Readers!

“What could today’s title possibly mean? It’s usually stupid pun, or something you don’t explain until the last paragraph,” I’m pretending you’re thinking. Well today, I’m going to rank the box toppers. The ones that are better in EDH are the ones I’m going to say I like more. Accordingly, I am going to do a stupid clickbait thing where I start with the worst one first and make you read the whole article to see what the best one is. Awww boo. You drove me to this, you have no one to blame but yourselves. Not you, personally, the collective you. Society. You as an individual are a lovely person and I’m so glad you’re reading my article.

This is part art part science. EDHREC ranks the cards by the percentage of total decks they could be in and are, but it also lists the raw number of decks. I’m going to take both of those numbers into account and do some “I have spent a lot of time thinking about EDH” math and then I’m going to determine the order. If it sounds not entirely scientific, that’s because there is subjectivity to what people are going to buy in the future, imo, and experience matters so I’m leveraging mine. Feel free to create your own ranking and post it in the comments. What’s that? It’s a lot of work and you don’t want to do a bunch of work just to argue with me? That’s what I thought. I’d love it if you did, but I get it if you don’t.

Some Questions I Think You Might Ask

Q: How are you determining the rankings?

A: I’m going to rank them by raw number rather than percentage, check the synergy score with the top 3 decks the card is in to see if it’s a format staple or a pet card in a really popular deck that people might not build forever and stop moving the cards around when the order “looks right.” It sounds goofy but this doesn’t have to be perfect since the difference between #12 and #13 doesn’t matter as much as the difference between #25 and #4 and I can’t imagine looking at lots of factors would make me flip those or something.

Q: Why are you doing this?

A: I want people who don’t play a ton of EDH to know which cards matter to EDH. The boxtoppers weren’t necessarily 100% made with EDH in mind but that doesn’t mean they don’t affect the format and people might not realize how much certain Legacy staples see play in EDH despite it being billed as a casual, bulk rare format.

Q: Yeah, but why are you doing THIS?

A: I’m trying to win “Article of the Year ” at next year’s content creator awards.

Let’s rank some cards, shall we?

40. Goblin Guide

Gobby Boy is just straight trash in EDH. 411 decks are probably playing him because there is Goblin synergy. This is a fine card and the repeated printings bringing the cost of a playset to $20 makes this an accessible deck to build in Modern, but this is the worst box-topper in terms of EDH and that’s what we’re looking at, right?

39. Meddling Mage

I’m surprised this doesn’t get played more in EDH, honestly, but that doesn’t change the fact that it doesn’t, and this is the real stinker boxtopper to get for any format. Goblin Guide is going to go out as a 4-of and make players of other formats happy, but this seems to be for no one. Humans in Modern? I don’t know.

38. Fatal Push

There are certainly formats where this card shines and EDH is not among them. A lot of people just have these from Standard and they put them in the deck because they have it, but I can’t justify playing this in EDH. This is in so many decks for as narrow as it is.

37. Thoughtseize

Damaging yourself to get 1 card from 1 hand 1 time? This isn’t an EDH card, and that’s fine.

36. Batterskull

This just isn’t that impressive in EDH. As a creature it’s pretty average and as an equipment it’s even more average. I’d be excited to open this boxtopper as a financier but I’m not keeping it unless I build a Kemba deck or something dumb like that.

35. Sword of Body and Mind

Artifacts throw off any attempt to do a standard numerical ranking. Of course any artifact is going to be super low in terms of percentage of eligible decks and super high in terms of included decks – both numbers are skewed. However, this is in a low absolute number of decks compared to the other artifacts and it’s the worst sword. It’s where it belongs. This is a bad box topper considering no other format really plays this card and EDH doesn’t want it much.

34. Sword of War and Peace

Compared to Body and Mind, this is much better, but it’s still in a pretty low number of decks. At least Body and Mind makes your creatures unblockable to the best decks, this makes your creatures unblockable by the worst decks. This sees more play outside of EDH than Body and Mind, which is to its credit, but EDH doesn’t care much outside of equipment tribal. Life gain and loss scales poorly into EDH.

33. Sword of Light and Shadow

All of the swords are just a little too fair in EDH. That said, this feels like it’s low on the list but it was hard to justify putting it any higher given the quality and good inclusion metrics of the rest of the cards. They didn’t make any truly abyssmal cards into box toppers so there will be good cards low on the list. The swords with numbers on them don’t scale as well in EDH 3 life, 1 life, mill 20. This can’t hang with Fire and Ice or Feast and Famine.

32. Karn Liberated

Karn is in a lot of decks because it can go in a lot of decks. Maybe you flip this and sword, I don’t know. It’s pretty wishy-washy in the middle but you are just starting to scroll a little faster by this point anyway, who cares?

31. Sneak Attack

There are better ways to cheat things into play and keep them. This card was also priced out of people’s collections forever, so that affected its inclusion a bit, and now that it’s cheaper, people have sort of moved on. This isn’t Legacy where you hit them with Emrakul and they can’t recover.

30. Kaalia of the Vast

You sort of have to ignore the inclusion numbers on this one. Kaalia is the #36 commander built on EDHREC in the last 2 years and it was very expensive. This maybe should be even higher on the list, especially since this is only an EDH card.

29. Council’s Judgment

This is played a lot outside of EDH but it’s still quite good in EDH. This is a very political card and can get rid of the permanent of each person’s that is annoying everyone, but one player can double up on their vote to mostly negate it, making this interesting every time. It’s a cheap card and not a great choice for box topper, but it will be a good card forever.

28-26. Tron Lands

These were included to let Modern players have more upgrade options for the lands and while it’s much better to have 12 lands in a 60 card deck, people have found some success with 3 Tron lands in a 99 card deck. These are no worse than a Wastes when you don’t have Tron and then they get quite good, even in EDH, when you assemble Tron, meaning there is no real downside to them. There are a lot of colorless commanders, hence the high inclusion numbers.

25. Blightsteel Colossus

This was basically a card for whales before because it was always over $50 and most players couldn’t afford it. Cards for whales are nice choices of cards to upgrade and this should free up some of the cheaper, non-premium copies. Not every deck wants these, but the decks that do REALLY want them. 2% doesn’t seem like a lot, but that’s 2% of all of the decks in the database. 1 in every 50 decks runs Blightsteel. That’s a lot for a card that was commanding a $50 price tag and beyond.

24. Sword of Fire and Ice

This is the second-best sword. 2 damage is pretty meh, but protection from relevant colors and drawing a card is good. I personally think this is overrated and Light and Shadow is underrated, but Fire and Ice is very expensive and desirable and the art on the box topper is insane.

23. Jace the Mind Sculptor

I have literally never once in my life had one of these played against me in EDH, but apparently 1 in every 25 Blue decks is packing this card that used to be a straight Benjamin. This is the most powerful Planeswalker ever, but you have 3 other opponents in EDH. Still, this is in a lot of decks, so who am I to argue?

22. Stoneforge Mystic

This is in the same number of decks as Jace? I should check to see how much Squadron Hawk is getting played in EDH. I should check our code to see if we’re accidentally scraping MTG Top8. A 3rd joke.

21. Blood Moon

Don’t play this card in EDH. You can, a lot of people do. But don’t.

20. Dark Confidant

Baffling. I can’t believe this many people play this card in EDH. Phyrexian Arena exists. I really can’t justify a card like this where board sweepers are played every turn and your best cards cost 5 mana.

19. Noble Hierarch

Bant is very good in EDH most of the time and 1 in every 9 Bant decks packs this card. That’s good because no one is playing Modern in paper right now and this is below $20 right now. This card needs all the help it can get. Sure glad I bought a bunch of these for like $20 each and didn’t sell in time. I mean, I kind of am glad, actually. I love this card, and we’re getting White Omanth soon.

18. Wurmcoil Engine

This is a reason to play EDH and a reason not to play Dark Confidant all in one card. Is there anything it can’t do? Teysa Karlov decks love this, Daretti decks love this. Unspecified future decks are going to love this. This is a very, very EDH card.

17. Academy Ruins

Gonna be a lot of Blue cards from here on out. Blue is the best color in Magic and it’s tied for the best color in EDH. I just bought a bunch of these box toppers because they look great and I like getting my cards back after someone blows them up.

16. Sword of Feast and Famine

This is the best sword and the second-best equipment in the set. No one would have complained if instead of making Sword of Body and Mind, they had made a Sunforger box topper instead. But hey, what do I know? I make bad decisions all the time.

15. Mox Opal

It’s not super exciting but this card is just fine in EDH, especially since metalcraft and colored mana go hand-in-hand in that format more than most others. I like this being under $50 even though that’s temporary.

14. Atraxa, Praetor’s Voice

This is the #1 commander built in the last 2 years. It’s in 2357 decks where it’s not the commander, which is nuts in and of itself. This might have been higher because it’s only for EDH but every other card in the top 13 is too good to displace.

13. Avacyn, Angel of Hope

This is in 7% of white decks with other commanders. Avacyn is insanely good in EDH and the box topper looks… well it looks like something you’d see airbrushed on the side of a van, but lots of people are into that.

12. Phyrexian Metamorph

This is in a lot of decks and for a good reason. Non-EDH players will be thrilled to crack one of these but EDH players will be especially stoked. This is a great card and while the price on the non-box topperis low from reprintings, it’s still a solid card to look at long-term.

11. Doubling Season

I remember opening this in a pack and being mad that I got casual garbage instead of a Plague Boiler. This is casual garbage but it turns out that just means that if there is ever a format full of casual garbage, something has to be the kind of the casual garbage. This is the EDHiest card of all time and I am glad I never got rid of the copies I was upset to get back in 2005.

10. Crop Rotation

This is a 1 mana tutor that puts the card you wanted into play. This is a 1 mana tutor. And it gets you any land. And it puts it into play. A 1 mana tutor that finds Nykthos or Cabal Coffers. Oh, and this was trash for like the first 5 years it was a card. Crop Rotation isn’t even in the Top 5 box toppers in this set, that’s how bonkers the rest of the set is.

9. Exploration

The regular copies of this card should not be under $20. I see no reason not to buy as many of the box toppers as you can afford, honestly. We’re about to go back to Zendikar and you can get an Exploration for under $20. The box topper is about as insulated from reprint as you can ask of a card and it looks better than this version, which itself looks fine. I’m bullish as hell on this.

8. Force of Will

This may not seem like an EDH card but it turns out you tap out a lot more as a control player when you need to keep countermagic mana up on 3 or 4 turns that aren’t yours instead of just 1. This is in 1 out of every 10 decks that play Blue and that’s half of the decks in the database.

7. Expedition Map

It turns out ways to get Cabal Coffers for 1 mana are popular, who knew? Being colorless, this can go in decks that don’t have Green making it even more versatile than Crop Rotation, a card that is, and I have to restate this, so, so good in EDH. Map gets played in non-EDH non-Legacy formats, so it has that over Crop Rotation, also. Super glad to have this as a box topper. The art isn’t that much of an improvement, though.

6. Chrome Mox

It turns out cards that are good in general are good in EDH. This gets played a ton and with good reason. It gets play outside of EDH which is good, but since EDH is basically the only format played in paper right now, strong EDH demand should be a factor you weigh heavily when selecting a box topper to invest in, and Chrome Mox ticks all of your boxes.

5. Toxic Deluge

I think in one of my articles I said this was played in Modern because I was thinking of Dead of Winter. This does NOT, in fact, see play in Modern, but it does NOT see play in Legacy because nothing sees play in Legacy. EDH demand is what is keeping this box topper from going in the trash, but there is a LOT of that. Roughly 40% of the decks on EDHREC are Black and this goes in 1 in every 8 of those. That’s a lot.

4. Mana Crypt

If you shelled out for foil copies of this when it was first reprinted and you’re upset that it’s being reprinted often, remember that the non-foils keep going back to $100 and also, the box topper is the new hotness so don’t worry so much, Moby Dick. WotC is well aware of who you are and what you’re about.

3. Brainstorm

This is a card that gets more play than it probably should, but I guess Aminatou is a thing. I think this is overrated in EDH but it’s easy to jam in a deck, it’s under a buck for most versions, it gets reprinted in EDH sets sometimes and also, it is the ugliest box topper of all time. Seriously, what were they thinking?

This is so bad. It looks like a cutscene from a 90s PC game. This is what you see when you die to the last boss in Shandalar. This is what the guy who made that Dire Straits Money for Nothing video has been up to lately. This is… Ron Spencer? OK, I’m going to let this one slide.

2. Lighting Greaves

1 in every 4 decks built by a person has a copy of Greaves. They can keep printing to get the baseline version under $5 every couple of years, but giving the whales who aren’t excited about the Judge foil something to aspire to was a great idea.

Double Masters Box Toppers: Lightning Greaves

The art even looks good. I’m all about this.

1. Cyclonic Rift

I bet a lot of you guessed this right and a lot of you guessed wrong. Rift is the best EDH card out of all of the box toppers and it’s not even remotely close. Other formats get 0 use from this card but that doesn’t matter because it’s so good in EDH that it blows every other card away. This is a pure EDH box topper and accordingly, it might be undervalued by a segment of the whale population, meaning it could have a steeper growth curve that cards people pick up for Modern. EDH is a behemoth and getting box toppers just for the format shows WotC knows it.

That’s all for me this week. I hope this informs your box topper shopping and if you want me to never do this format again, I understand. If that’s the case, leave me a comment below. Thanks for reading, everyone. Until next time!

Watchtower

20 – Post-Ban Formats, Again

August 17, 2020 David Sharman

It seems like I’m doing one of these articles every couple of months now, but until WotC sort out their card designs and stop printing stuff that needs banning, I guess I’ll keep going. Two weeks ago we had one of the biggest shake-ups across four formats (well, like three and a half; Brawl only kinda counts) that we’ve had in recent years, with Standard seeing the banning of Wilderness Reclamation, Growth Spiral, Tef3ri and Cauldron Familiar just two months before rotation. As well as that, we had Inverter, Ballista, Breach and Kethis banned in Pioneer, Reclamation and Tef3ri suspended in Historic and Tef3ri also banned in Brawl.

In terms of #mtgfinance, only one of those formats is likely relevant here, so let’s take a look at where Brawl is headed after this round of bans…

Just kidding, we’re obviously here for Pioneer. Having pretty much completely ignored the format in the last set of bans, it seems like Wizards have finally listened to peoples’ pleas and sorted Pioneer out. The takeaway from these bans is probably that Wizards don’t want Pioneer to be a combo format, as they’ve axed the three big combos and taken out Kethis just for good measure.

Niv-Mizzet Reborn (Foil)

Price today: $15
Possible price: $30

Now that Pioneer looks to be headed towards being a big midrange format, players have been very excited to get their Niv-Mizzets back out. The combo decks like Inverter and Breach really pushed these kinds of value-based decks out of the format for a while, and although people were still playing it, it wasn’t necessarily well positioned. With those gone, however, it’s time to cast 5 colour spells on turn 7 again, and there’s nothing Magic players love more than being able to throw a bunch of random 1-of spells in their deck with the justification that they need something of that guild’s colour to draw with Niv.

I’m sure foil Niv has been called out as a spec before, probably on the podcast, but I think it’s in a better position than ever right now. There are only 21 vendors with copies on TCGPlayer, and only another 8 with prerelease versions. WAR was a very popular set, but this is still a foil mythic so supply isn’t going to be too deep.

The ramp on this one is steep so if you want any personal copies then go get them right now, because they’ll be $20 before you can blink. Give it 6 months and if this deck is still popular in Pioneer, I can see these hitting $30 easily. It’s also the 2nd most popular commander from the set by quite a margin, which is pretty impressive for a five colour card!

An additional tip on this one is to look at some of the foil Japanese copies on TCGPlayer, because there are some that are significantly cheaper than the English copies, which is bound to be incorrect down the road. They’ll be from JPN WAR boxes that people have cracked looking for alternate art planeswalkers, so snag those deals whilst you can.

Agent of Treachery (Foil)

Price today: $8
Possible price: $20

Another deck that’s shot back up in popularity is the Yorion/Fires/Lukka/Agent whatever you want to call it deck. It’s kind of a Jeskai control deck, but it also tries to cheat out an Agent of Treachery as quickly as possible by making tokens and then using Lukka to turn it into an Agent. Doing that on turn 5 and stealing your opponent’s biggest threat, or even a land if they’re also a control deck, is pretty sweet.

Generally these lists will be playing full suites of Narset (can I say Nars3t because the deck sometimes plays the 4 mana one too?), Tef3ri and Lukka, and some are even packing as many as 18(!) planeswalkers into the deck! Superfriends aside, these decks are all playing three or four Agent of Treachery, obviously an integral part of the list. It’s a card that was powerful enough to get banned in Standard, and Pioneer is definitely closer to Standard+ rather than Modern Lite, so the power levels are relatively comparable.

Foil Agents have had a rocky ride up and down, but can now be had as low as $8 on TGCPlayer. The ramp up isn’t all that shallow, so these cheaper copies seem like a sure thing to hit $15 before long, and on to $20 given 12 months or less. It’s worth noting, as usual, that it’s in a reasonable number of EDH decks too – 7.5k – and sits in the top 10 cards from M20 as the most popular blue card *scowls at Deadeye Navigator*.

Eldritch Evolution (Foil)

Price today: $9
Possible price: $18

Rounding things off today, I’m taking a look at the Naya Winota lists tearing up the Pioneer metagame at the moment. Ok, maybe not totally tearing it up, but definitely doing pretty well. From what I’ve seen of this deck in action, it’s quite a high variance deck but when things go right, it’s insane. Your opponent can just die out of nowhere on turn 4 after you play a Winota, and that’s kinda busted if you ask me.

The aim of the game is to get your Goblin Rabblemasters and Legion Warbosses making tokens to attack, and use the Winota trigger to find an Angrath’s Marauders or two to hit your opponent really really really hard. One of the key pieces of the deck is Eldritch Evolution, which can mean you have a Winota in play on turn 3 quite consistently, and if you’re sacrificing a Voice of Resurgence to the Evolution then you’ll even have a decent body left behind to attack with the next turn as well.

Eldritch Evolution is again a card that’s been talked about a fair bit before now, but foils are in really short supply now. We had a non-foil reprint in the Mystery Boosters, but foils haven’t been seen since the original printing in Eldritch Moon. Starting at $9 on TCGPlayer, there are only 19 vendors with copies, with another 6 for the prerelease version. This deck can only get more consistent and/or powerful over time, and I am of course obligated to mention that this is also a card in 13k EDH decks, which is a very nice backup to have. Seeing as we got the Mystery Booster printing I don’t think we’ll see this card printed again for a little while, so I think you’re good to ride this up for at least the next 12 months.

David Sharman (@accidentprune on Twitter) has been playing Magic since 2013, dabbling in almost all formats but with a main focus on Modern, EDH and Pioneer. Based in the UK and a new writer for MTGPrice in 2020, he’s an active MTG finance speculator specialising in cross-border arbitrage.

Casual Fridays

The Worth of a Symbol

August 14, 2020 Cliff Daigle

With Double Masters lighting up our world and about three weeks to go until Zendikar Rising previews, I want to take a breath and think about Mystery Booster cards. Not just the Convention playtest cards, since people have gone crazy on the high end of those, but the foils that barely had a chance to shine. Some of these are very nicely priced compared to their original, and price gaps are worth examining.

Scourge of the Throne ($9 for MB foil vs. $75 for Conspiracy foil) – I originally stumbled across this price gap when I was looking for a foil version of this card for my Ur-Dragon deck, and my jaw dropped. Sure, original Conspiracy was forever ago and this is a foil mythic from a tiny set, but my goodness. I respect anyone who wants to get the original, but I’m pretty content to pick up the new foil, and a few extras. There’s 100+ NM foils for the MB version, but less than ten for the foils from Conspiracy. I don’t think anyone will lower their CNS prices, for the record. Mythic dragons will always have my attention, especially in foil when there’s no EA to chase. One of the best pickups right now.

Minamo, School at Water’s Edge ($8 MBF vs. $70 for Champions of Kamigawa foil) – Seven thousand Commander decks, and that likely should be higher. It’s an almost-no-cost upgrade over an island to give your Commander vigilance when you want it, and is capable of a whole lot more. It’s not just a legendary permanent you control, you can give the gift of an untap when needed too. This is far too large a price gap to hold forever, and represent a wonderful long-term spec.

Karrthus, Tyrant of Jund ($13 for Double Masters foil vs. $45 for Alara Reborn foil) – It’s no $60 gap but it’s a big gap for a sweet sweet Dragon. Kaarthus’s price has come down a lot since the beginning of the year, but it’s still a notable gap. It’s nice to have the haste enabler, but stealing the Dragons at the table can be amazing game in Commander. For comparison’s sake, Maelstrom Nexus has a similar gap in foil, from $5 to $27.

Boreal Druid ($2 MBF vs. $22 Coldsnap foil) – Snow mana is a big deal, especially now that we have some awesome accessories for snow shenanigans in Commander. Having early snow mana means a lot, in the face of the Astrolabe ban it’s a winner in most decks. There’s a limited number of one-mana accelerators, and this shows up in a lot of cubes just for this reason. Herald of Leshrac, a rare from the same set, has a $1/$13 split, if you need a reference for how commonly Boreal Druid is used.

Intruder Alarm ($6 MBF vs. $60 8th edition foil) – I think the original Stronghold art is superior, but your choice is a binary one if you’re looking for a foil. The question is, do you want to combo off with a $50 price gap? This is especially appealing due to the combo implications. This tends to spike when sweet legends come out, or a new Commander combo is unlocked. Now you can get the cheapest version possible in the face of the next spike.

Reki, the History of Kamigawa ($3 MBF vs. $34 Saviors of Kamigawa) – Reki isn’t used extensively in Commander, but there are Legendary-themed decks that love this effect. I especially love cast triggers, and this is cheap enough to cast and then follow-up with a legend.

Gilder Bairn ($1 MBF vs. $20 for Shadowmoor) – This is only in about 1000 Commander decks online, but the effect is one of the only ways to double up on any permanent. A lot of effects since then won’t touch planeswalkers (Vorel of the Hull Clade) and that’s why this uncommon is $20. Remember that the Mystery Booster collation comes from whole sheets of 121 cards, so the Bairn is as likely to be in a pack as Scourge of the Throne. The printed rarity doesn’t matter: you’re getting one in every 121 packs (slightly over 5 boxes). Yes, there’s 100 copies on TCG right now, but we’re not opening any more Mystery Retail. Who wants to draft that when there’s Double Masters, or Zendikar 3, or some other set yet to be released?

Teferi’s Puzzle Box ($7 MBF vs. $200 7th foil vs. $34 8th foil vs. $63 9th foil) – Speaking of combo enablers, there’s been a lot of stuff that works really well with the Box, things like Nekusar, the Mindrazer. Every time, these get a little more pricey. The original in Visions can’t have a foil, and now you can buy in at the cheapest version. It’s also the most common one, but with only 137 vendors and none with a huge amount, there’s a lot of room to grow. It’s the same art as the 8th Edition foil, so that’s your price comparison.

Braid of Fire ($8 MBF vs. $40 Coldsnap foil) – Finally, let’s look at a card that spiked towards the end of last year and then came back down. Remember, when this came out, mana burn was a thing and you could suffer for having this. Now there’s no drawback, you just need someplace to put the mana. I have confidence in the abilities of Commander players to pull this off, especially with less vendors for this card than the others on this list when looking at TCG. The regular nonfoil is $11, and that’s all due to being in a weird third set that came out during a totally different block.

Cliff (@WordOfCommander) has been writing for MTGPrice since 2013, and is an eager Commander player, Draft enthusiast, and Cube fanatic. A high school science teacher by day, he’s also the official substitute teacher of the MTG Fast Finance podcast. If you’re ever at a GP and you see a giant flashing ‘CUBE DRAFT’ sign, go over, say hi, and be ready to draft.

MTGO

Understanding MTGO treasure chests

August 13, 2020 James Chillcott

By: Oko Assassin

Studying MTGO Treasure Chests (TCs) is essential to understanding the overall Magic Online economy. Beyond drafting, TCs are the primary method of inserting new supply into MTGO. For non-drafting sets, like Commander and Jumpstart, TCs are often the only mechanism that WOTC uses to distribute new cards into the MTGO economy because these products are not available for direct purchase on MTGO.

While TCs are important, understanding them is easier said than done. The contents of TCs are quite complicated and change periodically, every 1-3 months. This article aims to empower you to understand current and future versions of the TCs, their likely impact on MTGO, and how you can fund your play and/or profit from future TC updates!

Treasure Chest Origins

TCs were implemented in 2016. At that time, and for many years after, TCs were viewed as a product that would ultimately destroy MTGO. As background, I encourage readers to check out this 2018 CFB analysis of TCs dramatic impact on MTGO. Prior to TCs, the MTGO economy was more like the paper magic market, where out-of-print assets reliably increased in value over time until reprinted. After TCs, the MTGO economy started to collapse because of the new influx of supply combined with negative perceptions leading to a shrinking player base, especially after the launch of MTG Arena spooked folks into thinking MTGO was doomed.

Fast forward to today and the MTGO economy has rebounded to some extent. The current value of a playset of every single MTGO card is $26,575 as of July 2020, which is similar to 2016 when TCs were first implemented. As recently as June 2019 this figure was less than $15,000. This recent stabilization is driven by several factors, including COVID-19 driving demand for digital products, the creation of Pioneer as a new format not yet available on Arena, and the continuing popularity of other eternal formats that are also exclusive to MTGO in digital. Predictions of doom and gloom for MTGO seem to be behind us, for now.

Treasure Chests Contents

The current contents of TCs are located here, and are updated every 1-3 months. Overall, TCs contain:

Play Points
A random Modern Legal Rare or Mythic
“Curated” cards, which are selected for inclusion on a rotating basis
Jumpstart and Commander 2020 cards
Avatars (which are financially irrelevant)

Play Points: Roughly half of the value of TCs is derived from Play Points. The exact percentage can be found here on Goatbots Expected Value (EV) Calculator. Due to this, the only way to profitably open up TCs is through needing Play Points to enter MTGO events, which means vendors are unwilling to crack TCs to access the cards inside. As a result, the TC market is relatively inefficient, with the EV often becoming higher than costs of chests, sometimes by a large margin.

Random Modern Rare or Mythic: In most TCs, one random Rare or Mythic from a Modern format legal set will be included. Specifically, you have 68% odds of getting at least one random Rare or Mythic, and 12.0% chance of getting two. Rares are twice as likely as Mythics. Often this slot translates into a random card you have never heard of and is worth nothing. But sometimes you will hit a Force of Negation worth a stack of tickets! The odds of hitting any specific rare is .013%, meaning you would have to open 7,692 TCs to get a specific rare on average. It is easier to get any given Mythic at .030% (or 3,333 TCs), because Mythics have such a smaller card pool. These numbers are subject to change overtime as new sets are added and the formula evolves. Overall, this slot slowly injects a consistent supply of Modern legal Rares and Mythics into the MTGO economy, even if those cards are not on the curated card list.

“Curated” Cards: In one quarter of TCs, you will get a card from a hand-selected list that is typically valuable. Specifically, you have around 24% odds of getting at least one curated card, and 1% chance of getting two. The current list of curated cards is available here, along with details of the most recent TC changes. Each curated item has a specific drop rate associated with it. The higher the drop rate, the more likely an item is to show up. Drop rates currently range from 1-50.

To determine the likelihood of any specific curated cards, you must divide the specific drop rate by the combined drop rate of all curated items (the denominator), which is currently 4,278, then multiply by the likelihood of getting this specific drop (25%). As a mathematical formula it looks like this: =1/((6/4,278)*0.25).

For cards with a drop rate of 6, you will have to open 2,852 TCs on average to get a copy. For a drop rate of 12, this decreases to 1,426. For a 50 drop rate, it is 342 TCs.

Overall, I recommend always checking whether a card is included in the curated TCs list – and at what drop rate – prior to speculating or purchasing any MTGO card.

New! Jumpstart and Commander 2020

TCs are the only method of inserting most non-draftable MTGO products into the online economy. For better or worse, players cannot buy a Commander deck in the MTGO store. To ensure there is enough supply of these specialty products Wizards recently added a new slot in the TCs specifically dedicated to Commander 2020 (C20) and Jumpstart (JMP) cards.

This slot was created following a failed effort to leverage the curated slot for this purpose, without success. Prior to this change, a full set of JMP was valued at over 500 tickets and C20 at over 600 tickets. This change created a huge influx of new supply and only two short weeks later, the prices on either set had plummeted to under 200 tickets. I expect future Commander and other specialty products to use this slot as well.

In TCs you have a 35% chance of getting a JMP/C20 card. The current card list and drop rate for this slot is available here. Similar to the curated slot, to determine the likelihood of any specific curated cards, you must divide the specific drop rate by the combined drop rate of all C20/JMP items (the denominator), which is currently 1,146, then multiply by the likelihood of getting this specific drop (35%). As a mathematical formula it looks like this: =1/((6/1146)*0.35).

If a C20/JMP card has a drop rate of 6, you will have to open 545 TCs on average to get a copy. For a drop rate of 12, this would decrease to 272. This is a roughly 10x increase in new supply compared to the old TC formulation for JMP & C20.

Treasure Chest Updates Impact on MTGO Economy

Updates to the TCs curated list can quickly and dramatically move the MTGO economy. I have already discussed how the value of entire sets dropped by 66% over only two weeks due to a TC update with JMP/C20. This price movement was driven by additional supply of a low supply set entering the market.

The reverse also occurs. Take for example when the Power Nine from Vintage Masters was removed from the TCs. Here you can see the iconic Black Lotus more than double in price as soon as the changes were announced. The price eventually retraced as speculators sold out, but for those who timed it right, profit was made.

Overall, any card included on the curated card list, C20/JMP, or to a lesser extent any modern era Rare/Mythic will slowly have new supply enter the MTGO economy. If the new supply is not too great, or the demand is enough to overcome the new supply, this is not a problem. That said cards included on the curated card list, especially at a drop rate of 12 or higher, will often see their price decrease slowly over time. I recommend steering clear of speculating on any card that has a drop rate of 12 or higher unless the factors truly warrant it and you are acting on a very short timeline.

How Many Treasure Chests Get Opened?

Only WOTC truly knows. Yet some recent Jumpstart data gives some indications. Without going into all the math, it seemed as though at least 40,000 TCs were opened in this single week based on JMP TC drop rates at the time. That’s a lot of TCs!

Goatbots, a major vendor who was in the past position to know, recently estimated that 10,000 chests were being opened daily during this time period. Although this was a blockbuster time-period for TCs, causing an abnormal amount to be opened, this new data highlights the large volume of new cards that must be pumped into the MTGO economy each week!

Future Applications

Understanding how TCs work and their impact on the MTGO economy will make you better at buying and selling cards on MTGO. At a bare minimum, you should check whether a card is included in the TC curated list before speculating on any card moving forward. Though we have covered the fundamentals here, you should also regularly review the curated card list to better understand this key factor in the movement of the MTGO economy.

To make a quick profit, consider monitoring for TC updates and acting on fresh changes. Specifically, you should sell cards that become much more common in TCs curated list and buy cards that become less common. It takes some experience to know exactly what changes to look out for. To be successful, you must act quickly! Price changes based on TC updates start happening within minutes and the latest solid entry point is typically one hour or less from the TC change announcement. MTGO signals their upcoming TC updates weeks in advance for those watching closely enough, but they never say the specific time/date. Sometimes you can find hints on this MTGO website, but the best way to stay in the loop is to join the MTG Price Pro Trader Discord, which explodes into chatter as soon as TC updates are posted.

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