Weekly Winners 2019 - 38

Spoiler season for Throne of Eldraine is ending, and all cards of the set should be known. Time to start brewing, and we can tell by the Interests that Eldraine prices are going all over the place, looking for a place to settle. Surprisingly this didn't lead to a lot of spikes outside of Eldraine. This edition of Weekly Winners, will mostly consist of cards going up or down that are printed in Throne of Eldraine or jumped because of it.

 

#1 Murderous Rider // Swift End $11.99 (+103.22%)

 

It seems like Murderous Rider // Swift End is the new chosen removal in black. With Vraska's Contempt rotating out, black may be looking for an alternative. When the knight goes on an adventure, it can kill a creature at instant speed, just like Contempt. However, instead of gaining two life, you lose two. And instead of exiling, the creature or planeswalker is destroyed, but you pay less. Another upside is that it can afterwards become a 2/3 lifelinker to get those 2 life back,

So far we can see this card having a similar price path like that of Vraska's Contempt, starting out before release around $4-5 and then jumping to $10. Contempt had a all time high of about $20, so the card may have some room to grow, but that's really dependant on how the metagame will shape up, and what kind of removal the coming sets may have to offer. The reason that Vraska's Contempt was so expensive, may also be because exiling is more relevant than you'd think. In a metagame with Rekindling Phoenix, the Amonkhet gods, Blood for Bones, and The Eldest Reborn the exiling is actually really relevant.

Taking this into consideration, maybe it's better to draw comparisons with Hero's Downfall, that also shot up to $15 coming from $5.

 

Hero's Downfall	CardKingdom $3.99	TCGPlayer $2.92
Vraska's Contempt	CardKingdom $1.49	TCGPlayer $1.83

 

#2 Kinsbaile Cavalier $5.39 (+62.3%)

 

This is a card from Morningtide, that went up all the sudden. Kinsbaile Cavalier is a Knight and gives your knights double strike. Now, why would this card go up in price now? The most logical reason would be that it would have some synergy with other knights. You may have heard from a little set called Throne of Eldraine, that features a bunch of knights, including a new knight Commander in Syr Gwyn, Hero of Ashvale.

So if you think that Throne of Eldraine is the reason for this jump, you would be correct. There's loads of support for this tribal, especially combined with Equipments. Since Kinsbaile Cavalier was already a $2 card, I don't see loads of them appearing in people's bulk boxes, but it may be worth checking whether you own a copy.

 

Kinsbaile Cavalier

CardKingdom $5.99

TCGPlayer $5.39

 

#3 Phyrexian Dreadnought $59.00 (+20.5%)

 

Usually when a card from the Reserved List spikes, it doesn't really draw my attention, since they happen to fluctuate all the time, or gets bought out to drive prices up. When it comes to Phyrexian Dreadnought, I figured it may be worth briefly discussing. As a little refresher, the Reserved List is a list of cards that will never be reprinted in order to preserve their value on the secondary market, and will never be printed again in a functionally identical form.

So this means that for these cards, there will not be an additional supply, where the demand may vary. Since most cards from this list are old, it also means that there wasn't that much supply to begin with compared to current sets. So it happens occasionally that someone tries to corner the market on this rare commodity, so the price goes up.

Phyrexian Dreadnought is interesting, because it's a card that used to see play in Legacy Stiflenought decks. The idea was simple, play Phyrexian Dreadnought, put its sacrifice trigger on the stack, and Stifle it. It was also played with Vision Charm, where you would put the trigger on the stack, and then phase the Dreadnought out, making it return (phase-in) on their next turn. Since Phasing is not found on cards anymore, here's a little reminder:

Phasing is a static ability that modifies the rules of the untap step. During each player’s untap step, before the active player untaps permanents, all phased-in permanents with phasing that player controls “phase out.” Simultaneously, all phased-out permanents that had phased out under that player’s control “phase in.”

With the printing of Scroll of Fate, the deck has gotten a new toy to get the Dreadnought into play and keeping it there. The Legacy Stiflenought has been putting up some results again lately in MTGO Legacy Leagues, meaning that more people may be interesting in purchasing this card, making the price go up. One of the decks is found below.

 

 

#4 Drafna's Restoration $11.75 (+840%)

 

This is the buyout of the week, meaning nothing to see here, and move along. So why am I addressing this card? More of a PSA Warning to not buy into it. MTG Seattle has actually commented on this buyout in a now removed thread on Reddit about this card. I'm actually impressed in how a store refuses to participate in a buy out.

So, the more you know, the more you don't buy into this price.

 

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.

 

Nicol Bolas, the Ravager $11.43 - Record low and going down because of rotation

 

Karn, Scion of Urza $8.48 - Record low and going down

 

Flusterstorm $10.00 - Record low, bottomed out

 

Grove of the Burnwillows $9.41 - Record low, bottomed out

 

Morophon, the Boundless $6.30 - Record low, bottomed out

 

Flusterstorm	CardKingdom $12.99	TCGPlayer $10.00
Grove of the Burnwillows	CardKingdom $9.99	TCGPlayer $9.41
Karn, Scion of Urza	CardKingdom $8.99	TCGPlayer $9.48
Nicol Bolas, the Ravager	CardKingdom $10.99	TCGPlayer $11.43
Morophon, the Boundless	CardKingdom $5.99	TCGPlayer $6.30