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Accumulated Knowledge, Modern Madness, Modern Masters, ProTrader, Unlocked ProTrader

UNLOCKED PROTRADER: The Coming Storm

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A quick bit of house-keeping at the top of today’s article: as you may have noticed, I’m on the ProTrader side of the site. Overall, my writing is going to stay the same, but I’m going to limit explanations of common terms and avoid rehashing the basics as much. If you ever have a question about something I write about, reach out on the forums or in the comments—I have really enjoyed the great feedback and discussion I’ve gotten from y’all so far. Also, I’m going to try my best to keep the parallels to football to a minimum, but sometimes they work, so let’s just try and meet somewhere in the middle on that. And now, onto your regularly scheduled programming.

“We are less than a month away from Modern Masters 2”

I seriously have to tell myself that sometimes, because it really seems absurd. The accelerated release schedule that we’ve had is probably the first time where I’ve felt like things are coming out too fast. Dragons of Tarkir has been out for a little over a month, and most of us are only now realizing what a great set it is (let’s come back to this another week, though).

Realize that, three months from today, two new Magic sets will have been released. It’s unheard of.

Of course, Wizards is well aware of the potential danger of product fatigue—the company has managed to avoid it for over two decades at this point, but I definitely think they are wading into deeper waters. The solution, at this point, is branding. Modern Masters 2015, like its predecessor, is not intended for newer or younger players. Per Aaron Forsythe’s article on the release of MM1:

“And third, we hope the price difference keeps the product out of the wrong hands. The set will not be Standard legal—I repeat, the set will not be Standard legal—and we don’t want newer players picking these up by mistake thinking they can use them at, say, Friday Night Magic. The higher price should give them pause and make sure that players that know exactly what they’re buying are the ones getting them.”

One of the great things about Wizards is that so many of their choices and decisions, even at a corporate level, are informed by context and “getting” their audience. There are a lot of valid reasons for pricing Modern Masters sets like they have, and some of them are things they can’t really spell out on the mothership (WOTC really doesn’t like talking publicly about the secondary market).

I hate this reasoning though—it’s like making Hello Kitty wine and saying that kids won’t want it, because they know the legal drinking age is 21. My LGS has a very casual and very young base, but they all drool over the Modern Masters boxes we have behind the counter. Magic, as a forward-facing product that is the subsidiary of a humongous toy corporation, is always trying to keep its #brand fresh by changing how it looks every year. Right now it’s Dragon World, before it was Greek World, and a couple of times it was Robot World (we won’t talk about the year that it was “Silk Button-Down Anime Shirt World”).

The problem is that for the overwhelming majority of Magic’s audience, the brand isn’t defined by who or what is pictured on the packs this month, it’s by the allure of owning really good cards. Tarmogoyf is one of the most constantly talked about cards ever, on the level of Black Lotus and the best Jace. Want to own a Tarmogoyf of your own? Well, you can always try your luck at Modern Masters.

I say all of that to illustrate that WOTC’s branding of Modern Masters seems to imply that demand will only be from a segment of the community. Here is, in actuality, a highly scientific chart illustrating the demand for this product:

mmdemand

There is going to be a lot of demand for this product, across a very wide spectrum of players. Those who can afford to buy sealed product are going to do so, but that number is likely to be a small percentage of the players you typically interact with. In the short term, I expect a lot of players to be looking to convert their extra standard and EDH stock into Modern Masters. If you are looking for a sneaky good opportunity to get in on things like Khans fetch lands or other standard-legal targets, it may be coming up. If you plan on getting into sealed product, consider having a box of packs that you trade out, especially if you are able to get in at the $200 to $225 range. A lot of players are going to want to get those packs, but taking a sure thing in trade is always going to be the winning side.

I also want to talk about what is in the set, because as of now (Wednesday), we are starting to get credible information and spoilers. Most recently, Spellskite was added, and Splinter Twin, first suspected to be a mythic, was downgraded to rare. I expect that we will start to get official WOTC spoilers soon, and that we will know the full set long before it gets published officially. There was a big leak over the weekend, which featured the (original) Command cycle, Goblin Guide, Noble Heirarch, and several other high-profile cards (in addition to the aforementioned Splinter Twin).

noblehierarch

On Monday morning, at least a full day after the leak went viral, I had a friend ask if now was the time to move his set of Noble Hierarchs (which he does not currently use, so it is not impacting his ability to play). I told him no, because the best time has likely already passed. At this point, the smartest move is to wait until Magic Origins: if the supply of MM2 has dried up, then prices will start to rise like last time, and he’ll come out as well as he would have (if not better) than selling them before the leak. If you have anything you are considering selling that falls in the range of “potentially in Modern Masters 2,” my best recommendation for right now is to wait. I think most vendors are going to be very conservative on buying until we know the full set, and once something is for sure not in, the price will likely see a small, quick uptick. Anything that is spoiled for MM2 will likely see a short dip, followed by whatever impact MM2 will have on the market.

My personal expectation is that there will likely be “enough” MM2. The print run on MM1 was small, and was made even smaller by distributors stashing away cases. I think the two-pronged solution of more product plus a higher MSRP (which also means “higher wholesale cost”) will prevent distributors from holding onto as much as they did last time, so a higher percentage of the total print run will hit the market. A lot of packs are going to be shipped out in anticipation of the massive bacchanal sealed GPs that will be happening the following weekend, but I suspect that that is merely in addition to the print run, not a portion of it. WOTC wants to make sure that people feel like they had the chance to get some, without devaluing the product so much (in either price or allure) that they can’t swing Modern Masters 2017 in two years. Things like Serum Visions will plummet back to earth, but the cards like Dark Confidant and Tarmogoyf will stay elusive enough to make people clamor for future printings.

bacchanals

Some quick Modern Masters-themed hits to close us out:

  • In the arcana for the upcoming FNM promos, they said July and August will both be Modern staples in honor of MM2, even though the set will be released two months earlier. It doesn’t say specifically if Path to Exile (the first promo) will or will not be in the set. I could see it going either way.
  • Speaking of promos, I read that roughly 1,200 of the new Liliana promos were given out last weekend. If that number stays the same, it means less than 10,000 of them will be in existence at the end of the year. I don’t plan on trying to get my set until after the third round of RPTQs, when they will lose their allure.
  • Speaking of Liliana of the Veil, all of the cards “safe” from Modern Masters 2 (Innistrad, Return to Ravnica, etc.) are probably going to see a short-term surge, but will settle back after people realize that wasn’t a supply-driven spike, but rather opportunism. Stay away in the short term, unless you see something that you absolutely can’t live without that has stayed relatively static. Shout out to Jagster in the forums.
  • I’m excited to see what draft archetypes get included this time around!
  • It’s crazy that Blood Moon, a card that has been in Eight Edition, Ninth Edition, and freakin’ CHRONICLES is still $20. That would be a great include, but at some point you have to expect Magus of the Moon to start climbing. That card was in one set, and that set was Future Sight, so it almost doesn’t even count. Plus, do you remember the 8-Moon decks? I sure do, they were sweet. I’m tempted to just buy a ton of magi right now for retail. I also want to build Karstenbot again.
  • Profane Command is about to be reprinted for the actual hundredth time. That card gets no respect, no respect at all! Profane Command gets so little respect, American Airlines called, they thanked him for flying United!
  • We haven’t gotten official confirmation, but I don’t think there will be room for any of the Swords since the Eldrazi (and their Dust) will be taking over mythic slots. This means that there won’t be many good targets for Steelshaper’s Gift, which means the card could very likely not make it in MM2. If it’s not, I expect it to be the most expensive uncommon in Modern, unless I’m missing something super obvious. Also, I’m hoping for a Remand reprint.
  • People were clamoring after Splinter Twin got confirmed at rare that the Reddit leak was wrong, but the source had a lot of credibility from getting stuff right with MM1. If you don’t remember the old leaks (Ranc0red_Elf, et al), then it may sound like these leaks are just people throwing stuff against a wall to see what sticks, but there are a few sources with credible info. Getting rarity wrong is not a glaring error, especially since they are typically only dealing with limited information, and I’ve seen a lot of pictures where the set symbol could be either gold or orange. When you are reading spoiler info, try to get a sense of the poster’s pedigree, and if they have a high resolution, full frame picture of a new planeswalker with a crazy ability, assume it’s fake.
  • We are going to do another set review coming up soon like I did with Future Sight. I’m thinking Coldsnap, but if you have a favorite, let me know!

Thanks for reading my first ProTrader article! It was a pretty difficult topic to try and cover all at once, but I am more than happy to go over anything I may have skimmed in the comments. If you want to talk about any of this below, I’ll keep a close eye on the feed. Thanks, and I’ll see y’all next week!

Best,

Ross

Corbin Hosler, ProTrader, Unlocked ProTrader

UNLOCKED PROTRADER: Why I Love Casual Magic, and Why You Should, Too

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Tell me, what do you consider the best spec right now?

Is it Rattleclaw Mystic? After all, the little thing could go nuts if Birds of Paradise isn’t reprinted.

Is it Abrupt Decay? It’s safe from Modern Masters 2015 and could easily go to $20 by this time next summer thanks to incoming product.

What about Flooded Strand or Polluted Delta? Both are great fetch lands, and will be around forever. Staying with Khans of Tarkir, what about Siege Rhino? Surely it’s bottomed.

All of those are good answers, and all of those are varying degrees of good specs. But they’re not the answer I came up with.

My money is on Phenax, God of Deception. Or Kruphix, God of Horizons.

kruphixgodofhorizons

In a Magic world full of Spikes, it’s Johnny that holds my heart.

The Table… You Know Which One

The mythical kitchen table. The place where epic battles are fought and technically terrible games of Magic are played. The place where no one cares about the latest tournament results or that Ulamog costs a million mana, because they will cast him, darn it.

If you’re reading this, chances are you’re on the spikier side. By that, I mean you’ve played Friday Night Magic. You may have even played in a larger tournament, or at least watched the coverage of one. You know the value of your cards and you keep them carefully sleeved.

But the truth is, we are the minority. The majority of players who spend money on this game are more interested in the cards their buddy is playing against them at home than they are in what LSV is sleeving up at the latest major event. People come into my store all the time who have never played outside of their homes. They have no interest in showing up to a tournament—all they want to do is crush their friend’s angel deck at home.

But don’t make the mistake of equating “casual” with “cheap,” because that’s just not the case. In fact, I sell more cards to these “casuals” than I ever do to tournament players.

It’s no surprise, then, that I say I love casual Magic. And so should you.

Casual What?

Before we any further, what exactly defines a “casual” card?

There is no hard-and-fast answer to this question, to be honest. A lot of times people conflate “Commander card” with “casual card.” And while the reality is very different and so are the market ramifications, the truth is they behave similarly pricewise. They’re dirt-cheap when they’re in Standard and typically grow from there, following the opposite path of most newly printed cards. So while I’m not calling them the same thing in theory, the truth is there’s not much difference in reality, at least when it comes to our strategy on them. That said, I’ll let Jason’s series fill you in on the Commander targets, and I’ll take care of the casuals.

Keep in mind everything can be a “casual” card, from the gods I mentioned earlier (I like all of these in the long-term, but especially the two I mentioned since they’re from small sets and are cheap right now) to the random lifegain cards that pop up from time to time. But I’ve done what I can do present at least some general guidelines.

Mill

Archive Trap is nearly $5 and still rising, while Glimpse the Unthinkable is the poster child here at $25. Hell, even Memory Sluice, a random trash common, is 50 cents. These cards are played in zero competitive decks, but still hold their value.

The reason? People love their mill, man. It’s a terrible strategy, but it never goes away. I (gently) tried to explain to a player at FNM last week who tried to convince me that playing one copy of Mind Sculpt in his Magic 2015 flashback Sealed deck was a good idea because, hey, you could mill their good cards!

It doesn’t make sense, but whatever. Just roll with it, and grab those Increasing Confusions as throw-ins or out of bulk piles while you still can. The card has languished for the last two years but has shown a little growth this year, and history tells us it will be $4 to $5 eventually. Obviously you’re looking at a long-term mover here, but it costs you nothing to hoard some of these and forget about them in the spec box.

Angels/Dragons

Without a doubt, these are the two biggest tribes when it comes to casual players. I’ve had people come in and literally say, “I want to buy every angel you have.” In fact, his buddy was with him and then said, “I want all your dragons.” If I didn’t see these two guys with my own eyes, I would never have believed this type of person existed.

But we need look no further than Dragons of Tarkir to the proof of this. Dragons from all over have gone crazy this year, from Scion of the Ur-Dragon to seemingly-random stuff like Utvara Hellkite and Scourge of Valkas. If it’s a dragon, it rose in price this year, and that’s not an accident, nor is it a coincidence that Wizards always includes one or two of these in each set.

There’s a big dropoff after that, but vampires and hydras have also done well historically. Captivating Vampire is $7 despite being in an Intro Deck.

captivatingvampire

There’s one other tribe I have to mention: the little green men. It’s not at all surprising that Wizards stuffed the mono-green Commander deck last year full of elves like Immaculate Magistrate and Imperious Perfect. Even the thrice-printed Elvish Promenade is worth a few bucks. People like their elves.

Lords/Tribal Cards

As much as I wish I was talking about Lord of Atlantis, I’m only doing so in the general sense.

People like to build linear decks at the kitchen table, and often that means tribal. I’m no different: I have a sweet Tribal Treefolk deck that I bust out for 60-card casual rarely, and I love my $4 Dauntless Dourbarks and $8 Timber Protectors.

The reason cards like Timber Protector and Elvish Champion ($4 despite numerous printings) and the aforementioned Captivating Vampire speak to this phenomenon. I’m not saying stock up on Rageblood Shaman (remember when people thought this was a good idea? Ew), but I am saying that stuff like Sliver Hivelord and Sliver Hive are good bets to steadily rise long-term. And I’m absolutely in love with Haven of the Spirit Dragon once it settles down a bit in Standard and falls to $2 or so.

Okay… but Why?

I’ve named a lot of good casual specs so far in this article, but the more important question is… why? What makes them better than speculating on a Standard or Modern card? After all, when those go, they tend to go big.

A few reasons.

Safety

Like I said before, these are almost always cheap at some point. They offer a super low buy-in point, and as such if they go nowhere or are reprinted into oblivion, you’re not losing much. On the other hand, they typically represent very steady gains every year. I know people refer to original duals as the “blue chip stocks” of Magic, but solid casual specs fill that role just as well while also having the advantage of starting out as penny stocks.

Predictability

Casual cards aren’t subject to the whims of the tournament crowd. We’ve all made lots of solid spec calls on competitive cards that never panned out for whatever reason (yes, this is where you remind me of my 94 Splinterfrights). Rattleclaw Mystic, for instance, could be a great spec heading into rotation. On the other hand, if Birds of Paradise is reprinted in Magic: Origins, then the Mystic isn’t going anywhere.

Casual cards don’t behave like that. Haven of the Spirit Dragon isn’t going to be made obsolete any time soon. And even if something similar and maybe better did come along, people are likely just to play both. After all, they can play as many cards as they want in their decks, so why stop at 60 if you have more sweet cards?

Ease of acquisition

As I spoke to above, these cards are not hard to find. Tournament players literally give away these cards or leave them on draft tables. If you want to be the guy grabbing all the Increasing Confusions at your store, no one is going to stop you. You can get these as throw-ins all day long, and no one will care.

And this even works with the obvious ones. I was all over Chromatic Lantern the minute it was printed, and despite it being such an obvious call at $2 people still threw these at me all day long. As we know, Lantern is at an all-time high of nearly $7 and is showing no signs of slowing. And I have a giant stack of these acquired solely through trades. This is not a humble brag: it’s proof of concept. Even when these things seem “obvious” to those of who care about finance, the truth is most players just don’t care.

Buylist Value

This may be a bit more anecdotal, but some of my best experiences buylisting cards comes when those cards are casual ones. Outside of the flavor-of-the-week Standard card, dealers usually have plenty of stock of something. They don’t need another Siege Rhino from you right now, no matter how busted the card is.

But they may need those Timber Protectors or Chromatic Lanterns. After all, the most common way for dealers to buy cards is from players at tournaments, which by default usually means tournament players. Those same players who threw all the Lanterns at me years ago and who don’t have any now.

To get the cards the casual players want to buy from them, stores often pay more on casual staples than they do random competitive cards. This is my experience and is not based on any empirical data, but it’s also how I operate when I buy cards. I have much more confidence in paying a good price for an Asceticism ($7 retail) than I do for a $7 Standard card that may or may not sell and may or may not stay $7 for long.

Keep It Casual

I love casual Magic. You should, too. And before I go, I have a few casual cards I haven’t yet called attention to.

  • Akroma’s Memorial. The Magic 2013 version is at an all-time high of $12, and this was a $20 card before the reprint. It’s going to get there again.
  • Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker is on a tear, and is almost $9. Again, we have what was a $20 card before a reprint. This has seen a lot of growth already this year so it’s not quite as attractive, but this is going to continue to climb.
  • Door of Destinies is at an all-time high of $3.50, and this will continue to climb back toward the $8 it was before the reprint.
  • Rise of the Dark Realms sits at $4.50 after some momentum, and as a mythic this one should rise at a faster clip than the others.
  • Gilded Lotus is also at an all-time high of $6.50 (noticing a theme of “casual reprints in core sets?”) and will be $10 within in a year.
  • Looking further ahead, Darksteel Forge has three printings and hasn’t shown much momentum this year, but it fits the exact same mold as Gilded Lotus, and Darksteel versions of this used to be $12.
  • Dragon Tempest and Dragonlord’s Servant are both on their way to bottoming out, and once they hit near-bulk status they become very good long-term players.
  • Adaptive Automaton is showing some steady progress over the past three months, and is likely due for a correction upward within the next year.

That’s a lot of picks, and truth be told I could go on. But then again, I love casual Magic.

 

Thanks for reading,

Corbin Hosler

@Chosler88 on Twitter

City of Traders, ProTrader, Unlocked ProTrader

UNLOCKED PROTRADER: Safety Deposit Boxes of Khans of Tarkir

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By: Travis Allen

After Modern Masters hit the streets not quite two years ago, I started acquiring Modern cards as much as possible. Anything that wasn’t printed in MM was fair game, especially anything with keywords. Spellskite? Scoop ‘em up. Snapcasters. Fast lands. Goryo’s Vengeance. Various other cards that I don’t recall at this point. Suffice to say, I spent well over a year trading for as much Modern product as I could. With the format growing in popularity and the big reprint vehicle in the rear-view mirror, I wanted as much of my stock as possible to be Modern staples. And that’s what I did for months and months.

Not that long ago, my consideration of that format as an iron-clad storage chest for Magic value began to wane. Modern Masters 2015 had been announced, and the number of places reprints were popping up was beginning to outnumber the amount of cards needing reprints. We’re now firmly amidst a sea of reprint avenues, each representing a potential hemorrhaging of value. I’ve been forced to stop stockpiling generic Modern staples and instead have been driven to find greener pastures in which to park my Magic value.

Standard card prices rise quickly and fall off almost as fast. Changes occur on a weekly basis. The entire market is far more nimble and lean than Modern or Legacy. And while nothing is as safe and effortless as plenty of Modern cards are, there’s definite money to be made. I can’t park a few hundred bucks in Spellskites anymore, but as long as I’m paying attention, I can probably make more money. The trick is not to chase weekly tides. Rather, I want to look at long cycles, and get in while they’re at their floors. Today we’re going to talk about Khans of Tarkir, a set that is rapidly approaching its local value floor, and where to put your MTG funbux for the next six months.

AAA Stocks

If you read my article last week all about rotations and pricing trends, you would know that Khan’s price peak should be some time in mid to late October, and that its floor should be between July and August. As good financiers who pay attention to the details though, we may notice that Khans is a little different than other sets . Whereas most fall sets are drafted through the spring, KTK is not. Once Dragons of Tarkir hit the market, KTK packs left the drafting economy. Is this enough to impact the price behavior?

Let’s do some homework and find out. After all, perhaps the most important skill to cultivate in this field is doing your homework. In order to make wise decisions, you need to ask questions, and you need information to answer those questions. And no, bugging myself or Corbin or whomever on Twitter doesn’t count as doing your homework. Check price graphs. Find cards that are similar and note their behaviors. Look back through older sets for comparisons. Without all of this effort, you’re not doing anything other than making wild guesses.

Alright, aside aside, we know the last time a set behaved in this fashion was Innistrad back in 2011. Once Avacyn Restored hit, Innistrad and Dark Ascension dropped out of the draft. Here’s INN’s price graph.

INN

Looks like the price floor is right where we expected it to be; between July and August. Excellent. Right now we’re six to twelve weeks from hitting the floor. How much further of a drop are we talking? Well, between today’s date in 2011 and the absolute floor that summer, Innistrad dropped about 18%. So we haven’t completely bottomed out yet, but we’re close. What we want to be doing now is identifying which cards we think will do the best through the fall rotation, and begin moving in on those. Starting now gives us a chance to decide our best course of action early, and time to start acquiring. Unless our plan is to just dump hundreds of dollars all at once on August 1, starting to trade today is a wise decision.

Today I’m going to start with Khans, and touch on Fate Reforged another week.

People have forgotten about Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker by now, given Stormbreath Dragon and a general preponderance of dragons in Standard. It may feel surprising today, but there was a time when Sarkhan was being compared favorably to Stormbreath, and he had a price tag to match.

Capture

While I’m not holding my breath for $50 again anytime soon, I do think that $8 is much lower than he can and should be. Admit it, you probably thought he was $10 or $12, right? We’ve collectively forgotten about him, and subsequently didn’t realize how cheap he’s gotten. His power level is undeniable though. He’s a five mana hasty 4/4 indestructible flyer—immune to cards like Ultimate Price, mind you—that can alternatively come down and nuke a tapped Ojutai. He’s a premier planeswalker from Khans, and when the index jumps 80 percent this fall, he’s going to be a big part of it. At the very least, we should see a price of $10 to $12, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see him climb above $15 at some point in October. There’s few safer bets in KTK than Sarkhan.

Take everything I said about Sarkhan and apply it to Sorin, Solemn Visitor, only slightly less so. His price spiked less hard at release, only cresting $30, and he hasn’t fallen as far, with a current price tag of $10, but he’s still a powerful planeswalker that is trading well below his future value. What makes Sorin particularly good is that while Sarkhan is mostly sitting on the sidelines right now, Sorin is still getting in game wins here and there in various stripes of Abzan decks. We know beyond a doubt that Sorin is strong enough for a high-powered Standard format such as this, and when we suddenly lose half the available cards, his relative power level will spike. There are plenty of decks in the format where your opponent casting a Sorin and activating the first ability it is essentially game over. We even see Sorin pop up in Modern decks occasionally, which is a testament to his strength. I can’t get enough Sorins right now.

I’m struggling to reconcile Siege Rhino’s price with everything I know about Magic finance. We have a premier-level threat in two formats—Standard and Modern—and I can currently buy multiple playsets on TCGplayer for $4.25 a copy? What? Yes, it’s a fall set rare, and that means there is no shortage of copies on the market. But so what? Abrupt Decay was a fall set rare and was $10 while in Standard. In fact, it was in the same set as Deathrite Shaman, which was also at least $10. Oh, and both of those were also in the same set as shock lands.

My point is that while fall set rares tend to be suppressed, especially when good lands are in the set, I don’t believe that it’s enough to stop tier-one grade-S staples from hitting high prices. Nearly every year I’m impressed by how valuable some rare manages to be despite being a fall set rare. This year around that card is going to be Siege Rhino. I expect it will at least double to $10, and I think $15 is within the realm of possibility. We’re talking about what is arguably the best card in Standard and is also a full playset in one of the best Modern decks in the format. In fact, my goal between now and July is to sell some excess stock I have and buy up Rhinos in anticipation of this fall.

I was lukewarm on See the Unwritten when Khans was spoiled, but I didn’t know the next set was Battle for Zendikar, either. After BFZ was spoiled at PAX, Unwritten jumped from around $2 to around $6. It’s since pulled back towards $4, which is great for us: the lower the buy-in, the better. As soon as the first Eldrazi is spoiled, Unwritten is going to jump towards at least $8 as people get hyped to flip gigantic otherworldly monsters into play. Let me be clear here: Eldrazi don’t even need to be legal yet for this to double in price. At $3 or $4 in trade, this is a spec that will be profitable on hype alone.

If it’s actually good, we’ll see prices well into the double digits. See the Unwritten is a popular card across several demographics and formats, such as kitchen-table Magic and EDH, so any Standard demand whatsoever is going to push the price very hard. I’m in for seventy copies or so right now and I’ll be looking to expand that investment through trade binders this summer.

We’ve all come to take Sylvan Caryatid for granted. It’s been so long at this point it feels like a permanent fixture. She’s (they?) are on her way out though, and we’ll need something in her stead. Enter Rattleclaw Mystic. There’s really no other comparable mana fixer in Standard right now. It’s possible we get Birds of Paradise, which would be awesome, but I’m not holding my breath.

As a buy-a-box promo, we already know that Rattleclaw Mystic is slated to be a serious Standard contender, just as Sylvan Caryatid was. It plays extremely well with the Deathmist Raptor/Den Protector synergy that is likely to be the backbone of many Standard decks over the coming months, allowing them to splash into red or blue. Battle for Zendikar will have all sorts of cool things to ramp into. What’s not to like here?

Notable Exclusions

While Wingmate Roc performed admirably earlier in the season, I’m not particularly excited about it this fall. Our embarrassment of riches in the DTK dragons is my primary reason for doubting the return of the bird. With so many powerful flying threats such as Ojutai and Atarka, it’s going to be tough to find a reason to play a card like Roc. Does this mean the card has no future whatsoever and is total bulk? No, absolutely not. It could very well come to transpire that Roc ends up being a relevant component of the metagame this fall and hits $10 again. I’m not writing this article to look for “maybes” though. While you could do worse than Roc, I’d much rather put my Magic dollars into what I feel are basically home runs, such as Siege Rhino and Sarkhan.

I’ve been hemming and hawing over what to do with Dig Through Time while writing this article, and I finally realized that my indecision is exactly my issue with the card. Could DTT hit $15? Aaaabsolutely. No question. Is it a 100 percent slam dunk the way I consider these other cards to be? Not at all. It’s banned in Modern, which cuts a big chunk of potential demand out from under it. It sees some light play in Legacy, but rarely as a full playset. Browsing the EDH stats over at MTGS, Dig Through Time isn’t even a top-50 blue card in the format.

Perhaps my biggest concern with Dig Through Time is that it’s already a $6 card. That’s a tough number to make profit on when we’re talking about a rare rather than a mythic. When Siege Rhinos are $4, Dig Through Times at $6 are simply less appealing to me.

I fully understand if some of you out there want to go deep because you expect DTT to hit $15 this fall. It’s definitely a possibility. It’s the strongest blue card draw spell we’ve seen in ages, and it’s clearly eternal playable. It comes down to a matter of opportunity cost. For every Dig Through Time you buy, it’s one-and-a-half fewer Siege Rhinos available to you. At the end of the day, I’m more comfortable with Rhinos than Digs, though I can respect those of you that opt to pick up copies.

What do you think about the opportunities out of Khans?

Corbin Hosler, ProTrader

Editor’s Note: Announcing exclusive content for ProTraders!

41 Comments

Hello!

If you’re reading this, I’m sure you’ve noticed that we’ve been quite busy around here.

Put simply, it’s an exciting time for MTGPrice. We’ve been working hard to increase our content offerings for you. I’m sure you’ve noticed we’ve been running more great content from the best authors in the business (If you haven’t, I suggest you take some time to look over the work our authors have created, it’s truly top-of-the-line). We’re working hard to make sure we’re ahead of the finance game and get that information to you as quickly as possible. We’ve got big plans for more content and features to come, and if you stick with us you’ll see the fruit of those labors over the coming months.

With that in mind, I have an exciting announcement for our ProTrader subscribers. We have an all-star staff of writers here, most of whom have many years of experience in the business and have seen it all when it comes to the financial side of the game. Beginning this week, we are making some of that content available exclusively to our ProTrader subscribers. Whether you’re a longtime member or just giving us a try as part of the Kickstarter, we’re excited to offer this to you.

Our lineup of ProTrader-exclusive articles comes from the most respected names in the business, a group of experienced traders and dealers who have time and again proven why they’re the best there is to offer.

Moving forward, this is the content that will be available exclusively to ProTraders.

Monday: Sigmund Ausfresser

Tuesday: Danny Brown

Wednesday: Jason Alt and Travis Allen

Thursday: Corbin Hosler and Guo Heng Chin

Friday: Ross Lennon

Saturday: Guo Heng Chin and James Chillcot

 

That’s six full days of the best Magic finance writing on the planet. In addition to that lineup, ProTraders have access to the buzzing MTGPrice forums (for all your truly up-to-the-second financial needs), early access to the industry-leading Brainstorm Brewery podcast, advanced tools for tracking your collection’s value over time, and access to raw inventory data from individual stores to track just how much a particular card is moving.

That’s a lot of value for your $4.99 monthly subscription, and if this sounds interesting to you, I hope you consider becoming a ProTrader today.

But if that’s not for you, fear not; MTGPrice will always have some free content as well. Our authors writing for the free side are quite capable, and I’m sure you’ll enjoy reading these guys every week.

Monday: Jared Yost and James Chillcot

Tuesday: Guo Heng Chin

Wednesday: Derek Madlem

Thursday: Douglas Johnson

Friday: Cliff Daigle and Houston Whitehead

 

Magic has made some huge leaps over the past few years, and it’s truly an exciting time to be around the game. We’re going to continue to work hard here at MTGPrice to make sure you’re able to keep up, and we like to think it’s an exciting time around here as well. Spend some time around our site, and I think you’ll agree.

 

– Corbin Hosler