Tag Archives: SOI

PROTRADER: Occam’s Razor and the Collectible Renaissance

March 27, 2016 Sigmund Ausfresser 7 Comments

I have a feeling many MTG finance eyes will be on three unrelated events: Shadows Over Innistrad’s release, banned and restricted updates for Modern specifically, and the gradual spoiling of Eternal Masters. Each of these separate events will have a very profound impact on card prices, and it’s likely many writers will cover each topic at length. I will most certainly be chiming in with Modern and Legacy impact once we have more information.

As for Standard – I tried to place a few small bets, picking up a handful of creature lands. After seeing the new rare land cycle in Shadows Over Innistrad, however, I fear I placed my money on a slower horse. The Battle Lands have all been rising steadily these last few weeks, and I can only hope the creature lands also find a home in Standard. Until then I’ll remain comforted by the fact that these remain near their bottom and should not drop lower in price.

But there’s one trend that is gradually unfolding, which I think will have a profound impact on the MTG market. Most importantly of all, I believe this trend is occurring so slowly and so out of focus that it’s happening under the radar. People would only notice this trend if they paid extremely close attention to this market, and not many do.

Interested? Here’s the good news – I do pay attention. And this week I’ll share my most recent observations along with some future predictions that can help you make some well-placed and timely investments in MTG.

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Casual Fridays

Mythic Predictions for Shadows over Innistrad

March 24, 2016 Cliff Daigle 6 Comments

The full spoiler is (probably) going to land today but since I have to write ahead of time, I always feel a little caught.

I want to go over the previewed mythics and make some predictions, not about how much they are now, but where they will be in about a month.

As always, I don’t think you should pre-order anything, as it’s almost always a better plan to wait a little for the hype to die down. (I’m looking straight at you, $15 Thing in the Ice!)

Sorin, Grim Nemesis

I like that he lets you draw and punish all at the same time. It’s pretty awesome to boost yourself up and then push others down. However, he can only deal with one problem at a time, as compared to other good six-mana planeswalkers, like Chandra, Flamecaller or Elspeth, Sun’s Champion. I think he’s got really great potential for top-of-the-library shenanigans, like Worldly Tutor for Draco. At his cost, and with these abilities, I wouldn’t expect him to be much more than $15.

Jace, Unraveler of Secrets

This plus ability is amazingly good. It’s a Scry 1 short of a card too good for Modern! You dig fast and have much more control over getting what you need. This is a pretty mediocre Commander card, until you get to the ultimate, which is the epitome of what every annoying blue deck wants to do. Five mana is not unreasonable, and he does get to come down and bounce a problem away, at which point the control player starts plusing away. I can see this getting some play, though it would be so much better with a four-mana wrath effect to play the turn before playing this. I think his price will bounce between $10 at first and bounce up to $20-$25 when the control deck appears.

Nahiri, the Harbinger

Now we are talking. Four mana and can come down, solve a problem, and then start drawing/enabling Madness effects. Plus, it’s totally reasonable to play Nahiri, exile something, let her get attacked, then play another Nahiri. Multiples can also get discarded away easily with the plus ability. Exiling the target is super-relevant as well. I like Nahiri, though her ultimate is pretty uninspiring. It’s kind of a rough time to be enemy-colored, though, and I think that will keep her around $15-$20.

Arlinn Kord

Oh the flavor. I love the flavor on this card, and I think she’s much stronger than she appears. You have such flexibility on what you can do with her, and that’s key. You can make a creature big, vigilant, and hasty (so it can defend her) or you can make a token and flip. Then it’s time to be offensive or defensive and as long as you can plan a turn or two ahead, she’s going to dominate. Plus, at four mana in the ramp colors, she’s frequently going to be on the board a turn early. I think she’s going to see a lot of play in decks that want to play a lot of creatures, and likely stabilize in the $10-$15 range.

The Gitrog Monster

Conveniently, Groundskeeper is in this set too, and while I love the late game of sacrificing extra lands to draw cards, he’s going to make you jump (hop?) through too many hoops. I don’t think this will stay over $5 for long.

Archangel Avacyn

Flash, Flying, Vigilance is already amazing. Transforming her is going to be all up to you and your deck, though, because your opponent is going to kill her first. If your deck is full of cheap, disposable creatures, they will also die when she flips, and she’s got no protection. I love her flavor, and it’s a great story card, but I don’t see right now what she is besides the front side. Casual appeal will keep her foils high, but she won’t break $10.

Behold the Beyond – Bulk mythic. Just look at how much play Diabolic Revelation gets.

Geralf’s Masterpiece – Being able to bring it back might be relevant, but so few decks will want to pay this cost. Bulk.

Mindwrack Demon – Four mana for a 4/5 flying trample would seems to be worth the risk of four life a turn. It’s a risk, but it has potential as a curve-topper in an aggressive deck. I have a hard time believing this stays at more than a buck or two, though.

Seasons Past – We’ve had other mega-Regrowth effects before, like Praetor’s Counsel, and that was never very expensive. This will likely stay just above $2.

Wolf of Devil’s Breach – As a Madness enabler, this is rather outstanding. You can’t pitch the card at your opponent directly, but there are going to be decks that use this to great effect. The Wolf is Fiery Temper‘s best friend, distributing three damage twice for three mana. I don’t think every deck wants this, but I do think enough will to keep it around $3-$5.

Ulvenwald Hydra – A fixed Primeval Titan? Really?? I’m going to have to think about this for Standard but I can tell you that this is going to be a chase Commander card. Finding one land is unexciting in some decks, and Gaea’s Cradle-broken in others. Nonfoils won’t be more than $5, but I would expect foils to be in the $20 range.

Goldnight Castigator – This is a bad card. This is as all-in as you can get, four hasty power that if you attack, effectively halves your life total. Don’t play this. Ever. Bulk.

Relentless Dead

If you need something to sacrifice for value, here you go. It’s efficient, resilient, and entering a phase of Magic where exile spells are incredibly common. No, really, I mean it. We’ve got more exile effects than I ever can recall at once and this poor guy is going to take the brunt of it. I love the art, recalling Endless Ranks of the Dead, and while I want this to be good…he’s going to be steady at about $3.

Olivia, Mobilized for War

One thing the last round of Madness cards taught us is that you want to have free discard effects, such as Psychatog. Olivia isn’t quite free, as you are playing a creature, but the potential is there. A 3/3 flying for three mana is an excellent starting point too. She will hold at about $5, because extra copies of her just get used as fuel for the next creature you play.

Sigarda, Heron’s Grace – Please don’t play this thinking she has hexproof. She’s got a big target on her, and while I like her ability to play a long game and grow a quick army, I don’t think she will stay at more than a dollar or two.

Descend upon the Sinful – This is a powerful card, but it’s got a high mana cost. The tools are there for a classic control deck, between this and Planar Outburst. Wiping the board and having a creature left behind is pretty amazing, though. I like this a lot as a Commander card too, as it’s a strict upgrade over Final Judgement, a card that doesn’t see enough play. This will not break $5, though.

Startled Awake – How much do we love mill cards! This has its own built-in recursion, but it’s slow and imperfect. Skulk is not unblockability, a 1/1 or any zero-power creature can block it, ruining your nefarious plan. This is going to win a lot of Limited games and not much else, though I can see the foils of this going for a high premium. This will struggle to not be bulk.

Jim Casale

Grinder Finance – The Shadows over Innistrad Preorder Article

March 23, 2016 Jim Casale 5 Comments

Hey guys, I’m a little this late this week as I was waiting for the maximum number of cards to be spoiled before putting out this article. Spoilers for Shadows over Innistrad will end Friday so it is unlikely much will change between then and now.

With every set, the pre-order prices for most cards are astronomically higher than they end up. There are some exceptions to that rule (I’m looking at you Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy) but the best bet is usually to buy the least amount possible.

Lands

I’m sure by now you’ve all seen the rare land cycle. I think the pre-order prices for these are a little too high to recommend buying them all but I couldn’t fault you for getting the ones you think you are likely to play for the first month. These should be $2-3 by this summer and then you can finish up your playsets.

Upgrading Old Strategies

Bought into the Eldrazi ramp deck recently? Here are my recommendations for pre-orders:

Deathcap Cultivator easily slots into the same spot as Rattleclaw Mystic and supports a black splash instead of a red one. That might be the best going forward anyway since Kozilek’s Return doesn’t kill a lot of the new vampires or many older creatures.

Drownyard Temple has a great synergy with World Breaker but I wouldn’t recommend getting a whole play set. One or two is probably all the deck can support anyway without cutting into Shrine of the Forsaken Gods or Sanctum of Ugin

With the additional ETB tapped lands, I expect ramp will find some mana earlier to use on Tireless Tracker. It’s obviously a huge favorite to be a huge monster if you play a ton of lands. It will help with some of the problems of flooding and isn’t legendary like Nissa, Vastwood Seer. While this card might not be a slam dunk, the pre-order price of $2 or less is not much to lose.

Stay away from this card. A lot of people are hypothesizing it’s synergy with Ruin in their Wake but the reality is this will often be much worse than Oath of Nissa. At $4 most places, I don’t want to buy into what is likely to be a bulk rare.

Collected Company more your jam? It’s likely that a Green/White based deck will be the bread and butter CoCo deck. There are unfortunately not a ton of great cards to add to those style decks but there are a few that could make the cut.

Collected Company decks are almost always light on removal (the nature of a green/white deck). Declaration in Stone gives you some more flexibility in removing troublesome creatures cleanly and doesn’t require a bigger creature, like Dromoka’s Command does.

Naturally, Hanweir Militia Captain’s flip trigger works well in a CoCo deck. Putting 2 Hanweir Militia Captains into play during your opponent’s end step could spell big game. This one is purely speculative as the next creature.

A deck with a ton of 3 or less drop creatures could be in the market for a reasonably costed flyer to draw some cards. This one unfortunately matches up pretty poorly against Drana, Liberator of Malakir and Olivia, Mobilized for War so we will have to see how the meta game shakes down. If we see a ton of Eldrazi Skyspawners and Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet (which makes Deathmist Raptor worse) maybe this guy gets the nod.

For the mono-red Eldrazi deck I only have 1 recommendation.

I know it looks like a pile of garbage but the truth is this will be a very important sideboard card against “slower” decks. Its great against Ramp and it will probably be great against Esper Dragons (or similarly controlling decks). The worst case scenario is this is a Skizzik (or Ball Lightning, if you prefer that) that can throw off your opponent’s math. Most of it’s text box is largely irrelevant if you kill them with it.

New Archtypes:

Some cards look deceptively powerful on paper but don’t realize any competitive play. For the most part, anything over $15 pre-order price is too high to pay unless you are sure it will be good. Here’s my shortlist of things I have (or would recommend) pre-ordering.

She’s cheap, she’s got reasonable stats, and she turns every spell you play for the rest of the game into an insane return. Olivia’s ability to curb your flooding while still putting pressure means it won’t be hard for her to find a home. I’m fine with pre-ordering these up to $15 if you are going to play them.

This is the best Serra Angel ever printed. Glowing endorsement, right? Well if you played with Restoration Angel during the first Innistrad block, you would know how powerful large flash flyers are. Avacyn is really big, at a great rate, and doesn’t need much help to be effective. She is largely immune to Reflector Mage. Combined with Ojutai’s Command, Avacyn delivers the same lose/lose situation as Cryptic Command and Mistbind Clique did. This is a card I’m not worried that we won’t find a deck for.

So Arlinn is definitely very good on paper. Probably the best planeswalker in the set. But I don’t think she will find a home. Be on the lookout for when she drops. I can’t imagine she stays anywhere over $20 in a month.

Traps

Don’t buy these cards. They’re too hyped and probably won’t be good enough to maintain their price tag for more than a month.

All of the Planeswalkers have the Planeswalker tax. Anguished Unmaking is fine but it’s also the Game Day promo and I’m not sure it can be played as a 4-of like Hero’s Downfall. Sin Prodder is a glorified Boggart Brute. It’s “fine” but on average it will draw you less cards than Abbot of Keral Keep. Thing in the Ice is purely an eternal card and as such will drop like a rock. It’s unlikely to see too much play in a Standard format that has Ultimate Price, Grasp of Darkness, Silk Wrap, and Reflector Mage.

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