Welcome to Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur’s Gate. I don’t know what the cards have to do with the game, or the lore, but I do know that this set is jammed with sweet cards and awesome interactions.

What the set lacks, though, is a headliner mythic in terms of value, a card that everyone is chasing. Granted, the first time around, that was a Jeweled Lotus, which set an incredibly high mark for value and for rarity. We didn’t get a card like that, nor a big-value reprint like a Mana Crypt or Mana Drain or anything like that. 

As a result, the value of these cards has to go somewhere, and the first place to look will be the mythics, the most difficult to get. I went over your odds last week, but let’s get into some examples of the cards in CLB and if I’m ready to buy yet.

Ancient Dragons – The key with these five mythics is that each version is twice as rare as other mythics, because they are the only mythics with two special versions. The number of Ancient Gold Dragons in Borderless foil plus the number of Ancient Gold Dragons in Showcase foil is equal to the number of Battle Angels of Tyr in Borderless foil. There aren’t more copies of AGD because there are more versions, there’s just more options for the same number of copies.

As a result, this cycle is probably going to contain the most expensive cards in the set, at least at the beginning. The early prices bear this out, as people move sooner than they should, but it’s entirely possible that one or two of these dragons follows the Old Gnawbone path and just never gets cheap:

Gnawbone is one end of the potential spectrum here, but the other end is this:

My inclination is that while the Ancient Dragons are expensive mana-wise, they will generally be worth it on the board. We might see things like Garruk’s Uprising tick up as Dragon players want to give trample (and draw cards!) but my hunch is that the borderless foils are going to start high and rarely go lower, even after a couple of weeks. 

Kindred Discovery – This is a card that’s had no support but still has been in registered in 18k decks online. Just the Commander 2017 printing and a meager inclusion in The List. We know the card is good, and it’s popular too. As a rare, it’ll be relatively common leftovers after the big operations are done cracking packs, and this is one of my favorite targets in the set. It’s already down to $3 for the cheapest and $20 for the FEA, prices I am content at but I’m waiting a bit longer for hopefully a farther fall. 

Might not go too low, as this is the first foil printing, but we’ll see.

The Allied Battlebond Lands – We have some exact comparisons here, and that puts this on easy mode. FEA versions of the enemy lands from Commander Legends 1 are around $30, and those are about 2.5 times more common. (1/88 for these vs. 1/206 in original CL) Don’t forget that we have Expedition versions to look at too: 

The presence of these cards in a much rarer frame will do a lot to create a price ceiling for these lands, but frankly, let’s look at the graph for the nonfoils:

Battlebond wasn’t as heavily opened as a regular set, but the steady growth of these lands is a sign that the lands might be the safest bet around. I’m going to look for them to fall a bit further, probably to $5 or even $4, and then I’ll want a nice stack.

Cultist of the Absolute – Backgrounds might be useful in the 99 too, especially giving certain abilities. Static, like auras that don’t need to be recast. I’m very likely to wait until the rare and mythic ones find a floor and then pick up a few. Unique effects like this are usually worth speculating on.

Herald’s Horn – Down to $5ish as an uncommon in CLB Precon, and present in 50k decks online, this is another spec I’m all over, except for one problem. Later this year, we’re going to get the first foil version of the card as a year of the Tiger promo coming with The Brothers’ War, and that will soak up a lot of the money to be made.

Buying staples when they get cheap is a basic principle, and Herald’s Horn definitely fits that description. 

Monster Manual – Elvish Piper is good. This is better. I’m not anticipating this being expensive by any means, but I am looking forward to getting in on this at nearly-bulk prices. There’s so many ways to abuse a card like this, and now we have it as an instant-use artifact instead of a fragile 1/1 that has to wait a turn.

Jaheira, Friend of the Forest – NONCREATURE TOKENS COUNT! So your Treasures are now Mox Emeralds, your Food tokens are Moss Diamond, your Blood tokens are some other artifact that hasn’t been printed but would be too good. This might be good on its own or as an amazing addition to the 99 of some other token-themed commander. Another bulk pick that will one day shine so very brightly.

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.

Here we are, the dawn of a new set. Preorders are all over the place, spikes are happening left and right, and we’re one month away from Double Masters 2.

For right now, though, I want to focus on the Collector Boosters from Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur’s Gate. Every set since the first Commander Legends I’ve calculated your odds, and I’m glad to bring you this set of data.

Please note that today’s piece is focusing on the Collector Boosters only. Set and Draft Boosters will have to wait, as those require a whole new set of tables and calculations.

Let’s get to it!

First of all, let’s go over what we’re told explicitly. This set has subdivided many of the types and treatments, which helps simplify what can be found where.

One thing I hate about this graphic is that it isn’t in order, according to the box opening videos I’ve watched. Just irks me. 

It’s a bit painful to say, but in terms of rarity, there’s only two slots we’re going to focus on here. The nonfoil, regular frame cards rarely carry a huge price difference from nonfoil showcase or foil regular frame. 

For instance, the slot for Extended-Art Commander rare/mythic. There’s 40 exclusive cards, 12 of them mythic. You’ll have a 1/67 of getting a particular EA mythic or 1/33.5 for a particular EA rare. (Artificer Class does not have an EA version.) Given the volume that’s going to be opened, that’ll be a LOT of cards. The prices on other EA rares/mythics from previous sets backs that up.

The Etched Foil (Legendary Rare/Mythic) slot in Collector Boosters is pretty straightforward. There’s 30 rares and just a pair of mythics. That means only 1/62 CBs will have a particular mythic etched foil, and you’re 1/31 to get whichever etched foil rare you wanted. This pool includes the five rare Backgrounds, which will not show up in the next slot. The other 27 cards are all the rare and mythic Legendary creatures.

Now, the last slot in the Collector Booster, traditionally where the biggest money and the rarest cards are found.

Let’s set up with the basics: When you get to the this slot in a Collector Booster, you’re going to get a Showcase (In this set, that’s the Monster Manual), Borderless, or Extended-Art treatment in foil. We’ve got 72 eligible rares and 22 eligible mythics. Since mythics are half as common as rares, we need to double the number of rares, but keep the same mythics. 

As a result, we get a pool of 176 cards. Two of each rare, one of each mythic. That means we have a 1/88 chance (reduced from 2/176) for any version of a particular rare, and a 1/176 chance of pulling any version of a particular mythic rare.

The short version is that you look up a card, see how many options you have. All rares and mythics in this set have one alternate frame, with the exception of the five Ancient Dragons. Those have a Borderless treatment and a Showcase treatment, and therefore will be the rarest cards in the set.

Yes, you’re reading that correctly. Given these odds, a full 80 percent or so of rares will be in Collector Boosters’ last slot. Please note, though, that the Legendary Rare Backgrounds are not in this list. Those are in regular foil and etched foil, and therefore are not included for this slot.

Point of clarification here: This set has less overlap in versions than the last few did. No mythics have three special versions, and no rare has two. An interesting choice from WotC here, but it makes my life simpler.

Generally speaking, things are as rare in this set as they were in previous sets. Let’s have a couple of comparisons, handily from my own research.

Or for specific cards, the rarest from each set:

That stacks up well, and while Wizards loves to mess with things and change around numbers to make my life miserable, it’s worth noting that the rarest cards in this set are about 25% more common than in Streets of New Capenna. Opening 140 less Collector Boosters is certainly good news for the biggest vendors.

I hope that this helps inform your decisions about what to buy and not buy, as well as manage your expectations when you’re opening these packs. 

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.