By Guo Heng Chin

A couple of days ago, I saw this on  my Twitter feed:

Ok #mtgfinance, can someone write an article comparing Thoughtseize with another Modern staple that rotated out of Std? S.oze? Abrupt Decay?

— Robobear (@Robobear82) February 12, 2015

@Robobear82‘s request couldn’t have come at a better time with Theros block staples having just seven more months of Standard play. @Robobear82 called for a Batman #mtgfinance writer and he shall get one.  

Today we will be discussing a Magic finance fundamental: the price trajectory of Standard-legal Modern staples and when to pick them up.

Historically, the price of Standard staples from the previous block began their downward spiral around this time of the year, all the way through summer until the end of their lifespan in Standard (Although this year may be slightly different due to the new preliminary Pro Tour Qualifier system, but that’s not what we would be discussing today).

The conventional wisdom would be to pick up Standard staples for casual use or investment around rotation in September. However, as all know that Modern staples are the exception.

So when then is the best time to pick up Modern staples that are currently Standard legal? Or rather, when is a good time to pick up this card:

Thoughtseize was one of the most iconic discard spell ever printed in the history of Magic. Ravaging hands since 2007, Thoughtseize saw play in every single format it was legal in, including the hallowed halls of Vintage, and Commander (Duel Commander counts as Commander right).

Thoughtseize’s cross-format ubiquity and popularity in Modern (mtgtop8 ranked Thoughtseize as the 23rd most played card in Modern in 2014 – just two places behind Tarmogoyf – being present in 17.5% of Modern decks in an average of 3 copies) made it one of the most sought after Theros card.

As of writing, the Theros version of Thoughtseize stands at $19 while the Lorwyn copy hovers around $35, half of its previous high of $70. I am not sure if Thoughtseize would ever hit $70 again, but one thing for sure, that card is not going to remain at $19 a year or two down the road.

To answer our question on when is the best time to get in on Thoughtseize, let’s dig through time to have a look at how the window to pick up Modern staples evolved through the years.

The figures used in this article comes from mtgtop8.com’s format top cards list. The list describes the ubiquity of cards in each format and ranks cards by the percentage of decks in which a card was found in.

The First to Buck the Trend

Modern was announced in fall of 2011. The price of Zendikar fetchlands – which were played in every single format they were legal in – barely budged when Zendikar rotated out during the fall of 2011, unlike the rest of the standard staples from the same block. The blue fetches actually experienced a slight bump upon rotation.

The Zendikar fetches were a precursor to a new trend where the price of Standard staples that saw play in Modern, then still a fledgling format with an uncertain future (kind of like Tiny Leaders now. Shameless subliminal message plug) would not tank upon rotation.

The Last of the Invitationals

Snapcaster Mage was a Standard powerhouse, and although he was not as pervasive in Modern as he is today, Tiago Chan’s invitational card was already considered a Modern staple when Innistrad rotated in the fall of 2013 (in 2014, Snapcaster was the most played creature in Modern, and fifth most played card with a presence in 30.8% of Modern decks, compared with 2013 when he was the second most played creature, and eleventh most played card with a mere 25.1% saturation across Modern decks). We expected no less from a card that was initially designed to be a land that could counter spells!

Let’s have a look at Snapcaster Mage’s price trajectory during his final year in Standard:

Snapcaster trended down during the months preceding Innistrad’s rotation in September 2013 and touched $20 briefly in mid-August 2013. He hovered around $20 – $23 for five months after rotation. At the end of February 2014, Snapcaster Mage shot up to $40.

Patrick Dickmann’s Tempo Twin archetype which ran a playset of Snapcasters alongside the Splinter Twin plan was the breakout deck at Pro Tour Born of the Gods, putting the Tempo Twin archetype on the list of tier one Modern decks (though the deck debut in November 2013).

Snapcaster went down to $35 for the better part of 2014, but as of writing, seemed to be hitting a new ceiling of $45. Again in no small part due to Antonio Del Moral León taking down Pro Tour Fate Reforged with a Splinter Twin deck running three copies of Snapcasters in the main.

The window to pick up Snapcaster Mage would have been the seven month trough between July 2013 and February 2014, when he was fluctuating between $20 to $23.

All rare cards are rare, but some rare cards are rarer than others. Being two years older, Innistrad’s print run was not as high as Theros’ and as a result Snapcaster Mage has a relatively higher rarity than Thoughtseize in terms of supply rarity (last week’s Brainstorm Brewery’s Finance 101 segment dealt with this topic).

The Answer to Everything, Nearly

Abrupt Decay was printed just one year apart from Thoughtseize. and as far as I can recall, Return to Ravnica set a new precedent by being the first of the annual bestselling ever set, a testimony to either the burgeoning Magic playerbase or the fact that shocks sell.

Abrupt Decay enjoyed similar levels of multi-format permeation as with Thoughtseize and Snapcaster Mage, being casted in all formats it is legal in. After all, Abrupt Decay is the ultimate removal for any nonland permanents it could target.

In 2014, Abrupt Decay was present in 22.1% of Vintage decks, being played in Fish variants (sometimes up to a full four copies in the mainboard), Sultai tempo decks and Control. It was found in 18.9% of Legacy decks and was the 17th most played Modern card in 2014, with 20.7% of decks running it. Hey, its even a staple in the newest format on the block, Tiny Leaders.

The price trajectory of Abrupt Decay however, was different from Snapcaster Mage’s:

Abrupt Decay bottomed out in November 2013. Its price started ascending at the beginning of February 2014, hitting $10 in the middle of March before peaking at $15 in July and has been hovering around $12 since.

The demand from Abrupt Decay was most likely from non-rotating formats; it barely saw play in the trifecta Mono Black vs UW Control vs Mono Blue Return to Ravniva – Theros Standard. Abrupt Decay was the 67th most played card in Standard, with a saturation of just 7.9% of the field.

The window to pick up Abrupt Decay shut a whole six months earlier than Snapcaster Mage. The best time to up Abrupt Decay was the two month trough between December 2013 and February 2014.

Abrupt Decay could be picked up on the cheap nine to seven months before rotation, compared to Snapcaster Mage, who could still be found on the cheap two months before rotation and up to five months post-rotation.

One More Thing

Let’s look at the price history of one more fall set Modern staple that just rotated out:

While Steam Vents did not enjoyed the amount of play Snapcaster Mage and Abrupt Decay saw, Steam Vents was the third most played card in Modern in 2014, being tapped by a whooping 36.1% of decks.

Like Abrupt Decay, the best time to pick up your Steam Vents would have been between December 2013 and February 2014 when it was $7.50. There was a slight dip in the month before rotation, but Steam Vents never went below $9.

The Window for Thoughtseize

As we have seen in the price history of the few Modern cards above, the window, the window to get your hands on Standard-legal Modern staples is no longer a few months prior rotation.

Thoughtseize was at its bottom from July to September last year, fluctuating between $15 to $17. It went up after Ari Lax took down Pro Tour Khans of Tarkir with Abzan Midrange with four mainboard Thoughtseize and spent a couple of months above $20, but is now back at $19.

Based on the price history of Modern staples from the previous block, the window to stock up on your Thoughtseizes is probably right now.

There is one caveat: the upcoming Dragons of Tarkir Event Deck could potentially contain Thoughtseize, the way the Fate Reforge’s Clash pack contained  a copy of Hero’s Downfall, leading to a dip in the price of Hero’s Downfall right after the decklists were spoiled. If you want to be safe, you could wait until the decklist for Dragons of Tarkir’s Event Deck comes out, which should be in a few weeks time.

However,  getting in on an all-format all-star card at $19 seems pretty good. Thoughtseize could easily be a $40 card in the near future, and I think it’s worth the risk of losing a few bucks to an Event Deck reprint. If you have any questions or comments, you can find me on Twitter @theguoheng or just drop a comment below.

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By Guo Heng Chin

Today’s article will kick off a series exploring undervalued Tiny Leaders cards. However as I have threw my hat into the proverbial ring in my pre-Pro Tour article last week and backed a number of cards as potential financial winners, I feel I ought to do a post-mortem on their results.

We have a new Modern Pro Tour champion (congrats to Antonio Del Moral León, the first Spanish Pro Tour champion) and a new Modern metagame. Travis Allen has an awesome Pro Tour analysis coming up tomorrow; I would just briefly go through the calls I’ve made in my article last week and discuss their performance.

Their results were grisly, but they were calls I’ve chose to make as a finance author and I think it is imperative for me to do a post-mortem on them, regardless of whether they soared or bored.

Post-mortem of My Pro Tour Calls

I am glad I decided to feature Amulet of Vigor as my first call based on Amulet Bloom’s performance in the young post-ban Modern metagame. It turned out to be my only call that spiked over the Pro Tour weekend as Amulet Bloom’s performance successfully ported over to the Pro Tour. Unfortunately, the rest of my calls barely saw play among the Pro Tour decks that finished with 18 points or more.

However, that does not mean they were all failed specs or sunken ships. I made those picks based on the fact that those were cards that were or still are Modern staples, or cards with power level ripe for Modern but has yet to find a home.

More importantly, the underlying thread of each call were the fact that they were all vastly undervalued at the time of writing. None had a price tag more than $10 and half of them were under $5, which made investing in them relatively low risk.

Moving forward, I would still consider them good pick-ups, as the Modern metagame is constantly evolving, and those cards are at a bottom right now.

Just picked up 40 Chord of Calling M15 at $3.25. This is the floor & it should find a home and a $10+ price tag within 2yrs #mtgfinance

— James Chillcott (@MTGCritic) February 7, 2015

Once upon a time when Lingering Souls was a pervasive threat, Thundermaw Hellkite was the apex predator in the metagame. As I mentioned in my article last week, the single driver that could make Thundermaw a format staple again is the prevalence of Lingering Souls.

There were 144 copies of Lingering Souls spread across 32% of decks at #PTFRF. Thundermaw Hellkite be like “Put me in, Coach!”.

— Dan A. (@dtg_mtg) February 9, 2015

Thundermaw Hellkite would have been good against a whooping 32% of the decks at the Pro Tour. I’ll let that thought linger here.

It’s going to be an unpopular opinion, but I think the Modern metagame took a step backward with the recent slate of bannings. 28% of the day two metagame comprising of Abzan reminded me of Jund’s level of dominance before Bloodbraid Elf was sent to the Undying Lands.

The second most successful deck, Burn occupied 12% of the day two metagame, nearly twice the number of the third most successful archetype, Infect. The top 8 metagame consisted of just four archetypes, which would have been acceptable for a Standard Pro Tour, but is not exactly the epitome of diversity in a non-rotating format with neartly 9000 cards. Perhaps the metagame still has space to evolve and we have yet to reach the peak diversity in the post-Birthing Pod ecosystem.

Enough about Modern, as I’ve mentioned, Travis has an awesome article lined up tomorrow on Modern finance, be sure to check it out.

Undervalued Cards in a New Format

I’ve written a primer on Tiny Leaders a few weeks back. Since then there has been some movements in the finances of a few cards which could have been driven by Tiny Leaders demand.

When I wrote about them  two weeks ago, foil copies Varolz, the Scar-Striped were just going for $3.50 and foil Ezuri, Renegade Leader were $5. 78. Today foil Varolzs are going for $9 and Ezuri foils skyrocketed to nearly $20.

I hesitate to call Tiny Leaders demand a market force to be reckoned yet, based on just two popular Tiny Leaders commander who saw their foil prices shoot up. Market correction could be a factor here: Ezuri foils were from a set released nearly five years ago and Varolz, while cheap, is one of best Golgari leader and he also fits into Abzan builds, one of the most powerful color combination in the format.

A good way to buy into a format on the cheap is to predict which cards are likely to become staples and buy into them when they are still cheap. I am going to embark on a Tiny Leaders series exploring undervalued cards, and today we shall begin with with undervalued white Tiny Leaders cards.

The boat has sailed for this one but it might be relevant for the first undervalued card I would be discussing. Foil copies of Leonin Shikari were going for $10 last month but doubled up early this month, while non-foil copies only moved from $5 to $7.

The spike is almost solely due to demand from Commander or Tiny Leaders. Besides the fact that the foil spiked by a larger margin than the non-foil, I have yet to see a Modern or Legacy deck running Leonin Shikari (and I suspect we are unlikely to see one) Leonin Shikari fits well in Nahiri, the Lithomancer Commander and the following leader:

Kemba, Kha Regent may not be a tier one deck (yet), but she is a popular leader, as far as the Tiny Leaders subreddit and Facebook group goes. I am not bullish on her normal copies as she was reprinted in Commander 2014, but Kemba’s single foil printing looks sweet at $4.61.

While foil Kemba would struggle to hit the heights Ezuri hit (Ezuri at $20 also seems like a bubble), she has a lot of room to grow at sub-$5. I would not be surprised to see her foils hit $10. As with all Scars of Mirrodin cards, Kemba is at risk of being reprinted in Modern Masters 2015. However, Modern Masters 2015 would have to feature an equipment theme for her to be included, something which I think is unlikely.

As mentioned, Kemba was just reprinted in Commander 2014. Unless Wizards thinks she is destined to be the next big thing in Modern, I would imagine the chances of her seeing reprint is relatively thin in the short-term.

That is all for today. Please accept my apologies for the shorter than usual article; things have been a little hectic over the past week. I have something nice in the pipeline for next Tuesday to make up to you readers.

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By Guo Heng Chin

I initially planned to write solely about cards to watch during Pro Tour Fate Reforged. However, I’ve had the chance to participate in the first ever Tiny Leaders tournament  in Malaysia over the weekend and friend and fellow Magic player @rezaaba convinced me that I should probably do a report on the event. So today’s article is going to be a two-in-one (talk about value for your time): the first portion discusses the cards which I am keeping an eye on as we count down towards the Pro Tour this weekend and throughout the Pro Tour. The second segment would be a round-by-round report of the Tiny Leaders tournament I attended.

Throwing My Hat into the Ring

The following are cards are possibly undervalued at the moment in terms of their price in relation to the amount of play they currently see and could potentially see. These are cards that could experience a spike if decks they running them performs at the Pro Tour.

Data on the post-ban metagame is sparse, with only five Modern Daily Events (the bans were enforced on Magic Online from 28 January onwards) and two StarCityGames Premier IQs. Going through the data, there is one deck that stood out, Amulet Bloom. It took down last weekend’s StarCityGames Premier IQ and is the most successful combo deck in the Modern Daily Events, comprising of 4.6% of the field. The deck is not exactly dominant, but it seems that reports of the death of Amulet Bloom have been greatly exaggerated. The deck is of interest financially because the namesake card of the deck could spike in price if Amulet Bloom spikes Pro Tour Fate Reforged.

Amulet of Vigor is at $3.05 even though the strategy of the archetype hinges on Amulet. If you are looking to invest in Amulet of Vigor, do keep in mind that it would be a short-term investment as Amulet of Vigor is at risk of being reprinted in Modern Masters 2015, although it escapes my mind what sort of limited archetype in Modern Masters would Amulet fit in.

I often wonder why Thalia, Guardian of Thraben remains so cheap despite the amount of play she is currently seeing in Modern and Legacy. Thalia is present in Modern Hatebears, Modern Death and Taxes and the occasional Modern Zoo. You can also find her in Maverick and Death and Taxes in Legacy. And decks running Thalia want to run three to four copies of her. Most importantly, Thalia is not going to be reprinted in Modern Masters 2015, and by the virtue of being the Guardian of Thraben, we are unlikely to find her anywhere else but on the plane of Innistrad.

Seeing that I have been raving about Tiny Leaders lately, it is worth noting that Thalia is also solid leader in the format. Thalia is reputedly a favorite of Bramwell Tackaberry, the progenitor of the Tiny Leaders, and has been topping of the Winnipeg Tiny Leaders scene.

Thalia is a card that would eventually bump up in price as her current price of $4.38 is out of sync with the amount of eternal play she has been seeing. Unfortunately the chance that her price would be bumped by Pro Tour Fate Reforged looks to be slim, for the fact that the Pro Tour metagame is historically skewed towards midrange or blue-based decks. Thalia is a card I consider a good great long-term investment, at least until the following Modern Masters is announced, which we probably would not see until 2017.

I wrote about the next two cards in my article a short while ago. I am revisiting them today as there were new developments during the two weeks that have passed.

Since the announcement of the bans on 19 January, Sphinx’s Revelation spiked on Magic Online from the 9.8 tickets it was hovering at before settling at 16.8 tickets, but remained at $6.18 on paper, which was pretty much the same price it was at when I wrote my previous article. Modern staples are generally cheaper online due to the larger quantity of boosters being drafted online; when a key component of one of the potential new overlords of Modern is nearly three times more expensive online than its paper counterpart, a price correction is inbound. I think it is paper Sphinx’s Revelation that is due for correction, rather than the digital one.

I mentioned in my previous article – before we got any data on the post-ban metagame – that Thundermaw Hellkite would soar once more if Lingering Souls becomes prevalent again. Lingering Souls was ran in 19.8% of all the decks that moneyed the five Modern Daily Events since the bans were implemented on Magic Online and 18.6% of the top 16 decks (3 out of 16) in the StarCityGames IQ in Washington two weeks back (but none in last week’s IQ in Indianapolis as no Abzan Midrange decks made top 16). Lingering Souls has got its staple status reinstated in Abzan Midrange, one of the most popular decks in the post-ban Modern landscape.

Thundermaw Hellkite could very well be a level one tech at the Pro Tour designed to trump Abzan Midrange, which is predicted to be one of the most played tier one decks at the Pro Tour.  Thundermaw Hellkite plays the role as a curve-topper in Jeskai Geist and Big Zoo. If Thundermaw sees a decent amount of play at the Pro Tour, I doubt Thundermaw’s price would remain under $10 as it is now ($9.25 as of writing). If you are looking to invest in Thundermaw Hellkite, it might be best to consider it a short-term investment due to the possibility of reprint in Magic 2016, as I have explained in my previous article.

Chord in a Post-Pod World

As someone who has lived through the era of $40 Chords, I’ve mentioned on multiple occasions that Chord of Calling is unbelievably cheap at the $3.40 it is at right now. While Chord of Calling was discarded by Birthing Pod decks in the final chapter of the archetype’s evolution in favor of a less combo-reliant build, Chord is now a potential saviour of the archetype.

Jay Lansdaal wrote about a few different Pod shells that could be given a breath of new life with Chord of Calling. The lists harked back to the days of yore when Pod decks were combo decks with a beatdown backup plan. Chord of Calling replaced Birthing Pod in helping you assemble the combo pieces, whose tutoring capabilities also imbued the deck with toolbox capabilities.

Chord of Calling was also seen as a playset in Elves, which finished 9th at the recent StarCityGames IQ in Indianapolis. It could be a fluke performance of that archetype, but we are traversing uncharted territory in Modern, a landscape free from the subtly oppressive dominion of Pod decks, and for all we know Elves might actually be viable now.

Speaking of Birthing Pod replacements,  Domri Rade is another value engine option as featured in Jay Lansdaal’s Kiki Pod Chord shell and Redditor /u/OctilleryLOL‘s iteration of Kiki Chord. Together with Courser of Kruphix, Domri Rade is a beast of an advantage engine. At $6.86, Domri has a lot of room to grow if decks running Domri performs, especially if Kibleresque Zoo decks becomes viable.

Moonshot Card

This new tech has been floating around for a while, but I’ve only stumbled upon it courtesy of Travis Allen‘s tweet.

Redditor /u/hp94 did pretty well with the list which possessed favorable matchups against BGx decks and Affinity. Magic Online user RaptureReady went 3 – 1 in a Modern Daily with a slightly modified list after reading the Reddit post.  Like Pod, the deck is chock-full of value creatures, and  to put it in Travis’ word, it is pretty much a Pod deck that runs Séance instead of Birthing Pod. And from what I’ve read, Séancing a Siege Rhino or Mulldrifter is quite a lot of value.

There has yet to be more results since then, though it has only been a little more than a week ago. Séance looks like a legitimate successor to Birthing Pod and at the bulk price of $0.29, it is a card worth keeping an eye  on for the Pro Tour. It does not take much for a relatively old card like Séance to jump.

Tiny Leaders Tournament Report

The first ever Tiny Leaders tournament in Malaysia was held last week. Shout-out to the tournament organiser Kelvin Seow at HQ Sri Petaling for the initiative and the wonderful players who gave their support to the event. The turnout for the event surpassed our expectations: 15 players for a new format in the local Magic scene.

I ran the Anafenza, the Foremost list which I posted at the end of my article last week. The deck drew its inspiration from Modern Pod decks: it attacks from two angles with a beatdown plan A and Melira combo plan B.

Round 1 – Athreos, God of Passage

A few of the players participating in the tournament built their Tiny Leaders the night before just to play in the tournament. Unfortunately, my first round opponent was one of them and I felt bad jamming a refined Abzan list against him. Kudos to him though, for building the deck the night before (if I recall correctly, he heard of the tournament the night before) and coming to support the LGS in their first ever Tiny Leaders tournament.

1-0

Notes from the round: Tiny Leaders is as competitive as non-rotating formats like Modern and Legacy and tuned decks would walk over untuned lists. This should not be viewed as a downside as it applies to Modern and Legacy, and to some extend, Standard as well. Budget options are available for Tiny Leaders, and a good tier one is Anex and Cymede, which I would be writing about in my next article.

Round 2 – Geist of Saint Traft

My second round opponent, Kean ran a well-tuned Geist of Saint Traft list and the power level and fun of Tiny Leaders manifested itself in this match. Game one was a close grind as we exchanged removals for each other’s haymakers. It felt a bit like Legacy: Kean resolved a Stoneforge Mystic searching for his Sword of Feast and Famine, I ripped a Thoughtseize the next turn and got rid of it.

After bashing at me with Geist of Saint Traft and other pesky evasive creatures and building a board position for the kill the next turn, he tapped out and I managed to resolve a Chord of Calling to assemble the Melira combo.

Sideboard: + Wrench Mind, +Council’s Judgement, +Sin Collector, +Cruel Edict, –Scavenging Ooze, –Dismember -Llanowar Elves, -Sword of Feast and Famine

In game two Kean fell on the wrong side of variance as he mulliganed to five and I proceeded to draw Wrench Mind (my Hymn to Tourach) and Thoughtseize.

2-0

Notes from the round: Kean pointed out a poignant observation about how Tiny Leaders differ from Legacy and Modern. Certain color combinations have access to less removals than they usually do due to the singleton nature of Tiny Leaders. My Dark Confidant survived longer than he should have in game one as Kean did not draw into one of his two answers: Swords to Plowshares or Path to Exile. The amount of card I drew off Dark Confidant allowed me to assemble the Melira combo pieces in the nick of time before he could swing for lethal.

Round 3 – Ezuri, Renegade Leader

Ah, the dreaded Elfball deck. Besides Geist of Saint Traft, Ezuri Elfball was the other deck I dedicated the most sideboard slots to. In game one, I was overruned by  elves as I attempted to develop my board position from a slow opening hand.

Sideboard: +Zealous Persecution, +Drown in Sorrow, +Golgari Charm, -Sword of Fire and Ice, -Thoughtseize, -Lingering Souls

In game two I assumed the control role and sandbagged my removals for key creatures like his Elvish lords, Ezuri and any elf that could generate more than one mana. It is difficult to outsize his board position as he is a swarm deck after all. It was a close back-and-forth battle: I thought my chances were good when I managed to connect with a Sword of Feast and Famine-wielding Anafenza, but he has a Reclamation Sage to remove it before shoring up his board position with elves that grew in to outsize my creatures in power and toughness. I took game two one turn away from a whooping 30 damage Elvish alpha strike on the back of the Melira combo.

I got greedy in game three, keeping a hand with Zealous Persecution and Golgari Charm but only one land which was a Wooded Foothills. Most of my opponent’s elves were 1/1 prior to any lords and I reasoned that if I drew one more of my 18 remaining lands, or one of my four mana dorks, I would be able to reset his board twice. Alas, I saw no lands nor mana dorks until he has an Elvish Champion in play and I was quickly dispatched. Thankfully my opponent, Keith ended up taking down the whole tournament and propping up my tiebreakers.

2-1

Notes from the round: Elfball was slower I imagined it to be. The deck still has one of the fastest board-building speed in the format, but it does not go critical until it could untap with either Priest of Titania or Elvish Archdruid. It is imperative to keep those two off the board or answer them as soon as possible. Allowing your Elfball opponent to untap with either of those in play means facing an exponential growth in the number of elves and a quick trip to the next game.

It is also important to keep Ezuri off the board due to his ability to regenerate other elves. Dismember was MVP here as it gets around Ezuri’s regeneration shield (for other elves, if you could not afford to remove Ezuri first). I would prioritise removing Elfball’s Priest and Archdruid, followed by the lords and Ezuri.

Round 4: Vendilion Clique

Vendilion Clique turned out to be one of the most popular leaders in the tournament as a lot of the participants were Duel Commander players and they ported over their Duel Commander decks. My final round opponent was local alterist extraordinaire, Patterson and he sported some of the most gorgeous-looking basic islands I have seen.

Game one was a drawn-out grind for me to amass a board position amid his flurry of counterspells and bounces. He flooded out in the mid-game as he ripped one too many islands in succession (perils of having beautiful islands), which allowed me to sneak in a Midnight Haunting and bolster my tokens with Gavony Township. An Ancestral Visions did not draw him into the Cyclonic Rift he was looking for and it was game two.

Sideboard: +Reclamation Sage, +Phyrexian Arena, +Wrench Mind, + Sin Collector, +Golgari Charm, -Dismember, -Smother, -Scavenging Ooze, -Swords to Plowshare, -Llanowar Elves.

I took out all my creature removals as there were no targets beyond Vendilion Clique and I have flying spirit tokens to handle that. The excessive number of artifact and enchantment removal stemmed from my fear of Back to Basics and getting Vedalken Shackled out of the game. Rightfully so,  game two would have been lost had I not have a Reclamation Sage in hand when he resolved his Vedalken Shackles.

Notes from the round: Playing against blue was not as dreadful as I initially thought. The lack of board wipes meant that the fight was to resolve a few threats through his counterspells and bounces, and bounces were net negative in terms of card advantage. However, blue does have a lot of deadly enchantments and artifacts post-board that could wreck a tricolor creature-based deck  if left unanswered.

3-1 (finished second)

Overall, the tournament was a hell of an experience. The complexity of Tiny Leaders and the decision trees available definitely felt like playing Legacy, or at the very least competitive Duel Commander. The singleton restriction was one of the factor as it promoted diversity in answers and threats. I have yet to amass enough Tiny Leaders experience to point out its flaws (and I am certain there are some), and from what little experience I’ve had, Tiny Leaders filled a gap for me by providing a format where I can experience the thrills of Legacy at a fraction of its cost and the fun of Commander without the long-drawn out games.

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By Guo Heng Chin

I’ve always wondered how it felt like to be an early adopter of bitcoins. To be one of those who got in when bitcoins were $0.20 each (bitcoin is now trading at $257.09 per bitcoin). To be a member of the bitcoin millionaire club just for the virtue of being an early adopter of a technology most initially shrugged off as a passing fad.

Ah, the perks of being an early adopter.

While I was drawn into Commander when the format first broke into the mainstream with the release of the first Commander products in 2011, I paid little attention to the financial aspects of Commander cards. It was a fun, casual format of singleton cards and my logic (flawed in retrospect) told me the demand for Commander cards would not be sufficient to drive the price of Commander staples.

In 2012,  I was surprised when I heard about the price of a foil Chromatic Lantern on an episode of Brainstorm Brewery. Then the Nekusar spikes happened in late 2013; Old rares like Forced Fruition, Teferi’s Puzzle Box and Wheel of Fortune spiked because they had synergy with Nekusar, the Mindrazer, who turned out to be one of the most popular commanders from Commander 2013.

Fast forward to 2015.  I am now writing a Magic finance column and one of my area of focus is undervalued Commander foils.  While most Commander staple foils have already spiked, there are still some undervalued Commander foils lurking beneath the bush, but they are hard to find. It feels a bit like foraging for truffles. I hate to admit it, but the treasure cruise for speccing on Commander foils had left the port a while ago and we are trawling the waters for any gold that fell off the barge.

Magic, fortunately is an ever-changing landscape, and once in a while we get something new brewing on the horizon. Sometimes it’s an innovative supplementary product like Conspiracy. Sometimes it’s an exciting new format.

The Littlest Giants

Tiny Leaders seemed to be the talk of Magic town lately. Tiny Leaders is a new take on the Commander format where players play with 50 card decks including their commander, and a defining caveat that only cards with three or less casting cost can be played. Designed by Bramwell Tackaberry in 2013, the format spread quickly among his local community and in the past few months, began to gain traction in the Magic community as a whole.

Chas Andres briefly discussed Tiny Leaders in his article last November. Jimi Brady at GatheringMagic.com put up a piece on Tiny Leaders with some sweet decklists the same month. Eric Levine, Commander-in-Residence at Channel Fireball wrote an article about it in December, so did Matt Higgs at StarCityGames. I first heard about the format myself from Brainstorm Brewery’s mid-January 2015 Fate Reforged set review podcast, where Jason E Alt was talking about the viability of two of the Fate Reforged khans as Tiny Leader commanders. My fellow finance writer at MTGPrice, Cliff Daigle also wrote an article about the format last week. Even people at The Mothership started paying attention to the format recently:

The Tiny Leader community is still growing, with the Facebook group and subreddit both boasting a membership of around 1,500 members each as of writing. I highly recommend checking out both groups if you are interested to delve more into the format. And I definitely recommend giving Tiny Leaders a try if you have yet to do so.

Tiny Leaders, Big Potential

Why do I think Tiny Leaders has the potential to be the next big format in Magic? It shares a characteristic found in a lot of successful startups: it caters to an unfulfilled niche.

Tiny Leaders is a cross between Commander and Legacy, a singleton Legacy. The majority of the mana curve in Legacy lies at three or less anyway, so cards that are good in Legacy are bound to be good in Tiny Leaders as Jimi Brady pointed out in his article.  Jimi also mentioned a very valid point on why the format has the potential to catch on like wildfire: it has a relatively low entry barrier. A Tiny Leaders deck requires less cards than the usual 60-card deck and only one-of rather than a playset-of expensive staples.

I can’t get into Legacy with the single Tarmogoyf and Dark Confidant I opened from my two boxes of Modern Masters, and they are not exactly optimal cards for Commander. However they fit snugly into my Anafenza, the Foremost Tiny Leaders brew. To be honest, the virtue of being a singleton format is that players could get away with missing a few expensive pieces and still have a relatively competitive deck. This list by redditor /u/darkflame1o1 performed pretty well at a tournament despite missing Dark Confidant and Tarmogoyf.

Tiny Leaders appeals to players too spikey to play Commander, or players who are weary of long Commander games and all the politicking which are integral to Commander games. Even Brainstorm Brewery’s ‘I’m-never-gonna-touch-Commander’ Marcel professed an interest in Tiny Leaders in their recent podcast.Tiny Leaders has the competitive lure of Duel Commander, and is better designed for competitive play.

I feel I ought to include arguments against Tiny Leaders taking off to provide an objective view of the format’s future. While Chas Andres mentioned a few good ones in his article, he nevertheless gave the format a moderate to high chance of future success. I think those drawbacks mentioned in Chas’ article – potential power-level imbalance and small number of players – are issues that confronted every new format as it made the leap from niche to mainstream.

Power-level imbalances could be ironed out with astute management of the banlist. The banlist is currently  managed by Steven Harmonic and Matthew Turnbull with input from the community (Steven and Matthew are highly active on the Tiny Leaders subreddit and Bram manages the Tiny Leaders Facebook group).

The issue with the format’s small player base is temporary and is remedied as format hits a tipping point in momentum, something which I think is Tiny Leaders is heading towards right now with the amount of interest and attention it is getting from the community. Besides the increasing number of articles being written about the format, and the number of times Brainstorm Brewery mentioned it in their podcast, Cedric Phillips and Patrick Sullivan briefly discussed Tiny Leaders during the commentary of StarCityGames’ Washington DC Open last weekend, all good signs of the format breaching through into the mainstream.

Tiny Investments

Tiny Leaders cards are in an interesting spot financially – the format’s three mana and below casting cost restriction meant that a swath of the format’s staple overlap with Legacy and Modern staples, which are already pricey. On the other hand, the restriction led to cards with casting cost-specific effects to be more powerful in the context of Tiny Leaders. Unearth becomes a Reanimate without a drawback. Smother becomes an unconditional removal. Three CMC and under spells with X as part of their casting cost is a way to circumvent the figurative power level of the format, as spells with an X in their casting cost scales according to the amount of mana channelled into X.

Today, we are going to go through a few of these cards that could potentially spike if Tiny Leaders takes off. First off, we have the heads of the states decks.

The Leaders

Grenzo, Dungeon Warden

Non-foil: $1.33

Foil: $18.03

Two reasons why Grenzo, Dungeon Warden is sweet in Tiny Leaders: He has an X in his casting cost and he could generate a swarm all by himself. Tristan Gregson pointed out on Twitter that Grenzo could be a good Tiny Leaders pick-up and I wholly agree. Non-foil copies are unlikely to stay at $1.33 as the demand for Grenzo increases and being flavor-tied to Conspiracy, Grenzo is unlikely to see a reprint. Foils are already expensive as Grenzo is also a decent Commander general and I am not a fan of speccing on those.

Ezuri, Renegade Leader

Non-foil: $1.67

Foil: $5.78

Ezuri Elfball is one of the tier one decks in Tiny Leaders. $5.78 is a good buy-in for foil copies of a tier one leader from an old set. Non-foils at $1.67 have room to grow but being reprinted Commander 2014 means a longer lag in appreciation. I would rather snag up foil copies.

Varolz, the Scar-Striped

Non-foil: $0.59

Foil: $3.05

Another tier one leader, foil Varolz, the Scar-Striped is only $3, courtesy of being from a recently rotated set. I would pick up foils rather than non-foils at this price. Varolz is also playable as part of the 49.

Ambassador Laquatus

Non-foil: $1.09 (Tenth Edition); $0.70 (Torment)

Foil: $3.51 (Tenth Edition); $3.68 (Torment)

Ambassador Laquatus is a good example of cards that are crap everywhere except in the context of Tiny Leaders. Against a 50-card deck, milling becomes a viable competitive strategy. Sword of Body and Mind was banned for the exact reason. Laquatus is a tier one leader and both foil and non-foil copies are good pick-ups at those prices.

Contextually Good Cards

As mentioned above, some cards are just better in a format with an imposed maximum casting cost of three.

Unearth

Non-foil: $0.72

Foil: $7.02

Unearth is a unconditional and drawback-free Animate Dead in Tiny Leaders. Cheating-into-play may not be necessary for most creatures costing three or less, but Entomb is legal in this young format and there is potential for graveyard shenanigans. Non-foil copies look like good pickups at under $1.

Sunforger

Non-foil: $1.44

Foil: $8.98

Jason E Alt has been harping about this card for a long time. Indeed the first time I’ve heard about Tiny Leaders was from Jason harping about Sunforger, so I have him to thank for that. Jason is confident that Sunforger is one of the best cards in Tiny Leaders. At $1.44, it is a low risk spec and a good one in my opinion. Also foil Sunforgers recently spiked, as highlighted by mtgmarketwatch subreddit founder /u/mtd14.

The Black and White Zeniths

Spells with X in their casting cost circumvent the imposed three casting cost ceiling and there is a lot of potential for powerful effects the power of those spells scale according to the amount of mana sinked into them. White Sun’s Zenith has the potential to be a late game finisher not just for control decks, but also for midrange decks looking for a card to close out games fast in the mid-to-late game. Foils for $2.39 could be a good investment.

Tiny Leaders’ three casting cost ceiling rendered a lot of sweepers illegal in deckbuilding. Black Sun’s Zenith is one of few black sweepers available as pointed out by Chaz from BoltSnapBolt. Although the Game Day full art foils just increased in price, the Mirrodin Besieged foils at $5 is not a a shabby pick-up.

Ratchet Bomb

Non-foil: $0.48 (M14); $0.51 (Scars of Mirrodin)

Foil: $1.70 (M14); $3.24 (Scars of Mirrodin)

Speaking of sweepers, Ratchet Bomb is a colorless sweeper that could become a staple in the Tiny Leaders besides Engineered Explosives. Ratchet Bomb may be too slow for other formats, but is efficient in Tiny Leaders. Foils at $1.70 have room to grow if the format takes off.

The Big Picture

Tiny Leaders is a format in its infancy. The format is a brewer’s paradise, brimming with unexplored deckbuilding space. There has yet to be a repository for Tiny Leaders decklists or tournament results. The two places to find Tiny Leaders decklists currently are the Tiny Leaders Facebook group and subreddit. I would definitely recommend checking out those forums. There are a lot of innovation and ideas being bounced around, but there has yet to be highly-tuned lists of respective archetypes, which means an abundance of opportunity for deck brewers to get brewing.

The metagame is still young and evolving. The addition of Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest and Alesha, Who Smiles at Death injected a lot new design space in the format as previously Tiny Leaders does not have a Jeskai or Mardu leader and resorted to a placeholder ‘leader’ with no abilities.

The format’s future is by no way certain. For all we know, the hype and interest that is building up a momentum right now could dissipate before the end of the year. However, judging by the overwhelmingly positive response from those who dipped their toes in the format, I am confident that Tiny Leaders would grow into the next big format.

In Retrospect

I guess I am not hopelessly bad in spotting the next big thing. I was an early fan of Modern and I completed my playset of blue-based staples back in 2011, shortly after the inception of Modern. I was confident that Modern would grow into the next big thing as it filled a niche that many players, myself included felt was missing from the competitive scene.

I wanted to play in a competitive non-rotating format where I could run my favorite pet deck all the time, but I could not afford to buy into Legacy. Modern filled that niche in that it served as an intermediary between Standard and Legacy, a non-rotating format with a lower barrier of entry. Gavin Verhey’s Overextended has been garnering a lot of interest, so there must have been plenty of other players in similar positions as I was.

I had my hipster moment with Modern. I acquired my Scalding Tarns and Misty Rainforests at $15 each, Vendilion Cliques at $8 each, Player Rewards Cryptic Commands at $10 each, among many others. I ran Storm in the first Modern PTQ season in 2012 and crashed badly, but it was fun. Storm was my pet deck for one whole year. It won me my first Grand Prix Trial and performed okay for me on Magic Online daily events. Eventually Jeskai (UWR back in those days) Geist took over and it has been my go-to deck up till Ancestral Recall became Modern legal (sort of).

My excitement for Tiny Leaders reminded me of how I felt about Modern in 2011. I am excited for Tiny Leaders because the format is an opportunity for me to play a fast-paced Duel Commander game with a touch of Legacy’s power level but only a fraction of Legacy’s buy-in fee. And I am excited that my enthusiasm for the format is shared by many other players and writers.

Bonus: My Anafenza, the Foremost Tiny Leaders

Seeing that there is a dearth of Tiny Leaders decklists at the moment, let me share with you my Anafenza brew that I am taking with me to what seems to be Malaysia’s first Tiny Leaders tournament this weekend.

Commander: Anafenza, the Foremost

Creatures

Avacyn’s Pilgrim

Bird of Paradise

Deathrite Shaman

Llanowar Elves

Cartel Aristocrat

Dark Confidant

Melira, Sylvok Outcast

Scavenging Ooze

Tarmogoyf

Tidehollow Sculler

Eternal Witness

Knight of the Reliquary

Kitchen Finks

Loxodon Smiter

Varolz, the Scar-Striped

Planeswalkers

Liliana of the Veil

Instants

Enlightened Tutor

Worldly Tutor

Sword to Plowshares

Abrupt Decay

Smother

Chord of Calling

Dismember

Midnight Haunting

Sorceries

Green Sun’s Zenith

Lingering Souls

Thoughtseize (I don’t own Inquisition of Kozilek)

Artifacts 

Sensei’s Divining Top

Sword of Feast and Famine

Sword of Fire and Ice

Lands

Gavony Township

Windswept Heath

Wooded Foothills

Flooded Strand

Polluted Delta

Bloodstained Mire

Arid Mesa

Marsh Flats

Godless Shrine

Overgrown Tomb

Temple Garden

Woodland Cemetery

Sunpetal Grove

City of Brass

Cavern of Souls

Command Tower

Plains

Swamp

Forest

The deck attacks on multiple angles, in the spirit of one of the best Magic strategy articles in recent time. There are four one-drop mana dorks to ‘ramp’ into the three drops on turn two for a fast start. One of the perks of having a leader is having access to a three drop to ramp into all the time. The deck is also quite mana-hungry as the mid-game plan hinges on Gavony Township and tutoring out value creatures.

The mana dorks help fuel the deck’s mid game, besides providing an extra layer of consistency to ensure that we hit our ‘land drops’ every turn. Those mana dorks could be conscripted to the frontline during the mid-to-late game as they get jacked up with Anafenza’s counters or Gavony Township.

Gavony Township could be tutored up with Knight of the Reliquary, who in turn is tutorable with Green Sun’s Zenith, Chord of Calling or Worldly Tutor. Yup, there’s plenty of tutors to maximise the consistency of the deck.

The tutors are also present for the deck’s second angle of attack: the classic Melira infinite life combo. The combo pieces are Melira, Sylvok Outcast, Kitchen Finks and either Cartel Aristocrat or Varolz, the Scar-Striped to loop for infinite life. The initial blueprint had a Blood Artist to enable a combo kill, but I’ve found that Blood Artist was a dead card outside the combo. With the exception of Melira, all the other components of the combo are creatures that can provide exceptional value by themselves. Kitchen Finks sort of combos with Anafenza to reset its -1/-1 persist counters. Varolz and Cartel Aristocrat are two hard to remove creatures, ideal targets for Anafenza to bestow +1/+1 counters on.

The game plan is resoundingly similar to Birthing Pod decks (RIP): grind your opponent out with value creatures and develop a superior board position with Gavony Township. If and when the opportunity arises, execute the infinite life combo by tutoring out the pieces on instant speed. Tidehollow Sculler is there to give us a tutorable hand disruption if we find the need to ensure that the coast is clear before we execute the Melira combo.

Thanks for reading through all 3,000 words of this article. I hope the article has provided you with an insight into this wonderful new format called Tiny Leaders and cards which price could take off together with the format. Comments are most welcomed and you either leave a comment below or at engage me on Twitter at @theguoheng.

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