Weekend Magic: 3/13-3/15

Jared Yost

Last weekend brought us Star City Games Dallas, which featured Standard as the main event with a side of Modern and Legacy. Let’s take a look at the results while also bearing in mind that Standard will yet again be shaken up by Dragons of Tarkir in just another week. We’ve got the full spoiler up, let’s see what opportunities the new cards might have in Standard.

Star City Games Dallas – Standard Open (Dallas, TX – USA)

Decklists

Deck	Finish	Player	Deck	Finish	Player
Sultai Control	1st	Michael Miller	R/W Aggro	9th	Aakash Barevadia
Jeskai Aggro	2nd	Jim Davis	Abzan Midrange	10th	Jaxon Day
Sultai Control	3rd	Dan Jessup	Jeskai Aggro	11th	Patrick Tierney
Jeskai Aggro	4th	Dylan Lerch	Abzan Aggro	12th	matthew cooper
Abzan Midrange	5th	Jacob Geeo	R/W Aggro	13th	Brock Mosley
Mono-Red Aggro	6th	JB Milo	Abzan Aggro	14th	Gabriel Joglar
Sultai Reanimator	7th	Masa Tokutome	Jeskai Aggro	15th	Nathan Blackmon
Jeskai Heroic	8th	Jason Crone	Abzan Midrange	16th	Jake Peralez

Sultai Control took down the event, piloted by Michael Miller. [card]Satyr Wayfinder[/card] does a surprising amount of work in the deck. Not only does it fuel [card]Dig Through Time[/card], [card]Treasure Cruise[/card], and [card]Tasigur, the Golden Fang[/card] from the sideboard, but it also chump blocks early in the game against faster aggro decks. It seems strange to see the Satyr without [card]Whip of Erebos[/card], but the third place Sultai Control was also running the full playset of Satyrs without Whip. This clearly means its inclusion was well-merited.

What are possible inclusions from Dragons of Tarkir that might go in Sultai Control?

I see all the above cards as having potential, with [card]Silumgar’s Command[/card] being the strongest candidate for inclusion. [card]Dragonlord Silumgar[/card] might be too much mana for the effect, while [card]Icefall Regent[/card] has the issue of only having three toughness. [card]Explosive Vegetation[/card] could be pretty sweet, as ramping up two lands in a single turn is quite powerful. By turn five, you have seven lands on the board and can more quickly deploy a threat like [card]Garruk, Apex Predator[/card] followed the next turn by [card]Ugin, the Spirit Dragon[/card].

Jeskai Aggro took second and fourth place. Which cards from Dragons could make the most impact in this build?

Ojutai’s Exemplars is a card which could find a home in Jeskai Aggro. The deck’s curve tops out at four with [card]Outpost Siege[/card], so taking out a [card]Soulfire Grand Master[/card] or two for some copies of Exemplars might be good. There are just so many options on this card in addition to it being an efficient four-mana 4/4 creature. Even if it doesn’t find a home in aggro, I think we’ll be seeing this card pop up in decklists over the coming months due to its versatility.

Rouding out the top eight were Abzan Midrange, Mono-Red Aggro, Sultai Reanimator, and Jeskai Heroic. Mono-Red Aggro is getting some pretty nice cards in Dragons.

While [card]Commune with Lava[/card] and [card]Dragon Fodder[/card] might be stretching it, I definitely think that [card]Dragon Whisperer[/card], [card]Ire Shaman[/card], and [card]Zurgo Bellstriker[/card] all have a place in Mono-Red Aggro.

Whisperer gives the deck a nice end game that it’s currently lacking, while also being able to apply pressure in the early game. Ire Shaman is a great beatdown creature that can generate card advantage. Zurgo Bellstriker is an extremely efficient beater that can also be Dashed into play during the late game if you top deck him and need the extra two points of damage.

I like Commune with Lava because it generates a large amount of card advantage, though I admit that Mono-Red Aggro probably won’t play this but G/R Devotion might be able to include this card. Dragon Fodder into [card]Hordeling Outburst[/card] seems good to me; however, Dragon Fodder is significantly weaker than Hordeling Outburst in the late game. Also, the new enchantment that hoses tokens is an issue.

Regardless, I like Dragon Fodder and think that it will have a home, if not in Mono-Red Aggro then in token strategies.

Rounding out the top eight: two R/W Aggro, two Abzan Midrange, two Jeskai Aggro, and two Abzan Aggro decks.

There aren’t any additional cards from Dragons that I’ve identified that would fit into the rest of top 16 (since it is so similar to the top eight), but I like the following cards for Standard and feel they will make an impact:

Ojutai’s Command – This card slots nicely as a one-of or two of in Jeskai strategies or possibly a four-of in U/W Control.

Dragonlord Dromoka – It could possibly be included in Abzan strategies. It also could spawn a G/W deck along with other new cards from Dragons.

Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit – Seems like a good inclusion in fast aggro decks. Might not have a home now but her future looks bright. Kind of stinks that we can’t use her in token strategies, but oh well.

Kolaghan’s Command, Atarka’s Command – Both commands are undercosted and have efficient effects. Though none of the effects are great singularly, combined together and with the mana cost they can be quite useful in many situations.

Secure the Wastes – This feels like a strong finisher card to me. I realize that it’s not [card]Decree of Justice[/card], but the effect is so similar that it still might see play in control lists.

Shorecrasher Elemental – Mono-Blue Devotion might be revived again due to this card, and it might even have implications beyond Standard (Modern Merfolk, maybe?).

Descent of the Dragons – This card could totally spawn a new archetype or bolster the power of current tokens decks. Either way, I’ll be excited the first time I see this cast on camera for a major blowout if it happens!

Deathmist Raptor – Very efficient green beater than can easily trade up into bigger targets in the late game. I like in G/R Devotion, which has some Morph creatures already that can take advantage of the recursion.

Collected Company – I feel that this card might spawn its own archetype as the effect is really powerful for only four mana. Yes, the creatures need to cost three or less, but if you build a deck around the odds of getting two creatures when you cast this then it becomes much better. The critic in me thinks that this card might just be a little bit too random to be great in Standard but you never know.

Star City Games Dallas – Modern IQ (Dallas, TX – USA)

Decklists

Deck	Finish	Player	Deck	Finish	Player
Infect	1st	Joel Heath	U/R Twin	9th	Dale Montgomery
Amulet Combo	2nd	Mason Young	Burn	10th	Andres Hernandez
Sultai Control	3rd	Cruz Hale	U/R Twin	11th	Jack Stewart
Abzan Midrange	4th	Andres Campion	Burn	12th	Donovan Lachney
R/W Burn	5th	Joshua Kendall	Burn	12th	Donovan Lachney
Affinity	6th	Brandon Borowicz	U/R Twin	14th	Craig Goebel
U/R Delver	7th	Eddie Solis	Amulet Combo	15th	Aaron Barich
Merfolk	8th	David Gomez	Infect	16th	Minh Tran

Infect and Amulet Combo continue to do well after the Modern Pro Tour in DC. Taking first and second at this Modern IQ, they have established themselves as Modern archetypes that are here to stay.

Looking at the rest of the Top 8, the decks that stand out to me are Sultai Control, R/W Burn, and Merfolk.

One of these decks featured some sweet tech. Yes, that’s right folks: [card]Monastery Siege[/card] tech in the Merfolk list! Analyzing Monastery Siege, we can see why it’s such a great card in Modern. The second mode hoses Burn and decks that have tons of removal, while the first mode gives you card advantage in control matchups where you are the aggressor and need to finish the game quickly. All in all, an interesting Merfolk list that tells us Monastery Siege is Modern-playable.

Rounding out the rest of the top 16 were Burn, U/R Twin, Amulet Combo, and Infect. Nothing new to report in these decks.

Star City Games Dallas – Legacy IQ (Dallas, TX – USA)

Decklists

Deck	Finish	Player	Deck	Finish	Player
Ad Nauseam	1st	Caleb Scherer	Burn	9th	Trent Avera
Grixis Delver	2nd	David Houghton	Temur Delver	10th	Simon Christie
Miracles	3rd	Ken-Min Yeoh	Merfolk	11th	William Yowell
Reanimator	4th	Noah Cohen	Infect	12th	Ben Wallace
Sultai Delver	5th	Tom Nelson	U/G Cloudpost	13th	Alex Khanin
Reanimator	6th	Aaron Segrest	Temur Delver	14th	Trevor Leinbach
Death and Taxes	7th	Blake Donnan	Show and Tell	15th	Zach Taylor
Lands	8th	Chris Cohen	Infect	16th	Tom Ross

Ad Nauseam took down the Legacy event, with Grixis Delver coming in at second place. Grixis Delver contained a one-of of [card]Gurmag Angler[/card] main deck. Ban [card]Treasure Cruise[/card]? Players will find some other one-mana nonsense to play. Delve is that good.

Not a ton of Legacy shakeups this week, but with Dragons of Tarkir on the horizon, there just might be some in the near future. Stay tuned.

Pitt Imps Podcast #110 Mushrooms

Pitt Imps 01:27:56

Wow. This episode was riddled with tech problems. I almost called this episode “Train Wreck.” Anyway, I managed to make it kind of listenable. We go over everything from PAX East and the GPs, and had Judge Frank on to look closer at the mechanics of Dragon of Tarkir. I also left a bit of raw unedited footage at the end just so you guys can hear exactly how bad it can be.

Host Angelo Twitter @ganksuou

Co-Host Will Facebook

The other guy Mike Twitter @Huntmaster_Mike

Guest Frank

Help the Imps never have these problems again.

Show Email [email protected]

Pitt imps is brought to you each week by the Brainstorm Brewery and Taitan Game Shop

Privileged Perspective 18 – DTK Preview Edition!

Ross Lennon

Sarkhan arose, wearily. He edged closer to the edge of the ravine, gazing into it with strain and apprehension. Ugin sprung to life from within the chasm, letting loose a cacophonous din that seemed to rend the very heavens. “What?” Sarkhan becked in reply, his voice coarse. Again, Ugin roared. Sarkhan seemed to this time take his meaning, and his brow furrowed. “Wait a minute. Doc, are you tellin’ me it’s 8:25? Damn, I’m late for school!”

Welcome to another preview card edition of Privileged Perspective! We are going to talk about a couple different things today, but I want to begin with my latest preview card!

BRIEF HOUSEKEEPING NOTE: If you aren’t familiar with my current cold war with the people who hand out preview cards, make sure to check out the FRF edition.

Our last preview card was actually quite a doozy. Although it didn’t appear until recently at a premier level event, [card]Mardu Shadowspear[/card] narrowly missed a top-eight berth at the hands of Tomoharu Saito in Memphis. Being both a human and a warrior is pretty vital right now, especially with some of the new weapons coming out for both black and black/white aggro decks. But hey, that was then and this is now S.E. Hinton, so let’s get on with the show!

And now, without further au juis…

ROSS’S TOTALLY LEGIT DRAGONS OF TARKIR PREVIEW CARD THAT WAS FOR REAL GIVEN TO HIM BY WIZARDS BUT THEY MUST HAVE LIKE FORGOT OR SOMETHING

Introducing Scaleguard Sentinels!

There’s a lot to take in here. On the face, it seems like we have an [card]Elvish Warrior[/card] with upside. Human and soldier are both semi-relevant creature types in this format, although typically not in green decks. Of course, this card does have an upside, and after ruminating on it for a day, it’s actually pretty significant.

A 2/3 for GG is actually near optimal on rate (we’ve gotten a 3/3 for GG before, but that’s not a frequently printed card), but a 3/4 for GG is incredible. That fourth point of toughness allows the Sentinels to dodge [card]Lightning Strike[/card] and [card]Bile Blight[/card], two of the most commonly played removal spells in the early game. It still gets hit by [card]Chained to the Rocks[/card], of course, but if they’re Chaining your Sentinels, then you’re probably in good shape anyways.

Unfortunately, that +1/+1 counter is going to require some work. While our last preview card slid neatly into a previously existing archetype, Scaleguard Sentinels is currently a card without a home. In order to get our ideal value from this guy, we need a deck that can have GG on turn two, with a significantly high enough amount of dragons in the deck to be able to reveal one, and wants to play an attacker on turn two instead of a [card]Sylvan Caryatid[/card].

BRIEF MORGAN FREEMAN VOICEOVER ASIDE: I wish I could tell you that there was a [card]Nameless Inversion[/card] in this format and that Scaleguard Sentinels would trigger off of it. I wish I could tell you that. But Tarkir is no fairy tale world.

Realistically, we need to figure out what the best dragons in this format are. [card]Stormbreath Dragon[/card] is probably the odds-on favorite, just because it has an aggressive body and rate, as well as protection from one of the best colors in the format. It’s not impossible to imagine a G/r list that is able to cast efficient beaters early and then curve into a Stormbreath to close things out, but at best, that is four cards out of 60 that trigger our ability—and we need to essentially have it in our opening hand each time! While we don’t have the full set available as of this article, most of the dragons are six to seven mana (yes, there are some fives, but not all of them are green). I’m not entirely sure we want aggressive two-drops in the same deck as our game-ending sevens, or even how many of those sevens are going to be Constructed-viable.

BRIEF DRAGON ASIDE: So when I was discussing this set with my LGS owner and longtime pal Eric, I said that Dragons of Tarkir is basically the Dragon version of Avacyn Restored (which is to say “A large Spring set with a hook that is targetted at casual players and collectors—you cannot have too many sealed boxes of it”). In terms of card design, however, it is much easier to create angels more evenly distributed along the spectrum of converted mana cost than dragons. [card]Restoration Angel[/card], arguably the best constructed angel in Avacyn Restored, cost four. There is currently only one dragon spoiled that costs four, and none that cost less than that. While dragons may be more objectively powerful, you also won’t see any in the two to three range, outside of the occasional [card]Dragon Whelp[/card]-type creature.

So what if we ignore the upside on Scaleguard Sentinels entirely? Well, he’s not going to be beating [card]Fleecemane Lion[/card] or [card]Rakshasa Deathdealer[/card] for a roster spot, and he’s likely worse than [card]Heir of the Wilds[/card]. Scaleguard Sentinels has something that none of those creatures has, however [Editor’s note: IT’S YOUR PREVIEW CARD?!], and that’s a second green mana symbol in its casting cost [Editor’s note: Oh.]. While most of the Green Devotion decks have slowed down by a turn to take advantage of a stronger top end, there was once an aggressive version that took full advantage of [card]Aspect of Hydra[/card] to end games. Scaleguard Sentinels is currently the only GG creature that doesn’t die to [card]Drown in Sorrow[/card] (unless your [card]Avatar of the Resolute[/card] is coming down later than turn two). Maybe this is where we should be looking instead!

[Deck title=Literal GGs]

[Creatures]

*4 Sunblade Elf

*4 Elvish Mystic

*4 Hero of Leina Tower

*4 Scaleguard Sentinels

*4 Avatar of the Resolute

*4 Boon Satyr

*4 Reverent Hunter

*4 Nylea, God of the Hunt

[/Creatures]

[Spells]

*4 Aspect of Hydra

*4 Gather Courage

[/Spells]

[Lands]

*4 Windswept Heath

*4 Wooded Foothills

*8 Forest

*1 Plains

*3 Mana Confluence

[/Lands]

[/Deck]

It’s a rough draft, but I think it has some legs. It has critical redundancy at all of the points on the curve, and a potential game-breaker in Nylea. There may be a list that has more synergistic interactions, or there may just be enough pull from white to be able to support [card]Warden of the First Tree[/card] (which I considered).

Speaking of Warden of the First Tree, you know what deck is really good right now?

Abzan Aggro

Remember when I told you about that Abzan Aggro list that I really liked? I took it to a 5K and ended 7-2, just outside of top eight on breakers. Well, I gave the list to my friend Devin, and he took it all the way to a top 32 finish (28^th!) at GP Miami, including a very strong 8-1 day one finish. His loss on day one was to Andrew Boswell in round nine, who was also on Abzan Aggro. You know, the archetype that everyone said was dead? Huh.

Here’s the list that I gave to Devin:

[Deck title = BoltTheBird Abzan Aggro]

[Creatures]

*4 Fleecemane Lion

*3 Heir of the Wilds

*3 Warden of the First Tree

*3 Anafenza the Foremost

*4 Siege Rhino

*3 Whisperwood Elemental

[/Creatures]

[Spells]

*4 Bile Blight

*1 Pharika’s Cure

*4 Hero’s Downfall

*4 Abzan Charm

*2 Sorin, Solemn Visitor

[/Spells]

[Lands]

*3 Windswept Heath

*1 Plains

*3 Forest

*3 Llanowar Wastes

*2 Caves of Koilos

*2 Mana Confluence

*4 Temple of Malady

*1 Temple of Silence

*4 Sandsteppe Citadel

[/Lands]

[Sideboard]

*4 Thoughtseize

*3 Back To Nature

*3 Glare of Heresy

*3 Drown In Sorrow

*1 Whisperwood Elemental

*1 Mastery of the Unseen

[/Sideboard]

[/Deck]

This is a deck that is positioned to beat WR and other assorted aggro decks. The [card]Pharika’s Cure[/card] as a fifth Bile Blight (that is to say, a BB removal spell that you must have when Rabblemaster or Mentor comes out) is pretty big, and it is also nice game one against the assorted green ramp lists (although it eventually comes out). Abzan Charm isn’t great against the aggressive decks, but is tremendous against everything else. I haven’t gotten a chance to sit down with Devin and see what his impressions of the deck were, but I have a feeling we will both be playing it at FNM.

Let’s close this bad boy out with some…

Quick Hits

Since I came up with that green deck, the new Surrak was spoiled. He is a potential top end for that deck. If you try picking up a version of the list, let me know!
Wes asked me last week about supplemental products. We will be discussing them next week.
I still haven’t sold anything on TCGplayer.
Speaking of, I’m looking for TCGplayer points again. :)
The last week has been pretty insane for (American) football fans. Off-season indeed.
I realized the other day that GP Vegas could be 10,000 people and 15 rounds. Pass.
No DTK cards jump out at me yet except the RG Command (Atarka? Artarka? Atari?). I would like four foils right now, please.
If you are reading this and enjoyed my thoughts on Scaleguard Sentinels, please pass those feelings along to Trick and the other WOTC people who handle the front-facing aspects of the game (MaRo and Aaron are too busy). I think the Game Day Gimme Card has gotten no respect (no respect, no respect at all!), so I feel like the least they can do is give it to me.
Modern Masters is gonna have [card]Tarmogoyf[/card] in it (as well as [card]Karn Liberated[/card]). I would not be surprised if there are other major cards from MM1 in MM2.
Thanks as always for reading!

Conjured Currency #54: Draguncommons!

Douglas Johnson

Welcome back, to another wonderful Thursday of learning how to make some spare change off of the card game known as Magic: The Gathering. During these next couple of weeks, there are going to be a lot of financial set reviews popping up. Should you sell this cool new mythic rare? Is $3 the correct price to preorder this other rare that you want for your EDH deck? What should you do with Narset upon release? Instead of doing one of those set reviews where I go through all of the rares and mythics of the set and predict what their price trends will be over a three, six, or twelve month period, I’m going to stick to one of my personal areas of expertise. I’m a lover of bulk commons and uncommons, and picking out the small treasures that end up being buylisted later for $.10, $.25, or even just given away to someone who is desperately looking for a set of a certain common at FNM. Keep in mind that these aren’t going to be listed on TCGplayer or eBay. We’re not making hundreds of dollars flipping these, because they’re the cards nobody else wants to deal with. These are the commons and uncommons that make us into my own version of an “FNM hero”, when the Spike grinder shows up with 73/75 cards for his Standard deck, and the LGS is completely out of stock of that last sideboarded uncommon.

While I’ve written about this subject before, it’s been a couple of months since I’ve touched on it. Dragons of Tarkir only has 88 out of 264 cards spoiled at the moment (according to mythicspoiler.com, my personal favorite site to keep up to date on the most recent spoilers), but there are a ton of common and uncommon picks in the set already that I can’t wait to scrounge out of discarded draft decks and pull from the large bulk lots that I enjoy buying. Let’s see what I’m going to be pulling these next few months!

Savage Ventmaw

Out of the five uncommon six-mana dragons, this one is the only one I’ll be pulling out and setting aside to buylist later. This fat lizard synergizes pretty well with [card]Aggravated Assault[/card] in EDH, and I have a feeling that people who like playing a lot of fat monsters also enjoy attacking with them more than once.

Surge of Righteousness

Encase in Ice

Self-Inflicted Wound

Rending Volley

“Rending Volley cannot be countered by spells or abilities.
Rending Volley deals 4 damage to target white or blue creature.”

Display of Dominance

Every now and again, Wizards gives us a set of Standard sideboardable color hate cards. Think back to [card]Combust[/card], [card]Deathmark[/card], [card]Celestial Purge[/card], [card]Flashfreeze[/card], and [card]Autumn’s Veil[/card]. These all saw reasonable amounts of sideboard play during their times in Standard, and some of them even snuck into mainboards. Even if these only end up buylisting for a quarter apiece, it’s free money that you’re leaving on the table by not picking them. If you don’t buylist, treat them as a quarter a piece in trades in your binder, and grind up the value bit by bit.

Warbringer

To be honest, I pick almost anything that reads “something something costs X less”. There will almost always be that one casual player who wants to make a “dash” deck, a “manifest” deck, or an “exploit” deck. Keywords are important for new players to latch onto and learn the concept of synergy, and you might be able to squeeze some value out of that by setting these aside for later. It’s not going to make it in Standard, but you’ll make someone’s day by having a playset of these at the ready.

Silumgar’s Scorn

[card]Counterspell[/card] is back! Well, as long as you reveal a [card]Nameless Inversion[/card] or control a [card]Chameleon Colossus[/card]. That’s the hard part. But [card]COUNTERSPELL[/card] IS BACK!! Is it good enough for Modern or Standard? I’d hedge my bets on a no, but damn it all if people won’t try it out in the first few weeks. In my experience as someone who used to be a casual player and/or brewer, I wanted to break the meta in my own special snowflake way, and try out all of the weird synergies. Picking this loses you basically no money if you find it in bulk, on draft tables, or get it as a throw-in.

Draconic Roar

“Instant
As an additional cost to cast Draconic Roar, you may reveal a Dragon card from your hand.
Draconic Roar deals 3 damage to target creature. If you revealed a Dragon card or controlled a Dragon as you cast Draconic Roar, Draconic Roar deals 3 damage to that creature’s controller.”

Similarly, there will be Johnnys and Jennys who want to make Mono-Red Standard Dragons a thing. We’ve got Dragon Tempests, we’ve got a Sarkhan that turns into a dragon, we’ve got actual dragons everywhere. Even if [card]Searing Blood[/card] is better, this one has the word “Dragon” on the card at least four times. Pull it out.

Sarkhan’s Triumph

This is a great card to follow up Draconic Roar with, because it goes in the exact same deck, but also any deck playing a reasonable number of dragons. This goes into tribal dragon EDH decks, and is one of those uncommons that will be $3 a couple years down the road (unless they decide to reprint it to death like [card]Lingering Souls[/card]…). I think you’ll be able to get $.50 to $1 for these during the first few weeks after the set’s release. There’s a lot of dragons, and people want them in their hands (in game and in real life) now!

Anticipate

Did you hear that? No? How about now? That was the sound of every hardened control mage at your LGS furiously scribbling down a decklist that started with “4x Ancicipate.” The fact that it’s a common kind of sucks for buylisting purposes, as there will be plenty on the market for $.25 from large retailers, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t pick it out of bulk. Ship them as playsets on Pucatrade, and be the guy that has multiple playsets at the ready. If you can get $1 in trade for a playset, you’ll do fine.

Dragonlord’s Servant

I was so happy when I saw this card. Not because I’m a fan of dragons (I’m not), not because the art is pretty silly (it is), and not because I’m going to sell an absolutely massive amount of these at $1 once I pull a bunch of them. Oh, wait, those are the reasons. There are multiple explanations as to why [card]Dragonspeaker Shaman[/card] is a $5 card, even with multiple printings. This thing is cheaper to cast and harder to kill. The biggest downside is that the obvious popularity will encourage more people to set them aside before their draft leavings or bulk lots ever reach my fingers. I don’t think this reaches $5, but $2 after rotation seems fine. Until then, I’ll keep them on my $.25 buylist for the competitive players in my area and wait.

End Step

Do you agree with my picks? Disagree? Has there been a sweet new card spoiled since this article went live that should get a special mention? While these aren’t the [card]Mastery of the Unseen[/card]s or the [card]Glittering Wish[/card]es of the finance world, they’re a lot easier to come across for a very low opportunity cost, and you have the ability to fill an important niche in your community by doing so. If you decide to buy a box of the new set, don’t just let the rares, mythics, and foils be the only cards you’re pulling out.

Have a great weekend!

Weekend Magic: 3/6-3/8

Jared Yost

WOTC and Star City Games teamed up to host Grand Prix Miami this past weekend, which will further add to the Standard results we’ve been seeing since Fate Reforged was released. However, we also need to keep in mind that Dragons of Tarkir is right around corner and that Standard again is due for another shakeup. Let’s take a look at the top decks to see which cards performed well.

Grand Prix Miami (USA)

Format – Standard

Decklists

Deck	Finish	Player	Deck	Finish	Player
G/W Devotion	1st	Daniel Cecchetti	Mardu Aggro	9th	Osyp Lebedowicz
G/W Devotion	2nd	Corey Baumeister	W/U Heroic	10th	Bradley Carpenter
Abzan Reanimator	3rd	Chad Kastel	Abzan Midrange	11th	Jaelin Funk
Abzan Aggro	4th	Ralph Betesh	G/W Devotion	12th	Brad Nelson
Mono-Red Aggro	5th	Ryan Grodzinski	Sultai Midrange	13th	Yuanji Li
Mono-Red Aggro	6th	Brian Lee	Jeskai Aggro	14th	Kevin Jones
Abzan Aggro	7th	Andrew Boswell	Abzan Aggro	15th	Aaron Barich
Naya Aggro	8th	Zan Syed	G/R Devotion	16th	Ruben Perez

G/W Devotion was the deck to beat that weekend, with two copies claiming the first and second spots in the tournament. Of course, we all know that Corey Baumeister might not have gotten second without his big brother Brad conceding to him in Round 15. What a great guy, right? Looks like his sacrifice paid off—even though Corey didn’t win the tournament, he still did fantastic.

Let’s quickly compare Daniel Cecchetti’s list to Baumeister’s. Cecchetti opted to play fewer [card]Fleecemane Lion[/card]s and instead focused on [card]Polukranos, World Eater[/card] and [card]Voyaging Satyr[/card], along with including a one-of [card]Temur Sabertooth[/card] for future value from [card]Genesis Hydra[/card]s or other creatures. Corey’s list was more straightforward. He decided not to go with Temur Sabertooth and instead put in an additional [card]Banishing Light[/card] along with the full playset of Fleecemane Lions to control the early game.

[card]Whisperwood Elemental[/card] should definitely be on everyone’s radar at this point. It started out at $4 in January and then spiked to $12 after results started coming in from the first Fate Reforged Standard events showcasing its power. Now, that power has been shown on camera at a GP final match for everyone to see. Whisperwood has proven that it is a Standard powerhouse that is capable of taking down a large tournament. I’m not sure how much more it can rise in the short term, but throughout the rest of its Standard life, there is a good chance it will continue to see play in green-based midrange strategies. Whisperwood is certainly a card to watch moving forward.

However, [card]Mastery of the Unseen[/card] was the real financial winner from this event. The TCGplayer median price on copies is now almost $5 when it could be had for low as $0.25 last week! If you were one to get in on Mastery of the Unseen before the GP, then you are doing quite well right now. This is definitely a short-term spike, so move any extra copies that you have before the price starts coming back down again. We need to keep in mind that Dragons of Tarkir is just around the corner, so even though G/W Devotion did incredibly well this weekend, that may not be the case another month or two from now. Take your profits and move along.

Rounding out the rest of the Top 8 were Abzan Reanimator, two Abzan Aggro, two Mono-Red Aggro, and Naya Aggro decks. Naya Aggro sounds pretty interesting to me so let’s take a look at that deck first.

One card to look out from Naya Aggro is [card]Shaman of the Great Hunt[/card]. It was played as a four-of in the deck, and could see an uptick of demand based on its various top 16 appearances. Again, we see [card]Outpost Siege[/card] playing a role as a finisher or a card advantage engine, along with [card]Chained to the Rocks[/card] as efficient removal for the best creatures in the format. I imagine Shaman was drawing plenty of cards off the back of pumped up [card]Goblin Rabblemaster[/card]s and [card]Stormbreath Dragon[/card]s. Another interesting inclusion was the [card]Mob Rule[/card] pair in the sideboard, which is great against both token strategies and decks that rely too heavily on gigantic creatures to finish the game for them.

Abzan Reanimator is a pretty stock list that utilizes [card]Tasigur, the Golden Fang[/card] to help create card advantage. There was a playset of [card]Rakshasa Deathdealer[/card] in both Abzan Aggro decks, which makes its price of $1 seem very appealing. A playset of [card]Warden of the First Tree[/card] was included in Boswell’s deck, which focused heavily on creatures. Surprisingly, [card]Wingmate Roc[/card] has gotten pretty cheap recently. It is now sitting around $7, its lowest price to date. Is there a chance that the Roc could back up in price over the rest of the year? I think so, considering how powerful it is if you can trigger the raid ability consistently. Gaining life is just icing on the cake.

Rounding out the rest of the Top 16 were Mardu Aggro, W/U Heroic, Abzan Midrange, another G/W Devotion, Sultai Midrange, Jeskai Aggro, another Abzan Aggro, and G/R Devotion.

Cards to watch include:

[card]Soulfire Grand Master[/card], [card]Outpost Siege[/card], and three [card]Wild Slash[/card] from Mardu Aggro.
Three [card]Rakshasa Deathdealer[/card], two [card]Torrent Elemental[/card] , and [card]Sidisi, Brood Tyrant[/card] out of Sultai Midrange.
[card]Mantis Rider[/card], two [card]Soulfire Grand Master[/card], and three [card]Dig Through Time[/card] out of Jeskai Aggro.
Three [card]Mardu Strike Leader[/card] out of Abzan Aggro.
[card]Rattleclaw Mystic[/card], thee [card]Shaman of the Great Hunt[/card], four [card]Whisperwood Elemental[/card], three [card]Xenagos, the Reveler[/card], and two [card]Crater’s Claws[/card] out of G/R Devotion.

That’s it for this weekend. Keep checking in for more updates every week of what happened and what cards you should watch based on results!

Pitt Imps Podcast #109 $900 in Goyfs

Pitt Imps 01:57:07

This week, we broke away from normal and took a look at the SCG Open. Then we got to go over some new mechanics and spoilers for Dragons of Tarkir. Will goes on some tangent about an old tournament that was won on the back of [card]Char[/card]. We find out its Mike’s birthday. We call one of the island boys racist. I talk for a while about DBZ Xenoverse and Will lets us know if he got to park his jeep mud deep.

Host Angelo Twitter @ganksuou

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Forced Fruition Reforged: Road to GP Vegas

Andrew Cochran

On May 30, 2015, we’ll all be gathered magically at the Las Vegas Convention Center to play Modern Masters 2015. Until then, I’ll be spending my weekends playing Magic at local Preliminary Pro Tour Qualifiers (PPTQs) and Grand Prix Trials (GPTs) to reach the critical mass of Planeswalker Points needed for a round-one GP bye. Over this time, my skills as a Magic player will be sharpened through sheer volume of games and adequate event preparation. I’ll be tracking my progress here at Brainstorm Brewery and seek to impart some wisdom regarding competitive Magic and goal setting to you. Maintaining a rigorous Magic schedule alongside a full-time job and other “real life” obligations will be a challenge I plan to rise to.

The basic structure of my week is as follows:

Monday: Off night
Tuesday: Constructed Playtesting
Wednesday: Off night, Local 3k/5k Fun run (exercise is important!)
Thursday: Cube
Friday: FNM Draft
Saturday: PPTQ/GPT
Sunday: PPTQ/GPT

I’m toying with possibly streaming some nights, playing either Draft or Construted on MTGO. With playing Magic in person, planning in advance is necessary, so having access to the game online is a huge asset for just playing a high volume of matches.

Much to my chagrin, grinding out 1000 Planeswalker Points means playing in mostly Standard events. While I did love playing the Red-White Burn deck of last (Theros/Return to Ravnica) Standard, I haven’t yet found something as compelling for this iteration. As you’ll see below, I’ve sleeved up a Sultai list focused on playing big things, most noteably [card]Ugin, the Spirit Dragon[/card]. My deck is modeled after Ali Aintrazi’s deck from SCG Washington 2015 with some small changes. I opted to play a [card]Villainous Wealth[/card] instead of [card]Worst Fears[/card], swapped the Ugin in the sideboard with the [card]Pearl Lake Ancient[/card], and traded [card]Treasure Cruise[/card] for [card]Ashiok[/card].

[deck title=Standard BUG Ramp]

[Land]

*2 Forest
*1 Island
*2 Llanowar Wastes
*4 Opulent Palace
*3 Polluted Delta
*2 Swamp
*4 Temple of Deceit
*4 Temple of Malady
*1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
*2 Yavimaya Coast

[/Land]

[Enchantments]

*3 Frontier Siege

[/Enchantments]

[Creatures]

*4 Courser of Kruphix
*2 Hornet Queen
*4 Sylvan Caryatid
*1 Tasigur, the Golden Fang

[/Creatures]

[Planeswalker]
*2 Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver
*1 Garruk, Apex Predator
*3 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
[/Planeswalker]

[Instants]

*3 Dig Through Time
*3 Hero’s Downfall
*2 Sultai Charm

[/Instants]

[Sorcery]
*3 Crux of Fate
*3 Thoughtseize
*1 Villainous Wealth
[/Sorcery]

[Sideboard]
*3 Bile Blight
*3 Disdainful Stroke
*2 Drown in Sorrow
*1 Kiora, the Crashing Wave
*1 Liliana Vess
*1 Murderous Cut
*1 Nissa, Worldwaker
*1 Pearl Lake Ancient
*1 Silence the Believers
*1 Silumgar, the Drifting Death
[/Sideboard]

[/deck]

These swaps bring me to this week’s topic: remembering to enjoy the game. Above, I mentioned enjoying the RW Burn deck from last Standard, a deck that I had no problem taking to a event in excess of six rounds and playing all day long. End of turn [card]Boros Charms[/card] and main-decked [card]Toil // Trouble[/card]s kept me entertained, win or lose. The deck might not have been “the best” for that week or even when I committed to building it, what mattered was that I kept coming back week after week. Setting out to acquire 1000 or more Planeswalker Points is a daunting task which is only made worse if the deck being piloted is a chore to play. My point of course is: play a deck you enjoy. Approaching an event where you’re pumped to play a deck will yield immensely better results than being forced to play the flavor of the month that you can’t stand.

Week of February 22nd

Last week I attended three events that earned me Planeswalker Points. A Friday Night Magic FRF/KTK Draft (+9), a Standard PPTQ (+40), and a Chaos Draft at my local game shop (+1) gave me a total of 50 on the week. Overall for the weekend, I won four matches, lost six, and drew two. I had only one severe misplay, which unfortunately cost me a match.

I drafted a blue-red deck at FNM with a tiny splash into green for a couple bomb rares, [card]Sagu Mauler[/card] and a foil [card]Savage Knuckleblade[/card]. Other all-stars included a foil [card]Flamerush Rider[/card] and an [card]Outpost Siege[/card]. My rares were great and I had a decent amount of removal and tempo cards. The result was a deck that depended heavily on draws. I certainly would suggest going for a more consistent deck over one that’s relying on its bombs, but there’s no reason you can’t do both when given the opportunity. The result of the evening was a 2-0-1 finish, splitting the six prize packs and two promos between myself and my finals opponent. We played the games out for fun and he did beat me in three. It was a match I was very interested in playing, since my opponent had passed me a pack with Flamerush Rider and [card]Temur Battle Rage[/card], two cards I would be happy to pick first. It turned out he had chosen an [card]Alesha, Who Smiles at Death[/card], forcing us both heavily into red.

Six rounds of Standard on Saturday followed at the PPTQ. An overwhelming amount of people showed up with Dimir and Sultai Control decks. I had more than one opponent peg my deck as such until seeing a Courser or Frontier Siege. My big misplay of the week came in game three of round three versus a Sultai control deck. After tapping out for an X=5 [card]Villainous Wealth[/card] that whiffed spectacularly, I cast a top-decked [card]Dig Through Time[/card] in desperation. The three relevant choices were a [card]Hero’s Downfall[/card], [card]Garruk, Apex Predator[/card], and [card]Ugin, the Spirit Dragon[/card]. I hastily took Downfall and Ugin to deal with an opposing Garruk and his two beast tokens. Had I taken the two walkers and deployed them appropriately, the cleanup and damage from Ugin would have taken the game. The takeaway is to consider late game lines of play entirely, even if time is scarce. My record on day the was a disappointing 2-3-1.

I have nothing to say about the Chaos Draft other than I crafted a [card]Semblance Anvil[/card] Dragon/Artifact deck that failed to win a single game, but was insanely fun to pilot.

Next week I’ll be attending FNM as usual along with two GPTs in the area on Saturday and Sunday. They are both Standard, and I’ll be taking the same list I have above.

My journey has just begun and I hope you’ll come along with me—we can teach each other a thing or two. You can follow my progress here at Brainstorm Brewery or on Twitter at @thatsnotmylane for more frequent updates. Have any question, comments, or advice? Hit up the comments below!

Pitt Imps Podcast #108 Lots of MTGO

Pitt Imps 01:35:58

This week, it’s our turn to go over the Modern and Standard GPs. We find out about Pac-t and why it’s so important to pronounce the T. We also dig deep into all the MTGO news that came out and we try to give new players a push in either direction as to why it is or is not worth jumping into MTGO. There’s bad beats, driving tips, and so much more on this week’s episode of the Pitt Imps Podcast. Did I mention all the cheese?

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Privileged Perspective 17 – Last Week and the Future

Ross Lennon

So last week’s article happened. The feedback that I got was mostly reticent confusion, which is how I imagine most test audiences walked out of advance screenings of Donnie Darko. Let’s address the problems with last week’s article:

I started an experiment that I knew could not be quantified within my typical writing window (my creative process works best somewhere between “Oh crap, it’s already Tuesday” and “Shit, it’s Thursday”).
Even though I briefly alluded that it would take more than a week, I didn’t rigidly lay out my plans and expectations, nor did I clearly express a hypothesis. I also failed to purchase one of those three-fold science fair boards.
It somehow took me 16 articles to reference Dream Theater’s flawless album Train of Thought. I still can’t believe Portnoy went to A7X (and that I just referred to them as “A7X”).

I think these problems arose partially because it was not a fully explored idea when I began and partially because I’m still getting my sea legs as a writer. So let’s synthesize all of my data since last we met:

Yep.

BRIEF REFLECTIVE ASIDE: Now, I’m lucky—I registered for this site essentially on a lark, I’m not counting on it for an income. If I was starting a new store, and I wanted to be active on TCGplayer without massively undercutting my first X sales to get past Level 1, I’d be dying a death. The influx of “civilian vendors” (sellers on TCGplayer that aren’t also brick-and-mortar shops, just like me) means that you have to undercut a LOT of people to get established, and many of those people have much less overhead to manage. If you’re a store, your margins are immediately worse than a civilian dealer, because each month you are also paying for AT LEAST rent, liability and property insurance (assuming you have no other employees), and utilities. I know a lot of stores that use TCGplayer as a means of selling cards. I also know that some of those stores that played the “Race to the Bottom” game died a slow death.

My goal for this next week is to make it out of Level 1. However, I don’t think that having a few random foreign cards listed is going to do the trick. In order to make this work, my plan is to list some Constructed (mostly Standard and Modern) staples, and see how low I have to go to get them to move (I’ll factor in fees to show what I really got at the end of the day for them, and we will compare that to buylist prices and other “civilian” outs). My hypothesis is that I am going to take a loss, but that the expected “gain” is moving up a level or two on TCGplayer (whether that is worth my time, energy, and ultimately my [potential] money is yet to be seen).

I can’t imagine being a new store trying to get established on TCGplayer.

Basically, just know that this is going to be something that we occasionally check in on, but likely won’t be the singular focus of another article. I hope the above also cleared up some of the confusion about last week.

Abzan Aggro

Speaking of things that happened last week, I got eleventh place (7-2, missed top eight on breakers) in that 5K I mentioned! Big congrats go to friend of the program and Floridian end-boss John Cuvelier on taking down the whole thing with Mardu. Let me show you the sweet list I played:

[deck title=BoltTheBird Abzan]

[Creatures]

*3 Anafenza, the Foremost

*4 Fleecemane Lion

*3 Heir of the Wilds

*4 Siege Rhino

*3 Warden of the First Tree

*3 Whisperwood Elemental

[/creatures]

[spells]

*2 Sorin, Solemn Visitor

*4 Abzan Charm

*4 Bile Blight

*4 Hero’s Downfall

[/spells]

[lands]

*2 Caves of Koilos

*3 Forest

*2 Llanowar Wastes

*1 Mana Confluence

*3 Plains

*4 Sandsteppe Citadel

*4 Temple of Malady

*1 Temple of Silence

*2 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth

*4 Windswept Heath

[/lands]

[sideboard]

*2 Back to Nature

*2 Brutal Hordechief

*3 Drown in Sorrow

*3 Glare of Heresy

*1 Mastery of the Unseen

*4 Thoughtseize

[/sideboard]

[/deck]

This is largely a stock Abzan Aggro list. However, the formerly headlining [card]Wingmate Roc[/card] has been replaced with [card]Whisperwood Elemental[/card]. My earlier lists featured both (three Rocs, two Elementals), but I noticed that I wanted to draw more Whisperwoods, and eventually made the bold move of cutting Roc entirely—which coincided neatly with the rise of [card]Stormbreath Dragon[/card]. Playing 26 lands was a last minute maneuver that I’m ultimately glad I made. Even though I drew more lands than I wanted, I also manifested a bunch of them, and that feels like the greatest thing in the world.

The sideboard may ultimately change, I think I want the two Hordechiefs to become a third [card]Back to Nature[/card] and a [card]Pharika’s Cure[/card] (I also think I want to shave the 26^th land for a Cure in the main, at least for FNMs).

I won’t do the whole tournament report run-down, but I will do an abbreviated Quick Hits type segment on the deck and this particular event.

As I said before, Whisperwood Elemental is incredible. Manifest is a tough nut to crack, especially in terms of crafting an understanding of it. Soul Summons, which is essentially just “1W, Manifest” is being cast on each of your end steps, except that you aren’t spending the additional cost of a card to play it AND you have a 4/4 body to boot! If we consider a card to be worth a half of a colorless mana (which is likely overly conservative), then we have gotten the benefit of 3WW out of our Whisperwood by the end of our second turn with him in play—that is a very quick recoup on our rate! I never had to activate its sacrifice ability because I just won every time it was in play. Being able to get the manifest guy at the end of your turn also allows you to be less conservative on defense, since you don’t have to leave as many of your creatures behind to guard against attack-backs.
If you weren’t aware, Manifested (and morphed) creatures don’t share a name while they are face-down. Nice [card]Bile Blight[/card], bro!

/Reveals [card]Caves of Koilos[/card]

I had an unfortunate situation where a match was decided (in my favor) because of a judge call in game three (my opponent had a scry trigger, and drew the card by mistake [with an immediate mini hand-shuffle, which I have to assume was just habit]). I knew my opponent prior to the match, which only made it more difficult. I don’t think they did it on purpose, and I hope there are no hard feelings. We’ve all made mental mistakes, especially towards the end of long days.
Speaking of which, this next point is going to be a big one. How conditioned are you for playing in long events? If you are a veteran event grinder, then you likely understand what I mean. You’re waking up early, spending a long day mostly sitting inside, and then leaving late, and you have to be mentally processing thousands of interactions and iterations over the course of the day. I don’t play as often as I used to, but I’ve learned that in order to give myself the best possible chance, I need to make choices that help preserve me for the long haul. This is why I prioritize getting byes for TCGplayer events: I know that eventually I will hit a wall, and I’d rather it be in the top eight than halfway through the Swiss. I also play more aggressive decks, so that I am not consuming a larger portion of mental energy per round. I pack a cooler with water and Red Bulls, and I try to walk around as much as I can, especially outside. I like to find (when possible) a quiet place to sit and read or pray. That way I am not constantly overwhelming myself with stimulation.

BRIEF JEDI MIND TRICK ASIDE: I don’t know if newer players know as many Jedi Mind Tricks as us old-timers, but a good defensive one is being able to just clear your mind in a match. If you can seriously wipe away all of the extraneous information, it will keep your brain (which is like a computer) from overheating. Conversely, if you fashion yourself as a Sith lord, you can attempt to overwhelm your opponent with extraneous information, to make them overload (but you will get Dark Force points).

The Truth About Modern Masters

Hello, Neo.

What if I told you that everything you thought you knew about Modern Masters wasn’t true? What if I told you that it wasn’t under-printed? What if I told you we could see more of it on the market, and soon?

Do you know how Magic distribution works? Don’t worry, it’s hard to if you don’t work with a store or haven’t been around for a very long time. The vast majority of stores only get a small percentage of their product directly from Wizards of the Coast. WOTC has too much else going on to worry about getting checks on time from smaller operations. Instead, large wholesale distributors buy from Wizards and then allocate and sell product to game stores (they also deal with sleeves, sports cards, different card games, and all that other stuff). Now, here is where things get sticky.

Once the product gets purchased by the distributors from Wizards, it is out of WOTC’s control. Wizards, as you may or may not be aware, also hosts distributor meetings and showcases a few times a year, to get the distributors excited about upcoming releases (and hopefully inspire them to buy more!).

Without revealing my sources (journalistic integrity!), I can tell you that every one of those distributors has cases of Modern Masters in their rafters. The set wasn’t under-printed (well, at least not as much as we thought), it just never made it past the middle man.

A part of this is normal. Distributors own the product, and so they will often set some aside to have down the line, or will buy unopened product back from stores that are closing. One of the things that is happening with Modern Masters specifically is using it as a honeypot to move unpopular products. Things like Core Set precons, which typically just gather dust, get a discount rate on Modern Masters (or even just the opportunity to buy more!) tacked on as an incentive. Something along the lines of, “Hey, store owner, if you buy six cases of these M15 Intro Decks, I’ll sell you a case of Modern Masters for $900!” This allows the distributor to not only move low-interest products, but also recoup back what they paid for the Modern Masters product as well as the sunk cost of not moving it before!

There was a sentiment expressed that if Modern Masters 2015 features many of the same ringers as the first series (distributors who attend WOTC’s showcases sign very explicit and strict non-disclosure agreements, so no, I don’t know the immediate future of [card]Tarmogoyf[/card]), then the distributors may not know what to do with all of their excess Modern Masters. I expect that it would suddenly start appearing more frequently on store shelves, which would likely do little to the prices of mythics and chase rares, but lower the value of the key uncommons.

Two of the changes to Modern Masters 2015, the increased MSRP and higher printing, are actually checks against distributor hording. The higher MSRP reflects a higher wholesaler cost to purchase, which will be harder to ignore up front. The increased supply as well will cause more of it to be sold up front to offset those higher up-front costs, even if some amount of it does end up in the midst of a warehouse a la Raiders of the Lost Ark.

At the End of Your Turn…

Until next week, when we will discuss my totally real preview card.

One last sneaky finance tip for those of you who made it this far—foil copies of [card]Plasm Capture[/card] seem like they should at least cost more than the terrible packs they come out of. Just sayin’.

Conjured Currency #53: TCGplayer Tour!

Douglas Johnson

Let me preface this by saying I was not paid by TCGplayer to write this article. I’m just a longtime buyer of cards from the website, and have had a seller account for a little over two years (although I don’t use it nearly as much as I probably should). If you’ve been reading my articles for a while, you know that I herald from ~~the middle of nowhere~~ Upstate New York, around the Oswego area during the school year. Due to the fact that I’m within an hour’s drive of the TCGplayer headquarters, and because I’m apparently a vocal member of the community, I was recently invited to take a tour of the place. I also got to have a sit-down talk with the brains behind the organization that provides us with a tournament series, articles, seller storefront, and so much more. It was a lot of fun, and I’m thankful to the amazing people who work at TCGplayer who let me snap pictures of the place to show you all.

I’ll preface this some more by saying that me getting to visit doesn’t exactly make me special [Editor’s note: I disagree!]. If you’re within driving distance of Syracuse, NY, you’re more than welcome to stop by and visit the offices for yourself, just like I did.

As someone who doesn’t travel much (read: at all), the elevators in the building were a bit… interesting, and took a few minutes to figure out. Don’t ask how they tricked me, it just happened. Once I defeated the first challenge, I rode up to the tenth-floor offices. TCGplayer was hard to miss:

Yep, I’m definitely in the right place.

I took a seat in the comfortable couches that you can see in the above photograph, but it wasn’t too long before my tour started. I met Sean, my tour guide. We started off at the TCGplayer Direct shipping center, where I got some great pictures of TCGplayer’s neatly sorted inventory. If you hate ordering from multiple different sellers at once, you can click the “TCG Direct” checkbox, and all of your selected cards will come in one convenient package, no matter how many sellers you ordered from. On the other end of the spectrum, individual sellers and stores that ship a dozen packages every day can now just send one large package to replace their inventory and have TCGplayer ship orders to buyers. Although I don’t personally sell enough volume on my personal TCGplayer store (as a general rule, sellers must complete at least 100 orders in the past 30 days and have a feedback rating of 99.5% or higher before applying), it’s certainly something I would consider if I sold cards through the website at a much higher frequency.

Where were we?

Oh, right.

And I thought I had a lot of cards…

Everything’s sorted by set and then alphabetized, which is the most efficient way to organize your collection, especially if you’re in the habit of buylisting. Almost every online buylist will request that you have the cards presorted in this condition, or will give you a percentage bonus in how much money you get for doing so. I was in the habit of sorting by color for the longest time, but there’s really zero benefit to doing so when you deal with a larger quantity of cards. Every morning, TCGplayer has a designated set of “pullers”, who go through the lists of orders from the night before and grab every card that they’ll be needing for that morning’s shipments from the cabinets above, which get sorted into a cool sorting tray.

From here, the cards in each order get pieced together, and what would have had to have been four or five different packages gets condensed into a single shipment.

A Quick Aside

I’m personally looking into getting one of these sorting trays myself, so I asked the Twitter population where the best choice to pick one up would be. Some of the suggestions were as follows. I haven’t locked in my personal purchase quite yet, so if anyone else has the following sorting trays and wants to voice their opinion on the positives or negatives, I’m all ears!

BCW is where I get all of my 1000-count boxes, and I’ve never been disappointed with their pricing. They specialize in bulk sales, so if for whatever reason you need 10 or more sorting trays, this is probably your cheapest option. This one has 24 total cells to sort cards into, which is unfortunately two letters short of the whole alphabet. Thankfully, I doubt you’ll be sorting too many X or Q cards, so it shouldn’t be too much of an issue.

CoolStuffInc is a lot more expensive, but is specifically designed for alphabetizing. Being $32 plus shipping really puts me off on wanting to order one, considering I can just make custom labels for the other trays like TCGplayer did. Definitely not a fan of paying $20+ for fancy letters and slightly more durable plastic.

Last, we have Troll and Toad. Although their tray only comes with 18 slots, it’s $10. The BCW one is $10 for just a single piece, getting cheaper the more you order. I don’t really see any hard advantages over BCW, so maybe writing this out helped me make my decision. Let me know if I’m wrong!

Back to TCGplayer HQ

On the other end of the tables, I got to see where all of the incoming cards go through. In order to [card]Replenish[/card] their inventory, several employees spend the morning unwrapping the incoming packages, verifying the condition and quantity with the packaging slip, then move it along to be sorted back into the mass of inventory.

After going through the shipping center, I got to learn about some of the parts of TCGplayer that made it look like an amazing place to work. I’m going to sound like a public relations official for the company at this point, but to be honest, I would definitely apply to work here if I wasn’t already going to college, living an hour away, and representing Brainstorm Brewery. If you’re someone who wants to get in some cardio while you work on the computer, they had two treadmill desks where you can multitask. Maybe this is a common thing in office spaces nowadays, but I’ve never seen it and thought it was extremely thoughtful of the management. Everyone who I talked to at TCGplayer sounded sincerely excited and happy to work there. While I know there are multiple horror stories of certain unnamed stores in this community, TCGplayer is the polar opposite, and is a shining example to the rest of the card industry.

I wonder if these can be adjusted to face each other… Card games on treadmills?

While I’ve raved about how TCGplayer looks like a great place to work, I haven’t talked much about what they do for the customers that allow the site to exist. A company exists because people spend money on their product, and a good company will give its customers a reason to do that over and over again. If you remember back to last fall when TCGplayer announced the opening of its Direct program, the company also gave goodies out to lucky individuals who made a purchase via the Direct program in the opening weeks. These included Modern staples like [card]Liliana of the Veil[/card], [card]Mox Opal[/card], oh, and uh, [card]Black Lotus[/card]. They gave away the Power 9, just as a thank you for the support they’ve received up until now from the community.

In Recent News..

I got to meet and talk with the customer service team while I was visiting, and this is exactly the type of thing I would expect from them after our conversation. They dedicate time and effort to every message, whether positive or negative. As a seller, I’ve had multiple positive interactions when dealing with issues that have come up with buyers. TCGplayer will go out of its way to fix whatever issues you might have with your order, while some companies will just hope the problem just gets brushed under the rug.

End Step

While my column is normally restricted to financial advice related to the game, I couldn’t pass up an opportunity to share my experience visiting the TCGplayer offices. Everyone I met was friendly, kind, and seemed like a family to each other. I can’t discuss some of the things I talked about, but I can assure everyone that there are some awesome things in store for the future, for both buyers and sellers alike.

Have you personally had an awesome experience with TCGplayer, where they went above and beyond for you? Let me know in the comments below!

The Wealth Effect

Anthony Capece

Magic financiers typically point to the growth of the playerbase as the primary driver of rising card prices in recent years. Rising card prices, in turn, have been the primary driver of Magic finance. Without new money pouring in, speculating on Magic cards would largely be a zero-sum game closer to gambling than investing.

The magnitude of this growth really came to light after the Hasbro Toy Fair Investor Presentation two years ago. They showed us this chart:

The chart shows that Hasbro attributed approximately 75 percent of revenue growth from 2008 to 2012 to “growth from player population” (had to estimate since the bars aren’t labeled) and about 25 percent to “growth in per player spending.” Simply put, new players were the ones mostly responsible for the surge in Magic’s sales.

Now let’s look at a slide from this year’s version of the same presentation, which was released just about two weeks ago.

Interesting how things have changed.

Hasbro is reporting that the active player base grew by only six percent in 2014, but that per-player spending grew by 11 percent. It can be tough to make perfect apples-to-apples comparisons from these presentations because there are small but important differences in the way Hasbro reported the metrics, but I think the overall message is clear.

In 2014, the increase in per-player spending of existing players had a bigger impact on Magic’s revenues than new players did. This is a pretty dramatic reversal from a few years ago.

New Players, Old Players

Take a minute to think about new players and existing players and your experiences with them. Anecdotal as it may be, I think it’s a good way to add context.

My perception of new players is that they mostly buy sealed product. After new players start playing Magic, they go through a phase where they accumulate cards to start a collection and begin building decks. To accomplish this, they buy boosters, fat packs, intro decks, etc. I’m not saying it’s the only thing they buy, but it’s the main thing.

New players do trade for cards, but they need something to trade away first. They might buy some individual cards to fill gaps here or there, but I rarely see brand new players shelling out for expensive singles and I rarely see them putting entire decks together this way. Even if they want to jump right to a fully-built deck, they are more likely to buy a Commander deck or another preconstructed product than to walk into a game store with a deck list and a credit card.

Existing players are mostly the opposite, from what I have seen (and since I am one of these, from what I do). Most of their money goes to singles because they have a better idea of what they need and buying singles is the most cost-efficient way to get those cards (aside from trading). Existing players are much more likely than new players to be playing expensive formats like Modern or Legacy as well, and with few exceptions the cards needed aren’t available in sealed product.

Existing players do buy some sealed product, in my experience. They certainly draft with it, and they might pick up some amount of sealed product each time a set comes out. It could be a booster, a fat pack, or maybe even a box. Still, I think it is typical for existing players to spend more, and sometimes considerably more, on singles than on sealed product. I know this is the case for my playgroup.

Based on this, one would think that the key to Magic’s revenue growth is new players buying sealed product. While existing players do supplement this revenue, a large part of their spending goes into the secondary market and thus does not make it into the coffers at Wizards HQ.

At least that’s what I thought two years ago. Hasbro said in their annual report that year that Magic revenues grew by 30 percent, and if three-quarters of that came from new players (as the graph indicates) we were looking at 22.5 percent growth in the player base. That number dwindled to six percent in 2014.

Here’s the thing about new players: they don’t stay new. By the time Hasbro issues its next annual report, this year’s class of new players gets tossed right in with the existing players. Hasbro is depending on another group of newbies, even bigger than the last, to show up each year.

In 2014, the class of new players was bigger than the year before, but not that much bigger. Don’t get me wrong—six percent growth is still very strong; it’s just not the explosive growth we have become accustomed to. In fact, according to the 2014 slide, the increase in per-player spending outstripped the growth in the player base two to one.

The story of Magic’s growth, it seems, has taken a turn. Today it is less about new players than about existing players spending more on the game than ever before. It’s about you and me opening our wallets even further. We’re getting older, we’re making more money (maybe even because of this website), and we’re spending it on Magic.

What does this mean for Magic finance?

Changing Dynamics

The first thing I want to point out is that existing players haven’t changed their habits too much. The flip-flopping of new and existing players is mostly about the precipitous drop in new player growth. Existing players may have upped their spending marginally, but that spending is now much larger in comparison to new players than it was before. [Quick math: if 22.5 of the 30 percent total growth in 2012 was from new players, 7.5 percent was from per-player spending growth. It’s 11 percent today.]

The second thing is that existing players are probably still spending most of their money in the secondary market, and that still doesn’t show up on Hasbro’s slides. With existing players, think of that 11 percent revenue growth as the part of the iceberg above water; for every dollar that goes to Wizards for sealed product, there are many more going to local and online dealers that we can’t see.

That’s mainly to say that dwindling player growth doesn’t spell an immediate end to Magic finance. I’m still spending my bonus on dual lands for my cube this year just like a lot of you, and that is still going to drive those prices higher regardless of how well Fate Reforged sells.

It certainly does affect the outlook for recently printed cards, though. One of the tenets of Magic finance is that out-of-print cards will climb in value due to growth in the playerbase. For example, Wizards will print enough Khans of Tarkir for the playerbase today, so after a few years of solid growth in the playerbase and no more Khans being printed, there will no longer be enough to go around. Prices climb. We’ve seen it happen over and over.

Now we may be looking at a world where the player base will be only slightly larger next year and the year after. Prepare for the possibility that there will still be plenty of [card]Siege Rhino[/card]s to go around in 2017. Every time you hear the phrase “slow gainer” in 2015, take a drink.

Also consider that cards which formerly held high prices due to low supply (not high demand) and have been reprinted near the height of Magic may be ruined forever. That is to say, the days of “recovering” from a big reprint may be behind us if the card is not a tier-one Modern staple. [card]Stifle[/card], I’m looking for you. There might be enough [card]Stifle[/card]s at under $10 for everyone that wants to play them for a long time.

Wealth and Magic

In the past, we’ve focused on demand created by new players picking up the game and “catching up” on out-of-print cards. I think it is time to start shifting that focus to the demand created by existing players as they accumulate wealth. Why the change? Because this wealth effect is not going way, no matter how weak or strong Hasbro’s sales are next year.

Magic is twenty years old. Those of us who started playing as kids early in the game’s existence are now in our late 20s or early 30s. Most people make a lot more money in their 30s than they did as kids. Guess what? Most people make more money in their 40s or 50s than they did in their 30s, too. Many Magic players are now squarely in their prime wealth-building years.

This is to say that even if you froze the player base at the current size, prices of out-of-print cards could still increase. Wealth triggers demand. Every year, I can afford something I couldn’t afford last year, and every year it gets easier to justify spending more money on my hobbies. Magic players are an intelligent bunch. I imagine that, on average, they are well-educated and successful. That means they are going to make quite a bit of money in their lifetimes.

Not only are players building wealth, but more players are graduating (literally) to this wealth-building period of their lives each year. You know the drill—work hard, graduate college, get a good job, buy power. This wealth-building period of life is long. Unlike the quick transitions from high school to college to the job market, people stay in this phase for decades.

For lack of a better way to say it, many Magic players are becoming rich and these rich Magic players will probably grow in number for years to come.

As we established earlier, experienced Magic players tend toward the secondary market. Nobody is buying ten cases of Khans instead of a Lotus. So what exactly are they buying? Ask yourself that question, because you are very likely an experienced Magic player.

If you had the money to buy any Magic card, what would you buy? The question is becoming relevant to a lot of players and I can tell you that the answer is never [card]Siege Rhino[/card].

In Conclusion

The growth in the playerbase may vary quite a bit in the coming years, and that is going to make Magic finance tricky when it comes to newly printed cards.

One thing you can count on, though, is that entrenched Magic players are accumulating wealth and will continue to spend more and more of it on their hobby. I think this will be the biggest driver of Magic finance in the future, if it isn’t already. Remember, the 11 percent growth in per-player spending last year doesn’t include secondary-market purchases, it’s just the tip of the iceberg.

If new player growth drops to zero, newer Magic sets are going to have a very hard time holding value. But this money from entrenched players is still going to be out there, growing, and chasing high-end Magic cards. The most attractive cards in this environment are those that are highly coveted, in limited supply, and are immune to reprints. Obviously that spells “Reserved List” for most, but there are other unique and rare cards out there that will benefit—promos, old set foils, etc.

That’s all I have for today. Find me on Twitter or Reddit (@acmtg) if you have any questions or comments.

Thanks for reading.

Weekend Magic: 2/27-3/1

Jared Yost

This week brought us Star City Games: Baltimore, where Modern was the featured format with a side of Standard and Legacy. Let’s dive into the results to see what innovations were showcased this weekend.

Star City Games: Baltimore – Modern Open (Baltimore, MD – USA)

Decklists

Deck	Finish	Player	Deck	Finish	Player
Sultai	1st	Gerard Fabiano	Infect	9th	Robert Lee
U/R Twin	2nd	Seth Manfield	Infect	10th	Stephen White
U/R Twin	3rd	Jeff Folinus	Jeskai Control	11th	Kevin Thomas
4-color Control	4th	Jonathan Sukenik	Infect	12th	Andrew Jessup
Jund	5th	Hugo Rodrigues	Scapeshift	13th	Gregory Romine
Temur Twin	6th	Todd Anderson	Abzan	14th	Robert Pompa
Temur Moons	7th	Jeff Hoogland	Abzan	15th	Christopher Juliano
W/B Tokens	8th	Elliott Jones	Abzan	16th	Jon Goss

Gerard Fabiano keeps on killing it on the Star City circuit, taking down the Modern Open and continuing to add to his major finishes record. Piloting an innovative Sultai list, this deck features several cards that were previously unseen at the top tables of Modern tournaments. Highlights from the deck include two [card]Thragtusk[/card], two [card]Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver[/card], a single [card]Jace, Architect of Though[/card], two [card]Damnation[/card], and two [card]Creeping Tar Pit[/card].

Ashiok is currently out of stock at Star City Games at $18. The planeswalker is definitely on an upswing from the lows it experienced back around the $9 price point.

This is the type of card that casual players salivate over, so the casual demand in addition to the Standard and now Modern demand of the card will bolster the price in the short term. U/B Control in Standard will continue to be a deck thanks to [card]Crux of Fate[/card] and other cards, so Ashiok seems well positioned in the Standard metagame. Of course, as the summer lull approaches the planeswalker’s price will drop back down a bit but I can’t see it ever going below $10 again. I will definitely be watching for deals on Ashiok during the late summer and through rotation.

Going back to Gerard’s deck, [card]Jace, Architect of Thought[/card] is also quite cheap at $3 or less. This is due to the Duel Deck printing but now that it’s possible for Jace, AOT to have a home in Modern, I could see this price starting to tick up over the next few months.

[card]Thragtusk[/card] is also cheap at $2.50 and less—this was a card that was once $25 or more when it was in Standard. Could we also seen an upswing in Thragtusk prices as well? Foils seem cheap to me if you can get them for $8 or less.

[card]Creeping Tar Pit[/card] is among the cheaper of the Worldwake manlands at $9 per copy. I would caution a MM2 reprint here, though—the Worldwake manlands could easily be included in MM2 or even another supplemental product like Commander. The only reason to pick them up is If you can quickly flip them based on the hype of the Sultai win, because I don’t think the risk of waiting to see if they are in MM2 is worth it. The same could be said of [card]Damnation[/card]—another card players have been clamoring to see reprinted, and already with a hefty price tag, I would stay away from [card]Damnation[/card] with the looming MM2 set on the horizon.

Rounding out the rest of the Top 8 were two copies of U/R Twin, 4-Color Control, Jund, Temur Twin, Temur Moons, and W/B Tokens.

Four-Color Control seems like a very unique deck based on the name, but is really just Jeskai Control that splashes black for [card]Lingering Souls[/card], [card]Mystical Teachings[/card], and sometimes [card]Shadow of Doubt[/card]. The only financially relevant news from the deck’s result is that [card]Mystical Teachings[/card] foils spiked hard after someone saw the single copy in the decklist.

Temur Moons is a spin on the Blue Moon deck that splashes green for the one and only [card]Tarmogoyf[/card]. Out of the sideboard, it gains access to [card]Engineered Explosives[/card] and [card]Nature’s Claim[/card] as well. [card]Blood Moon[/card] has been a card that has seen a ton of play recently and has also seen a Modern Masters reprint. I’m not sure if we can expect it to be in MM2 too. If it isn’t, then I expect [card]Blood Moon[/card]’s price to continue climbing since it seems to be shining in a Modern format that mostly consists of three color decks and decks like Temur Moons (Blood Moon) that punish them. Another interesting deck choice is [card]Boomerang[/card]—a nice trick if you drop a Blood Moon, then bounce a creature (or permanent) that they can’t cast again back to their hand. Quickly, buy out all the foils just like [card]Mystical Teachings[/card], guys!

Finally, the last unique deck to make Top 8 is W/B Tokens. The notable cards from this deck include two [card]Hero of Bladehold[/card], a playset of [card]Sorin, Solemn Visitor[/card], [card]Lingering Souls[/card], two [card]Timely Reinforcements[/card], and two [card]Bitterblossom[/card]. [card]Sorin, Solemn Visitor[/card] is pretty cheap for a Standard-legal planeswalker that sees play in Mardu and Abzan strategies. He’s currently only $13.50, so I’ll be watching to see if he starts going up in price due to his Modern playability combined with Standard applications.

The rest of the Top 16 was much less diverse. Three Abzan and three Infect decks, along with Jeskai Control and Scapeshift. Abzan and Infect have been covered pretty extensively since the Pro Tour, so nothing new financially from those decks. Scapeshift also hasn’t changed much so nothing new from that deck either. Jeskai Control seems to be on a downward swing since it has a hard time against many of the new decks in the format. However, cards to watch from that deck include [card]Ajani Vengeant[/card], [card]Restoration Angel[/card], and [card]Sphinx’s Revelation[/card].

Star City Games: Baltimore – Standard IQ (Baltimore, MD – USA)

Decklists

Deck	Finish	Player	Deck	Finish	Player
R/W Aggro	1st	Andrew Skorik	Sultai Control	9th	Robert Seder
Jeskai Aggro	2nd	Kevin Jones	Jeskai Aggro	10th	Andrew Davis
U/W Heroic	3rd	Zach Jesse	W/U Heroic	11th	Chas Hinkle
Abzan Midrange	4th	William Dean	R/W Aggro	12th	David Reed
U/B Control	5th	Ted Felicetti	R/W Aggro	13th	Tim Candee
Abzan Aggro	6th	Elliot Wolchesky	Sultai Control	14th	Jonathan Alvarado
Abzan Aggro	7th	Andrew Boswell	R/W Aggro	15th	Stan Smith
U/B Control	8th	Garrick Mathis	G/B Constellation	16th	Christopher Wright

R/W Aggro took down the Standard IQ piloted by Andrew Skorik. Nothing financially notable from the deck that hasn’t been discussed before. [card]Outpost Siege[/card], [card]Wild Slash[/card], and [card]Ashcloud Phoenix[/card] are the cards to watch.

Rounding out the Top 8 were Jeskai Aggro, U/W Heroic, two U/B Control, Abzan Midrange, and two Abzan Aggro decks. Notable cards from these decks include:

[card]Rakshasa Deathdealer[/card] from Abzan Midrange and Boswell’s Abzan Aggro.
[card]Ugin, the Spirit Dragon[/card] and [card]Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver[/card] from Mathis’ U/B Control.
[card]Dig Through Time[/card] from both U/B Control decks.
[card]Monastery Mentor[/card] and [card]Sorin, Solemn Visitor[/card] from Wolchesky’s Abzan Aggro.
[card]Warden of the First Tree[/card], which appeared as a playset in both Abzan Aggro lists.
[card]Anafenza, the Foremost[/card] out of Boswell’s Abzan Aggro list

Star City Games: Baltimore – Legacy IQ (Baltimore, MD – USA)

Decklists

Deck	Finish	Player	Deck	Finish	Player
Painter	1st	Jack Kitchen	Dredge	9th	Andrew Shrout
Lands	2nd	David Long	Death and Taxes	10th	Allen Norman
Maverick	3rd	Raymond Cornely	Temur Delver	11th	Aaron Parsons
Lands	4th	Ralph Betesh	Sultai Delver	12th	Dan Jessup
Elves	5th	David Perry	Storm	13th	Caleb Scherer
Metalworker	6th	Justin Moss	Sultai Delver	14th	Bob Huang
Dredge	7th	Eric Copenhaver	Jeskai Delver	15th	Adonnys Medrano
Sultai Delver	8th	Bob Marshall	Jeskai Stoneblade	16th	Shaun Dickson

Painter took down the Legacy IQ with Jack Kitchen at the helm. Painter is what I like to call a pet deck in Legacy – which means that it is hard to pilot correctly without extensive playtesting, can easily be hated out with the right sideboard, and usually contains a card (or cards) that 95 percent of the playerbase can’t find or afford. Painter’s issue is containing a playset of [card]Imperial Recruiter[/card], where the cheapest version is the judge foil for $160 per copy. Like Lands (which also appeared in the Top 8 twice), it’s basically the same as getting [card]The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale[/card]—the deck doesn’t run well without it and will set you back about $800 or more for a copy, thus limiting the number of players who can potentially play the deck.

Regardless, there are cards in Painter that are financially relevant. [card]Painter’s Servant[/card] (and foils), [card]Grindstone[/card], and [card]Blood Moon[/card] are all important pieces of the deck and could see gains. [card]Ancient Tomb[/card] and [card]City of Traitors[/card] seem to have come down slightly in price from their highs, but with enough exposure in Legacy events, these lands could once again bounce back in price.

The rest of the Top 8 included two Lands decks, Maverick, Elves, Metalworker, Dredge, and Sultai Delver. Notable cards include:

[card]Mox Diamond[/card] and [card]Manabond[/card] (which has lowered to about $2.50 retail) from Lands. [card]Gamble[/card] spiked pretty hard last year up to $20 but hasn’t moved much from there. [card]Dark Depths[/card] also hasn’t moved from its spike to $50 around the same time.
[card]Kuldotha Forgemaster[/card], [card]Lodestone Golem[/card], and [card]Metalworker[/card] from the Metalworker deck. [card]Wurmcoil Engine[/card] has taken a huge hit in price from the Commander printing, yet will go back up in time from it’s lows due to its use in Modern, Legacy, and Commander. [card]Chalice of the Void[/card] and [card]Grim Monolith[/card], especially foils, should also be watched.

Other notables from the Top 16 include:

[card]Thalia, Guardian of Thraben[/card] in Death and Taxes, due to Tiny Leaders along with Legacy and Modern demand.
[card]Nimble Mongoose[/card] in Temur Delver, especially foils.
[card]True-Name Nemesis[/card], which has dropped to its lowest price ever at $17.50 since it was released in Commander 2013.
[card]Abrupt Decay[/card], [card]Deathrite Shaman[/card], and [card]Dark Confidant[/card] were seen quite a bit throughout the Top 8 and Top 16 results.

That’s all for this week! Keep coming back for more summaries of last weekend’s Magic action.

Pitt Imps Podcast #107 Age of Affinity

Pitt Imps 01:26:48

This week, we go over the Standard GP that just passed. We also cover some quick news. I don’t know, something about a Dual Deck or a FTV or something. Then we ramble for a bit. Oh wait. Crap, almost forgot. We are giving a guy a try at the third seat.

Host Angelo Twitter Ganksuou

Co-Host Will Facebook

The New Guy Mike Twitter @Huntmaster_Mike

We need your Help

Show Email [email protected]

Casually Infinite – Manifest and Other Troubled Mechanics of Magic‘s Past

Marc DeArmond

I’ve kept no secret about the fact that I’m not impressed with manifest as a mechanic. To me, it fits in with a number of previous unimpressive “feel bad” mechanics. As a featured new keyword in a set, it has a number of issues similar to other troubled mechanics such as tribute, cipher, and curses. Here I’m going to go in depth to look at the repeated flaws of these mechanics to see what it is that drives these mechanics to look so good, but end up so unloved.

Manifesting Failure

For those not familiar with manifest, it is a mechanic that has you put the top card of your library onto the battlefield as a face-down 2/2 creature, similar to a morph. However, if the card is a creature card, it can be turned face up by paying its mana cost. If it’s not a creature card, it sits on the battlefield as a 2/2 for eternity. There are a number of instants and sorceries that manifest, as well as a few creatures and enchantments that attach to newly manifested creatures. Most of the time, manifest exists as a fairly priced 2/2 creature with fairly priced bonuses. The basic manifest card, [card]Soul Summons[/card], is basically a white bear with possible upside.

The problem is that the upside promises big things but the reality of it is incredibly small. In a regular Limited deck with 40 cards, 17 lands, 8 spells, and 15 creatures, you have only about a 37.5 percent chance of hitting a creature. This means you have a 62.5 percent chance of getting an unexciting manifest. About 20 percent of the time, your manifest will be an instant or sorcery that you probably wanted. Having my [card]Reach of Shadows[/card] manifested was one of the worst feel-bad moments in my entire time playing in the block so far. With the 37.5 percent chance of getting a creature, there’s a number of creatures that you don’t want manifested. When you look at cards like [card]Hooded Assassin[/card], [card]Aven Surveyor[/card], or even the famed [card]Siege Rhino[/card], manifesting these cards is mostly downside. Getting the “free card” doesn’t even matter because most of the time you spent a card to get the manifest. With a number of creatures that you don’t want manifested being a significant portion of your deck, it appears that the “good case” scenario is manifesting a land, which is great until it gets bounced.

I figure that less than 20 percent of most decks is made up of creatures you actually want to manifest. These include morphs and some big-mana creatures. In most of those cases, you’d rather cast the creature from your hand. Paying three for a morph is generally much better than paying 1W for a manifest that has a 20 percent chance of being a morph. Especially considering that there’s a 40 percent chance that I’ll manifest a card I actually want. The promise of manifesting my [card]Abzan Guide[/card] is dwarfed by the likelihood that I won’t and surpassed by the probability that I’ll manifest something I actively don’t want. In the end, this is a feel-bad mechanic in the vast majority of cases. So long as the cost is fair, I’d generally rather just have a 2/2 than a manifest.

Manifesting Success

While at it’s core I’d consider manifest a failure, there are a couple of examples where it is a decent success. Cards like [card]Lightform[/card] and [card]Mistform[/card] represent cards that I’m perfectly happy to play as a 2/2 with the attached abilities. If these cards were just 2/2s instead, they would still find a place in my deck. In these cases, manifest could be considered a success because it basically just gives a 2/2 token with the attached enchantment. This means that it’s a good deal. However, I’d consider the manifest as more of a downside than an upside. It has the downside of taking a card I actually want out of my deck. Even with a small downside like exiling the top card of my library, I’d still play Cloudform or Lightform, but it’s important to note that these cards generating an acceptable creature doesn’t make the mechanic good.

The cards that makes manifest shine are cards like [card]Whisperwood Elemental[/card] and [card]Mastery of the Unseen[/card]. These cards allow for continual manifesting, which drastically increases the chance of getting a good card while a card like [card]Soul Summons[/card] is more like a scratch-to-win lotto ticket. The eventual payoff of getting continual 2/2 creatures along with the chance to “strike it big” makes these cards far more exciting. However, these are the rare and mythic cards and most of the common cards are very unexciting.

The other issue here is there is incredibly few cards with a big payoff for manifesting. Manifesting [card]Master of Pearls[/card], [card]Icefeather Aven[/card], or [card]Hooded Hydra[/card] feels like winning the Mega Millions, but it is incredibly unlikely to happen. You’re more likely to feel awesome by morphing your [card]Icefeather Aven[/card] and flipping it up to bounce your opponent’s [card]Dragonbell Monk[/card] and block their [card]Battle Brawler[/card], which feels just as much like winning but can actually happen in a game of Limited Magic. All the cards that are great with manifest were already great. Manifesting them is good, but they’re not cards you’ll have lots of in your deck.

Feeling Bad About Mechanics

One of the biggest complaints stemming from manifest is that it is a “feel bad” mechanic. Reading the mechanic, your mind drifts to flipping up hydras or monks for two, but the reality isn’t the case. LSV recently commented that Soul Summons has basically become a bear. I might argue that it is possibly worse than a bear without some sort of scry or [card]Brainstorm[/card] mechanic. This means not only is the promise fulfilled less than desired, but the promise failing to be fulfilled leaves the player somewhat frustrated. If you hit a good spell or utility creature with an ETB effect, it feels pretty bad. At this point, not only is the promise of something cool not fulfilled, but you “lose a good card.” I understand that all you really lose is a random card off the top of your library, but the reality of the situation is that you have to continue to look at that Reach of Shadows or, God forbid, [card]Duneblast[/card], wishing there was a way to cast it. The promise of something good is simply too often eclipsed by something less than stellar or bad.

Tribute

There’s a recent string of similar mechanics in recent small sets that share a similar feel bad issue. Most recently Born of the Gods brought about the tribute mechanic. This mechanic provided the opportunity for the opponent to pick one of two “modes” upon the resolution of creature. Tribute, much like manifest, promised great things, but rarely delivered. There were rare occasions where your opponent would pick the wrong choice for tribute. Perhaps they were relying on their kill spell to take down the massive creature they just allowed you to land and you had a counter, or sometimes the board state just wasn’t what they thought it was. But the vast majority of the time, you got to read a card with two cool abilities and pick the worst one in your given situation. Again, some of these cards had modes that were very close, such that picking either one went pretty badly for your opponent. But even in those 55/45 situations, you were pretty much guaranteed to lose the 10 percent. Here, similar to manifest, there was a promise of big things with little delivery.

Cipher

Cipher was a very interesting Dimir mechanic in Return to Ravnica block that also brought with it big promise. Cipher allowed you to cast a spell, then attach it to a creature that would allow you to cast the spell for free every time you hit an opponent with it. The idea of getting to tap down two of your opponent’s creatures every turn with [card]Hidden Strings[/card] is quite a draw. If you could pair it up with a small unblockable creature, you could have quite an impact.

…Except that you already could get through with an unblocked attacker every turn, which makes tapping your opponent’s creatures down far less significant. Additionally, the cards were too expensive to be priced fairly for a single use, making it necessary to get in twice in order to make it “worth it.” Paying 3U to draw a card with [card]Last Thoughts[/card] is pretty unimpressive. Paying it to draw two cards makes it a sorcery speed [card]Inspiration[/card], which is still worse than [card]Divination[/card]. If you could get three cards out of it, you were doing pretty good. But considering the inherent risks of casting what is essentially an enchantment with an ETB ability that is significantly overpriced, most all of the cipher cards promised far more than they could deliver.

Curses

Curses are probably the most successful of the mechanics mentioned here as they still play a role in some decks. I still see [card]Curse of the Bloody Tome[/card] in mill decks and [card]Curse of the Stalked Prey[/card] had it’s day in the sun—or moonlight, perhaps.

Curses made big promises. The primary difference is the frequency with which they could actually deliver. Cheap or impactful curses just operated similarly to world enhancements when you could build your deck around them. The problem was that they were a mechanic of build-around-me cards. You couldn’t really build around curses, which meant that there were a large number of build-around-me cards in each set. Each of these promised big things which were, for the most part, attainable in the right deck, but very difficult to make proper use of. Of the mechanics listed, I wouldn’t mind curses coming back, but I think that they need to come in low enough numbers that they will really just operate like other build-around-me enchantments like [card]Angelic Accord[/card], [card]Quiet Contemplation[/card], or[card]Goblin Slide[/card].

Planning for the Future

It is my hope that in the future we see more mechanics where the big promises can be fulfilled rather than falling flat. Cards with monstrosity that were fair at their original cost could provide additional value if the game went long. My initial doubts about morph in Khans were mitigated by the five-mana cost to flip face up, and morph ended up being one of my favorite parts of the set.

While I expect to see individual cards that may not hit the mark, an entire mechanic that suffers from these problems can really drag a set down. With mechanics like tribute and manifest, there is no way that they won’t be a let down the majority of times they show up, so I hope they do not return. Give me more mechanics like prowess, outlast, dash, raid, and delve, and I’ll be a happy man.

Privileged Perspective 16 – Once More Unto The Breach

Ross Lennon

So today we are going to do something that we have never done before, and could theoretically never do again. Thanks to a conflux of semi-recent events, driven primarily by the new foreign card market, I am about to sign up for TCGplayer—and you’re going to go through it with me! Obviously this experiment is going to take more than a week to have quantified results, so we will see how far we get today and I’ll update you as appropriate.

AUTHOR’S WARNING: The proceeding segment is an extreme stream of consciousness, like the righteous Dream Theater track of the same name.

Okay, so the first thing I did was make a bunch of guacamole. Basically mash up some avocado, add taco seasoning, diced tomato trinity from the supermarket (not as good as pico, but way easier), and lime juice. Avocado is a super-food, which means you can eat way too much of it and not hate yourself for it! Any sort of gourmet sweet chili flavored chip will do nicely.

The next step was going to TCGplayer’s website. Down at the bottom of the home page appears to be the registration link.

Also, the USS Enterprise for some reason? How is that okay? Does CBS know about this? And I can only assume that the superhero figure is supposed to be my noted nemesis, Frank Lepore. Hang on, folks, it only gets worse from here.

Hey, log in time! This should be-

DAMMIT.

Ugh, this is gonna be a while. So, did you watch the Oscars? [Editor’s note: No.] Yeah, me neither. Hey, how about [card]Whisperwood Elemental[/card]? I haven’t really talked about it on here, but I was starting to get psyched up about it on Reddit leading up to this weekend, and I guess everyone else figured it out too. A 4/4 for five mana (an easy-to-cast five to boot!) is a decent rate, and its ability is sort of in that EDH school of card advantage, where it’s an incremental gain that left unchecked can take over a game (but does little to nothing if stopped immediately). I say “EDH School” because traditionally things like rate and card advantage were only evaluated on an up-front basis—[card]Divination[/card] was two cards right now no matter what, while [card]Rhystic Study[/card] was maybe more than two cards later. Obviously both are better in certain formats, but this just highlights WOTC’s push to have interaction and development on the battlefield and not the stack.

Okay, so TCGplayer’s guy emailed me. Looks like he’s going to reset my password? As someone who got locked out of his university provided email account very often, this feels eerily familiar.

Hey, we got it! NO, I WON’T TELL YOU WHAT THE NEW PASSWORD IS.

No screenshots here because I’m filling in my info. Just look over there for a minute, okay? C’mon, don’t make this weird.

Ugh, bank stuff. I can’t have this just go to my PayPal account? I’m starting to really regret this.

Okay, now they need to verify my email AND phone? They want to either call or text me. Uh, text obviously. I’m a Millennial, we fear human interaction. We capitalize Millennial, right? Probably. Damn kids.

So now that they’ve texted me, taken a blood sample, and know my entire life story, we are finally able to start selling cards! First thing I’m going to add to the inventory is a promo Pernicious Deed, because why not?

Okay, seems pretty easy so far. Let’s try a harder one, Euro promo Forest.

CRAP.

Luckily, I was able to find it by sorting by rarity (they let you sort by all the different columns, which is nice. I appreciate that). Here’s the next problem though.

…I guess we are just gonna keep this one.

Okay, let’s get down to the real business and start listing some foreign cards! The first thing we are going to list is a JP foil Shrine of Piercing Vision.

So basically, we scrolled down until we found the listing (there are a lot!) and punched it in. Oh! I changed the shipping price too. It was on the front page of the selling page, it lets you set flat rates for everything. I’m also listing a JP non-foil Polukranos, a JP foil Seventh Edition Gravedigger (spicy!), an English foil Scourge Form of the Dragon, four Demon of Death’s Gate, a Russian Day of Judgment…

Oh, brother. What now?

Okay, so it looks like I can only have ten cards listed at once, and I can’t move up to a higher level until I sell two things. I went ahead and dropped the quantity of those demons to three so I could throw up that Day of Judgment. Hopefully somebody buys something soon!

/Looks at clock, word count, clock again

Okay, so I guess let’s just run this down to the buzzer.

Duel Deck Questions

I am fascinated to see what happens when this Duel Deck comes out on Friday. Elspeth’s price is still firmly in the $16 range, which is about as low as it’s ever been. The best probable corollary to her is [card]Jace, Architect of Thought[/card]—a Standard staple ‘walker that got the Duel Deck treatment last year. The spot that the arrow is pointing to is the exact date that the product was released.

Of course, I don’t think the Jace comparison paints the entire picture. While Jace was a four-of in Standard, he was only played in a few decks. Elspeth, while typically maxed at three copies or less, is played in a wider variety of archetypes. While I’m sure people bought the Jace decks just to own Jaces, they were still four [card]Sphinx’s Revelations[/card] and more away from playing most of the Jace decks in the format. Elspeth, on the other hand, casts a wider net.

This is also probably the best Duel Deck in terms of marquee names. Elspeth is a Standard powerhouse with Cube and Commander potential, and Kiora isn’t Tibalt. In actuality, I like Kiora a lot, and it’s a very popular seller in my store (my LGS, not the TCGplayer store we started just now). While I don’t expect either to make the jump to eternal (or “non-rotating”) Constructed events, they’re both individually powerful cards that will likely hold strong casual demand. Sadly for Kiora, I expect her value to plummet (perhaps more so than Elspeth) as she becomes the unwitting casualty of people tearing open these decks to load up on Elspeths. [card]Mother of Runes[/card] is about to outstrip its demand entirely, shy of the Urza’s Legacy/FNM foils.

I’m excited that we are getting more copies of [card]Decree of Justice[/card], because that card is very cool and neat. That was our best control finisher once! You kids don’t know how lucky you have it.

The [card]Explore[/card] art is great, and there are two in the deck, which is funny. I’m glad whoever designs these was also not bullish enough to only put two copies of [card]Accumulated Knowledge[/card] in the deck—that would have been unforgivable. Still, it needs an [card]Isochron Scepter[/card] to imprint one on…

Well, I’d say we’re about close enough for government work, so let’s close out this bad boy with some:

Quick Hits!

My MTG finance call of the week is Ghirardelli’s Intense Dark Cherry Tango Chocolate Squares. So decadent! It’s like my mouth is swimming in a midnight sea of amaretto.
Haven’t sold anything on TCGplayer yet. Dammit.
Speaking of TCGplayer, I’m going to go win one of their 5K Open things on Saturday. I went to check out the comment section, and discovered these are your choices for interacting.

It’s like internet stratigraphy—it gets older as you go down! LOL HOTMAIL SUCKS.

I tried to list one of those JP Jace v Chandra [card]Counterspell[/card]s on both PucaTrade and TCGplayer (they should pay me for this week’s article at this point), and neither platform support it.
Saito went 11-3-1 at GP Memphis with a very affordable mono-black aggro deck. It played no mythics at all, with [card]Obelisk of Urd[/card] as a four-of as well as [card]Mardu Strike Leader[/card]. The first-ever Privileged Perspective preview card, [card]Mardu Shadowspear[/card], was also a four-of. I’m not going to play it in a tournament that I’m paying $35 to enter, but I am definitely going to start slinging it at FNM.
Dragons of Tarkir spoilers start soon! I can only assume WOTC is going to do the right thing and give me my preview card on time. Come on guys, be cool. WE NEED THIS.
If you haven’t already, check out the Brainstorm Brewery Patreon and donate. Your generous contributions keep their podcast on the airwaves, and stop writers like me from jumping ship to Star City (they wish they had me).
Were you aware of the crazy Wheel of Time pilot that aired two weeks ago? It ran at 1:30 a.m. on FXX, and starred friend of the program Billy Zane (is that better, Jason?). Apparently the director died and the producers are now suing Robert Jordan’s wife! Show business is crazy.
Whisperwood has gone up $5 since you started reading this. Wait… $6.
Don’t forget to submit questions for my mailbag article! I’d like at least one of them to be Magic related, but whatever. I’M GIVING THE PEOPLE WHAT THEY WANT.

Conjured Currency #52: Wizards Has Never Done That!

Douglas Johnson

Welcome back, everyone who still reads my articles (or are just starting to read my articles!). I’d like to start out this week by clearing up a misconception that many people have about what I (and other Magic financiers) do in the community. I do not own a [card]Crystal Ball[/card]. Well, I probably do somewhere in my bulk 1,000 count boxes, but I’m saying that I’m not a fortune teller. I can’t predict the future with 100 percent accuracy. When someone asks me a question along the lines of “What should I do with the foil copy of [card]Soulfire Grand Master[/card] that I opened at the prerelease?” I’m going to look back at similar, previous trends in price graphs and make an educated guess as to where that card is going to go.

However, there are always going to be curveballs and new products thrown our way. We’ve seen products such as Duel Deck: Jace vs. Chandra, the original Commander sets, San Diego Comic Con planeswalkers, and Commander’s Arsenal reach absurd prices that were much higher than their MSRPs. While the Duel Deck series and Commander products have calmed down significantly once WOTC got a handle on how much they needed to put into circulation to satisfy a large amount of demand, the company still throws us the occasional product that it wants to feel special and unprecedented. Today, I want to go over wild cards like the promo Ugin, and what you should do the next time something like this comes out.

Ugin, the Money Dragon

Ugin has been the first planeswalker in a long time to break the “Planeswalker Tax” trend. For those of you who haven’t been playing very long, [card]Jace the Mind Sculptor[/card] presold for $20 for a short period of time. Yep, that one. $20. Yeah. Once he skyrocketed to more than $100, vendors realized their mistake, and saw just how format-warping, iconic, and valuable planeswalker cards could be. Ever since that era, planeswalker cards have historically presold for ridiculously overpriced values, trying to capitalize on the hype and “wow” factor that the new walker might happen to have. If you check out the graph, you’ll see that “normal” Ugin dipped by a couple of dollars in week one, then quickly climbed out of that gutter to a hefty $35 price tag.

As for the Ugin’s Fate Ugin… I certainly didn’t predict that he’d double in price from $100 to almost $200 in less than a month. In fact, I predicted the opposite, and encouraged the players who opened them to dump them while they had the chance. Whoops:

As you can see in my comment, I felt that the card not being foil would put a huge dent in demand. That in addition to presale planeswalker hype were my main reasons for suggesting to get rid of the card. Where did I go wrong?

First of all, I underestimated the worldwide demand for these Ugins. If you listen to the Brainstorm Brewery podcast, Kyle Lopez recently hinted towards a massive demand from outside the United States for these promo Ugins. They’re only available in English, and weren’t given away outside of the USA. [Editor’s note: European readers have informed us this is not, in fact, the case, and that these were given out in German and other EU languages at the very least.] The second reason, which will look extremely obvious in hindsight, was that these were a brand new, experimental product with a very low print run. I’m not talking about a From the Vault print run where every store got a couple cases; I heard about stores who went the entire weekend without anyone opening an alternate art Ugin.

While Ugin’s Fate packs were an unprecedented thing, let’s try and see if we can examine some of the other unprecedented product releases in Magic’s recent history, and try to establish a pattern as to whether or not we should buy in immediately upon release, or wait it out. Some of the recent examples that come to mind include the “Book Jace” from the Agents of Artifice planeswalker novel, Commander’s Arsenal, the San Diego Comic Con Planeswalker sets (2013 and 2014), and the experimental “Jace Coin” from the New Zealand Mint.

Read About Book Jace

It doesn’t really seem like 2009 was six years ago, because I was still a freshman in high school at the time. Back when WOTC still released paperback copies of the planeswalker novels to keep us up to date on the lore of the story, the company announced this promotional copy of [card]Jace Beleren[/card] in order to hype up the book sales. Considering that this was before the massive player base increase of Innistrad and Return to Ravnica, there weren’t many people hyped about the book. That’s what flavor texts are for, right? As a casual player who never played blue, I didn’t really care either. I can remember the promo selling for well under $100 when it came out, and those who did get it were unloading them as soon as possible.

MTGstocks only goes back so far, so we’re using MTGgoldfish graphs here

It took less than a couple years after release for the promo to shoot up to above $150, and it tapered down after that before growing and approaching the $200 mark in 2014. What makes this Jace more special than a heavily played M10 version that I found in a snowbank in a parking lot? Well, it’s foil, and alternate art. Big deal, though: a copy of foil promo [card]Emrakul, the Aeons Torn[/card] is cheaper than the booster pack version by a good $10.

The bigger draw is how few copies of this “Book Jace” exist. The physical copies of the planeswalker books weren’t exactly a home run anymore compared to internet versions, so nobody cared about the book. Do you see anyone banging on WOTC’s front door to bring back the novels? I didn’t think so. And because the reception on the books was so low, it led the company to try something different next time. There aren’t any more Book Jaces entering the market. They get to sit at the bar with [card]Savannah[/card] and [card]Granite Gargoyle[/card], and drink away their sorrows of never being reprinted ever in the history of ever. If you buy one of these today, it’s not going down.

Commander’s Arsenal

Let’s fast forward a few years to 2012, around the time when Return to Ravnica was being released. The year after the first Commander products, Wizards announces Commander’s Arsenal, with a $75 MSRP. This was more of a, “If you’re already heavily invested into Commander, this is your chance to get a foil [card]Sylvan Library[/card],” but players were still wary of preordering at the $150 eBay tag until they knew for sure what was in it.

Brief aside: If you keep up to date on your MTGstocks, you’ll know that the Commander’s Arsenal version of Library recently jumped to over $100, and was pretty clearly an intentional buyout. [card]Kaalia of the Vast[/card] experienced something similar, sitting at around $80. One interesting thing to note is that [card]Scroll Rack[/card] has just as low of a supply, but the foil CA copy is less than twice the copy of a Tempest version. While I recognize that Library sees more Legacy play and Kaalia sees more EDH play, I don’t think a 1.5 multiplier on Rack is going to last very long. Full disclosure: I own zero copies here.

Right now, SCG has five copies of the Commander’s Arsenal product in stock for $325, and that’s probably one of the better deals you’ll find at this point if you were interested in multiple cards in the package like the Library and Kaalia. If you were hoping to get either of these cards in foil on the cheap, I’m afraid you’ve missed the boat. The ship sailed back when the product was first available, and you had to either be the first one calling your LGS, or you had to know someone who could hook you up upon release. Even if Wizards decides to release a Commander’s Arsenal 2016, I don’t think the company will be wasting any of the 18 slots with reprints from the first set.

San Diego Comic Con (2013 and 2014)

When the San Diego Comic Con walkers were announced, there was a massive amount of people rushing to buy them. I heard stories of people who attended the event and waited more than eight hours to even get a chance at purchasing them (and didn’t end up getting their sets). The initial online buy-in was around $250, and I almost pulled the trigger for a set myself. Within about a day and a half, the price had skyrocketed to more than $400, and Hasbro made it clear that they were done printing. That was all, everyone could go home.

Currently, a sealed set of the SDCC 2013 walkers goes for anywhere from $500 to $600 on eBay, and it doesn’t look like it will drop anytime soon. Your chance to buy in was the weekend of the event, not a day later. We can see the same factors that popped up in Book Jace and Commander’s Arsenal: buying in early on will yield the best results.

However, we can see a much different trend with last year’s repeat performance. Hasbro still showcased the year’s Core Set walkers in stylish black artwork, but a lot of the magic was gone. They were still exciting, but their current eBay status reflects a significantly lower price than the first time around. The set even came with a giant NERF Garruk Axe, that currently retails for less than the price of a normal [card]Snapcaster Mage[/card]. Either Hasbro increased the supply this time around, or people cared a lot less about the product because it wasn’t “special” enough anymore. Either way, the big takeaway here is that Wizards tends to learn from their mistakes (even if it’s little by little), and the demand for the follow-up products will be judged more accurately. We saw this with the progression of Duel Decks. Divine vs Demonic, Jace vs Chandra, and Elves vs Goblins were growing extremely valuable as the years went by, compared to Speed vs Cunning and Elspeth vs Kiora not being promising collectors items. The Commander sets also learned this lesson, going from $100 Heavenly Infernos to every deck being readily available for under MSRP two years later. The first product in the series will always be the most desired, the one with the lowest supply, or both.

Now, let’s take a look at something specific to the 2014 set, that was added onto the SDCC package. A NERF Garruk Axe was given away, in addition to the five other Planeswalkers. While one might initially think that this adds to the value of the product, it certainly isn’t worth a whole lot of money right now. We can check eBay’s completed listings page to learn that the Axe itself only sells for about $30 total

Why is that? Wizards made a one-of-a-kind collector’s item that was only available for a short period of time, and it’s certainly not going to get “reprinted” anytime soon. Well, the answer is probably simpler than you might expect at first.

…

It’s not actually a Magic card. While I assume there won’t be a whole ton of people playing with their SDCC walkers either, they at least have the ability to be cracked open and jammed into cubes or EDH decks. This Axe can do nothing other than provide novelty fun by whacking friends on the head for a few minutes, and then sit on your shelf forever. If we’re looking to invest in unprecedented Magic products, I don’t think we should be looking towards novelty toys, and I have anotherexample to back that up.

The $100 Jace

No, not that Jace….

This Jace. Back in January of 2014, Wizards announced a special silver coin with an image of [card]Jace, the Mind Sculptor[/card] on the front. While it’s labeled as being worth $2 in legal tender in New Zealand, I don’t recommend flying out there to spend this on a cup of coffee, because it’s not even considered legal tender. Once they were announced, the going eBay price was around $100, and there was a bit of a discussion as to whether or not these would go up in value over time. After all, it’s literally Jace’s face on money, and not even photoshopped over Benjamin Franklin’s face on a $100 bill this time around. But if we look at the market value today…

Right now, it sits at basically the same price as it was a year ago. You could have bought ~~almost 1000 copies of [card]Seance[/card] with that kind of money~~ [card]Glittering Wish[/card] back in January, and you would have been able to reap huge profits back in the fall. So why didn’t the price on the coin budge? It’s certainly special, limited-edition, and was an experimental marketing attempt that WOTC tried to make work. Just like the axe, it’s not a Magic card. You can’t sleeve it up and pay 2UU to cast it in Legacy. In addition to that, there wasn’t the same hype or excitement about it. It seemed extremely out of place, and even Evan Erwin (who gets hyped about pretty much every single announcement Wizards makes), was confused and chewed out Wizards for pulling such a dumb move. If I’m agreeing with Evan Erwin in the world of Magic Finance, something has gone horribly wrong.

Put a Bow On It, DJ

So where do we wrap this up? I think there are a few takeaways when dealing with the next “super amazing limited print run Magic product” that Wizards farts out.

First of all, if it’s not an actual Magic card(s) that can be sleeved up, traded out of binders, or sold to a vendor at a Grand Prix, stay the hell away from it. Wizards tries weird things, and sometimes they work, but sometimes they don’t. While the little Funko planeswalker figures have been selling pretty well from what I hear, you don’t want to be the guy investing in them for the long term when there are other real cards that can be bought. Stick to the Book Jaces, Commander’s Arsenals, and promo Ugins.

Second, if you get the chance to buy the next promo Ugin, Commander’s Aresnal, or Book Jace, and you can afford it, you should probably buy it, immediately. It hasn’t been announced yet, but Wizards is sure to do some sort of weird, unique, and unprecedented promo or product release. Gauge the initial demand, figure out how many copies that stores and players will be receiving, and act accordingly.

Weekend Magic: 2/20-2/22

Jared Yost

This certainly wasn’t a weekend to miss. Two grands prix, along with Star City Games Open Series in Los Angeles, means there is a ton of information for us to digest. Let’s dig in and see the results.

Grand Prix: Memphis (Memphis, TN – USA)

Format – Standard

Top 8 Decklists

Jack Fogle took down the event piloting Sultai Control. Notables from the deck included two [card]Ugin, the Spirit Dragon[/card], four [card]Dig Through Time[/card], two [card]Crux of Fate[/card], and three [card]Sultai Charm[/card]. Temples also made a strong showing alongside [card]Opulent Palace[/card] in the deck; however, many temples have failed to go above $4 even this late into the Standard season. I expect that Theros supplies will be drying up soon, so if you have any extra temples the upcoming months will be the time to move them to maximize your value.

Ben Stark was the runner-up, piloting R/W Aggro. His list featured a full playset of [card]Outpost Siege[/card] (which has already reached $3 and will continue to climb in price if it is featured as a mainstay in red decks from now on) along with four [card]Soulfire Grand Master[/card]s, four [card]Hordeling Outburst[/card]s, four [card]Wild Slash[/card]es, and four [card]Chained to the Rocks[/card]. Also notable are three copies of [card]Valorous Stance[/card] across the main deck and sideboard. Could Soulfire Grand Master be the real deal? Its price has halved since the preorder phase of Fate Reforged. However, Ben Stark’s finish could generate interest toward the card and a higher price.

The rest of the Top 8 wasn’t so diverse. Five Abzan Control decks and another R/W Aggro list rounded out the top tables. Let’s first talk about trends among the Abzan Control decks.

[card]Elspeth, Sun’s Champion[/card] – The play here is to dump your copies as soon as possible due to the impending Duel Deck reprint. Her price will crash hard once this deck is released en masse.
[card]Thoughtseize[/card] – Hovering around $20 TCGplayer median, Thoughtseize has room to grow before the summer as Theros dries up. I don’t expect it to fall below $17 ever again, so if you can pick them up at or near this price, I think it will be a good move. This is a great card for the long term as Modern and Legacy will drive demand for years.
[card]Siege Rhino[/card] – Rhino has been trending upwards on the backs of both Standard and Modern demand. It’s $8 TCGplayer median, which is on the higher side for large set rares. I don’t expect Rhino to fall, but I doubt it is going to reach $16 or more any time soon. Pick up your copies if you need them for Standard or Modern, but otherwise avoid Rhino as a financial speculation target.
[card]Tasigur, the Golden Fang[/card] – With a price driven by both low supply and hype due to results, Tasigur is now around $9, down three dollars from the $12 Pro Tour DC hype. I expect Tasigur to maintain a price of $6 to $9 moving forward through his Standard life. Cheap foils are where you want to look if you want extra copies. Even foils for $25 seem good since Tasigur sees both Modern and Legacy play.
[card]Sandsteppe Citadel[/card] – Wedge tap lands are very cheap right now. If you can buy them in large quantities for $0.40 or cheaper, its a no brainer. The shards tap lands have had multiple printings and today are at least $1.50. Wedge lands should follow a similar pattern in the future. Make room in a bulk box, collect and fill, wait a while, and see results.

Finally, the other R/W Aggro deck that made the Top 8 included four [card]Stormbreath Dragon[/card], two [card]Outpost Siege[/card], and two [card]Brimaz, King of Oreskos[/card]. Brimaz and Stormbreath have passed their peak and will decrease in price upon rotation. Outpost Siege has potential but at $3 it is a high buy-in price. I fear the window has passed for making large profits on Outpost Siege, since the odds of it hitting $6 or higher seem slim to me.

Grand Prix: Vancouver (Vancouver, CA)

Format – Modern

Top 8 Decklists

Dan Lanthier won the Vancouver GP piloting Blue-Red Twin, further cementing the deck’s presence in the Modern metagame. Second place went to Affinity, another respectable deck that continues to put up good results.

Notables from the Twin deck include two [card]Grim Lavamancer[/card]s in the main deck, along with two [card]Keranos, God of Storms[/card] out of the sideboard. Lavamancer has been trending upwards and has passed $5 due to the recent success of two-toughness creatures in the format. Picking up a few copies seems like a good play if you can trade for them. On a side note, Torment foils are $93 and higher! On the other hand, Keranos will soon rotate from Standard. However, his price is mainly driven by Modern demand (perceived or otherwise). Keranos could drop upon Theros rotation, and if he does, that will be the time to get in.

Nothing notable from Affinity, barring cards that could see a MM2 reprint. [card]Mox Opal[/card] and [card]Steel Overseer[/card] are at the top of the list, and with the incoming reprint of [card]Etched Champion[/card], there could certainly be other reprints from the deck. Trade or buylist any extra Affinity pieces you have since they will most likely continue to drop through the summer.

Rounding out the rest of the Top 8, the decks included Infect, Bogles, two Abzan, and two Amulet Bloom decks. Infect, Abzan, and Amulet Bloom have been covered pretty extensively since the pro tour, so I will limit my discussion to Bogles to see where the deck is heading.

Truth be told, Bogles could become a very cheap deck once MM2 is released. The most expensive pieces of the deck are [card]Spellskite[/card], [card]Daybreak Coronet[/card], and [card]Horizon Canopy[/card]. Thankfully, [card]Kor Spiritdancer[/card] has already had a reprint, which is keeping its price in check around $6. However, players have been howling for reprints for all three of the other cards I’ve mentioned. If reprinted, their prices would crash considerably, and then Bogles would be a very cheap deck to pick up. Bogles tends to be hit or miss—either it does really well, or you can mulligan to four regularly with it and just shrug when you lose. If reprinted, pieces of the deck will gain in value over time, but the gains will be much slower. If you have Spellskite, Daybreak Coronet, and Horizon Canopy and aren’t playing Bogles, I urge you to consider whether the risk of reprint is worth holding onto the cards at this point.

SCG Open: Los Angeles (USA) – Standard

Decklists

Deck	Finish	Player	Deck	Finish	Player
R/W Aggro	1st	Chad White	Abzan Midrange	9th	Vidianto Wijaya
Naya Midrange	2nd	David Moline	Jeskai Aggro	10th	Joey Nguyen
Abzan Midrange	3rd	Qian Shen	Jeskai Tokens	11th	Michael Boland
G/R Devotion	4th	William Miller	G/R Devotion	12th	Simon Sung
R/W Aggro	5th	Nick Gil	Temur Midrange	13th	Yurien Seyssel
W/U Heroic	6th	Nicholas Allen	Jeskai Aggro	14th	Kelvin Young
Mono-Red Aggro	7th	Gary Quach	Mono-Red Aggro	15th	Juan Hernandez
Jeskai Heroic	8th	Zach Scales	W/U Heroic	16th	Michael Nunez

R/W Aggro took down the Standard portion. Again, [card]Outpost Siege[/card] should be noted and watched closely moving forward.

Naya Midrange took second place. This deck featured a full playset of [card]Whisperwood Elemental[/card]s, two [card]Shaman of the Great Hunt[/card], two [card]Purphoros, God of the Forge[/card], two [card]Mastery of the Unseen[/card], and a single [card]Shamanic Revelation[/card]. Whisperwood Elemental seems to be picking up steam, as the price has doubled since Fate Reforged was released. I’m not sure how much more room it has to grow, but if midrange strategies like this Naya version start popping up again, you can expect another increase in Whisperwood’s price.

Notable cards from the rest of the Top 8 include:

Four [card]Whisperwood Elemental[/card]s and three [card]Shamanic Revelation[/card] in G/R Devotion
Four [card]Mardu Scout[/card]s, three [card]Outpost Siege[/card]s, and four [card]Wild Slash[/card]s in Mono-Red Aggro
Four [card]Temur Battle Rage[/card] in Jeskai Heroic

Notables cards from the Top 16 include:

Two [card]Soulfire Grand Master[/card] in Nguyen’s Jeskai Aggro
Four [card]Rattleclaw Mystic[/card], three [card]Genesis Hydra[/card], four [card]Shaman of the Great Hunt[/card], and four [card]Whisperwood Elemental[/card] in Sung’s G/R Devotion
Four [card]Ashcloud Phoenix[/card], four [card]Rattleclaw Mystic[/card], four [card]Savage Knuckleblade[/card], three [card]Shaman of the Great Hunt[/card], three [card]Stubbon Denial[/card], and four [card]Crater’s Claws[/card] out of Temur Midrange
Four [card]Soulfire Grand Master[/card], four [card]Monastery Mentor[/card], and four [card]Wild Slash[/card] in Young’s Jeskai Aggro

SCG Premier IQ: Los Angeles (USA) – Modern

Decklists

Deck	Finish	Player	Deck	Finish	Player
U/R Delver	1st	Calvin Kim	Abzan Midrange	9th	Chris Blair
Abzan Midrange	2nd	Shaun Hughes	Affinity	10th	Bryan De La Torre
Scapeshift	3rd	Paul Cuillier	4-Color Gifts	11th	Francis Cellona
R/W Burn	4th	Rick Chong	Merfolk	12th	Sam Green
Storm	5th	Derk Chad	U/W Tron	13th	Levi McNeese
R/W Burn	6th	Seung Han	R/W Aggro	14th	Steven Cotera
B/W Tokens	7th	Michael Terasaki	Affinity	15th	Alex To
Abzan Midrange	8th	Chang Han	Jeskai Control	16th	Nicholas Chapman

U/R Delver took down the Modern IQ in LA. It appears that [card]Young Pyromancer[/card] is still crushing it, despite the [card]Treasure Cruise[/card] banning. Foils are still commanding a solid $40 and I don’t see them moving from there any time soon. Also, [card]Snapcaster Mage[/card] is on the rise and is over $40 TCGplayer median. I see this continuing to increase with the recent success of U/R Twin and Delver in Modern. However, [card]Remand[/card] and [card]Serum Visions[/card] are due for a big price drop if they are reprinted in MM2, and I expect that these cards are near the top of someone’s list at Wizards for a reprint.

Scapeshift, Storm, and B/W Tokens made an impressive showing in the Top 8. Cards to watch from these decks include:

Scapeshift
- [card]Cryptic Command[/card] – Again, I sense the MM2 reprint on the horizon due to the huge price tag of this card regardless of a reprint already in the first MM set.
- [card]Scapeshift[/card] – The deck’s namesake card is also pretty expensive at $20 and due for a reprint.
- Again, [card]Remand[/card] and [card]Serum Visions[/card] reprints should help lower the cost of this deck.
Storm
- More of a pet deck than anything, but cards to watch from this deck include [card]Lotus Bloom[/card], [card]Gemstone Mine[/card] (also due to Amulet Bloom success), [card]Ad Nauseum[/card], [card]Angel’s Grace[/card], and [card]Pact of Negation[/card]. Also, [card]Favor of the Mighty[/card] out of the sideboard is good tech against U/R Twin and Bogles!
B/W Tokens
- Cards to watch from this deck include [card]Hero of Bladehold[/card], [card]Elspeth Tirel[/card], [card]Angelic Destiny[/card], [card]Intangible Virtue[/card] (FOIL), [card]Midnight Haunting[/card] (FOIL), [card]Gather the Townsfolk[/card] (FOIL), [card]Lingering Souls[/card], and [card]Timely Reinforcements[/card].
  - On a side note, check out the manabase – two [card]Scoured Barrens[/card]!? And three [card]Inkmoth Nexus[/card], to get that sweet three turn clock with [card]Elspeth, Knight-Errant[/card]!

4-Color Gifts, Merfolk, and U/W Tron made the Top 16. Cards to watch from these decks include:

4-Color Gifts
- [card]Gifts Ungiven[/card], [card]Tasigur, the Golden Fang[/card], [card]Liliana of the Veil[/card], and [card]Lingering Souls[/card]
Merfolk
- [card]Mutavault[/card], [card]Cavern of Souls[/card], [card]Master of Waves[/card], and [card]Aether Vial[/card]
U/W Tron
- [card]Emrakul, the Aeons Torn[/card], [card]Krark-Clan Ironworks[/card], [card]Thopter Foundry[/card], [card]Mox Opal[/card], [card]Open the Vaults[/card]
  - Definitely not your traditional Tron list! More like a re-envisioning of Eggs.

SCG Premier IQ: Los Angeles (USA) – Legacy

Decklists

Deck	Finish	Player	Deck	Finish	Player
Bant Stoneblade	1st	Alex Gellerman	Dredge	9th	Joseph Moreno
Sultai Delver	2nd	Jeffrey Simpson	Jeskai Stoneblade	10th	Mitchell Nguyen
Infect	3rd	Michael Nguyen	Infect	11th	Brett Jensen
Storm	4th	Thomas Kainz	Sneak and Show	12th	David Nguyen
Grixis Delver	5th	Mathew Chung	MUD	13th	Jake Weinmann
MUD	6th	Grant Gutierrez	Storm	14th	Caleb Scherer
Sultai Delver	7th	Tannon Grace	Punishing Naya	15th	Chris Arebalo
Jeskai Stoneblade	8th	Fred Chen	Jund	16th	Corey Armstrong

Bant Stoneblade took down the Legacy portion. Highlights from this deck include [card]Knight of the Reliquary[/card] (which is yet to be seen in Modern, though it may have its day), [card]Stoneforge Mystic[/card], and [card]Green Sun’s Zenith[/card]. Like [card]Snapcaster Mage[/card], Stoneforge Mystic has also been climbing in price recently. It currently sits at $35 and will continue to trend upwards since we can reasonably assume it won’t be in MM2 due to its banning in Modern. Green Sun’s Zenith is in the same boat: a low chance of a reprint and lots of Legacy play means that it too will trend upwards as time goes on.

Other notables from the Top 8 include [card]Tasigur, the Golden Fang[/card] in Simpson’s Sultai Delver and Chung’s Grixis Delver as well as [card]Kuldotha Forgemaster[/card] (which recently saw a price increase to $5), [card]Metalworker[/card], and [card]Grim Monolith[/card] in MUD.

Jund and Punishing Naya were the other outlier decks of the Top 16. Cards to watch from Punishing Naya include [card]Domri Rade[/card] and all other cards mentioned for Bant Stoneblade. Cards to watch from Jund include [card]Bloodbraid Elf[/card] (especially if it is unbanned in Modern eventually), [card]Scavenging Ooze[/card], [card]Sylvan Library[/card] (especially Commander’s Arsenal foils, which recently spiked in price), and [card]Grove of the Burnwillows[/card] (for price decline due to impending MM2 reprint).

Last Thoughts

There was a ton of action last weekend, especially with some of the camera matches. Who can forget the board full of manifest creatures and the confusion resulting from them? Will we still complain about the crap quality of WOTC’s streaming? It’s hard to say, but hopefully they’ve gotten the point now that SCG is way better at streaming than they are.

Regardless of any technical difficulties, last weekend gave us a ton of data to see the direction of Stand, Modern, and Legacy. The trick is putting it to use in figuring out which cards are the most financially impacted.

Pauper Cube: Drafting Tips, Tricks, and Archetypes

Houston Whitehead

Pauper? What does poverty have to do with Magic?

If you’re new to Magic, you might not know what Pauper is. Those who know of Pauper are asking, “Why are you writing about Pauper? Isn’t that format dead?” Well, Wizards of the Coast (WOTC) no long supports MTGO Daily Events for Pauper (editor’s note: This was recently changed) but I still support the format and will continue to use Pauper as a teaching tool for new players. Also, Cube is not dead. It’s actually thriving, so why not show some Pauper love?

So, back to those who haven’t heard of Pauper Cube. First off, a Cube, in MTG terms, is a draft format created by players like you. You basically have the power to become your own designer and developer for your own Magic set. Adjust the theme or power level of your cube as you see fit and, after some testing, all you’ll need to get your MTG fix is a group of people. For my parameters, I chose to only use cards that have been printed at the common rarity at least once.

Example #1: [card]Oblivion Ring[/card] was first printed in Lorwyn as a common. All printings of Oblivion Ring after Lorwyn were printed at uncommon, but since it had at least one common printing, it is legal in Pauper.
Example #2: [card]Abzan Charm[/card] is an uncommon from Khans of Tarkir and has no other prior printing. Therefore, it is not legal in Pauper.

Before we jump into the archetypes of my Pauper Cube, you might want the cube list as a reference.

Ginger Ale’s Pauper Cube

Archetypes

These six drafting strategies are not the only archetypes worth drafting. I’ve drafted my share of frankenstein decks and had success. These are just some straightforward archetypes that have enough cube support to survive when other players are in your colors. After you get used to the cube or your fellow drafters, I would actually encourage you to attempt something new or out of your element.

G/U Ramp

Priority #1: Ramp Spells ([card]Sakura-Tribe Elder[/card] & [card]Cultivate[/card])

Turns two to four are your ramp turns. Draft enough ramp so you can ramp two out on those three turns. Most of the fatties are five- and six-drops, so the sooner you get there, the better.

Priority #2: Bounce ([card]Mist Raven[/card] & [card]Man-O’-War[/card])

I prefer bounce over counter spells. Quite a few creatures in the cube bounce something when they come in. This allows you to advance your board presence for pressure and encourages your opponents to use removal spells before your fatties join the battle. Counters just don’t do enough for this strategy.

Priority #3: Fatties ([card]Nessian Asp[/card], [card]Horncaller’s Chant[/card], [card]Sprout Swarm[/card])

Trample should be your favorite fatty ability. Any creature with high toughness can’t kill your fatties in combat due to low power and most of the high-power creatures have one or two toughness. Trample is your friend and don’t you forget it. Also, most of the six- and seven-drop fatties will table. Value the four- and five-drop fatties higher, unless a bigger one has trample.

This is by far my favorite archetype. Even when I start a draft with intent to draft something else, someone passes me a [card]Mulldrifter[/card] or [card]Sprout Swarm[/card] and I just can’t resist.

U/W Fliers

Priority #1 Fliers ([card]Kor Skyfisher[/card] & [card]Stormbound Geist[/card])

Ca-Caw! Fly your way to victory. Fliers that also tap blockers are worth keeping an eye out for. Not too many exist, though. You need an offense, so pick up strong fliers first.

Priority #2 “Arrest” Effects ( [card]Pacifism[/card], [card]Faith’s Fetters[/card], [card]Bonds of Faith[/card])

Though blue gives you access to bounce spells, many times the arrest effects are more of a permanent answer. An example when [card]Arrest[/card] effects are bad tend to show in the B/W builds since a large chunk of black removal in the cube makes them sacrifice a creature. Which one will they choose? Probably the one imitating the knot on a log. My point is, blue has to use a bounce spell, green and white may have sideboard cards to help with removing them, and both red and black have no efficient answers. [card]Sunlance[/card] should be the only removal you take over enchantment removal. Don’t pick up so many you outnumber your creatures but take them over bounce or counters.

Priority #3 – Counter/Cantrip ([card]Counterspell[/card] & [card]Memory Lapse[/card], [card]Ponder[/card] & [card]Preordain[/card])

Many times the counter spells will be in your sideboard for control matchups or decks with buyback spells. It’s great to have a few, but don’t take them over other playables. If you need to fill some holes, don’t see a creature worth taking, or don’t need a sixth Arrest effect, don’t hesitate picking up a few cantrips to keep the deck nice-n-smooth.

B/W Shadow Aggro

Priority #1 – Shadow Creatures ([card]Dauthi Horror[/card] & [card]Soltari Visionary[/card])

Makes sense, right? But what if I don’t see any shadow creatures (Only six in the cube) after I commit? Pick the most aggressive creature on color ([card]Carnophage[/card] and [card]Porcelain Legionnaire[/card] are good examples). Many times when drafting this archetype you’ll either get all the shadow creatures or none of them. Thankfully, many cheap B/W creature have a similar type of evasiveness ([card]Tormented Soul[/card], [card]Blind Zealot[/card], and [card]Benalish Cavalry[/card]), hence the archetype name.

Priority #2 – Pump/Equipment ([card]Sinister Strength[/card] & [card]Bonesplitter[/card])

Instead of relying on card draw or resilient creatures to push through the damage, consider permanently pumping up the creatures you already have. Drawing cards wastes precious time and resilient creatures often cost more than you are willing to pay besides [card]Loyal Cathar[/card] or [card]Doomed Traveler[/card] (thanks Innistrad block!). Also, a turn-one one-drop into turn-two [card]Sinister Strength[/card] is many times way better than playing another creature. Turn three is a good place to lay down two more creatures. This demands a removal spell and gives your second and third creatures a chance to get in for one or more turns. If they don’t have removal on turn two, your percentage to win rapidly increases.

Priority #3 – Removal ([card]Disfigure[/card] & [card]Sunlance[/card])

For this strategy, you require far fewer removal spells than any other archetype. These are only to move the small creatures out of the way for the few creatures that don’t have evasion or to take out a problematic lifelinker. Stick to one-mana removal spells if possible. Every turn should involve a new creature or pumping an existing one. After that, your extra mana can unlock a removal spell for the turn.

U/B Control

Before addressing the priority order, keep in mind priorities one through three have spell versions and creature versions. I’ll add an example of each version on those but the creature versions are almost always favored over the spell versions.

Priority #1 – Disruption ([card]Hymn to Tourach[/card], [card]Capsize[/card], [card]Liliana’s Specter[/card], [card]Aethersnipe[/card])

Putting pressure on your opponent’s hand size is a great way to attack in pauper. Aggro can’t recover and can only cast a portion of its spells. Ramp decks have to choose between ramp and a fatty when the deck requires both to work smoothly.

Priority #2 – Removal/Counters ([card]Evincar’s Justice[/card], [card]Crypt Rats[/card], [card]Shaper Parasite[/card])

After disruption, take care of leftover spells with counters for noncreature spells and removal for creatures. Draft more removal that other strategies, but I wouldn’t recommend going over three removal spells in the main deck. Creature counters are usually better than noncreature counters in the main deck. Noncreature counters should be sideboarded in for buyback spells.

Priority #3 – Draw/Cantrips ([card]Treasure Cruise[/card], [card]Mulldrifter[/card], [card]Phyrexian Rager[/card])

Cantrips smooth out your draws and help you make your land drops. Draw cards to stay ahead of your opponent’s cards. This lets you use the weakest removal spell to kill that problematic creature, or you can save the broader removal for bigger threats. Apply the same philosophy with your counter spells.

Priority #4 – Win Con ([card]Gray Merchant of Asphodel[/card], [card]Shimmering Glasskite[/card], or splash for [card]Guardian of the Guildpact[/card])

You should only need a couple of these. The amount of creature version cards you picked up in the draft will determine the amount of reliance you place on your win cons. The more damage you can safely get in before it’s time to release your finisher will determine the amount of pressure each of your win cons will have.

G/W Aggro

Priority #1 – Combat-Ready Creatures ([card]Loyal Cathar[/card], [card]Kor Skyfisher[/card], [card]Thundering Tanadon[/card])

Look for resilience, evasiveness, or both. This archetype relies on your creatures holding their own in the red zone. This strategy has a wide variety of builds but should always be open during the cube draft.

Priority #2 – Upgrade Spells ([card]Travel Preparations[/card], [card]Leafcrown Dryad[/card], [card]Shield of the Oversoul[/card])

These spells enable your weakest creatures to join the battle or keep your larger creatures from getting double blocked. I probably wouldn’t play more than four of these effects, unless they are also creatures like [card]Leafcrown Dryad[/card]. The more creatures you have, the more options you have for your upgrade spells.

Priority #3 – Support Creatures ([card]Gideon’s Lawkeeper[/card] & [card]Kabuto Moth[/card])

These types of creatures make combat a pain for your opponent. Lawkeeper helps support your attacking creatures and Kabuto Moths supports your creatures after blocks are declared or removal spells are on the stack. Support creatures help skilled players craft the winning battlefield and can play both offense and defense. A couple of these creatures can take your GW Aggro deck from good to great.

Burn & Friends

Priority #1 – The Burn ([card]Staggershock[/card], [card]Brimestone Volley[/card], [card]Fireball[/card])

This drafting strategy is different than all the others. Red needs a friend. So while you take the burn spells, keep your eyes peeled for an open second color.

Priority #2 – Choosing a Second Color

R/U Bounce Burn plays a tempo game with ways to rebuy your burn spells for extra value.

R/W Weenie Burn / Shadow Burn plays the same as the B/W Shadow Aggro deck, except most of the black removal is … well … removed, and replaced with burn spells that can scorch creatures or sunburn your opponent’s face.

R/B Dark Burn is the style i have had the most success with. The black enables disruption, drain effects, and card draw at the price of life points. This strategy can pressure the hand, battlefield, and face all at the same time. Black can also assist with better overall aggressive creatures versus the red alternatives. With this disruption, you could buy an extra three or four turns to draw that top-deck burn spell you’re waiting on.

Priority #3 – Balance

Balancing like the B/W Shadow deck with a slightly higher priority on taking burn spells over spot removal should set you up in a place where the red-based decks thrive in. Keep in mind your creatures are potential repetitive damage while your burn spells are only one-time use.

Wrap Up

Pauper will always have a special in my heart. It’s a budget friendly format that heavily punishes your misplays. Many times I’ve even said, “Wow, this format feels like Legacy.” It demands optimal plays and always surprises players after I convince them to give it a shot. When I say, “It’s a common-only format,” players never think long enough to remember the high number of powerful yet value-filled staples. All in all, the best advice I can give you is: don’t knock it ’til you try it.

If you enjoyed this Pauper content and want more, leave a comment below or hit me up on Twitter and tell me what you want to read about next.

As always, thanks for reading!

@TNSGingerAle

Pimp My Deck: Commander 2014 – Built from Scratch (featuring Bosh, Iron Golem)

Jim Casale

Hey, guys, sorry for the long hiatus. Between the holidays and the Fate Reforge release, I haven’t had much time to do any research for this series. But here I am, back again to bring you some Commander goodies. I won’t be including price ranges for the upgrades (it simply takes too much time for something that ends up inaccurate very quickly), but I will be making price-conscious decisions to keep the theme of increasingly costly upgrades.

Let’s start with [card]Bosh, Iron Golem[/card].

What to Remove

-[card]Dualcaster Mage[/card] – This guy is fine, but really we don’t want to spend our turn copying a spell. Most often he will be a 3 mana 2/2 flash and that’s not particularly good.

-[card]Beetleback Chief[/card] – Goblin tokens are fine and all but this guy isn’t an artifact and has RR in his casting cost. We’re trying to play a bunch of artifacts and this guy is hard to cast off a lot of colorless sources.

-[card]Panic Spellbomb[/card] – This card isn’t for us.

-[card]Jalum Tome[/card] – This card is great for [card]Daretti, Scrap Savant[/card], but not Bosh.

-[card]Volcanic Offering[/card] – Theoretically, this can kill a bunch of stuff but it’s too unreliable in my opinion. I’d rather take it out of the deck than hope it does what I want it to do.

-[card]Tuktuk the Explorer[/card] – Nothing to explore here. He’s fine as a chump blocker but his artifact has a CMC of 0 and it’s really what we’re looking to do.

-[card]Warmonger Hellkite[/card] – I prefer my hellkite below. This guy might just make us suicide our biggest threats for no reason.

-[card]Spitebellows[/card] – Despite its cool name and art, we would often want to evoke it and it would tie up too much of our red mana.

-[card]Bogardan Hellkite[/card] – I like me some big dumb dragons but this guy is really expensive and doesn’t add much flexibility to the deck. If I were to play a dragon, I’d rather play an artifact one like [card]Draco[/card] or [card]Clockwork Dragon[/card].

-[card]Commander’s Sphere[/card] – Much like the green decks from last article, this doesn’t provide a lot of ramp or fix our colors so I’m not terribly interested in having it in our deck.

What to Add

– [card]Thopter Assembly[/card] – This assembly is a little slow but provides a ton of value, giving you tiny little flying thopters to hold down the fort for your bigger cards. Bosh allows you to throw away Thopter tokens when you get low so you can cash in another whole assembly!

– [card]Duplicant[/card] – I’m really not sure why this card wasn’t included. It’s a bit on the expensive side, but its utility cannot be denied. Being able to “eat” your opponent’s largest creature and then throw it at them when you’re done means this guy is an instant include.

-[card]Kurkesh, Onakke Ancient[/card] – If Magic cards could get married, I’m pretty sure Bosh would ask Kurkesh to marry him. This duo is a match made in heaven as every artifact you throw can now do double damage (or hit two different targets even!).

-[card]Myr Enforcer[/card] – This guy is a little innocuous, but being a seven-mana artifact is great for throwing with Bosh. It also has affinity for artifacts, so often it will end up costing far less than seven mana to cast.

-[card]Dictate of the Twin Gods[/card] – There is already a similar card in this deck ([card]Bitter Feud[/card]), but this one has flash and can be used to set up sweet combo kills with Bosh and expensive artifacts.

-[card]Ward of Bones[/card] – This is an odd card, but in order to keep parity, this will allow you to limit your opponent’s creatures. It’s also a six-mana artifact ripe for the throwing when you’re done with it!

-[card]Thran Dynamo[/card] – Somehow this ended up in the blue deck and not the red one. I’ll never understand why, but it’s definitely a huge boon to this deck.

-[card]Kuldotha Forgemaster[/card] – This needs a few smaller artifacts to get going (good bye [card]Ichor Wellspring[/card], thanks for the card!) but it allows us to tutor up our big fatties to help end the game. It can also find Bosh in a pinch if he gets shuffled into our deck with effects like [card]Chaos Warp[/card].

-[card]Worn Powerstone[/card] – Did you know the blue deck and the black deck get this card but the red deck doesn’t? It’s a travesty, really.

-[card]Hellkite Tyrant[/card] – Well, might as well save the sweet dragon for last, right? This guy lets us steal our opponent’s big artifacts and throw them back at them! That seems like everything a Bosh deck wants to do.

Honorable mentions: [card]Urza’s Blueprint[/card], [card]Darksteel Colossus[/card], [card]Blightsteel Colossus[/card], [card]Mycosynth Golem[/card]

I hope this little exercise has helped you pick out some nice improvements for your copy of Built from Scratch. If you have any suggestions or comments, you know what to do.

Privileged Perspective 15: Challenging Perspectives

Ross Lennon

Confession: I wasn’t 100 percent sold on the name of this column when I started. I liked “Privileged Position,” but I think someone else is already using it. Privileged Perspective sounds like a Magic card name, and maybe some day it will be, but I’m worried the name doesn’t make a whole lot of sense if you haven’t read my first article (you read it, right? Sweet). Well, today we are going to challenge a lot of firmly-held, inaccurate beliefs that Magic players have, and hopefully expand their visions to see the bigger picture. And for the record, the name has grown on me—probably because I really enjoy writing these.

Challenged Perspective #1, “Playtesting”

“You wanna playtest?” How many times do you hear people refer to casual games as “playtesting”? Almost everyone is guilty of it at some point, myself included. The truth of the matter is that there is a big difference between playing a couple casual matches before FNM and legitimate playtesting.

BRIEF SELF-ESTEEM ASIDE: I suspect part of the reason many people say “playtest” is because they want the word “test” to overshadow the word “play,” since most adults feel silly saying, “You wanna go play?”

Here are some guidelines to follow if you want your “playtesting” to actually serve its intended purpose:

Play a Ton of Games: Don’t just play a match and consider yourself done. Every game presents a dizzying amount of choices, and you need a high amount of iterations to be able to see consistent flow.
Play Mostly Sideboard Games: I watch a lot of fledgling Spikes play a lot of game ones, and then treat sideboarding as an afterthought. The reality is that two-thirds of many matches are sideboarded games, and you need a lot of experience knowing what to bring in and what to bring out.
Diversify: If you play a thousand rounds against Sidisi Whip, but nothing else, you will not be ready to waltz into a tournament. If you want to be able to beat the best five decks in a format, find people with those decks and develop a coherent plan against each archetype. This leads us directly into our next point…
Take Notes!: This is perhaps the best advice I can ever give someone about Magic. Your brain can only hold so much information at a time. Taking notes relieves you of having to track so many different things, and can be a good place to store oblique interactions that you’ve observed during testing, in case they reappear during your tournament matches.
Practice How You’re Going to Play: If you’re watching TV or being otherwise distracted, you’re less likely to absorb quality information. You’re also more likely to keep bad hands. Make the game your primary focus.
Understand That It’s Still Practice: Do I allow takebacks in my testing sessions? Absolutely. If a player is on a complex turn, and they play a Swamp instead of a Ghost Quarter, and they think out a line, and decide it’s better to play the Ghost Quarter? Awesome, that’s what this is for. If you don’t help your partner parce out and process their lines, then you aren’t helping them. That said, don’t try and take back something that was more than a turn ago—then nobody is learning. Talk through lines of play with your partner, and discuss possible lines of play, as well as what should and should not be respected in a certain situation (“Do I play around removal or go all-in here?” “Do I Abzan Charm and draw two or kill your Tasigur?”). Sometimes in a game, I like to take a snapshot and replay that turn multiple times (shuffling unknown portions of the deck each time). This is especially useful for combo decks like Storm when they ask, “Can I go off from this situation?”

Ultimately, playtesting is about getting in quality practice reps with a likeminded partner. If they don’t have the same mindset, then understand it’s just play.

Challenged Perspective #2, “Magic Cards as Stocks”

The rise of the MTG financier has created a lot of misconceptions about how Magic finance actually works. Many neophite mages think that a card’s success in a format is the primary driving factor in a card’s value. You’ll see this a lot after events. Let’s look in on a timely example of this: [card]Amulet of Vigor[/card].

This first chart begins with the birth of the Modern format (the little E), and details the price history of the card to the present day. Can you guess when the Modern pro tours were?

Now, [card]Amulet of Vigor[/card] has some unusual wrinkles to it (chief among them being printed in Worldwake), but it’s a great card for teaching the lessons I want to get to.

After major events, you will often see knee-jerk reactionists claiming that a card that had a strong finish is primed to rise. This was most recently the case with Amulet, coming off of a second-place performance in PT Fate Reforged. If this *were* the stock market, then the positive news would drive price, especially on a commodity with a capped supply (the specter of a reprint is always looming in Modern, but it wouldn’t be until at least this summer). Magic is different because there are contextual elements that impose restrictions—namely that Amulet of Vigor is a one-trick pony. If the card were played (or playable) in multiple archetypes, then both its starting price and trajectory would likely be very different. The Amulet deck is also very difficult to pilot properly, especially over the course of a large event. It also has extremely limited applications in formats like Commander, where you have so many turns that you don’t care if your lands come in tapped (and you dont have sufficient redundancy to abuse it). The spikes you see in those charts are reactions to the deck having success (as well as feature matches); the tapers are reality correcting the price. We are going to loop back to Amulet, because there is a finance concept I want to touch on that Amulet exemplifies, but I want to mention how Standard fits into challenging this perspective.

Unlike the other constructed formats, Standard is comprised almost entirely of sets that are currently (or have just stopped) being printed. The supply is either at its peak or increasing. The reason why cards of equal rarity experience different prices ([card]Outpost Siege[/card] versus Tasigur, let’s say) is largely based on predicted, and later experienced, demand. So when someone says, “Hey, this card won SCG Wherever, I bet it’s going to go up!” they really meant, “I love you” “The demand for this card will likely rise!” We could spend all day talking about how Standard finance is wonky, but Marcel pays me the same no matter what, so just know that I don’t really believe in Standard finance. Maybe the next section will help explain why.

So Yeah, That Amulet Deck

So yeah, that Amulet deck. What I wanted to say before is that one thing that the deck has going for it financially is that a lot of the cards have scarcity issues (insomuch as a Modern deck can). Do you know what the most important piece of information on a card is for MTG finance? The set symbol (and its color). Amulet of Vigor has been printed once, in Worldwake, and that’s doing more work for the price of the card than almost winning a PT. Summer Bloom was last seen in Ninth Edition, with its only other printings being Portal and Starter 99 (at rare!), as well as Visions and Sixth Edition (at uncommon). What inferences can you glean from that information?

The first thing that came to my attention when I saw that list was that, despite five printings, there is only one foil version! Eighth, Ninth, and Tenth Editions were also those down years where literally nobody wanted Core Set cards or packs—there were no new cards, and they typically sold very poorly (at least Seventh Edition shook things up by having terrible¹ art!). That means that we have one foil printing for a key part of the deck from a set nobody ever wanted. In terms of non-foil, only two versions have black borders, Visions and Portal. Each also has different artwork. The Portal artwork is rarer (and the card itself was rare), so those are the most pricey non-foils at roughly $3.25. Visions is in second for about a dollar less, with Sixth and Starter close behind. Ninth copies are about $1.50 because they are new frame, the most populous, and kinda ugly. If we were doing Aesthetically Pleasing Power Rankings, this would be my pick order (excluding foil Ninth from judgment, since the foil would win by default). Summer Bloom also likely sees more Cube, EDH, and casual play than Amulet.

Anyways, I said all that to get to this: Your job when looking for buys or spec targets isn’t too find good cards, it’s to find good situations. [card]Summer Bloom[/card], while only an uncommon, is unlikely to ever see a printing outside of a supplemental product (I could have sworn it was in a Duel Deck). Other good cards from the deck ([card]Simian Spirit Guide[/card], [card]Hive Mind[/card], [card]Serum Visions[/card]) are all but assured to be either in Modern Masters 2015 or see some semi-immediate printing. Amulet is somewhere in the middle, high-profile enough to get some demand for another printing (unless people start to call it “The Summer Bloom Deck”), and not too out of line with current design philosophy to forbid it from coming back to Standard (where it would do literally nothing). That puts Summer Bloom in the best situation (or worst, depending on your perspective). Other cards that have their price impacted by their situation include the Worldwake manlands, [card]Sleight of Hand[/card], [card]Sensei’s Divining Top[/card] (although Commander has breathed life into that set), [card]Voice of Resurgence[/card], and [card]Noble Hierarch[/card]. These aren’t necessarily examples of cards you should run out and buy today, but they are historical presedents of this concept. Be on the lookout for cards with similarly exploitable situations!

Quick Hits

We may revisit this concept in the future, but I thought today’s article went well. I think the kids liked it too, they seemed pretty engaged throughout.

Even though they support my arch-nemesis Frank Lepore, I really like the TCGplayer tournament series. I mentioned those point cards last week—there is absolutely nothing better than having guaranteed byes in a tournament that typically doesn’t pull in more than 200 to 250 people. They’re just 5Ks, so they don’t have the same pull as SCG Opens, and they have a guaranteed cash payout. Those point cards are an interesting phenomenon, too! They were considered worthless the first year, but people caught on and now they can command a pretty healthy premium on site (I’ve seen people actually pay $3/point the morning of). Listings on [popular auction site] typically close at about half that much, since the demand is not as strong or constant. If you live in an area where the smaller TCGplayer events run (the best source of points cards), then always target them in trade (I’d do .75-1 per point). They also expire after two years, which is dumb, but worth remembering. Don’t buy old points!
[card]Mastery of the Unseen[/card] into [card]Whelming Wave[/card] is something I will do at FNM this year.
I am not even remotely interested in the new From The Vaults. Friend of the program Dr. Jeebus made a good point the other day.

jeebusftv

I really like [card]Outpost Siege[/card], as well as the rest of the cycle (to varying degrees). I think the red one is splashable enough that it could see play in multiple decks, if the mana is ever good enough in Standard that you can just do whatever the hell you want.
“You have sent 325 cards with a total value of $1,570.65 and you have received 314 cards from other members with a total value of $1,500.06.” This is not including the ~3800 points I have available, or the 3200 that are currently in escrow. Crazy how well this lines up!
I’m hoping to do a mailbag article soon, so please leave questions in the comment section (or tweet them or email them or whatever). We can talk about whatever, I guess.

1I actually love Seventh Edition art, but the set has been referred to as “the time comic book artists took over WotC.” I don’t really get it, but I pretend I do. I bet Mike Linneman could tell us all about it.

Conjured Currency #51: From the Helvault

Douglas Johnson

Have you missed out on some of the “most formidable winged warriors to ever grace the game”? Do you have an Angel-themed EDH deck? Are you trying to collect one copy of every Angel to ever be printed? If the answer to any of the above questions is “maybe,” “I guess,” or “not really,” you may or may not be delighted to learn that Wizards of the Coast heard your cry to the heavens, and is releasing this. I’ll save you the trouble of Googling it, because several people have already learned that it doesn’t end well. Considering how Wizards of the Coast Damned our hopes and prayers with the last From the Vault interation, I’m fairly confident that they won’t screw up this one nearly as bad.

As Brainstorm Brewery’s Nicholas Cage from Lord of War, I’m going to provide you with my personal thought process on what I’m going to do with this announcement from a financial perspective, look at what’s most likely to be reprinted, and how a potential reprint could affect the price of these cards. From the Vaults also have a particularly interesting foiling process that’s very hit or miss, and that’ll be especially relevant in a casual archetype like Angels where a foil [card]Avacyn, Angel of Hope[/card] (aka Avacyn, the one that’s not garbage) is $90.

Let’s Open the Theoretical [card]Helvault[/card]

The first thing to note is that the release date is August 21. That’s exactly 6 months away, so I don’t think there’s any reason to firesale things yet, even if you believe in the possibility of a certain card being reprinted in the set. These FTV sets have an “extremely limited print run,” as opposed to something like a Duel Deck, where they jam as many copies as possible into the market. Listing your unused copies of [card]Elspeth, Sun’s Champion[/card] on TCGplayer for $30 on November 3 when Elspeth vs. Kiora was announced was the correct call, because the card had nowhere to go from there but down.

In the cases of From the Vaults, powerful Modern or Legacy cards won’t experience such harsh decline. Let’s spoil my assumption on a spoiler, and assume that [card]Restoration Angel[/card] makes it into the FTV. The card has held fast at $8 for the past year or so, and I don’t think that price is going to drop anytime soon. It’s locked out of Modern Masters 2015, and sees enough play in the Modern Jeskai control deck to justify demand going into August.

If we look at [card]Maze of Ith[/card] from the FTV Realms, we can see that the reprint at the end of the summer didn’t cause the Dark version of the card to drop by more than a couple of dollars. I’d argue that the steady drop of Maze in the years to follow had more to do with the card being played less and less in Legacy, since the card was already dropping before then as far back as M13 in July. I think we can take away that Restoration Angel is a fine pickup even going into this set, if you expect to play with them in any fashion in the coming months.

Historically, the recent FTV sets have had a hallmark card that holds a significant portion of the set’s value. Realms tried to get people excited about [card]Maze of Ith[/card] (which is amusing, because [card]Grove of the Burnwillows[/card] ended up being much more exciting in the long term), Twenty obviously had Jace, and Annihilation had… [card]Burning of Xinye[/card], I guess? Or [card]Wrath of God[/card]? It was pretty bad, barring the Cubers who were excited about Burning and [card]Rolling Earthquake[/card], which were previously Portal Three Kingdoms-only cards with a massive price tag simply due to their rarity. I think it’s pretty safe to assume that Wizards will include at least one big, splashy, mythic angel whose pre-reprint price tag will encourage players to buy the set. Here’s a short list of expensive Angels that I think we could see in that slot:

[card]Iona, Shield of Emeria[/card]

[card]Avacyn, Angel of Hope[/card]

[card]Linvala, Keeper of Silence[/card]

Are they going to jam-pack all three of these into a product that is $34.99 MSRP? No. Definitely not. In fact, we almost certainly won’t even get two of the above in the same product. While FTV Exiled and Relics each have multiple $25 cards nowadays, those were printed when the player base was much smaller, and they probably had a smaller print run as well. I’m predicting that we get one “WOW!” angel that headlines the set as value-packed, followed by a string of $5 or $10 angels spread across multiple colors and rarities that appeal to casual players and have unique effects. Lastly, the set will have its [card]Char[/card], [card]Virtue’s Ruin[/card], and [card]Desert[/card]s, at the bottom of the pile that nobody cares about from a financial perspective.

One of the “garbage” cards that most of us financiers won’t care about will almost certainly be [card]Serra Angel[/card]. Apparently Serra Angel is Richard Garfield’s favorite card in Magic, so I predict an homage to the designer of the game we love, with a foil (possibly alternate art) version of one of Magic’s first creatures. While there will be Angel collectors who get excited over the card, I don’t expect it to survive higher than a dollar with all of the other desirable Angels flying around in the set.

Whitewashed

If we go with the assumption that Wizards doesn’t want every single card in the set to be white, or at least mono-white (and I think that’s a fair assumption), it narrows down our search for the other winged warriors by quite a lot. In no particular order, here are a few highlights that I think round out the product.

[card]Iona, Shield of Emeria[/card] ($28)
[card]Akroma, Angel of Fury[/card] ($5)
[card]Platinum Angel[/card] ($7)
[card]Emeria Angel[/card] ($1)
[card]Sera Angel[/card] ($1)
[card]Exalted Angel[/card] ($3)
[card]Desolation Angel[/card] ($1)
[card]Angel of Serenity[/card] ($2)
[card]Gisela, Blade of Goldnight[/card] ($12)
[card]Empyrial Archangel[/card] ($4)
[card]Maelstrom Archangel[/card] ($11)
[card]Restoration Angel[/card] ($8)
[card]Herald of War[/card] ($1)
[card]Indomitable Archangel[/card] ($2)
[card]Jenara, Asura of War[/card] ($8)

I don’t think this is an exact list of 15 cards that will all be in the set together. In fact, I’d be surprised if I got more than three or four correct. The product release is half a year away, but it’s something to think about if you’re a fan of angels and are debating on buying into some expensive fliers. For what it’s worth, I think a Gatherer search filtering rare angels for which the community vote is 3.5 or higher is a pretty good indication of a lot of the possibilities for the set.

The Takeaway

Although there’s a lot of pure speculation in this article, I think there’s a few simple finance 101 takeaways.

If you have the opportunity to grab an FTV Angels at MSRP for whatever reason, then buy it. There will almost certainly be money to be made by reselling the $30 angel plus the rest of the random stuff, because I have faith that WOTC fixed the issue it had with Annihilation.
If you’re a collector and you want one of every sealed From the Vault, you can probably wait a while after release before picking one up. I remember that FTV 20 preordered for around $700 on eBay at one point, when the only spoiled card was Jace.
If you only want two or three cards out of the set once the entire list gets spoiled, you’re probably better off trading for them. There will be the guy who buys the box so that his girlfriend can have a foil Avacyn in her angel deck, and he’ll have no other use for the other 14 cards. After a few weeks, the random $5 or $10 angels will probably drop a bit.
If you own copies of Avacyn, Linvala, or Iona that you’re not using, I would sell them just to free up cash to spend on other things. Sure, there’s a chance that Linvala crawls from $45 to $50 by August, but you’re probably better off hedging your bets and selling for $45 just in case the FTV one ends up dropping for whatever reason. If you don’t own them and want them for your angel EDH deck, you can probably wait until the set comes out, depending on how often you play and how much you think you need it. If you own pack foils, I’d definitely list them for sale and try to get as much as you can for them over the course of the next few months.
Don’t do what I did with the FTV Twenty and assume that they’d be worth double what they sold for two years ago. I don’t recommend buying multiple copies for investment purposes, when there are other reserved-list staples like dual lands that will be easier to move and have a higher chance of going up in value.

What’s on your list of what’ll be in the set? Angels are just behind dragons in being the most popular creature type in all of Magic, so there are quite a lot of possibilities to choose from. Thanks for reading!

Commanding Opinion: Ghoulcaller Gisa

David Rowell

Ghoulcaller Gisa is definitely the better of the two zombie masters.

To recap what she does:

Ghoulcaller Gisa
3BB
Legendary Creature – Human Wizard
B, tap, Sacrifice another creature: Put X 2/2 black Zombie creature tokens onto the battlefield, where X is the sacrificed creature’s power.
3/4

I’m also a fan of her flavor text; it’s actually a quote straight from the Uncharted Realms talking about her and her brother.

“Geralf, must you always whine? I agreed to nothing. I’ll raise ghouls anytime I wish.”

It’s pretty obvious that she wants to be surrounded by a horde of zombies. The flavor of throwing a monster to the zombies to call forth more zombies is pretty solid in my book. Mechanically, mono-black doesn’t mind getting a swarm of monsters—black is used to getting tokens at the cost of resources. The only real downside to her ability is having to tap along with having a mana cost. She’s also rather high on the curve at 3BB, meaning she’ll get expensive fast if she gets killed a lot. Luckily, black is also very good at getting a lot of mana through mana doublers and cards like [card]Cabal Coffers[/card] and [card]Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx[/card].

As far as mono-black zombies in Commander are concerned, however, [card]Ghoulcaller Gisa[/card] is probably going to be our best bet. [card]Mikaeus, the Unhallowed[/card] is another powerful option, but we’ll be playing him too.

[card]Mikaeus, the Unhallowed[/card], in fact, is the first lord our deck gets to see. It gives all of our non-humans (so not our Commander, but everything else) +1/+1 and undying. While undying doesn’t effect our zombie tokens, it gives the majority of our creatures another layer of protection.

Aside for players who like broken stuff: If you’re playing [card]Mikaeus, the Unhallowed]/card] you also have the option to play [card]Triskelion[/card] solely as a combo piece. As long as you use Triskelion to kill itself while it has undying and remove all of its counters, you can do infinite damage with Triskelion’s ability to remove a +1/+1 counter to deal 1 damage to target creature or player. I’m personally not playing it, but it’s an option.

We’re looking to make our little zombie tokens as strong as possible, so why not play all of the zombie lords?

[card]Cemetery Reaper[/card] is a 2/2 Zombie lord for 1BB that gives our other zombies +1/+1. Not just that, but for 2B, tap, and exile a creature from a graveyard, we can make a 2/2 black zombie creature token. It lets you hate a little on reanimation decks while fueling your zombie army.

[card]Death Baron[/card] is one of the more expensive zombie lords, sitting around $12. But it’s solid. At 1BB for a 2/2, it doesn’t differ too much from Cemetery Reaper. He gives both zombies and skeletons +1/+1 (he’s the only skeleton lord in the game, by the way). But he also gives each of those creatures deathtouch, which is fantastic due to the smaller size of our zombie companions.

[card]Lord of the Undead[/card] is one of the strongest zombie lords by far, and is also pretty pricey at around $9. Yet again, a 2/2 for 1BB that gives other zombies +1/+1, he also has a pretty cool ability. For 1B tap, you can return a zombie card from your graveyard to your hand. Sadly, there are no zombie tribal spells, so he’s only going to be grabbing creatures back (or changeling cards, but they’re not prominent in black).

[card]Undead Warchief[/card] is probably the coolest of the lords. For 2BB, we get a 1/1. Not great. He also gives all of our zombies, himself included, +2/+1, which is pretty solid. That at least brings him up to a 3/2 for 2BB, which is much more reasonable. Making all zombies cost one less to cast can lead to explosive turns after this hits the board.

Lastly, [card]Zombie Master[/card] is the first zombie lord printed. He’s a 2/3 for 1BB. Instead of giving a power boost, he gives all zombies swampwalk and regenerate. The only real downside with this is that it works for all zombies, not just yours. If you’re facing something like [card]Thraximundar[/card], you should probably avoid casting your [card]Zombie Master[/card].

[card]Filth[/card], on the other hand, gives just your creatures swampwalk. We’ll explain later why this swampwalk is important, but it’s also nice to have a horde of unblockable zombies.

In addition to the lords, we’ve got a few more things that give us boosts.

In addition to being mana doublers, [card]Caged Sun[/card] and [card]Gauntlet of Power[/card] also give all creatures of the chosen color +1/+1. As all of our zombies are black, this easily gives us even more power for our zombies.

[card]Obelisk of Urd[/card], on the other hand, takes advantage of having a lot of tokens by having convoke and giving the chosen creature type +2/+2, easily making our zombies twice their original size. [card]Hall of Triumph[/card] is for all of your black creatures and is pretty solid at only three mana. [card]Coat of Arms[/card] is the classic tribal support card, but it’s a risky play against other tribal decks.

Between all of these lords and buffs, the 2/2 zombie tokens that Gisa makes get much larger, but how are we going to get those tokens when we have to sacrifice creatures?

Well, [card]Gravecrawler[/card] is probably the best possible option.

As a constantly recastable 2/1 zombie, he’s perfect for Gisa’s goals. You can play him for B, sacrifice him for another B to get tw or more 2/2 zombies to replace him, and then you can just replay him for another B. But the fantastic thing is that our zombie lords significantly increase the number of creatures we get, as it changes how big our sacrificed zombie is. The rest of the time, however, it’s generally fine to sacrifice other zombie tokens to increase the total number of zombie tokens you have.

Gravecrawler is also a heavy combo card. It only costs B and can be sacrificed to [card]Phyrexian Altar[/card] for B, meaning you can sacrifice it to recast itself as long as you control another zombie, giving you an infinite sacrifice outlet. Meaning, a card like [card]Blood Artist[/card] turns into a win condition.

But what else makes tokens?

[card]Army of the Damned[/card] and [card]Endless Ranks of the Dead[/card] were both really cool zombie token cards from Innistrad block that never saw Standard play, but I think they have a place here. [card]Army of the Damned[/card] already sees play due to 5BBB not being as hard to hit in Commander, and being a win condition on its own. [card]Endless Ranks of the Dead[/card] is less played due to not doing anything the turn it comes into play, but here it can do a little bit more due to how slow the format is and how many zombies you’ll have on board.

Now, what else does black like doing? Well, encouraging us to play more black!

These two are additional mana doublers in the forms of creatures. [card]Crypt Ghast[/card] gives us a pretty relevant extort trigger, too: when we’re recasting [card]Gravecrawler[/card] a ton of times, being able to drain people out and keep your life total up is very helpful. [card]Nirkana Revenant[/card] does the same thing as [card]Crypt Ghast[/card], but also has the ability to pump itself +1/+1 per black you pay into it. With [card]Filth[/card] in the graveyard and a swamp under an opponent’s control, you can completely blow a player out of the game.

[card]Extraplanar Lens[/card] is another mana doubler, but it does come at the cost of exiling one of your basic lands to imprint onto it. I wouldn’t say this is an auto-include, but it’s a strong option for this deck.

[card]Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx[/card] and [card]Cabal Coffers[/card] are the two big mana producers of this deck. Each of them can produce huge amounts of mana. [card]Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx[/card] pulls a ton of mana equal to your devotion to black (in the case of this deck at least), while [card]Cabal Coffers[/card] gives you mana equal to the number of swamps you control.

[card]Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth[/card] serves a few purposes here. One, it allows Cabal Coffers to tap for black equal to the lands you control rather than just the swamps. Two, it makes all of your opponent’s lands swamps, so you can hit any player with swampwalk.

[deck title=Ghoulcaller Gisa Commander Brew]
[Creatures]
Ghoulcaller Gisa
Blood Artist
Bone Dancer
Burnished Hart
Butcher of Malakir
Cemetery Reaper
Coffin Queen
Crypt Ghast
Death Baron
Fleshbag Marauder
Filth
Geralf’s Messenger
Geth, Lord of the Vault
Graveborn Muse
Gravecrawler
Grave Titan
Gray Merchant of Asphodel
Lord of the Undead
Magus of the Coffers
Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
Nirkana Revenant
Overseer of the Damned
Solemn Simulacrum
Undead Warchief
Zombie Master
[/creatures]

[Spells]
Animate Dead
Army of the Damned
Bad Moon
Black Market
Buried Alive
Caged Sun
Coat of Arms
Consume Spirit
Crux of Fate
Damnation
Demonic Tutor
Diabolic Intent
Dictate of Erebos
Drain Life
Endless Ranks of the Dead
Entomb
Exquisite Blood
Exsanguinate
Extraplanar Lens
Gauntlet of Power
Grave Pact
Illusionist’s Bracers
Hall of Triumph
Lightning Greaves
Liliana of Dark Realms
Liliana Vess
Mutilate
Necropotence
Obelisk of Urd
Profane Command
Reanimate
Sol Ring
Sorin Markov
Thornbite Staff
Phyrexian Altar
Victim of Night
Whip of Erebos
[/spells]

[Lands]
Cabal Coffers
Cavern of Souls
Myriad Landscape
Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
31 Swamp
Unholy Grotto
Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
[/Lands]
[/deck]

Until next time,

– David Rowell

PT Fate Reforged: 18 Match Points (6-4) or Better, By the Numbers

Jared Yost

Based on comments from my previous article, I would like to take a more in-depth approach to Pro Tour Fate Reforged. Covering only the top eight leaves out many of other archetypes that were present over the weekend. This time, I’m going to look at all the players who earned at least 18 match points (a 6-4 record equivalent) and see if there are any deeper trends that the top eight did not show. First we’ll look at the data, then note the trends that are present, and finally see if there are any undervalued cards that haven’t caught up with the pro tour hype.

Decklists

A-E, F-L, M-R, S-Z

18 Match Points or Better, By the Numbers

Mythic	Rare	Uncommon
136 [card]Tarmogoyf[/card]	197 [card]Verdant Catacombs[/card]	116 [card]Lingering Souls[/card]
107 [card]Liliana of the Veil[/card]	124 [card]Windswept Heath[/card]	115 [card]Path to Exile[/card]
32 [card]Mox Opal[/card]	123 [card]Siege Rhino[/card]	102 [card]Inquisition of Kozilek[/card]
25 [card]Grove of the Burnwillows[/card]	123 [card]Thoughtseize[/card]	73 [card]Boros Charm[/card]
22 [card]Dark Confidant[/card]	121 [card]Abrupt Decay[/card]	72 [card]Monastery Swiftspear[/card]
21 [card]Voice of Resurgence[/card]	108 [card]Marsh Flats[/card]	59 [card]Might of Old Krosa[/card]
20 [card]Primeval Titan[/card]	102 [card]Scalding Tarn[/card]	58 [card]Skullcrack[/card]
16 [card]AEther Vial[/card]	97 [card]Noble Hierarch[/card]	55 [card]Become Immense[/card]
16 [card]Karn Liberated[/card]	92 [card]Inkmoth Nexus[/card]	48 [card]Tectonic Edge[/card]
12 [card]Windbrisk Heights[/card]	88 [card]Wooded Foothills[/card]	45 [card]Remand[/card]
11 [card]Wurmcoil Engine[/card]	83 [card]Scavenging Ooze[/card]	39 [card]Lightning Helix[/card]
10 [card]Doran, the Siege Tower[/card]	80 [card]Misty Rainforest[/card]	33 [card]Dismember[/card]
9 [card]Master of Waves[/card]	76 [card]Goblin Guide[/card]	32 [card]Darksteel Citadel[/card]
8 [card]Geist of Saint Traft[/card]	72 [card]Overgrown Tomb[/card]	32 [card]Springleaf Drum[/card]
8 [card]Sorin, Solemn Visitor[/card]	68 [card]Eidolon of the Great Revel[/card]	28 [card]Deceiver Exarch[/card]
6 [card]Dryad Arbor[/card]	62 [card]Arid Mesa[/card]
5 [card]Batterskull[/card]	55 [card]Tasigur, the Golden Fang[/card]
5 [card] Vesuva[/card]	54 [card]Sacred Foundry[/card]
4 [card]Emrakul, the Aeons Torn[/card]	51 [card]Bloodstained Mire[/card]
4 [card]Eye of Ugin[/card]	51 [card]Godless Shrine[/card]
4 [card]Sphinx’s Revelation[/card]	47 [card]Breeding Pool[/card]
4 [card]Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas[/card]	47 [card]Snapcaster Mage[/card]
4 [card]Ugin, the Spirit Dragon[/card]	45 [card]Steam Vents[/card]
4 [card]Vengevine[/card]	45 [card]Stomping Ground[/card]
3 [card]Past in Flames[/card]	42 [card]Stirring Wildwood[/card]
2 [card]Archangel of Thune[/card]	39 [card]Temple Garden[/card]
2 [card]Chandra, Pyromaster[/card]	37 [card]Cryptic Command[/card]
2 [card]Murmuring Bosk[/card]	37 [card]Twilight Mire[/card]
1 [card]Anafenza, the Foremost[/card]	32 [card]Arcbound Ravager[/card]
1 [card]Gideon Jura[/card]	32 [card]Blinkmoth Nexus[/card]
1 [card]Linvala, Keeper of Silence[/card]	31 [card]Grim Lavamancer[/card]
1 [card]Sigarda, Host of Herons[/card]	31 [card]Splinter Twin[/card]
1 [card]Sorin, Lord of Innistrad[/card]	30 [card]Pendelhaven[/card]
1 [card]Sundering Titan[/card]	30 [card]Wild Defiance[/card]
1 [card]Sword of Feast and Famine[/card]	29 [card]Glimmervoid[/card]
1 [card]Sword of Fire and Ice[/card]	29 [card]Spellskite[/card]
1 [card]Sword of Light and Shadow[/card]	26 [card]Flooded Strand[/card]
1 [card]Thrun, the Last Troll[/card]	24 [card]Steel Overseer[/card]
	23 [card]Birds of Paradise[/card]
	22 [card]Maelstrom Pulse[/card]
	21 [card]Sulfur Falls[/card]
	20 [card]Amulet of Vigor[/card]
	20 [card]Gemstone Mine[/card]
	20 [card]Summoner’s Pact[/card]
	18 [card]Gavony Township[/card]
	16 [card]Fulminator Mage[/card]
	16 [card]Oblivion Stone[/card]
	16 [card]Scapeshift[/card]
	15 [card]Loxodon Smiter[/card]
	14 [card]Blackcleave Cliffs[/card]
	14 [card]Etched Champion[/card]
	14 [card]Hive Mind[/card]
	13 [card]Master of Etherium[/card]
	13 [card]Razorverge Thicket[/card]
	13 [card]Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth[/card]
	12 [card]Blood Moon[/card]
	12 [card]Cavern of Souls[/card]
	12 [card]Celestial Colonnade[/card]
	12 [card]Lord of Atlantis[/card]
	12 [card]Master of the Pearl Trident[/card]
	12 [card]Mutavault[/card]
	12 [card]Wilt-Leaf Liege[/card]
	11 [card]Azusa, Lost but Seeking[/card]
	10 [card]Blood Crypt[/card]
	10 [card]Hallowed Fountain[/card]
	10 [card]Pact of Negation[/card]
	10 [card]Polluted Delta[/card]
	10 [card]Vault of the Archangel[/card]
	9 [card]Courser of Kruphi[/card]
	9 [card]Desolate Lighthouse[/card]
	9 [card]Living End[/card]
	9 [card]Restoration Angel[/card]
	9 [card]Seachrome Coast[/card]
	9 [card]Slaughter Pact[/card]
	8 [card]Bloodghast[/card]
	8 [card]Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle[/card]
	8 [card]Wanderwine Hub[/card]
	7 [card]Auriok Champion[/card]
	6 [card]Isolated Chapel[/card]
	6 [card]Tidebinder Mage[/card]
	5 [card]Honor of the Pure[/card]
	5 [card]Slayers’ Stronghold[/card]
	5 [card]Supreme Verdict[/card]
	4 [card]Bitterblossom[/card]
	4 [card]Clifftop Retreat[/card]
	4 [card]Fetid Heath[/card]
	4 [card]Flagstones of Trokair[/card]
	4 [card]Flooded Grove[/card]
	4 [card]Gravecrawler[/card]
	4 [card]Horizon Canopy[/card]
	4 [card]Leonin Arbiter[/card]
	4 [card]Life from the Loam[/card]
	4 [card]Lotleth Troll[/card]
	4 [card]Mana Confluence[/card]
	4 [card]Phantasmal Image[/card]
	4 [card]Pyromancer Ascension[/card]
	4 [card]Ranger of Eos[/card]
	4 [card]Serra Ascendant[/card]
	4 [card]Tempered Steel[/card]
	4 [card]Tendo Ice Bridge[/card]
	4 [card]Thalia, Guardian of Thraben[/card]
	4 [card]Watery Grave[/card]
	3 [card]Copperline Gorge[/card]
	3 [card]Engineered Explosives[/card]
	3 [card]Golgari Grave-Troll[/card]
	3 [card]Leyline of Sanctity[/card]
	3 [card]Woodland Cemetery[/card]
	2 [card]Glacial Fortress[/card]
	2 [card]Hinterland Harbor[/card]
	2 [card]Mirran Crusader[/card]
	2 [card]Mystic Gate[/card]
	2 [card]Raging Ravine[/card]
	2 [card]Shivan Reef[/card]
	2 [card]Squee, Goblin Nabob[/card]
	2 [card]Swan Song[/card]
	2 [card]Sygg, River Guide[/card]
	2 [card]Temple of Mystery[/card]
	1 [card]Cascade Bluffs[/card]
	1 [card]Chord of Calling[/card]
	1 [card]City of Brass[/card]
	1 [card]Dragonskull Summit[/card]
	1 [card]Fire-Lit Thicket[/card]
	1 [card]Ghostfire Blade[/card]
	1 [card]Llanowar Wastes[/card]
	1 [card]Minamo, School at Water’s Edge[/card]
	1 [card]Oboro, Palace in the Clouds[/card]
	1 [card]Profane Command[/card]
	1 [card]Ruric Thar, the Unbowed[/card]
	1 [card]Slaughter Games[/card]
	1 [card]Underground River[/card]
	1 [card]Vengeful Pharaoh[/card]
	1 [card]Yavimaya Coast[/card]

Common	Sideboard
131 [card]Lightning Bolt[/card]	93 [card]Stony Silence[/card]
68 [card]Lava Spike[/card]	90 [card]Fulminator Mage[/card]
68 [card]Rift Bolt[/card]	78 [card]Spellskite[/card]
63 [card]Serum Visions[/card]	65 [card]Nature’s Claim[/card]
63 [card]Treetop Village[/card]	59 [card]Destructive Revelry[/card]
61 [card]Gitaxian Probe[/card]	52 [card]Molten Rain[/card]
61 [card]Searing Blaze[/card]	48 [card]Timely Reinforcements[/card]
60 [card]Blighted Agent[/card]	47 [card]Ancient Grudge[/card]
60 [card]Glistener Elf[/card]	38 [card]Kor Firewalker[/card]
59 [card]Mutagenic Growth[/card]	36 [card]Twisted Image[/card]
56 [card]Vines of Vastwood[/card]	35 [card]Dispel[/card]
32 [card]Apostle’s Blessing[/card]	35 [card]Spell Pierce[/card]
32 [card]Cranial Plating[/card]	31 [card]Leyline of Sanctity[/card]
32 [card]Ornithopter[/card]	27 [card]Creeping Corrosion[/card]
32 [card]Vault Skirge[/card]	26 [card]Path to Exile[/card]
31 [card]Ancient Stirrings[/card]	26 [card]Thoughtseize[/card]
31 [card]Shard Volley[/card]	24 [card]Engineered Explosives[/card]
26 [card]Distortion Strike[/card]	23 [card]Lightning Heli[/card]
24 [card]Sleight of Hand[/card]	21 [card]Negate[/card]
20 [card]Simic Growth Chamber[/card]	21 [card]Smash to Smithereens[/card]
18 [card]Mana Leak[/card]	20 [card]Dismember[/card]
16 [card]Chromatic Sphere[/card]	19 [card]Combust[/card]
16 [card]Expedition Map[/card]	18 [card]Batterskull[/card]
16 [card]Pestermite[/card]	18 [card]Blood Moon[/card]
16 [card]Sakura-Tribe Elder[/card]	18 [card]Obstinate Baloth[/card]
16 [card]Search for Tomorrow[/card]	16 [card]Duress[/card]
15 [card]Gruul Turf[/card]	16 [card]Swan Song[/card]
14 [card]Groundswell[/card]	15 [card]Chalice of the Void[/card]
14 [card]Spreading Seas[/card]	14 [card]Anger of the Gods[/card]
12 [card]Deadshot Minotaur[/card]	14 [card]Etched Champion[/card]
12 [card]Demonic Dread[/card]	14 [card]Slaughter Games[/card]
12 [card]Monstrous Carabid[/card]	14 [card]Sower of Temptation[/card]
12 [card]Street Wraith[/card]	14 [card]Wild Defiance[/card]
12 [card]Violent Outburst[/card]	12 [card]Pyroclasm[/card]
12 [card]Wild Nacatl[/card]	12 [card]Wear / Tear[/card]
9 [card]Galvanic Blast[/card]	11 [card]Boil[/card]
9 [card]Jungle Weaver[/card]	11 [card]Rest in Peace[/card]
9 [card]Qasali Pridemage[/card]	11 [card]Seal of Primordium[/card]
9 [card]Thoughtcast[/card]	11 [card]Zealous Persecution[/card]
9 [card]Welding Jar[/card]	10 [card]Carrion Call[/card]
8 [card]Faithless Looting[/card]	10 [card]Choke[/card]
8 [card]Ichorclaw Myr[/card]	10 [card]Damnation[/card]
8 [card]Thought Scour[/card]	10 [card]Firespout[/card]
7 [card]Peer Through Depths[/card]	10 [card]Lingering Souls[/card]
6 [card]Architects of Will[/card]	10 [card]Relic of Progenitus[/card]
6 [card]Terminate[/card]	10 [card]Skullcrack[/card]
5 [card]Boros Garrison[/card]	9 [card]Dryad Arbor[/card]
5 [card]Golgari Rot Farm[/card]	9 [card]Rule of Law[/card]
5 [card]Khalni Garden[/card]	9 [card]Thrun, the Last Troll[/card]
5 [card]Selesnya Sanctuary[/card]	8 [card]Celestial Purge[/card]
5 [card]Simian Spirit Guide[/card]	8 [card]Maelstrom Pulse[/card]
5 [card]Victim of Night[/card]	8 [card]Mirran Crusader[/card]
4 [card]Flame Slash[/card]	8 [card]Nyx-Fleece Ram[/card]
4 [card]Goblin Electromancer[/card]	8 [card]Sigarda, Host of Herons[/card]
4 [card]Grisly Salvage[/card]	8 [card]Thragtusk[/card]
4 [card]Pale Recluse[/card]	7 [card]Burrenton Forge-Tender[/card]
4 [card]Plague Stinger[/card]	7 [card]Deathmark[/card]
4 [card]Pyretic Ritual[/card]	7 [card]Drown in Sorrow[/card]
4 [card]Radiant Fountain[/card]	7 [card]Fracturing Gust[/card]
4 [card]Raise the Alarm[/card]	7 [card]Illness in the Ranks[/card]
4 [card]Repeal[/card]	7 [card]Searing Blaze[/card]
4 [card]Soul Warden[/card]	7 [card]Thalia, Guardian of Thraben[/card]
4 [card]Soul’s Attendant[/card]	7 [card]Vendilion Clique[/card]
4 [card]Squadron Hawk[/card]	7 [card]Wurmcoil Engine[/card]
3 [card]Farseek[/card]	6 [card]Aven Mindcensor[/card]
3 [card]Gurmag Angler[/card]	6 [card]Deflecting Palm[/card]
3 [card]Peek[/card]	6 [card]Gaddock Teeg[/card]
3 [card]Satyr Wayfinder[/card]	6 [card]Golgari Charm[/card]
3 [card]Seal of Primordium[/card]	6 [card]Ingot Chewer[/card]
3 [card]Spell Pierce[/card]	6 [card]Kataki, War’s Wage[/card]
2 [card]Gather the Townsfolk[/card]	6 [card]Shatterstorm[/card]
2 [card]Grapeshot[/card]	6 [card]Slaughter Pact[/card]
2 [card]Nature’s Claim[/card]	6 [card]Sorin, Solemn Visitor[/card]
1 [card]Compulsive Research[/card]	6 [card]Sword of War and Peace[/card]
1 [card]Dispel[/card]	5 [card]Feed the Clan[/card]
1 [card]Duress[/card]	5 [card]Flames of the Blood Hand[/card]
1 [card]Flame Jab[/card]	5 [card]Gnaw to the Bone[/card]
1 [card]Giant Growth[/card]	5 [card]Keranos, God of Storms[/card]
1 [card]Golgari Brownscale[/card]	5 [card]Kitchen Finks[/card]
1 [card]Igneous Pouncer[/card]	5 [card]Ricochet Trap[/card]
1 [card]Kabira Crossroads[/card]	5 [card]Shriekmaw[/card]
1 [card]Raven’s Crime[/card]	5 [card]Sword of Light and Shadow[/card]
1 [card]Temur Battle Rage[/card]	5 [card]Tectonic Edge[/card]
1 [card]Twisted Abomination[/card]	4 [card]Abrupt Decay[/card]
1 [card]Vapor Snag[/card]	4 [card]Counterflu[/card]
	4 [card]Dark Confidant[/card]
	4 [card]Elspeth, Knight-Errant[/card]
	4 [card]Grim Lavamancer[/card]
	4 [card]Liliana of the Veil[/card]
	4 [card]Memoricide[/card]
	4 [card]Nihil Spellbomb[/card]
	4 [card]Piracy Charm[/card]
	4 [card]Scavenging Ooze[/card]
	4 [card]Stain the Mind[/card]
	4 [card]Surgical Extraction[/card]
	4 [card]Tarmogoyf[/card]
	4 [card]Tidebinder Mage[/card]
	4 [card]Torpor Orb[/card]
	4 [card]Whipflare[/card]
	3 [card]Ajani, Mentor of Heroes[/card]
	3 [card]All Is Dust[/card]
	3 [card]Baneslayer Angel[/card]
	3 [card]Damping Matri[/card]
	3 [card]Eidolon of the Great Revel[/card]
	3 [card]Empty the Warrens[/card]
	3 [card]Geist of Saint Traft[/card]
	3 [card]Gideon Jura[/card]
	3 [card]Gifts Ungiven[/card]
	3 [card]Gigadrowse[/card]
	3 [card]Inferno Titan[/card]
	3 [card]Lightning Bolt[/card]
	3 [card]Pithing Needle[/card]
	3 [card]Sowing Salt[/card]
	3 [card]Sylvan Scrying[/card]
	3 [card]Tormod’s Crypt[/card]
	2 [card]Abzan Charm[/card]
	2 [card]Back to Nature[/card]
	2 [card]Bojuka Bog[/card]
	2 [card]Chained to the Rocks[/card]
	2 [card]Crackling Doom[/card]
	2 [card]Creeping Tar Pit[/card]
	2 [card]Crucible of Worlds[/card]
	2 [card]Darkblast[/card]
	2 [card]Dispatch[/card]
	2 [card]Eidolon of Rhetoric[/card]
	2 [card]Ghost Quarter[/card]
	2 [card]Golgari Brownscale[/card]
	2 [card]Hero of Bladehold[/card]
	2 [card]Hornet Queen[/card]
	2 [card]Hurkyl’s Recall[/card]
	2 [card]Keranos, God of Storms[/card]
	2 [card]Kiora, the Crashing Wave[/card]
	2 [card]Kira, Great Glass-Spinner[/card]
	2 [card]Living End[/card]
	2 [card]Murderous Cut[/card]
	2 [card]Olivia Voldaren[/card]
	2 [card]Phyrexian Unlife[/card]
	2 [card]Pyrite Spellbomb[/card]
	2 [card]Raven’s Crime[/card]
	2 [card]Ray of Revelation[/card]
	2 [card]Remand[/card]
	2 [card]Stubborn Denial[/card]
	2 [card]Sundering Titan[/card]
	2 [card]Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas[/card]
	2 [card]Threads of Disloyalty[/card]
	2 [card]Thundermaw Hellkite[/card]
	2 [card]Unflinching Courage[/card]
	2 [card]Unified Will[/card]
	2 [card]Unravel the Aether[/card]
	2 [card]Vengeful Pharaoh[/card]
	2 [card]Vines of Vastwood[/card]
	2 [card]Viridian Corrupter[/card]
	1 [card]Annul[/card]
	1 [card]Aura of Silence[/card]
	1 [card]Blood Baron of Vizkopa[/card]
	1 [card]Boseiju, Who Shelters All[/card]
	1 [card]Brindle Boar[/card]
	1 [card]Courser of Kruphi[/card]
	1 [card]Cranial Extraction[/card]
	1 [card]Defense Grid[/card]
	1 [card]Deglamer[/card]
	1 [card]Detention Sphere[/card]
	1 [card]Disenchant[/card]
	1 [card]Distortion Strike[/card]
	1 [card]Dragon’s Claw[/card]
	1 [card]Echoing Truth[/card]
	1 [card]Elspeth, Sun’s Champion[/card]
	1 [card]Ethersworn Canonist[/card]
	1 [card]Faerie Macabre[/card]
	1 [card]Flame Slash[/card]
	1 [card]Galvanic Blast[/card]
	1 [card]Ghostly Prison[/card]
	1 [card]Go for the Throat[/card]
	1 [card]Grave Titan[/card]
	1 [card]Harmonize[/card]
	1 [card]Jace, Architect of Thought[/card]
	1 [card]Karn Liberated[/card]
	1 [card]Krosan Grip[/card]
	1 [card]Master of Etherium[/card]
	1 [card]Mindslaver[/card]
	1 [card]Orzhov Pontiff[/card]
	1 [card]Primeval Titan[/card]
	1 [card]Ratchet Bomb[/card]
	1 [card]Read the Bones[/card]
	1 [card]Reclamation Sage[/card]
	1 [card]Ruric Thar, the Unbowed[/card]
	1 [card]Siege Rhino[/card]
	1 [card]Sunlance[/card]
	1 [card]Surrak Dragonclaw[/card]
	1 [card]Tasigur, the Golden Fang[/card]
	1 [card]Valorous Stance[/card]
	1 [card]Vandalblast[/card]
	1 [card]Vedalken Shackles[/card]
	1 [card]Wall of Roots[/card]
	1 [card]Zombie Infestation[/card]

Trends

Top 10 Mythics	Top 10 Rares	Top 10 Uncommons	Top 10 Commons	Top 10 Sideboard
[card]Tarmogoyf[/card]*	[card]Verdant Catacombs[/card]	[card]Lingering Souls[/card]	[card]Lightning Bolt[/card]	[card]Stony Silence[/card]
[card]Liliana of the Veil[/card]	[card]Windswept Heath[/card]	[card]Path to Exile[/card]	[card]Lava Spike[/card]	[card]Fulminator Mage[/card]
[card]Mox Opal[/card]	[card]Siege Rhino[/card]	[card]Inquisition of Kozilek[/card]	[card]Rift Bolt[/card]	[card]Spellskite[/card]
[card]Grove of the Burnwillows[/card]*	[card]Thoughtseize[/card]	[card]Boros Charm[/card]	[card]Serum Visions[/card]	[card]Nature’s Claim[/card]
[card]Dark Confidant[/card]	[card]Abrupt Decay[/card]	[card]Monastery Swiftspear[/card]	[card]Treetop Village*[/card]	[card]Destructive Revelry[/card]
[card]Voice of Resurgence[/card]	[card]Marsh Flats[/card]	[card]Might of Old Krosa[/card]	[card]Gitaxian Probe[/card]	[card]Molten Rain[/card]
[card]Primeval Titan[/card]	[card]Scalding Tarn[/card]	[card]Skullcrack[/card]	[card]Searing Blaze[/card]	[card]Timely Reinforcements[/card]
[card]Aether Vial[/card]*	[card]Noble Hierarch[/card]	[card]Become Immense[/card]	[card]Blighted Agent[/card]	[card]Ancient Grudge[/card]
[card]Karn Liberated[/card]	[card]Inkmoth Nexus[/card]	[card]Tectonic Edge[/card]	[card]Glistener Elf[/card]	[card]Kor Firewalker[/card]
[card]Windbrisk Heights[/card]*	[card]Wooded Foothills[/card]	[card]Remand[/card]	[card]Mutagenic Growth[/card]	[card]Twisted Image[/card]
Top 10 Mythics (Printed as Mythic only)			[card]Vines of Vastwood[/card]
[card]Liliana of the Veil[/card]
[card]Mox Opal[/card]
[card]Dark Confidant[/card]
[card]Voice of Resurgence[/card]
[card]Primeval Titan[/card]
[card]Karn Liberated[/card]
[card]Wurmcoil Engine[/card]
[card]Doran, the Siege Tower[/card]
[card]Master of Waves[/card]
[card]Geist of Saint Traft [/card] [card]Sorin, Solemn Visitor[/card] (each had 8 copies)

*Printed at lower rarity, but should be considered as appropriate for the purposes of this analysis. Thus I listed the true mythic rare counts below and added the next runner up common [card]Vines of Vastwood[/card].

Looking at the trends for the top tens of each category, there are several undervalued cards that are seen. From mythics, we have [card]Voice of Resurgence[/card], [card]Primeval Titan[/card], [card]Doran, the Siege Tower[/card], and [card]Master of Waves[/card]. I especially like Voice and Master here, as we aren’t expected to see them in MM2 and Master is currently very cheap for a mythic at around $3 each.

[card]Inkmoth Nexus[/card] is undervalued at rare and is in the best position to increase in price, at least in the short term. Khans fetchlands [card]Windswept Heath[/card] and [card]Wooded Foothills[/card] are very close to their bottoms as well—since they are in Standard, they are poised to increase in price next year due to the Standard season cycle in addition to the Modern demand they are seeing.

[card]Lingering Souls[/card] is very cheap right now at $0.30. However, it does have several printings which is going to suppress the nonfoil price. Foils still look good to me right now if you can get them on the cheap. [card]Boros Charm[/card], [card]Skullcrack[/card], and [card]Become Immense[/card] non-foils could also be good targets. I believe that they also have casual demand to back up their tournament demand, so stocking up on these uncommons on the cheap could be a good play. In terms of foils, I like [card]Boros Charm[/card] the most as it has a ton of cube potential.

Looking at commons, I’m not sure if there is anything I want to pick up that I already mentioned on Tuesday. Each has a decent chance of being included in Modern Masters 2015 and foils of all the noted commons are all pretty pricey already.

Sideboards of the wider field tell a completely different story. [card]Stony Silence[/card] was the number-one sideboard card, and I really like foils and non-foils of this card. [card]Destructive Revelry[/card] still saw a ton of play, but other notables are [card]Timely Reinforcements[/card] and [card]Twisted Image[/card]. Picking up extra copies of these cards, in both foil and non-foil, could see decent returns if the metagame from this point out reflects the decks seen at the top tables of the pro tour.

Other Notables

[card]Scavenging Ooze[/card] – 83 copies is pretty huge, so I expect the Ooze to maintain value and then go up if not included in MM2.

[card]Eidolon of the Great Revel[/card] – Tons of copies of this guy, and I will be looking to pick them up when Theros rotates from Standard.

[card]Tasigur, the Golden Fang[/card] – Tasigur is the real deal in Modern, and with his Standard demand already cemented, he seems like he is going places. I’m going to keep a close eye on this card moving forward.

[card]Grim Lavamancer[/card] – Lavamancer is back in action, so watch for any copies floating around that you can trade for.

[card]Wild Defiance[/card] – Foils of this card already spiked, but non-foils at $2 or less seem appealing to me. Infect is a great deck in the new Modern format and I think players are going to want to try this card out in their decks.

[card]Maelstrom Pulse[/card] – If not included in MM2, I feel that Pulse has nowhere to go but up in price. Pick up your copies if you like playing one of the new Abzan decks in the format.

[card]Leyline of Sanctity[/card] – Though Wizards would be remiss to keep this Leyline out of MM2, if they do, I would expect a significant price bump.

[card]Combust[/card] – Though not talked about that much, this sideboard card showed up pretty significantly and I would expect it to rise from the current $0.20 that it sits at if it remains a popular sideboard choice.

[card]Obstinate Baloth[/card] – Another cheap sideboard card that is good in the format, the Baloth seems like a good pickup to me if you can get copies for $2 or less.

Data!!!

The people have spoken and I have provided. Hopefully this presents a better picture to you all of what types of cards the pros were slinging at Pro Tour Fate Reforged.

Pitt Imps Podcast #106 PT Fate Reforged

Pitt Imps 02:58:48

Obviously this is our big week. We take great pride in being the best PT coverage podcast out there, and WE ARE. The work that goes into one of these is unreal but its so worth it. PTs are the very best Magic out there being played and we try to give them justice. If you have never listened to a Pitt Imps this is a good place to start. We cover round by round action and still hit the news that always comes out during these things. So if you missed it, don’t worry: we got your back.

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Tiny Leaders: Tips for Getting Ahead in Baby Commander

Jim Casale

For those unaware, Tiny Leaders, which I affectionately call “Baby Commander,” is a variant of the Commander format. One still plays a singleton deck with a legendary creature acting as commander. The most significant differences are its banned and restricted list, its deck size limit (50 instead of 100), and one huge caveat: all cards must have a converted mana cost of three or less. I’m here to help those new to the format to figure out ways to get ahead,

Restrictions Breed Cheating on Casting Costs

The biggest difference between Tiny Leaders and Commander is the restriction on the cost of spells. Not being able to play any cards that cost more than three mana limits the quality and power of the cards you can play. Or does it? I’ve found a few tips to get bigger effects from smaller cards.

X Spells

These are just a few examples of the flexibility that X spells can give you in a game of Tiny Leaders. They are typically ineffective early, but when the game gets much longer and drawn out, their power is unquestionable. Some, like [card]Engineered Explosives[/card], are just fantastic for their flexibility. There are 221 X spells in magic that have a converted mana cost of three or less mana. That means plenty of choices for every deck!

Buyback

Buyback spells are similar to X Spells (and sometimes also X Spells), as they give you a way to maximize your mana every turn. When you are playing a format of cards that cost three or less, it’s not uncommon for every spell to be played and a ton of mana to go unused every turn.

Kicker

Kicker was developed as a way to strengthen otherwise weak spells. You could play [card]Kavu Titan[/card] as a decent two-mana 2/2, or you could play it later as a much more impressive five-mana 5/5 trampler. The flexibility of these spells make them good stopgaps early and allow you to pack more power for the later game.

Getting the Most from Your Lands

If all of your lands only produce mana, you’re going to have a rough time winning games. This is just a tiny sample of non-basic lands you can use that have a serious power outside of producing mana. Every color has access to one on-color man land (with [card]Treetop Village[/card] and [card]Faerie Conclave[/card] being the best of the bunch), so it’s hard to not include any.

Keep Thinking Outside the Box

morph morph3 cost morph2 overload1

There aren’t as many of these, so they don’t each get their own categories, but it’s easy to see how morph, overload, cards with “additional cost” downsides, and cards with abilities that cost a lot of mana can give you additional power to add to your Tiny Leaders deck.

To top it all off, I’ll leave you with the deck I’ve cooked up. It’s still a little rough around the edges, but iterative deck design is my favorite way to play!

[deck title= Geist of Saint Traft Tiny Leaders]

[Leader]Geist of Saint Traft[/Leader]

[Creature]

* Vendilion Clique

*Invisible Stalker

* True-Name Nemesis

* Stoneforge Mystic

* Trinket Mage

* Snapcaster Mage

[/Creature]

[Artifact]

* Engineered Explosives

* Sensei’s Divining Top

* Relic of Progenitus

* Ratchet Bomb

* Runechanter’s Pike

* Sword of Feast and Famine

[/Artifact]
[Instant]

* Hindering Light

* Azorius Charm

* Sphinx’s Revelation

* Ajani’s Presence

* Swords to Plowshares

* Path to Exile

* Exclude

* Vapor Snag

* Think Twice

* Cyclonic Rift

* Counterspell

* Spell Snare

* Disrupting Shoal

* Dissolve

* Impulse

[/Instant]

[Sorcery]

* Ponder

* Preordain

* Serum Visions

* Martial Coup

[/Sorcery]
[Land]

*3 Island

* Plains

* Azorius Guildgate

* Mystic Gate

* Urza’s Factory

* Opal Palace

* Eiganjo Castle

* Tranquil Cove

* Academy Ruins

* Flooded Strand

* Kor Haven

* Celestial Colonnade

* Faerie Conclave

* Glacial Fortress

* Command Tower

* Hallowed Fountain

* Temple of Enlightenment

[/Land]
[/deck]

Have you tried out the format? Found any ways to get big effects that I didn’t mention here? Sound off below.

Episode Archives

Star City Games Dallas – Standard Open (Dallas, TX – USA)

Star City Games Dallas – Modern IQ (Dallas, TX – USA)

Star City Games Dallas – Legacy IQ (Dallas, TX – USA)

ROSS’S TOTALLY LEGIT DRAGONS OF TARKIR PREVIEW CARD THAT WAS FOR REAL GIVEN TO HIM BY WIZARDS BUT THEY MUST HAVE LIKE FORGOT OR SOMETHING

Abzan Aggro

Quick Hits

Savage Ventmaw

Surge of Righteousness

Encase in Ice

Self-Inflicted Wound

Rending Volley

Display of Dominance

Warbringer

Silumgar’s Scorn

Draconic Roar

Sarkhan’s Triumph

Anticipate

Dragonlord’s Servant

End Step

Grand Prix Miami (USA)

Week of February 22nd

Abzan Aggro

The Truth About Modern Masters

At the End of Your Turn…

A Quick Aside

Back to TCGplayer HQ

In Recent News..

End Step

New Players, Old Players

Changing Dynamics

Wealth and Magic

In Conclusion

Star City Games: Baltimore – Modern Open (Baltimore, MD – USA)

Star City Games: Baltimore – Standard IQ (Baltimore, MD – USA)

Star City Games: Baltimore – Legacy IQ (Baltimore, MD – USA)

Manifesting Failure

Manifesting Success

Feeling Bad About Mechanics

Tribute

Cipher

Curses

Planning for the Future

Duel Deck Questions

Quick Hits!

Ugin, the Money Dragon

San Diego Comic Con (2013 and 2014)

The $100 Jace

Put a Bow On It, DJ

Grand Prix: Memphis (Memphis, TN – USA)

Grand Prix: Vancouver (Vancouver, CA)

SCG Open: Los Angeles (USA) – Standard

SCG Premier IQ: Los Angeles (USA) – Modern

SCG Premier IQ: Los Angeles (USA) – Legacy

Last Thoughts

Archetypes

G/U Ramp

U/W Fliers

B/W Shadow Aggro

U/B Control

G/W Aggro

Burn & Friends

Wrap Up

What to Remove

What to Add

Challenged Perspective #1, “Playtesting”

Challenged Perspective #2, “Magic Cards as Stocks”

So Yeah, That Amulet Deck

Quick Hits

Let’s Open the Theoretical [card]Helvault[/card]

Whitewashed

The Takeaway

Decklists

Other Notables

Data!!!

Restrictions Breed Cheating on Casting Costs

X Spells

Buyback

Kicker

Getting the Most from Your Lands