Hey, everyone. I’m going to be soloing the financial review for this set and I couldn’t be happier to have additional pressure. I’m going to be doing the best I can to extrapolate where I expect prices to go based on any similarities I can draw between cards in this set and cards in the first Conspiracy which I expect to be drafted roughly the same amount. This is an unlimited print run set so comparisons to cards in Modern Masters 2 will only be made when it is used to illustrate how much more profound a price drop will be for the Conspiracy 2 card. For reference, what’s even worth what in the first Conspiracy set?

This set cratered prices. Misdirection and Hydra Omnivore, in particular, were high-demand cards with low supply due to where they were originally printed and the new copies at non-mythic rare just buried them in an avalanche of supply. I expect Conspiracy 2 reprints to share the same fate. Let’s look at what we have so far.

8/20 Spoilers

Spitting Slime

This is a bulk rare. I like it, but, come on.

Kami of the Crescent Moon

This was a victim of Nekusar hype plus some non-deck in Modern all happening roughly the same month. This is going to be fun in Limited and if you get a sealed pool with this and Loevold, your deck is built. This will get very cheap indeed. And Nekusar can’t bail it out. Sell these and buy Puzzle Boxes if you didn’t already.

Spirit of the Hearth

This had crept up to $2. It will probably never be $2 again.

Manaplasm

This was bulk before

Ghostly Prison

This is an Emperor’s New Clothes scenario. This high price is predicated on how good it is against Splinter Twin, a card that’s banned into Oblivion. EDH loves it, obviously, but Modern isn’t really killing people with lots of tokens the way it use to. This is less useful. However, it’s a popular EDH card so is a dealer who paid $10 for it going to sell it for $9.50? But the reprinting is going to make people start paying attention to this card, questioning why it’s as high and realizing the new supply and the lower demand means this card will plummet. Buy at the bottom and if you’re holding, well, them’s the breaks. This could have just as easily happened in Commander 2015 or 2016.

Guul Draz Specter

This was bulk before

Beast Within

This is a card that has shrugged off multiple reprintings and maintained a decent price. Could it shrug this off, too? Yes, but only in the long term which means buying opportunities.

Followed Foosteps

This is a bad graph shape if you’re holding these. The buylist price started tanking years before the reprint. This is a bulk rare waiting to happen.

Gratuitous Violence

Well this has been crawling up because of Narset decks, but this is going to crater this. I don’t know if Narset demand can help this pull itself out of the crater its price is about to start residing in.

Forgotten Ancient

$3ish for a card with multiple reprints is pretty promising. I think if this hits bulk, you trade for all of these, despite the reprint risk being pretty substantial. I think it will take more printings than just this one to make this worthless forever.

Throne of the High City

This can start the Monarch shenanigans in any EDH deck. I’m not sure I hate this since if they can’t hit you, you get a free Howling Mine just for you. I don’t think this gets above bulk, but I will be checking EDHREC to see if people are brewing with this so I know whether to move in on foils.

Covenant of Minds

This was bulk before

Sphinx of Magosi

This was bulk before

Horn of Greed

This climbed its way to $9 and with The Gitrog Monster and other land decks popular, it’s easy to see why. I bet this tanks, and I’m a buyer when it does. It’s not just scarcity that made this card a monster lately.

Pariah

This is under $5 and cards under $5 are about to plummet. This doesn’t have enough EDH demand to recover from this in the near term.

Hamletback Goliath

This was bulk before

Sangromancer

This only got up to about $2.50. See what I said about Pariah.

Hundred-Handed One

This was bulk before

Psychosis Crawler

This wasn’t quite bulk, but this should be the final nail in the coffin built by Commander 2015.

Selvala’s Stampede

This is a better Tooth and Nail in some decks and a silly value monster in other decks. Mayael, Maelstrom Wanderer, Omnath – the list of decks which will call this green Browbeat an on-the-spot win is long. It’s impossible to find presale data on this right now, but this has the capacity to gain in price as other cards tank. I think this will be underappreciated off the bat. Target these if the price seems too low, like $2 or under.

Show and Tell

So this is the Blue mythic in the spot where they’re going to print Damnation, I guess. This is going to tank the price of this significantly. Either this card is 50% of the price of a box or this takes a bath. Right now Show and Tell is the same price Sneak Attack was before it was reprinted in Eternal Masters. Right now Sneak Attack is $25. Things will turn out much, much worse for Show and Tell since it’s in a set with $3 boosters not $12 boosters.

Platinum Angel

These are gettable for like $6-$8 right now, which means this is about to be pretty cheap. That’s good because it’s an EDH staple and will always, always trade out. Pay whatever buylist on these is in a few weeks (like $2, I bet) if you can do that locally and sit on them for a year before you trade them for like $5 worth of specs. You’ll never have a hard time getting rid of Platinum Angel.

Damnation

The new art makes it look like Damnation costs 6BB instead of 2BB and RK Post put a power and toughness in the bottom corner, but make no mitake, Wotc knew how badly we needed this card to be reprinted and they delivered. What, did you think they were going to give us a $2 rare that had already been printed 6 times in the same slot as Show and Tell, did you? After EDH players have been begging for Damnation for years? Give them some credit.

8/19 Spoilers

Selvala, Heart of the Wilds

This is pretty boss. It’s going to ramp you quite a bit and draw you some cards to boot. In a mono-green situation, you’re just going to play a ton of huge creatures and draw some extra cards, keeping your hand stocked as you play bigger and bigger dudes. You need a way to keep them off of big creatures, which can be tough in green, but if all this does is tap for GG, then GGG, then GGGG etc, you’re in good shape. If this is not your commander, but is part of the 99, the mana ability is even better. I like this a lot and this is getting jammed in my Mayael deck for sure.

This is preselling for $6 on eBay and that seems about right to me.  With all of the gas in this set, it’s going to take quite a bit to get over that mark and I don’t know if this card has the juice. This is going to just fart out Eldrazi all day and that’s cool, but I don’t know if it will be better than Marchesa was in Conspiracy 1 which it would need to do to get over $6.

Caller of the Untamed

This is a sweet ability that you’ll basically never get to use. Bulk rare unless Cube plays this to a degree that would be unprecedented for cube. EDH couldn’t make this not bulk on its own for at least a year or two.

Stunt Double

People play Clone in EDH. Quite a bit, actually. As many times as they have “improved” Clone by tacking weird stuff onto it, they haven’t really made something that was just so much better than Clone that Clone was obsolete.

Until now. They fundamentally changed the way you can play Clone and there’s no reason to be forced to play it Sorcery-speed anymore. Clone is dead. Long live Clone.

This is also going to be a bulk rare with an expensive foil for a long while. Maybe Carter Hatfield, the largest collector of Clones I know and owner of Perfect Storm MTG, can start collecting these and the price will nose up.

Birds of Paradise

Just reprint the stupid Mark Poole art, already. Pay him what you need to pay him and bring back the iconic birds.

As far as this is concerned, this reprint is going to tank its price a bit, but it will be back. If you missed your last dozen chances to buy these for dirt cheap at reprinting and then you were surprised at how high they climbed later, don’t miss this one.

8/18 Spoilers

Subterranean Tremors

I don’t think any of the cards in this set can possibly be worth any money at this point. This will be a set with 20 $10 cards. It’s crazy how good this stuff is. If you don’t know about formats other than Standard, this card is bugnutty in formats where this can replace Vandalblast such as EDH and Vintage. This has a ton of upside compared with any card that does any one of the three things this card does. 9 mana is super doable in EDH and getting a Blasphemous Act/Shatterstorm/Devastating Summons for one card is stupid. Cube is in, Vintage is in, EDH is in. People love this card. How much will it be worth? Probably less than its presale price at this point! This set has too many good cards.

Regal Behemoth

Speaking of good cards, this is good. I don’t think this is “be worth money” good but I think it’s bound to be a roleplayer in EDH or at least get tried out. I like cards that make you the Monarch in EDH because if no one else is playing those cards, you’re the one that introduces the Monarch emblem to the game. This is solid when you have it out and you’re the Monarch, doubling and fixing your mana. This is a very EDH card and I could see it being a buck or two in the short term and more in the long term, especially if the flashy mythics that are soaking up all of the value now fall off. I’m still not buying these for cash but I will trade for them, especially foils.

Volatile Chimera

This could be very good in cube, but I feel like there are more EDH decks than cubes and EDH couldn’t save this from bulk. We could see a high foil multiplier, but stores are getting better at predicting that when the set comes out instead of like 3 years later like they used to. I’m not interested in this card.

Berserk

Well, this was unexpected. This is a very narrow card but it’s also a very old and iconic one so seeing it here was a surprise. The price is about to take a gigantic hit, which is what they wanted, I suspect. Infect in Legacy is a thing and this goes in it and that’s basically it apart from Cube. That’s not to say there won’t be demand, but I think this squashes the price of Berserk, which is probably fine. This also gives us decent foils, albeit with the same art as the FTV ones.

An Unlimited Berserk is $100 right now and the price will likely try to start out there, but with all of the gas in this set and MSRP being enforced by stores like Target, pack price is going to tank a lot of these preorder prices. Don’t be surprised to see Berserk for $15 soon.

Duskmantle Seer

This was $0.75 when it was a mythic

Dragonlair Spider

This was about $4 and it had a ridiculous 1.1 foil multiplier, maybe due to distaste for Commander’s Arsenal foils. Whatever the case, this is going to get a big hunk taken out of it. I doubt this ever recovers.

Skyline Despot

This is pretty savage. You’re going to really punish people for not attacking you so this may bring some additional heat, but I could see this coupled with a card like Blazing Archon in my Mayael deck to just bury them in a slow avalanche of card advantage. This isn’t powerful on the level of Scourge of Thrones, though, so I bet this is a few bucks, maximum, but it could start out at bulk and climb.

Grenzo, Havoc Raiser

I like this card a lot and it’s both a sweet commander and sweet inclusion in the 99. I don’t, however, think this will be more popular as a commander than the other Grenzo.

This may start to climb a bit, soon, but I feel like this is probably a pretty good corollary. The new Grenzo is sick, but so is the old one and it’s like $1.50

8/17 Spoilers

Exotic Orchard

This card may just be done. It was crawling out of the hole formed when Planechase reprinted it and I don’t know if it can recover. The foil is also likely to be impacted which seemed safer since Planechase only reprinted the nonfoil, allowing it to climb to $10. This is an OK land that can screw you sometimes and it barely hit $4 before this. This is most likely $1 again for quite a while.

Spy Kit

This is much better than you think. There are endless shenanigans possible with this card and I’ll let the EDH subreddit tell you all about it. I think this could end up being a decent foil though I don’t think EDH demand will move the needle on an uncommon for quite a while.

Keeper of Keys

This is just a solid evasion-enabler that can draw you cards. I’m really excited about this card, although I don’t think it will be above $2. If you look at the stuff that was above $1.75 last time around, nothing of this caliber with its appeal limited to just EDH cracked the $2 mark.

Leovold, Emissary of Trest

This. Card. Is. Insane.

This is the best EDH colors, has elf tribal synergy, draws you a ton of cards, turns Howling Mine and Teferi’s Puzzle Box into bludgeons… I could go on and on about this card. I think this has the potential to be as popular as the last Marchesa or even more-so.  The floor on this card is $5 if you ask me and it could go higher. Again, though, Marchesa from the last Conspiracy is very popular and that’s like $5.50 so insane or not, I don’t know if we buy these at $4 for cash hoping to make anything. People are excited at least.

Daretti, Ingenious Iconoclast

This seems pretty narrow. It’s not good enough for Vintage in all likelihood except maybe in some sort of Tezzerator deck? I am not sure. I think this goes in a lot of EDH decks like Shattergang Brothers (how good would it be to ultimate this targeting Wurmcoil Engine or Myr Battlesphere?) but I don’t know if that’s going to be enough to prop his price up, much. This is one more planeswalker than I expected to see in the set. Is this part of a cycle? Could there be 3 more?

This is preselling on SCG for $20 and I think that’s a little high even though I like this card. It’s a 3 mana walker that can use his -3 3 times before he dies, which is really good. But until I see someone who knows more about Vintage than I do (almost everyone) or Legacy (still a lot of people) tell me why this is as good as Dack Fayden outside of EDH, I’m out at $20.

Edit – I finally got a chance to talk to some Vintage players about it and they are hyped about this. I still don’t think this gets as expensive as Dack Fayden since this isn’t the only good card in the set, but  it could have upside at $20 in their view. His middle ability does a ton of work in Vintage where the number of permanents is smaller and they are more important and 3 mana happens routinely on turn 1 in Vintage. It’s hard to know how the value will be spread out in this set, but it’s bonkers so far.

Wild Pair

This used to be $2. That bodes poorly for the future of this card.

Burgeoning

The new art is pretty sweet and it’s the first time this card will be foil, which is super relevant.

Right now, a Conspiracy Exploration is $11, down from a high of $40. Burgeoning is at like $30 so I could see Burgeoning getting to $10 or cheaper as a result of this reprinting. The foils are anyone’s guess, but I would guess they will decline from their initial price the way Exploration did. Exploration is a very nice price corollary and I’d follow its trajectory to see what to do with Burgeoning.

Sanctum Prelate

Wow. This is one of the craziest hatebears ever printed. This can straight shut people down. It gets worse in EDH where you can’t just name 2 or 3 and drop the mic, but it’s still good there. I don’t know if this is Containment Priest good, but it’s certainly very solid. I’m still waiting on a presale price for this, but I imagine this will be $20 at least. This basically makes me less confident in the ability of Recruiter of the Guard to maintain even $20. I wrote about that card not knowing if there would be other good cards in the set and every card I see spoiled makes me less and less bullish on Recruiter, as good as it is.

8/16 Spoilers – Updated

Inquisition of Kozilek

This is a crazy price trajectory for an uncommon and while it’s already sinking on its own due to the relative lack of Modern events lately (?) I expect the Conspiracy 2 printing to cut its legs off.

If you’re whining about it being rare and think this won’t torpedo its price, you haven’t been paying attention lately at all. We had an expensive uncommon reprinted as a rare in a smaller, limited-print-run set and we can look at what that did to prices.

Look at the price of Heritage Druid. If you’re worried that Conspiracy, with its $3 booster packs as opposed to $12 booster packs and its unlimited print run versus its ridiculously tiny print run, can’t lower the price of an uncommon printed at rare, you aren’t paying attention. Inquisition could his as low as $4 or $5, especially in the short term. Buy your set then, and buy a second set in case it ever hits $30 again.

Desertion

This is a card that’s in some trouble, finace-wise. It was already down to like $6 because of the multiple printings. The Commander’s Arsenal version was a paltry $9, so sexier foils from a real set are going to start out around that and tank. If Desertion hits like $1, I’m a buyer for cash, though because the price should do an OK job of recovering and they always trade out well. It’s sicko in EDH and cube.

Phyrexian Arena 

This card has been printed a lot and keeps on ticking. I expect a dip and I expect people who care about the new art to pay a little more if that’s what they want. The real loser here is the foil versions from other sets which have enjoyed a lot of safety since Arena has been reprinted 3 times since 9th edition and none of those times have been foil. 9th Edition foil is the cheapest at around $50 and we could see the Apocalypse version approach that if people indeed prefer the new art foil. I would say rather than think about how much the old foils are going to be dragged down, think about how high they could get and if you can get a Conspiracy 2 foil for around $25 or $30, I think we can see there should be upside. This is a good card and EDH will always want it because it’s a great way to draw cards in black decks.

Burning Wish

Some speculative buying began to abut reality in a way that exposed the price was artificially high. This card doesn’t get played like it used to. Goofy Wish board combo decks in Legacy and Vintage aren’t as appealing when you can dummy-proof the game with cards like Past in Flames. This is a fine card, but it can’t possibly maintain above $10 with the copies we’re about to get since it was on the decline already and was barely clinging to $12. This is a $5 card soon, I think. I also think it may have upside at $5.

Hallowed Burial

This card is going to slip to a buck or two. It was played in Modern sideboards for a hot minute, including back in 2014 when everyone was all “Modern plays a copy of this in a sideboard? BUY EVERY COPY ON TCG PLAYER!” and cards like this and Fracturing Gust were $10 overnight. I think this may have upside when it gets very cheap. The thing about EDH is you can pay an extra mana for upside on your wrath effects (or more than one mana – I win games off of the back of a big Decree of Pain) and this is a good wrath variant. Modern doesn’t have to fight pod decks like it used to do this isn’t as appealing anymore but I still think this is a trade target when it craters, and it will.

That’s all of the reprints from the last day or two. The next cards will be a little murkier without anything solid to  compare them to from the first Conspiracy.

Dack Fayden peaked at $60 last time around. We could see that again if we don’t have multiple cards trying to pick up all of the slack from the whole set. A strong planeswalker would have to be quite strong indeed to compare to Dack, for example. Another card that isn’t a planeswalker would need to be played in as many formats. It’s tough to judge.

Kaya, Ghost Assassin

Kaya is not going to be $60, I fear. She is cool and EDH players are excited but I don’t think this impacts the game enough for Legacy and Vintage and Cube. The colors it’s in are awkward. If you want a WB walker in your cube, you have a dozen decent Sorin versions to choose from. This is preordering for $20 and while it could have upside at that price, I would have to be misevaluating this card AND the rest of the set so far pretty badly. If there were no other good card in the set, I could see maybe wanting this at $20 for speculation purposes, but there is one. I think $20 may be the price this settles near, but it’s hard to imagine.

Recruiter of the Guard

This is a card that could hit $60 in a world with no planeswalker in the set? Maybe? I guess it really depends on what else they reprint to soak up some of the value. This snap sold out at a $20 preorder and I think this could get closer to $50 before they are out of pre-sale copies to list.

People are comparing this to Imperial Recruiter which is wrong, but I don’t know how wrong it is. It has some distinct advantages in decks like Death and Taxes which was splashing red in some versions for Recruiter. There are a lot of decks running Recruiter but that has a lot of different roles in a lot of different decks and this doesn’t do all of them. It’s better in a D&T variant, sure. It could go in a reworked version of Aluren where you can grab Whitemane Lion or Deputy of Acquittals to get your combo going? Maybe? I don’t know, Aluren sucks and this can’t grab Lobber Crew and killing someone with Lobber Crew and Harpy is the one reason I’d play Aluren. Oh, and this new card can’t grab Painter’s Servant. So that’s a big red X in its “How does this card stack up against Imperial Recruiter?” column regarding whether it could be an affordable replacement for Recruiter in the best deck running Recruiter.

I am not super high on a non-mythic in a set with other cards in it. Let’s not forget a great deal of Recruiter’s price is predicated on its relative scarcity since it’s a P3K card. Let’s also not forget that this is a rare and Dack Fayden was a mythic. That means $20 is a more likely ceiling.

I like this card and it’s fully possible this is the best card in the set. I do, however, think the set will be structured such that this won’t need to soak up all of the value. I expect a high foil multiplier but I don’t expect the foils to be like $600 like Dack’s were unless the set is truly garbage. Oh, and like Dack, this card is super reprintable in Eternal Masters, so I’m a seller if I crack this in a draft, not a buyer.

Capital Punishment

This is a bulk rare even if it gets played in EDH, which is the only format which could conceivably play it though I’m not sure we want it.

Paliano Vanguard

Draft-specific cards end up bulk rares unless they’re cube all-stars like this isn’t.

Queen Marchesa 

The other Marchesa is $5-$6 right now. I expect this to be less popular so the ceiling on this is basically $5. There might be money to be made in the short term, but just know that this is headed to $5.50 or lower and you don’t want to be holding them when it does if you paid more than that. I don’t know how much cheaper I like this at because I don’t know how close it will get to the old Marchesa’s price. That’s a very popular commander and it’s in blue. This will not be as popular and it’s in worse colors. That all bodes poorly.

Archdemon of Paliano

I kind of don’t understand this card. It could be silly fun to draft it late in the pack where your last picks are garbage, anyway. Still, I don’t want this in cube and that’s the only thing that could save this. I’ll be padding out instant collections with copies of this forever.

Is this good enough for Legacy where the draft-specific stuff doesn’t matter and you’re left with a better Juzam Djinn? Do we care about this in a world where Tombstalker both exists and doesn’t get played all that much? Hard to know. I think this is probably bulk, but I wouldn’t be surprised if people decided this was playable in Legacy. Stranger things have happened.

Arcane Savant

This is going to be sicko in cube. I have a feeling foils of this will be something absurd like 10 or 20 times the price of the non-foil, especially if the foil ends up a bulk rare.

“Protector of the Throne”

When Protector of the Throne enters the battlefield, you become the monarch.

If damage would be dealt to you, you may instead have that damage be dealt to Protector of the Throne.

Bulk.

Custodi Lich

This is one of the best cards that makes you the Monarch, and it disincentivizes people to attack you better than any of the other Monarch-centric cards. This may get above bulk. Note that even if this is the only Monarch card in your deck, you can use this as a kill spell that also draws you cards. I think this will be above bulk.

Adriana, Captain of the Guard

To the extent that there are only a few legendary creatures ever that fewer than 10 people submitted decklists for to EDHREC.com this is playable. But that is by no means an endorsement. This is just another super boring Boros commander, it forces you to play subpar creatures if you want to stack melee triggers and it’s a non-mythic rare. I think this is headed for bulk bins and I’m not even optimistic about the foils.

“Confiscate Riches”

Sorcery
Council’s dilemma – Starting with you, each player votes Time or Money. For each player that voted Time, take an extra turn. For each player that voted Money, gain control of a permanent that player owns. Exile ~.

This is exactly what I want a 9 mana EDH sorcery to be. This is an excellent Time Stretch variant and even if you take 0 extra turns, you still get an awful lot of value from this. I’m in love.

 

Editor’s Note: Relevant financial details in blue, folks.

Wow, what a Top 8 to top off the season with. Two Hall of Fame members and a few likely future inductees make for a bracket where anything can happen as a diverse set of new decks make waves and vie for the first place trophy in Australia.

Heading into this Pro Tour many observers seemed convinced that the metagame was likely to revolve around Bant Company. Indeed this is what happened, but not in the way folks expected. With everyone gunning for the same deck, the consensus that coalesced across multiple new decks was to go big or go home.As a result we got an incredibly diverse field and a Top 8 full to the brim with eight distinct decks and a plethora of innovative brewing technology. The Top 8 competition may be the best of all time, with three Hall of Fame members, a former Player of the Year, and the current World Champion.

Our quarter-final match ladder starts as follows this evening:

• Owen Turtenwald (Temur Emerge) vs. Yuta Takahashi (Bant Company)
• LSV (Bant Company) vs. Reid Duke (GR Ramp)
• Sam Pardee (BG Delirium) vs. Andrew Brown (Temur Emerge)
• Ken Yukihiro (GR Ramp) vs. Lukas Blohon (BW Control)

To recap, here are our Top 8 deck types with their their notable main deck cards:

1. Sam Pardee (BG Delirium): 4x Grim Flayer, 2x Ishkanah, Grafwidow, 3x Tireless Tracker, 4x Traverse the Ulvenwald, 4x Liliana, the Last Hope, 4x Hissing Quagmire
2. LSV (Bant Company): 4x Collected Company, 4x Sylvan Advocate, 4x Reflector Mage, 4x Spell Queller, 2x Archangel Avacyn, 3x Tireless Tracker, 4x Selfless Spirit, 4x Dromoka’s Command, 1x Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy
3. Yuta Takahashi (Bant Company): 4x Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy, 4x Collected Company, 4x Sylvan Advocate, 4x Reflector Mage, 4x Spell Queller, 2x Archangel Avacyn, 4x Tireless Tracker, 4x Dromoka’s Command
4. Lukas Blohon (BW Control): 3x Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet, 3x Archangel Avacyn, 3x Liliana, the Last Hope, 2x Ob Nixilis, 1x Sorin Grim Nemesis
5. Ken Yukihiro (GR Ramp): 4x Hangarback Walker, 3x Ishkanah, Grafwidow, 3x Emrakul, the Promised End, 4x Traverse the Ulvenwald, 2x Chandra, Flamecaller, 3x Kozilek’s Return
6. Owen Turtenwald (Temur Emerge): 3x Emrakul, the Promised End, 3x Elder Deep-Fiend, 4x Kozilek’s Return, 1x Chandra, Flamecaller, 2x Ishkanah, Grafwidow
7. Reid Duke (GR Delirium Ramp): 2x World Breaker, 2x Dragonlord Atarka, 2x Ishkanah, Grafwidow, 2x Emrakul, the Promised End, 4x Traverse the Ulvenwald, 3x Kozilek’s Return
8. Andrew Brown (Temur Emerge): 4x Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy, 4x Matter Reshaper, 3x Elder Deep-Fiend, 4x Kozilek’s Return, 3x Shaman of the Forgotten Ways

The main deck appearance count on the hottest cards of the weekend ends up looking like this:

• 12x Traverse the Ulvenwald
• 11x Kozilek’s Return
• 9x Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy
• 9x Ishkanah, Grafwidow
• 8x Emrakul, the Promised End
• 8x Collected Company
• 8x Spell Queller
• 7x Archangel Avacyn
• 7x Liliana, the Last Hope
•  6x Elder Deep Fiend

Based on this, it’s worth taking a look at Kozilek’s Return near $10, and Liliana looks like a solid sell at current prices. 

Quarterfinals:  Owen Turtenwald (Temur Emerge) vs. Yuta Takahashi (Bant Company)

Owen and Yuta trade blows, earning a game each, before Owen takes an epic game three after casting Emrakul, the Promised End four times in the same game, and top decks a crucial Elder Deep-Fiend to dodge yet another bullet this weekend. In the final game some familiar back and forth ends in sadness for Takahashi as Emrakul ends up finishing yet another critical game this weekend.

Quarterfinals:  LSV (Bant Company) vs. Reid Duke (GR Ramp) 

LSV is up two games off camera, and seems likely to dash Reid’s hope of a Pro Tour win. Reid rallies in the third game and puts LSV on the ropes with an Emrakul, but LSV manages to beat the biggest threat of the weekend yet again to move ahead into the semi-finals and a chance at a big addition to his resume.

Quarterfinals: Sam Pardee (BG Delirium) vs. Andrew Brown (Temur Emerge)

Sam Pardee took this match while I was at dinner…sorry about that 😉

Quarterfinals: Ken Yukihiro (GR Ramp) vs. Lukas Blohon (BW Control)

The players trade two games a piece, and the players move to a deciding game. Great to see Hangarback Walker making a late mark on the format to punctuate the dominance the card held last fall. After a grindy Game 5, Blohon cleans up the board after some timely discard spells, and is able to drive home the necessary damage to take the match.

Semi-Finals Matches:

LSV (Bant Company) vs. Owen Turtenwald (Temur Emerge)

LSV is in fine form this evening, and takes Game 1 after a sick Avacyn flip to clear Owen’s board and set up an alpha strike. In Game 2, LSV presents significant early pressure without the help of Collected Company, but Owen is able to go from Elder Deep-Fiend to stabilize on into Emrakul to wreck Luis’ board and take the game. Game 3 is our first sideboarded game and LSV again presents early pressure and has the Dromoka’s Command needed to drive it home to take a 2-1 lead. In Game 4 a timely back to back casting of Kozilek’s Return via Emrakul coming into play, absolutely wrecks LSV’s attack force, and Owen is able to fade a couple of draws from his opponent to force Game 5.

In the final game, LSV stumbles on land for a turn too long, allowing Owen to dictate the tempo of the early game and drop him to just one life in short order. Luis managed to stabilize and started looking for a window to cast Subjugator Angel, tap Owen’s team and swing for a win. Instead Owen is able to force blocks with Ishkanah and the threat of Kozilek’s Return and a timely Elder Deep-Fiend puts Owen into the finals. Hats off to LSV for making his third Pro Tour Top 8 in a row, an accomplishment only matched once in Magic history.

Lukas Blohon (BW Control) vs. Sam Pardee (GB Delirium)

LSV in the booth as we watch the Liliana, the Last Hope show, with a total of seven copies between these two decks. Luis notes that he had to face Emrakul in nine of ten rounds of Standard play. Card is everywhere. In Game 1, Lukas is able to get to the Liliana zombie ultimate first, and a few turns later he claims first blood.

In Game 2, Blohon ends up with three powerful planeswalkers in play and drives home Avacyn to go up two games.

In Game 3, Lukas easily handles the early threat from Pardee, and then gets Kalitas, some zombie minions and an Avacyn onto an empty board to easily dispatch his opponent and move to a final against Owen Turtenwald.

Pro Tour Eldritch Moon Finals: Owen Turtenwald (Temur Emerge) vs. Lukas Blohon (WB Control)

Owen Turtenwald comes into this finals match an absolute juggernaut, having won Player of the Year, US National Champion and joining the Hall of Fame all in the same weekend. Now he has the chance to be the first ever Hall of Famer to win the Pro Tour where they joined the Hall. Lukas however, has been playing very tightly all weekend and seems reasonably well positioned here if he can get rid of Emrakul and his Eldrazi brethren with early discard spells or timely kill spells. Owen has won many games on the back of Kozilek’s Return flashing back from Elder Deep-Fiend or Emrakul, the Promised Hope, a game plan I’m sure he’ll be looking to lock in for the win.

Financially, we’ve seen movement on Kozilek’s Return over the last few hours up to $13 (from spring lows around $5), and Liliana and Emrakul are both holding solid price points from earlier spikes.

Game 1 sees Lukas get down an early Liliana that ticks up to her emblem unchecked as Owen gets stuck holding a grip of lands and only enough threats to swallow a few kill spells from Lukas. With Avacyn and Linvala also in play from Blohon, Owen goes down without getting a chance to engage in Eldrazi emerge shenanigans.

Game 2 sees the scene set in similar fashion with early plays from Owen, including an Emrakul, being handled efficiently by kill spells and sweepers, only to have Liliana enter play and march up toward the inevitable zombie army. Backing Liliana are once again Avacyn and Kalitas, and once the emblem kicks in, things spiral toward a 2-0 lead for Lukas, with Lukas at thirty-six life. An Emrakul almost gets Owen back in the game, but he ends up needing two strong draw steps in a row to stave off defeat and doesn’t find what he needs.

So far the dark walker looks set to hold her price for the time being, though the BW archetype didn’t do particularly well across the full tournament record.

Game 3 starts no better for Owen, as he misses his third land drop, and Infinite Obliteration hits not one, but two copies of Emrakul in Owen’s hand, along with the third one in the deck. Owen misses the land once again, and Gideon arrives to apply Pro Tour winning pressure.

Lukas Blohon takes down Pro Tour Eldritch Moon and justifies the Liliana, the Last Hope hype, and brings the set narrative to life in fantastic fashion. Emrakul, despite finishing 2nd, has posted up at the $30 plateau, providing a solid shot at $10/copy in gains after fees for those that got in closer to $12.

See you guys next time in Kaladesh!

James Chillcott is the CEO of ShelfLife.net, The Future of Collecting, Senior Partner at Advoca, a designer, adventurer, toy fanatic and an avid Magic player and collector since 1994.

Down in the golden city of Sydney, Australia the world’s best Magic: The Gathering players are coming together once more to polish off the 2015-2016 Pro Tour season.   Now, after weeks of secretive testing, the top pro teams from around the world have gathered for another epic quest to take home the trophy. With over $250,000 USD on the line, and the winner taking home a hefty $40,000, players will be hard pressed to overcome the deep pool of talent. Coming out of the first couple of weeks on the SCG circuit, the pros are forced to either run Bant Company or find the solution that can beat it consistently enough to Top 8.  Other contenders include the consistently great G/W Tokens, B/W Angel Control and even the surprising G/U Crush of Tentacles deck from last week.

The Pro Tour, of course, requires players to succeed in a mixed schedule of booster draft (EMN – EMN – SOI) and constructed play (Standard in this case) with 3 rounds of draft Friday morning Australia time, followed by 5 rounds of Standard starting around 1am EST, Friday.

For the MTG Finance community, the question of the day is which decks will rise to dominance today in a field that has been largely oriented around Collected Company and the tempo/value combo of Spell Queller and Reflector Mage. Of note, given the unique time zone of this tournament, overnight speculation has the potential to be much more successful than usual.

Will any of the pros find a way to unlock a new archetype with game against the known field? Will an underplayed deck from the previous weeks results suddenly end up perfectly positioned after adding a few new pieces of tech? Will there be a chance to get in on a must-have card that shows early promise or will the hype train leave the bandwagon speculators out in the cold without buyers come Monday morning?

Cards to Watch

With many SOI/EMN cards already commanding high price tags, most of the speculation potential lies this weekend should reside in cards that have yet to make an impact.

Here are a few of the interesting cards on our radar this weekend:

Lilianna, the Last Hope: Ready to Win?

So far several of the Eldritch Moon cards are expensive if they can’t continue to make top tables.  Liliana, the Last Hope is currently priced for success at around $40. Mostly showing up in BW Angel, BG Delerium or BGW control decks Liliana proves yet again that planeswalkers at 3cc are not to be underestimated. Often played as a 4-of, she needs to do well to hold her premium price. If several decks in the Top 8 make prominent use of this powerful lady, the potential for a short term spike over $50 could trigger a good chance to sell. If she fails to make an impact, her price could plummet back toward $25-30 in a hurry.

Current Price: $40
Predicted Price Monday: $50+
Odds to Top 8: 2 to 1

Spell Queller: Too Pricey For A Rare?

There is no doubt at all that Spell Queller is kicking serious ass in Bant Company decks alongside fellow value creatures Reflector Mage and Duskwatch Recruiter. This is however a recently printed rare and holding a price over $10 is a rare event indeed for such a card. The fact that Spell Queller may have a future in Modern certainly helps the prospects, but only the ubiquitous Collected Company has managed to hold a $15 price tag at rare for long as of late. With CoCo due to rotate in October, we are likely to face a major change up in Standard deck types, and who knows if W/U will be good at that point in the season. If you’re holding this card, hope it does very well this weekend and look to get out at the high point closer to $20 because like Hangarback Walker before it, this could easily be a powerhouse that ends up on the sidelines after rotation.

Current Price: $15
Predicted Price Monday: $20
Odds to Top 8: 1 to 2

Gisela, the Broken Blade: Catch a falling star?

B/W Angel control decks look viable, but nowhere dominant coming out of the first few weeks of Standard tournaments including Eldritch Moon. Gisela is often just a 2-of in these decks and the case for needing four copies in a consistently performing deck has yet to develop. In fact, I am hoping that the card is largely absent this weekend, so that we get a chance to get in under $10. In such a scenario, I would be looking to unload in the short to mid term before she rotates out of Standard on the premise that she eventually makes a relevant Top 8 as a 4-of. If that never develops her status as a powerful angel and the small-set, mythic half of an important collectible in the Magic community should make her an easy $20 card a couple of years down the road.

Current Price: $14
Predicted Price Monday: $14
Odds to Top 8: 2 to 3

Ishkanah, Grafwidow: Weaving a Larger Web?

So far, no one seems certain how many copies of this surprisingly powerful mythic rare they should be running. To jump from $7 to say $15, we likely need to see a build that truly optimizes her ability stabalize a board, blunt flying aggression and set up recursive graveyard shenanigans. There may also be long term EDH demand for this eight-legged queen of the webs, but I need to see strong Standard demand to get in on the action.

Current Price: $7
Predicted Price Monday: $10+
Odds to Top 8: 1 to 1

Eldritch Evolution: Did someone find a home?

Despite being one of the most hyped Eldritch Moon cards early on, Eldritch Evolution has largely failed to show up at the top tables in Standard thus far. Oddly enough, Jeff Hoogland had little trouble justifying a full four copies of the card in his 3rd place Modern deck at the SCG Classic in Baltimore last weekend, so the potential for great things is certainly there. If the card shows up in some hot new deck this weekend, a spike over $10 could follow. If it doesn’t make the top tables however, it could easily fall toward $3-4 at which point I’ll start picking these up.

Current Price: $5
Predicted Price Monday: $5

Emrakul, the Promised End: Enough Demand to Pop?

Coming into the Pro Tour Emrakul has already made some waves as a top end finisher in a few different decks, but look out this weekend to see if it can become a ubiquitous finisher in high enough demand to move the price needle. The art is awesome, and the card is powerful, so the long term prospects are good and I’m going to pick a couple of sets up to try and work both the short and long term angles here.

Current Price: $13
Monday Price: $20+

Do you have an outsider pick? Share it in the comments!

Stay tuned for Round by Round MTGFinance coverage of Pro Tour: Shadows Over Innistrad all weekend!

James Chillcott is the CEO of ShelfLife.net, The Future of Collecting, Senior Partner at Advoca, a designer, adventurer, toy fanatic and an avid Magic player and collector since 1994.