Going Mad – From the Ashes

September 16, 2015 Derek Madlem 3 Comments

By: Derek Madlem

Rising from the ashes like a phoenix this fall, we have the return of Zendikar…one of the most popular planes of recent years. In mythology, a phoenix appeared and reappeared infrequently with great spectacle and awe inspiring destruction following in it’s wake… after all it was a giant bird made of fire and lava and ash flying across the sky; how can that not be epic?

Here’s how:

Why does this suck? Well let’s take a stroll through Phoenix Memory Lane to see where we’ve come from and the high and low points of this underperforming tribe.

In the beginning there was Firestorm Phoenix, it was awesome purely because it was the only phoenix in the game and it did something neat. This certainly wasn’t the most aggressively priced creature at the time, and it basically died to everything that had the same mana cost…but from a design standpoint, it did everything you would expect of a phoenix. We’ll also cut them some slack because card design hadn’t become real refined yet…1994 was pretty much the wild west, you never knew who or what was going to turn up.

Fast forward a few years to Visions where we first met the Bogardan variety of Phoenix. This phoenix returned to play automatically, but not repeatedly. They got a little more aggressive with the casting cost and made what was a surprisingly reasonable card for the time.

Shard Phoenix is arguably the most powerful phoenix ever printed. Showing up in Stronghold, this not-so-fiery bird was a board wipe tacked onto a recyclable threat. This is pretty much the top of the phoenix design game for the Magic’s 22 year history.

By the time Urza’s Legacy rolled around, Firestorm Phoenix was on the reserved list; this mean that you couldn’t print a functional reprint of any existing card… but that didn’t stop Wizards from printing strict upgrades like they did with Shivan Phoenix. The design for this bird was simple and reasonable. It just came back. I’m going to go ahead and quote that here because it might be relevant later:

“It just came back.”
-Me, just now

After this, it would appear that R&D simply forgot about phoenixes for the bulk of a decade or so. When we returned we ended up with an attached guild mechanic:

Did I forget that the guild mechanic was also a conditional requirement for returning the phoenix to it’s owner’s hand? Yeah, it doesn’t just come back. Skarrgan Firebird had the upside of potentially being the biggest phoenix ever printed if you were fortunate enough to get that sweet sweet bloodthirst trigger, but it was also the most mana intensive of the entire species.

From there we went to a color shifted alternative in phoenix design. This card originally appeared in white, and looked a little something like this:

While Molten Firebird was far from the best phoenix, or even playable really, it was at least a derivative of being a color shifted reprint. Phoenixes were seemingly back on the design table now, and after taking Lorwyn off, we were given this pipedream in Conflux:

While it was unlikely to ever happen, Worldheart Phoenix did have the intent of being a pretty sweet recurring threat in all those five color draft decks that just never really happened at the time. From a design perspective, it was at least a refreshing twist on an old trope.

Magic 2010 and Zendikar gave us no phoenixes, but in Magic 2011 we got a pretty reasonable likeness to Shard Phoenix. Its stats were pushed a little further, but it didn’t have the ability to self-destruct, thought it did pose some really great judge calls when equipped with a Basilisk Collar…hint: it works out in the best way imaginable.

This is where the designers started to get themselves into trouble. Phoenixes were to be a regular thing, but realistically how many ways can you recreate the flavor of a 3-4ish power bird that comes back from the dead. This left design with a problem that had a clear and terrible answer: block mechanics. They had already done it once with the Gruul phoenix to a lesser extent, but this is where it began in earnest.

That next summer we got what is arguably the most playable phoenix ever printed. Chandra’s Phoenix has a conditional return clause, but it’s about as conditional as water being wet. The low casting cost and haste also made this creature not only annoying, but also a reasonably priced threat. It’s all down hill from here.

Yay! We made another phoenix! Ravnica and Innistrad didn’t feature lame block mechanics that they could tack onto a mediocre flying body in red, so it wasn’t until Born of the Gods that we got to see another phoenix (though Chandra’s Phoenix did make another appearance in Magic 2014).

Tribute, a truly terrible and unplayable mechanic. Giving your opponent the choice will always result in you not getting what you want out of a card. Always. At this point it’s really time to just open the floodgate with rapid-fire mediocre birds!

See what they did there? Block mechanic. Ashcloud wasn’t the worst phoenix ever printed, but it rarely felt like the right thing to be casting while your opponent was dropping Siege Rhinos.

What’s this? Another block mechanic, Ferocious! As you can see with that landfall trigger above, phoenixes might just be steaming turds from here on out…and there’s a good chance that turd is a going to take up a mythic slot as well. Here it is again so you don’t have to scroll up to see what treasure awaits you in Battle for Zendikar:

The real problem here is how “safe” all of the designs we’ve seen in Battle for Zendikar are. I’m sure Battle for Zendikar will be a compellingly epic limited format. Rise of the Eldrazi was one of the most revered limited formats of all time and most of that set is pretty durdly, just like we’re seeing this time around…but we need SOME cards to peak their heads above water, it can’t be all bulk rares.

What do I think about what’s been revealed since last week?

I think Shambling Vent is easily the worst of the cycle so far. Yes, even worse than Lavaclaw Reaches…at least THAT had firebreathing so you could dump a boatload of mana into it and end the game. Shambling Vent is a tired uninspired design. Lifelink on a black/white card?! Never saw that one coming!

Here’s another great example of R&D dialing back design to “make the limited format more dynamic.” What’s the solution to making it so that rares don’t decide who wins a limited game? I guess it’s to make rares into uncommons. Last time we came to Zendikar, we had Rampaging Baloths. They started bigger and gave you a freaking 4/4 for every land you played. You want to know a secret? We never played it either. Why would we want to play a bad hydra?

While this is seemingly an irrelevant uncommon, it furthers my point: we’re at a state where design is getting very stale. What’s between Mind Stone and Dreamstone Hedron? I’m really looking forward to the eight mana artifact that taps for four and draws four cards when you sac it!

Taking a look over the rest of the spoilers we see more of the same, reprints, or even more sweet “devoid” reprints or existing cards. But these are totally different because their devoid, right? Right?! Did the world really need Dragonmaster Outcast and Felidar Sovereign brought back? It’s becoming clearer and clearer why they chose to include Expeditions in Battle for Zendikar: the design team turned in their assignment and when the number crunchers finished grading it, they had a big fat F on their hands. Add in some hundred dollar bills randomly and you can slide the grade up into the D+/C- range. Congrats Wizards, you passed.

Let’s hope this level of design is temporary and not phoenixical™. Yeah, I’m trademarking that word…so what?

Silver Lining(s)

Void Winnower has received a lot of “that’s interesting” nods from the collective peanut gallery, but this card does have one legitimate use: reanimator decks. “Winny” might have a place in eternal metagames as a sideboard card against combo decks, or as an Oath of Druids target. Shutting off roughly 50% of the spells your opponent could cast is a good way to keep them from comboing. Here are some classic combo finishers that Winny voids without going too deep:

Is that going to be enough to make this guy worth a million bajillion dollars? Unlikely. BUT…IF…the price of FOIL versions of this card dip below $10 at any point, I’m going to feel pretty safe picking up a few copies to stow away. Niche play in eternal formats + being an absolute nut-kicker in Commander seems like a combination for long-term success to me. I’d love to see a world where we could reanimate this in Standard…but any such spell would most likely have converge and be all but unplayable.

See you next week, hopefully with some cards worth talking about!

Unlocked ProTrader

So Much Unlocked ProTrader

September 15, 2015 Danny Brown 2 Comments

Every so often, we here at MTGPrice unlock some older ProTrader articles for everyone to read. Well, lucky reader, have I got good news for you: today is one of those days! Here’s a plethora of content, now available to everyone:

DEATH OF A BINDER GRINDER

By Travis “Firsty Firsty” Allen

TRIBAL GAINS

By Jason Alt”ernative Humorist”

THE FALLOUT FROM VEGAS

By Corbin “Big Hoss” Hosler

BITS ‘N PIECES

By Ross “Not John” Lennon

LESSONS LEARNED FROM GP VEGAS

By Sigmund “Freud” Ausfresser

IS MODERN MASTERS 2015 BOTTOMING OUT?

By Travis All”i”en “Encounter”

GODS AND GENERALS, PART 1

By Jason Alt “Key”

ONE LAST LOOK AT MODERN MASTERS 2015

By “Shut Up” Corbin Hosler

MY BETS FOR GP CHARLOTTE

By Guo “I’ve Heard of a Hang Nail but Never a” Heng Chin

HOMO MAGICONIMUS AND DARKSTEEL

By Ross “The Boss” Lennon

TWO MORE MODERN CARDS

By Guo Heng Chin “Up”

THE CHICKEN LITTLE OF MTG FINANCE

By Sigmund “Yeah, We’re Going Back There” Aus”Freud”er

DREGS OF TARKIR

By Danny “Not Dan” Brown

GODS AND GENERALS, PART 2

By Jason “E. (Thanks, Marcel) S”Alt

RETROSPECTIVE: GP RICHMO…ER, CHARLOTTE. WHATEVER.

By Travis “Name Not Well Suited to Puns or Nicnames” Allen

MODERN WATCH I

By Guo Heng Chin, “The Notorious GHC”

PLAYER FINANCE – TOURNAMENT FINANCE 101

By Ross “Dress for Less” Lennon

A NEW WORLD OF ARBITRAGE

By Sigmund “Never Met Him in Person and Always Wonder If He Has an Accent” Ausfresser

TAKING A CLOSER LOOK AT DEMAND SOURCES

By Danny “Whitest Guy in the Room but Still Named” Brown

GODS AND GENERALS, PART 3

By Jason “Mr. So-Prolific-That-I’m-Running-Out-of-Puns” Alt

TRANSACTION ETIQUETTE

By Travis Allen “Ant Farm?”

COMMONS AND PLANESWALKERS

By Ross “Not Lenin” Lennon

ELVES, MERFOLK, AND GOBLINS (OH MY!)

By Sigmund “Mr. Wall Street” Ausfresser

BUYLISTING EFFICIENTLY

By Danny “Still Not Dan” Brown

That’s, count ’em, twenty-four articles that you previously couldn’t access that you now can. You can thank us later. You’ve got some reading to do.

Jim Casale

Grinder Finance – The Ages of Magic Supply

September 15, 2015 Jim Casale 7 Comments

Have you ever wondered how some cards, despite their rarity, are so out of line with cards from recent sets of the same rarity? Some of Modern’s biggest offenders are below.

The Pre-Mythic Age (Mirrodin through Shadowmoor)

These cards are from the earliest stages of Modern’s history. I would refer to this as the “Pre-Mythic Age.” Mirrodin through Shadowmoor has the lowest print amounts of any Modern-legal Magic cards. Despite this fact, the absence of Mythic rares means there are generally more rares than you would expect from that set. This means that even despite Vedelkan Shackles being reprinted as a Mythic in Modern Masters, it is still relatively easy to find.

What happens to these types of cards when they get reprinted? Well look at Smash to Smithereens. It was strictly a sideboard card that cost over $5.50 as a common! What happens when it’s reprinted twice in one calendar year? Well it’s worth basically nothing. Despite the fact that Modern Masters 2015 was a very limited print run, more copies of Smash to Smithereens were printed in that set than probably in all of Shadowmoor.

Another issue we have with older cards is they’re just lost. There are probably people that have 20-30 copies of smash to smithereens in some box they never look in. If a card goes up gradually over the course of a year (Smash went from ~ $1.50 to $4 in 12 months), people don’t notice it. This is a reason why sometimes, spikes in price are good. Quick price corrections cause people to dig up “lost supply” and reintroduce it to the market. This helps undo some of the damage from a spike if the supply is high enough.

The First Post-Mythic Golden Age (Shards of Alara through Rise of the Eldrazi)

There have been a few sets that are heralded as the start of “Golden Ages” in Magic. There were a few in particular that brought Magic back from the brink of extinction but usually did not last long. Rather ironically, the short Golden age periods were during gold themed sets. Invasion and Ravnica blocks are often pointed as significant to bring players back into the fold. Finally, we’ve reached a kind of equilibrium that brings players back into the game for good. Shards of Alara starts this first post-mythic Golden Age. As players return to the game after a rather unpopular block, much more product is opened than usual. As you might expect, cards from these sets (which were printed up to 7 years ago) are much easier to find and cost less. There are still some standouts because the player base has had 7 years to grow!

Terminate is a recent example of a card that was obscure but once demand increases it can very quickly out strip supply, even of a common. But still, as you can see, reprinting a card can still end up bringing it out of the stratosphere. Relic of Progenitus was reprinted at a higher rarity in Modern Masters and yet still lost 60% of it’s value. Cards from these sets can usually support casual play but strong Modern demand sends them through the roof.

As we get toward the end of this Golden Age, it becomes a lot harder for most commons to keep up large price tags. Worldwake‘s Dispel has never been more than $0.50 despite it’s popularity.

New Age Design (Scars of Mirrodin through Avacyn Restored)

These two blocks dictate a lot of the trends that would follow into more recent sets. With Scars of Mirrodin players are now expecting to return to previous planes and get reprints from that block. Scars of Mirrodin, despite only having 1 reprint at rare or mythic (Mind Slaver), showed that nostalgia fueled sets were coming and reprints could happen. This was later a cause of the huge suppression of the prices of Zendikar fetch lands. People now expect to return to old planes and they expect some new and some old of what they know. These two blocks also prove the theory that later sets are opened much less than fall sets. There is only 1 common in Scars of Mirrodin worth more than $1 (Ichor Claw Myr), none in Mirrodin Besieged, and 1 in New Phyrexia (Gitaxian Probe). Once we go to higher rarities, New Phyrexia is by far the most expensive set despite the reprints. Avacyn Restored similarly beats out Innistrad and Dark Ascension.

The Second Golden Age (Return to Ravnica through Battle for Zendikar)

You know, Mirrodin left a bad taste in some people’s mouths. It wasn’t received well the first time and the 2nd time it brought together one of the worst marriages in recent standard (Jace, the Mindsculptor, Stoneforge Mystic, Sword of Feast and Famine, and later Batterskull). But you know what really get’s people’s gears going? Ravnica. You know what people love? Guilds. Do you know how much they love them? Enough to explain them in terms of cows. Return to Ravnica had 10 high profile reprints in the most precious Modern shock lands. This leads people to bust insane numbers of booster packs for these expensive reprints. People are a lot more likely to boosters when they know good cards are in them.

So what does this all mean? Cards that have been reprinted infinity-million times are still worth money. That is true, there is one other factor to consider, playability.

Graph courtesy of MTGGoldFish - http://www.mtggoldfish.com/format-staples/modern/full/all — Graph courtesy of MTGGoldFish – http://www.mtggoldfish.com/format-staples/modern/full/all

This graph is skewed a bit by Magic Online but should be a good jumping off point to make my point. Lightning Bolt has been printed 13 times. 13 times and it’s still $2!

Yeah, some of the printings really don’t count. The combined number of sleeve playable Alpha, Beta, and promo Lightning Bolts is so small they don’t have an effect on other printing’s prices. What is notable is Lightning Bolt was a common in both M10 and M11 and an uncommon in Modern Masters 2015 but still commands a $2 price tag. When 4 copies of a card is played in 42% of decks it doesn’t matter how many times it has been printed as much. Serum Visions is only present in 21% of decks and commands a price point six times higher despite being half as popular.

But Lightning Bolt can’t be the only card like that, right?

Path to Exile’s first printing was during Conflux, the first post-mythic golden age. Since then it has been reprinted in a booster set once (Modern Masters) as well as available in 3 supplementary products and 2 promo printings. That should be a lot of copies, right? Path to Exile still commands a $9 price tag. But we can see from this graph that it didn’t always exist like that. After it’s reprint in Modern Masters it was available for almost half as much as it costs now. When cards are reprinted in limited runs, it is imperative you buy in quickly because prices are often suppressed by players worried about a reprint.

With this information I hope you can figure out why a card is expensive. It might be due to scarcity (Smash to Smithereens), playability (Lightning Bolt), or a combination of both (Serum Visions) and knowing how a reprint will affect it’s price accordingly.

Danny Brown, ProTrader

PROTRADER: Rotation Picks for the Cheap-Ass Casual Player

September 15, 2015 Danny Brown 8 Comments

I don’t make any secret of my disdain for spending more than I have to for Magic cards. Immediate tournament needs aside, I am more than happy to wait a year or two to acquire a copy of a card for my cube or Commander deck if it will save me a few bucks.

With everyone’s attention focused on Battle for Zendikar and Theros block prices at all-time lows, now is the time for casual-format acquisitions we’ve been putting off in the face of not-quite-bottomed-out prices. We’ll be touching mostly on Theros block today, but a few other cards and sets will get a call out, as well.

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