Price of Knowledge - Painter's Servant

Ok everybody, it’s time again for us here at MTGStocks to pay tribute to one of the better cards we have in our Magic arsenal by showcasing it on its own instead of putting it together with others to provide diversified content. This is Price of Knowledge, and it’s one of my favorite articles to helm because it not only lets me talk about the cards I love, but sometimes shows me cards I never knew or combos I had never seen before.

This article does exactly that with Painter's Servant, a card I not only have owned before but one I have also thought was worthless and traded away for some far less worthwhile card! So without delay here is some information about a quite captivating card.

Painter's Servant

When Shadowmoor was first released in 2008 I was in my “Magic Dark Age” and was on a hiatus from the realms of the Magic universe. So when I first became aware of this card was when our very own Arjen introduced it to me just last month. To be honest, at first I was unimpressed. Yeah, it’s nice, but eighty dollars nice? I was rudely awakened however when I began looking further into what made this card strut proudly through our graphs at a solid 73 dollars. Being released in a larger set made me think that it must have its own niche pairings from within the set, which it does, and anyone trying to stick to a color scheme would love it. But then I got to 2016 and saw that the card that had a meager seven dollar price tag at the time went up to 20 almost overnight, and I had to know why. That’s when I found the ChannelFireball deck of the day article on its combo with Grindstone and I was floored.

The ability to simply say “I Win” on any given turn with only two cards and three mana… Man this combo really made this card the powerhouse it is financially today. Some diligent players came up with pairing Grindstone and Servant together in order to create a scenario where, as early as turn two with the proper hand, they could pay three mana and basically tell the opponent that the game was over. Just like that, pay three mana, activate Grindstone with Servant on the field and it mills the opponent for two cards repeatedly, draining their decks to nothing before their eyes, and when the Servant player passes turn back to the opponent they can’t draw. Game over.

Before 2016 the card had seen great play with this combo, but when ChannelFireball covered it the metrics went crazy and the world of Magic's eyes all turned towards it. Looking at our price graph this is easy to see. It was only about eight dollars until it jumped to nearly 20 (with some down-trend afterword) and maintained a price over ten dollars after this until the world basically ended in 2020. Once that worldly doom and gloom time started this card has done nothing but grow in price. With everyone staying indoors and buying away at all their favorites, Painter's Servant became a hot commodity. Demand drove the price up by around twenty five percent in a matter of only a few months, and that is where it still resides.

Changing the Way It’s Played…

Not only does it combo quite well with Grindstone, it has several other cards that can be used with it to create different and personalized situations for your deck and style. Want to get rid of everything and swing through? Replace Grindstone with Llawan, Cephalid Empress. Rather have your enemies creatures have to sit back and watch the destruction? Replace Grindstone with Wrath of Marit Lage. I see, you wanna make creatures or add counters. Replace Grindstone with Teysa, Orzhov Scion and one of about fifteen other cards (see Commander Spellbook’s Painter’s Servant combos for the whole list). So this one card that I thought would be nothing turns out to be a very versatile and vastly wanted card for anyone trying to play a great and easy Legacy deck, which is where the card currently sees heavy play even still.

  Being able to really get down to the bones on these cards is one of the greatest pleasures in my life, and finding ones like Painter’s Servant that I never suspected would make me want to buy more cards that my wife would kill me for having purchased, that’s a lovely experience in and of itself. Remember, just because you saw a card as great when you first read it, or as trash, you never know when someone can find the gold in it. So make sure to read you cards carefully, listen to the opinions and gameplay of others, and be willing to modify your decks when these sudden and surprising cards appear. I hope you all will enjoy this information and come back for more of this and my other articles. Remember also that our Premium members will have a vast and superior look at the inner workings of this corner of the Magic universe, so stop by this side of things with a membership and check out what you’re missing! Until next time, be good everyone!