Pro Tour Fate Reforged was not the first Modern Pro Tour, but actually the fourth. Nonetheless the last month's B&R list changes and the addition of several Modern-playable cards from Khans of Tarkir made Modern smell like a brand new format.

Expectations and speculation were high before this Pro Tour. As expected, Siege Rhino and Abazan decks took the metagame in charge, and behind them the field was revealed to be fairly opened with few surprises.

Sunday night, Antonio Del Moral Leon and his Splinter Twin deck took the trophy home. From a financial perspective, all lot of exciting things happened. A few cards disappointed by their quasi absence (so be it--not all specs can pay off), and other cards were surprising winners. Aside from the usual impressive price spikes generated by a Pro Tour, let's see how we can capitalize on these results with an incoming MOCS Modern season on MTGO.

Of the Relative Non-Importance of Pro Tours on Card Prices

Pro Tour speculations are flying higher and higher Pro Tour after Pro Tour, with no exceptions this weekend. A card could gain 50% in two hours after showing up on camera and lose 50% the next day for not making it into the Top 8. Blinkmoth Nexus jumped from 10 Tix to 14 Tix and came to back to 10 Tix, the whole thing in merely two days.

Because of the ease of trading cards on MTGO, prices fluctuate extremely rapidly, moving from one speculator to another. Does such a price volatility make any sense? Does it really condition the future of card prices? These questions are real and I'm more and more inclined to think that as crazy as prices are during Pro Tours these fluctuations are mostly irrelevant. It's important not to succumb to temptation to sell everything, losers or winners, and to put things in perspective.

The Aftermath of Pro Tour Khans of Tarkir

I was making the same comment right after Pro Tour Khans of Tarkir. If the story is to repeat itself (I really believe it will) then we should take a brief moment to see what happened a few weeks after Pro Tour Khans of Tarkir.

Stormbreath Dragon flopped at Pro Tour Khans of Tarkir and payed for it with a relatively spectacular drop of 30% the following week. A week later the dragon was back to 12 Tix thanks to being part a the winning deck at GP Los Angeles. Since then, and despite being discrete in Standard decks, Stormbreath Dragon stabilized between 10 and 12 Tix and rose to 15 Tix lately.

Hornet Queen lost about 60% of its value in three days for disappointing results at Pro Tour Khans of Tarkir. Less then two weeks after this Pro Tour, the queen was more expensive than she even was before the event and emerged as a defining card of the Sidisi Whip deck, a deck that didn't do well during the Pro Tour.

On a different trend, Mantis Rider was in three decks that Top 8'd at Pro Tour Khans of Tarkir and then...nothing. As a card from the newest block, Rider wasn't a good speculative target anyway but if it had been it would have been a disappointing one.

These three examples are here to remind us that Pro Tours don't always accurately predict future winners and losers. Most of all, waiting for all the dust thrown in the air by the Pro Tour hype to settle down before making any big decision is probably wise for most of your positions.

A New Modern Era

As is the case for the Modern format now, pro players cannot solve a new eternal format in one Pro Tour. Pro Tour Fate Reforged only set some basis for a possible new Modern environment after the addition of key cards from Khans of Tarkir and after the big changes from the B&R list last month.

With too much discussion on the diversity of the field as seen in D.C. the the main contenders all showed up. Not surprisingly, most competitors (a little less than 30%) brought an Abzan deck. If the deck is for sure a strong force in Modern I wonder how many players chose this option as a default deck that would have good chances against anything in this relatively undefined metagame.

Burn and Infect decks were not expected at that level and will have to be seriously taken into account when brewing in this format. Amulet decks showed their real potential and a good old Splinter Twin deck, also a good choice in an unclear environment, won it all. In the no-show section Dredge decks proved, if you needed it, that Golgari Grave-Troll is not enough to suddenly turn Dredge decks into power-houses, even with the delve mechanic around.

From a speculative standpoint Modern is and always has been very diverse, with or without the dominance of a few decks. This format is even more diverse on MTGO and allows the price swing of hundreds of potentially playable cards. Some cards will break new record highs in the weeks or months to come, others might drop significantly, and all will established new cycles of ups and downs as Modern cards always do.

Big Winners, Big Losers and Others

A lot can be said about what cards benefited from this Pro Tour and what cards didn't. There are also a lot of nuances that can't be summarized by the decks that made it to the Top 8 or even by the top Modern decks (the decks that scored 18 points of better).

Here I'll focus on the cards I consider to have lost or gained the most from this past weekend. Especially for the big losers I think it's important to decide now. With MMA2015 coming up soon, all cards (with the exception of excluded sets) are susceptible to be reprinted, meaning that losers may not have time to bottom and rebound again before Modern Masters 2015 is released.

This review here applies to positions you currently hold; I would not recommend buying the following cards if you wanted to spec on them now.

Winners

Goblin Guide & Eidolon of the Great Revel. Burn decks were a known thing on MTGO but they never reached such notoriety during Grand Prix or Pro Tours. They were the second most played deck after Abzan ones. Even more players might now be interested in playing that strategy online and during the Modern MOCS season.

Grim Lavamancer could also be part this team but was not as widely played as the goblin and the eidolon were. This strong finish will also help sustain the price of Sacred Foundry, Lightning Helix and Skullcrack

Expecting Burn decks to be even more popular now than usual on MTGO, I'm expecting the key cards of the deck to keep rising, at least until they reach their previous heights.

Primeval Titan, Azusa, Lost but Seeking, Pact of Negation, Summoner's Pact & Amulet of Vigor. The deck didn't win the Pro Tour but it made a strong impression. As the Amulet deck proved resilient against several decks including Burn and Abzan, it should generate some enthusiasm online. However, two things put the deck in a delicate situation for future growth--the deck is not easy to play and the deck seems to be quite vulnerable to Splinter Twin decks and Blood Moon in general.

For these reasons I would not be too greedy with these positions, especially since Azusa, Titan and Amulet have already broken their record high. The pacts may have a little more room to growth though.

Ignoble Hierarch is a big winner here. Not only is he a major card of Infect decks but is also now part of Abzan decks. Hierarch is a serious candidate for a reprint in MMA2015. Waiting for that this month of February should be favorable to this mana dork and should set it back to 40 Tix.

Blinkmoth Nexus is also in a strong position after the Pro Tour. Infect decks didn't make it to the top but they left a sweet taste in the mouth of anyone who watched them on camera. Nexus jumped from 10 Tix to 14 Tix when Infect decks were confirmed to be played by pros from the CFB Pantheon team. The card went back down to 10 Tix as a sanction for not appearing in Top 8. Nevertheless I fully expect Blinkmoth Nexus to rise again to 12-14 Tix thanks to the MOCS season.

Splinter Twin. This is still and again the deck to beat. Winning, again, the Modern Pro Tour is a good sign for speculators that are still holding their copies of the red enchantment. No doubt that Splinter Twin deck will be a deck of choice for Modern players on MTGO. Moving forward I think it's reasonable to expect this card to pass 20 Tix before the end of the month.

Lingering Souls. Finally this card get the credit it deserved, with massive play at this Pro Tour. Although Lingering Souls was always floating around without any price movement it seems now that the white sorcery has become a defining card. Being safe from reprint in MMA2015 will certainly make this card a new Modern cyclical position. I had accumulated a dozen playsets since it rotated out of Standard and it's time to cash out, in a week or two off course.

Losers

Some decks were under-represented, some decks didn't perform well, but some cards were clearly missing in this new Modern environment even in decklists that usually play them.

Dark Confidant is a rather unexpected loser of this new Modern era. Even with aggressive U/R Delver deck out of the way the Confidant didn't resist the incorporation of Siege Rhino and Tasigur, the Golden Fang to Abzan decks. With two high-casting-cost cards in the mix the risk of losing too much life to Bob is real. Unless the environment evolves rapidly to get Dark Confidant back in decklists soon I would recommend selling it now.

Cryptic Command. With more Burn decks, more Infect decks and Amulet decks that can kill you turn two, the four-mana counterspell appears underwhelming. A few copies were seen here and there in Splinter Twin decks and UWR Control decks (the other deck that could play the Command) didn't do great at all this past weekend. I don't see any upside for Cryptic Command in a near future, and with still a potential reprint in MMA2015 I won't to get stuck with this blue instant in portfolio at the moment. I sold my copies.

Pyromancer Ascension. Not really a big loser but Storm didn't do great this time around and unlike in previous Modern Pro Tours. Ascension was at its top during Fate Reforged release last week and is on the decline since then. Without a strong finish at the Pro Tour to consolidate its price I'm afraid Pyromancer Ascension is cycling down. Amulet decks, Burn decks and Infect decks seem to have taken the slots of the non-interacting deck of the format. Here again, I have sold my copies.

One Month to Turn Your Stock Into Profit

Beside these few obvious losers and winners (in my opinion) everything remain fairly open. Numerous decks didn't particularly shine during this Pro Tour--R/G Tron, Living End, Bogles, Merfolk, U/W Tron, Zoo and Affinity. As I said in the introduction, one Pro Tour doesn't tell the whole story of a format, and all these archetypes will have their chance to shine online.

In the Top 16 of this past weekend's Pro Tour, Burn (5 players) and Infect (3 players) showed the strongest finish and we should expect to see these decks showing up frequently in Daily Events.

MTGO is known to be a place where metagames adapt and change rapidly. With a Modern MOCS season to motivate players to further shape this new Modern format, we should have several opportunities to sell all kind of Modern positions with a decent profit. After price variations that don't make a lot of sense due to speculators, I expect prices to be supported by players within a week. Next weekend should be a good starting point to seriously define new trends in Modern.

Keep in mind that this month might as well be the last opportunity to sell several Modern positions for a long time. Not only will prices be at their highest this month because of the MOCS season, but as we approach the release of MMA2015 and learn more about potential reprints, some cards will lose a significant chunk of their value. For this reason I think selling all cards threatened by a reprint in MMA2015 in the following three to four weeks is the best thing to do, with or without profit.

 

Thanks for reading,

Sylvain Lehoux