The first week or so of actual sales are in the books, and we’ve got some prices that have risen impressively. Some of these we sort of saw coming, others arrived from the clear blue sky.

Let’s get into what is what, and where they might go from here.

See Double (Low of fifty cents, now $4) 

See Double is a good card. It’s already strong at 2UU for an instant-speed clone of a creature in play. It’s also 2UU: Copy target spell, which will never ever feel bad, especially if you’re getting a sweet permanent into play. Go ahead and copy someone’s Commander! Having the flexibility to do either of these things is a big game in modern Commander games, and feels pretty great.

In the later turns, being able to do BOTH is nigh ridiculous. Cleary you’re getting a 2-for-1 on pure cards, but it’s not hard to imagine you getting a lot more. Did you copy a Time Stretch and then clone someone’s Etali, Primal Storm? Perhaps you liked that Crackle with Power enough to kill the original caster AND give yourself someone else’s Avacyn, Angel of Hope?

This is a clear case where the people have spoken and the people speaking don’t use EDHREC. See Double is only listed in 1500 decks so far, and that’s good for #40 on the list. For perspective, Hoarding Broodlord is in about 150 more decks, is the same rarity, and is half as much. Give the people their best clone spell ever!

I think See Double can hold its current price nicely. TCG will backfill copies in, seeking the low points, but this has been popular enough early enough that it’ll stay above two dollars. You might see a copy here and there for $1.99 plus shipping, feel free to believe that’s a steal.

Ancient Imperiosaur (fifty cents to $2.50) 

There are ways to make this redundantly huge. If you can tap four creatures, making this cost 1GG, then it’ll come in as a 14/14. If you get to turn four, and have five creatures, you can spend GG casting this as a 16/16 with enough mana left over to Surge-cast Reckless Bushwhacker and smash some real face. 

Ward 2 is really underestimated for Constructed play. Decks in the modern day are optimized to the millimeter, and adding a big tax like this is probably going to take a whole turn. Doesn’t matter if they have a Plains and Swamp untapped, your dino is going to live and do a lot of work, at least this turn. 

The really good news here is that Ancient Imperiosaur will sell by the playset, not by the singleton. This is another card that I think will hold its price, even as an in-print rare. There’s a lot going for it and if the deck places high in results for a week or two, it could easily be a $5 card. Keep an eye on where the price is in a few months, because this might end up being a very attractive brick target.

Faerie Mastermind ($4.50 to $11) –

If you’ve listened to MTG Fast Finance, you’ve heard James talk about this card and he’s been right. It’s a standout in Commander, easily drawing you a lot more cards than it does for other people. Right away, it was expensive and like most cards, it dropped pretty far. However, it’s rebounded up from a $5 floor and come back up to $10, which is about the limit for in-print rares unless they are mega-staples like Ledger Shredder or Fable of the Mirror-Breaker. 

The deterrent factor is real here too. People don’t like giving cards away, and Flash gives you the chance to get the card back quickly. After that, people won’t want to do things that end up giving you cards, so you get to have that hanging over their heads. I can also see this in group hug strategies, where you give something to everyone, but you get more!

There’s also a Rogues deck running around in Pioneer that’s playing this as a four-of, and when you add that to the #1 ranking from March of the Machine on EDHREC, you have a recipe for staying in the $8-$10 range. There’s a lot of copies being opened, but there’s also a lot of copies being bought. Keep in mind that this is a delightful target for stocking up on if it’s nearly to $6 in a couple months.

Invasion of Ikoria ($6 to $18 to $15)

We know tutors are good, so good that Green Sun’s Zenith is banned in Modern. Finale of Devastation is so good that it’s a $40 card, though it’s avoided reprints since its original printing in 2019. This battle is showing up in Pioneer’s Mono-Green decks in dribs and drabs, less as a combo piece and more as something to do with all the mana Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx is making for you.

Invasion of Ikoria is also very good, though its restriction of non-Humans rules out a big section of potential targets, including a target that would probably play this in Devoted Druid combo decks. This is the #3 card from MOM currently, being in just over 5000 decks. It’s pretty awesome to have a tutor put the creature into play, and then for the low price of getting six combat damage in, you get a free 8/8 with reach and sort-of-unblockable-ness. 

All that said, it’s a rare and it’s very difficult to have a rare keep a price this high in a Standard set, especially one being opened at the rate MOM is going. I think that this price is reflective of the number of people who open one and don’t sell it, putting it in a Commander deck instead. Even with the invisible hands at work, though, I expect this to come down to the $10 range over time.

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.

My favorite leak of all time has got to be the New Phyrexia Godbook being shared on IRC chat way back in the day. A new favorite of mine, though, is the YouTuber who filmed a couple of box openings for March of the Machine: Aftermath and decided to release those a couple months early.

As a result, we know a lot of the cards in the set ahead of schedule, and if you don’t like unofficial spoilers, you can read what I think and avoid specifics card images. I’m not going to post any of those, but I am going to talk about potential gainers based on the cards.

Krakens, Leviathans, Serpents, and Octopus cards – There’s a new blue-green legend that cares about these creature types, giving you a free card off the top based on the creature’s mana cost. You have to cast it from hand, but then you get a peek at some number of cards, then cast the spell for free. A pretty great deal for any circumstance, but what if there was a huge Kraken that reduced its cost for playing special lands, and could even return itself to your hand?

Step right up, Icebreaker Kraken, this might be your time to shine:

(disclaimer: I bought 101 of these at forty cents each when Runo Stromkirk was previewed. It’s up to sixty cents now!)

Really, this is everything the new Kraken commander might want, letting you look at a ton of cards, but not costing full price because of the built-in reduction. Then once you get the cast and ETB triggers, you can bounce it to your hand to be replayed when you want to do it all again.

There’s a lot of sweet Kraken, Leviathan, Octopus, or Serpent (hereafter known as KLOS) cards that could rise. Breaching Leviathan hasn’t had a reprint since its debut in C14 and if it dodges a reprint in Commander Masters, it might shoot to the moon. Quest for Ula’s Temple has already spiked hard once and could hit $10 again. Whelming Wave is probably the best card in your deck but it’s had so many printings that I don’t think it’ll rise to a good value. Spawning Kraken used to be a lot cheaper than it is, but making 9/9 tokens is an experience every player should have.

Special notice for Hullbreaker Horror, though. 

The Double Feature foil is over fifty bucks, so there’s unlikely to be huge gains made there. The FEA versions can still be had under $20, especially because this is going to rotate out of Standard in a few months. It still sees a sprinkle of Standard play, most often as a control finisher, but blue decks of any type, even KLOS, love to leave mana up for shenanigans then resolve something bonkers like this.

Moving on from KLOS cards, there’s a new Ob Nixilis who is an immediate game-ending combo with All Will Be One, with the catch that every damage dealt exiles the top card of your library. This doesn’t immediately lose you the game, as it never says ‘draw a card’ but it’s something to be aware of. We’re also going to see a certain number of pingers spike, things like Pestilence and Pyrohemia as well. Repeatable ways to deal one damage, like Shivan Gorge, the unloved child of Urza’s Saga’s five rare lands. Gaea’s Cradle, Tolarian Academy, Serra’s Sanctum, Phyrexian Tower, and then poor ol’ Gorge. Tough times.

Since it triggers off of opponents losing exactly one life, there’s a range of cards that might go haywire. Ayara, First of Locthwain or Bastion of Remembrance are good, Bontu’s Monument is already a $10 foil in uncommon. Cryptolith Fragment is possibly going to jump too, but the deeper cut is Karazikar, the Eye Tyrant, from the AFR Commander subset. Lots of fun for everyone! Ob Nixilis of the Black Oath, one of the original planeswalker-as-commanders who will also work very well in the deck.

There’s a new Karn, who cares both about having a high mana value artifact in play as well as having lots of artifacts in play. Gotta go big and wide. Myr Battlesphere comes to mind, and while that’s had twelve printings, there’s foils only from Double Masters and Scars of Mirrodin, reasonable targets both. 

Snake Basket also comes to mind as a way to take a lot of mana and make tokens, as does Hangarback Walker. Thopter Assembly is slow, but can be a fun way to do the thing you want to do. The big thing I’m thinking of, though, is a card that I can’t advocate speculating on because it cries out to be in Commander Masters: Mycosynth Golem.

It was in Fifth Dawn and it had a presence on The List for a short while, but the card is pushing $40 on the idea that there’s almost no copies in circulation somehow. This will get reprinted, and remind players all over again how busted a mechanic this truly is. I can’t say if it’ll be in a Secret Lair or Commander Masters, or when the reprint will arrive, but it’s a matter of when, not if.

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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.