PROTRADER: A Neutral Analysis of Pump-and-Dumps

July 4, 2016 Sigmund Ausfresser 10 Comments

Editor’s Note: We hear your feedback asking to make this publicly available, so we’ve decided to do just that. Feel free to share this article with anyone you think might enjoy it. – Corbin

By now you’ve all likely seen this Facebook video from Craig Berry: https://www.facebook.com/craig.berry.754/videos/10206960745401441/

For those uninterested in watching these videos, let me give you a summary with one picture.

This person publicly announced his intended buyout of Lion’s Eye Diamond. When this video went public, it spawned a cascade of Twitter debates and discussion around morality and regulation. I recognize that some may already be tired of this subject, but it really requires a deeper look. This type of behavior directly impacts MTG finance whether we want to admit it or not, so I need to spend an article assessing the behavior analytically and recommending where to go from here.

Legality

Most will agree what Craig did with his video is not illegal. There are no regulations in the Magic card market. In fact, I started thinking about this further – are there any regulations that prohibit pump and dump schemes in other collectible markets? I’m honestly not sure. If someone wanted to buy out a certain artist or a particular coin I suppose they could try.

But Magic has a couple unique aspects going for it. First of all, people aren’t playing games with artwork and coins. I mean, my father and I used to play this game called “Hit the Penny” when I was five years old, but I don’t think collectible coins are something you want to line up on a sidewalk and throw tennis balls at. Magic cards have a utility outside of being collectible – when a card’s price is tampered with, it could prevent some people from acquiring copies they need for a deck.

Second of all, I think it’s fairly unique that such a small number of copies of a good that people want are available at any given time and at such a reasonable price. Buying out a 1909-S VDP penny, for example, would require far more capital than buying out LED and I imagine it would be much more difficult because there may not necessarily be a centralized website where all dealers sell. All barriers to similar pump and dump schemes.

I could also compare the LED and Moat pump-and-dump schemes to those on Wall Street. This is where things become a bit fuzzier. The Security and Exchange Commission does their best to discourage behaviors like Craig Berry’s, but is it truly illegal? An individual named Jonathan Lebed ran pump and dump stock schemes out of his parents’ basement when he was just 15 years old, making hundreds of thousands of dollars. When the SEC stepped in and prosecuted him, they settled with a fractional fine and a slap on the wrist. While many regulations are in place attempting to prohibit shady behavior with penny stocks, the reality is there lacks effective means to address pump and dump schemes by unregistered groups and individuals (according to Wikipedia).

Net, it’s extremely frowned upon but difficult to regulate when people are posting on forums every minute about their stock picks – well-intentioned or not.

Unique Enablers

I alluded to two unique aspects of MTG earlier: game utility and centralized stock. Both of these factors feed heavily into the feasibility of pump-and-dump schemes in MTG finance. Add in the “Fear of Missing Out” phenomenon I talked about last week, and you have a fairly reliable mechanism to make money.

Once vendors increase their buy lists to restock on these targeted cards, the pump-and-dump game is won. Perpetrators cash out and enjoy their profits.

There is a way to circumnavigate this system, or at least avoid risk of having to pay an artificially higher price for your cards. The idea is fairly simple to execute. All you have to do is prioritize what you need most from the reserve list and acquire as soon as feasible.

I recognize everyone has limited resources at their disposal, but this is where prioritization comes into play. If you focus your attention on the most critical cards – especially ones on the reserve list with low stock – then you’ll have what you need in advance of any questionable activity. After all, it’s not like these Legacy playable reserve list staples are going down any time soon, right? At worst their prices will remain flat, but you’ll be better able to sleep at night knowing you have what you need from the reserve list.

The other distinguishing factor of Magic is the centralized location of stock. By buying out a few websites, the vast majority of copies available on the open market are acquired. These sites include TCG Player, eBay and Star City Games. Once these sites go out of stock, the rest of the market quickly follows as late-comers pick up the remaining copies.

If you insist on putting off reserve list buys until last minute, I have one recommendation to offer. As soon as you see movement in a card’s price, you have an extremely narrow window to visit other sites to try and find copies at the “old price”. These are sites that don’t sell on TCG Player, and therefore would be overlooked during coordinated buyout efforts. I keep a list of these sites, and I’d recommend you do as well. Mine is admittedly short: Cardshark.com, ABUGames.com, and CardKingdom.com are the ones I visit immediately. If these are out of stock I usually give up but I know there are other, more obscure names out there. I most recently found success with this strategy when acquiring Ancient Tombs – I noticed TCG Player was drying up quickly but I found reasonably priced copies on Card Shark during the buy-out.

Planning Ahead

People really despise pump and dump schemes in MTG. But here’s the reality: it’s legal, extremely difficult to regulate, and profitable due to unique aspects of the game. Therefore, I can say without a doubt that this will happen again. If you don’t want to get burned by these schemes, you need to be prepared. That means remaining vigilant and being pro-active with your acquisitions. Investing in older cards has been very profitable over the past few years, but we need to act decisively and unemotionally if we wish to increase our returns.

For starters, I would examine the reserve list and compare it against stock on TCG Player. It’s best to “think like the schemers” to try and identify what may be targeted next. By no means am I advocating launching a scheme like this yourself. But if you are in need of a reserve list card for your deck and you notice stock is low, please don’t ignore it. This way if a buyout does happen, you won’t be caught unprepared, wishing you had made your purchase the week before. If there’s an inverse of buyer’s remorse, surely this must be it.

I’m not going to offer up suggestions because I don’t want this article to be construed as another pump-and-dump scheme. I recognize there are many readers of MTG Price’s content and it is not my wish to incite another buyout. I will, however, mention one specific group of cards because they should not be a surprise to anyone: Dual Lands.

With the printing of Eternal Masters, the most desirable Dual Lands are returning to their all-time highs. If this was a stock chart, I’d begin looking for a break-out cup-with-handle pattern.

Alas, I’m not sure if such technical analysis can be applied to Magic cards (perhaps that’s an article for another week). What I am sure about is that the demand for Underground Sea is very strong. I am currently in the market for a copy to complete a deck, and I’m having a difficult time finding an attractive deal. TCG Player starts in the $240’s for heavily played copies, which I don’t particularly like. Any time a copy is listed for less on eBay it’s immediately bought. And copies on Facebook groups are bought relatively quickly as well.

There are plenty of copies at Star City Games (making a pump-and-dump scheme expensive) but their stock is already priced above going market rate. For example they’re selling Moderately Played copies for $350 even though copies in similar condition start in the $260’s on TCG Player. Similar trends can be found with other blue duals as well, showing the recent swoon in dual pricing is over.

Again, I’m not advocating rampant speculation in these cards. But if you have been sitting on the sidelines for the past few months debating when to acquire I’d recommend making the move once you have the resources available. There are other vulnerable targets out there, but duals are the only one I’ll mention in this article to avoid inciting rash buying behavior.

Wrapping It Up

There’s no reason to believe the recent pump-and-dump effort with Lion’s Eye Diamond was an isolated incident. Rumors abound call out the same group as responsible for the recent spike in Moat. It’s hardly a stretch to suspect similar culprits for other buyouts such as Library of Alexandria and The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale. Because of how profitable this act is – along with the fact it’s legal and virtually impossible to regulate – we have every reason to believe this will happen again.

Your best defense against this behavior is a good offense. That doesn’t mean you should find the next buyout target and coordinate your own scheme. Instead, I advocate that you prioritize cards you need by evaluating their presence on the reserve list and availability on TCG Player / Star City Games. If a card is sparse and cannot be reprinted, it’s vulnerable to a pump-and-dump scheme. By acquiring these as you need them and not procrastinating, you can rest assured you have what you need to play with (while also reaping the reward of a more valuable collection).

If you insist on ignoring these behaviors, then the best I can offer is my list of less-known sites where you can purchase copies of a card at the “old price” during a buyout. This doesn’t work all the time, but it’s worked enough to justify visiting Card Shark, ABU Games, and Card Kingdom on a regular basis. These are all great sites to use even for ongoing needs, so I have no qualms advocating for them.

Lastly, I encourage you to plan ahead. Think about cards you will be needing in the future and think about what you’ll do if they start to sell out. By having this forethought, you’ll avoid emotional buying. FoMO is a powerful influencer, and it could lead you to making suboptimal decisions with your money. I never advocate chasing these buyouts at higher prices, and a well-thought plan in advance will ensure you never have to, no matter how manipulative market movers become.

…

Sig’s Quick Hits

When Triskaidekaphobia spiked, I noticed Star City Games increased their price from around fifty cents to $1.13. This was an amusing shout-out to the card’s flavor, but the price tag was short lived. Now copies are up to $1.99, which is as high as I see this one going. If you bought copies near bulk before the spike, your window to profit is closing as we speak. I would recommend flipping those copies now and moving onto the next target.
“Open a Tarmogoyf, need three more” was the active phrase used to describe Modern Masters’ impact on Modern prices. It would appear the Tarmogoy of Eternal Masters is Force of Will. The card’s price didn’t stay low for very long, and Star City Games is completely sold out of all non-foil copies: $90 for Alliances and $100 for EMA copies. If Legacy interest is truly rising due to Eternal Masters, my push to acquire duals becomes even stronger.
Dodging reprint has propelled Infernal Tutor to all-time highs. Star City Games is sold out of English copies of this Legacy staple with a $28 price tag. Honestly, I see no reason this card won’t keep climbing since it’s a 4-of in the popular Legacy storm deck and could one day become relevant in Modern. If Legacy demand alone is enough to buoy this card’s price higher, then expect Eternal Masters to drive more interest rather than less.

Casual Fridays

The Bookmarks

June 30, 2016 Cliff Daigle 2 Comments

One of the things that I haven’t consciously thought about in a while is the range of information sources available to me.

I’ve got a bunch of bookmarks filed away for Magic and I want to share them with you. Not all of them are price-related, but when I’m writing or thinking or getting ready for a podcast, these are valuable resources.

This is not intended to be a comprehensive list, but instead represents what I use most. These give me current information from a range of angles, and I combine that with my experience playing and collecting Magic cards to help me make financial decisions.

I try to share my experience, but I also want to share my sources of information.

Mtgprice.com

Well, let’s start with the best. We aggregate prices, keep track of spikes and craters, offer fantastic collection management tools, but there’s some sneaky-good stuff you might not notice.

For instance, if you use us on mobile while trading, the price is in the title of the page, so if you look at your history you’ll see every card you looked up.

Also, we have the easiest screen for comparing prices of different versions. Lots of places are going to make you click once or twice more, whereas we just give it all to you. You’re welcome.
Tcgplayer

Since TCGplayer switched over to letting individuals sell cards, it’s different than it once was. Instead of being an aggregator, it’s like a reverse eBay, where people list their lowest acceptable prices.

One of the things TCG is good for is seeing how many copies are left to be easily accessible. A low supply means it’s easier to move the price, especially when it comes to high-end or collectible cards

Speaking of prices: if stock is super low, it just takes one or two people to move the TCG mid price significantly. For example, foils of Steamflogger Boss. There’s two for $6, one for $30, and then six for about $100. So the TCG mid is listed at $99.99.

Other writers have gone into a lot more detail about why TCG mid shouldn’t be your default value, so be aware of its limitations.

eBay

I like looking at the completed sales in eBay to get another price point. For the example of Steamflogger Boss, there’s only two completed sales, one for $50 and one for $25 in the last month.

So yeah, that $100 price is a myth. Always good to check!

eBay is also one of the main resources I use when trying to price rare or foreign foils. Prices on these can vary widely, and while I’ve looked at international sellers (Hareuya, MCM.eu and such) there’s only so many hoops I’m willing to jump through.

Mtgstocks

This is more than just a compilation of prices going up and down. It’s also very useful for organizing tournament results and article mentions as a factor of spikes. It’s a delight to see that when one deck does well, which cards spike? Which cards is it often played with?

Mtgstocks suffers from TCG manipulation as well, though. (Which is why our ProTrader emails also keep track of supply changes, not just price changes.)

Magiccards.info

Honestly, I’ve had this site bookmarked for years upon years. Not so much for price information, but more for the most helpful search tools around. I don’t remember cards names all the time, and this offers me the best methods for narrowing down the card I’m thinking of.

Also of particular help is that on here, there’s a special color and line for when cards are banned, restricted, or on the dreaded Reserve List. I really hate having to jump to those pages separately, and having it all in one view is incredibly easy.

Mtggoldfish

There’s a delightful amalgamation of information here, from cards to tournament results to articles that mention the cards. This is also one of the better sites for tracking MTGO prices, though I’m not keeping up with that metagame.

EDHREC

Jason Alt refers to this database constantly, and he’s right to do so. This is an easy way to quantify what is and is not a staple, and what cards are most frequently played with other cards.

I personally don’t agree with the philosophy of optimizing a Commander deck. I would rather figure things out piece by piece than have someone spit out a fully combined decklist for me to copy. But to each their own.

If you play around with the Analyze Deck function, you’ll notice trends that tend to lead you to combo-oriented decks. EDHREC is not a resource for innovation, but instead points you to the (usually) degenerate stuff people build. Using this will lead you down that path, so tread carefully.

Did I miss some of your favorite sites? Are you someone who values a different perspective? Please, share in the comments or on the forums.

Conjured Currency, Douglas Johnson

Customer Service in #MTGFINANCE

June 29, 2016 Douglas Johnson 11 Comments

Written By:

Douglas Johnson @Rose0fthorns
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Let’s say for the sake of argument that you’re new to the whole financial side of Magic. You’ve traded a bit at your local store, you’ve overheard discussions about how X card is worth X price now, and you’ve bought cards on TCGplayer or SCG before. Now you want to become financially savvy, and make the most out of how to sell your cards at their peaks while buying cards at their lows. There’s a whole pile of articles out there to help you do that. One of the more recently published comprehensive guides to selling a card was written by our own Travis Allen, and is a great place to start.

Unfortunately, the card you sold doesn’t just magically disappear and transform into those crisp dollar bills we all know and love. It’s not like all of your cards are double-faced, where the other side holds real (your country here) currency. You have to ship the card to another human being (or store, but for the sake of this article we’re assuming that you will be selling to other people). A person that has hopes, dreams, and emotions. Just like you.

Instead of focusing on bulk today, I’m going to try and go over one of the oft-forgotten aspects of this whole #MTGFINANCE thing; customer service. We’re going to look at some common mishaps and situations that sometimes occur when a buyer purchases a card from a seller, and then talk about some solutions and practices that each party can remember to help approach a resolution. I’ve been on both sides of these situations, and can understand how frustrating it can be.

Situation 1: Cards Lost in the Mail

This is one of the more common things that will cause a buyer and seller to interact with each other when working through a platform like TCGplayer, eBay, or Pucatrade. These websites generally allow the seller 6-8 business days before the buyer can take action, to account for sometimes slow service by the USPS. Sometimes time passes, and the card still hasn’t shown up. So what do you do as a buyer? What do you do as a seller?

You might already be thinking that almost every situation where this has happened can be preemptively solved by shipping with tracking, and you’re not wrong. Shipping securely in a bubble mailer with a PayPal shipping label for $2.45 is a (relatively) cheap way to increase the probability that the package will reach its’ destination. Unfortunately, that’s not always economically viable for either party. If I buy an Overgrown Tomb from a local player at $4 and then ship it to someone over Facebook for $7, there’s literally zero point in me putting tracking on that card alone unless I pass those shipping costs onto the buyer. In that case, the buyer will gladly purchase the shockland from some other venue where he/she can avoid paying close to 30% more.

My personal rule is that I provide free tracked shipping for any order totaling $25 or more. My margins are safe enough at that point to make it worth tracking, and it encourages the buyer to purchase more cards to hit that number. For orders totaling $24 and under, I ship in a PWE (Plain white envelope) with a stamp. There are a bunch of other articles out there on how to ship a Magic card safely and securely, so we won’t spend anymore time on that here.

As a Buyer

If you’re purchasing cards from TCGplayer or eBay, remember that the expectation is on the seller to get you those cards in that 6-8 business day window. If you order cards on a Saturday and they’re shipped out Monday morning, it’s not the fault of the buyer if those cards don’t arrive in time for your Friday Night Magic (unless you specifically agreed to and paid extra for expedited shipping, but TCGplayer doesn’t allow this). Give yourself that window of at least a week and a half for the cards to arrive, or be ready to pay the extra shipping cost.

Okay, so now it’s been 9 business days and your Grafdigger’s Cage that was shipped in a PWE still didn’t come in the mail. You’re not happy. I get that. However, it’s not exactly going to reflect well on you if you use the TCGplayer/eBay/Puca messaging system to immediately berate the buyer and demand a refund, or by leaving scathing feedback. Our USPS system is far from perfect, and sometimes stuff gets lost. This is the part where you politely message the seller, and let them know about the situation. Your card(s) didn’t show up, and you waited the appropriate amount of time. If the seller knows what they’re doing and takes the actions that I’ve detailed in the next few paragraphs, they’ll make it right with you because they don’t want to lose your trust (and your future dollars) as a seller.

As a Seller

We all dread this email (or Twitter/Facebook) message. Some variant of “My cards still haven’t shown up yet..” While the dollar value isn’t going to be too high if you’re using tracked for high-end orders, it’s still annoying to think that you might have put the wrong address on the PWE when mailing out those orders. So what do you do?

First of all, don’t accuse the buyer of stealing or lying. That’s not going to get you anywhere close to a positive feedback review, and it doesn’t help to resolve the situation. If you do feel like something is sketchy, I would absolutely send a report to the real customer service representatives at TCGplayer or eBay (although I highly doubt eBay will do anything to help the seller). At the very least, the platforms can keep track and see if the buyer forms a pattern of making the same claim to other sellers on a regular basis.

Secondly, don’t just immediately apologize and refund the order. This is a big mistake that I’ve heard happens a lot. Most players will still want that card instead of just their money back, because then they have to go through the process of finding another copy for the same price. If you do own another copy of that Grafdigger’s Cage, just ship it to the buyer. ~~Double~~ Triple check the address and name on the PWE, and take extra care to make sure that it’s being dropped off at the post office instead of just leaving it in your mailbox and risking it getting stolen.

Situation 2: Condition Disputes

This is the other common issue I’ve run into, as both a buyer and a seller (Not that I run into this often as a TCGplayer seller….). Different people are taught how to grade Magic cards differently, and those opinions can clash when one party receives a card that they believe is in a worse condition than what they ordered. Even some of the superstores like SCG, Channelfireball, and Cardkingdom have different grading scales; I’ve bought cards from SCG at “Moderately Played” and immediately sold them back to Cardkingdom where they were graded as “Slightly Played”.

As a Buyer

This might start to sound repetitive, but the first step is to contact the seller without exploding in a fit of rage. Sometimes there’s a mark on the card that was only visible in a certain light, and sometimes two cards from inventory get swapped on accident so someone gets MP and the other person gets NM. It happens, we’re all human. While not an absolute law, it’s a good rule of thumb to follow that an LP card (in place of NM) gets a 10% partial refund, MP gets 15-20%, and HP is 30-35%. It helps if you have pictures of the card that you received to help make your case, although TCGplayer doesn’t allow buyers and sellers to send images between each other so you’d have to provide email addresses or imgur links.

This is not an excuse to go around and complain to every seller you buy cards from, and think of yourself as a “super harsh grader”, which is something I’ve heard before from a buyer. There are some buyers out there who think they can get 10% off every single purchase just by claiming LP on the cards they buy, expecting a discount. This behavior is absolutely kept track of by TCGplayer and Pucatrade, and crying wolf will leave you helpless when you actually get sent a MP card when you wanted NM.

As a Seller

Grade your cards realistically before listing them. I’ve heard a lot of people say “Oh I’m a conservative grader like SCG” or “I grade dual lands differently because they’ve been around for 20 years, so this one is actually LP ‘for its age'”. No. None of that. @ZachSellsMagic summarized card grading in a single tweet that I’ve since taken and started using in my conversations with sellers who disagree with me when selling me cards. (Also, Zach is absolutely worth a follow on Twitter.)

Look at the card from multiple angles of light to see if it has any markings that are invisible from only one perspective. Water damage, scratches, and grime are all more elusive forms of wear that go unnoticed without proper grading, and it’s always better to get that customer feedback that says they expected a worse for wear card rather than the dreaded email saying that their NM card was actually LP. Grade what the card actually is, instead of what you wish it was. This is especially true for foils, where a buyer of a NM foil is much more likely to be more critical.

End Step

I spent way more words than I expected to while writing this, but I think that’s fine. If this gets a positive response, I’ll write another one next week where I go over more niche and advanced scenarios involving customer service to ensure that even strangers come back to you for repeat business. I still believe that this is a hugely under-reported aspect of this #MTGFINANCE banner that’s all the rage right now, and some people are going to get in over their heads.

On a closing note, remember that as a TCGplayer/Pucatrade/eBay salesperson, you are your own Public Relations person. SCG, CFB, CK, ABU… They all have a person specifically trained to deal with situations like the ones stated in the article. When you decide to become an independent seller, all of that burden goes to you and you only. Even if it looses you a few dollars on a transaction when you have to give back 10% to someone who you didn’t think deserved it, that customer service will make them more likely to come back to you again and again.

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Jason Alt

The Game Done Changed

June 29, 2016 Jason Alt 7 Comments

Today on the next episode of “Can one Magic card change EDH completely?” we have another white card. That’s odd. I feel like we get a lot of white cards in this game lately.

Past winners have included:

White card

I mean, Stoneforge Mystic is a white card

C-C-C-C-C-Combo breaker!

Annnnnd white’s back.

This card is stupid and it’s going to make a huge impact on EDH (I’m calling it a bit early to say “biggest impact of the set” but it’s hard to imagine a bigger impact from another card) and the number of cards that just got a whole lot better is huge.

The Actual Scope

Unlike cards that are very good in very specific decks like how good Fevered Visions seemed, but basically just in a small number of decks, mainly Nekusar, this has broad appeal. Instead of being a card that goes into 90%+ of all Captain Sissay decks and nothing else, this could see that sort of coverage in the specific decks it seems tailored for but has wider-reaching implications. Captain Sissay likely jams this card. And why not? It does what you want, it’s in the right colors, the body isn’t irrelevant. But unlike a card that’s perfectly-tailored to one deck but little else, I think Lancers can grab so many different cards that it’s going to get a look in a lot of different shells and give a lot of different cards upside. Legendary stuff just got a whole lot better, and not just creatures.

The Decks

Sisay

This deck obviously has the most targets, making Lancers a sicko toolbox card in the deck. If people play Sisay a bit more, it could see some upside. It’s mostly plateaued, owing a lot of its lack of growth to the injection of copies with the FTV printing. $23 isn’t even close to the all-time high for the foil, but it could climb again since the FTV foils are about as visually appealing as that Billy Squier “Rock Me Tonight” music video.

Do an impression of your future record sales!

More than just the commander could see a bump from new relevance vis-a-vis being more fetchable.

This card hasn’t quite recovered from its Commander’s Aresenal printing and the CA printing shown above shows how the new price doesn’t know what to do with itself. With new relevance on Legendary stuff in white, this could be the bump it needs to approach the $50 people want for the non-foil copy. Legacy isn’t going to do it, so EDH needs to pick up the slack. This card can’t be as cheap as it is forever and there isn’t much impetus for a reprint so this feels safe. This is a good card to just have because Legendary creatures will always be good in EDH. I mean, duh.

These two cards are good together and Reki is already taking off. If people play more Sisay because of Lancers, they’ll play more Reki, one imagines. Look at Azusa for the ceiling on a Kamigawa green Legendary creature, and I guess look at Dosan the Falling Leaf for an example of a card which currently see as much play as this could, soon. This could be an easy quadruple-up.

Did you know this was almost $2? Well, it is. It seems like it’s not done growing. This is practically a planeswalker and if it’s easy to tutor for, why not play it? Stashing dead Legends back in the deck to be tutored for seems OK to me.

This seems tied to Sisay directly more than most cards, but this IS growing, unlikely to be reprinted and solid. It’s a very, very EDH card and if it gets played more, its price should go up.

Ra-Ra-Rasputin, Magic’s Greatest Love Machine

Eldrazi Displacer didn’t make this $30 Legend bump as much as it could have but it’s being built more. I used Rasputin for the heading but it could easily be Roon or Brago. I basically think it’s vital to talk about the interaction between Lancers and another white card.

Bliggedy-BLAM. This was made to pair with Lancers. Sure, Mistmeadow Witch and Deadeye Navigator pair just as well (well, maybe not JUST as well) with Lancers but Displacer doesn’t require you to be in blue at all. Displacer and Lancers are a great team and I expect white decks to use this pairing to great effect. Decks with access to blue get more flicker redundancy so I expect the decks that can run blue to do so, but if you can run Lancers, you can run Displacer, something I can’t say for the other flicker creatures.

Rasputin is bound to start moving, but I have a feeling his price spiking on principle back in 2013 just because a lot of Legends did means it will take a minute for demand to push the price at all. Still, it’s a Legend, it combos well with flicker effects, which are popular and it’s never getting reprinted. Rasputin is worth what he’s going for now, but it could be a minute before he’s worth more than that.

I bought in at $0.50 and basically misplaced a big stack of these. It made me happy to find them in a box of shame with cards like Nivmagus Elemental. This card didn’t get banned and that sent it price up when the uncertainty surrounding its status was cleared up. Just like Consecrated Sphinx, mentioning this card when they talked about why Prophet of Kruphix was getting banned emboldened people. This likely isn’t done growing. This card is dope and does dope shit.

This is the kind of growth you want to see following a reprint. This card is too good not to have in your deckbuilding box and if you don’t have one, better buy one, soon. It’s at a historic (post-Standard) high and doesn’t seem to want to slow down. If you’re running blue and flicker stuff, you want this.

This graph shape is a little discouraging, but I think this is bound to climb a bit more. It’s certainly unfair with flicker creatures and can lock people out of playing spells and can also get big enough to rule the unfriendly skies. This flirted with $5 a few years ago and it didn’t stick, but I think that could be the new reality for this card in a bit and new flicker cards certainly can’t hurt.

Mangara

This card couldn’t possibly have more going for it. I think the new Brisela deck can be built very easily on the shell of an existing Mangara flicker deck. Not only will this see more EDH play with Lancers and Brisela running around, this is a second spike, has potential upside from people playing Death and Taxes and D&T variants in Legacy since Eternal Masters has made some of those cards a little cheaper and new flicker cards make this card even better. I think Mangara has a ton of upside and has already established that it can be an $8 card.

Another potential D&T inclusion, it’s actually insane how well this card has recovered from 4 printings. It’s like Wall of Omens. I think if this gets printed again and dips at all, it likely recovers. Mostly, though, just be aware of this card so you don’t accidentally bulk it out.

This has a high degree of affinity with Mangara decks because the same untap and flicker shenanigans that can help you stack multiple triggers of Mangara destruction can also turn this into a murder machine. Lots of printings have hurt the upside, but more Mangara in EDH means more of this and it’s worth watching.

I like second spikes a lot and the shape of this graph is giving me really positive vibes. I think something is going to happen, here.

What Else?

Well, I covered a few of the decks that have cards in them that could incidentally spike if Lancers makes those decks get played bit more, but I think I want to finish the article just by mentioning some Legendary stuff that you can grab with Lancers that gets a lot better with a convenient (and flickerable) tutor.

This recovered from its reprinting and then some! This card is super popular and Lancers probably don’t make a blip in its price, but knowing you can fetch this with something other than Tolaria West and Expedition Map means Esper artifact decks have another tool in their arsenal.

EDH gold, unlikely to get another reprinting, now easy to tutor for with a decent creature. I think Memorial is going to be more than it is now this time next year. This is a safe place to stash value and a good card to play with.

When this card is $12, we’re going to look at this part of the graph and marvel that it was $5 for an entire year. You still have some time on this card, but this card is dumb, it doubles two important resources and it’s an artifact. Lots of stuff that tutors for Legendary creatures leaves this out.

Somehow EDH made this an $8 foil but it hasn’t been able to do anything for the non-foil price despite it coming from a set where most of the boosters contained metaphorical herpes back in the day. Packs of this set are way more appealing, now, but this set was under-opened. I channel Arashi more than I cast it and this is worth playing. It’s got some work to do to unseat Silklash Spider, but it could happen.

Who saw this coming? I didn’t and I played EDH back when this was $5 and I used to talk about how unfair it was. $20? OK, then. I don’t think this is done growing. This is aching for a reprint – let’s hope one is forthcoming.

We’re not doing anything to this price, but Lancers fetch half of the combo, whether it’s the one with Thespian’s Stage or the one with Vampire Hexmage.

More people than are playing this should play it. Oh well. When I win the game with this, people didn’t see it coming, so that’s cool. I like having the creature that fetches it able to turn this into an overrun if it’s the biggest creature I have, and in a deck where I run Assemble the Legion, sometimes it is.

There are worse things to go grab

Again, we’re not doing anything to this price, but it’s nice to know you can grab a Cradle. That fact may add more upside to the price of Lancers than Cradle.

Someone is making this card $8. Maybe those people will play it more now that there is one more way to grab it out of the deck, and it come with better body to staple it to than a 1/2 Kor.

This costs a lot to activate, but it solves problems and the price can only go up. I mean, look at the chasm between retail and what dealers will touch it at. Ugly.

How good is this equipped to a four-color Legendary creature? We’re about to find out, I guess.

This may be one of the best cards to go and get. It’s not Maze of Ith, but it’s close and it’s in your colors.

I don’t want to do this anymore and I’m only on “K”

Do all of these even need a justification? Probably not, right?

I could probably put just about anything here and my editor won’t even notice

Taxation is theft

9/11 was an inside job

I want you all to know I contemplated going back and changing the first letter of every paragraph to spell “And his name is Jon Cena” but I didn’t because I’m lazy and you’re not worth it.

From a piece of Laura’s secret diary, Cooper discovers that he and Laura shared the same dream; Catherine tricks Ben into signing away the mill; Andy and Tremayne – the potential fathers of Lucy’s baby – confront each other; James leaves town; and Laura’s killer is unmasked.

When I wrote the following pages, or rather the bulk of them, I lived alone, in the woods, a mile from any neighbor, in a house which I had built myself, on the shore of Walden Pond, in Concord, Massachusetts, and earned my living by the labor of my hands only. I lived there two years and two months. At present I am a sojourner in civilized life again.

Anyone else watching Preacher on AMC? What are they even doing? It’s like they never even read the comic books. I mean, The Walking Dead is diverging from the comics a lot which makes things exciting for the people who have read the books because we can still be surprised by the show, but, come on. It’s like the team making Preacher wants to hurt us for reading the source material. I may give up on it. No, I’ll give it a season. One season to turn it around, but that’s it.

I can probably start my closing paragraph in here so I don’t have to write it at the end and you can be done reading this article when you see the last card.

Cards like Serra’s Sanctum make me very excited about Lancers. There are a ton of good cards we can grab and while we could tutor for them before with other cards, this exciting creature is easier to flicker and rebuy than those other cards, making it the ideal way to go grab them.

That about does it for me this week.

If there is anything you think I missed or which you want to discuss, leave it in the comments section below.

I’ll be back next week with more value.

Until then, stay safe and don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.

Until next time!

MTGPrice Blog

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Unique Enablers

Planning Ahead