Weekly Winners 2022 - 02

This week we have seen some interesting movement in prices. An older card that is spiking, but is not on the reserved list. And we see movement because of the Neon Dynasty leaks. A more interesting week than last week in my opinion.

Like every week, just in time for FNM, I'll now tell you about the cards that will be the talk of the town tonight!

Come discuss this week's price movements with us on Reddit.

 

Premium Peak Preview

Our Premium users may have noticed Agadeem's Awakening showing up in the Trends section. The card has mostly been stable price wise around $15 for quite some months but has slowly started it's uptrend a month ago. This is a popular card in commander and also sees fringe play in Modern, Legacy and also in Standard. The limited time Premium offer of $9.95 doesn't seem to be lasting much longer, so if you want to lock yourself in for that price for the duration of the subscription, this seems to be the time.

 

#1 Eater of the Dead $91.38 (+83%)

 

Whenever I see an old card spike all of the sudden, my initial reaction is "must be reserved list", but shockingly enough Eater of the Dead is not on there and thus can technically be reprinted at any time. Like spikes we have seen in the past few weeks this creature works well in Umbris, Fear Manifest and also enables Gravestorm that we have seen spiking recently. And while there definitely is synergy there, I don't really think it's that good to build around. When looking at other Commander builds we see the Eater show up in Phenax, God of Deception decks. These two together could potentially kill an opponent outright.

Eater of the Dead also works pretty well with cards like Earthcraft. With both on the battlefield you can untap a basic land each time you remove a card from a graveyard with Eater of the Dead and while it will not give you infinite mana it will give you as many as there are creatures in graveyards.

But there's more about this card. Many people, myself included, love this art. Eater of the Dead is a pretty iconic card from The Dark. And while this card may be reprinted in the future, it is not that likely that the same art will be used making this version pretty rare. But so far it looks like this may have been a targeted buyout. But since it is quite a notable buy out many content creators have given this card attention which could have led to the card being driven up more. A notable example of this Rudy from Alpha Investments who has even made a separate video about this buyout.

 

#2 Flickering Ward $11.00 (+57%)

 

This Aura from Tempest has already been jumping up since May 2021, and while the price slowly seemed to be settling it spiked again to its all time high of $11 today. That it has been getting more attention the last few months is not add since it does fairly well in commander decks that care about Enchantments like Sram, Senior Edificer or Sythis, Harvest's Hand. Being able to give a creature, or more notably your commander, protection for a color is pretty cool but if you can return it to your hand for and then replay it for extra enter-the-battlefield value then that's pretty good. But this interaction isn't new.

So the reason it is spiking again now is because of new Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty leaks that have appeared. And even though these leaks are not confirmed, they do look pretty real. I will not show images of these cards to respect the people who do not want to know about cards until they have been officially spoiled. But I will link these cards and briefly discuss them including their names. So if you don't want to know, stop reading here and move on to the next winner.

SPOILER ALERT: I AM NOW GOING TO DISCUSS THESE LEAKED CARDS. IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO KNOW I SUGGEST YOU SKIP TO THE NEXT WINNER

The first of these leaked cards is called Kami of Transcience. It says that whenever you cast an enchantment spell, put a +1/+1 counter on it. This spirit creature also can return itself from the graveyard to you hand. You can see why it works well with Flickering Ward. By returning it to your hand and replaying it you can make a very large Kami which also has Trample. We also see movement in Slippery Bogbonder this week that may be linked to this card.

The second leaked card is called Light-Paws, Emperor's Voice. It reads that whenever an Aura enters the battlefield, if you cast it, you may search your library for an Aura card with mana value less than or equal to the Aura and with a different name than each Aura you control, put that card onto the battlefield attached to Light-Paws. So when you play, and replay, Flickering Ward you get to search your library for another Aura of mana value 0 or 1 and put it on Light-Paws. There obviously is a restriction that it cannot have the same name as an Aura you already control, but in commander that is a moot restriction.

 

#3 Perplexing Test (Extended Art) $5.21 (+57%)

 

The Extended version of Perplexing Test has some catching up to do! While the regular version comes in around $5.21, the extended version is still at $4.95 and this difference was a lot larger last week. And personally I don't get why this card is not more popular.

An instant-speed way to return all token or non-token creatures to their owner's hand. That can be really fun to do at the end of someones turn right before yours. Sure, it may cost you a friend or two, but you would have lost a lot more friends if you played Cyclonic Rift instead. It sees play in Geralf, Visionary Stitcher decks where a lot of your zombies may be tokens.

 

Cheap Pickups

Please note: for our 'record low' we consider the price of the card over the past 7 years. Many cards have been even cheaper (a) decade(s) ago. Also note: some cards are still going down, and might be even cheaper pickups next week.

 

Iymrith, Desert Doom $4.59 - Slowly trending down

 

Sanctum Prelate $5.58 - Average trending down, Market going up

 

Galazeth Prismari $5.11 - Trending down, slowly stabilizing

 

Galazeth Prismari	CardKingdom $6.49	TCGPlayer $5.11
Sanctum Prelate		TCGPlayer $5.58
Iymrith, Desert Doom	CardKingdom $6.99	TCGPlayer $5.49