The Magic: The Gathering Crashers and Climbers are here as we tiptoe closer to prerelease for Spider-Man this week, with one card from the new set already worth over $130.
Elsewhere, there’s big news for Vivi, some Tarkir: Dragonstorm fluctuation, and yet another card that pairs with Toph from the upcoming Avatar set.
Climbing
Those clever clogs at Wargamer have spotted a fun one this week. Equinox, which dates back to 1994 (I was 4, in case you were wondering, and didn’t know my Mana from my Modern Horizons), has seen a price hike.
The reason, as is often the case in recent weeks, is the upcoming Magic: The Gathering Avatar crossover set. This card protects your lands, which is lovely, and despite a lack of land removal in recent years (I did manage to pull off a very enjoyable Planetary Annihilation in a recent Commander session), it pairs nicely with the upcoming Toph, the First Metalbender, since it makes everything into lands.
It’s going for $20, but the market value is around $5. Considering it was just $1.50 not long ago, it could climb higher for formats where it’s still legal.
It’s not even here yet, but Magic’s hunt for the Infinity Stones has well and truly kicked off with The Soul Stone.
The card taps for mana, which is neat, but by exiling a creature, you can ‘Harness’ the stone to pull a creature from your graveyard to your side of the field each turn. It’s up to $130 market value and isn’t even here yet.
Tarkir Dragonstorm’s Elspeth, Storm Slayer is on the rise again. This Planeswalker can create tokens (and double them), add counters and flying, and offer targeted removal of big threats.
She’s now over $30, having dipped to $24 in late June, and she’s not the only White spell from the set to see a climb.
Voice of Victory is up to a market value of $13.70, a 64% increase in a few weeks.
Crashing
Vivi Ornitier has been dropping for some time, but he’s likely to tumble now. Why? Well, it seems Wizards of the Coast will follow through with the community’s request to ban the diminutive spellcaster from Standard.
He’ll likely be gone in November 10’s next banwave, so have your fun while you can, Standard spellslingers.
Sticking with Final Fantasy, Summon: Bahamut is on the way down, too. This powerful Saga Dragon is a 9/9 with removal, card draw, and a big ol’ potential game-ending attack all wrapped into one.
It’s now just over $20, and I can see it being fun to pop into a dragon-themed deck.
I love Craterhoof Behemoth, and the big ol’ beast has seen another drop. It’s now sitting at a market value of around $11.50, a dollar or so below where it was just a couple of weeks ago. As a potential match-ender, it has plenty of utility in any deck with green.
Finally, two Edge of Eternities cards are plummeting, despite still being very useful. The first, Exalted Sunborn, is down to $18, having been $27 when the set launched. It offers a flying 4/5 with Lifelink that can double your tokens.
Moonlit Meditation is now just a dollar or so, and also doubles tokens once per turn, but turns them into copies of a chosen artifact or creature. It’s the kind of fun card that could lead to utter chaos, and it’s super cheap.
Lloyd Coombes is an experienced freelancer in tech, gaming and fitness seen at Polygon, Eurogamer, Macworld, TechRadar and many more. He's a big fan of Magic: The Gathering and other collectible card games, much to his wife's dismay.
