Jason Alt

Unlocked Pro Trader: The Next Shoe To Drop

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Commander 2016 commanders are selling out like they’re made out of heroin and taste like Nutella. With the set being officially declared out of print and big box retailers no longer restocking shelves with C16 product (or if they do, replacing it with something that’s not quite as good, though some people think it is better), people are finally taking a look at TCG Player stock of the commanders and realizing how easy it is to buy them out. The rest of the Magic community, unaware that a card being sold out on TCG Player doesn’t mean the price automatically has to go up 200%, buys out the rest of the internet because “OMG Breya is $60 on TCGPlayer but I found 10 copies on Card Kingdom for $5! I’m rich!”

PSA – you better want all of these singles for yourself because they will not sell

Magic Finance is weird sometimes. However, while it’s too late to get in on Tymna, Breya and Thraisos, all of which popped this week, there’s still time to get ahead of the other cards that are good buys for the same reasons that people think the other cards were good buys. C16 is going to be harder to get, partner commanders are likely to be unique and therefore if you want the partner commanders, now is the time to buy and it will be a long, long time before we get more 4-color commanders. There are cards that haven’t popped yet and I think there are some opportunities to make some money. Let’s explore.

 

Ash Barrens

I’m not convinced the window is closed on this. It’s pretty solidly a few bucks on a lot of sites, up from about 50 cents, but there are a lot of copies available for around a buck. I think EDH demand coupled with a modicum of Pauper demand (which is a real thing, but not really enough to move a card on its own, though I think it’s a non-zero factor for cards relevant in other formats) could see this hit $3 and a reprinting might not move the price down as much as you might expect. Myriad Landscape maintained $3 after a reprinting, though that’s uncommon and therefore in fewer of the decks than Ash Barrens. Barrens triggers cycling and discard stuff which is relevant with Amonkhet cards so it’s getting even more scrutiny as people try to figure out if it’s worth it to play stuff like Archfiend of Ifnir in EDH (I think it is because of cards like Windfall, personally). This has room to grow and the Magic Community is split between people who bought this under $2 hoping it hits $5 and people who think this is bulk and will sell it to you as such.

Lurking Predators

Down from $7, this card took a real hit. The question is what will happen to the cards in Stalwart Unity once MSRP is no longer enforcing the price of the total deck. Stalwart Unity has the most value in cards that were not new in Commander 2016 so while the demand for the cards in the Atraxa deck are in a tug of war between the competing forces of the fact that a $20 Atraxa is in the deck and that the sealed decks sell for like $70 or more on eBay, things are more cut-and-dried for the cards in Stalwart Unity. That deck was the worst-selling deck which means there will be loose copies of the deck on shelves (or on sale to make room for new inventory, which is a great opportunity) but once even that supply is gone, MSRP no longer determines the prices of the cards in the deck. Demand takes over and demand is weird for the deck. It has a lot of durdly cards in it, but those durdly cards are casual favorites. If Prismatic Geoscope doesn’t go anywhere, this deck has the worst Commander 2016 cards of all of the decks, also. Kraum , Ludevic and Sidar Kondo are all pretty bad. Benefactor’s Draught could get there, conceivably, as could Seeds of Renewal, but more likely is that the Commander 2016 cards in the deck all sort of peter out. Should that happen, there is nothing new to soak up value meaning the old cards have to do a lot of the heavy lifting. Will the value spread equally or will it be weighted somehow? I think that’s more likely and while we can’t know exactly, we can sort of eyeball how the value will be weighted (this won’t be 100% accurate because the number of copies matters, also). Using this metric, Lurking Predators isn’t the strongest pick in the deck, however. Lurking Predators has some upside for sure, and under $2, this is a no-brainer given how good it is and how $7 it used to be. I bought in at $1 like I said I would when this card was first spoiled, but I don’t think this is going to see $1 again.

Tempt With Discovery

Everything I said about Lurking Predators is true of this card, except in checking out which cards were played the most per EDHREC, this is played twice as much as Lurking Predators. This isn’t as “splashy” and obvious but this is a bit of a secret staple of the format, impacting a ton of decks. It’s gotten cheap due to the reprinting and another one is plausible but for now, this seems like a low-risk spec and likely grows as much as if not more than Lurking Predators. There were way more copies of a C13 card than an M10 card but this is played twice as much so those factors might cancel each other out meaning if one of these hits, they both should. But you know what’s in twice as many decks as Tempt with Discovery and four times as many decks as Lurking Predators?

Propaganda

This gets printed every couple of years in a Commander deck and it still maintains a decent price. I think this could eat up some of the growth the cards in the deck experience. This is played in so many decks that it’s bound to recover better than cards with fewer copies and that’s why I’m lumping it in with a bunch of other $2 cards that used to be $7 and will probably be $5 from the same deck. That’s all predicated on none of the Commander 2016 cards in that deck really growing but that seems like a fair assessment. Obviously, Kynaios and Tiro are the exception since that’s a very popular deck lately, but the rest of the cards look sort of lethargic.

Bruse Tarl, Boorish Herder

This guy hasn’t popped, yet and it kind of makes sense. Boros is pretty bad in EDH and what Bruse does, there are angels who do it. Still, Bruse can partner and that’s the best thing about him. Partner commanders are unique and this makes him have more upside than other boring Boros commanders because at least you can have access to other colors. If you can get in under $2, I think the reprint risk is low enough that this is a nice medium-to-long-term gainer and it’s worth picking these up since other people don’t seem to be paying attention to him. Right now, EDHREC has this in as many decks as Tymna, a card that is disappearing everywhere.

Kydele, Chosen of Kruphix

Kydele makes infinite mana and can be partnered which can put you into up to two other colors, or 0 if you want to partner Kydele with Thraisos and win every game. If you can get a creature that creates colorless mana and can go infinite with as little as an Umbral Mantle and a Brainstorm, look no further. This is even a useful inclusion in the 99 of decks like Kruphix (should be mandatory, really) and while some of the sexier targets are being gobbled up, this is in more decks than Tymna and should be looked at accordingly.

Looking at the cards in the Kynaios and Tiro deck made me think about targeting other decks where the balance of the value wouldn’t be soaked up by new cards and would therefore likely lead to older cards to regain some of their value (barring a subsequent reprinting, if you want to see what repeated reprintings does to promising specs, look no farther than Mycoloth or Windborn Muse) so I took a look at Open Hostility, also (the Saskia deck).

Of the new stuff in Open Hostility, Stonehoof Chieftain and Tymna and one other card look promising but the rest of the new cards don’t look that good. That said, the old cards don’t look that good, either. Without MSRP to enforce some modicum of a price, the market is going to do whatever it will with these prices and I think some of the cards will rebound absent anything holding them back. Buying this deck is a losing proposition but clearly people were doing it and the singles are out there. But what has upside?

Conqueror’s Flail 

Even at its current $4ish, I think this has legs. It’s not quite Blade of Selves but it’s still very useful and as long as players are going to be aggressive with their creatures, this has a home. Equipment is a bit of a tough sell unless you are building around it, though, and most of the time the only equipment that makes a deck is Lightning Greaves and/or Swiftfoot Boots. Still, this shuts down annoying spells from other decks and can give a creature a significant boost in its power for a small mana investment and that’s got to appeal to people. I think with the narrowing spread on this card, we’re in good shape.

Is that enough value for you? It should be. There are some cards that haven’t popped yet but likely will in the coming months. A lot of these cards are good investments if their reprint risk is low and there are some factors I want to talk about that we should look at. If we want two years of growth, which should be enough to get in, profit and get out, we need to avoid stuff that will be in Commander 2017. What do we know about that stuff?

  • 4 Decks instead of 5. With 56 new cards promised, we’ll see fewer reprints than normal since there will be more new cards per deck.
  • The decks will be tribal. Stuff like Urza’s Incubator seems bad. Stuff that’s a-tribal seems safer. Still, being tribal indicates risk while not being strictly tribal doesn’t indicate a lack of risk. Use cards’ tribal affiliation as a means of disqualifying them as a spec but not as a means of qualifying them.
  • How many colors are these tribal decks likely to be? And in what combinations? If you don’t think there will be a Hydra deck, maybe Managorger is a good pickup. Maybe lay off of Mirror Entity.

That’s it for me this week. Next week there will be another topic, probably some Commander 2017 speculation. If you want me to address a certain topic, hit me up in the comments. Until next time!

Watchtower

UNLOCKED: The Watchtower 5/8/17

By: Travis Allen
@wizardbumpin

Don’t miss this week’s installment of the MTG Fast Finance podcast, an on-topic, no-nonsense tour through the week’s most important changes in the Magic economy. And if you enjoy playing Magic, make sure to visit https://scry.land to find PPTQs, SCG Opens, and more events on an interactive map with worldwide coverage. Find Magic near you today.

With only a single weekend’s worth of New Standard events in the books, and those having been impacted by a late-stage ban, we got a triple limited GP weekend. This is a tad irksome, as I’m sure many of us would have liked to see a more fleshed out format get a chance to stretch its legs. Now we’re heading into the stretch before the Pro Tour with only one good Open to look back on. I suppose that at least this PT will be a bit more exciting, since it’s so much more unexplored than it normally is, especially at this time of the year.

Our best bet will be to watch MTGO dailies to see what floats to the top. Don’t expect the online meta to match the Pro Tour at all of course. Instead, we want to see if any especially powerful or interesting interactions appear. Does a UB control deck pop up that finds a tremendous amount of synergy between Pull from Tomorrow and Liliana, Death’s Majesty, for instance? The deck it lands in may suck, but the cards themselves would be worth considering.

Keep in mind that I’ve also already talked about some cards in previous weeks that are still appealing, especially Aetherworks Marvel. There’s also stuff like zombies, which is looking good, but that I can’t really write about because Cryptbreaker and Relentless Dead already jumped and there isn’t enough meat left on the bones to be worth serious consideration.

Commit//Memory

Price Today: $1.50
Possible Price: $8

In Magic, there are a few truths. Wizards could put $100 bills in the packs and players would complain about how they are folded. Always Bolt the Bird. And, despite an infinite amount of practice and an infinite amount of chances, as a whole we’re bad at figuring out what cards are good. Aftermath, the latest edition of split cards, is yet another example of that.

Basically, any effect or mechanic that acts as though it’s an additional card in your hand is good, even if they’re overcosted. It was true of Flashback, and it’s true of Aftermath. Six mana to Wheel of Fortune is way too much, as is four mana to Commit something, but being able to cast the former several turns after the latter is going to warrant the slot. We’re beginning to see that manifest in a few places.

Commit//Memory is most immediately being put to use in a UG Turbofog deck, an archetype that pops up roughly once every two years. It involves drawing a lot of cards, putting a lot of lands into play, probably taking some extra turns, and yes, casting whatever variant of Fog is currently legal. In this case, Commit stops (or puts back) a problematic permanent from coming down, such as Aetherworks Marvel or an Ishkanah, Grafwidow, and then it shuffle-up-and-deals everything, probably drawing its caster three to seven cards while frustrating your opponent. It appears to be a locked four-of in the strategy so far.

We’re also seeing it pop up in various control strategies; mostly UR Control. Those shells are running four Torrential Gearhulk basically by default, and thanks to Gearhulk’s wording and Commit’s status as an instant, we get one of those powerful synergies I mentioned earlier. In this case, you can flash down Gearhulk on the end of your opponent’s turn and Wheel of Fortune, giving yourself seven brand new cards to work with immediately, while your opponent has to wait through your entire turn before they get access to theirs.

It’s a little tough to say that a card with a combined mana cost of ten is going to be a major component of Standard, but if Turbofog establishes itself as a tier two (or even tier one???) deck and the control lists find they like being able to Torrential Gearhulk a Wheel of Fate, it could easily end up one of the most valuable rares in the set. That may sound expensive, but really, probably means it would sit in the $5 to $9 range. Still, that’s a good bit higher than the $1.50 you can score copies for today.


Hazoret the Fervent

Price Today: $7.50
Possible Price: $13

Admittedly, Hazoret isn’t yet positioned as a purchase. Even though I think he may take a stronger position in the format, I’m still hoping we see his price slip closer to $4 or $5 before he’s seriously worth considering. With the Pro Tour this weekend though, there may not be enough time for that to happen. Depending on how things break, it may be tough to flip copies for a profit if you’re buying and selling on TCG, but there could certainly be profit if you’re the type of player that carries a trade binder.

As for the card itself, “The Pervert,” he’s a heap of damage in exactly the way red decks want it. He’s a hasty four-drop, which is sort of the standard for aggressive red cards, you turn him on by doing exactly what you want to anyways, which is dump all your cards, and finally, he provides reach, which is desperately important when you’re trying to close the game out.

We didn’t see too much of him at Atlanta last weekend, but he was a 4-of in two 5-0 constructed leagues, alongside Scrapheap Scrounger, Key to the City, and a bunch of madness cards. That’s enough to at least draw our attention.

Were he to take the position as the top end of multiple aggressive strategies, Hazoret’s price would push into the low teens. Most of the decks are commons and uncommons, and so far it looks like Hazoret could be the only mythic in several lists. Given that there’s almost always at least one aggressive deck that does reasonable at a Pro Tour, I’d encourage you to look for these in trade this week at your store, and if it’s the type of card you’d like to play with, at least consider purchasing a set for yourself.

Silvergill Adept

Price Today: $3
Possible Price: $10

Loathe as I am to admit it, lest Corbin hear me, Merfolk isn’t the worst deck in Modern. In fact, it’s one of the best fair decks you can find. There’s nothing too clever or fancy, just a slew of threats that will get your opponent dead real fast if you don’t execute your game plan perfectly. It also gets to play with Aether Vial, a card who makes the “fair” description of Merfolk questionable at best.

Merfolk popped up on MTGO recently, and really, it doesn’t actually leave. It’s always there, casting Spreading Seas and then attacking with four unblockable 5/5s. The list is fairly consistent too, and therein lies our target: Silvergill Adept has been a permanent part of Merfolk since Modern was introduced. With the need to maintain such a high creature density, Merfolk can’t make room for very many spells. Silvergill plays much-needed double duty here, attacking and drawing cards both. There’s room for Merfolk to move around some of the numbers it plays based on meta, but I don’t think I’ve seen a successful list a single time that didn’t have all the Silvergills it could manage.

As a Lorwyn uncommon, overall supply is comically low compared to many other Modern staples. There’s a fair bit on TCG right now, but it’s been a real card for years, so there aren’t a lot of copies left hiding in the woodwork. It jumped to $6 about three years ago, and $4.50 one year ago after Harbinger of the Tides was printed. One of these days it’s likely to be a highly in-demand card again, and if that comes before it’s reprinted, $10 will be on the low end of the range of potential prices.

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.

 

Casual Fridays

Preparing for BFZ Rotation

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I wrote a lot of words when 18-month Standard was introduced. Many many pixels were burned out with the weight of speculation about what would happen to prices.

So now, we are looking down the barrel of the realigned plan, with Shadows Over Innistrad block and Battle for Zendikar block both rotating at the end of September. That’s about five months away, but with this current infusion of energy and vitality into Standard brewing, I want to look at what’s worth keeping till the end and what you should be getting rid of soon.

Battle for Zendikar

Gideon, Ally of Zendikar ($25): I would get rid of any extras you have. He’s got some appeal outside Standard, especially as he makes an Ally every turn, but he’s a small presence in a couple of Modern sideboards and that’s it. He’s still the defining card of Standard, though, while he remains legal.

Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger ($23): I recognize that this card is about the best thing that Aetherworks Marvel can cast, and is a four-of in those Standard decks. Keep in mind, though, that this is also one of the best things to do in Modern Tron, and is also a popular card in the semi-niche Legacy Cloudpost decks. The foils available for $40 or less are something I would like to have going forward, as the Commander appeal is high. Keep all you have right now–he’s not going to dip far, if at all, when he rotates.

Sunken Hollow ($4) and the other double-check lands: If you think Frontier has a future, this is a fun spec. Fetches will be legal, and these would be among the choices for fetchable duals, since shocklands aren’t going to be allowed. I’m not going to load up on these, not yet. There is a market for these until September, as manabases are going to play lots and lots of duals (and Islands especially, for Engulf the Shore).

Part the Waterveil ($3.50): I don’t think these will fall very much, but this is among the best of the Time Walk effects in the modern day. I’m going to be trading for these on sight for the next year as a long-term hold.

Oath of the Gatewatch

Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet ($22): If you like Golgari, or delirium decks, you love this card in Standard. Otherwise, he’s ready to take a big dive. I don’t want to have any at all in my possession when rotation hits. Keep your four if you love the deck in Standard, but he’s a one-of in Modern Jund and while he’s good in Commander, he’s not good enough to keep his price high. A loss down to the $10-$12 range seems likely.

Kozilek’s Return ($11): I’d get out of this card too. It’s already done some funky tricks with its price during its time in Standard, and it’s seeing very little play outside Standard. Get rid of them.

Chandra, Flamecaller ($7): Overshadowed by the Torch, and it’s going to lose some big value at rotation. Sell/trade away all of your copies.

Thought-Knot Seer ($7): The spotlight is off of the Eldrazi in Standard, but my goodness, this is a popular card in older formats. I’m advocating that you keep the ones you have, and aggressively go after more, especially the $20 foils that will be popping at some point.

Eldrazi Displacer ($7): Thought-Knot shines in Modern, and Displacer is not only good in that format but it’s an all-star in Commander. I’m in for picking these up in foil or in nonfoil. We know that the Commander decks this year are tribal, and having one of those decks be Eldrazi seems unlikely.

Oath of Nissa ($4): Not worth keeping, and I’ll get in on some foils after rotation if they fall to about $3, as I think that’s a good entry point for the effect in Superfriends Commander decks.

Sea Gate Wreckage: ($1.50/$3): I’d be picking these up all over the place going forward. I love the potential when it gets lower and lower, but it’s seeing just enough play to keep it out of bulk territory.

James Chillcott, MTG Fast Finance

Is Modern too expensive? (Video Debate w/ Tolarian Academy’s The Professor)

Hey folks.

This week we’ve got some juicy video content for you. Last week, The Professor from The Tolarian Academy YouTube channel stated his case for Modern being too expensive as a format. Here is the original video:

After viewing the video, I had a lot of notes for the professor so we started talking. After a brief chat, we quickly established that a) we were unlikely to ever agree on the fundamentals of the debate on hand and b) it might be interesting for folks to get both sides of the debate in order to drive further discussion.

The professor was good enough to offer to post my rebuttal to his arguments on his YouTube channel, and here is the result for your consideration:

You can find the full script of my segments here, in case you wanted to review my arguments in text form.

Now I should point out that a key segment from the video was cut out in error, and we can’t easily double back on that at this point, so for the record, here is the script from the segment that should have been inserted just before 3:21 in the video.

  • So, let’s dive in.
  • Firstly, comparing the cost of a board game to the cost of a Modern deck, is little different than comparing the cost of a frisbee to the cost of a fully loaded gaming computer or a full set of snowboarding gear. Both alternatives provide entertainment but at vastly different price points to the frisbee. Does this mean that snowboarding and video gaming are “too expensive” and that the price of these activities should be aggressively reduced to more effectively compete with frisbee? Certainly not. The value of every gaming experience is relative, and it’s up to us to decide which experiences we value most and what we’re willing to pay for them.
  • In relative terms, Magic could be considered to be a medium cost hobby. Magic is far more expensive than a frisbee or a deck of cards, but far less expensive than a sailboat, a golf club membership or regular ski trips. Heck, at $30 for popcorn and a movie, or $80 for a mainstream video game, committed movie buffs and video gamers also spend at a rate comparable to a good Modern deck.
  • The reality is that competitive Magic: The Gathering is designed for the committed player who makes Magic a primary hobby, and it is priced accordingly.
  • Most competitive Standard decks are cheaper than Modern decks, with costs typically landing between $100 and $400, depending on the season. Standard decks however are much much susceptible to shifts in the meta game and only last for a maximum of two years.
  • Also, claiming that Modern is essential to encouraging Standard play because it provides an outlet for rotating Standard cards is also fairly loose since 95% of Standard cards are not good enough for Modern, and again, this is by design.
  • Draft and sealed players can also easily spend $500+ per annum.
    It is also worth pointing out that though The Professor was holding up his $1000 UB Faeries deck as an average deck, there are actually a significant number of more competitive Modern decks available in the $500-$700 range. This list would include Burn, Eldrazi Tron, Dredge, Affinity, Merfolk, Tron, Ad Nauseum, Elves and Titan Shift.
  • This list represents a diverse array of options, that while significantly more expensive than a single board game, will still compare favorably to many sports and gaming hobbies in terms of long term value.
  • We should also at least touch on the concept of retail price theory, which would suggest that the difference in participation and sales of Modern related cards and products are highly unlikely to change whether average decks are $450, $650 or $850. See, all of those numbers are still pretty large from the perspective of a casual Magic player.
  • Would Modern participation change if decks averaged $99? Well, yes, almost certainly, but we’ll talk about why that wouldn’t be a good thing in a moment.
  • Carry on at 3:22

    So in keeping with my final challenge at the end of the video, what is the “correct” price for the average Modern deck and why?

    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.

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