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As I mentioned last time, I’m employing a new strategy (for me) in preparation for PT EMN. Normally, I identify a spec based on some outside metric. Maybe the price is at an all-time low. Perhaps the card is at peak supply. Maybe a metagame shift has occurred and I’m attempting to react before everyone else. In each case, there is a clear and external reason behind the speculation of a market shift.

Unfortunately, nothing (concrete) like that is available for the PT. Thus, one is forced to turn inward and make, quite literal, guesses at what could spike, based on what I think will be "good". To compensate for the randomness of this approach, it’s important to 'go wide'. Rather than buy 40 copies of a single spec, instead you get 10 copies of 4 different specs, with the hope of a net positive, even if some specs don’t work out. New set releases can be hectic events, as there are many parameters that need to be balanced. As a general rule, MTGO card values will decline across the board. However, as data from things like EMN spoilers and SCG Columbus roll in, spikes will begin to occur. My strategy has been to buy in early (as in first week of July early), prior to any possible spikes. This also takes advantage of depressed prices from the EMA release and the Standard doldrums of summer. However, there is a risk: prices may continue to fall, as I’m buying at least a month before the PT and it’s unknown if/how much the few days of pre-PT EMN release events will affect DTK-SOI prices (probably lower them). So, today we’re going to go through most of my in-preparation-for-PTEMN (and EMA) pickups and I’ll explain my rationale behind each, so you can kinda get inside my head. A caveat, there are many "good" cards in standard that don’t get played. So, me listing qualities of a card I think are good, doesn’t mean they will actually see play, just that they could, so I’m buying accordingly.



Closed Positions (link updated weekly)

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1l2d_EYf5Mg9w7BCfVwrL5vzMx_FVKhTWg3LyxrBUXj4





Goin’ Wide

EMA Specs – Last week I talked about opening and closing a position on Cabal Therapy. Let’s now go over the other cards from EMA that I managed to get into.

Sensei's Divining Top : Top is a legacy-defining card that hasn’t had too many printings online. As a rare in EMA, there shouldn’t have been too much additional supply. I bought in around 2 tix, and it’s down to 1.5 at the moment, which is a bit worrying. Currently, many EMA prices are slowly falling. Perhaps the demand for Legacy on MTGO is just too small…But, I think Top is probably a decent long term spec on MTGO, eventually legacy demand will pick up. Right? However, the question now becomes: will demand materialize before the end of Battle Of Tix? I might be out a couple of tix with this one.

Heritage Druid : (sold) – Elves is probably one of the cheaper Legacy decks. Heritage Druid, although somewhat volatile, is able to frequently command a high price on MTGO, as it is both playable and Morningtide is relatively scarce. As I mentioned last time, my working hypothesis is that EMA will be scarce on MTGO, as the poor EV discouraged people from playing ‘real’ drafts (as opposed to phantom, which doesn’t introduce product into the system). If this is true, then Heritage Druid should be on the rise, as the EMA supply wouldn’t be enough to bring its supply above the level of scarce (after the initial EMA supply moves through the market). I actually went ahead and sold my 7 copies recently, for a profit of almost 5 tix total. I began to worry about the short term demand of EMA cards, so I took my 0.7 tix/card profit and ran.

Ancestral Mask : (sold) – I like random EMA uncommons that previously had low supply on MTGO. I am betting on the supply from EMA being overestimated, dropping the price “too low”, allowing me to pick them up before a price correction occurs. Well, that was my thought, at least. In reality, the price began to stagnate, and I got out. Perhaps I need to exercise more patience, but we only have 5 weeks left in the competition, which is not enough time to weather volatility in the market. While not as good as Cabal Therapy, my 20 copies of Ancestral mask did net almost 9 tix, which is just fine in my book.

Toxic Deluge : – By now, you may have noticed a common theme in my choice of EMA pickups – scarcity on MTGO. When I considered buying into Toxic Deluge, I was shocked to find many bots completely out of stock, but the price was relatively steady at the time. Additionally, the only other MTGO printings (Commander and Legendary Cube), were still significantly more expensive than the EMA version. This seemed like a promising signal to me, so I picked up 8 copies. Unfortunately, those signals may not have been enough. The prices of all versions of Toxic Deluge have slowly declined. There just doesn’t seem to be enough demand…

Goblin Charbelcher – Like many of my other EMA specs, this just seemed like too low a price for good old Charbelcher. Then, it got lower :(

Price of Progress – I got Price of Progress shortly after EMA drafts ended. This is a card I would have loved to pick up 50+ of at 0.05 tix or less for long-term (non-Battle of Tix). Unfortunately, I had missed that window by a week or two. I guess I somewhat panicked here and decided to get some, as the hype machine was pointing towards all EMA cards as sure bets. Unfortunately, after I got these at 0.17, the price dropped to ~0.1 tix, (which I consider pretty reasonable). Now, I’m stuck with over-Priced of no-Progress. Fortunately, the worst case scenario is an ~1 tix loss, so nothing too major.

Innocent Blood – I got these for 0.009 tix each. Yes, nine thousandths of a ticket. Like, this was a 2+ tix common before EMA!? I’m totally happy sinking an entire 0.144 tix into 16 of these. I could easily see them going back up to a ticket, but it’s going to take Pauper metagame shifts, which could be in a few months or a few years. Even then, it might only be a quick spike. Either way, it’s not like I can lose, I just might not win.

Eternal Masters Booster (sold) – I don’t remember why, but something possessed me to check the price of EMA boosters. They had bottomed out the day before (right after drafts ended) at ~4.5 tix and were, at that moment, available for ~4.9. With no more EMA drafts, additional packs won’t be going into circulation. What really sold me was a buyer for 6.41. Hard to pass up a sweet arbitrage opportunity, so I grabbed 8 packs and sold 1 for 6.41. I figured this could see a steady increase, like PZ1 packs did. Unfortunately, I think I pulled the trigger too fast. There were a few days after I go these packs where I could sell for slight gains (0.1-0.2 per pack). Then, the bottom fell out and prices began to drop, so I got out ASAP. The last 3 packs were at a slight loss each, so I only came out ahead by a little over a tix. I probably should have just bought the one pack and arbitraged it for almost 2 tix, then waited to see if the price continued to settle. That’s what you get for making rash decisions in fear, I suppose.

PT EMN/EMN Spoiler Specs

Remember how we talked about Allosaurus Rider last week? When Eldritch Moon was spoiled, it went from 0.02 tix to 3+ tix, within just a few hours. Similarly, new UW spirits sent Rattlechains on an unprecedented spike. These spikes happen incredibly quickly, and there will, no doubt, be many of them during the Pro Tour. They are so fast that it is difficult to react to. Thus, as I said above, I’m attempting to get these cards before there is reason for a spike. Basically, it’s going around buying “awesome” standard cards, with the hopes that EMN spoilers or PT Tech generates a nice spike. Then, I can just sell out, instead of trying to frantically buy the card, as everyone else rushes to do the same.

Atarka's Command – This is the second time I’ve opened a position on Atarka's Command . It’s been showing a semi-consistent price pattern, allowing for 1 tix/card profits. When it hit a low, I decided to buy in again, aiming to take advantage of whatever is causing these patterns. As this was well before EMN spoilers, I got the added bonus of a windfall if EMN makes RG aggro a contender again. One other thing I like is the various spirits and fliers decks that pop up occasionally. I anticipated more Spirit support in EMN (which came to fruition). If fliers start to dominate, well…did you know Atarka's Command grants reach? Yeah, could be useful in that scenario.

Westvale Abbey – I still think this card is objectively sick. I had set a buy-in target price at 1.5 tix, and picked up a few copies it when it dipped to that price last month. Who knows how the metagame will shape up with EMN in the mix, perhaps the profane price will become a pauper?

The Gitrog Monster (sold) – On a chilly night a month ago, I was browsing standard prices. I’m not sure what happened next, as I awoke several hours later in the Home Depot parking lot, with newly purchased shovel, gloves, duct tape, lime, and a ceiling fan in my trunk. Weird. When I logged back into MTGO, I also had 4 Gitrog Monster in my account. Not sure about this spec as it mig- ALL HAIL THE HYPNOTOAD! j/k – I only shop at Lowes

Olivia, Mobilized for War & Drana, Liberator of Malakir – Maybe vampires will be good. It’d certainly help that pile of Falkenrath Gorger ’s that I’ve had since the beginning of the competition. However, they might not be able to get there, as RB (and especially mono-red) lacks reach, since WotC has decided to stop printing decent burn spells, for some reason. Well, those were my thoughts in the beginning of spoiler season, when I picked up these two ladies. Sadly, vampire support didn’t materialize and I’m currently in the negative with both of these. I’m hoping somebody brings a vampire deck to the PT and makes it to the feature match area, so I can recoup my losses. Of course, since I’m betting on the price to pop up (at least temporarily) I could go deeper on this spec and make money rather than break even. It’s something I’ve done many times during Battle of Tix. This time, I won’t, though. I think the risk is too high. Additionally, with only 5 weeks left, there is little time to recover if things don’t work out during the PT. Thus, I’m going to hold with the few copies of these that I picked up and hope for the best.

Kolaghan's Command – This would obviously benefit by RB vampires becoming a real deck, but K command is strong in its own right. In paper, you can depend on modern demand buffering the price of this command when it rotates, not so with MTGO. It’s all or nothing. At the moment, I’m actually >1tix/card on this spec. So, it’s working quite nicely, even though, that I’m aware of, it’s not a key component of the current top decks. If it shows up on camera during the PT, wowzer. Actually, I’ll probably be sad then, as I only bought a playset. Oh well, I’m not going to complain about a very easy 5-10 tix profit.

Dromoka's Command – Like Atarka's Command , this is the second time I’ve opened a position on Dromoka's Command . The first time, I sold out faaaaaaaar too soon, as Dromoka's Command made some crazy gains. For whatever reason, it then dropped back down to near to my preset buy in price. While we all hope that EMN will shift the metagame away from GW tokens, Bant Company, and all other flavors of white decks, this is not a guarantee. We could very well see GW tokens dominate PTEMN resulting in a tidy little profit for this spec. Interestingly, I was up over 1 tix per copy with this command for a while, but I was continuing to hold out for the PT. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, the bottom fell out and Dromoka's Command plummeted to, like, 4.78 a copy. I was faced with an extremely tough choice here. I was down to ~100 tix and could just buy up these commands, with the expectation that they’d quickly bounce back. But…what if the price keeps plummeting? I couldn’t take the pressure and only bought an additional playset (at 5.13, before it dropped to 4.78). Thankfully, it’s already rebounded into the profitable range. So, I’m, of course, kicking myself for not being more confident and buying a ton of these.

Mindwrack Demon – Mindwrack Demon ’s been down on his luck since SOI release. His wife left him, he lost his job, his kids won’t talk to him, other demons make fun of him and his ‘measly’ 4 power, and he just didn’t quite get enough delirium support in SOI. So, he’s never found a spot in a Tier 1 deck, the poor guy’s homeless! Before the spoilers were over, I made a bet that delirium would have enough support in EMN to give this guy a home. It just seemed like a card development made sure to push, at the very least, just enough to be standard playable. When I saw some of the delirium stuff being spoiled, especially Grim Flayer, I doubled down and went 28 copies deep. At one point, I was almost 1 tix per card ahead due to spoilers giving others similar ideas. It was really hard, but I controlled myself and didn’t sell a single copy. I really hope someone brings a sweet Delirium deck to the PT. I could see myself making 60 tix from this spec if things play out as I anticipate.

Kozilek's Return – This was made much easier to ‘flashback’ with the new Emerge creatures. New’makrul also gives RG ramp a nice payoff for durdling the first half of the game. Thus, this could be a key player in some of the EMN standard decks. I actually really don’t like the Kozilek's Return at my buy-in price (~7.6), but I decided I’d be true to my goal at the beginning and attempt some riskier specs. Interestingly, I was recently up 3 tix/card for this spec, and I didn’t sell a single copy, as I sat there, greedily salivating and hoping for further gains. Then…it dropped back down to +1.5 tix or so. I really do expect this to show up at the PT, I just need the price to, at the very least, stabilize where it currently is, so that a PT spike will mean more profit. If it falls back down to near my buy-in price, a PT spike might not net more than the 3 tix/copy I could have gotten a few days ago.

Abbot of Keral Keep – I was hoping EMN would bring a quality burn spell to make RDW competitive again. I don’t think the new kindle is it, unfortunately. Perhaps the Abbot can see some glory at the PT before he retires out of standard this Fall? I was pretty dejected when I saw this guy drop to 0.15, about a third of my buy-in price. I probably should have picked up a few more, as that was a temporary dip, and the Abbot is already back up to >0.5 tix. Heh, if only I had not made my original buy-in and picked up a bunch during that day he was at 0.15. Oh wells.

Geier Reach Bandit – If werewolves is a thing, I’d say this is what could hold the deck together or give it the linear explosiveness that it needs to compete. Additionally, the new Eldrazi Werewolves don’t un-flip, like previous ones. This could end up being a ridiculous interaction, one I felt was worth an ENTIRE Magic the Gathering: Online Event Ticket investment. We’re talking high stakes, guys. I might even DOUBLE UP!

Shaman of Forgotten Ways – Eldrazi are expensive creatures. This shaman’s sole purpose is to help you cast expensive creatures. As a bonus, many Eldrazi will turn on formidable (if you don’t just sack this to Elder Deep-Fiend).

Sorin, Grim Nemesis (Sold) – Planeswalkers are awesome, right? They’re the face of the brand! Surely the face of the brand will make an appearance at the PT. No, not you Jace, let Sorin have a turn. At the very least, we gotta throw him a bone after the beating Nahiri, the Harbinger delivered. Actually, Sorin was doing pretty good, for some reason, with no press whatsoever. I was up ~0.5 tix a copy, and then the price plummeted, as randomly as it had gone up. Luckily, it happened around the time I check prices, so I was able to quickly sell my 5 copies before some of the bots adjusted their prices, preserving my 2 tix profit. I expect this to drop back close to my previous buy-in price before the PT, so I might pick up a playset or two again.

Dragonlord Kolaghan – Like, why is this guy only a few tix? He gives all your dudes haste. Not just your dragons. All. Your. Dudes. He’s a 6/5 for 6. At one point, Rorix Bladewing was the go-to reanimation target. Kolaghan is WAY better. Did you know he has more than just flying and TeamHaste? Yeah, that wall-o-text at the bottom isn’t flavor text. Seems to me like a good way to shut down the delirium decks…If an Ever After deck is able to ‘get there’, then I would hazard a guess that it would be on the backs of Kolghan + Emrakul. That being said, RB obviously hasn’t had much standard support recently, so I don’t actually considered Kolaghan to be the next big thing, but I guy can dream, can’t he. What’s that? Am I married? Well, yeah, I am, why? Oh, I see. I’ve just been informed that, no, I, in fact, can not dream. Go figure.

Rattlechains & Bygone Bishop – SPIRITS!! I was actually up quite a bit on both of these guys at various points during spoiler season. I held. Perhaps it was foolish and I should have taken what profits I had, but I’m really hoping for a good PT showing from these guys. I mean, I’m not going to lose money on either of these specs, it’s just can I get maximal profit.

Oath of Nissa – I bought in to this much higher than I’m comfortable with, as it is nowhere near its lows of ~1 tix. However, I’m trying to take risks, and Oath of Nissa may be a key piece of delirium decks. I really really really like the elegance of the Oath’s being Legendary. It provides a built-in way to get these into the graveyard to fuel delirium. It just tickles me. Fortunately, this bet doesn’t 100% hinge on delirium being the bees knees AND Oath of Nissa has shown the ability to break 3 tix on multiple occasions, just on its general utility.

Zurgo Bellstriker – There has got to be a red deck, right? There’s always a red deck, right?

Hangarback Walker – You obviously want to play this turn 1 for 0 to fuel delirium, right? Surely the card disadvantage is worth it? No? It’s still bad against Reflector Mage ? Nobody is going to play that anymore, right? No? Well, it does make fliers, which can help against spirits and let you go over top of Bant Company (except for Spell Queller, but what Bant decks would play that).

One thing you may have noticed: A decent bit of ORI and DTK cards. I know another competitor, Nick (magic4everMTGO), said he would stay away from ORI and DTK as they should see a generally downward trend as they approach rotation. While this is true, the price histories of many DTK and ORI cards suggest (to me) that supply is relatively low. Thus, if the PT creates metagame shifts in favor of any ORI/DTK cards, they could see substantial gains. As most of these recent purchases are aimed at cashing out during the EMN release or with camera time at the PT, I’m not too worried about rotation. Really, the most worrysome thing is what happens between when I bought in and the PT. It may end up that I bought in too soon for several cards (and there has already been some evidence of that, unfortunately).