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After some recent debate on the forums about the merits of a Master of the Pearl Trident spec, I thought I'd take a look. Merfolk is an archetype with a lot of longevity in Legacy and with many pieces also available to Modern players, it sees play across both formats. With Wizards offering FNM support for the Modern Format, I'd expect more demand for Merfolk as the season kicks off.
Most of the comments on the forum talked about the potential for Master of the Pearl Trident to see standard play, or the likelihood of a tribal deck in the format. Â While I see this as a distinct possibility, if for no reason other than the decks popularity across formats, others are less convinced. Looking at the standard pool right now, Augur of Bolas, Talrand and even Scroll Thief all look very playable. The deck is screaming for a one drop, but any decent Merfolk in Gatecrash is going to have people toying with the idea.
The real challenge for any deck right in Standard is its ability to deal with the meta and put up results. Thankfully, in Gatecrash the Merfolk are most likely coming out of Simic which opens up another home for Thragtusk at 5cc. People insisting any Merfolk deck needs another lord are forgetting Clone. Using that card to copy just a Master of the Pearl Trident is awful, but the ability to shut down other legendary creatures or gain life and deliver resilient beats is strong. A Standard Merfolk variant might also finally be a home for Cackling Counterpart.
Ultimately, who cares about viability. The question is, how do we make money with Merfolk? The easiest way to do that: Phantasmal Image. Recent rotation out of Standard has hurt pricing on this super cost efficient clone. Modern runs this as a 4-of and Legacy calls for 2 at least. This card is starting to turn up after bottoming around 4$, but was a 12$ card in its prime. Conservatively this card could easily reach 8$ very quickly come January.
Moving into Modern
With Master of the Pearl Trident also a 4-of in Modern decklists, the card could peak in value around 4$ come Modern season. If it sees no play in Standard that is still almost a 100% return on investment at today's prices. For me, the margins aren't quite there at $2, so I'm limiting myself to aggressively trading into the Master of the Pearl Trident rather than buying it outright. This guy should perform at least as well as Coralhelm Commander.
Like many decks that need to protect vulnerable targets, Merfolk decklists often run Spellskite in the sideboard.  Here we've a $2 card that might settle out around $4 over time. I don't expect this card to spike much even as it creeps into some deck's main, but its utility will likely raise the floor on prices as time passes.
Related Targets
At $16 Cavern of Souls is about 25% off its high water mark. Here we have a card that belongs in many decks today in Standard and will see play in almost any deck that runs Æther Vial. For me, $14 looks like a good entry point for a long term investment that can turn hot in standard in a flash.
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I had a lot planned but I may make this one brief. Today, in the process of minding her own business in a pedestrian crossing, my wife managed to get struck by a car. I have it on good authority from an eyewitness that the noise she made when her head bounced off of the windshield was roughly "GaFAWK!" which, slowed down, I imagine stretches out to "Is this ACTUALLY #$*%ing happening right now?" Worst of all, Team Dreamcrush member (he insists on being referred to as the founder) Dr. Kyle English was on duty in the ER that day, so he insisted on treating her when she came in.
"Does it hurt when I do this?"
"Yes."
"Does this hurt?"
"YES!"
"How about now?"
"STILL YES! GaFAWK!"
Six hours later she's resting comfortably at home, propped up in bed with her laptop, eating painkillers and demanding to be waited on. Unfortunately, she is going to live.
That's Fascinating. Want to Talk About Something I Care About?
Wow, you're kind of a dick, rhetorical device.
Fine, let's talk about the latest MTG drama before we talk about decks.
Over the weekend, someone posted something racist on Twitter. Ok, lots of people posted lots of racist somethings on Twitter, but only one in particular caught the particular ire of the Magic Community. I won't repost the tweet here, you can find it on Helene Bergeot's page should you desire. Helene's response is also at this link.
Essentially someone made a racist tweet, it was reported to Helene Bergeot and she responded by saying there would be an investigation. Predictably, the community lost its damn mind. There were people defending the tweet as "not that racist" (I personally think it's kind of funny but that doesn't mean it's not racist; it so is) and that they were "disgusted by the level of PC." PV compared getting a DCI ban for a tweet to getting a DCI ban for getting in a fight at school. Phrases like "Twitter police" and "PC police" and "Nate Silver is a genius!" were tossed around on Twitter all weekend.
Here's what the libertarian wing of the Magic community forgot in their condemnation of the DCI ban (which itself is something they made up; if you re-read Helene's tweet, you'll see she used the word "investigation"). Tweety McRacist used the #SCGSea hashtag.
Can you see how that's maybe kinda relevant? Anyone who types in that hashtag to read about coverage is going to get that racist tweet as one of the search results. That means when someone performs a search associated with the event, they'll see that tweet, and Wizards allowing it to stand could be construed as a tacit endorsement of racism. Wizards should be allowed to take steps to protect its brand. If you think it's a First Amendment issue, you're mistaken. If some guy is putting flyers on windshields in a WalMart parking lot, no one will likely think the guy speaks for Walmart. But what if the flyer he's distributing is printed on WalMart's letterhead? See how that is a little different?
This isn't about WoTC caring what some chucklef%$^ says on Twitter. It's about Chuckles' use of a Magic hashtag. That's it. No one said he'd get a ban. Helene Bergeot only responded when an offended member of the community brought the tweet in question to her attention. Put down your pitchforks. WoTC isn't abridging anyone's First Amendment rights, it isn't policing twitter, and it certainly isn't banning someone for the equivalent of getting into a fight at school (PV himself conceded that the use of the hashtag was a nuance he hadn't considered that made the situation different).
I think WoTC is within its rights to investigate someone making a racist comment using an SCG hashtag which could cause the tweet to show up in the crawler on coverage, could be seen by people searching for coverage and could be construed as being tacitly endorsed by Wizards if they don't condemn the tweet in question.
Am I wrong? Let me know what you think in the comments, the forums or on my own Twitter feed. I'm pretty entrenched in my position (my position being "calm down, you're not thinking this through") but I'm willing to have the discussion. Anything's better than going upstairs and having to fluff pillows and refill water glasses.
Deck Me in the Face!
Besides racial controversy, what else happened at SCG Seattle?
Good God! Is that... Zombies!? In the top eight? It is! Is that eight unique decks out of a possible eight? Yep! Seems like the format is getting healthier.
Half of the decks jammed the maximum possible number of Thragtusks, but I prefer to think of the glass half empty. Meaning only half of the decks jammed the maximum number of Thragtusks, and given the diverse top eight, the other half can beat Tusk. Bant Control, a deck I've been on for weeks, has so many possible permutations to respond to different metagames. I've seen it built around [card Snapcaster Mage]Snapcaster[/card], planeswalkers-- even Cyclonic Rift. Whichever way you build it, the shell is sound and probably the right colors for a control strategy right now.
Garruk, Primal Hunter is criminally underpriced right now. I can't keep them in my binder and I was buying them for $3 cash a few weeks ago. That seems not correct.
How many [card Thalia, Guardian of Thraben]Thalia[/card] do you have? That card's on its way up, and with its high Legacy playability, not on its way back down. If you can trade another Standard card straight for Thalia, get the Eternal card always. Geist of Saint Traft is putting up results too, which is why it's sold out at $75 on a popular website. That's not even exaggerated that much!
Zombies went from the most expensive deck in Standard to a budget deck. [card Gravecrawler]Crawlers[/card] and [card Geralfs Messenger]Messengers[/card] were still beaucoup bucks because of other formats, but the rest of the deck was really affordable ($3 Lotleth Troll? Gimme!) and it might pop up more as people put it together on the cheap. It may not be able to beat double Thragtusk, but as decks get durdlier, it may be to go-to aggro deck for the budget-conscious. The mana base is still bonkers, but every mana base is, and Zombies is the deck without the $35 mythic or the $25 core set rare.
Augur of Bolas may be the best consolation prize for Ponder we've seen in years. It's getting jammed in a lot of decks, and its tribal alignment may be relevant in the next block. As a Simic guild member, I don't foresee us not getting crapped on, but others are more optimistic. I personally think all the merfolk will be prohibitively-costed.
I said to pick up Hellrider before it went out of control, and the top eight mono-red deck is why. With Gruul and Boros both in the pipe, Hellrider will almost certainly go up even more post rotation.
Reanimator is changing. With Brad Nelson's hoof deck stomping people (more on that later), expect more graveyard hate. Don't jam a Reanimator deck unless it can win through a Rest in Peace. Could those be going up the more popular [card Craterhoof Behemoth]Hoof[/card] gets? That all depends on whether it beats Hoof. Test it, and if it's effective, pick some up. They're practically a throw-in on trades, and if it hits $4 or $5, you did pretty well.
High Tide wins? Ugh. What a miserable deck both to play and play against.
Maverick was declared dead on Brainstorm Brewery this week (not by me) and it's looking good for a reanimated corpse. I'm sure a deck with efficient beaters, good ramp, access to hate bears, Green Sun's Zenith and Sylvan Library will always get there. Maverick is the best Knight of the Reliquary deck.
Junk begs to differ, though. Essentially "Dark Maverick," this list is also a contender for "best Knight of the Reliquary" deck.
BUG Still is a great deck idea and BUG decks have always been popular in Legacy since they printed Tarmogoyf.
I went a long time without mentioning Aluren! I love this deck! Parasitic Strix makes the combo much deadlier than previous iterations and Aluren proves that pet decks can get there given a skilled pilot and a little luck.
Eight decks in the top eight. Not much else to say. Legacy trends show RUG Delver and Sneak and Tell decks decreasing in popularity as players have finally figured out how to beat them. Show and Tell is peaking, and if you don't think you'll play them again, now may be the time to ship. Still no Academy Rectors... why did that card spike, again? Certainly not based on results.
Brad Nelson and event winner Martin Juza both played a silly Craterhoof Behemoth Ramp deck that uses Hoof (hope you got these at $2 like we said to on Brainstorm Brewery) and Somberwald Sage (potential spec target here as well). With its resilience to graveyard hate, hopefully its popularity won't cause other graveyard decks to take a lot of splash damage. Monkey see monkey do is in full effect here as the entire internet is scrambling for Hoofs and Sages. You pay a premium for lacking foresight and imagination, it would seem. It may be too late to get on the Hoof train, but Rest in Peace could get there as I said earlier.
Three similar Jund decks in the top eight. The pros still like this deck even if it's falling off a bit on the SCG trail.
B/R Zombies? OK, sounds fine, I guess. These could be on the rebound, so get those trade binders stocked. Anyone who sold their cards off and now is kicking themselves when they want to rebuild it will likely need the entire deck from you. Oblige them.
U/W/R and U/W Flash are both getting there. It's possible the pros play a little tighter and that Thragtusks are training wheels for control decks, or it's possible they made a metagame call. Either way, only one Bant deck top-eighted, but I guess only one U/W Flash deck made top eight and people won't shut up about how that deck is the dominant deck in Standard. Everyone's a pundit, but waiting for a U/W deck to get two top eights before declaring it the dominant deck isn't exactly Sabermetrics. The deck is good, but so are a lot of decks.
This Is Your Idea of "Short?"
I guess I can't half-ass my article, even when I'm busy. Oh well, more for you. I'll be back next week where I'll be telling you how I've invested my Craterhoof money. I may try to pay my house off a decade early.
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A profitable transaction always feels satisfying. Being able to find a discounted card and flip for profit is nice – speculating on a card and watching it catch on is even nicer. It’s truly a rewarding hobby.
With this in mind, I often strive to achieve as many profitable opportunities as possible. Whether I’m trading, selling online, or selling to a dealer, I always love the gratifying feeling of making money on Magic Cards. Perhaps this satisfying feeling is the emotional motivator that keeps me going in this hobby even though I rarely have time to actually play the game.
But sometimes I wonder if this greed for profitability is a hindrance. It drives me to emotionally charged decisions, and based on all that I’ve observed and read I should not be defaulting to emotions when running the MTG Finance gauntlet. Often times the best profit comes from patience and emotional neutrality.
My propensity to snap-sell cards for profit may inhibit my absolute performance due to acceptance of lower profit margins. This easily calculable factor is a key driver for business growth and success. There aren’t many companies around the world that are content with their current profit margins – we would all like them to be greater. Sometimes there is a difficult balance between emotions and profit margins, and I want to do my very best to explain (justify?) why I settle for lower margins so often.
Time Sensitivity
Card prices are in constant flux. As Magic grows in popularity the opportunities will become more frequent, but some may also be short lived. This is especially true thanks to the modernization of Magic. With live internet broadcasting of premier events, net decking, and endless forums, many cards are exposed to their fifteen minutes of fame. The most recent example was Nivmagus Elemental, a card that saw a tad of hype for about fifteen minutes while highlighted in a Pro Tour Feature Match.
Like Nivmagus Elemental, many cards don’t maintain their higher prices. And in some cases the price drop could occur at a moment’s notice. A card like Gravecrawler has seen peaks and troughs as Zombies succeeds and fails in Standard (chart from blacklotusproject.com).
Because of these price fluctuations, I’m often quick to sell when I can profit. If I had purchased several copies of Gravecrawler at $4 back in July (I think I did, actually), I’d be inclined to sell them as quickly and as conveniently as possible as the card’s price rises. Therefore, when a desperate dealer offered $6 on the card, I was more than happy to sell. Even though the card was still on an upward trend, I was way too concerned that there would be a significant price drop. Rather than extend the risk of owning this card, I was sure to move it right away.
More recently, I jumped on two play sets of Sphinxs Revelation. Below is a snapshot of the deal I found on Amazon.com:
Within days of placing this order, Star City Games increased their buy price on Sphinxs Revelation to $6 and sell price to $13. Seeing this sudden increase, I was faced with a dilemma. Do I hold out and hope this Mythic Rare continues it’s drive? Or do I cash out, freeing up some profits for a subsequent purchase.
This card is very metagame-dependent. Now that U/W control strategies are thriving in Standard, Sphinxs Revelation is well positioned. But once Gatecrash is released, that could easily change. Rather than hope the metagame remains constant, it seems like a safer bet to expect change. With this assessment in mind, I decided to sell. Four copies sold on eBay for $41.99 and the rest were traded / sold to a local dealer to $8.
Could I have made more? Possibly. Do I feel rewarded and emotionally charged from this successful speculation? Absolutely. And emotions are likely to win in a case like this.
Opportunity Cost
The concept of opportunity cost has been discussed multiple times before on this site – both in articles and the forums. In short, owning cards locks up funds and may prevent you from investing elsewhere. If I hold fifteen non-blue Zendikar Fetch Lands in anticipation of a price rise, that equates to about $120 of funds tied up in this asset. This is cash that I can’t use elsewhere.
So, if non-blue fetch lands end up spiking significantly then my choice was a wise one (chart from blacklotusproject.com).
But if these cards only increase marginally and/or gradually, perhaps my money would have been better suited elsewhere. For example, while Arid Mesa has increased nicely since July (about $2), could another R/W land have increased more in this time window? How about this one:
Clifftop Retreat (chart from blacklotusproject.com) has gone from $4 to $7.50 in about the same time period. Not only is this a greater absolute gain vs. Arid Mesa, but the percentage gain is substantially higher. Arid Mesa has seen a 25% increase while Clifftop Retreat has risen 67% in that same time frame.
So if I bought a few Arid Mesas at $8.50 a few months ago and sold recently, did I maximize profits? Arguably, no. Everyone expects non-blue Zendikar Fetch Lands to follow their blue counterparts and see a significant price bump due to Modern. But to me profit is profit. And selling those Arid Mesas freed up my cash so that I can speculate in something else. This ensures high turnover in my stock and shields me from significant risk of holding cards which are not top performers.
Fear of Losses
The final motivation for cashing out prematurely I want to touch upon is the irrational fear of losses. This is the most emotional motivating factor and perhaps the most costly. I’ll describe the concept with an example that took place just this past week.
A couple weeks ago Star City Games decided Jace, the Mind Sculptor was too cheap. They decided the price should be higher and they increased their buy price to $60 and their sell price to $100. Naturally, the internet reacted immediately and the “invisible hand” of economics shifted the price up significantly.
During this bump I noticed copies of the Planeswalker were selling out all over the place. eBay cracked $80, Amazon was even higher, and of course most retailers sold out. I found a copy at Card Shark selling for $69.99. Thinking this card was surely going to hit $80 at least, I pulled the trigger.
When the card arrived things had calmed down a bit. While Star City Games hadn’t changed their pricing, eBay had at least settled down. Copies were reliably selling in the low $70’s and I couldn’t even recoup my costs by selling. This created an internal dilemma.
To hold the card was to carry a double-edged sword. If Jace were to be unbanned in Modern, for example, the card could have no price ceiling. But unbanning of Jace in Modern seems unlikely. Even if it was possible, Wizards of the Coast has made it clear they want Modern to be affordable. A reprint would surely be on the horizon.
Because I didn’t want to be stuck holding a $75 card (opportunity cost), I started pushing the extra Jace. But there were no takers. Already I had felt like I was destined for a loss with potential for greater downside. The loss was so unbearable that the first dealer to offer me $70 was the proud owner of a new Jace. (chart from blacklotusproject.com)
Here I am fairly confident the decision was not technically correct. I should have held out and sought at least a trade outlet if not an improved selling price. But I was unhappy even with losing a few bucks on the card already that I had developed an irrational fear that I may lose more. Wanting to avoid being left with a “hot potato”, I cut loose and ate the $4 loss.
Give and Take
There are some benefits to being anxious to sell. I rarely lose excessive amounts on an investment and I keep high turnover in my binder. Opportunity cost is also rarely an issue for me.
The cost of this, however, is that I must accept a lower profit margin sometimes. Being quick to sell doesn’t always ensure the greatest payouts.
This is where my emotions come in. By justifying my actions with the rationalization that profiting from a hobby is an invigorating pastime, I’ve overcome disquiet from suboptimal business. This could be for better or worse. From a logical standpoint you could say I am “not doing it right”. But if I’m making money and having a blast, I don’t really care.
…
Sigbits
Some dealers are still overvaluing Umezawas Jitte. It seems like retailers want this to be a $30 card, but that is just not the case. This weekend I sold my extra copy to a dealer for $17 even though auctions on eBay are ending in the $18-$20 range.
If you haven’t been following along in the forums, then you need to know that Helm of Obedience is now a $20 card thanks to Star City Games. NM copies can be sold to SCG for $10. I’m not sure if this price will stick, but I hope to unload my copies quickly. It’s worth noting that Helm is on the Reserved List.
Speaking of Reserved List, what is going on with Gaeas Cradle? This card is sold out at Star City Games at $80 and I don’t see very many copies in trade binders. I had my shot at a MP Japanese copy today but it’s too difficult for me to stomach giving up so much for this card when it sees almost no play outside of EDH. I passed and opted to sell my Jace rather than trade it for the Cradle.
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Mike, Forrest and Ryan get together to rant about Modern, GP Chicago and the foul condition of Mike's recently "cleaned" room. This week's episode features Mike contemplating donating his body to science, Forrest finding an Oreo and Ryan complaining about T-shirts. All of this plus discussion of A+ card Unsummon for well under five dollars!
(The views expressed in "Good Luck, High Five!" are those of the personalities featured and do not necessarily represent the views of and should not be attributed to our host.)
Parental Advisory: May Contain Mild Obscene Language
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In the world of MTGO speculating, certain factors have a larger influence on the digital economy than others. One of these highly influential factors is set redemption.
In a previous article, I outlined how set redemption affects the MTGO economy. If you need a refresher I'd recommend starting there. Today I'm going to analyze some price data to illustrate some of these principles in action.
Comparing MTGO and Paper Prices
Presented below is a chart with set prices from the last 4 years, both from supernova bots and Star City Games. A simple ratio is calculated using these two values to show how an online set is priced relative to its paper counterpart. Also presented are the ratios from the previous time this metric was used. This illustrates how the relative value of sets can change over time and informs what broader trends can be expected in the MTGO market.
Set
MTGO to Paper Ratio (Aug 12th)
MTGO to Paper Ratio (Nov 14th)
Supernova
SCG
Trend
Shards of Alara
0.23
0.17
$29
$175
Down
Conflux
0.33
0.28
$39
$140
Down
Alara Reborn
0.27
0.27
$30
$110
Flat
Magic 2010
0.23
0.18
$27
$150
Down
Zendikar
0.56
0.6
$135
$225
Up
Worldwake
0.74
0.64
$96
$150
Down
Rise of the Eldrazi
0.77
0.65
$130
$200
Down
Magic 2011
0.41
0.26
$39
$150
Down
Scars of Mirrodin
0.38
0.45
$56
$125
Up
Mirrodin Besieged
0.4
0.39
$39
$100
Flat
New Phyrexia
0.61
0.57
$63
$110
Down
Magic 2012
0.37
0.36
$54
$150
Flat
Innistrad
0.54
0.51
$141
$275
Down
Dark Ascension
0.46
0.64
$96
$150
Up
Avacyn Restored
0.53
0.76
$190
$250
Up
Magic 2013
0.33
0.5
$125
$250
Up
Return to Ravnica
N/A
0.39
$138
$350
N/A
The Non-Redeemable Sets
Shards of Alara block and Magic 2010 have seen further price declines overall. Without redemption to support prices, these sets are priced according to the presence of tournament staples. Eternal play is still dwarfed by Standard, so the down trend in these ratios is not unexpected.
Zendikar block and Magic 2011 just went offline for redemption. This means there is no longer a strong connection between digital and paper prices for these sets. In the table, the trend for these sets as well as other non-redeemable sets is mostly down, with Zendikar being the exception. The price of online sets are falling relative to paper prices. Expect this trend to continue so avoid speculating on cards that are not format staples as the long term trend for these sets is down. Any reprints or Zen block draft queues will make a large impact on prices without redemption to sop up extra supply.
Opportunities in Scars Block
Scars block and Magic 2012 just rotated out of Standard and the price on these sets has fallen for both digital and paper versions. New Phyrexia (NPH) has the highest ratio of these sets, and the other three all have a ratio about 2/3 the value of NPH. On a relative basis, this suggests that redeemers will have more incentive to convert the first two Scars block sets rather than NPH to capture the greater price differential.
With reprints in the core set muddying the waters somewhat, the recommended course of action is to focus on mythics from Mirrodin Besieged (MBS) and Scars of Mirrodin (SOM), in that order. From MBS, cards like Hero of Oxid Ridge and Consecrated Sphinx are good medium term targets and both have bounced off of their post rotation lows. Longer term, both Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas and Sword of Feast and Famine will benefit from being both redeemable and playable in Eternal formats.
Nissa Revane as a Guide
Nissa Revane saw a steady price increase after Zendikar rotated. The trajectory of this card can inform an approach to potential speculation targets from SOM. The presence of the fetch lands in Zendikar no doubt increased demand from redeemers for all ZEN mythics, so lower price targets are more realistic for SOM mythics.
In the chart below, the price bottom of Nissa Revane is clearly visible just prior to rotation in October 2011, followed by a steady up trend over the course of the year. A price peak is observed just prior to the end of Zendikar redemption, followed by a sharp decline.
The trio of planeswalkers from SOM have all found their post rotation lows. Elspeth Tirel, Koth of the Hammer and Venser, the Sojourner should all see steady increases in prices over the following year.
The Big Lesson
Looking back to the August ratios, one of the lowest for in-print sets was Magic 2013. In retrospect there turned out to be a ton of value in Magic 2013 back in August. We've seen Thundermaw Hellkite, Sublime Archangel and Thragtusk drag the ratio much higher in the last six weeks. It's foolish to suggest the ratio predicted price increases on these cards, but it definitely pointed to the online set being priced too low.
Looking at the highest ratios, the old high was held by Rise of the Eldrazi, and the current high is held by Avacyn Restored. At this point, this ratio metric is not very well developed, but it suggests that Avacyn Restored is close to being fully priced and does not present much value overall. On the other hand, despite the recent price increase on the cards from Magic 2013, it looks like there is still some value in this set as its ratio is currently in the middle of the pack.
In particular, both Ajani, Caller of the Pride and Liliana of the Dark Realms have seen slightly higher prices in the last month, which can be attributed mostly to redemption and the slowdown in core set drafting. Both of these planeswalkers could see more play in Standard than they do currently, and with Gatecrash looming expect the format to be shaken up.
Aggressive mono red decks are the current beatdown deck of choice on MTGO. Its rock solid mana base is a part of the reason. Once Sacred Foundry is available, along with any Boros goodies, aggressive R/W builds will become more viable and Ajani looks well suited to appear in decks that enjoy the attack step. In particular, the interaction between Precinct Captain and Ajani seems currently underexploited. For those with only a few tix, Precinct Captain appears well positioned to join the Boros guild.
Liliana of the Dark Realms's +1 Loyalty ability is only functioning at half power in the current Standard environment. When Watery Grave and Godless Shrine are printed in Gatecrash, the cycle of swamp shocklands will be complete, reducing deck building restrictions on this card. Liliana of the Dark Realms might fit into an Esper control deck at that time, so currently this card represents good value to the patient speculator.
Both the new Ajani and new Liliana currently present low-risk opportunities as they are near their respective price floors, and redemption will support prices for M13 mythics. The prices on the other mythic rares that have broken out give a good indicator for potential gains.
Dark Ascension (DKA) has one of the higher ratios of the redeemable sets, which suggests that DKA presents less value to redeemers and should be avoided by speculators. Without demand due to redemption, prices are more volatile and thus present riskier opportunities. This is not to suggest there are no gains to be had from speculating on cards from DKA, but that speculators tread cautiously when assessing cards from this set.
Return to Ravnica
Interestingly enough, Return to Ravnica (RtR) presents the best opportunity for speculators, as indicated by the ratio. Redemption for RtR begins after the downtime today, Wednesday November 14th 2012, which means the ratio will start to rise. The start of redemption will push a steady supply of physical sets into the real world, bringing down IRL prices.
Also although it's not known whether redemption consumes all the packs that are currently opened in draft, it seems unlikely that that is the case. This suggests that that online prices for cards from RtR should continue to fall over the coming weeks. It's expected that IRL prices fall faster than digital prices. Keeping an eye on the ratio will inform us which effect is dominating.
Also, a low RtR ratio in the New Year would suggest a good speculative opportunity. Once Gatecrash is released online, RtR drafting will slow down considerably. This will reduce new supply. If the ratio stays low, demand from redeemers should be unchanged as they seek to capture the difference between digital and paper prices. This would indicate that RtR could offer exceptional value as a speculation target in the weeks leading up to the release of Gatecrash.
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Finally back in Oklahoma and trying to recover from a crazy weekend!
I was actually able to make it to a big event (a rarity for me during the sportsball seasons), and went to SCG: Dallas last weekend. Before I get into what was moving well on the trading floor, let's get out of the way how much trying to get myself there sucked.
Most reasonable people left on Friday night to make the three-hour trip from Norman to Dallas, but since I had to cover a football game on Friday night that wasn't an option for me. Luckily I found a group of people leaving Saturday morning to head down there, which also helped me to save a night on hotel costs. The only catch? The group themselves lived two hours away in Lawton, which while south of Norman, wasn't exactly on the way to Dallas. And since I don't finish with work until about 11:30, this meant I had a difficult choice to make as to when to head down there. Luckily, someone was kind enough to let me crash on their couch in the wee hours of Saturday morning when I finally made it down there, and I got about three hours of sleep before we left at 5 a.m. for Dallas.
This started the theme of not sleeping, resulting in the crash once I arrived home. But before that happened I was able to do some nice work out on the trade floor.
Let's start with what went well.
- Thragtusk was in demand, and I was happy to flip any copies away. While the card is highly liquid and the price is probably stable, there's also no upside on it, which is a problem. And since only two of the decks in the Top 8 were running the beast, we could even see a price dip if the trend continues.
- Speaking of the Top 8, Restoration Angel was all over the place, as was Geist and Snapcaster. The RWU decks seem like the real deal going forward, at least until the meta shifts to combat them.
- Deathrite Shaman is ridiculously hot. This is almost entirely because of Modern and Legacy play, although he's proven to be better in Standard than I initially gave it credit for. It was trading for $12 on the floor, and I flipped at that price and traded for everyone I could at $8-10. While only a Rare, and certainly no Snapcaster, Deathrite probably has legs at $10, so I'm not afraid of moving on some at that price to keep them stocked.
- Thundermaw Hellkite continues to climb. We've been ahead of this one for awhile, and it's starting to pay off. I have a handful in my trade binder that people have been going crazy for over the last two weeks, but I've been up front with them that I have to have at least $20 to trade them away. While people scoffed at me at first, it's now up to $20 on SCG and pushing that on TCGPlayer. Wouldn't be surprised to see this hit $25 on the trade floor in the next week or two.
- Now here's my "spec" of the weekend. Hellrider. With the Red deck tearing up Magic Online but not yet translating into paper, not many people have caught onto this. This allowed me to pick them up at $2-3 all weekend, and I even felt comfortable grabbing them at the SCG price of $4. SCG had them in stock for a while on Saturday, but by the afternoon they were sold out online. Since then, the card has gone up to $6 (still sold out) on SCG and nearly $6 on TCGPlayer. Remember, this is a card from Dark Ascension with no secondary printings. We're talking about an underopened set that was only available for a few months. Don't be surprised to see this hit $8-10 in couple weeks.
- Dark Ascension in general. For instance, Thalia finally has reached the heights I originally predict for it, $6-8. And with all the Legacy play this sees, $10 won't be out of the question before long. I'm more than happy to pick these up at $5-6 and hold onto them for the forseeable future.
Now, an interlude.
Back to the hassles of making real life work with Magic. Since I technically work on Saturdays (although most of the work can be done remotely), I planned on spending the drive down there getting some work done. Of course, conversations about life and Magic and Allies in Modern (Aether Vial, anyone?) Â instead dominated the trip, so I was left with work to do when we arrived. This led to the humorous sight of me sitting down on the convention center ground with a laptop on the floor and high school football rosters spread out around me. Not the weirdest place I've done work before, but certainly inconvenient. Anyway, after only a few people giving me weird looks like I may be lost I was able to finish up and hit the floor again.
So let's talk about what didn't trade well out on the floor.
- Zombies. As expected, the deck has completely fallen off, though some of the prices haven't yet caught up. The biggest issue I see at the moment is Falkenrath Aristocrat. Still sitting at $20 (higher than Huntmaster) despite seeing absolutely no play. I still had a handful in my binder and I was ecstatic when I found probably the only player in the room looking for them. If you still have any of these, I suggest moving them before the price catches up with the playability.
- Bonfire of the Damned. I may have failed miserably calling the initial rise of Bonfire, but it looks like I've been spot-on in predicting its downfall. SCG was paying just $12 on-site. It's still listed at $30 on their site, but you know it's a bad trend when you're not even getting 50% on a card. That's a clear sign that it's probably headed even further down.
- Niv-Mizzet. This one hurt me a little, since I still think it's basically the nuts finisher in a control deck. It's seen some play in that role already, yet somehow this thing isn't difficult to find and retails for just $5-6. I'm telling you again, this is a steal. With Dimir coming out in Gatecrash and making Grixis more viable, a Control finisher that doesn't die to something like Mizzium Mortars and is good in both the creature and control matchups is something to watch out for. There's no reason now to stack up on these at $5. Worst-case scenario you break about even or lose a little value, since as a Commander general and iconic card there's a certain floor for Mythics like this ($3 or so), and this is way better than something like that. We're going to see a spike somewhere along the line, and you'll be glad you had them.
A second interlude.
Look at the art on the card Syncopate. Now imagine a waitress serving you delicious adult beverages who looks exactly like her. That's exactly the experience a group of friends and I had while out on Saturday. And the best part was, when someone was brave enough to actually show her the card and tell her, she had a good time with it. A pretty awesome experience, all in all, especially considering I drafted RTR for just the second time later that night after drinks and crushed everyone with Rakdos.
In fact, I was feeling so confident after the draft I entered one of SCG's $10 casual drafts the next day, where the prize is three packs for the winner. Determined to rare draft over drafting a good deck, I preceded to open Blood Crypt, Overgrown Tomb and Cyclonic Rift. Then, playing an awkward Bant deck where two of my four wins came from Doorkeepers, I accidentally made it to the finals, where I scooped to a friend who promptly opened three bulk rares in his pack.
Sometimes you're just good at Magic.
- The only other note I want to make is the benefit of trading with dealers on the floor. Some people are very leery about trading with dealers who don't have a booth because they think they're only going to get ripped off. On the other hand, i enjoy being able to be honest about real prices when trading with dealers, and I have no problem trading Standard stuff at cash prices to floor dealers who want to move their Legacy cards. This is how I've come into my Dual Land collection, and it nets me a better deal than simply going to a booth and trying to trade in. If you're interested in acquiring high-end Legacy cards, don't be afraid to take this route, since dealers usually need Standard cards that sell easily more than they need Dual Lands.
All in all, I had a great time at my first big event in 3+ months. Hopefully I'll be at either San Antonio or Indy in the next few weeks, and if so, I hope to see you there!
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Here’s the situation: It’s been a long day. You are playing in round eight of nine at Grand Prix Chicago.
Format: Modern
Your Deck: Naya Pod
Untitled Deck
Creatures
4 Birds of Paradise
2 Noble Hierarch
4 Wall of Roots
4 Restoration Angel
3 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
1 Meddling Mage
1 Spellskite
1 Wall of Omens
1 Phantasmal Image
1 Deceiver Exarch
1 Kitchen Finks
1 Eternal Witness
1 Aven Mindcensor
1 Harmonic Sliver
1 Murderous Redcap
1 Zealous Conscripts
Spells
2 Commune With Nature
4 Birthing Pod
3 Chord of Calling
Lands
4 Arid Mesa
2 Misty Rainforest
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Marsh Flats
1 Temple Garden
1 Stomping Ground
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Steam Vents
2 Fire-Lit Thicket
4 Copperline Gorge
2 Razorverge Thicket
1 Forest
1 Mountain
1 Plains
Sideboard
3 Path to Exile
3 Creeping Corrosion
2 Obstinate Baloth
1 Kitchen Finks
1 Qasali Pridemage
1 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Linvala, Keeper of Silence
1 Cunning Sparkmage
Your Opponent’s Deck: Storm with Pyromancer Ascension and Goblin Electromancer
Your board state:
After drawing for the turn, your only card in hand is Fire-Lit Thicket.
You know that you need to do something otherwise there is a good probability you will lose on your opponent’s next turn. So, what’s the play?
These are the types of situations you find yourself in piloting Modern Naya Pod. The large number of one-of’s regularly create complex decision trees. For this case, since I needed to stop my opponent immediately, I sacrificed the Wall of Roots to the Birthing Pod and searched out Harmonic Sliver to blow up his Pyromancer Ascension. Was that the correct play though? At the time I thought it was, but after the match I realized that I blew it. My opponent needed one extra turn but he beat me easily by comboing out.
Here was the correct line of play:
Pod out Wall of Roots using the mana it produced and two life. Search out Deceiver Exarch and untap the Birthing Pod. Activate the Birthing Pod again sacrificing the Restoration Angel to get Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker. Proceed to win the game.
This was not a complex or uncommon board state and I was disappointed that I did not see the play. It was likely I would lose game three with Storm on the play, but I would have at least gotten to play the game.
9 days earlier…
After finalizing arrangements for a place to stay outside of Chicago, I was tormented by the fact that I didn’t know what I was going to play. Modern is a complex format that is always in a state of flux. I think one of the most important parts of playing the format is knowing which deck will be good from event to event. For this event, it was obvious that Jund would be a huge hurdle to overcome. I was not going to this event with a deck that didn’t have a decent match against the most popular deck. This is solid advice for any event but especially one where as much as thirty percent of the metagame could be the deck-to-beat. The problem is that no deck has a significant edge against it.
I spent a lot of time thinking about what deck I could play. Briefly I considered trying to develop my own deck to trump Jund, Infect and Affinity, all three of which I believe are weak against a controlling deck. With a limited amount of time to prepare I decided this plan was not the best idea.
The two main decks I played in Modern last PTQ season were Melira Pod and Splinter Twin so I thought about my experiences with them. I hated the Jund vs. Splinter Twin match so that was not a route I was willing to take. Jund vs. Melira Pod though, was not bad at all. Sometimes they beat you but often you have a ton of time to stabalize and win either by grinding damage or eventually comboing them out. Jund with Deathrite Shamans seemed like it would be a closer match but ultimately still in favor of the combo deck. Melira Pod seemed much less efficient than the newer version using the Kiki-Jiki combos.
Once I decided on Naya Pod for the event, I got to work on my list. Some of the cards are auto-includes but there is actually a lot of wiggle room to play around with the slots. Many of the singletons can be changed for other things so keep that in mind when you are going to play a version of this deck.
This list may look generic, but there are some significant differences between my list and the more common versions. The first main difference is my inclusion of Commune with Nature. Unfortunately, my tech was spoiled a few weeks ago at a European Grand Prix, but the card is still very good, adding consistency to the deck for a low mana cost. I considered playing a third copy but I didn't want to cut anything. Playing the full four Chord of Callings can be a liability due to its mana cost, especially when you don't draw a Wall of Roots. Commune with Nature is very good early on turns one and two when you are trying to set up the combo. Having the option to regrow it later with Eternal Witness is also good.
Another card I included was Meddling Mage. I feel that Modern is weak to this card right now especially in game one of many matches. Storm, Splinter Twin, Eggs, and even decks like U/W Midrange have a tough time playing through a Meddling Mage chanting the correct card. The only match where I don’t like the original hate bear is against Jund but it is so good against the rest of the field that it’s worth including. Even naming something like Cranial Plating against Affinity is great because it forces them to have a removal spell or not be able to kill you quickly. Against every deck, naming their key card gives you time to find or protect your combo.
Murderous Redcap may seem like a normal card choice but it actually went out of style many months ago. Sometimes you just need to cap a guy though right? Seriously though, I think Redcap is great against Jund where it is often trading for two of their creatures. It is a solid metagame choice when you are expecting aggro decks be prevalent. Against many opponents Redcap gets swapped for Glen Elendra Archmage. For this event I believe my choice to be correct.
Wall of Omens was a great idea but even with many aggressive decks being played, it seemed not quite good enough. I like the idea of podding into it since it replaces itself but I think the spot could be better served as something else. [card Chord of Calling]Chording[/card] for it is moot because you'd rather just wait to chord for Eternal Witness and follow it up with another Chord for Restoration Angel to blink Witness. This line of play should be used in many hands with this deck.
Make sure you are aware of the most important line of play with this deck because it comes up so much of the time. Opponents will rarely be able to predict their demise from this sequence of turns. Take a look.
Turn 1 – Land, Birds of Paradise
Turn 2 – Land, Wall of Roots
Turn 3 – Land, Birthing Pod
Turn 4 – *Blindside Win
*Blindside Win:
Pod Wall of Roots using its mana and two life into Deceiver Exarch.
Pod Birds of Paradise with its mana and two life into Phantasmal Image copying Deceiver Exarch.
Pod the Deceiver Exarch copy into Restoration Angel and blink the original.
Pod Restoration Angel into Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker.
This version of the combo highlights the power of this deck. Many players are still not aware of how easy it is to win with this deck and they will often tap out leaving a window open for you to kill them.
There are many ways to win on turn four but winning on turn three involves some luck. If you have double Wall of Roots and double Birds of Paradise in addition to Birthing Pod and the right number of lands you can win turn three, but I believe that is the only way.
Nine days and many card choice changes later I arrived at GP Chicago. Here’s what happened.
Round 1 – Bye
Round 2 - The first game of my tournament I got to show off the blindside win. My opponent tapped out turn four and was punished with a loss. Game two was a thirty-five minute affair that finally ended with me unable to deal the final couple points of damage to finish the game. I maintained pressure for a long time but eventually I drew too many lands in a row. Drawing all four Birds of Paradise did not help at all this game either. Game three was never finished so I started out my day with a draw. Frustrating.
Record: 1-0-1
Round 3 – The draw bracket scared me because I thought I would be grinding games against blue-white all day. Luckily, that was not the case and I was granted an unprepared GR Tron opponent. He literally said he removed all of his sideboard cards for this matchup. He was not lying either and it was a quick match. He did have some sick natural tron draws and a bunch of Karn Liberated.
Record: 2-0-1
Round 4 – Running it right back, I had another GR Tron player to take down. When your opponent has the right sideboard cards, Combust, the match is a lot closer though. Game one was slow because I had to fight through not one but two Karns, but eventually I won. Game two he blew me out with the Combust but I knew he had Emrakul, the Aeons Torn in hand so I had to go for it. Late in game three I tanked at the end of his turn and finally came up with the play to chord for Deceiver Exarch, tapping his Prismatic Lens so he did not have access to Combust mana. I successfully assembled the combo on my turn. If you have enough time, you should try to combo with Kiki-Jiki and Zealous Conscripts against them because it wins even through Combust.
Record: 3-0-1
Round 5 – My opponent this round was playing Jund but he was almost as defensive as a control deck. This gave me plenty of time to assemble Restoration Angel plus Kiki-Jiki. Because he did not have any pressure, I was able to win through two discard spells and two or three removal spells. The second game played out similarly, like playing against a Jund control deck rather than the hard-to-manage aggro control deck.
When I thought I was going to win the game, instead I lost to an unlikely card. Rakdos Charm. Making 500 Restoration Angels seems terrible when you die immediately. Game three was more of the same accept I was resigned not to lose to a terrible Standard uncommon. Instead of focusing on assembling the combo, my goal was to grind him out with damage. He didn’t realize this in time and found himself in a position with no outs to my Restoration Angel attacking for the win.
Record: 4-0-1
Round 6 – Being on the draw when your opponent plays first turn Celestial Colonnade is not the best place for Naya Pod. Even though this opponent had a much better record than the last one with a similar deck, it was a much easier match for me. It was not too hard though when he had two Mutavaults and a Tectonic Edge to go with his man land. He quickly ran out of answers due to a lack of colored mana.
Game two I was starting to think the game was going long after he countered a bunch of my spells, but luckily when I tried to steal his Tectonic Edge with my Zealous Conscripts he was out of counters and had to sac it in response. Making this play on his turn off of Chord sealed the match because then he was tapped out for my turn when I hardcast Kiki-Jiki to make 500 Zealous Conscripts. Turns out, he didn’t know that was a combo.
Record: 5-0-1
Round 7 – After four straight wins, I was feeling confident wrecking up the draw bracket. This was not my day though and I finally got a terrible paring. I was up against eventual Top 8 player Michael Simon piloting U/R Splinter Twin, but of course I didn’t know it at the time. While we were playing I noted how strong his deck list was as well so I was not surprised to see him do well.
In my opinion, this is the worst match for Naya Pod. They are basically playing the same deck as you except theirs is much better positioned. Moving Linvala, Keeper of Silence to the sideboard really hurt me here. Game one he was on the play, I kept a fine hand in the dark, but losing on turn four highlighted how bad it was against him. Game two should have gone in my favor but instead of winning on turn four, I missed two land drops to fall too far behind.
Record: 5-1-1
Round 8 – Right after getting crushed by my worst matchup, I had to go play the second worst one, Storm. Despite the Pod vs. Storm match being distinctly in their favor, it was a great match. Game one, I kept a strong hand with four lands, Angel, Kiki-Jiki and Wall of Roots. This is an auto-keep against almost anyone. Unfortunately he won the die roll and I never got a fourth turn to kill him. He did play a Gitaxian Probe to rub it in though. Remember the story from the beginning of the article? That’s what happened game two. I missed the kill because I was too focused on disrupting his gameplan. With this deck it is really important to know when to disrupt your opponent and when to go for the kill so be careful.
Record: 5-2-1
Round 9 – Despite having an extremely small window to make day two, I stuck around for the last round. My opponent had to go catch a train so I got the end of the day concession which was nice. We played a quick game one in which I smashed his homebrew Esper Gifts deck, but it seemed to be quite an interesting sixty.
Final Record: 6-2-1 and five spots short of making day two.
Naya Pod is a great deck and I don’t regret my decision to play it. With the exception of the misplay against Storm that cost me the match, I was pleased with my level of play with the deck. I made a number of subtle plays over the course of the event that led to game wins and that is key with this deck. The deck seems apt for PTQ season but some tweaks are necessary. Any comments on the deck list are welcome so share your thoughts!
Until Next Time, remember…
Four mana,
Birds of Paradise,
Wall of Roots,
Birthing Pod,
And eight life to pay,
Is a recipe for infinite damage.
Mike Lanigan MtgJedi on Twitter
(I'm active on twitter again, so send me a message sometime.)
Jedicouncilman23@gmail.com
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Over the past few weeks I've discussed my transition into focus on MTGO, and switching out of Paper Magic. This has been a very educational process thus far, and I am confident more lessons are on their way. This is really a two fold process: Closing all of my Paper specs; and moving into MTGO markets. Closing paper specs can be easy, and for the most part I took the least time consuming route by unloading most of my stuff via dealers.
While knowing I'm coughing up a small amount of value by doing so, the time I saved was more valuable to me. I've held onto a handful of cards to have a single deck to play with, and that's about it. Transitioning to MTGO has been slower than expected. The main issue is the huge time sink that comes into being a savvy investor on MTGO. That being said, I'm setting up a process for myself to make things as simple as possible.
The major time sink in speculating on MTGO is the format in which trades take place. The only real method for finding places to buy and sell cards is on the classifieds which has an awful search feature and absolutely no mechanism for sorting. If you're looking to buy a card, you simply have to scan classifieds looking for the best price, or use major bot-chains like MTGOLibrary to search on the web prior to accessing bots via the MTGO client. The other side of it is just as time consuming, when looking to sell off cards; however, I've found that creating your own classified to offload cards is much better.
The key is to frequently remove and repost it while you're logged into the client. This ensures that your classified is easily found. Posting your own classifieds is important because not only do you get better value than what the bots offer, but you're often actually able to sell more volume this way. Most bots have a cap as to the quantity of a single card they will buy from you, but if you are slightly undercutting Bot Sell prices, and list your cards as sold by "HUMAN" you'll get a decent response, and most people I've talked to prefer to buy from a person rather than a bot. Mostly because prices are lower, but also it just "feels" right. Given that I'm spending significantly more time to acquire and offload cards than I would in paper, I need to have an effective tracking method to minimize times spent on other facets of speculation.
To contrast the drawbacks to speculating on MTGO, there are some key upsides. The primary benefit is the lack of physical cards. No sorting, no searching for where you left a certain card, no wondering "Wait, do I still have that set of X?" and no worries about condition. You also get a handy filter in your MTGO account, but it's lacking in the features I'd like to see. As a result, I built myself a spreadsheet for tracking my speculations on MTGO without getting them confused with my other junk stuck on my account. Feel free to use or adapt this to your own needs, and if you need a spreadsheet to do something else , I'd be happy to help any Insider customize this sheet to their needs. The theory here is I'll have a front page of my current speculation portfolio and an additional sheet to track closed positions.
On the portfolio side, most of the fields are obvious. Tracking the quantity and price that you got in at is important, but also important is the % of your portfolio that is being used by that single position. If you have one position that greatly outweighs the others in terms of percentage, you're not doing yourself much of a service by diversifying. Diversification of risk is not just how many different positions you hold, but how large they are in comparison to your portfolio. As of this writing, my portfolio has 3 positions, you'll see two of them make up 25% each while the other makes up 50%.
Ideally, my positions would be fairly evenly spread, unless I specifically chose one position to be a stronger investment than the others. My goal in terms of speculation is to get 10 solid specs in the list that each make up about the same percent of the portfolio. This protects you from huge dips in a single card, while also hurts you when only one of your positions is gaining. Each time you open or close a position you should re-evaluate your portfolio and see if you should shift any of your quantities held around to keep the portfolio balanced.
On the Closed Speculations sheet you can track your results. You can see about how frequently you close your positions, giving you an idea on how much time cards typically stay in your inventory. This is important, because when you have specs that aren't moving, you need to know how long you're willing to sit on that idea. With each spec you make you should have a general timeline for how long until you expect it to move. My most confident position right now is Nephalia Drownyard (Notice the pros are already starting to play this card? Both Michael Hetrick and Sam Black are playing it now.) and I expect it to peak around the release of Gatecrash.
When I assess my results, I want to know how accurate my estimations were so I can use that information to revise expectations of other positions while also improving my ability to estimate future predictions. Secondly, you have the track record of gains and losses. It's easy to remember your big gains and losses, but sometimes the small movements are hard to gauge their impact as a whole on your portfolio with out actually keeping track of the numbers and revisiting them. Keep yourself honest.
For those of you who frequent the Forums here, I am going to start a thread for tracking MTGO Bots. (If you aren't using the Forums, you are really missing out). My primary purpose is to report what I find on the Bulk Bots as I am slowly dumping old useless commons on my account that I simply have no use for. It's a painstaking task, but compiling a list of what bulk bots actually will buy and for what price will help you keep the time spent hunting classifieds to a minimum. My time frame for completing all of my bulk sales is still unknown, but I will be updating that thread rather than revisiting this topic again in the future.
Are there key features to tracking your portfolio that I didn't include? What are other issues that come up with speculation online that we can make easier by sharing information in the Forums?
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I really like to brew. I’m not nearly as good at brewing as I am at tweaking existing archetypes, but that has never stopped me from staying up until 4 A.M. hashing out what would fit best in a dedicated Augury Adept pile. Legacy is far and away the format that I have had the most success with, but I have never come close to brewing a remotely viable Legacy deck. That may have changed last night.
I’ve been thinking about Deathrite Shaman a lot lately. The card has proven to be very strong in Standard and phenomenal in Modern. As of yet I haven’t seen the card take off in Legacy. I mean, I’ve seen people playing it, but in shells that I don’t think are competitive enough. There’s a local player that shoe-horned the card into Nic Fit, but at the end of the day he’s still playing Nic Fit. I’d like to play a deck that doesn’t need to mulligan into Veteran Explorer plus Cabal Therapy to even play Magic.
What Should a Deathrite Shaman Deck Look Like?
I’ve heard the comparison to Grim Lavamancer many times, but I don’t think it fits at all. Lavaman isn’t about just doming your opponent- it’s largely about killing creatures. Shaman also isn’t all that much about doming your opponent. It serves as a mana accelerant, a graveyard hoser, a clock, and in a pinch it gains life, too. The best Deathrite Shaman deck is going to take advantage of all of these things.
Most of what the card does is exploited simply by virtue of playing a game of Magic, but exploiting the mana acceleration in the best way is the key to building the best Deathrite Shaman deck. Strong three drops and one/two drops that synergize effectively on turn two seem to be the ticket.
Along this line of thought, the best turn two plays that I came up with were the following:
Liliana of the Veil
We’ll start with the most obvious of the turn two plays I came up with. Liliana is a card that has seen on and off play in Legacy and has always been on my radar. I think that the problem previously was that she didn’t have a very strong home, but I believe I found one for her. She shines in any deck that battles for attrition and that’s exactly where my list landed. Liliana plays very well with cards like Dark Confidant and Life from the Loam, and you’d best believe that this is the direction the deck is going.
Having too many threes is a good way to do nothing while your opponent kills you in Legacy, so while I am excited about Liliana I believe that the following card combinations are even more important to the deck.
Dark Confidant + Discard/Spell Pierce
The ability to play a Dark Confidant with Spell Pierce backup on turn two can be quite devastating. This will make it so that your opponent will have to have either two removal spells or one with counter backup to deal with your Bob. On turn two. Even if they do have that combination they’re still not doing anything proactive. Leaving the Spell Pierce up against combo decks while safely landing a Bob goes a very long way as well.
Being able to Thoughtseize or Inquisition of Kozilek to protect Bob or to disrupt combos is also very clearly powerful. Of course, when it comes to the discard suite I’m starting with four Cabal Therapy because of the following card:
Baleful Strix + Cabal Therapy
Baleful Strix has mostly only been showing up in Tezzeret decks, but I think that the card is absolutely playable ipso facto. It trades with literal everything and draws a card while doing so. Against combo decks it is a prime candidate for being sacrificed to Therapy. It’s not as explosive as a Veteran Explorer, but I’m not building an explosive deck, I am building a consistent deck.
And the Rest
From here we get to some obvious inclusions like Brainstorm and to a lesser extent Abrupt Decay. That leaves us with the following list:
Shaman Ain’t Easy
spells
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Dark Confidant
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Baleful Strix
4 Brainstorm
1 Life from the Loam
2 Darkblast
3 Spell Pierce
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Intuition
3 Liliana of the Veil
1 Thoughtseize
lands
2 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Polluted Delta
4 Wasteland
2 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
1 Bayou
2 Swamp
1 Island
1 Creeping Tar Pit
I prefer having Intuition over a second copy of Life from the Loam, and it also has added utility of specifically tutoring for Wateland and Creeping Tar Pit. Not to mention that it can at times just search for three copies of a given spell.
Two Darkblast is probably wrong, but I haven’t yet made my mind up on what to run over it. Another discard spell, a Ghastly Demise or an Innocent Blood are all enticing options. All I know for certain is that I probably want whatever takes the space to cost one mana.
Now let’s talk about some notable omissions:
Force of Will
The two major points that I have against Force is that taking five with Bob sucks and that with a bunch of discard spells it is unnecessary in a lot of matchups. I’ll probably have somewhere between two and four in the sideboard for combo decks, but there is not a single fair deck that a BUG deck needs Force against. It’s miserable against RUG, pretty bad against Maverick and unnecessary against Miracles.
Daze
This deck is specifically trying to play a long game. Daze just doesn’t make any sense in this shell.
Delver of Secrets
All of the BUG lists that I’ve seen lately have had some sort of Delver shell, with a high density of instants and sorceries. My list, alternatively, is built around the power level of the creatures featured and of Liliana of the Veil. Additionally, I am by no means trying to race anybody, so an aggressive creature like Delver really doesn’t fit the bill.
Engineered Explosives + Academy Ruins
If I find that games are going long enough and that having more colorless lands doesn't hurt too much I could see fitting these cards into the deck. As of now I'm not convinced that they are necessary and they are probably too slow. I could very well be wrong here on all counts.
~
This deck is entirely the product of a late-night brewing session yesterday, so it would be extremely arrogant for me to claim that it will be a force in Legacy. I can easily see changing the numbers on many of the cards as I battle with it and learn more about how its matchups play out. That said I am optimistic about the potential that this list has, and I fully intend to battle with it at local Legacy events when I can find time to do so. I’ll be sure to write about any updates and how the deck plays when I know more, and am very open to any suggestions that anybody may have.
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What follows is an outline of five cash purchases I'm considering as speculative investments. Each will include some of the reasoning behind the picks and some basic rules to follow if the purchase gets made.
The Event Deck Play
The first purchase is one Sigmund brought to my attention here. The M13 event deck: Repeat Performance. Buying these individually for 23$ or less seems like a good deal. I like both for 30$ better. The highlights of Repeat performance include a single Thragtusk, two Razorverge Thickets, a Blade Splicer and a Geist-Honored Monk. That reads to me like a blue chip standard rare, two blue chip modern rares and two more red chip rares. Buying both M13 event decks for thirty means an extra 5$ gets you a Darkslick Shores, two Slagstorms, and a full playset of Dismembers.
Anyone considering these deals need to be able to move Thragtusk or be willing to flip to a dealer at $14. Presently, Thragtusk remains a very popular card despite its inclusion in this M13 Deck and the latest RTR event deck. While the price resilience looks surprising at first glance, a quick look at competitive Standard decklists gives a good reason for the card's current evaluation. The biggest risk this purchase presents a buyer is obtaining the necessary Thragtusk valuation.
Modern staples Razorverge Thicket and Darkslick Shores give buyers a margin of safety. While Modern cards are approaching seasonal lows, a late December rise in values should make turning a profit pretty easy with these purchases. Blade Splicer and Slagstorm give you two borderline playable cards that are easy to move. As long as Lingering Souls is being played, there will be a market for Geist-Honored Monk.
Single Targets
Next couple of purchases will target individual cards. First up, Inkmoth Nexus. This card is the backbone of any Infect deck and that ability is too powerful to not see play. Any purchase at $4 should turn black in 45 days. TCG has a few NM copies at this price as I write this article and while Ebay pricing is moving higher already, there are still some to be had around the $4 target. The card saw enough play while in Standard that trading to pick up copies is an option. For that reason, be very frugal with your cash and look to buy only at $4.
Blackcleave Cliffs is a great Modern target at $4.50 or less. Both Ebay and TCG have multiple copies listed around $4 in NM condition. B/R will form the backbone of many a competitive Modern deck. Of every Magic format, Modern has the most room to grow. I expect that as the format gets more tournament support, the cards in the format will see a big rise in valuation. Much like Legacy before it, Modern should put in a higher floor for staples. The easiest way to position oneself for that kind of movement is to get a hold of some real estate in the form of lands. The larger the format, the more the broader demand for lands benefits you. Instead of figuring out the next hot piece to a deck, enjoy the safety of fastlands. Their inclusion is almost automatic, assuming the deck runs the appropriate colors.
Next up... another land. River of Tears is selling for less than 2$ all over the place. This card should at least get to today's prices for Darkslick Shores as its drawback is easy enough to play around early. Considering how many Darkslick Shores and other Scars lands are still in binders, I find the pricing of River of Tears a bit ridiculous. Maybe no one remembers playing with it? I am very interested in picking these up at around $ 1.80, as I expect they'll climb to around $3 in short order.
Finally, a card with a home outside of Modern: Phantasmal Image. This card at $5 is worth a look. It functions as a lord, making it a 4-of in any Merfolk deck. For 2cc you can copy hexproof creatures, kill legends and either trigger enter the battlefield effects or replicate those effects. This card is played in Legacy, and with Simic promising more Merfolk has a good chance to become a regular in Modern. At 2cc, even Legacy can't ignore Phantasmal Image. While it is hard to find this guy for less than 4.5$, a quick survey of TCG prices suggests that even stores are not sure how to value this guy. Playing that spread when trading for Phantasmal Image makes him a great trade target too.
Lessons Learned
There are plenty of cheap, readily available Modern targets. Most should be acquired through trade (see Phyrexian Metamorph, Birthing Pod, Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite). When surveying the field of Magic formats ask yourself what is over-hyped/over-valued and look to trade out. Trading away from hype and into value will help you unlock value and let you both flip cards quickly AND maintain an inventory of growth plays. Buying into M13 event decks, looking to trade Thragtusk at TCG mid prices for future Modern Staples, will maximize your dollar.
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Grand Prix: Chicago was this past weekend and the format was Modern. How good for us! Modern moves a lot of card prices, even though it doesn't get played that much. It's the reason that Remand and Kitchen Finks are worth so much; why Path to Exile pushes $5 in the face of so many reprints. The PTQ season is coming up and Modern cards are going to be in demand for awhile. With continued WOTC support, with Modern Masters, with shocklands being reprinted, this format is coming together... if it can deal with Jund.
Should we be upset about losing to Jund?
A 74-card mirror Jund match concluded the event. All Jund does is get more than one cards' value out of a card through most of its deck. Do you get upset when you lose to it? After all, it's full of fair monsters and it rarely kills before turn 6 or so. It doesn't execute dumb combos. All it does is this illusion where every card it casts translates to insane value. I suppose I get frustrated when that deck goes Thoughtseize, Dark Confidant, Liliana, Bloodbraid Elf, but what can you get rid of to make the rest fair? Bloodbraid Elf is a likely target, but I feel like the core of the deck would remain.
Jund's dominance pushes on a lot of other decks. Good luck, Delver - your Geists are just going to get overwhelmed. Counterspells are a bit worse because many of the Jund deck's spells are interchangeable. It really pushes on the big Tron decks that intend to do things other than summon Karn on turn 3. Jund decks also have enough disruption so that they can reasonably fight storm combo, though the Second Sunrise deck still gives them problems.
What's worth betting on in Jund? I would have said Maelstrom Pulse, but Abrupt Decay has mostly invalidated that card. Good proof that sometimes, even the sure bets get blown out by new printings. Dark Confidant is a fine bet, since I think we'll see it in Modern Masters - which means it won't get banned before then. The lands are good and will remain good, and Raging Ravine ($1.50) is going to be good for a long time. Ravine doesn't get the love that Creeping Tar Pit does, but it's an integral element of Jund. It makes a really oppressive monster that shrugs off Lingering Souls tokens. "When I finally get through," the elemental says as it adds another counter, "it'll make up for all this chump blocking."
Lingering Souls is an obvious choice for stocking up on
Originally printed in Alpha!
Lingering Souls ($1.75) came up in Spirit Jund and in the Gifts deck. It's a power uncommon from an under-drafted set. Lingering Souls is going to be worthwhile for a long time, in spans of years. Let's just put it this way on this card: Spectral Procession ($2.75) is a worse card and it's worth nearly twice what Lingering Souls is. Do you see Lingering Souls getting played in four years? I do. That card is steady - you play it and the first copy keeps you from dying and the second makes you win.
Lingering Souls is at a nadir of price right now because it isn't seeing Standard play. This isn't going to last. Remember that Orzhov is coming up in a few months and Godless Shrine will accompany it. There will be a lot of B/W cards to try out; even something on the power level of Zealous Persecution would make the Souls great. Lingering Souls is a good card to chew up the U/W Miracles decks that are doing well, and we might even see something that stops Thragtusk as early as Gatecrash (but we might have to wait until Dragon's Maze for that).
Deathrite Shaman is highly liquid but probably at a price ceiling
Deathrite Shaman was all over the top tables, too. I came in with a dim view of this guy at the beginning. he's hard to understand, you know? It's like a bad Grim Lavamancer or a bad Birds of Paradise. Turns out, a bad version of both of those in one card is really stone-cold. Deathrite Shaman puts a lot of pressure on Lingering Souls decks, since it can scoop away their Flashback spells for value. It can really screw up a Gifts deck, since it's much harder to set up Unburial Rites + Elesh Norn. This is a very, very good little monster. I am packing Deathrites in my Gifts board and I'll probably justify some copies of Slay, too. You just can't let these live, and hitting them with a Path to Exile is one of the worst feelings that there is.
The Shaman is about $8 shipped right now and there's been a lot of internal debate on the QS Forum about his price ceiling. Deathrite Shaman isn't seeing much love in Standard, so he doesn't track with Snapcaster Mage completely. However, this card is going to be gold for years to come. I don't know if he has the price durability that Noble Hierarch has and that's because you need to be playing both green and black to get the best results from it. Packing only black is doable, but it's not as versatile. I think Deathrite Shaman is going to top out at $10. The bad news is that we can't speculate much on him. The good news is that he's highly desirable, as evidenced by several posters talking about how quickly they traded their copies away. Trading Standard cards involves a lot of touchstones for price; trading into and out of Shamans is going to be one of those metrics.
 That Gifts Ungiven deck is pretty crazy, right?
I'm big big big on Gifts decks. I wrote about a Coalition Relic Gifts deck awhile back on the site and I'm glad to see a Gifts deck continuing to do well. I actually ended up brainstorming a list that was about nine cards away from Shane's list, but he got a big check and I didn't! I think his list is about 90% there, but there's a bit of junk in it. You don't need Darkblast, for instance. The combo of Lingering Souls + Deathrite Shaman to make a turn-2 Souls is really fly, and Liliana is doing good work in this deck. I hesitate because Shamans make Gifts for Rites a lot worse, but lots of decks aren't going to have Shaman or have it in time and they'll lose.
I don't see a whole lot of profit to be made here, but Gifts Ungiven remains a powerful card in this format and it's one that people love to get and trade for. The art is sicko. This is another reason that Lingering Souls is going to be around for awhile. McDermott mentioned that the deck has issues with Jund and that it's about a coin flip, but if you dedicate some sideboard cards to beating Jund (cards like SUNLANCE), you can swing it more favorably. If you could fit Gideon Jura in, I feel like that match would get really silly.
More Modern quick hits
Modern Masters doesn't come out until next June, meaning that there's no sense in selling off staples just yet. The PTQs for Dragon's Maze start next spring, so Modern Masters will have zero effect on the season or the accessibility of cards. However, we'll have the full set of reprinted duals by then and I think that those, combined with Modern Masters, are going to pull a lot more people in.
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Despite being married to a cinephobe I managed to make it to three different movies last week, more than I've seen in theaters in the last year. I found Flight, which looked like total Oscar bait but compelling nonetheless, to be deeply flawed. Its serious moments were spoiled by poor dialogue and unintentional comic moments, which made the deliberate attempts at humor even more jarring. I expected a little better and was disappointed.
After Avengers, the movie I looked forward to the most in 2012 was Skyfall, and even that left me feeling let down. Instead of epitomizing British style and sophistication, the franchise comes back from the brink of oblivion (read more here) by borrowing from Hollywood's lowest common denominator cliches. The "computers can do anything" hacker subplot, the Goldbergian booby traps from Nightmare on Elm Street, the haphazard throwback to classic Bond films.
It all leaves you wondering whether this movie belongs to the new continuity started by Casino Royale or the 50-year-long "many actors, one Bond" continuity with more questions than answers. James Bond isn't the "James Bourne" of Casino or Quantum but rather a stern-faced and stoic mish-mash of John McClane in Die Hard 4 and Kevin McCallister in Home Alone --a combination that should result in more comic one-liners yet somehow results in fewer.
The only movie I actually liked was Wreck-It Ralph. I'm not sure adults need to see this one unless they're accompanying their children, but at least it left me entertained.
All this exposition seems necessary to explain how this week, I'm used to disappointment.
Announcing Dragon's Maze
"Oh, that's so cool! They kept the 'R-G-D' scheme the same as the last block."
-- Lots of you, for some reason
I'd like to be done crapping on everything so I'm actually doing my level best to get swept up in the wave of enthusiasm that surrounded Wizard's announcement this weekend.
Initially I allowed snark to take over and my first reaction was "Wow, they've really outdone themselves. I didn't think it was possible to come up with a worse set name than "Gatecrash" but somehow they managed to beat the odds." Then, something curious happened.
Saved By... Reddit?
That's right, Reddit.com, home to kickass deckboxes, fan-made expansion sets and its new patron saint, artist Noah Bradley. I have a very curious relationship with Reddit, which took on a whole new dynamic this week.
At first I was keen to find as much good Magic content on reddit as I could and share it with all of you, but as the well dried up, I found myself going all the way to page 20 every week just to find a paltry three or four things of interest. Increasingly annoyed by the high volume of obvious rules questions and other "brand new player" content, I sought refuge in r/spikes -- a subreddit for the serious tournament player.
What I found there was the "Magic is srs bsns" crew but not the content I was looking for. Tournament reports and deckbuilding queries may be more worthwhile than posts asking what happens if you Prey Upon a creature with first strike, but I don't actually want to read them. If I wanted to read tournament reports, I'd go to a website with reports written by people I actually recognize.
Frustrated, I headed back to the main r/magictcg subreddit. What I found there surprised me.
Since I was feeling snarky about the new set's stupid name (on Twitter Joe Spanier said even "Dragon Maze" would have sounded better) I was totally unprepared for the wave of relentless enthusiasm I encountered in the reddit post announcing this set.
This is me when my heart grew two sizes -- a dangerous condition known as cardiomegaly.
Here, read the entire comment section. It's sweeter than a bag of Skittles mixed in a can of Mountain Dew, but it sure cheered me up. At first I was taken aback by people's sheer earnest glee at the announcement.
Seriously?
Who the $%#^ is that?
But Maro said Nicol Bolas wasn't going to be in this block at all!
And they kept coming. People super excited about the name, the symbol, the stupid RGD letters, "OMG Same as last time!" I really couldn't help but be caught up along with them.
Most of the people in the Magic subreddit aren't the best Magic players. Most of them aren't even good at all. But that's not why you go on reddit, is it? It's not a hub of tournament reports, finance information or discussions about Limited pick orders. It is, however, a haven for people that genuinely love the $%*& out of this game and want nothing more than to talk about their excitement for the new set.
Five minutes in the right thread in that subreddit is like a cool dip in a desert oasis. All the accumulated grime of disappointment and the false sense of superiority is washed away and you're left with a clean, optimistic feeling.
There's merit to reveling in the casual aspects of this game. There's also merit to checking yourself occasionally when you find you're not as bright-eyed and in awe as you used to be. Maybe you don't let your attitude get as bad as I do sometimes, but we all need to take five from time to time and remember-- this is a card game and games are supposed to be fun.
Also:
"Gatecrash" may sound more like a mechanic than a set name, but it's still better than "Saviors of Kamigawa."
"Dragon's Maze" may sound more like a 4RRR enchantment than a set name, but it's still better than "Mercadian Masques."
Skyfall may have featured a "computer expert" who plugs a strange laptop into the entire network before asking "how did he access our network?" but it's still a better movie than Quantum of Solace
So what if it can get confusing for a second or two when you mention an RGD draft. If they ask which one, you can always say "The one that cost less than $36".
The finals at the Chicago GP was a 74-card Jund mirror. Seriously? What am I supposed to do with that?
The controversial Edgar Flores made Top 8 with the same U/W durdlefest that top-eighted the last Modern event. I kind of like this deck, a throwback to the U/W Tapout decks of a few years ago. I thought it was a good idea to snatch up [card Baneslayer Angel]Baneslayers[/card] but if you do, get them in trade because they're still around $8-$10 retail. Casuals do so love their angels. I couldn't play a deck like this for ten rounds, but it looks like fun.
Can we stop calling Affinity "Robots" please? Even if someone played an artifact creature deck with zero creatures and zero spells with the affinity mechanic I still won't call it "Robots". Stop it.
I rather liked Shane McDermott's Rites Ungiven reanimator deck (I made the name up, but it's still better than Robots). This seems like a fun strategy in Modern since the format lacks much of the graveyard hate that's so prominent in Legacy. While many of the same cards are legal, Reanimator and Dredge aren't very dominant or popular, so the impetus to run hate is low. Modern also gives you better access to fun reanimation targets than Standard. Who else already misses [card Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite]Norn[/card]?
Modern is becoming a format with an established best deck, but where pet decks can still be competitive. R/G Tron, for example, doesn't seem to depend on the meta but rather on ducking 'unfair' matchups and getting paired against decks that can't quite deal with the formidable threats it presents early. Jund has a lot of hand disruption but they can't stop your topdecks and if you make the game go long, you have a good shot.
To that end, Splinter Twin makes a heartwarming comeback. I like when this deck is the scrappy underdog and not the format-warping deck-to-beat behemoth. Right when they printed Splinter Twin I ran the deck in Extended, before we had access to Spellskite and Deceiver Exarch. It was a game of "Show me Path to Exile or let's shuffle up for the next one." Spoiler alert, they had Path a lot. Turns out Cryptic Command is poor backup for a four-mana enchantment when you've run out of Dispels.
There were seven decks in the Top 8 at Chicago. Modern is really shaping up to be a good, healthy format. Great job, everyone.
P.S. Did anyone notice the best card in Jund right now is white?
Don't Mess With-- Sorry. It Was This or a "Who Shot JR?" Joke
As the title poorly implies, there was an SCG Open this weekend in Dallas.
Not a bad Top 8. For all the whining about "Ban Thragtusk!" there were exactly eight of a possible thirty-two in the Top 8 of this event.
I was a little thrown by how fast U/W/R Miracles, the first real control deck of the season, came out. I expected it to take until about now for control to get figured out. Far beyond "figured out," these decks are already the decks to beat, muscling out all but the least fair aggro decks.
Jund, unfair in its inherent card advantage and G/W, unfair in its sheer explosiveness. Turn three Rancor on [card Loxodon Smiter]Smiter[/card], cast [card Silverblade Paladin]Silverblade[/card], swing for 12 is pretty good when your opponent only has two lands in play.
That said, the event was won by a control deck I thought fringe at first as the players wielding it were those who missed Delver the most and were having trouble letting go. This deck is the real deal though, as a [card Runechanters Pike]Pike[/card] and a pile of spent instants in your yard is good in conjunction with any dude, not just a flying nacatl. It doesn't hurt that Pike makes your [card Snapcaster Mage]Snapcaster[/card] a Thragtusk murder machine and an Augur of Bolas can handle nearly any first (or double) striker with its huge butt.
Lyev Skyknight is a human? Sure, why not? He joins a different take on the "too fast to be fair" deck that G/W has taken over but which really started with U/W Humans. It's a tossup which of the two is less fair-- Loxodon Smiter and Rancor or Geist of Saint Traft and War Falcon. That's a super unfair comparison, I know. What is also unfair is free rolling a Smiter. With Rakdos's Return gaining traction I might lean toward G/W over U/W, although Geist is so good with Sublime Archangel (otherwise known as "curving out" but better than that term usually implies). When Geist swings as a 5/5, he does so with impunity.
This time the ratio of U/W Midrange decks splashing red to straight U/W is 2:1. Thundermaw Hellkite is too legit to quit, and if the Top 8 is full of durdly angel decks (Even the Humans deck had Sublime Archangel and [card Lyev Skyknight]Skyknight[/card]), punching through them to connect to the domus is legit. Both of the midrange decks with red did better than the one without, again. Take note, metagame.
Reanimator will never disappear entirely. It's too much fun to reanimate an Angel of Serenity with Unburial Rites or "Oops, I win" a Craterhoof Behemoth with Seance. Deathrite Shaman goes up a buck or two each week accordingly. Where's the ceiling? All I know is I bought them at $4 and I bought them hard. (That sounds dirty. I just mean I bought a lot of them.) These puppies trade out above $10 no matter which site people use. Pick them up el cheapo if you can.
Despite being the most popular Magic website, StarCity can't seem to properly name decks in their coverage or post the Top 8 in the correct order. Apparently Joe Bass was not in a 4-way tie for 8th place, but rather won the event with U/W Miracles. Sorry Corbin, Merfolk didn't win, it got 3rd.
Merfolk did Top 8, though, as did Goblins, to the delight of old school Legacy players everywhere.
Wait, two High Tide decks? That's more High Tide in the Top 8 than in most Legacy Top 64s. I can dig it. High Tide may be difficult to wield, but at least it's annoying as balls to play against.
Worth mentioning is the RUG Grove deck in the Top 16 piloted by Marcus Kozminski. RUG is good; Punishing Grove is good. Those two things in the same 75 seems good. I wish he'd done better, but this may catch on, which I think is exciting.
The front page says Joe Bass played U/W/R Miracleblade. What is going on with this coverage? I guess they're saying it's U/W/R with the R standing for "a few Pyroblasts in the board". No Spinal Villain? Have you guys read that card?
Miracles are good though, and they'll continue to plague Legacy. While all Legacy players could see at first was "OMG Time Walk!", eventually they calmed down and realized Terminus and [card Entreat the Angels]Entreat[/card] were much better bargains and impacted the game more. Expect this list to continue to develop.
Where are the Sneak Attacks and Show and Tells? Where are the Academy Rectors? Interesting meta they have in Texas, although I suspect this is more indicative of the way Legacy as a whole is shifting. I wouldn't expect Sneak and Show to maintain their bloated price tags, although Legacy prices rarely drop. Bubbles don't burst in old formats, they just remain high and unjustified.
That's All, Folks
Don't be a sourpuss. Magic is supposed to be fun. Next time you find yourself hating some aspect of it, head to the saccharine dunk tank that is the Magic subreddit. It's like spending a week as the Kindergarten Cop. I defy you to have a bad time after seeing a pile of grown men high fiving each other over a picture of Ral Zarek.
If not, now is a perfect time to join up! Our powerful tools, breaking-news analysis, and exclusive Discord channel will make sure you stay up to date and ahead of the curve.
If you haven’t already noticed, I absolutely love the thrill of MTG speculation. The rules of economics have always been a hobby of mine. And while actively trading on the stock market can be fun and rewarding, I simply do not get the same level of enjoyment out of owning digital representations of shares of a company as I do physical trading cards.
The lucrative aspect of the hobby is also appealing. I can seed my competitive decks while remaining active and relevant in the MTG community, often without setting foot outside my apartment (besides walking to the post office).
But even though I’ve been doing this for a couple years, I still don’t feel my “MTG funds” are as high as they could be. I’m making solid profit on most of my speculative plays, so where is all my money going?
Recently, much of my profits have been getting reinvested into additional speculation targets, but I’m starting to have trouble keeping up. Especially with the activity in the QS Forums, I’ve felt some unwanted strain in trying to dabble in all the viable speculation targets discussed.
Just this past week or two we’ve seen talk of Vengevine, Bloodghast, Zendikar Fetch Lands, Might of Old Krosa, Goblin Electromancer, Sphinxs Revelation, Rakdos' Return, Thundermaw Hellkite, Sigarda, Host of Herons (chart from blacklotusproject.com) and even more.
I simply do not have the excess funds (nor the guts) to go deep in all of these cards. To do so would risk the majority of my “MTG funds” and lock me out of future opportunities which may have even more upside.
So how do I proceed? This week I will discuss how I weigh whether or not to buy into a speculative card and how deep I should go. While my approach may not be a one-size-fits-all, hopefully those of you with limited funds and time will find these guidelines useful in some capacity.
The News Hits
It’s happened many times already. I take a quick peek at the Quiet Speculation Forums or my Twitter feed and I see discussion on a new card. Most recently it was Vengevine (chart from blacklotusproject.com).
Seems like a practical choice – the card used to be a $30 Mythic in Standard, it was the third set of its block, and it has started making a splash in Modern. But after reading discussions on the forums I see that the early buyers were grabbing this card at $9 and now the cheapest copy online is $12. Is this still a buy?
Factors to Consider
Before pulling the trigger, I do some quick and dirty research. First, I see what the cheapest copies are selling for on eBay, Card Shark and Amazon. If I find any cards still priced low I do pull the trigger on those right away. It’s no surprise that most of the time this isn’t the case.
So I look at the average selling price and see that indeed $12 is the card’s value at this instant. My next step is to head over to StarCityGames.com and check a) what they are selling at, b) what they are buying at, and c) how many they have in stock. All three data points indicate a different piece of information you should weigh before buying into a spec.
The selling price tells you what you can hope to trade the card away at should you be unable to sell for profit. Cash is always king, but sometimes getting an inflated retail value on an overhyped card can also be profitable if the right trades are made. Currently the sell price on SCG is $17.99 for NM copies – a solid 50% premium above average sell prices at auction.
The buy-price is your safety net, but only to a degree. In general, I try to buy any cards I find online that are at or below SCG’s buy price, but even this can be a fallacy. Star City Games has way more selling outlets than I do and they can afford to overpay on some cards. Even though the buy price is subject to change, I use it as a general rule of thumb for what my downside risk is for this speculation. Currently the SCG buy price is $8, indicating a 33% risk should I purchase Vengevines at $12.
The number of copies in stock is the wild card – it often tips the decision for me in one direction or another. Since Star City Games always has their fingers on the pulse of the market, they are quick to modify their available quantities to reflect demand. If there are many in stock, chances are they have excess copies they are happy to unload.
If SCG’s website is out of stock, it means they are likely waiting to see where the price settles at, and a price change is more likely. For Vengevine, SCG currently has 16 non-foil copies in stock. Not a huge number, and the fact that the quantity is a multiple of 4 indicates to me they may be rationing copies out by playsets. There is no doubt in my mind that they are watching this card closely.
Exit Strategy
Vengevine is a hot card right now, many speculators are buying in. But I missed the price bottom, is there still room to grow? I could always trade them at $18 if I can’t sell for profit, but what if SCG adds more to their stock? Perhaps that $8 buy price isn’t too low after all…
These thoughts all run through my mind as I try to decide if I want to buy and how many copies I should acquire. But before pulling the trigger, there is one other part of the strategy I should consider: the exit strategy. How do I plan on unloading these cards?
The best scenario is when the card increases so much in price that I could sell to buy lists for easy profit – even if I had 50 copies. You may be able to get more, but working directly with a retailer, especially at a premier event, can net you easy cash with minimal effort. The best kind of profits are the profits you had to work very little to acquire.
Most often, I sell my cards online via MOTL, eBay, or other MTG listing site. This approach enables me to get the most for my cards albeit with some investment of effort. For more expensive plays, this can often be the favored route.
If I buy 50 copies of Might of Old Krosa (chart from blacklotusproject.com) at $0.50 each and I sell them on eBay for $4/set, it may look like I’ve doubled up on the investment. But with fees and shipping costs I’d be lucky to break even. Simply put, not many people will want to buy all 50 copies at $1 each. Retailers will, however, and even if you only get $3/set selling to a buy list, you may net larger profits.
Going back to the Vengevine example, I need to realize that a buy list bump is not likely in the near term, and even if it did happen the next logical buy price would be $10. This is still not profitable. That means we’re either hoping for a significant jump in price or we plan on selling to other players / trading them away. This means more effort and more risk.
The Decision
Ultimately, the decision is yours. If you feel Vengevine is destined to return to its former glory and reach $30 again, then you would of course buy heavily. My conclusion was that I think the card could have legs but there’s not a ton of near-term profit to be had. As a result, I purchased a few copies at $11 each and I’ve put a hold for now. I figure I can sell them on eBay and at least make my money back if not earn a 10% profit.
It’s all about opportunity cost. My funds are limited and I can’t chase every card that may have legs. To help me decide, I move motion aside and weigh costs/risks as best as I can. This objective approach often (but not always) prevents me from making foolhardy investments simply because of an emotional reaction.
And even after all of this analysis, the card still has to perform to make you money. This is often the unknown part and yet the most crucial. When I ran through this analysis on Nivmagus Elemental I realized there was a chance for major profit. I acquired 25 copies at around $1.25 each knowing that the card could hit $2 or even $3 on retailer buy lists. All I needed was for the card to perform well at the Pro Tour… which just didn’t happen.
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Sigbits – Booster Box Edition
A while back I wrote an article about how sealed booster boxes could be a solid, safe investment. Today I want to revisit some of the calls I made in the April 2012 article and compare them against recent completed eBay auctions.
Unhinged: In my article I discussed how purchasing two boxes of Unhinged at $144 had paid off since boxes had just cracked $200 on eBay. Looking at eBay auctions completing now, I see that the price has risen even further. They have approached and in a rare instance even broke the $300 barrier. The ride isn’t over yet.
Coldsnap: I talked about purchasing a booster box of Coldsnap due to being Modern legal and being underprinted. The average price I paid was around $110. Recent completed listings have been in the $150 range. I don’t expect to see a whole lot of Coldsnap in Modern Masters, and boxes of this mostly casual set may slowly increase. Upside from here may be limited though.
 Time Spiral: In the article I cite that I was happy to purchase an English Booster Box of Time Spiral for $160. Looking at recent completed listings on eBay, I see that the price on English Time Spiral boxes range from $200 - $240.
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A solid $50 increase, this investment has also paid out fairly well. The casual appeal of the set combined with a few Modern/Legacy playable cards should help keep this set’s sealed product pricing stable. Without a major catalyst, however, I’m fairly confident there could be a set with higher upside potential right now (Avacyn Restored, New Phyrexia).
