Weekly Winners 2022 - 26

Double Masters 2022 cards are trying to find the prices they will settle at, but thus-far seem to be all over the place. This week we also see some movement in cards because of Pioneer and Commander. These two formats seem to currently be the driving factors of prices.

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.

 

#1 Unlicensed Hearse $12.59 (+57%)

 

I have a little bit of a love/hate relationship with this card. When Streets Of New Capenna came out it was selling for about $1 and seems like it was wildly underestimated when it came out. The card has found its way into both mainboards and sideboards in multiple 60-card formats like Pioneer, Modern, Standard, and Vintage. So why do I hate it? Because I like playing graveyard strategies and this card hoses them!

The card has become popular for a few reasons. It gives you the ability to interact with your opponent's graveyard and keep it in check! Make sure no stuff come back from there since multiple strategies in these formats rely on this. But it also immediately provides you with a board presence that could become substantial. If you are able to clear your opponent's graveyard every turn cycle your Unlicensed Hearse could easily become a 6/6 or greater and all you'd need is a creature with power 2 or greater to crew it.

Since it is a vehicle it dodges more removal than, let's say Scavenging Ooze, and since it is colorless it easily slots into any deck. Being repeatable graveyard hate that can be activated at instant speed without having to keep any resources open is very important when you are playing against a deck that care about the graveyard. Being able to keep them from Delving cards, reanimating, or any other shenanigans you can think of. But besides that it is a ticking time bomb that may become a factor at some point. As the game progresses it will exile more and more cards. It can also exile cards from your own graveyard to keep feeding it.

 

#2 Mind Grind $8.63 (+42%)

 

Dimir commander color-identity is at it again! This card is a good upgrade to the Mind Flayarrrs commander deck and obviously also in decks that revolve around its commander Captain N'ghathrod. It also seems to appear in other commander decks revolving around Tasha, the Witch Queen.

For each opponent reveals cards from the top of their library until they reveal X land cards, then they put all cards revealed this way into their graveyards. If you can play this later in the game for a bunch of mana you are milling your opponents for quite a bit. Along with cards like Zellix, Sanity Flayer it could also provide you with an army of 1/1 black Horrors.

The cards I just mentioned are mostly the newer cards that are popular in commander, but Mind Grind already saw play in decks around Mirko Vosk, Mind Drinker, Phenax, God of Deception, and Lazav, Dimir Mastermind. All commanders that care about cards going to the graveyard from the library.

Lazav, Dimir Mastermind	CardKingdom $1.49	TCGPlayer $1.27
Mind Grind	CardKingdom $5.49	TCGPlayer $8.63
Mirko Vosk, Mind Drinker	CardKingdom $1.49	TCGPlayer $1.23
Phenax, God of Deception	CardKingdom $9.49	TCGPlayer $9.23

 

#3 Cavalier of Thorns $22.31 (+22%)

 

With Winota, Joiner of Forces and Expressive Iteration being banned in Pioneer we are slowly seeing some changes happening in the metagame. One of the decks that seem to be benefiting a lot from these bans is the mono-green ramp deck. These decks ramp quickly and try to churn out big threats. Cavalier of Thorns is both a big creature with Reach, will help you ramp as well and when it dies you can recur something from the graveyard by putting it back on top of your deck. There's a lot of value there. Other finishers in the deck are cards like Polukranos, World Eater, Old-Growth Troll, and Lair of the Hydra.

And we see another card from this deck popping up in the interests because of this reason. That card is Sylvan Caryatid that went up to $11.03 with 18%.

 

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.

 

Cyberdrive Awakener $2.55 - Moving up!

 

Cyberdrive Awakener has been identified by the MTGStocks Premium Penny Stocks feature as a card that has bottomed for a bit but is now starting an uptrend.

 

Acererak the Archlich $6.35 - Slowly trending down

 

Gravecrawler $6.49 - Trending down

 

Cyberdrive Awakener	CardKingdom $2.79	TCGPlayer $3.18
Gravecrawler	CardKingdom $5.99	TCGPlayer $6.49
Acererak the Archlich	CardKingdom $9.99	TCGPlayer $6.35