Jason Alt, Unlocked ProTrader

Unlocked Pro Trader: A Few Surprises

Readers!

I work for EDHREC as you probably know and you would think that things on EDHREC wouldn’t surprise me considering I am on the site daily plus I access it in my capacity as finance writer. You would think so, rightfully, and yet there are things that escaped my attention that seem like they’re of consequence. Let’s take a look at some of them and see if there is anything we should have noticed before. I’m goin to be looking at the Top 100 commanders built the last two weeks to see if anything snuck in. Ideally, you’d expect the Top 100 of the last two weeks to be mostly the top 10 of the last 10 sets which were all released roughly in the last two weeks, but you’ll see what it actually looks like, and… well, there are a few surprises.

You miss a lot if you just look at the top 10. Sure, Dragons being hot is no surprise to anyone, and Proper and Yuriko, boring decks that are 95% assembled in the box they came in chart highly, but once you start checking deeper, you’ll see a lot you missed. Here are some of the hits among the misses.

26th place is a long way to scroll down the page and despite seeming very weak and very narrow both, Sefris is nonetheless getting built quite a bit. The ability to trigger this 4 times a turn cycle fairly trivially and recycle creatures has caught the eye of Value Mavens everywhere.

Acererak seems like it’s in a great place. It’s got some functional utility with cards like Aluren, and future decks that do something similar to Aluren could make a 2 card combo with Acererak that draws your whole deck or pings them to death. Couple that with its obvious utility with completing the dungeon and its price currently seeing signs of life and you have yourselves a card to throw in a box for 2 years.

You’d have to really be asleep at the wheel not to notice Liesa was THIRTIETH OVERALL but I done did that. Let’s redeem myself if I can.

This card, which has flirted with $15 twice now, is the kind of casual favorite that will always be worth something because of 60 card casual players. They are the solid majority of players, and while they tend not to use our markets a ton, TCG and CK have good enough SEO that if they’re buying those cards online, they’re buying from one of those sites. This is currently gettable for $10 less than the price it peaked at, it’s on its way up and I don’t need a third thing.

It’s a little surprising for an uncommon to be ranked this highly, but this card does see some play, and it also held a very tasty secret that a lot of people missed – there was a card in there that was arbable as recently as March. Everything changed when Jinnie Fay Nation attacked.

I wish I’d noticed this when it hit its floor but the price seemed flat for so long, I stopped checking. I revisted both Aura Mutation and Artifact Mutation in the wake of Jinnie Fay but I forget about the more recent InPestation. If you can get these for the old price, do. This isn’t as much as spec opportunity as a “woopsie daisy” – I don’t always notice everything. This likely tops out at $10 but $15 isn’t unreasonable. I think expecting to spec at $8 and get out at $15 maybe is, though.

Ranked #218 overall, this is a recent (I mean, obviously) inclusion in the Rick Dees Biweekly 2.5 times Top 40. However, Value hunters found a lot to like here, and they unearthed an older card that seems more fun than ever.

The regular-border version of this is $1.50 or so making the meteoric rise of the EA version kind of surprising. Cards with large gaps between the EA version and regular version are hard for me to identify using my current routine and I’ll really need to address that or I’ll miss more than just this. Regular version can’t be terribly far behind, but in terms of sheer availability, I’m not sure what the ceiling is. EA versions are the new foils, and the foils are the new rules or token insert. What a world to rear children up in.

I don’t have a spec based on this pretty old but very, very, very linear and boring commander which I gave up on building because the process of it being on rails literally bored me, but this is as good a time as any to point out that Kindred Discovery got a reprint.

Reprinted cards have a tendency to settle between their spike price and their reprint price. I won’t bore you with the average of $55 and $5, but that number is more than $5 and it’s more than $10 and it’s more than $20, so maybe you want these at $5.

That does it for me, readers. I have to get better about identifying cards that have a very juicy EA version but a really boring regular version and foil, and I have to start tracking commanders we all know are good but which will be like 7th in a set and 50th for the month and like 63rd overall. Not being in the Top 5 can make me miss it with my current routine, and I need to tighten up. That said, missing stuff doesn’t feel nearly as bad as false positives, something my current method has been good about. All I know is that I’ve been at this more than a decade, I’m still learning and I couldn’t have done it without your support. Until next time!

Watchtower

Obvious is Easy, But Still Good

I’m back this week with more Modern talk! Last week we discussed how the Modern format still has an impact on card prices, despite less extensive paper play. This week we’ll consider a few more key role players, all of whom have proven to be resilient in the metagame over the last year. Each of these cards is a Modern Horizons 2 (MH2) mythic rare, which helps ensure that their price floor is reasonably high. If you look at the current price of all mythics from original Modern Horizons, the lowest priced card is around $5.00, meaning that even if the metagame shift, these cards are unlikely to lose most of their value.

Murktide Regent (Non-Foil)
30th Most Frequently Played Card in Modern  
7th Most Frequently Played Creature in Modern

Current Price: $16
Potential Price: $35 in 18 months
Confidence: 8/10
Disclosure: N/A

Murktide is a known quantity. It’s been dominating Modern and Legacy for a while. It’s the best at what it does, which is sticking a very fast clock for a small amount of mana. Despite its continued success, Murktide’s price remains near its historical low due to new supply entering the market. One factor that has helped suppress the price of Murktide over time is the possibility that it could get banned in either Modern or Legacy. While this is possible, I don’t think a Modern ban is in the cards anytime soon (if anything, Omnath would be the first target). WOTC has taken a hands-off approach to Modern lately, so I’m not worried unless the metagame becomes even more heavily skewed in favor of Blue/Red Murktide. In Legacy, I do think a ban could be possible, but even if that occurred, I don’t think it would be anything more than a blimp on Murktide’s price trajectory. Legacy’s impact on paper cards is nominal these days, especially for a basic no frill version.

Like most other MH2 cards, I’m not sure whether Murktide Regent is already at its price floor or whether it will continue to decline through December, but personally, I plan to start moving in on these cards slowly over the next five months until the end of the holiday season.  

Archon of Cruelty (Non-Foil)

Current Price: $11
Potential Price: $25 in 18 months
Confidence: 8/10
Disclosure: I own a few copies. 

Archon of Cruelty has come and gone in several different shells already. Current decks that run it include Five-Color Indomitable Creativity, which has seen the most success, Esper reanimator, Dimir Control, and more. What unifies these shells is that Archon of Cruelty is the best creature threat to cheat into play at the moment, even better than Emrakul, the Aeons Torn in decks that have both options, which is a bit absurd honestly. How does an 8-mana mana value card compete with the biggest baddie of them all? Much of Archon’s success can be attributed to it having an enter-the-battlefield (ETB) effect that has the potential to be a 3-1. And if it lives, the effect compounds. That’s pretty back-breaking. The original Archon shells were more fragile, but over time they have built-in resiliency and more redundancy.

On top of Modern play, Archon of Cruelty is in 13,677 decks on EDHREC.com. This is solid for a mythic from MH2, trailing only Ragavan and Sword of Hearth and Home. So even if Modern doesn’t apply enough pressure to Archon, over time Commander may take care of the job on its own.

Grist (Non-Foil)  

Current Price: $6
Potential Price: $15 in 18 months
Confidence: 7/10
Disclosure: N/A   

A strong three mana planeswalker that is played as a full four copies in a top-tier deck? Sign me. Grist was clearly designed to be a strong, yet unique card. It seems to have succeeded in both – being limited generally to one type of deck, but is able to be very strong in that deck. The mix of uniqueness combined with power reminds me a bit of Urza, Lord High Artificer, except of course that Urza was designed to be crazy powerful while Grist is a value card. But neither can be just thrown into a random deck – they both require build around synergies.

It’s hard to evaluate whether Grist’s ability to be a create when not on the battlefield will ever be more useful than it is today. I could see a world where Green Sun Zenith gets unbanned, forcing Grist’s price to spike hard. But this is not a scenario that I would want to rely on, it’s rather icing on the cake. I could also see a world where a two-card combo comes together that allows Grist to efficiently mill one’s entire deck via its +1 ability, but that seems even more unreliable to count on.  

Grist is run in 7,100 decks on EDHREC.com, plus an additional 2,235 decks as a commander! While these numbers are too low to be the basis of a speculation target, they do help Grist a bit here.  

Watch List: Hydroid Krasis (Etched Foil)   

Did you see that epic steamer Kanister ran a full four copies of Hydroid Krasis in his 6th place (two main, two sideboard) list during the recent Modern Challenge as part of Amulet? And he wasn’t the only one.

Is Hydroid Krasis, once the terror of Standard, getting a second life in Modern? My guess is this innovation will be a flash in the pan that won’t be around in a few months. Amulet, more than other decks, seems to “find” new tools and then forget about them quickly. Some stick around like Cultivator Colossus, while others go by the wayside.  

My advice here is to keep an eye on Amulet decks for the next few months – and if Krasis continues to do well – then consider picking up some of the Double Masters 2022 Etched-Foils, which are unique, much rarer than other editions, and fairly gorgeous.


Oko (@OkoAssassin) has been writing for MTGPrice since 2020 with a focus on competitive play and Magic Online. In his personal life Oko is a lawyer, father, ice-hockey player, runner, and PC gamer.

Casual Fridays

Slivers, Slivers, Everywhere!

We were given a hint of Dominaria United, and there’s been some leaks, but the more notable news is that some Secret Lairs have shipped with Foil Extended Art Slivers!

If you’re new to that creature type, that’s okay. We haven’t gotten any new Slivers since Modern Horizons 1, so it’s been a few years since the tribe of tribes has gotten some love.

However, if we’re about to get new Slivers, the world is about to go wild.

So far, I’ve been able to find pictures of six Sliver cards, including their collector numbers:

617: Ward Sliver

628: Winged Sliver

646: Two-Headed Sliver

649: Horned Sliver

657: Tempered Sliver

668: Sliver Hive

This tracks with the usual arrangement of collector numbers: WUBRG order, with lands last. It’s those five colors, then multicolor, then lands. Secret Lair has been different, with collector numbers starting at lands and going sort of chronologically. The Left-Handed Lair started at 9999 and worked its way downward, for instance.

In terms of how many Slivers there might be, we’ve got a big frame. Before Ward Sliver, the last SL collector number we see is 609 for the Hawkins National Lab and then 676 for the Pyrite Spellbomb from the Fortnite lair.

The big deal here is that there’s a LOT of Slivers left to go…and also, not too many. If there’s a new round of Slivers, we know full well what happens to the existing ones: the prices go crazy. Let’s get into some examples.

Sliver Queen is on the Reserved List. We aren’t getting more. I don’t put it past Wizards to print Sliver King as WWUUBBRRGG and have some ridiculous way to make a horde of Sliver tokens, though. The graph here doesn’t do the spikes justice, as copies sold for just under $600 during the most recent spike last year.

However, being an already expensive Reserved List card is going to make the Queen go bananas again. Near Mint Copies are currently in the $275 range, and I wouldn’t be shocked to see NM Queens break $500 with a new Commander or a new batch of Slivers. Keep in mind that Sliver Queen has some interesting offshoots: The oversized Commander’s Arsenal version is more than $100 and the Duel Masters version should see a jump too.

But if you want to make money without buying high-end RL cardboard, we’ve got other options.

Sliver Overlord is at its lowest it’s been in some time, with all three printings in the $30 range. The Scourge foils with the old border are up there in price, but with so few copies moving around, I’d expect big jumps there. The other versions should at least hit $50, given that Overlord has always been the most logical Commander for the tribe, given those two amazing abilities.

It’s entirely possible that for minor Slivers, that we get a FEA version tossed into Secret Lairs. I’m inclined against the big ones being in there, because we already got Overlord and Hivelord, but most of the useful ones will possibly make an appearance. 

The First Sliver and Sliver Hivelord are pretty safe, I think. Both are wonderful inclusions in the deck and are worth evaluating in their premium versions. The First Sliver in retro foil at $22 is the most appealing, but there’s also etched versions out there too. I definitely like the retro versions over the pricier original MH1 versions in foil, but the big risk is both the SL yet to come and what version might be coming in Dominaria itself.

Sliver Hivelord should be pretty safe, as there’s already been a SL version in the Thomas Baxa Lair. The cheapest foil version of Hivelord is the SL version, as the M15 version is $100 and will go crazy indeed in the new wave of Slivers. Right now there’s a few foil SL versions under $20, but it ramps pretty quickly to $25 and beyond.

Lavabelly Sliver as a MH2 retro foil is probably not going to get a reprint, but Cloudshredder Sliver in retro foil as part of Time Spiral Remastered is much safer. The TSR print run is done, we’re not getting more and frankly, we didn’t get a huge amount of what there was. TCG has only 38 foils listed for the retro foil, most in the $20 range, and considering what abilities you get, most Sliver decks want to have a copy.

It’s worth mentioning the FNM Crystalline Sliver too. There’s not a lot of this available, and Shroud is an ability that can have downsides, like no equipment or untapping. Still, if the wave breaks, I wouldn’t be shocked if this 20-year-old FNM promo broke $100.

I do not think Morophon, the Boundless would end up in five-color Sliver decks. While it’s a neat trick, it’s a lot of mana to pay for not a lot of effect. What I am very interested in, though, would be other tribal enablers. Guardian Project is a great one, but don’t overlook things like Herald’s Horn and my favorite for Slivers: Reflections of Littjara. 

Reflections is dirt cheap right now, both in FEA and the bundle version with alternate art, but Slivers more than most other tribes would really benefit from doubling each one that comes into play, since so few of them are Legendary. Plus, doubling up on static effects or ETB abilities gets out of hand real quick. Dormant Sliver is a strong contender to be an EA inclusion, but if you want to really get nuts with the card drawing, you want Kindred Discovery. 

I don’t think the current price of $6 is the bottom for this card, either. We’re on a good track, but in terms of a long-term spec I fully expect this to dip to $5, but with every tribal deck that can play blue, this should be one of the first inclusions. Not only does it trigger with tokens, there’s no size restriction (such as Temur Ascendancy or Garruk’s Uprising) and if you run out of things to play, then attack and draw some more cards! 

While I’m leaving out mention of most of the possible SL inclusions as FEA versions, there’s one Sliver that rises above the rest for me and deserves special mention: Hibernation Sliver. This stupid card is so dang backbreaking, as it allows Slivers to escape all sorts of situations. It’s an odd one, in that the original nonfoil from Stronghold is about $4 and the shiny Premium Deck version is a couple bucks more, but neither has a lot of copies online. This is the Sliver that every deck wants to have in play, an emergency exit in case of board wipe, and the one I’m going to buy up fast if it’s not reprinted.

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.

Watchtower

A Few Underpriced Modern Cards

Last week we evaluated the Pioneer metagame and highlighted a few cheap pick-up opportunities. Today, we’ll do the same level-setting exercise for Modern, Magic’s most popular competitive format. The Modern metagame has been fairly stable since Modern Horizon’s 2 (MH2), with new decks emerging slowly over time. This remained true even after Lurrus was banned in March 2022. While some decks got a little better/worse because of this change, nothing major completely fell out of the metagame. The format is very diverse, with certain decks clearly being top tier and others doing well but lacking the consistency to be dominant every week.

The format primarily features a combination of the following archetypes, along with others: Blue/Red Murktide Regent Decks; Four-Five Color Piles featuring Omnath; Hammer Time; Burn; Yawgmoth Combo; Amulet Titan; Living End; Crashing Footfalls; Death’s Shadow; Azorius Control; Archon of Cruelty Reanimator; and Rakdos Midrange.

That’s a lot of decks! While Modern organized play certainly doesn’t impact cards to anything close to the level that it used, cards like Murktide Regent or Seasoned Pyromancer show that competitive play still matters since they see virtually zero EDH play. With paper play coming back slowly, both at local shops and the “Return to the Pro Tour”, it is time to dive into some Modern competitive cards that may see gains in the near future.

After reviewing the currently top played cards in Modern, a few trends jump out. First, most top non-Modern Horizons 2 cards have either been reprinted at least once, are already expensive, or are commons/uncommons. I always avoid commons and tend to avoid uncommons, except in rare circumstances. Additionally, only a small number were recently re-printed in Double Masters 2022 (Wrenn and Six, Force of Negation, Pithing Needle, Supreme Verdict, Kolaghan’s Command). Based on these factors, for the moment I believe targeting key Modern Horizons 2 staples continues to be the easiest way to find success going forward. While many good options exist, here are three cards that I would specifically focus on:

Fury (Borderless Foil)
10 Most Frequently Played Card in Modern  
2 Most Frequently Played Creature in Modern  

Current Price: $60
Potential Price: $100 in 12 months
Confidence: 9/10
Disclosure: I own four copies

All the free creature spells from Modern Horizons 2 have done well. Of all creatures, they are #1 (Endurance), #2 (Fury), #4 (Subtlety), and #7 (Solitude). Grief is the least played but is still in the top 50 creatures at #45. Free spells are good, who knew!

Despite all being top modern cards, the price for the Foil-Extended Art (FEA) versions of each varies widely. Solitude was always expensive but I recently noticed that both Endurance and Subtlety foils recently jumped significantly. Fury FEAs have not yet jumped, but I think it’s only a matter of time, especially when factoring in its use in Legacy, where it’s the 12th most played creature. Legacy isn’t a huge factor these days, but that’s a lot of play and we all know Legacy players love bling. While some of the price gaps between the free creatures can partially be explained by some cards having more EDH play (Solitude, Endurance), I still think Fury will soon rise as supply continues to drain out of the market.

Dress Down (Pack Foil)
7 Most Frequently Played Card in Modern
6 Most Frequently Played Spell in Modern  

Current Price: $9
Potential Price: $20+ in 12 months
Confidence: 8/10
Disclosure: None

I was surprised that Dress Down is such a big part of the Modern metagame once again. Its use tends to ebb and flows depending on what other cards are being played – since it’s a reactive card. Currently, it’s seeing play in Murktide, Omnath, Azorius Control just to name a few. Typically, it’s played in both the main and sideboard. While trying to figure out what is the likely price trajectory for this card, I looked to find examples from Modern Horizon 1. No perfect analogy exists, but I do think it’s fairly similar to Archmage’s Charm. Both cards are blue and have strong competitive play patterns but little EDH play. Archmage’s Charm typically has an average of 3 copies in a deck, Dress down is normally only 2 copies, but it is in more decks overall due to its splashability.

When looking at Archmage’s Charm it started cheap and then slowly got expensive over time. Foils went from a low of $7 to over $60 at its absurd peak. Modern Horizons 2 has more foils in circulation compared to the original set, but that difference is likely baked into the price already. Dress Down set foils seem like the obvious choice compared to the sketch version, which I think are ugly, but maybe that’s just me. Also, regular foil versions are rarer. Non-foil versions could also do well here too, but supply remains fairly deep and its price could linger.

Urza’s Saga (Pack Version)   
16 Most Frequently Played Land in Modern  

Current Price: $30
Potential Price: $55 in 12 months
Confidence: 8/10
Disclosure: Own many copies  

Urza’s Saga has been discussed many times by many MTG Price commentators because it’s an exceptional card that is irreplaceable in the competitive Modern strategies that leverage it. Urza’s Saga is included in about 20% of Modern decks and is almost always run as four copies. But to add to this, it’s a powerful commander card that is featured in 70,000 decks on EDHREC.com and sees significant Legacy play to boot. I bring up this card again because the MH2 hype has faded and with it all the MH2 cards have retreated in price near their all-time lows. At some point supply will dry up on MH2, forcing prices to climb.

If you look at Force of Negation, the summer after its set release was the turning point towards its high of $100. I don’t know whether Urza’s Saga will be cheaper come the December holidays, but absent a reprint I’m very confident that it will be much higher than $30 come this time next year.  

Oko (@OkoAssassin) has been writing for MTGPrice since 2020 with a focus on competitive play and Magic Online. In his personal life Oko is a lawyer, father, ice-hockey player, runner, and PC gamer.

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