By: Travis Allen

Welcome to part one of a two part series. These two articles are going to explain exactly how Magic Online’s trading system is foundationally flawed because it ignores the very economic nature of Magic cards. The progress will be as follows: In the first article, we will learn what a commodity is in terms of the marketplace and then we will see how Magic cards behave as commodities. In part two we will see how MTGO fails to treat Magic cards as such, and finally examine a possible solution. We hope that a breakdown of the issue and a presentation of a potential solution will encourage Wizards to make similar changes in future versions of Magic Online.

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When your car needs gas, how do you decide where to fill it up? Do you have a specific gas station you go out of your way to visit because their gas smells like flowers, or because it’s organic, or it fits into your gluten-free lifestyle? Or instead do you just pull up to the nearest pump that takes credit cards whenever the light on your dashboard turns on? If you’re like most Americans, you have little or no allegiance to a particular location or brand of gas station. The right gas for you is whichever happens to be closest. Why is it that you don’t bother to make a point to use one particular location, especially when we live in such a brand-oriented culture? It’s because when you pull the handle on that eighty-eight octane pump you know that the dead dinosaur gushing into your car’s hungry coffer is the same there as it would be from any other of the eighty-eight octane pumps in America.

Have you ever shopped for art? Unless you know the specific piece you want it can be time consuming, intimidating, and expensive. Let’s say you decide that a wall in your apartment is looking rather bare. You’re not sure what you want, just that you’d like to hang a piece of art there. If you live in a metropolitan area and/or you’re wealthy you may hit up the local galleries to see what’s available for purchase locally. Most internet denizens such as you and I won’t have the funds to purchase originals like that though, so we hit up Google and plug in “art.” Lo and behold we find ourselves at art.com. “Alright,” you think, “time to buy me a sweet piece of wall candy.” As you begin scanning the page you realize this could be a big project. The splash page is separated into categories – landscape, abstract, vintage, photographs, etc. You’re not even sure what type of art you want. An abstract series of cubes and circles? A photograph of a stunning waterfall? An artist’s rendition of the Grand Canyon? A replica of a famous painting? A horse? Mapplethorpe? Regardless of what you’re searching for, one thing is for sure: you’re going to be browsing a lot of photos before you find something you’re happy with. There’s no way to get around it; you simply have to view hundreds or thousands (or if you’re me, tens of thousands) of images before you can be content with your decision. 

This consumer-oriented perspective on the dichotomy of gasoline and artwork illustrates just how different purchases on opposite ends of the commodity spectrum behave. On the one hand a good like gasoline is, for all intents and purposes, identical from one vendor to the next. The gas you pump into your car at the Sonoco in Maine is basically the same as the gas you get from the BP down in Louisiana as it is the same as the gas at the…whatever gas station chains exist in California. On the flip side of that, artwork is wildly different in character from one piece to the next. If I take your 2’x2’ photograph worth roughly $300 and replace it with a different 2’x2’ photograph worth roughly $300, you would be really annoyed. They may have similar physical dimensions and market demand, but it’s the content of the image that you care about.

Let’s step back a little bit for a better view of the bigger picture. Common parlance is that a commodity is a good or service which is interchangeable with another good or service of the same sort. (In other words, a commodity has a high level of fungibility.) An ounce of copper is basically the same as any other ounce of copper, as far as the market is concerned. As long as that ounce of copper falls within a certain set of specifications, it doesn’t really matter who I get it from. I am only interested in the price, because the copper itself will not be much different from vendor to vendor. As Marx once said, “From the taste of wheat it is not possible to tell who produced it, a Russian serf, a French peasant or an English capitalist.” There are many basic commodities. A few examples (that I’m stealing from Wikipedia): iron ore, crude oil, coal, salt, sugar, tea, coffee beans, soybeans, aluminum, copper, rice, wheat, gold, silver, palladium, and platinum.

Some of those examples may strike you as a little odd. Gold comes in different purities, so not all gold is equal, right? And you know for a fact that there are more types of coffee than is humanly possible to count at this point. Why are those commodities?

Instead of thinking of things in black and white – commodity or not commodity – think of it as a scale. On the one end, you have your goods like crude oil. On the other end is original paintings. In between are various levels of ‘commodification.’ The less differing factors between one product of the type to the next, the more of a commodity it is. For instance, laptops have a low commodity value. Due to the customizable nature of the internal hardware, such as the amount of RAM or cpu speed, there are untold variations that exist even within a single brand. When considering purchasing a laptop, there is far more to consider than the price.

Moving up the commodity scale a bit we would find iPhones. These are more of a commodity for a few reasons. For one thing, there is only one brand. Within that brand there are various epochs – iPhone 3, 3g, 3gs, 4, 4s, 5, 6, etc. Then within each of those is differentiation between color, storage space, and possibly cellular network. Once you settle on one though – perhaps a Verizon-enabled black 32gb iPhone 6 – they are identical to each other. It doesn’t matter whether I buy the Verizon-enabled black 32gb iPhone 6 from Best Buy or the Apple store, I’m getting the exact same thing. Once you’ve settled on a specific model, it becomes a question of who will sell it to you cheapest. In fact, because instances across a model number have no differentiation at all, Apple has to impose price floor restrictions on them so that competition between vendors doesn’t drive the price into the dirt.

The nature of commodities is such that the markets in which they are sold is a bit different than your common markets. As you move up the scale towards a greater level of commodification, the ability to differentiate your product from another becomes more and more difficult. When you reach a point that the only real difference between your product and a competitor’s product is the price, you end up in a commodity market. 

In a commodity market, all buyers and sellers come to the same place. It begins with an agreement of standards. A consensus is reached on the quality of each good, for example the purity of gold in a bullion. Once everyone in the market knows that everything they buy and sell will meet a certain threshold of quality, it becomes a question of price. Sellers advertise how much they’re selling their gold for and buyers can advertise how much they will pay for gold. Anyone can come to market and immediately see how much a gold bullion will cost, and how much they can immediately get for their own gold. Commodity markets typically find a price equilibrium very quickly since all data is publicly available and there’s a high volume of trades.

Now we understand commodities a bit better. The more interchangeable a product is with a replacement for it, the more of a commodity it is. How does this apply to Magic cards?

Anyone who is reading this is extraordinarily aware that Magic cards are not interchangeable. Prices on unique cards vary from “firewood” to “down payment on a house.” You don’t want to walk into a store and say “I’ll take one pound of Magic cards please.” Yet each named Magic card is nearly fully fungible with another of the same name. This NM non-foil M10 Lightning Bolt is the same as any other NM non-foil M10 Lightning Bolt. The names of Magic cards are sort of like model numbers. They uniquely differentiate one card from another, but cards with the same model number are identical, controlling for condition, set, and the foil characteristic. (You can think of the difference between a non-foil and a foil of the same card as the difference between a 32gb iPhone 6 and a 64gb iPhone 6.) Magic cards are unique across names, but individual instances of a specific name are nearly 100% commodities.

Chances are you’ve actually seen and used a pseudo-commodity market for Magic cards, although you may not have been aware of it. TCGP acts as an aggregator for many vendors selling the same cards. Plug in Savage Knuckleblade and you’ve immediately got a large list of everyone selling their Knuckleblades, with the cheapest price listed first. If you’re a buyer, this is pretty darn close to a commodity market. What’s missing is the typical “buying” list, where you can see all the prices people will give you for your copy. That service is available here at MTGPrice of course. All the buying/selling doesn’t happen under one roof though, so it’s not really a full-fledged commodity market.

The reason TCGP has been so successful in it’s market niche is because they were the first intelligent way to buy Magic cards. Why should I have to go to websites for Troll and Toad, SCG, and ABU to look at prices for the same card? They’re all selling the same damn thing. Having to visit individual retail spaces for the same product is time-consuming and inefficient as a consumer. I’m likely to not end up with the cheapest possible price on the card. Meanwhile, the vendors are not only competing on the price they can offer you the card for, but also how good they are at marketing to consumers. SCG is obviously the best at this, and the result is that they charge more money for the exact same product because they know people will come buy from them simply because theirs is the only storefront some players are aware of. Meanwhile ABU and other vendors are offering the cards for less money but are selling less copies than SCG because consumers are unaware of their options. On a whole, the Magic market was quite inefficient before TCGP popped up. It’s better now, but it still isn’t perfect. Paper Magic isn’t really likely to reach true efficiency either, at least not in the next few years. There is too much vested interest from SCG and the like to move to a true commodity market system.

Magic cards want a true commodity market. While paper Magic has moved in that direction over the last few years, I doubt we’ll ever truly get there. Without a unified location for market agents to buy and sell cards, consumers will always need to visit individual storefronts. The companies behind those storefronts will always want that, because once you’re at their storefront they can attempt to sell you extra things, expose you more to their brand, attract you to their events, etc etc.

In order for a market to fully embrace a commodity there really needs to be some central hub where the buying and selling occurs. That doesn’t exist in paper Magic, and is unlikely too.

You know where it does exist though? Magic Online.

Join me next week as we take a look at how Magic Online has failed to treat cards as a commodity and how it might look if they did.

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By: Travis Allen

Khans of Tarkir is nearly upon us. Players from every format can’t wait to start cracking packs due to the long-awaited return of the Onslaught Fetchlands. The return of the fetches, along with the curious nature of the block, the change to the Standard rotation model, and the official arrival of wedges has sent people into a tizzy. It’s that lovely time of year when every card is bursting with potential and brewers are salivating uncontrollably.

The pricing for this set, like most fall sets before it, will have its own little wrinkles. The major factor in thinking about card prices for Khans is the fetches. Demand for these is going to extend across virtually every single format. Vintage, Legacy, Modern, Standard, Cube, and EDH players alike are going to want copies. With such a massive amount of demand they will easily be the most expensive rares. When five rares are hogging the lion’s share of the box value it’s going to suppress the price of the entire rest of the box. Rares that would have been $10+ in another set will be $4-$6 instead. Mythics will still be worth the most, but their ceilings will be lower than they would have been otherwise.

Of course card prices are still limited by the value of a box. As soon as cracking packs gets more valuable than selling boxes sealed, vendors will immediately start doing so. A natural balance is reached and demand is satiated while prices stabilize. This means we won’t be seeing any $30 Polluted Deltas, but it does mean we’re going to see a lot of the non-fetch rares in circulation. Oh, did I also mention this is going to be the most opened set in history? It will be. Theros was similarly the most opened at its launch, and hype for Khans is higher what with the fetches in the set. Because of this, it may appear that a lot of my prices are on the low side. I prefer to err on the side of prudence anyways, but it is especially wise in light of this set’s dynamics. In fact, take a look at Theros prices right now.

There are a whopping three non-land rares over $3. These prices should rise a bit between now and Christmas, so while a few more may break into the $5+ range I doubt it will be more than a small handful. Also notice that all five rare lands are sub-$4. Imagine what the set breakdown looks like when you jack those five up into the $8-$15 range. All the rest of the cards, mythics included, get noticeably cheaper.

I bring all of this up to make a point that nearly all of these cards will drop from their current values, and they will drop hard. I discuss prices for many of these rares that would be over $2-$3, but only two or three from all that I discuss will manage that. The rest will drop firmly into bulk.

One last thing before I jump into the review. It’s important to remember when reading any set review that we are forced to evaluate cards in a pseudo-vacuum, but they never exist as such. When I look at Brimaz, King of Oreskos I have to consider the card individually, free of whatever the metagame looks like that particular month. Brimaz’s text box isn’t going to change, but the cards other people are playing will. I need to focus on what concrete information I have available to me. Because of this, set reviews are especially challenging. I have to look at Brimaz and make an evaluation based strictly on the words printed on the card, but his true worth will be dependent on the cards around him, a pool that will change significantly over time. Cards that are excellent right now may have been trash in an alternate timeline. It would be easy to construct a Standard environment where Desecration Demon is crap (such as he was in INN-RTR when Lingering Souls was legal,) or where Prime Speaker Zegana is a chase mythic. Even the hallowed Jace, the Mind Sculptor was nigh unplayable at release since there wasn’t a single other playable blue card in the format and Bloodbraid Elf + Blightning threatened to shut him down as soon as he resolved.

The point I’m making is that when considering this review, and all other reviews, it’s important to be good Bayesians and recognize that while a powerful card should be good, and a weaker situational card should be bad, the constraints of the format around them, complete unknowns to the hapless reviewer, will be the true determining factor in identifying whether a card is a bulk mythic or a $20 rare.

If you just want to know what to expect from the lands, click here.

White

Bulk:
Herald of Anafenza
High Sentinels of Arashin
Master of Pearls

 

End Hostilities
1 Month: $2-$4
Fate Reforged: $2-$3

With the departure of Supreme Verdict, the cheapest unconditional sweeper we are left with is End Hostilities at five mana. (I believe there has only been one other brief period where there was no four-mana sweeper.) Even given that history it isn’t terribly surprising Wizards finally tossed it, as morph really wants the format to slow down a bit so it has time to shine.

End Hostilities will certainly be played, but only in Standard. While Verdict was exciting because of applications in Modern and Legacy, Hostilities has none of that appeal. Supreme Verdict hung around $3-$6 for most of its lifespan. End Hostilities should be a tad lower; probably in the $2-$4 range for the most part. People will play it and there will be demand, but they will do so because they have to, not because they want to.

 

Wingmate Roc
1 Month: $4-$6
Fate Reforged: $3-$5

Imagine for a minute that instead of mythic this was printed at rare. Would you even give it a second look? If I told you this was an intro deck rare, would you believe me? I’m thinking it’s likely.

Perhaps I don’t “get” Roc. That’s entirely possible. It’s just that this feels rather underwhelming to me. Broodmate Dragon was good during his time, but as long as you tapped the mana you were getting eight flying power. Roc loses 25% of the damage and becomes conditional in exchange for easier mana and a small lifegain trigger. I’ve heard people compare Wingmate to Archangel of Thune. I don’t see them as being similar though. Archangel immediately put an end to racing. Attacking into it was so difficult because of the lifegain, and as soon as your opponent untapped with it their entire army was growing along with their life total.

That raid trigger isn’t just going to fire every time either. There are plenty of situations where you either will be unable to trigger it at all, or you’ll be chump-attacking to turn it on. In those situations you trade whatever for a ¾ flyer. Occasionally you’ll be happy to make that exchange, but not always. Finally, the lifegain is fairly minimal. If you only attack with your two Rocs you’re gaining a whopping two life. Sure you can alpha strike and gain maybe five or six, but aren’t you in great shape at that point anyways?

Archangel was pretty expensive. Archangel was also a major Standard threat, Modern playable, and an Angel. I don’t see Roc doing much at all in Standard, but I accept that I could be totally wrong on that. If we see it start putting up results then the price will certainly rise and you’ll have time to get in, but until then, I’d trade my copies away.

Blue

Bulk:
Dig Through Time
Icy Blast
Kheru Spellsnatcher

 

Clever Impersonator
1 Month: $7-$10
Fate Reforged: $5-$8

First things first, EDH is going to love this. If you have blue in your deck this is basically an auto-include. Impersonator is getting a good chunk of demand from there, especially the foils. Now how about sixty card formats? The last time a clone was playable was back in the M12 days when we had both Phantasmal Image and Phyrexian Metamorph. We also had something else at that time: Birthing Pod. Birthing Pod decks brought a giant pile of ETB creatures to the table that both Image and Metamorph were happy to copy, and Metamorph could even copy Pod as well. Image continued to see support in Modern and Legacy where it acts as another two-drop lord for fish. You’ll notice that no merfolk decks are running any other clones though.

Unless there’s a deck with a great deal of ETB effects, I don’t see Impersonator making huge waves in Standard. Yes, cloning your opponent’s Planeswalker is awesome, but it doesn’t actually solve the problem of your opponent having a Planeswalker. (Unless it’s Garruk.) They also got theirs down before you. When using a clone effect cloning your opponent’s creatures is usually plan B, so you’re really only playing this to clone your guys. Without a Pod deck, is it going to be good enough? Given that Siege Rhino is in Abzan, I’d guess not.

As I said, EDH demand will persist for Impersonator. There will also be people eager to try it out at FNM. As such, the price is likely to stay north of $4, but I doubt by too much. I’d expect a slow descent until next Spring.

 

Pearl Lake Ancient
1 Month: $2
Fate Reforged: $1-$3

Pearl Lake Ancient is a control finisher, and by definition, a one or two-of. Even Aetherling, the most obnoxious control finisher in years, spent his entire Standard tenure dwindling towards his current price of seventy cents. Pearl Lake will hang out at mythic bulk.

Black

Bulk:
Retribution of the Ancients

 

Bloodsoaked Champion
1 Month: $2-$4
Fate Reforged: $2-$5

Bloodsoaked Champion is a curious one. Normally it would be a pretty easy bulk rare. A few aggro black lists would run it, but generally it would be unlikely to have a large enough presence to warrant a real price tag. The equation this time around is changed by the Mardu hotness Butcher of the Horde, which we’ll discuss further down in the multicolor section. The hook here is that you can sac Champion to Butcher for haste or lifelink, swing with Butcher, then rebuy your champion for 1B. As a creature that can come down on turn one then become relevant with your curve-topper later, Champion has potential.

I don’t think he hits bulk anytime soon. His preorder price is in the $4-$5 range and cards don’t typically drop to bulk from there too quickly. There are two possible paths for Champion. The first is that there aren’t enough lists running him alongside Butcher, which means his price dwindles towards bulk further down the road. The second path is that he and Butcher become bestest buds, which should shore his price up in the $3-$5 range, depending on how good the lists end up being.

 

Empty the Pits
1 Month: $2-$4
Fate Reforged: $1-$4

When I read this at first I saw “XBBBB” and I figured it was a real card. Then I noticed it was XX instead. Oof.

What happens when you pay real mana for this? Six mana gets you a 2/2. Eight for four power. Ten for six. Twelve mana for eight power. Meanwhile, Wingmate Roc up there is getting you six power for half the cost, and it’s all in the air. Clearly we’re supposed to be paying for this with Delve. How reliable is delve going to be? On average I’d say you could probably expect to get one to three extra zombies around turn six. Let’s say that on turn six you can exile four cards. That means you’re paying six mana (one zombie) and exiling four cards (two more zombies) for a total of three zombies. At that point it’s a six-mana instant that says “put three 2/2 zombies into play tapped.” Limited all-star perhaps, but we’re playing constructed here.

As the game goes late this clearly gets much stronger, and with that mana cost later rather than sooner is going to be the game plan anyways.  On turn eight you could potentially threaten fix or six zombies at end of turn which will certainly win a game, but hardly feels format-breaking.

Even if you imagine this in a best-case scenario, how often do decks run more than two copies? Only the most devoted self-mill decks could conceivably run four. As with any delve card, each copy of Empty the Pits in your deck makes the rest of them worse. That doesn’t bode well for financial gains.

I have difficulty seeing Empty the Pits doing much to really shape the way the format plays. I don’t doubt it will see action, perhaps even consistently, in a few black lists. It’s just that the quantity used will be limited and the slot fillable by other late-game finishers if you prefer. As for casual demand, Army of the Damned seems like it would be better in 80% of situations, and that card is $1.80. I see Empty the Pits petering out over the next few months towards mythic bulk.

 

Grim Haruspex
1 Month: Bulk
Fate Reforged: Bulk – $2

I’m tossing this in here basically as a heads up that I think this card may be playable. The drawing condition is a bit restrictive, but with Bloodsoaked Champion and Butcher of the Horde you’re certainly setting up a machine to get paid. The unmorph cost is about as aggressive as it gets, and while a 3/2 for 3 isn’t winning any awards it isn’t shameful either. I don’t think this ever really breaks $3 but I wouldn’t hesitate to pick up a set now if you want to play a Bloodsoaked Champion/Butcher list.

 

Necropolis Fiend
1 Month: Bulk
Fate Reforged: Bulk – $2

Is this the next Desecration Demon? Maybe. A 6/6 body was pretty legit because it was bigger than nearly every other creature in the format. A 4/5 is nothing to shake a stick at, but he loses to Polukranos straight up. You also can’t just slam him on T4 and run away with the game. On the flip side he can come down on turn five or six for two or three mana while easily leaving removal up, and he’ll let you Avatar of Woe a relevant creature about once a game.

Perhaps Fiend is bulk for the next eighteen months. Perhaps he’s bulk until 5/5s for four mana rotate and suddenly he becomes way more playable. I’m honestly not sure. I know that I want him on our radar though.

Red

Bulk:
Crater’s Claws
Dragon-Style Twins
Howl of the Horde
Jeering Instigator

 

Ashcloud Phoenix
1 Month: $3-$4
Fate Reforged: $1-$3

I’ve been bullish on four-drop red mythics once or twice in the past few years and they haven’t panned out a single time. While Hellrider and Hero of Oxid ridge saw gigantic spikes in price in their day, we haven’t seen anything of that sort since Innistrad. Whether we just haven’t had the right card or the right format I’m not sure. What I do know is that Ashcloud Phoenix will not be that card.

A 4/1 flyer for four is about on par with what to expect out of red’s aggressive deck curve-topper so long as it has lots of other good text. Unfortunately, Ashcloud doesn’t. When it returns to the battlefield it’s as a morph that will be easily blocked or killed. If it hasn’t been unmorphed it will stay dead the second time. Meanwhile the unmorph cost is prohibitively expensive at six. Any deck reasonably interested in Ashcloud is not going to be getting excited about getting to six mana to be able to unmorph this. Even if you do, it’s trigger is good but not necessarily game-winning. The end result is that it’s a weak-ish creature whose condition for repetition is too difficult or costly to satisfy. We won’t be seeing this one’s prices rise from inevitable ashes.

 

Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker
1 Month: $15-$20
Fate Reforged: $12-$18

Chandra, Pyromaster was the best red Planeswalker ever when she first hit the scene last year. This year it appears Sarkhan is wresting that trophy away from her. The turn he comes down he has two choices: become a 4/4 flying indestructible haste dragon, or do four damage to something on the other side of the table. Given that he shares a mana cost with Stormbreath Dragon, his first ability is right on curve. Both Sarkhan and Stormbreath come down on five and attack for four in the air. If you’re not in the market to swing immediately, perhaps because you’re being pressured by an opposing creature, Sarkhan is capable of blowing that up instead of attacking. Four damage is a serious chunk of damage. It won’t kill Polukranos, but it will nail most other creatures, including your opponent’s Nissa’d land.

There are a few factors that are working against Sarkhan. One roadblock will be the glut at four and five in red and green. With so many options, it’s unlikely that people will be in the market for four Sarkhans. Off the top of my head you’ve got Polukranos, Xenagos, Nissa, and Stormbreath Dragon. I’m sure there are more that will be viable options as well. With so many cards all filling similar roles, most decks will want to vary their choices instead of going all-in on one or two. As for more casual formats I don’t’ see Sarkhan causing much of a stir. He’s bad in EDH, and while dragons tend to be quite popular, he doesn’t actually have “dragon” written on his typeline. The demand here should be mostly limited to Standard with perhaps some spilling over into Cube.

Overall I anticipate Sarkhan seeing moderate to heavy amounts of play. Assuming that some form of RG deck is in the top five of the format, and each one has two to three copies of Sarkhan, he should hang around north of $15 for awhile. While he is unlikely to be as pervasive as Elspeth, he should do well for himself. When Elspeth released along with Theros she was over $30. By the time January rolled around she was under $20. Even now she is only barely over $20. When Elspeth has trouble maintaining a price tag close to $25, it’s unlikely any could manage better.

Green

Bulk:
Meandering Towershell
Trail of Mystery

 

Hardened Scales
1 Month: Bulk – $1
Fate Reforged: Bulk

Ordinarily this would be unquestionable bulk but for two items. First, it’s aggressively costed. At any other mana cost I want nothing to do with this, but one is exactly where a card of this sort needs to be to have shot. The second is James’ entire article on the topic. While I’m not as much on board with the card as he is, I do see room for potential. This may pull a Parallel Lives while still in Standard, climbing to $2-$4, although Bayes tells us it’s unlikely. Rather it seems like it may be good to snag in as a throw-in once it hits real bulk because not only will it have the casual token demand at some point, it could also end up becoming part of some tier two strategies.

 

Hooded Hydra
1 Month: $2-$3
Fate Reforged: $1-$3

This is another one of those cards that I would have believed you if you told me it was rare. The fair cost on this card is unappealing, especially with Genesis Hydra and Hornet Queen running around. You can really only put this in your deck if your plan is to be unmorphing it. The cost to play it as a morph then flip it is a total of eight spread over two turns. That’s rather expensive. You end up getting paid on the back end when this finally dies with five 1/1s, but how much do we care? It’s obviously excellent insurance against End Hostilities. Beyond that I’m not sure how exciting this is in a color that also has Nissa at five.

Wizards keeps throwing these hydras at us and they have a real poor track record going so far. Polukranos is good, and Genesis Hydra is nifty, but take a look back at the other eight hydras currently in Standard and see how many others you remember. Mistcutter maybe? Here’s hoping they change “green’s creature.”

 

Rattleclaw Mystic
1 Month: $2-$4
Fate Reforged: $3-$7

As the Buy-a-Box promo for Khans, Rattleclaw deserves extra scrutiny. We’ve seen time and time again that BaB promos have a strong tendency to be Standard staples.

When Sylvan Caryatid was spoiled I was a bit bearish on it because it cost two mana and I like my dorks to cost one. I ended up coming around on Caryatid once it was clear that the 0/3 hexproof body was so powerful. Your opponent couldn’t kill him and he blocked 2-power creatures reliably.

Rattleclaw is two mana as well, but instead of dodging removal and blocking he dies to everything and can’t block a thing. The phrase “always bolt the bird” remains just as relevant today as it was some twenty years ago when it was coined, meaning that savvy opponents are not going to let this live if they have a choice.

What makes Rattleclaw unique is the morph ability. Playing Rattleclaw face-down on T3 means that on T4 you ramp to six mana. (Unmorph for 2 adding RUG with two lands left open, tap Rattleclaw for one.) This sets up a plethora of plays. You could run out double Savage Knuckleblade, Temur Ascendancy + Knuckleblade, a Scuttling Doom Engine, Sagu Mauler, the RUG Khan, or one of any multiple planeswalkers available to you. With Elvish Mystic on T1 this is all sped up a turn, which means six mana on T3. I think the last time we had six mana on T3 was Lotus Cobra, which Bant Mythic put to good use by attacking with a trampling 12/11 annihilator 2.

As a normal mana dork Rattleclaw is weak. With the shenanigans the morph ability promises, his outlook becomes much more promising. I anticipate we’ll see an immediate drop off following the release of the set. The price shouldn’t drop too low, and I’d expect growth by the time we hit Fate Reforged. For comparison, Sylvan Caryatid hung around the $5-$6 range until mid-to-late summer this year when it spiked to $10. It’s quite possible Rattleclaw follows a similar trajectory.

 

See the Unwritten
1 Month: $2-3
Fate Reforged: Bulk Mythic

In every format other than Standard Summoning Trap is preferable. As for Standard, there’s currently nothing in the format I really care about cheating into play at sorcery speed. Maybe if the Eldrazi show up later in the block this spikes, but unless that happens this is a bulk mythic.

Multicolor

Bulk:
Abzan Ascendancy
Ankle Shanker
Avalanche Tusker
Deflecting Blast
Duneblast
Crackling Doom
Flying Crane Technique
Ivorytusk Fortress (Intro Deck)
Jeskai Ascendancy
Kheru Lich Lord
Mardu Ascendancy
Mindswipe
Rakshasa Vizier
Sage of the Inward Eye
Temur Ascendancy
Trap Essence
Villainous Wealth

 

Anafenza, the Foremost
1 Month: $3-$5
Fate Reforged: $2-$4

We’ve got a three mana 4/4 in GW leaving the format right now which provides us a good idea of how much play Anafenza can manage. Loxodon Smiter got around in Standard for sure, although only being two colors instead of three is a huge boon. His counter clause is overall weaker than Anafenza’s two special abilities though. Her first ability will be decent, but won’t come up until at least turn five. If you cast her on turn three she won’t be able to put the counter on the creature you play turn four. That means you get your first +1/+1 counter a whole two turns later, assuming you even attack with your four-drop.

The more appealing text on here is the Rest in Peace, I believe. Keeping cards out of opponent’s graveyards is one of those things that doesn’t feel like it matters that much but surprises you with its utility in many situations. This is especially noticeable in Modern, when you realize just how much damage Leyline of the Void or Rest in Peace do to so many different opponents.

My concern with Anafenza is that CDE casting cost. Not only is she going to be tough to get down on turn three, it means only exactly decks playing those colors will want in. Compare that to a card like Loxodon Smiter which can be played in GW, Naya, or Bant.

Anafenza is a reasonably strong card that could see mild to moderate Standard play, and even possibly some Modern play alongside Doran. Unless she makes a big impact in that format though, I expect her price to remain fairly low. With Sarkhan and Sorin running around alongside all those fetches the other mythics are going to have a lot of work to do to keep their prices up.

 

Butcher of the Horde
1 Month: $3-$7
Fate Reforged: ???

Butcher of the Horde is looking to be the breakout card in the set. When I first saw it in the spoiler I shrugged my shoulders and kept scrolling. Apparently I was alone in this. Both Sam Black and BBD have spoken about how good the card seems to be in Standard. If it was just Sam Black I may not care too much since he’ll play anything with the word ‘sacrifice’ on it, but two players speaking about it’s strength is not something to handwave away. While I’m personally not wild about the card, I’ll respect the opinion of those that know better than me.

Apparently Butcher can and probably will be a real thing in Standard. His immediately floor should be $2 or $3 since so many people think he’s the real deal, and his ceiling will be in the $6-$8 range. It will be tough for him to pull a full-fledged Boros Reckoner and break $20 because of the fetches. He’s going to have to see a lot of play to even break $10; enough that you should see it coming before it happens.

In the short term I wouldn’t hesitate to pick up a set if it looks like a card you’d want to play. The worst case scenario is you lose two or three bucks a copy, but you’re also protecting against it doubling within two to three weeks. Watch tournament results, listen to what the good players have to say about him, and remember that we shouldn’t see him go full-on Reckoner but that double digits isn’t out of the question.

 

Mantis Rider
1 Month: Bulk – $2
Fate Reforged: Bulk – $2

I almost put this in the bulk section but it’s just slightly better than that. I really doubt that Mantis Rider can get there, but stranger things have happened I guess. Mantis Rider is pretty strictly a Standard card. I doubt anyone in Modern needs it, and even if they do the demand won’t be great enough to push the price much. I’m 98% this is a bulk card.

 

Narset, Enlightened Master
1 Month: $3-$5
Fate Reforged: $2-$4

Supposedly Narset had her cost bumped up from five to six in development because she was too good at five. I believe it. First strike is a great combat ability that makes blocking much more miserable than it would be otherwise. Hexproof has proven time and time again to be miserable to put up with. It forces interaction with the creature to occur on the battlefield, where her FS will shine. Her triggered ability is patently absurd. It has the potential to buy you up to four (!) free spells. We know most of the time that won’t happen, and that on average you’ll flip a little less than two lands each time. The spells also have to be non-creatures, but that seems easy to mitigate. Flipping Divinations, Banishing Lights, Lightning Strikes, or Planeswalkers for free can pay you for casting Narset even if you only get to attack once. Can you imagine flipping an Elspeth with Narset? Hooo boy.

Even though her triggered ability means business, there’s still some serious downsides. Not casting lands or creatures means you can’t just go hog wild with her. She’s on the slightly more expensive side of things, and is vulnerable to any number of sweepers. She’s also a CDE spell, meaning there won’t be many decks that can take advantage of her. There will be demand for Narset, but it won’t be intense. That demand should keep her slightly above bulk mythic, but not much higher. As a long term spec I think she’s got legs, because EDH and casual players will be a big fan. In the meantime though, I wouldn’t mind shipping her if you don’t plan on playing with her.

 

Rakshasa Deathdealer
1 Month: Bulk – $1
Fate Reforged: Bulk – $2

While I pegged Butcher of the Horde as the breakout card of the set, Rakshasa Deathdealer may be the sleeper of the set.

Those of you that were playing several years ago may remember a little zombie leech that was integral to the success of Standard Jund: Putrid Leech. The ability of that card to come down on turn two and start threatening four damage a turn was instrumental in Jund applying heavy pressure with nearly every permanent. Deathdealer is going to play a similar role, although with a slightly different feature set. One of the things that made Leech so powerful was that pumping it didn’t require mana. On turn two you could pay the two life to hit for four and still cast a Sprouting Thrinax. Deathdealer won’t give you quite the same option but the game will be similar. A common play with Deathdealer will be attacking into a Sylvan Caryatid. If they choose to block you can trade two mana to kill their Caryatid in a 0-for-1. If they don’t block, you simply skip paying the two and proceed to cast your spells on curve. Later in the game Deathdealer can remain a threatening attacker or blocker, play defense against giant Polukranosi, or an act as a wrath deterrent. That’s a lot of options for a two-drop that can hit for four on turn three.

I’d be more excited to buy into Deathdealer if this wasn’t the fall set of what will assuredly be the most widely-opened set in history. If he hits it big and becomes a staple in a tier one BG list I don’t think $3-$6 or more is out of the question, but it would have to be a solid tier one list akin to Mono-Black or Mono-Blue. If he only sees mild play he won’t be able to climb out of bulk status. Rakshasa Deathdealer has the chops to make it big, and while the format won’t necessarily shake out in such a way that he’s able to shine, it would be wise to pay close attention.

 

Sagu Mauler
1 Month: Bulk – $2
Fate Reforged: Bulk – $5

These are wide margins but bear with me a moment. Let’s talk about what Sagu Mauler does well. He’s got trample, which is one of the best combat keywords. He’s got hexproof, the most frustrating and possibly broken keyword since storm. He’s got morph, which means you get to cheat on his mana cost and sneak him into play underneath counterspells. (Morph is especially savage here, since you can blow people out if they try to kill him. Unmorph in response to Hero’s Downfall and it fizzles.) Mauler has a giant body, exactly the combat ability you want on a 6/6, and total immunity to removal. There’s definitely a lot of competition at the six-drop slot in the upcoming Standard but Mauler has a threatening body that demands the opponent interact with it on the board.

Is Sagu Mauler going to break out and become a defining card of the format? Unlikely. Things would have to shake very specifically for him to be a legitimate contender. Chances are best that he’ll hit bulk and stay there. However there is a possibility, admittedly rather slim, that he becomes a major component of Standard and his price reflects that. I wouldn’t expect him to break out, but I’ll be keeping an eye on him either way.

 

Savage Knuckleblade
1 Month: $3-$6
Fate Reforged: $1-$4

When Ravnica came out I was definitively Simic. When Khans was released, there was no question I was looking forward to the Temur cards. RUG is my probably my most-played color combination of constructed decks. I played RUG in Standard with Kiora and Xenagos for months and I play it in Modern with Scapeshift. I like the colors and it’s awesome that RUG is getting a card everyone thinks is great.

That said, I’m not entirely convinced Knuckleblade can cut it. Perhaps it’s because I’ve been burned so many times before. When was the last time a really playable Simic card was printed? Kiora is solid I guess. The guild was one of the worst in Ravnica block. Before that, the last time I remember UG being playable was the turboland deck back in Zendikar Standard, and even that was short-lived. I’m worried that if I get my hopes up for Knuckleblade and RUG to actually be a tier one strategy in Standard they’re just going to get dashed once more. After all, RUG is cut from playing the two best cards in the format; Thoughtseize and Elspeth. How good can it really be?

Knuckleblade is clearly pushed, and the power level is there. The question is whether there will be enough support in the format for the colors. The good news for Knuckleblade is that Courser and Caryatid are in the same wedge, and those are both going to be bonkers. The bad news is that you can go play Abzan and still get Caryatid and Courser, as well as all the best black and white spells. Or even just Sultai, where you trade the damage of red in for the firm removal and hand disruption of black. The silver lining here is that red happens to contain Goblin Rabblemaster, currently one of the top ten creatures in the format. It’s been a long, long time since a RUG deck played the red for a creature, but hey maybe it’s finally time.

I can be optimistic about Sagu Mauler because it’s so likely to be bulk. It’s a fun looking card and if it hits it big then great. With nobody else rooting for him I get to feel like I’m championing the underdog. I’m not deluding myself about his chances though. He’ll probably be trash. Knuckleblade is much more on the map right now, with SCG sold out at $6 and eBay sets finishing at about $4 a copy. People will try him for awhile, and the power level is present, so his price shouldn’t tank too hard too fast. My guess is that Knuckleblade, and RUG in general are just not going to have enough raw power to be competitive. If that happens Knuckleblade will be doomed to bulk, a powerful card a victim of his colors.

It’s entirely possible RUG ends up being excellent and Savage Knuckblade is at the center of the deck. In that situation he’s $4-$10+, depending on just how excellent he and the deck are. A more realist approach is that it’s been forever since RUG has been good in Standard and that history repeats itself. In that eventuality, Knuckleblade hits bulk – $2.

 

Sidsi, Brood Tyrant
1 Month: $3-$6
Fate Reforged: $3 or $10

BUG was possibly the best deck in Theros block so we know that Sidisi is coming in with a strong precedent. When he enters the battlefield you’re getting a creature more often than not, and if Sidisi is in your deck you’ll be playing cards that set up additional triggers. Sultai Ascendancy, a card already possibly playable, gives you another trigger. Cards like Satyr Wayfinder and Pharika help a good bit too. Maybe there’s a deck with Wayfinder, Caryatid, Courser, Ascendancy, Eidolon of Blossoms, and Sidisi? Nyx Weaver even? I don’t know but it sure sounds fun.

Sidisi is a solid card that will have cross-format appeal. This alone will keep the price in the $3-$4 range for awhile. If he doesn’t materialize in Standard I wouldn’t expect his price to move much from there. However if it turns out some sort of BUG mill deck is real he’ll jump to $10+. In that situation Pharikas will also be a great buy. See how things shake out and be ready to pounce of Sidsi comes out strong.

 

Siege Rhino
1 Month: $2-$4
Fate Reforged: $3-$6+

Siege Rhino is seriously strong. Four mana for a 4/5 is a reasonable rate to begin with. Trample is exactly what you want on fat creatures and that ETB trigger is fantastic. You immediately dome your opponent and pad your life total while putting a sizeable threat on the board that can attack through opposing Coursers. He even survives combat with Knuckleblade when your opponent is tapped down. The biggest challenge to Rhino that I can see from here is Polukranos. Polukranos will be cheaper to cast and is slightly bigger. Anyone that’s played with him is aware that it’s tough to attack through sometimes because of chump blocks, so maybe the trample and trigger push Rhino into the lead.

I don’t see Rhino cratering too hard unless it turns out Abzan is just junk (heh) in the new format. That seems unlikely to pass given it’s in the same colors as Courser, Thoughtseize and Elspeth. Rhino is on the short list to be one of the most expensive rares in the set. If early lists come out with three or four copies don’t hesitate to at least pick up your own playset. It will be tough to make actual cash flipping these since the preorder price is already $4+, but you can always trade for them aggressively if he’s looking to be a real contender.

 

Sorin, Solemn Visitor
1 Month: $9-$14
Fate Reforged: $11-$16

This may be the first time in a long while that a Planeswalker actually rises from his preorder price. SCG has copies in stock at $15 and eBay sets are finishing for about $10-$11 a card. This is surprising to me because Sorin is so solid.

First things first, he’s a four-drop four-loyalty Planeswalker. Second, he’s in both black and white, two colors with some of the strongest cards in the format. Third, he is capable of putting a token down that can not only chump on the ground but also in the air, protecting him from any hasty airborne threats. If you’re worried that his protection mode is a minus instead of a plus, remember that JtMS lost a loyalty when he bounced creatures. Fourth, Sorin’s +1 is going to make attacking into Sorin a nightmare for your opponent if you have any creatures in play at all. It also makes winning races against him a impossible. Fifth, that emblem is fairly easy to obtain and has the potential to completely shut some opponents out of the game. It isn’t as strong as other emblems are but you sure can get to ultimate loyalty quickly.

I never spent much time casting Senor de Innistrad, but I have a good bit of experience playing against him. I was almost always more concerned with the +1/+0 emblem he created rather than the piddly token he was putting into play. In this situation the roles are reversed. Sorin is buffing your whole team with a plus ability every turn, and only dropping the token into play when you’re short on bodies.

Sorin has a competitive mana cost, three strong abilities, and is in two great colors. Senor de Innistrad was quite popular and was reasonably pricey until the duel deck was announced. Solemn Visitor may creep down a bit from his current price, but I don’t think we see him much below $9 or $10. If he does get that low, trade aggressively. He’s good enough to warrant $15-$20 if he sees any real play in the format.

 

Sultai Ascendancy
1 Month: Bulk – $1
Fate Reforged: Bulk – $3

I’m pretty confident all of the Ascendancies are bulk for quite some time, even if they’re playable. Still, Sultai is looking to be the best of the bunch and I’d be remiss not to mention it. It probably joins its brethren in the sub-$1.50 category, but it seems the most likely to reach a few bucks. It’s no Sylvan Library but what is? Thassa has shown us the power of repeated upkeep card selection, and the fact that it works so well with Sidsi certainly doesn’t hurt.

 

Surrak Dragonclaw
1 Month: $3-$6
Fate Reforged: Bulk Mythic

I did a double take when I looked up his preorder price. $15 on SCG and $9+ on eBay? Are you all reading a different card than I am?

He’s a five-mana 6/6. That’s fine I guess. Flash is good, sure. It let’s you leave up Knuckleblade mana or Temur Charm and flash him down if you don’t need them. The fact that he can’t be countered is wildly situational at best. Unless Temur Charm becomes a 4-of format staple I don’t think the uncounterable clause will matter much. Same with making your other guys uncounterable. Giving the rest of your team trample is certainly solid, as Nylea has shown, but without having it himself it can be totally useless in a lot of board states.

Surrak will be a reasonable threat against control decks for sure. Not only does he blank all their counterspells but he allows your other threats to trample over Elspeth tokens. Unfortunately, I don’t see him having much of a role outside of this. Other formats won’t really want him. Maybe some Riku decks will run him since more casual-oriented players are so drawn to “can’t be countered.”

Overall demand here should be low across the board. The “can’t be countered” clause tends to drive the price of pre-order cards to absurd highs (Savage Summoning was preordering at $6), but I fully expect a crash here over the next month or two. Get out and stay out.

 

Utter End
1 Month: $1-$3
Fate Reforged: $1-$4

While I’m not wild about this card being more than two or three bucks, it would be shortsighted of me to forget what happened with Hero’s Downfall. Everything went right in the case of Downfall – black was the best color in the format, it was relatively cheap, there were no enchantments or artifacts it really needed to kill – so of course the price was high. Utter end is more expensive and harder to cast, although it hits much harder than Downfall does. The biggest strike against End is that it’s four mana instead of three. When it comes to staple removal you really want to cast it as fast as possible. Each extra mana makes it much tougher to run as a full playset instead of as a one or two-of.

Given that it’s in two colors instead of one it seems much tougher for Utter End to climb towards double digits the way Downfall did. Still, there’s a lot of room between $1 and $10. I anticipate it hanging out on the lower end of things, but I could see it climbing towards $4-$5 if the format is slow enough to allow four mana removal spells.

 

Zurgo Helmsmasher
1 Month: $2-$3
Fate Reforged: Mythic Bulk

Zurgo is one of the two headlining cards of the upcoming Speed vs Cunning product, just as Polukranos was last year. Polukranos would be $15 today if not for that duel deck because he’s so playable. Zurgo…is less playable.

Zurgo of course absolutely has a dangerous front end, and I’m sure I’ll be taking seven damage on turn five multiple times in the future because I don’t want to block with anything I have in play. If you do decide to block to save yourself one-third of your life, Zurgo grows.

My issue with Zurgo is that he’s so easy to chump. Toss a spare Elvish Mystic or Caryatid or Xenagos satyr in front of him to buy yourself the turn or two you need to assemble a reasonable answer. Even if you chump him on turn five and turn him into an 8/3, there are still a plethora of effects that can kill him on the next turn. Lightning Strike picks off an 8/3 Zurgo. Polukranos and seven mana can eat an 8/3. If you decide to take the damage, a lowly Magma Spray will get him. While Zurgo applies a lot of pressure unanswered, he happens to be very answerable.

A CDE mana cost will hurt his value in competitive formats. He’s not particularly noteworthy in EDH. Any demand he has will be squelched by the Duel Deck printing. I think Zurgo is headed right for bulk mythic.

Artifact

Bulk:
Dragon Throne of Tarkir
Ghostfire Blade

 

Altar of the Brood
1 Month: Bulk – $1
Fate Reforged: Bulk – $2

This is a sneaky little artifact here. It triggers for any permanent, which means it includes lands. Fetchlands even get to trigger it twice. The mana cost is as pushed as you can get, which is exactly what you need on a card like this. Only milling one is sort of a bummer. If it milled two, or allowed you to target yourself, it would be even more exciting.

We know the casual crowd loves mill to an extent that is difficult to understand, so there’s already going to be a base of people looking to snatch this up. What really excites me is the possibility that it breaks out in Legacy or Modern to create a combo. Even if it’s part of a tier two combo deck in Modern out of the gate we won’t see the price rise too much because there will be too many in rotation, but down the road this will have real potential to jump from bulk to $5. It’s a long term play – two years at least – but there’s the chance someone could make a killing on these if they have hundreds (or thousands) of copies.

 

Ugin’s Nexus
1 Month: Mythic Bulk
Fate Reforged: Mythic Bulk

This card is exciting mostly because it references Ugin. Are we getting another colorless Planeswalker this block? Ghostfire Blade certainly sets up Ugin bringing a horde of colorless creatures with him.

Financially this card is a bulk mythic. Very clearly designed for the EDH crowd, the foils should hold value pretty well. There may be a day down the road where someone figures out how to break this, or the EDH demand ends up pushing it close to double digits, but that is at least a year or two away.

Land

The Fetchlands
1 Month: $10-$15
Fate Reforged: $8-$13

I wrote an entire article about these! Go look!

 

By: Travis Allen

Khans of Tarkir, or perhaps more appropriately “Fetchlands of Tarkir,” is bearing down on us quickly. There will be no shortage of things to talk about once we get there, but before we do I want to take a quick look back at Journey Into Nyx. I’ve started publicly reviewing my reviews as an additional level of accountability, and as a learning exercise both for my readers and I. Seeing the calls I made and why I made them can help both you and I be better at it in the future. It also provides a scoreboard for everyone keeping track at home for how well I’m doing. It’s very easy to say “oh X card will be worth $20” or “z is trash and will be bulk,” then forget all about those predictions when they don’t come true. I don’t mind tooting my own horn when I made a public statement and it comes true later, but I’m also willing to own up when I made a bad call, as I did last week in reference to the return on the fetchlands.

A quick note on those: since the article went up there’s been a lot more discussion on the topic. While I steadfastly believe they aren’t in Fate Reforged, I’m warming up to them being in Louie. I still am not wholly convinced, and Chas Andres also agrees that they are unlikely there, but I’d be the worst kind of person if I refused to learn from my mistakes and the insight of others.

That said, let’s see how I did with my review of Journey Into Nyx. Italics will be text from the original review.

White

Bulk:
Dawnbringer Charioteers
Dictate of Heliod
Launch the Fleet
Skybind

All right where I want them to be. Launch the Fleet is hanging on at the upper end of bulk as there are whispers it may be good enough. Perhaps in two months it will be. It’s right where anticipated for rotation though.

 

Aegis of the Gods
Rotation: Bulk

Currently $1 on MTGPrice, I was spot on here. It’s seen close to no play at in any format.

 

Deicide
Rotation: Bulk – $1

$1.96 on MTGPrice, and about $1-$1.50 on TCGP. Admittedly better than bulk, but not by much.

 

Godsend
Rotation: $2-$3

$5.63 on MTGPrice right now, with a few copies available at $3.50 on TCGPlayer. I had the right idea about where this was going to land, although it’s a few bucks more than I thought it may be. My expectations of its competitive chops were accurate, so I think what we’re seeing here is the limited supply of Journey pushing the price a little higher than the card would normally have. Same thing for Deicide, and many other cards I’ll be looking at today.

 

Blue

Bulk:
Daring Thief
Hypnotic Siren
Polymorphous Rush
Scourge of Fleets

Battlefield Thaumaturge
Rotation:???

I don’t think Thaumaturge will take off right away. There isn’t anywhere he belongs yet so it will take time for him to find a deck. Delver took some time before he had a proper home, after all. We may even have to wait for rotation and the subsequent cardpool/metagame to undergo a major shift. He’ll require the right enablers for sure. If we get the right mix of spells he’ll be a format role-player, but if we don’t get the tools he’ll be filling boxes of shame nationwide. His best chance today is probably going to be with Young Pyromancer.

I mostly talked about how good the card seems like it could be, and I still stand by that assessment. More problematically is that since this review Thaumaturge was printed in an event deck. After what happened with Advent of the Wurm, I’m staying away from anything in those decks. Thaumaturge may eventually end up a few bucks but I’m not going to own any when it does.

 

Dictate of Kruphix
Rotation: Bulk – $1

Bingo.

 

Sage of Hours
Rotation: $2-$3

$1.96 on MTGPrice. Overall he’s a tad cheaper than I expected, but this is a slow grower anyways. I’m still a big fan of this long term, and with the recently spoiled Hardened Scales this could potentially be a fringe player in Standard. Not good, mind you, since Wizards doesn’t want combo anywhere near Standard, but a fringe player nonetheless.

 

Black

Bulk:
Dictate of Erebos
Doomwake Giant
Extinguish All Hope
King Macar, the Gold-Cursed
Silence the Believers
Worst Fears

 

Master of the Feast
Rotation: Bulk? $10?

Master of the Feast is going to be an all or nothing card. Either the drawback is going to be too much and he’s going to end up at total bulk, or he’s going to pull a Desecration Demon and climb to $10+. Either way, I think he’s hitting $1 before he gets his chance to shine so you’ll have some time to make a decision either way.

This has proven reasonably accurate so far. He’s dropped to $3.50 on MTGPrice and I haven’t seen him in a single competitive list yet. There’s clearly a bit of lingering demand, as he hasn’t quite fallen all the way into the bulk bin yet. He’s been steadily dropping since release, so my prediction that he reaches $1 before possibly spiking is still viable. At this point in time I’d say it seems more likely he ends up at under $2 rather than tears up Standard.

 

Red

Bulk:
Bearer of the Heavens
Dictate of the Twin Gods
Harness by Force
Spawn of Thraxes
Twinflame

 

Eidolon of the Great Revel
Rotation: Bulk – $1

This is my biggest miss by a wide margin, so let’s see what went wrong. Here’s what I had to say about it.

Probably more important for Legacy and Modern than Standard…The Legacy and Modern implications will be different. Both formats are packed with small spells so he’ll have much more relative strength. He’ll die more often for sure, but at least anything that’s killing him is probably going to shock it’s controller….The biggest issue financially is that there’s going to be exactly one deck in each format that wants to cast him. This isn’t like Courser of Kruphix that can go in any deck that makes green mana. Eidolon only goes in the most aggressive of red lists, which means the overall demand for him will remain lowish. I see him slipping towards bulk prices, but I don’t think he’ll get too far below $1 or so. I don’t believe that he’s a Vexing Devil or Goblin Guide, but he’s still better than Firedrinker Satyr. If he has a very slow descent or even seems surprisingly resilient after the honeymoon period is over, that probably means the casual market likes him, which will make him safe as a long-term pickup regardless of his tournament success.

I was mostly correct in my power level read, perhaps being a tad conservative. I was also right that it would be a bigger deal in Modern and Legacy than Standard. Where I erred appears to be in my appreciation for how much a card of this caliber can cost. It turns out that being one of the best burn spells in eternal formats, even if it is only playable in exactly the burn deck, is enough to make the card worth over $7. There’s also some amount of casual burn demand that I overlooked. Plenty of individuals out there that enjoy playing Lava Spike at their kitchen table, I’m sure much to the chagrin of their peer group. I did have the foresight to give myself an out; I commented that if his price didn’t decline as quickly as you would think that there would be more than the originally anticipated demand. I still feel far short of where I needed to be though.

The lesson here is that single-deck staples are still capable of reaching respectable prices, even for decks I personally don’t care much for. I had the right idea with Revel, but didn’t respect how much a card of that type can be worth. In the future I need to recognize that multi-format staples, even if they’re only a staple in a single deck, will probably fetch at least several dollars.

 

Prophetic Flamespeaker
Rotation: $8+

Flamespeaker is $5.64 on MTGPrice right now, so while I was a little aggressive, I’m still in the right neighborhood.

Being a mythic from a small spring set as this, it won’t take much to get his price up. I think he’s going to come down from his roughly $10 preorder price in the near future, but will climb above $10 again when people start realizing how much power he puts on the table.

Flamespeaker has seen some occasional play in Modern Jund, as well as a handful of Standard builds floating around. There isn’t much doubt to his power level, rather, it’s a question of whether anyone can utilize it. The fact that he isn’t $2 or $3 means I didn’t completely miss and that people are on board, just not enough yet. I think I was afraid of missing the next big thing here, so I set the price a little higher in the hopes that it wouldn’t look like I way undervalued him if he was $15 today.

Overall I don’t feel too bad about this. I think it’s entirely possible he does climb above $10 in the next two months, and even if he didn’t, I was only slightly too eager.

 

Green

Bulk:
Dictate of Karametra
Hero’s Bane
Hydra Broodmaster
Pheres-Band Warchief
Setessan Tactics

 

Eidolon of Blossoms
Rotation: $3-$7

I expect Eidolon of Blossoms to very slowly dwindle towards $2-3 but it may be sticky due to people wanting to try it out and likely needing three to four copies. I don’t think it will really get a whole lot lower than that as some people will always be interested. Beyond that, if it does turn out to be solid it will behave like Courser of Kruphix and Sylvan Caryatid. I wouldn’t get rid of these at the Prerelease, and if it’s the type of card you see yourself playing, don’t feel bad about trading for a playset. The worst that happens is that you trade for them at $2-$3 and they end up at $1.

While my expectation of Blossoms’ price was a little high, overall I was spot on. My description of the power level was fairly accurate. It dwindled in value after release, and after a solid performance at the Pro Tour it jumped north of $4. Only in the last few weeks has it dwindled back beneath the $3 mark. What’s  keeping Blossoms from being $10 is that it hasn’t seen much success since the Pro Tour. The complete lack of support in M15 but rather the printing of Back to Nature didn’t help, that’s for sure. Khans looks like it may provide some assistance though, as Courser is poised to be one of the best cards in the format and the Ascendancy cycle is looking like it may be playable at this point. In general I may have been a little on the eager side of things when it came to Blossoms, but I’m pleased with the call.

 

Gold

Bulk:
Revel of the Fallen God

 

Ajani, Mentor of Heroes
Rotation: $9-$13

I fell short here, but not by an embarrassing amount.

The one thing Ajani has going for him will be his relative scarcity. That may push his price a bit higher than we would normally see for a fringe Planeswalker. If he does about as well as I expect, he should mostly be in the low teens and even under ten. If he sticks around $15, it will be because of the spring set bump.

With a current price of $16.50, it’s clear Ajani outperformed my expectations by ten or twenty percent. He’s been mildly playable so far in Standard, but on the other hand I didn’t see any copies at the recent SCG invitational in New Jersey either. I also made sure in the original review to recognize the possibility of his price sticking a little higher with attribution to the set size.

I feel like my read on his power level was quite accurate given how much tournament play he’s seen, which leads me to believe that the reason his price is higher than I anticipated is because of set economics. That’s not a bad place to be.

 

Athreos, God of Passage
Rotation: $14-$18+?

Hoo boy, now that is a God. He’s aggressively costed, revives a previously-successful Standard archetype, and will be popular in EDH. Those are all markers of a hefty price tag. The only reason I’m not expecting $40+ is because there is a little too much else going on in this set for him to turn into a Voice of Resurgence.

People think Athreos is good, and for good reason. Because of that his price will be slow to fall. If he sees very little Standard play, I don’t think he can get much below $10-$13. If he’s part of a major Standard deck, expect him to stick closer to $20, or perhaps even more depending on how pronounced the small set effect is.

This wasn’t as bad as Eidolon of the Revel, but it was close. Athreos was possibly the most-hyped card coming into the set. Many saw him as a legitimate engine, capable of putting a lot of pressure on the opponent either through creature recursion or life payments. While it isn’t the type of card I like to play, I respected the excitement of those around me and judged his price accordingly.

To be fair, it took over a month before he dropped below $15 on MTGPrice so clearly there was continuing demand. He just couldn’t cut it though, and subsequently his price dropped to match his tournament results. His golden age has probably passed, so at $8 I’d probably ship him now.

I messed up Revel pretty good but I’m not beating myself up over Athreos. Many people, including pros, really thought Athreos was going to be a big player. I listened to those around me and made a call based on that. If he was as good as people thought he may have been, my numbers would have been where they needed to be. Ultimately this is a miss, but one in which I think I made the right play and got a bad result.

 

Iroas, God of Victory
Rotation: $6-$9

People will play him, and there will be some casual appeal, but it won’t be enough to keep him inflated with several other spicy mythics and rares in the set. The small set effect should keep him above Nylea and Heliod, but not by too much.

Currently at $5.38 on MTGPrice, I like where I landed on this guy. I said he should be more expensive than Nylea and Heliod. Nylea is seeing a bit of a renaissance right now and has climbed a bit above Iroas, but Heliod remains low.

 

Keranos, God of Storms
Rotation: $6-$9

On the one hand, Keranos has the best or second best text box of all the gods this time around. He is always doing something that matters, whether it’s putting cards into your hand or draining your opponent’s board/life total. On the other hand he’s a little expensive and it will take some time for his ability to really take a game over. I think he’s nearly as playable as Athreos is, but unlike Athreos will likely not be a four-of wherever he ends up. We also don’t have a home for him to slot into right away which makes it tougher for him to maintain his current $10-$15. The best advice I can give on Keranos is to expect nothing in the short term, but pay close attention to the block Pro Tour.

Keranos is $16 right now but I’m totally calling this a win. Why? From June 1st to September 1st, he was in the $6-$9 range. It was only a week or so ago that his price rose so dramatically. I am also under the impression that his spike was due in part to a buyout, which can change prices prematurely. (Not unfounded changes mind you, just premature.) Once we started to see him pop up in Modern occasionally or two after release I was warming up to him, and was recommending him as a pickup by the time we hit August. I had an accurate read at release, and I was able to update my opinion on him over the summer as it became clear he was a threat in more than one format.

 

Kruphix, God of Horizons
Rotation: $3-$5

Currently $3.43. The price is dead on and my review of “Ugh.” says everything else.

 

Pharika, God of Affliction
Rotation: $4-$6

Pharika is preselling on Channelfireball right now for a whopping $7 so there obviously there isn’t a whole lot of hype surrounding her at this point. Most people are relatively unimpressed, but I’ve heard from a few intelligent people that there’s some silver lining here. She’s cheap with a nice fat body. She’s in green, so we can see her come down on turn two, potentially allowing you to put four colored mana symbols into play on turn three and swing for five. She recycles your dead bodies into threats, which is great in attrition decks, a common theme for GB. Perhaps most importantly and mostly under the radar, those snakes she puts into play are enchantments. That means they trigger constellation, such as on Eidolon of Blossoms or Underworld Coinsmith or Doomwake Giant.

Will any of that be enough to keep her above bulk god prices? Honestly, probably not. She’s going to slip before she rises again, and if she ever does make it back above $10 I don’t think it will be overnight. You’ll have time to react if she sees an uptick in play and price.

Pharika is $4 at the moment so my price prediction was quite good. She’s done about as much as I thought she would up until now, which is to say basically nothing.

I’ll use this space to say that Pharika is growing on me. As I said earlier, Courser is shaping up to be one of the defining cards of the new meta. Pharika really likes Courser, as he adds double devotion. She also likes cards such as Eidolon of Blossoms, which also likes Courser. How about that! Pharika is even in Sultai, which is giving us delve and the cards to support it. With wedge cards floating around it may not be too tough to turn Pharika on. I’d keep my eye on her going forward.

 

Hall of Triumph
Rotation: $1-$3

Mono-Blue could possibly be in the market for two of these, and decks running Prophetic Flamespeaker could conceivably be interested as well. I believe this will always manage to stay a little above bulk, and will probably climb towards $5 in the months and years after rotation.

At $.74, I’d say I was in the right ballpark. Mono-Blue did in fact start running these, with a few having shown up in the Top 8 of some SCG Opens. That deck has been on the downswing for awhile though, as all the other decks keep getting better and better while it gets nothing. The deck slowing down has prevented Hall of Triumph from getting anywhere. I maintain that the card’s outlook is good two or three years down the line, but that’s a long time to wait to make a dollar or two per card.

 

Lands

Mana Confluence
Rotation: $9-$12

I’d say we’ll see this in the $10-$12 range for the most part, but it may take some time to get there. If it ends up over-performing we’re probably looking at it being $15+. If Thoughtseize can’t break $20, I don’t think MC can.

As of September 3rd, Mana Confluence was just under $11 – right at my predicted target. The next day it jumped to over $16, where it remains today. This, like Keranos, was doing exactly what I expected it to right up until just a few days ago. In Confluence’s case, the spike was a result of PAX. Once the Khans spoilers began trickling in people jumped on Confluence. I figured a jump was coming but I didn’t think we would see it until after rotation. I guess people are getting a little wiser about when they need to grab their staples.

I previously said I didn’t think MC could break $20, but I’m revising that now. While I don’t think it’s an auto-4-of in every wedge deck, I do think it will be an important component of the metagame. The presence of fetchlands should also actually help MC. Fetchlands are “dual” lands right up until you crack them, at which point they no longer offer both colors of mana. For decks trying to hit CDE consistently, fetches may fall short. The Temples and MC will have to do some work to fill in the gaps.

 

The Temples
Rotation: $7-$8+

Most of the other Temples are in the $5-$6 range and there will be considerably more of those than there are of these. Lands nearly always rise at rotation and there’s no reason to expect ones with such a strong effect to behave any differently. Don’t hesitate to trade or buy your set now. You pretty much can’t lose. Hoard any you can get in trade because it’s likely enough that they break $10 that it’s totally worth risking them being $4-$5.

Temple of Epiphany is $7 and Malady is $11 right now. Epiphany is spot on; Malady ended up climbing more than I originally anticipated because of how good the BG combination became in Standard. (It’s currently the most expensive scryland.)

Unless the missing cycle of lands in Khans ends up being a big deal for constructed, I really like the scrylands as a component of Standard manabases with fetches in the format. As I mentioned above, fetches can’t continually make two colors. This is going to put a lot more pressure on Standard decks to keep the scrylands around in order to consistently hit their costs.

 

At the end of the day I’m reasonably pleased with how my prediction of the set went. I did a great job identifying the bulk cards. Two cards that jumped well past my prediction only did so in the last week or two, before that having followed my timeline closely. They’re also two cards that I later on earmarked as good pickups on Twitter and/or in real life, so I was onto them after the review went live.

The biggest miss here was Eidolon of the Great Revel, where I was off by a decimal place. I failed to appreciate just how much demand the older formats and casual circles would place on such a narrow card. I’ll need to be more careful about respecting just how much demand a card such as this can generate. Beyond that a handful of my predictions were off, but only by a handful of dollars at worst. You can’t really expect to get every single card exactly right, so those gaps between my guesses and the true prices are mostly within the accepted margins of error. I’d say I deserve a B+ or an A- on this review, with Revel being my only big strike.

By: Travis Allen

It’s Christmas time for us Wizards. The fall set always brings with it a crackling excitement of new spoilers each day to be dissected at FNM and on Twitter, with thousands of players trying to break the card in each available format. Many stay up until midnight eastern to see the new spoilers that hit from non-WotC sites, and those of us at work at 11am each morning are F5ing DailyMTG for the official spoilers. It’s hard not to be swept up in the collective thrill of the community.

I suppose a more appropriate metaphor would be Hanukkah, right? We don’t have a single night of hundreds of spoilers, but rather, a little bit doled out each night. We even have a Candelabra. That sounds more accurate than Christmas, really.

This weekend was Pax, and they lit a big ol’ present candle at the Magic party they have there every year. (Annual reminder: Don’t go to Pax.) A bunch of cards were spoiled, including a ridiculous Jeskai Khan, a legitimate-looking Sarkhan Planeswalker, and, the subject of today’s article, the Onslaught fetches.

Let me begin by saying I’m sorry. I’ve been spending months talking about how I didn’t think the fetches would be in Khans. If you got burned on this reprint because of my advice, I really do apologize. If it makes you feel any better I’ve got a bunch of Zendikar fetches in my possession, so I’m getting gotten by this just the same.

The decision still seems odd to me, honestly. There’s no mechanic to really support their presence. Sure they work with delve, but what doesn’t work with delve. As long as you’re playing Magic, you’re fueling delve. Morph doesn’t care about fetching. Prowess and raid and outlast don’t. They even chose what feels like the wrong fetches. This block is all about wedges – RUG, UWR, etc. With the allied fetches, for RUG we only get RG. If we got the enemy fetches we would get both UR and UG. Basically what I’m saying is that they really seem shoehorned in. I’m guessing they weren’t originally planned for the block, but Wizards made the decision sometime possibly late in design or in development that they needed to put fetches in. It was brought to my attention that apparently the fetches were the first cards in the set. This doesn’t change the fact that they feel out of place. I’m guessing they make more sense once we get to the end of Louie.

Regardless, this is the world we live in. The Onslaught allied fetches are on their way and we need to decide what this means for our existing Onslaught copies, as well as what’s going to happen with the Zendikar fetches.

Lucky for us there is some precedent for expensive old cards being reprinted in Standard. We don’t have to turn our gaze past Standard to see both Thoughtseize and the Shocklands. Let’s check out the Lorwyn printing of Thoughtseize. The red strips indicate Modern PTQ seasons.

According to Wikipedia Modern was announced back in the spring of 2011, so our graph starts off with people knowing about Modern as a format. Thoughtseize was in the $30-$40 range at the time. At the start of the PTQ season it skyrocketed towards $60, and lived at $60-$70 until Theros released. It slowly dropped back to it’s pre-PTQ price of $30-$35, which is where it is today. The reprint clearly had an affect on the price of the card, although you’ll notice that the price today is not really much lower than the price of it before it saw a massive spike thanks to a PTQ season.

Hallowed Fountain didn’t fare quite so well.

It was floating around $30 at the start of 2012, which is right about when we would have gotten the announcement that the fall set that year would be Return to Ravnica. Shocks would have been clearly evident at that point. You see a slow decline starting around the fall of ‘12, and they’ve since leveled off to around $15 or so.

The behavior of the rest of the shocks is mostly similar, although Hallowed Fountain and Watery Grave seem to have gotten the worst of it. The original printings of Temple Garden and Stomping Ground have lost only maybe $5, and Sacred Foundry doesn’t appear to have moved at all. It seems that the inflated blue shocks (Fountain, Grave, Breeding Pool, Steam Vents) lost the most, but the non-blue shocks didn’t see more than maybe a 40% loss.

Let’s analyze our data a bit at this point. When Thoughtseize was reprinted it was cut in half from its current value, but that doesn’t tell the whole story. With a longer timeline in view, it would be incomplete to say that it was simply a case of the card losing half it’s value. A more accurate description would be that the reprint reversed the doubling of the price the card had seen about a year earlier. I think it would be safe to say that while Thoughtseize being reprinted certainly didn’t help the price, at the end of the day it didn’t really have that much of an impact on the original copy.

Here’s another way to consider the price change. The original copy of Thoughtseize has a variety of types of demand. There’s the demand from people that want the first printing, demand from people that think the old art looked better, demand from PTQ grinders, etc. There’s a quantitative amount of demand and it can be segmented into types. When the reprint occurred all the excess PTQ grinder demand was chopped off. The card lost all that extra ‘fat’ demand it had acquired from people that just needed to cast it competitively. It still retained all of it’s other demand. The doubling from $30 to $60 was all competitive demand. The rest of the price was legitimate, sustainable desire for the Lorwyn copy.

Hallowed Fountain behaved a bit differently. The price on Dissension copies today is about twice the RTR copy, so clearly there’s still some amount of demand for the first printing. That doesn’t mean it didn’t take a beating when the reprint hit. While it was $30+ ahead of RTR, it’s now only about $15. This would be pretty damning for the Onslaught fetches as a whole if we didn’t consider the other shocks as well. The non-blue shocks lost between zero and forty percent or so, which is not too severe a loss when you consider how many extra copies hit the market in RTR.

Thoughtseize and the Shocklands indicate that Onslaught copies will take a loss, but we aren’t quite sure how much. Let’s take a look at the price graph of the most expensive of the five, Polluted Delta.

That is some pretty wild growth. We see the price more than double from the spring of ‘12 to early this summer, and it’s still holding a solid $80 even after losing a chunk in the last two months. A growth in price like this immediately makes me think of the Thoughtseize jump at the start of the PTQ season. If you drag this graph out another year into the future, what do you think it looks like? Where do you envision it landing? Which price plateau is the “real” one?

One thing that split Thoughtseize from the shocks is playability. Of course both were extremely playable in Standard and Modern, but Thoughtseize went beyond that into Legacy and even Vintage. There is additional playability demand for Thoughtseize that didn’t exist for the shocks. That extra layer of competitive demand provided insulation for Thoughtseize’s price that the shocks didn’t get.

These new fetches will absolutely behave similarly to Thoughtseize, except even more so. Ally fetches will be required for Standard, Modern, Legacy, Vintage, EDH, and Cube. Really, who doesn’t want them? Greater demand across the board will help the old copies stand up to a brand new batch much better than if they were only a two-format card.

Here’s another factor that was in play to an extent when Thoughtseize was reprinted, but not as drastic as it will be now. Have you seen the new fetches? Like, seen what the cards look like?

Those…do not look that hot. The Flooded Strand is sort of cute, and the Bloodstained Mire is by talented artist Daarken, but overall I would say these are not visually impressive lands. I’m not alone either. Upon reveal Twitter blew up about their inclusion in Khans, but the first things I was reading beyond “omg fetches!” was “hey these are kind of dumb looking.” Compared to the the original lands there is a stunning difference in appearance.

The aesthetic of the old cards is remarkably different from the new copies in a way that neither the shocks nor Thoughtseize experienced. With a distinction in appearance this strong, there will be a real incentive for aesthetic-oriented players to seek out original copies. A real layer of demand is going to exist from this characteristic alone. I’m partial to old borders so I’ll of course be using the original ones where I can, but even players that are unbiased may find themselves drawn to the original copies. This type of demand is something that cannot be sated by additional printings. For players such as myself, it doesn’t matter how many times Windswept Heath is printed – I only want to play with the original. We’ve seen it on Thoughtseize with the fairy art, and we’re going to see it even more here.

It’s difficult to put a number on this since Wizards doesn’t officially release any of this data, but another quick item to keep in mind is that the original Onslaught fetches were printed less than both the original shocks and the original Thoughtseize, meaning there won’t actually be that many original border copies.

Taking everything we know into consideration, what happens with all of our original Onslaught fetches? It seems clear that they’ll be dropping in price, but the question is by how much. I’d hazard a guess that we’ll see Polluted Delta and Flooded Strand land north of $40, but I’m not exactly sure where. I would expect anywhere between $30-$60 to be plausible, and $40-$50 to be a reasonable expectation. The other ones will move, but not by as much. I’d guess that Windswept Heath, Bloodstained Mire, and Wooded Foothills, all about $40 right now, don’t drop below $25 or possibly even $30. These are all educated guesses though, and I’m not promising anything. There may be factors I’m missing or unforeseen changes that will alter these trajectories in ways I can’t predict at the moment.

Foil Onslaught copies are only going to rise, not fall. Damnit.

What do we do with this? I’m personally holding onto my original copies. Playing with the old border is worth it to me. If you don’t care, I’d look to move them ASAP. Keep the prices in mind that I outlined above, and as long as your trade/sale looks good with that information, go for it. Don’t be afraid to offer a discount on the $80 retail price of Polluted Delta today if it’s going to be $50 in three weeks.

If that’s what’s in store for the original copies, how about all the new ones? Well that’s a lot easier to answer. You won’t see in-print rares from a fall set, especially a cycle of five, get too expensive. I’d guess our maximum is about $15 each. If that sounds too low, just do a little math. You average over three of each rare land in a single box. At $20 a piece, three lands would make up well more than half of the value of the box. There’s no way the box prices will support those numbers on rares. I’d say we’ll see prices hover between $7 and $15, with each taking turns at the higher end of that as they see their time to shine in Standard. Bloodstained Mire should consistently be the cheapest one, and Polluted Delta/Flooded Strand will pretty consistently be near the most expensive. The Zendikar fetches averaged maybe $10 each while they were in Standard, so that sounds like a comfortable place for these to live.

The best time to get the fetches will be a month or two after release, just like with most rares. There will be an extended period of increased demand as Modern and Legacy players seek to fill out their sets but by the time we hit Christmas that should quiet. They’ll probably be cheapest sometime next year, but nobody wants to wait that long. Feel free to start grabbing your non-foil copies around October if you’re impatient, and December if you can wait. If you’re looking to score foil copies, the best time to buy is also easy. It’s now. Take a look at the price graph for foil Breeding Pool.

Trends for the other shocks are comparable. The foil copies tend to be lowest immediately after release and see very slow to no movement for a few months before they finally start to creep up. I’d say that grabbing foil copies ahead of Christmas would be your best bet. They’ll probably be rather expensive, but that’s the nature of a cycle like this. People will want foil copies for their Cubes, EDH, and Legacy decks.

Now that we’ve covered the Onslaught fetches pretty thoroughly, let’s turn our attention to the other five: the Zendikar fetches. What does this reprint mean for them?

Well it’s not great, that’s for sure. Currently the Zendikar fetches are as expensive as they are because not only do they have that playable demand from nearly every format, they’re also the only fetches legal in Modern, the largest format that fetches are played in. Way more players are taking one in Modern than Legacy these days and there’s currently only five ways to do it. Adding the ally fetches is going to double the number of choices for Modern players.

This is going to be what does the most damage to the Zendikar copies. Why would Johnny Random Shell out $60 apiece for Scalding Tarns when he can get Polluted Deltas and Bloodstained Mires for $10 each? Sure the Tarns are better for his deck, but are they six times as expensive better? That’s a question everyone has to answer for themselves, but I bet for a large majority of players the answer is “hell no.”

There will still be plenty of places you want the enemy fetches over the ally fetches. Any three-color deck is going to be in the market for at least a set of enemy fetches still, and possibly two sets if it’s a wedge rather than a shard. Still, no longer being the only game in town is just going to be too hard for them to weather in the near future. Consider the enemy fetches in the same way that I presented Thoughtseize earlier. There’s an existing layer of demand ‘fat’ from being the only legal fetches. While there’s still other types of demand that will help keep the price up, that entire chunk of demand is about to be excised.

One thing going for the Zen fetches is that their supply will still be limited. While the ally fetches are going to flood the market, there aren’t any more Misty Rainforests now than there were six months ago. Less people will need them, but those that do need them will still be in the market for them. While many will make do with the inexpensive ally fetches from Khans, plenty of players will continue to insist on having exactly the right ones for the deck. We may see a small surge in the number of players looking for enemy fetches as well. Up until now, people have put off Modern because the mana was too expensive and they didn’t want to deal with it. With shocks readily available and a fetch reprint only a few weeks away, the format suddenly looks wildly more accessible. Once these players start jumping into Modern they will inevitably start looking to fill out their fetch collection with the enemy copies, even if it is only just one or two for a specific deck.

The long and short of it is that even though it isn’t all doom and gloom for the Zendikar fetches, it’s still a bad time for them. If you have extra copies (like I do), I wouldn’t hesitate to move them if the prices stay somewhat stable over the next few weeks. If you can get reasonable offers for them now, take it. However if there’s a huge market crash and they lose 60% of their value, don’t sell. It’s not uncommon for the market to overreact to this type of news, and the devalued cards often quickly rebound as players start snatching up now under-valued copies. In the case of a crash, hang on and wait it out until after prices rebound a bit. Watch buylists to see how vendors are reacting; that will give you an idea of how the market is handling the news. Today, September second, Misty Rainforest is still getting $40 and Scalding Tarn $45. Those aren’t any lower than they were a week ago.

With this news, when is the next time we’ll actually see Zendikar fetches? I hear some people talking about seeing them later in the block, but that sounds rather silly to me. With their printing, the mana will be even across enemy and ally pairs. There’s all ten Scrylands, five enemy Painlands, and now five ally Fetchlands. Adding more fetches would push the balance back towards enemy pairs.

Assuming there’s a Modern Masters 2, which we are operating assuming that there is, they’re a good choice for that release now. I’ve claimed before that I didn’t think we’d see Zen fetches in MM2, but that was before the ally fetches were in Khans. With the Khans reprint, it takes a lot of pressure off Zen fetches, which means Wizards isn’t in a situation where they need to flood the market with more copies. A more limited release via MM2 would be perfectly acceptable. If we don’t see them there, then I’d say any fall set after Khans is conceivable. It’s hard to say for sure until we get closer. For right now assume an MM2 release is possible/probable, and if they’re not there, then who knows.

One more topic I’m seeing discussed a lot – what does the printing of the ally fetches do to Modern? Their appearance will likely see a surge in the overall index of the format. When format staples drop in price due to an event like this, currently under-priced cards tend to jump. Cards like Leonin Arbiter had trouble climbing in the past because the barrier to entry on mana was so high. Nobody wants to shell out for Arbiters if they spent a fortune getting the mana together. Once the mana is accessible more people start buying Arbiters, and the price begins to rise. As a result of the mana getting cheaper, the rest of the deck corrects in response.

We’re also going to see a flood of new players enter Modern now that they’ve got both cheap shocks and fetches, which is going to put a greater demand on the already constrained copies of many format staples such as Clique, Spellskite, Goyf, Celestial Colonnade, Snapcaster, etc etc. This is probably the biggest impact the fetches will have on Modern (and Legacy, to a lesser extent). Players that have been priced out of the format up until now are suddenly going to be capable of diving in. Add in that Modern will be playable at PreTQs year round and you’ve got a recipe for price jumps across the board.

Beyond that I don’t see the addition of the fetches doing much specifically. The mana in Modern is already so good I can’t imagine these suddenly opening the floodgates for decks previously unplayable. It’s not like there’s some list out there that’s just waiting to become a tier one contender that has only been held back by the lack of Wooded Foothills in the format. Some matchups will change by a few percentage points in certain situations, and Blood Moons may become marginally less effective in a few places as fetching basics gets easier, but overall I don’t see sweeping changes to the format. What’s more likely is that many tier two decks (and worse) become over-represented as people assemble affordable mana bases without actually having the rest of the deck. Sure you can build any mana you want with your RTR shocks and your KTK fetches, but you’re still going to have to cast something with them. Players that don’t feel like shelling out for Liliana of the Veil may find themselves playing all sorts of more off-the-wall brews that could put additional demand on cards currently in the fringe. Those are probably the types of cards that in terms of percentage of growth do the best as a result of all of this.

There you have it. In short, the original Onslaught fetches will drop but they won’t crater. Foils will go up. New copies won’t be more than $10-!15. Zendikar fetches will drop. Don’t expect any new Modern decks, but the general Modern index will rise.

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