Hello everyone and welcome back to my daily series of financial articles about Born of the Gods. There were a lot of new cards spoiled overnight and some movement on a card spoiled yesterday. Hold on tight and let’s look at the rares and mythics spoiled since yesterday!
How I review:
Starting Price: The first price we assign to this card as a preorder.
Current Price: The current price of the card, by the time this article goes live.
Future Price – Short Term: The price I believe this card will be at before Magic Online redemptions go live for Born of the Gods.
Future Price – Medium Term: The price I believe this card will be at by the time the next set (Journey into Nyx) comes out.
Future Price – Long Term: The price I believe this card will be at a year from now when the next winter set is released (name unknown still).
Please note that two cards were unofficially spoiled or spoiled in a foreign language: Fated Intervention and Fated Retribution. I’m going to hold off creating those cards for presale and talking about them here until the English wording/names are confirmed.
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Starting Price: $1 Current Price: $1 Future Price (Short Term): $0.75 Future Price (Medium Term): $0.75 Future Price (Long Term): $1 |
Bulk rare. I’m not high on it for the same reasons I’m not high on Pain Seer. If you play Arbiter of the Ideal on turn 6, you’ll only get the inspired effect on turn 8 unless you have an effect that can tap/untap it outside of attacking. The effect is powerful enough to have Commander appeal, but I don’t think it’ll make a splash with the majority of players.
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Starting Price: $0.50 Current Price: $0.50 Future Price (Short Term): $0.50 Future Price (Medium Term): $0.50 Future Price (Long Term): $0.50 |
Bulk rare. None of these Intro Pack rare cards are extremely powerful, but some have less chance of having fringe Standard play than others. This one has less of a chance—four toughness is a killer in this environment, and seven mana is a lot to pay for a 6/4 flyer that doesn’t threaten to win the game on the spot.
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Starting Price:$1 Current Price: $5 Future Price (Short Term): $5 Future Price (Medium Term): $4 Future Price (Long Term): $4 |
Initially mispriced by me at $1 since I read this as a rare. It’s a mythic, but this is a card that sure looks like it should have been a rare effect to me. You end up with either a 5/5 flyer for four mana or a 3/3 haste flyer that returns to hand if it dies for four mana. As with most punisher cards, you’re going to end up with the one of these two that you least want. I can think of situations where I wouldn’t want my opponent to choose either of these creatures. I’ve never thought most punisher cards are tournament playable, and this one is fringe but likely not to get played. This is currently at a low eBay Buy-It-Now at $10, and I’m happy to sell these at $5-$6 right now since I don’t think it’ll be a winner.
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Starting Price: $1 Current Price: $1 Future Price (Short Term): $0.75 Future Price (Medium Term): $1 Future Price (Long Term): $1 |
Bulk rare and the third of five Intro Pack rares. It’ll be on the upper end of bulk value ($1 versus $0.50) because it’s a Dragon that’s playable on casual tables, but it won’t have much of an upside in value past that $1 mark.
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Starting Price: $2 Current Price: $2 Future Price (Short Term): $1.50 Future Price (Medium Term): $2 Future Price (Long Term): $3 |
There is a Modern deck that relies heavily on Enchantress effects—it revolves around Slippery Boggle, Kor Spiritdancer, and Gladecover Scout. The problem with slotting Hero of Iroas into that deck is that the majority of Auras in that deck will not cost one less to cast with Hero of Iroas out:
Daybreak Coronet (WW)
Rancor (G)
Ethereal Armor (W)
Spider Umbra (G)
Hyena Umbra (W)
Keen Sense (G)
The only commonly played Auras in this deck that have a colorless in their mana cost are Spirit Mantle (1W) and Fists of Ironwood (1G). It’s a shame because Hero of Iroas is a very aggressively crafted creature. The mana cost and body (2/2 for two) and the two abilities (symmetry between cheaper Auras and heroic) are both very strong, but there isn’t a deck that Hero slots right into right now.
Another issue is that bestow creatures do not count as Auras. Otherwise, bestow creatures would have been a place where Hero of Iroas might have shined.
I think Hero of Iroas is a card that is very rare in Magic—it’s a very powerful card in a vacuum that doesn’t have anything around it that will make it reach full potential right now. This is a card that I would make sure to pick up a set of if it dips to $1 because it can only go up from there. I also believe that about two years down the road this will be a $3-$4 card just based on demand from casual players.
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Starting Price: $10 Current Price: $10 Future Price (Short Term): $8 Future Price (Medium Term): $6 Future Price (Long Term): $8 |
I’m going to restate this for every multicolored God spoiled:
Old Gods: Needs five devotion to be a creature. Counts one toward itself so needs four more to turn on.
New Gods: Needs seven devotion to be a creature. Counts two toward itself so needs five more to turn on.
So the difference between making old and new Gods work as creatures is only one devotion, not the two that many people seem to think when they look at seven versus five.
With that said, how is Mogis? 7/5 for four mana is one of the larger stats on a God so far. The ability is essentially the punisher mechanic—an opponent either sacrifices a creature or takes two damage. This is not a particularly strong ability in a competitive match, as it doesn’t do enough to discourage an opponent from just paying two life and then swinging in on your board (especially if you spent the fourth turn playing Mogis versus playing a creature that can attack/block immediately).
In a multiplayer match, this ability scales proportionately, so I think Mogis will be very popular at casual tables. I think all Gods have a long-term value (think of the Eldrazi but not as expensive since there’s a lot more Theros block printed than Rise of the Eldrazi), but I think in the short term Mogis will be one of the less-popular Gods.
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Starting Price: $1 Current Price: $1 Future Price (Short Term): $1 Future Price (Medium Term): $1.50 Future Price (Long Term): $1 |
Let’s talk about the punisher mechanic. One of the biggest issues of the punisher mechanic has always been that your opponent will always end up with the effect that hurts them less. In order for a punisher card to be good, both ends of the equation have to be worth playing in a worst-case scenario.
Nessian Wilds Ravager will either be a 12/12 non-trample creature for six mana or a 6/6 Duplicant (because it’ll basically kill whatever it fights). If Nessian Wilds Ravager had trample, it would be a Standard staple. Because it can be chump blocked to infinity as a 12/12, this is the mode opponents will often choose (unless you’re playing the Ravager against a God or an empty board, in which case your opponent will have a 6/6 that won’t fight anything). Travis Gibson (one of the other people who help price cards on this website) equated this to Arbor Colossus in power level and popularity, and I tend to agree.
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Starting Price: $0.50 Current Price: $0.50 Future Price (Short Term): $0.50 Future Price (Medium Term): $0.50 Future Price (Long Term): $0.50 |
Bulk rare and one that will have a lot of extra copies in circulation due to being an Intro Pack card.
Updates
Pain Seer – Up to $10. The lowest current Buy-It-Now on eBay for a single copy is $11, and there are a more than a dozen completed 4x playset auctions at $44-$60. I still think this card is being vastly overrated, so I’ll be happy to sell out at $10 since I think it’ll plummet once the set is released.
Thank you all for reading. I’ll see you tomorrow for the next update of this series!
- Ben Bleiweiss
- General Manager, StarCityGames.com