing mechanically unique, there’s only one card in all of this that hasn’t had a premium printing before. Good, but not great. Thankfully these are all at the $30/$40 price instead of the $40/$50, with the exception of the $60 for 10 lands.

However, we’re in a different era and a very different IP. Spider-Man is one of the most recognized figures on the planet, and the comic collecting crowd is going to be wild for this. The hype is high, and I fully expect the Secret Lair site to be extremely busy, if not outright crashed, as happened with the Marvel release last November.

As such, I think these are all pretty safe buys if you can get in at MSRP. I have a strong preference for the Heroic Deeds set, as I said, but these should all do well. If the site crashes or you can’t stare at the little walking figure all morning, don’t fret. I suspect a lot of these will have very good prices when Dump Week arrives and people flood the market as is the usual pattern.

We haven’t been told about the bonus cards, or special add-ons like a Seedborn Muse or an Arcane Signet, and if there’s extra collectibles around, that just means more value. 

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 an event and you see a giant flashing ‘CUBE DRAFT’ sign, go over, say hi, and be ready to draft.