Around here, we do a lot of discussion for what to buy while it’s cheap so that you can resell it when it’s expensive. This is really the core principle of any commodity: Buy low, sell high.
Magic cards are a tricky asset though. They have a retail value, but it’s nigh impossible for individuals to obtain retail prices on cards.
Today, I want to look at the core concept of how to move cards after they’ve increased in value, and the pros/cons of each. I’m not a high-volume TCGPlayer seller, I’ll let others who move more cards there expound upon that system at higher tiers.
By next week, we’ll have a lot of War of the Spark previews and some cards will have gone crazy…
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Cliff ( @WordOfCommander ) has been writing for MTGPrice for five years now, 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.
As we creep closer to War of the Spark, more and more planeswalker-adjacent cards gain attention. Deploy the Gatewatch was one of the first, and more recently, Oath of Teferi followed suit. I fully expect that we’ll see continued picking off of these types of cards leading up to the official spoilers, and once those begin, there will be an even greater movement across the market, as the level two players — people that watch the spoilers, but aren’t quite tuned in enough to see the writing on the wall before WotC makes it official — begin picking up assorted pieces. In the meantime, we’re spending more time browsing EDH, the format that keeps on giving. And let me tell you fellow friends, it doesn’t get much easier than this week.
Mirrorpool (Foil)
Price Today: $7-8 Possible Price: $18
I’m starting with Mirrorpool this week, but all three cards on the list are basically the same deal. Each is a powerful land that slots into a wide variety of EDH decks. Each manages to pack a great deal of impact into a single land slot, which is especially valuable, as the spell package in any given deck is always tight.
Mirrorpool is a one-shot Riku, for all purposes. It will double a single spell effect, or create a copy of a creature token. Casting a Time Stretch? You’re a monster, but you may as well lean into it and Mirrorpool it. Or maybe you’ll mirror the kicked Rite of Replication, or whatever the cool spell is these days at your local store. On the bottom half you can create copies of your own creature, for when you need another Diluvian Primordial (which will then cast your opponent’s Rite of Replication out of their graveyard, which you’ll use to target your Diluvian Primordial, which will then cast a Life from the Loam out of your opponent’s graveyard, returning your Mirrorpool to your hand, which…).
At 6,200 EDH decks, Mirrorpool has a reasonable presence in the format. It’s not as high as it could be, but if it were 12k or 15k, the foils wouldn’t still be $7. What makes me so confident in telling you to check out Mirrorpool is the supply — 8 vendors of NM pack foils, for a combined total of 17 total copies. There’s roughly as many prerelease foils, which start about a dollar cheaper.
Alchemist’s Refuge (Foil)
Price Today: $9 Possible Price: $20
Landing in twice as many decks as Mirrorpool is Alchemist’s Refuge, the — I guess it’s old, sheesh — flashland from Avacyn Restored. Somehow never having been reprinted, Refuge is intended to be a fixed Winding Canyons. (A card which is certainly not in enough EDH decks for its effect, at a relatively accessible $20, which leads me to believe it suffers from the Marton Stromgald problem, in that it’s an absurd card people simply don’t realize exist.) Giving all of your creatures flash lets you do some obnoxious stuff, whether it’s dropping answers to an invading force, tossing out a Sunblast Angel after attackers have been assigned, using one of a variety of creatures to cast the Time Stop in your hand at instant speed, or “only” dropping your threats for the turn at the end of turn of the opponent that acts before you, giving your bodies virtual haste, and not exposing them to sorceries for a turn rotation.
Refuge has a potent effect that is found on one of the most resilient and difficult to answer card types in EDH. It slots into any deck with blue and green, the two most popular colors in EDH. And it comes into play untapped, making its inclusion a low opportunity cost. My only complaint is that its from Avacyn Restored, a set with notoriously bad foils. A tip on that — some foreign language AVR cards were printed with a different foiling process, making them preferable over English copies.
There’s a grand total of 22 copies on TCG right now, with half of them in the hands of one vendor, and several well over $10. Shouldn’t be long before we’re looking at $20s on these bad boys.
Geier Reach Sanitarium (Foil)
Price Today: $7 Possible Price: $20
I’ve got a curious one to wrap up with this week. Sanitarium is in 11,500 decks, just short of Alchemist’s Refuge. Of course, it’s from Eldritch Moon, not Avacyn Restored, which means it’s four years newer. The text of the card is unassuming; each player draws and then discards a card. While that isn’t as immediately impactful as Mirrorpool or Alchemist’s Refuge, it’s phenomenal utility on a land. Repeated card draw that isn’t easy to target? Heck yes. That you can untap with Seedborn Muse or Frantic Search? Heck yes. That lets you bin cards you want to reanimate or dredge or cast out of the graveyard? Heckin yes.
Sanitarium has, as best as I can tell, a whopping ten copies on TCG right now, with a small smattering across other internet vendors. Here’s where it gets curious. The beginning of this month, prices jumped from $3.50 or so up to the $7 it will cost you to get in today. The market price hasn’t made it above $4 yet either. ABU, CFB, SCG — all basically empty, aside from a random $8 here or there. This smells like a buyout to me, and it hasn’t gotten anyone to take the bait yet.
That said, it doesn’t inherently mean that copies at $7 are a bad idea. If the market will pay a higher price, then it will pay it. My biggest concern would be that there could be a healthy supply hiding in the wings, waiting for copies to crest $10 before they start getting unloaded. Proceed with caution, but keep it on your radar. [/hide]
Travis Allen has been playing Magic: The Gathering since 1994, mostly in upstate New York. Ever since his first FNM he’s been trying to make playing Magic cheaper, and he first brought his perspective to MTGPrice in 2012. You can find his articles there weekly, as well as on the podcast MTG Fast Finance.
Over the last couple of years Masterpiece Inventions have allowed players, speculators and vendors to go back to the well at least a few times. Travis and I first noticed an arbitrage opportunity on the Masterpiece Inventions in late 2016. Due primarily to differences in EDH adoption in Europe vs. North America, the already too cheap Inventions were often selling for another 30-50% less than copies in the US or Canada.
As it so happened, I was looking to cash out of my $20k in Magic Online specs at the time, justifiably spooked by the early news on Magic Arena and needed a solid strategy for reinvestment. My thesis was dual-pronged: first that Inventions were largely EDH relevant and likely to be too cheap overseas and secondly, that they would sell better as $300 singles than Expeditions would as $800-1200 sets.
From Dec 2016 to June 2017, I was snapping up $70-100 MPS Sol Rings, Mana Crypts and Mana Vaults, $40 Paradox Engines, Rings of Brighthearth and Extraplanar Lens, etc, etc. As it became obvious to everyone that the Inventions were a smash hit, vendors and speculators started taking a harder look at Expeditions and (eventually) Invocations, driving boom/bust cycles on all of the Masterpieces that have result in generally higher plateaus and some noteable retraces. Turns out, that move was an important cornerstone of my action for the next 18 months, and I’m still not finished selling up the ramp. Truly a gift that keeps on giving.
Fast forward to spring 2019 and many of the Inventions are demonstrating relative price stability. Just last week MPS Paradox Engine tipped up over $150, representing potential 300% gains before fees for folks who were in on that in the earliest days. MPS Sol Rings sell consistently near $300, and will likely hit $500 down the road, but a couple of new factors have me looking at some of the middle tier Masterpieces, wondering where they might land in 6-12 months or less.
The first factor is that a combination of dwindling Kaladesh booster box supply on the open market, and steady demand for the Inventions is draining inventory levels on some cards to the point again where they look like they could show real growth at their next tipping point. The second factor is the announcement of Modern Horizons. What does a Modern focused set have to do with the Inventions, you ask? Well, the thing about Modern Horizons is that it draws a very clear line in the sand on what can’t be reprinted in the next six months or so, removing any lingering doubt for as to whether they we might get a chance at a new premium version in the near future. Certainty of draining supply = sales.
On that basis, let’s take a look at a handful of Masterpieces that could easily see price motion in 2019:
Extraplanar Lens Current Price: $60-65 2019 Target: $90
Extraplanar Lens was underestimated in the extreme during the first few rounds of the Masterpiece feeding frenzy. Originally available overseas close to $30, and in the US around $40, the Lens has shown slow steady gains on the back of relatively strong usage in mono-color EDH decks where it can go to work abusing the mana doubling of your plentiful basic lands. At present Extraplanar Lens has one of the lowest inventory levels on TCGPlayer, and they are increasingly hard to find near $60, with a solid ramp pointing to imminent gains. I see no reason not to snap up a couple of these given that buylists are already backing the play over $60.
Chalice of the Void Current Price: $170-180 2019 Target: $225
Here we have a Modern staple that is increasingly relevant in a format that is looking to abuse the casting of multiple cheap spells per turn. Chalice is also typically played as a 4 of and has relevant in Legacy and Vintage as well. As with Lens, the ramp is steep and the inventory is shallow, so while the gains aren’t the highest possible by %, the odds that this joins the rest of the elite $250+ MPS cards in the near future seem good.
Aether Vial Current Price: $160-170 2019 Target: $225
Given the near constant presence of this card as a 4-of staple in both Modern and Legacy, I’m a bit surprised that it hasn’t already pushed $250+. Part of the issue is likely that the decks that are most often using Vial are not at the top of the heap in Modern so long as Dredge and Phoenix reign supreme. That being said, if you believe that the Modern meta is due for a shakeup, either via the banning of Faithless Looting and/or Ancient Stirrings, or through some fresh hotness from the forthcoming Modern Horizons set, there is a decent chance that Aether Vial decks stand to gain from the coming sea shift. Regardless of how it gets there, I’ll be very surprised to see this card ride out the year under $200. The inventory is moderate here, but they do tend to get bought in 4s, so that’s worth consideration.
Sword of Feast & Famine Current Price: $160-170 2019 Target: $225
Sword of Feast & Famine is the most popular of the original sword series for EDH purposes, with nearly 19,000 decks registered on EDHREC.com. Some MTGPrice Pro Traders have been theory crafting that Modern Horizons could include the printing of the five swords with the missing color pairs. This could be enough to get people to clean out the very, very low supply of this card, and from a collector perspective I don’t think you want to be sleeping on this card any longer.
Wurmcoil Engine Current Price: $150 2019 Target: $200
Wurmcoil Engine is a staple in EDH (16k decks+ on EDHREC) and consistently played in Tron in Modern, as well as being a cube staple. Inventory is very low in the US, and this one seems like a straight shot at adding some value in the next six months.
Chrome Mox Current Price: $100 2019 Target: $160
Chrome Mox is registered in 14k+ EDH decks on EDHREC.com despite a relatively shallow past of set printings (Mirrodin + Eternal Masters). That’s a solid display of demand for a gorgeous mana rock that still be had for close to $100 on dwindling supply and a very steep ramp. Further, I don’t see WoTC prioritizing a reprint any time soon.
Rings of Brighthearth Current Price: $110 2019 Target: $160
If you’re looking to pick up an Invention with reach, you can do a lot worse than picking one that is about to undergo a serious boost in demand as War of the Spark makes doubling Planeswalker abilities a very sexy ability indeed. This card makes every build of Atraxa Superfriends already, supply is low and I smell a winner.
Chromatic Lantern Current Price: $95 2019 Target: $140
Oh, how many EDH decks is this in? (Spits coffee out!) 63K! Sure, this card just caught a reprint in Guilds of Ravnica and there are plenty of copies floating around, but that just means the odds of a fresh version in the next couple of years just dropped through the floor. Never out of fashion in a format full of greedy color requirements, the inventory on this Invention is only moderately low near $100, but this pushing closer to $150 is a question of when, not if in my books. Not an immediate priority, but zero reason to hold off as a collector and an excellent target for a good coupon.
So there you have it, my current picks for solid Invention specs. What’s on your radar? Did I miss anything? Catch you next time.
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.
I’ve played a lot of Magic Online. There was a two-year period, from about 2007 to 2009, when I could only play online, as there was no good card shop near to me. Even after repeated culling of the collection, I’ve got something like 50k cards online that I’ll never be able to use in person.
I’m all too familiar with the financial model of MTGO, where you buy digital packs for the same price as paper packs, because there’s a time period when you’re able to collect a whole set and then redeem it online. Some card shops/vendors exist off of that model alone, managing their ticket inventories and buying sets online for the sole purpose of redemption.
I’ve pretty much stopped playing on MTGO, except for Momir Basic, a format that speaks directly to who I am as a gamer. Random, swingy, with just enough skill.
With all of that said, I can’t believe what I’m about to say: Magic Arena is phenomenal value, and let me explain why.
I have been resistant to Arena pretty much from the beginning, dismissive of the weird shapes, unnecessary animations, and apparently frenetic pace of games. I like watching drafts on MTGO; couldn’t stand it if that event was Arena.
That changed a few weeks ago when the Omniscience Drafts were held for a couple of days. Arena’s able to fire off short-term format variants, and those can spike interest from players who aren’t otherwise interested, like me. OmniDraft offered a combination of two things: Dominaria, a set I had done well with and knew the card pool well, and the potential for doing a lot of broken things very quickly.
So I decided I’d try.
I downloaded it, picked a username, sat through the tutorial so I’d understand what was popping up, and bought the Welcome Bundle of 2500 gems and five packs for $4.99.
Having been trained on MTGO, I thought packs I won/bought would be used for drafting, and part of going infinite, but nope. (More on that in a sec.)
The OmniDrafts were 750 gems and my first one went well, but I got crushed a lot and some on the first turn, an experience I dearly wanted to give others. I did some research, reviewed some strategies, and went on a tear.
By the end of the event, I’d done eight drafts, I had 3000 gems, and a couple dozen packs.
More importantly, I’d gotten a whole lot of hours of fun for a mere $5, and I had a collection with some excellent Dominaria cards to start me off.
Now, let’s pause here and reflect on what I’ve spent and what I’ve gotten, but most important, what I’ve discovered.
I’ve said repeatedly that there’s no better ratio of money to amount of enjoyment than Cube drafting, and I stand by that statement. It’s a fantastic investment, and depending on the format and your willingness to print out a picture of a card and slide it on top of a land, can be exceedingly inexpensive.
Arena is in the ballpark for me, and I’m quite impressed.
Since that weekend, I’ve done three more RNA drafts and I have to say that they offer delightful flexibility on timing. I can do the draft, choose all my cards, and then not play for two days if my schedule doesn’t allow it. That’s a level of convenience that I’ve never experienced before.
I love drafting. I’ve been doing it long enough that I’m rarely going to draft a clunking monstrosity of a deck, and I can usually squeeze a couple of wins out of a deck. That’s helped me not have to spend more money so far, but what I’m finding is that I’m interested in playing Standard for the first time in a long time.
I’ve written before about the Gates deck, and the existence of such a good deck that has such a minor cost in paper Magic. Hydroid Krasis is a nice touch for a ramp deck, and a couple of those are as expensive as the rest of the deck.
No, I’m not going this janky, but I’d think about it if it were possible.
On Arena, every card of the same rarity level is worth the same, and this is blowing my mind. I did well in an RNA draft with a Gates deck, and then immediately moved it to Standard. I added a couple of wildcards, and boom, I’ve got a mid-tier deck that I enjoy playing and is helping me win. I’m not cleaning up in events, but my goal is to grind some free-to-play action, get more gold, which I’ll use to enter drafts.
I had really low expectations for Arena, having been trained to the mediocrity of MTGO, but I’m a convert now.
I haven’t yet had to buy packs, and I’m not hardcore enough to try and grind up to a tier deck in Standard, but I am having a delightful time playing Magic at home, and that’s an experience I haven’t had in a while.
One thing I didn’t notice until I played Arena: there’s a lot of downtime in games, and Arena games just go faster. It’s difficult for me to put a finger on exactly why. Is it the auto-tapping and triggers that have just one target? There’s less clicking than in MTGO, that’s for sure. Is it the fuse-timer system? Is it something else? I’m not sure but my goodness it’s noticeable.
This is a lot to say but here’s the most important thing: Arena is a good enough program and ecosystem to win me over, and I was a skeptic. I didn’t think it was possible to have a good Magic game online, and now, I’m impressed.
It’s worth noting that this is still in Open Beta mode. There’s ideas and functions they haven’t gotten to, ideas they are tweaking. Most notably, the game was built on Unity, an engine that allows for cross-platform gaming. That means not only will there eventually be a version for Mac, something MTGO hasn’t had in its 17 years, but a mobile version seems quite likely too.
Good Magic games on my phone would be both very good and very bad for me. I sense screen time limits coming!
Cliff ( @WordOfCommander ) has been writing for MTGPrice for five years now, 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.
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