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Insider: How Price Changes Really Happen

Posted on March 16, 2015January 17, 2022 by Sigmund Ausfresser

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Supply and Demand. These are the two factors that dictate a card’s value. The Invisible Hand, a metaphor used by Adam Smith, matches up the supply and demand curves to identify the appropriate price for a given item.

As much as it may pain dissenters, Magic Cards are no exception. Supply and demand dictate price – the only way to materially impact the market is to alter one of these two factors in a lasting way.

I use the word “materially” because artificial, short-term impact to supply or demand will not have a lasting impact on price. It may lead to ridiculous people trying to get greedy by charging an exorbitant amount of money for a card, sure. But that doesn’t mean the price is truly “changed”, no matter what mtgstocks.com tells you.

Allow me to explain further and provide some context.

Motivation

Last week, Jason wrote a terrific piece warning people who become excited by the notion of a card’s low supply. He cited multiple examples where a low supply on a card could incite panic despite there being no need to rush out and buy copies of a card. The example he cited was in my opinion the worst card in Magic: Sorrow's Path.

Last week I also entered into a heated debate over a Tweet I sent out.

This tweet was direct inspiration from Jason’s article. There was an edgy sarcasm to it – recognizing that Judge Promo Command Tower was extremely low in stock for weeks, I figured I’d share my observation. Those who read Jason’s article hopefully found the humor in the Tweet.

Unfortunately, some others decided this was an outrageous communication for me to make.

The last tweet above incited grand debate. Fortunately, all parties were highly civil and I left the discussion with some new insights.

So I’m calling that a win, despite the momentary increase in heart rate I experienced. Allow me to elaborate…

ZOMG – A Case Study

One day I came across a thread in the QS forums discussing Command Tower. About a zillion copies of the card exists, but many theorized a rise in popularity of Tiny Leaders could lead to increased demand for the mana-fixing land. Adam Smith tells me an increase in demand leads to a increase in price.

Certainly seemed like a sound thesis. I bought 12 copies.

There was an error retrieving a chart for Command Tower

But then I had an epiphany – what are Judge Foils selling for? If those are cheap, I’d rather put my money into those versions. If Tiny Leaders truly is like Legacy Light, and if many Commander players still like to foil out their decks, then demand for Judge Foil copies should be even juicier relative to the far smaller print run. Right?

Well to my surprise, there were a whopping 8 copies in stock on TCG Player. Star City Games was sold out, eBay was nearly sold out, and other sites didn’t have more than a copy or two. So I decided to buy 3 Judge Foils from TCG Player, leaving just 5 behind.

This did not have an immediate effect on the card’s price, but let’s face it: in terms of availability on the internet, I virtually reduced the supply by roughly 30%. I found this perplexing. Using Jason’s article for inspiration, I decided to send out my tweet sharing my observation.

Two things happened. First, I initiated a heated (yet civil) Twitter debate. Second, this:

This is all my fault, right? If I hadn’t mentioned the scarcity of Command Tower, there’s no way those 5 remaining copies would have been bought up so quickly. It’s not like people actually WANT fancy Command Towers for their new Commander and Tiny Leader decks, right? /sarcasm.

FIVE COPIES!!!! Supply was SO low on this Commander staple that any shift in demand – real or artificial – would have triggered this kind of jump. I’ll admit it’s possible I may have accelerated the 5 copy buyout of this card by tweeting about the low supply. But demand for the card is strong, and increasing. With supply being so low, the ensuing price jump was inevitable!

Fly In My Ointment

Here’s the part I don’t wish to be held responsible for – the new “price” on the card. $49.50? Give me a break!

First of all, this “price” is an artifact of mtgstocks.com’s pricing algorithm. There are only a few copies on TCG Player, so naturally the greedy sellers trying to capitalize on hype will temporarily dictate the price. It’s the same reason we saw a rapid spike in Whispersilk Cloak only to be followed by a rapid drop back down to reality.

There was an error retrieving a chart for Whispersilk Cloak

This is the way pricing works. A sudden increase in demand does lead to a rapid rise in price. However, as the price rises, more sellers dig through their binders to try and sell their own copies at the new price. After all, everyone has a price at which they’d be willing to sell a given card. That’s the way the supply curve is drawn.

Coming back to Judge Foil Command Tower, this new “price” is only an interim step as part of the ensuing drop back down to reality. I don’t expect a $50 price tag to suddenly stick simply because I tweeted about it.

One quick look at recently sold copies on eBay supports this argument in spades: Not a single copy sold yet at the new price.

What if the price does stick, you ask? If the price sticks, it’s not because of my tweet. It’s because of the fundamental shifts in demand that inspired my purchase in the first place. People want copies more, and supply just isn’t available enough to match the growing demand. Thus the price rises.

It may overshoot a bit, but eventually the Invisible Hand gets it right. It always does.

Wrapping It Up

The major retailers currently have both foil versions of Command Tower in the $30 range, although some are currently priced higher. Given the likely long-term rise in demand and short supply of these premium cards, I’d say that kind of price increase is perfectly reasonable. I could even see $35 if Star City Games continues to remain out of stock for too long. I know I’m not willing to sell them my copies at $15, their current buy price.

Are you? If not, then expect them to increase both their buy and sell prices until they do have some in stock.

If they decide to increase their buy price, are they “manipulating the market”? Not at all. They are trying to get a sense for where the Invisible Hand is taking the price given the shift in the market. Only they’re doing it the right way – gradually increasing prices until they have supply again.

The sellers on TCG Player are doing it backwards. They are starting with an astronomically high price hoping to find a greater fool. But watch the race downward – it’ll be fun to observe. Prices will drop and drop until a buyer is found, establishing that new price.

As for my tweet? By this time next week, most will have forgotten about it. But they won’t forget about the ubiquity of Command Tower in both Commander and Tiny Leaders.

I may have caused a (silly) sudden spike in demand based simply on a scarcity metric – a mindset I condemn right alongside Jason. But the change in price was not my doing. The short term price change is being driven by an mtgstocks.com algorithm and greedy sellers. The long term price change will be driven by the increasing demand for this staple.

I feel an obligation to make one last defensive statement: I was NOT one of the greedy sellers charging $50+ for my 3 Judge Foil Command Towers.

In fact, I don’t even have a TCG Player account. If I was, then I would certainly deserve the accusations of coordinating a pump and dump effort. But my 3 copies are sitting tight in my binder. One of them will almost certainly make it into my Tiny Leaders deck, while I plan on sitting on the other two until the market stabilizes. After all, the $50 price tag may not stick in the short term.

But barring another foil printing in the original artwork, I see values even higher in the coming years. This is an investment made for the long haul. Fundamentals look terrific for this investment, with demand surely to increase against a fixed supply.

Adam Smith doesn’t need to tell us what that means for the price trajectory.

…

Sigbits

This Sigbits segment is very similar to my Command Tower tweet. I use this section of my article each week to highlight cards which are low in stock at Star City Games. These statements are for informational purposes, and are not meant to incite buyouts. That being said, low supply often does correlate well with high demand and could indicate a pending price increase. Hence my segment.

After spiking initially, foil Abrupt Decays have stagnated. My guess is that too many speculators were in the kitchen, and now the market supply is a bit flooded at this higher price. Star City Games has 37 copies in stock, including 10 NM at $69.99. Meanwhile they are quite low on nonfoil copies – 0 NM at $12.29 and just 16 SP at $11.05.
What began as a longshot buy for self-amusement has turned into one of my worst decisions in quite some time. I bought a set of Mishra's Bauble a couple weeks ago for around $14 shipped and promptly sold them for marginal profits when the card had zero impact on the Modern Pro Tour. Apparently that didn’t matter. The card has continued to skyrocket in price and Star City Games is now sold out at $9.99! Even a small increase in demand can do amazing things to a card’s price if supply is low enough. (see: Judge Foil Command Tower).
Here’s one I almost missed: Karrthus, Tyrant of Jund. You know, that sweet dragon from Alara Reborn that can take everyone else’s dragons? There are currently only three sellers on TCG Player with this card in stock, although they have 15 copies amongst them. There are also 0 foil copies in stock. SCG has just 5 nonfoils in stock themselves, with 0 being NM with a $19.99 price tag. They also have just 1 foil in stock, in MP condition, at $24.99. I’m sure it’s going to be bought up quickly. I just sold my 2 foil copies on eBay myself for an average of $41. A quick shipping and fee calculation, and I don’t think there’s a ton of profit on the single MP copy. But if you have store credit with SCG, you could do FAR worse than buying up these from them.

Insider: Dragons of Tarkir – Mythics & More

Posted on March 16, 2015January 17, 2022 by Derek Madlem

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Like I was saying last week, the mythics in a set are the foundation on which an entire set's value is built.

A set with lower priced mythics will generally be less popular and push up the prices of playable rares over time because fewer are entering the market. While Dragons of Tarkir is less likely to experience this effect because dragons have always been extremely popular, there will be less incentive for retailers to open large quantities of this product going forward.

Since Dragons of Tarkir is leaning so heavily on the dragon aspect of the set, we have a five card cycle of dragons at mythic rare. Looking at these cards, I see a failed opportunity on Wizards' part to create something worthwhile. We could have had a powerful cycle of relevant creatures like the Titan cycle in core sets--those cards were all playable in constructed and held a decent monetary value throughout their standard lifespans.

Going forward, any five card cycle of mythic rares is going to be compared to the Titans, and the dragons just don't hold up.

Dragonlord Silumgar is arguably less powerful than his former self, Silumgar, the Drifting Death. The ability to temporarily steal a planeswalker or creature is powerful, but the fragility and high mana cost of Silumgar in this scenario doesn't make him constructed playable. Sower of Temptation he is not. In a format that is filled to the brim with spot removal, Silumgar's six mana buy-in is just too much.

Dragonlord Atarka... well, that's another story. The first iteration of Atarka wasn't playable, and this one isn't either. Even in a world of mana ramp and See the Unwritten, this card is not something that is going to see any real constructed play. This is the Borborygmos Enraged of Tarkir, except it'll probably never show up in a sweet Modern deck.

Ojutai, Soul of Winter was basically unplayable at seven mana, and her newest iteration Dragonlord Ojutai is a little less expensive and has a fairly relevant ability. I'm not sure if this is the creature control decks will want as a finisher, but the abilities to sit pretty the turn it's cast followed by digging deep for countermagic to protect it are pretty nice.

Ojutai is a lot of what we pretended Prognostic Sphinx was going to be. The biggest weakness for Ojutai is six more months of Stoke the Flames being a popular card. Four toughness just might not be enough.

Dromoka, the Eternal was not a terrible card, but bolster was hardly an inspiring ability outside of limited.

Dragonlord Dromoka gives you four abilities in addition to a large body. Being uncounterable and shutting off your opponent's spells during your turn are the two abilities that give Dromoka the push he needs to be on the cusp of constructed relevance. Dromoka's success in standard is going to depend heavily on the speed of the format and the viability of G/W decks. There's a decent chance that Dromoka breaks into some Abzan lists as they try to go larger and outclass the other Abzan midrange decks.

Of the entire Dragonlord cycle, I like Dragonlord Kolaghan the most, mostly because he's arbitrarily large and grants haste to your entire team. The secondary ability is likely to be about as relevant as Ob Nixilis, Unshackled's, but recasting creatures in the late game is much harder to avoid than cracking an errant fetch.

Kolaghan is ironically the only dragon in this cycle that I feel has a genuine chance of seeing play in constructed (likely in a Jund or Mardu deck) and the one preselling for the lowest amount ($3.99). Even at $3.99, I think Kolaghan is a gamble at best.

History

So how do you evaluate a cycle of mythics that's unlikely to see constructed play from a financial perspective?

The closest analog I could find was the angels from Avacyn Restored. Legendary creatures at mythic rare have typically done poorly from the financial side. Sure we have Geist of Saint Traft and Griselbrand on one end of the spectrum, but on the other we have cards like Bruna, Light of Alabaster.

Bruna's price is propped up by a build-around Commander ability and a huge casual appeal for angels. If I remember correctly,
Bruna started off around $8 and began a slow downward spiral immediately, losing about a dollar a week until it reached the $2-3 range it's hovering at now.

As a long-term pickup, you can see that a legendary mythic with a mediocre ability doesn't have a good forecast for #value.

Any dragons you can get rid of at (pre)release should be shipped immediately. Even if they do make it into constructed as finishers, they'll be closer to a Pearl Lake Ancient than a Stormbreath Dragon.

Onto some non-dragon mythics.

This is purely a Commander card, and not incredibly exciting. If this card somehow strikes an emotional chord in Commander, you'll have plenty of time to pick these up for a dollar or so and stockpile them for the couple of years it's going to take for the price to start climbing.

This is the bulkiest of the bulk, so get your groans ready for every time you open one.

If Ojutai Exemplars has any problem, it's that it does too much. Cards like this can be hard for players to parse and play correctly, making their play value hard to determine simply by looking at it.

The Exemplars slot in nicely right alongside Monastery Mentor and Seeker of the Way and will be exceptionally hard to deal with when played by a skilled and patient pilot.

The viability of the Exemplars will be pretty apparent within the first couple weeks of release, with the Pro Tour cementing its place in Standard. If this card sticks, I can see it climbing to the $20-25 range. If not, expect it to creep lower akin to what we saw with Prophetic Flamespeaker.

I'm not excited about this card as a $10 buy-in, but if I open any from packs, I'll hold onto them to see which way the wind is blowing on it.

Well, this is a thing that exists. The best way to begin evaluating this card is ignoring the second ability all-together.

Would you pay three mana for a 2/3 creature that taps for two mana that can only be used to cast creatures? Mul Daya Channelers saw absolutely zero play when it existed in Standard and that's somewhat similar.

There is a sweet curve with Elvish Mystic into Shaman of Forgotten Ways into a six mana creature on turn three, which sounds pretty sweet, right? But then there's Rattleclaw Mystic offering us a similar scenario with the option to cast anything, rather than just creatures, and Rattleclaw is seeing little play...

Alright, what about this! Shaman is a great finisher in the Temur Ascendancy deck because you have so many mana dorks to reach the eleven mana threshold needed to activate him. Or you could just cast Chord of Calling instead and search for whatever you need to end the game.

Any time this card would be good outside of Commander, it's already a "win more" card.

As far as I can tell, this card is garbage. Maybe we'll end up in a format where all we do is cast giant creatures and smash them into each other, but I'm not going to hold my breath and I'm not going to play that format. This card is preselling for $7.99 and I'm of the belief that you would have to be crazy to pay that much for it.

Dragon Whisperer is probably the easiest card to evaluate of this set's mythics - it's everything a red deck needs right now.

It's an efficient creature with two solid mana sinks and one that has the potential to be significant in the late game. Dragon Whisperer is one of two creatures (Lightning Berserker is the other) in Dragons that fills gaps in mono-red decks and enables Flamewake Pheonix to come back into play.

As a utility creature more than a splashy mythic, Dragon Whisperer isn't likely to gain a ton in value and is likely overpriced at the $7.99 preorder price that Star City has it listed for.

The Score

For those keeping score at home, that's only 2-5 of the fifteen mythics in this set that I feel are constructed viable, and that's including Deathmist Raptor purely because some folks see something in it that I'm missing (currently sold out at $7.99 on SCG).

With so little #value apparent in the mythics, and no cycle of rare lands to help bolster it, I'm probably going to forgo picking up any boxes of this set at release. I'm expecting most of those preorder prices to crash hard as soon as the set is released--the downside effect to SCG's "preorder guarantee."

Dragons of Tarkir Sealed Pool Generator

Posted on March 14, 2015 by Jason Alt

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Who is excited?

The entire set is spoiled, everyone is working hard on their prerelease guides and QS is busy gathering data to help put together the prerelease cheat sheet to help you make the most effective trades you can.

The Limited experts will be weighing in soon with the opinion about how to build but if you aren't content to wait, there are tools that will let you explore a bit on your own. One I found that I liked was a Dragons of Tarkir sealed pool generator that even lets you pick which seeded pack you want so you can get the full prerelease experience. It is available at this link.

I have jammed a few pools and while it suffers from the same problem most of these tools do in that the same rares crop up somewhat often, it was instructive and fun to monkey with. Those who prefer to play Sealed in person and are at GP Cleveland this weekend can find me on the floor durdling. Come say hi.

Modern Playables – Dragons of Tarkir Edition

Posted on March 13, 2015 by Editorial Staff

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Welcome to Modern Playables. Dragons of Tarkir has been fully spoiled, and so, with a new set comes the question: which of these cards is truly viable in Modern? We're here to help you sort through the muck to tell you what's a yes or maybe, and where it all fits.

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Dragons of Tarkir Top Picks

Here are the cards in Tarkir that are most likely to make waves in Modern. These cards will probably go into top-tier decks or give other decks a much-needed boost. They might even enable new decks all on their own!

Myth Realized

Sheridan: If I had to make one longshot bet for the set, it would be this card. I view it like a white, mini-Delver that goes in control decks, Enchantress decks, and perhaps even UWR Delver/Midrange strategies. Although the Monk Avatar doesn't have evasion, this guy can easily be a giant 6/6 or larger beefcake by the time he gets going. It's a great mana sink for low-action turns, it works just fine in multiples, and at 1 mana to cast and 1 mana to activate, it's a very low commitment.

I'm not sure if control decks want to open themselves up to Abrupt Decay to run this kind of win condition alongside or instead of Colonnade. But like the Delve mechanic that was so broken in the last two sets, Myth is a card that just rewards you for playing Magic. It's a tiny bit slow for some of the more aggressive decks like UWR Delver/Midrange, but if you want a midgame or higher-range win condition, this might be the card for you.

Secure the Wastes

Sean: Competes with White Sun's Zenith as a control finisher in Esper (see Wafo Tapa's list here) and possibly other decks. Let's do some math, shall we?

6 mana = 5 power with Secure / 6 power with Sun
7 mana = 6 power with Secure / 8 power with Sun
8 mana = 7 power with Secure / 10 power with Sun

And on it goes. So the power difference isn't huge, it's less mana intensive, and more flexible with its casting cost, but the tokens can't profitably block as many creatures, and the card doesn't shuffle back into your library. All things considered, I'm unsure if it will see play in control lists or not.

Sheridan: Looks like a great 1-2 card inclusion for BW Tokens. WSZ was never really playable there because it couldn't do anything in the early game. This card is never quite dead in Tokens and will definitely close out a game on turns 5-6. There are a few top-end flex slots in that deck anyway (2-3 Hero of Bladehold, 2-3 Sorin, Solemn Visitor, etc.), and Secure fits nicely into one of their slots. I expect to see at least 1 of these in BW Tokens decks as a way to go over the top of midrange and control decks that try to play too fair.

Surge of Righteousness

Sean: A decent sideboard card for Burn that effectively reads: counter target burn spell and destroy target Goblin Guide.

Sheridan: Reasons to play this over Celestial Purge? The big one is that this is almost a two for one, killing a creature and stopping 2/3 of a Bolt effect. Reasons not to play it over Purge? You can't hit Keranos or Lily with this, and conservative Burn players might not throw their Eidolons into Surge's crosshairs. But if you are delaying an Eidolon attack, that's not terrible either.

Anticipate

Sean: A smaller Impulse and cousin to Telling Time, this could be the best option for blue combo decks that want to dig beyond the 1 cmc options, especially if they go long (Scapeshift). When you want two of the cards seen, it's worse than Time, but always having one card you want and a blind draw seems better overall than sometimes having two cards you want, and sometimes having one you want and don't want.

Sheridan: In most cases, this is going to be better than Time. When evaluating the two cards, I ask myself which is more likely: 1) That I flip 0-1 good cards or 2) That I flip 2-3 good cards. If I flip 2-3 cards that I want to keep, then yes, Time is better. But if I flip 0-1 cards that I want to keep, then Time is a disaster. Not only do you maybe not find the card you want, but you also now have to draw a card you didn't want. So Time is actively setting you back a turn. With Anticipate, even if you see a card you wanted and had to ship it back, you at least get a chance next turn to draw something equal or better. And if you didn't see a card you wanted, then you get to keep digging without losing an entire draw step.

Rending Volley

Sean: One of the strongest sideboard cards from Tarkir, cheaper Combust, which was usually for Pestermite and Deceiver Exarch anyway. Thanks, Wizards! Any red deck that has trouble with Twin should be happy to run this. It also hurts Jeskai.

Sheridan: This will see sideboard play across the format. In addition to killing Exarch and Mite, it also can't be stopped by the Twin staple of Spellskite. Combust was decent at 2 mana, but bumping it down to 1 makes it much better in this format. Volley might not hit Rhino, but if you were playing either Combust/Volley in the Abzan matchup to begin with, you were doing it wrong.

Also, Celestial Colonnade and Restoration Angel are unhappy.

Roast

Sean: Flame Slash currently fills the role of dirt cheap Goyf and friends removal; Roast is a bit more expensive but kills many other key creatures (Siege Rhino, Tasigur, etc), which could warrant it sideboard or even mainboard slots in red tempo decks.

Sheridan: Anyone who maindecks Slash needs to seriously consider switching that out for Roast. In a format that is somewhere around 15% Abzan, the ability to blow up the Abzan triumvirate (Goyf, Rhino, Tas) is huge. Of course, if your only reason for running the Slash is to kill enemy Spellskites to clear the way for a combo, then that's one thing. But if you aspire to a more interactive game plan, Roast becomes a lot better. It's competing with the already-played Harvest Pyre for this slot, but in decks that don't play lots of creatures of their own, I think Roast is way more reliable.

Avatar of the Resolute

Sean: Stompy has been doing well in small tournaments since its first showing at the Grand Bazaar of Moxen tournament back in May 2014, and this card looks to give it another nice boost thanks to its Reach ability and synergy with Strangleroot Geist, Experiment One, and Scavenging Ooze. I don't think it'll be enough to push it to tier 2, even if we attempt a traditional Stompy build with 1 and 2 cmc cards only (think Dryad Militant, Experiment One, Garruk's Companion, Kalonian Tusker, Avatar, etc), but I've been surprised before. The reach is more important than you might think, given Affinity causes the deck trouble sometimes, and Lingering Souls is everywhere right now.

Sheridan: Stompy players rejoice! Avatar is a strict upgrade to Companion, a maindeck interaction with Souls tokens and the flyers of Infect/Affinity, and a much better topdeck than cards like Companion/Tusker. Stompy has sometimes struggled with midgame pressure, especially when you are topdecking turn 5 Tuskers and your opponent is topdecking turn 5 Rhinos. But if that Tusker has the potential to be a 5/4 (or bigger), that's a game changer.

Note that if you go turn 1 E1 into turn 2 Avatar, you don't get the counter on the Avatar itself. Solution: wait until turn 3!

Collected Company

Sean: Has potential for slower Stompy lists as well as Elves. I'm inclined to believe Stompy is best served by capping the curve at 3 (possibly even 2), but there's no denying Collected Company should be tested in it (Collected Company into two Leatherback Baloth seems good). Combo Elves probably doesn't want this card (it wants to run a reasonable amount of non-creature cards), but an Aggro Elves list with a playset of these might do well. 3 cmc is the magical number for Elves, so that hurts its case, but instant speed and entering the battlefield instead of going to the hand (like with Lead the Stampede) are advantages that can't be ignored.

Sheridan: If you were wondering why Congregation at Dawn got sold out across the internet last week, this is why. Pod players will be familiar with how this works. Cast Congregation and put Kitchen Finks, Melira/Anafeza (the new one; more DTK action!), and Viscera Seer on top with Seer first. Next turn, draw the Seer and cast both it and Company. Profit.

Company seems strong in a number of fringe decks like Shamans, Elves, and those Podless Pod decks we have seen on MTGO. To maximize this card, you don't want to just make it a combo engine. You also need to be able to get value off it, which means playing lots of creatures to flip.

Atarka's Command

Sean: Command is likely to make Burn go deeper into green, if only because its damage ability doesn't target, thus alleviating the Leyline of Sanctity weakness. Whether Burn players will replace Skullcrack with this or run both I'm not sure, but either way, it has a definite place. One of the stronger cards from Tarkir.

Sheridan: Do not think of this as Skullcracks 5-8. Instead, think of Skullcrack as Commands 5-8. In my opinion, AC is by far the most playable of the DTK cards. This is an auto-include in Burn, a probably-include in Zoo, and a definitely-hate for anyone who doesn't like the Burn matchup already. It stops lifegain, it pumps Swiftspears and Guides, it accelerates you into an additional Bolt effect off a third land, and it gets around Leyline. It's almost scarier in Zoo, a deck that can take better advantage of the acceleration effect and the mass Silk Net.

Dromoka's Command

Sheridan: This is one of the clear Modern playables for me. Abzan, Abzan Liege, and Naya Zoo benefit from all of these modes, especially in a metagame that is packed with Burn. You are almost guaranteed to 2 for 1 Burn pilots with this card, whether in countering a Bolt effect and edicting a Eidolon of the Great Revel, fighting one creature and saving another from something like Searing Blood, or some other combination of those effects.

DC is also strong against the other top decks of the format: Twin and Abzan. Against Twin, you can kill the namesake enchantment, stop burn spells, and destroy their creatures. Bonus points for getting rid of the otherwise unstoppable Keranos, God of Storms, a classic bullet used against Abzan midrange. And against Abzan itself, DC breaks open Siege Rhino, Tarmogoyf, and Tasigur, the Golden Fang staring contests.

When you have a card that's relevant against the top three decks in the format, you know you are looking at good sideboard and maybe even maindeck material.

Kolaghan's Command

Sean: This has some potential in an 8Rack red splash list of the hard control variety (as opposed to the tempo-based variety Pete Casella ran recently in an SCG IQ). Returning a Pack Rat or Grim Lavamancer is nice, instant speed discard is welcome, artifact destruction helps the Affinity matchup, and we love the ability to speed up our clock or remove a creature. Still, I'm not sure it's high impact enough to warrant its 3 cmc, given what else we can run at that cost. Testing will tell. This also has potential in goodstuff BRx decks.

Sheridan: Another playable Command from Tarkir! I'm loving this in Grixis Delver. Recurring a Delver of Secrets, Young Pyromancer, or Tasigur on top of a Shock effect is pure value. Same thing if you can blow up an opposing Inkmoth Nexus, Cranial Plating, or Spellskite in the deal. Decks that want to use this (like Grixis Delver) will be able to abuse the Raise Dead effect, which makes this a great topdeck at any time in the game.

Narset Transcendent

Sean: Could be very strong in UWx Control decks, or a bit of a dud. Its key drawbacks are that the +1 ability will miss sometimes, and that Restoration Angel and Snapcaster Mage make it sad. In UWBx, Rebounding Lingering Souls is nasty. When it works it will be stupid good, it's just a matter of how often it works, and if it does more harm than good. It's high loyalty is a form of protection, as is the shell you want it in. Probably the best planeswalker from Tarkir, although it's not like there's much competition.

Sheridan: Toughest card to evaluate in the set. Every time you find something good or bad about Narset, you find something else that balances it out. Narset costs 4, which is right in the playable casting cost for Modern. But none of her abilities interact with the board or directly defend her, which is exactly what we don't want to see in Modern. But then again... she "starts" with a whopping 7 loyalty; if you ever tested or played Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver, then you know how awesome a high starting loyalty is on its own. 7 puts Narset out of range of a LOT: Abzan creatures, Snap + Bolt, Electrolyze + Bolt, Swiftspear + Bolt, etc. But just when you thought you found something good, you see that the +1 doesn't even draw you cards all the time! Even in a deck jammed with 30 spells, that's still about a 40-50% chance to miss your draw on an activation.

As for her other abilities, rebound on Souls is excellent (hurray!) but rebound on your sorcery speed Bolt/Helix is not quite as good (booo!). The ultimate shuts down control and combo decks (hurray!) but isn't game over against midrange and doesn't do much at all against most aggro (booo!). So overall, she's a very tricky card to evaluate. I see 1-2 Narsets making the cut for Esper Control and 4C Control, but nowhere else.

Sarkhan Unbroken

Sheridan: The Dragons of Tarkir edition of Sarkhan is a pretty modest dude. His +1 is a nice unconditional draw engine, and his -2 will win the game over time. Unfortunately, his ultimate is, more or less, totally irrelevant in Modern. So if Sarkhan is playable, he needs to be carried by those first two abilities.

I am skeptical of his playability because those dragons just aren't big or bad enough. 4/4 flyers get blocked by 1/1 Spirits any day of the week. And 4/4 flyers can't tangle with the big ground-pounders of Abzan, like Rhino, Tas, and Goyf. But he's also a pretty decent finisher in Temur Moon-style lists, similar to Hoogland's 7th place list at SCG Baltimore.

Honorable Mentions

Some of the cards from Dragons of Tarkir just miss the mark or just don't have a home yet. Others inspire cool brews or slot into some decks that needed a little love. Either way, don't count on the selections below taking down the next Grand Prix, but also don't count them out of the format just yet!

Anafenza, Tree-Kin Spirit: Melira 2.0 (alongside Finks/Seer, at least). Melira might steal games from Infect, but ghost-Anafenza has way more relevance in other matchups. Even in decks that don't care about persist combo shenanigans, Anafenza is a nice mini-lord that helps your deck grind through an enemy's defenses.

Living Lore: Are your Johnny senses tingling? Probably not playable, but it's hard to not get excited by the prospect of pairing this with Cruel Ultimatum, Enter the Infinite, Time Stretch, Worldfire, or any of the other insane high CMC sorceries and instants of the format.

Impact Tremors: Norin the Wary decks use cards like its namesake and other little creatures to trigger enter-the-battlefield effects and take over a game. Tremors is a cost-effective and high impact (couldn't resist) engine for that deck.

Qal Sisma Behemoth: A 5/5 for 3 is always going to turn heads, but the drawback on this one is a bit steep. If you play Behemoth, ask yourself why you aren't just playing Gurmag Angler instead, a creature that will almost always be a 5/5 for 3 with basically no drawbacks.

Thunderbreak Regent: Doesn't die to Bolt or Abrupt Decay, and if they kill it, it's a Lava Spike. Could be a solid 4 drop in Jund, but is it worth stretching the manabase to compete with Hellkite, especially in the Souls-infested metagame?

Assault Formation: There's a little discussion going on now that this card could open the door for a respectable Wall deck (which would probably include Doran). If this deck turns out to be playable, it will be on the backs of the 4 maindeck Spellskite that its deck will be running. Add to that some other playable walls like Wall of Omens, Wall of Roots, and Nyx-Fleece Ram, and you have the start of a spicy brew.

Ojutai's Command: Cryptic Command-esque with different advantages and disadvantages. To evaluate this in the context of UWx Control: the recur Snapcaster mode is absurd, lifegain is very relevant against aggro, creatures are usually your biggest problem, and you love drawing cards -- what's not to love? Then again, it doesn't counter any spell, which is definitely something a control mage won't love. Some UWx Control lists might try this out, as might some Bant mages trying to tie together their Goyfs and Pridemages with a cool new toy.

Final Thoughts

Maybe it's just our imagination, but judging from this list, it feels like Wizards has pushed the power level more than usual in Dragons of Tarkir, and even designed cards specifically for Modern. This bodes well for the future of the format. Bring on the playables!

Hate Cards in Modern – White Edition

Posted on March 13, 2015 by Sean Ridgeley

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Hate and You

Welcome to Hate Cards in Modern, where we teach you how to be hateful colour by colour. I'm your host Timmy Tryhard. Ahem.

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Modern, unlike Standard, is a format defined somewhat by its hate cards, by which I mean cards that specifically target your opponent's strategy in attempt to lock them out of a win or at least delay them long enough for you to win. Because of the larger card pool, the decks in Modern go more "in" on their strategy, and so, hate cards become quite important. Some find this to be a downside of the format, and while perhaps it could be lessened for the better of the format's health, I personally enjoy the challenge of fighting through hate in the deckbuilding process and in actual games.

Diving In

Moving on, below are the best, most popular, and most currently relevant hate cards in white, the most hateful of all the colours. Typically these will be in your sideboard, but depending on the meta, your deck, and what the card does, sometimes you can be extra hateful and make it work mainboard.

Thalia, Guardian of Thraben

Usually mainboard material, Thalia works great in creature heavy decks that want to slow down creature light decks with lots of answers. You can find this in "Hatebears" decks (which have a lot of hateful creature cards), and even the occasional Elves list.

Aven Mindcensor

Another hatebear you'll often find maindeck, Mindcensor is decent on its own as a 2/1 flash flyer, but the search hate can be brutal for decks like Scapeshift, RG Tron, and Amulet.

Kataki, War's Wage

Affinity flat out loses to this if it's timely enough and doesn't have the Galvanic Blast, and can still struggle even if the timing is suboptimal. Unfortunately, it only really does work against Affinity, so only use it if the deck gives you a lot of trouble.

Leonin Arbiter

Hatebear #3. Like the others, he's decent on his own to hate on the same decks as Mindcensor, but when you consider he turns Path to Exile into the unconditionally best removal in the format, and Ghost Quarter into a Strip Mine, you get the real sense of his power. Run him maindeck with these cards.

Leyline of Sanctity

A card so hateful you don't even need to be in white to use it. Of course, it's not usually recommended to go without the hardcast option, as then you're pretty much forced to run four copies, which in turn requires you to remove four cards from your deck just to have a chance at this working. If you can hardcast it and your deck is capable of holding off Burn and Abzan decks on its own, you'll find this very powerful whether it's in the opener or not. It's recommended you use it in all-in (or almost all-in) decks like Amulet and Auras that just want to slam this, lest they become fragile to discard, or get raced by Burn.

Stony Silence

Hates on Affinity but a little less harder than Kataki, while proving much more effective against Tron. As a bonus, it's much harder to destroy for these decks. If you have trouble with both or just dislike the idea of using sideboard slots for one deck, Stony Silence will serve you very well.

Timely Reinforcements

One of the best hate cards for Burn, and aggro in general. When playing against Burn, try to play it around Skullcrack / Atarka's Command, but keep in mind even if they do negate the life loss, you still get some valuable tokens. The downside is it only really works in creature light decks. As a bonus, this card has flavour up the wazoo.

Rest in Peace

A lot more relevant these days than it used to be, Rest in Peace (RIP) hates on Snapcaster Mage, Tasigur, the Golden Fang (or Ladyboy, the Golden Wang as I've heard him called), and Become Immense, as well as the odd graveyard deck like Gifts Tron. Graveyards can be a very important resource for decks that run these cards, and RIP does well to take that away.

Mirran Crusader

You probably never want to run this guy mainboard, but out of the sideboard he's an extremely potent threat against Abzan, both on offense and defense. Can also work great against less common decks like Stompy.

Suppression Field

If you run few or no activated abilities yourself, or perhaps you just have enough mana that you don't have to care, Suppression Field can do a ton of work for you against the likes of Abzan, Twin, Affinity, Tron, and more. A criminally underused card in Modern.

Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite

You don't see the Queen of Phyrexia too often because of her high casting cost, but in Reanimator decks, if used in combination with the right amount of control, she can end the game promptly. A real beating against Infect, Affinity, and Merfolk, among other decks.

That's all for now. Next time I'll cover blue hate cards. Round and round the colour pie we go!

Magic Online Quietly Does Something Awesome

Posted on March 13, 2015September 16, 2020 by Danny Brown

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Like most users of the client, I have some serious problems with Magic Online and the way that it's run. I use it because I love Magic and want to play it more often, but if I wasn't already hooked on the game (or if I had first started playing with MTGO), it would not even be installed on my computer today.

A long-time complaint of MTGO players has been that the 4-3-2-2 draft queues that are offered are horrible value. In short, Swiss and 8-4 queues both provide a total of 12 packs in prizes, whereas the 4-3-2-2 queues provide only 11.

Not like that, though. In a bad way.

Anyway, in the Magic Online announcements from earlier this week, Wizards quietly introduced a new prize structure for flashback drafts:

As a bonus for the reality-devouring titan enthusiasts amongst you, we'll be running Rise of the Eldrazi 6-2-2-2 Drafts throughout the same time period! Check out the tables below for full Event information.

Rise of the Eldrazi 6-2-2-2 Draft

START TIMES Wednesday, March 18, 12:00 p.m.
until
Wednesday, April 1, downtime
All times are Pacific (for UTC, add 7 hours)

LOCATION Limited Queues

ENTRY OPTIONS

Option 1 Option 2

14 Event Tickets 2 Event Tickets, plus product

PRODUCT 3 Rise of the Eldrazi booster packs

SIZE 8 players

PLAY STYLE Swiss

FORMAT Draft

DURATION 10 minutes deck-building time. Three rounds, each round up to 50 minutes.

PRIZES

Match Wins Prizes QPs

3 Wins 6 Rise of the Eldrazibooster packs 1

2 Wins 2 Rise of the Eldrazibooster packs 0

I really, really like this. I've extolled the virtues of Swiss drafts in the past, and in the same article, alluded to the fact that 4-3-2-2 queues are bad value. The new 6-2-2-2 prize structure is basically everything I could ever want, and in some ways even more attractive than the commonly requested 5-3-2-2 structure.

The downside, if there is one, is that if you go 0-2, it's very unlikely that your opponent will stick around for round three, should you have wanted to play that last matchup. Some would argue that makes this not a "true" Swiss format, but I think it's a mercy, if anything.

It would be fantastic to see these 6-2-2-2 queues completely replace both Swiss and 4-3-2-2 queues on MTGO. You could even make an argument that 8-4 queues could be swallowed as well, but keeping one single-elimination and one Swiss queue seems more correct.

Of course, this is Magic Online, so for every step forward, there are two steps back:

Magic Online players the world over are looking forward to filling out this monstrosity five times a week.

Insider: MTG Stock Watch 3/8/15

Posted on March 13, 2015January 17, 2022 by David Schumann

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Welcome back fellow speculators! Before we begin today I would like to get people's thoughts and opinions on this series. Please post in the comments section what you do/don't like, what changes you would like to see, what else I should be covering or if something doesn't seem to have much relevance if I should simply add more to a different category.

As always we'll start with the Penny Stocks.

Penny Stocks

1. Mastery of the Unseen (+1022.2%) - Wow! This card sky rocketed. It had a strong showing at GP Miami and went from bulk to $4. This is one of those cards that should have been on people's radars as previous/similar iterations have usually found a home somewhere (looking at you Sacred Mesa).

The ability to psuedo draw cards for four mana isn't terrible and when you do flip creatures you can gain a considerable amount of life. The fact that you get uncounterable 2/2 creatures (and can sneak powerful threats onto the board under countermagic) makes it the perfect card for midrange decks to beat control, forcing them to use targeted removal on unknown targets or mass removal on what could potentially be a collection of 2/2's.

2. Gutteral Response (+177.7%) - This is an interesting call. It is a powerful Modern sideboard option that's old enough that there aren't a lot of copies floating around. However, with MM2015 looming around the corner I wouldn't hold onto these expecting more, as a reprint would destroy this recently gained value.

3. Master of Waves (+139.1%) - Good ol' Master of Waves got a big jump this week with the spoiling of Shorecrasher Elemental and all the mono-blue devotion decks people started brewing because of it.

It's cute that Shorecrasher will get pumped by Master of Waves, but the mono-blue deck doesn't really have any good devotion enablers in the one- and two-drop slot like it did with RTR block. I would be happy to unload my extra copies at their current new price of around $7.

4. Dragon Tempest (+110.2%) - This card isn't even out yet but it already jumped from the basic "bulk" category of pre-release cards (around $1) to over $2.50, based heavily on the interaction with Descent of the Dragons.

The problem is we already had a similar combo like this from Journey into Nyx with Hour of Need plus Battlefield Thaumaturge and that never panned out. Granted this combo is a bit stronger, but it's still a three-card combo (Dragon Tempest, Descent of the Dragons and cards that make creatures/are creatures). This will likely fall back down as the hype train moves on and people realize it's not the best strategy for the Standard environment.

5. Thassa, God of the Sea (+59.6%) - This jump is following suit of the Master of Waves jump. People think that Mono-Blue Devotion will be a thing so the key components of the old deck (that are still Standard-legal) all see a bit of a jump. Again, unless we see some solid one- or two-drops for the deck I don't know if all it was really missing was a three-drop, but people will try to make it work again given how powerful turn four Master with 7 devotion really is.

Blue Chip Stocks

1. Scrubland (-2.98%) - We're seeing very few Esper style decks in Legacy recently, and even fewer non-blue W/B decks. Scrubland has finally fallen into the bottom three of the duals, but should we see a resurgence in Esper Stoneblade decks we'll see a bump in Scrubland again. If you need them, now seems like a good time to pick them up.

2. Volcanic Island (+2.32%) - Yet again we see Volcanic moving upwards. It is now very close to being even with Underground Sea, which just goes to show you how powerful red has become in the eternal formats.

3. Dark Confidant (-2.08%) - Bob still seems to be falling despite the loss of Dig Through Time and Treasure Cruise in Modern and Cruise in Legacy. He is still the #2 card of Modern (behind Tarmogoyf) with Vendilion Clique in a very close third.

With the resurgence in burn strategies in the Modern format it makes sense that he's in decline, but should those decks get pushed out by all the Siege Rhinos then expect Bob to see a resurgence.

4. Tarmogoyf (+1.988%) - Despite the announcement of his imminent reprint in MM2015, Tarmogoyf still seems to be moving upward. The fact that the reprint is mythic might provide people with the feeling of security that his price won't move much (just like last time...or he could even move up). However, I think this is a false sense of security.

WoTC barely printed Modern Masters for fear of another Chronicles debacle. Its popularity and the growth of the Modern format likely means we'll see a much larger print run for MM2015. We will see a drop in Tarmogoyf's price come MM2015, but by how much is not something I feel I can guess at this time without more information from WoTC regarding the print run.

It is important to note that the Modern Masters Tarmogoyf dropped $10 at the announcement of his reprinting in MM2015 (so it appears that while the original artwork continues to move upward, the new artwork took a hit).

5. Sneak Attack (-1.87%) - Sneak and Show decks are still not performing like they used to and the jump in Sneak Attack's value occurred a while after the deck proved dominant. It hasn't recovered since the Treasure Cruise tempo decks pushed it out of the format a while back.

Opportunities

While it's only March we already hear talk of players looking at rotation and trying to move their Theros cards earlier and earlier. While I don't advocate starting to sell all your Theros block cards now, if you aren't using them it isn't the worst time to start trading them off.

What really hurts is the scrylands that many of us bought heavily in on and have yet to see any sort of return on. They should be close to their high point now if they had followed the typical trajectory (which they definitely did not).

But it's not all bad news in the Theros block world. A lot of solid casual cards from the block are at their all-time lows. Given that each block since Innistrad has sold better than the previous one, (though I honestly had a hard time believing Theros block did better than RTR) I am weary of casual non-mythics simply due to massive supply. So what we're going to look at opportunity-wise are the Theros block mythics (with a stronger focus on Journey given it was the third set) for low-priced casual all-stars.

1. Sage of Hours - This mythic is pretty close to bulk status, sitting at sub $2 for a third set mythic with a cool ability that never caught on in Standard. We've seen "take extra turn" cards become staples in EDH (look at Time Stretch) and this is the only one I'm aware of attached directly to a creature. EDH is also full of ways to add/move counters and being a single color means that it can fit into more decks than a multi-colored card.

2. Kruphix, God of Horizons - While he got no love in Standard, he is both of EDH's best colors (green for ramp and blue for card draw/counterspells). His abilities are powerful and he can come down early enough to allow people to gain an advantage from storing up mana.

Also given how often Reliquary Tower finds a home in EDH decks, his "no maximum hand size" ability is also a really nice one to have for a deck that ramps and draws tons of cards. Copies can be picked up for less than $3 currently and I honestly don't expect him to drop much as we get closer to rotation.

3. Champion of Stray Souls - This one definitely falls into the bulk mythic price, but his abilities are quite powerful and again being mono-colored means he can go into quite a lot of decks. Graveyard recursion is a pretty popular way to gain card advantage in EDH and he actually serves as a mini-engine if you build a deck around creatures with ETB abilities and tokens makers (Sengir Autocrat, Skeletal Vampire, et.al.). Given he is so close to bulk mythic status your risk is pretty limited and in a few years he could easily be a $4-5 card.

4. Karametra, God of Harvests - The power of this card is that it provides continual ramping by doing what green-whtie players already want to do (play creatures). The fact that the lands don't have to be basic (just forest or plains) means that she can actually be really useful in five-color decks as a great way to mana-fix consistently. Her biggest downside is that she costs five, which is usually when EDH players want to be casting bigger/more powerful spells...not continue ramping (except those of us who love playing Boundless Realms).

5. Xenagos, God of Revels - Giving a creature haste and berserking it in this format are still incredibly powerful abilities. What I like most about Xenagos is that he's the type of card you don't have to build around but instead plays a solid support role. I can easily see him fitting into any Mayael decks (as both a way to give Mayael haste if necessary and as a way to hit people really hard, really fast).

Honorable Mention: Phenax, God of Deception - This one I was on the fence about adding to the list...not because it's not an awesome casual card, but because its current price is basically already 100% due to the casual crowd. He makes for a really good general and matches with the mill colors, but ironically his ability requires mill players to play creatures...preferably walls, which they may or may not want to do.

I still like the card long term, but I am a bit concerned about future growth opportunity. Then again, people are still paying $24 for Glimpse the Unthinkable so there must be a lot of players who just like to mill.

Ponder Shuffle Episode 5- Three is the New Infinite

Posted on March 13, 2015March 12, 2015 by Ryan Overturf

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Ryan and Jens talk about the new kid on the block in Standard as well as more Dragon's of Tarkir spoilers!

Time Does Things To You

Posted on March 13, 2015 by Corbin Hosler

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And in Magic, it does even more.

I'm not an art guy. I'm no Mike Linnemann. Half the time I don't even look at the art outside of using it to identify cards. But, hell, when you take the time there's some really cool stuff there.

Take this, for instance.

Looked at separately, you'd never notice anything special about Durdle Turtle and the random 1/6 Tombshell. But next to each other? Suddenly we have a story being told. That's really cool, and it's far from the only time we've seen this in this block, much less all of Magic.

So, what else have I been missing? Any other really cool stories being told by multiple pieces of art I've never picked up on?

A Beginner’s Guide to Modern

Posted on March 12, 2015 by Sean Ridgeley

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Modern can be a daunting format if you're coming from Standard, or if you're one of the rare birds that starts here. I'm here to tell you it's probably not as intimidating as it might seem, and to help you get started.

Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!

Where Standard is about a turn 7 format, Modern is quicker. It's described by Wizards of the Coast as a turn 4 format, which means many of the decks are capable of winning consistently on turn 4. There are decks that can win turn 3, but this happens inconsistently (except maybe unless you're Amulet, which could see a banning soon).

What this means in terms of actual gameplay is mistakes are much less easily forgiven: you often only have 4 turns to win or lose, so you need to make the most of each of those turns. This will come with time: playing against all of the format's popular decks and memorizing their lines, as well as your own. For Modern lovers, this is a great source of joy: finally feeling like you've mastered the format (ahem). It can take years, but if you love depth and a challenge, you'll come to appreciate how rewarding it is.

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More pow-ah!

With almost 9,000 cards to choose from over Standard's ~1,200, you can understand why Modern's power level is higher. Think about the most powerful cards in every Standard since 8th Edition or later you've ever played in, then imagine all of those cards in one format. That's pretty much Modern.

You've got your Lightning Bolt, your Delver of Secrets, your Liliana of the Veil, your Path to Exile, your Tarmogoyf, and plenty more. While it can be intimidating playing against these cards, remember you have access to the same cards and that playing with them is a very empowering feeling.

Modern prices

Modern decks are more expensive on average than Standard decks, but you shouldn't let this stop you from playing the format at all.

For one, there are some inherently cheap decks you can get started with that will put up very respectable results for you. The Modern Event deck is a $75 B/W Tokens deck that's proven a decent place to begin, for one. Other good choices include Merfolk ($350), Soul Sisters ($230), and Blue Tron ($350).

Blue Tron by shoktroopa - Modern Daily #8046363, (4-0), Mar 07, 2015

Creatures

1 Platinum Angel

2 Snapcaster Mage

1 Solemn Simulacrum

1 Sundering Titan

2 Treasure Mage

1 Wurmcoil Engine

Instants

4 Condescend

1 Cyclonic Rift

2 Gifts Ungiven

4 Remand

3 Repeal

1 Spell Burst

4 Thirst for Knowledge

Artifacts

4 Expedition Map

2 Mindslaver

1 Oblivion Stone

3 Talisman of Dominance

Lands

1 Academy Ruins

6 Island

1 Oboro, Palace in the Clouds

2 Snow-Covered Island

1 Tectonic Edge

4 Urza's Mine

4 Urza's Power Plant

4 Urza's Tower

Sideboard

1 Wurmcoil Engine

1 Repeal

1 Aetherspouts

2 Chalice of the Void

1 Crucible of Worlds

4 Dismember

1 Ghost Quarter

2 Spell Pierce

2 Spell Snare

Second, you can budget-ize popular decks. Some will suffer a lot for it, but some very little. The best suggestion for this is Burn -- swap the fetches and Grim Lavamancer for basics and more burn or creatures and you're in nearly as good shape, while dropping the price about $400.

Third, Modern is a non-rotating format, so once you have your deck, assuming you love it enough, you could play it for as long as Modern exists, with few new cards needed the entire time (and even when you do make new purchases, they'll cost much less than a new Standard deck would). So, long-term Modern is actually much cheaper, unless you build a lot of expensive decks, but even then you can share the expensive cards between them.

Introducing Combo

Standard sometimes has a little combo, but mostly it's aggro, midrange, and control. In Modern, you have all that and shouldn't have too much trouble figuring out how they work, but combo is very much apart of the metagame and a major factor in how people build their decks. So, to do well, you'll need to familiarize yourself with how they win (as for the when, it's usually about turn 4).

Twin wins by playing a Pestermite or Deceiver Exarch at the end of your turn and then equipping it with Splinter Twin for an infinite creature combo, killing you outright. They play counterspells to hurt your plan while protecting their own; if you disrupt them enough, sometimes they'll just beat down with their fliers and throw burn spells at your face until you die the old-fashioned way. The key here is to keep their creatures off the table. Some of the best and most popular hate cards for Twin include the upcoming Rending Volley and Spellskite -- both of which have applications against other decks, too.

Amulet abuses bouncelands like Simic Growth Chamber and Amulet of Vigor to acquire great amounts of mana in a short time, at which point they drop a Primeval Titan, activate Slayer's Stronghold, and swing with Titan to kill you outright. This can happen as early as turn 1, though this is very rare. Their backup plan is to play Hive Mind then Summoner's Pact or Slaughter Pact, which causes you to lose. The key to beating them is to keep their Titans off the table, and if you run counterspells, to counter Hive Mind (unless you have green and black mana to pay for their Pacts). The best hate card for Amulet is Blood Moon, which the deck has an extremely difficult time dealing with, even if they build their sideboard for it -- often it will win the game outright.

RG Tron uses land search lands to assemble Tron lands (see: Urza's Mine) and thus, lots of mana. Like Amulet, they do this quickly and use the large amounts of mana to play expensive things that kill you -- specifically, Karn Liberated, Wurmcoil Engine, and less often, Emrakul, the Aeons Torn and Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre. Aggro is Tron's weakness, but if you're not playing that, you'll probably have to rely on hate cards to win. Some of the best and most popular include Stony Silence, Aven Mindcensor, and Blood Moon.

Scapeshift wins by rushing out seven lands into play and then throwing their deck at you after casting Scapeshift (which gets Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle into play if it's not already, and then a bajillion mountains). Like Twin, they have counterspells to disrupt you and protect themselves. It's not blazing fast like Twin, so you can just race them sometimes. Otherwise, counter their Scapeshift and/or blow up their Valakut if they play it early with Ghost Quarter or Tectonic Edge (if your deck can afford to run them). Some of the most popular hate cards include Aven Mindcensor, Blood Moon, and Shadow of Doubt.

There are more combo decks in Modern, but these are the most popular at the moment. Now you should be reasonably well equipped to fight them, as opposed to being blindsided with a win "out of nowhere".

On Your Own

From here, you should research the various decks in Modern (many of which we'll cover as time goes on) and decide which is best for you. Then, either proxy it or watch a lot of coverage of it in action to see if it's your thing.

Once you're set on one, buy it and play it at Friday Night Magic (or on whichever day your local shop runs Modern), and/or grab it on Magic Online and test it there in the Tournament Practice room, then in dailies (which are basically Friday Night Magic, but more competitive on average).

Best of luck!

Johnny Karate and Magic: The Gathering

Posted on March 12, 2015March 12, 2015 by Danny Brown

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I'm a big fan of the television show Parks and Recreation, which just ended its seventh and final season. One of the last episodes featured a TV show within the TV show: The Johnny Karate Super Awesome Musical Explosion Show!

It's a kids' show, and that means there's inspirational content. The best part, to me, were the Five Karate Moves to Success:

The reason why I'm bringing this up here is because of how well these concepts apply so neatly to MTG. You don't have to do these things every single day, but doing them on a regular basis will help improve your enjoyment with MTG and the community itself. Check it out:

1. Make Something

Do something constructive with your MTG time. Make a trade. Make a deck. Make some changes to your cube. Reorganize your trade binder.

You can get more creative, too: make a cosplay outfit or a craft project out of Magic cards. Write a blog post or an MTG-related song. Contribute something.

Or, short of all that, you could just make a top eight!

2. Learn Something

Even the smartest person in the world, whoever he or she may be, still learns things daily. When it comes to MTG, you can always learn something new: the history an old Standard format, the best line to win a tough matchup, another trade strategy.

You can take a little bit more of a passive approach and just watch MTG videos or read articles. I learn something from everything I take in—even if sometimes the thing I learn is what not to do.

3. Karate Chop Something

Win a game of Magic every once in a while. It's good for the soul.

4. Try Something New

Magic is such a huge game, and there's always something new to try. Never drafted a cube before? Find a group or jump on MTGO! Always play aggro in Standard? Borrow a control deck. Never attended a PPTQ? Check the schedule and try out the one at your LGS this season. You can try a new format, a new line of play, or even a new brand of sleeves.

Like I said, there's always something new to try. What if you find something you didn't know you couldn't live without?

5. Be Nice to Someone

You should always do this, because being nice to people is... nice. Seriously, it makes you and the other person feel good, and who doesn't like to feel good?

Next time you're at your LGS, pick out the lonely looking guy in the corner and strike up a conversation. Give up a little value in a trade to a kid without much of a collection. Let your brand-new opponent take back a misplay. It doesn't take a major effort to brighten someone's day: sometimes just saying hi in a genuinely friendly way will do the trick.

Parks and Rec may be over, but that doesn't mean Johnny Karate's philosophy can't live on. Use these concepts to improve you Magic community, starting today!

Spoilers for 3/12/15

Posted on March 12, 2015 by Jason Alt

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Sarkhan's Triumph

This is bound to be worth $3-$5 in a few years if the set follows the typical trend of small third sets. This is narrow but it is also very powerful and I expect you to be able to grab these for free from draft chaff or trade for them a playset at a time for like a bulk rare. Put these in a box and sit on them. Foils are bound to be insane also. There are two red dragon enablers at uncommon in the set and I fully expect them to get there.

Surrak, the Hunt Caller

As an EDH player, I saw this card and said "Yuck, this is worse than Yeva, Nature's Herald but Standard players have been a bit more charitable in their assessment. This is essentially a 5/4 haste if you have 3 power of creatures in play, something that is doable. Turn 1 elf into turn 2 Courser into this turn 3 is strong, for example. Still, conditional haste seems weak. Formidable is a toughest trigger to pull off. They should call it "Megaferocious". If the payoff for getting a win-more board state like Formidable isn't, well, formidable, then the card is not great. I think this could see play, but I feel like this is a justifiable $2 preorder. Seems like even people who like it aren't buying.

Icefall Regent

What if Dungeon Geists had more power and frost armor? Could this be the dragon that mono-blue is looking for? It gets the job done, is hard to kill and adds two pips. All in all, I would say this card is very attractive. If there is a card in the set that I think has the most upside at a $2 preorder, you're looking at it. The spikes seem split on the card, however, so if you go in, realize you're gambling.

Damnable Pact

What does black really want? Does it want a necrofireball like this or does it want to pay 2 mana for Sign in Blood rather than 4? Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx is a big reason why this card has potential, but that will be gone soon. This seems like it could be better than Skeletal Scrying in certain circumstances. It's hard to say what the deal is here, but this is likely a bulk rare unless someone breaks it early after release. This gets worse in three months when mana is harder to come by. The spikes don't know what to think.

Commune with Lava

This seems kind of similar to Damnable Pact except this has a ton of upside. I don't think standard wants it, but Storm would absolutely get a kick out of this. It costs a lot of mana, but if you're playing a ton of rituals, this will draw you into more rituals. Is this better than Past in Flames in those situations? Past has a flat cost and gives you access to guaranteed rituals in your yard. If you can't beat graveyard hate, maybe this is a tool, but it is hard for me to say this is what the deck needs not having tested. This is yet another $2 preorder, so no one seems all that excited. There is a good discussion going about whether this would replace Epic Experiment which is a good question to be asking. It DOES say end of your NEXT turn, which is the real relevant part here. Still, storm doesn't want to play a bunch of rituals to get mana, play this for x=10 then pass the turn hoping to go off next turn, so you need to keep mana up to cast what you draw into. This card is tricky but I don't see much interest yet.

Myth Realized

This seems like it could get big very quickly. You basically have an unwrathable creature that has megaprowess and can get +1/+1 counters for 2W. Does a deck want this? Hard to say! This is sold out at $4, though, which means people are more excited for this than they are for the new Dungeon Geists. Abrupt Decay and the like makes this tough to love in Modern, but Standard may want this. See what people are saying. a $4 buy-in severely cramps upside, but you could end up buying now at discount if you want these to play with. There is hype here.

Dromoka's Command

Sold out at $3, this may be the best of the cycle. Each of these commands has a mode that is basically a sideboard card and the fact that they are maindeckable makes them attractive. This is very strong, but a scenario I see being a bit awkward is trying to blank a burn spell and not being quite sure which other mode to pick. Still, people are really excited about this card. I am among them.

Clone Legion

From the makers of Megamorph comes "Megaclone".

Probably destined to be a bulk mythic, I could see some EDH decks putting this in, I just don't think they won't take it back out again. 9 mana is steep to only target one player, but you could end up cloning a ton of value cards against a Roon deck or getting a million tokens. Still, that leaves you with board parity. For 9 mana, I want Insurrection, not board parity.

Dragons of Tarkir Spoilers 3/12/15

Posted on March 12, 2015March 12, 2015 by Jason Alt

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